Not everyone uses them. A lot of people don’t use them because they don’t know how and probably don’t think it’s worth the effort to learn how. The only way you know if something works or not is to try it.

For getting a hold of audio testimonials I recommend you get a copy of “Sonic Memo”. It allows you to stream audio from your site and the creator of the product shows you how to get your own toll-free testimonial line for only $2 a month.

The “Sonic Memo” program is something that you download to your computer for a one-time fee. No monthly payments and you maintain control over all of the audio you create with it.

This is something you’ll have to test on your own to see if it boosts your sales or not but in my opinion it’s worth a try.

Personally, I’ve found that people are a little nervous about leaving audio testimonials so it helps if you prepare them first by letting them know what to expect when they call your toll-free feedback line.

Basically…

v  There’s no need to be nervous. You won’t encounter a live operator when you call. It’s just you and the testimonial system so take your time and imagine talking to a friend.

v  You should write out what you want to say ahead of time.

v  You can record your message more than once to get it right.

v  After you record your message, please state that I have permission to use it in my marketing material. If you forget to do that, don’t worry. You can always just send me an email later.

You get the idea.

Familiarity gives people the confidence to leave you quality audio testimonials so what you may want to do is go through the process of leaving yourself an audio testimonial to get a feel for what people can expect when the go through the process themselves.

Because people aren’t normally asked to leave audio testimonials you may want to offer a more enticing incentive for them to do so. On top of that you should also ask people to send a written version of their testimonial in case you’d rather use that.

It’s better to ask for the written backup than to wish you had it later.

Here’s an example audio testimonial request letter…

Hi (CUSTOMER NAME),

I want to thank you for purchasing (PRODUCT NAME) a few days ago from (http://www.yourwebsite.com).

It’s always my pleasure to email customers and thank them for their purchase because I do realize that you could have chosen to do business with someone else so again, Thank You for giving me the opportunity to serve you.

The other reason I’m writing you today is to ask if you had any feedback about your experience with (PRODUCT NAME). I generally use this feedback as a testimonial in my marketing material.

With that in mind (CUSTOMER NAME), could I ask you to send me your feedback about (PRODUCT NAME) so that I could use it on my website for others to see and in other marketing material?

If you’d be willing to do that please make sure you include a link to your site I can display along with your feedback.

Keep in mind that I’m also open to constructive criticism so if there’s something you feel is missing from my product please let me know and I’ll do my best to correct the issue.

You have two options:

1)  You can send me your written feedback.

2)  You can send me audio feedback through our toll-free number listed here: 1-888-123-4567

I realize that you’re busy so just for taking the time to send me your feedback I’d like to give you a copy of (THE FREE BONUS OFFER) as soon as I hear back from you.

Just to give you a little information about the report I’m sending you in exchange for your feedback.

(Describe The Bonus Offer In Enough Detail To Make Sure People Understand The Value Of Your Feedback Incentive)

This is one of my personal resources and I generally don’t share it with any other than people like you who have shown a willingness to take action towards their goals.

If you’re willing to send me your audio feedback for possible use in our marketing material, on top of (THE FIRST BONUS OFFER)

I’ll also send you (DESCRIBE ANOTHER BONUS OFFER).

Once again…

1)  You can either send me your written feedback by replying to this email or here: http://www.yourwebsite.com/feedback.html

Or…

2)  You can send me audio feedback through our toll-free number listed here: 1-888-123-4567

If you were going to send me your audio feedback, would you mind also sending a written copy of it as well? This is so that I’ll be able to use your feedback in a variety of marketing material.

After all, it’s kind of hard to put an audio testimonial on a postcard or a sales letter sent through the mail. ;-)

Thank you for your time (NAME) and if you have any questions at all please feel free to let me know.

(YOUR NAME)

      (YOUR WEBSITE)

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Again, I know that sounds like a lot to ask and it is but that’s why you have to make sure you offer an original incentive for the time it would take someone to send you feedback.

You have to remember that a good testimonial can add sales to your bottom line so it’s worth the effort to get.

You may be wondering how you’re going to get people on your autoresponder to ask them for their feedback in the first place.

Well, you have a few options...

v  You’re offering a bonus with your product like free updates. If so, you can have people hit your autoresponder to get notification of the new updates when they’re ready. When people sign up to be notified of updates your autoresponder would be set up to ask for feedback on your product a few days up to a week.

