Your Own Products VS Just An Affiliate...

Howdy!

What's better... create your own products or just be an affiliate?
I'm not sure there's a right answer here for this question, and
each person is different, but I want to make a case for "creating
your own products".

If you'd like to make the case for the other side "just being an
affiliate" that would be fantastic.

However, this is a question often asked by customers and clients
of mine looking to get going earning money... and almost every
single time I answer that, I say "create your own products".

A strong case could be made that newbies should first start
out as an affiliate first, then go for creating their own products,
which is what I did, but I advise otherwise to my customers.

Now, to some of you savvy and wicked smart Warriors, this might
not be the case... but it's what I teach and here's why:

Profits

With my own products, I have found it easier to make higher
profits. I can only teach and share what has really worked for
me to customers, and this is one that stands out tremendously
for me.

I have earned my fair share of profits as an affiliate too, but FAR
more as a product owner and here's why:

Up-sells, back-end and LTV

With my own products, I can create free products (list builders),
front end products and back-end products. I can have my front
end offer cheap (say $24...) and my up-sells be anywhere from $50
to $5,000

LTV = Lifetime value of your customer. So, I have found it easier
and more effective to build a lifetime value with the customers if
I control my own products. I can turn them on to me, warm them
up to me and maybe even create a raving fan if I'm lucky and do
my job well.

A customer who buys from me on the front end (say... $19) can
get warmed up to me and end up spending $1,900+ with me --
because they have grown to know, like and trust me more.

After all, one of the main reasons people DO NOT buy from you
is because they don't believe you and are skeptical of your
big promise to solve their problem.

Although I have been able to earn nice profits as an affiliate,
and being an affiliate certainly has it's PROS too (indeed) I tend
to teach most people to create their own products.

One of the main reasons people struggle is because of traffic
and conversions, which brings me to the next reason I am
recommending creating your own products, which is:

Traffic!

You see, if you have a front end offer and you drive paid traffic
to that front end offer, often times you break even... or maybe
make a little profit or even lose money.

However, if you have up-sells (maybe a continuity program, or
other up-sells and back-end offers), then you now stand a much
better chance of turning a profit with that paid traffic.

In other words, if you spend $100 today on paid traffic and only
make $50 back, then you lost $50 today. However, if you have
up-sells, you can hopefully earn more and turn a profit.

Sometimes, you might lose money on the front end, lose money
on the first up-sell, but turn a profit on the second up-sell. This
allows you to drive more traffic and compete in the "paid traffic"
market much better. This is often why some of your competitors
can actually spend $3 per click (or higher) and remain in business.

Now, I know you can STILL build LTV as only an affiliate. I understand
that well and I believe in order to pull that off (as just an affiliate),
you must be pretty good at "building a relationship with your list"

Which brings me to the next reason:

Conversions

As an affiliate, if you only promote other people's offers, then it's
possible you are building other people's brands and other people's
businesses. I believe, it will take some savvy "relationship building"
to keep your list engaged over time due to the fact you are promoting
and building other people's brands.

However, with your own products, you can certainly control the
conversions better. You can tweak your front end and up-sells
easier because you control them. If you want to add a video, poof!
you add a video.

And, if you can beat your own control and get conversions higher,
then, again, that increases your ability to compete and even pay
for traffic.

Plus, you can tweak:

-- the offer
-- the price
-- the graphics
-- the copy
-- videos
-- footer pops, exit pops
-- so on

Additionally, you can quickly interchange your front end offers
with your up-sell offers. Perhaps an up-sell offer you have (maybe
the membership site) is converting like crazy... you can try that
baby out on the front end. Flexibility

Lastly...

technical, tracking, tweaking & testing

Yes, you can certainly do a lot of this as an affiliate too, but think
about how much possibilities you have if you own the products.

You can test to see how long the visitor remains on your site,
the abandon cart ratio, the exit pop ratio, up-sell conversions
and so on. You can quickly change, tweak and adapt your sites
and offers and test them.

You can try so many things!

[oh, final thing]

Affiliates!

By far... and I mean BY FREAKING FAR... the most amount of money
I've ever made in my entire life -- so far -- has come from getting
affiliates to promote my offers.

AND, not only has that been the MOST I've ever made, it's been the
quickest way I've earned a lot. Therefore, with your own products,
you can then recruit affiliates to promote for you!

You can also take your products and integrate them with other people's
offers and sales funnels. You can use them as bonuses to provide when
you do promote an affiliate offer. There's so much more leverage you
have when you have your own products.

AND, it's not as hard to create your own products as many people
think it is. There's plenty of people who will interview with you... plenty
of PLR you can take and edit and add to... plenty of ghostwriters
out there... plenty of content creators to partner with... etc.

So, yes, being just an affiliate certainly has it's advantages too. Not much
customer service, not much fulfillment, not as much copywriting or conversions
to master, etc etc.

I just wanted to take a few moments here and share with my fellow Warriors
why I think (my opinion) creating your own products is a very smart move.
(so is finding a kick-butt copywriter or learning conversions yourself). Cuz,
if you can convert... traffic is a breeze!

Happy Father's Day To My Brothers Here!

Eric Louviere

PS - My son is now 3 1/2 years old and I'm very thankful to have had
the luxury of NOT having a day job so I could spend so much time watching him
grow. The Warrior Forum has a lot to do with me having that blessing
and I'd also be doing a disservice by not thanking these people as well:
Mike Filsaime & Dr. Mike Woo-Ming (holla!)

[You can do it too! I promise you can!]