HOW I NET AT LEAST $1,000,000 FROM EACH OF MY "HOW-TO" BOOKS; WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO SO YOU WILL, TOO! By Dr. Jeffrey Lant As I write, I'm looking at a book called Chicken Soup for the Soul. Written ("and compiled") by author Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen it's one of the 50-60,000 (that's thousand) "how- to" books published this year. And there are lots more booklets that bring the total of longer-than-article-length "how-to" publications to a staggering sum. In other reports -- and in my book HOW TO MAKE A WHOLE LOT MORE THAN $1,000,000 WRITING, COMMISSIONING, PUBLISHING AND SELLING "HOW-TO" INFORMATION -- I've discussed why so many of these publications fail from the readers' point of view, why, that is, they just don't work as "how-to" productions. Today, however, I want share the reasons why they don't work from the authors' standpoint, why the vast majority of their authors fail to become rich from what they know and publish... which is, let's be candid, probably the principal reason why most writers produce "how-to" materials in the first place. Towards this end I'm dedicating this report to authors Canfield & Hansen who daringly confessed to me that they expected to sell 1.5 million copies of their $12 book. Between you and me, I'm willing to bet a dollar they don't sell even 1% of their exalted goal... thus failing to meet their bloated income objectives. #1 Select A Growing Market The first key to getting rich producing "how-to" materials is to make sure you're catering to a large and growing market. When I cast my eye over my shelved packed with "how-to" creations, I'm staggered by just how narrow many of these books are. Just how rich can you get, anyway, producing product for people who want to start laundromats anyway? (I kid you not; I'm looking at a booklet on this subject as I write.) If you want to get rich, harness demographics to your chariot. If the number of people you're aiming at is relatively small and, worse, shrinking, you're going after the wrong market. Problem is, how do you get the information you need about current and future market size? This isn't so difficult. Lots of people in lots of professional associations and government agencies are interested in just where sectors of the nation are heading. Your job is to link up with the people who are doing the bean counting and stay abreast of their work. If you've never done research before, check out Finding Facts Fast by Alden Todd. Or go to your local library and discuss what you need with your reference librarian. I've never understood how anyone could succeed in publishing "how-to" books without having a good friend at the reference desk. Note: making sure your market is large and growing is only part of the part. You've also got to ensure that you can get easy access to them. Thus, if a market is growing but you cannot access it easily, it's no market for you. Let's go back to the poorly named Chicken Soup for the Soul, subtitled "1 Stories to Open The Heart And Rekindle The Spirit. Can you tell from the title, or subtitle, who the audience is for this book? Can you deduce whether this audience is large and growing? Equally, can you deduce just how to get easy, continuing access to this market so that they'll hear about your book more than once and therefore have a higher likelihood of buying it? On all counts, the answers are NEGATIVE! If you want to net a million bucks on each of your "how-to" publications, you need clear demographic information and equal clarity about your ability to access this market in an organized, continuing way. #2 Resolve To Work With This Market For Life The problem with most "how-to" authors is that they are fickle. They select a subject. Publish something. Wait for the big results that never happen. Then jump to something else... that produces the same disappointing results. I've seen a lot of this in the over 13 years I've been milking this business. Now let me tell you something about me: all my "how-to" books are still in print and each year I continue to draw predictable sums from the same kinds of people I was selling to... THE FIRST DAY I BEGAN IN THE PUBLISHING BUSINESS! In other words, I selected my fields wisely, crafted my products carefully, targeted my markets surely... and have never looked back! People who really make money in "how-to" publishing (and there are lots of us) publish perennials. We are not looking for the big score (although, God knows, we wouldn't turn the bucks away); we're looking for a predictable return on investment. The equation goes something like this: we take our intellectual capital and assemble an information product. We take this product, and other resources, and invest in accessing targeted markets. From these markets we expect to get a reasonable, predictable, and, as our marketing expands, growing return. Voila! We are not interested in producing a one season "smash." We are willing to work with our defined markets year in, year out. In short, we have made a lifetime commitment. #3 Produce A Work Of Disproportionate Value At all times, but especially in an age of economic problems like ours, people want VALUE. People continue to have all the wants they usually have... but they either have less money to cater to them... or they are much more careful about doing so. That's where you come in. The "how-to" product you produce must be a work of value. It must, that is, deliver precisely what your client-centered title says it will. It must be packed with immediately usable information; it must provide names, addresses and phone numbers of helpful sources. It must save the reader/client time, money, aggravation, frustration. It must, in short, DELIVER. By this standard, a large percentage of "how-to" publications are a joke. Instead of telling you how to do the thing in question, they tell you what you should do... and leave you scratching your head for the crucial details. This isn't what the genre should be all about... but it is what the genre is about, in far too many cases. Let me be blunt with you: you are going to make yourself wealthy and famous in "how-to" information to the extent you anticipate just what your reader/client wants... and go out of your way to deliver it... AND MORE! I've tried like the dickens over the past many years to hammer this message home to "how-to" writers. Nonetheless, I continue to get such publications every day where the author has failed to understand what the reader wants and needs... and