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Get Paid to Speak Words and Sentences

1/1/2015

Would it be awesome to learn how to speak at events?

Would it be even cooler to be paid an extravagant amount of money for it?

Well you can by becoming a professional speaker.

All you have to do is follow these simple steps:

First,

You need to master the craft of PUBLIC SPEAKING.

So immediately find a site to place your soapbox, such as a Toastmasters International, MeetUp.com, your Local Chamber of Commerce, or other speaking association to learn how to speak in public.

Once, you are there. You must craft a portfolio of speeches, speaking programs, and videos of your speeches to use later for marketing.

Until you get to the point where you feel you can speak in thee Free Circuit.

Which is Second,

Start speaking at free events. This will help solidify your ability and determine what type of speaker you would like to be.

Anywhere from entertaining, motivational, informational, training, presentations, technical, or keynote are just some of many options.

These can be found by talking with everyone where you’re currently speaking or connecting with local groups, clubs, or non-profits.

The Third thing,

Once you have enough material to make into a profile or website, you turn it all into an “I’m a Professional Speaker” Page.

What it consists of:

·         Start with a two paragraph overview of who you are and the type of speaker and speeches you do

·         Then talk about speaking topics, with write-ups of presentations you’ve given

·         Followed with video presentations, a list for the people you have spoken for, and finally testimonials, where others recommend you.

The Fourth Part,

Now that you have mastered the craft, have experience speaking, and now have the marketing to prove it.

It’s time to become a professional speaker by entering the Amateur Circuit.

Here you will start getting paid.

So it is imperative to figure out how much you think you are worth right now and how much you will you be worth when your experience grows.

After some more events are done in this market, continue to build portfolio of speeches, speaking programs, and videos of your speeches to use later for marketing.

This will help you into the final step.

The Final Step,

Enter the high-dollar professional circuit.

Here you can hire an agent and work with speaking bureaus to help with booking shows.

Make sure to impress them with a professionally done:

·         3 to 5-minute demo video.

·         Great photos of you speaking.

·         A printed one-sheet with your programs.

·         A professional speaking-oriented website.

Once you’re at this point just keep looking for the next big opportunity.

Tips for throughout the process:

·         Build Credibility – use any and all features of you on any recognizable media outlets, big corporate events, or television

·         Network – knowing the promoter or conference organizer is key to success

·         Practice, Practice, Practice

The hardest part of becoming a speaker is in fact the writing and editing of everything from the speeches to the marketing.

Which is why you need a professional speech writer:

·         To save you time and effort

·         Providing the talking notes to speak from

·         And giving you a writing from an experienced professional

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The 9 ways to LEVERAGE Yourself and Win.

12/25/2014

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The world is a chess board.

Every decision and move you make causes openings and closings.

Openings that can create opportunities of a lifetime… or leave you open for attack.

And Closings that protect your position and strengthen your leverage… or leave you trapped and under siege.

Which comes to the main point of this week’s blog post, the continuation of last week’s post of Questions to Ask Yourself to Leverage Yourself.

What are the 9 best ways to leverage yourself?

As we spoke of last week, Leverage is Key to success.

And asking yourself last week’s questions will give you a great idea on which techniques will be your best fit to build yourself leverage.

Now without further ado.

The 9 ways to leverage yourself…

Relationships

The easiest way to leverage yourself is to become the human rolodex or social connecter.

Having the ability to contact anyone or everyone someone else needs is a powerful position.

For example,

Business is all about who you know from investors, business partners, and clients. If you need someone to help you distribute a product, your advertising, referrals, or get you a spot on the show you always wanted. You need to know someone.

So the 1st way to leverage yourself is with relationships.

Go out and sincerely help connect others.

How do you do it:

1.       Become an interesting person who can effectively entertain others in conversation.

a.       Do interesting things that create stories you can pull from.

b.      Read classic literature and interesting books on Philosophy, Politics, and History

c.       Read the news so you can talk about the latest news

2.       Next, you need to be able to have an entertaining conversation with anyone, anywhere and be able to convince them (if interested) to give them their/your contact information so you can help them with your service or product.

a.       This can be established with practice by talking to strangers at events, bus stops, or anyone who happens to be standing next to you

b.      And PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE

3.       Tactically network at events, groups, and other locations with others that are your ideal clients

a.       When your there, don’t try to sell people on anything. Instead tell stories and entertain them.

b.      This makes it that much easier to tell them about what you do and let them know to give you a call if they need your services.

c.       Or even better, get their information so you both can stay in contact if they are interested in the future.

Expertise

Another way to leverage yourself in any organization or in the job market is to have the expertise that others need.

This is best spelled out by the constant need for engineers, doctors, and many other professions.

If you have the skill, then they will come.

For example…

·         Vocational Skills – Plumbers, Electricians, and others

·         Technical Skills – Programmers, Engineers, and others

·         Licenses – Lawyers, Doctors, and others

With these skills, you can leverage yourself as an expert and use it as a way to gain access to the field of your choice, be held in a high regard by others, and able to be a productive member of society.

