Bond Halbert shares a brilliant tip for keeping people reading your sales copy, so you can hook them and make a sure sale.
How to Get the Full Interview:
We enjoyed an hour long discussion with Bond where he talked about his unique experience growing up and being mentored by his father, legendary copywriter, Gary Halbert. He also told us how to edit your own copy for more sales, how to plan your books and products and a whole bunch more.
The complete interview with available exclusively for our Elite Writer’s Lab members and the good news is, you can join us for $1 by clicking here.
You’ll also have access to a huge library of other expert interviews, courses and resources for turning your writing skills into a living.
We enjoyed an hour long discussion with Bond where he talked about his unique experience growing up and being mentored by his father, legendary copywriter, Gary Halbert. He also told us how to edit your own copy for more sales, how to plan your books and products and a whole bunch more.
The complete interview with available exclusively for our Elite Writer’s Lab members and the good news is, you can join us for $1 by clicking here.
You’ll also have access to a huge library of other expert interviews, courses and resources for turning your writing skills into a living.
You’re probably aware that much of the content found online is misleading at best and unfortunately, a good amount is downright false. That makes writing credible, accurate content not only a necessity but also a bit more difficult.
Presenting yourself as a business that is authoritative and credible is important for long-term relationships, trust, and customer loyalty. If you rely on online resources to find your facts, then you have to take a few extra steps to make sure you’re using credible information.
The following steps can help you improve your credibility and earn the trust of your audience.
Presenting Facts and Data
When you add facts and data to your content, you help add credibility to it. Instead of an article or blog post being 100% opinion, facts add a level of information and value that gives your piece more impact. For example, think about the difference between the following sentences:
Many people give up on their New Year’s Resolutions by February.
According to a CNN poll, 79% of people who made New Year’s Resolutions this year gave them up by February.
The second sentence, with a fact and a source, has more credibility and therefor more value. It puts the information in context and helps the reader trust it more as well as connect to the information more. Make sure the facts you present are relevant to your content and that you include your source.
Presenting Quotes
Quotes are another way to add credibility and value to your content. Like facts, they should be relevant to your content and add interest and value to it. When quoting someone else, make sure not to get carried away. Use a few sentences and perhaps a paragraph or two, depending on how you’re using it. However, using more of the quote opens the door to copyright issues, even if you give credit to the original author.
Finding the Original Source
With so much false information online, it can be difficult to find the original source of something. First, consider googling the fact that you want to use. For example, you might find this fact on a website, “79% of people who made New Year’s Resolutions this year gave them up by February.”
Google it and see where else the fact shows up. Even if you find it on dozens of other sites doesn’t make it true. You’ll want to find the first website that published the fact. Look at the date of the article or post. Look to see if any of the articles sourced their quote. Do a bit of digging. What you’re looking for is called “Primary Sources.”
“Primary sources are the raw materials of history — original documents and objects, which were created at the time under study. They are different from secondary sources, accounts, or interpretations of events created by someone without firsthand experience.” (Source: http://www.loc.gov/teachers/usingprimarysources/)
Tips for Verifying Facts
When trying to verify a fact, the following tips can help:
• Find the primary source. This can take some digging.
• Look at the URL. For example, cnn.com is a legitimate news source, but cnn.com.co is not.
• Read the “about us” page. This section should tell what the company that published the story does. This can give you an idea about whether it’s a legitimate source.
• Does the website cite their facts? If so, follow that link and evaluate the source.
Adding facts and quotes to your content improves the value of your material. It also adds credibility and authority. When you cite your sources, it increases trust through transparency. Sure, you have to do a little bit of extra digging to make sure the information is factual and accurate. However, your reputation and your audience are worth it. Additionally, you can outsource research and fact checking to your virtual assistant, making the process simple and easy.
Writing, for some, can take quite a lot of time. It’s a difficult balance for a business owner who wants their voice to be heard but doesn’t have the time it can take to write a blog post, ebook, or article. The truth is that with a few simple tips, you can cut your writing time in half (or even more) and retain the quality your audience expects and deserves.
1. Write first, edit later. Editing as you write is a difficult habit to break. However, if you’re able to manage breaking the habit, your writing time will be significantly cut. Each time you stop to edit, you break the flow of words onto the page. You make your corrections and then have to restart the creative process. Write first, edit later. Don’t stop to fix spelling errors. Don’t stop for any reason. Type until you’ve said all that you want to say. Then go back and edit. Run through first with your computer’s spelling and grammar check. Then run through it with your own eyes and look for clarity.
