Webalize Your Business

A few days ago I got an interesting idea from Rocky Agrawal (@rakeshlobster) on Twitter. He put together a Google doc with ideas for new articles he was thinking of writing. He asked for input from his Twitter followers.

Although it seems he has since pulled that document down, I think it’s an idea worth testing.

So this week I began jotting down ideas in a Google doc. I’ve made that document public so you can see it. You can comment on the document by clicking on the Comments drop-down menu and selecting “Show comment stream.”

As you’ll see when you view the document, I’ve lined out the first idea since I’ve now used it. I’ve also placed a link back to the blog post where I wrote about the idea.

For now, this is how I plan to collect and cull my blog post ideas.

Here’s what I’d like to know:

Of the ideas I’ve listed, is there any one in particular that you’d like me to write about?

Or do you have a specific idea or question you’d like me to answer in the form of a blog post?

I’d appreciate it if you’d leave a comment and let me know.

• Click here to view my Blog Post Ideas document.

Thanks in advance for reading and providing your input.

-Ryan M. HealySimilar Posts:

• How to Generate Traffic from Blog Comments
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• Any More Takers?

In 2011, I re-read The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss. Except this time, I was intentional about taking action on some of the recommendations in the book.

One of the recommendations was to buy and read One Simple Idea: Turn Your Dreams into a Licensing Goldmine While Letting Others Do the Work by Stephen Key. Since licensing is something I’ve wanted to learn more about, I decided to get the book and read it.

And I’m glad I did. It’s one of the best business books I’ve read recently.

In a nutshell, One Simple Idea teaches you how to come up with simple-yet-marketable product ideas and license those ideas to manufacturers and distributors.

Licensing means that you’re renting your idea to a company in exchange for a royalty on every unit sold. If you come up with a “hit,” you could literally make millions from just one idea.

The author, Stephen Key, has done this multiple times. In fact…

I’ve licensed more than 20 ideas for products in such diverse fields as the toy, beverage, music, novelty, and pharmaceutical industries. Celebrities Michael Jordan and Alex Trebek have served as pitchmen for two of my products. Collectively, my creations have sold more than a half billion units and generated billions of dollars of retail revenue. I have served as a consultant on the reality show “American Inventor” and been featured on the CNBC show “The Big Idea with Donny Deutsch.” I am invited to speak at U.S. Patent and Trademark Office events, Stanford University, IDEO (one of the world’s top design firms), and elsewhere, and I teach my “invent right” strategies to thousands of people.

Not only does Key have more than 30 years of experience creating and licensing products, many of his students have gone on to create their own licensing “hits.”

So Key is highly qualified to teach on the subject.

In Just 19 Chapters Key Takes You from Product Idea to Licensing Agreement

There are two things I really appreciate about One Simple Idea.

First, the book walks you through every phase of product creation and licensing, from coming up with good ideas all the way to cutting licensing deals.

In between, Key is liberal with the nitty-gritty details of how to make it all work. He teaches you:

• How to protect your intellectual property without spending a fortune on a patent;
• How to create cheap prototypes quickly and easily;
• How to shop your idea around to interested companies;
• What you should expect from a licensing arrangement;
• How to make sure you get paid what you’re owed;
• And all sorts of things I would never have thought of.

Secondly, interspersed throughout the book are a number of real-life examples of products that were successfully licensed to companies.

Some of these examples are especially inspiring. They also serve to deepen your understanding of how the licensing process works.

Info Products vs. Real Products

I may be considered a charlatan for saying this, but it seems to me that real physical products have more value than information products. And as the number of information products explodes, we’ll see downward pressure on prices (just look at the Kindle market).

What’s more, running an information product business is no walk in the park. It requires constant ongoing time and effort to keep the wheels of the business turning. You have to constantly be bringing in new subscribers and customers and creating more products to sell to your existing customer base.

It’s not that I think information product businesses are bad; I actually like them very much. But I think creating and licensing real products to manufacturing companies seems like it could provide a person with some real time freedom and financial freedom to live life on their own terms.

If you agree — and you’d like to learn more about creating and licensing products — then I highly recommend One Simple Idea by Stephen Key. I bought the Kindle version from Amazon, but you can get a copy from just about any major bookseller. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

-Ryan M. HealySimilar Posts:

• From Concept to Product in 21 Days
• A Simple Strategy for Creating and Launching More Products
• Ideas Are Cheap and Plentiful
• From Shelf-Help to Self-Help
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Many people today have been laid off from their jobs and are currently employed. Many more will be laid off within the next couple years and find themselves in the same position.

As the pool of available jobs dries up, savvy individuals will try to generate a part-time or full-time income on the Internet. They will try to replace their income by starting an online business.

Unfortunately, desperation and urgency will cause many of these people to get sucked into the “business opportunities” that are prevalent on the Internet. They will end up becoming “make money online” junkies, buying every new “opportunity” that comes out.

