You can create and release any number of products:

• teleseminar
• report or ebook
• video training series
• software
• home study course
• simple audio program
• or any combination of the above.

But perhaps you need more convincing that creating a product is important. After all, maybe you’re convinced that simple promoting other people’s products (affiliate marketing, network marketing, etc.) is good enough.

Here are 5 reasons to create your own product now (in no particular order):

1. Be taken more seriously - I remember how different I was treated at live events than other beginners simply because I had created a product. Whether in person, or virtually, once you have your name on your own product you become part of the “action takers” and get a lot further in conversations in your industry.
2. Build more reliable income – Once you have an information product, it can be sold any time, day or night, whether you are by your computer, at work, or even on vacation. I remember when I was still in the classroom how exciting it was to get paid for one of my products while I was administering a quiz to my history students. Once you have a product, you truly can “make money while you sleep.” You’ll just work really hard while you’re awake to make it into a full time income :)
3. Gain confidence in your business – If you’re the kind of person that jumps from thing to shiny thing, getting a product will help focus your attention. This gives you confidence and direction because you’ll have completed something that helps other people. Once you get a taste of that, you won’t want to stop with just one product.
4. Attract affiliate partners to promote you – Perhaps the biggest benefit I’ve personally seen from having my own products is the realization that you can get other people to do a lot of promotional work for you. Once you have a product for sale, you can attach an affiliate program to it (running software like Digital Access Pass or Butterfly Marketing, for example). And with the right incentives, your customers and affiliates from around the world can do the heavy lifting of sending you traffic.
5. It’s easier to sell affiliate products (even MLM opportunities) – If you’re an affiliate or network marketer right now, you probably see a big wall in front of you for making consistent sales. This is partly because you’re selling something that other people are selling too. You have to stand out from the crowd by being someone people can trust. And a great way to build that trust is to give people something of value in exchange for money – even if it’s just a few dollars. When people see that you deliver more than what you promise, they take your recommendations for other products more seriously. To this day, I earn at least 33% or so of my income from affiliate programs, including a few network marketing companies.

I challenge you to create a product within the next 4-6 weeks. Do it by creating a teleseminar, or putting together a quality ebook.

If you want someone there to guide you along the way, take this info-product creation training from Nicole Dean and Ronnie Nijmeh. While I’m busy planning the summer “Class Reunion” event and not teaching live courses at the moment, you can still learn from 2 people I trust to deliver a great program. Take action on what they teach, and you will have that product for sale before the summer begins.

Bob Jenkins

p.s. There are more than 5 reasons to create your own product, but these 5 should give you the kick in the rear you need to get going. And seriously, if you’re not sure exactly how you’ll make it happen, take the Rapid Product Creation training from Nicole and Ronnie. You’re going to love how fast you get it all done with their expert help.

And the winner is…

Creating profitable membership sites with WordPress and Digital Access Pass

Here is the complete poll result:

I took the total numbers of “Definitely” and gave that vote 3 points. The “Probably” votes get 1 vote. So numerically…

• Discover DAP got 371 points
• Unstoppable Blogging 2 got 276 points
• Teleseminar Formula 4 got 162 points

As you can see, business blogging was a close second. However, in order to teach Discover DAP, there will be a fair amount of WordPress and blogging included to make your membership site look good and be profitable.

What Happens Now?

On Wednesday, March 17, I’ll send an invitation to my existing subscribers, customers, and clients to a free preview call with Ravi Jayagopal. We’ll dive into why DAP fills the needs of savvy membership site owners better than any other script on the market, and what’s coming soon in the next update of DAP.

Those that attend the call will then receive a special invite to the Discover DAP course.

Over the next 48 hours, I’ll be designing the curriculum for the course. It’s going to start early next week, and we’ll meet 5-7 times through live webinars before April 15.

Your next steps…

What you can do right now is post a comment below about what you’d like to see taught in the course. What is your biggest question about creating a profitable membership site?

Also, the course will not be free; so you can suggest what would be a fair investment you’d be willing to make for a 2-3 week live virtual workshop that gives you the roadmap toward a profitable membership site.

If you have never created a membership site, the initial target for your site would be to earn $10,000 within the first 9 months through recurring or one-time revenue. If you’re more experienced, and you already have content, then the target would be to earn $2000/month or more within the first 6 months of your site. (Your results will vary of course)

I’m looking forward to teaching the Digital Access Pass software and membership site strategies to you!

Bob Jenkins

p.s. Remember, I’ll be sending the invitations to be part of the free preview call for Discover DAP to subscribers. You can sign up for my primary internet marketing training email list through the blue form you see on this page.

p.p.s. You’ll see a list of links below that point to the previous articles I’ve written about creating membership sites with WordPress and why I chose Digital Access Pass over Wishlist.

