How can I monetize my Psychological Personality Type Identification discovery?

[FindYourPersonality]

Hi Everyone,
Just finished Tim's book and needless to say I am a fan.

The book inspired me to create my own on line business.

For a long time I have been doing research on psychological personality types.
I made a discovery that allows me to find individuals' personalities with great accuracy.

I am trying to monetize the discovery and this is proving difficult.

I have set up the website and it a moderate number of hits, about 3,000 per month. It showcases the personalities of many famous personalities, such as President Obama and his wife, President Bush and his wife, John Lennon, Anne Frank and many other. It has a fully automated personality test, books for sale, and is translated in several languages.

Many of the visitors are from high profile sources. For instance someone from the CIA was getting information about a famous personality, the computer lab admin at Harvard was looking for Tim Lee's personality, etc, etc. MIT, Cambridge, Fidelity Investments, Fort Bragg, Berkley's Office of the president, and many others have benefited from the information.

Most of the personalities are listed for free. But I have several paying options. For instance Bill Gates' personality is just $100. The full personality profiles of the Obama administration, etc.

The problem is I have not made any sales of these paying options. As I said the demand is high for the free profiles, the Obama profile was getting dozens of hits every day. But no sales yet :confused:

What am I doing wrong? I am on page one on google for "bill gates personality" for instance. I would love some advice on creating, packaging and marketing the products.

Thanks.

[slaser]

It's hard to tell from your description, what's wrong. I'd like to suggest three things:

1. Have you tested the market first? Well, you obviously have visitors. But how do they get to your site? What keywords do they use? Maybe they're not the ones who like to pay for the information.

2. When traffic isn't your problem, conversion is. Let a professional copywriter and then a professional designer have a look at the site. They can help you optimize your content and your design to support the conversion process.

3. I understand you offer some products for free and others for a price. Sometimes potential customers have a hard time understanding why some products are free and why others are not. And if they don't get it, they probably won't spend money.
You could try to find other criteria on how to offer something for free and something for a price. Maybe it's a better strategy to offer basic profile information for free and detailed information for a price for all your products?

[jetpacklife]

Of course I'll jump in here with my opposite suggestions.

You should look to pump up your traffic and make money from ads. Can your site make or generate profiles on every celeb? Maybe with your user's help? Do you have good natural SEO? Do you come up in google search results for every celeb name you offer?

You could also make a facebook app.. I know there are a lot of personality tests on there doing pretty well now.. not sure if yours is actually better or what.

[kamakiri]

One of the few times I have to disagree with Jet Set. Adding ads will cheapen your site and take away from the message you are trying to put out.

What I fail to see is a need for your service. It looks like you came up with the product first then thought about how to make money, when you should have done it the exact opposite.

What differentiates you from the many personality tests? Are your results verifiable in any way, or proven? (heck, since you haven't made any sales, posting the site here is probably not going to be looked at as 'sales').

Can you duplicate the results in the form of a test?

Even though my post might sound critical, don't throw out the baby with the bath water. You are on the right track, just not moving in the proper direction.

[webgal]

What I fail to see is a need for your service. It looks like you came up with the product first then thought about how to make money, when you should have done it the exact opposite.



You need to think in terms of strategy. Why would they buy Bill Gates personality profile? Have you offered a snippet of what's in there to tease. You really need to do some testing. Be patient. When you offer a lot free, it's hard to get people to take that leap of faith. Is it a one-time sort of thing or do you have returning visitors? Why and who needs these personality profiles? Once you determine an audience who values it, then you can nail down why and position your product.

[froldt]

I have to agree with Kam on this one... I can't see why I would want or need info on someone's personality, especially since I can already buy books written by Bill Gates, etc.

Perhaps focus on what benefit one can get from knowing their personality. Help them find their best suited career, determine what they really want to get from life, the characteristics they might be looking for in a mate, etc. Sell them the benefit, use your personality profiling as the way to reach it.

[jetpacklife]

You guys are all thinking so small. The free online personality test market is HUGE. The paid market is tiny. If this guy really has a compelling test with interesting results, it could be big. If it's the best test, it should be number #1.
The current top facebook personality app has over a 1/4 million active users.
http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=2490151219

When I started my current muse a few years ago, the field was dominated by a multi-billion dollar company's main product. Within months I was listed at #1 in google for the product type, and soon gained millions of users. The multi-billion dollar company? They quickly moved to offer a free product of their own to compete with mine, but I still beat them in the free market. I simply don't need to charge for my product as I make enough money with ads.

[kamakiri]

You guys are all thinking so small. The free online personality test market is HUGE.

Sounds like the guys who sell $1 for 95 cents. Yes they lose money on every transaction, but they make it up in VOLUME!

Seriously though, where did you get he idea that the paid personality test market is tiny? That is huge. And, in today's market it has the potential to be even bigger. Think about all of the restaurants that have lines of applicants coming in. No restaurant in this economy should have bad staff or management. An online test that is effective? Exactly what they need. $5 A pop is cheap.

[FreedomFinder]

Hi Everyone,
Just finished Tim's book and needless to say I am a fan.

The book inspired me to create my own on line business.

For a long time I have been doing research on psychological personality types.
I made a discovery that allows me to find individuals' personalities with great accuracy.

I am trying to monetize the discovery and this is proving difficult.

I have set up the website and it a moderate number of hits, about 3,000 per month. It showcases the personalities of many famous personalities, such as President Obama and his wife, President Bush and his wife, John Lennon, Anne Frank and many other. It has a fully automated personality test, books for sale, and is translated in several languages.

