Here’s a question for you. How do people actually make money with their online businesses? When you start out online as a freelancer, solopreneur, or a side hustler, it can be utterly overwhelming to try to decide what to offer as your products or services. I mean, what will people even pay you for? To be honest, this is the biggest obstacle that I faced when I started my business too. In fact, I was praying that someone would just hand me the blueprint and tell me what to offer because I had no idea how to package my products and services. It took me years to figure this out, but I don’t want it to take that long for you, which is why I’ve created this video.
You’re going to want to make sure that you pick the one or two offers that are perfect for the stage of business that you’re at right now.
Now that we’ve got that covered, let’s go over the first side of offers, which are service-based offers. There are three types of services that you can offer in order to get started with your business and start making some real money.
Option #1: Mini Service
The first type of service you can offer is what I like to call a mini service. It’s an anybody service you can offer that’s going to help you to get momentum in your business and generate some quick cash flow.
In order to develop a mini service, you’ve got to ask yourself, “What’s a result that you could help someone to achieve in a small session?” Maybe a one-hour session with a workbook, maybe some pre-work. Something very, very contained, not a big done-for-you hoopla. Your mini service in many cases is going to be a precursor to your bigger service package. So really think about what is it that someone might need and can get a quick result or a quick win from by working with you in a smaller capacity but that will also kind of lead them into that next step, which would be working with you in your larger service.
Not sure what you could offer? I guarantee you that there is something perfect for your business. So I want you to leave a comment below. Let us know what industry you work in, who you’re trying to help, and what you do for work, and we want to go in those comments, and you should do this as well. Read the comments and help people out. Give them ideas because oftentimes, it is so much easier for other people to be able to see what would be a no-brainer offer for you to create for your business, whereas you’re going to have a difficult time seeing the forest through the trees.
Option #2: Done for You
That brings me to the second type of service that you can offer, which is what I like to call done-for-you services. All service providers should offer some type of signature service. I talked about this a lot. So you want to check out some of my other videos about packaging services to get more details on this. For many of you, a done-for-you service package is going to be the type of service you’re going to provide as your signature service. This is the exact type of service that I teach people to create in my signature program, Yay for Clients.
So if you want more information and an entire step-by-step process on how to package those services and even book them out, you’ll want to go over and check out yayforclients.com for more information. Now, let’s say that you aren’t in the done-for-you realm. You’re more of a coach or consultant. You’re not doing the work for somebody, but you are working with them in a long-term commitment. This is a very similar type of service. But rather than calling it a done-for-you, this is going to be option number three, which is a long-term service package.
Option #3: Long Term
The rules for this one are exactly the same as for a done-for-you service. It’s just a little bit different of a business. And just like the done-for-you service, a lot of people you work with in your mini service are going to end up wanting to work with you long-term in your signature coaching or consulting package. A great example of a long-term coaching package would be a relationship coach who works with couples to rekindle their connection and passion and intimacy for each other.
In fact, we have a Yay for Clients alumni who does just that. Her name is Janna Denton-Howes, and I’m going to link to her website below this video, so you can see an example of an awesome, long-term coaching package. Janna was able to use what I taught her to start her business from scratch and start making a full-time income working for herself. This is a great example of someone who is actually following this process and getting awesome results.
And that, my friend, brings us to the other side of your business, which is products that you can offer. This is definitely the side that people get excited about because this is where you have potential for creating passive income. But again, I want to make sure that you’re watching my other video on the four stages of business before you make any decisions on which of these five types of offers you’re going to create. You’re promising me that, right? Okay. Now that I trust that you’re paying attention, there are two main types of digital products you can create for your business.
Option #4: Digital Downloads
The first type of product is what I like to call digital downloads. This is an awesome product to create if you are getting started to master the learning curve of creating and promoting and launching and selling a digital product. For me, having a few low-cost digital products as I was working with clients was a great way for me to get my feet wet, creating products, and selling them, and figuring out how that stuff works, and also making a little bit of passive income on the side.
Digital downloads could be anything from a workbook or an ebook or e-guide. In fact, my product, the sales page kit and the launch copy kit, are awesome examples of digital downloads. They’re not quite courses, but they are quite a meaty product that you can use to get a very specific result. Now, if you want to know how to create beautiful PDF downloads, which is what a digital download is going to be, is a PDF, I have a video for you on that and how to create gorgeous PDFs and workbooks for your business. So, I’ll link to that video below as well, and make sure to check that out to create your products.
Option #5: Online Courses
And that brings us to our final type of offer, which are online courses. A bit of a warning here, again, you should not be creating any type of online course until you have established yourself as a business, have worked with clients to get results, and have built at least a little bit of an audience for yourself because it’s just not going to work if you don’t do those things first. However, once you’re ready, creating an online course is the most amazing to scale your business and start making money regularly and removing yourself from the daily operations. How cool is that?
I think launching online courses is a great end goal for most online business owners, and my business at this point is 100% based on courses and digital products. Are you ready for our bonus tip for today? I am. Here it is. How do you pick what offer to create right now? This is the biggest question that I get from business owners, and it’s a really smart question too. My answer to this question is always, always, always go with the lowest-hanging fruit. That means, what is the easiest thing for you to create right now using the resources that you have? If you’re just getting started, an online course ain’t it.
As I mentioned a couple times already, I have a video for you that walks you through the four stages of business and exactly what types of offers you should be creating at each stage. So now is the time to click on over to watch that video if you haven’t already. For most of you, spoiler alert, it’s going to be services. You want to book out those services before you start creating digital products. In fact, I’ve actually got an entire free checklist for you on 64 things you can do in your business right now in order to start booking out your clients and making some real money coming into your business, so then you can reinvest it on creating digital products or something else.
