It’s every creator’s nightmare: You spend hours creating digital content you really believe in, all while imagining the hordes of people who would love your creation. But when you finally launch your product…crickets. Nobody buys it.
You give it a few days, trying not to think about it, but you can’t help it. You keep refreshing the webpage. Still nothing. Your Aunt Margaret keeps asking how your launch is going, and telling you about her friend Bob who she heard is hiring, would you maybe like her to give him a call?
We’re begging you: Ignore your Aunt Margaret. She means well, but she’s just telling you what she was told when she was growing up: that the best way to make money is to work at a traditional job for thirty years and collect your retirement fund. She has no idea how many people are already making loads of money selling digital content or that most of them are just following the same tried-and-true formula that anyone can follow.
Even you.
Even your Aunt Margaret.
Table of Contents
The 9-Step Formula to Monetise Digital Content
- Choose a great web host
- Create a good product
- Establish authority
- Incentivise early buying, repeat buying, and spreading the word
- Make your copy shine
- Use social proof
- Make an emotional connection
- Make it a no-sweat decision for customers to buy from you
- Don’t give up too soon – Money multiplies
1. Choose a great web host
Choosing a web host is easy to overlook when you’re busy bringing your idea to life, but this is one of the most important parts of your content monetisation strategy.
A web host manages the servers where your website will be stored. If you choose a web host with slow servers, your website will load too slowly, and your customers will end up clicking out of the page before your stunning homepage can even finish loading. If you choose a web host with poor security and few backup offerings, your site will be vulnerable to hackers and data loss, which could put such a dent in your reputation that you might have to build a new brand from scratch if you ever want anyone to buy from you again.
So, now that you know what web hosts to avoid, what are some things you can look for in a good web host?
A great web host will have these features:
- 99.9% server uptime
- Cloud backup
- Monitoring tools
- 24/7 customer service
These features will ensure that your site stays up and running, and that you’ll have someone to guide you through it if something does go wrong.
(BONUS: Selling web hosting is one more way you can make money from a digital product. Check out our amazing reseller hosting packages, so you can make money renting server space without even buying your own servers!)
2. Create a good product
This seems to go without saying, but you’d be surprised how many people create shoddy, sub-par products and expect the money to come rolling in any second. Unfortunately, that’s not quite how customers work.
Most people don’t want to spend their money on something that isn’t going to add real value to their lives. So, your job as a person who’s hoping to monetise digital content, is to make sure whatever you create is actually worth the money.
In fact, your job is to make sure you add so much value to your digital content that customers feel that whatever they’re paying for it is a bargain.
3. Establish authority
You can’t expect to monetise digital content if people don’t trust your ability to create a good product. A huge part of your content monetisation strategy is having people perceive you as an expert on whatever need your product is designed to fill.
If you’re selling an eBook or a course, for example, people need to know that they can trust the information they’re buying from you. This could involve things like starting a blog where you dispense some of your knowledge for free then point customers to your digital product, or starting a YouTube channel or Instagram account where you demonstrate how you apply some of the tips in your eBook or course.
If you have any qualifications or experience related to the product you’re selling, you’ll want to showcase that as well.
4. Incentivise early buying, repeat buying, and spreading the word
Impulse is the soul of sales.
If you want to make money, don’t give your customers time to thinkabout whether they should buy from you or whether they should tell their friends about your product.
Create urgency by giving special discounts to customers who buy within a certain time frame or who refer friends to your product. And with each product, include a time-sensitive discount code that they can use when they buy from you again.
5. Make your copy shine
“Copy” is basically the voice of your brand. Brands have different copy styles. It’s why some brands sound responsible and no-nonsense, while some sound trendy and energetic.
Your brand voice doesn’t need to match the way you speak in real life. It should be whatever it needs to be to sell the digital product you’ve created. A light, flirty brand voice will work better for an eBook about dating than for a course on stock trading. But whatever your brand’s voice is, keep it consistent, and polish it until it shines.
6. Use social proof
Show your customers that people just like them are already using and enjoying your digital product. Use testimonials and reviews to boost sales.
7. Make an emotional connection
Let your customers peek behind the curtain sometimes. Show them the parts of the process that most creators don’t show. Make them feel like they’re a part of the creative process, and they’ll want it to succeed. They’ll buy from you, spread the word, and do whatever it takes to make sure your product sells.
8. Make it a no-sweat decision for customers to buy from you
Spending money is hard, especially when you haven’t bought a certain product before.
Calm your skittish customers. Create a no-strings-attached refund policy, so they know that if they try your product and don’t like it, they’ll get their money back, no problem.
And soothe their specific fears about online shopping by making sure it’s safe for them to shop with you.
9. Don’t give up too soon – Money multiplies
Sales lead to more sales. When a customer gets value from your product, they buy from you again, and they tell people they love.
The first sale you make will be your hardest. Don’t give up.
It would be a boring, colourless world if creative people stopped making things. These 9 tips are our way of making sure you actually make money doing what you love, so you can keep making the world a little brighter than you found it. (Thank you, by the way.)
