Yes, they want to know that you are qualified to speak on a certain topic, but they won’t be interested in hearing you boast about your achievements. There are ways in which you can establish credibility without boasting. Here are some valuable tips on how to do that.

Be A Little Vulnerable With Your Audience
Remember the purpose of establishing credibility with your audience is so that they will listen to what you have to say. You want your audience to warm to you. So you can see why boasting about your achievements will really be counterproductive. Sometimes being a little vulnerable with your audiences and sharing personal stories has a far more powerful effect.

I have used this strategy myself.  When I first started out doing talks on cold-calling I would introduce my talk with a true story.   Did you know there was a point when I was told – “The problem with you, Bernadette, is you’re just no good on the phone”.  I was terrified of making a cold call.  I’d share with my audience this true, real-life experience.  My audience could see where I had come from and it very quickly helped me to establish credibility and their attention!

Of course, if you’re going to relate a personal experience like that it is important to continue backing it up with evidence of the results you’ve achieved.  I would usually share some of the specific results I’d helped big companies achieve.

When you share information in this way you are not bragging, you are simply demonstrating to your audience why you are someone worth listening to. Think about how you would introduce yourself to a new acquaintance. You wouldn’t immediately tell them how successful you are. If you needed to establish credibility you would be more subtle. You need to take the same approach with your audience at talks.

Keep Them Engaged with Useful Information
As you engage with your audience share your UNIQUE experience and knowledge.  You are an interesting personality with expertise in your field.  As long as you share of yourself from the heart and provide USEFUL information, your audience will naturally want to know more about you and your strategies.  Share you’re real life success stories and show your audience how they can apply the lessons and mistakes you’ve experienced.  By doing this your audience will be inspired to change their current situation by listening to you.

When you’re preparing to connect with your audience think about these questions below.  It will help you establish credibility with your audience without boasting them to sleep ….

•  Where have you come from – what obstacles have you overcome to be where you are today?

•  What results have you achieved or helped other people achieve?

•  What are some of your key learning experiences – and how can they be applied to your audience

•  What remarkable results have you achieved while working on specific projects or in certain areas of business.

Remember, people DO want to know who you are – but generally shy away from people continually talking about themselves and boasting about their achievements.   Weave these tips into your next talk or seminar.  By making small changes to the way you deliver your message, you’ll see a BIG impact to the results you are achieving.  Remember, it’s all about your audience not all about YOU.

If you’ve enjoyed this article and want to know how you can make more money from holding your own live events, then check out my  Event Money Machine Series – you can sign up for this FREE online training here:  www.eventmoneymachine.com

In order to create the type of magnetism that attracts prospective clients to you, you must find that one thing that you’re inherently intended to do and eliminate the rest.  With so many resources available to every one of us, there really is no excuse to continue to do OR continue procrastinate on those things we hate to do. But, you might ask, “How can I find that one thing I’m meant to do?”  You can start with your current business.  Here’s how:

•    Make a list of all of the tasks that you’re responsible for in your business.  Often, it can be hard to call up every duty, so it can be helpful to keep a daily log.

•    Assign a love factor to each task.  Is it your favorite?  Do you want to do it first every day because it makes you feel fulfilled?  Or is it the one you detest?  The one you try to avoid?

•    Isolate the tasks that you detest and ask yourself if those tasks can be eliminated.  Can you redesign your business’ purpose to cut them from your routine?

•    If the detested duties are necessary duties, start, right away, to find another way to get them done.  Hire someone.  Automate them.  Anything that will eliminate the negative energy from your daily repertoire.

If this process has been completed efficiently, you will be left with one main task…the one that you’re absolutely wild about.

The laws of positive energy dictate that you’ll be paid more for those tasks which you enjoy the most. Once you can figure out what you’re good at, and do that thing exclusively, you’ll realize more success than you had when you were bogged down doing all of the other false necessities.

