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Tips for Starting a Small Business: 3 Tips to Identifying a Viable Market – Part 1

It’s very easy to get caught up in the excitement of new ideas when starting a business.  But once that excitement wears off it is critical to be sure whether or not you have a viable market for your product or service.  Barking up the wrong tree, so to speak, can cost you a lot of time, money and energy.  Here are three quick and easy ways to determine if you have a market hungry enough for your business to make a go at it.

1. Google Adwords

Google offers a great, free tool to do research and see what people are searching for on the internet.  You can go to Adwords.google.com and do a bit of testing out before you go hog wild and spend your last dollar making widgets for a market that doesn’t exist.

Be sure to consider what the person on the other end of the computer is thinking when they enter a specific term.  “Weight loss” is much different than “How to lose 15 pounds”.  The motivation behind the latter is much clearer.

2. Send a Survey

If you already have an ezine or newsletter list, be sure to survey that list before launching your next product or service.  Ask them what it is that they want or need.  You can use the free survey tool at SurveyMonkey.com.

If you’re just getting started, then dip into the social media world.  Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn in are just three of many great ways to connect with the rest of the world.  As you build your list of followers and friends be sure to start asking what they want and need as it relates to your business.

3. Find Associations

If there’s a popular association related to your product or service there is about a 99.9% chance that you are on the right track.  You can find a list of associations at ASAECenter.org.

Peace

Tom

 

What Do Skydiving And Setting Your Fees Have In Common?

Did I just compare an extreme sport with your business? I sure
did, and here’s why.

A little background first. A few years ago some friends and I
decided that it would be a good idea to go and jump from a
plane…so, we did! And it was a total blast! (No pun intended) I
had so much fun that I began lessons to become a certified skydiver
a couple weeks later. Although I haven’t made any recent jumps, I
have logged 47 in total.

So, here is where I draw the comparison between skydiving and
raising (or establishing) prices in your business and charging what
you deserve. Just like in skydiving, the fear surrounding what you
charge is all in the build-up. It’s not what happens after the
leap that’s scary; it’s everything in your mind that leads up to
the leap.

I will never remember my very first drive out to the drop zone
(DZ). I was PETRIFIED! Frankly, I didn’t know if I would go
through with it, but with two of your best friends out there with
me did I really have a choice? GUYS! LOL.

Well, looking back on the experience I was clearly more scared on
the drive out and the plane ride up than I was during the jump.
After I was in the open air free falling at 150+ miles per hour
there was nothing to it but to have some fun. And have fun I did!

It’s also my experience that the same mental process occurs when
you set your fees; especially when you set them where they SHOULD
be and that’s a bit (or WAY) outside of your comfort zone.

You begin having all of these negative thoughts like, “nobody will
pay that” or “am I really worth that much?” And let me just answer
those two questions FOR you: Yes, they will and yes, you ARE!

Stop fretting about the build-up and go for the jump. You just
might have the ride of your life!

Cheers
Tom

 

3 Things You DON’T Need to Begin Attracting New Clients

The other day I was giving a presentation here in Atlanta for a business networking group called Women Intelligently Networking. There were some real go-getters in the room and everyone seemed to be involved in amazing businesses.

This was a great opportunity for me to find out why so many service professionals are refusing to charge what they deserve. One of the points that kept coming up was, “I don’t have the experience” or “I don’t have thus and such certification”…

…you get my point. I stopped one person right in her tracks with four simple words when she began to explain that she had a difficult time convincing clients to pay her what she was worth since she is just getting her business started…regardless of the fact that she has an incredible array of relevant skills to offer.

What were those four words?

“How do they know?”

How do your clients know that you are starting a new business or don’t have umpteen years of experience? Probably because you told them… NOT because they asked.

Charging what you deserve and attracting great clients does NOT require the following three things:

1) More experience
2) More certification
3) More time

Charging what you deserve DOES require the following:

1) Finding a market that has a clear need or desire for a service that you offer (or can offer)
2) Clearly expressing that you have a solution for this need or desire

Your path to a profitable business will be much shorter if you focus on these two areas rather than equating your income with your experience. The value that you offer your marketplace has very little to do with the next certification that you obtain.

Listen, we are always learning. We will never know it all. Understand that you have something incredible to offer your market right now!

Start focusing on the value that you deliver (and realize that you can deliver that value today) and you will start building that successful business you’ve been dreaming of sooner rather than later!

 

Expert Interview with Lisa Manyon

Lisa Manyon, founder of www.WriteOnCreative.com, shares tips and techniques for business owners to turbo-charge their visibility using the power of short, simple press releases.

Click below to listen in:

 

Build Your List with Interviews

How To Build Your List With Interviews

Not only can you build a list by interviewing other people,
you can also create new content for your own programs, get
thousands of dollars worth of information for free, pop out
an info product in a matter of a few days and have multiple
streams of revenue coming into your business.

You see, there are actually a lot of very knowledgeable experts
who are lined up waiting to be interviewed so that they can
increase their own exposure. Taking part in an interview series
is both compelling and rewarding for them and most will be
happy to help you spread the word which, of course, will radically
increase the size of your list.

I created an interview series last year and getting the interviews
was actually pretty simple. Yes, it took a little bit of legwork,
but nothing worth having comes without effort.

Here are the 5 basic steps to creating an interview series and
turning into a profitable project that you can repeat over and
over again:

Step 1: Pick your topic

Create a topic that excites you and that you know will excite other
people and this will make it simple to sell and promote.

One tip to finding if others are interested in the topic is to put
out a quick survey using SurveyMonkey.com. This way you can get
direct feedback and know that there’s water in the pool before you
take the plunge.

