Hi Jim,
I’ll answer your questions one at a time….
Question #1: But why am I still afraid?
You can't be a winner and be afraid to lose!
It sounds like you are afraid of FAILURE, which stems from a lack of self-confidence in your own abilities. This is a common problem many people who venture into a new area of business have.
It’s easy to conjure up all the negatives of why something you’d like to do will fail. Sometimes we fail in our endeavors simply because we BELIEVE we will fail right from the start. Failure is a state of mind, and your attitude towards what you set out to do is often the determining factor in your success.
If you do nothing, if you “talk yourself” out of your ideas then you have definitely failed. However, if you give it your best shot but don’t succeed, then you have not totally failed….. Instead you will have learned a great deal about yourself which will only make you stronger and wiser and bring you closer to success in your next venture. Remember that success often comes after failure. Failure is success if we learn from it.
How do you build that self-confidence you may be feeling?…..
Take action!…. In the words of the great American author, “Norman Vincent Peale”….
“Action is a great restorer and builder of confidence. Inaction is not only the result, but the cause, of fear. Perhaps the action you take will be successful; perhaps different action or adjustments will have to follow. But any action is better than no action at all”.
Question #2: I have even written a book that with a little tweaking should be of interest to people. So why am I apprehensive?
You are apprehensive because you fear REJECTION. You may feel that your written work won’t be a number one “best seller”, that it won’t be well received by it’s target readership or your book’s competition maybe better.
Again, these are thoughts that pass through the minds of all but the most positive of minded authors. You are not alone in the way you feel.
Question #3: I keep thinking about what will make people buy from me versus my competition?
That’s good!
Keep thinking about that which will set you apart from whatever competition you may have. Don’t fear your competition, learn to embrace it.
Competition is good not bad. Your competition is what has created a demand for your product before your arrival, competition is what makes it easy for you. A business without competition is a hard road. For you alone must create awareness, want and desire which may never existed.
I used to worry about the competition... All of my competitors selling ebooks on topics the same as mine. Would they offer better value?
Better and more information? Lower pricing? Would they eat into my market share? Would it make it harder for me to get a piece of the cake?
These are normal thoughts that cross the minds of anyone who sits down and puts pen to paper to create an ebook at one time or another. Rest assured, the more popular your subject matter, and the higher the demand for that type of information, the heavier the competition will be.
Then I thought it all out..... And arrived at this conclusion;
I welcome competition ... the more the merrier!
And so should you.... Here's why....
From the moment you are born to the day you die, in whatever endeavor or activity you participate in... There is always going to be competition.
The competition of getting that top job, in every sport, in the mating game, at school, in life itself. We soon learn the truth of Darwin's theory "It's the survival of the fittest". We live in a "dog eat dog world", always has been and always will be for as long as you decide to live in a competitive society.
On the Web, it’s not going to get any easier either... With more and more ecommerce Web sites appearing by the day, the popularity of ebook marketing on the increase ... The competition will not decline.
Now there are three choices you can make;
1. "If the kitchen gets too hot"... you can get out.
2. Fight your competition and hope you are the last man standing.
or 3. Use your competitors to your advantage
Competition is good ...not bad. All that online marketing your competitors are doing indirectly works to your advantage. You see, they are creating a greater awareness of your ebook topic with the buying public. They are creating and increasing the demand by their accumulative actions. Imagine if you had no competition... If you wrote an ebook on a topic, never before written about.... You think you've got it made, you think the target market would be all yours. Maybe that might be so. But did you ever stop to think that because YOU alone will be creating the awareness that such an ebook of uniqueness exists, that you would have to spend a fortune all by yourself to tell the world? Your competitors are your friends ....They have made it easier for you, by revving up demand, telling the world, creating awareness and giving credibility to "the must have" information you unfold in your own competing info-product.
Competition is healthy ... It keeps you on your toes, stops you sinking into that "comfort zone", forces you to devise marketing methods to stay one step ahead, challenges you to survive and strive to be the best at what you do... How boring life would be without like-minded competitors!
It's all part of the game ... The competitive spirit in all of us.
Question #4: Is it simply a matter of price? I see my competition offering some of the books for a lower price than I am intending. However, should I compete on price alone?
Price alone will not sell your ebooks on the Web. Perceived value in your information and its benefits it offers to your customers is what will sell your info-products. People won’t buy your information at any price if they don’t want, need or desire it.
The only time you may have a problem with pricing and your competition is when you are offering “apples for apples”. That is with your 20 books that you have the resell rights to as you stated. It’s much harder to sell an ebook that is available from many sources on the Web than an ebook that is only available from you, your own creation.
The best way to sell other people’s works that you own the reprint and resell rights to, is to package them with other unique offerings of your own.
For example…. Offering your expertise in services that your competitors and other resellers of the same ebooks cannot or are not prepared to do.
Such as….
1. A private “one on one” email or phone consultation.
2. A customer only ezine.
3. A customer only private forum
Regarding your worry about… “ Then there is the matter of getting buyers to my site. I do not have a list of people to send a notice to. I am starting from scratch. I have tried other opportunities and not had much success. So, I am a little skeptical it will work this time.
Getting buyers to your site is indeed the hardest part of running any Internet business. Your successes here will all depend on the amount of time and or money you are prepared to spend on marketing your website.
Without letting people know you are in business and what you are offering on a regular basis you cannot succeed on the Web.
You have no doubt heard the saying;
“So you built a Web site… But nobody came?”
Nothing is truer than this statement when it comes to having a presence on the World Wide Web! …. Not unless of course, you’re a well-known international organization or household brand name, and even then this does not guarantee success. If the Internet is the Information Superhighway, and your Web site, a home on it, then your promotion can be likened to advertising billboards by the side of the highway. The more “billboards” or sign posts pointing to your home, the more passing traffic and visitors knocking at your door.
Unless you promote your site, let people know that it exists, nothing will happen.
This is why approximately 94% of businesses relying on the Internet fail.
You can have the best award winning designed Web site offering the best product there is, but if no one knows about it, its just a work of art sitting in someone’s dark attic!
The more marketing methods you employ and the more time you spend promoting your site, the greater chance you have of building a successful online business.
Warmest Regards & $uccess
Ricky Higgs
Author of the highly regarded digital book
- Sell Your Brain On The Net
http://www.work-at-home-making-money-online.com
