To celebrate 600+ RSS subscribers, first three comments on this post get a free 125 x 125 ad – one condition, you have to be in the Top Commentators list. Just email your image link and URL (upload to Image Shack or something) to admin @ theuniversitykid . com
One of my greatest recommendations to make money on the Internet is to create your own product – it’s one of the best ways to make money. Payments are instant (unlike Adsense or affiliate programs), you’re in complete control (one of the most important reasons!) and it’s easier to build a reputation with your viewers if you’re known for producing top notch content. I wrote a post about this a while ago with more reasons why you should use your own products to make money.
A lot of you, however may find creating a ‘product’ difficult… what do you put in it, how do you format it, what do you price it at? For the latter two, I recommend Open Office for formatting (it’s free…) and $1/page to sell at when you start out (so a ten page report would sell for $10), which you can increase as your reputation grows.
If you can’t think up what to do to create your own product, here’s some ideas…
Outsource. I outsource EVERYTHING I don’t like in online business (so that’s about 95% of the work 
). Seriously though, you can often find writers for pretty cheap on the various webmaster forums.
At $0.01/word (which is the standard rate for those starting out – I don’t like that it’s so low, but there you go) you can get a huge (4,000 – 5,000 word) report written for $50 or so. If you wanted to sell it at $10, you’d just need five sales. And if you wanted a smaller report, it would cost you less than $20.
For me, a good size for a low value product (less than $20) is around 1,000 – 2,000 words. People get bored reading much more than that.
Forums. The thing about forums is that they turn people lazy, myself included. People find a good forum they like (in any niche…) they start using it instead of Google, and posting all questions there without searching for the answers.
This is where you take advantage. Google ‘niche forum’ and take a few minutes analysing the threads.
Take any questions you find, Google them, create a report and rewrite the answer in your own words.
For example… ‘How Do I Get My Cat To Not Scratch The Furniture’ is a topic that could make a decent report. Add some stock images, bullet points, bam – you’ve got a report.
Use experts. A great website is Guru.com… you can find experts on various niches there.
What you can do, is find a few questions you think would do well in the niche (or use SEOBook’s tool to see what people are searching for). Get the expert to answer them in a Skype call, pay them something like $50 – $100.
Outsource a short report for less than $20 with that, and maybe even create a video or two – you now have a complete product you can sell for $50 or more. You won’t realise how easy it is until you’ve tried it.
Private Label Rights. Buy a PLR product cheap from somewhere like the Warrior Forum, slap on your name and resell it.
Free Content. Grab articles from the likes of Ezine Articles, take the best 5-10 and create a report (with sources properly attributed at the end). This is not for a report to sell, but one that you could give away (to build a list).
The first, and last two will take you ten minutes or less of work if you’re slightly clued into the IM game 
How do you promote?
Now, you could concentrate on the one time sale, but that’s not the best way to go.
What you want to do is build up a following in the niche – build a list, and provide them with good information. If you provide them with top quality stuff week after week, your conversion rates will shoot through the roof (I’ve seen more than 60% buy a product after just 4-5 emails).
Use a program like Aweber, and setup a simple landing page. A few paragraphs of text, offer a free report (which you can create yourself using one of the ways above) and drive traffic to it in various ways (see below). An example landing page is mine at Earners Guide – check it out for ideas.
The BEST way to promote a list is through niche forums. You do not have to spend a dime to build a list, nor do things like article marketing which can be short term and arduous.
Of course, you’ll need to do some Googling. You’re looking for niche forums with less than 100,000 members – it’s easier to establish yourself on there. Just search for “keyword forum” (you can add in + powered by vBulletin if you want).
You want a catchy signature. For example:
>>>> CLICK HERE TO FIND OUT HOW I LOST 20 LBS LAST WEEK, FREE <<<<
You get the idea. People are interested in that kind of thing – you want them to click through. You can also outsource posts (you’ll start to notice a common trend in this post…) you can get posts at around $0.1/post, so 250 posts for $25 (or $20, negotiate a little ). A little posting activity, and you’re not just building links and increasing exposure to your squeeze page, but also becoming more trustable in the eyes of the community.
As long as your posts are good, you will get visits, and signups. Getting ideas for emails is easy too – use the same ways mentioned above.
