How To Create An Empire Of Profitable Products Using The Short Report Formula

If you are looking for an easy and proven way to quickly crank out products that have real potential, you may want to thoroughly consider the Short Report Formula. It’s a really fast method for creating targeted, audience focused information products that people are willing to pay real money for.

So what I want to freely share with you today is an excerpt from one of my own ebooks on what kinds of short reports you can quickly write and sell for a profit.

We will look at 10 proven formulas (sorry, I couldn’t bring myself to say “formulae”!) for quickly writing reports that people actually want to buy. Feel free to use them to brainstorm ideas for YOUR next short report.

Let’s get right into them.

The first type of report is what I’ve labeled, “frequently asked questions”. With this model, you would take 10-20 of the most asked questions about a particular topic and answer them in your content. This is one of the easiest kinds of small reports to create because outlining is simple due to the Q&A style:

1. List the question.

2. Answer it.

Now, you’ll definitely want to create better titles than the ones below, but here are just a few ideas for how this kind of small report might be created –

1) Top 20 Questions About Website Building

2) Top 20 Questions About Generating Site Traffic

3) Top 20 Questions About Salesletter writing

4) Top 20 Questions About Reducing Body Fat

5) Top 20 Questions About Starting A Membership Site

6) Top 20 Questions About Self-Publishing

If you want to write a short report on internet marketing, you can easily find frequently asked questions by lurking at… you guessed it, the Warrior Forum! If your report caters to a different niche, it will make sense for you to find a high traffic forum in that specific niche and do your research there.

The second type of short report is the “case study” model. This would consist of you profiling different successful examples of accomplishing a common task. In other words, you’d show how several different people (including or not including yourself) have achieved the desired result.

The great thing about this kind of short report is the variety of different methods people use in attaining similar results. Your readers will likely “connect” with one or more of the examples and get a sense of motivation and empowerment to reach their goal as well. Bottom line: you’ve got a satisfied customer.

A few examples include (these are ideas, not titles) –

1) Learn How 7 Stay-At-Home Moms Each Lost 20 Pounds

2) The Machine Weight Workouts of 7 Top Olympic Athletes

3) Marketing Strategies of the 10 Fastest Growing Rolex Retailers

4) 10 Affiliate Marketing Campaigns You Can Legally “Steal” And Use to Promote Any Program You Want.

We’ve all seen reports of this type selling on Amazon. It’s because people are interested in this type of information. As Tim Ferriss said in “The 4-Hour Work Week”, I only read “How I did it” information. Well, “How they did it” is also a pretty credible and hence popular approach.

The next kind of short report is the“resource directory”. That is, you would include a group of related entries of resources (usually indexed categorically and then alphabetically) along with their contact information such as web site, phone number and or mailing/physical address.

A few examples of this kind of report would include –

1) The West Australian Bed And Breakfast Guide

2) The Wholesaler’s Resource Guide for Import

3) The Stay-At-Home Mom Publisher’s Resource Guide

4) The Product Duplication and Fulfillment Source Book

5) The 101 Most Entertaining Soccer Video Sites

6) The Top 50 Recommended Web Design Resources

Anyone looking for information on a particular topic is elated to find a directory full of information on JUST that topic! Make YOUR short report that directory.

Up next we have the “idea generators” style of short report. This particular kind of report is best described as “a series of prompts to help the reader brainstorm ideas”.

Here are a few different examples –

1) 101 Idea Prompts for Busy Ghost Writers

2) 75 Starter Questions for Small Group Discussion

3) 97 Winning Ad Headlines For Your Salesletter Swipe File

4) 101 Fill-In-The-Blank Internet Auction Templates

5) The Ultimate Book of Ideas for Home-Schoolers

Not everyone is an idea generator so if you are endowed with this ability, you may be able to help a lot of people.

The next type of short report is what I’ve labeled “the first year”. In this kind of report, you’d walk a newcomer through the first 12 months of a particular endeavor.

What beginner standing on the threshold of something completely new to them wouldn’t want the wisdom of what to expect and how to successfully navigate through the foundation period?

You could chronicle the first year with a calendar of milestones and guideposts, pitfalls to avoid, shortcuts to take and so forth.

Some examples are –

1) The First Year of Parenting

2) The First Year of Home-schooling

3) The First Year of College

4) The First Year of Internet Business (I wish I read one of these earlier!)

5) The First Year of Teaching

6) The first year of working as a…

One of the biggest mistakes that most“internet marketers” make is only creating information products to sell to other internet marketers.

So, while everyone else is competing with each other, you have an opportunity to teach “niches” how to market. (I can’t believe I’m telling you this!) Instead of selling marketing information to other marketers, teach niche business owners how to market. ALL business owners, regardless of what their business is, need more customers.