Eventually, after running up their credit cards, they will get a wholly unoriginal idea that goes something like this:

“I’ve bought so many products about how to make money online, I’m now qualified to teach other people how to make money online!”

And so in a strange form of irony they will begin making money online by selling their own products about how to make money online.

Obviously, this is not how you should replace your income online. It’s costly, it’s slow, and it’s completely disingenuous.

A Better Way to Replace Your Income Online

When I quit my job back in 2005, I had originally planned to become a financial planner. When this didn’t work out, I launched my freelance copywriting career.

I was an unusual case. I was able to get my first clients in less than two weeks. And I’ve been freelancing ever since.

Of course, I had a few things working in my favor:

1. I had already been writing sales copy for 3 years.
2. I already had some entrepreneurial experience.
3. I had already studied how to become a direct response copywriter.
4. I had access to a private web site where potential clients posted copywriting projects they were hiring for.

All of these things contributed to my quick success.

Here’s something else I discovered…

Services Generate Revenue Faster than Products

People will pay good money for valuable services. That’s why the fastest way to replace your income online is to provide a service.

Some of the most in-demand service careers online include:

• Copywriter (both sales and content)
• Web Designer (HTML, XML, CSS, WordPress, etc.)
• Programmer (PHP, iPhone apps, etc.)
• Consultant/Coach
• Social Media Manager
• SEO Writer/Consultant
• PPC Campaign Manager
• Affiliate Program Manager

Obviously, your quickest path to profit will be leveraging skills you already have and building a business around that. For example, when a friend of mine quit his job, he leveraged his programming skills to begin building and customizing membership web sites.

If you lack skills that are conducive for offering a service online, then take some time to develop those skills. There are plenty of books and courses available to help you develop almost any skill you want.

I personally spent more than 100 hours outside of my job to develop both my copywriting and web site coding skills. (I taught myself HTML and CSS in my spare time and then coded an entire web site by hand.) This gave me an enormous advantage when I launched my freelance career.

What if I had tried to create an information product and sell it to the masses? I most certainly would have failed. It takes a long time to build a product-based business that generates a full-time income.

That is why I don’t recommend trying to replace your income this way. Providing a service is a much better (and faster) way to start.

Once You’ve Got the Skill, You’ll Need Clients

One of the biggest struggles for service providers is getting good clients. Just because you’re a professional service provider doesn’t mean you’ll be good at actually selling your services.

So in addition to improving and perfecting the service you provide, you’ll also need to learn how to market yourself… how to find good clients… how to name your fee (and get it)… and a whole host of marketing activities.

With that in mind, my colleagues Daniel Levis and Ben Settle are hosting a webinar this Thursday night, February 22, that’s all about how to make more money from fewer clients who demand less from you.

The official title of the webinar is “The Fastest Way to 6 Figures and Beyond, As an In-Demand Coach, Consultant or Freelancing Pro.” Ben will be asking the questions and Daniel will be answering them.

Frankly, I’m a bit jealous of Daniel simply because I know he works less than I do… and I’ve got a hunch he makes more, too. I know I could learn a few things from him myself.

If you’re interested, you can register for the webinar here.

-Ryan M. HealySimilar Posts:

• Product Creation Work Group
• Planning for Obsolescence
• How to Shatter Your Productivity Barriers in 2012 – the 80/20 Way
• Lifestyle Design, Product Creation and Profit Sharing
• Copywriter Burn Out and “The Big Push”

Part of being successful in business is making money.

Another part is keeping it.

And while there are many business people who have high earning power, far fewer have high saving power.

(Gary Halbert was famous for making large sums of money, then promptly spending it all. He once wrote: “Here’s the real truth: I have made, in my lifetime, zillions of dollars. However, I am not prudent with money. I have very little of it left.”)

But even prudent savers don’t have it made because of the relentless wealth-destroying power of inflation…

• Inflation is a consequence of fiat currency.
• Inflation erodes your purchasing power every year.
• Inflation a disincentive to saving and a destroyer of wealth.

Here’s the thing: Inflation is at work all the time, but it often goes into overdrive during times of war.

War with Iran has been planned for many years. It has been delayed for at least four years due to political disagreements in Washington. Now, it may finally happen. Official reports indicate that war with Iran may begin as early as spring 2012.

What will happen if the U.S. or Israel starts a preemptive war with Iran?

Gonzalo Lira predicts a sharp increase in the price of oil, which is to be expected. He also predicts temporary price deflation in precious metals (two weeks max) followed by a rapid rise in value.

Dollar inflation and euro inflation is in the offing, in the weeks and months following a war with Iran. The assets that will rise drastically in price will be precious metals, especially silver; agricultural commodities; and oil – obviously. The assets that will collapse in price will be sovereign bonds, corporate bonds, and equities, in that order.

Saving some cash in a bank is probably a better strategy than blowing it all on lifestyle, but leaving it in the bank (or even the stock market) is still risky, especially with another war on the horizon.