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For event promoters, having smaller audiences is depressing. For those hoping to attract people wanting to make a major change in their lives because of economic circumstances, they’re finding that most of their target market is unable to make the trip. The cost of the ticket, airfare/travel, and hotel is just not available to many.

While that’s bad news for event hosts, it’s great news for you!

If you are in the minority, and can get to these events, it’s a perfect time to go. With attendance being 30-60% smaller than normal, there’s never been a better opportunity to get on the radar of the current and feature leaders of the industry.

When seminars are 150-300 people, you can get lost in the shuffle. The speakers get swarmed by attendees, and it’s 99% likely you’ll never meet key people that could really impact your business.

But when you get in a room of high caliber people, but there’s only 50-80 of us in the room, the networking is amazing. You meet just about everyone, and the availability of the speakers triples.

As an example: At JV Alert this past weekend, I had substantial time with speakers Stephanie Frank, David Preston, Ron Davies, Susan Preston, Shannon Cherry, Anik Singal, Trevor Crook and Ken McArthur. I met some terrific people like Jacqueline Wales, Jen Blackert, Jennifer Carter, Harun Bahri,  Jonathan Freeman, and so many others. And of course reconnected with old friends Andre Arnett, Danielle Miller, Frank Sousa, Sanyika Calloway-Boyce, and more.

So although I wouldn’t suggest that you run your own event right now (in fact, I’ve pushed mine back myself – although that’s mostly due to my focus on my IM Success Library and Teleseminar Formula Training Camp projects), I would suggest you get to a live event this summer and fall.

Here are 2 suggestions that come to mind of great seminars for your business.

In August, I’ll be in Poland for the entire month, but if I was in the States, I would have already registered for the NAMS Workshop, because David Perdew has constructed my ideal formula for an event.

It’s a true workshop, where the speakers take time to talk their strategy, and then spend extra time helping you actual implement it right then and there.

Some of my favorite people in the industry will be there, and they’re extraordinary teachers. People like Lynn Terry (an affiliate marketing GENIUS!), Willie Crawford (he bleeds internet marketing), Jeff Herring (article marketing), Kathleen Gage (one of my teleseminar teaching colleagues), David Preston (offline business workshops), and many more.

I expect this event to be the best of the summer, and if you can make it there, do it. Honestly, I wish the timing was better so I could be there.

Learn more about the Niche Affiliate Marketing Seminar (NAMS2)

Another event I’ve recently heard about is from motivational speaker and personal development guru Les Brown. I recently met Les at an event in Orlando.

And by that I mean my highly connected friend Mark Shilensky from Life Classroom introduced us, we shook hands, spoke for about 30 seconds. :)

In any case, he’s doing a seminar at the end of June to teach you how to discover your power voice. This would be helpful for speakers, consultants, teleseminar presenters, workshop leaders, and anyone else who finds themselves in front of an audience at some point in their business.

If this sounds like you, check out Les Brown’s Power Voice Seminar for more of the details.

Regardless of which event you attend, don’t let the doomsdayers of seminar attendance dissuade you from the incredible opportunity in front of you. Small events mean better networking and access to the “big stars” that you just can’t get when you’re at a typical conference.

Bob Jenkins

p.s. By the way, with attendance rates down, it’s also a great time to learn how to do teleseminars – no travel needed for those at all! I’ll be teaching my 3.0 version of Teleseminar Formula Training Camp in July. Details will be posted at my teleseminar training resource center.

This is because Donna’s area of expertise is creating your own book as a “big business card.” This is something I’ve been wanting to do for quite some time. And Donna’s helping me break through the excuses of not having it done yet. I have an article for you to read from Donna below, but first, something even better.

I asked her if I could get her on the phone for some consulting for my own book, and then I realized that you might want to do this too. So after she said yes to giving me advice, I asked her if I could let you listen in as well, and thankfully she agreed.

You can listen in (and even ask questions) Tuesday night at 7 p.m. ET – call details are at WriteABookThisWeekend.com. Oh, and it’s free for the live call and to get the replay for the first 24 hours after the call is done.

So if you’ve ever dreamed to see your name on the cover of a book, and perhaps giving someone a copy of your own published book, then you got to join me Tuesday night!

Bob

p.s. Here’s that article I was talking about…

Do ‘Just One Thing’ To Get Your Book Done

By Donna Kozik

Many times when we think about writing and publishing a book our minds careen out of control into the depths of overwhelm.

Let’s put the brakes on that.

Instead, what one thing could you do right now to move forward in your dream of becoming a published author?

