1990’s. This game was created by a few programmers who wrote it and then GAVE AWAY a fully functioning copy of their game for free. Not just a canned video demo of the game, this was a full-blown playable game. Of course there was a caveat: it only contained the first level. If you wanted to play more levels you had to buy it, but if you were satisfied with the first level, or if you justIf you’ve been trying to increase your sales, but you’re stuck, here’s a new trick you might want to try: GIVE YOUR PRODUCT AWAY! Yes, you heard that right, you can actually INCREASE your sales if you give your product away!

It may seem counter-intuitive, but it really works. In the old days (before the Information Explosion), people primarily bought tangible products. Things that they could hold in their hand. They could examine something before buying it. They could feel the quality of the materials that had been used to make the product. In those days you rarely had to plunk down your money for something until you’d had a chance to assure yourself you were getting what you wanted.

With the advent of the Internet and the proliferation of information products, it has become increasingly difficult to examine and try out products before you buy them. Vendors are hesitant to let you try their products unless you pay up front because they’re afraid that you won’t ever pay at all, but you’ll still be using the product anyway. This is an understandable concern, but it has also helped to make people wary of information products in general. After all, who wants to shell out tons of money for a product only to be disappointed with it? Sure, you might be able to return it, if you’re lucky, but honestly once a vendor has your money they have you a definite disadvantage.

As an example of how this might work consider the phenomenal success story of Id Software. You’ve probably heard of the PC shooter game “Doom” that came out in the early 1990’s. This game was created by a few programmers who wrote it and then GAVE AWAY a fully functioning copy of their game for free. Not just a canned video demo of the game, this was a full-blown playable game. Of course there was a caveat: it only contained the first level. If you wanted to play more levels you had to buy it, but if you were satisfied with the first level, or if you just

hey could hold in their hand. They could examine something before buying it. They could feel the quality of the materials that had been used to make the product. In those days you rarely had to plunk down your money for something until you’d had a chance to assure yourself you were getting what you wanted.

With the advent of the Internet and the proliferation of information products, it has become increasingly difficult to examine and try out products before you buy them. Vendors are hesitant to let you try their products unless you pay up front because they’re afraid that you won’t ever pay at all, but you’ll still be using the product anyway. This is an understandable concern, but it has also helped to make people wary of information products in general. After all, who wants to shell out tons of money for a product only to be disappointed with it? Sure, you might be able to return it, if you’re lucky, but honestly once a vendor has your money they have you a definite disadvantage.

As an example of how this might work consider the phenomenal success story of Id Software. You’ve probably heard of the PC shooter game “Doom” that came out in the early 1990’s. This game was created by a few programmers who wrote it and then GAVE AWAY a fully functioning copy of their game for free. Not just a canned video demo of the game, this was a full-blown playable game. Of course there was a caveat: it only contained the first level. If you wanted to play more levels you had to buy it, but if you were satisfied with the first level, or if you just

it has become increasingly difficult to examine and try out products before you buy them. Vendors are hesitant to let you try their products unless you pay up front because they’re afraid that you won’t ever pay at all, but you’ll still be using the product anyway. This is an understandable concern, but it has also helped to make people wary of information products in general. After all, who wants to shell out tons of money for a product only to be disappointed with it? Sure, you might be able to return it, if you’re lucky, but honestly once a vendor has your money they have you a definite disadvantage.

As an example of how this might work consider the phenomenal success story of Id Software. You’ve probably heard of the PC shooter game “Doom” that came out in the early 1990’s. This game was created by a few programmers who wrote it and then GAVE AWAY a fully functioning copy of their game for free. Not just a canned video demo of the game, this was a full-blown playable game. Of course there was a caveat: it only contained the first level. If you wanted to play more levels you had to buy it, but if you were satisfied with the first level, or if you just

o wants to shell out tons of money for a product only to be disappointed with it? Sure, you might be able to return it, if you’re lucky, but honestly once a vendor has your money they have you a definite disadvantage.

As an example of how this might work consider the phenomenal success story of Id Software. You’ve probably heard of the PC shooter game “Doom” that came out in the early 1990’s. This game was created by a few programmers who wrote it and then GAVE AWAY a fully functioning copy of their game for free. Not just a canned video demo of the game, this was a full-blown playable game. Of course there was a caveat: it only contained the first level. If you wanted to play more levels you had to buy it, but if you were satisfied with the first level, or if you just

1990’s. This game was created by a few programmers who wrote it and then GAVE AWAY a fully functioning copy of their game for free. Not just a canned video demo of the game, this was a full-blown playable game. Of course there was a caveat: it only contained the first level. If you wanted to play more levels you had to buy it, but if you were satisfied with the first level, or if you just didn’t like the game, then you weren’t out any money at all. (As an aside, I sure wish the purveyors of video game cartridges and CD’s for black-box game systems like PS2, Xbox, GameBoy, etc. would learn this lesson. I’m pretty darn frustrated by the fact that you usually can’t try any of those games out before you buy them, and then they are non-refundable to boot!)

I realize information marketing isn’t exactly like video game marketing, and you can’t just give away your product and hope your customers will be nice enough to pay you. But you can give away little bits of your product, or small teasers to keep them interested so that they’ll want to come back and buy the full package. Even better is to put your teaser info into an easily shared document format, like Adobe’s PDF format, and encourage your customers to share your info with anyone and everyone. Be sure to include links back to your website within your PDF document so that people can find your products if they want to make a purchase.

Even if you only include one or two percent of your total product info in your teaser file, you should be able to generate enough sales to make it worth your while. Be sure to include some tantalizing language, too, that will make them want more. Say things like, “Learn the top 5 things never to do”, or “Find out what how one single trick could (whatever)…”. This is the sort of stuff that will make people want to buy your products. But a warning: Make sure you really deliver on the promises you make in your teaser file! If you mislead your cu