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DIGITAL ELECTRONIC PUBLISHING
Publish Your Own Information Product
E books are information products sold in electronic format. They sell online in the same way downloadable software programs sell online.
Everyone has a special area of interest and expertise. eBooks are the single most profitable online product. I am proof of the fact that It is easy to write a useful ebook and publish it. If I can do it anyone can, give some serious thought to developing your own information product.
This is my third information product. When I created my first and second information products, there was no such thing as an electronic book. The following story should help you understand the process and evolution required to create an information product.
I live in Eugene, Oregon, known as the track capital of the United States. In the 60s and 70s I was a long distance runner. I spent most of my weekends traveling to compete in foot races.
After my first 26.2-mile marathon, I began a keeping a training journal to keep track of all kinds of variables. I tracked the number of miles a week I ran and how fast I ran them. I also started tracking calories, body weight, resting heart rate, and perceived workout intensity. I found that after a while, I had collected a lot of information. I discovered that this information was useful in planning and measuring my improvement.
I decided to share what I had learned with others. I was coaching a local cross-country team and I wanted to help my team measure and plan their improvement.
I owned a small printing plant at the time so I developed my own "runner's log" book. I called it "Be Your Own Coach" because that is what we were learning how to do. The book organized the task of collecting information.
My First Unique Information Product Was Born!
My father and I visited bookstores all over the Northwest United States with boxes of logbooks, which I had designed and printed myself. Selling the books barely paid our travel costs.
Long distance runners attend races and sporting events all over the Northwest. I found while attending running events I had access to a highly targeted niche of runners in which to sell my logbooks. At these events, I soon learned that it was difficult to get good reliable information about the events in advance.
The races were usually localized so people living outside of a specific area had great difficulty even learning about the existence of a running event. Runners wanted information about who to contact to get an application, the history of the event, the average temperatures on race day, the past winning times, and the age groups and prizes offered, and so on
The Northwest Runner's Guide
I needed to acquire information about the various foot races in order to choose which races to put on my calendar. I spent a year in my spare time collecting information and developing relationships with the Northwest race directors & promoters.
The following are a few of the details I needed in order to plan my racingcalendar.
- 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
- Directions to get to the race site
- Entry requirements
I figured if I saw a need for this information, that others would too. I self published a second book entitled "The Northwest Runners Guide" This book offered complete information about every race held in within a day's drive in the Northwest United States.
When I started, I had placed 500 books in about 35 stores throughout the Northwest. However, we soon started getting calls from all over the Northwest wanting to offer the book in their stores. Soon the book started selling well.
I sold the book for $5, but it cost me about $2 to produce it, this paid for my travel and a small profit. There were additional costs such as shipping. Lastly, there was the time required in reaching the narrow interested niche and in promoting, and marketing the book.
It was my plan to supply a new and updated version of the book each year detailing the events in the upcoming year. The high costs of self-publishing made that goal difficult. My targeted niche "long Distance Runners who were willing and able to travel to running events" was too small to justify conventional publishing costs.
Bookstores demanded 40% to 60% profit just to sell it and they didn't pay me for at least 90 days AFTER they sold a book. I barely broke even selling them in bookstores because of the costs and labor required to produce the physical books.
Before the Internet, it was difficult and expensive to reach this small niche of qualified buyers. The book was an ideal information product for the Internet because the information was timely and very specific, and because there was nothing else like it was on the market. The only problem is no-one even knew the Internet existed at the time.
I had developed a great product with a dedicated niche market. Yet, without the Internet I couldn't sell the product at a reasonable profit.
Identify A Niche Market In Need Of A Product
In evaluating any information product there must be a need for an information product and a qualified target market to buy it.
I was able to create specific products because I had developed unique access a narrow niche of willing buyers.
The ideal information product is one where you can sell to a high percentage of a small market rather than a smaller percentage of a bigger market.
This turned out to be a win-win for everyone involved. Runners could get access to information not available elsewhere, and the event directors, which often included charities, were attracting more runners. This in turn resulted in earning a lot more money for the various fund-raising organizations.
I earned enough to attend the best regional events and I was developing a growing product line based on doing what I would have been doing free anyway. As a side benefit, my athletes were winning more races and I was establishing my expertise as a motivator and coach.
Enter the Personal Computer
I discovered I could use the computer to not only record and display workout data; I could use it to track and forecast future performance. I replicated the logbook concept on the computer where I could combine it with other data and produce customized reports and graphs.
My third product was a computer program that helped people record workout data and produce complex interactive reports. I named it - What else? "Be Your Own Coach" because that was the name of the manual logbook and I could take advantage of the synergy already created. The three products together funded my training full time, which was exactly what I most wanted to do anyway. In essence, my information products sponsored my ideal lifestyle.
Work Is Not Work If You Would Do It Free
The most successful business ventures are activities you enjoy so much you would do them free. You might even pay to GET to do them. Nothing is more powerful than a goal fueled with desire.
Look within your experience and your passion for a product you can create. Who said it has to be work? Develop your own unique product. Alternatively, find a product you like so much you would tell others about it free. Take your time developing YOUR OWN marketing strategy, instead of following in someone else's footsteps.
Today the Internet makes it so much easier to reach a much larger yet much narrower target markets. This is the reason I always suggest researching and understanding the market even before you consider what products to sell. Do a good job understanding your market's needs, and customers will find you.
The Advantage Of Electronic Publishing
Compared to traditional hard copy publishing, the cost of ebook publishing is almost nothing! Electronic books may be updated as needed without accruing additional costs.
The advantages of self-publishing electronic books include:
- NO office to rent
- NO printing costs
- NO delivery costs.
- NO staffing costs
- NO warehousing
- NO inventory tracking
- NO geographic limits.
- NO production costs
- NO distribution costs
- NO bookstore returns
- NO damaged returns
- NO shipping costs
- NO return costs
Anyone Can Self Publish Online
Delivering your information product electronically over the Internet eliminates all of the problems I had encountered earlier. Your information product can always be up to date. You can revise your electronic book in a few minutes without incurring any additional cost.
Publishing an electronic ebook is easy to accomplish and it costs less than you would think. All one needs to dhttp://www.1st-be-your-own-boss.com/ebookpub.htmlo is research the material, purchase software, and set up an automatic online ordering and delivery system.
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