Step 2: Interview your experts

Create your wish list of experts and start getting in touch. One
of the easiest ways is to simple ask people you already know who
they might be able to recommend. Some of those people you already
know might make great interviews also, so don’t rule that option out.

Step 3: Build your list

Ask each expert to share the recording with their list and
circle of influence. You simply host the playback of the recording
on your website and have an opt-in box for people who would like the
MP3 downnload. This is just ONE of many ways to begin building your
list with interviews.

Step 4: Create your info product

After you have between 5-8 interviews, go ahead and package them
into an information product. You can include transcriptions of the
calls, worksheets to guide people along, helpful resources, etc to
really add value to the project.

Step 5: Start the cash flow

Remember all of those people who opted in to get the free download
of one of the interviews? If they were interested in that, I bet
they’d love to have the whole enchilada. You’ve already demonstrated
the value that the interviews offer. Many of those people will be
more than happy to purchase the entire program. You can deliver this
as a digital download (MP3 recordings and Ebook) or as a physical
product (CDs and binder). The best is to offer both and let clients
choose. If you sell a physical product, I recommend including the
digital download as well. The immediate access to the information
will help with sales and the physical product will increase the
perceived value.

If you want to learn more about how you can create a very profitable
interview series and have a whole lot of fun doing it then sign up
for the FREE teleseminar that I’m having on Monday, June 29th at
6pm EST. Even if you can’t make the call live, I will send you a
recording, but you have to sign up to get access.

Just go here to register: Interview Series Profits

Cheers
Tom

 

Become a Published Author…if I can do it, so can you!

 

Charge What You Deserve Interview with Tad Hargrave

Thanks for signing up for the call. Here is the playback link from yesterday’s call with Tad Hargrave.

Have a great week!

Cheers
Tom

 

Make More Money with a Smaller Market: 5 Reasons to Narrow your Niche as a Service Provider

It’s like pulling teeth to convince some service providers that they NEED to narrow their niche. I understand that it can seem very scary at first, but service providers such as coaches, trainers, speakers and consultants need to recognize that they can’t work with everybody. And, in fact, they will be able to actually help MORE people by narrowing their niche. One of the best marketing tips that I ever got was that I needed to make my market smaller.

Here are 5 reasons why it’s important to narrow your niche if you’re a service provider.

1. You’ll know what to sell.
To be successful, you need to create solutions to urgent problems. You can’t identify a market’s urgent problems if your market is “everybody.” But these problems become very easy to identify once you begin to narrow your niche.

2. You’ll know HOW to market.
Every market will have a different set of emotional “hot buttons” and triggers. They will also identify with different types of marketing approaches. This is a great reason to narrow your niche. Once you learn exactly who your market is, you will know exactly how to market to them.

3. You’ll know WHERE to find your audience.
Trying to solve all problems for all people creates an obvious problem: where do you begin? When you narrow your niche, you will know exactly where to find them. They will be hanging out on very specific forums, blogs, social media sites, networking groups, etc. One of the greatest challenges that many business owners face is knowing exactly how to find their market. Fine tuning your “who” will make the “where” a simple question to answer.

4. You’ll spend less money on marketing.
Since you now know exactly who you want to work with and where they’re hanging out, doesn’t it seem fair that you can expect to spend less on your marketing budget to get in touch with them? Yup! This is a great way to really get the most bang for your marketing buck.

5. You’ll be able to work less and make more.
Wow…now that’s a good reason to narrow your niche! And it’s a valid reason to boot. The more you can narrow your niche, the more efficient you can work. Your thoughts, energy and marketing ideas can go into “ultra laser-focus” mode, making you a lean, mean, money-making machine. OK, no more metaphors, but you get the picture.

So, what can you do with this new inspiration to narrow your niche?

Action step:
Take out a sheet of paper and write down exactly who your ideal clients are and what they need MOST that you can supply. Answer the following questions:

Who are they?
What do they like?
Where do they hang out to learn or gather information?
What hobbies do they have?
What’s their biggest fear?
What’s their biggest desire?

Take 10 minutes to answer these 6 questions and you’ll see that your marketing vision will become much clearer.

 

Meet Me in Atlanta

Hey there. Thanks for popping in. I’d love to know if you’d like to participate in a cost-friendly, 2-hour workshop here in my hometown of Atlanta sometime in the next couple of weeks. You can let me know by emailing tom@chargewhatyoudeserve.com or simply post a comment on this page.

If I get enough response I’ll make this happen. This will be a great opportunity for you to work in a unique setting on fee-setting and marketing strategies that you can put into action immediately for your business.

I’m looking forward to your input!

Have a great week.

Cheers
Tom

 

How are Pages different than personal profiles?

You probably aren’t monetizing your Facebook activity very well if you haven’t started your own Facebook Group or Page. I want to wanted to share what a Facebook Page is so I decided to go straight to the source. Here is some great information describing the differences between Pages and personal profiles that I found on the Facebook Help site.

“Each user is permitted to maintain a single account, which is represented by a profile. Profiles can only be used to represent an individual, and must be held under an individual name. This account can also be used to manage multiple Facebook Pages that represent businesses or other organizations. You may only create Facebook Pages to represent real organizations of which you are an authorized representative, and fans of these Pages won’t be able to see that you are the Page admin, or have any access to your personal account.

All personal site features, such as friending and messaging, are also for personal use only and may not be used for professional promotion. If you add a user as a friend, for example, this person will be invited to be a friend of your profile and not your Page. Using personal site features for professional promotion, or creating unauthorized Pages, may result in your account being warned or disabled.”

I hope this was helpful.

You can also find out:
What is a Facebook Page?
How are Pages different than Facebook Groups?

Cheers
Tom

 

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