

Cringely: Making 400k/yr profit on an eBook about parrots - tptacek
http://www.cringely.com/2009/03/parrot-secrets/

======
miles
Two quotes from the comments on Cringley's site bear repeating (or should I
say "parroting" - sorry ;-)

William: "Ugh. I was really excited you’d found something that entrepreneurs
could do to bring value to the world. But this guy’s taken the basics somebody
could get from any $20 parrot book, added a heap of the sort of dubious
marketing that fills the low-grade tabloids, thrown in a web forum they could
get for free, and charged $80 for it. From an economic perspective — which is
something we clearly could use more of — this business adds little or no value
to the world. All it does is extract money from people who aren’t smart enough
to find the right parrot book through Amazon or their local pet store. It
moves money around, but it makes us net poorer, as it consumes more value than
it creates. I’m sure it’s great for the guy running it, but don’t fool
yourself into thinking this does anything good for our economy at all."

Mike Gamerland: "Following this model, you would suggest we all pick a niche
market, identify ourselves as someone we are not, with experience and
expertise we don’t have and sell products to people who, by the very nature of
the market – would find it difficult if not impossible to know the truth... So
- instead of identifying expertise and raising it above the clatter of the
girl 'who would love to talk to me now' and the 'banker from Africa – who can
make me millions,' I am stuck with more liars working to get money from me."

~~~
byrneseyeview
_All it does is extract money from people who aren’t smart enough to find the
right parrot book through Amazon or their local pet store._

All your grocery store ever does is extract money from people who aren't smart
enough to find the right produce through their local farmer.

This is a new model of retail. Instead of creating a central box into which a
hundred different products can be dumped, for a thousand different people,
this site creates a single location for a single product, which a huge number
of searchers will find. The fact that there _is_ a Parrot Book, and that it's
easy to find, is good for humanity. Not sure if the rewards are commensurate
to the goodness, but if you average this in with a few hundred other sites
using the same scheme with less success, you get a saner picture.

~~~
miles
I agree that the market/individuals should decide whether a parrot ebook is
worth $80. If he sold it for $1 or $1000 it wouldn't make any difference to
me. However, I strongly agree with Mike's comments; setting up fake identities
and passing them off as the real owners/buyers/etc is simply fraud. Cringley
likens these fake identities to Betty Crocker - what a crock. No one believes
there is a Betty Crocker any more than they believe there is a "Mister
Doughnut" <http://www.mister-donut.com/> or a "Wendy" <http://www.wendys.com/>
, nor do these companies lie to convince us of their reality ("Wendy came over
with three of her friends yesterday to make a fresh batch of burgers - you
just missed her!"). In short, sell the parrot book on its merits, not on
outright lies.

~~~
mechanical_fish
As someone elsewhere on this thread has pointed out: If this guy sold the
books under his own name, and his own name happened not to be "Joe Smith" but
rather "Rajesh Bhatnagar"... people in Middle America [1] would not be as
likely to buy his book. Despite the fact that there could obviously be plenty
of people with Indian-sounding names, great writing skill, and a knowledge of
parrots.

If working under a pseudonym is a "fraud" then a lot of great writers were
frauds: Charles Dodgson, Samuel Clemens, Stephen King, Robert Heinlein, Isaac
Asimov, a sizeable percentage of the artists who draw your newspaper's comic
strips, and 100% of the authors of the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books, among
others. Many musicians are "frauds" (Farrokh Bulsara, Robert Zimmermann,
Reginald Dwight), including most famous rap musicians. Half of Hollywood is a
a "fraud": Frances Gumm, Archibald Leach, Margarita Cansino, Marion Morrison,
Allen Konigsberg, Carlos Estévez, Maurice Mickelwhite.

(Sorry about the flood of examples. I just can't resist them. Isn't it fun how
much less bland the world looks if we just remove the whitewash? But, alas, I
can't blame Marion Morrison for deciding that he'd sell more tickets as "John
Wayne", because I don't doubt that fact for a minute.)

As we've seen, many pseudonyms were chosen precisely to hide the author's true
race or gender from the buying public: George Sand, George Eliot. And there's
an analogous practice: the creative use of initials. (Especially common for
women trying to break in to SF/F. Isn't that interesting?) Thus, Joanne
Rowling publishes as "J.K. Rowling" [2], Carolyn Cherry's 60-odd works of SF
are published as "C.J. Cherryh" [3], and Celia Friedman writes as "C.S.
Friedman".

\---

[1] I single out Middle America because it's the place I know -- I was born
and raised in Ohio. I'm sure Middle America isn't the only place where this is
true.

[2] Of course, this doesn't fool anyone anymore in her case.

[3] According to Wikipedia, the extra "h" is there because "Cherry" sounded
too much like a _romance_ novelist's name.