has certainly failed to provide it. Publications without intense reader value not only ensure reader anger and disappointment but failure in all ways for their authors. YOU MUST BE DIFFERENT! Read over the information you've provided. Does it provide details the reader doesn't know? Are you acting as a disembodied information authority merely providing general guidelines... or as a consultant guiding the reader step-by-step through the process of achieving what he wants? One way ensures your failure... the other your paramount success. #4 Price It Accordingly People pay for value. That's why there are luxury cars, luxury houses, luxury trips, luxury foods, luxury health care... and luxury everything else. Not surprisingly these luxury items have a higher price tag than items of less perceived value. It should be the same with your information products. Take Chicken Soup... It sells for $12. Now look at the prices of my books. They start at $24.95 and go up to $50... for paperback books! Most are priced at $39.95. What's going on here? Just this... My operating philosophy is simple: Always provide reader/client value. Always charge a fair price for it. Yet take a look at the prices of most "how-to" books. They are priced below $20. Their publishers, I imagine, have priced them thus thinking they would make up in volume what they lose on any individual sale. This is fine if you expect a large bookstore sale where such thinking makes sense. However, the vast majority of "how-to" books never make it into bookstores... and almost no "how-to" booklets. Pricing your product this low ensures that you cannot use direct mail for the sale.. unless you have an item that you are sure you can sell to catalog houses. In short, you've severely limited your options. Personally, I prefer to pack a product with real value and raise the price as high as possible, building in sufficient margin so that I can use all available means of marketing to approach my prospects, not just once but several times. #5 Start Selling As Soon As You've Got A Publication Date However you slice it, publishers is a rich person's game. If you're an author in association with a publisher, you need resources to keep alive while you're completing the great work; if you're a publisher, you're going to have to dish out a bundle for your printer before you see much revenue. From the vantage point of the person using publishing to get rich, this situation is intolerable. That's why you need to start selling your product as soon as possible; from as soon as you've settled your publication date, or not less than 90 days preceding publication. The objective, of course, is plain: to get as much cash into the deal as early as possible. This is only possible, however, if you are absolutely certain your product will be ready at the announced time. If you've the kind of person who venerates deadlines and meets them religiously, then you should start selling your product as soon as you know when you'll have it in hand. To spur sales, offer your prospects a discount if they'll buy now... and be patient for a little while. Keep the focus of your marketing communications on reader benefits... and make sure they know the special price you're offering is one of them. #6 Mine The Work For Other Products, Including Booklets, Special Reports, Audio And Video Cassettes One crucial mistake too many "how-to" authors and publishers make is that they gamble all on one product... one book, one booklet, one audio cassette. This is ridiculous! As every wise entrepreneur knows, it's better to spread the risk around several products... especially several products you can market simultaneously to the same designated group(s) of prospects. Thus, take my fund raising book DEVELOPMENT TODAY: A FUND RAISING GUIDE FOR NONPROFIT ORGANIZATIONS. It's made up of individual chapters on raising money from foundations, direct mail, special events, the government, etc. Each of these subjects is of interest to some portion of my target market. Thus, it makes sense to spin off complementary products from the body and substance of the main product... AND SELL THEM EITHER BEFORE THAT PRODUCT IS AVAILABLE OR SIMULTANEOUSLY WITH IT. Your object must always be to absorb as much revenue as you can from your targeted markets. Your one product can gather so much; complementary products will gather more... or may at least gather something from a prospect who would not otherwise buy. Moreover, by marketing these products -- all directed, mind, to the same market -- at the same time, you are reducing the cost of marketing any one. This is just good sense. #7 START WORK ON YOUR NEXT "HOW-TO" PRODUCT ASAP Time after time I've been visited by authors of "how-to" products who are pleased as punch at the work they've just finished. They sit in my living room and preen themselves on their success. I'm indulgent, because I know that in 9 cases out of they'll fail to give the correct answer to my insistent question, "So, what are you working on now?" All too often I get just a blank look in response as if they thought they had now finished. No way! People who make million dollar fortunes from "how-to" information keep pushing. There are very good reasons for this: ## the first product you write is hardly likely to be your best. Practice does make perfect; ## the second product you create enables you to market not just that product... but the preceding one... as well as all the products drawn from the preceding one and the second one, too ## people buy from you when they trust you... and they are more likely to trust you when they've seen more about you. This is only likely to happen over time. For these reasons, run, don't walk to your computer keyboard after you've given yourself, say, a week's relaxation between products. Indeed, if you're smart, you'll use some of your intellectual down-time during the production of the first product to play with ideas and sketch out outlines for your second, third... or thirteen product. Remember, you've made a lifetime commitment to your field... and its prospects. #8 Start A Dealer Program With the best will in the world, you can't sell all your products personally. Not even marketing wizards like me can do it, so don't even try. You'll make more money if you enlist the marketing and sales services of lots of other people, and one way of doing this is to create your own dealer network. Keep in mind there are lots more sales people in the world -- including those who want to make money selling information