In Part One we did some research to make sure that our product idea actually had a market. In addition, we took a look at all the ways at our disposal for delivering our product: ebooks, CDs, audio files, videos, membership sites and any combination of these.
In Part Two we did some brainstorming to determine what we knew and what we didn't know about our topic. After that, we purchased some competing products to evaluate them and to see if there were sub-topics we may have overlooked in our brainstorming session.
Now, you're going to continue gathering information and ideas.
Take a trip to the bookstore. Are there any magazines that target your topic? Take a look at the table of contents. What kinds of sub-topics are they covering? Did you include these when you organized your material in Part Two? If not, add them. Read the ads in the back. Anything there you might want to include under a sub-topic?
Keep taking those notes.
Check out the bookshelves as well. If you find some books on your topic, follow the same process.
Online, return to the groups and forums you discovered in Part One. What are they talking about? What problems are they having? What solutions are being proposed? Once again, make note of sub-topic areas you may have overlooked. And continue to collect information that you'll want to have included in your product.
A Quick Note: you're only collecting information. You can gather passages, paragraphs, chapters, whatever. However, you can't pull these directly out of your source material and use them as is. That's plagiarism. It's a form of stealing. Respect the intellectual property of others as you would want them to respect your own intellectual property. Everything you gather MUST be rewritten in your own words. This may sound a bit intimidating at first, but trust me, in the end it will make your product far more interesting and readable.
Okay, back to business.
By now, you should have developed a much better idea of your target audience ... not just the topic (making custom jewelry, as in our example), but also the buyer. Beginner? Advanced? Hobbyist or professional? Male or female or both? Old or young or both? It's much easier to develop a product when you have your target buyer clear in your mind. You'll want to be aware of this general profile as you begin to organize your material.
Organizing Your Product Material
This is an easy, straightforward process. You've already established a list of sub-topics, and you've already added material within those sub-topics. All you need to do now is to organize your sub-topic list.
So the question that comes to mind is this: what's the most effective way to present your material?
The most common way to organize content is from the easiest to comprehend to the hardest, from the basics to the advanced. However, you may want to organize your content in some other manner. For example, with our sample topic of making custom jewelry it might be necessary to begin with an overview, then move to the materials used, then maybe the tools, then perhaps the various forms of jewelry (rings, earrings, necklaces, bracelets, etc.).
There is no right way or wrong way. You need to decide for yourself how the material will most effectively be absorbed by your target audience.
Once your material is organized, you should actually have a fairly comprehensive table of contents. Now, it's time to get down to the business of fleshing everything out, rewriting the material in your own words, and cleaning things up. If you have someone who can proof read for you, take advantage of that opportunity. It's easy to turn blind to your own words.
In our next and final installment of How To Create Your Own Successful Product, we'll take a look at some short cuts that can save you time and plenty of anxiety.
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