You’ve created a blog or a niche website with quality content that your prospects want.  You’ve included a compelling sales page and an order button.

Now what?  How do you convince your prospects to become subscribers and customers of your niche business?

There are many creative and unique ways to do it, but often the tried and true proven techniques that other successful online business owners have used for years are the place you should start.

1. Specialize and Focus Like a Laser

It seems almost counter-intuitive – you’d think that if your site would appeal to as many people as possible, you’d get more members.  But usually it doesn’t work that way.  Instead, you’ll get more members once you focus your site’s topic and all your marketing materials like a laser on one niche only.

Example:  Let’s say your site teaches people how to build a website.  You should focus on one niche, such as “web design for ebook marketers” or “web design for private practice doctors.”

Think about it . . .

Let’s say an ebook marketer wants to learn how to build a site.  Is he going to go to “Joe Blow’s Web Design” membership site . .  or to the “Web Design for Ebook Marketers Site?”  That’s right, he’s going to choose your site because it’s geared specifically to his needs.

2. Give a Free or Low-Cost Sample

You can get more paying customers and members if you first give people a free or low-cost trial membership (such as $1 for one week).

Doing so gives people a chance to get a look at the inside of your site to see if it’s right for them.  Since you collected their credit card info before they joined the site, you can automatically start their paid subscription once the trial is over (of course begin fully transparent about how your offer works, when they will be charged, etc).

3. Share the Benefits

As mentioned previously, you’ll need a sales letter to help turn prospects into members.  While you’re sharing all the benefits of your membership content in general, don’t forget about the benefits of the membership site itself.  For example:

• Small price.  A monthly fee (such as $10 or $20 or even $50 per month) sounds small compared to a one-time fee such as $297.  As such, you can get more members by focusing on this small recurring fee.  You may even break it down further by reminding your prospects of the daily cost (e.g., “just 75 cents a day – about the price of a candy bar…”).
• Not overwhelming. If you have a training site and you’re tackling a big topic, let prospects know that they won’t get overwhelmed since you’re offering a step-by-step course in weekly installments.

4. Let People “Peek” Inside the Site

Whether you offer free trials or not, you can get more members simply by letting prospects “peek” inside the site.  There are multiple ways to do this, including (but not necessarily limited to):

• Providing partial content, such as the first paragraph of an article with a link or a description of report with a link.  When people click on the link, they’re encourage to become a member.
• Screenshots of the inside of the site, which shows the materials available, a listing or relevant content, the community forum, etc.
• Video of the inside of the members-only area of the site.  Just use screen recording software like Camtasia and record yourself “touring” the site.  It’s a very compelling way to introduce what you offer.

5. Create an Enticing Squeeze Page

You can’t just put up the words “free newsletter,” post your subscription form and expect a rush of new subscribers.

Instead, you need to create a squeeze page, which is sort of a sales letter for your newsletter.  This page should include the usual parts of a sales letter such as the headline, the bulleted benefit list and a strong call to action.

Here are two additional tips:

• Answer the “what’s in it for me” question (WIIFM).  From the second your reader lands on your squeeze page, he’s going to wonder, “what’s in it for me?”  Your headline should answer that question by promising a big benefit.  Every line of your copy should continue answering that question until your prospect is convinced he needs to join your list.
• Make it reader-oriented.  Your letter should use the word “you” as much as possible (otherwise the reader will lose interest).  If you have statements that include the word “I,” see if you can rewrite them using the word “you.”

Example:  “I’ll show you how to train your dog.”

Rewritten:  “You’ll discover how to train your dog.”

6. Offer a Freebie in the Form of a “Lead Magnet”

Yes, your newsletter is free.  But you need to offer a little extra bonus to entice subscribers to join right now.  This extra bonus might be something like:

• Free access to a membership site.
• Free ebook or special report.
• Free access to tele-seminar.
• Free audio recordings.
• Free video.
• Free software.
• A free multi-part e-course delivered by autoresponder. (This is one of the best freebies, because it trains your subscribers to read your emails!).
• Other free tools, help or resources.

7. Provide Social Proof

Your prospects may not believe or trust you if they don’t know you well.  If they don’t believe you, they’ll guard their email addresses and click the back button.  That’s why you should include proof such as endorsements, testimonials, screenshots, video, pictures and other evidence that your claims are true.

Examples:

• You might provide “before” and “after” pictures on a bodybuilding site.
• You might provide video proof of your Clickbank account to show that you know what you’re talking about in terms of affiliate marketing.
• You might add testimonials from your customers showing how you gave them expert training in your membership site.