You can promote affiliate products through your list, but my recommendation is always your own products… however, you need to make sure there is a want.
The easiest way to do this is to ask what your customers want (although most might say they would be unwilling to pay, if they think they had a choice; but pay if you promoted to them without the choice), or you could just have the product created yourself.
A good list number to start promoting products is 500. At least five emails before you mention them parting with money. If your emails are good quality, and your prospects targeted (check x 2 in our case) you will generally see a conversion of at least 10%. So that’s 50 buyers of your $27+ product – decent amount, don’t you think?
Good luck – as always, feel free to ask any questions. I’ve also been asked by a few about products I recommend – there will be a post tomorrow on one of them
August 8th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Oh yay.
Emailing you.
BlackHatWay’s last blog post..Showing you some luv
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August 8th, 2008 at 4:57 pm
Thanks for the guide. I’ve been curious as to ways to help build a list and when you should start sending promotions out.
As for the free ad, just skip me.
Faint’s last blog post..How To Make Your Own Beer
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August 8th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Nice “report” of your own. I get lazy from forums too, I just ask questions there sometimes:)(Though I usually ask around somewhere else first)
Nathaniel’s last blog post..Review: Rajaie Talks
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August 8th, 2008 at 5:11 pm
Darn it, missed the opportunity for a free ad!!
Flimjo’s last blog post..YouTube Friday – Aaron Wall’s On Page SEO Tips
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August 8th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
I believe that you didn’t as Faint isn’t in the top commentators.
BlackHatWay’s last blog post..Showing you some luv
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August 8th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Oh well, he is, but he said that he skips it. =P
BlackHatWay’s last blog post..Showing you some luv
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August 8th, 2008 at 5:33 pm
Real nice post. I’ve never been good with writing, well, maybe thats phrased wrong. It just takes me longer than the average person, I keep trying to find the right words and such, make it sound great. (This is what AP English class has done to me
) I’d so run out of patience with $0.01 a word, wow.
Ralph’s last blog post..Giving Out 224 Entrecard Credits & Ad Spots
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August 8th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Three ads go to BHW / Nathaniel / Flimjo. If not taken, we’ll go down the list… etc
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August 8th, 2008 at 5:55 pm
Put me in if one of those don’t qualify!!!
Congrats on 600!
Sell Porn Make Money’s last blog post..Sell More Porn With Expired Domain Names
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August 8th, 2008 at 6:20 pm
Question… when you say posts, you mean comments in a forum, right? Not blog posts or anything similar.
Sell Porn Make Money’s last blog post..Sell More Porn With Expired Domain Names
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August 8th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
@ SPMM, aye – forum posts
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August 8th, 2008 at 7:08 pm
@Jason – I see Faint in the top commentators, with 11 comments.
And, you blog is seriously messed up on IE. I am at the library and it is really not looking it’s best.
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August 8th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
Lol, maybe a wrong choice for the banner.
But whatever.
BlackHatWay’s last blog post..Make money by flipping expired domains
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August 8th, 2008 at 7:43 pm
Wow, I just did a browsershots.org on this site, and even though it is slightly messed up in IE 6 and 7, I laughed at the bar at the top that says:
”
“This blog is messed up in Internet Explorer, Get Firefox With Google Toolbar and Become a Better Person
Ralph’s last blog post..Giving Out 224 Entrecard Credits & Ad Spots
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August 8th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
Question – to promote your product, should you have little designs done such as a logo, a picture of it in a “box,” or other little side graphics to entice people?
Nathaniel’s last blog post..Review: Rajaie Talks
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August 8th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Thanks this is filled with excellent ideas, and I can do this. The forum suggestion is the best!~ kudos..
MsTrisBeats’s last blog post..A Closer Look At Reason 4.0
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August 8th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
I would say yes, graphics speak louder than words, in a way. I know if I saw a shiny “box” with a nice design on it, that’d catch my eye rather than plain text (thats not font size 25 lol)
Ralph’s last blog post..Does The World End Tomorrow?…
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August 9th, 2008 at 1:01 am
This stuff about where and what to buy content-wise for products is something my friends and I decided to start looking for last night.
Good timing!
