Literally millions of people log on every day searching for information on how to solve their problem. As you become more open to your options of what to write your info-products about you will start to see concepts everywhere.
There are niches all over the place, some staring us right in the face. They may be closer than you think right now, just look around you. Look in the magazine racks, your bookshelves, the self help section at the library.
Magazines are brilliant resources for ideas, and then once you have them you have something to refer back to, to back up your story. You may see a story about someone who has overcome enormous odds, or lost a lot of weight, or done anything that you know others aspire to do or be.
Once you have the idea, tell the story of the lady who smoked for 80 years and gave up with no withdrawal symptoms with the very method you got the idea from in the first place. There are always those kinds of stories in women’s magazines, ‘Obese Child Loses 50kg – Learn How’ etc. Learn how alright, and then base your info product around exactly how they achieved success.
Ask friends, family if they have problems they could do without. Do they have arthritis, acne, toothache? Do they want something they can’t afford? Can you provide information on where they can find it cheaply? Did they go through a foreclosure on their mortgage? Have they been trying to sell their home for months but they can’t?
Here are some online resources for generating ideas:
Message boards and forums: This does require you to have an idea of what you could be interested in writing. Forums are a fantastic resource for both generating ideas and also researching your content. If your niche is excessive sweating, you would do a search for ‘excessive sweating forum’ or ‘message board for excessive sweating.’ Look for questions with no answers and also questions that are asked over and over again.
Yahoo Answers: Click on a subheading in the side bar to dig around within your area of interest. See what questions appear again and again. Note the absolutely shocking advice people are giving – so only ever do question research here. Remember how easy it is to put something out there that is better. Health problems never go out of fashion, I don’t go there with anything terminal, but people will always have these problems and an info-product in this area will put money in your bank account for the rest of your life.
Keep your eyes and ears open, on the TV, the newspapers and on the radio.
When brainstorming ideas for a new book, I ask the following 5 questions:
1. Is this a ‘desperate’ issue?
2. Is this problem keeping them awake at night?
3. Is this something that’s going to weigh on their mind if they don’t find a solution fast?
4. Is this affecting their lives so they are unable to function as normal? Ie:
- hold down a relationship
- appear normal to other people (save face)
- unable to live their dreams etc
5. Is this something that if they don’t know, could affect themselves or their family if left unsaid?
If you start to come up against ‘no’s’ to these questions, I personally don’t recommend that topic. You can write books on anything you like of course, and people do. It’s just that you won’t have a stream of buyers beating down your door for the information many times in a day; you may only have two or three a week.
If absolutely none of the ideas you come up with seem like something you can write about, there are always the so-called ‘evergreen’ niches. These are always in season. They are your quit smoking, weight loss, dating and making money niches. These are highly competitive, and usually require something that set you apart from all the rest. This can mean you do something totally different to what everyone else is doing, or set yourself apart from everyone else in some way.
Drilling down into the niche is also a good idea, e.g.: Not just diet – Mediterranean Diet or not just dating – How to Meet Singles into Cycling or not just make money online – How to Make $4327 in 3 Days With No Money Down etc. Considering most of us would like to know ourselves how to make $4327 in 3 days with no money down, this is generally suited more to someone who has actually been there.
If you have been there however, this is a good area to get into. If you have succeeded in making money in any way possible, especially if it is a lot, you can sell this information for a lot of money, maybe even more than what you made in the first place.
People are quick to buy blueprints to other’s success. For instance, if you successfully set up your own carpet cleaning business and made a good living, other people are more than likely to want to do this too. Give a detailed roadmap as to exactly step by step how you achieved this success. Be specific – ‘How I Made $789 Per Week Cleaning Other People’s Carpets!’ etc.
If you are still having problems generating ideas for your information products, I highly recommend ‘The Ultimate Million Dollar Idea Generator‘ by Jeff Gardner. I bought this book a few years back and it was absolutely invaluable to get creative juices flowing.
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Cool looking blog, can I ask you what template you are using and how much it costs? I’ve been using cheap ones but cannot locate one that I actually like.
Hey there, I use Artisteer to create my websites. You still need to create your own custom graphics, but it gives you a great base. Flick me an email if you have any problems and I’ll do my best to help.