CHAPTER THREE
The Do-It-Yourself Game Plan
As we are getting started with your game plan we have a couple choices to make. Are you interested in creating something on your own? Or do you value your time to the point that you’d want to consider a proven done-for-you approach?
There’s nothing wrong with either of these approaches… it all really amounts to which is the best fit for you, your needs, and your goals.
First let’s talk about creating something yourself:
Leverage existing products & services
The first thing you need to know is that you don’t necessarily need to have a website in order to have an online business. I’ll give you a couple of examples.
Affiliate Marketing & CPA Offers
If you’re unfamiliar with what an affiliate offer is, let me attempt to explain. You know those kiosks at the mall where you can sign up for cell phone service? Those kiosks are not owned by AT&T, Verizon, or any of their competitors. Instead, they are owned by agents… or affiliates, who earn a percentage of the income from the sales they make for those service providers.
Here’s another example: Nearly every major online retailer has some sort of affiliate program. The best example, of course, is Amazon.com, the largest online retailer in the world. Much of Amazon’s traffic and sales are made as a result of affiliates generating referral traffic to their website (the links to the books I’ve mentioned in this report are my Amazon affiliate links, which means that if/when you click on them and make a purchase, I get a small commission for sending there). Amazon, of course, is not alone. Companies like Walmart, Sears, and other household names also have affiliate programs.
And while working with one of these major retailers can be incredibly profitable, there are many, many other options out there to promote, most of them paying considerably more than the 4% to 10% Amazon pays per sale.
CPA (or cost per action) offers are similar, but instead of getting paid when someone makes a purchase, an affiliate typically gets paid when someone clicks their link and performs an action, like signing up for an email list or submits a request for more information.
Promoting affiliate and CPAs offers, for me is all about context. Some things I promote through blogging. Some things I’ll promote through my e-mail lists. Some things I promote through reports and e-books (just like Amazon, many of the products or services I recommend will pay me an affiliate fee should you end up buying something. Please note that I only recommend products or service that I’ve actually used or have real confidence in.). And I even use YouTube videos and press releases to promote other offers.
Why, you may ask, is this passive income? Because when I published this report or posted a video on YouTube, for example, it stays there working it’s magic sending people to one of my links 24/7/365.
It’s not as simple, of course, as slapping affiliate links all over the Internet. My links still need to be seen by people… and that requires they are positioned to get as much traffic as possible. Targeted traffic, that is - that means the links are being seen by the RIGHT people.
(And you know what? I also promote products that help marketers get their affiliate links seen by more people. There’s virtually no end to what can be promoted online.)
Here’s a list of some of the top affiliate and CPA networks where you can find products and services you may wish to recommend. This list is by no means exhaustive, but many of the major players are here:
ClickBank
JVZoo
Share a Sale
Link Share
Product Pay
CJ.com
Offer Vault (a warehouse of many of the other major sites)
There are easily hundreds of resources out there teaching you how to become an effective and successful affiliate marketer… I know because I’ve wasted plenty of money on many of them, and suggest you save your cash for your marketing.
The resources that I do recommend can be found over at my DIY page at Passive Income Game Plan.
Amazon.com
Let’s get back to that powerhouse, Amazon.com - because it is a MAJOR player in making people great passive income. And I’ve broken this section into three distinctive areas where you can create an online business, and generate ongoing passive income using Amazon.com.
These areas are affiliate marketing, which we discussed before, selling products and services through Amazon, and Kindle book publishing. In the next few paragraphs, we’ll discuss each in detail.
Amazon.com affiliate marketing
In our discussion of affiliate marketing above, I used Amazon.com is a perfect example of A company that generates huge numbers through its affiliates. In fact, Amazon.com sees over 250 million visitors each and every month. Some estimates put the numbers of visitors coming through affiliates at nearly 30% of that traffic. There are many ways to generate traffic to Amazon.
One of my favorites is niche blogging. A friend of mine has a couple dozen blogs all pointed to Amazon. Each site of his focuses on a specific topic and range of products. Some blog posts are about a topic in general, with occasional links to Amazon products, while others are product reviews. He outsources all of the writing and content creation for the websites, regularly updates the content, and gets monthly deposits in his bank account for all the sales his traffic generates.
That, of course, is just one of many ways to send traffic to Amazon.com. There lots of tutorials out there to teach you more about how to become an effective and successful Amazon affiliate… One of my favorites is AmaSuite 3.0 [aff link], which not only provides comprehensive training, but also research tools to help you determine the most profitable niches in products within the Amazon website.
Selling on Amazon
Did you know that not everything you buy from Amazon is actually sold by Amazon? In fact there are thousands of individuals and businesses who sell through Amazon. Some simply make the sale on Amazon and ship their products directly. Others utilize Amazons FBA or Fulfillment by Amazon program to warehouse and ship their products to customers all over the United States. You could also consider selling dropship items on Amazon and have someone else take care of the warehousing and fulfillment.