One thing I did with this method was to have people sign up through my autoresponder inside the /members/ area before they could even access the updates. That way I was assured that everyone who ordered the main product would be on my mailing list.

v  When people get to your download page, have a form there that asks for their email address. Some people will be angry if you don’t forward them to the actual product they paid to download immediately after they order so you may want to have your sign up form be an option only.

In other words the first thing on your download page would be a sign

up form. Offer something extra for signing up. The real purpose

though is to get the testimonial down the line automatically.

v  You can also do something I do with one of my products. I offer bonuses with one of my products that come 15 days apart. Bonus one can be downloaded immediately but I tell people on the download page that bonuses two and three are delivered by autoresponder so they have to sign up to get them.

That gets them on my list so that I can follow up with them and ask for their feedback later.

I set it up this way…

In plain view I ask people to join the list to get their first bonus. The rest of the bonuses will be delivered at set intervals. I can ask for feedback on the main product at any point in time once people are on the bonus list and they won’t unsubscribe from it until they get all of the bonuses.

The point is that you can always find an automated way to get people to hit your autoresponder. There’s no need to add people manually. This puts your testimonial collection on autopilot.

You know, when I’ve told people about this method in the past, many misunderstood and thought that you could offer people just about anything for free and they’ll want to send you their glowing feedback.

That couldn’t be further from the truth.

You have to look at the feedback incentive as a product. A product people would actually pay for if it were for sale.

That’s why I recommend you create something of your own instead of just giving people something they can find for free somewhere on the net. And keep in mind that I’m not talking about anything major.

Just a simple 5-10 page report.

That’s it.

To get some ideas, download "Five Steps to a Big-Profit, S.M.A.L.L. Reports Business" because it contains a lot of solid ideas for developing small reports that are valuable.

The best incentive you can offer is a small report people can’t get anywhere else, especially since you aren’t charging them for it. All you’re asking for in exchange is a simple email with their feedback.

I can also recommend you get a copy of “The Recipe For Product Creation” for a step-by-step process for creating small reports.

One thing people either don't know or tend to overlook is the fact that just because a product is selling well doesn't mean that people actually want the product.

What I mean by that is this...

How many times have you seen a sales letter for a $97 product for example but were only interested in one or two of the bullets listed in the sales letter? You would gladly pay $7-$10 just for the few pages that contains the information talked about in those bullets.

Many times, the sales letter isn't what gets me to buy a product. Most of the time, only certain things a product says it'll teach me will catch my attention.

With that in mind, whenever you see a product out there selling well you should study the sales letter to see if you can develop a simple report based on one or two of the bullets that catch your eye. With the $7 Secrets craze going on right now this could easily spark the idea for your next report. Keep your eyes open and look for opportunities.

This gives you an instant link to a product a lot of people will be out there promoting, so not only can you sell them your low-cost front end report but you can back end them on the product that gave you the idea for your short report in the first place.

Just think about it.

If someone is interested enough to buy a report just based off one of the ideas you got from the higher-priced product, you know they should be interested in that product so you have nothing to lose by sending them to the sales letter for it through your affiliate link.

In a way this is like getting paid to presell an affiliate product. The one thing you need to remember though is that your report needs to stand on its own. It can't be a sales letter for the affiliate product you want to promote. That will just tick people off.

Make it so that your report does what you told people it would do whether they buy another product or not. Your report has to stand up on it's own based on the quality of your information.

Read that last line again and always remember it.

Whenever someone does a big product launch (especially the ones where the product costs $495 and up) they're creating a market of buyers who want the type of information they're selling.

Many people won't be able to afford the big price tag but they still want that type of information.

That's where you can swoop in and pocket some extra cash.

Tying your short (low-cost) report in with a major product launch is an easy way to get paid. Just pay attention to your email and notice when you see a big buzz about a certain product.

Let other people do all the hard work as far as getting people to want certain types of information. You just step in and profit from their efforts with a short report you already know people want because everybody is already talking about the subject. This is much more profitable than trying to guess at what to write about.

Borrow ideas from magazines that feature successful people and hot topic articles.

Magazine editors are “under the gun” every month to produce quality articles on relevant topics their readers would be interested in. Why not use their hard work to your advantage. Subscribe to magazines that cater to whatever market you’re thinking about writing for so you can use ideas other people have taken the time to research for your own use and profit.