~~~
cedsav
You make a good point. However the author goes beyond just taking a pseudonym.
He pretends to have 12 years of experiences with parrots, when the reality is
zero. This is where overcoming bias turns into deceptive marketing practices.

~~~
mechanical_fish
_He pretends to have 12 years of experiences with parrots, when the reality is
zero._

Yeah, that one would be a little harder to explain away. ;)

------
ShabbyDoo
We who hang out on HN don't have a very diverse group of acquaintances. If we
find someone to be an idiot, we probably don't waste too much time with him.
So, we end up with a very biased view of the world. Given this, when we see a
smarmy-looking site for an expensive parrot book, we laugh and think, "Who the
hell would buy that?" The guy who's running the site was able to see how dumb
most Americans (or at least English readers) are and picked a business
accordingly.

Also, many of us would be embarrassed to admit that we were making our money
this way, so we avoid even considering such activities.

So, what other information niches exist that would satisfy the needs of some
small fraction of other 90-some percent? Yes, this question is arrogant,
crass, and probably repugnant to many. However, it's the kind of question that
Parrot Guy probably asked himself when he got started.

~~~
TweedHeads
Diabetes, go with diabetes and you'll make ten times more.

Or anything health related.

~~~
ShabbyDoo
Yeah. It's a category that people certainly have an incentive to care about. I
wonder if there are laws that prevent claims like, "Learn the true secrets of
diabetes management." Also, you'd be competing with WebMD and other free and
legit sources.

Yesterday on the TeeVee, I saw an ad for a DVD on how to make one's child
behave himself. Given that we have a 3 1/2 year-old who is a terror, I paused
to evaluate the claims made. Perhaps mental health-related stuff would get
around the "playing doctor" problem? I mean light claims like "feel better"
rather than "cure your depression."

Not that I actually want to do any business like this...I'm no better at it
than the next guy. Also, isn't a bookstore the oldest form of this? The only
thing new is the disintermediation and electronic distribution.

------
MaysonL
For a contrary opinion on the guy's ethics, see <http://nancyrichards.org/>
(hoisted from the comments on Cringely's site).

~~~
iamelgringo
There is a difference between, "This guy doesn't deliver his digital goods"
and "This guy is making money left and right selling digital goods".

Both may be true.

Whether this guy has terrible customer service is a different discussion than
asking if the business model works. I'm much more interested in hearing if the
business model works or not.

~~~
sofal
There are a lot of "working business models" that consist of tricking older
people into paying much more than they should.

There is a lot of money to be made off of unsuspecting people in a perfectly
legal way. Are you into that kind of thing?

Don't ask me where I think the line should be drawn. But the line needs to be
drawn somewhere, and it shouldn't be right at the boundary between what is
technically legal and what is not.

------
ashleyw
Do sites/pages like this actually work?

    
    
        http://www.parrotsecrets.com/
    

I've always thought they look too cheap, scammy and desperate for most people
to bother with...

~~~
Alex3917
"I've always thought they look too cheap, scammy and desperate for most people
to bother with..."

