One thing I pride myself on are my checklists and forms. I use them everyday at work. In fact, there is even a checklist for using the checklist. Because my job in real estate and property management is sooo detailed, I find that it’s pretty handy just to have a sheet of items that I need to do ready to go. I don’t want to miss anything.
But I’m not just talking about to do lists. These are actual step-by-step checklists and forms that could get anyone started in the landlording game. I started to put these forms into a book format and even shopped a few publishers. But overall, I couldn’t see the book being a New York Times Bestseller, and packaging them all together would make the book itself kinda of expensive. I don’t want to worry about marketing the whole book and justifying the hefty price tag. I just want to present it one form at a time. I want to blog about the one form and how great it is and then get my property management groupie following (yes, there is such a thing) to want the individual form. They should be able to purchase it a la carte or just download it for free. Afterall, I am all about sharing information in an open source world.
My idea is to post these checklists on my company web site and allow information-hungry landlords to search for them and download them for their own personal use. These checklists will include (but certainly not be limited to) inspection forms, applications and lease agreements, final walk through checklists, lease signing checklists, etc. Most of them will probably be free, but a few of the bigger, more intense premium checklists will be for purchase. I don’t plan on becoming a millionaire off of these forms and checklists, but to make enough money to buy a large Panera Hazelnut coffee is enough to make my day.
The problem I’m running into now is finding a WordPress plugin to help organize the numerous checklists and present them for download. I’ve got the WP-Download Manager plugin and it is not shiny or pretty. It is just okay, at best. Next, I need to find a plugin that will allow me to sell the forms or checklists. I need something that easy to work with and will handle providing the download links to the end user. Any suggestions?
I’m reaching out to you, my peeps here. Whether or not to you are a Property Manager Groupie. What WordPress plugins do you suggest to make this idea come together? What would you like to see?
And for those of you that are Property Manager Groupies… I suggest you seek help. Just as I am.
UPDATE! 12-14-2010 —- I have found something! WP eStore Plugin. If you’re looking for the property management forms, go here.
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Checklist Queen Needs A Wordpress Plugin – http://www.jessicahickok.com/archives/12…
One thing is for sure, you are the checklist queen. However, I think you need to put cleaning your car on one of your lists.
I’m always curious as to how people keep themselves organized. I’m such a digital and (usual) paperless geek but if I type To-Do Lists, I don’t read them – tried Tadalist.com, notes on iPhone and emailing them to myself – still forget to look at it. For me, to-do lists have to be done with paper and pen. And the environment has to suffer just a little bit more.
And everyone calls their list something different, but the best I ever heard was “Creative Hit List.” Liked it so much I titled 365 sheets of paper with it – one for each day.
Not related to WP Plugins but close enough.
Try http://www.docstoc.com – They’re great. Problem is, if I’m not mistaken, when it comes to selling documents, they take a pretty large cut.
The other option of course would be to set up a selling page on your blog with a paypal checkout for example. Then, upon purchase, send an email with a password to a password protected page on the site where they can download the document. e-junkie.com works GREAT for this sorta thing.
Anyway, Staples always sells all kinds of documents. I’ve bought several on occasion over the years. Why not pitch a local store to allow you to sell a few of your lists?
Hope that helps