How to Make Money at Home by Giving Free Stuff Away
Announcing free stuff is a marketing tactic that almost always attracts interested consumers. Anyone can make money at home by setting up a website and giving away free stuff to a specific niche market--that is, a certain area of the market filled with hungry buyers (for example, the weight-loss and money-making markets). Giving away products, such as ebooks, podcasts or video series, helps you create a list of "leads" to which you can market and sell, making a profit in the process.
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Instructions
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Research trendy and "hot" topics to figure out what free stuff would most attract website visitors and Internet traffic. Go online to places like Yahoo Buzz and Google Trends to research popular Internet search queries and topics. Popular areas that usually attract many people include weight loss, making money, and alternative health and wellness. Make a decision about which area you're going to offer something.
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Create a product surrounding the genre you've chosen. Develop a digital ebook on the topic, email course or series of lessons about it, or downloadable podcast or some other product that can be sent via email. Outsource the work, if necessary, to a freelancer via websites like iFreelance, oDesk or Guru.com.
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Set up a website or blog with an opt-in box. An opt-in box allows site visitors to enter their name and email address to sign up for your mailing list. Upload the product you created to your Web server. Subscribe to an email marketing service (a.k.a. autoresponder)--such as Aweber, Constant Contact or iContact--to help you create your opt-in box and manage individuals who sign up for your email list. Customize your autoresponder "welcome" message that individuals automatically receive when signing up; place a link in this "welcome" message to the free product you created. Copy and paste the autoresponder opt-in box's HTML code into your website.
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Create a section on your site promoting the free product. Write about the benefits that such a product can give website visitors and why it's important. Give this section a prominent spot on your website so it stands out and is one of the first things site visitors see.
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Find products which you can advertise, promote and/or sell to regular subscribers of your email list. Sign up for affiliate programs that allow you to promote others' products in return for a commission when you achieve sales. Examples of places where you can find affiliate programs include Clickbank, Commission Junction, PayDotCom, Amazon and Walmart.com. Or, create additional products authored by yourself or freelancers.
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Customize follow-up email messages through your autoresponder service. Write about issues relevant to the "hot" or popular topic you've chosen, providing value and important information to your email list subscribers while at the same time promoting the affiliate programs for which you've signed up.
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Promote your website to attract website visitor and obtain more "leads" for your email marketing list. Create text-links for your email address and in online forums and message boards that feature your website. Discuss your website and post announcements on social networking websites like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. Share your website on social bookmarking sites. Write articles on "hot" topics and submit them to online article directories to increase your website traffic through links back to your site.
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References
Resources
- Photo Credit free stuff image by Paul Moore from Fotolia.com