There’re two great guides I’d love to recommend to you to learn more about this topic. One is by a woman named Jessica Larrew, who, together with her husband Cliff, generates over $100,000 a year selling products on Amazon that they buy on closeout at their local drugstores and dollar stores. She has a great website at www.jessicalarrew.com where she offers free information as well as some products she’s written to help others get into this kind of business. [This is not an affiliate link… just visit Jessica’s site – the content is really worthwhile].
Publishing Amazon Kindle Books
Notice I wrote publishing and not writing. Sure you maybe an aspiring writer, and there’s nothing wrong with writing your own books, but we’re talking about creating passive income here… and investing time in writing something isn’t required when you can outsource it.
Amazon Kindle books is perhaps one of the most profitable and simplest passive income opportunities out there today. There’s a never ending source of customers, Kindle books are reasonably inexpensive, and, most importantly, they’re very easy to buy… just one click and it’s done.
Soon after the Kindle store debuted, some very innovative internet marketers discovered the amazing opportunity that Amazon Kindle books provided in generating income for the average person. And they’ve found ways to exploit this opening to benefit both the readers and the publishers.
Today there are dozens upon dozens of courses and great software built around developing a stream of income through the Amazon Kindle bookstore. I’ve had the opportunity to review several of these, and found a few that I really like and happily endorse. They’re not only tutorials, they also include software to help you research competition, keywords, pricing, and promotional opportunities. I’ve included my affiliate links to the three here. Check them all out and see if any of them (no need to get all three) make sense for your needs.
Kindle Money Mastery [aff link]
AK Elite [aff link]
KD Suite [aff link]
Okay we talked about affiliate marketing, we talked about Amazon, and I also want to mention that there’s plenty of other ways to make money online including eBay, selling informational products, selling physical products, making money from Google’s AdSense and other contextual ads, offering coaching or consulting services, web hosting services, membership sites, freelancing, trading stocks, commodities or even currencies. And this list is by no means exhaustive.
Build something around your passion
Your Own Website
So let’s move onto the second do-it-yourself option in creating you a passive income. This one involves having your own website. Basically what I’m going to show you is how to build an information marketing business where you can create, if you wish, and sell your own product(s).
Informational products include things like audios, videos, interviews, workshops, courses, newsletters, e-books, and much more. And, as an added bonus, we’ll be discussing some affiliate marketing techniques, which can work really nicely alongside an information product business.
If you’re a little confused about exactly what kind of website were talking about when you give you a couple of great examples.
Website owner, entrepreneur, and piano instructor Jacques Hopkins has built a website around his passion… Teaching music. Jacques’ site is intended to teach people how to play the piano quickly and efficiently, all while having fun doing it. He does this through a series of video classes arranged in a sequence to help students follow along and perfect the content of each lesson before they move on. It’s a really cool website, and allows him to monetize his personal passion for music.
castmembersecrets.com
John Kenny works at Disney World in Orlando, Florida. Over the years friends and family have always been asking him for tips and tricks on creating magical experiences when they come to visit the theme park. So back in 2011, John decided to write an e-book offering advice on how to make a visit to Disney World something even more special than the average visitor experiences. This site is an outgrowth of that e-book.
I hope the above examples give you a better idea of how you can take it current interest or passion, and build a web-based business around it.
So let’s move on.
Okay, so if you’re totally overwhelmed with what I’ve been discussing, I thought I’d provide you with a quick list of things you are going to need to get started with your online business:
•A computer (duh!)
•An Internet connection
•An e-mail account
•Some basic productivity software (Google Drive & Open Office are both great free options)
•Some start up capital – I suggest at least $200
•Credit card to use exclusively for business
•A PayPal account
•A business checking account
•A registered business entity (as mentioned earlier, a sole proprietorship or LLC is probably best)
•A backup drive (it only took losing all of my data once to realize how important this one is)
•A good team of professional service providers (accountant, lawyer, insurance). My friend Gary, owner of DefendMyLife.com [not an affiliate link] is a great resource for many small business needs.
One of the keys to making sure your business is going to be successful is to think like a marketer. Sure you may be great at product creation, or making a snazzy looking website, but without thinking like a marketer, you’re going to miss out on the one essential element in creating sustainable online success… customers.
So, to be clear, you don’t need to be salesman… you don’t need to be a product expert… you need to be a marketer first and foremost. Because the fact is that what you sell is probably not going to be unique. But how you sell it – that is to say your marketing – is what will set you apart from everyone else online.
