Booklets - Product Expansions and Extensions

Have you ever wondered about leveraging your booklet content into other product formats, and who is actually doing it?

My colleague Marcia Yudkin shared that very information in her recent free weekly Marketing Minute newsletter. Christopher Knight, at EzineArticles.com (a thriving and popular online article distribution company, where you'll find several dozen of my articles) has come out with 52 article writing templates designed and packaged as a set of playing cards. I've often suggested card decks as a product line extension, and so does Marcia. Marcia goes to product ideas I've never consider yet enthusiastically applaud, including jigsaw puzzles, chocolates, trading cards, and many other formats.

Many tipsbooklets.com followers have found Marcia's products and services the perfect addition to go beyond what I teach. Go see for yourself. She has a wide range of ways to assist you.

Until next time,

Paulette - who is always happy to refer you to outstanding colleagues

www.tipsbooklets.com

www.CollectionOfExperts.com

Booklets - Being a Resource

You may be "leading" with your tips booklet or it may be an "also" in your business. Either way, be sure to let your clients and future clients know you are a larger resource for them. That means you have other related products and services of your own. You also probably have connections to people, products, and services within and beyond your expertise that you can introduce.

Unless you make it clear to people that you are more than a "once trick pony," they have no reason to think otherwise of you. And it is YOUR responsibility to let them know. Assuming that they will connect the dots themselves leave everyone coming out on the short end.

Until next time,

Paulette - one-stop shopping for much more than only tips booklets

www.tipsbooklets.com

www.CollectionOfExperts.com

Booklets - How Fast Can You Go

How fast can you write your tips booklet? And why does that matter anyway?

The fastest I've known someone to write a tips booklet has been a few hours, immediately following a workshop I presented. The attendee went back to the hotel room and just wrote it out.

The longest it's taken has been well over a decade. At last that's the longest I know about. Obviously it just wasn't time yet for that person, until it was.

Why this matters is at least two-fold:

• People in the world need your knowledge and perspective.
• The booklet markets your business in some way.

Can you think of two more important reasons to write your booklet -- today?!

What the heck are you waiting for?

Until next time,

Paulette - who took two weeks to write her booklet 20 years ago when she had no one's guidance to follow

www.tipsbooklets.com

www.CollectionOfExperts.com

Booklets - You, We, Us, I, Most, All

When writing your tips booklet, write to the individual reader, using lots of "you." It's a great way to make a good connection without being presumptuous.

Writing "most of you..." can leave the reader wondering about "which part of me is being left out?" or be gathering many people into one assumption that may or may not be true.

Using a lot of "I," "we," and "our," can also lean toward excluding the reader.

Once you write "all" or "everyone" it makes something untrue since there is bound to be an exception.

Re-read your booklet manuscript from the perspective of the reader and see what you see.

Until next time,

Paulette - giving you information intended to be helpful in your life so you can be helpful to others

www.tipsbooklets.com

www.CollectionOfExperts.com

Booklets - But I Can Get Info Free Online

Yes, there are people who will spend tons of time and talent digging around online for free information that's in your booklet that you sell.

And there are plenty more who won't.

Having information in one place, put forth by you as an expert, with more in-depth ways to teach people what you know all make you the go-to resource to SELL what you've got.

There are also plenty of companies and organizations who will buy your booklet and its contents to use to further market their product or service. SELL your booklet to them so they can then give it away.

Until next time,

Paulette - who believes in strategically giving away the booklet and also selling it

www.tipsbooklets.com

www.CollectionOfExperts.com

Booklets - Selling Downloads When Speaking or at Trade Shows

For many years I've been suggesting that a good way to sell or give away a downloadable version of your booklet when you're at a trade show or a speaking engagement is to provide a coupon with the URL to the specific place on your website.

Technology has now advanced to offer many other ways to do that, including providing what's known as a QR Code. If you're not familiar with a QR Code, it looks sort of like a bar code. This recent article below addresses the issue well enough for me to bring it to you. It was in last week's issue of one of a couple of my favorite ezines in the professional speaking industry. While the author speaks about DVDs and CDs, everything she writes applies to booklets and other formats of your information.

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Selling downloads BOR (Back of Room) — by Beth Terry

Since our audiences are usually split between those who want tangible product and those who want instant access via digital downloads, here’s a way to satisfy both.

• Make 100 of the DVD/CDs
• Print 100 additional package covers (like square postcards) with a space on the back for a message
• Using QR Codes, put a link on the back of the postcard that takes your buyer to a download page.

You can find a QR code generator and sticker maker at Stickerscan.com. (Note: QR Codes can be URLs, address info, or messages of different types.)

In your shopping cart, create unique download keys for individual sale.

When someone says, “I don’t want to cart around a CD, how do I download?” sell them a download right there. Give them a postcard with a sticker with a key printed on it. The QR Code will take them directly to the URL in your store that says, “Enter your download key here.”

You can make the key stickers on your computer using Avery labels, and you can order the stickers for the QR codes from stickerscan.com.

If your shopping cart doesn’t allow you to make keys, then just hand the buyer the postcard with the QR Code on it that takes them directly to a page in your store for the product. They can then go directly to the store and enter their payment information from their smartphone. And you don’t have to hand-process any payments. Either way you are giving them instant gratification.

