How Is Product Creation Like Gift Giving?

photo credit: LittleCrazyButterfly ♥

As I was wrapping and wrapping and wrapping presents last night, this thought occurred to me… Product creation is like gift giving.

How? you ask?

When you go shopping for a gift to give someone else, how do you pick out a present?  Do you give them what YOU want to give?  You pick out something big and bright and absolutely wonderful.  It's something they need (even if they don't know it) and it's exactly what you'd want to get yourself if you were in their shoes! 

You're so pleased with the present that you go all out on the wrapping. You grab some beautiful shiny paper and a huge bow plus some ribbon and take more time meticulously wrapping the present than you did in picking it out.

You then hand them the gift on the special day with a flourish and they ooh and aah over the wrapppings and you can tell they're excited to open it.

But, after they've opened it you get the feeling it's not what they were expecting or hoping for. Where did you go wrong? You picked out a wonderful gift!

 

Did you ask them what they wanted?

It's no use thinking you "know" what they want or what's best for them. Or picking out something you'd like for yourself.  My spouse might think I need a new iron, and I do, but that's not something I want.  He might think tickets to a monster truck rally would be a cool gift, but I certainly would not!  [He really wouldn't, I'm just trying to illustrate my point.]

Perhaps a better idea is to ask them what they want, ask for their list of desires.

Giving a requested gift is probably not as pleasurable for you; you might have to work a little harder to find it, but the end result is worth it!

 

It's the same with product creation.

You don't want to create a product because you think people need it, or it's something YOU would like, or it's fun for YOU to create (guilty of that one).  You should ask them what they want.  Ask for a list and use that as your guide. Otherwise, what's the point of creating a product that no one wants to buy?

True, producing products that your customers want might not be as pleasurable for you.  You have to work harder at it, do further research, go places you're not familiar with, but the end result is a product that customers want to purchase and it makes them happy!

 

I am always open to product requests.   I love creating products, but I want to create ones you're interested in.  I've had several requests lately about how to set up a PLR business, so that's what I'm working on now.

But then what?

What  product would you like to see me come out with? 

Last Day of the Written Word Challenge

Yeah, yeah, the challenge was over on Friday, but I didn't have a chance to post the last day's results until now.

Much of Day 5 was a bust, I'll admit it.

 

"Mom, I'm going to make some cookies. Which recipe should I use?"

"I'll pick one out for you (my favorite of course), just let me finish this paragraph."

"We're out of flour. Is there more some where?"

"Yes, you can't find it? Let me hunt it down and then I've got to get back to work."

"How do I make different colors of frosting?"

"I'll be happy to show you if you let me lick one of the beaters!"

"Mom, cookies are ready! Will you help me clean up the kitchen… pretty please?"

And so on… sigh.

 

Day 5  TOTAL –  2633 written words

Blog Posts - 516 (2 1/2 blog posts)
Articles - 0
PLR Articles - 1350 (4 AR articles)
PLR eBook or Report - 564
Blog Commenting, mine and others - 203  ( 5 comments)
Physical Book - 0 
Forum Posting - 0
Emails - 0
I didn’t count tweets.

 

Grand Total Results for the 5 days: 16,094 words

Blog Posts - 3047 (9 blog posts)
Articles - 778 (1 article)
PLR Articles - 7427 (20 PLR articles)
PLR eBook or Report - 2330
Blog Commenting, mine and others - 1543  (26 comments)
Physical Book - 587 
Forum Posting - 0
Emails - 382 (3 emails)

The results of this challenge were both physical and mental.  After 5 days I had 20 PLR articles I could then sell! That makes me happy since making online money is important to me. I do wish I'd spent more time working on my physical book, but I tend to only add to that as the spirit moves me.

I am happy to say I did not compromise my quality for the sake of the word counts.

But I did find out I can write much more in a day than I thought I could. It helped to have a challenge like this so that I could hopefully create a new habit of just getting over my internal objections. getting myself out of the way, and just start pumping out those articles. And making it public really helped me because I don't want to look too stupid.

It's true I was all over the place as far as what I worked on, but that's what makes writing fun for me. I didn't think about it at the time, but I did absolutely no forum posting. I must have put that on the backburner as not being important in my mission.

 

Yes, you can force creativity!

 

 Join Me In The Written Word Challenge?
Day 1 of The Written Word Challenge
Day 2 Results
Day 3 Results
Day 4 Results

 

 

 

The Written Word Challenge Day 4

My count is waaay down today, but I have the best of reasons!
I went to fetch my daughter from college at noon and didn't get back until almost dinner time.

I'm not going to sweat the lower count.  I did work hard and stayed focused while I was home.

I got a couple of important emails sent to my list and I got another 2 AR articles done for the new Offline PLR pack. It's at 10 now, but I want to add more and I've figured out a different angle on these. I'm going to offer them as a WSO on the Warrior Forum and my offer needs to be different than what the other Offline PLR writers are offering.

I also wrote up an outline of what I want to do for the next challenge!  It'll be a little while though, I've got other stuff to do first.

Just one more day left of this challenge!  Yay!

 

Day 4  TOTAL – 2091 written words

Blog Posts - 608 (2 blog posts)
Articles - 0
PLR Articles - 649 (2 AR articles)
PLR eBook or Report - 0
Blog Commenting, mine and others - 543  ( 10 comments)
Physical Book - 0 
Forum Posting - 0
Emails - 230 (2 emails)
Misc - 61
I didn’t count tweets.

 

Day 3 of the Written Word Challenge

I had  a hard time getting started this morning but eventually I got my motor running and blazed a trail through my forest of excuses, procrastination, and whining.

I am finding it hard to find time to edit what I've written as I don't want to take time away from writing. Oh well, not a bad problem to have!