Another thing that most people who start an online business forget to do is to develop the essential vision, goals, and tangible practical business plan so necessary to ensure the success of any business. We talked about the importance of mindset, vision, and goals earlier. Do not skip the vital step of including them in the foundation of your new online business. As for a business plan, there are many great resources to help you develop one… Contact Gary at DefendMyLife.com for more information on services he can provide.
Now I know I’m harping on this “Mindset” topic again, but another thing you need to do is make sure you stay motivated. “Okay David,” you may ask, “how do I stay motivated?” Well each of us is different… but I can say that you want to use your WHY as a key element in your motivation. You want to make sure that you are motivated for the long-term, not simply the short-term.
So you have the foundations of your business in order – you’ve committed to incorporate a vision driven mindset into your business – now let’s move onto the business itself.
How to determine your business niche.
A niche is basically a specialized market containing a group of people who have interests or qualities in common. The best niche to choose is one that will sustain you, your interest, and your enthusiasm for a long period of time. Focus on things that excite you… that you can relate to… and that you can enjoy communicating to your marketplace about regularly. Avoid fad niches.
When choosing a niche, do a little bit of research. Let Google be your friend…
•Type in the topic and see how many results you get (if it’s too few, say in the hundreds, the topic is probably a bit too obscure… but if it’s too many, like in the millions, you’ll probably want to tighten up your niche a bit);
•How many paid ads are there? (Lots of ads will certainly mean there’s money to be made in this niche… but it’s important to keep in mind that the more ads there are, the more competitors there are.)
•What kinds of sites are in the top 10? Are they sites that make money? Do they sell information products? If so they could be direct competition. How many direct competitors are there? What sort of page ranks do these sites have? If you don’t know what page ranks are, Google it.
•To better understand the niche even more, and understand what sort of competition is out there, be sure to visit sites like ClickBank.com, EBay.com, and Amazon.com to search for your topic as well. The results will be very telling.
Doing some additional market research will be highly beneficial as well. You want to make sure that what you are promoting is going to be something people are willing to spend money on. In general people are willing to pay for information that will a) ease their pain and/or b) fuel their pleasure. The most successful information products focus on solving problems.
Naming your product and registering your domain
Once you’ve locked in a niche, you want to make sure to develop a brand name and finding a website domain name that will work with it. The domain name is basically the web address for a specific website. The simpler the name, the better off you are. Try to avoid more than four words in the name, and stay away from hyphenated names if at all possible. There are plenty of domain extensions to choose from, but in general, you should stick with .COM or (.ORG if appropriate). There are hundreds of registrars out there. For years I have used dreamhost.com [aff link], a service I also use to host many of my websites.
Once you register your domain and have set up hosting, you need to start getting your site built. Dreamhost offers a comprehensive WordPress integration. While I don’t love everything about WordPress, it has become the web design industry-standard, and many of the best design teams, plugins, and other tools are written specifically for this platform. There are plenty of free themes for WordPress – a theme is a website’s visual framework – but if you’re looking for something really sophisticated and specific to the type of website we are looking to build, You may want to check out Socrates [aff link], which is designed specifically for Internet marketing professionals (newbies included).
Okay now that you’re on your way to having a WordPress sites all set up, let’s talk about its content. Websites can be either static (meaning they never ever change) or dynamic… which we’ve commonly come to know as a blog. Blogs are websites that contain an online journal or a series of entries of some sort. They could include text photos videos or even other types of content. Blogs help your site gain traffic through SEO (search engine optimization) as well as links from other blogs. They can also be monetized with ads or affiliate links. And, finally, they help tremendously in positioning you as an authority in your niche.
Outsourcing
Another alternative is to simply outsource the creation of your website. There are many places online where you can get a great website built for not very much money. While it may be worthwhile considering a local website development company, chances are they won’t be the most cost-effective option for you. Instead, check out websites like ODesk.com, Elance.com, or Guru.com to find professionals who can help you. Many of the people you will find on these sites may be overseas where costs are lower and you can probably find someone who can do the work for you at a great price. And the additional advantage of sites like these is that you can see reviews from other users before engaging someone to do work for you.
Using images and video
In its brief life, the Internet has transformed tremendously from a text-based platform to a space where images and video rule the day. You’re going to want to make sure that what you put online fits in with what others are doing in the 21st century. We are a society filled with short attention spans and lazy people who don’t want to read (which reminds me, you should be congratulated for reading this far into this report). Don’t miss out on a sale because you neglected to incorporate compelling images, infographics (these are images which demonstrate a point or teach a lesson), or videos. Videos, in particular, are a great way to position yourself personally as an authority within your niche.