Get magazine subscriptions at sites like:

Amazon.com
DiscountMagazines.com
Magazines.com
MagazineBlowout.com
MagazineLand.com
Mags4Cheap.com
MagsOnTheNet.com
MagMall.com
NetMagazines.com

I mean seriously, magazine editors put a lot of work into coming up with great information for their readers every single month and if you’re truly dedicated to making more money, you need to at least stay on top of the current information that’s out there. Don’t let the net be your one stop source for information.

That’s how you get left behind.

Quick Tip: ==================================================
If you’re going to be developing products for women and other markets it’s almost a requirement to get yourself a couple of yearly subscriptions to various magazines. Most of your competitors are so stuck on the Internet that they become blind to other sources of information. That’s to your advantage.
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The whole point of staying current is the fact that many of your competitors don’t. They simply wait around for the nearest “guru” to sell them a product with “current” information in it to work from. Don’t do that. You were born with a brain of your own.

Use it.

On top of all that, study the case studies of people profiled in all of the magazines you choose. They are in those magazines for a reason. Find out what idea, invention, insight, etc, led them to where they are. There just might be a hot selling topic in there for you.

Another reason you’ll want to subscribe to magazines, newspapers, online newsletters and the like is so that you can start to develop your own “idea base” that your brain can draw from to generate profitable ideas whenever you need them.

The biggest secret I can give you is that you have to become a student in order to become a better teacher. If you want to teach others, you have to make an effort to constantly learn new things so that you have the ability to constantly give people new direction and insights.

Always look to learn something new for the rest of your life.

This is similar to the previous idea generator. It’s basically just a variation on the same theme. Your brain (like everyone else’s) just hates an unanswered question. When you ask yourself questions, your brain will continue working on an answer even while you sleep.

Your brain hates “loose ends” and will always seek to tie them up.

With that in mind, try to ask yourself questions that the people in the target market you’re trying to reach would ask themselves. The questions I just gave you are pretty standard and I’m sure you can come up with a few of your own with a little thought.

If you can hit on something you want to know about and there aren’t a lot of products already out there, you could be in a great position to step in, fill a void and cash some checks where your competitors never even saw an opportunity for profit in the first place.

WARNING: The hidden danger with this approach is that you could end up creating something no one but you wants so before you put any real time into developing a major product always do small scale tests and expand from there if you're not sure an idea will fly.

You might want to do something like this...

1. You write an article and judge the feedback. If the results are positive move to...
2. Creating a short report on the same topic. No more than 10-20 pages. It could even be to your advantage at this point to give your report away for a short period to guage the reponse. If the response is overwhelmingly positive then you might want to...
3. Create a more detailed (for sale) report perhaps with audio and/or video that gives people exactly what they need to put your information to good use.

Creating a detailed report with audio and/or video right from the start could be a big waste of time if there's no real interest in the subject matter so if you're not sure about an idea, test the waters first and see if you get any bites.

I know that seems obvious but if you pay close attention you'll see that many products out there are about how to do something instead of how the author did something.

There's a subtle difference there and it's an important one.

For the most part, people are very insecure about their ability to do something for the first time so learning how to do something from someone who has already done it is appealing for that very reason.

The average "How To" product just isn't as appealing as the "How I Did It And How You Can Too" angle.

If you don’t know how to do something other people would also like to do, then go out and learn how to do something constructive.

Everybody who knows something at one point didn’t know what he or she now knows. They went out and learned what they know and there’s no reason why you can’t do the same.

The whole point of your short report is to demonstrate to people who don’t know you that you know what you’re talking about and therefore are someone they should listen to and buy products from.

Teaching people from your own experience instead of just telling them how to do something you haven't really done yourself is a great way to get them to trust what you say in the future.

The biggest thing is that when you’re writing a short report from your own experiences is don’t hold anything back. You’ll always have something else to write about later so don’t hold back. Give people all the information you can give them about the subject they trust you to provide information on.

If you do that, you’ll have no shortage of people lining up to tell others about the quality of your products and when they do that, you’ll have no shortage of checks to fill up your bank account.

I’m going to let you in on a little secret that can instant bury your competition because many never consider branching out from their main product to target specific types of people.

What do I mean by that?

Simply this…

If you’re a man, do you realize that women make up at least half of the world’s population? With that in mind, why does there seem to be so few information products out there geared towards women? Women want a lot of the same things men want but the majority of products (at least in the online marketing field) are targeted primarily at men.

Read all of this because I’m going to tie everything up in a few minutes. Marketing specifically to women is a largely untapped market so you can cash in immediately if you hit women with something that catches their interest. Something they can relate to and pass on to other women.

