Posts

Make Something Worth Driving For

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If you're ever in Longmont, CO, stop in at Babette's Artisan Bakery for a breakfast or lunch sandwich, some wood-fired pizza, and don't forget to wrap up a loaf or two of their amazing sourdough bread to take home with you. Find their hours and more about them here: https://www.babettesbakery.com/ We found out about Babette's from some foodie friends who would drive from their home in Genessee, about an hour away, to stock up on their favorite bread and desserts. We've been going there for the past several years, including the pandemic years, and we tell everyone we know about it. Yes, their food is expensive, but we've already spent the money on gas; we'll pay what it takes. It's that good. There's more about Babette's in the Coffee Break today, but I wanted to make the point that if you focus on exceptional work, people will do whatever they must to get it. Make your first priority mastering the craft of what you do, and don't settle for a

Duh, It's the Relationships!

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All the recent changes in my life have me reflecting on what matters most. Figuring out what I'm doing now that I'm only doing one thing. I want to do it well. I looked back at all I've done for the past 13 years, and the one thread that keeps showing up is helping people start and build strong relationships. This hasn't been limited to one area of my life; it's come up in several. And it's also been the common thread in all of the work I've done with people in my coaching role. Identifying the key relationships they need and then finding ways to cultivate them. Relationships are the context for everything we do as humans, and yet we often do our creating and planning outside of that context. Then we wonder why our efforts fail or don't land quite as we'd hoped.  And the same dynamics at play in our personal relationships also show up in our professional relationships. They go through similar stages, are affected by personality and preferences, and r

Targeting Underserved Niches With Your Content with Scott Schang

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What if 96 percent of people looking for a service like yours were ignored by the top-performing competitors in your industry? By now, the easiest to find customers in your industry are finding the companies who can afford the most expensive ads, keywords, and the top of page one on Google. But imagine if you found a closet full of bankers' boxes with people who wanted your service but couldn't access it as easily as the customers your competitors have the resources to reach. Wouldn't it be worth it to find ways to serve them? That's what Scott Schang did. He used blogging as a way to teach people who had been refused mortgages on their first try how to succeed on their second. The sales in his division tripled. Now Scott teaches other mortgage vendors how to reach their customers through content marketing using blogs, videos, and other channels. He's taken his most successful content and packaged it so that other people in his industry can share in the success he&#

Has Audience Building Changed for You?

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Today was a day full of great conversations. A recurring theme today was the question of how audience building has changed for people over the past few years. We also wondered aloud how the pandemic and quarantines have impacted how we attract and gather people to our causes. In my case, my enjoyment of participating in social media has changed pretty drastically in the last few years. It used to be a more enjoyable and manageable activity. Still, it has gotten increasingly sophisticated and demanding, and it's hard to know how to reach people there without just sending them DMs. The number of content options has also made it challenging to know how to reach people. I know I can repurpose TikTok videos as Shorts and Reels, but whatever happened to just posting pictures, and why aren't as many people seeing them? The strange thing is that visits to my blog have increased over the same period. And again, I don't know why. I haven't increased sharing of my posts. In fact,

What Makes an Experience Valuable?

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I use a simple framework to guide my marketing and sales activities. 1. Connect human to human - forget the technique and build a real relationship through your message. 2. Inspire imagination - Help people experience a different possibility in their mind and show how you will help them reach it. 3. Invite people to take the next step toward that outcome. 4. Deliver valuable and memorable experiences - No matter how small your message is, you have an opportunity to make a positive difference. Make it. This framework has served me well, and I recommend it to everyone. In this Coffee Break, I share a recent conversation in which the topic of delivering valuable experiences came up. I've shared the same ideas here. I offer coaching and courses to teach you how to do this. Please get in touch, and let's explore how this framework can help you. #messaging #framework #value 

