Turn Your Passions and Talents Into Money

February 2nd, 2010

Do you wonder just what it is you’re supposed to do with your unique combination of skills and interests? Are you overlooking the commercial value of your passions and talents?

You would be surprised at the backgrounds and interests of some of the people I know who are running information empires.

Have you ever heard of Feng Shui? It’s the Chinese art which believes that how you set up your environment, and where you place certain things in your home, affects the energy around you.

A lot of people use Feng Shui to enhance their luck and even their relationships. So, now that you’re more familiar with the art, have you ever heard of a Feng Shui expert? You’ll be intrigued to learn that someone who started out using Feng Shui for herself has actually managed to build an information empire around it. She has created products and programs to support her clients in using Feng Shui.

Another woman I’ve met has built an information empire around her ability to do handwriting analysis.

If these two women can have information empires based on their individual talents, you can too. Both of them are turning over about £250,000 a year in their businesses. And both of them are working part time – fewer than 30 hours a week.

If they can do that, what’s possible for you?

Another example is a man I met who used to sell men’s clothing. Then he started teaching. He had been very successful using direct mail to promote his clothing store, so he combined his skills and started teaching other men’s wear retailers how to build their business in the same way.

Your expertise was given to you for a reason. What you know matches up with the corresponding need of someone else, somewhere else in the world.

And if that need exists, then what you know has commercial value. That’s for sure. Someone, somewhere, is willing to pay for what you know.

You may not be quite sure yet about where you want to place your focus. You may find that you have a number of choices, that there is almost too much opportunity for you!

But look at your skills and your interests from the point of view of someone who doesn’t have them. How can you turn them into information and products that give you the greatest return for your efforts? The answer to that question will be the first step in laying the foundation of your information empire.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Turn Your Passions and Talents Into Money

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Posted in Business & Money, Business Plans, Business Success, Cash Flow, Make Money At Home, Make Money Online, Marketing, Money Making Ideas, Motivation, Personal Productivity | 4 Comments »

Great Copywriting Begins At The End

December 23rd, 2009

Whenever you are putting together a piece of copy, it is a good idea to follow the advice of Steven Covey and “start with the end in mind.” This is true whether you are writing an email or a long sales letter, a brochure or a page on your web site. The surest way to arrive at your desired destination is to know where you are going before you take your first step.

It follows quite naturally that the initial question you need to ask is “What are you hoping your reader will do at the end of this piece of communication?” How you answer this will determine not only everything you write, but also how successful your communications are in achieving results.

Always Go For The Goal

On a web site, for example, you may be writing copy for your opt-in page. What is your ultimate objective? Most likely, you are hoping visitors will identify themselves by giving you their e-mail addresses along with permission to send them mail. Everything you write on the page should be directed toward that end.

Or perhaps you are planning a seminar or workshop and creating invitations to send out by post. Obviously you want each recipient to book a place the event, but you can be even more specific than that. Ask yourself, “How exactly to I want people to respond?”

Do you want them to pick up the phone? Should they send back a pre-printed form? Or would you rather have everyone visit your web site and register there? Being able to visualize the desired outcome will help you direct your readers to that action.

Whatever you are writing, keep the end firmly in sight and limit your writing to the shortest course that will take the reader there. If you are putting together a lead generation advertisement, just stayed focused on generating the lead. You don’t have to do more than that.

Unfortunately, sometimes people put too much material into their copywriting – more than they need to get the job done. This can actually be counterproductive, distracting readers from taking the desired action. Avoid this, by all means. Edit out any copy that is off the mark.

A Caution About Copywriting

Having said all of that, it is also important to let you know what copywriting can’t do. All the best copy in the world cannot compensate for the wrong product or service being offered to the wrong market.

Whatever you are planning to sell or promote, be absolutely sure you’ve done your homework before you start writing about it. You need to be able to say with confidence, “I know that I’ve got something which is targeted to the right group of people, and I know there is some demand for it.”

That’s a critical first step. If for any reason you haven’t done it, no matter how much thought and effort you put into your copy, it will be wasted. On the other hand, for the right product being offered to the right target, copy written with the end in mind will really help things take off.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Great Copywriting Begins At The End

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Posted in Direct Mail, Direct Marketing, Email Marketing, Make Money Online, Marketing, Online Marketing, Personal Productivity, Success Secrets, copywriting | 3 Comments »

Free Offers Can Mean More Money

December 14th, 2009

If you’ve tried direct mail and advertising and it didn’t work for you, fine tune and adjust your advertising and mailings to make them produce results.  One method that I’ve found that makes an ad or mailing successful is to offer specific free items; a report, a tele-seminar or e-books.

I’ve heard from many of you that you’ve tried direct mail or lead generation advertising and didn’t see instant results.  There’s a learning curve with direct response advertising and you’re not always going to get a flood of business from your first ad or mailing.  By fine tuning and testing, you’re going to find the messages that you can rely on to bring in a certain number of inquiries.  Once you have this message, it’s going to produce going forward, it’s not a one time-deal.