Another point to remember is though many of us would like to believe that our business lives and our personal lives can be maintained separately, with a definitive line dividing the two, it’s nearly impossible to isolate them.  If there are things in your personal life that drag you down (laundry, cooking, cleaning), then do what you can to justify hiring someone to do them for you.  The positive energy that you’ll create in your personal life will spill over into your professional life, multiplying the magnetism that you create.

Just loving your general profession or business is never enough to warrant truthfulness from the statement, “I love my work.”   In order for your magnetism to be IRRESISTIBLE to potential clients, you must love every aspect of your business, even if that means whittling it down to one, exclusive task.

Do what you love, and only what you love…and others will love the idea of becoming part of your magnetic field of success.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Offer Advice: One way you can get real personal, real fast with your contacts is to offer advice or even just sympathetic comments. Listen to what people say, and respond to them even when it’s not related to your business. This is a fast and easy way to form personal connections with people, which can lead to unexpected business opportunities. Additionally, by offering advice or sharing information about related things in your life, you’re letting people find out more about you as a person and letting your personality shine through your social networking.

Share Personal Information: Share personal information via Twitter and Facebook. For years, people have had distinctive mindsets of “this is business” and “personal is for friends.” Let your business contacts be your friends, too. When you share information about your diet, or struggling with the conflicts of being a parent and business person, you’re sharing personal information that lets other people see that you’re not just a faceless business – you’re an individual.

The things that you share might resonate with your followers, and give them a reason to keep following you beyond your business information. People are also more likely to refer friends to other friends for business opportunities than to faceless strangers, so if you and your business can become a friend, you’ll get more business opportunities.

Find Ways to Blend Business and Personal: Find ways to blend business and personal updates. If all of your updates are personal, your followers who aren’t particularly interested in your business might just go away. If you share personal information, too, your followers may be interested in you as a person and continue to follow, even if they don’t find your business particularly interesting.

By blending business with personal updates, you can share information about your business without being blatant. For example, you could say something like “Going to Ireland to speak for business, and taking my husband along as an anniversary gift.” This lets people know that you’re a successful business person who travels and speaks, but also shares information about your personal life – that you and your husband have an anniversary.

Be Genuine: The most important thing about sharing your personality through social networking is to be genuine. Don’t give fake updates tailored just to get a reaction from your followers; be forthright and honest, and people will respect your integrity. If you let your personality shine through to your social networking followers, you’ll find yourself with a bigger pool of followers, which potentially gives you more business opportunities.

Bernadette Doyle created Client Magnets Ltd to help self-employed people solve one of their biggest business problems: attract a steady stream of clients. If you’d like to receive invaluable tips and advice on how to attract clients with ease, register at http://www.clientmagnets.com

It’s also important to keep in mind that blogging involves more than just writing the posts. You have to consider such factors as user experience, site design, and the software you’ll need to get your blog running.

Here are a few resources you can check out that offer great information for starting a blog.

www.IncomeDiary.com. This is the site where Michael Dunlop, blogging entrepreneur, offers a free e-course that details his process.

www.WordPress.com. WordPress offers the software you’ll need to get started. One of its strongest selling points is the ability to customize features to suit your own needs. There are also many free features you can use to get started in a matter of minutes. It also allows you to track statistics and block spam.

www.UXBooth.com. You want visitors to your site to have a good experience; this is what will bring them back again and again. This site offers tips for creating the best experience for your readers.

www.SmashingMagazine.com. This design site presents the latest in web design and development. While you won’t need to study design in order to launch a blog, this site can be a useful resource for getting ideas about how your site should look.

www.CopyBlogger.com. This is a good resource for learning how to write blogs that will drive traffic to your site as you build your list and market products.  It offers courses on copywriting, SEO, headline writing and keywords, among other topics.

www.ProBlogger.net. Visit this site to learn about the more technical side of having a successful blog. You’ll find information about blog design, advertising, tools and services, and much more.

www.WarriorForum.com. A forum where Internet marketers talk about their trade, this site can provide useful information about sales techniques. You might even find tips for marketing methods that apply directly to your niche.

www.TaskUS.com. Although this is technically a virtual assistant site, you can use the service to create custom ranking lists and other useful information that you can post in your blog.