8. Arouse Curiosity

One of the best ways to boost your conversion rate is by arousing your prospect’s curiosity about your newsletter and/or your freebie offer.  You can do this in your headline as well as in your list of benefits.

Examples:

• “Discover a sales letter trick that doubles your conversion rate overnight – see page 18 to learn this surprisingly simple trick!”
• “You’ll find out what five words you can say to a marketer that will virtually guarantee he’ll agree to your joint venture!”

9. List Your Policies (Terms & Conditions, Privacy Policy, Earnings Disclaimer, etc)

You should include a link to your privacy policy on your newsletter subscription page.  Most people won’t read it; but, it can boost your conversion rate for those individuals who are concerned about how you’ll use their contact details.  Be sure to let subscribers know you won’t trade, sell or otherwise share their information.  You want to reduce the risk a prospect feels when volunteering his private information.

10. Make Individual Contact or Follow-up

Most marketers won’t do this . . . but if you can (especially if your list is small and in the early stages), it will endear your subscribers to you because most of them will never have another business owner personally follow-up with them without being asked to do so.  Personal contact is not “business as usual” on the Internet!  Don’t be afraid to show your customers that you’re a concerned and caring individual.

Well, there you have it – 10 proven ways successful marketers get more people to join their email list.  Naturally, just knowing these tips won’t grow your list.  So start applying them today, because the sooner you do, the sooner you can reap the rewards!

To your online business success,

Steve Browne

www.SteveBrowneDirect.com

You can save time and money if you use PLR (private label rights) content to create products and to market your business.  To that end, here are 10 different ideas for turning your PLR content into cash.

Mind you, I can think of others ways to capitalize on PLR content and I will write about those in the future.  I hope you’ll at least consider how quality content that you don’t create yourself might be an asset in your niche business.

1. Rewrite it

No matter what you’re using the content for, change it so that you don’t have competition and so that your content is, in deed, unique to your business.  At a minimum, change the title, the introduction, headings (or chapters) and the conclusion if you are working with articles and reports.  You may also delete irrelevant content and add in your own examples and tips to truly make the content your own.

2. Publish it in a different format

Most people that use PLR text content leave it in the form of text (as that’s how it’s typically purchased).  You can virtually guarantee that you’ll have a unique product if you put it in a different format, such as converting text to an audio book or even a video.  Text articles on a particular subject can be combined to create nice reports or ebooks.

3. Turn it into a physical book

Another way to make money with your PLR content is by turning it into a physical book.  Just use a self-publishing company like Lulu.com, CreateSpace, or other similar services.

4. Use as a subscription incentive

You can compile a pack of PLR articles or just rewrite a PLR report or ebook.  You might even turn it into a video or audio book.  Then finish by adding your affiliate links to the product (or links to your own products) and give the former PLR content away for free to your subscribers and site visitors.

5. Use it as a bonus for your paid products

In addition to giving the content away to prospects, you can give it away to your paying customers as well. Just use your PLR content as a bonus – you might even offer it as an unadvertised bonus or as a loyalty reward.

6. Stock a membership site with re-worked PLR

You can stock your membership site with PLR content.  Or, break the content up into six months worth of weekly lessons and run a fixed-term membership site.  The ways PLR can be employed in your business are many!

7. Put it on CD and sell it on eBay or similar web sites

You can use your PLR content as a lead-generator on eBay.  Simply add your product links or affiliate links to the content, burn it onto a CD or DVD and auction it off.

8. Use it as content for your autoresponder series

You can create an evergreen, “set it and forget it” newsletter using PLR content.  Just chop it up into weekly lessons and load it into your autoresponder.  To “bribe” people to subscribe to your newsletter, you may consider throwing in another PLR report as a bonus.

9. Create blog posts from PLR content

You can rewrite PLR articles or break down reports and books to create blog posts.  Just insert your product or affiliate links and let these posts make money for you on autopilot.

10. Combine multiple sources to create a new paid product or upsell product

As previously mentioned, you should rewrite your PLR content to make it your own unique content.  Another way to make it unique is to combine multiple PLR products together as long as they are relevant to one another.  For example, you can compile a set of related articles. Or you can take a chapter from multiple PLR ebooks to create an entirely new product.  The ways to employ PLR into your own marketing and product selection are numerous and limited only by your imagination.

Obviously, you can use this new product in any way you like, including offering it as a bonus, turning it into a subscription incentive, or adding it to a membership site.  You can also offer it as a standalone paid product, or even as an upsell to another paid product.

In summary . . . you just discovered lots of practical and easy ways to turn PLR content into cash in your niche.  The next step is yours – take action!  The sooner you use these ideas, the sooner you get to enjoy the added traffic, subscribers and cash!

