Cathy Stucker - The Idea Lady

Attract Customers and Make Yourself Famous

Your Business Budget

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business-budget

Mention the word “budget” and most of us have a negative reaction. First of all, we may hate the detailed planning that goes in to budgeting. And, “budget” has come to mean “limit”–something else we don’t like.

In reality, a budget is simply a way of allocating your available resources so that you get the most you can out of what you have. As you think about your marketing budget for the coming year, don’t forget to include all of the resources you have available to you:

Money – OK, this is the obvious one. Plan on spending some money to reach your goals. Don’t forget that as your marketing efforts succeed, you should generate additional revenues. Set aside a percentage of these revenues to continue and expand your marketing efforts. Remember, though, that how much money you spend is less important than how you spend it.

Time – How will you use your time most effectively? You may believe that you have more time than money, but don’t fall in to the trap of doing everything yourself. This is especially important if your time can be used more effectively in revenue-producing activities than do-it-yourself marketing. Also consider that you may get better results by hiring a pro than by doing it yourself. Look for ways to delegate or outsource the things that are not a good use of your time.

Automation – Are there tasks you could automate to increase your results? For example, if you find yourself responding to the same questions over and over, consider offering a FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) at your website, or via email autoresponder.

Evangelists – The people who believe in you and your business are great marketing tools, but you are probably not using them in an organized way. Give them the tools to make it easy for them to tell others about you (e.g., give them extra business cards, brochures and other materials) and to refer business to you (e.g., set up a referral procedure and reward program). Don’t forget about social media. Provide suggested Tweets they can use to tell their friends about you. Include “Share” buttons on your blog posts.

You probably have many other resources available to help you market. Look for opportunities to joint venture with colleagues on projects and promotions. Would friends or family members be willing to pitch in to help with an event? Do you have access to a location where you could hold an event, such as an open house or seminar? Are there people you know who would be willing to provide advice and mentoring?

Use your resources wisely and effectively to maximize your results. 

Planning for Success

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People generally do not say to themselves, ‘At the end of next year, I want to be in exactly the same place I am today.’ Usually they hope that they will be in a better place—that might mean making more money, having more flexibility and freedom, or taking on a new career or business. However, many people find themselves doing the same things year after year because they do not plan to get the things they say that they want. 

To reach your goals, you first need to know what they are. Think about where you want to be five years from now. Do you see yourself retiring, selling your business, starting a new business, adding staff, expanding to new areas, or scaling back to enjoy more time with family? Whatever you imagine, work backwards from that vision to determine what you must do to get there.

Set goals for yourself. ‘I want to make more money,’ is not a goal. Goals should be specific and quantifiable. How much more money do you want? By what date? And what will you do to reach that goal?

Goals should be achievable. If you set impossible standards for yourself, you will become frustrated, not successful.

Goals that require you to stretch a little are good. If you can reach your objectives in your sleep, there is no challenge and hitting your targets is not as satisfying. The best goals require you to step up your performance in some way.

Put your goals into an overall plan. What steps will you have to take in order to reach the goals you have identified? Each step becomes a part of the plan.

Put it in writing. Write down your plan. The steps, the time frame, the resources needed, the outcome expected…all of it gets written down where it can be referenced as it is executed.

Have a partner or a buddy. Share your goals with someone else and encourage them to hold you accountable. Do the same for them. If they know that your plan is to finally write that novel this year, they will expect you to do it. That outside accountability makes it more likely to happen.

Be willing to change. You may find that changes in circumstance cause you to change your goals. That’s fine. Don’t stubbornly cling to goals ‘just because.’ Revise them when new opportunities come up.

Now do it. Take the first step, and then the next. Rejoice in your successes and reward yourself for taking risk and doing the hard work. 

Getting Help

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help

Do you find that your marketing suffers because you lack the time, the motivation or the skill to do certain things? 

Maybe you don’t have the time to put together a brochure, you hate to cold call, or you don’t know how to create a website (and don’t want to learn).

It may be more cost-effective for you to hire someone than to do it yourself. Hate to cold call? Hire a telemarketing firm to make calls and set appointments for you. Because that is their primary business they will probably get better results than you would. They will definitely get better results if you never get around to making the calls! A professional copy writer could create a sales letter that gets more orders than one you write, so you end up making more than the writer’s services cost. 

If cost is an issue, use help judiciously. Editing and revising take less time than writing from scratch, so many writers charge less for those services than for writing an entire document.

