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Browse published articles attributed to Diane Conklin, with full-archive search.
Strategy is a term that gets thrown around a lot in business, especially when it comes to marketing. Sometimes we use the word to the point of forgetting what it really means to have strategy in your business. Strategy is much more than what you’re doing. Strategy is about knowing why you’re doing what you’re doing.
To put it simply, no one likes having to write checks…to spend or invest money. Writing checks means money is leaving your account, and no one likes money leaving their account. However, it becomes a little easier when you know the money is being well invested and, two, that you’ll be making the money back quickly because of how you invested it. This is about the investment you make by having mentors and coaches.
Part of the holiday season is about giving and receiving gifts. Most of us like doing both – giving and receiving, whether we admit it or not. When we give gifts, we certainly want to be sure that the recipient knows it came from us.
Marketing to the general public can produce income and give you a good financial life. Marketing to a niche can make you very wealthy. And, digging deep into a niche can make you wealthy beyond your wildest dreams – like money raining from the sky kind of wealthy. If that’s the kind of wealthy you’re looking to be, it’s time to start considering niching your products and services to more specific types of clients.
There’s a lot of talk these days about being authentic, especially as it relates to your business. The question is: what exactly does that mean? Some business owners have taken this to mean they can say and do whatever they want to, because it’s just them being authentic. Everyone’s talking about it in different ways lately, but it seems everywhere you go, somebody’s talking about being authentic. The dictionary defines authentic as “the quality or condition of being trustworthy or genuine.” It also used words like genuine, real, and character.
Most businesses lack adequate systems to get things done efficiently and effectively in their businesses. Anything and everything, from how the phone is answered, to processing refunds, to running successful events can and should be systematized. Standards should be put in place so everyone knows what is expected of them and their job position.
Does your marketing strategy include an integrated plan? You have a variety of ways to market your business - including advertising, direct mail, social media, email marketing - just to name a few. All of these enable you to reach out to your clients to let them know what’s going on in your business and the products and services you have available for them. Each of those systems has its own marketing strategy. When you integrate your marketing strategies together you’re making your marketing message stronger.
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?
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.
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?