Title: The Newbie's Guide To Profiting Online Part 5 Word Count: 2415 Summary: How To Sell There are plenty of creative ways that you can start marketing your products to potential customers. Of course these aren't all the processes of profit generation, but those listed are some pretty darn good ones. Take some time to read up on each one and try them out. Everyone's path to success is a different one, and yours will be no exception. Most of the methods listed below are more commonly used for selling information products online, but can be adapted to selling physical p Keywords: home business,start home business,running a home business,how to Article Body: There are plenty of creative ways that you can start marketing your products to potential customers. Of course these aren't all the processes of profit generation, but those listed are some pretty darn good ones. Take some time to read up on each one and try them out. Everyone's path to success is a different one, and yours will be no exception. Most of the methods listed below are more commonly used for selling information products online, but can be adapted to selling physical products also. Keep in mind, these methods I've outlined for you below are just basic descriptions and there are many different products available that describe each one or a combination of them in lots more detail. Think of this as your "selling dictionary" so that when you begin learning the actual process of selling, you'll know many of the terms that are discussed ahead of time. The Traffic Method Using traffic exchange sites is a great way to begin sending floods of visitors to your online store or web site. If people don't know about your business, then how do you expect to make any money from it? That's where these exchanges come in. Although, it's not without plenty of effort and time that will get those visitors to your site. If you want to participate for free, then expect to spend lots of time looking at other participants web sites to earn credits that go towards getting visitors to your own site. An alternative is to pay for traffic if this is in your budget. Understand though that just because you pay to get the people visiting your site doesn't mean that they buy, or even stay longer than 30 seconds. I would suggest that you try the free traffic generation options available to test the waters. There have been many informative ebooks written on the subject with new ones cropping up all the time due to the popularity of this method. A wonderful ebook on this is Auto Hits Machine. The Forum Method This is a pretty simple, but effective method. Forums have long been an incredible source for information. So why not start participating in them?! Use a basic search engine and find the right forum that discusses the subject matter that pertain to the products you are intending to sell. Join the forum. Read the posts. Offer your own unique perspective on them. Be helpful. Be friendly. Everything isn't always about selling, even though this is your main goal. There are plenty of routes to get you where you're headed. It's often said that you must give before you can receive. No truer words were ever spoken. Especially when selling online! You must be prepared to give something away, even if it's just your own experience, friendly advice, or much needed help by those also participating and accessing the forum. Remember also that there is an existing advertising space already available inside almost every single forum. The signature. This is where you want to place a link to your product, web site, or service with a tiny bit of "mouth-watering" descriptive text. Use that space! It's just as important as participating in the forums. You want to get the word out, so do so in a rather unobtrusive way with the signature tag. The Blogging Method Starting your own blog is not only easy, it can also be very therapeutic. And in some cases very lucrative! Many bloggers are making nice profits just from their blogs alone. How can you do this? Simple! Set up a product review section that describes your personal opinions on those products listed, and if you like them, be sure to add an affiliate link to them. Or you could place banner advertisements on your blog and even charge others for placing their advertisement banners inside your blog. Also, you can add Google box ads inside your blog along the side or even within your posts. You could even have people interested in the information you provide inside your blog pay a monthly fee to access it. There are plenty of creative ways to profit from your own blog. If you have no idea what a blog is, or how to begin one, then be sure to download the Blogging Power Package. Everything you could need to know is inside. The Affiliate Method By far, this is the most inexpensive and easiest method to use. Every single day people just like you begin earning money from simply signing up for various affiliate programs. It won't cost you a thing past a few minutes to begin earning. That is, you need to become an affiliate before you can see any rewards. Most all affiliate programs will give you all the information and tools you need to begin seeing profits. They want you to succeed. Otherwise, if you fail, they do too and no money is made for either end. A word of caution though, not all affiliate programs are created equal. Or even close! Some actually pay their affiliates and some, well, beat around the bush and it could take up to 3-6 months to see even one dime from them. Be sure that you read all information available on any affiliate program beforehand. Time is an extremely valuable commodity when doing business online, and you can't afford to waste it on crappy products or programs that bring you zilch results. The Auction Method Another popular method for newbies and experienced sellers alike. Explosive sites like eBay have millions of visitors per day, so it's easy to see why this is such a popular choice for selling products online. It can be incredibly easy to list an item for sale and make quick cash when needed with the use of online auctions. However, you must choose your prices, products, and descriptions very carefully to make good profits. This takes time of course to learn the best ways, but it can be well worth it so long as your earnings stay in the "black", or positive numbers. To sell through an auction site all you need is an account through the site itself, which is normally free, a product, and a payment processor such as PayPal to get your money as fast as possible. And, most big auction sites like eBay offer plenty of useful information along with step-by-step instructions to get you up and "auctioning" quick as a flash. The "Upsell" Method Upselling is a tactic in where you offer a product to your customers, they purchase it, and then they are given the choice on whether or not they would like to upgrade their purchase with another product. There are different variations of the upsell and it's purpose is similar to that of the back end method. Take for instance a product that comes in three different version, a lite version(usually something that is free but with limitations put on functionality), a