Finding a product to promote
Finding a product to promote wasn’t the most popular question but it is the key to starting and was almost at the top. After all everything you do to set up your business is based on exactly what you are going to promote.
Quick aside
After all lets take a minute to be real here (rare I know
)but if you don’t sell anything, even a click at times with some business models, you don’t make money. One of the fallacies of you can build a business for free is that if no one is paying anything there is no money made by anyone. Back on topic now.
First you have to pick a niche that you are going to sell in. This can be anything that you want and where there are items you can sell. Picking the niche is a different article and was one topic that wasn’t answered as a problem from anybody that chose other. Was a real surprise to me but leave a comment if you would like that included in the topics. If you are looking for niche ideas check out Daily Niche Idea and get a daily niche topic, the stats for the niche and a product recommendation.
There are a variety of ways to pick a product once you have a niche. I prefer to start with my favorite place Google and look at the top 10 sites on the topic. What are they selling?
Then go look at the big digital affiliate networks like Clickbank and PayDotCom. Depending on the niche I usually prefer to start with digital products because the commissions are higher. A tool I really like for this PayDotClickbankAlert. The free version will send you an email each day with all the changes in both of these programs. I personally upgraded so I can use their rising stars which shows you the top 25 items increasing in gravity on Clickbank and the search functions to save time. At $27 for a year it is a worthwhile investment.
You can also use Google once again to just search for “topic” + affiliate program. Check them out and you can use that to find products to sell some of which may be physical products. These usually don’t pay the high percentage that digital products do but if you were selling LCD TV’s at $1000+ a pop it can add up quickly even at a low percentage.
The other choice is to check out some of the CPA networks like AzoogleAds. Here you may not need to sell anything except a click or form fill in.
Now that you found the product or service should you bother to promote it?
By far the best way is to actually buy the product and try it. Then you know if they have good support, the product works as it says it does. That is not always possible especially when starting out or once you start expanding into areas that you are promoting just because they are hot.
Then check the sales letter. Is it compelling? Are the graphics first rate? Is the offer compelling?
Send in a support ticket. Do you get an answer quickly?
Remember that it is you that is recommending the product and the key as we discuss in future posts is to build trust with your customers. Recommending a bad product or one that provides poor service reflects back on you. Pick with care and do the due diligence.
Mike Paetzold
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Disclaimer: Some of the links mentioned within this post or posts it may lead to are my affiliate links and in such case I will get compensated for recommending those products. However, I will never recommend something that I don't personally believe in and I welcome your questions and feedback.
March 15th, 2009 at 11:49 am
Mike,
Good post. I haven’t been using those resources very well. Have accounts with both of them but haven’t done much with it. So time to follow your advise and look again into it.
Fred
Fred Lotgering´s last blog post..Twitter More Traffic More Sales
March 15th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
One of my favorite places to get ideas of what niche to promote is Amazon. You can easily check their best sellers in books and magazines, and this will give you a good idea of what the hot topics are. Then you just go from there to find a specific product to promote.
Joel Osborne´s last blog post..Ideas for Other PLR Material
March 15th, 2009 at 5:42 pm
I agree that amazon is a great place to check for what is hot. I have also tried eBay Pulse which seems to work well also. Can at least give you a start as to what to check out.
Andre Arnett´s last blog post..So Many Tweets To Follow On Twitter
March 17th, 2009 at 7:55 am
Mike thanks for the update. I use all of these tools in doing the little research that I do.
Have to start using them more the closer I get to launching my next project.
Thanks.
Ron
Ron Barrett´s last blog post..I Want To Participate In The Giveaways, But I Don’t Have a Gift! Help Me!