I started a new PLR pack today – an autoresponder series packet for offliners.  That meant I had to research article topics, which I find fun.  These articles are shorter, mostly less than 300 words each as they're meant for emails.  I'm really liking writing these shorter articles and I managed to spit out 8 of them today.

However, I should be finishing up the PLR ebook!

 

Day 3  TOTAL – 3588 written words

Blog Posts -  391 (1-1/2 blog posts)
Articles - 0
PLR Articles - 2371  (8 AR articles)
PLR eBook or Report - 473
Blog Commenting, mine and others - 353  ( 4 comments)
Physical Book - 0 
Forum Posting - 0
Emails - 0
I didn’t count tweets.

 

Article Ideas When You’re Not Feeling Creative

I've been asked about how or where I get inspiration for articles when I can't come up with any ideas readily.   Unfortunately, this happens all too often.  For as many times as I'm in creative freefalling mode, there are probably more times I haven't a clue what to write about and I have to force it.

It always depends on what you're writing – blog posts, articles for article marketing, or many times in my case – PLR articles to sell.  Please note that what I'm sharing with you are ways to trigger article ideas, not how to find articles to copy and plagiarize.

Writing PLR has it's own needs, but many of the ways I'm going to share here work across the board for other writing.  Any of these can trigger an idea or a whole slew of topic ideas.

 

Writing topic generators in no particular order:

Physical newsletters and propaganda that arrives in my mailbox.

Anything is fair game that lands on my kitchen counter – alumni newsletters, health brochures, AARP leaflets that they keep sending me even though I'm not that old, and various other paperwork that stacks up daily.  What catches my eye are articles that lend themselves to a Top 10 format or any sort of list.  Those make excellent fodder and are easy to write.

 

Online newsletters that I subscribe to.

Again, I'm always looking at info I receive through the eyes of a writer on the hunt for new topics.

 

Yahoo web search box.

I love this one.  I recently wanted to write 7 articles on the topic of yoga.  I don't know that much about yoga, so I stuck the word – yoga – in the search box and then started going through some of the alphabet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I got more than enough topic ideas on yoga this way.  I prefer using Yahoo rather than Google for this because Yahoo shows 10 results at a time and Google only shows 5.

 

Magazines at the bookstore.

My favorite getaway is the bookstore.  The smell of coffee and books are ambrosia to me.  I really know how to live, eh?  I like to hit the magazine rack and find the magazines in the niche I want to write about.  I will scan the covers and tables of content, and then read some of the articles if it's a niche I don't know anything about.  This is a good way for me to learn some of the lingo as well.

 

Other blogs.

I don't always know when another's blog will inspire me, so I usually don't go looking for blog inspirations.  What happens is sometimes when I read a blog I find myself intrigued with the idea behind a post and realize I have strong opinions about the topic.  I have an ongoing list of topic ideas and I'll add a sentence or two about the idea to my topic list.

 

The Warrior Forum – questions being asked.

On occasion, when I want to write about Internet marketing, I head over to the Warrior Forum and look at the questions people are asking.  These are generally questions from inexperienced people and ones that I can answer (in an article).

 

My blog readers/commenters.

This blog post you're reading right now is really just a looong answer to Travis' question.

 

My list

Somedays when I send out an email to my list, I get several questions on the subject.  This lets me know that  a) They're interested in it and  b) I should explain it further.

 

My customer request list.

My opt-in form on my PLR site asks for topic suggestions as one of the form fields.  About 50% of the subscribers actually take this seriously and let me know what they want me to write about.  I appreciate the requests.

 

EzineArticles.

I pick the article category I want, then check out the various article titles.  This is often all I need to write my own articles.  I'd rather not read the articles as I want to be original.  I just use the titles to give my brain a kick-start.

 

Elance – what jobs people are requesting.

Customers go to Elance constantly looking for people who will write stuff for them.  If I see several requests for articles on top-selling Amazon toys, for example, then it's an indication that this is a hot niche and I can make some PLR sales on this topic.

 

The Warrior Forum – WSO subjects that are selling.

Warrior Special Offers, where Internet markets hock their digital goods, is a great place for ideas.  For example, I might see a product for offline marketers.  Each bullet point might be a topic worthy of a 400 word article.  Or take several bullet points and add some of your own to make a Top 10 article.

 

Top Clickbank products in various niches.

The articles I want to write are the ones that people want to buy.  What's the point of me writing PLR for a niche that's not at all popular?  Therefore, I try to follow the niches that see the most success.  Looking at the top Clickbank products, in say, the health and fitness category will give me lots of ideas for articles.

 

Google news.

Lots of ideas here without even needing to read the articles. 

 

My own stash of PLR.

Who doesn't have PLR on their hard drive?  Sometimes I take a walk through my PLR folder and instead of wondering "Where the heck did I get  that?" I think "Wow, I could write an article around that title!"

 

Products I've purchased.

Who doesn't have info products they've purchased on their hard drive?  Let's say I want to come up with some articles about blogging (like for the recent blogging PLR pack I wrote).  I have all my downloads in general categories so I leaf through the blogging info I've downloaded and quickly scan the likely candidates.  Viola!   I've got ideas I can put a different slant on.   

 

Interesting tweets.

Instead of saying "Oh that's funny!" when I read a tweet, I think about how I could turn it into a blog post or article, applying it to my niche.

 

Emails

There are some marketers who actually send emails that are educational, not just promotional.  I know, hard to believe, isn't it?  I can always count on some good ideas from emails I get from these marketers.

 

So that's my list of article idea generators. 

 

What would you like to add to the list? 
What get's you coming up with ideas and cranking out the articles or blog posts?

 

 

 

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