Key Takeaways
- Not everything you know is equally worth packaging — some of it is common knowledge, some of it is uniquely yours, and only the second kind reliably sells.
- The strongest signal is repetition: what you find yourself explaining, in a similar way, to more than one client.
- A second signal is what clients pay specifically to avoid figuring out themselves — the shortcut, not just the information.
- A third signal is specificity: advice tied to your particular approach or framework outsells generic advice available anywhere.
- Combine the three signals into a shortlist before building anything — validation comes from evidence in your own client work, not from guessing what might sell.
In this article
Ask most experienced practitioners what they'd package and sell, and the honest answer is "I don't know — I know a lot of things." That answer isn't a lack of expertise. It's a lack of a method for finding the specific slice of it worth packaging.
There's a reliable way to find it, and it doesn't involve guessing. It involves looking at evidence you already have.
Why "everything I know" is the wrong starting point
Expertise accumulates unevenly. Some of what you know is common knowledge in your field — available in any textbook or a quick search. Some of it is specific to how you approach problems, built from years of pattern recognition across real clients. Only the second kind reliably sells, because it's not available anywhere else.
The goal isn't to catalog everything you know. It's to filter for the parts that are both valuable and specifically yours.
Signal 1: what you explain more than once
The single strongest signal is repetition — anything you find yourself explaining, in a similar way, to more than one client. Repetition means the need is common enough to package once and reuse, and that you already have a clear, practiced way of explaining it. Both are prerequisites for a good product.
Go back through your last 10-15 client conversations, sessions, or emails and note anything you explained more than once in roughly the same way. That list is your starting shortlist.
Signal 2: what clients pay to skip the struggle on
A second, related signal: what do clients specifically pay you for the shortcut on, rather than trying to figure out themselves? This isn't the same as general expertise — it's the specific friction point where struggling alone is expensive enough that people pay to skip it.
This overlaps with what's covered in why most professionals undervalue their knowledge — the thing you consider "obvious" is often the exact thing clients are paying to avoid struggling through alone.
Signal 3: what's yours, not generic advice
The third filter: is this advice tied to your specific approach, framework, or way of working — or is it generic information available from any practitioner in your field? Generic advice is harder to sell because it's not scarce. A specific method, even for a common problem, is.
Turning the signal into a shortlist
Cross-reference the three signals: what you repeat, what clients pay to skip, and what's specifically yours. Whatever shows up across two or more of them is a strong candidate to package first — not a guess, but a pattern backed by your own client history.
Once you have that shortlist, the next step is turning it into an actual product — covered in how to package your knowledge for sale. The identification step is what makes that process fast instead of speculative — Merkora gives you a single place to put it once you know what it is.
Frequently asked questions
What if I feel like I know a lot but nothing specific stands out?
That usually means you haven't looked at your own client history systematically yet. Go through the last 10-15 client conversations and note anything you explained more than once — the pattern is almost always there, it's just not obvious from memory alone.
Is popular knowledge (what everyone searches for) the same as monetizable knowledge?
Not necessarily. Popular topics have more competition and more free information already available. Monetizable knowledge is often narrower and more specific to your approach — which is exactly what makes it hard to get for free elsewhere.
Should I ask clients directly what they'd pay for?
It's useful context, but treat it as a secondary signal. People are often inaccurate predictors of their own future purchasing behavior. What they've already paid for, or already asked you to explain twice, is more reliable than what they say they'd buy.
What if my most repeated knowledge feels too basic to sell?
That feeling is common and usually wrong — what feels basic to you after years of experience is often exactly what a client has been unable to find a clear answer to elsewhere. Familiarity with your own expertise makes it feel less valuable than it actually is.
