I’ve just had an update from Dawn over at ScrapventurePro who has released a very interesting and potentially invaluable new book for people considering – or just starting out in – their own scrapbooking business.

If you signed up for my free newsletter you’ll already have receive Dawn’s free ebook on starting a scrapbook business so you’ll know this one is well worth a look.

It’s also remarkable value.

The book is, in effect, the first eight lessons of her personal coaching course. That course itself is an unbeatable way to start and build your scrapbooking business but during what are difficult times for many, the monthly fee is perhaps a bit of a stretch.

Hence this book, which for eight scrapbooking business lessons actually adds up to the price of less than two. Got to be worth a closer look, don’t you think? What’s more, everyone who buys a copy will also receive a free personal email consultations with Dawn for a full 30 days – usually that costs $60.00 on it’s own! Full details here.

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Everyone loves a scrapbook freebie, right? Literally thousands of people a month search for scrapbooking freebies – perhaps you are among them?

And the best way to have a profitable business is to find out what people want – and then give it to them!

So freebies are a must in your scrapbooking business because giving someone a freebie gives you so many opportunities to profit.

For a start, give one for signing up for your newsletter. Follow up with valuable help and information, and eventually include the chance for your newsletter subscribers to buy from you. Make it a discounted price, make it a “subscriber special” for example, and not only do you get a chance to profit but you make your customer feel special too.

Another way to employ this tactic is with digital scrapbook freebies. Give someone a free sample to prove the value of your work. Give someone some digital scrapbooking elements to prove that your larger offer is of high quality and great value. Include a “satisfaction guarantee” and people will be comfortable buying from you.

Of course you always have to be careful to value that trust. Don’t abuse people’s confidence by offering second rate goods or by hitting them with a newsletter once a week that’s just packed with stuff for sale. That will just tick people off and word of poor service spreads much faster than the good.

Which will do your scrapbooking business no good at all. Use scrapbooking freebies as a way in, then treat people as you would like to be treated and you’ll go from strength to strength.

To prove I practice what I preach, anyone who signs up for my free newsletter gets two valuable scrapbooking business reports that can be downloaded instantly. Current subscribers are also getting a free digital mask of the USA too, and a 50% discount off a full set of high resolution US state masks (with full commercial use license) which will be indispensable to any digital scrapbook business working nationwide.

Want a look? Just let me have your details over there top right…

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Marketing is just a word for getting your scrapbook business in front of people. The more people you can get your business in front of, the better your chances of making a sale, right?

Well, nearly right. I mean it’s no good marketing your scrapbook business to people looking for mufflers for a Chevy!

The point I’m trying to make here is that it’s targeted marketing that is most effective. If you’re selling finished scrapbooks, you have a different set of customers to those if you’re selling digital scrapbook elements, yes?

Now really there are just two ways of trying to attract those scrapbook customers. You pay for them, or you get them for free. Paying for them is any of the advertising you might do, whether that’s on or off-line. What you’re betting on (hoping for) is that you get more profit than the cost of the advertising. If you don’t, you loose money, and that ain’t the idea at all!

So getting free customers is obviously preferable. If someone comes to your scrapbook business and buys something, and it cost you nothing, that’s a pretty ideal situation, right?

Off-line you might try to do it through PR – like getting a story in the local press maybe. Online we can use a blog and we can use Article Marketing.

The principle of Article Marketing is that you submit short informative articles to relevant websites (there are many to choose from). Those articles tend to do very well in the search engines. Individually they will certainly do better than a young website, often better than a blog for a short time.

Inevitably some of the people who visit those articles will also visit your site… and voila! Free visitors! Now all you’ve got to do is have a strong enough offer to convert some of those visitors into customers.

As you can see, it’s a powerful principle to use in your scrapbook business.

Obviously there’s a bit more to it than that and doing it right is a bit of an art, which brings me to a very special offer from my friend Bob Beacham over at Sellingcraftsonline.com

Bob is an acknowledged expert at Article Marketing and is the originator of Blog Power Posting, which is closely related and another very powerful business tool. Bob has written two ebooks which he is currently offering at a quite ridiculously low price – under ten bucks the pair – which I would thoroughly recommend you get a copy of before he puts the price back up. Full details here.

Under $10.00 to bring dozens, possibly hundreds of potential new customers to your scrapbooking business? Got to be a good deal.

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Do you know the old saying among real estate agents? There are three things that are important to the value of your property and they are location, location and location. The same is true of your online scrapbook business except the three secrets to success are traffic, traffic and traffic!

Traffic – the people who visit your blog or website – is obviously the lifeblood of your online business. You might make the best scrapbooks the world has ever seen, you might design fabulous digital scrapbooking elements, you might provide the best scrapbook supplies at the cheapest prices. Without people visiting your site – what we call “traffic” – all you have is a lot of stuff…

…and no income.

So how do you get that all important traffic?

There are two main approaches, pay for it or get it for free. Paying for it is easy and lots of people will be more than happy to separate you from your money while offering you the earth. Some paid-for traffic tactics can be very successful and, as you can probably guess, some of them are an expensive waste of time.

The trouble with “free” is it’s often associated with low value. Free traffic for your online scrapbook business might be looked at as kind of scraping the bottom of the barrel. A lot of effort for very little reward.

Well in some cases that’s true, but pro bloggers and article marketers will tell you a whole different story.

There is a particular blogging tactic called “Blog Power Posting” that has proven to be highly effective at drawing not only plenty of traffic, but traffic that is highly qualified too. People who we already know are interested in your scrapbook business when they arrive at your site. Affiliate marketing itself can be used for the same purpose, or for driving targeted traffic towards traditional websites.

These are not new internet buzz-words that are only going to work for the next five minutes, they are proven business-building techniques that top marketers in many industries have been taking advantage of for some time.

Whatever your particular kind of online scrapbook business, a blog and the techniques of blog power posting can radically improve your traffic. Affiliate marketing is closely related and can produce equally impressive results if you have a traditional scrapbooking website.

If you want further information on these tactics there’s plenty to be found online. I have two favorite ebooks on the subject by the guy who originally coined the phrase “Blog Power Posting” so you can’t get much better recommendation than that! They’re on special offer as I write this but I don’t know for how much longer. Full details here.

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There are several ways to distribute your digital scrapbook. As a pdf you can make it available for download or put it on a CD and mail it.

Sometimes though, only a printed scrapbook will do. It’s also an important consideration if you are doing hybrid scrapbooking. You need to get a decent print out before adding extra “real” embellishments.

Printers suitable for printing digital scrapbook pages are available but they’re not cheap! You need to be producing a lot of pages to justify the outlay. Fortunately there are cost-effective alternatives and one such is Viovio.

Now Viovio are not the only company capable of printing digital scrapbooks. There are several large-format printers out there. However, Viovio are the only one I know of that have a dedicated section for digital scrapbookers.

They have a variety of digital scrapbook page sizes from 3.5 inch square mini-scrapbooks up to the 12 inch square format which is probably the scrapbooking standard. You can also have soft or hard cover.

There’s a huge amount of information at the site whether you’re new to making digital scrapbooking pages or more experienced. There are useful guides to walk you through the technical aspects and simplify the process.

With prices starting at only $4.99 for a soft cover and then 25 cents a page, Viovio offer a complete digital scrapbook printing service that you can customize precisely to your own requirements. They’re the best I’ve found but you’ll probably want to check them out for yourself and compare prices. You can find full details here.

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