April 9, 2012 was a turning point in my life. I was diagnosed with breast cancer, faced fears of
my mortaility and of the unknown as it related to surgeries and treatments.
As a business owner I was accustomed to living by schedules and having a plan for the day; breast cancer took all of that away. I went from being "whelmed" to being overwhelmed and feeling I was trapped in a cyclone. It took a few months, but I was able to regain control, get back on track, deal with oncologists, surgeons and the life-altering consequences of my diagnosis.
Drawing on my time management and productivity skills along with my need to take back control of my life and I started Conquering The Overwhelm.
According to news reports, LinkedIn has seen major revenue earnings increases and that leads me
to believe there are more business professionals taking advantage of this professional business social media site.
LinkedIn profiles can help you stand out from the crowd when you’re looking for a job or if you’re an entrepreneur seeking new clients. If professionals are flocking to use this site, that means that you should make certain you not only have a professional presence, but you should have a complete profile as well. Here are my tips to making certain your LinkedIn profile is not only complete, but compelling:
Several years ago I taught adult writing classes at a local literary center. The classes I taught
focused on magazine writing, fiction, confession magazine writing and blogging. Whenever someone came to class with the story that they didn't do their assignment it was because they had Writer's Block I countered by saying it wasn't WB, but Writing Anxiety or in some cases, Writing Laziness!
Writers should be avid readers and as an avid reader you should be exposed to myriad ideas all the time that should spark your creativity. If it doesn't and you find yourself with sweaty palms and beating heart when you sit down to write a blog post, it could be a case of Writer's Anxiety.
Here are some tips to overcome that, move forward, and get that blog post written:
How often do you look at your marketing and promotion plan for your business? Just as you track
the financial health of the organization, so too should you monitor the health and rate of return on your marketing efforts. Are the goals you set for your marketing being met? If not, it's time to revamp them. Even if you’re only setting a baseline of: increase my social media followers by 10 each week, it’s something you need to monitor and rework if it’s not helping you reach your goals.
Here are some items in your marketing arsenal that you should look into and revamp if necessary:
Do you understand your audience/your ideal client? If you don’t know who your client is, how can you effectively target him? In addition to knowing your demographic’s age and location, you should also understand whether they’re the “on-line” type or if they prefer their news/coupons offline in a newspaper or in a television or radio ad. If you’ve been targeting one section of media and not reaping results, refocus your efforts. Remember too that social media and print media work cooperatively.
How functional is your website? Do you have a website? If not, we have professionals on trade that will work with you to build a new site. If you don’t have a website, you need to get one as soon as possible because your competition is well ahead of you if you don’t. Consider that your website is your 24/7 business card. Understand the key words you want to target for your business and use them judiciously throughout the site.
Do you have a “sales funnel”? Do you know what a sales funnel is? One way to create a sales funnel is through a series of articles/blog posts on your website. Take a look at the goods and services that you provide and consider whether you have a case study you could use as an example for a sales funnel series. As an example, look at an individual that has decided she wants to become a business owner. Follow her trials and tribulations from the “a-ha” moment through to her throwing open her virtual doors. If you’re a website builder, that’s where you come in – the virtual doors. Talk about the steps in business ownership from accounting and bookkeeping needs to the need for marketing and promotion, hiring of employees, social media management and profile building, networking, etc. You’re not specifically telling the readers to “buy me” or pushing your product on them, you’re showing them a person with a dilemma and offering ideas for solutions. You will be known as the solution provider to a potential client.
As a business owner, it’s not enough to have a great website and stellar content on that site if no one is reading it. Harness the power of social media to spread the word about your site and the new blog posts you’re writing. Draw them to the site. Let them get to know, like and trust you and you will be looking at a potential client! Do you need help with your marketing efforts? A reworking of your social media efforts? Let me know!
Working from home as a solopreneur is something that brings with it the luxury and freedom of
setting the schedule (and wearing the wardrobe!) of my choosing. There is also the isolation and void of having no one to bounce ideas off of and no one to be accountable to. I don't have a boss hanging over my shoulder expecting resutls by 5 pm. Of course, I have clients that expect results, but as long as they're delivered in a timely fashion, it doesn't really matter if I perform at 6 am or 6 pm or midnight, right? Wrong... if I want to have any kind of a lifestyle.
Last week I made the leap and "got" an accountability partner. My partner,Anne McAuley, is involved in the same field of expertise that I am and that's a boon as we know the obstacles faced in that career path and we can help each other brainstorm and our connections feed off of each other. We sent messages to each other of the items to which we wanted to be held accountable and when we got on the phone we hashed them out, set goals and planned for another talk. I think it's going to work!
Google, it sometimes seems, is the be all and
end all for business owners looking to be found on the Internet. While the
rules change, sometimes before you’ve even implemented them, there are ways to
remain relevant, be found and up your Google rankings when you write a blog
post.
Always write original content. Don’t be
redundant – even if you write and post on more than one website in the
same niche market. While you don’t have to recreate the wheel with your
posts, you do want to make certain the content has been rewritten even
though the ideas may be the same.
Do you read blog posts because you want to learn something from the blogger? Chances are, that is why you read. In a world crammed full of work, life, spending time with family and pets, giving your time to a blogger and her blog post is a gift. If you like to walk away from a blog post having learned something or if you write blog posts and want your readers to walk away having learned something, writing a great how-to article is the way to go.
There are days when I am faced with the blank page, the blank screen and words simply do not want
to come out. It doesn't matter though, as a full time writer I have no choice but to write whether the muse graces me with her presence or not. She is a fickle bitch at times, but I have learned to work around her moods and lack of showing up when I need her.
Knowing that you have to write, as I do for a living, means that I have trained my brain to be "on" whether I am really feeling it or not. On those days when my energy is flagging I make certain my inner editor is turned on full force because I will formulate run on sentences and even use words that might not make sense.
Today's blogging prompt is to research what blog tasks take the most energy and which ones drain you. This one took me a while to determine (lol maybe that's what my post should be about!)
When I stepped back and gave it some thought I believe what drains me when it comes to blogging is the "What Am I Going To Blog About Today" syndrome. Some days I am chock full of ideas; they overflow my thoughts and I can't usually write them quickly enough. Other days, finding an idea is a long, slow slog through quicksand.
I believe, though what drains me on those "what am I going to write about" days are outside forces. Outside stressors that pluck at me and tug me in directions from which I'd like to not travel. Taking advantage of my high energy days and formulating ways to get more of those high energy days has been a recent. on-going quest.
2013 is the Year of Me and of Conquering The Overwhelm. Onward and upward.
I'd love to hear... are there any blogging tasks that drain you? How can you make them less draining and more enjoyable?
NaBloPoMo prompt: Talk about a time when you used up an extraordinary amount of energy and were exhausted.
This question/prompt brought up a lot of "stuff." To say the past eight months have been trying and challenging and energy-draining would be an understatement. From my diagnosis on April 9 to rounds of surgeons, oncologists, treatment options, etc. etc. dealing with life following a cancer diagnosis and simply trying to get back to "normal" whatever that means right now drains me almost daily.
Has anyone ever asked you: How do you blog? That question was asked of me recently during a
blogging seminar I was leading, prompted me to go through my blogging process to try and break down the process. This is what I came up with:
Write the post aimed toward a “you.” What this means is when you write a blog post use the word you not “we,” “them” or “I”. Your blog posts should make the reader feel as though he is sitting in your kitchen, sipping coffee, and hearing the information you are imparting.