The Power of Positive Suggestion

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In the right state of mind, every one of us is susceptible to the suggestions of others. Advertisers have been planting ideas, catchphrases, taglines, mottoes, and anything else they can slip through our mental filters for the length of human history. Every day, we witness how powerful irrational and sometimes dangerous beliefs can be, yet we constantly expose ourselves to them through the inputs we choose. Just today, I heard a well-known senator plant the seed that Americans are ready for civil war. And I know he knows exactly what he's doing. He's made a long political career out of the power of suggestion. If you hear the same messages over and over and over again, at some point, you stop questioning their validity, and they become "true" to you. After several hours of concentrated work this afternoon, I listened to a YouTube video while finishing some reports. About 45 minutes after the video had ended, there was a phrase that kept inserting itself into my awaren

Satisfied With Enough

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  In a recent conversation with a friend, she asked what I did to build my audience. I asked her where her curiosity about that question stemmed from. She talked about recent events she's applied to be a speaker or presenter for and how much importance was placed, not on her topic or her expertise, but on the size of her audience. While she has a respectable number of loyal followers, a large percentage who engage with her social media efforts and open her emails, it wasn't enough to satisfy the event hosts. The only metric that meant anything to them was her list size. They passed on having her present - in my mind, a huge loss for them. In answer to her question, I offered that I was fanatical about building my mailing list for the first several years of my coaching and my online businesses. I spent significant time every day strategically creating and posting content in front of new eyes, doing anything I could to get subscribers. And I got subscribers. But in the process, I

The Willie Nelson Idea Test

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I've had twenty ideas for what to talk about in this video, but when I push the record, I can't remember one. So here we are after 11 PM on a Sunday, and I have no idea what to say. What does this have to do with Willie Nelson? I saw Willie on VH1 Storytellers a couple of decades ago and remember him talking about how he wrote the song Crazy. Yes, the one immortalized by Patsy Cline. While in the show he talked about driving to Austin from Nashville, other accounts that made it to Wikipedia said it was an hour commute between his home and the radio station where he worked in Houston in 1958. This is the oral tradition here, so don't take me literally. In Storytellers, Willie came around to the idea of how he knew he had a good idea for a song. I'll talk about it in the Coffee Break, but it seems to me this information will be valuable to any content creator. How do you decide which ideas are good enough to make into something? Willie's idea test is one I've used

Why I Love Quizzes

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 I've made a lot of PDF downloads for lead magnets, starting with a first guitar buyer's guide I offered for one of the first blogs I started in 2009. Free PDFs were how most online marketers built their lists back then, and it seemed to work pretty well - until it didn't. When I started to study digital marketing more intensely a few years later, I started to collect PDF lead magnets. The Google Drive folder where I keep them now lists over 600 document files stored there, and I can probably count the number I've read completely with my two hands. I've also tried to offer mini-courses in exchange for email addresses, which worked for a while, but those ultimately slowed down as the PDFs did. Finding ways to attract new customers and clients grew more difficult as people became wise to the tactics and the lead magnets' quality declined. I remember trying to find a way to use tools like surveys, and Google Forms to both gather information and deliver value, but i

The Power of Quizzes with Jessmyn Solana

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▼Watch and Listen Below!▼ A couple of years ago, I was on The Solopreneur Society website, and there was an invitation to find out my brand archetype. All I had to do was take a short quiz that would tell me some important information about my personality and how it relates to branding my business. I took the quiz and was blown away by the insights I gained from the result. I had to know how Dre Beltrami had done this Voodoo. She told me she used a quiz software called Interact. I looked it up immediately and subscribed right there. I had not seen anything like this - an interactive tool that piqued visitors' curiosity, delivered valuable information, and allowed me to be much more targeted with specific offers tailored to their needs. This was a marketer's dream! Since then, I've made several quizzes for clients and helped other clients navigate their way through the process of creating their quizzes, and I've been repeatedly impressed with the results. I've become

What Attracts People to What You Do?

