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A Guide on Successful Product Creation and Internet Marketing

Product creation in Internet marketing is getting stiffer and stiffer nowadays owing to tough competition between Internet-based businesses. Putting up a new product requires plenty of brainpower and finances along with an ability to take risk. With that, even if you have the product well-set already, you have to position it strategically in the Internet landscape for others to notice. You should get the interest of Web users and turn them to actual customers. Aside from the usual physical products, many different products that thrive well on Internet marketing include E-books, membership sites, and video lectures.

The long and difficult process of product creation begins with ideas. They are easy to get – compared to the effort that comes with analyzing the market for that idea. Before the idea turns to a product, businesses often spend money, even amounting to millions of dollars, to ensure the success of the new product that emerges from an idea. Businesses undertake many types of market research and surveys before releasing their products to the public. Now, you may think that because your business is small, you can’t afford research or you don’t have to do research; you can and you should. The Internet allows you to disseminate materials needed for your market study to many people at once without your having to spend a cent.

It is a common maxim in business: Look at your destination first before mapping out your journey. So what are the goals you intend to accomplish with your product creation ventures? The everyday travails of your business may make you forget the end in sight. On the other hand, prepare to entertain new developments that come to your mind in your product creation. Your conception of a product may have started this way, but a few tweaks here and there along with some market research results and it ends up another way. Take it as the result of a creative process, not as a failure to reach your goal. After all, your product creation activities are intertwined with a long-term goal that you should strive to sustain at your utmost: profit generation. So if your less profitable initial idea evolves to a more profitable product, be thankful!

With your product made up already, start doing some aggressive Internet marketing. A product purchase typically comes after more than five times a customer is exposed to an informative call-to-buy message. Thus it is important to get the contact details, like the e-mail address, of potential customers who are on the brink of a sale. Use the results of your market research to determine the demographics to which you should concentrate your marketing efforts.

With consistent product creation, you can make an inventory of your products that you can market in due time. Just keep making products – the moment you succeed in making and marketing a product, customers are surely wanting more from you, so give it to them. Keep them on your side through constant product creation.

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Plan To Succeed With Information Product Creation: Why You Need To Split Your Process Up

One of the keys to succeeding in information product creation is to break the process up into discrete steps. This frequently isn’t an instinctive reaction for the typical information marketer. Especially on the internet where small sized learning products are the norm.

However, it is extremely important to your ultimate success. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if you don’t do this you probably won’t succeed… even when you are starting out let alone as you move forward.

Your product creation system should do this for you if only to help you to understand the overall task.

But why?

In this article, I’m going to ignore chunking and focus on the practical aspects. That’s not to say that chunking isn’t important. It is. It’s important to understanding and to learning the process. But while you can use the same chunks as you move forward, long term your focus needs to be on the operation of the system not the understanding of it. Unless of course you are constantly training new people!

So why is chunking important to long term use of the product creation process? (Yes, I know systems design uses a different term for this process but I’m not teaching you systems design. So I’m going to use the word learning content designers use.)

The first reason that having individual discrete tasks is important is one of schedule estimation. Frequently it is very difficult to estimate how long the total task of creating a product will take. After all, the size and type of the products matters as does the number of products in your product funnel. And those are just the most obvious elements. However, estimating a discrete task is often much easier. The total can then be estimated as the total of the discrete tasks.

Secondly, scheduling a large task can be problematic. However, by segmenting the task into a number of discrete tasks, you gain a much greater flexibility in scheduling. Not only that but as your business begins to add people you are able to schedule multiple people to the product creation.

Finally, segmenting a large task into smaller discrete tasks allows you to have much better control over the product creation. This affects two different areas — status and quality.

By segmenting your process into discrete tasks you are able to schedule and record the progress at much more detailed level. As a result you are more in control of the status of the product creation. You know what everyone is doing. When they should complete it. And how much it should cost. You also know exactly what has been done.

You also improve your overall quality. Instead of waiting until everything is done you can check quality as you go. This allows you to immediate react to low quality products without absorbing their costs. This means that you have less rework and your rework costs less. And if the product is not going to meet its quality requirement you will know about it in time to stop the development, change the requirement or fix the product.

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Rent Or Buy Real Estate?

Recently….well over the last year anyway, I have had friends ask me for advice on whether now is a good time to rent or buy real estate. As most of my friends, colleagues, and locals know, I consider myself a real estate geek and have learned enough hard lessons, however had many great experiences professionally and personally to last a lifetime…and I am only 30 years old but this is an age to where we can take those lessons and build on our future, using real estate as a catapult to financial freedom one day….Discontinue reading if you think real estate is a “get rich quick” scheme. I thought it was when I was younger. Believe me, it’s not.