The best part of this leverage is being sought out by others for your technical knowledge, making you indispensable to their lives.

Experience

This best translates as being mentor for others.

Become the person that people in your life or company come to for advice.

This leverage is similar to Expertise except it relates more to soft skills and knowing things that people don’t learn at school like relationships, ethics, and other wisdom you only get from experience.

How to gain experience:

1.       Learn it.

a.       Just crack open a book, fiddle around with the tools of the trade, or even take a class

2.       Find someone who you can get it from

a.       Find a person with the skill you want and turn them into a mentor

3.       Just work the job

a.       This is finding someone who needs workers and experiencing it on the job.

Build a Following

This has always been my favorite way to gain leverage.

Become the leader for others who believe in what you do and focus it into a community, forum, or organization.

This can be from a following of people who love your products, service, personality, beliefs, stories, or anything else you can build a community around such as books, movies, and feelings.

How to build a following:

1.       Find something that others will rally around such as a product, service, or piece of culture such as art, events, or happening.

2.       Recruit a strong initial group of followers (Make them loyal and others will follow)

3.       Have your strong followers recruit with fervor

4.       And let the natural order of things take its hold as you grow your following

This all can happen gradually or overnight.

For example, it can take years to build a successful Fortune 500 company, or you can build a massive following with just one YouTube video or event.

Be in the Legal Right

Another way to leverage yourself is to understand the law and how to work it in your favor.

This can be as simple as having a copyright and taking the royalties for others to use it.

Or having clauses in contracts that protect you and your service.

Too many times have people tried or were able to run out of paying me for my work.

How to be in the legal right:

1.       Have a lawyer.

2.       If you can’t afford one, make friends with one.

Or…

1.       Have a Technical Writer do it.

Otherwise, you may have to read/write legal documents yourself. Which can be very hard and boring for some.

But if you’re interested, you need to:

1.       Read simple business law books that cover contract law, tort law, and the laws that govern your particular industry

2.       Read the blogs of lawyers.

This will help you understand the nature of the law system and be able to protect yourself from bad business dealings and people who don’t fulfill their side of the bargain.

Opportunity Seeker

Another way to leverage yourself is be at the right place at the right time by seeking opportunities.

This is the entrepreneurial leverage in seeking to establish yourself as the first in this business or creating something that everyone needs or wants.

The best way to do this one is to continuously keeping yourself in the loop. Looking for industry problems, people’s problems, or any problems really that you could solve and ultimately build a business solving those problems.

How to seek the opportunity leverage:

1.       Keep your eyes peeled for the opportunity of a lifetime such as the invention of something new and great.

2.       Keep on the lookout for someone else’s great idea and either help them achieve it or execute it better.

3.       Create your own opportunity with a Pet Project.

Become a Trendsetter

Another way to leverage yourself is to be a trendsetter (Think Famous People).

This leverage is created by having people emulate what you do by either being a role model or creating something new and creative that people can get behind such as viral videos, art, and other culture pieces.

Being in the position of role model makes it easier to build a following, relationships, and opportunities.

This is a little harder than the rest as it relies mostly on luck. No one really knows what the next trend is, but once you strike gold and become one. It’s a lot easier to ride your trend and continue building off of it to do it again and again.

How to become a trendsetter:

1.       Continuously build your repertoire of things that can become a trend such as writings, films, audios, acts, or other medium.

2.       Continuously put them out there on the market until it is discovered by someone or goes viral on YouTube or other media site.

3.       Get discovered and ride your trend.

4.       Don’t let your 15 minutes of fame die.

5.       Keep yourself relevant and ride your trend again and again.

6.       Becoming a personality that you can leverage more.

A perfect sample of this would be a stand-up comedian.

He is funny, but you never know which routine will skyrocket him to the top.

But once he is there. It is easier for him to leverage himself as an actor, director, and create a new trend.

Finances

If you have the money or know someone who does, you can leverage yourself by being the biggest spender or at least being able to take bigger financial hits than others.

This leverage allows you to do more by being able to pay others for their expertise, reach further by being able to brand yourself through marketing, and be the biggest fish in the pond.

As the saying always goes… You need money to make money.

You can do this quickly or very gradually.

How to do it quickly:

·         Get lucky.

How to do it gradually:

·         Learn Long-term Investing in Stocks

·         Make something that you can collect royalties off of every time it is used (Art, Music, Films)

·         Create a business and grow it

·         Get into Real Estate

·         Leverage YOURSELF

Confidence

One of the best and for some, the hardest way, to leverage yourself is to build a confidence about you.

Have confidence that no matter what you do. You will do it well. And if you don’t, you will do it until you are.

Resilience to know that even if you fail. You will make it look good. Because you are the Champion.

The best way to build this leverage is by reading my article about Joe and his journey in Becoming the Champion.