Legal compliance
In the United States, the Federal Trade Commission regulates online commerce. If you’re going to be selling something, be sure to protect yourself legally. I recommend using A third-party processor like PayPal.com to complete sales on your behalf. They may be slightly more expensive than typical online credit card processors, but you won’t be exposed to the same sort of financial risk by using them. Beyond the issue of credit card processing, it’s important to include a clearly stated privacy policy along with any important legal disclaimers you may need to make depending on your industry. Because this subject is so broad, I suggest you do a little bit of online research to make sure that you include all necessary details on your website. One great resource is LegalZoom [aff link].
An introduction to information products
Okay it’s time to talk about where the money’s actually going to come from. As I explained earlier, passive income benefits from automation, and nothing automates better than information products, which can be sold over and over again. You can either create your own information materials or you can outsource their creation (again, check out odesk.com, elance.com, or guru.com). Information products can take lots of forms, many of which we’ve already discussed. But ultimately digital information products will be the easiest for you to deal with. Unlike physical products, there’s no warehousing or shipping involved. When somebody buys a digital product, they can get instant access to it. And digital products are easily scalable. You can start with one product and continuously add more complementary products to your website.
Another reason to consider digital information products, Is that they will dovetail nicely with many other businesses. Say, for example, you are running an off-line business in the mortgage industry. You may earn your main income from mortgage contracts, but what about offering educational products for homebuyers or realtors? Most mortgage brokers get their clients through realtors. What if your website focused on teaching realtors important things they need to know about mortgages and how they relate to the homebuyer? You could offer ebooks or a video course for example. These things could put a few bucks in your pocket and also help build your reputation in the marketplace.
Creating your marketing funnel
One major mistake most online marketers make is to offer too few options. Prospective customers come to you looking for something, and you can respond to their interest in a couple of ways: You could a) sell them all of your knowledge in one product for a single price, or b) provide them with the option to buy multiple products, each focusing on a narrow aspect of your niche. If you’re thinking like a marketer, which I’ve already told you that you should be, the right choice is obvious. You want to bring your customer as much value as possible while profiting as much as possible. This means that offering multiple products, each building on the previous one, is the best option for your passive income game plan. It also helps build a long term relationship with a customer, rather than a one time sale.
You can typically start with a free or very low cost offer, and work your way up to bigger-ticket items. The following list will give you an idea of what sorts of things can fit in each category:
FREE Level:
Newsletters
Articles
Reports
Ebooks
Interviews
Webinars
Free Membership sites
Free Trial Memberships
Free plus shipping*
Low Price Level: ($1 – $100)
Special Reports
Audio Interviews
Videos
Ebooks
Trial Membership Offers
Trial Software
Paid Membership Sites
Mini-courses
Webinars
Medium Price Level: ($50 – $1,000)
Software
Video Collection
Webinars
Exclusive Membership sites
Home Study Course
Bundles/Packages
Big Ticket Level: ($500 – $100,000)
Coaching/Consulting
High-end services: copywriting, websites, etc.
Home Study Course
Live Seminar
Bootcamp/Conference
Anything requiring your personal time
Getting traffic to your site
If you’ve done to all the effort to create a website and fill it with products you’re probably going to want to have people come visit your website.
There are numerous techniques for getting traffic to a website. You can focus on social media marketing, video marketing, search engine optimization, solo ad list building, and many, many other options.
The purpose of this report is not to teach you traffic techniques, but rather to provide you with an understanding of the range of options you have. For the most comprehensive traffic product, for serious marketers, check out Internet Traffic Formula [aff link], a course from internet marketing legend Vick Strizheus.
Connecting with Customers
On the bottom of this image, over on the left hand side, You’ll see an image that says lead nurturing. This is one of the most overlooked aspects of developing a strong supportive and recurring customer base in any business. With any online business, you have the ability to connect and nurture in a number of ways… and you should make sure to take completed advantage of as many of them as possible.
What I’m talking about here is regular communication. Communication which provides value, not a sales pitch. Let’s say your blog content offers regular advice on your industry or niche. Make sure that every time you post something on the blog, you invite your list to come read it and participate as well. “Wait a second David… list?” Yup, that’s right, you’re going to need to have an e-mail list. I’ve used plenty of e-mail list companies in the past, But the one I seem to keep coming back to is called Get Response [aff link]. They not only offer an easy-to-use service that you can incorporate into your website, but they also provide terrific training on how to be an expert email marketer.
There are a wealth of additional resources I could offer you here, complete with affiliate links, but that really wouldn’t be fair to you at this point in your passive income game plan development. So, instead, I’m simply laying out major resources for you to consider, and let you do your homework to decide what really works best for you. And if you’d like a list of other resources, you can always visit the resources & tools page of Passive Income Game Plan which I am constantly updating.
Offline Passive Income
Real Estate Investing
Real estate is an enormous industry, and it accounts for a ridiculously large