Quote:
Originally Posted by EscortBiz
mainstream is not easy at all and you need 10x as much money and effort, but if you set it up right and put in the cash time and brains there is lots of money to be made but its not easy at all
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Here's how to make mainstream as easy as pie, in a few short steps:
1: Find small but vibrant niche with mostly paid services.
2: Develop free, high-quality alternative (with either upsales or advertising, or both).
3: Sit back and laugh as the competition fails to adapt to the changed marketplace.
The key part is to think *small*, though. The bigger a market, the more competition you'll probably encounter, and the smaller the profit margins are likely to be. Small markets, on the other hand, often have only a handful of semi-serious players, who in many cases depend on that small market for their entire income, and thus both overcharge and overdeliver.
Cut the 20% most labor-intensive parts from their business model, and you'll often be able to offer what 90% of the market wants for free while still enjoying decent profit margins.
A good example is something I did a few years ago. There was a small agency that put together customized guides for a certain semi-popular touristic area. I drove them out of business by coming up with two short standard guides and putting them online for free. They made a living by selling complete packages with a ridiculous profit margin, I made decent money from advertising by a few hotels and restaurants in the region (in the form of reviews, of course).
It took me a week to create what 90% of their customers wanted. It took them two people working a full time job to deliver the little bit extra that the remaining 10% wanted. The moment I entered the market, they lost 90% of their customer base to me, and went out of business. After that, the rest of the market was mine, too.