So a year’s gone by since my last post and I could easily give up on this blog altogether because I really don’t have the time for it, but I’ve had a burst of renewed enthusiasm so here I am.

I’ve spent the last year focussing on my main software business which has done well. Of course, it could always be better and I’m about to put a lot more effort into marketing the business (mostly online). However, I’ve noticed a significant levelling off or even a downturn in business over the past few months. I haven’t worked out yet whether it’s due to the current state of the global enonomy or other factors. What I do know is that I’m concerned about being reliant on this one income stream and want to try a little side project.

If you’ve read any of my earlier posts, you’ll see that, a year or so ago, I was planning a niche info project (something I was calling my “Mercury Project”), but that still hasn’t really got started because I’ve been so busy with the software business.

The trouble with Mercury is that there’s no existing info products out in the marketplace to sell as an affiliate to get started. There are plenty of associated sites selling related hard goods so I know the market is potentially quite strong. But, as an info product marketer, it would mean creating my own product.

That’s fine because it’s what I really want to do but the niche is a bit like “how to build a summer house” and the way I want to create my product is to actually build that “summer house” and then show step-by-step how it’s done.

Except that my “summer house” (the actual Mercury Project) is going to take me years to build and I can’t wait that long!

Well, I have a new plan brewing and with my new early morning “get ready for the day” fitness routine, I’m getting fairly excited about the prospect.

I’ll write more about it soon (I promise)…

For one thing, the gradual approach will allow me to slowly build momentum with highly personalised and unique, high quality content that the search engines love so much. It will also allow me to feel my way through the topic, discover what people (potential customers) will be interested to know about and form friendships with like-minded people (potential partners).

Having said that, I have enough ideas about marketing and the longer-term view of the business side of things to know that if I set it up right from the start then things will be a lot easier later on.

In good-old Internet Marketing tradition, I won’t reveal exactly what my topic is (yet) but instead will use the generic “Sausage Making” niche that worked so well during the 30-day challenge.

So I can immediately see the following long-term objectives, though there will be others:

• A personal Sausage Making project blog
• Articles about various aspects of Sausage Making
• Information products including e-books, videos and audios
• Physical information products along the same lines
• Reviews of Sausage Making products
• The sale of Sausage Making products either directly or through affiliation
• A discussion forum for Sausage Makers
• The creation of a Sausage Makers club with local group meetings
• Provision of other Sausage Making resources

If you have followed Internet Marketing for any length of time then, perhaps with a few exceptions, all of these will be fairly familiar to you as ways to build a Sausage Making “Virtual Real Estate (VRE) Empire”. But because this is a topic that I’m extremely interested in, my goal is to take it slowly and make it the best it can possibly be, and with my own spin on things.

My step-by-step plan is currently this:

1. Choose, register and get hosting for 2 domains: 1 for the blog and one for a resource site. I could use just 1 but I want the blog site to be just about my Sausage Making project with the resource site being more generic. There might also be search engine advantages to splitting them (as long as they’re on different hosts or IP addresses) but that’s a secondary concern.

2. Investigate and choose a good Content Management System (CMS) for the resource site. As I progress with my own project, I will discover information that I will want to turn into articles or references, even just for my own purposes. I could slap these up as simple Web pages but, long-term, I know I will need a better way of managing them and I don’t want to suddenly find myself having to convert what I’ve already created. I also want it to be as quick and easy to add content to the site from anywhere to save myself effort but also allow others to add content later on.

3. Set up the blog with a suitable template and customise it as necessary, probably adding AdSense blocks (though I might save those until later).

4. Start my own Sausage Making project and, at the same time, report on my progress through the blog.

5. As I work on the project I will keep a detailed log in addition to the blog (possibly on paper) and record videos and still images of progress. These will later be used for resources and to form the basis of information products. It’s probably worth mentioning at this point that the project is not something that can be put together in a week. It may take a year or more so I’m really in this for the long haul.

6. Slowly build up the resources site and as the content reaches a reasonable level, turn it into a free membership site. This will allow me to start building a prospects list but it can also have the effect of making the site users feel more special, particularly if what they’re joining is called a “club”. It’s tempting to set this up from the start but I don’t think it will work without a certain level of content. Even a free membership site has to offer a compelling reason to sign up.

I could go on but that’s plenty to be getting on with and I don’t want to plan too far ahead because a lot will depend on what happens along the way.