Now.

Isn't that exciting?

You now have the knowledge you need to effectively leverage yourself.

Albeit, you will most likely not be able to use them all, you can however figure out the best combination for you as you only need to be leveraged correctly in one or two to create value for others and come out on top.

Hope you enjoyed this week’s blog post.

Please leave suggestions for more blog ideas in the comments.

Best,

L. Thomas

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The 5 Questions you have to ask yourself...

12/18/2014

3 Comments

How does one become king?

How does one go from being a nothing to slowly tipping the scale in their favor, until it falls into their lap?

Making them the King?

There is only one answer.

Leverage.

Leverage is the only way to go from being the bottom of the barrel to the king of the hill.

But how does one gain leverage?

Gradually.

One gains leverage gradually.

By pining their resources and time.

And through time, the strategies themselves have not changed, simply the ways to implement them. Coming to the point of the conversation.

The 5 Questions you have to ask yourself to figure out how to leverage yourself.

1. What are my marketable skills/talents?

You have to ask yourself what marketable skills I have that others need.

This can be anything from numbers (Accounting, Finance, etc.), relationships (Business, Management, Sales, etc.), hard skills (Programming, Engineering, Medicine, etc.), soft skills (Customer Service, Public Relations, etc.), creative skills (Artists, Musicians, etc.), and more.

2. What are the skills/talents of the best and how can I realistically compete?

This is where you set the stage for a realistic look at your talents and how you can realistically compete against the best in your industry.

And even if your main talents are dwarfed by the best in your industry does not mean you are out. It simply means you have to position and leverage your other talents in such a way to take advantage of the opportunities to overcome the best’s strengths. As no one is invincible and they always let their guard down. Always.

3. What am I not good at, but have to be good at to gain leverage to become the best?

This is the hardest question people have to ask themselves because the answers are usually the most painful.

Mostly because many people don’t want to do what they have to do to become successful.

This includes public speaking, taking risks, sacrificing, and many more.

But truly ask yourself, what the skills I need to be successful are.

But always keep in mind…

Do you need to learn them or can you buy them?

4. How can I effectively leverage my talents to become the best and triumph over those who are?

Everyone has strengths and weaknesses.

And with the first three questions, you found what yours and the best in your industries are. Now that you know both. You can plan strategies to leverage yourself with the best of your industry.

This can include finding a way to partner up with the best in your industry, emulating what they do and doing it better, maximizing your own talents to become the best, or a myriad of other ways to leverage your position.

Leaving us with the last question:

5. What are the Top 9 ways to leverage yourself?

Which will be answered next week so subscribe today so you don’t miss it.

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Techniques of the Week: The Lucky 7 Interation

12/12/2014

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Morning,

This is my 7th iteration of “Techniques of the Week” which is an ode to simple writing and marketing techniques that can be used immediately with measurable results in the Before, During, and After of your sales process.

Today however, I am running a Twilight Zone special where everything is running backwards!!!

With that said, let’s be off…

The After

Your customers and clients will not always need you. This is a fact.

But they need to remember you when they do. This is why it is so important to have them on a Contact Drip.

A contact drip is a way to maintain contact and keep you in the forefront of their minds so when they are in need of your services. They know who to call.

Now a contact drip can be any form of communication between you and your customers.

To include:

·         Direct Mail, Emails, Phone Calls, or even In-Person depending how important they are to your business as some business has and needs only 3 or 4 BIG clients to maintain their success.

Now how does it work…

First you need to have your customers or prospects contact information such as an address, email, phone #, or other way to contact them.

It is most preferable to have a Customer Relationship Management System where the emails are automatically sent so you don’t have to worry about it. All you have to do is put them in the database.

Second you need to build a drip campaign of marketing material (Mail) or emails (Email).

For the more personal connections, you need to have a fleshed out system where with every client, you meet with them periodically to ensure you are still there working hard for them.

Here is an example of the material and timeline for a Drip Campaign:

                                EXAMPLE Timeline: Mail/Email

1.       Month 1 = Letter announcing new service

2.       Month 2 = Newsletter highlighting tips and company news

3.       Month 3 = Phone Call to discover opportunities

4.       Month 4 = Reprint of an industry magazine article

5.       Month 5 = Case Study of a Successful client

6.       Month 6 = Request for a critique on proposed sales letter

7.       Month 7 = Another newsletter

8.       Month 8 = Reprint of an article you submitted into an industry magazine

9.       Month 9 = Announce a new service

10.   Month 10 = Invite them to a workshop

11.   Month 11 = Phone call to introduce them to someone in your referral network

12.   Month 12 = Checklist of helpful tips for your industry and service

Here is an example to keep them in constant contact if they are very important to your business.

EXAMPLE Timeline: Personal (Phone/Meetings)

1.       Meet with them periodically.

2.       Phone call every month.

3.       In-person Meeting every 2-3 months.

Third you have to make sure it’s working. You have to track to see that those in your Drip Campaigns are not opting out because they think you’re annoying or are referring you properly.

