If you say run

That was the question that started it all for me.I didn’t know much about digital marketing, but I was fascinated by the idea of cultivating an audience and creating digital customers by turning my knowledge into income.But nothing about it was easy.I never did get my $1,000 in 30 days or 5 figures in 6 months, which made me believe for the longest time that I was the biggest loser around.I’ve been irked, disturbed, and frustrated by the assumptions, false yardsticks, and misinformation being spread over and over again about digital products.Heck, I’ve even at some point believed some of them myself!Maybe you’re still deciding if digital products are for you.What are the right actions to take?Maybe you already have one or more digital products and are wondering what your next step should be.Maybe you’ve hustled and failed.No matter what your situation, I want you to know that I see you.I know what it’s like to wonder if you’re the only one not getting it or not doing the right things.To feel like you’re not moving at all no matter how hard you’re trying.I know how it feels to be plagued with doubts.Creating and launching something as intangible as a digital product can give rise to its own unique set of complexities.It can also be overwhelming and exhausting when you don’t know what to focus on.Yet, here I am championing digital products.Because the beauty of digital products is that you’re not just selling your knowledge for income.You’re teaching an entire way of doing things.It was a reminder of the impact and transformation that digital products can provide.Finding a digital product that solves a nagging pain point can create an enormous sense of satisfaction and change to the way you do things.This feeling isn’t limited to just purchases like gadgets or cars, but it can arise from purchases like digital products as well.But a critical element skipped in the process is strategy.You’re not just building a product.You’re building a brand asset.Something that’s going to fuel your audience’s transformation and journey with your brand.Before we dive into how you can chart your very own plan, let’s challenge some of these false truths or yardsticks that you perhaps have been believing about digital products.There are a lot of people who’ll tell you that a single course or one main offer is what you’ll need to change your life.Or that you can easily enroll three hundred members in the beta round of your membership launch.Or that one digital product will create a defining moment in your business.That’s simply not true!I can assure you that these stories are an anomaly, not the norm.When I started out in 2016, the rule of thumb was you just need to sell ten spots in a Wars - tic tac too flash game. $97 program.About four years later, the rhetoric was sell ten spots of a $1,000 program.I’m not saying it’s impossible.But it’s not as easy as putting together a bunch of emails, sending them out to your list, and raking in cash.Courses and memberships are incredible revenue streams.I have both of these revenue streams in my own business model, but they do take time.They’re not magic bullets.This doesn’t mean you should forget about digital products or that they’re only within the realms of those with massive email lists.If you have a much shorter timeline to work with, offering services will serve you better.You’re nudged in this direction regardless of whether you have an audience or are just starting out in the online space.Creating a course can certainly make you money, but there’s a lot that goes into creating a course that sells.Firstly, courses take a lot of time to create.Especially if it’s your first product, you may come out of it feeling frustrated and like you never ever want to create another course or digital product again.Releasing my first course was and still is a painful memory.There is a time and place for your signature or premium course.But your first product does not, and dare I say should not, be a signature course or premium product, especially if you’re new to digital products, you’re new to online business, and you’re still growing your audience.You will feel tempted to trash your digital product and create new ones, especially if it didn’t get you the results you wanted.But the last thing you should do is trash it.What about the offer isn’t working?The lack of sales is always a symptom of some other problem.Is the message of your product confusing?Are you not understanding your audience’s pain points?Are your expectations even logical considering the size of your audience?All products need a few iterations to test things out.That’s something that people don’t really speak about.Someone who has more experience or who has coached more people.But that someone does not have your unique perspective or background.The online world is a noisy place.Maybe you’re saying, I don’t think this audience needs another offer with everything that’s already out there!A crowded market is an opportunity when you know how to make your offer stand out.Offers differ in terms of price, the customers they serve, their promise, their style, or their mode of delivery.If you map each competing offer against these elements, you’ll realize that they all say something a little bit different.What you need to work on is finding the opportunity or empty parking space in the market for your digital product.Your business model is a description of how your business makes money.It’s how you deliver value to your customers.My business model [https://www.likemagazine.com.hk/jobseeker/rlinkz.aspx?page=LL§ion=B&item=5&url=http://cleaningthedishes.blogspot.com and] why I do certain things look very different from someone else in the same niche as me.That’s because it’s modeled after my strengths and vision.It’s good