Short reports will enable you to build your list, drive massive traffic to your blog and other sites, and increase your online revenue, as long as you think about how you will be able to monetize them over time. That’s right, you must decide what you will promote before you even start to write the report, and how to make sure that it remains evergreen (information that will be good for years, not just at the present time) so that you your prospects will be able to use the information you prepare for them for many years to come without it becoming stale or outdated. Take a look at this short report I wrote on eBook writing and marketing.
The thought of writing a ten page report was daunting to me when I was first getting started with my online business. I had written reports of that length for the classes I had taken in order to get my teaching credential, but I typically had a full semester in which to do my research and prepare my paper on the topic I had chosen or had been assigned. This style of writing is very different. And, I’m happy to tell you, no one will be giving you a grade on what you write!
In fact, you will want to start your short report by just writing a short blog post on your topic. I recommend just letting your ideas flow to see what comes up. I get some of my best ideas this way, and I’m not sure exactly where they come from. I think about what I want to share with my readers, and then just start writing with small paragraphs, such as the ones I am using here.
Like I said in the very beginning, decide what you will be promoting before you write anything more than your blog post or article. Sometimes I am writing in order to promote one of my own courses or programs, but most often it is to promote an affiliate product or course. The idea is to present information in your short report that will explain clearly to the readers how they will benefit from the products you are recommending. It must all make sense to them, in terms of what they need to do first, and then what they need to do next to move closer to their goals.
By now you can see that writing your short report will be an excellent way to promote your own products and those of others for whom you are an affiliate.
Aaron Hoos says
Thanks for the post, Connie. Reports are so valuable and I love your iterative approach — start small and build from there. A blog post can turn into an article which can turn into a short report… and a short report can always turn into a long report later.
The other advantage to this method is that you can get multiple pieces of content out of just one idea.
All the best, Connie!
-Aaron