This week I launched my very first for-sale product that I built from the grounds up, all by myself.
It turns out that you need to pull together a few skills to pull off a product launch! And I don't think I even did everything I should have.
Yet, even in my amateur state of being a true "sales person" for myself, I've managed to make sales in my first week.
You must listen.
The plugin I just launched is a very, very niche product. It's not going to let me retire, and in fact will probably not even cover half of my bills.
However, it's something that people have asked me for repetitively over the last couple of years.
I wrote a simple tutorial on how I hacked together a [WordPress Dictionary]({{ site.url }}/wp-dictionary "The WordPress Dictionary Plugin designed for you."), and people just wanted me to offer a solution. (That link goes to a very clean and not-hacked solution... not the original tutorial.)
Now that I'm on my own, I need to stop giving everything away for free - so I decided to start listening to what people were already telling me they'd be willing to pay for from me.
If I weren't paying attention to the people paying attention to me, I'd have started with one of the various other product ideas I have floating around my head. I don't think any of those would have worked out the same way.
You must fill a need.
However, I did listen. So I heard the need.
This is the most important part - if you hear the need, but do nothing about it, that's useless.
But if you do something and take action to filling that need... well, my friend, people will actually thank you for offering them your paid product or service.
That happened to me this week, and it has made me so happy. I have produced something that is sincerely making people's lives easier.
I filled a need that no one else was filling. Because of that, I got sales.
What need are you filling?
Have people ever told you about what they wish you had?
Have you ever overhead anyone mentioning what would make their lives easier if only you had...
If you haven't heard about a need, then you need to start listening.
If you've heard about the need, you need to start filling.
The secret to my sales.
Once again, my sales haven't been through the roof and I'm not exactly retiring in the Bahamas (...yet).
However, considering I'm not using an existing marketplace or sales website other than my own, the fact I made first week sales just by throwing something out into the open is something I consider quite exciting.
Imagine what you can do as a small business owner who has a group of people who are raptly paying attention to you and what you offer.