Moving on from this, and developing the non profit resource building ideas, there's another way to look at this too, the first of two being to sacrifice a profit for resource building. Now ideally, you'll want to build all your resources at the same time. However when this is not possible through a specific circumstance joint venture for example, if you get the choice of sales over resources, don't do it, resources over sales every time, unless you've set out to sell a high ticket item.
Remember, like we talked about earlier, and I'm going to say again and again until every single person reading this dreams about it, where do the most powerful resources lie? JVs, other people’s lists, people that have already spent money and are willing to spend more, the best affiliates, the best buyers, the best customers, all on other peoples lists already. You've no need to go searching for new blood when others have done the work for you. Scored a JV with a good list owner? Nice job. You better make sure you gather them as leads over sales, because you may not get another chance to sink your teeth into this particular valuable gold mine.
The second option relating to sacrificing profit for resources is through e-zine ads. Oh yep, I have no doubt they still work, and there's plenty of good well read publications out there that aren't there just to provide another source of advertising for us all. Subscribe to a few and see what they’re about before even thinking about sending ads to them. When you know your target market is contained within, get out there and start hitting the e-zines through paid solo ads (generally the only ones that seem to work) with the sole intention of building your list.
I've seen some great examples of people actually selling a product, but placing a kind of entry page, a taster if you will that asks for information prior to them being able to read your sales letter. Whilst this doesn't immediately interrupt a sales process already in motion, it can hurt profits if you're not selling a lower price item, again with the intention of building resources, and if you're not one heck of a copywriter that can persuade people to move on and fill in details with the minimal of information about you, get practicing and tracking or stick with alternative less risky methods. On a random note, I saw a website the other that day that featured these entry pages but with no lead generation forms. What’s worse is the website owner’s affiliates are promoting these pages! So much scope and potential wasted through a minor oversight. Don't do it.