The web is full of "free." Most of the stuff one the web that is "free," is just plain old garbage. Probably 95% of all blogs that give free eBooks that are "$500 values" are restating just a bunch of useless, irrelevant, and time-wasting information, in order for you to sign up to their RSS feed or capture your email address. Anything in the real world, that is given for "free," is usually useless as well. You see this a lot when companies promote their products and say "get this for FREE," but there is usually some sort of procedure with claiming your free product. Most of the "free" stuff out there is either a scam or is quite useless.
Now that I have established how much "free" is crap, let me tell you that if you have something really useful, don't say it is free. Whenever something is usually associated with the word "free," most people get the common thought of either useless or garbage, information or products. Now you will say, "Well what if my product is actually phenomenal and I want to give it away for free so people can actually use it and gain from it?"
Give away 1/2 of the product or service and charge for the remainder. Everytime I go blog-surfing around the web, I run across some money making blogs who are giving me a free eBook in return for my email address. Just to see, I have actually taken advantage of a few "free" eBooks and checked them out. Out of the 3 I read, 3 were the biggest waste of my time. Correct...100% of the "free" goods I scored, were completely useless to me. On the other hand, if the book was truly useful and I only got a few pages from it, I would have actually went ahead and PAID for the rest. Showing your audience that you have something they want by giving them a "preview" is a great way to actually promote your goods without being judged beforehand.
Blogger Timothy Sykes makes a boat load of cash each month from his blog and selling his PennyStocking DVD's also along with selling his TimAlerts service. This shows that people pay, for what is worth it. He has people paying month after month and they are only sticking around for one reason, it is because he is providing useful information that helps people.
Think about the movie trailers you see. Why do we go to the movie theaters or rent movies? Simply because the trailer shows us what to expect and if we like it we go ahead and PAY to see the movie. Your business should be no different.
But now you tell me... "Romil, you didn't answer my question, I said I wanted to GIVE AWAY my product." Well, if your product is REALLY and TRULY that amazing and you want to just give it away, then you should give it away. Know this- if your product is really great, people will spread the word about it and it will automatically market itself. But why wouldn't you want to make money off of something that is truly great? I would.
And a last thought...
Don't deliver some 1/2 baked sales scheme to the person you are trying to sell to. People aren't dumb. Don't say they are getting a deal or something is on sale, even if it is. Try to get them to get the preview or trailer of something and let THEM JUDGE. They will tell you what they think and it is their thought that really counts. If you have something great, people will NOT mind paying for it.
