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EDIT: 2021 – Do any of these apply in 2021?
EDIT: 2018 – I recommend you get my FREE book Work Less Make More because it will help you achieve that much money per week much faster
Video Highlights:
00:22 – Get paid first and then create. Avoid putting in work to make a product nobody wants.
02:39 – How would email coaching work in 2021?
03:05 – 6 ways to earn money online
Make your product creation efforts profitable with help from James
A big problem for product creators is when they build products and services that no one buys despite their best efforts.
There’s an easy solution to this, which is simply putting the payment option up first. Get paid and then create.
Making money upfront with what you create
There are a number of ways to make this work. Take the person who pitches a workshop for local businesses online. They get paid, and then they run the workshop. Membership sites are similar. You get paid a monthly subscription and then you deliver the content.
There are lots of models. What you do is, when someone asks you for something, you say, “Would you like to go ahead with that?” and then actually have them pay you, and then create it.
You can still charge up front for online courses, training, masterminds, boot camps, etc., before you deliver it.
Create your product after getting paid for it
The worst thing you can do is spend time and energy building something that doesn’t sell. Read The Lean Start Up. It’s a great example of getting paid first. You can put together an offer and a payment option and get paid, and then create.
You’ll get rewarded right away for your time and effort, and you’ll know with certainty that people are interested, because they’re voting with their wallet instead of a survey.
Surveys are great for market research. You can set up a survey on Survey Junkie to get the data you need, but the trouble with surveys is that people often say one thing and do another. This is called preference versus performance.
Beware of basing your future just on a survey. Most people don’t even know what they want until you show them.
We’ve certainly learned things like the Ask method, we’ve read the Lean Startup where we have minimum viable product, concepts and they all talk about the same concept of getting paid up front.
Work with the existing demand
I’m a huge fan of that.
Find out what people are already buying. Find out what your customers want now, see if you can step in front of an existing purchase, rather than try and invent a whole category when you’re starting out.
We once added packages to our website at the request of a customer. We put together a scope and asked them to pay for it. They paid for it, we did the job, it worked out great. So we made it available for other customers and so on.
That is the innovation curve that we have within our service business, looking for existing needs to earn extra money. You can do the same for your business. Once you start selling stuff, people will make requests. Ask them to pay for it and then roll it out.
Here are some business models you could do to make $5,000 a week with 2 hours a day:
Someone in SuperFastBusiness asked, “Can you make $5,000 a week putting in 2 hours a day?” The answer of course is yes. I in fact know you can make $5,000 a day putting in 2 hours a day. But that’s a different story.
This isn’t about pet sitting, dog walking or tutoring services – all these are great options for making extra cash on a per hour basis, as a side hustle in your spare time, but let’s not play games here: you’re not reading this because you want to perform odd jobs like grocery shopping.
You’re here because you want to make more money, possibly have a full time income, preferably doing home jobs and working on your own schedule, am I right?
I’ve answered that forum post with a bunch of answers and I’m going to give you the summary here.
1. You can do email coaching. This is where you can have a bunch of subscribers paying you a fee per month and you set up a helpdesk or an email coaching facility. You just need to be an expert in your field.
That is almost exactly what SuperFastBusiness is. But in the meantime, I also started a test in 2020 with SuperFastResults.
I set up a program where the only feature was answering questions. So I went and actually validated this eight years after this post in a more modernized version. These days, you could also do it with a Facebook group.
But you could definitely do email coaching. I think that is still as valid in 2021, as it was in 2012.
2. You could get started doing local business services. That is everything from websites, SEO, copywriting, heatmap tracking, conversions, images, graphic design, banners, setting up an affiliate program, rolling out a podcast, setting up a YouTube channel, Facebook, social media marketing, Adwords…
There’s so many odd jobs you can help businesses with that they know nothing about. And you can easily charge 5 or 6 thousand dollars per month with a combination of this, and you really only need 4 customers a month to make it work, maybe even as a full time job.
I used that model for over 4 years, and it’s a winner. And you can scale it if you want to build a team.
If you don’t want to do all the services and the work, you could build in a supplier. Get someone to do the work and wedge yourself between the customer and the work. If you don’t even want to sell it, then get affiliates or a salesperson to do it. Now someone else supplies it, someone else sells it, and you are in the middle taking cut.
I built a business that did nearly $600,000 a year with this particular business model, before we did our own services. It’s totally viable and it’s something you can do as a side hustle while you have another job.
3. You can make a membership site. Create a forum or some kind of newsletter where you’re sending out information on a weekly, daily, monthly basis. People will keep paying. The thing is, you sell it once and then it just keeps billing. Memberships are a great source of semi-passive income.
And most people will stick around as long as the value you deliver exceeds the amount you ask for. I’ve built several communities with recurring rent rolls that certainly exceed $5,000 a week.
4. You can set up an ecommerce store to sell stuff. Create a specialized store that just laser shoots into the market. You can take that market and use all your internet marketing knowledge about conversions and email marketing and content marketing and dominate that space for any product you want.
5. Be an affiliate marketer. Make extra money selling products made by other people for commission. That means you don’t have to worry so much about the sales copy, you don’t have any customer service, you don’t have to do research and development for products. You just have to promote. You just create and syndicate content that promotes the thing.