standard version(most commonly with most features enabled within the product but less "comfort creatures" such as 24 hour support, upgrades, etc.), and a pro version(normally this one will have all the "bells and whistles like free lifetime upgrades to the product, a special license to profit from reselling the product, either a resale rights license or an exclusive affiliate program). Using the lite version of the product, you can give it away as a free gift and then those people you give it to will have the chance to upgrade the product to a less restrictive version. This is upselling in a nutshell. There are plenty of products created out there that use this method to earn more profits. The Back-End Method This method is very popular in the ebook information industry. What it does is gives you the power to pull in more profits after you have made the initial sale to your customers by providing you with specific links enabling the reader of the product to buy other related products. Thus creating a built in back-end sales force that runs on autopilot. Imagine, if you will, having a product that you can not only resell over and over again, but one that has additional purchase links to other associated products within it bringing in more profits to you without you having to do nothing more than distribute the original file. It's a very easy way to earn extra money after the first sale when you have a good product with a strong back-end. Changing these back-end links to point to your own special affiliate links is also referred to as "rebranding". However, full rebranding gives you special permission and tools to change other important details that help drive traffic to your site by providing you with other rebrandible links and text you can change letting your customers know who has provided this rich resource of information to them, and most importantly, where they can get more! The "FireSale" Method I'm sure you have seen this or at least heard of it before. This is when a company or organization has a massive sale at an extremely discounted price to move their merchandise. Firesales have gained in popularity because of the sheer amount of profits being pulled in from them. It's not unreal to hear people say that they earned thousands of dollars in just 3 days. That's the power of the Firesale. A good Firesale will offer top quality products for an insanely low price, with the price going up by any given percentage or dollar amount throughout the length of the sale. It builds like a fire! Until it's all over and it has burned out, or run it's course. There are some marketers that sell products online who dismiss these types of sales and never get involved in them. I feel they are doing themselves a great disservice this way. If you can get some great products for an unheard of price, why not? There are specific tools you need to run such a sale, and speaking from experience I have to say that John Delavera has one of the best called JV Manager. It's pricy, but worth every single penny. Of course there are others, but my money is on John all the way. In addition, you'll need to have your own domain and web space that allows you to upload and access .cgi and, or .php files since many of these types of Firesale programs run on this scripting. The Membership Method Creating your own membership site is a very profitable business. It also creates a stable flow of monthly income on a regular basis. That's what makes this method a great one. Consider this, you could utilize a content management system such as PostNuke or Mambo and run the whole thing just from it. If you're more inclined to offer a place that is specifically for downloading products like those of the information or ebook nature, then a file hosting system like TradeBit may be the way for you to go. Or, you could even run a membership website from your very own web space with a script such as Membership Millionaire. It's not a very difficult method to use, but it is quite time consuming. And there is a lot of stiff competition with this type of site because it is such a successful method. So, you have to think of a way to put a unique spin on whatever it is you are offering. For instance, you could give your members original content, private forums to build a helpful community, video tutorials, etc. This will bump up the value of your membership site over that of your competition. Usually, this method doesn't do that well on auction sites since many of those searching through there are looking for the lowest price they can find. The "Recycle" Method Recycling old products for profit is not a new idea. People have been doing this with paper, cans, and other assorted items for years. When you are offering an unused, or used product in your possession for sale, you are recycling it. So it is with information products too. But, there's a difference here. When you offer a used physical product for sale, you offer it one time, get paid one time, and that's all there is to it. When you sell an resellable information product, you can sell it as many times as you are able to, and can profit with back-end affiliate links or add a free sign up form for your mailing list, generating new leads and more profits over and over again. Now, when an information reseller has products that are a bit older, they will take these and package them up. In other words, they recycle them and are able to take something that's been on the market for a while, give it a "face lift" with new graphics, new sales copy, and BAM! They have an all new profit generation system. However, they do need to add a few new things within the collection of the recycled products. It makes it much easier to get buyers this way. In my book, Info Product Recycling, this process is clearly explained with more in depth information on adding this method to your selling arsenal. The Viral Method Ever heard the saying, "You don't get something for nothing."? Well, this method power-blasts that into dust! Just what is a "viral" product? Think of it as a nasty bug. And this little bug carries itself everywhere until it creates a full blown virus. That's what this method is all about. You create your own unique product on whatever topic you decide on, add lots of good information and affiliate links inside it, and then give it away. Yes. I said give it away. Everyone likes getting something for free. What makes this method even better than just giving great information away is the fact that you create a product that is chock full of back-end affiliate links for those that receive it from you to change those back-end links so they can profit by giving it away. So how the heck are you suppose to profit after the downloaders have changed all those links? That's easy! By adding your own advertisements that cannot be changed with your affiliate or direct purchase links throughout it! You could put one or two on every single page or before every chapter of your informative product. Even though all the other back-end affiliate links can be changed, those ads cannot. So you'll still generate profits or mailing list sign ups even though you're giving this specific product away.