Contact drip – maintain contact with prospects by mailing something 8-10 times a year

Yes = Sales, and No = reminders funnel

The During

This is called the High Price, High Value Approach to Pricing Strategy.

The way it works is that you sell products that are essentially the same as everyone else’s except you convince people that the higher price equates to higher value.

And once they are convinced, you take the more money you make over your competitors and use it to fuel your marketing to continue to convince others that your product is “different”.

Therefore, it becomes a virtuous circle where your customers believe that your product is much better than anyone else’s, fueling the hype and belief inside your marketing. Making you more and more money.

This is essentially the pricing foundation for most luxury products. Where you are not paying more for the materials to make the products, but are paying for the privilege to wear the brand itself.

The only differences are when the item is rare or made out of rare raw materials like cashmere.

High Price, High Value – Raise your prices because you’re worth it and clients know they are getting better service

The other approach is the opposite and equates to Low Price, Good Value.

This Pricing Strategy is more about just selling as much product as possible and have it be durable enough that people don’t think it’s cheap. Because no one likes the Low Price, Low Value strategy where people hate your product because it doesn’t work or doesn’t do as advertised.

This strategy entails less marketing and more operational efficiency of the company. Meaning to keep the prices of your product low, you have to be better at everything else.

So pick your pricing strategy based on the goals you want from your company.

Low Price, Good Value – Have your prices reflect how good you are at producing your product and your operational efficiency

The Before

What makes you want something more than anything?

Not being able to have it… or even worse… told you can’t have it.

If you’re like me, that always strikes a nerve. And I end up doing everything in my power to prove them wrong.

This psychological phenomenon known as Boy/Girl Theory is great in business because you can use it to present a challenge to your prospects and customers.

For example, you have a roller coaster or a product that is extreme.

This is useful to know for your product because now you can market your products as a challenge saying that they can’t handle it. Like a food eating challenges and other competitive type products.

Another example is a little more subtle. You just have to convince people that they can’t have what you sell. By having high prices or a 5-Star-Experience. This entails creating mystery around your product, scarcity, or other gimmicks.

Boy/Girl Theory – Make customer want what they can’t have

And there you have it.

Three ways to get your prospects and clients to knock down your door for your products and services.

Let me know how you get people to knock down your door for everything you do.

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How to get people to talk about you.

12/4/2014

2 Comments

How to turn your clients into Champions And become a Referral Business.

First off,

You need to provide good service, be open, honest, and fair with your clients, and teach them from the beginning that you are a referral business.

To begin,

You need to find out the potential of your current client’s ability to become a champion for your business. As some people just are not good at referring others. That is why during your business process with your current client you find out who they are, who they know, and how much they enjoy sharing their business experience with you.

After you develop an idea of how successful they will be as a champion for your business, you put them into one of these 3 categories.

Gold – (2 referrals per year) these clients are your champions. They seek out and exploit every chance to tell friends, family, and strangers about you and your services. And tell them just how smooth and easy you made it for them.

Silver – (1 referral per year) these clients are your regulars. They do not actively seek out every hint of an opportunity to billboard your services, but instead will refer someone if someone is blatantly looking for help to purchase or sell their house.

Bronze – (Roulette Referrals) these clients are passersby. They kind of forget you exist except when someone asks them who they used to buy or purchase their house and then they refer you.

Next then,

Once you decide how effective your current client will be as a champion. You can put them through the process to teach them that you are a referral business, what services you provide to your ideal clients, and the tell-tale signs of someone looking to enter the real estate market.

Such as pregnancy, recent adoption, promotion, transfer, trouble with aging parents, a recent empty nest, or trouble in a marriage or relationship.

After that,

You need to ask.

And not ask in an off the cuff remark at the end of a conversation like…

“Oh yeah, could you tell any of your friends to give me a call if they are looking to buy and sell their home. Thanks!”

It needs to be a real conversation. Started out with…

“I have an important question to ask you.”

Because a quality referral request should be take least five minutes maybe even ten minutes to emphasize how important it is to you and how much you value them to help you out.

And in those ten minutes you must…

Ask for help
•         Say “I need your help” or “I value your help” and watch as they do everything they can to make sure you get the referrals you need.

Ask permission
•         Ask permission to see if they are willing to help and that you can ask about referrals
•         Say “I’m glad that I’ve been able help you. I was wondering who else you know that could benefit from my service. Do you have a few moments to talk about it”

Get specific
•         Get specific about who they know, how they know them, and are they currently looking to enter the real estate market or in the near future.
•         Going as far as to ask specifically about churches, clubs, associations, etc.

And finally,

Once they refer someone thank them profusely and ask:

•         How do you know this person?

•         How would you describe your relationship?

•         What type of a personality will I encounter with this person?

•         What are a few of this person’s personal interests?

