Abandon ship or repair damage?

12 years ago

Originally Posted by Ignotus

Hello warriors!

I have a question to you concerning what you think would be best to prioritize!

Here's my current situation.
I created an information product, took me a year pretty much due to procrastination and endless finishing touches. I uploaded it to Clickbank, had it up for about 4 weeks, made 3 sales and cancelled CB to sell it through Paypal. Said and done, made 2 sales through PP (price is in 20-30$ range) and now im at a crossroad.
My products niche is highly targeted with few searches and even harder language-level when creating content. Due to it's nature and small scope its easy to just repeat the same old again and again.
Now don't get me wrong, I both see the total havoc in this project AND appreciate it. I have learned much from it, most of which could have been avoided but I think I needed to "hardcode" the mistakes to fully learn from it.

So, do you think (I understand if its hard to answer with this unspecific information) that I should once again rebuild my old projects website and let it lie as a side project or begin creating a different project (and hopefully not make as much mistakes in it).

So, advance or fallback?
I will attach a poll to this thread but if anyone wants to write something about their opinion or has some insights feel most appreciated writing that as a full post.

Some questions:

1. Is this the only product you are offering?

2. Are you capturing emails or other information so that you can build a list that you can build a relationship with a market to?

3. Where is the traffic coming from?

Lastly, do not post your URL here as the mods will see it as promotional and will nuke or close the thread.

RoD

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AlexCN

12 years ago

There are SO many variables here... could it be a case of just needing better copy?

Is targeted traffic the problem?

Is the niche simply too small?

Are people in the niche even buying information products?

All of those questions are important to answer before you spend a year creating a product...

Even if it seems like this ended up being a 'bad niche' there are still lots of things you can do with a report that isn't selling!

Try not to think of it as time wasted, but time you spent creating a valuable asset.

Alex

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Ignotus

12 years ago

Thank you for your replies,
Yes Rod, this is the only product so far that I offer and nei, I dont capture emails yet but if I rebuild the website that will be added. The traffic is mostly from the US and Germany.
P.S I haven't posted any URL Rod?

AlexCN;
Better copy definately. Too small niche, probably/most likely. I haven't considered offering it by any other way then "pure sale" but I will look into that, perhaps capturing emails is the way to go.
Indeed it is an asset, a good product ( I'm perhaps a little biased but I wouldn't offer it if not so) but these variables need tweaking a lot to make it into a valuable asset. Thanks for your post!

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Rod Cortez

12 years ago

Originally Posted by Ignotus

Thank you for your replies,
Yes Rod, this is the only product so far that I offer and nei, I dont capture emails yet but if I rebuild the website that will be added. The traffic is mostly from the US and Germany.

P.S I haven't posted any URL Rod?...............

Definitely don't post your URL because the mods will nuke the thread (it will appear self-promotional) or they will edit it out.

Unless the item is a high ticket item, I don't go into a market unless I have a comprehensive product promotion strategy.

Granted, you need at least ONE product to market so you can begin testing your conversions. And this is where affiliate programs come in handy because you can market other people's products along with your own to begin testing out your sales funnel.

Now, not all business models need lists, but the vast majority of them do. So if you're selling information, then you'll definitely want to start capturing emails and sending them a mixture of content and offers (again, this varies greatly depending on your business model, pricing struction, how you position and brand yourself, etc.)

Where is your traffic coming from? I got the countries but are you buying your traffic? Getting it from social media? SEO? Uploading videos to Youtube?

All these factor into the success of your website.

Based on what I know so far I don't need to look at the website yet, you can definitely do a lot to improve on it.

RoD

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"Your personal philosophy is the greatest determining factor in how your life works out."

- Jim Rohn

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Ignotus

12 years ago

Rod Cortez;
The traffic is natural via Google. Thank you Rod for your advice, even though I tell you again, I have not posted any URLs in any of my topics so your advice on that is a bit misplaced.
RobinInTexas;
I will consider Clickbank if I choose to rebuild it. So far I have got some pointers towards listbuilding, and the poll resultat is clear (even if a bit thin on answers). I think I will rebuild it and then either go for a professional copywriter and Clickbank or try to create indirect value through email collecting. I am well aware I can do both, and that is probably better if one knows how to utilize it fully.

Again, thank you all for your replies.

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Rod Cortez

12 years ago

Originally Posted by Ignotus

Rod Cortez;
The traffic is natural via Google. Thank you Rod for your advice, even though I tell you again, I have not posted any URLs in any of my topics so your advice on that is a bit misplaced.......................

I've been at this for 15 years and have been involved in many, many niches so I don't need to see the URL at this point, but it is important to know what the traffic source is.

You asked if you should abandon ship or continue so I asked questions that were relevant to that.

Very seldom are one-product launches enough to sustain a business, which is why I asked if this was your only product.

I'm not a big fan of SEO / natural traffic because it's not as scalable or measurable as paid traffic, nor is it as fast.

So based on this information alone you definitely shouldn't "abandon ship". What you need to do is set up a sales funnel, send paid traffic to it, and then continue to refine your funnel until you have optimized your conversions.

This could take a few weeks or it could take a few months, depending on many variables.

RoD

Side note: You may PM your URL to me and I'll take a quick look at it. Conversions is what I'm good at and I can give you some pointers.

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"Your personal philosophy is the greatest determining factor in how your life works out."

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RobinInTexas

12 years ago

I would put it back on Clickbank. If it's a small niche, you should be able to dominate it with little effort.

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Robin

...Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just set there.

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Tim45

12 years ago

Unless it has a lot of searches, I'd learn from it and move on. If it an evergreen product then you can always go back to it at a later date.

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shadeofinfo

12 years ago

I would advise to stick it out and rebuild ... if it's only one product you have and it's for a specific niche, couldn't you build up a website that's focused on that topic, drive traffic there and sell your information product that way? Put up a little bit more content possibly and sell it through pay pal and also offer it through clickbank.

And what Rod said is correct. SEO traffic and building through that way would take alot longer than paid traffic. Seeing as though you only had it for a year, it's not something you should give up on. You already made some sales (which takes some people alot longer to make) so what you need to do is better conversions from your traffic and maybe even more targeted traffic through paid ads.

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akasher

12 years ago

Abandon ship. Start from scratch. Pick up a copy of the Millionaire Fastlane - it's the best business book that'll set you in the right direction in terms of wealth creation.

Learn from your mistakes. It sounds to me like you could have finished that CB product within a week, but you decided not to due to procrastination. Work hard and focus!

Good luck

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Rod Cortez

12 years ago

Originally Posted by akasher

Abandon ship. Start from scratch. Pick up a copy of the Millionaire Fastlane - it's the best business book that'll set you in the right direction in terms of wealth creation.

Learn from your mistakes. It sounds to me like you could have finished that CB product within a week, but you decided not to due to procrastination. Work hard and focus!

Good luck

I've got to ask: so you've never taken a business or a website, improved it's conversions and turned it around? I'm dying to know why you would recommend the OP to abandon ship.

RoD

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"Your personal philosophy is the greatest determining factor in how your life works out."

- Jim Rohn

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profitsforall

12 years ago

Can I vote that you rebuild the website, work on it as a side project whilst also working on a new project.

Don't just let it lie there gathering dust, but don't let it be the only thing you do.