How to Make Your Ideas More Valuable
“Adam” seems like a nice guy. He subscribes to Early to Rise, and, in a recent e-mail, said he is especially interested in my articles about how to get into the movie business. He said that he doesn’t have time to try to get into the movie business himself, but he has tons of ideas. So he would like to offer his ideas to me – and, if I wanted to do something with them, he would get a percentage of whatever money they brought in.
You might think this sounds like an attractive deal for me – but it’s not. Here’s how I explained it to Adam: I get about 20 of these offers a week. Not only that, but I have no shortage of my own ideas that I want to develop. And those ideas are my babies. I only wish I had enough time to work on them all. So do I need his ideas? Nope.
Compare Adam’s e-mail to the one I got from “Cara.” She wrote to tell me that she has the signed life rights of one of baseball’s biggest stars. She also has a finished script based on his story – one she claims was written at a professional level. She wanted to know if I would be interested in helping her market it in exchange for a cut of the profits.
Unlike Adam’s offer, Cara’s seems worth looking at. I asked her to send me a copy of the script and the signed agreement on the life rights. If the script is good, I know I can make a few quick calls and get it seen by someone who might want to produce it.
What’s the difference between Adam and Cara? Cara has a complete package that sounds highly marketable. So by putting in a little effort on it, there’s a chance I could see a big payday. Adam might have some great ideas, but so what? As the saying goes, an idea and 62 cents will get you a phone call.
If you’re serious about making money with your great idea, don’t just offer it up to someone in the hopes that they will be able to turn it into something profitable. You’ve got to do the hard work yourself. Bring them a package that they can help you produce or market – a package that has the very real potential to make both of you a lot of money.
[Ed. Note: Paul Lawrence is a successful small-business entrepreneur who has sold and licensed the rights to both intellectual and physical products. The results? He receives quarterly checks for many thousands of dollars in royalty payments from other companies. For more information on his program – which teaches you how to obtain and license rights – click here.]Paul Lawrence
Paul Lawrence is an entrepreneur who has made his living starting and running a series of profitable businesses. One day while cleaning his mother's pool for a few extra bucks, it dawned on Paul that he could perhaps start his own pool cleaning business. He carefully employed all the marketing techniques that he had learned in school and designed his first flyer. Immediately the business took off and within a week, Paul had his own little business. He quickly expanded, hired employees and then eventually sold it some relatives who made well over $250,000 in the next year before they eventually sold it for a six figure profit. After finishing college, Paul did a brief stint in a management program for a national rental company, but he quickly realized that he was much happier running his own show. Paul left the rental company and launched one of the most financially successful independent ballroom dance instruction companies in the state of Florida where he received quite a bit of media attention for his revolutionary business practices that included front page features in the Life Style section of the Sun Sentinel, features in the Miami Herald, Boca News, Center Stage Entertainment and many others. With that business running profitably, Paul started several other businesses either individually or as partnerships that included a million dollar video production company, a mortgage brokerage, a home maintenance business, several mail order companies, a business consulting service among others.With a love of movies, Paul began to work at breaking into Hollywood as a screenwriter where he's beaten the odds by becoming a produced writer. He is a credited writer for the film CRUEL WORLD, starring Jaime Presley and Eddie Furlong and has signed a development deal for a national television series with one of the world's largest producers of television and films among his half a dozen sales and options of movie scripts he wrote. Paul is the creator of the Quick & Easy Microbusiness program.