•         What organizations does this person belong to?

•         Do you see anything that we have in common?

This way you can have an idea of how to convert them before you contact them.

And there,

Now you have it. The Step-by-Step Procedure to turn Clients into Champions. And your business into a Referral Business.

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The Best Way to Track Your Ads is the way you least expect it!

11/27/2014

5 Comments

How to Track Ads On and Off Line

If there is anything in this life that you need as a person.

The Top 3 will be food, water, and love.

If there is anything you need as a business.

The Top 3 are customers, advertising, and the ability to track your advertising.

As customers bring in cashflow. Advertising brings in the customers. And you have nothing unless you can track what’s effective.

Therefore, let’s go over the best ways to track the effectiveness of your ads.

First up is Offline Advertising.

1.      Point Of Origin Method -The best way to track ads is having a trail to follow from you to a customer’s point of origin. This is harder to do in offline advertising unless you know exactly where your customer came from such as a mailing list, call-in, or referrals because they are already in your system. The easiest way for this to work is to input every new customer and prospect into your database through promotion, Infoproducts, and more.

This is easier to track ads for current customers in your ecosystem to see how they respond to deals and pricing.

2.      Gate Key Method - But the best way to understand where they come from before they are in the database is to only let customers through your gate who have the key. The key will be customized codes that identify exactly which flyer, postcard, magazine ad, etc. was used to bring in the customer. And you incentivize the customer to give the code by telling them it’s the only way to gain access to your special offers or other gimmicks.

This is easier for finding out where they came from outside your ecosystem.

3.      Just Ask Method - And a not as good as others, but a way to get a general consensus is to survey how they heard about you through the sales process. This as simple as asking how they heard about you.

This is a less effective way to find where they came from outside your ecosystem as they might not remember or may just not tell you.

Next up is Online Advertising.

Online Advertising is much easier to track than offline as everything leaves a trail and with the right programs or systems, it becomes easy to do. The hardest part is the setup to ensure you’re getting the information you want from the analytics.

1.      Buy a System – This makes it easy as you have a support group to do it for you and gives you tech support if you have problems after. These are better than most free systems as you get more analytics and less DIY to make it work.

The way they work is you just put a short code into your website and they will take care of the rest.

a.      This includes…

                                                              i.      Unified Social

                                                            ii.      Easy Tracker Pro

2.      Setup a Free System – Free systems are great for the DIY Guru as you have to do a little extra work to get what you want from them, but you don’t have to pay for it. These entail making customized shortened URL’s and setting up other systems to bring prospects in and when they click on them, they tell you where the clicks come from. This is more intensive and sometimes doesn't provide you with the analytics you need.

a.       This Includes…

                                                               i.      Google’s URL Shortener

                                                             ii.      Bit.ly

3.      Use the system already in place – if it’s a major advertising channel, it most likely has its own analytic and ad tracking system. Therefore, use it. This includes search engines (Bing, Google, etc.) and social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.). The worse part of this method is you have to learn each system to follow your analytics and can have steep learning curves.

And there you have it. The different ways to track your ads, on and off line.

If you know a better way to track your ads, let us know in the comments.

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Are you on the Treadmill of Stagnation!?

11/20/2014

11 Comments

Are you on the Treadmill of Torpid Stagnation

Pet Project

You work.

You play.

Both are fine and dandy.

Until you feel it...

Stagnation.

The feeling you get when you walk the same path… day in… day out…

Slowly feeling the ground beneath you sag from how many times you have traversed it…

Like running on a treadmill… getting nowhere fast.

This feeling is the reason you need a Pet Project.

Something exciting to work on in your off-time that can…

·         Take your mind off your day-to-day mundane tasks

·         Make you extra money on the side

·         Give you something with accomplishable milestones that gives you victories in your life

·         Or even become your next career

Now what exactly is a Pet Project?

A pet project is anything outside of work or school that you do for fun.

But…

It is not something that is destructive or willy-nilly, that you focus on a few times before you quit.

It is a constructive goal-oriented adventure. Where you lay out many milestones, which win you many small victories that you can celebrate.

For example:

A man went to college, and during his off time, he wrote.
He wrote a lot.
And after a while he noticed that people would pay for his ability to write.
SO he started looking into it and realized people would pay a lot for someone who can write well…
SO he started a Pet Project he worked on between school and work.
Which included making a website and advertising his services…
And pretty soon… he had a laundry list of clients and was making more money than he ever had before.
SO he quit his job.
And became a Professional Copywriter and Technical Writer.

And Another Example…

A women at work likes to work with mobile applications in her spare time.
She just tinkers and works on things she think would be helpful to her.
One day, a friend sees her on her app that she created and asks what it is.
So she tells her, and her friend wants the app too!
So she gives it to her friend and is convinced to put it on the app store for $0.99.
In a month, she has over a 100,000 downloads and has made thousands of dollars.
She then turns around and starts developing more!
Realizing that a pet project she just likes to do for fun can be so much more for her.

