In the last 2 issues we looked at creating your own products and services. If you missed those, you can read then on-line at http://williecrawford.com/archives.html Today, let's look at a shortcut to getting your own product. Let's examine buying reprint rights.

I've been in business on-line since 1997 and I have only purchased 1 set of reprint rights that I marketed. I have gotten rights to lots of products as a bonus or had them given to me. Get reprint rights to the right product and you're set to generate a steady income stream for a long time. Buy the wrong reprint rights and you're just out of your time and money.

When considering buying reprint rights to a product, the most important factor is the demand for the product. If nobody wants the product, everything else is irrelevant. So I personally will only consider reprint rights for a product I would consider buying in the first place.

A little acknowledged FACT is the reason reprint rights are often offered for products is because the owner isn't making any money on the product itself. Offering reprint rights for many products actually decrease their value in the mind of potential buyers. Therefore, if a product is selling briskly at retail, it would usually be unwise to offer reprint rights. Consider this when looking for products to buy reprint rights to.

Another reason reprint rights are often offered for a product is because the product's creator wants to benefit from the viral effect. He is willing to forgo a large upfront profit to benefit from backend sales or publicity. These are generally products that contain links back to the person selling them embedded within the product. If the product is nothing more than a bunch of affiliate links then these links need to be brandable to make reprint rights to that product a potentially worthwhile investment.

What does make a great product to buy reprint rights to? I recently conducted a tele-seminar on using pay-per-click search engines. The tele-seminar was very profitable and generated a product I could resell. Shortly after that experience I confirmed that there were a lot of people who would buy an info product on how to conduct tele-seminars and regular seminars. So I considered writing such a product based upon my experiences.

With perfect timing, reprint rights to a product that teaches how to conduct seminars and tele-seminars was offered to me. It was by my friend Fred Gleeck who has conducted over 1350 one-day seminars. I met Fred at a recent workshop and knew that he really knew his stuff. They were offering a very limited number of reprint rights (they are no longer available) so I knew the market wouldn't be saturated. It was perfect. The rights were for a product I was actually considering buying anyway. I am planning on organizing my own small seminar or workshop in mid-2003 and am in the early stages of planning things.

This is the only product I've ever considered worth buying reprint rights to. Do yourself a favor and check it out at: http://williecrawford.com/your-own-seminar.html It a great product. Reprint rights sold for $197, so I needed to sell 10 copies to recoup my costs. I did that the first day.

Always ask yourself why reprint rights are being offered for a product. Really examine the product and know that there is a market for it. An excellent example of a product with tremendous potential for example, is my very own pay-per-clicks tele-seminar. I sell reprint rights to the digitally downloadable audio files, the PDF transcripts, and both the CD and audio cassette versions. Purchasers of the reprint rights are free to copy and resell the product in all of it's forms for any price that they want. They do not get the right to resell the reprint rights! I think that would destroy the market for all potential buyers. It would be offered on Ebay at cut-rates within a week and all purchasers of the reprint licenses would have wasted their money.

As you can see, not all reprint rights are the same. Some are totally worthless. I recommend only buying reprint rights where your market is somewhat protected. I have seen a lot of people buy reprint rights to products and do very heavy promotion with dismal results. I've seen solo mailings to thousand produce zero orders. The reason was because there was no demand for the product and other resellers behavior destroyed the potential for anyone to make any real money from the reprint rights.

To check out my reprint right, go to: http://williecrawford.com/pay-per-clicks.html Before wasting your money on any reprint rights, do a very thorough market analysis and KNOW that people already want the product. Convincing people that they need a product that you have reprint rights for is the hard way to do things. Find a product already in demand if you're going to buy reprint rights and you will find yourself with a very successful info product empire.