The results are in for the product creation survey. Over 500 responses so far with more coming in every day. If you missed the opportunity to respond got to http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/ProductCreation. When you hit done, you will be taken to a page where you can download my free video, Power Profits 101: 3 must do’s in marketing to make more money this month than all of last year.
Here are the results from what we received up to this point.
Do you currently have information products developed?
Yes 63.9%
No 36.1%
How long have you been creating products?
Less than a month 16.2%
One year 19.0%
2-3 years 18.3%
3-5 years 11.4%
More than 5 years 35.0%%
How many products have you created
1 23.2%
Less than 5 36.8%
5 – 10 18.4%
10 – 20 6.7%
More than 20 14.9%
Do you make money from your products?
Not at all 40.1%
Under $100 per month 27.2%
Under $500 per month 9.3%
Under $1000 per month 5.3%
$1000 – $3,000 per month 4.8%
$3,000 – $5,000 per month 3.5%
More than $5,000 9.8%
What are your greatest challenges with product creation?
Knowledge 15.4%
Time 49.2%
Money 22.0%
Resources to help me do this 33.5%
Fear 11.5%
People to buy 36.8%
If you could learn one thing about product creation, what would it be?
The majority of people responded with how to market and sell their products. There were many respondents who wanted to know how to create faster and more effectively. Many others wanted to know how to find the resources to outsource to.
Quite a few said they just don’t know where to start.
If you could ask me one question about making money online, what would it be?
Nicest
Your information is great Kathleen. I trust you and know you go above and beyond with your information. You are the real deal.
Funniest
Q: Do you know someone willing to help someone like me pro-bono, I mean for free?
A: Would you go to your doctor, dentist or auto mechanic and ask them to provide their services for free? Likely not.
So why would you believe that those of us who offer various types of business building resources and training should offer things for free?
If you’re serious about generating revenue through product creation and online means you must be willing to invest.
You would be amazed at how much I continue to invest in my education, learning, mentors and training. Virtually everyone I know who takes running a business online seriously invests in their business.
Granted, when you first start out your investments will be less than when your business is generating hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. But you absolutely must be willing to invest.
Saddest
Q1: Isn’t it basically a complete racket of affiliate marketing b.s. out there?
Q2: Is it legit? Do you have references?
Q3: Are there any honest people left in the internet marketing world.
A: I will be the first to admit there are scams online. And yet, there are plenty of honest people who have incredible information to offer the market. If you have not noticed this, I believe it’s because you are not looking.
For example, if you check me out you will see I have been around for decades as have many of my colleagues.
We offer real solutions to real problems. There are plenty of people who have posted positive comments about us.
If you think we are all scammers, running rackets and not honest, that’s likely all you will see.
A quick search through Google, Facebook, LinkedIn and various other locations will reveal a lot. There are plenty of hard working experts who are definitely the real deal.
We run our online businesses like businesses. Anyone who is serious about making money online must be willing to invest time, money and resources.
Those who are constantly looking for something for nothing will never, ever, ever be able to run a successful business.
There are people in virtually any industry you can think of who are making a great living online. Many you will never hear about because they are not selling services, information products and resources on how to make money.
Industries like health and nutrition, photography, dog training, spiritual topics, real estate investments, astrology, and interior design to name just a few.
Over the next few months I am going to provide responses to many of the hundreds of questions that were submitted. Be watching for this information as it is designed to help you achieve your goals in the fastest, most efficient, most integrous way possible.
Haven’t taken the survey yet? Go to http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/ProductCreation
What do you think? Did this year’s respondents get it right? Comments welcome.
I was surprised to find that in each question the majority answers were the same as mine. I should be relieved but I’m actually disconcerted that so many people are creating information products and not making much money from them and that time is the greatest issue. I have a good excuse – all alone and caring for an elderly mum a lot of the time but I wonder if all your respondents have that kind of issue or whether time managed is the problem. It’s so easy to be distracted and procrastinate. But I’m sure you’ll be developing a great programme to address these kinds of issues !!
Hope all is well with you – it’s been a long time since we interacted.
Thank you for your input Gillian. One of the greatest challenges for respondents is time.
It can be very time consuming caring for an elderly parent. I know. I did that for nearly two years when my mom was ill. It was during that time I got very focused while by her hospital bedside and while tending to her needs when she was out of the hospital on creating, marketing and selling products that served my market and generated revenue.