2. Outline First. A simple bulleted outline that covers all of the main points that you want to address in your content can be a serious time saver. Trying to determine what you want to say, as you write, slows you down. If you create a simple bulleted outline, then you can go back and fill in the content. You don’t have to stop and think about what should come next.
3. Dictation. Did you know that in one minute of talking you can dictate several hundred words? Talk about a time saver! While it can take a little time to learn and effectively use dictation software (check out nuance’s Dragon Naturally Speaking) it is often worth the investment. You can dictate a blog post in a matter of minutes. Clean it up, or ask your assistant to edit it for you, and publish. There are writers who dictate their books and swear by this time saving tool.
4. Write When You’re Focused. What’s the best time of day for you to focus? For many, writing is slowed down because the phone is ringing, they’re checking their email, and they somehow end up on Facebook. A blog post that should take 15 minutes to write ends up taking an hour and fifteen minutes. Find that time when you know you have more control over your thoughts and attention. Make that your writing time.
5. Write Every Day. Writing every day helps you train your brain to write. Published authors of fiction and non-fiction alike swear by the write every day rule. And you don’t have to sit down and write for hours. If you write a blog post every day, or spend 30 minutes a day writing, you’ll be able to accomplish a lot. As this becomes habit, your writing speed and comfort level will grow.
6. Have a Plan. A plan is different from an outline. It simply means that when you sit down to write, you know what you’re going to write about, why you’re writing it, and the goal it will help you achieve. Sitting down to a blank computer screen with no real direction is a recipe for writer’s block.
7. Set a timer. Setting a timer has the effect of forcing you to focus. It holds you accountable. For example, if you’re writing a blog post you might give yourself 20 minutes to write the post. That doesn’t leave time for checking Facebook.
8. Schedule it. Add writing into your daily schedule and make sure to schedule something after it. For example, you might schedule in writing every day before you make phone calls to your coaching clients. This forces you to finish before your call and it supports your writing commitment by making room in your day.
9. Get comfortable, and confident, with writing. One of the reasons why it can take some people a long time to write is that they lack a bit of confidence in their own voice. Take a deep breath. Trust that you know what you’re talking about and that your audience wants to listen. Acknowledge that the more you write, the better your skills will become.
10. Create a writing routine. Now, unless you’re writing a novel, you don’t necessarily have to create a writing space that calls to your muse. However, setting up your space and creating a writing routine can help you focus on the task. Something as simple as grabbing a notebook, pencil, and a cup of coffee before you sit down can help. Other business owners find that starting a writing project by reviewing their editorial calendar or content marketing plan can really help.
Improving your writing speed is often a matter of getting the clutter out of the way. Eliminate distractions, write when you’re most focused, and use systems to maximize your efficiency.
Some days it’s easy to feel that the well has run dry. You’ve written every word within you and you’ll never have another creative thought.
Rubbish. You’ve only just begun. Here are few ideas that will help you get the juices flowing again.
1. Go for a walk. Fresh air and exercise can lift your mood and give you a burst of energy. Don’t stare down at the sidewalk while you walk. Look around at the houses and the people you pass.
2. Make up stories about the people you see in restaurants or walking down the street. Where are they going? Why are they hurrying? Are they falling in love with a co-worker? Are they plotting to murder their obnoxious boss? Are they a compulsive gambler?
I do this when driving down the highway. I’ll see a dilapidated old building and I think “who used to live there?” “Why haven’t they torn that down?” “What would happen if a young couple bought it and tried to restore it?”
3. Read. Whether its newspapers, magazines or your Facebook feed, there are stories abounding in all media.
4. Reread some classics. You have not have picked one up since high school. But there are reasons why some books stand the test of time. Though writing styles may have changed, these books still have a lot to teach us about the art of using words to tell timeless stories. I have a cousin who is currently on a mission to read all the Pulitzer Prize winners for fiction. That’s a total of 89 books. Though I don’t currently have the time to follow him in that pursuit, it did inspire me to reread some of my favorites.
5. Spend some time in the library. Wander the aisles in sections you might not normally visit. Look at some travel guides for ideas about locations to write about or to use as story settings. See what kind of pets people read about most.
