So, you’re an online marketer with a great idea that you know will be loved by your target market. You’re quite certain that it’s going to be a venerable cash cow once it is implemented properly.

The problem is, your resources are quite wanting at the moment. For starters, you have yet to establish a credible brand that could instantly win consumer confidence. You will not be able to sell your new product on the strength of your name alone. Also, your mailing list is composed of ten subscribers, and more importantly, you don’t have the financial capital to fund the production of your idea.

So, what should be done? Should you give up on your grand idea just like that?

Hold your horses, friend. There is a way for you to have your idea see the light of day.

It’s called joint venturing, or “doing a JV”, as it has fondly been called in the online marketing scene. Joint ventures are partnerships between two or more online marketers, who pool together their resources to ensure the success of a particular project. Once profit is realized, these partners employ a previously established profit-sharing scheme. Everyone who chipped in would be given his or her just share. And everyone would go home happy.

If you don’t have the resources for the idea you have in mind, you could seek out some online marketers who would be willing to enter a joint venture with you. Why would they want to partner up with someone like you? Well, there are many benefits that can be had with joint ventures which they will find pretty hard to resist.

* Since several people will pool together their resources for a joint venture, the risks can be minimized. Assuming the worst scenario that the project would fail, the losses would be less since it will be borne by several individuals, compared to the losses that can be incurred by one individual.

* Joint ventures allow online marketers to compensate for missing components in their portfolios. Don’t have a big mailing list? Partner up with someone who has tens of thousands of subscribers. Don’t have the cash to fund production? Seek out someone who has some extra money to invest. Don’t have an idea that can be profitably pursued? Seek out a creative soul beaming with novel concepts that are begging to be exploited.

* Joint ventures help build your brand in the online marketing community. If you’re an intermediate marketer who manages to enter a joint venture with a renowned guru, you’d be able to enjoy an instant boost to your reputation in the industry.

* Joint ventures foster great relationships between marketers. The experience of having worked with each other can blossom into future partnerships or even friendships.

There is no reason for an online marketer to refuse whatever helpful contribution you could provide for a project. He may be a well established personality in the industry, and you’re just a cub who’s starting out, but you may possess something that he does not have, and this would make you a valuable part of the team.

The trick, really, is in knowing where to seek out joint venture partners. If you have a great idea backed up by an equally amazing business plan, then finding willing partners would be easy, if you’re looking for them in the right places.

Here’s a tip. Join online business forums and start posting significant messages. Be a helpful member of the community and build your reputation. Then publish a thread that calls for joint venture partners. Explain to your respondents what you have in mind, and chances are, they’ll be more than interested in signing on for your endeavor.

Joint ventures prove that in internet marketing, there is no such thing as lack of resources. What can lead to failure in this field is a lack of imagination.

Often in our marketing, our efforts are focused on detailed descriptions of products and services. We see this all the time in advertising. The business goes into great detail talking about the great features of the product and the specific process of how they will do this for you. Sometimes these details are critical to the buyer’s buying decision and it does have merit.

However, don’t spend too much time describing the details when the customer really wants to know the results. They want to know what’s in it for them.

The old adage that you can’t see the forest for the trees may apply here. If you describe in detail the physical make-up of the trees of a forest, you might do so at the exclusion of adequately describing the entire beauty of the forest. If a beautiful forest is exactly what the customer is shopping for, you have now made an error in the way you are describing it by focusing on the trees.

It’s not just limited to trees in the forest, of course. Let’s talk about it in terms of products and services

Let’s relate that to a maid service. The specifics of what they do is not really that important. They do clean house, but that’s not necessarily what I’m interested in. What I’m interested in is having a great looking, clean, germ free house without lifting a finger.

Whatever your business offers, you need to tailor your marketing to communicate to your customers what your products and services do for them. You want to give a description of the product and a list of features, but you really want to focus on the benefits to the customer.

Until next time.

Here’s to Your Success,

Tim