These stories epitomize the Pet Project. As they emphasize projects outside your normal day that you work on to benefit yourself or others financially or emotionally. As a Pet Project can even include Non-Profit Activities like charities.

The point is not the project, but the adventure of working on something that is completely yours.

It’s your baby.

How can you start one today?

Well listen in and you will know exactly, step-by-step, what you need to do.

1.      First pick a Pet Project that interests you.

Examples:

Play the guitar so one day you can do a show.

Learn stand up and write material so you can do a show.

Learn how to develop programs you can give away for free or sell online. (Drop Box/Flappy Bird)

Learn to do business and start a business from your garage.

And the list goes on…

2.      Next, do some research.

Look into what you want to do for your pet project. Research what you need to be good it, the different niches inside the sector, and the forums or groups of people you should associate with to learn even more.

3.      Then, find someone who knows more than you do.

Once you have done the research to ensure it’s something you would like to pursue. It’s time to become the best at it.

So find those people who are considered the best in your Pet Project Arena, and learn everything you can about what they do to be the best. Even better, become friends so they can teach you themselves.

4.      And learn and practice all you can in your spare time.

Do it until you’re really good at it. Practice for others. Practice for yourself. Make your Pet Project work for you. Because it should be fun and exciting for you.

5.      Finally… take it to the big times.

The final step in your Pet Project is to show it off to the unsuspecting public. This could be a show, event, competition, or anything that involves showing your pet project off. As this is everything you have been working for.

6.      Do it again.

What’s the best part about Pet Projects?

You can actually expand your Pet Project more!

Or have more than one at the same time! (I have 4 running as of right now.)

Expand into a career, side job, or just keep it a hobby. The main point is to get it rolling enough to show it off to the world.

Hope you enjoyed this week’s article.

Please let us know what your Pet Project is in the comments!

11 Comments

Marketing Techniques of the Week: Epic 6

11/6/2014

9 Comments

Affect them and they will come.

Halloo,

This is my sixth iteration of “Techniques of the Week” which is an ode to simple writing and marketing techniques that can be used immediately with measurable results in the Before, During, and After of your sales process.

Today, we will be going over 3 major parts of marketing that ensures that you will never be left without content, have a uniform marketing policy in place, and how to get underneath your customer’s skin.

With that said, let’s be off…

The Before – Marketing Policy

Before you let your advertisers advertise, copywriters write, and google adders google ad. You need to know that you have a uniform campaign being run across all your media outlets spewing forth your single marketing message.

Because without a combined effort, you are not benefiting from having a reputation and presentation that precedes you. And without this added effect, it will be that much harder for them to remember you when it comes time for your customers to refer you. As you are just like everyone else.

Having a quick policy book will give your advertisers, copywriters, and google adders reference to build your marketing message further and let people know exactly what your business is about. Avoiding alienating customers by using marketing faux pas. Building your reputation as the person to call for business.

What it’s all about…

When creating your policy just have an idea of:

·        What is the marketing message you want to say to your customer

o   Cheapest Prices

o   Best Warranties and Guarantees

o   Most Trusted

o   Etc.

·        What is the atmosphere you want to create when people are dealing with your company

o   Safety

o   Comfort-ability

o   Rugged and Tough

o   Reliable

o   Etc.

·        Will this marketing tarnish or give mix messages about your company

o   Sex sells, but do you want it associated with your company

o   Is this marketing controversial or unethical

o   Do we offer the cheapest prices, but make people pay more for shipping

Marketing Policy – Does this advertising meet what the company expects and represents… Of course it does!

The During – Build an atmosphere to your product

Building an atmosphere directly relates to your marketing message and could be the most important part of your company. Because the atmosphere you create is what brings your customers back.

Just as a film affect the way a person feels during viewing it, you must instill the same theatrics to your business. The atmosphere you create affects all five senses, taste, smell, touch, hear, and seeing. And if you get it right, you get referred by your customers because they want to share the experience and atmosphere with their friends.

In the other direction, if your company isn’t on par in any category, it could negatively affect your business. One bad experience could cost you hundreds of customers because people love to share bad experiences rather than good ones. And each new person told is a potential loss as they will not choose you based off what their friend told them.

How it works

Entrench customer in your product through their five senses. Ensure they know exactly what it feels, tastes, and smells like.

And to do that you just have to answer a few questions about the atmosphere you want to create and how you can make it for your customers.

Such as:

·        What is it that you want your customers to feel when they use your products? And when they are doing business with you?

·        How can you take those feelings and create an experience that makes them feel that and want to share it with their friends?

·        Techniques

•           Audio Email with written paragraph as you speak. End with a video of product.

Atmosphere – Bring the theater to everything you do as the atmosphere you create will be what they remember most

The After – Everything is Marketing

Everything is Marketing.

This simple quote establishes how important marketing is to your business.

But is actually talking about how everything you do can be considered marketing.

