by Pete Savage, co-author, The Wealthy Freelancer

“If you’re selling a professional service, you need a five-step process. I don’t care what you’re selling, your buyer needs to know that when they do business with YOU, they’re in the hands of someone who’s done this before.”

I learned this from Jim, a former Executive Vice President at the largest bank in Canada. As a bank exec big shot, Jim was a seasoned and discerning buyer of professional services from solo consultants and firms. When he offered free advice like this, I listened.

I promptly created my own five-step process for my freelance copywriting practice. And sure enough, I promptly began closing more business.

Over the years, I’ve honed my five-step process into what is truly a “battle-tested” version that helps me land clients. (I like the description “battle-tested”, which I thieved from Kyle’s recent blog post Starting a Consulting Business.)

Why This 5-Step Process Works Like a Charm

Why does the 5-Step Process work so well? Well just listen to how it sounds…

You’re on the phone with a new prospect. He has just recited to you the requirements for a project and is now preparing to shut off his brain and hang up. His ears are about to toggle over to half-listening mode, as he expects you to say, “Well thank you, I’ll be in touch very shortly with a quote,” just like every other freelancer always does.

But you don’t say that.

Instead, you say, “Well this sounds great, and I have a five-step process that’s designed to get this project started off on the right track AND limit your time involvement to critical items only.”

You’ve just woken him back up! This is music to every client’s ears. In my experience, upon hearing this, 8 out of 10 clients will then ask to hear your five steps.

You’ve just set yourself up to end the call on a high note. Not only that, you’re very likely the only freelancer he’s talked to in recent history who’s said anything remotely like this. Points to you. Big points.

Get Your Pen Out. Anyone Can Do This.

Every freelancer, consultant or other type of professional service provider can communicate what they do in five steps. Try this yourself:

On a pad of paper, write down all the different steps you go through when servicing your client.

You may come up with 13, or 113, at first. That’s fine, on your first pass. But then you must do whatever you can to group, categorize, push, pull or force all of these pieces into five main steps.

Five is the magic number because a four-step process appears to lack substance and a six-step process gets too cumbersome to explain concisely.

When you have your five steps named, write a one-to-three sentence description for each step.

And you’re done.

The next step, is to use your five-step process on every call, with every new prospect. Hone it, perfect it, battle-test it, until rolls off your tongue like a verse from Killer Queen.

Now you’ve now got a powerful and succinct script that will help you differentiate yourself and win the confidence of prospective clients on your very first call.

–

Pete Savage is co-author of The Wealthy Freelancer: 12 Secrets to a Great Income and an Enviable Lifestyle. Order Pete’s book this week from Amazon.com and get up to $300 in free instructional materials to help you attract more clients and better paying projects. Click here for more info…

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Can you make multiple six-figures in less than 2 years online?

Most people don’t believe it’s possible.

What if you were starting with nothing — no money, no technical skills, no connections — could you hit six-figures in 6 months?

Most people don’t believe that’s possible either.

And most people struggle for years before they make any money online.

Is there a connection between your beliefs and your reality? Perhaps.

All I know is my friend Brian did both those things.

After spending a year as a student in the Dominican Republic, he moved to New York…

… he taught himself HTML by candlelight and learned copywriting in his spare time…

… he started his business from the floor of a studio apartment in Spanish Harlem…

And then…

Brian made six figures his first 6 months online. In less than 2 years he created a multiple six-figure business. My prediction is he’ll crack the million mark next year.

He started at age 23, and at 25 is now set for life.

You can hear Brian tell the full story of how he got started, learn exactly how he did it, and get a whole bunch free training from him here.

Talk soon
Kyle

P.S. I’m lucky to call Brian a friend, but I also consider him a mentor. He knows how to get things done, take action, and make amazing things happen like few people I’ve met. Definitely one to watch.

