The Three Phases of Information Product Marketing

Information product marketers tend to go through three distinct phases in their careers. By knowing what to expect, you can prepare yourself for these different phases, as well as work towards progressing through them faster.

Here are the three phases of being an information marketer.

=> The Unknown Phase

In this phase, you’re an unknown in the industry. You’re driving primarily “cold” traffic – through pay per click, through SEO, through article marketing, etc.

Your conversions are generally pretty low; from 0.25% to 1.5%. Your conversions depend primarily upon the strength of your sales letters.

This is the most difficult phase of being an information marketer. Unfortunately, it’s also the phase that a lot of people get stuck in. Marketers will also often keep starting new websites that end up in this phase, rather than progressing existing websites to the next level.

=> The Take-Off Phase

The take-off phase starts when you’ve figured out a way to successfully sell one product. For example, if you’ve figured out how to profitably sell one product via Google AdWords, that marks the beginning of the take-off phase.

Once you’re successfully selling one product, then your concerns change quite a bit. Instead of getting a business off the ground, you’re now increasing business. It’s a very different mindset.

The two primary things that people in the take-off phase are concerned about are building a list and creating new products.

If your initial product is good and you have solid upselling skills, you can often get as much as 10% to 25% of your buyers to buy from you again – even if the next item is significantly more expensive than the first. That’s why it’s so important to start adding more products.

Building your list will allow you to start developing more long-term influence and clout in the industry, as well as build your most powerful marketing tool.

=> The Solid Reputation Phase

Getting to this phase usually takes nine months to a year and a half of solid progress. At this stage, you have a reputation in the industry. People know who you are and what your company stands for.

You’ll start getting traffic that just comes from direct type-ins and people who Googled your company name. This is “reputation traffic” – word-of-mouth traffic.

You’ll also see your conversions increase, without you having to change your sales letters. Again, this is because people know you’re not a fly-by-night website. You have a reputation, which builds trust. People are more willing to pull out their credit cards and place their faith in you.

At this point, your main concerns are adding high-ticket items and subscription programs. This is the stage at which you’ll start to have “hyper consumers” – people who will buy anything you put out. It may be time to roll out that $1,000 DVD program or $10,000 live program. Or perhaps roll out that $47 a month subscription. You have the trust to do it.

These are the three typical phases of an information product marketing website. Don’t get stuck in the first one – progress through each phase as quickly as you can. The real money is made in stage three, not stage one.