Category: Business Ideas

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Business Ideas

Why do We Believe the Big Fat Lies about Internet Marketing?

As you may know, I am on a MISSION to shine a great big TRUTH spotlight on all the Big Fat Lies you’re most likely telling yourself about Internet Marketing right now.

However, I can only do so much.

I can tell you what the truth is. And you may even believe it. (In your head that is.)

But then, come the darkest part of the night, you’ll wake up in a sweat. And you’ll be thinking: “What if Michele is wrong? What if the reason why I’m having so much trouble succeeding on the Internet really IS all about me?”

During the day it’s easy to be rational. We understand in our heads that some marketing strategies will succeed, some will fail, and the best way to grow a successful business is to analyze why the failures failed and use that information to create more successes.

But in the dead of night, all of those good, objective intentions can fly away, leaving us alone with our doubts, fears, frustrations and anxiety.

So what IS it about these Big Fat Internet Marketing Lies that can wreak such havoc in our mental and emotional health?

This is what I believe — marketing pushes entrepreneurs’ hot buttons more than anything else out there.

Think about it. What other activity do you do for your business that is knotted up with all these MAJOR fears and blocks you’re dragging around right now? Marketing DIRECTLY relates to:

  • Fear of success
  • Fear of failure
  • Fear of visibility (including being seen, becoming famous, etc.)
  • Any blocks you have around making money
  • Any issues you have around the value you offer to your clients or the world
  • And more

The problem is, if you want to make enough money in your business to actually live on (much less get rich with your business) you’re going to have to make marketing a priority. But if you have any of these blocks or fears rattling around in your head, more likely than not you’re going to self-sabotage your marketing strategies.

(Or find yourself waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat with these Big Fat Internet Marketing Lies swirling around in your head.)

Worse, these blocks can also suddenly appear when you start reaching for another level in your business. (It’s like that darn onion — peel away one layer and another one appears.)

So what do you do? Well, first off, knowing there’s a connection between marketing and blocks/fears is a good first step. Now, if you see any sort of sabotage (or find yourself waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat) this is what’s happening.

And the second thing to do is get help.

Because even though I can tell you the truth, I can’t make you believe it. Only you can do that.

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Business Ideas

3 Keys To Attracting Leads, Clients and Sales to You Effortlessly

It sounds magical, doesn’t it? Attracting leads, clients and sales to you effortlessly. In fact, it almost doesn’t sound possible.

But the truth is, it IS possible, even if it isn’t magic. It’s all about good, solid marketing principles. And if you follow the below 3 keys, you’ll be well on your way to experiencing that for yourself in your business.

1. Create a powerful message that appeals to your ideal clients. This could also be thought of as your Unique Selling Proposition (or USP).

So what exactly is that? Basically it’s the solution you provide presented from your ideal client’s viewpoint. So, for example, let’s say you’re a business coach. Well, those are a dime a dozen. Instead, what if you specialize in helping women entrepreneurs get over their blocks to making more money in their business. See how more powerful that is? And how it can magnetically attract your ideal clients to you?

Or let’s say you’re a fitness and nutrition expert. Yawn. But what if you specialize in helping women with hormonal issues lose weight. Ah, much more powerful.

In addition to attracting your ideal clients to you, you’ll also notice these also position yourself as an expert. After all, if you have such a specialty, then you must be an expert. And of course, people would much rather do business with experts.

2. Be consistent with your message. Once you know what your message is (and you’ve tested it so you know it attracts your ideal clients) now you need to get it out into the world. Resist the urge to be creative about it.

I know, I know. You get tired of saying it. You’re sure other people must be tired of hearing it. But if you’re not consistent, if you tweak a little here, a little there, maybe edit it here, you’re not getting the full power of it out there.

Look, even you’re most loyal clients aren’t going to get sick of hearing your message. Why? Because they really don’t “hear” it as much as you think they do. People are busy with their own lives and they really aren’t paying as much attention to you as you think they are. So if you don’t repeat it and repeat it consistently, then you run the risk of people not remembering what you stand for, or maybe being confused about it, and if they don’t remember or are confused, they’re not going to invest with you or recommend you or anything else.

3. Be frequent with your message. You’re going to feel like a broken record, but the best marketers are the ones who have a simple, powerful message, are consistent with that message and repeat it over and over again.

And don’t just repeat it in the same places, find different ones. Get your message out there in as many ways as you possibly can. (Just as long as those places are where your ideal clients hang out.) Online. Offline. Networking events. Speeches. Podcasts. Etc.

