Information Products (LinkedIn for Job Seekers, etc.) Is My Ninth Revenue Stream

I had to wait to announce this one for a while because I was still putting it together, however I suspect this will be a considerable revenue stream.  In my post on Consulting as a revenue stream I said that YOU ARE AN EXPERT IN SOMETHING, and I hope that this post helps you understand how you might be able to capitalize on your expertise.  There are some grand differences between consulting and having information products, as you’ll be able to determine from this post.  I’ll use the first new product as an example.

I should mention two things:

1. I have already had information products available for quite some time on the JibberJobber CEO page (CEO because YOU are the CEO of YOU, Inc.!).  They were recordings I did and sold online, but I didn’t push them much because I didn’t have fancy graphics, nor did I have squeeze pages (which I think are annoying), nor did I fully understand how I was going to distribute them.  Alas, I think the products are awesome, especially the Write Your Book webinar as well as the Blog Marketing 201 – 501 webinar.  I’ll be updating both of those.
2. My vision of how to do information Products was greatly expanded by my participating in chapter meetings of the National Speakers Association, and for that I’m indebted to Marc Wolfsfeld, who invited me to come to my first meeting (and who has shared great ideas with me throughout the months I’ve gotten to know him better).

Let’s get back to this revenue stream, Information Products.  To get this up and running I had to bring in help.  My videos are good, but I wanted to make them better (and for a future product, I have to make them better).  So I hired a full-time video editor.  I know, however, that you don’t have to have a full-time editor, or even have video, to have products.  If you have expertise, you can create a product TODAY, and have it ready to sell TODAY.  How?  Either record an audio presentation (there are a billion ways to do that), or get the 30 day trial of GoToMeeting and spend the next 30 days recording your visual presentation – it’s as easy as that!  I’ll share some thoughts about Information Products in the framework of Marketing’s Four P’s:

Product

The difference between a product like this and a service like consulting is the scalability.  Ask anyone who consults for a living and one of their concerns is how to create revenue without putting in the hours (how do I get an hour of billing without doing an hour of work?).

That’s the beauty of a product – I can sell 1 or 1,000 or 1,000,000 and, if I have a good system, it won’t matter.  I’m sure if I get to the 1M mark, I’ll have a very different system than if I had 10 sales, but I can still scale the sales… even to a billion (in theory).

I have had to come to terms with the idea that this product can’t be crap.  As the creator of my webinars, I’m very concerned about the quality… something to lose sleep over for sure.  However, I’ve also realized that if I over-concern myself about creating the perfect product, I’ll never get it done.  Sometimes you have to just hit the “record” button and start.

Here’s a funny thing about LinkedIn for Job Seekers… many of you may know that I do not like to script things – I like a good bullet-point list to work from, and then just wing it.  But on this series I had to script, WORD FOR WORD, each of the sessions.  The one time I didn’t do that, I had to re-record until I finally did it.

Price

How much are you worth?  I can’t answer that for you.  Pricing your product is tough – that’s why there’s the Professional Pricing Society (no kidding)!  Here are three considerations on pricing my products:

1. I am an expert, and therefore, should command a higher price. Because of my books, my speaking, and my experience in the last three years, I think I’m qualified to be an expert in this space.  Of course, having others say I’m the LinkedIn expert helps considerably :p  Too many professionals think what they do is easy, and price themselves way too low.
2. I can’t price myself out of the market, if I want to sell a lot (or make a lot). If I charge $500 to individuals for LinkedIn for Job Seekers, how many sales do you think I’ll make?  I agree (none).
3. Many products like this go for around $100 (which I think is too much, especially for a job seeker). I was in an internet marketing mastermind group and was asked how much my ebook sold for.  “$11.95,” I responded.  They all thought I was nuts, and that I should sell it for $80+.  There is some weird phenomenon online where people are selling their products for a lot more than I’d pay … I think it depends on WHO the prospect is – a job seeker vs a company = different pricing thoughts.

I’ve decided to price LinkedIn for Job Seekers at $59.95, which includes shipping and handling (the final product is a DVD, since the files are way too big to download)… for the next month I’ll offer it for $49.95 since it won’t be shipping until mid-March (so prepurchase it and save $10).

Promotion

Promoting my JibberJobber CEO webinars was done halfway, as I wasn’t quite sure how to really sure how I would run that side of the business.  But it’s a solid revenue stream now and with my video editor, and my DVD plans, and my marketing plan in place, I’m ready to get behind it.

I will beef up my JibberJobber CEO page, but I’ll also have other places where I’ll communicate the information (including affiliates (I’ll announce that later) and JibberJobber Partners).  I’ll also put information about my products in my newsletters (my monthly newsletter hasn’t gone out for 9 months!  It will go out as soon as we get some mail server stuff worked out), and I’ll look at some traditional advertising.

They key here, as I mentioned in my First Revenue Stream post, is that marketing and sales is a substantial, significant part of the success of this revenue stream.  I’ve seen crap products fly off the shelf, while awesome stuff just sits there.  Making sales leads to success, not making an excellent product.  Again, I’m sensitive to the quality of my product because I want to have strong reputation of having excellent stuff.

Placement

This has always been an awkward “P” for me, since most of my stuff has always been on the word wide web.  So perhaps I’m interpreting this wrong, but a lot of “placement” will be on the websites I mentioned in the Promotion section above.

I’ll also have an inventory at my office and in my laptop bag, so that I’m always ready to deliver a DVD if someone wants it.  What am I missing here?

Helpful information?  If you have an information product, have purchased one, or want to have one, what do you think makes it successful?  Share thoughts or ideas below 🙂

Here is a breakdown of the revenue streams I’ve shared so far:

• Revenue Stream 1: JibberJobber User Upgrades
• Revenue Stream 2: JibberJobber Partnership Program
• Revenue Stream 3: Books I write
• Revenue Stream 4: (not announced yet)
• Revenue Stream 5: Professional Speaking
• Revenue Stream 6: Consulting
• Revenue Stream 7: (not announced yet)
• Revenue Stream 8: (not announced yet)
• Revenue Stream 9: Information Products
• Revenue Stream 10: (not announced yet)

Kristen Jacoway works with highly motivated professionals in leveraging career marketing services that utilizes the innovative methodology of the REACH 1-2-3 SuccessTM personal branding program. Her program includes a career marketing portfolio and online identity services through a highly collaborative partnership with clients. She has organized teleseminars/webinars that focuses on personal branding, job search strategies, interview skills, and resume development. JibberJobber customers can receive a 10% discount on the personal branding, job search, interview skills, and resume workshop. Enter coupon code CDCJIBBERJOBBER10 in the coupon field at checkout. Learn more at https://www.careerdesigncoach.com