Create Your Own Economy

Two of my favorite movie characters of all time are from the Shrek series. They are, of course, Gingerbread Man, and Puss ‘n’ Boots. Who doesn’t like Gingy and Puss, right?

Especially now that Puss has his own movie.

He’s now a franchise within a franchise in the Shrek ecosystem.

All of these pouring money back into one original idea, making Mike Meyers a very wealthy man, no doubt. (Not that he wasn’t already from his Wayne’s World and Austin Powers franchises.)

You seeing a trend here?

It’s time to build your own franchise on the Internet and have your own ecosystem, because when you can do that, you’ll control your own economy system.

I’ll show you how in a second, but first let me explain the importance of having your own ecosystem…

While on a recent flight to Mexico I read an article about one of the many factors determining Apple’s success in the tablet computer market.

The author chalked up their dominance to the fact that Apple has built an ecosystem around the product, rather than just standalone items.

The ecosystem includes the hundreds of thousands of apps that have been developed for the iPhone and iPad, plus iTunes.

This ecosystem has created a “pain of disconnect” that would be felt if a customer decided to stop using the Apple product. You can’t transfer your apps and content to a new device.

Amazon works much the same way, and its entry into the tablet market enhances their ecosystem and increases the pain of disconnect for their clients, although Amazon comes at the market with a different bent.

“We are building premium products and offering them at non-premium prices.” – Jeff Bezos.

Of note, Apple’s profit margin is a healthy 20-25 percent, while Amazon’s is a razor thin four percent. It will be interesting to see if these numbers change while we watch these two companies battle it out.

(Note: The people I know who have switched to the Kindle Fire are very, very happy. Should make for a very interest battle in 2012 between these two giants.)

But for now, the lesson is to build an ecosystem in your business, not just a set of products.

Here are just two examples of how you might do that:

a) Create a membership site where customers create a profile, earn points, and develop relationships – that will be lost if they cancel their membership.

I’m slowly working on my own version of this in our 24-7 fat loss membership site, as are a few others in the fitness industry. It’s had a few hiccups, but we’re getting there.

b) An easier way to build your own ecosystem is creating a set of franchises within your main franchise, like the movie example I gave at the start of this article.

Within my Turbulence Training fitness business, I have created over 130 e-books and DVD products, and within that lengthy list are mini-franchises, such as my TT for Meatheads series, my Bodyweight Cardio franchise, and my most recent foray, TT MRT programs.

Each of these has a “collectible” mindset that makes readers want to have all of them. Plus, it provides me a large variety of promotional and giveaway opportunities.

Just this week, for example, I gave away my TT Meatheads franchise products during an affiliate promotion. It no doubt boosted my sales without any extra effort on my part.

That’s why you want more products and your own ecosystem of product franchises.

That’s why you want to be prolific.

Because when you have this in place, you create your own economy that protects you financially no matter how bad the real world economy might get.

Create your own economy and financial independence with everything I teach you here:

Craig Ballantyne

“Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is: Everything around that you call life was made up by people who were no smarter than you. And you can change it.

You can influence it. You can build your own things that other people can use. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.” – Steve Jobs