6. Take care of your health. Eat healthy foods, drink lots of water, and get plenty of sleep. If you’re constantly feeling sluggish it’s harder to be creative.
7. Go to a book store and walk the aisles. Look at what’s currently being published. Notice what magazines are still in print. These can narrow down topics for you to write about in your own work.
8. Write a fanciful tale that the childhood you would have loved. Create a world filled with dragons or wizards. Send a hero into space or to the Wild West. Don’t stress when you’re writing – just have fun.
9. Spend an hour doodling or coloring. Don’t laugh. I’ve always doodled and I’ve always loved coloring. But I use to have to find a child to color with to make it an acceptable activity. Those days are over now that adult coloring books are booming. You can relax your brain for a little while and then come back to your writing refreshed.
If you don’t enjoy coloring, play the guitar, crochet or paint a watercolor. Any type of artistic endeavor that is not connected to writing can help get you back into the groove.
10. Free write for thirty minutes. In her book, “Writing Down the Bones” Natalie Goldberg talks about this method of writing. You simply put pen to paper or keys to keyboard and write about anything or anyone for the allotted time. Don’t edit, don’t delete, don’t rewrite. This works to simply get your ideas and creativity flowing. Sometimes what you write is sheer garbage but it doesn’t matter, it still works. Other times you’ll surprise yourself by coming up with a sentence or a paragraph that is so good you want to save it for later.
Remember, that creativity breeds creativity. The more you feed your mind and spirit with creative thoughts and energy the more you’ll have to pull from when you need it for your work.
Selling private label rights to customers can be a lucrative online business. But even the smartest content creator can still be leaving money on the table without realizing it. If you want to boost your earnings, make sure you’re doing these seven smart things:
#1: Use a sales funnel
Don’t just sell one product when you could sell several. Make sure you have a complete sales funnel for each project you launch. Additional products can be add-ons that don’t take long to create like worksheets, checklists, slideshows, or audio/video files.
If you want a funnel without creating too much additional work, then try offering different licenses to customers. For example, you could have a “reseller’s license” that gives your customer the right to resell your products. Another option might be a “developer’s license” so customers can use your content on their clients’ websites.
#2: Create a mailing list of affiliates.
With a mailing list, you can email your affiliates about your next big launch. This gives affiliates advance notice so they can promote your latest offering to their audience. When affiliates have more time to prepare, they can offer better bonuses and write better sales copy.
#3: Make special bonuses for affiliates.
If you really want to go the extra mile for your affiliates, then create special bonuses. Affiliates love these type of bonuses because they don’t have to do the work of creating it themselves.
Try this: make several bonus items. Then let your affiliates pick and choose which bonuses they will offer to their buyers. Even better, give them permission to customize the bonus. You’ll have a lot of happy affiliates if you do this!
#4: Host an affiliate contest.
Get more affiliates to promote you by offering a contest with your next launch. You can give away a big cash price or offer a popular item like an iPad to the winner. Be sure to use a leaderboard so affiliates can check their standing regularly.
#5: Add downsells to your funnel.
A simple way to boost your profits from your PLR launch is to offer a downsell or even several downsells. Downsells are the pages that customers see when they reject your upsells. You can make downsells easily by offering older content. For example, bundle one of your previous products and offer it for a big discount.
#6: Regularly split test your headlines.
Don’t just assume that you have the best headlines. Instead, split test your headlines to make sure they’re converting well. You might find that tweaking a headline, even subtlety can make a big difference when it comes to sales numbers.
#7: Ask for feedback.
Once you have a sales page up, ask for feedback from more experienced PLR sellers. They can offer tips on how to improve your page as well as copy suggestions. Be willing to listen and learn from their recommendations.
Increasing your profits doesn’t have to be hard and you don’t have to spend hours working away. Instead, focus on doing little tweaks like adding downsells and you’ll notice bigger profits in no time.
What to Do Next: Get Training and Support Directly from Alice for Your PLR Business
As you may or may not know, we have a training and support program where Alice walks you through the ins and outs of getting started with a PLR business and she even reviews and promotes your first product for you, giving you that kick start you need to get your business growing.
As you can imagine, the extra promotion and support Alice offers does take up a lot of time and resources, so that part of the program won’t be available at that price for much longer.
Plus, if you join now, you’ll be invited to a special March 6 bonus training session called: How to Boost Your Earnings Per PLR Sale, which will show you how to ensure typically low cost PLR products bring an even better income for each sale you make.