The reason all these pages have that look is that each paragraph is designed
only to get you to read the next paragraph. The idea is that if you've already
decided that you're going to buy it, you'll just scroll down to the bottom.
And if you haven't yet decided to buy it, then the next thing that needs to
happen before closing the sale is that you need to read the next paragraph.
The logic of it actually makes a lot of sense.

~~~
access_denied
And it is scientifically proven that it works. It is called direct marketing
and works since the 1920s. No big deal.

------
tobych
Despite having lived in the US for a couple of years now and beginning to lose
my English accent, I think if I ever met the bloke who does this, despite my
love of beauty, elegance and other good things, I'd inevitably end up slapping
him heartily on the back and pronouncing: "Good for you, mate. Nice one. Gotta
hand it to you."

I've long wondered about those long-paged red-yellow-and-white sites. They've
always seemed like they live in this other, mysterious world. A parallel web,
at least. Who would read this stuff? Who would /write/ this stuff? Do they not
know what they're doing? Now I know they (often) /really/ know what they're
doing. It's not my thing at all, but it's impressive.

And yes, very much 4 Hour Work Week. Equally yukky and impressive all at the
same time.

------
mechanical_fish
As the owner of a parrot and a reader of several parrot books and magazines...
the advice at the top of the sample page looks completely legit.

In particular, I cringe inwardly whenever I see someone with a parrot on their
shoulder.

------
steveplace
If you guys want to know more about how to do this, I have an ebook for you.
It's a steal at only $49!

------
TY
Here is another take on targeting a narrow niche from an interview by Andrew
Warner (also about selling to bird lovers - an interesting coincidence):

"When Bob Dunlap of ClickBank told me that one of his clients made $500,000
last year selling an ebook about how to attract humming birds to your home, I
had to interview him."

<http://blog.mixergy.com/sell-ebooks/>

The article for that post pretty much outlines exactly what parrotsecrets.com
has done.

Important part of business like this is the role of affiliate marketing in
driving traffic to these sites. Affiliate costs (that can be very substantial)
should be factored into how much these sites make.

~~~
AndrewWarner
ClickBank told me there are a lot of people making this kind of money from
ebooks on niche subjects.

------
zaidf
I have friends making just as much using adwords so I would not doubt this.

On the other hand, it is not easy money as it may appear. You have to drain a
lot of hours and money into testing different markets/products until you find
a niche and product with a math that returns a profit. Pros of it is because
it uses adwords, the business can scale in most cases.

------
russell
You know, I can see the logic of this from the buyers point of view. Last year
bats got into my house and I couldnt get rid of them because I couldnt figure
out where they came from. My GF was terrified. She wouldnt leave the bedroom
without me around. I certainly would have paid $10-20 (not $80) for an ebook
that even hinted at a solution.

I finally arrived at a solution, but backwards. I sealed all the entrances
into my house, but I hadn't sealed the bats out, I had sealed them in. For a
couple of months, whenever I moved a piece of furniture, I'd uncover another
dead bat. Dead bats dont look like dead bats. They look like balls of dust. I
had vacuumed up a couple before I realized what they were.

~~~
chops
We had exactly the same problem several years ago. We had lots of bats in our
attic of our vacation cottage. In an effort to lock them out, we effectively
locked them in, and they started coming in to the house through openings from
the attic to the main part of the house.

------
arram
I wonder how much of the profit comes from selling customer contact info.
Privacy Statement: Personally Identifiable Information

This web site may collect personally identifiable information about you. The
information may include your name, your email address, your location and
mailing address, and your phone number.

Your personally identifiable information may be used to send you emails or
postal mails about special offers that may be relevant to you. Your personally
identifiable information may be disclosed to third parties who may be
interested in sending you emails or postal mails about special offers that may
be relevant to you.

~~~
garyrichardson
Having worked in the industry, I'd say very little of it. An $80 ebook is
almost all profit. If you can write/edit your own copy, your costs are
typically a domain reg, super cheap hosting and whatever cut your payment
gateway takes.

It's much more important to have a good reputation than make a few dollars off
of an email address. That good rep means more testimonials, which leads to
more consumer confidence in buying from your website.

------
garyrichardson
This is straight out of my old gig. Google Corey Rudl or visit
<http://www.marketingtips.com> if you want a manual on the process.

~~~
quickpost
Why did you decide to get out of it? It seems rather lucrative and
straightforward if you've cracked the code...

~~~
garyrichardson
I was a sysadmin for marketingtips.com, then left for a startup.

I've seen/met some of the success stories. The system does work. As always,
money out is dependent on effort in. Plus luck.

I'd much rather my effort in be code based than marketing copy based.

------
siegler
There's no way that a book on Perl 6 makes 400k/year!

~~~
acangiano
It ships with Perl 6's source code. :)

------
piramida
Oh great, article about how much money a scam generates! We need more of these
on the Internet, it's too honest and valuable now! Everybody that's out of job
should do some ebay scam, why bother working while there are so many easy
money making schemes...

~~~
pixpox3
Why is it a scam? This guy is selling an ebook, with a money back guarantee.

