Insider Guide to Ezine Publishing

1 - Decide What You Are Going To Write About

What are you good at? Think about what interests you. What are you passionate about? Do you have expert knowledge or experience in a particular subject or topic? Do people ask you for help or assistance with things? What things? What kind of help?

Finding out what you are passionate about is the most important thing as you plan your ezine's topic. Great success is almost always bred by great passion.

Do what you love, and you won't have to work a single day in your life (Learn how to brainstorm for the ideal ezine topic in Lesson 3.1.1 of Ezine Launch, pg.14)

2 - Study the competition

Is there a need or demand for the information you plan to provide? If you're teaching people about solving a common problem, or bringing happiness and money, or relieving pain or stress, you're sure to have an audience ready to look at your offer. Maybe even pay for it.

Look for other ezines on the topic you plan to write about. How crowded and competitive is the market?

Studying your competition is a very skilled task that takes specialized insider knowledge to do well. Corey Rudl is one of the experts who shows you exactly how to do it. See Lesson 21 of Corey's Internet Marketing Course Version 3.0 for step-by-step instructions, resources, and tools for researching your competition.

3 - Find out what your readers want

Who are your readers? Which group or population are you targeting with your ezine?

Ask your customers and contacts what they would like to learn about. Visit discussion groups, bulletin boards and online forums where they gather and observe the topics and issues being debated. (See Lesson 3.1.3, pg.17 of Ezine Launch for instructions and ideas about determining what exactly your readers are looking for.).

4 - Determine your ezine's purpose

Why are you creating your ezine? Is it to instruct and educate? Entertain? Market your product or service? Sell directly to customers?

Try and define this as clearly as possible before you start. The entire process of planning and publishing your ezine will depend upon its purpose.

5 - Do you want to make money from your ezine?

Yes or No? How much? How fast?

You can choose between three methods of making money

   - selling your content (paid-subscription model)

   - advertising products and services (affiliate program model)

   - selling advertising space and sponsorships (ad supported model)

Learn more about these models and how you can adopt them in your ezine creating strategy in Lesson #3 of my free "7 Days To Ezine Marketing Success" course. To sign up send any email to emailcourse@ezinemarketingcenter.com or submit the online form at http://www.EzineMarketingCenter.com/emailcourse.htm

6 - Write Your USP

If you've followed the steps above, by now you should be able to write out a short statement (25 to 50 words) explaining your plans for your ezine. People are more likely to sign up for a newsletter with a clearly stated purpose