As a writer, there are many ways that you can earn a living. You can write information products on a topic and create a niche for yourself. You can write for others, a ghostwriter or blogger. You can also create private label rights content. Creating PLR may be the most lucrative way to make money as a writer.
What is PLR?
If you’re not familiar with PLR or private label rights, it’s when you license most or all the intellectual property rights to your content. For example, instead of writing a report for a client, you write a report and sell the rights to use that report however a person wants and you can sell it to several people, from 10-1000 or more.
People use PLR for their own business content. PLR can be anything from short blog posts to videos to books. Now, the fewer people you sell it to, the higher price you can charge. Additionally, depending on the rights that you sell with the content, you can increase the price. Imagine that you get commissioned as a ghostwriter to write a 10-page report. If you charge $50 per page that’s $500.
Now imagine that you write a PLR report and you sell that 10-page report for $100. The customer saves $400 by purchasing PLR and you only have to sell 5 of those reports to make the same income. If you sell 10 or 20 now you’re earning $2000 on one report. And of course, you can write much more than one report.
How you choose to grow and expand your business is entirely up to you. You can be as big or as small as you want. Identify your long-term goals, what you want your business to look like in five years, and start planning.
How Do You Sell PLR?
When you set your business up to sell PLR you’re now a retailer. You’re selling a product, which is quite different than selling your services as a ghost writer. You might think that selling PLR would be difficult. However, it’s actually a bit easier to sell products than services.
Establish yourself as a credible PLR resource – you can share free PLR that people can use or view as a sample of your work.
Tell buyers how to get the most return on their investment – educate your website visitors and buyers on how to use PLR to grow their business.
Focus on a niche. When you first get started, consider choosing a niche to write for. For example, if you love health and fitness you might write that type of PLR exclusively. Once you have a good catalog, you can add to it.
Partner with other PLR providers. You can also create partnerships with other PLR companies. For example, a health and fitness PLR company might partner with a healthy eating PLR company to create unique content bundles.
What to Do Next: Get Training and Support Directly from Alice for Your PLR Business
As you may or may not know, we have a training and support program where Alice walks you through the ins and outs of getting started with a PLR business and she even reviews and promotes your first product for you, giving you that kick start you need to get your business growing.
As you can imagine, the extra promotion and support Alice offers does take up a lot of time and resources, so that part of the program won’t be available at that price for much longer.
Plus, if you join now, you’ll receive instant access to the bonus training session called: How to Boost Your Earnings Per PLR Sale, that shows you how to ensure typically low cost PLR products bring an even better income for each sale you make.
If you’ve already created courses, reports, blog posts or just about any type of content…have you ever considered boosting your income by licensing that content? Many people will pay you for the rights to publish their content as their own. In other words, they’ll pay you for private label rights, which means they can edit the content, brand it and monetize it for their own business purposes.
Here’s a little excerpt from Alice’s Best Sellers Summit presentation that talks about this idea. Just listen below or read the notes that follow…AND be sure to keep reading as Alice has offered extra tips after the transcripts.
Here’s a transcript of the above video…
So, this is an idea for people who may have content already out there, and the question is, can you sell PLR rights to the content you’ve already created?
So say you have a course or something or you have content you’ve written, whether you’ve published it and sold it or not, but it’s something you might want to offer PLR rights to. It’s a great way to break into the PLR market.
For me, when I sell PLR rights to content that I’ve personally created or a course that I’ve made and I can say that “it’s proven to sell, I’ve sold it, now you could take over and run with it,” then my customers absolutely love that.
I’ve repackaged blog posts and things that I’ve made and I’ve called it “premium content” because, again, it’s content that I’ve personally created and they’ll know that it’s good stuff. Of course, it’s good stuff. It is a great — even if you don’t want to be in the PLR business, it’s a possibility of increasing your income that way.
You guys will notice that on the Best Sellers Summit, when you signed up, you could sign up just to be an attendee and you get the recordings. Then we had the Premium package and then we had the Resell and Branding Rights package, which is essentially PLR.
It’s a little bit different just because of the presentations by the speakers, but it was the same thing. We offered it right on the same sales page for people, and in our market, that makes sense.
If you’re doing scrapbooking or something like that, you probably don’t want to be selling personal use and PLR in the exact same sales page because your customers are going to be like, “What the heck is that?” But it’s a possibility to do it separately, you know, sell it as PLR separately, or sometimes on the same sales page.