Just because you think the book is crappy doesn't mean its a scam. Who cares
if Nancy Roberts or whoever doesn't exist, he's just realised that parrot
owners from middle America aren't likely to buy a book from a guy called
Manupek Chandajee.

~~~
sofal
If you went up to my grandma and started telling her why she needs to buy a
$100 book that tells her how to get rich, with enough convincing she would
seriously buy it from you. This is because my grandma is not very money-wise
and is especially vulnerable to that kind of thing. I doubt she is
particularly unique in this respect among grandmas.

Do you see the problem here? Do you perhaps realize why I might want to
discourage salesmen like that from coming in contact with my grandma? Look,
it's just a guy selling a book, right? If my grandma decides that she needs it
then that's up to her, right?

Why is it hard to understand that there are people out there who can be taken
advantage of legally but shouldn't be? There is a point when you cross the
line from providing value to taking unfair advantage of others. It's
reasonable in the latter case to call it a scam, ebook or no ebook.

~~~
slance
I see what you mean.

But people buy stupid stuff, it's up to them to decide what they spend their
money on, not for some arbiter of fairness to ban products that they think are
too expensive or don't provide enough value.

Capitalism isn't ethical, it's morally neutral, if you start banning people
from selling books that are too expensive or that you think don't provide the
correct information (have you even read it?) then the whole economy doesn't
work.

What about razors? They cost $20/£10 and the advertising preys on men who are
likely to be convinced of the necessity of "FOUR BLADES!" when in fact it
makes no difference at all. They don't have to buy the overpriced razor.

~~~
sofal
I'm not advocating a ban on that sort of thing. I think that codifying it into
some sort of law and forcing it upon everyone else would be the dumbest thing
possible. What I'm suggesting is that people like you and I should shun that
kind of business behavior voluntarily. It's more of a moral thing, like not
being a patent troll.

------
airlabam
"$79.95 is nothing to pay if it saves a vet visit per year and keeps you from
losing a fingertip or having your parrot call Grandma a whore."

The last reason was actually kind of the reason I've been wanting to get a
parrot. Inappropriate? Yes. Hilarious? Even more so.

------
sofal
Here's what a legitimate parrot expert has to say about it:

[http://goodbirdinc.blogspot.com/2009/02/buyer-beware-
parrot-...](http://goodbirdinc.blogspot.com/2009/02/buyer-beware-parrot-
training.html)

------
ratsbane
Everyone missing the obvious thing here. It's not about the parrot site at
all. It's about Cringely's site. Cringely has written a post about how to make
a lot of money doing something easy. Cringely's post gets a lot of traffic.
(Currently #1 on HN.) Cringely's site hosts ads. Cringely (and Mrs. Cringely)
make lots of money. The parrot site is to Cringely's site what parrots are to
the parrot site.

~~~
slance
He won't make much from the traffic from HN. Social media tech traffic is
worth hardly anything.

Ultra targetted non-tech savvy traffic like the parrot site gets from adwords
is worth a lot.

~~~
ratsbane
His traffic has come up sharply over the last few months (Quantcast:
<http://www.quantcast.com/cringely.com>) to ~3k/month. Compare with
ParrotSecrets.com at ~13k. Cringely is just following his own advice. What
he's doing is as interesting as what he's saying.

------
tptacek
"The owner of Parrotsecrets, for one thing, doesn’t even own a parrot."

First instinct: I call shenanigans.

Second take: remember the numbers 37signals posted on the "Getting Real"
eBook?

~~~
mixmax
There might actually be more people interested in parrots than in how to run a
small software company efficiently.

~~~
mechanical_fish
Indeed. Particularly when you consider that the average small software company
doesn't live for 25 to 70 years.

Even though I don't have a problem with my parrot, I'm acutely aware of the
possibility that my _executor_ might someday have a problem with my parrot.
And I've got one of the shorter-lived species!

------
mahmud
"eBooks have no manufacturing costs, no inventory costs, and almost no
distribution costs. Best of all, it is a GLOBAL business."

As long as the topic of your ebook does not appeal to the mainstream[1]

[1]<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=516239>

~~~
jcl
This makes parrots a great subject choice.

------
willhf
Who is going to help me with the Jellyfish secrets eBook?

~~~
russell
Fried jellyfish are surprisingly good, crisp on the outside and slightly chewy
in the center. I kid you not.

------
jwilliams
Sorry for the meta-comment, but, the text on the page is justified -- strange!
I can't think of any other significant web examples where they justify?

~~~
gord
I can parse justified text, although I prefer left side only...

But, centered? thats completely unjustified!

------
RobGR
This site reminds me of Timothy Ferris and that 4 Hour Work Week book.