In fact, here’s the place where you can be creative. Find new and different ways of getting your message out there, and do it as frequently as possible. Because the more often your ideal clients stumble across your message, the more likely it is when they’re ready to make a change, they’ll reach out to see how you can help them.

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6 Tips for Better Office Brainstorming Sessions

Article Contributed by John Brook

Brainstorming is a very effective tool to use within business settings; however, it is important that all managers and team leaders take not that there are wrong ways to go about brainstorming. Brainstorming in inappropriate manners only wastes time, and we all know wasting time means lower worker productivity and a loss of money. Let’s take a look at several different tips that can be utilized to make your office a little more successful when it comes to solving problems by brainstorming.

1. Set Up Different Sessions

Brainstorming itself is broken up into several different portions. There is no sense in trying to cram all the parts of a brainstorming adventure into one session. In fact, different parts of brainstorming include critical thinking and other parts include creative thinking, and each of these parts take utilizing different sides of persons’ brains. So, do not let your group overwork and overwhelm itself by trying to use both sides of their brains at one time. Set up several different sessions for brainstorming.

2. Never Criticize

As creative thinking is taking place in a brainstorming session there should be no person there to criticize, no matter how silly or absurd an idea may sound it should be left out on the table at least for the first brainstorming session. There are a large number of ideas that often seem silly in the beginning; however, these ideas are often so creatively thought of that they can be utilized in several different manners to address several different types of problems.

Having a critic at a brainstorming session also dampens the atmosphere, creative ideas tend to not flow as easily. In fact, many people taking part in the brainstorming session will keep all their ideas to their self in fear they will only be criticized if they speak up. Not only should negative criticism be left at home for the first brainstorming session but praise for ideas should be left at home too. While this may seem silly it does prove to be helpful because people will generally throw more ideas out on the table knowing they will not receive praise or criticism.

3. Move On To Better Ideas

Just like said before there are many creative ideas that often lead to a formation of more and more ideas being developed; however, when an idea or even a heap of ideas run dry it is time to move on. Do not waste time trying to revive an idea just because it sounds good.

4. Try To Come Up With As Many Ideas As Possible

Always, always, always seek more and more ideas. The more ideas that are thrown out on the table the more a group will have to work with. As long as tip two stated above can be thoroughly and effectively followed then the ability to gain as many ideas as possible from group members should be no problem.

5. Establish Time Limits

One of the most important elements to implement into brainstorming sessions is time limits. The best ideas and most quantitative amount of ideas will come out within the first four to six minutes of a brainstorming session. Keeping this is mind it is always best for the brainstorming sessions to be kept at a minimal time limit, generally no longer than ten to fifteen minutes to start, brainstorm and finish.

6. Define All The Factors

When brainstorming for ideas on how to solve an issue it is best to first brainstorm on what the exact issue is that needs to be resolved. So, do not always start out a brainstorming session looking for solutions. Be creative and bring ideas to the table that are most likely causing the issue to be occurring. After ideas for both issues and solutions have been developed it is best to narrow down the ideas by making a list; however, everyone in the group should agree on ideas that should be kept or thrown out. If all group members cannot agree for an idea to be thrown out then it should be kept because at least one member sees some potential in it. That group member should go home and develop the idea to a further level and present their developments to the group at a later date. If the group does not like the further developed idea it can then be thrown out.

About the Author

Deeply involved with OfficeKitten.co.uk, John Brook finds himself helping out by writing reviews of cheap office furniture on the internet.

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3 Mistakes Entrepreneurs Make While Building Their Businesses

Over the years I’ve had the pleasure of working with both very successful entrepreneurs and ones who aren’t so successful. What makes one entrepreneur successful while the other one not-so-much? Chances are they’re making one (or all three) of these mistakes. Read on to learn more.

1. Marketing their business is not a priority. This is probably the biggest reason why I see businesses fail or either get sucked into a stressful feast-or-famine model (either too many or too few clients). They don’t make marketing their business a priority.

If you want to have a full pipeline of clients at all times then it’s crucial you make marketing a priority.

So what do I mean exactly by marketing your business? Basically two things — you have one or more ways to bring new leads in the door and you have one or more ways to turn those leads into clients. One of the easiest ways to do this is to set up an opt-in box on your website so you can collect the names and email addresses of the people who visit your site, then have a follow up system in place once they give you their email address to start warming them up so they become clients. Ezines and teleclasses are two great tactics to use as follow up.

2. They don’t take action (or they don’t take action fast enough). Successful businesses are built on momentum. Momentum is built on taking action. Whether it’s creating information products, launching new programs or even getting your new website up (or your ezine out), it’s all about taking action.