Personally, I’ve been investing in both gold and silver for the last two and a half years. By converting cash into precious metals, I’m gaining some protection from price inflation. As the dollar loses value, the value of my gold and silver goes up.

I’ve already doubled my money once. And if silver cracks $50/oz (as I expect it will), I will double my money again.

I recommend two sources for buying gold and silver if you are interested. I have purchased from both sources.

One is Colorado Gold. Their commissions are low because they don’t spend money on advertising and they have high minimum purchases. You will need to have a few thousand dollars ready to invest if you want to do business with Colorado Gold.

The other source I’m using now is Silver Saver, a unique service that lets you invest in small amounts over time.

You can make one-off purchases or set up regular recurring purchases either weekly or monthly. This puts your investing on autopilot and takes advantage of dollar cost averaging.

Silver Saver works like a savings account — except all your “money” is in silver and gold. You can convert your purchases back into dollars whenever you’d like (and have it deposited directly into your bank account). Or you can take delivery of your gold and silver at some point.

Either way, I think it’s an excellent way to invest and preserve a portion of your wealth — and get off the feast/famine cycle that’s so common among freelance types.

• Click here to join Silver Saver.

-Ryan M. Healy

P.S. Just like PayPal, you will need to link your bank account to Silver Saver when you sign up. You should be able to start scheduling purchases within 48-72 hours.Similar Posts:

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Just the other day I read a blog post on a fitness blog. The title was interesting and the article itself was decent. But at the end, there was a blatant hoplink (affiliate link) to a ClickBank product.

Now, I’m not against affiliate links. I promote affiliate products often here on my blog.

What I am against are blatant “raw” affiliate links, especially when they point to a ClickBank product.

You see, ClickBank doesn’t have any rules against using your own affiliate link to buy CB products. You can basically give yourself the commission on any personal purchase — which usually amounts to a 50% to 75% discount on the product.

I know people do this because I’ve seen obvious examples of it in my own ClickBank account.

And so I wonder: How much commission is a person losing by blatantly pitching a ClickBank product — and then posting a raw hoplink for people to click on?

Probably more than he or she thinks.

Just like you wouldn’t go fishing without concealing the hook, so you shouldn’t promote affiliate products without concealing the link.

I don’t mean that you should try to hide the fact that you’ll get a commission, but rather that you should make the link more attractive to click and more difficult to circumvent.

To conceal your affiliate links, I strongly recommend LinkTrackr. I’ve been using it about a year now, and I love it. My affiliate commissions began going up the same month I started using it.

This is one affiliate marketing tool that gets my highest recommendation.

If you’re interested, you can read my review of LinkTrackr here. (Note: The free version is no longer available. I’m still using the Basic version, which is $9 a month.)

-Ryan M. HealySimilar Posts:

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Ever since I got my Ooma VOIP system, I’ve reduced my sales calls quite a bit. Anytime I get a sales call (usually a robocaller), I simply add the number to my blacklist. No more sales calls!

Or almost…

Lately, they’ve been resorting to using local numbers that make it look like a legitimate phone call. So yesterday I answered the phone and was greeted by a woman who wanted to help me save money on my merchant account.

Here’s how it went:

“Do you accept credit cards?”

Yes.

“What kind of business are you in?”

A service business.

“Recently, the government passed some new laws that removed mandatory merchant fees. We’d like to stop by and take just 15 minutes of your time to review your merchant statement and see if you’re paying any unnecessary fees. I have time on Thursday or Friday afternoon, which day works best for you?”

No, thanks. I’m not interested.

“So you’re not interested in saving money?”

Not in this way. Goodbye.

And I hung up the phone.

Now think about how ridiculous this cold calling script is…

A complete stranger calls me and in the span of 60 seconds wants me to invite yet another stranger to my house to look at my merchant account statements?

Uh, no thanks.

The worst part, I think, was that the woman had the audacity to use a leading question to imply I don’t care about saving money. Normally, I’m fairly tolerant of sales people seeing as I am one. But her question-disguised-as-an-accusation was over the line.

I’ve gotten multiple calls over the last 6 months that follow a script similar to the one above. It usually involves a merchant account… saving money… and a request to meet with me for “just 15 minutes.”

I assume it must be working, otherwise they wouldn’t be using it.

But I have to wonder… wouldn’t it be better to actually build rapport with prospects before asking for an appointment? And wouldn’t it be better to avoid insulting your prospects?

Better yet, why not eliminate cold calling entirely by approaching prospects by direct mail and enticing them to call in and self-qualify themselves?

If the laws had recently changed and there really were thousands of business owners being charged unnecessary merchant fees, it seems like that would be a fairly easy sale.

Furthermore, wouldn’t it be better to set up a system whereby you could do the statement review over the phone — no appointment necessary?

I pose these questions because right now the cold calls I’m getting are complete claptrap. If you’ve got a sales pitch you want to make over the phone, at least make it good.

-Ryan M. HealySimilar Posts:

• How to Control Your Telephone
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