Has the Quality of PLR Improved?

As one who is constantly evaluating money making programs, I get asked if the quality of PLR has improved. There's reason to be optimistic as you'll read in this article.

What Is PLR?

PLR is an acronym for Private Label Rights. This is a fancy term for usage rights that the product creator assigns. PLR tends to have the most flexibility in how products can be used. However, there are differences among creators. It's important to heed the differences (more on this later).

As an example, someone who wrote a document could sell this document to the highest bidder. The person who buys that document obtains full rights to it. In most cases, the writer transfers  those rights to the buyer. The writer no longer has the right to do anything with that document. This is not PLR.

Suppose the writer wanted to maximize his or her earnings on that document. The document could be sold to several people and each of those people are assigned rights as defined by the writer.

What Kinds of Rights Are Attributed?

The creator of the product (the document above, etc.), can give as much or as little to the buyers he or she feels. These often include (but not limited to):

There are variations and creators can choose which they want to include (as well as others not on this list). In short, whatever the creators decide is what is allowed.

Quality of PLR

PLR started about ten years ago. People flooded the market with it and over time the quality suffered. Also, because distribution was so widespread, the value of the products diminished. If one person sells a product, it may be worth $100. If thousands are selling that same product, the price eventually gets reduced to close to zero.

People were also abusing the system by not paying attention to the rights assigned. They were giving away products when they weren't supposed to. Product creators had a difficult time keeping up with who was doing what with their products.

PLR was also used for article spinning, which is the practice of using software to replace words (usually adjectives) to create several iterations of the same document. It seemed like a good idea, except for the fact that these spun documents became unreadable. People could easily tell spun content.

Amazon and other book sellers also cracked down on sellers who passed PLR off as their own work. ​

Many PLR creators threw in the towel and
scrapped their PLR efforts!

Recently, within the past couple of years, there has been a renaissance in the PLR markets. Smart product creators decided to pour in some time and money and create products worthy of selling once again.

As a result, people are started to catch on that they can get quality products at attractive prices and use them strategically.

Buyers of these products are more savvy now and will hit sellers with bad reviews if they see any sign of poor quality. This is the way it should work!

How to Use the New PLR?

If you decide to use PLR for your marketing efforts, keep in mind the following:

Why You Need to Make It Your Own

Imagine if you saw a sales page for a product and it looked enticing. Then, a few days later, you see the same exact product appear as a free giveaway, or at the very least, it cost much less than what you paid for it. How would that make you feel? How angry would you be with the seller? Would you ask for a refund?

This scenario plays out over-and-over again, even with this newfound love for PLR. If you decide to sell PLR products, you need to make sure that others won't get caught up in this situation. When you add value to your product, this won't happen.

Example of Adding Value

Suppose you found a product offering PLR rights. The product is video instruction on a popular topic. Instead of simply selling the videos, which many others will, why not create transcripts for them? Perhaps you can extract the audio as well. Now, you have an entire package that you can offer that no one else is doing.

Few people who read the previous paragraph will take advantage of the message given! Use that to your advantage. Most people are lazy. But, you're not!

Please Evaluate the Quality of All PLR You Obtain

Your reputation is on the line. If you simply take a PLR product that you buy and sell it without scrutinizing it, what if it's junk? Do you think you will have the luxury of explaining it's the fault of the product creator? You have a responsibility to your customers to make sure what you sell is high quality.

End of Story!

How to Find Sellers of PLR

I could write an entire article just on this topic...maybe I will 🙂

The point is it will take up too much space and bloat this post. One major factor when selecting sellers of PLR is do they retain editorial control? This means they either create the content themselves (or contract writers), or they read through submissions and approve them.

Try to avoid PLR sellers who allow any member to submit without approval. There is simply no way to control the quality when that happens.

Also, see if you can find the age of the content submitted. There are PLR sellers who are still selling content created back in 2008 or earlier. This content is not likely to be relevant now. The exception to this is evergreen topics such as fishing, cooking, etc. Many PLR repositories contain Internet Marketing related topics. Products from earlier than 2015 (at the time of this writing) will quite likely not be relevant in this field.

Many PLR websites try to hook you in with a monthly membership. This doesn't make them bad places to find PLR. However, they will need a great number of products in their repository for members to continue paying the membership fee, month after month. They maybe tempted to load up the membership with anything they find, irrespective of quality.

The good news is many of these PLR websites offer trial periods usually lasting for 30-days. Be sure to scrutinize them carefully during this period and by all means, pay attention to the date they will begin charging you. Ask them what their cancellation procedures are before you sign up.

Become the Shovel Seller

So, maybe you decide you don't want to use PLR for your marketing efforts. This doesn't mean others won't. Become the shovel seller. During the United States Gold Rush era, many people tried to dig for gold. Most of them came away with nothing, especially during the latter part of the rush.

But, guess what? They needed equipment to dig for gold. Specifically, they needed shovels. Guess who made money whether those diggers found gold or not? The shovel sellers (or renters).

You could create the PLR that others want to buy. You will make money whether they make any from the PLR or not. You will make money from multiple people and it matters not whether they make a dime. Of course, if you can help them make money from your creations, they will return to you for more.

Will the New PLR Gold Rush Last?

Who knows. The quality of PLR has improved and content creation is coveted. Fewer marketers are using PLR for notorious purposes any more. It's just not in their best interest to do so. My personal feeling is the trend will continue for as long as content is needed.

One Last Use for PLR

Even if you don't want to get involved with selling or creating PLR to sell to others, it still can be used in your content creation efforts. You can use it to generate ideas on what kinds of content to create for your own market. Higher quality content that has hit the market recently requires higher quality research. You can use the PLR content as the basis for your own research efforts.