I can write a novel on the difference between renting and buying real estate but I will try to make this short yet helpful. All things equal, owning a house far exceeds the benefit of renting a home. The obvious factors are that by owning, you can build equity and write-off your interest payments on your mortgage. This doesn’t mean that everyone in America should be a homeowner. Real estate is local. For instance, property values are still declining in California. In Florida, prices are starting to level off. In New Jersey I can point out 30 different markets where the market conditions are different. If you live in Montclair, the market is different in Clifton, less than 2 miles away.

If real estate values are deteriorating in your neighborhood of choice and your interest rate is not favorable, it could be a good reason to stick with renting for now. Deals don’t go away overnight.

If you have cash saved, some tenants prefer renting so that they can play the stock market which historically return 8-10% per year with a good broker. Real estate values typically follow the rate of inflation over the long term. That being said, home ownership has the best tax incentive. Married couples can earn up to $500,000 in gains on their homes TAX FREE, where singles can earn up to $250,000 in gains TAX FREE. If you played the stock market, those gains would be hit by nearly 50% by Uncle Sam.

First and foremost, you need to find a neighborhood that you absolutely love. If you have kids, it is important to look in their best interest FIRST before yours. Second, look at property values. If prices are declining and homes are sitting on the market for over 180 days, it may be better off to hold off and rent, analyze for the next year, and buy something possibly in foreclosure when you are ready. How do you find out about Days On Market (DOM)? Call a local agent and ask for homes for sale in your preferred neighborhood. DOM is normally listed.

If you do buy, it is best to put down 20%. Avoiding Private Mortgage Insurance is huge today. PMI companies are going broke or already did, and the ones left standing are charging an arm and 2 legs for coverage. Not to mention your closing costs are about 3% higher. Although an FHA loan sounds great with 97% Loan To Value loans, it is quite expensive when you roll things out. Be sure that you understand the pros and cons of FHA versus Conventional financing. I will offer friendly advice to those who ask.

Some pros and cons about renting and buying…Well if you rent, you have the flexibility to move. Leases run month to month, 6 months, and 1 year. Home ownership limits you to the market whether it is a buyer or sellers market. The resale of your home is based off of competitive sales and overall demand, not a lease. Renting allows you to blame everything on the landlord. If you don’t like dealing with broken water heaters, leaky roof, and running toilets, then maybe you are a lifelong renter. OWNING a home allows you a huge tax advantage, potential tax-free capital gains, and emotional satisfaction. With that however, comes property taxes and upkeep.

If you purchase or contract a home by the end of 2009, you are eligible for the $8,000 tax credit from the IRS and can spread this out over 2 years, something Congress passed to stimulate home ownership. All things aside, this is truly a very good time to start shopping for a home. Historically low prices, low interest rates, and real estate provides an amazing tax shelter. Read my article about the tax credit HERE

So a couple paragraphs to conclude, real estate is a very tough and mean industry. If you are not careful, it will eat you up 10 times over. Most people get only one chance and you are done for a long time. Most decisions in life are based off emotion, and in real estate, if you let emotion control your decisions, you are in for a potentially catastrophic ride. Most importantly, let a professional help you with a plan. You can either agree or disagree with their input. But a guy like me can share a wealth of information for those who don’t even know what a home inspection is. Don’t try to tackle buying a home by yourself.

On a side note, most of you that know me know that I have more stories about real estate and business that will even draw a surprised look from Ben Stein. I have learned from the best in the industry though and at 30, I feel I have a great amount of experience in real estate acquisition, construction, and finance. I have shared my stories with investment groups across the country and now speak at forums about risk mitigation. One thing that is so important to understand and I’ll say it again, is that real estate is the biggest catapult to financial wealth, freedom, and stability. Most of our parents made a lot of our upbringing possible by home ownership and equity.

If you are not ready now, don’t panic or feel that you are missing the boat. The nice thing about real estate is that it is tangible. It will always be there no matter what, different than stocks. Think things through, talk to people, and make a smart decision. Once you make a smart decision, your emotions will take over.

Aside from my beautiful family, real estate is the most important thing in my life. I strive to make more good decisions than bad, and if you understand the way I just said that, the industry will force you to make both types of decisions. The key is to not jump the gun. Understand EVERYTHING. Then…one day…everyone will have an opportunity to lead a more secure life no matter whether it is just buying 1 house or 20 houses.