Once you’re comfortable with the technical and writing aspects of blogging, you can start drawing visitors to your site.

Remember that if you want to become a great copywriter, you should first be a great copyreader. You can learn so much from reading other people’s copy and applying what you learn to your own niche.

These resources are sure to give you tips and tricks that will help make your blog successful.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Avoid Sterile Updates
Some businesses create social networking accounts, but just don’t “get” the purpose of networking. These businesses share sterile updates, like “New article posted today” or “New article posted today.” These updates just aren’t very interesting, and they don’t generate buzz or interest in the way that more conversational updates can do.

Instead of saying “Teleseminar today,” a business could say “Excited about the teleseminar today, with 300 people registered and more openings available!” You’re conveying the same basic information, but in a more engaging way. This more conversational style generates buzz and makes it more likely that people will follow your links or want to find out more about what you’re promoting.

Find Ways to Interest Your Followers
Don’t just share a bunch of self-serving updates whenever you have a new product to promote, or an action you want your followers to take. Find ways to interest your followers, and make them want to know what you’ll share next. This can be interesting quotes related to your business, or just general quotes designed to make people think or give them ideas.

You could also share interesting things that other people have posted on the Web, either via sharing links or Re-Tweeting things that other Twitter users have already shared. You don’t have to spend a lot of time creating interesting content in order to interest your followers; just share interesting content, even if it already exists elsewhere.

Promote Conversation to Build Social Networking Success
One of the single most successful social networking marketing techniques hardly seems like marketing at all: promoting conversations. Promoting conversations, particularly when they tie back in to your business, is a great way to keep and build followers, and even boost sales.

One business that uses social networking to promote conversations is a motorcycle part supplier. Every Friday, they ask people if they’re working on their motorcycles or riding for the weekend. People share information about the repairs they’re making, which gives other people the confidence to make similar repairs, or undertake their own repairs. This translates directly to additional sales for the parts supplier, because people order parts to make their repairs. All of this is because the supplier asks a single question every weekend that promotes conversation.

Bottom line: if you’re using social networking to promote your business, don’t just promote your business. Don’t just share sterile, boring updates. Engage your social networking followers. Share interesting information and links, and encourage conversations. You don’t have to talk directly about your business to boost business performance; in fact, some of the best performance boosts come when you don’t talk about your business at all, but instead facilitate interaction among your followers.

Bernadette Doyle is a marketing specialist who helps entrepreneurs become client magnets and attract a steady stream of their ideal clients. She publishes a free, weekly newsletter for trainers, speakers, coaches, consultants, complementary therapists and solo professionals. If you’d like to receive invaluable tips and advice on how to attract clients with ease, register at http://www.clientmagnets.com

•    Carefully choose the niche that you want to be known as an expert at.

•    Learn everything there is to know about your declared area of expertise. Go through the experiences and learn the lessons, connect with a mentor and then put it into practice to be successful. Only then can you teach and help other people to do the same.

•    Pick something that you’re passionate about; when you’re passionate, that really shows through.

•    You will make a greater impact in a place where you genuinely have some value to offer.

•    Realize that you don’t have to try to get every person you ever encounter to become a client.

•    Build your relationship with the people who have already “raised their hands” and expressed an interest in your product or service.

•    Focus your effort and energy on people who are pre-qualified to buy. It is more pleasurable to work with and for them than to try to convert people who will never be interested or will never be qualified to buy your services.

•    Approach your tasks with the right energy. A positive attitude will resonate with your clients; conversely, so will negativity.

•    Be a congruent model for success by focusing on and being committed to your prospects and clients.

•    Use one-to-many methods for connecting with clients and offering services, as much as possible.

•    Put systems in place to start building your list.  Then continue to grow and improve your lead generation systems.