Change Your Focus - Cater Your Message To Women

Below I’ve listed some sites that cater specifically to women and the things that are of interest to them. That’s a huge and largely untapped market. I’m a guy and most of the information I see out there is from other guys so I know women would appreciate information that’s created with them and their needs and perspective in mind.

You have no idea how much people crave information that’s tailored to what they care about written in a way they can relate to.

Quick Tip: ==================================================
Pay attention to the information that’s presented and see if you can come up with ideas that take what you see and twist them in a way that would be appealing to the women who frequent those sites.
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Most women say that us guys don’t listen and that’s a big clue to what I’m saying. Women will tell you what they want if you just listen long enough. I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not (if you’re a guy) but women have no problem buying products that interest them. Find out what topics are of interest to them build around that.

Write down every idea you get and know that you don’t have to actually create a product from your idea yourself.

http://www.IVillage.com
http://www.ConcerningWomen.com
http://www.DivaTribe.com
http://www.WomenTodayMagazine.com
http://www.EzineArticles.com/?cat=Women's-Interests
http://www.BetweenFriends.org - Tips for busy moms
http://SheKnows.com
http://www.Digital-Women.com
http://www.WomanOwned.com
http://www.FoDreams.com/services/directory.php
http://www.AdvancingWomen.com
http://www.BlueSuitMom.com
http://www.WomensForum.com
http://www.AWomansResource.com
http://www.4Woman.gov
http://www.BriefcaseMoms.com

Here’s the thing…

Women have the same hopes, dreams, fears, feelings and insecurities that men have. As you absorb more and more information from sites like the ones I’m listing, you’ll start to realize that creating products targeted specifically for women doesn’t require much more work than creating a regular product you try to sell to everyone.

People are mainly interested in information that comes from their point of view or that at least tries to come from their perspective so targeting women with your information gives you an advantage over competitors who for the most part ignore a large segment of our population.

Quick Tip: ==================================================
The cool thing about developing products specifically for women or any other market for that matter is that you can then go about selling your information to those markets using the same sites and resources you used to find out about them in the first place.
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Yes, that even applies to magazines.

What you could do is contact the magazines you’re subscribed to and ask them what their article submission guidelines are so that you can start submitting your own articles to them.

Remember, you can get other people to actually create your articles so if you find a market that has a lot of passion about their chosen subject, you can get your own information created for that market and get free advertising to those people by submitting your own articles.

If you need to find magazines that cater to women to subscribe to, I found a few sites for you to check out:

Amazon.com
DiscountMagazines.com
Magazines.com
MagazineBlowout.com
MagazineLand.com
Mags4Cheap.com
MagsOnTheNet.com
MagMall.com
NetMagazines.com

That should be enough to get you going. Those sites allow you to buy subscriptions to various magazines on a wide variety of topics at discount prices!

In general, people who subscribe to various magazines are constantly hungry for the type of information those magazines produce so they’re an ideal market to sell information to.

Again, most of your competitors completely ignore the offline market, which is why you should not.

If you want to learn how to quickly write quality articles look at:
The Article Speed Writing Formula

Last, but certainly not least, listen to your customers. Ask, and then listen. Women will tell you everything that you need to know about how to market to them and how to make them want to buy your products. Just ask and listen.

Publishers constantly rack their brains every week, two weeks or every month (depending on how often they publish) searching the net for information their readers (their target market) would be interested in. You can use their hard work to your advantage by joining their lists and spying on what they send out.

I suggest you get a separate email account somewhere that you only use for subscribing to email lists for research.

You can get email accounts at places like:

Mail.com – Free
Mail2World.com – Yearly Fee

The world of email publishing offers fast results. If a publisher starts to publish crap then they lose tons of subscribers so they are constantly testing ideas to see what works the best. As with anything else, don’t take what you see at face value. Use your own brain to determine what’s worth taking a closer look at and what to ignore.

Quick Tip: ==================================================
Pay special attention to products and services that are repeatedly mentioned in multiple newsletters because that might be a subject you want to develop a product on. People have short attention spans so if you can tie your product topic into a subject that is already fresh on people’s minds; you have a better shot at getting them to buy.
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This idea also applies to newspapers and TV. Current events are pushed out there by major corporations with million dollar advertising budgets so why not take advantage of the ideas they put in people’s heads? If the news media does a good job of making people aware of a certain topic and getting them interested in more information on it, there’s nothing wrong with you creating a product on that very topic so that you can put some extra cash in your pockets.