6. You can create information products. It’s so easy to get in front of a camera or make Looms or PDF documents or audios and put them into a bundle and put a price on them and sell them. Upload them and they sell 24/7. You don’t have to do much after you’ve actually created them. You can get affiliates to sell them.
This is how you build up or snowball a nice recurring revenue. Is it hard work up front? Yes. Should you start with a minimum viable product? Yes. Get paid by somebody to do something and then scale it because then you’re onto a winner.
How do you keep people from getting sick of your emails?
The traditional marketer has this problem. They’ve been sending promotional email after promotional email, or canned auto sequences for a year. It’s pretty hard to keep that fresh.
I suggest you go to a news platform. Put out news. Speak to your prospects, speak to your existing customers and speak to your past customers by sending out a weekly news update.
It’s done wonders for my business. It’s what I talk about in the Own the Racecourse training, and I strongly recommend it. It’s probably one of the best things I’ve done this year in particular, is building a news platform. That way you don’t have to worry about people dropping off your list, because they stick around to find out what’s new.
News is educational, it’s interesting, and if you put good tips into your news then you can certainly recommend your other products. It’s a natural thing for you to do, a way to make people aware of what you have to offer.
I hope you’ve enjoyed these tips. Be sure to leave your comments on iTunes and YouTube. Thank you.
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Emma says
Hi James. Re the business model where you wedge yourself in between the supplier (and potentially the seller), can you please direct me to where i can learn more about that? Thanks
James Schramko says
Emma we discuss such things inside http://www.FastWebFormula.com (in fact you can ask me any question you like I’ll do my best to answer it). I make more than $5000 a DAY doing some of these models (combined).
Here are the rough steps:
It first starts with awareness that it is even possible.
Next you find a common group of people with a problem
Then you find a solution provider
Next you agree to buy wholesale from the supplier
Then you setup a selling system (website is ideal)
Collect the payments, and manage the customer (later you can get the end supplier to manager the customer via your support desk)
After that you pay the supplier
the evolution of this business model is to introduce marketing (affiliates or other)
Then bring the supply in-house if you think you can do better or want to own that type of business.
Akil says
Great video James, useful tips I can really use at the moment. I am logging into traffic grab right now to check out those tips and re watch all the videos and put them into action.
Thanks
Akil
James Schramko says
I am continuing to add more videos as we get more data. I have a few in pre-release just waiting for me to land in a quiet hotel. (Travelling today).
Quantella Owens says
Dear Mr. Schramko,
I have about 6 or 7 domains. None of them are up, all of them have hosting space paid for them..and I know what markets I’m after and why…but I’m am so untechie it’s hysterical. This isn’t just a case of my not being able to code…it’s the whole shooting match. My question: How do I find reliable, reasonably priced techies who are willing to do actual work. I’m in the US and it seems like everyone here just wants to shine me on…and/or take me for a very expensive ride. I either get no answer, I think because I’m a small start-up, or I get some outrageous quote. I don’t speak any foreign languages and managing overseas workers is out of the question right now. I hoped that Reese’s Outsource Force would be the answer…but he wanted $2k and it was never going to updated. I just need an all round techie who can post content, manage a little SEO and work within a WP theme. Any ideas?
Thanks,
Quantella Owens
James Schramko says
Quantella,
Great questions.
In your case (you dont want to manage an overseas worker) you are best to hire someone for contract work on an as needed basis. We do work like this at http://www.atlweb.com
You can have a quality WordPress website built (pre-done theme) for $199 and then we can do whatever you need using hours. My team built this site and over one thousand others so we are capable. We also run an SEO firm so you can be sure we know that topic as well.
Scott Lundergan says
Hey James,
The points about service businesses and packages are rock solid. That’s how I’ve ran my video marketing service business 2007 and it’s done over 6 figures without a dime in advertising. I only start the service package after I get paid an escrow deposit.
I’ve found that providing service packages gives more clarity to a new customer and they feel better doing business rather than saying that someone is an “all-in-one” company. If someone does provide “all-in-one” that should be a package too so at least the new customer can differentiate the key services.
Thanks for releasing the updated version of Traffic Grab. It’s all solid content.
Caroline J says
James – I’m interested in your idea of creating a weekly news update for subscribers. However, do you really mean a news update from places like BBC, Yahoo news? Do people really want to know about all the depressing stuff out there? Or do you just select a couple of news items related to your niche? (there wouldn’t be much about Graphic Design in the news…)
Could you clarify this for me?
Caroline
James Schramko says
Caroline, I mean like these videos. Only publish content that interests your customers.
Kimberly Castleberry says
Love your tips for 5k earning on low work hours. That’s information that certainly interests a lot of people! I’m pretty sure I’ve commented on itunes before so guess I need to go scout your youtube channel with some more comments LOL
James Schramko says
Kimberly you are incredibly kind!!! thank you
Thomas says
Hey James, loved this episode, excellent content!
One question, you mention local businesses as your market. Could you give an example of 3 types of local businesses that would be the best to approach? Or is anyone with no online presence a green light?
James Schramko says
I have met success with many local business types. You should make a list of every person you know and it will not take long until you recognise someone who has a trade (pest control, carpentry, electrical, plumbing, wardrobes, floor polishing) professional service (accounting, legal,dental) retail store (appliance, electrical, kitchen, spa, vehicle) who you can help..
Thomas says
and again you deliver.
Thanks for the tips mate.