Here are four “just 1 thing” ideas I have for the want-to-be-published. I encourage you to pick one to apply today so you can be a published authors sooner rather than later.

1. Develop Your “Goal Statement.”

If you join one of my “Write a Book in a Weekend” events, the first thing I will encourage you to do is write and send me a goal statement describing why you want to write your book and what it will accomplish for you.

It doesn’t have to be long—200-300 words should do it.

And there is great power in those few words—more often than not, it’s the participants who take a few minutes to write and send me their goal statement who get their book done by the end of the weekend. How about that? No coincidences.

2. Describe Your Ideal Reader

When you are in the throes of thinking, thinking, thinking about your book and get caught up in the “doing” of writing, it can be very easy to become, frankly, quite self-absorbed—meaning you lose focus about who the book is for in the first place: your reader.

Another short assignment I would give you as a “Write a Book in a Weekend” participant is to write a short description of your “ideal reader.” Tell me about one person who will benefit from your book. Is it a man or woman? What age? Where do they live? What do they do? And then the big question: what is the biggest problem or challenge they face that your book will solve?

3. Write Your “About the Author”

You might think this is a “save for last” item, however I encourage my peeps to write their “About the Author” section first, stressing not only their own credentials, but the specific problems and challenges their readers face and how they intend to solve them. It’s another good way to get your book defined in your own mind, plus provide yourself with a big picture overview.

4. Take the “10 Minute Challenge”

This is a simple but effective technique to get going on a larger project. Set a timer for 10 minutes and GO, GO, GO, GO, GO! Challenge yourself to see how much you can write in those 10 minutes. Most likely you’ll get such momentum going you’ll add another 10, and another, and another…I use this often, including now as I write this piece. ;-)

5. Speed Write About Your Favorite Topic

Sometimes what gets in our way is thinking too much about what we “should” write versus what we “want” to write. No one says you have to start with Chapter One. A great way to jumpstart your book project is to pick your favorite topic and start writing about that, even if it might be the “wrap up” chapter.

You can see a common theme to all these ideas—getting started somewhere, anywhere! It’s amazing—and also magical—about what getting started can do for a person. I encourage you to pick one or two of the items above, apply them right now, and let me know the results.

Donna Kozik is a two-time award winning author who has been featured in Woman’s Day, Women’s World, Teen People, The L.A. Times, The Baltimore Sun, NPR’s “Marketplace” and other media. She now shows others how to write and publish a book fast and easy to use as a “big business card.” She does this through “Write a Book in a Weekend” live and virtual events. You can find out more about how to write your book fast and easy at WriteABookThisWeekend.com.

What’s holding you back from writing your book? Post a comment below to share. And if you’ve written a book, how has it helped you in your business?

So instead, I want you to think of a teleseminar as the opportunity to create your own tele-factory. In other words, use the phone to create a line of information products.

With just one call, you can create an Audio MP3, the transcripts, and even a physical CD that you could hand out. You can either give these away to build your list, or sell them to grow your revenue.

But let’s go even further.

Take the same transcripts and turn them into several articles, a few reports, a number of blog posts, and even a series of autoresponder messages.

Add a few teleseminars together and you have a nice ebook, physical book. Put all the by-products together and you can come up with a stellar home-study course.

This past Sunday, at JV Alert Orlando, Ken McArthur invited me to be a speaker and share my Teleseminar Formula Tele-Factory system. Perhaps you were there, perhaps you were on Ustream.

While I can’t take you back in time, I can do the next best thing: prove to you how the tele-factory system works.

I did the presentation on Sunday morning (at 8:30 a.m.!). I brought my own video camera, but I really just wanted the sound recorded. When I got home on Monday, I took the audio (just like I would a teleseminar) and sent it to a transcriptionist.

Yesterday (Thursday), the transcripts came back. I now have the transcripts, the MP3, and the slides inside a membership site with an affiliate program attached.

The entire process (the 6 Ps) complete in under 6 days!

What it would be like for your business if you could turn out products that fast? How much momentum could you gain from knowing exactly what steps to take, and in what order to take them?

I invite you to take part in my upcoming Teleseminar Training Camp. It’s a 10 day virtual workshop, where I teach you all the steps in methodical detail. Better still, during the 10 day period, you actually do your teleseminar with other people in the course (a no-pressure environment for sure!), so that everyone who takes action has a product by the end of the 10 day program.

Go get your recording and transcripts from Sunday’s talk (they’re free). And as you listen and/or read along, start to imagine where your business could be at the end of the month if you work with our group.

