One of the most powerful gifts I was ever given was Paul Zane Pilzer's "Economic Alchemy." That was 15 years ago and at the time I only had the slightest inkling of what that could truly mean. But I was riveted. He explained that wealth and resources are not things that are merely dug out of the ground or "negotiated out of" or taken from other people -- they are actually created out of thin air by ingenuity.
-Intel makes Pentium chips (worth their weight in gold, literally) out of sand (which itself is almost worthless).
-Every single person who has ever written a piece of software was creating value, literally, out of thin air. Re-arranging 1's and 0's. Pure ingenuity, yet immensely useful and productive.
Today, 7 "thin air" strategies that take existing resources and apply them in new ways. You can do these things within your own business - or using what already exists in somebody else's business. Either way you profit:
1. Transform Expertise into Profitable Training - between the ears of every company's employees is knowledge and expertise that goes largely untapped. When I worked for a high-tech firm selling networking equipment, I realized that customers desperately needed to know what my own support staff knew. (That's why they were calling for support.) Furthermore, I knew a service / installation company in Pennsylvania that literally had more experience with this than any other company in the country.
With the company in Pennsylvania, I assembled a training program and we sold it to our customers for $1500 a head. Every $1 we spent mailing our customers flyers about our training events brought us $8 in sales.
Please understand, before we did this we were not even remotely in the training or seminar business. Our gig was selling industrial equipment. But the training created an extra revenue stream for us and it also did something else: It positioned us as Grand Central Station for training on this technology in our industry.
2. License something you have to another company - I'll just stick to the example I already gave you. Once we had this training system in place, we sold it to a major trade organization who in turn sold it to their 300 member companies.
If you have any kind of real business, you probably have something you can license to somebody else.
3. Tollgate Joint Ventures - If you're "only" a consultant or freelancer, but you have friends or clients who do have a "real business": You can license their know-how to others and keep some of it in your pocket. That's called a Tollgate Joint Venture. The essence of doing this is making it easy for the people on both sides. Be willing to do the legwork and make it easy and there's little resistance.
4. Customer Re-Activation - Friend of a friend is a retired dentist who goes around in his motor home now and every time he wants to make $40 grand he works out a "customer reactivation" strategy with a local dentist office somewhere. He takes their old customer files and mails out letters that get those people back in the door. His cut is 100% of their first visit. Re-activating old customers is highly profitable, whether you do it for yourself or others.
5. Re-Niching or Sub-Niching a Product - You know the "Chicken Soup for the Soul" books? Those are the quintessential example. Chicken soup for the Chiropractor's soul, Chicken Soup for the Preteen Soul, Chicken Soup for the Couple's Soul, the list is endless.
You can probably do this too, even with products that have nothing to do with books. All you have to do is cater to the identity of your customer. Often the necessary changes to your product are minimal.
6. Selling Leads for Big Bucks - Affiliate marketers and Google Cash guys do this a lot but that's not the only place you can do it. My first consulting gig - this company sold expensive software and I asked El Presidente how much money it cost him to acquire one new customer.
He said, "It costs me $50,000 to get a new customer."
I said, "What if I got that number down to $15,000?"
He said, "That would be great." I knew it was just a matter of generating the leads. If it took 100 leads to get one customer, then a lead would be worth $150. I sent him an action plan, he signed off on it and we had a deal.
If you want to sell leads, all you have to do is find out what one is worth. If you're any good at marketing you can get the lead for a lot less than it's worth to your customer.
7. Knock Yourself Off - The prevailing Google advertisers in my coaching programs occupy not just one but two, three, four positions on the page. One position is their original flagship product but other ads emphasize other things - different shapes and colors; one accents high levels of service, another goes for lowest price. Doubles their market share.
Hey.... If you don't do it your competitors will.
If you want to build a business that capitalizes on all seven of these concepts - and does so with an ongoing, evolving stream of information - I invite you to investigate my Mastermind Club. Mastermind is for people who aim to achieve a six or seven-figure income with direct application of state-of-the-art marketing knowledge:
http://perrymarshall.com/mastermind
There is wealth and profit sitting literally under your nose. All you need is someone to lead you by the hand and show you how to put the pieces together. Mastermind Club can do that.