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Thanks to all who attended this morning's masterclass. I enjoyed the discussion in my breakout group very much and have been reflecting on it all day. We were specifically talking about what it is that people are attracted to in the work we do, whether as creative people, in business, or in the causes we support. A few answers presented themselves. First, we are attracted to people we sense have the same values as ours, or at least similar values. The qualities of life we find important tend to be important to them as well. We're also attracted to personality. I shared how many of the clients who find me tend to have a similar personality to mine and how the clients with an opposite personality often find working with me to be a conflicted experience.  Lastly, we just started talking about the quality of life people desire and how it often is a driver in finding our work. They're looking for a difference that our work delivers. Maybe enrichment, enlivenment, fulfillment, or

Expertise is Suspicious and Life Has Other Plans

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A great gig tonight that may be my last, at least for a while. Gigs like this make me remember that music is worth it sometimes. Thanks for all your interest and support over the years - 43 years now. I'm always questioning how and why things work or don't work. Business is a fine laboratory for such studies. It's a mystery how something will work beautifully once, and then the next time it will sink like a stone. Even with excellent systems in place, you can still get mixed results and not have a clue why. For this reason, I find experts, expertise, and any combination of the two to be suspect. The best batters in the majors are lucky to average .300. This means that the most expert batters worldwide are successful less than a third of the time. I love to learn about business and marketing, and it's been a lifelong study that I enjoy immensely. I've had a lot of business ventures, and most of them have ended as learning experiences more than successes. As Edison sa

You Don't Want to Miss This Masterclass!

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▼▼Happening Tomorrow!▼▼ Even if you're not currently having any business problems, you will not want to miss out on this masterclass. It is going to be the best use of your time this year. You'll learn a repeatable, 15-minute technique to discover the core problem hamstringing your business, no matter the size of your business.    Once you discover the problem,  you'll find the solution that will have the biggest financial impact on your business today.    ... and the more impact you get, the more impact you have to give...   A 90-minute investment of your time tomorrow will pay dividends for the rest of your business-owning career.  And I mean dividends in every sense of the word... but especially dollars and time.  You have everything to gain and nothing to lose. Register here! https://bit.ly/NextStepMasterclass Meet the Coaches!

How to Make a Zoom Interview Overlay for 3-Person Videos with Canva

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 For those who have been asking if I have a template for a three-person Zoom video overlay, I have had this one for a while now.  It's a little more complicated than the two-person overlay because you have to resize your video track for the frames to align. If you want the template for the frames, click here: https://www.canva.com/design/DAFKGYSzvRA/-EEvc4xVF2GVWXBMyPC-hA/view?utm_content=DAFKGYSzvRA&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link&utm_source=publishsharelink&mode=preview Canva is a product I use every day. I'm also a Canva affiliate. I'd love for you to try Canva Pro here: https://partner.canva.com/c/1245006/647168/10068 #canva #zoom #videoediting 

How I Learned to Love Marketing (and Why I'd Like You to Attend Thursday's Workshop)

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Thanks for the positive feedback and the interest in What's Your Next Step? A Choose your Own Adventure Business Masterclass coming up this Thursday, August 25th, at 10 AM Mountain Time. I've featured interviews with the other six coaches on the program for the past week, and I have been asked to share what I'll be focusing on in the breakout session I'll be leading. When I was asked to identify the area I wanted to be my focus for the event, I came back to my favorite area of business - marketing. I've talked at length before about how much my views of marketing have changed. I used to loathe every minute I spent in marketing. It was difficult, exhausting, and not very fruitful. In order to get better at it, I didn't have to start thinking positively about the activities I didn't enjoy. That never worked! But I had to start evaluating how I was bringing my business and my clients together and let go of the things that didn't work. As I started to do tha

Maryann Cruz - What's Your Next Step Masterclass Introduction

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The last coach in this series of introductions is Maryann Cruz. Maryann is a Connecticut-based business strategist, coach, and consultant who helps creatives build and grow the business side of their careers. In What's Your Next Step, Maryann will be leading a breakout session on the topic of when to automate, delegate, or outsource business tasks, so you have more time for the aspects of your business and work that you're best suited for. You can learn more about Maryann at https://MaryannCruz.co What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass will be happening this Thursday, August 25, 2022, at 10 AM Mountain Time. The first half of the 90-minute event will pinpoint the area of your business you need to concentrate on right now. The second half will be spent in a breakout session with one of seven coaches specializing in the area you've identified as your priority. You don't have to set aside there to five days to attend this event, and you