To your online business success,

Steve Browne

www.SteveBrowneDirect.com

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

No, I’m not Irish but I do have some Irish ancestors back generations ago.

Admittedly, I know very little about Irish culture or history.  From what I have read, St. Patrick was the foremost patron saint of Ireland though not “Irish” himself.  He is credited with bringing and spreading Christianity to Ireland more than any other single person around 400 AD.  Much of what is known about Patrick’s legendary life comes from the Confessio, a book he wrote during his last years.

Why do I bring this up?  There’s a wealth of interesting, valuable, cool, and wonderful content in old books.  In fact, old magazines, newspapers, greeting cards, images, music, artwork, films, and many other types of content are all a treasure trove of wonderful material that you can sell, give away, discuss on your site, and use in a multitude of ways in your online business.

I’m, of course, talking about public domain content – “PD” for short.

There is a sad misconception about public domain material in general.  It is that public domain content is simply old, worn-out, and useless stuff that has no relevancy in today’s culture.  What an unfounded belief!

Public domain material is everywhere and you can use it very profitably in your business if you have a little creativity and you know where to find the repositories of public domain content.  It really is quite easy to use public domain once you understand what it is.

Forget the notion that public domain content is only “old” outdated material.  Much of what the U.S. federal government prints is in the public domain.  Additionally, creative writers and artists dedicate new things they produce to be in the public domain.  PD is not just “old” or vintage works.

What I would like to do is share some of the ways I’ve personally used public domain content to just give you a very small sampling of what is possible – this is by no means an exhaustive list!

Here are ten ways I’ve used public domain material:

1. Break up a book into “single idea” articles or reports and post them with your own keywords and branding so that you get backlinks and some visitors to your web site.

2. I love vintage graphics and so do others (see all the big sellers on eBay and Etsy). But don’t just make a collection of graphics — use them in your advertising, as ebook illustrations, in banners, etc. It’s easy to strip old text from great graphic images. You can also simply get some great ideas from vintage ads for your own modern-day creations without actually using the graphics.

3. There are millions of old music sheets available that are a real novelty and many people (singers, musicians, patriots, Christians, etc.) will buy them to get access to forgotten or unfamiliar tunes.

4. Pick the right kind of “evergreen” content to go after. Things like home remedies, survival tactics, and gardening still work today just like they did a hundred years ago. The lesson is — public domain is hot in certain niches so you must do some work to find out what niches still excite people and sell best.  Old movie posters is an example of PD content that people love to frame and display.

5. There are tons and tons of great resources put out be the federal government, some as new as this year. I know a guy selling a 30 page report to small businesses on a tax related topic — it came straight from the IRS and anyone could get it FREE. The point is, he found it, marketed it, and is now reaping the reward. Lots of freely available stuff on the Internet is never found by folks because they don’t know where to look or they are fine with paying a small fee to have it handed to them on a silver platter. That is especially true with collections of tightly niched resources (like a package of 20 ebooks on all aspects of how to raise chickens).

6. Did you know that there are many magazines in the public domain? Talk about a goldmine of resources. These magazines contain articles anyone can use to make great “how to” information products, content for a niche membership site, short report content, and on and on …

7. Most marketers do nothing but pitch sales messages to their email lists. Why not present great niche content to your subscribers as a way of nurturing your list? Good public domain materials take very little re-writing. Your customers will appreciate it given to them freely and will probably not know that it’s PD.

8. There are lots of pulp fiction stories from tabloids in the public domain. These are the exact kinds of content that could make short 20-40 page Kindle books selling for $1.99. You’d be surprised how good some of these are at drawing interest (and most have a “national enquirer” type graphic and headline that you can also use.)

9. I have found dozens of collections of “royalty free” artwork on DVD that can be used for any purpose. The images could be used on note cards, calendars, posters, wall art and even things like tee shirts, coffee mugs, and tote bags (think Cafe Press, Etsy or Zazzle.)

10. Why not find an obscure niche and hunt for related public domain material to compile into a collection and sell? Cooking is a great niche and how much has it changed over the years? Yes, there have been some innovations in equipment, but you could focus on 100-year-old fantastic recipes made from all natural ingredients just like great grandma used to make. Sell 500 recipes on a DVD with associated artwork.

This is just a scratch of the surface of what’s out there. I’ve said too much, I suppose. Can’t give away all my secrets! Now go out and be creative and find your sources — they are freely available to anyone who is willing to put in a little effort to uncover them and then turn them into something unique and desirable.

To your online business success,

Steve Browne

www.SteveBrowneDirect.com