What Makes Your Business Unique?

Welcome to Episode #48!

One of the most important questions to ask yourself when starting your business is, “What makes MY business different from my competitors?” Or what is my Unique Selling Point (USP)?

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Press Release Missteps

What You Don’t Know Can Make All The Difference

Michelle’s Note: My friend and colleague Patrysha wrote this article to help you understand why your press release submissions aren’t working. She is a public relations superstar who has many years experience and has now started a home-based business to help small, women-owned companies profit from publicity. I read the free special report that Patrysha offers at the end of her post and it’s full of excellent advice!

By Patrysha Korchinski

As a publicist, my job is to help my clients get media coverage. The tool I use most often on their behalf is the simple, but highly effective, press release. What I do isn’t rocket science; seeking publicity can be an in-house job for most small business owners.

Press releases can seem like a panacea for small business owners. The prospect of getting free publicity in exchange for a couple of hours of writing and submitting a 400 word release seems like a great deal. And on the surface – it is a great deal.

The publicity generated from one release picked up by a major media outlet can increase awareness and sales with a far greater impact than buying advertising in the same outlet.

Under the surface though, lurk thousand of disappointed publicity seekers who for one reason or another did not get the coverage they desired.

I used to believe that the reasons for the failed attempts lay mostly, if not entirely, on the message within the release.

• The headline wasn’t strong enough
• It read like a sales pitch rather than news
• The subject wasn’t newsworthy

While those are definitely factors that will get your press release a one-way ticket to the circular file, most serious business owners I’ve met don’t fall victim to these mistakes. They took the time to craft newsworthy releases that were topical, relevant and well-written. They had the initiative to create a targeted media list to submit to – and yet still they struggled to get coverage.

What was going on?

It was only when I dug deeper and examined other aspects of their failed efforts that a few trends began to emerge. There are factors in press release pick up that the professional publicist innately utilizes for the benefit of their clients that most small business owners just aren’t aware of.

The timing of your submission is one component that is often to blame for poor results. You see, each media outlet has what is called a lead time. This is how far in advance they need to start working on stories that will eventually appear. Magazines with a large circulation tend to have the longest lead times, often 9 months or longer. If you send out a release geared towards Christmas to a major magazine in November, you’ve missed your window of opportunity by eight months!

You don’t necessarily need a publicist to get over these hurdles, you just need to be aware of what hurdles exist. Overcoming them is usually a fairly simple matter. As I said before, getting media coverage is not rocket science. You can improve your odds significantly with a little fine tuning.

For more tips on turning the odds in your favor, you’ll want to grab the free special report You can’t write just one – A long range approach to getting the media attention you crave.

Do You Love Your Work?

Welcome to Episode #47!

This title is not meant to be a rhetorical question. I ask it in all seriousness because if you don’t love what you do, the job will become that much harder and will take more of your energy to succeed. The only way to find a job you love is to TAKE ACTION.

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Should We Move, Or Should We Not

So, everything is still up in the air with The House.

I still love the inside, love the landscape, and can live with the shop.

My husband assured me back in May, when we first found The House, that he’d be able to make The Internet work out in The Boondocks. That we might need a 50-foot pole, but we could get the good service, as opposed to the terrible satellite service.

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We Might Be Moving — Again

So, we might be moving again. Yes, I said again.

Anyone who knows me for longer than a year, knows that we tend to move often. (Of course, thanks to the Internet, my business just packs up and moves with me.)

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Could You Walk Away From A Corporate Job?

Welcome to Episode #46!

Many of us dream of walking (or running!) away from the corporate world, leaving the politics and stress behind. But could you actually do it? Could you give up that corporate salary and the lifestyle that you and your family have become accustomed to?

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Do You Value Yourself?

I bet if I asked you that question directly, you’d say, “Yes! Of course, I do.”

But do you really?

Take a close look at your business, crunch the numbers, and then see, do you really value yourself? If you figure out exactly how much money you’re making per hour, would you be like the woman in my colleague Kelly McCausey’s “I Need More Money Now!” post, who is really only making $2-3 per hour — and is happy about it?

Kelly is talking about get rich quick schemes. But I know of several women business owners who are making pennies for the products that they create at home. And I know other women who are in the same boat — and who gripe about having to pay “too much” for products created by women who DO value themselves and their time.

Read through Kelly’s post and you’ll hear the desperation in this woman’s post. And you’ll see the answer in Kelly’s reply.

In short, you need to value yourself, to be willing to accept — no expect — to be paid well for the time, love and sacrifice that you put in to your work.

So what can we do?

The first thing, is to realize that you are valueable. God created you and he doesn’t create junk. You deserve to be paid for the time, effort and expertise you put into the products that you sell.

Second, you need to raise your prices. You need to be paid for your time, for your expenses, for your materials. And you need to be paid well.

Third, the work at home mom and women-owned business communities need to get their heads out of the sand and start looking up to those women who DO respect themselves and figuring out how create our own success.

If you have any questions about how to increase your prices, or how much you should charge, head over to my business coaching page. I’d be happy to spend an hour helping you realize how valuable you are.

Moving Your Site To A New Domain Name

Changing the domain name of your site seems pretty easy at first.

You just submit a helpdesk ticket to tech support, they wave their magic wand over the server and your domain name is changed.

Right?

Unfortunately for one of my SKP clients, it’s more complex than this.

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How To Hire The Right Business Coach

Speak with successful business owners and one of the most important things they’ll tell you is that they couldn’t have made it without the wise advise of others.

Seeking advice from people who have been there, done that can cut your learning curve down significantly, increasing your chances of succeeding. Go it alone, and you’re doomed to make mistakes that can cripple your business in the long run.

Chances are though, if you’re reading this post, you already know this. And you’re seriously searching for the information you need to start your business on the right foot.

Often, the problem is finding the right business coach to hire. With so many people hanging their business coaching shingle on the internet, it’s hard to know who to hire to help you. And prices vary widely. I’ve seen non-guru coaches charge as much as $300 a month for four coaching sessions. And I’ve worked with coaches who only charged $120 for the same amount of time.

So, how do you know who to choose when you’re looking for a business coach?
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How Well Do You Know Your Target Market?

Welcome to Episode #45!

We all know how important it is to know your niche (or target market) but just HOW WELL do you know what they need? Are you a part of your own target market, with your finger on the pulse of their every want and ready to solve their problems?

My guest this week is Kristina Hughes, owner of HoldOnLog.com, which is a company that provides organizational planners, logbooks, and software for the budding performer.

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