Income is not the goal at this stage though I expect to make a small trickle through AdSense and perhaps a few affiliate product links. Instead, the aim will be to build a community of Sausage Makers that can add to the content and provide a ready market for later plans. This may sound a little under hand but it’s not. I think it’s fair to make money from people if you’re offering them things they desperately want to buy.

So there you have it. Basic plans for a small niche business.

Nothing wrong with that is there?

Well, what if I said that Mercury has a business element to it? It doesn’t have to but it certainly could be set up to make some money. So am I now pursuing two different business opportunities at the same time and contradicting myself?

It’s an interesting question that I have to ask myself. The obvious answer is “Yes” but it goes much deeper than that.

Ever since I first encountered the world of Internet Marketing and Information Publishing several years ago, I’ve been trained to see things in a different way. Now everything is an opportunity to provide information and make money. “Having trouble with your end of year tax returns? Here’s a special guide to get you through it easily… Need to create some standard business letters and documents? Here’s a bunch of guidelines and templates…”. I’m sure you know what I mean. Whenever I encounter a problem with something, chances are there are other people in the same boat that need helping. When you start thinking like that then you have no end of “ideas” for business projects. That’s before you even start thinking about hobbies.

Of course, not everything necessarily will make money but the potential is there in practically any subject you care to choose.

So what about Mercury? If I was trying to choose an arbitrary niche topic for maximum income potential then this would not be it. The numbers simply don’t add up. My research suggests that the potential is limited with low search numbers and not much in the way of existing info products to prove the market, etc. If this was an Underachievers project then it would most definitely be rejected.

But Mercury is something I want to do for myself. Something I’ve wanted to do for a very long time. Something I’m going to do regardless. It’s really a hobby. But at the same time, my training won’t let me ignore the potential for turning it into a money-spinner. All I need to do is structure the project in the right way. But why should I bother if my research indicates that it won’t be a financial goldmine?

Well, here’s a thought: What do you think would have the greatest chance of success for you – a project based on a topic within a really hot market that could make you loads of money but bores you to tears, or a project based on a topic that really interests you but has much less potential?

Opinion is divided but I think it depends what kind of person you are and what else is going on in your life. Some gurus will tell you to follow the money and just get yourself interested in the topic (after all, it shouldn’t be hard if it’s going to make you a stash of cash). And if you can really do that over and over then you’ll probably become very successful.

At the simplest level, you could create a cheap little info product, slap it up on the Web with a few AdWords and leave it to just bring in the dough. But if you really do have a lucrative niche then you’ll want to do a lot more than that to make the most from it. You’ll need an opt-in page, a fully loaded autoresponder, an ongoing newsletter, articles, back-end products, affiliate offers and a host of JV partners to work with. Otherwise “you’re just leaving money on the table” as the gurus like to tell me on a daily basis (usually when they’re trying to sell me stuff).

All of that requires a LOT of effort, so it better be worth it. And if you take the simple approach you won’t make nearly as much so you’ll need to replicate the process over and over with different topics. It can be done, of course, but finding good topics is difficult, at least that’s been my experience, and how many uninteresting topics will it take to wear you down?

Then there’s the issue of quality. Whether you outsource product creation and everything else or not, do you think that the final product, the Web site and everything related to the operation will be better or worse for a topic that you are or are not interested in? Nobody (in their right mind) wants to put out rubbish products but I think that a lot of the rubbish products out there are due to the fact that the marketer really doesn’t care enough for the subject matter to make it better.

I’ve come to the conclusion that this type of approach is not for me at this stage in my life with an existing business and family taking up a huge proportion of my time and energy. I want to enjoy whatever I spend time working on. It has to matter to me and be of sufficient quality for me to be proud of the work.

So if it’s not obvious where this is leading, another approach is to choose a subject that has some special interest to you or something you at least know a lot about. Ideally you should be passionate about the subject as this will give you the motivation to make it all happen. This approach is especially good if you’re just starting out and can’t afford to outsource because you’ll really need something to keep you going.

I strongly believe that if you create a business that’s right for you in an area that interests you then it should make you money. It may not be a short-term hit but if your interest is high then you will put in the effort to build the business slowly, create multiple products, service the market’s wants, build a reputation, survive and actually enjoy yourself in the process.

And that, to me, is what Mercury is all about. It will start as a hobby in whatever time I can find to spend on it. But by thinking of it in business terms from the start, I can slowly build up momentum and turn it into a long-term source of income.

I’ll let you know how I get on…