Content Mastery Guide

Editor and Ghostwriter

A simple framework for growing your business

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I attended a meeting last week of the Alliance of Independent Practitioners [Update December 8, 2012 – This is now known as PIC – Professional Independent Communicators, part of Toronto’s International Association of Business Communicators chapter.

The speaker was Jennifer Beale, of unleashpr and BizNetworkNews.

While the topic was networking, and I got TONS of ideas about how to do that, the key ideas that I took away were these:

There are basically four ways that I’m going to bring money into my business:

  1. Sales (actually “closing the sale” and receiving the money)
  2. Marketing (generating leads, making contacts and networking)
  3. Client Retention (repeat sales to current customers)
  4. Referrals (requesting referrals)

I need to systemize what I’m doing in each of these areas. Creating a system is as simple as three steps:

  • Planning e.g. At which networking events am I most likely to find members of my target market?
  • Preparation e.g. Do I have business cards to hand out? Do I have a simple and concise way of explaining what I do and who I do it for?
  • Action e.g. After I attend the networking event, spend an hour or two on follow-up like adding contacts to my mailing list (with their permission, of course!), sending them promised information or setting up a coffee date. Jennifer suggests we schedule that time in our calendars before we head out.

For each step I can either do it myself, delegate it, and/or find a technology solution to make it easier and more efficient.

Along those lines, Jennifer also mentioned the importance of having a good contact management system. Right now I’m using Outlook, but I did experiment for awhile with a free program called Kurlo. I quite liked it, actually!

[Update December 8, 2012 – I don’t remember Kurlo at all! At this point I use Google Apps for Business.]

Are you on Ezine Articles yet?

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I’ve been a Platinum expert author at Ezine Articles since March 2005. In that time, my articles have generated a combined total of over 100,000 page views. It also led to more website traffic and newsletter subscribers.

I interviewed Chris Knight [update December 8, 2012 – this interview is no longer available], the owner of Ezine Articles, to find out more about what makes this site such a useful tool for business owners. He also has a list of benefits on the site.

When I “Google” my own name, I also get to see just how far and wide my ideas have spread. My articles have been reprinted on countless other websites and in other newsletters (both print and online).

I also created a “Google Alert” for my own name, so I can see when my articles are published in new places.

Submit your first article to Ezine Articles now. If you’ve done that, great! Make sure to keep up with it. You won’t be promoted to Platinum Author status until 10 of your articles have been accepted.