So, it’s definitely something to think about, especially if there’s content that you’ve got and you haven’t even published it yet. There’s a possibility for it. I know a lot of people — I don’t know why people sit on content that they’ve created and they haven’t done anything, but there’s an idea for you.
Not in the Video: How to Repackage Content for PLR Buyers
This actually isn’t in the video, but it might be useful for you to know how to take your existing content and make it useful to a PLR buyer.
Here are a few pointers:
Check the content is still accurate and update anything that needs updating.
Remove any personal stories or information that applies directly to you. Alice usually gets her virtual assistant to do this and to check on any updates that might be required.
If there is information your customer needs to add to the content, highlight it as clearly as possible. For example, if they need to link to another document or link for the course, highlight it in red or yellow, so they can clearly see they need to take action on that part of the content.
Make the files you give them as simple as possible. In other words, make it easy for them to download content and go. That means putting blog posts into text files, for example. Or if you’ve created a complicated course, arrange it into files and order everything so it makes sense and is easy for your customer to use.
Just keep in mind that you’re selling this for someone else to publish content from, rather than consume or take action on your content, so their objective is quite different from someone who buys your course or reads your content.
What to Do Next: Get Training and Support Directly from Alice for Your PLR Business
As you may or may not know, we have a training and support program where Alice walks you through the ins and outs of getting started with a PLR business and she even reviews and promotes your first product for you, giving you that kick start you need to get your business growing.
As you can imagine, the extra promotion and support Alice offers does take up a lot of time and resources, so that part of the program won’t be available at that price for much longer.
Plus, if you join now, you’ll be invited to a special March 6 bonus training session called: How to Boost Your Earnings Per PLR Sale, which will show you how to ensure typically low cost PLR products bring an even better income for each sale you make.
Here’s another excerpt from Alice’s Best Sellers Summit presentation that shows you the ins and outs of starting your own PLR business. This time, she talks about the mistakes people make selling PLR and how to avoid them.
Just listen below or read the notes that follow…
Here’s a transcript of the above video…
So, let’s talk about mistakes people make and how you can avoid those. Actually, I’ve got three mistakes, I think, if I remember. [Laughter] They all revolve around trying to do everything.
So, some of this has come up already, in a way, in this presentation, but maybe it’s a good time to review it in a few ways. Avoid trying to do everything, and that’s trying to do all the tasks, trying to cover all the topics, and trying to do all the content.
What the heck does that mean? I did write a couple notes, and I don’t actually know what that means, but that’s going to come to me.
Ron: [Laughter]
Alice: [Laughter] All right.
Ron: Are you trying to Rick Perry this thing, with the three points? [Laughter]
Alice: Right. I shouldn’t have said “three.” What was I thinking?
Ron: [Laughter]
Alice: I shouldn’t have committed. All right, so again, don’t try to do all the tasks. Hire out. You know, I don’t do customer service for the PLR. I don’t do the writing. I don’t even manage the writers.
My customer service person, Melody Spier, manages the writers. I have another assistant who — and, I mean, this might be goal in the future, too. You may not start out this way, but it gives you an idea. The more I got to this point, the more money I made. It’s because I was able to really focus.
I also have another assistant who is a backup in the customer support, but she does all the sales pages. She sets up all the products because I have all these templates that she just works from. She’s not a copywriter, but because a lot of the sales pages are very similar, it’s easy for her to work from a template and get it set up.
So, I am only focused, really, on coming up with the product ideas, and then I do work with my list and I work with my affiliates. So, I’m selling the products, basically. That is my main focus and figuring out what we’re going to sell.
Whenever I have fallen off that — say I lost some people who worked for me and I started doing more — immediately, I see the income drop. So, where you can, you know, make that first product. Start investing somewhere else.
Another thing, too, is if you were going to — say maybe you don’t want to give up the writing to start with, but you’re doing the writing and you’re doing the customer support.
If you have a thin skin at all, hire someone to do your customer support, because they’re going to be criticizing, and sometimes unfairly because they just want to get a refund, [Laughter] criticizing your work. That gets you distracted. It discourages you, and I always encourage.
It doesn’t even matter what kind of business you’re in. Outsource your customer support. It doesn’t mean you’re totally oblivious to what’s happening, but it means there’s a professional there who’s not going to get upset. They’re going to deal with people properly.