Why Free Offers Work

When you’re offering a free report, you’re giving people something tangible to ask for.  You’re giving them a specific task and they’re going to be more responsive than a general ‘call for further information’ request.

I’ve tested this myself.  I ran an advertisement in a trade magazine and offered a phone number to call for further information.  The next time that I ran the ad; I offered a free report for callers.  There was a significant increase in the number of inquiries.

By offering this free report, you’re not only giving a specific ‘call to action’, you’re taking one more step to establishing yourself as an expert in your field.

What NOT to offer….

Well, let’s start with what NOT to offer as a freebie.  Products that take your time and only offer the one-to-one marketing approach are not cost effective and have limited sales potential.  This includes free consultations.

They’re time consuming and they’re taking your time from other projects and prospects.  Change your one-to-one marketing to one-to-many.  For example, that free consultation would reach significantly more people if it’s offered as a tele-seminar.

It’s also known that when you offer anything for free, you’re going to attract a certain number of people who just want the freebie.  They’re never going to buy from you, no matter what.  If you’re offering a consultation, you’ve lost a chunk of your time and it’s not going to pay off for you.  By offering a one-to-many product, you’ve significantly cut your losses with these bargain hunters.

What to offer…

You need to focus on the one-to-many marketing techniques, particularly if you’re going to offer a giveaway.  These giveaways need to be low cost for you, but offer a perceived value to the prospect.  A free report works well in advertisements, as do other techniques of one-to-many marketing such as tele-seminars or an electronic-book via email.

The Bottom Line

Creating advertisements and offers with unlimited potential to produce results over time will trump the hour of cold calling or one-on-one consultation that’s going to yield limited results.  Converting your one-to-one marketing techniques to one-to-many techniques is the key to becoming a Client Magnet.

Using free offers that have the one-to-many benefits is going to help your advertisements become more effective.   Think about where you’re putting your time in marketing.  If you’re using manual lead generators, change your methods to identify the fastest path to generate good leads.  That path is going to be direct response advertising, and the use of free reports is going to make them more effective.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Free Offers Can Mean More Money

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Posted in Advertising, Business Plans, Business Success, Direct Mail, Direct Marketing, Email Marketing, Make Money Online, Marketing, Money Making Ideas, Online Marketing, Success Secrets | 1 Comment »

Selling In Print

December 2nd, 2009

Your webpage is like a salesperson in print.

When visitors go to your website, it should provide them with all the information they need to know, and leave them with no doubts about ordering products or services from you.

Does your webpage do that? If it doesn’t, you’re missing one of the best conversion opportunities there is. One-to-many selling. Your strategy should be to get people to visit your site, and let the site make the sales for you. Use your webpages as sales pages.

This has been my own strategy and specialty, because sadly, I don’t have time to speak to every single person who expresses interest in what I am offering.

And frankly, not everybody needs to speak with me. Some people wouldn’t even want to speak to me; they just want the information they need in order to be able to make up their own mind.

So if you’ve made the decision to drive traffic to your website because you don’t have the time for conversations with too many people, focus on the quality of your webpage. Make sure that page is in the absolute, best possible shape to close the deal for you.

Think of it this way. If you were to expend time and energy recruiting and training a salesperson, you would make absolutely sure they were fully informed.

They would know all of the information about your business to give to prospective clients. They would be able to give all of the reasons why the prospect should buy this particular offer at this particular time. They would be able to overcome every objection.

That is what your webpage should do.

It should answer every possible question. It should inform visitors of the value of your service and convince them to make the purchase. And that may take a lot of information, a lot of words and facts and details. Don’t worry if it seems like a lot of copy. Since you aren’t having a back and forth exchange with the potential client, you have to anticipate any questions they might have, and address them all. Your webpage should be as long as it needs to be to get the job done.

You don’t want them leaving your webpage without making the purchase because they didn’t have some piece of information that they wanted. If a piece is missing or incomplete, you risk the chance that some people simply won’t buy.

So are you cutting corners in your sales process? Do you just seem to always run out of time or are you too lazy to get your webpage sorted out? Have you put proper emphasis on effective copywriting or considered hiring a copywriter to do it for you? If not, you are shortchanging yourself and your prospective clients.

And that will be so wrong. If you’re selling something that can make a difference to people, it’s your duty to make sure that as many people as possible benefit from it.

Their lives are going to be enhanced by what you’re offering. It’s going to move them forward, in their business and in their life. You need to make sure you’re doing a complete and thorough sales job on your webpage to help make that happen for people.

That page should function as your own personal salesman or woman, working for you 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Selling In Print

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Posted in Advertising, Business Plans, Make Money Online, Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Success Secrets, Website sales | 4 Comments »