Marketing for Solopreneurs

Face Up: Is Your Photo On Your Website?

Judy and I are members of a cool business networking community called Biznik.com. Recently on one of the forums, someone asked: “Should you put your photo on your website?”

How did people weigh in? The original poster said she always looks for a photo on someone’s website and doesn’t like it when she can’t find one. She compared it to starting a book and turning to the back inside cover first to look at the author’s picture. She just needs to see the person.

Another poster felt that photos can build credibility. But she also said that someone she met who sold information products online tested with and without a photo and actually sold more without his photo. Assuming the reason wasn’t that he’s incredibly ugly, I’m curious about those results. Are there certain businesses, services, products, where it’s best to go “photo-less?”

Most biznik posters felt it was a good thing to have your photo on your website. I feel, especially for the solopreneur, it can help in your branding, particularly if you have a service-focused business. But if you are selling a product, marketing the solution to your customer’s problem that your product will provide is probably more important than your personal branding. In short, focus on what you are selling —yourself or a product.

We have chosen to put photos on our blog and websites. Why? The Internet is impersonal and there are so many sites out there offering so many services that sometimes it just helps your customers get a better feel for who you are. It makes you more human. When I visit a site, I ask myself: Does this website show me friendly, approachable, solution-focused professionals, or is it a group of strange dudes in the corner of their basement trying to sell me the world?

At MarketingYourSmallBiz.com, our faces are a key part of our personal branding. Our local clients know us as well, if not better, by our photos as they do by our business name. And hopefully you, our online customers and future customers, know us a little better, too.

Help!: Marketing Information Overload

I read an interesting article by master copywriter Bob Bly today in the Early to Rise newsletter. He was commenting on the vast amounts of information available to people who are learning a new skill or job. In this case, he was talking about people who want learn how to be an effective marketer.

He said, “You are interested in some aspect of marketing. ..But you are overwhelmed by all the information being offered on the subject…So you go ‘information crazy’…buying every course, attending every conference, reading every e-book, listening to every recording…Before you know it, a month, six months…or a year has gone by and you are no closer to your business or career goal. That’s because you’ve spent all your time reading, studying, and learning the thing you are interested in…rather than actually doing it.”

Bly calls this “analysis paralysis.” It can also happen to the solopreneur who is looking for “just one more good marketing strategy.” (I know because I’m guilty of it myself.) After all, there’s always one more article or book to read, one more blog or web site with good stuff. Right?

But there’s a new wave lapping on the shores of the Information Age. It’s called the Age of Advice. The problem is not just all the information out there. It’s what does it mean. Who can make sense of it? Where is the really good stuff and who can help me apply it to my career or business or life? That is where the Age of Advice comes in. Some experts are pointing to a new trend: people are actually starting to pay for services that sift though all the information, gather the best and help them apply it to their own lives and businesses.

At risk of being accused of “shameless promotion,” I will dare to say this: That is what marketingyoursmallbiz is all about: taking the vast amounts of information out there, sorting the good from the bad and delivering the most valuable nuggets to our readers, in our free weekly marketing e-tips (click here to sign up) and in our monthly membership subscription e-zine (click here to learn more). Here at marketingyoursmallbiz.com, we are firmly planted in the Age of Advice.

My questions for you: Do you ever feel information overload or “analysis paralysis”? What do you do to cope?

Small Business Trends Offers Free E-book: ‘Best-Kept Marketing Secrets’

I just got my copy of Best-Kept Marketing Secrets: 100 Experts Dish With Their Marketing Tips. It’s a free e-book with jewels from some of the best and brightest in the field of marketing. Wait a minute. How did I get in there? (I’m on page 11, in case you’re curious.)

You can download a copy of it by clicking here. Anita Campbell, Publisher of Small Business Trends, has gathered in one book tips from the likes of Seth Godin, Brian Clark from CopyBlogger, Guy Kawasaki, John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing fame, and Yaro Starik, not to mention 95 others, including Campbell herself.