Here's to more Economic Alchemy and Success in your corner of the world.
Perry Marshall
-Intel makes Pentium chips (worth their weight in gold, literally) out of sand (which itself is almost worthless).
-Every single person who has ever written a piece of software was creating value, literally, out of thin air. Re-arranging 1's and 0's. Pure ingenuity, yet immensely useful and productive.
Today, 7 "thin air" strategies that take existing resources and apply them in new ways. You can do these things within your own business - or using what already exists in somebody else's business. Either way you profit:
1. Transform Expertise into Profitable Training - between the ears of every company's employees is knowledge and expertise that goes largely untapped. When I worked for a high-tech firm selling networking equipment, I realized that customers desperately needed to know what my own support staff knew. (That's why they were calling for support.) Furthermore, I knew a service / installation company in Pennsylvania that literally had more experience with this than any other company in the country.
With the company in Pennsylvania, I assembled a training program and we sold it to our customers for $1500 a head. Every $1 we spent mailing our customers flyers about our training events brought us $8 in sales.
Please understand, before we did this we were not even remotely in the training or seminar business. Our gig was selling industrial equipment. But the training created an extra revenue stream for us and it also did something else: It positioned us as Grand Central Station for training on this technology in our industry.
2. License something you have to another company - I'll just stick to the example I already gave you. Once we had this training system in place, we sold it to a major trade organization who in turn sold it to their 300 member companies.
If you have any kind of real business, you probably have something you can license to somebody else.
3. Tollgate Joint Ventures - If you're "only" a consultant or freelancer, but you have friends or clients who do have a "real business": You can license their know-how to others and keep some of it in your pocket. That's called a Tollgate Joint Venture. The essence of doing this is making it easy for the people on both sides. Be willing to do the legwork and make it easy and there's little resistance.
4. Customer Re-Activation - Friend of a friend is a retired dentist who goes around in his motor home now and every time he wants to make $40 grand he works out a "customer reactivation" strategy with a local dentist office somewhere. He takes their old customer files and mails out letters that get those people back in the door. His cut is 100% of their first visit. Re-activating old customers is highly profitable, whether you do it for yourself or others.
5. Re-Niching or Sub-Niching a Product - You know the "Chicken Soup for the Soul" books? Those are the quintessential example. Chicken soup for the Chiropractor's soul, Chicken Soup for the Preteen Soul, Chicken Soup for the Couple's Soul, the list is endless.
You can probably do this too, even with products that have nothing to do with books. All you have to do is cater to the identity of your customer. Often the necessary changes to your product are minimal.
6. Selling Leads for Big Bucks - Affiliate marketers and Google Cash guys do this a lot but that's not the only place you can do it. My first consulting gig - this company sold expensive software and I asked El Presidente how much money it cost him to acquire one new customer.
He said, "It costs me $50,000 to get a new customer."
I said, "What if I got that number down to $15,000?"
He said, "That would be great." I knew it was just a matter of generating the leads. If it took 100 leads to get one customer, then a lead would be worth $150. I sent him an action plan, he signed off on it and we had a deal.
If you want to sell leads, all you have to do is find out what one is worth. If you're any good at marketing you can get the lead for a lot less than it's worth to your customer.
7. Knock Yourself Off - The prevailing Google advertisers in my coaching programs occupy not just one but two, three, four positions on the page. One position is their original flagship product but other ads emphasize other things - different shapes and colors; one accents high levels of service, another goes for lowest price. Doubles their market share.
Hey.... If you don't do it your competitors will.
If you want to build a business that capitalizes on all seven of these concepts - and does so with an ongoing, evolving stream of information - I invite you to investigate my Mastermind Club. Mastermind is for people who aim to achieve a six or seven-figure income with direct application of state-of-the-art marketing knowledge:
http://perrymarshall.com/mastermind
There is wealth and profit sitting literally under your nose. All you need is someone to lead you by the hand and show you how to put the pieces together. Mastermind Club can do that.
Here's to more Economic Alchemy and Success in your corner of the world.
Perry Marshall
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