Start your tele-factory now

Bob Jenkins

p.s. By the way, we already have about 40 members, so we’re just about halfway full. So if this is for you, I’d get in before the end of the weekend.

p.p.s. If you doubt teleseminars are appropriate for your business, I challenge you to listen to the free presentation first – the 13 myths I expose should address your concerns completely.

On Sunday, you’ll be able to get the best lessons from my best training during the second annual Halftime Sale…

Here’s just a few of the courses you’ll be able to learn from:

• Squidoo Secrets 2
• Teleseminar Formula
• Discover Freemind (mindmapping)
• Discover Autoresponders (Aweber)
• Discover Social Networking (Twitter)
• Discover Product Creation (make free reports)
• IM Success Live Workshop (Ellicott City)

I’ll be taking the best audio or video module (10-90 minutes) from each of these courses for the Halftime Sale learning library.

I also created lessons for my Inner Circle that are currently unpublished, which I’ll be including as well.

Each month my IM Success Tribe (inner circle) members ask me point-blank questions and I give them direct, actionable answers. I’ll be including the best Q&A session as well.

And don’t be surprised if a few other goodies sneak in to help you learn internet marketing strategies faster.

So if you want to learn from the best training, perhaps even for free, then grab your admission ticket to the Halftime Sale.

This is one event you will NOT want to miss!

Bob Jenkins

– go Cardinals! :)

p.s.  Specific details of what’s included will be revealed as we get closer to Sunday night’s Big Game between the Cardinals and Steelers. In the meantime, grab your affiliate link so you can be a winner this Sunday, too!

p.p.s. Last year, over 250 wise action-takers picked up over $200 worth of training for just $10. Maybe this year, everything will be free! Can’t wait to find out…

Be sure to mark your calendar for these learning events I’m teaching or hosting this week:

Rapid Business Acceleration With Carrie Wilkerson (IM Success Radio)
Monday, January 26 (2 p.m. EST) Free
Carrie’s one of the “Best New Business Friends of 2008″, and I can’t wait to get her to share her secrets to rapid business success while overcoming serious challenges along the way. She’ll motivate, inspire, and instruct you to take massive, focused action and never quit til you’ve exceeded the goals you set.

My Profit And Product Creation System (As Ken McArthur’s guest on JV Alert Preview Call Series)
Tuesday, January 27 (8 p.m. EST) Free (quick signup required)
I’ll be revealing specific strategies I’ve used over the last 3 years to build a successful online information business using rapid product creation and delivery methods. This is a preview call for my presentation at JV Alert in Orlando February 6-8.

Massive Targeted Traffic With Ross Goldberg (IM Success Radio)
Thursday, January 29 (8 p.m. EST) Free
Tune into IMSR again on Thursday as I get Ross to share his methods for attracting multiple streams of targeted traffic to his websites.

Second Annual Halftime Sale
Sunday, February 1 (Approximately 8 p.m. – 8:34 p.m. EST)
While the Cardinals and Steelers take their break in the middle of the “Big Game”, you’ll be able to score my extensive, hand-picked library of personally created internet marketing lessons. The score at halftime determines the final price (last year, it was just $10!). Read the Halftime Sale blog for details and a recap from last year.

And I may have 1 or 2 more surprise teleseminars later in the week – so stay connected so you won’t miss out!

Bob Jenkins

p.s. This week is filled with great opportunities to learn. It starts today at 2 p.m. EST with Carrie Wilkerson on IM Success Radio.

In fact, most internet marketing teachers say without a list, you have no business. This is because it’s very difficult to sustain most online revenue models without having subscribers and customers to communicate with.

Now let’s leave that argument aside and instead debate whether Twitter is more important than list building.

The truth of the matter is, Twitter IS listbuilding. Just in a different sense of the concept. Instead of building a list of subscribers who receive email messages from you whenever you like, Twitter builds a
list of followers who are able to engage in conversation with you and your network.

This may be even more powerful than the traditional list, especially with the tendency for emails to end up getting lost in a sea of Viagra ads and bank transfer requests from the wife of the ambassador of a foreign land.

But more important than getting attention, Twitter and other social networking tools is a relationship builder, not just a list builder.

Whereas the traditional list building mentality is your subscriber list gives you access to wallets…

The new media list building mentality is your follower network gives you access to ideas, connections, market research, partnerships, and profits. This multi-directional approach is more sustainable, and honestly, a lot more fun.

What do you think? Comment below…

Bob Jenkins

p.s. Later today, I’ll be asking this question of one of the leaders of social networking and new media marketing, Deb Micek.

Deb is the author of Twitter Revolution, and Secrets of Online Persuasion. She’s my guest expert to teach you about Twitter during the Discover Social Networking virtual workshop. There’s still time for you to join
us!