Note: This is part of a 7-day challenge called “Please Don't Starve” which is intended to help you create and sell your first product in a week. To learn more about the challenge, click here. Today is Day 5.
Digital products have changed my life. Courses. Ebooks. Coaching programs. Masterminds. Membership sites. All of it.
Making things and sharing them on the Internet has revolutionized the way I live, learn, and earn a living. And if you aren't taking advantage of this revolution right now, you are missing out on a lot.
Listen to the audio version of this lesson here:
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Today, I want to share with you two things. First, I want to de-mysticize the process of making digital products and sharing them with people you can help (i.e. selling them for profit). Second, I want to actually walk you through the process so that you get started today.
Before we get into the practical, let's start with the theoretical; that is, what it takes to create stuff and sell it on the Internet. And before we talk about that, let's talk about how this used to work.
Back in the day
When I started my business in 2012, which wasn't that long ago, I needed the following tools to sell things on the Internet:
- Content management system (I started with WordPress)
- Email list (I used MailChimp at the time)
- Web host (like Bluehost)
- Domain name (which I register through Name Cheap)
- Product to sell (originally, I just started with PDFs that I created using Keynote on my MacBook)
- Shopping cart (I started with e-junkie.com)
- Payment processor and a merchant account (I started with PayPal, which I just linked to a bank account)
This was a super simple setup that became much more complicated when I started accepting other forms of payment, working internationally, hosting events, and doing lots of other things. But even then, with such a simple setup, it was a lot to keep track of.
Today, though, there are much better tools that make this far simpler. But the fundamentals are still the same. You need:
- A way to host the product online (usually a website or webpage)
- A way to package the product (PDFs, audio files, videos, etc.)
- A way to take people's money
- A way to contact people who need your product
Fortunately, there are single tools that allow you to do this all in one place, and my favorite tool right now is Thinkific.
There are other brands out there like Teachable and Udemy that help you create online courses, but Thinkific is the easiest, most flexible tool that allows you to do all these things in one place. Plus, I've met their team, and they are super nice people. I highly recommend this tool.
Walking through your product setup
So today, we're going to walk you through how to get set up on Thinkific and start creating a digital product you can sell (even before you're finished making it), using the outline you created from yesterday's lesson.
All you need to get started is to do the following:
- Go to https://goinswriter.com/thinkific to set up your account (I'm a proud affiliate of this resource so if you end up using one of the paid versions of Thinkific, I will get a commission from that sale).
- Choose what kind of digital product you want to create.
- Fill out the product based on the outline you created yesterday.
- Then you can generate a sales page link and officially launch your product before it's even finished!
I've asked my friend and tech guru Andy Traub to create this tutorial for you. He is the best expert I know on the subject, and he can help you if you get stuck with this sort of thing.
Be sure to check him out at TakePermission.com and send Andy a nice “thank you” note for the generous gift of this video. He's more thorough on this stuff than I am, so I hope you appreciate it.
Click here to view the video on YouTube or watch it below.
Once you complete the walkthrough and setup your product in Thinkific, you’ll get a link. Share it in our Facebook group for the challenge.
See you in the next lesson.