Now there is a caveat here. It’s not enough just to take action. You need to take the RIGHT action at the RIGHT time in the RIGHT order. So how do you know if you’re doing that or not?

Well, one way to do that is to educate yourself about marketing and business-building. Or an easier (and faster) way is to find yourself a business/marketing coach or mentor who can quickly assess your situation and give you a plan of action. (Of course, once you have that, then you need to make sure you actually implement that plan.)

3. They give up too soon. Look, every successful business person and entrepreneur I know has had a few stinkers. The difference is they’ve been in a business long enough to know a failure or two every now and then is normal and they move on. Entrepreneurs who are new or a little unsure of themselves tend to create a story around their failures that are simply not true. They’ll instead think there’s a problem with the product or the industry or themselves or something else — you get the picture. When the reality could be they didn’t market enough or they didn’t take enough action or they skipped a couple of steps when they were marketing their product or a myriad other easily preventable mistakes.

Before you throw in the towel on something — whether it’s a product you just created or your entire business, stop and ask for some help. Find out if success is just a few tweaks away or you really do need to do something more drastic.

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5 Things I Did Right to Start Seeing Consistent Business Growth, Income and Success!

I was very excited about how I ended 2010. I finally hit a financial milestone.

However, I wasn’t an overnight success. I started this process in 2005 to transform my business from a one-woman freelance copywriter to president of a copywriting and marketing company.

I’m going through all the things I did so you can duplicate my success. Below are 5 things that worked for me:

1. Started attending events. Now, I’m not talking about becoming an event junkie. But I do believe going to events is key to taking your business to the next level.

There are so many benefits from attending events beyond what you’re going to learn from the speakers — networking, connecting with your “tribe,” getting out of your own little world so you can get some fresh ideas for your business, meeting the “movers and shakers” in your industry and more.

In addition to all of that, you also may discover your business starts to take off because you’re finally taking yourself and your business seriously.

2. Started regularly marketing. This one is tough if you don’t have a support system, but it’s crucial if you want to break the feast-famine cycle (either too much or too little business — when there’s too much you stop marketing because you’re crazy busy and when there’s too little you’re in “desperation marketing mode.”)

If you want to have a steady stream of clients and customers and a full pipeline of leads, the way to do that is by regularly marketing. It’s that simple…and that difficult.

But there are 2 things you can do to make this MUCH easier — change your mindset so you put as much emphasis on marketing as you do everything else in your business and implement a system to make it easier for you to follow through and your team to support you.

3. Got in alignment with what I teach. In my case, it meant making marketing my own business as important as marketing my clients’ businesses. In your case it may look different. But the reality is, you personally need to be in alignment with what you teach or how can you possibly stand tall and value your gifts and your brilliance?

Now, I have an important note about this — do NOT use this as an excuse to not move forward in your business. If you feel like you’re not in alignment, then get yourself in alignment. The only way you’re going to transform your business is if you do what you need to do to be an alignment and practice what you preach. (And if you can’t get yourself in alignment, maybe you need to take a hard look at what you’re providing. You might need to tweak your offering — this could be a message from the universe you’re not doing what you’re truly meant to do.)

4. Surrounded myself with the right people. You can’t do it all yourself. If you want to grow your business, you need to get a team in place to support you. Now this is something else that can feel scary — after all, hiring people is a big commitment. So what I would suggest is start small. Hire a VA (virtual assistant) for a few hours a month or a bookkeeper. Then make sure you use that time for revenue-producing activities.

Eventually, you’re going to reach a point where you have a big team working for you. The only problem with that is then you suddenly find yourself spending a bunch of time managing them. That’s when you want to look into getting a COO or a business manager for your business. I was lucky. My husband has joined the business as the COO and that has made a HUGE difference in being able to grow the business.

5. Did what I needed to do to work through my blocks. You may have heard the quote (and I’m paraphrasing) that the best self-development tool is having a business. ALL your obstacles and blocks will show up as you start and grow a business. And don’t be surprised if some of the biggest blocks show up when everything looks good on the surface.

I have 2 suggestions: First, know this is normal and be prepared for it. Second, don’t stop investing in yourself. Whatever you need to do to keep moving forward and busting through those blocks. Maybe you need a coach, a product, or something else. Or maybe you need to finally outsource something you’ve been reluctant to let go of (your copywriting for instance?)

Chances are you know what you need to do to keep moving forward, so what I want to encourage you to do is honor that feeling start taking action.

Which leads me to the last (bonus) tip:

6. Take action. Nothing happens if you don’t take action. The best advice I can give you (other than marketing yourself regularly) is take action. Get those to-do’s crossed off your to-do list and watch your business grow!