Note: What’s interesting about this “kind” of short report is the fact that you can make a few changes and “niche it” for numerous different topics. (I.E. “Pet Store Owner’s Guide to Marketing”, “Real Estate Agent’s Guide to Marketing”, “The Chiropractor’s Guide to Marketing”, etc.)

Some examples are –

1) The Book Store Owner’s Guide To Marketing

2) The Dentist’s Guide To Getting More Clients

3) How To Quickly And Easily Get More Real Estate Referrals

4) A Crash Course In Free Publicity For Independent Singers

5) A 10-Day Plan For Cheaply Promoting Your Next Garage Sale

Get the idea?

Who among us wouldn’t like to take shortcuts (assuming they don’t have drawbacks) to achieve a desired result faster, easier or better? The short answer is: no one. With this kind of report you would focus on ways to save time or effort in accomplishing a specific task without sacrificing any benefits or quality.

Some examples are –

1) 17 Money-Saving Shortcuts For Buying Your First Home

2) 10 Shortcuts To Becoming A Jedi Poker Player

3) Top 10 Shortcuts For Using Dreamweaver

4) 5 Simple Shortcuts For Acing The SAT

5) 7 Shortcuts For Planning The Perfect Wedding

6) Shortcuts For Writers: How To Write Faster, Easier and

Better!

With this kind of short report you would focus most of your “positioning” on the TIME FRAME in which the task can be completed. Everything would be structured towards seeing results within a specific period of time; that would be the selling point. More important than getting results is knowing how long it’s going to take to get those results (assuming it’s not long! ).

Case Study: Jim Edwards did this when he created a course entitled, “How To Write An Ebook In 7 Days”. It was a huge smash hit.

There were NUMEROUS courses available at the time that taught how to write ebooks, but his was the first that emphasized a specific time frame. The point: you can sell the sametopic to a crowded marketplace if you stress a time period!

Some examples are –

1) How To Make Money Online In 10 Days Or Less From Scratch

2) The 7-Day Weight Loss Plan

3) Rapid Restoration: Save Your Marriage In The Next 24 Hours

4) The Ultimate Guide To Creating Your First App in 30 Days

5) 21 Days To Breaking Any Habit, Addiction or Weakness

6) How To Get A Part-Time Job That You Love In 2 Weeks Or Less!

This is another classic example of the “problem/solution” format. It’s just expressed in a different way. The idea here is to inform the reader what they should do when they find themselves facing a specific problem that can still be remedied.

A key is to focus on as specific information as possible in your title.

For example, it’s not “What To Do When You Want To Lose Weight”, but rather “What To Do When You Want To Lose *That Last 5 Pounds*”.

Some examples are –

1) What To Do When You’re Lost In A South American Jungle

2) What To Do When You Love Your Job But Hate Your Boss

3) What To Do When You Worry Too Much

4) What To Do When Someone You Love Is Battling Addiction

5) What To Do When You Need To Rob Your Local Bank – No just kidding.

But you get the point!

Lastly, this kind of short report is for the creative writer. If you’re not creative, then feel free to skip this one. The idea here is to share lessons that you’ve gleaned from pop culture. (I.E. Movies, music, lifestyles, fashion, entertainment, cooking, etc.)

One of the reasons why this is usually a very good seller is because of its inherent ability to create curiosity. For example

What dieter wouldn’t be interested to learn how watching American Idol can help them lose weight? Or,

What golfer wouldn’t be enticed enough to see what the “Captain Jack Sparrow techniques” are?

The point is, there are built-in opportunities to grab attention (and get sales!) by including pop culture lessons as the focus of your small report.

Some examples are –

1) 3 Word-Of-Mouth Marketing Lessons From The Academy Awards

2) What I Learned From Victoria’s Secret About Wooing Women

3) The William Shatner Fan’s Guide To Relationships

4) The Survivor Success Model For Achieving Your Dreams

5) How To Turn “You’re Fired” Into“You’re Hired”

6) What I Learned About Traffic Generation From Watching The FIFA World Cup

Use pop culture lessons. They work.

So those are the 10 ideas on how to quickly write an in demand short report that I wanted to share with you. Try using them to create your first report, a series of short reports or even an empire of reports. You may be pleasantly surprised at your results!

To Your Inevitable Success!

Musonda

P.S. I am currently offering one of my courses for review. It covers EVERYTHING on how to create a product, a high-ticket product, an army of affiliates (including Super Affiliates) to promote your product, and how to build your list from scratch. It is the same formula one of my newest product follows.

If you want to review it, check out this page to see if you qualify. I'm only accepting a few more reviewers.

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