Everything from processes you do, the charities you give to, to the business trips you go on. If its record it, it can be turned to marketing. This technique is training your eye to not take things at face value, but to look deeper with a marketing eye.

A marketing eye that sees how anything and everything you do can be marketed as a part of your business to reinforce your reputation.

How it works

Record everything.

·        Training events

·        Processes

·        Sales Calls

·        Operations

·        Business Trips

And turn it into marketing or training material as one technique and event can boost the whole organization overall. Or affect one more prospect to become motivated to buy because they like what you’re about.

Everything is Marketing – If it happened, market it. If it didn’t happen, market it.

9 Comments

Grab attention QUICKLY and NEVER LET GO.

10/30/2014

5 Comments

You could have the best copy in the world, but if nobody sees it. You have nothing.

But just how do you get their attention. Just how do you entice them, just how to get them to bite.

Well my friend, you have walked through the right door and met the right man for your inquiries.

Because I have 15 different tips to get their attention. 15 different tips to get your ads noticed. 15 different tips to entice them, 15 different tips to make them bite.

And I will give them to you now…

15 Ways to bring attention to your Advertising.

1. State the Offer

Here you give the offer they can’t refuse.

Free stuff. Free information.

Anything they need to make a buying decision.

·         The offer consists of the product for sale, its price, the terms of the sale (including discounts), and the guarantee.

·         If your offer is particularly attractive, you may make the offer—and not the product or its benefits—the theme of the letter.

2. Highlight the Free Literature

Here you highlight the free literature they get by following the Call-to-Action.

All theirs by giving an email. A phone #. An inquiry.

Giving them anything they need to learn more.

·         Generate inquiries by offering

o   Free brochure, booklet, catalog, or other piece of sale literature.

o   Stressing the offer and center the sales pitch around it

3. Make an Announcement

Here you announce something new.

Something exciting. Something they should want.

And announce what they need to know and do to get it.

·         Announce—a special offer, a new product, a new club, a one-of-a-kind event—start your letter with this important news.

4. Tell a Story

This is where you appeal to the fact everyone likes a good story.

You grab their attention with a story with action, romance, etc.

Ending with a cliffhanger, something they just can’t miss.

·         Use a narrative format to interest and help reader remember it.

·         For more on Telling a Story

5. Flatter the Reader

Let them know that even though it is a mailing list.

You care. You know their name.

And you appreciate everything they do for your business.

·         Make it personal.

·         Acknowledge the fact that they are from a mailing list, but an important group

6. Write to the Reader Peer-to-Peer

Write not as a writer, but someone who is the same.

Who knows the same highs. Knows the same lows.

Knows what it’s like to be them.

·         Peers are more receptive to a sales pitch from a peer than from an outsider.

·         Example: letters aimed at farmers should be signed by a farmer and written in the plain, straightforward language of one farmer talking to another.

7. A Personal Message from the President

Getting to talk to the man in charge is always better than speaking with his talking heads.

Give this experience to your customer with a personal message from him.

Signed and all official.

·         In direct mail, the owner or manager of a business can talk directly with his or her customers.

·         Customers like dealing with the person in charge. When the top person in your company signs the letter, it makes the reader feel important.

8. Use a Provocative Quote

Say something so profound or shocking that they can’t look away.

Then follow-through with the best copywriting in the world.

That way they have no way to escape.

·         Contain news, a startling statistic or fact, or say something outrageous.

·         Must raise a question or arouse curiosity to make the reader want to read

9. Ask a Question

Ask a question.

They will want to answer it or to find the answer.

Accommodate them.

·         Question leads are effective when the answer to the question is interesting or important to the reader, or when the question arouses genuine curiosity.

10. Make It Personal

Let them hear their name.

Speak to what they want to hear.

Make it as if you’re talking just to them

· Use their names.

·         Use hand written signature

·         Speak to their ego

11. Identify the Reader’s Problem

Grab their attention by knowing the problem they have.

The problem they could have.

Or the problem they don’t even know about.

·         Product or service solves a problem

o   create a strong sales letter

o   featuring the problem in the lead

o   Tell how the product or service solves the problem

12. Stress a Benefit

Stress the benefit that will greatly affect them and their daily lives.

Stress how they can’t live without it. Stress how they must have it now.

By portraying a future without pain, without suffering, without knowing.

·         To get results, a benefit-oriented headline must appeal to the reader’s self-interest.

13. Use Human Interest

Hit them where they are their most vulnerable.

Needing top know they are not alone.

That others have the same fears and problems as they do.

People enjoy reading about other people

·         Use anxieties, fears, problems, and interests similar to target customer

·         Use dramatic human interest stories.

·         Relate it to their lives

14. Let the Reader in on Some inside Information

Everyone loves a secret.

But everyone loves more to learn about a secret.

Give them what they want.

·         Appeal to the reader’s need to feel special, important, and exclusive.

