A blueprint is created by an architect or drafter as a plan or design for a building. It provides very precise measurements of all the little detail about the height of the building, width of the windows, thickness of the door frames. What about providing this type of precise and detailed plan for customers in your niche?

Here are some examples from Amazon.com:

• The Gingerbread Architect: Recipes and Blueprints for Twelve Classic American Homes – This book is written by an architect and a pasty chef. Tell me what’s better than building a cookie house designed by an architect? This cookbook is unique in that you learn to build gingerbread houses and a get a history lesson about architectural types. I think I will buy this one, although I’ll probably not make a gingerbread house any time soon!
• The Guerilla Film Makers Movie Blueprint
• Blueprints for a Solid Marriage: Build/Repair/Remodel
• Tracking : A Blueprint for Learning How – If I ever wanted to learn how to track humans, I’d probably grab this one just because of the reviews.
• The McGraw-Hill Guide to Writing a High-Impact Business Plan: A Proven Blueprint for First-Time Entrepreneurs – Here you see this is a blueprint focused on  ”first-time entrepreneurs.” But what about second-time entrepreneurs, women-entrepreneurs, small-town entrepreneurs? Great example of reaching sub-niches!
• The Ever-Blooming Flower Garden: A Blueprint for Continuous Color
• College Match: A Blueprint for Choosing the Best School for You
• The Complete Blueprint for an Escort Service – Odd niche, but good example of repurposing. This version is actually a compilation of the author’s previous two blueprints which were shorter. She repurposed the first version and made it more detailed in a second version, then took those two and made this third version which is longer and more expensive.)
• Men’s Health Better Body Blueprint: The Start-Right, Stick-to-It Strength Training Plan
• The Feng Shui Continuum: A Blueprint for Balanced Living

As you can see, blueprints can be made for almost any niche, especially those where you are teaching “how to do something.” When I hear the term blueprint, I’m thinking I should be getting a solid plan that takes me from beginning to end of what I’m learning how to do.

Here’s a tip: I suggest including a flowchart in your blueprint. A flowchart will show how you will reach the end and all the steps you would take. Mindmaps, while popular, might not support a blueprint because they are a way of organizing ideas and options.  In a blueprint, you want to provide specifics and direction, not give too many options.

For many of us, this was our 2nd 30-day blog challenge.  This challenge was definitely bigger and better and more diverse for sure.  One thing that saddened me about the last blog challenge was that when I saw the list of finishers, I didn’t know many of them were in the challenge.  While we were supposed to tweet our posts to @conniegreen, many people did not do that, so we only got to meet them at the very end.

Luckily, this time Jeanette Cates set up MeetOurMembers.com – where most of the challengers have signed up.  Last I heard, there were about 250 participants!  I’m pretty excited to find out who the finishers are of the 2nd blog challenge!

After the last challenge I posted what I accomplished in 30 days.  I just re-read that list and I realize my accomplishments from this challenge are not as evident as they were during the first challenge.  I don’t have a list of things that I “did” as a result of the challenge. I think the benefit of this challenge was that I was able to reach people more and I learned how far my reach can actually go.  For example:

• I wrote a post about FISH!  and voila, here were people from the company that sells it visiting my blog.
• I’ve had a number of  service/product providers contacting me and introducing me to their products – stuff I wouldn’t have known existed. I can’t wait to tell you all about them!
• I’ve had others writing to me directly asking for advice
• I’ve seen some of my posts referenced on other websites (via Trackbacks), like my DemoCreator review.
• I’ve gotten to see reactions of many people about products they have purchased – and that gives me direction in  being a better product creator and also helping others to become better product creators.

Now, once again, the challenge is to keep up the momentum!

One great thing about being an expert in your niche is having your own tried and true techniques, models or methods for doing something.  For example, I have a method called P.I.E.S.  that I developed for people who want to create ecourses to sell online.  Some fitness examples you may be familiar with are Winsor Pilates and Tae-Bo.  Mari Winsor has a very specific way of doing pilates that she sells under the name Winsor Pilates.  Billy Banks had a method of combining martial arts and boxing into his method of exercise he named Tae-Bo.

