Special Guest Post by: Wendy Y Bailey

We’re bombarded with so much more in life these days. Business is no different. It’s a far cry from the simpler life my parents experienced more than 40 years ago. Fewer people. Less technology. No information superhighway. Today we marvel at the convenience of plug and play, cell phones and other touch-able devices that make our lives and businesses easier.

For the past seven years, I’ve coached many clients through overwhelm to create stronger systems and processes to support their business. That’s the easy part! Each time, I found a highly beneficial starting place – unexercise.

Unexercise is the act of doing absolutely nothing. I don’t recall where I first heard the term but when I did, it really stuck with me. It’s a fairly simple practice yet most entrepreneurs have a diffult time with unexercise. Why? I think it’s because you’re so accustomed to constant activity. Sounds of a ringing phone, ringing. Email notifications chiming. Tweets chirping. Flashing banners on your computer monitor. Write a blog post. Get on a call. Check your calendar. Get on another call. Whew, it’s no wonder!

Schedule an hour on your calendar for unexercise. For that one hour, do absolutely nothing. No telephone, no tv, no talking, no tweeting, no writing, no reading. Just sit. Let your mind flow freely. Daydream. Let your ideas pour out of you. Unclog your worries.

This will help to rid your brain of the garbage. Eliminate the muddled trivial details. Silence the noise keeping you from being your best self.

If you fall asleep during this time, your body is telling you to rest.

If your mind wanders to new ideas, let it. You’re moving to a highly productive space. How kewl is that?!

My clients love it! Start your unexercise in 5 or 10 minute chunks and grow to the hour. Engage in unexercise once a week and watch your business grow to greater heights. You may also find a way to quiet the activity in your life and gain a stronger sense of focus and purpose for business.

Ready to benefit from unexercise? I’d love to know your comments.

Special Guest Post By: Christine Banning, SCORE VP of Corporate Relations

1. Protect Your Name. As an entrepreneur, your name is vital to your brand & the identity of your business. Be sure to secure a domain name in your name. For example, www.myname with .com, .net and/or .biz. It’s usually a good idea to register multiple domains in case someone types the wrong extension, that way you can be found. Network Solutions and GoDaddy are two choices to register a domain name.

2. Create a Founder Profile Page. Brand yourself on your Web site. Create a profile about you to build trust with potential clients. Make it easy for visitors to find info about you. Clients and prospects want to know who you are in terms of industry, experience and personality. Personalize your Web site and share info to build a relationship with visitors to your site.

3. Prepare for the Future. Millions of people use mobile devices to connect to their business, when they are out of the office. Make sure your Web site is accessible to these devices and will load quickly and easily. Even if your site is not yet formatted for .mobi, get the name. By registering a domain with a .mobi extension you secure the name for your company.

4. Protect Yourself from Spam. Search bots troll the Web looking for email addresses. This can lead to spam emails to your inbox. Protect your business email box. Use email addresses on your Web site like: contactus@domainname.com, media@mybusiness.com or moreinfo@mybusiness.com.

5. Considering joining LinkedIn or ZoomInfo. These popular, social networking sites give you a free way to post a biographical profile. Be aware: everything you post is public information. You give up some privacy when you post info. The sites can provide connections between people with similar interests. The sites add to search engine results for your name & your company name.

Brought to you by SCORE, America’s small business mentors, at www.score.org.

As a woman in business, you should have a website. A website allows potential customers to learn more about your and your business. Here are some tips on how to market your business through your site:

Think strategically. Your Web site should be a part of your overall marketing plan.

Choose a Web site address (URL) that’s intuitive and easy to remember. Your company’s name (if it’s short) or the name of your main product might work well.

Put your Web address on all your printed material, including business cards, letterhead, press releases and invoices. Include it in all your advertising.

Don’t forget offline media and traditional publicity techniques. Send news releases promoting your site to newspapers, broadcasters, and magazines.

Speak at conferences and trade shows, and write informative articles for trade publications. When you do, mention your Web address.

Brought to you by SCORE, America’s small business mentors, at www.score.org.