Was it easy? Not at all. There were times I was exhausted but knew that with all my responsibilities as the primary bread winner in our home, I had to be extremely focused.
I am most surprised by the percentage who make almost nothing from their products. I thought I was the only one doing something wrong! This has given me confidence to know that I am merely lacking some know how and need to invest in learning to do better at marketing and creating sales.
I will be posting tips, strategies and ideas on the blog so be sure to subscribe in order to get regular updates.
I think you hit the nail on the head Lesley. And it is in the recognition of what we need to learn that we can begin the change. Thanks for sharing.
Great survey Kathleen and thanks for sharing the results.
My challenge right now is that I’ve created programs that sell very well and I want to turn them into evergreen launches vs. a few big splashes a year. I’m making progress on it but as always, look forward to your insights.
Thanks and warm wishes,
Cindy
Do you have a team you can outsource the job of converting the programs to an evergreen format? If not, this would definitely be worth researching. Thanks for your comments.
Thanks for sharing the survey results. Many of the results are consistent with my answers: not enough time and looking for quality resources to get things done efficiently.
I know how frustrating it is when people ask for free services. The last person who asked for “a few hours of my time” at no cost was a software developer who creates Apps for smart phones. I asked him if he would create an App for me at no cost. Not surprisingly, he quickly said NO. I occasionally offer a free introductory session to see if my services are a good fit for a prospective client, but this is a one-time session that typically lasts 30 minutes or less.
I’m looking forward to seeing how you transform this survey data into new product or service offerings. Thanks for sharing this with everyone.
Something that helps with the time issue is to determine what your time is worth and then outsource based on the tasks, projects and jobs that can be done by someone else in order that you can put your energy into what will generate the greatest result.
For example, I have a VA who posts my tweets for me. It takes me about 10 minutes to write dozens of tweets. I send them to my VA who will post them in Hootsuite. It may take him up to an hour to post the dozens upon dozens of tweets I have provided to him.
It would be counterproductive for me to be the one working in Hootsuite when I can pay him under $10 an hour and my hourly fee is $600.
Often we think we are saving money by doing the work ourselves when in reality we may be losing money by doing so.
I too, have offered complimentary strategy sessions. However, before I do there is a process one must go through. They complete an application and if they are a candidate for my services I may set up an appointment with them.
If they put little effort in to the application they have automatically disqualified themselves. After all, why would I spend 30 minutes of my time with someone who can’t put 100% effort into the application?
If their answers are unrealistic, such as, “I want to make a million dollars this month even though I have never made any money AND I don’t want to have to work more than a couple hours a day for it.” Well, that’s a no-brainer for me.
I want to work with those who have a realistic view of what running a business is all about.
Unfortunately, many have been led to believe you don’t have to do much at all to be successful online. I beg to differ. As it’s likely most of my colleagues would beg to differ.
It takes work. It takes effort. And it takes time.
Thanks for your comments Steve.
Fascinating survey results, Kathleen. And what great reservoir of needs you have to address!
I am pretty shocked at how few people are actually making money, and I’ll be very interested to see how you dig down and figure out what are the most prevalent reasons.
At first glance, and from years of working with entrepreneurs, the #1 reason is not making it a priority. By it, this can mean, developing the right products for your market. It can mean, not knowing what your market wants, needs and is willing to pay for. It can mean that you have never even figured out who your market is. It can mean that you are not consistently getting in front of your market. It can mean not continuously building an opt in subscriber list. It can mean not building a social media presence. It can mean not asking for the sale. And this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Be watching this blog because I will be posting more thoughts, insights and ideas.
I would recommend folks subscribe to my blog in order to get regular updates.
I too am a little shocked at how few people are making money. or much money. On the other hand, I’m delighted that nearly 10% of your respondents exceed $60K per annum. That’s VERY good news, I think.
And I have to agree with your “nicest” respondent: you are the real deal. I appreciate you more and more as time goes on.
Wow, surprizing that so many heart centered people are not making money doing what they love. I would be willing to bet that the products are amazing and life changing….but its probably the marketing that is left wanting. If no one knows about it and the transformation it can provide to them, how can they purchase it? That is what I would be interested in hearing about….
I am in complete agreement Renee. Often the marketing is very lacking. With our recent campaign, which was extremely successful, we worked on it for weeks and weeks just putting the marketing material in place, getting our shopping cart set up, crafting the right promotional emails and working on focused follow up.