It’s really just a matter of thinking about what you know and forming it into “something” – like a process or a model that others can follow – and that you can give a snazzy name.

Take a look at the Slot Machine Method, from Jeanette Cates for a good example of a method for product creation using private label rights (PLR) content.

After you develop your method, the next step is to create a product around it. This is a great way to create a product that stands out from others, espeically in crowded niches because you’ll be offering something never seen before.

You can create a workbook to walk people through using your method; you can create a course to teach your method in detail; or you can even give a 2-hour webinar where people can interact with you and ask you questions about your method.

Do you have a method already?

Confirmation bias is a phenomenon where people seek out information that confirms what they believe to be true.  They don’t seek information to prove what they believe is incorrect. This post about confirmation bias on the You Are Not So Smart blog gives very nice examples of confirmation bias in action (and yes, I love the Golden Child, so I just might see if it’s available for instant viewing on Netflix tonight).

We all know that many techniques in marketing, advertising, sales are psychological tricks to get us to make a decision, hopefully in a way that benefits the seller. I’m sure you’ve heard the basic sales/marketing technique is to “find their pain point, and explain to them how your product can make them feel much better.”  That’s fine, it works on me. I’m a sucker for a good sales pitch even though I know it’s a pitch. Sometimes you just have to reward the sales person for being so good!

As far as choosing a product to create, understanding confirmation bias could be to your advantage.  Basically, you can think of it this way – what you’re currently thinking about is going to affect what you take notice of.  So if I’m pre-occupied with losing weight, everything having to do with dieting, weight loss, food, scales, and so on, will become more obvious to me.  My clothes are going to feel tighter, I’m going to feel hungrier more often, I’m going to notice how skinny all of my friends are too.

Now, a person obsessing about their weight is going to search for information about  how to lose weight fast because that is what she thinks she needs.  She probably will not look for information about why fast weight loss is dangerous because she believes she needs to lose weight fast . On the other hand there may be overweight people who don’t want to lose weight, and they will search for information on why one shouldn’t diet and the health risks involved in dieting.

When you’re choosing your topic and your angle, it could be good to understand these confirmations; it could be a very good way to discover a whole other market of people and repurpose your content for them. Try to keep in mind that it might not be you’re information they are after. It could be they are looking for another person who confirms what they believe.

I guess my point is to try to understand all of the reasons someone will buy your product and try to fit those things into your product and the sales pitch for your product – you just might attract people who wouldn’t have bought it initially. Here are some reasons people might buy your product:

1. they want to learn how to do something because they have a personal desire
2. they have to learn how to do something as a requirement for something else (like for their job)
3. they are just curious about something, no real interest, but it seems interesting to take a look at
4. they believe something and need more proof
5. it was on sale, it was a bargain, so why not, could be useful in the future (stockpiling)
6. they have a goal of knowing everything about everything
7. they want to find things wrong with your information to complain
8. they want to compare your information to someone else’s
9. they are shopaholics (will buy anything)
10. they may not understand why they need it, but it was recommended by a trusted friend
11. they simply believe in what you are teaching
12. they buy everything you sell

I’m sure there are many other reasons too!

>>Thanks for wanting to read the rest of this post! If you missed the first part click here <<

This happens a lot with information products. When you read their sales pages, you get a laundry list of stuff that you will learn when you buy the product. You think “Wow! Yes, that’s exactly what I wanted to know, FINALLY someone is going to teach me how to do that! Woo hoo!”  You get excited, re-read the whole sales page, look through 100 of affiliate emails to see who has the best bonus when buying through their link, go back and re-read the sales page just to make sure you’re really going to learn that one thing.