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• Turn Your $27 eBook Into A $2700 Info Product

Just wrapped up a killer interview with Daniel Levis — all about how to grow BIG, responsive email lists up to 7 times faster than average.

Daniel is a world-class copywriter and marketing consultant who gets paid $17,500 for ONE marketing campaign…

… he has worked with MAJOR direct marketing powerhouses such as The Motley Fool, Safe Money Report, Stealth Stocks Online…

… helped promote well-known authors like Mark Victor Hansen, Robert Allen and Dr. Stephen Sinatra…

… collaborated with top-flight online marketing talent like Joe Vitale, Yanik Silver and Dan Kennedy…

And on this call he reveals a simple step-by-step system that he says, anyone, regardless of experience, can use to begin growing online sourced customer and prospect lists 4 to 7 times faster.

This interview has TONS of actionable information you can use right away.

Listen in (or download) the replay here:

www.KyleTully.com/DanielLevisReplay

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IMPORTANT Teleseminar News Below!

FOUR HOUR ENTREPRENEUR #4
March 24, 2009

Inside this issue:

How to Get Unlimited
Product Ideas

Plus:
Product Creation Teleseminar News
Tully Traffic Tip #201

Get Rapid Actions Profits on an installment plan…
Download now for just $67 ==>

“Small opportunities are often
the beginning of great enterprises.”

- Demosthenes

Man what a week…

You might have noticed there was no issue last Tuesday.

I spent the entire week preparing for a lawsuit against my old
financial adviser — been neck-deep in documents, papers and
never ending legal forms.

To cut a long story short… they made stupid mistakes, sued the
wrong company (one of their creditors), lost, and went
bankrupt… taking millions of investor money with them.

I lost tens of thousands.

And I was one of the lucky ones.

Other people are losing their houses.

I’m young. I can rebuild. But these folks… some of them are
already retired. They have no income. Soon they won’t have a
home.

The lesson?

Be very careful taking on debt. Play nice with your creditors.
Don’t risk what you can’t afford to lose.

Anyway, enough about me. Let’s talk about you.

Last issue we talked about creating info products.

Specifically, using the “Instant Product Creation System” to crank out high-quality products in record time.

Which is great if you already have a topic for your product.

But what if don’t have the foggiest idea about what to create?

How do you come up with an idea for a product?

Let me show you how I do it…

HOW TO GET UNLIMITED PRODUCT IDEAS

Here’s something you might not know:

Not every product you create is going to be a winner.

In fact, probably only 1 in 10 will be a runaway success.

Another 3 in 10 will make money, but they won’t make you rich.

And the other 6? A few will break even, a few will lose money or
take more time to create than they are worth.

These aren’t hard and fast numbers. Some people seem to have the
midas touch and couldn’t make a dud if they tried. But most of
us will see numbers similar to above.

So it stands to reason, the more products you create, the better
your chances of finding that 1 in 10 product that will make
you millions.

And the more products you create, the more front end customers
you get, the more back end sales you make, the more affiliates
you attract… until you’ve got so much momentum that nothing
can stop you.

That’s why the ability to come up with lots of products and
create them FAST is such a valuable skill.

Now let’s take all the guesswork and creativity out of the
picture and make everything step-by-step with a simple system
you can follow.

1. YOUR LIST

If you’ve got a list, survey them. There is no better way to find
out what product to create than to ask the people who are going
to buy it what they want.

You can get a free 100-response survey from SurveyMoney.com.

The trick is NOT to ask what product they want, but to ask what
problems they are having. Create a product that solves an urgent
problem and it will sell itself.

2. FORUMS

People love to complain. And what better place than forums!

Check out these two resources to find forums in your niche:

http://www.theforumfinder.org/

http://directory.big-boards.com/

Or just type “YOUR NICHE + forum” into Google.

The good news is complaints are often about problems people are
having. Look for problems that come up often or that many people
seem to be having.

Can you create a product that solves those problems?

Often it’s VERY simple to model your own product on an existing
one then simply “fix” whatever people were complaining about.