The funny thing is that we always think this customer support and answering emails take so much time and it’s going to be so expensive to outsource. But if it is going to take a lot of time, then the expense of it means your business is doing really well and you can afford it.
So, to start with, it’s going to be just a few hours, but it frees your mind up to focus on creating great content, and serving those customers who are really happy to buy from you, and not worry about those grumpy people. Right?
Ron: For sure.
Alice: And the other… Sorry?
Ron: For sure.
Alice: Yes. [Laughter] You like customer service, right, Ron?
Ron: I do not, at all. [Laughter]
Alice: [Laughter] The other thing is, trying to cover all the topics, and I made this mistake. I mean, at the time it wasn’t a mistake, but I started to see it became a mistake. Maybe it’s because there were so many more providers that it meant that I needed to change.
You know, at first, we were offering all kinds of content. It was health content, marketing, family stuff, all kinds. We had a bunch of memberships for each major content type, and that went well for a while, but it was hard to maintain. When I say that more sellers came, it didn’t mean it was saturated. It just meant that I couldn’t try to control all those topics anymore, right? I needed to focus more.
So now I have two sites. One is focused on marketing content and one is focused on personal development content, and even I find that a bit challenging to do both, but it’s whittled down over the years. Again, even though I’ve stopped doing so many topics, I’m making more money than I was way back when.
So, find a specialization. And you may not want to go too specific because then you might end up with a really small audience and you won’t be able to find them, but you’ll figure it out.
So even to start with what you decide — you know, whatever topic that you decide to go into — maybe it’s not where you’ll stay, so you don’t have to commit yourself completely. You can experiment with your first few products, but do find something that you specialize in so that people know you’re the go-to resource for that topic area, that subject area.
But I would keep it… I don’t think I would do — and then maybe it’s possible and it depends on how good you are at your marketing and stuff like that, but I wouldn’t do golf. I might do sports or maybe exercise — those kinds of things go further out than, say, health or something like that — and do a variety of topics in the wide topic, if that makes sense.
Ron: For sure, for sure. Another thing that I’ve heard you mention was charging what you’re worth and not being afraid to have recurring income PLR products, as well.
Alice: For sure.
Ron: And not trying to compete with everybody on price; trying to position yourself as a premium product that people are willing to pay you more for, instead of trying to be a commodity.
Alice: Look at you. You’re telling the… oh, wait, no, that’s this next one. This is one thing and then I’m going to talk about that, actually, charging more, because PLR does sell cheap. And some of it sells crazy cheap, so you wonder how those people make money.
It’s because they do crazy amounts of volume, and most of us don’t do crazy amounts of volume. I do okay, but I’m not a huge volume seller.
What to Do Next: Get Training and Support Directly from Alice for Your PLR Business
As you may or may not know, we have a training and support program where Alice walks you through the ins and outs of getting started with a PLR business and she even reviews and promotes your first product for you, giving you that kick start you need to get your business growing.
As you can imagine, the extra promotion and support Alice offers does take up a lot of time and resources, so that part of the program won’t be available at that price for much longer.
Plus, if you join now, you’ll receive instant access to the bonus training session called: How to Boost Your Earnings Per PLR Sale, that shows you how to ensure typically low cost PLR products bring an even better income for each sale you make.
If you’ve ever thought of running a private label rights (PLR) content business, but wanted to know the ins and outs of doing so, you’re in luck.
Alice recently presented on the topic at our Best Sellers Summit and we’ve got some excerpts for you here. And hey, if you’re a writer who wants to earn a living using your skills…but don’t know what PLR is, sit tight because Alice explains that too.
Just listen below or read the notes that follow…
In this excerpt, Alice covered the following:
What is a PLR business?
And even if you know what it is, WHY it’s such a great business to be in
Who can run a PLR business?
Do you see the concept of PLR becoming worn out?
What you should know before starting a PLR business
Here’s a transcript of the above video…
What is Private Label Rights (PLR) Content?
So, what is private label rights content? If you know this already, bear with me. I might have something new for you to think about in that, in my explanation. But basically, you could think of it as somebody offering a similar service — but different and better, I think — as a ghostwriter.
So, what my company does is we write content. It might be articles, blog posts, reports, e-books. It could be even videos — it can be multimedia content, as well — graphics, and we create those so that our customers can use them.