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August 9th, 2008 at 1:23 am
Um, I guess I’m too late, huh? lol
Jay
Jay’s last blog post..Current Projects: Testing Out Different Niches, Site Flipping, Design Work, Etc
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August 9th, 2008 at 3:22 am
@ Jason
Hey Jason,
You talk about outsourcing to make products. But do you use outsourcing for website flips as well. I am just currently making my website flip (a product website) and it can take a fair bit of time.
I was wondering if outsourcing is a good idea for flipping websites?
Ryan @ SmarterWealth’s last blog post..How To Make $300 per Week Every Week
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August 9th, 2008 at 3:26 am
@ Jason (or anyone who can answer my question)
Another question.
With getting others to forum post for you do they do it from their own account with a signature pointing to your site? or do you set up a seperate account for them?
Also how to you check if they have actually done to 250 forum posts you paid them for?
Ryan @ SmarterWealth’s last blog post..How To Make $300 per Week Every Week
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August 9th, 2008 at 4:44 am
Congrats on 600, I’m just behind you with 575. Keep up the good content and you’ll see 1,000 soon enough!
BlogSavvy’s last blog post..What do you mean Blogging for a Cause?
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August 9th, 2008 at 7:40 am
Its pretty amazing the information that you give away on TUK, when you could be doing these as “paid reports” yourself!
I am extremely lazy also so my biggest challenge has always been finding the right people to outsource to and then utilizing the content that they provide. Quite a few times I have paid to have an article/report written, then did nothing with it, or really didn’t like it after having thoroughly analyzed it. I guess laziness will always kill your activities/plans! How many people read your great posts here and never act on them!?
Great post though!
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August 9th, 2008 at 1:45 pm
didnt know about guru.com thanx for sharing it wud make work very easier and also i wud now try a bit outsourcing.i m skeptical about outsourcing coz of bad freelancers.
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August 9th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
jason tuk is a bit messed up in ie.can u pl look into it.
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August 9th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
Exactly what I was looking for!
Rajaie AlKorani’s last blog post..6 Sources of Free Ideas on What to Write About
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August 9th, 2008 at 5:23 pm
Haven’t received ads from Nathaniel / Flimjo; free ads go to Ralph / Sell Porn Make Money.
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August 9th, 2008 at 5:53 pm
[...] Jumpstart your Website’s traffic. There are hundreds of ways to make money online, and as Jason pointed out yesterday one of them is to create free Reports or even paid reports. These types of [...]
August 9th, 2008 at 8:36 pm
Wow, very cool Jason, thanks, I’ll email you now.
Ralph’s last blog post..Does The World End Tomorrow?…
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August 9th, 2008 at 9:01 pm
@ Everyone complaining about IE – Just switch to Firefox. It truly will make you a better person.
Also, I didn’t want the banner because I don’t really have any sites that are related to TUK so I figured I would pass on the offer. I don’t mean to be ungrateful/come off as an ass.
Faint’s last blog post..How To Make Your Own Beer
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August 10th, 2008 at 2:09 am
I am amazed to know that 95% of the work is outsourced. Then again, you must have done your research whether the product is attractive, else all the money spent cannot be recouped.
How much do you spend on average for each new project?
jeflin’s last blog post..Tougher Times For Investors Ahead
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August 10th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
Right now I’m happy to just absorb the info I’m finding here … time enough to worry about getting ads another day!
You have a great knack for boiling down large projects to their constituent parts, making them more manageable. I’m already thinking about products to begin working on.
Minnesota Weekend Getaways’s last blog post..Three Wonderful Art Museums in Minneapolis
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August 10th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
I should email you the ad? Sure I will.
Nathaniel’s last blog post..The Olympic Games Begin!
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August 11th, 2008 at 9:54 am
TUK you’ve been absolutely KILLING it lately man! Everything you’ve been sharing is top notch, “paid ebook” stuff. You’re giving out some practical knowledge that people can use immediately and I love that…keep it up man!
Normal Joe’s last blog post..Look at the Bloggers Joe Sees
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August 12th, 2008 at 4:58 pm
Just a quick tip, treat your outsources well, and he will treat you well.
Faint’s last blog post..How To Make Your Own Beer
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August 30th, 2008 at 12:25 pm
Are all the folks who read this blog, actually following through and making money on the ideas? It would be great to post about some of your readers and their successes!
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