Browse published articles attributed to Diane Conklin, with full-archive search.
Have you spent any time lately considering the pull-marketing strategy you’re using to attract ideal clients to you? Pull-marketing strategies go beyond turning on your open for business sign, setting up your website and hoping that people find you. That’s the hope and pray method of marketing, and it doesn’t work (except in the movies).
Do you ever start your day and before you know it, it's just gone? Time is gone and you can't figure out where your day went. You're looking at what you've accomplished and the only answer you can come up with is... nothing at all. Have you taken the time to think about what's happening? What's draining your day? What's keeping you from completing the tasks you needed to get done?
Have you ever found yourself faced with some new insights in your life, or a new theme in your life or just found yourself struggling? We all have, and I'm no different. Several months ago, I was struggling - going through a difficult time in my life, as many of us do at times - when a good friend of mine said if you ever feel like you have to fight, then it’s the wrong situation because life should never be about fighting, forcing or struggling. Instead, things in your life should just flow.
Can you think of anything in this world that’s absolutely perfect? If you can, it’s probably doubtful that it’s man-made. Are you making the mistake of treating yourself, or your business as if it has to be perfect? If you are you really need to stop. Too often, you strive to achieve perfection in yourself and in your business, and all you’re doing is giving yourself an unrealistic goal. Stop white-knuckling life and stop trying to be perfect. No one expects you to be perfect, except you.
We all strive to be number one, meaning we want to be the best, we want to finish first and we want to be ahead of the pack. The number one is the worst possible number there is in business and marketing. Why? A lot of business owners use one marketing message, only one media to get their message out, have only one stream of income in their business, are only doing one thing or have only one product or service they offer. This strategy is really scary if you take some time to look at it.
Do you ever feel like an alien? I’m not talking about the kind that’s green, from another planet and oozes nasty fluids. I’m talking about the feeling you get when you feel like you’re the only one who cares that the store clerk is having a personal conversation with her co-worker, while staring right at you, and still just goes right on talking as if they were the only 2 people in the world. Do you ever feel like you’re the only one who knows how to pick up the telephone and have a conversation with somebody to solve a problem or handle an issue?
Sometimes when we get into business, we know what our products are going to be and we have a firm hold on our price points, but we don’t necessarily have all the necessary knowledge or skills to put it all together to get people to buy. Having a sales process is an important factor in sales and it also becomes important in having repeat customers or clients who buy from you over and over again.
You have your business up and running and you have some products and services set up to offer to clients and prospects. Sometimes this is the part where you might begin to feel a little stuck, because you begin to wonder how to set your prices. Maybe you have a business where prices are already set, that’s fine because then you don’t have a choice – or maybe it’s bad because you don’t have a choice. More than likely you have a business where you need to really think about what you’re going to charge your clients for what you’re offering.
Do you see your clients? Do they see you? Those may seem like strange questions, but when you really think about it, they really aren't. Do you see your clients where they are or do you see them where they could be? Do you see your clients beyond the here and now and in a place of massive success, which they are striving toward?
It’s never easy, in life or in business – making decisions. There is no magic formula or magic crystal ball that can show you the results of your decision before you make them. So how do you know when you’re making the right decision, or even good decisions? As a business owner, you know how important it is to at least make good decisions. Bad decisions can be costly, and in extreme cases, even put you out of business. Not being able to make a decision can be the thing that keeps you from doing what you want in your business.
What does it mean that somebody provides done-for-you services? It can mean a lot of things but essentially it means you hire somebody to take care of developing things like newsletters, fliers, ezines, marketing plans and other things like that, that help you get your business done.
It’s easy to make costly mistakes at your live events. Most time, you make these mistakes and you’re not even aware that they might be costing you money…and probably some goodwill with your attendees. Recently, an event promoter asked for the volume of the music to be really cranked up during break. The idea was that people would be inspired to move around and that the loud music would really get their juices flowing and the excitement up.
Do you look for ways to make more money in your business and to maximize what you’re doing with your clients? If you are, great! If you’re not, you should be.
Often times it may seem like you have a lot of work to do in your business, from writing newsletters, emails, articles and blogs, to generating audios and videos for distribution. Because we want to reach out to our customers in every way imaginable, we sometimes forget how easily we can turn one product into many.
One of the best ways for small business owners to secure a successful future is to always be considering the next thing - the next product or the next service to put out. Not only considering what that next thing is, but how it will be made, marketed and sold. This is one of the best strategies you can use in your business, because it allows you to focus on the future of your business instead of your present condition.
It’s pretty much understood among those currently on social media that pretty much every business needs to have a presence there in today’s world. However, you might be surprised to find out, especially if you are active on social media, and have been for awhile, there are still people every single day, who are joining Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and all the other social media platforms that are out there – many of them are businesses and business owners.
When it comes to list building most small business owner aren’t ever really satisfied with their results and most wonder if they could do a better job of attracting ideal clients to their list. It’s often said that the person with the largest list has the biggest business. The person with the biggest list doesn’t always have the biggest business because there are many other factors that go into building a successful business. It’s not only the size of your list that counts, it’s how you use your list and the relationship you have with your list that counts most.
Recently, I’ve had a lot of people saying things to me like “Oh, Diane, you’re so lucky” or “How do you know all these famous people, and how do they know you?” or “Opportunities seem to fall in your lap, how does that happen for you?” Well, it was suggested to me that I share some of my secrets, so I’ve decided to do just that.
We could easily spend days talking about the masterful marketing techniques of the cruise industry. If you’ve never been on a cruise and you get the chance, you should take it. There are great marketing and business lessons to be learned on cruises. Just watching and paying attention to how they market everything and thinking about how it pertains to your business can make the cruise so worthwhile. This isn’t about selling you onto a cruise. This is about lessons learned just by watching what others do. The cruise industry is an industry that really capitalizes on what they do.
One of the easiest ways to attract ideal clients and prospects is a really simple thing that will make you stand out to people who would be interested in doing business with you. It’s talking about what you believe. While that might sound strange, it’s something every person in business should be thinking about. • What do you believe about your business? • What do you believe about life in general? • Why do you get out of bed every morning, and do what you do?