to have a look at what others in the online space are doing.But just because a strategy, formula, or methodology worked for them, doesn’t mean that it will make sense for you too.So don’t jump on that course or membership or [insert new and shiny thing] bandwagon just because it seems to be flashy and the next in thing.The right questions to ask areWhy did it work for them?Would it work for you considering your strengths, zone of genius, and what you want out of your business?Can it be replicated?Make your formula or methodology unique to you.It’s a practical guide with insights and strategies you can deploy to create a thriving digital product business.In section I, I’ll walk you through how to stack your products and gradually escalate the experience that members of your audience have with you and your brand so that they keep coming back to buy more.I’ll also share with you the seven principles of becoming an extraordinary digital product creator.It assumes that you have your niche figured out.If you’re ready, let’s go!Structure your products such that your audience can come back and buy from you repeatedly.You want to cultivate loyal customers, not buyers.When you focus on customers, you’re focused on nurturing relationships and not just a single transaction.And it’s important to note that the first sale is the hardest to make.It gets easier to (木) 02:47:17url=http://cleaningthedishes.blogspot.com sell to someone who has purchased from you before.Someone new in your audience hasn’t tasted your paid content as yet.They start by consuming your free content via your podcasts, YouTube videos, or blog posts.This free, ungated content may convince them to subscribe to your email list.But how can you decrease the time taken from when someone becomes a subscriber to then going on to making their first purchase from you?How can you help ease that jump from subscriber to buyer to eventually a customer?Would that jump or transition be easier with a $39 or $2,000 product?Signature courses and memberships are a lot harder to sell than people will have you believe.When you are new to the online space or are just starting to build your audience, a course creates a huge paywall and makes it harder for your audience to say yes to your offer.Because they’re new to your brand.They’re still learning to associate you with the topic of your offer.As much as they may want to support you, a huge monstrous offer doesn’t make it easy to say yes.Likewise, a membership is a recurring fee.People might be more hesitant to say yes to a recurring payment when they haven’t gotten a taste of your paid content as yet.We are so hardwired to think only about catchall courses, memberships, and premium products that we don’t consider the potential of smaller products.Remember that a signature or premium course or membership is but just one type of digital product.And when you’re still not used to creating digital products, you want something you can get out into the world fast, with the least resistance possible for you and your audience.Is this a blanket statement for all businesses?But most of us don’t sell packages or offers that cost thousands, making this a very viable option.This is where a product ecosystem comes in.You can then go on to offer them a minicourse or signature course that dives deeper into the topic and their needs.For people in your audience who would love ongoing support from you, you can then offer them a membership.Your audience progresses along their journey experiencing different outcomes and greater transformations with each product they consume.They interact with you at different stages of their journey and in different ways.Most of my clients and students who venture into digital products by creating a membership or course as their first product get stuck in creation mode.All that initial excitement quickly gets overtaken by overwhelm with everything they need to do and learn.You’re learning how to deal with the tech stack, how to create slides and film your videos, and how much to say and what to leave out.But the struggles don’t stop there!If you do finally manage to crawl out of product creation mode, you may face a situation of crickets when you launch the offer.But the entire fiasco makes you think that all that effort was for nothing.I’ve been in that very same spot of overwhelm, defeat, and dread.This is where a product ecosystem comes in.It stacks your successes and builds your confidence as you grow your audience.Smaller products give subscribers more reasons to buy from you rather than close all doors with a huge single sale like a $2,000 premium course.A client can stay with you for years and years because they are getting one solution after another that satisfies different needs and helps them achieve different outcomes.This is a piece of advice I wish I had when I started.Let’s take a look at different products at different tiers of solutions.I’ve also included revenue streams that are not digital products because it will give you an idea of where they are in the offer stack.The main goal is not profit but to get that first sale.These products give your new subscriber a taste of your paid content, who you are, and how you can serve them.It piques their curiosity, helps to establish trust, and associates you and your brand with the topic of the offer.It has your signature framework, methodology, or formula of doing something.A specialist course is one main topic that you cover in detail.A membership works when your audience see you as a regular, normal expense that is essential to their growth and success.How you structure your membership, as I mentioned, is dependent on your goals, who your audience is, and how you want to serve your audience.Here’s what each of the digital product tiers [https://www.daysout.co.uk/cgi-bin/WebObjects/Daysout.woa/wa/redirect?company=Drusillas+250×250+-+Nov2016&url=http://cleaningthedishes.blogspot.com looks] like.Do I need to create products at every level?This very much depends on the revenue streams you want in your business and the audience you want to serve.I have clients who are interested only in serving a 101 audience.Naturally, when you have helped this audience get past their startup or beginner phase, they will look to others to help them continue on in their journey to the intermediate and advanced stages.People will naturally outgrow how you can serve and help them, and this is a good thing!You’ve helped them through that promised initial stages of transformation.Look at this as them graduating from your course or teachings.If you speak to all audiences at different stages, you can end up speaking to no one.The takeaway isn’t that you should have an offer at every single tier or level.The takeaway is that catchall single solutions like huge courses or memberships are not the only options out there and to consider leading deeper transformation one product at a time.What if someone is an Footer&af_web_dp=http://cleaningthedishes.blogspot.com ardent fan and has bought all of your products?What if there isn’t anything more to offer?You may likely encounter this situation somewhere down the road.These are students and clients like I mentioned earlier who may have graduated or achieved that transformation that you have set out for your audience.There does come a time when someone may not need your business anymore.This doesn’t have to be goodbye.You can invite them on as brand ambassadors into support groups for existing customers at the beginning of their journey.How soon is too soon to add a product?A tripwire is a great product to add especially if you’ve just started building your list.But the type of tripwire you add matters.Create something too complicated and you lose the sale.How do I know if my first product is too big?What’s small or big?Look at the transformation of that product.That’s an indicator of the size of your product.The bigger the transformation, the higher the price point, and the bigger the product.How do I know what products to create in the ecosystem?This depends on the specific pain points that you want to tackle or help your audience solve.This is a framework that I, as well as several people in my audience, have followed.If you’re looking for more clarity on when you should be attempting specific offers within the respective tiers, this sheet will serve as a guide.Its purpose is to serve as a guideline to help you make progress and avoid overwhelm and frustration.A pain point is a specific problem that prospective customers at that particular stage are experiencing.Understanding the problem you are solving for your customers is undoubtedly the biggest challenge you’ll face when you’re creating a digital product.This is one way of thinking about buyer awareness.These frameworks can also be used as a guide to chart customer pain points.It’s these pain points that will feed your product ecosystem and what digital product to create at each stage.Here’s a look at how pain points at different stages map onto the product ecosystem.Imagine these as the pack of gum [banner.zol.ru/noteb/adclick.php?bannerid=2677&zoneid=10&source=&dest=http://cleaningthedishes.blogspot.com or] chocolates they sell near the checkout counter at the grocery store.They never made it to your grocery list.You likely don’t need them, but you have this impulse to purchase them either way!They offer temporary relief of the pain point but never really resolve the underlying problem.They may not have identified the real problem but rather are looking for ways to soothe or get rid of their symptoms.They’re trying to read up on as much material as they can, and the topic is on their radar.Why isn’t this working for me?Why am I not getting these results?What can I do to get these results?Their pain points are geared around specific solutions.Their pain points are centered around seeking connection, support, and access.Here’s an example of pain point progression of a client for my email marketing category.Depending on your niche and audience, there may be overlapping pain points between different levels.But how do you know what people want or what they will pay to get rid of their pain point?Do your audience really know what they want?This is why I [http://www.swindonweb.com/pages/click.asp?a=1033<=site_idno&ls=1&ap=250&link=http://cleaningthedishes.blogspot.com don’t] recommend running surveys to your entire list to ask them what they want.If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.Instead of forcing your audience to discuss solutions that they don’t yet appreciate or fully recognize, get them to discuss problems or symptoms they have.If you’re thinking of running a survey, send it out to your customers or fans.These are people who have bought from you and most likely will buy again.But what if you can’t ask your audience what they want, or you don’t have access to an audience because you’re just starting out?How can you test the viability of a product then?How do you know if this is something people will pay for?There are lots of signs that can give you an indication of whether you’ve hit product gold.Here are some places that are teeming with insights you can get about your ideal buyer.You want to be committed to a product idea.You need to see a product through the launch process a couple of times even if you are tempted to scratch it and start over.It takes a few iterations to know how to hit the right pain points and how to position your offer well.This takes a certain degree of commitment to the outcome of your offer and how it can help your audience.