Now, normally when you’re a ghostwriter, your client tells you what they want. You are at their beck and call to do it exactly how they want it, and sometimes, clients can be annoying. [Laughter] They get the full rights to that content.
You can be paid quite well, but if you do private label rights, you can be paid even more and get rid of that obligation to be at all your client’s whims. Because my company makes premade packages of content, I decide the subjects, what types of things to put in there, based on the knowledge I’ve gained about what I know people will buy, and I sell it over and over again.
So, the customers come to me, they see if they want the content I’ve created, and they buy it. The benefit to me is that I don’t have to deal with clients. I can sell this content over and over again and make more money than I could as a ghostwriter.
The benefit to the customer is that they can buy the content right away, because it’s ready, and they get it at a much cheaper price than if they were to hire a ghostwriter. So, per sale, I make less than as a ghostwriter, but because I can sell it hundreds or even thousands of times over again, I make much more money in the long run.
Who Can Run a PLR Business?
So, let’s talk about who can run a PLR business, and this is interesting because we’re targeting writers here. Our writers are our audience here, but seriously, anyone can run a PLR business if they take the time to learn things and figure it out, because it’s an easy business to get into.
And I’m not kidding. People think I’m exaggerating, but I wouldn’t be doing this for so long. It’s the main part of my business and has been for a long time, and I do not see any change happening in that because people need content and they keep buying content.
I’ve never run a virtual business like this where people just keep buying over and over again. I bet there are people in this room right now who have purchased almost — maybe not all of my PLR, but close. Or actually, they may be All-Access members, so maybe they have purchased everything.
Just, that’s the nature of a PLR buyer. They keep buying because they want more, and because it’s inexpensive, they can often afford to just go ahead and purchase it. Maybe they will use it, maybe they won’t, but overall, still they’ve got that content to drawn on when they need it.
So, I think writers can start a PLR business and anyone who wants to learn a little bit about marketing, you know, people who like to create videos, anybody who is willing to learn what their customers want and deliver it to them.
Do You See an End to PLR?
Here’s another question that people often ask me. People kept predicting the end of PLR being such a hot business opportunity, like everything else — the death of something, the death of email marketing, the death of something.
It’s not such a big topic. People aren’t always talking about PLR, but they kept thinking — and I even think Ron was a little skeptical at some point, too, asking. [Laughter]
Ron: I was. I certainly was.
Alice: Yep. [Laughter]
Ron: I’m like, “People still buy PLR?” You’re like, “Yeah, I’m making hundreds of thousands of dollars.” I’m like, “Whoa. Really?” [Laughter]
Alice: Yes, but I guess, you know, in the early days, people were using it to try to maybe totally get search engine traffic from it.
So, it was a lot of articles. It was things people were posting to just get search engine traffic. In that way, it is a bit limiting because if you’re going to build a site solely out of PLR that other people are also posting, then you may find some challenges.
Because we do so many different types of things, we do content that helps you put your products together, get your emails out there, they’re not relying on Google. Our customers aren’t relying on Google. They’re just relying on us to give them good content that they could share with their customers, their subscribers, and their new visitors.
And people just need content, period. It’s not going away. You think about — it’s similar to stock photos, right? You license the content. You use it. Stock photos aren’t going away.
Associated Press, which I believe doesn’t charge money — or I don’t know if they do — for people to be able to publish their news stories and things like that, they’ve been around forever and they’re not going anywhere. People need content.
People also get worried that the market might be saturated, and I’ve never felt that. One of the reasons I don’t feel that way is because of customers wanting to buy more and more.
I actually personally can’t provide everything my customers want, so I am always promoting other PLR sellers. I have no problems promoting someone else. I’m not worried about losing customers because I know that people need content.
What Should You Know before Trying to Break into the PLR Business?
So, what should you know before trying to break into the PLR business? And by the way, is anybody here already running a PLR business, as well?
I think there might be a couple people here. I’m going to check back in a bit, but we might have some expertise here, as well.
Ron: We have some customers buying PLR, for sure.
Alice: Customers, yeah! [Laughter]
Ron: Yeah.
Alice: Good! Keep buying. [Laughter] I think I just saw — I glanced at a question asking about a small bit of content, and I think actually one of the things to know to break into it is, all you need is one product to start.
A lot of people think they have to have this big PLR store where all these customers can come and they could pick what they want. Most of my sales don’t come that way. Most of it comes from a launch of a PLR product, and then affiliates are promoting it and everything.
