Tag Archives: Target market

Shock yourself—make a decision

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Indecision

Indecision (Photo credit: Bichuas (E. Carton))

A liability

One of the biggest liabilities of a small business owner is his or her inability to make quick and effective decisions.  In large corporations, unless you’re top management, this is less of a problem because there’s always someone else who’s got more authority than you. So if there’s a decision it’s usually not yours to make alone.

However, small business is different. You need to make a million decisions every day about who to call, what to say, how to blog, what to accomplish first etc. It is an endless stream of decision that ultimately affects your bottom line.

Why so hard?

How come decision making is so hard for most people? Renowned leadership author and guru Napoleon Hill said that most successful leaders of all walks of life are capable of quick and effective decisions. They decide and move quickly. Why is it then that I look around me and see a sea of indecision when faced with either a buying decision or a change to a business? The root of every inability is simple—it’s fear. Fear that the decision will be regretted.

Shake the bad habit

If your small business could definitely stand to grow, I challenge you to take small steps to get yourself rid of the indecision demon.  Make simple decisions everyday that lead to bigger ones as time goes on.

For example, decide and act on three new things you’ll incorporate into your business practice. (Like trying a new cold calling script or visiting a new association that you’ve never heard of etc.) Then the next week, you can graduate up to the bigger decisions like hiring a VA or refreshing your website etc.

Incomplete means indecision

If you look at anything incomplete in your life and business you’ll see that it’s because of indecision.  Take stock and make some decisions today, then you’ll start to see true transformation everywhere you look.

Need more chicken soup for your biz? Follow me on Twitter, friend me on Facebook or connect with me on LinkedIn –and let’s talk!

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The top 3 strategies for your business to survive and thrive in the new digital economy.

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facebook (Photo credit: sitmonkeysupreme)

Digital is a dirty word for some, an exciting word for other small business owners. Either way, you have to know a little bit about it and if all you know is the below three tips, you’ve got it made.

1. Get customers into YOUR marketing system – not just “fans” on someone else’s:

Make sure that your marketing process drives fans from places like Facebook into a marketing sequence that you control – like an email marketing auto-responder for prospects, then one for your customer list.

2. Make regular offers to your existing customers:

A customer is the most valuable asset a business has – not finding what else you can offer them is a near-criminal waste of business resources and disservice for your clients.

3. Automate the followup:

A simple sequence of emails educating your customer on a product or service that would complement their purchase is one of the most effective ways of making a sale.

via The top 3 strategies for your business to survive and thrive in the new digital economy..

Marketing books written 80 years ago are still relevant even in the digital age. How can that be? Well, marketing and selling are based on human emotions and reactions. That hasn’t fundamentally changed much over the years. So make sure you have a strategy that appeals to the right target with the right message and simply utilise digital means as one new channel to disseminate that message and to keep the communication with your community alive and well.

Need more chicken soup for your biz? Follow me on Twitter, friend me on Facebook or connect with me on LinkedIn –and let’s talk!

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The Stupefying Simple Way to Pick Your Niche

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40.77 Stupefied

It’s easy to pick your niche            (Photo credit: eelx)

 

Tough nut to crack

Picking a niche has been the bane of every entrepreneur’s existence. If you are a small business owner and recognise that to grow your business, you need to focus your marketing efforts on 1 target market (WHO) and talk to them about only 1 product or service (WHAT), then you might still be struggling with HOW to pick them.Here’s a simple and proven technique I’ve devised to decide for once and for all, what your niche is.

Criteria

There are really only 3 basic things you need to consider in picking a niche:

  1. Fit for you—your personal preference, skill set, experience and background
  2. Fit for the income you want—how many of this group x how much price you would charge per person
  3. Access—your ability to reach your target and how accessible they are to you in large numbers

Rate Them

Give each niche combo of 1 WHO and 1 WHAT a score of desirability from 1-10. 10 Being the best fit.  Then, choose the niche combo with the highest rating to base your marketing plan on.

Example

Here’s the exercise I actually went through for my own business when I left my full time marketing job exactly 1 year ago this month!

  1.  Fit for your personality, skill set, experience, background and preference
  • Leadership coaching to CEOs:  Score 8/10
  • Marketing to entrepreneurs:  Score  10/10

2.   Ability to generate the revenue you want

  • Leadership coaching to CEOs:  Score 10/10
  • Marketing to entrepreneurs:  Score 8/10

3.   Access

  • Leadership coaching to CEOs:  Score 2/10
  • Marketing to entrepreneurs:  Score 10/10

Total Scores

  • Leadership coaching to CEOs: 20
  • Marketing to entrepreneurs: 28

I guess by now you know that I teach marketing to entrepreneurs and have been very successful with my niche. I’m living proof that this stupefying simple way to pick your niche works!

