By
Robert Smith
©
2000 All Rights Reserved
Publish
Your Own Information Product
The
key to earning lots of money is to really care about the work
you are doing. Everyone has a special area of interest and
expertise to write about. Anyone can publish an information
product. In fact, publishing a digital book is the single most
profitable product you should consider marketing on-line.
I
live in Eugene Oregon, known as the track capital of the
United States. In the 60s & 70s I was a long distance
runner. I spent most of my weekends traveling to compete in
foot races. I enjoyed the time invested.
I
needed to acquire information about the various footraces in
order to choose which races to put on my calendar. I spent a
year collecting information and developing relationships with
the race directors & promoters.
Here
are a few of the details I wanted to know in order to plan my
racing calendar.
-
The
race dates and the fees required.
-
The
specific city and location for each race
-
The
purpose for the race
-
Where
the entry fees go
-
The
specific race rules and details,
-
Age
groups and other entry requirements
-
Expected
weather and temperatures expected
-
The
past winning times.
-
The
race sponsors
-
How
to get to the race site
-
Entry
requirements
I
figured if I saw a need for this information, others would
too. Later I self published a ink and paper book entitled
"The Northwest Runners Guide" This book offered
complete information about every race held in within a day's
drive in the Northwest.
This
was my first self-published information product. My father and
I hit the road placing the book in as many sports and
bookstores as possible. When we first started we had placed
our first 500 books in about 35 stores throughout the
Northwest.
However
we soon started getting calls from all over from stores all
over the Northwest wanting to offer the book in their stores.
Soon the book started selling well.
The
book sold well because the information was timely and very
specific, and because there was nothing else like it was on
the market. I could have sold it at almost any price.
I
published my information book in 1983 the year that IBM
introduced the personal PC. It was one of the first
information products produced and updated on computer. It was
ahead of its time.
This
whole project required thousands of hours and took over a year
to produce. The sad part was it was already out of date the
day it was published.
The
cost to print the books in such small quantities was over $1.
I sold the book directly to runners for $5 at races, this paid
for my travel. That's an 80% profit.
The
bookstores wanted 40% to 60% profit just to sell it and they
didn't pay me for at least 90 days. I didn't make much from
the bookstores because of the costs and labor required to
print the physical book. I was lucky to earn a dollar a copy
in profit.
If
I had considered how much time would be required to prepare
the database and keep it updated on ink & paper I might
have had second thoughts. If I hadn't owned my own print shop
or I could have never afforded to self publish and market it
in the first place.
I
discontinued marketing the book after a year because I found
it impossible to keep all the information up to date or to
make a profit. I had developed a great product with a
dedicated niche market yet I couldn't sell the product at a
reasonable profit. Had the Internet been available to the
public at large at that time I could have offered an
electronic book.
I
give you this project as an example of a perfect Internet
information product. You can develop your own information
product and market it profitably on-line.
THE
ADVANTAGES OF PUBLISHING AN E- BOOK
Compared
to traditional hard copy publishing, the cost of e-book
publishing is almost nothing! Electronic books can be updated
as often as needed without accruing additional costs.
The
advantages of self-publishing electronic books include:
Delivering
your information product electronically over the Internet
eliminates all of the problems I encountered entirely!
Publishing
an electronic e-book is easy to accomplish and it costs less
than you would think. Just about anyone can do it. All one
needs to do is research the material, purchase software, and
set up an automatic on-line ordering and delivery system.
Your
info product can always be up to date. You can revise your
electronic book in a few minutes without incurring any
additional hard costs.
In
next week's newsletter I will review an inexpensive software
product you can use to create and protect your information
product. I'll explain how you can automate the process of
creating your own electronic book. It's as easy as building a
web site and it's easier than you think.
Best
Wishes
Bob
ROBERT
SMITH helps thousands successfully market their
Internet based home business. You'll find tons of free
marketing tools & resources on his Internet Marketing web
site at: <http://www.smithfam.com/>.
You
can reach him by phone at: (541) 689-1847 PST, and by email
at. <mailto:bob@smithfam.com>
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Read
Other Free Articles about Online Success........
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