Jan
30
Do people know what you do?
That may sound like a simple question. But really think about it for a moment.
Do people truly understand what you do? All of it?
I know from personal experience that its sometimes hard to list every single thing you do either on your brochures, on your website, or in your other marketing materials. You might give them a list of the few things you think would be best for them, but you might also leave off a few things you don’t think they are interested in.
Yet the easiest way to bring in money is to sell more to your existing client base.
Here are some ideas for you to start generating new sales just be letting people know what you do.
1. Blog about an existing client. You can highlight their business, talk about the work you’ve done from them, and possible results they’ve had by using your product or service.
Jan
28
5 Ways To Make Your Business Stand Out From The Competition
Filed Under Blog Marketing | Leave a Comment
What separates you from your competition? 
When you visit your competitions’ websites, can you tell the difference between your site and theirs? (I’m not talking about a few different photographs, and a change of address. Does your site truly look different in your prospects eye?)
The one sure-fire way of stepping away from the crowd is to provide a wide array of content. People need to be able to see and hear the difference. And when you can’t do that in person, its important to put as much into your web presence as possible.
1. Write
Don’t just write a paragraph or two on each of your five pages. Write as if you’re speaking directly with a customer. The average person speaks around 160 words per minute. In a one hour meeting, you would speak around 9,600 words. Use those words to tell people about you and your services.
2. Create a video
Have you ever hired a person because of the way they speak? People resonate with other people because of their speech, their body language, and the way they communicate. The easiest way to get your point across is to create a video for your site or blog. It doesn’t have to be a 60 minute full production. Even just a 2 minute opening can produce amazing results.
Jan
26
What’s the biggest thing standing in your way of success?
If you’re like most people, I’m sure you can come up with a list of things that are currently holding you back. But ultimately all of it can be lumped into one of two things: 
1. I don’t have enough time
2. I don’t have the money
How can you overcome them to be more successful online?
1. We all have a ton of things to do each day. And if you own your own business, that list can seem to grow to a mile long some times. How do you squeeze it all in?
Priorities. What is the most important thing you can do today that will impact your business in the future?
Try this activity. Write down everything you need to accomplish today that will help you build your business. Then prioritize them as a 1, 2 or 3.
Jan
21
No matter what niche you’re in, or who your target customer is, the more of an authority you have, th
e more clients you will win.
People want to do business with people they like. But more importantly, people want to do business with people they feel have a certain level of expertise; they can trust them because they really understand what they are talking about.
So if you’re trying to find a financial planner, you may check to see:
· What strategy they are using for their own family
· How well they are doing with their own investments
· How connected they are in the community
· What type of advice they give, and where they give advice regularly
You may trust your own instincts after meeting with a person. But it definitely adds to credibility when you confirm your opinion by seeing them out in your community.
For some businesses, they do little or nothing to control what’s being said about them. But in today’s environment, its easier than ever to steer the information to build up a true picture of who you are and what you stand for.
Jan
19
One of the hardest things to see in an existing business is an entirely new way to bring in a new stream of income. 
I was talking with a friend over the weekend who already has a successful business. She owns a service business, and consults with local business owners.
She already works 40 hours per week, has no desire to increase her hours, but would love another revenue source that she really doesn’t have to work that hard for. Her question was, “Can I do that with a blog?”
You bet
Anytime you work one to one with a client, you have the ability to turn it into a one to many relationship.
So if you’re spending one hour with a client giving them technical advice, wouldn’t ten other business owners pay to hear that same material?
And if you’re spending one hour with a client in Denver, Colorado, would someone in Florida (or Australia, or Ireland, etc) pay to hear that same advice?
Jan
15
Blogging For Business Tip #10
Filed Under Blogging Tips | Leave a Comment
I’ve been on several social sites lately where people have asked the question, “How do I gain traffic to my blog?” So as my Blogging For Business Tip #10, I thought I would include ten simple ways you can gain traffic to your blog.
1. Write quality posts all the time. Yep, I know, I’m a broken record. But regular content is really the key to building up your following. If they get there and you haven’t written in two months, or you only have 10 posts to go through, there’s no reason to stick around.
2. Now that you have blog posts, you need to spread them around the blogosphere. Connect your RSS feed to your accounts in Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.
3. Stay active in your social sites, and your sure to find other bloggers that target similar audiences. When they create a new blog post, head over and make a comment. Not a, “great post” comment. Put some thought into it, and really add to the conversation. The comment will make people want to find out more about you, which they can do by following your link.
Jan
13
The Point In Blogging
Filed Under Blogging For Business | 1 Comment
I had an interesting conversation with a person I met out networking today. I explained a little of what I do, and of course the subject of blogging came up.
First question was, “What is a blog?”
Second question was, “Why would you do that?”
I get that from a lot of
people. Why would you keep writing up posts giving away solid information when you aren’t getting an immediate return? Is it really worth your time?
Your blog is an extension of your marketing program.
If you’ve been in business for a while now, chances are you do certain marketing items just to keep your name out there. Maybe you continually advertise in a community magazine. Maybe you send out newsletters. Whatever you do, you do it for the exposure. You do it to remain in the thoughts of those who know you.
Jan
7
Every post you write does not have to be completely original content, 
and bring up new subject matter. Occasionally its good to use past blog posts, and bring them together to make a new post, and give people another way to think about things.
For most websites, the search engines love the home page because everything is linked to it. The internal pages of the site link back to the home page. And in many cases, external links on other sites also link only to the home page.
But on your blog, it’s easy to connect multiple blog posts together.
For instance, if I’m writing a new post on creating titles for your blog posts, I may write some new material, but I’m also going to link you back to one of my popular entries – Blogging For Business Tip #8 – which is all about creating titles.
Jan
5
Finally back from a long holiday break. 
I always love the first Monday in January. The holidays are behind us, it’s the beginning of a New Year, and I’ve got all my goal sheets and tasks laid out in front of me. I’m ready to get started on making the New Year the best yet.
Since I’m putting the details in place for my new class Make Money Online in 2009, I thought I would put together a post giving you some questions to think about.
1. Do you know the difference between SEO (search engine optimization) and SMM (social media marketing) and where you should be focusing your efforts?
The world has been using buzz words like SEO for years. For many years its been at the top of Internet savvy business owners lists. But now social media is rapidly moving up the ranks, and more importantly, giving business owners huge results.
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