·         Reveal inside information on a sale or product

15. Sweepstakes

Appeal to their optimism.

Their optimism that it could be their lucky day.

And they could be a winner.

A sweepstakes can greatly increase the response to a direct-mail campaign.

There are three ways of structuring a sweepstakes:

·         YOU MAY WIN . . .

·         YOU MAY HAVE WON . . .

·         YOU HAVE WON . . . (Give complimentary prize)

And there you have it.

The 15 ways to grab your readers attention and never let go. Increasing the click-through rate. Increasing the coverage. Increasing the sales. Increasing your business.

How do you grab attention?

Let us know in the comments.

5 Comments

Want to get the Job you always dreamed of?

10/23/2014

3 Comments

Pinpoint your Success and get the BULLS-EYE.

In my years as a writer, I have edited hundreds of resumes. And what I have learned is that many people have no idea the process you have to follow to be hired. Especially when it comes down to their resume.

And the saddest part about this is that your resume, albeit is only used once to get an interview for a job, is the most important piece of paper you can have to boost your career and your income.

Because even if you have a job, you should continually be updating it and having it out to be found by recruiters everywhere. This is helpful in leveraging for a raise and getting a better opportunity to be paid what you’re truly worth. Certainly not minimum wage or other outrageously low sum.

But before I go into the 3 things I have learned to get hired, I’d like to give a quick overview of the hiring process. Because I have worked specifically with Human Resource Departments for technical writing, and know exactly how they work.

First, most human resource departments get hundreds or thousands of applications. Being human, they don’t have the time to go through them all. So they go through two different strategies.

·         Strategy ONE

o   Let the hiring software root out the good resumes by looking for keywords that they want from their candidates

·         Strategy TWO

o   Go through themselves and eliminate resumes by how good they look

§ Eliminating resumes for any arbitrary thing such as font type, where you live, or if it was hit by the dart they were throwing.

Because of the volume of resumes and the strategies they use. Your resume has an extremely low chance of being seen, let alone accepted for an interview.

Keep this in mind as I proceed with the 3 things I have learned about getting your dream job…

1.       You need multiple resumes at one time.

The first tip is to have multiple resumes at one time. This allows you to have a customized resume for a particular job and not a particular company. As the jobs across the board are relatively generic from worker (customer service, engineer, cashier, etc.) to manager (Supervisor, Manager, VP, GM, etc.).

With worker jobs, the fundamentals are the same. The hiring manager needs someone with a certain set of skills that they need for a job to get down. This involves similar soft skills like being able to socialize and sell. And hard skills like engineering, being licensed (doctors, etc.), information technology, etc.

With management jobs, they need to know you can manage a group of people. And successfully lead them to meet company’s goals. This is the same from being a CEO to being a team manager.

Due to this, you should know exactly what job you want and build a resume to fit that job. If you want to be a salesperson. Have a sales resume. If you want to be a professional writer. Have a professional writer resume. If you want to be a manager. Have a management resume.

Making a perfect segue into the next thing I have learned... the power of the Law of Averages.

2.     You need to build your resume off job descriptions.

The Law of Averages is that if you take the average of answers, you will get closer and closer to the exact answer. In this sample, you use it to get closer and closer to becoming exactly what the hiring manager wants.

Make a resume that impresses by being exactly what your employer wants. While also beating the search engine by having the keywords it needs.

The strategy to get such a resume goes as follows.

·         Step One: Identify

o   Identify the exact position you want and the skills you need to be successful in it

·         Step Two: Average

o   Find 5 job descriptions for the exact position you want

o   Average them out to find the key things that multiple hiring managers are looking for

o   Use a lot of the job description words as well as it is what they use for the hiring software

·         Step Three: Write

o   Using the job descriptions, write your resume to fit exactly what a hiring manager wants.

o   Using the words that they use to search with the hiring software.

Now that you know how to write the best resume possible, you need to ensure it is seen by the one in charge of hiring.

Which leads into the last thing I have learned…

3.     It is MANDATORY to follow-up with the person in charge of hiring.

The biggest problem facing your resume when it is sent in, is getting past the gatekeepers. Including the hiring software, the recruiters, and others it goes by.

To get it passed them, you need an over-the-top resume that gets noticed.

The best way for your resume to get to the top of the pile is it being Unique.

Unique Resume Strategies

·         Know someone who you can put as a reference who works there.

o   Find someone through LinkedIn and get the referral

·         Use a gimmick like a shoe with a resume attached that says, just want my foot through the door.

Or just get in contact them and become human and real to the hiring manager, instead of just a number.

This is easiest with calling, showing up, or building a relationship through different channels.

With these 3 things I have learned, you can maximize your exposure to hiring managers everywhere. You can increase your income and be paid what your worth. Get the job you always wanted and live the life you deserve.

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Marketing Techniques of the Week: Epic 6

Grab attention QUICKLY and NEVER LET GO.

Want to get the Job you always dreamed of?

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