Create,New,Products,amp,#58,Us marketing Create New Products: Use Leveraging

Awhile ago, I got an email from one of the "gurus" I follow and it shocked me. The gist of it was this person wanted to trade services for a household item.To say it floored me would be an understatement.What was worse was a few days later t Automation technologies represent a fundamental aspect of any modern industry. The major types of industrial automation solutions, such as DCS, PLC, SCADA, and MES, are used on a large-scale in process and discrete industries.DCS technologie

It still surprises me when a light bulb flash turns into anaha moment. Yesterday I had the light bulb flash that grewand grew until it gave me a big smack upside the back of myhead this morning.Yesterday was like most of my days, yet while writingyesterday’s article, I stopped mid sentence, and my thoughtswent back to an ezine article I read early that morning. Itwas one of those times when your thoughts completely jump toanother circuit -- you know the kind.Quickly I dashed down the hall and corner with lighteningspeed. Not. Just walked. I had always wanted to writethat, I know cute, Catherine. What caught my attention wasthe contest announcement in that ezine. I remembered thatJanice (name not changed to protect the innocent) would beinterested in the information since she wrote poetry. Ifound it and e-mailed her the info. Cut and dry, huh? Ithought so to, but not quite.Later that evening during our coaching session, Janicementioned how she appreciated the information but she didn'twrite poetry for children. Oops, I didn't even see thatimportant detail. However, she appreciated the thought andexplained that it gave her a flash of another contest sheknew about that she had always wanted to enter. As she wastalking about this, I remembered my childhood try at poetry."Now where did I put those" came to mind.Yes, you guess it; I went looking for my old poems after thecall. Including staying up past midnight reading them againand chuckling on my mindset at the time. I even wrote quotea few on President Kennedy’s death -- but that’s anothertopic. I chose three, submitted them, and went to bedpleased with myself about taking some action with them.Did you know that the difference between a light bulb momentand an aha moment is the depth of experience in whatever isoccurring. Light bulb is the flash, the aha is when youmake the connections between that and other experiences inyour life.This morning the aha part of the light bulb moment hit me --the marketing aspect to all this. In order to give you acomplete picture, let me including the "ad" I found in theezine. This is a quote.*************** AD ********Half Price Books' 10th Annual Bedtime Story ContestDEADLINE: December 1, 2003GENRE: Children's fiction and poetryOPEN TO: All, except employees of Half Price Books and TheTexas Bookman, or any agents or affiliates thereof.LENGTH: Stories: up to 300 words; Poems: up to 50 lines.THEME: To promote literacy and encourage people to read,Half Price Books will publish a book featuring the winningstories. All proceeds from the sale of the book fundliteracy and education projects. All entries should beappropriate to be read to and by children, ages 8 and under.We do not require our authors to illustrate their ownstories. However, if you are an artist and would like tosubmit your artwork along with your story or poem, weencourage you to do so. All entries must be typed andinclude your name, address, phone number and e-mail address.Entries, whether mailed or e-mailed, that do not includecontact information will be disqualified. See our onlinecontest guidelines for more information.PRIZES: Grand Prize: $200 gift card from Half Price Books;2nd Prize: $100 gift card; 3rd Prize: $50 gift card;Finalists: $20 gift cardELECTRONIC ENTRY: Yes, must be in MS Word or rich textformats.ADDRESS: Half Price Books, ATTN: Bedtime Story Contest, 5803E Northwest Hwy, Dallas, TX 75231EMAIL: [email protected]: http://www.halfpricebooks.com (Click on "Enter ourBedtime Story Contest")*************************Here is the marketing aha: They saw a need for children’sbooks in the 8th grade and lower market. They connectedwith a publisher, sold the idea to them, and then createdthis advertisement and place it in many ezines (someassumptions here). Then they leveraged to bring them theresults they desired with the least amount of effort ontheir part.Let me move this strategy in a way on how you can apply itto your success:1. Find a hungry niche/market (they found one – the 8thgrade and lower markets lacked poetry).2. Made sure there was an excellent chance for a sale orguaranteed revenue (I'm sure they wouldn't have done it hadit not).3. Leverage other people resources to fill the product(they are taking other people’s material, accumulating it,finding the best, and putting it into a product).4. Don't pay out anything until you have the advance, oryou can make enough money on presales to cover the expenses(their prize awards aren't going to be paid out until theyget an advance from the publisher for the book or theypresell it through their own marketing program). [Specialnote: their break even point is so low all they would needto do is sell 100 books -- fairly easy since they alreadyown hundreds of retails stores already.]5. Sell the product and pocket the profit. (Except, theyare probably going to make some money, their biggestadvantage is in their new market attraction to theirstores.)Think about all the times this has been done in the past.One of the best-case scenarios is the Chicken Soup of theSoul books. They didn't write any of them, they leveragedall the content by finding the writers that wanted to gettheir name in print anyway possible (most professionalslooking to built visibility for their practice). And theywere happy to have that opportunity. Therefore, ChickenSoup created a win/win. Dollars for their pocket and"published author" recognition for the writers.After a few issues it took on a whole new momentum, evenChicken Soup didn't even see coming, people volunteeredtheir ideas for more topics/books and even leveraged toproduce more books for their series and they rode it all theway to the bank -- becoming an overnight millionaire -- oh,I think it’s billionaire now.In summary, here is some of the wisdom from this light bulbmoment:* Relationships are important in building a practice.Taking the time to not only see things from our ownperspective, it is important to see them from thepossibilities for our clients/customers. It only takes amoment and the experience can be so fabulous.* How much easier it is to develop a product withleveraging. How can you apply this to something in yourbusiness?* Synergy builds with action after a light bulb flash. So,why not stop and take action when it occurs. The journey issooooo worth it.* Where is the hungry market for your product/services?Identify them and make your marketing so much easier. Theycan be just an age group away.* What is sitting on your desk right now that could helpone of your clients? Share it, it will come back. This ishow the universe works.Take a moment right now and write down three action steps onwhat you are taking away from this. Did you have differentflashes? Share them with me so I can spread the energy. Orshare them with whom you need to. Send them an e-mail, itonly takes a moment. Go ahead, do it. The ripple will befelt for a long time. Leveraging is a mindset, let it starthere and now.