Sales

Is $0.99 The New Free?

April 18, 2014 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

I happened to stumble across a book on Amazon recently called Is $0.99 The New Free? by Steve Scott The title intrigued me, so I decided to do some searching. This book, and most of the other author’s books are priced at $0.99, and many of these books have over 100 reviews. His books are close to 50 pages, and I decided that I should be able to do something like that. On Kindle Direct Publishing, selling a book for $0.99 results in you getting a 35% commission per sale while selling a book for $2.99-$9.99 results in you getting a 70% commission per sale.

The next thing that came to mind is the highly successful App Store in which most of the successful paid apps are priced at $0.99. Angry Birds, Doodle Jump, and all of the other cool paid games are worth $0.99.

While working on Lead The Stampede, I have decided to give this a try. I am aware that this would result in a commission cut, but the volume of sales can easily make up for the commission. It is better to make 5 sales and make $10 than it is to make 1 sale and make $10. As more people get their hands on the $0.99 books, that will result in more reviews which will result in more customers as well.

Lead The Stampede will still be published in the summer, but I may be able to write another book before the start of summer. By the end of the year, I will most likely be selling a $0.99 eBook.

6 Components Of An Effective Membership Site

April 13, 2014 by Marc Guberti 6 Comments

Over the years, membership sites have turned from experiments to giant revenue making machines. Some people make millions of dollars every month from their membership sites. More people than ever are trying to create their own membership sites because of the possibility of making a lot of revenue with a systematized process. In order to get more sales for your membership site and eventually have it systematized, you need to have these 6 components.

Know your price and why you chose that price. A low-priced membership site ($19.99 a month to $29.99 a month) will get a big volume of sales while an expensive membership site (anything over $100 a month) will get less sales, but you will make a higher commission for every sale.
Create a sense of urgency in your intro video. “The world is changing fast, and although there are thousands of “claimed” solutions out there, my membership site offers the real solution that you need for this problem. Here is exactly what my membership site is and has.” If you can explain that in a 2 minute introduction video, you will be able to get more sign ups.
Have a membership site with a tiered price system. Many thriving membership sites have a tiered price system, and for the ones that do not have a tiered price system, chances are the person who created the membership site has multiple membership sites at different prices. Different prices will open your membership site to a wider audience. For $9.99 a month, people can get some of your content, for $19.99 a month, people can get all of your content, and for $49.99 a month, they get all of your content, access to a Facebook Group Page, and access to two teleseminars every month. The more options you give your potential customers, the better.
Have the “Buy Now” button show up on the sales page three times. This is the ideal number of times for the “Buy Now” button to appear on your sales page while generating a lot of sales. Many people make the mistake of only showing the “Buy Now” button at the bottom of the page. However, this button needs to be shown three times so no one overlooks it.
After you get the sale, have videos, PDFs, and teleseminars waiting. Once you get someone to buy access to your membership site, you need to have videos, PDFs, and teleseminars waiting for everyone. You want your members to know that their investment was worth every penny.
Give your members a sense of direction. New members will have no idea what to do when they access your membership site. When new members see 50 different videos, many of them will have no idea where to begin. Others will freestyle, watch videos in a random order, and not get the best results from your training course. By giving your members an order (weeks, modules, lessons, etc) to view your content and introducing the content to your members in bite-sized pieces, your members will have a better understanding of what is going on.

Those are the 6 components for successful membership sites. What are your thoughts on the list? Do you have any additional tips about creating successful membership sites? Please share your thoughts and insights below.

Take Advantage Of A Problem By Being The Solution

April 7, 2014 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

If you’re like me, you use some of Google’s services and have no idea how half of them work. Adsense and broadcasted Google Hangouts are some of the services I have trouble with (I spent $15 to create a screen recorder for Google Hangouts so I can put those videos on YouTube). Chances are you are probably just like me or were just like me at one point. There are millions of people who have no idea how to use certain Google services or how certain features work. The worst part is that Google makes changes to many of its services every year. Someone who could host a Google Hangout in 2013 would have to relearn how to host a Google Hangout this year.

Let’s continue with my story of misfortune and hope that I am two for two. If you’re like me, you have watched videos or read articles on blogs to try to solve the problem. When seeing someone using the Google service that we cannot get to function, that person suddenly looks like one of those super humans chosen by the ancients or something cool like that.

