Today's Innovative Woman Magazine
All About Business. All About Success. All About YOU!
When social media came around, did you get excited thinking “Yeah, finally, an easier, free way to market”?
And since that time, do you think differently?
I ask because most small business owners I know are NOT getting clients and prospects from their online social media marketing efforts. If they are getting them, it’s very few and far between.
Social Media by itself does not build relationships with your target market. Social media is merely a calling card that invites people to your “home” where you share “content” (valuable information) with your clients.
While social media is a great way of reaching out to clients – it is also a demanding mistress – constantly needing to be fed with new content. This is where people often get discouraged because they quickly run out of things to say.
Is there anyone on the planet who hasn’t heard that public speaking is the number one fear in America? Many business people are so genuinely freaked out by what they are going to say that they give too little thought to HOW they will say it. Not to make a challenging situation worse, but today I want to point out that how you speak can be even more important than the content you’re sharing, and certain vocal patterns can rob you of authority before you’re even out of the gate.
This is an interesting year. We are facing an election year, the economy is trying to recover, and jobs are not where everyone would like them to be. Corporations are watching what they spend, from gas to office supplies to corporate events. Not only is everything under scrutiny, employees and contractors alike are being asked to pitch in a little more even if they have a little less. And oh by the way, they are being guided to be more creative in their solutions.
A friend of mine keeps as many promises as she breaks. Why are we still friends? The main reason is that the promises she makes to me aren’t important.
When she promises to meet me for coffee, I enter the time in my iPhone and then before I leave my house, I send her a text to confirm. Sometimes she remembers and sometimes she doesn’t.
While those broken promises aren’t earth-shattering and haven’t affected our friendship, if she did the same thing to her clients, her client list were dry up. To a client, any broken promise is important, so you need to do what you can to keep every promise you make.
This is an interesting year. We are facing an election year, the economy is trying to recover, and jobs are not where everyone would like them to be. Corporations are watching what they spend, from gas to office supplies to corporate events. Not only is everything under scrutiny, employees and contractors alike are being asked to pitch in a little more even if they have a little less. And oh by the way, they are being guided to be more creative in their solutions. [Read more...]
In the movie, The Prestige, one of the main characters dissects the elements of a magic trick.
You start by showing the object you’re going to manipulate in some way (i.e. make disappear).
You manipulate the object, in this case you make it disappear.
Then, you bring it back. This is the prestige. It’s not enough to make something disappear. You need to bring it back.
When you chose the name for your business, did you violate the two cardinal rules for naming your business? If you did, your business name is one that will likely never be trademarkable (if that isn’t a word, it should be), or your business is at risk of getting lost in a sea of other businesses in your industry. Do I have your attention? Good.
Especially in recent years, I have seen a large number of entrepreneurs choosing business names that have words or phrases in them that are really buzz words in their industry. This is especially true in the coaching arena. There are two huge reasons not to do this.
There has been a lot of buzz lately about the two newest social media channels — Google+ and Pinterest. Many of my clients have been asking me which one should I choose? The answer is the same as it was before G+ and Pinterest exploded on to the scene, go where your audience hangs out the most. As I go through the two platforms, you’ll learn which one would work best for your business.
As entrepreneurs we have a second role above and beyond our area of expertise. We must also be marketers or at the very least understand what we want to accomplish with our marketing so we can make sure our team is on track (another reason it’s so important to have your Content Strategy Plan in place – team accountability).
PLUS, receive the audio, Stop the Marketing Madness: 7 Business Essentials for Complete Success, recorded LIVE at SUCCESS Summit 2011!
