Use your online skills to help offline businesses
Something I realized just a few short weeks ago and have been cramming information into my poor little brain since then is one very simple fact that I am absolutely sure is going to help me start earning a wonderful and steadily growing income.
That simple fact, which probably applies to most Internet Marketers (yes even you new to the game guys and gals) is that, everything you have learnt to help you build your business online is most probably an absolute goldmine of information to an “offline business”.
I know that in my little area of the world in South Wales, UK that most people barely know how to switch their computer on, let alone how to use it to increase business to their offline interests BUT and this is the important bit, a lot of those very same people are now realizing that they NEED an online presence but yikes! they have no idea how to go about it, nor the time it would take to learn what to do. Well can you see where you come in?
Are you a copywriter and can you put a site online, e.g. a self hosted wordpress site?
If you can’t put a site online but you know a little about online marketing then you can outsource the other work.
If your an SEO expert this is perfect for you as well.
In fact, all you really need is enough online marketing knowledge to get a business owners attention.
Well I have, what I thought was a little bit of knowledge in each of the above areas (after a bit of offline research I am now realizing, it’s a fair bit of knowledge compare to offline business owners) and with the contacts I have made online, I know I can, if I want or need to, outsource some of the work at very reasonable costs.
You are probably thinking, well that’s going to cost me a lot to get this business set up if I have to outsource some of it.. well no actually.
You see, offline businesses are used to spending way more on Marketing than we online people are used to, so you simply include the outsource into the quote you will give them, they invariably are still getting marketing cheaper than they normally pay and you are left to do the part of the business that you are good at, or perhaps just love more than the other bits, whatever your personal reason would be to outsource.
OK so before I go off on another tangent, which I am apt to do, sorry LOL let me give you this link to a pdf I found that is going to help me set about doing this because if this idea interests you at all, well I reckon you want me to stop blabbing and get to the point LOL.
This is by “Andrew Cavanagh” who is a member of the marvellous Warrior Forum and it’s called “Offline Gold for the Online Marketer” and yes there is a price tag, at the moment that is $19.99 and I am told, that price will go up - take a look and see if you think it’s something you could do, oh and wish me luck as I embark on this endeavor which I am very excited about.
I am very tempted to say I will give a progress report here BUT I also realize I might be to damn busy! Hey let’s see how that goes, perhaps a monthly update will be a doable thing and we can all compare notes.
Use your online skills to help offline businesses…
Article about how your skills in online Internet Marketing that you take for granted “could” earn you a good income in the offline world….
June 23rd, 2008 at 9:48 pmReally nice article most marketers will tell you keep everything online,but off line my be your gold mine !
to your success
June 24th, 2008 at 12:09 amJacob
Well written, Sue. See you in Adland
June 24th, 2008 at 1:43 amThanks Jacob for your comments. Keeping everything online is probably going to benefit those marketers who would tell you that LOL - I say, nothing wrong with doing a bit of both - certainly I could not attempt what I will now without the experience I have picked up - good and bad - in the last couple of years online but I will put more of my efforts now into offline for another reason not mentioned in my article, “my competition” online I am competing with some fantastic marketers, offline, ummm pretty much nobody except for the odd “high priced” website building agency.
In my area it seems that businesses have not had much choice in the matter, had to pay those prices if they want a website and often pay a lot “Just” for a website little realizing it’s not getting any traffic and the website just becomes a financial burden for them. I hope to give them a bit of choice now both in what they get and price.
Glad you liked the article John and yep, see you at Adland.
Sue
June 24th, 2008 at 7:27 amHi Sue
I know what you mean about the divide in knowledge, comming from the other side of the Bristol channel.
I guess if you are good enough at selling an idea - that idea being as simple as getting a website, you’d make your cash in the south west in no time.
June 24th, 2008 at 8:52 amHi Zara, nice to hear from you.
I did used to work in a call centre but I do think with this and with what I have read from others doing the same thing, you don’t really need to “sell” this. Just get the word out that the service is there and people will come to you.
I have a couple of ideas for doing that, more on that another time.
I have already found that I just get asked for help anyway.. for instance in my sons school where I have chatted with parents from time to time and the question of what do you do comes up I have just said, I work from home in IM and leave it at that.
Later I have had parents who have small businesses come up to me saying, “your Jon’s Mum, you work with computers don’t you, I could use some help with…” so the grapevine works very well LOL.
My first step is in fact building a website for a school parent - I am not going to charge this guy but have already said I would like some kind of testimony from him later, so that way I hope to have something to show people when I do start getting the word out more actively.
Zara this is a good way for us to earn an income for those of us in the UK particularly, I already have reseller hosting which because of the exchange rate does not cost much at all per month, I can upload WP for free as you probably know and can have lots of domains on my reseller account.
Tons of ways I can utilize those things, perhaps someone will just pay me for hosting for instance or a package of domain name registration, website build with hosting and SEO, what have I actually paid out for? My hosting account, as I said, that’s cheap for me here in the UK and paying for the domain name, also not expensive.. so ummm, you do the math LOL perhaps you should consider the same thing
Again, its a win/win for the business and for me, they get a good website WITH traffic at a far cheaper cost than they would pay before and I get an income (some of that residual).
Thanks
June 24th, 2008 at 9:18 amSue
Internet is no doubt a big help to business entrepreneur, big or small companies are taking advantage of it. Just learn how to do it and your business will go up the ground.
July 5th, 2008 at 7:45 amthanks for giving information
July 17th, 2008 at 8:41 pmThanks for your comments Jack and Nitish
Sue
July 17th, 2008 at 10:35 pm