•    Know the principles behind offering ethical bribes, such as a free report, and have processes in place to handle responses.

•    Incite a call to action by creating a sense of urgency for people to sign up with you or purchase your offer. Deadlines work well for this.

•    Don’t underestimate the value of affiliates and joint venture partnerships.

•    Be consistent. Systematize and automate your process so that you can make money even when you aren’t working.

•    Use articles, teleseminars and social media to increase your exposure and the perception of you as an expert.

•    Use quality software to build and maintain your websites and blogs.

•    Always offer an upgrade with every sale.

•    Build relationships by following up with the people you meet at networking events right after the event.

•    Offer something for free or do a product giveaway at an event, collecting contact information in exchange for entry.

Implementing just some of these strategies today will add many more prospects to your list and take you closer to a more profitable business.  When you’ve applied them all, you will be a true client magnet.

You see, recently several of my clients have been having BIG BREAKTHROUGHS in their businesses:

• Katharine went from zero to $100,000 in just 4 months….

• Moira made $30,000 in just 8 days…

• Melina made more in the last quarter than she did in the WHOLE of the previous year…

• Hazel has QUADRUPLED her prices and is attracting the high quality, committed clients that she wants…

• Wendy has gone from charging $40 an hour to offering $10,000 clients…

I could go on, but you get the picture!

So what do all of these women have in common? Aside from that fact that they are ALL my favourite clients They’ve ALL been using this same strategy to experience these BIG income leaps.

Want to know what it is?

Then JOIN ME on this special webinar ‘How to Have BIG Income Leaps in Your Business – Without Working Longer Or Harder’ that’s happening Wednesday 9th June at 1pm UK time.

Register here http://www.clientmagnets.com/bigincomeleaps/

On this webinar, I will share with you:

• The critical MINDSET shift you must make to experience BIG income leaps in YOUR business

• The ‘invisible wall’ that blocks big income LEAPS – and how to bring it crashing down!

• The simple strategy that can help you QUADRUPLE your revenues this year – yes, really!
• A specific action plan for generating YOUR BIG income LEAP

Spaces on this webinar are LIMITED. So reserve your spot right now by going to http://www.clientmagnets.com/bigincomeleap/

I look forward to helping you discover how to have YOUR Big Income Leap!

I love this quote. It’s true that all of the knowledge, skill and expertise in the world won’t make you money and turn your vision into reality unless you have an actual plan for how to use them.

Before you can formulate your plan, however, you need to start first with your vision. You have to really see where you want your business to go.

The following questions will help you to plan to reach your business goals by first giving you a clear mental image of what those goals are.

How much money do you want to make?

Name your revenue goal for this year. You have to put a figure on it. When you voice that goal, don’t phrase it in the form of a question. You’re not asking someone’s permission to make that money. State, out loud, what you want to make.

If that figure is in your head, if it’s in your heart, and if it’s something you’ve been dreaming of, it’s absolutely achievable. Doreen Virtue says that God doesn’t give us our dreams without the ability to make them real.

So whatever the figure is, you have to name it to claim it.

Rather than naming a general, round figure – 100,000, a quarter-of-a million, or a million -  be more specific.  Round figures aren’t real enough for you.  Calculate what your dream life would cost you, and then cost it out. It’s rarely going to be a round number. So, get really clear on your revenue goals.

What kind of lifestyle do you want to live?

Think about your lifestyle goals. How much do you want to be working? For example, do you want to take extended vacations and not work for a couple of months?

I decided last year that I didn’t want to work more than three days a week. And now, I don’t. There are plenty of things that will test your decision. You have to decide what’s right for you, and get it down on paper. Remember, the point is to visualize how you want things to be.

Will your business make a significant impact?

Finally, your vision is probably not solely about serving yourself. I’m willing to bet that it’s not only about money and a nice lifestyle, although these are great to have.

I believe that all of us are here to make a difference.

What are your impact goals? Know who the people are that you want to serve and what contribution you want to make. What do you want to be remembered for?