products ... than those who are apt at producing them. You can benefit from this fact, but you have to succeed in two things: creating a meaningful dealer program and locating dealers to sell your products -- Creating a meaningful dealer program A meaningful dealer program consists of providing your dealers with substantial discounts, client-centered marketing communications, and marketing tips. Discounts must begin at 50% and may go as high as 80% depending on the number of your products the dealer is buying. Client-centered marketing communications consist of space and classified ads, cover letters, catalog sheets, etc. Marketing tips will include where and how to advertise your product, how to handle telephone sales, how to sell your products in catalogs, and in such specialized situations as workshops and trade shows. In other words, you'll think through just what your dealers will need... and you'll give it to them! -- Locating dealers to sell your products Locating dealers is not so difficult. ## Check out the ads in opportunity seeker publications. ## Advertise for them in such publications. ## Use card decks (like my own Sales & Marketing SuccessDek) to generate dealer inquiries. ## Make sure to include a line on all your sales materials like "dealer inquiries welcome." ## Get yourself listed in "Wholesale Book Sources & Moneymaking Book Selling Ideas" and dealers will find out! $15 postpaid from Selective Books, Box 1140, Clearwater, FL 34617. In short, hustle. Dealers can make you rich if you keep soliciting for them... and think through just what they need... and provide it! #9 Build A Catalog My quarterly Sure-Fire Business Success Catalog is now forty pages and contains hundreds of items. But it wasn't always so hefty. I started with a single back-to-back 8 1/2" x 11" page without about items. Over the years I've continually invested in my catalog... not just producing it, but building it, like a house with new rooms. You do the same. Once you've made a commitment to 1) a given market or related group of markets and 2) the production of "how-to" products for your prospects, it's time to start producing a catalog, building a house list and producing regular income from your customers. In the beginning, your catalog may have only one of your own products. Your goal, however, should be to displace other "how- to" products as you produce your own similar items. Despite the money you must invest in producing your own products, it makes more economic sense to do so instead of selling other peoples' products. Don't be afraid to start small as I did. What matters is that you make a start... and have an objective. If it takes you ten years to realize it, fine. Just keep at it. Remember, you are not playing a seasonal game; you are playing for life and for the substantial rewards of deriving regular income from your own customers. Note: Don't be afraid to sell services in your catalog. I make substantial sums by selling my copywriting, speaking and other consulting services through my catalogs. These produce tens of thousands of extra dollars for me yearly. Frankly, I've never understood why most people think catalogs are exclusively for the same of products by mail. I'd rather sell a $1,000 consulting contract via my catalog than a $44.95 book. Well, actually, I'd like to sell them both... to the same person. So should you! # Invest A major study completed in the summer of 1993, estimated that 76 million US households, or nearly 8 out of , will have less than half the money they need to retire in comfort. Eight out of ten! These numbers have stayed consistent now in many studies over many years, and they alarm me profoundly. I long ago resolved that I wouldn't be in this hapless mass of down-at-heel aged. That's why I invest a considerable portion of all the money I make, taking revenues and turning them, via the options available to the self-employed, into future comfort and security. When you start producing "how-to" information products, it's time to get savvy about investment. You need to take a good hard look at your lifestyle... and figure out how to turn the revenue you're going to get from your products into both present and future comfort. Note, present and future. This means... ## staying constantly abreast of the federal pension options available to you; ## contributing the maximum amount you can, as early in the tax year as possible; ## not allowing yourself to postpone, procrastinate or provide spurious excuses why now isn't the moment to contribute; ## reviewing investment options with your "risk tolerance" in mind; ## understanding that no "how-to" product can ever be considered successful that hasn't funded part of your pension and retirement income. Last Words Over the course of the years, I've known lots of "how-to" authors. Many, like Canfield and Hansen, are ingenues who make themselves foolish by boasting about all the money they'll make without having a clue how that'll happen; (remember, they told me their thin little book would gross at least $18,000,000... but I've never seen a single article or ad about it, ever!) I prefer another course, a more certain course. Many years ago Dan Poynter, that wise fellow, told me he produces books like Kellogg's produces corn flakes... selling regularly to a constant market. I never forgot the remark or its significance. Years later, I see people like Poynter... and many others... living by this rigorous regimen, selling predictable amounts of information products, reaping predictable income... just like Kellogg's. Just like, I might say, Lant, too. Unlike big talkers like Canfield & Hansen, who should be taking chicken soup themselves for the illness which assails them. **************************************************************** ************ Want to make money from information products? Get a copy of Dr. Jeffrey Lant's HOW TO MAKE A WHOLE LOT MORE THAN $1,000,000 WRITING, COMMISSIONING, PUBLISHING AND SELLING "HOW-TO" INFORMATION (552 pages, $44.95 postpaid). Use his book THE UNABASHED SELF-PROMOTER'S GUIDE to get free media attention for your product/service (365 pages, $39.50) and MONEY TALKS: THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO CREATING A PROFITABLE WORKSHOP OR SEMINAR IN ANY FIELD (308 pages, $35 postpaid) to make extra money through talk programs. Get all three and a FREE year's subscription to his quarterly Sure-Fire Business Success Catalog by calling (617) 547-6372 with MC/VISA/AMEX or writing 50 Follen St., Suite 507, Cambridge, MA 02138.