What to Sell Based on Who You Are
What to Sell Based on Who You Are
And a funny YouTube story.
YouTube started as a totally different product.
In a 2016, Steve Chen revealed that YouTube was originally designed as a video-dating website. It even had its own slogan: “Tune in, Hook up.”
After the company launched the platform, goal #1 was to get 10 women to record videos as part of their dating profiles. The service was offered entirely free, and any woman could join.
(Because, when women join, men join.)
After two weeks & a significant ad spent, guess how many women had agreed to join the platform and record their videos? Absolutely none.
That’s when the founders figured there’s something wrong with this product. If women don’t buy it, men won’t buy it. And how are we supposed to make women buy it if they won’t even use it for free??
There are 3 steps to learning sales.
Understanding the process. Read more here.
Understanding the product.
Understanding the clients.
Today, we focus on the product. If you’re selling the wrong product, it doesn’t matter that it’s perfect, it doesn’t matter that it’s cheap, it doesn’t matter that you’ve built the most amazing sales page.
You’ll get no results.
But if you know how to take the exact same skills/features you already have and turn them into the biggest video-sharing platform in the world, everything changes.
So what should you be selling based on the type of solopreneur that you are?
As a creator/writer, sell:
Choose one primary and one secondary of the bullets below.
Sell results. This means selling information leading to results, plus coaching and/or community. Example: any “how to grow your Substack” Substack.
Sell emotion. This is usually personal development content, though it could be anything. It makes people feel more productive, confident, inspired, and more. Example:
from Shy By Design. Go read his writing and you’ll see what I mean.Sell entertainment. Stories, anecdotes, visuals—or what I call, selling “escape from reality.” Example:
who brings us back to nature.Sell a cause. People love to support something bigger: from independent journalism on Substack (Judd Legum has over 10K paid subscribers without paywalling anything) to socks for the homeless (Stand4 Socks is a massively successful socks company because, for each pair of socks you buy, they donate one pair of socks to the homeless.)
Sell facts. Speaking of journalism, if you’re interested in any topic or recent events, go write about it. Curate information from the sources you already read and give us interesting facts, experiments, news, science, celebrities: anything goes.
As a freelancer / service provider, sell:
Choose one of these.
Sell energy. Perfect for newbies, but not only. People love to work with powerhouse solopreneurs who get shit done.
Sell expertise. This is where you provide the process and the know-how. You build a specific offer. You charge more and do things your way because you know that way works.
As a product developer:
Choose one for each specific product you develop.
Sell specific solutions to specific problems. In a digital product, you can go deeper in a specific problem and help your customer figure it out completely.
Sell specific results. Content can offer long-term, broad results. A digital product can take you from point A to point B or C. My Fiverr Launcher course helps new sellers get their first sale within a week.
Sell ease. One of the key differences between free and paid information is that paid information is structured better. Sell ease by offering step-by-step guides, video tutorials and anything else that makes your customers’ lives simpler.
Focus brings results.
One product - one offer. With every piece of content, you should know which one of these you’re selling. With every product; with every service.
This will help you attract the right people to it and sell more of it, because everyone will be clear on exactly what they’re getting.
Speaking of attracting people…
Search for Product-Market fit.
Product-market fit is when you park a hot dog truck in the middle of a hungry crowd. The entrepreneurial term for what YouTube was lacking when they were trying to sell their product as a dating platform is precisely that: they didn’t have product-market fit.
To find product-market fit and be certain your audience will buy what you have to sell, consider these:
Focus on the one thing you already know your audience loves.
Research what your audience needs.
Find a bigger market (if you have a narrow niche, that may make things difficult).
I’ve written a detailed post explaining how you can do all those things here.
The Sell Anything Webinar is happening!
This month’s webinar is called Sell Anything and it will teach you more about:
The sales process--and what to sell at each stage.
The products that will sell best --and how to know whether you have "product-market fit", fast.
The customers that will buy - and how to single them out in the sales process.
The Sell Anything webinar will happen on 26th of Sept, 10 am PDT / 1pm EST / 6pm GMT.
During the webinar, I’ll review the sales pages/sales e-mails of 5 of you. This includes giving you feedback on what you sell, how you sell it and how to make it fly off the shelves.
To become one of those 5, comment below.
The webinar and the sales page reviews are only available for paid subscribers. If you’re a paid subscriber, you’ll be able to add the event to your calendar below. ↘
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Smarter Solopreneurs to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.