While trying to find the fix for one of my Google services, I ended up reading 10 blog posts from the same blog dealing with this issue. I did not find the solution to the giant puzzle (trying to use a Google service that is not functioning properly). However, one blogger just got an extra visitor and 10 pageviews. Some people on YouTube got some extra views as well.

As these people get more visitors, pageviews, and views, their SEO increases, and they start to see traffic on the rise. What happened? These people knew the solution to a problem that millions of people have. Not all of these millions of people will get a solution from a single video, but as these people get more views for their videos about Google services, their other videos get viewed as well. In addition, their blogs also get more visitors and pageviews.

There are plenty of problems out there. If you are a solution to one of the problems that a large group of people have, numerous people will come to you to get the answer.

Why You Need To Pay Attention To Data On The Web

April 5, 2014 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

The only data most people pay attention to are their own statistics. We know how many clicks our Bitly links get, how many people visited our blogs last Wednesday, and how many sales you are getting as an Amazon Associate. However, we need to pay more attention to data that exists on the web about customers.

I never thought of looking at the data on the web. I was focused on looking at my own data and finding ways to improve on that data. After reading Big Data Marketing, my entire aspect about collecting data changed. While it is still important to collect our own data, we must explore data on the web that can relate to getting more customers, increasing the percentage of deals gone through, and other aspects of business as well.

There are many sites on the web with data. By looking at the data, we can see the trends and rising industries. The reason we know mobile is going to be huge for businesses is because data indicates a big rise in mobile sales.

By looking at our own data, we are able to find ways to better ourselves. By looking at the big picture, we are able to expand on what we already know, think outside of the box, and get data results that we never thought were possible.

Creating The Free Prize For Subscribers

March 29, 2014 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

One of the best ways to get more subscribers is by offering them a free prize. The free prize that I offer my subscribers is the Pinterest Mastery Video Tutorial. Social Media Examiner offers a free video about Facebook, and many other bloggers either offer a free video or a free report.

This free prize will serve as an incentive towards getting someone to subscribe to your blog. The thought of getting something makes people more likely to enter in their details. If you knew you could win a giveaway by subscribing to someone’s blog, would you subscribe to that blog? The free prize allows everyone to be a winner…that is everyone who decides to subscribe to your blog.

The free prize will do a good job at getting people to subscribe to your blog just like a Christmas present attracts attention. Once you get the visitor’s attention, and that visitor becomes the subscriber, they are opening the present you gave them. If the present you gave them (the free prize) is bad, the people who receive the free prize may decide to unsubscribe to your blog. If the present is a good one, the people who receive it are more likely to stick around.

When you create the free prize, you need to create a product that you could charge for. An empty box of cookies is technically a free prize, but it is not necessarily the free prize that consumers want. 30 second videos with bad content and lighting are not the things that people want. 30 minute videos with quality content and lighting are the things that people want. The 5 page report does not keep as many subscribers as the 50 page report. The more time and effort you put into creating the free prize, the more likely your subscribers will stick around and engage with your content.

The free prize is a simple, easy to implement concept with numerous benefits. Before I distributed the Pinterest Mastery Video Tutorial to my subscribers, I was stuck at 10 subscribers. Immediately when I introduced the free prize, I was getting subscribers every day. In addition, some of those subscribers leave comments on my blog posts to this day. Introduce the free prize to your visitors and see what the free prize can do for you.

If you have any thoughts about the free prize or any additional tips, please share them below.

Why Testimonials Are Important

March 20, 2014 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

When first looking at the sales page, no one cares about the product. They only care about what people have said about products. After potential customers see numerous good reviews, then they start to buy in on the idea (and the product).

Testimonials act as proof that your product is elite. You don’t want people to guess about how good your product is. Amazon does not let people guess. All of their products can be reviewed based on a 1 to 5 star scale. The products with more 5 star are the products that get more sales. A lot of 5 star reviews reveals that the product is a must-have.

A description will not be enough to get people to buy your product. It is helpful, but in the end, the description is written by someone who wants you to buy their product. That’s where the testimonials come in. Real customers say what they like about the product, and that encourages potential customers to buy the product.

The products with the most sales are the ones with the most testimonials. Testimonials (also known as reviews on Amazon and many other places) tell people that what you have is extraordinary.