Look for other opportunities to use help to increase your profits.  Could you devote more time to marketing, or have more billable hours, if you hired someone to handle clerical or administrative tasks? If you can bill $50, $75, $100 an hour or more should you be filing, or should you hire someone to do it for $10 or $15 an hour? Especially if the time you spend filing takes away from time you could be billing to clients or generating new business.

Consider bartering or swapping services with other professionals.  You can both benefit by spending your time doing what you do best and getting help with a task at which you are less proficient.

You don’t have to do it all. Get help to make you more effective and use your most precious commodity–time–where you can profit most.

Productivity, Stress and Meditation

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Are you burned out and stressed? Perhaps meditation will help. This is a guest post from Tom Von Deck of www.DeeperMeditation.Net

Whether you work for yourself or for a company, stress is a productivity killer. In fact, it is estimated that stress costs USA businesses about $300 Billion per year in absenteeism, insurance claims, sick leave, illness, poor communication, low energy at work, office politics and more. If you do the math, that’s a couple thousand dollars per person per year.

Meditation is one of the best ways to truly go to the root of stress by making life much easier to process from moment to moment. However, many people try to beat stress with meditation techniques, then give up.

You may have even tried meditation as a form of stress relief and failed. This is not necessarily because meditation is not your thing. In fact, meditation is for everyone because it is your natural peaceful state of mind when you’re not resisting experience. Resisting experience means clinging to comfortable experience and pushing away undesirable experience.

The key to a successful meditation practice is compatibility. There are many teachers and centers out there pushing the “best” meditation technique. Maybe you tried some and found that they were not for you. Regardless, there is a technique for you.

The first step to beating stress with meditation is to find an “object of focus” that you find deep, loving absorption in. This is something constant or repetitive that you can fall in love with easily. Examples include the breath, a visualization of Jesus or Krishna, a line of a peaceful song, a mantra and images of a familiar waterfall. Once you find your object of focus, choose a consistent time each day to meditate on it. Fall in love with it. It does not matter how “deeply” you fall in love. Your capacity for concentration will rise and fall in the short run and expand in the long run.

When thoughts come up, just take note of them like they are clouds and you are the sky. Practice observing thought and emotion in a detached manner. Then bring your attention back to the object of focus. This builds equanimity and reduces stress.

Meditating at the same time every day builds a momentum of peace behind the scenes regardless of the amount of time you spend doing it. If you’re busy, 5-10 minutes is ok. If you can aim for an hour, even better. Keep that consistency going and it will have a cumulative effect that greatly banishes stress from your life.

Another momentum builder is the wise use of “elevator time”. You have 20 seconds in an elevator to do whatever you wish. Why not do those yoga stretches, conscious breathing, spiritual song, gratitude work, prayer, etc? You know what “turns you on” on a deep level. Do those things regardless of the abundance or lack of immediate results. You will notice profound results in time.

If you properly follow this advice and develop a solid meditation program that slips into your time schedule, then stress will easily roll off of you and productivity will soar.

Tom Von Deck is an internationally available workplace meditation trainer, stress management speaker and author of Oceanic Mind – The Deeper Meditation Training Course and The Deeper Meditation Audio Course. His website is www.DeeperMeditation.Net

Get the Most From Consulting

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When you pay someone to advise you, you want to get the greatest possible benefit. Not only are you investing money in the advice, you are spending your time with the expert and implementing the advice they give. Here is how to make the most of your investment.

Choose the right expert. Do they know about what you need to do? Do an online search for them and see what comes up. That is especially useful if they are going to teach you how to do something online. If someone claims they can give you a great online presence, but you can’t find them online, there is a disconnect there.

Let the expert know what your needs are. What issues do you need to discuss? What do you need to walk away with in order to consider your consultation a success? Be as specific as possible about your goals.

Focus on goals, not process. Although you should be specific about your goals, you might leave it open about how you will get there. For example, instead of saying, “I need to know how to implement a Pay-per-click advertising campaign,” maybe what you really need to know is how to get more people to your web site. Pay-per-click is one option, and if that is the only one you know, you limit what the expert may be able to share with you.

Give background. I always ask if there is something I should review to have a better idea of where the client is now. That might mean looking at their web site, or information about their products or services.

Record your conversations. You will not remember everything that is discussed, so make a recording that you can review later. You do not want to spend a lot of time taking notes, you want to be focused on the conversation. Let the consultant know that you will be recording. If they object, maybe they are not the right expert for you. (I record all of my consultations and provide the recordings to the clients.)

Do not be intimidated. If the consultant says something you do not understand, ask her to explain. That is her job.

Use what you learn. Now that you know what to do, do it. Put the ideas your gained to work for you.

Cathy is available to consult with you. Get more information on Cathy’s consulting services here.