The big burst of traffic comes to the new products, and then, I mean, it’s good to have that store where people could keep coming back. Regular customers buy more and you can offer, you know, if they need bulk discounts and things like that.
All you need is that one product to drive traffic to because after all, you want them to go to a focused page of one product. Promote something. You don’t have to offer everything. You don’t have to be an Amazon. You just need to offer something that they can use at that time.
Other things that I’ve learned too is that, as I said, PLR started a lot with articles. Mostly, it was people posting articles to possibly static Web sites at the time. WordPress sites were starting to become popular. But it’s come a long way. We’ve gone to reports, graphics, videos and stuff.
What I really find — and think about this if you are planning to sell or you are selling — is the more practical you can make the content, the better it sells. For example, we created journals. They’re lovely-looking journals.
If you spoke to Melody, who is our customer support here, she also helps me with a lot of the PLR creation. She makes these gorgeous planners for me. Journals, checklists, workbooks, anything that’s a little kind of outside of the box that can get customers working on something, those are the great places to start and grab customers.
Because if you’ve got an article pack and it’s on a certain topic — there are tons of article packs out there, but if you can think about how to make yourself stand out with unique types of content that you don’t always find, customers will come buying it.
What you should know though, also, which I already said, is that customers are going to keep buying from you. So, when you do that one product, make the plan to make the next one and keep that going. Really try to figure out what they like and focus on something, and focus on that instead of trying to provide everything. Right?
Here’s what I want to come back to: the right leveraging and the writing of other people. And it might hurt because if you really like writing — you’re still going to be doing lots of writing, I promise you.
But if you’re going to be focusing on creating all this content, it’s going to be really hard for you to build your customer base, to get people promoting you, and strategizing good products that people will want to buy. You get bogged down in that writing.
So even though I was a writer and I went from ghostwriting and copywriting for clients, I went to the PLR business. When I started with my partner at that time, I said, “I am not writing the content. I will get us customers. I will work our mailing list and all of that stuff,” and that was the best thing I ever did.
We hired writers, my business partner wrote some stuff, and that way I was able to focus on growing. But I’m still using my writing skills and knowledge of writing because I figure out what those products should be, what that content should be. I’m just having someone else create it.
If you feel like that — it’s hard to afford that to start out with — the great thing here is, again, you can start with that one product. Write it yourself if you want, so you could take your time and get that done.
Then you’re going to focus on marketing it and making a good launch out of it. You’re going to make some money and you’re going to be able to pay somebody to do your next one, and then you can focus on the places you need to be a part of.
I think that, I mean, there are exceptions to people who are doing well in the PLR business and do all the writing, but I think they’re few and far between. I know that probably some people — you know Tiffany Lambert? I think she’s crazy. She works way too hard. [Laughter] She works way too hard, but she is an exception.
So, if you want to try it, do it, but I could never do it. It would be too stressful, and I like my freedom and I like to be able to do things when I want to do them. By doing all the PLR writing, I’ll feel like I’m working for a client and the client is me. And I don’t think I’m a very good client. I don’t want to be my client. [Laughter]
The last thing that you should know before you try to break in is, make a plan to get to know other PLR providers. As I said, I’m always willing to promote people. So are most other PLR providers. I don’t know a single one who says they don’t promote other people’s products. It’s because there’s so much opportunity, people are always buying the content.
So, it should be a part of your strategy to get to talk to them. I mean, you could, to start out with, maybe offer a free pack or something to their audience. Just start opening the doors of conversation.
There are also Facebook groups dedicated to PLR sellers. Find those and get involved with them. You know, it’s just the same as getting to know anybody else online. Just identify who those people are and start to get to know them so that when you’re ready to sell products, they will be ready to promote you.
What to Do Next: Get Training and Support Directly from Alice for Your PLR Business
As you may or may not know, we have a training and support program where Alice walks you through the ins and outs of getting started with a PLR business and she even reviews and promotes your first product for you, giving you that kick start you need to get your business growing.
As you can imagine, the extra promotion and support Alice offers does take up a lot of time and resources, so that part of the program won’t be available at that price for much longer.
Plus, if you join now, you’ll have access to the bonus training: How to Boost Your Earnings Per PLR Sale, which will show you how to ensure typically low cost PLR products bring an even better income for each sale you make.
