How to transition from service to product?

Hi gpacx,

All of the above sound like viable options. A team of ghost writers would free you up to expand your client base. A web site selling your services would ensure that you have sufficient work to hire out, and there is always room for a new product in any space.

If you can craft an irresistible offer and get enough eyeballs on it, sales will be forthcoming.

The web is your pot of gold! :-)

Dave

I recommend investigating whether you want a job or a business.

Basically, a business is something that can be outsourced or sold, if not, it's a job.

I came across an article by someone (Shay Rodkhold, if I'm getting the name right) here, a few years ago. She said that instead of getting paid for writing an article for someone else, she writes the article to sell herself, and gets paid MUCH more.

Since I prefer the idea of a business to that of a job, I followed her suggestion. I already had some content I'd written for an internet-marketing course, a 97-page Ebook which had sold only one copy in 3 years on my own website. I followed the advice and simply put the same content on JVZoo at $7 with PLR rights, and never did anything else about it (no traffic generation etc). That was 4 years ago, and last month, my personal profit from that reached over $1000, and the money still comes in, not much, but a bit every month, for zero effort on my part.

More recently, someone else helped me realize that I also have the list of buyers, which I can market to, and also the list of affiliates who've sold that product, who I can tell about other products of mine.

So a lot more value than if I'd just been paid to write the ebook, but the value is much more long-term.

That's a difference between a job and a business . . . a job makes more money in the short-term, and is a lot easier, but a business, if successful, should make FAR more money in the long-term.

Written content can be sold in many ways . . . as Ebooks on JVZoo, etc. as a Kindle book on Amazon, as a CD on Amazon or ebay, as a printed book on either of those, and in other ways too. Sometimes the same exact content can be sold in all those ways.

Building a business is more challenging and takes longer, but if successful will make a lot more profit for the same work, in the long-term.

Yes, as you say you can create a product to teach others to make money as a writer. My comment on that would be that creating a product is about 1% of what's needed . . . the other 99% is marketing . . . most writers sell almost nothing. Even listing the product in the right places, providing banners and email swipes, listing on the announcement-sites etc. is no guarantee if even a single sale (as I know from experience!), so there is a lot to learn in that area, but since some people are doing it effectively, it is certainly possible to learn (or find someone to JV with).

Hope that gives you some ideas

Chris