Many of the visitors are from high profile sources. For instance someone from the CIA was getting information about a famous personality, the computer lab admin at Harvard was looking for Tim Lee's personality, etc, etc. MIT, Cambridge, Fidelity Investments, Fort Bragg, Berkley's Office of the president, and many others have benefited from the information.

Most of the personalities are listed for free. But I have several paying options. For instance Bill Gates' personality is just $100. The full personality profiles of the Obama administration, etc.

The problem is I have not made any sales of these paying options. As I said the demand is high for the free profiles, the Obama profile was getting dozens of hits every day. But no sales yet :confused:

What am I doing wrong? I am on page one on google for "bill gates personality" for instance. I would love some advice on creating, packaging and marketing the products.

Thanks.

If you're getting hits, just put ads up, that should allow you to at least generate SOME income while you're figuring out how to get people to BUY what you have to offer. Hope that helps.

[Merlin]

Is this your site: edited

If so, how is this unique? What are you offering that someone cannot create themselves? This Myers-Briggs typing modality has been around for decades.

After looking at your site (if this is your site... fits your description above...) here's what I notice:
1. Cluttered and confusing - I suggest clarifying and refining all of your copy.
2. No clear example of what one gets for the price. When I clicked on the Britney Spears personality type for example (free) there was no analysis of what this type means. So there is no perceived value in your product.

I can go much more into depth, but I need to know if this is your site first.

Cheers

[TomScarlato]

Perhaps you should give away all your personality info on famous people and let people take the online test for free to build credibility then sell a book or package kit that shows the consumer to peg someones personality and how to use that info to your advantage (negotiations, dating, office politics, whatever).

I doubt people will pay for gimmicky personality traits (who cares what Bill Gates personality is). But they will pay for a useful or neat skill.

[FindYourPersonality]

Is this your site: edited

If so, how is this unique? What are you offering that someone cannot create themselves? This Myers-Briggs typing modality has been around for decades.

After looking at your site (if this is your site... fits your description above...) here's what I notice:
1. Cluttered and confusing - I suggest clarifying and refining all of your copy.
2. No clear example of what one gets for the price. When I clicked on the Britney Spears personality type for example (free) there was no analysis of what this type means. So there is no perceived value in your product.

I can go much more into depth, but I need to know if this is your site first.

Cheers

Hi,

That could be my website. Interesting, how did you find it?

Thank you for your input. Please elaborate more on what you think about it.

[FindYourPersonality]

Here is the data for the Google visitors to my website - top 5 search terms:

Impressions : Your site appeared in these searches
# % Query Position

1 17% karl jung 10

2 11% carl yung 5

3 9% jung personality types 6

4 8% carl jung personality test 7

5 5% carl jung books 8

[Merlin]

Hi,

That could be my website. Interesting, how did you find it?

Thank you for your input. Please elaborate more on what you think about it.

LOL. First of all, consider what is keeping you from revealing the identity of your website?

Second, Google is good at what it does.

Third, I asked you to confirm if that was your website so that I would know I was actually helping you and not spending our time on some random website. Now you're wasting my time by not confirming/disconfirming. So I'm happy to consult with you for $90/hour (discounted rate) on how to increase conversions. PM me when you're ready.

Regards,
M

[Marcie]

It's up to the original poster to post his link or not. Please feel free to do so (or not). Otherwise, please don't post other people's (muse) links without permission...Thanks!

[Sven]

Well Marcie, I am curious. Of course it is up to the OP to place a link or not. But if the website is open to the public I feel that anyone is open to place a link in a reply. If you do not want content to be found on the internet it should not be there or it should be hidden well...

And if Merlin feels he's wasting his time, I would probably feel the same, OP seems way too reluctant to keep spending time on well thought trough feedback.... But then again, he is free to do so.

In reading this thread I now feel that it is a bit harsh to use the term "wasting my time" which I have also used quite often myself. Didn't seem that harsh when I used it. I'll be sure to check next time it comes up.

[Marcie]

I'm just guessing that original poster had a reason for *not* posting the link in the first place. I could be wrong.

[FindYourPersonality]

Thank you Marcie. You are right.

The reason is the same reason that most people do not post their full name and personal details on a forum, but use avatars instead. Privacy I would say.

[FindYourPersonality]

LOL. First of all, consider what is keeping you from revealing the identity of your website?

Second, Google is good at what it does.

Third, I asked you to confirm if that was your website so that I would know I was actually helping you and not spending our time on some random website. Now you're wasting my time by not confirming/disconfirming. So I'm happy to consult with you for $90/hour (discounted rate) on how to increase conversions. PM me when you're ready.

Regards,
M

Haha, that was out of the blue. You are not doing a good job converting me. Show me how good you are, make me pay. (My day job is investment banking, I invest only in sure things ie. prob 1, with returns of 10x).
Good luck.

[Merlin]

Sven said it perfectly - and I agree that 'wasting my time' can come across quite strongly.

FindYourPersonality - not looking for a pissing contest, best wishes for your site.

[FindYourPersonality]

No problem. I just want to discuss some general points, I don't necessarily need a detailed report at this time.

[beowulf.of.wa@gmail.com]

i know from personal experience that the personality profile need in business can be huge (had several companies require them as part of the interview). if your test is better than theirs, you might consider targeting that market instead. and part of that adjustment might be to show how various celebs would perform within various job fields.