Then you visit the site of the seller to make sure he’s legit, read comments that people left to see if he’s “great” and if people love him. Then back to the sales page, giving it another once over, just to make sure. Then you re-read the fine print to make sure it’s not a continuity offer. Then you re-read that one part that caught your attention one more time and click the buy button. You get all kinds of emails confirming your purchase – at least 4. You read them all to find the one with the actual download link….and you get your product, all ready to learn that one thing. You skip everything else, and it all looks pretty detailed, “yeah, yeah..whatever.” So you just know you’re going to get some great information – but when you DO find it, it’s just a couple of sentences, and most of it is stuff you already know, like “you should do this wonderful thing…”    The first bite you wanted from this product, fell to the floor, just like your steak.

You want to try to avoid building up the hopes of your potential customers, then letting them down with your information. They are coming to you to help them with a problem or to learn how to do something you promised to teach them. If you are going to teach them something be sure that you have the expertise to do it, otherwise you will leave out important details, or get the details incorrect (which could cause them more problems).

I recently reviewed a product where the author did not have the expertise to even do what he was teaching, but he still attempted to teach it – it made no sense, it was confusing and too many details were left out.  If you want to include something you don’t have the expertise in this is a good opportunity to add a link to an affiliate product that can teach it better (don’t reinvent the wheel if you don’t have t0). You can even send them to a blog post, support site for a product, Amazon.com book, Wikipedia, any resource you have.

This will protect you and your credibility and you will still be seen as an expert because you won’t let them down.

Imagine this… You haven’t eaten since breakfast because you were so busy all day long you just didn’t get a chance to stop to each lunch, not even a snack. By the time dinner comes around you are shaking from hunger and all you can think of was a nice sizzling steak that someone was a home preparing for you.

You rush into your home and throw your stuff to the side, and the strongest smell in the air is the aroma of the steak (you can even hear it sizzling, like it’s calling you telling you it’s ready).  You can smell potatoes and green beans too, but you don’t care about those….only the steak because you’ve been waiting for it for hours.  You take your seat at the table and your steak is finally served to you, still steaming and it looks so juicy and tender!

You grab your knife to make a cut (pushing the potatoes and green beans out the way) and its like butter.  You stab your fork into it and lean over with your mouth wide open… then the laws of gravity take over, the steak falls to the floor before you can even just lick it!  Plop!  Right there on the floor – you want to cry.  And to top it off, the dog appears out of now where from under the table and gobbles it up! You’re devastated.

It’s not that you don’t have any more steak left, its just the first piece that was so important! It was what you had anticipated all day long. That one first bite was going to solve all your hunger problems. You came so close… not only didn’t you get to eat it, but it took time to watch it fall to the floor, realize what happened (feels like slow motion), then notice the dog and watch him eat it – and scold him for eating it. It’s the let down of not being able to enjoy the first bite.

All the anticipation and focus, then a let down.

>>I’m splitting this post because it’s way too long (plus I need a 2nd post for the blog challenge, this solves that problem, but don’t tell anyone!)  Click here for the continuation…

Before you start creating your information product, you will need to be honest with yourself: are you creating the product for your customer or yourself?  In all of the gigabytes of products I’ve accumulated over the last 7-8 years, I can easily tell what was created for “me.”  And there weren’t that many.

When a product is created with customers in mind you can tell they were well thought out and planned.  The quality is better, the organization of the information is better. They are usually a fair price (often a pretty low price)  and full of information.  The product creator will have gone above and beyond showing the value. The product is also accompanied by great customer service.  As a customer, you feel good about having purchased this product because you know it was made for you.

Other times products are created for the creator. Maybe they wanted to make some quick cash from their list or had a goal of adding to their product funnel.  You can tell these are rushed to be created. There are mistakes made. There isn’t much content.  In some case you can tell that the content writing has been outsourced. It’s often priced way more than it’s worth.  Sometimes it’s accompanied by 100s of old bonus products. On the other hand, you may run into a fairly high-quality product, but the information is way over your head. You start off reading about the creator and all of his accomplishments and all of his wealth – for the first 1/2 of the ebook. Then you learn about his system, his method and his way – and then he tries to sell even more stuff.  So it may seem like some type of self-glorifying product or just a way to sell more stuff.

Before you create your product, decide who it’s going to be for.  The obvious answer is to create it for your customers, but there may be times when having a self-serving product is appropriate.