One of the first tasks you will face when it comes to creating informational products for sale on the Internet is deciding what the subject matter for the product will involve. There are actually several ways that you can come up with ideas that will allow you to form the basis for your product.
As is true with any type of informational writing, it is a good idea to start with that you know. The basis for your informational product may be the result of just about any type of experience that has been part of your life.
For example, you may find that some of the formal educational experiences of years past have given you some particular insights that can form the basis for an informational product. Work experience is another fertile field for coming up with numerous topics and approaches for constructing products that convey a great deal of information.
Religious backgrounds are another example of mining past experiences that may help to produce marketable information products that will have an appeal to one or more niche markets. In like manner, hobbies can also yield a wealth of ideas for information products that would attract the interest of a credible section of consumers.
Along with mining your own past experiences, there is also the need to determine the direction of your pitch in the informational products. Do you want to adopt an approach that helps to inform people of how to perform a task associated with a specific subject? Perhaps your emphasis is not going to be so much on how to do something, but what not to do.
With this approach, your direction is more along the lines of presenting information that will help people avoid pitfalls associated with particular actions or tasks. The idea is to create a credible and thought provoking information product that prevents people from wasting time and resources by pursuing ideas or procedures that have proven all too often to be nothing more than dead ends.
Cautionary information products are certainly a viable option, since they often attract the attention of people who do not want to be slowed down on the road to success.
If for some reason you do not want to mine your own past life experience, there are still other ways to come up with ideas that are likely to be ideal for creating information products to market and sell.
One method is to take a long hard look at the people around you. What types of interests do they have? Are there life experiences of theirs that you can learn from and thus utilize to create a product that would be attractive to a wider public? Spending some time with family and friends and just allowing them to talk about whatever comes to mind may yield some interesting topics that you can explore as subject matter for your information product or products.
Regional or national issues may also be a source of ideas. Events that seem to have a significant impact on the ideas and attitudes of a large group of people can often provide the seed of an idea for an information product.
For example, persons who work in industries that are going through a period of downsizing may be very interested in an informational product that has to do with making lateral moves into new industries, as well as products that have to do with starting a whole new career.
Natural disasters may be the impetus behind the creation of informational products that speak to the development of skills and practices that help to keep people going when waters rise, the power is off, and weather conditions are not comfortable. Looking around you and connecting with what is going on in the world right now can often lead to several intriguing ideas for information products.
Once you have your basic idea for your information product, start putting it together. If your mind is a jumble of ideas and thoughts, sort them out by making a simple outline. This will provide a basis for how you want to present the information and will help you organize the data in a flow that is logical and easy to grasp. The outline will also help you to not forget a point of interest that strikes you as being particularly relevant to the subject matter.
As helpful as the outline will be to the process of drafting the content of your information product, don’t feel as if you are a slave to the outline. As you progress with the work, you will no doubt encounter other ideas or thoughts that you want to include. Feel free to see the outline as a work in progress, and add, revise, and delete as you see fit.
One of the truly great attributes of the computer age is the fact that a word processing program is a lot easier to use than a typewriter. It is very easy to go back and insert additional text when a burst of inspiration strikes.
No doubt, as you go along, there will be details that come to you that may be relevant to a section of the product that you have already completed. Simply go back and find a way to insert the new thought in the right place, so the integrity of the product is maintained.
Along with finding the inspiration for your information products, there is also the need to find ways to market and sell the products. One thing to understand is that there is no one mode of advertising that is going to be the only solid avenue to generating sales. One of the quickest ways to kill the chances for making money with a product is to assume that engaging in one mode of advertising will take care of everything. Before you ever begin the first stages of working on your information product, make up your mind to be open to multiple options for marketing your work.
This will often include establishing your own web site, which will provide a connection to your product. You may also look for ways to establish ads on other web sites, providing links back to advertising copy and ordering instructions for your product.
Don’t forget to look into print media options as well. You may be planning on going after a big audience via the Internet, but the fact is that many people still look for information in magazines, newspapers, and community publications. You may be surprised how much attention you can get from a simple well-placed ad in a well regarded print publication that caters to your target audience.
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