Archive for the ‘Market Research’ Category

I received a very sharp lesson (by which I mean, ‘metaphorical smack in the face’) recently and wanted to share it with you…

I was on the phone to a relatively new friend of mine a couple of weeks ago, and we were discussing what to sell and how to do it.

To give you a bit of background, the friend I was chatting to was Shaqir Hussyin, a marketer who comfortably makes around $35,000 every month with his online business. Yes, you read that right. That’s his monthly income.

So I figured he might know a thing or two about making money online.

I mentioned that it was all very well trying to sell expensive products to people as an affiliate marketer but would people really pay thousands for a product when they can get a basic version for $100 or less.

Shaq actually paused for a moment before he answered:

‘Man, you’ve gotta shift that belief. That’s a limiting belief you have right there. There will always be people willing to pay top-dollar for stuff.‘

I thought about that for a moment. Logically, I immediately knew it was true, but I realised that emotionally, I hadn’t changed the way I thought. I automatically saw lack instead of abundance. I know that I would much rather drive an Aston Martin DB9 at £130,000 ($202,485) than a Vauxhall Corsa  at £9995 ($15,568) so it stands to reason that other people must feel the same way about whatever they’re into.

This was confirmed to me again the following week when I watched an ‘over-the-shoulder’ video by Neil Asher.

In the video, Neil showed us how he researched a particular niche, firstly to see if it was profitable (i.e. people were searching in high numbers etc.) then to see if there were high-end products to sell within that market. Now of course, it may be the case that fewer people will buy if the product is expensive, but again, The First Law of Shaq states: There will always be people who want to buy expensive stuff.

So Neil took us through the cigar market and to a particular (very niche) item that people who smoke cigars want and need: A humidor. For those not in the know (like me when Neil mentioned it), a humidor is a case or cabinet where you store cigars in a constant environment, so that they don’t get very dry or too damp but stay at the optimum level for a good ol’ smoke.

Anyway, Neil showed us this and found a company that sold high-end humidors for thousand of dollars each.

And that’s when it hit me: It takes exactly the same amount of work Read the rest of this entry »

I asked my subscribers for their feedback recently. I simply posed the question: ‘What do you want to learn?’

One of the many replies I recieved was from a guy called Ian who asked a couple of very good questions. I thought that rather than just answering him via e-mail, I would share the questions and my answers to them.

So here goes:

Do you look for the niche first then create a product around it or do you have an idea for a product then research it’s viability?

This is an interesting one. The truth is, I’ve done it both ways but from my experience, there’s only one way that is very likely to work:

• Find a niche that you have some interest in – The interest isn’t vital but helps to determine where you start looking.
• Find out if there are people selling to that market – Run a search for all the terms you can think of relating to that niche and see if there are Google ads for it. Also look to see if there are people on the first page with things to sell on their site.
• Find out if there are people buying in that market (this is vital) – Forums within your niche are a good place for this. Also, look on Clickbank and Amazon to see if there are products out there. On Clickbank you can see if the product is actually selling.
• Find out what they want to buy – Note that I didn’t say ‘need’ to buy. Again, best way is to ask them. Go to forums and see what they’re discussing and what problems aren’t being solved well enough by others.
• Then create a product around that and place it on Clickbank.

When I first started, I created a product that I thought the market needed. It was a lot harder to sell than subsequent products because I was attempting to sell them something I thought they needed. In fact, I should have looked into what they wanted to buy. I also needed a market full of rabid buyers – ideally people who are obsessed by their field of interest. The classic example are golfers, but there are hundreds out there.

One advanced strategy that my mentor shared with me is
Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve just started working with an awesome tool for internet marketing and market research. Thought you might like to know about it so I made this video tutorial, showing you:

• Why You Need Quantcast
• How To Get Quantified
• How To Use The Information

Read the rest of this entry »

This is a tool that I’ve discovered thanks to fellow marketer Simon Cad, in his excellent e-book, a review of which will be available on here shortly.

The Warrior Forum

In the meantime, check out the Warrior Forum at

http://www.warriorforum.com

This is a follow-up to the last video I made (below). Here I show you how to find the keywords for your niche or website, so that you can dominate the niche effectively.

Please leave a comment below and let me know what you thought of the tutorial.

Internet Marketing Top Tip: Don’t Read Anything This Man Has Written Before Bedtime!

I’ve only had four hours sleep. And yet I’m buzzing this morning as I write this. And no, it’s not because I’ve just injected coffee into my bloodstream (I don’t even drink it).

The reason for my lack of sleep is because I made a mistake last night. I read a book.

http://bit.ly/Millionaire-Living

The ideas I got from it and the motivation it gave me to work on my business kept me awake for 2 hours and 35 minutes after I finally managed to put it down and turn out the light.

You see, it spoke to me because over the last few months (since November of 2009) I’ve been a serious student of internet marketing. I’ve seen the potential for some incredible money to be made, but more importantly, some amazing freedom to be created.

But I’ve found that, having created a product (and made a good deal of mistakes in doing so, of which more later) I couldn’t seem to get away from all the ‘stuff’ that I needed to do. I wanted to walk away for a week or two and still make money, like the pros do.

This book is the blueprint I was looking for. The man’s a genius and has created the life I think most people want.

http://bit.ly/Millionaire-Living

What’s more, the chapters on internet marketing and information products are brilliant.

For example, I always struggled with market research. Tim’s process for researching his market is brilliant and solves any worries or problems that I used to come up against.

If you want to make it in internet marketing, I would suggest that you need to read this. I’m going to re-read it after I finish it as it’s packed with great stuff.

Not reading it will mean you have to spend a long time accumulating the information. Seems silly when it’s all already here.

http://bit.ly/Millionaire-Living

Highly recommended.

Leave a comment below and let me know if you’ve already read this little gem.