I have to wonder how many people opt in for, or buy, information products on marketing and never get past the first few minutes of a video, audio or first few pages of a PDF.
There is plenty of great information available to all of us. Buying it doesn’t create the success.
Going through the information with a fine tooth comb and applying it, tweaking, testing and staying the course is where the success resides. It is also essential to make sure your product offerings are a match for the market you are targeting.
Kathleen,
Thanks so much for posting these results. Very insightful – and love the category of questions. Too funny……..or sad.
Interesting results, to say the least. Just had my first ‘real’ product launch and made some decent money. Always willing to learn more and try more……..
I appreciate you and all the knowledge you have in this regard.
Take care,
Pat
Part of the reason you made money Pat is based on how strategic you were. I know the effort you put into your launch. It was very well engineered.
Selling products takes more than putting a landing page up. It takes fine tuning, testing, promotions, testing, more promotions, more testing and tweaking.
It’s amazing how often people can hear that and yet, they continue to put minimal effort into the outcome.
Making money takes work. It doesn’t happen by chance.
I’m waiting to give you money again, Kathleen, for your stellar products, guidance and mentoring. Anyone who has tried you out know you’re the best of the best. Of course, I’m a knowledge junkie or I wouldn’t take your classes, but I never buy junk. I know who to go to and I’m so happy you’re in my corner. I wish I had a quarter of your energy. Thanks for sharing the results!
Thank you Bea. You brought a big smile to my face.
Kathleen pays GENEROUSLY to her affiliates. She is the real deal – no scam! 😉 (and no one paid me to say this).
Thank you Sandi. I appreciate your kind words. Recently one of my vendors sent me an invoice for nearly $1,000. I gladly wrote the check and dropped it in the mail. She said, “I wish everyone was that fast.” My response, “I believe that we reap what we sow. I choose to pay my vendors as quickly as I like to get paid.” This is true for affiliates, my mortgage lender, utility companies and anyone I have a financial commitment to.
Hi, Kathleen,
Thanks you sooo much for posting the results. They are fascinating and I’m going to take them for food for thought. I’m eagerly waiting your analysis and suggestions. As for the doubters, well –we all have a Dreamer and a Doubter. It’s up to us who we feed. And when we feed the Doubter, we doubt everyone else, which may be a projection of our own self-doubt. The thing is that to succeed in our dreams, we need to take risks; albeit well-informed ones. But when you cannot trust, you cannot take risks. So the issue is bigger than how you see others. It is about trusting life. I wish you all a beautiful life, and thanks for the rich comments.
Thanks Maria. I’m looking forward to watching my analysis unfold. It so true that we can focus on being the Dreamer or Doubter. The Dreamer says, “If you can do it I can too. I just need to find out your model.”
The Doubter says, “It’s easy for you but I can’t because of this, that and the other.”
I remember making my first $15 online. It was a day of celebration. I was over the moon excited. I had been working on something for a while before it finally took. Not long after that I had my first $15,000 campaign. Did I work my butt off? Absolutely.
I also bought a program by one of the early adopters of online marketing. I went through every single word in the learning guide several times. We implemented one thing at a time, tweaked it, fine tuned, tweaked some more and continued on.
I was working 12 – 16 hours (sometimes more) per day. I held on to the vision that if others could do it so could I.
I was a dreamer then and I am a dreamer now.
Dear Kathleen
The Statistics are very encouraging. Firstly, your Product Creation Survey has had over 500 responses. That is good!
Secondly, the results tell me that there is plenty of opportunity for people:
1. 63.9% of respondents have information products IN DEVELOPMENT, although 60.0% are yet to CREATE more than than 5 of them. Lots of scope for creating more!
2. 67.3% of respondents make less than $100 a month from their products. On the assumption that this is a growing market, they are only scraping the surface of a rich market. Just got to get the marketing right!
3. At 49.2%, the biggest challenge to product-creation is Time! Where this reason is permanent and genuine, the respondent will be advised to walk away from the idea now. But for many of us, we can change our priorities on time and exercise a little time-management. If Time is the biggest block to getting going then, for many, we don’t have an insurmountable problem at all. It would be far worse if it needed massive financial investment or there was no demand for information products.
I’m sure you will analyse the results in a more structured way than me, Kathleen! However, they tell me that anyone with a decent product and plenty of energy will be very successful……..
I’m going to be posting lots of great information on how people can move from the zero dollars category to making money.