You too can do this simple exercise and move on towards the light where your marketing plan and consequently more clients await.

Need more chicken soup for your biz? Follow me on Twitter, friend me on Facebook or connect with me on LinkedIn –and let’s talk!

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5 Business Naming Trends Startups Should Consider

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How to pick a brand name that pops  (Photo credit: Aray Chen)

I’m often asked during my branding seminars about how to pick a brand name for a business. It’s a subject that’s almost as emotional and personal as picking your baby’s name so I can only give my personal opinion based on research that I’ve read as well as share the tips in this article below:

1. Real words When you consider Yahoo, Apple, indeed, Amazon and Twitter, they mean something but often have little immediate relation to your business.

Reasons to try this approach: It’s fun, easy and can be quite effective for generating buzz.

Reasons not to: Go too abstract and it can be confusing.

2. Misspelled words  Consider the following examples: Tumblr (Tumbler), del.icio.us (delicious), Digg (dig), flickr (flicker) and Google (Gogol).

Reasons to try this approach: Not only does amisspelled word stand out in a crowd  but it can help you overcome those pesky URL registration issues.

Reasons not to: Using misspelled word could be confusing and is often hard to remember.

3. Two syllable, compound words  Among others, there’s Birchbox, Skillshare, Crowdtilt and JackThreads.

Reasons to try this approach: With the number of URL’s available dwindling this strategy can help you overcome that challenge.

Reasons not to: The compound approach can be overdone.

4.Initials and acronyms Go old school ala IBM (International Business Machines), AOL (America Online) and TBS (Turner Broadcast System).

Reasons to try this approach: If a long, multiword phrase best describes your business, using an acronym can be a logical answer.

Reasons not to: B.O.R.I.N.G. Also, most businesses identified by an acronym use three letters. There are no three letter dot com URL’s left available on the Internet. Zero. So you might be paying big bucks to buy one.

5. Made-up words Skype, Hulu, Zynga… Nonsense can be fun, too.

Reasons to try this approach: A made up name can be catchy and extremely memorable when done properly.

Reasons not to:  If the name is too abstract, it’s likely to be forgotten, or worse, dismissed as silly.

via 5 Business Naming Trends Startups Should Consider.

My best advice on branding a business is timeless. Pick a single word in the English language that relates to something you do, give or cause. My favorite example of this is Staples. It’s easy, memorable and descriptive of what industry they’re in. I urge you to relook at your company’s brand name and make sure it has the same qualities so you can grow your business effortlessly!

Need more chicken soup for your biz? Follow me on Twitter, friend me on Facebook or connect with me on LinkedIn –and let’s talk!

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7 Simple Ways to Relieve Stress Now

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stressed and worried (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I just got back from a weekend away and it’s now back to work Monday. I must admit I feel ALOT better about Mondays since I started my business growth coaching practice full-time. However, stress comes in all forms. Positive stress, son having tantrum stress, parents not getting younger stress. You name it! Here in this article I read this morning, were surefire ways to relieve some right now:

1. Count your breath.  Counting the length of your inhale and exhale and gradually lengthening how long you take to exhale will help counter this stress response.

2. Sing it out. If sitting quietly and counting your breaths sounds impossible or unappealing, you can sing or hum to achieve a similar effect.

3. Drink more water. When your hydration level drops by even 2 percent, your ability to do simple math and make decisions is disrupted.

4. Do a body scan. Redirecting your focus away from your worries and toward your physical body for a minute or two can help alleviate stress.

5. Keep vacation photos handy.  When you feel stressed, look at an image for a moment, close your eyes and try to imagine all the sensations you were feeling in that place–what you saw, smelled, felt, heard and tasted.

6. Create a ritual. Instead of rushing to grab a cup of coffee or scarfing a snack, make a ritual of it, says Puddicombe.

7. Laugh out loud. Humor is the opposite of stress, according to John Morreall, president of Williamsburg, Va.-based Humorworks, which focuses on using humor in team-building exercises and other workplace activities.

via 7 Simple Ways to Relieve Stress Now.

If you’re not stressed and you’re growing your small business, I want to meet you! I have so much positive stress right now from experiencing the highs of my first group program launch, to helping my clients market their own very first events, I can barely see straight. I will be using at least 6 of these 7 tips today and that’s a promise to myself!

Need more chicken soup for your biz? Follow me on Twitter, friend me on Facebook or connect with me on LinkedIn –and let’s talk!

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