In case you don’t have time to read all 33 pages right now, Campbell synopsizes the content around three broad concepts as they relate to solopreneur/small biz marketing:

1. Simple and inexpensive works best. No complex strategies here. Many of the tips take nothing more than your time to implement. Others are not exactly free, but quite affordable.

2. Honesty and attention to building relationships are essential. For the solopreneur and small business owner, whose customers frequently number under 100, friendliness, accessibility, authenticity, and relationship building are key to keeping the customers you have.

3. Creative online marketing can play an important role. Solopreneurs with limited marketing budgets would be wise to read and incorporate some of the many tips for reaching their target customers with online tools.

While none of the tips in the book may take you by surprise (or then again, maybe some will), I think you’ll be rewarded with a greater sense of all we small businesses do day after day to get “that marketing thing” right.

What’s more, I found several new ideas I’m excited about trying. Happy reading!

Networking: The Wandering Eye Syndrome

From time to time, at a networking event, I have been talking to a colleague or client and their eyes are wandering elsewhere, sweeping the room. I suspect that they are looking for someone in particular. But it always makes me feel insignificant, like I’m just a “place holder” until someone more important comes along.

In fact, a couple of weeks ago I met with someone after a lunch networking event. The entire time we were talking, he was glancing over my shoulder to see who else was coming in the door. It was difficult to even keep my train of thought because I wasn’t sure I had his attention.

So what happens? Yesterday, at a business luncheon, I was visiting with a good friend before the event. I was also periodically checking the entrance door for our guests so I could direct them to our table when they arrived. I suddenly realized I was doing the exact thing I resent when other people do it to me. In fact, my business partner scolded me afterwards. I felt horrible!

Two lessons here. First, when you are talking with a business colleague, or client, or prospect, stay focused on the moment. Whatever your reason is for not giving them your full attention, your wandering eyes will send a message that they are not important to you. Secondly, always practice what you preach!

A Marketer’s Nightmare: The Death of FREE

There was a recurring skit on Saturday Night Live years ago, a TV show parody called, “People Who Ruin It for Other People.” Each week, the host would interview guests who had done something to take advantage of someone’s trust and “ruin it for other people.”

To the guy who first drove off without paying for his gas, the exasperated host said, “What you’re saying, then, is that you screwed up and didn’t pay for your gas, so you ruined it for other people. And now we have to pay before we pump? ”

The guest meekly bowed his head and said, “Well…yes.”

The next guest had gone into a restroom and trashed the place, making it so we all have to ask for the key first. And so on. People who ruin it for other people.

I was reminded of that skit when I recently read an article by Doug D’Anna in Clayton Makepeace’s ezine, The Total Package (makepeacetotalpackage.com). In his article, “Why FREE Doesn’t Work Anymore,” D’Anna declares the word FREE officially dead. His reasons: 1) Too many FREE e-zines (and, I might add, ones that are short on value— and full of sales pitches) and 2) the explosion of spam— and with it the consumer’s expectation that we are dangling the FREE carrot so we can get his e-mail address and hit him with frequent, blatant sales messages. I call this the “Businesses That Ruin It for Other Businesses” syndrome.

How else are businesses diluting the power of the word FREE? Deceptive advertising. Today I saw a TV commercial telling me I could get credit reports for FREE. They even had a website with “free credit report” in the name. But, in tiny letters at the top of the screen, it said, “Available when you sign up for the ‘Platinum Program.’

D’Anna suggests that the better strategy, at least in e-marketing, is to cultivate a relationship of trust with the people on your list first. And if you do offer a FREE e-zine in your sales copy, be sure the reader recognizes the value of your e-zine first—in and of itself.

I am still using the word FREE in the sign-up pitch for our weekly marketing e-tips. After all, they are free, with no purchase requirement — and our readers say that they are useful, so they have value. But it certainly gave me something to think about.

How about you? Has the misuse of the word FREE taken away its power as a marketing tool? Are you skeptical when you see it now?

The Changing Entrepreneur: What Kind of Business Are You?