Most problems people are complaining about can be solved very
easily with a few minutes on Google.

But here’s the thing: most people are REALLY BAD at using Google.

If it doesn’t come up on the first page for the most obvious
search term then they can’t find it. You can take an hour or
two to research a topic other people are either too lazy or
incompetent to research and create a product that hands the
solution to them.

3. TWEAK A PROVEN SELLER

Check out the best seller lists on Amazon, eBay, Paypal etc.

Look at what is already selling and think about how you can
put your own unique twist on it.

Here are a few idea-generators to get you thinking:

Sub-Niche, Rename, Offer, Bonus, Expand, Contract, Combine,
Split, Format, Language, Delivery, Structure, Compliment, Oppose,
Sequel, Prequel

Each of those represents a way you can tweak an existing proven
seller and make it your own.

For example, do you remember “The Secret”?

It was a HUGE huge success.

Search for “The Secret” on Amazon and look at how Rhonda Byrne
tweaked the original idea to generate half a dozen other
products.

There is…

The Secret
The Secret (Extended Edition)
The Secret Daily Teachings
The Secret Gratitude Book
The Secret Soundtrack
El Secreto (The Secret) (Spanish Edition)

Then other people jumped on the “Law of attraction” bandwagon
and came out with products such as:

• Law of Attraction: The Science of Attracting More of What You
  Want and Less of What You Don’t
• The Soulmate Secret: Manifest the Love of Your Life with the Law of Attraction
• The Secret Diary: A Personal Workbook for Achieving Health, Wealth and Happiness

All of these leverage the initial success of “The Secret”.

4. USE IDEA TEMPLATES

As a copywriter I have an extensive swipe file of proven
ads — including headlines, openings, guarantees, offers etc –
I can use to get my creative juices flowing.

(I highly suggest you start building a swipe file if you have
not already — more on this in future issues.)

As a product creator I have a swipe file of product names,
article / report titles, and other templates I can use to
quickly generate dozens of product ideas.

For example:

• 5 Easy Ways to _______
• 10 Things to Avoid When _______
• The 7 Most Important _______ For _______
• How _______ Can Get Twice As Much Done In Half the Time
• 51 Costly Mistakes New _______ Make

Then you simply plug in your niche/topic and away you go.

Follow these 4 steps and coming up with ideas for your next
product won’t be an issue anymore. In fact, you’ll likely
have a new problem — deciding which idea to go with.

My suggestion — go with your gut and make the decision fast.

Let the market tell you which ideas are good and which are not.

About The Author

Kyle Tully is an Internet Marketing Consultant, direct response copywriter and information marketer from Sydney, Australia. He helps entrepreneurs and small business owners get more new customers, increase cash flow and make more money using his proven marketing systems.

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See below for details on the
insider-only product creation teleseminar.

FOUR HOUR ENTREPRENEUR #3
March 10, 2009

Inside this issue:

Creating high-quality info products
in 48 hours or less.

Plus:
Insiders-Only Product Creation Teleseminar
Tully Traffic Tip #12
Competition Winner
Reader Q & A

Thanks for being a subscriber!

“Success is a science;
if you have the conditions,
you get the result.”

- Oscar Wilde

Let’s talk about creating info products.

But not just any old junk.

High-quality products you’ll be proud to profit from.

Products that help people, establish you as an expert, and make
your customers want to buy everything you put out.

Products you can sell for $10 – $97 (or more), give away to
build your list, distribute to promote your launch, or use as a
bonus in a product launch sniping campaign.

And let’s talk about products you can create in less than 2 days.

Sound impossible?

Well, my system can let you do all of this and more…

Imagine… entering any new market you choose… creating a
top-of-the-line information product… and making your first
sales… all within 48 hours.

This is the power of systemized product creation!

Here’s the bottom line:

The ability to create info products is a cash-generating skill.