Alison Proffit - What's Your Next Step Masterclass Introduction

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Followers of my podcast are already well acquainted with Alison Proffit. She's been a guest a couple of times, talking about soulful entrepreneurship and her January summit. Alison will be one of the featured coaches at What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass coming up this Thursday, August 25, at 10 AM Mountain Time. Alison is a master coach when it comes to sales conversations. In the masterclass, she'll be leading a breakout session on the topic of conversion conversations. If sales is your top business priority, you won't want to miss it. Register at https://bit.ly/NextStepMasterclass The masterclass format is uniquely set up to deliver the highest value in a short amount of time. The first forty minutes will be spent helping you pinpoint the area of your business that needs your immediate focus. In the second half, you'll be paired with one of seven coaches specializing in the area you've identified as your priority. It's

What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass

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▼ Watch and Listen Below! ▼   This week, Your Own Best Company is making room to introduce you to six coaches who will be joining forces next Thursday, August 25th, at 10 AM Mountain Time for a 90-minute class that will be an unforgettable event. What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass will be happening online. In 90-minutes you'll have a chance to pinpoint the one business priority that needs your attention right now, and then you'll join one of our seven coaches for a breakout session targeted to the specific priority you've identified. On the podcast this week, I'm excited to introduce you to the other six coaches I'll be joining for the Masterclass: LeAndra Foster - Speaking on building profit systems ( LeAndra@ElanLyfe.com ) Karen Joy Fritz - Presenting on the tech you need to deliver your best services ( https://karenjoyfritz.com ) Alison Proffit - Speaking on conversion conversations ( https://proffitcoach.com ) Maryann Cru

Mary Gaul - What's Your Next Step Masterclass Introduction

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Instead of the regular Virtual Coffee Break shows this week, I'm introducing you to the coaches I'll join next Thursday for the What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass. This event is designed to be short, sweet, and to the point. The first half will be spent pinpointing the one area of your business where you need to focus right now. The second half will be a breakout session with one of seven coaches specializing in the area you need to focus on. Wins all around! Today, I'd like you to meet Mary Gaul. Mary is a coach and strategist with her company  Success Magnified, and she also has a company that specializes in virtual assistant services. Mary will offer a breakout session for this masterclass on when and how to hire help. Learn more about Mary at https://successmagnified.com This 90-minute masterclass will be one of your most helpful events this year. You don't have to set aside several days, and you don't have to weed throug

Amanda Fuel - What's Your Next Step Masterclass - Introduction

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Continuing the intros for next week's What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass, I'm excited to be working with my friend Amanda Fuel. Amanda is a highly sought-after transformational speaking coach whose programs have made confident public speakers from people at every level of speaking experience. For the masterclass, Amanda will lead a breakout session on marketing without social media in which speaking plays a central role. She also has a free transformational speaking resource available at her website, https://nextlevelfuel.com . What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass is happening Thursday, August 25th, from 10-11:30 AM Mountain Time in an online forum. The first half of the event will be a time for participants to identify their primary area of concern in their business right now, and the second half will pair them with one of seven coaches whose specialty aligns with their business priority. For more

Karen Joy Fritz - What's Your Next Step Masterclass Introduction

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I'm taking a few days away from the regular Coffee Break schedule to tell you about a masterclass I'm participating in next week and to introduce you to the other coaches I'll be working with on the event. Today, I'll introduce Karen Joy Fritz, who helps business owners find the right tech solutions that help them deliver their best service. You can learn more about Karen at https://karenjoyfritz.com . Here's more information and an enrollment link for the masterclass. I hope to see you there! https://bit.ly/NextStepMasterclass Cut through the Marketing Overwhelm NOW It used to be so simple…  You’d realize there was a problem, do a little online research, and then BAM, you’d choose a solution.  Simple. Easy. CLEAR. But nowadays, I get targeted ads for problems I don’t even know if I have yet! Do I have that problem?  Am I ready for that yet? Do I need that now? Later? Someday? Never? This is Marketing Overwhelm.  And it impacts 100% of business owners, because no on