Mapping out your vision of your business, in your mind’s eye and on paper, will give you a good idea of what you want your business to look like.

The mental image and visual reinforcement will help you to develop a plan for making your vision a reality.

Bernadette Doyle is a marketing specialist who helps entrepreneurs become client magnets and attract a steady stream of their ideal clients. She publishes a free, weekly newsletter for trainers, speakers, coaches, consultants, complementary therapists and solo professionals. If you’d like to receive invaluable tips and advice on how to attract clients with ease, register at http://www.clientmagnets.com

One way to create those opportunities is to put structures in place that allow you to receive money 24/7.  Set systems in place that allow you to make money while you sleep.  For example, by offering products and programs on a web site, you are increasing your ability to receive.  You are giving your prospects and clients the means to give you money.

If you don’t have simple and continuous methods for people to give you money, your capacity to receive is only as big as a pinhole!   You need to turn your receiving pinhole into a wide open chasm and watch your income soar …

Here are a few things to consider:

•    Do you have an ecommerce website yet?

•    Are you in a position where someone can come to your website and find out about you?

•    Can a potential client book a session with you and pay for it on your website?

•    Can potential clients buy something on your website, right then and there?

•    Do you have a way for clients to automatically pay you for your product or service?

By implementing these elements in your business you will increase your capacity to receive, and in turn increase your income.

I’ve often talked about mindset and how it is so important to work on yourself from the inside – to analyze why you are limiting yourself and your capacity to receive.

Well, today I’m asking you to also work it on the outside? How about putting that external structure in place to be the metaphor for you becoming a better receiver?”

Think about how much you have been allowing yourself to receive, but don’t stop at the thinking. You need to act on it. Take the next step to implement the necessary structures in your business. Don’t just analyze.  Thinking and talking about receiving and how you can improve, won’t be as effective as doing something externally. You may hit obstacles along the way but with persistence, the right support, coaching and advice you will succeed!

Yes, work on the inside but also work on the outside.

Continue to step up through those obstacles until the elements for you to receive are in place. Get the advice and expertise you need to make it happen!

Good things do not always come to those who wait. You need to stop waiting for permission and approval. No one is going to come along and deem you the expert or hand you an award. This is something that you must step up and claim.

Only when you have the guts to step up and claim it, will you be thinking and acting like a winner.

When I began my first business, at 26 years old, I had no track record. I had no past clients and no success stories to talk about. I had no marketing experience, and no budget.

I basically had every possible disadvantage.

The one thing I did have was alot of enthusiasm and a very positive mindset about what I was doing. I started positioning myself and calling myself an expert – long before anybody else came along and awarded me that title.

To think and act like a winner, you need to keep your focus on where you’re heading, not where you’re starting from.

Many people get crippled by this. Don’t be one of them. Don’t get caught up in this cycle of looking for some type of approval or permission that will suddenly make you step up and be the expert.

Once I chose to define myself as a cold-calling expert, I started acting like one and before too long, I did indeed become one. I was honest about it; not arrogant and thinking I knew it all. I brushed up my skills and learned the things I needed to in order to claim my expertise.

The same holds true for my friend, Carrie Wilkerson, who has an absolutely huge following on Twitter. A big part of how she gathered that following was that she just acted like the expert. Before long, people started treating her like the expert and inviting her to speak at events.

A lot of people call her “the overnight expert” because she went from zero to a million dollars in less than 12 months.

You have that ability too. The thing that you need, first and foremost, is a positive mindset. You need to be confident enough in your skills and your knowledge to step out in front and make yourself known.

You also need to be astute enough to research and master all of the things that your area of expertise requires. Make a list of exactly what an expert in your field needs to know in order to be considered “the expert.” You probably have all of those qualities and requirements already.  If you don’t, you will at least know what you need to do or improve upon to claim the role.

Once you know that you have what you need, you can begin to act the part of expert. Then you can pass on all of that expertise to your clients.

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