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Until next time,

Paulette - bringing you ideas so you can choose what's best for you

www.tipsbooklets.com

www.CollectionOfExperts.com

Booklets - Same Yet Different

On one of the three local network television evening news programs, they decided to schedule the weather report at 10 minutes into the broadcast rather than at the end. This became a point of distinction for this station by merely "shuffling the deck" of content, putting it in a different order.

It got me thinking about how that can apply to tips booklets. The easiest change is in the title of a booklet, focusing on a different audience. "110 Ideas for Organizing Your Business Life" can easily become ""110 Ideas for Organizing Your Small Business Office" or "110 Ideas for Organizing Your Child Care Business " or "110 Ideas for Organizing Your Interior Design Business" or "110 Ideas for Organizing Your ..." , well, you get the idea.

What can you change without changing what you've got, and create a point of distinction for your business?

Until next time,

Paulette - who calls her consulting "Rent-a-Brain"

www.tipsbooklets.com

www.CollectionOfExperts.com

Booklets - Reactive, Proactive, or Both?

Yes, writing a tips booklet for a "hungry" market increases the likelihood of making sales when you know the best channels to reach that hungry market. It may be an indirect route if those who want your information can't afford to buy it. (Think: unemployed people who want and need info on getting a job.)

What's more, just because there is a need doesn't mean it's necessarily within your area of expertise. Sure, you can do research and create something. And then what? What else will you have to sell to those same people once you sold them the booklet?

While identifying a need, look at who ELSE can benefit. Who is a buyer with money to spend who may also want to reach the same end user? Or what's a creative way to reach the people who need what you've got. Can a group buy your booklet and then make it a fundraiser so it's funded by someone other than the end user? Is there a company that has a foundation whose goal it is to do good work in a community and can give away the booklet?

It's often a combination of being reactive to the need and proactive in finding a solution.

Until next time,

Paulette - looking at things from both ends toward the middle

www.tipsbooklets.com

www.CollectionOfExperts.com

Booklets - Naming Strategies

You may know I'm a big fan of several colleagues, one 
of whom is Marcia Yudkin. 
 
Every Wednesday she sends out The Marketing Minute, 
which I always find interesting. 
  
Here's the one she sent this week. 'Gets me thinking 
  
about names for tips booklets and for websites associated 
  
with them. How about you?
  
================                     
  
 
  
                         The Marketing Minute 
  
      by Marcia Yudkin, Marketing Expert and Mentor
  
             http://www.yudkin.com/markmin.htm
  
 
  
                 *******************
  
 
  
In a vacation reply message from a Marketing Minute 
  
subscriber, a cleverly named domain caught my eye: 
  
TheMuseIsIn.com.  Clearly the site offers creativity help in 
  
a light-hearted spirit.
  
 
  
We don't see many domains using this naming strategy: a 
  
phrase or sentence.  When all the conventional company names 
  
seem to be taken, try raiding literature, the Bible, 
  
proverbs and fables for expressions.  When I looked up ten 
  
Shakespearean phrases today, four were available as domains.
  
 
  
Other uncommon domain name approaches:
  
 
  
* Start with a verb.  Available this morning, for example: 
  
EditABook.com, BecomeADogSitter.com, SubtractSalt.com, 
  
GoingToGeorgia.com.
  
 
  
* Indulge in wordplay.  Think up key words, then look for 
  
ways to match starting letters or sounds.  KeenOnKarate.com, 
  
SqueakyCleanSquad.com and NeedToNibble.com were there for 
  
the taking today.
  
 
  
* Switch word order.  If someone has already nabbed 
  
NewEnglandNannies.com, spring for NanniesNewEngland.com.  
  
(Both were available, actually, today - and the reversal has 
  
more pizzazz.)
  
 
  
* Ask a question.  Despite all the divorce specialists 
  
who have already set up shop online, both CanIGetCustody.com 
  
and CanYouGetCustody.com weren't taken yet this morning.
  
 
  
When it comes to finding a domain, zig instead of zagging.
  
(ZigDontZag.com was available, too!)
  
 
  
[Note: The last time I ran something on this theme, a 
  
smartypants immediately reserved all my clever inventions.  
  
Since I expect this to happen again, I used past tense 
  
here.]
  
 
  
                 *******************
  
 
  
LEARN NAMING:  Anyone can learn to put words together in 
  
original, captivating ways.  Learn the art of thinking up 
  
creative, effective names and tag lines in my upcoming 
  
naming class, which meets by teleseminar on four Thursdays 
  
starting June 9.
  
 
  
In a small group, you'll get lots of personal attention for 
  
your current naming challenge and have ample resources to 
  
reuse for future projects.
  
 
  
Sign up today:
  
 
  
http://www.namedatlast.com/roses.htm
  
 
  
                 *******************
  
 
  
MORE MARCIA...
  
 
  
One-on-One Copywriting Training
  
http://www.yudkin.com/become.htm
  
 
  
Marketing Mentoring 
  
http://www.marketingformore.com
  
 
  
Marketing Thought of the Day
  
http://www.yudkin.com/mantras or twitter.com/marciasmantras
  
===============
  
Until next time,
  
Paulette - who loves how Marcia thinks!
  
 
  
www.tipsbooklets.com
  
www.CollectionOfExperts.com