I read an article in the Wall Street Journal yesterday. The author, Diana Ransom of smSmallBiz.com, reported on the new trend of specialized labeling for entrepreneurs.

While “solopreneur” has become widely accepted as a term for someone who owns a one-person-shop, the number of ways to distinguish the small business owner may be getting a little out of control. With everything from “ecopreneur” to “mompreneur”, there seems to be a label for everyone.

Some marketers like this new trend because it helps the business owner stand out in a competitive marketplace. The label can describe you as the businessperson, your niche market or both.

Here are some of the current buzzwords:

Solopreneur: a one-person business.
Copreneurs: owners of a two-person business, often a husband and wife.
Sideline Entrepreneur: a moonlighter who is testing the waters with a side business.
Travelpreneur/Adventurepreneur: the adventure-seeking entrepreneur.
Socialpreneur: the owner of a nonprofit company looking to solve a social problem
Ecopreneurs/Greenpreneurs: entrepreneurs who have turned their “green” causes into profits
Mompreneur/Dadpreneur: a parent with young children and a home-based business
Teenpreneur: a college or teen-aged entrepreneur
Entrepreness/Fempreneur: a female entrepreneur who caters to the women’s market
Serial Entrepreneur: a start-up “addict” who goes from one business to another

So, a woman who is a one-person business, who has a child and works at home, and who creates environmentally-friendly products is a solo-mom-eco-social-preneur?

Do you fit anywhere on this list? Do you like being labeled?

Marketing with Music: What Is Led Zeppelin Selling?

Watching TV the other day, I recognized a Led Zeppelin song in a commercial. It was a commercial for a car, but I can't say for sure what brand or model. But the song, I definitely remember.

It got me thinking about target marketing. This commercial was aimed at the boomer market, the 44-62-year-old demographic—people born between 1946 and 1964.

For most of us, music is powerful. It brings back memories, both good and bad. How many of us hear a song and remember a very specific point in time, sometimes down to the street we were driving down and who we were with when we heard it?

So what's to say that when I am watching this commercial, and I hear this song, my mind doesn't wander to past times and the advertiser loses me? I no longer care about the car whipping along. I’m singing along to the music, remembering the good old Led Zeppelin days.

Or, do I subconsciously think, "Wow, this company knows me. It's playing a song from my past. I think I’ll check out this car." I think it could go either way.

Me? I remember the song. But the car? Couldn’t tell you the brand if my life depended on it.

What do you think? Is music a powerful advertising tool or does it distract you from the sales message?

Finding Time for Marketing

It’s a crazy world. Everyone wants a piece of your time. To-do lists are made and tossed aside. And those e-mails, well, they’re like those insistent knocks on the door–impossible to ignore.

The first issue of our e-zine went out today. (Learn more about it at marketingyoursmallbiz.com.) One of the columns, The 15-Minute Marketer, gives our subscribers practical ways to promote their business in as little as 900 seconds a day. Don’t have 15 minutes, you say?

I just stumbled on a resource that might help. I read an interesting post yesterday on the infomarketing blog (infomarketingblog.com). The author suggested some excellent strategies for freeing up more time for the important stuff (like marketing). Some of his suggestions:

1. Make four hours of your work day “uninterruptable.” This means absolutely no checking, sending or answering e-mails (if you are like me, it is an addiction that steals precious minutes every day). No making or receiving phone calls. No checking messages. (I say, let the voice mail take over. That’s what it’s for.)

2. Limit the windows open on your computer to one or two. This applies to the tabs for e-mail, you know, the ones that ping or light up and scream, “Open me! Open me!”

3. Say “no” more often. Bob, my business (and life) partner has this problem. He has to stand in front of a mirror and practice using those facial muscles that produce the word “no.” (I’m not sure he ever learned how to use them!) If you are a “yes” person, you know what I mean.

4. When it comes to your work projects, change your attitude from “I have to…” to “I want to…” Seems like a subtle change, but the mindset of choosing over feeling forced to complete something can make all the difference in the world.

I was never at the top of my game when it came to time management, but I am going to try these strategies. They make sense to me.