The faster you create them, the more money you make.

The higher quality they are, the more repeat sales you get.

Beginning to sound like a skill you want to master?

Great! Let’s take a look at the 48 hour info product system…

CREATING HIGH-QUALITY INFO PRODUCTS
IN 48 HOURS OR LESS.

The key to fast info product creation is having a system.

Systems take most of the effort, guesswork and need to be
“creative” out of the equation and give you a simple set of
steps to follow.

You follow the proven steps, you get the proven result.

My own system is based on Jason Fladlien’s excellent “Instant
Product Creation System” which you can get here.

I’ve used this system to create all my recent products including:

$10 reports such as The Lost Blueprint
$97 video courses like Overnight Membership Site
Even my $497 Consulting Tycoon home study course

(And that’s just in the IM niche, the system works just as
effectively in every single market I’ve applied it to.)

Each time I use the system, not only does it make me a lot of
money, but people love my products and are able to apply the
information in them.

At the core of the system is an outline that forces you to
create quality products, and allows you to do it very quickly.

Here’s the 20,000 ft view of how it works:

Studies show there are basically 4 learning styles –

Why, What, How, What If.

WHY learners need to know why they should learn what’s in your
product otherwise they will never even consume it, let alone
take action on it.

WHAT learners want to know step-by-step what they need to do to
get results.

HOW learners need more hands on help such as exercises and
“here’s what do do when X happens” advice.

WHAT IF learners want to see the big picture before they get
started.

We all learn using a combination of these styles.

If your products do not cater to each of these learning styles
then certain people will not “get” your product — refunds will
skyrocket and repeat purchases will plummet.

The good news is this gives us the perfect outline for any
information product:

WHY
WHAT
HOW
WHAT IF

You’ll notice all of my products follow this same general
formula — I tell you WHY you need to know this, show you WHAT
to do, tell you HOW to overcome obstacles, then show you WHAT
you can expect IF you follow the steps. It works like magic.

Then it’s simply a matter of filling in each section with the
appropriate information.

(Jason makes this super-simple by showing you exactly what to
include in each section — it makes creating info products
paint-by-numbers simple.)

For a short report or brief video you could use the WWHW formula
to outline your entire product — in fact, I’m doing this right
now in this very article!

For a longer ebook or more involved video you would use WWHW
to outline each chapter of your product. For example, each
video in my Overnight Membership Site course uses it’s own WWHW.

Using this system I can…

Write a 20-page report in a single day.
Outline and script a video in a matter of hours.
Create entire products in less than 2 days.

And contrary to popular belief, I’m NOT a “natural” writer.

I almost failed English in high school.

Until a few months ago (well into my career as a copywriter) I
didn’t even like writing — I never knew where to start, wasn’t
sure if I’d made all my points, and could never tell if what I
was writing was any good.

Now I find writing MUCH easier. Product creation is a snap.

And I put it down to two things — practice, and Jason’s system.

Obviously there’s a lot more to the system than just an outline.

Mindset, understanding, strategy, procrastination killers…

The outline is a great place to start but there are many more
pieces of the puzzle.

In fact, I’ve added many of my own twists and techniques to
simplify things even more, and make creating high-quality
products faster.

Would you like to know what they are?

I’ll be holding a free product creation training teleseminar
next Thursday where I reveal all my info product creation
secrets.

All you have to do is grab Jason’s “Instant Product Creation
System” from me today and you’ll automatically be registered
for the call.

During the call I’ll go in-depth on Jason’s methods and share
my own personal twists and tweaks to let you create better
products faster and easier than anything you’ve ever tried.

Here’s the link and I look forward to seeing you on Thursday:

Click here to download the system and register for the teleseminar.

About The Author

Kyle Tully is an Internet Marketing Consultant, direct response copywriter and information marketer from Sydney, Australia. He helps entrepreneurs and small business owners get more new customers, increase cash flow and make more money using his proven marketing systems.

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