Special Guest Post by: Annmarie Kelly

Are you juggling work, caregiving and the holidays and feeling the holiday stress? Me too!

I don’t know about how it’s been at your workplace, but these past few months have been exceptionally busy for me! On the business side, I presented at women’s leadership conferences in Philadelphia PA and Asheville NC. I also facilitated several corporate and public workshops on communication, management and leadership skills for women. The conferences and classes were great!

At the same time, however, in October and November my mom was in and out of the hospital and skilled nursing care. Every working woman knows what it’s like to juggle caregiving with work. The stress can feel overwhelming.

Happily, my mom is back to independent living – with the help of home nursing and me. However, her illness reminded me of two self-care tips and, for all you caregivers, I’m sharing them with you this holiday season.

Here’s the first one: Watch Out for Overcare

One Sunday in November, somewhere between presenting at a Saturday conference and picking my mother up for a family party, I got a “nervous stomach”. It took a full day before I realized what the problem was. Yes, I was in overcare. In spite of all the seminars and workshops I’ve given on overcare and how it happens, I fell into it anyway.

Overcare happens to any of us when we upset the balance between our own self-care and caring for others. It happens because we put our own care on the back burner while being busy taking care of parents, or children, or both. Overcare also happens during certain times or events, like getting ready for the holidays. The result? We run down, maybe get ill, and then miss work or a special event.

Once I realized I was “in it” I started rebalancing. For me, breaking the cycle meant blocking off thirty minutes a few times a week for exercise and prioritizing that time. Also, I restarted my vitamin regime and made appointments with a chiropractor. Small things but they are making a big difference.

Here’s the second: Remember the Moments

For most of us, time zips by, one day into the next. And during the busiest moments, like Christmas and the holidays, we get so caught up in what we’re doing that we often forget to just stop and enjoy the moment.

That’s what I realized during one of the all-night ER stays with my mom. The two of us were laughing about how all the medical staff kept saying she didn’t look her age. Then, all of a sudden, she became very wistful about her ninety years and said, “It went so fast” Her words startled me. Later I thought, “How could that be? How could that many years seem ’so fast’?” But then I thought about how long I’ve known my spouse, Joseph – nearly twenty-five years. It doesn’t seem so long ago that I wondered if I’d ever meet someone I’d want to marry…and now it’s nearly a quarter of a century ago. How did that happen? It went so fast.

In recent talks with my mother, I’ve realized that what really stands out in our memory isn’t a “big” event. What makes up the best part of our lives are the little moments. When we are alone, it’s the memories of our moments that come back to us. It’s up to us if those memory-moments warm and comfort us, or make us feel sad.

So here’s the thing I’m urging you to do, starting today. STOP and pay attention to what’s happening around you. Make a point to take a mental picture of something, like a special look someone gives you or an intimate moment with a loved one. And also internally record your child’s laugh or a kind word someone says that touches your heart. Jot it down in your journal too. Don’t have time to journal? Then when you email a friend about something special that happened, make a copy and file it – it can substitute for that journal entry you might not make time to write. Bottom line: Do something to help your mind remember your best moments.

© 2009 Annmarie Kelly. All rights reserved.

Annmarie Kelly, Victory Strategist, speaks to Women Leaders at corporate and association meetings about how to face challenges, strategize their way to success and live victoriously. She is the author of Victorious Woman! Shaping Life’s Challenges into Personal Victories (Optimal Living Press 2005). Victorious Woman! features stories of everyday women who overcame overwhelming odds to achieve personal victories. To learn more, go to www.victoriouswoman.com or email Annmarie at info@victoriouswoman.com

Special Guest Post by: Stanley Popovich

When your fears and depression have the best of you, it is easy to feel that things will not get any better. This is not true. There is much help available in today’s society and the best way to deal with your fears is to find effective ways to overcome them. As a result, here are some techniques a person can use to help manage their fears and anxieties.

Challenge your negative thinking with positive statements and realistic thinking. When encountering thoughts that make you feel fearful or depressed, challenge those thoughts by asking yourself questions that will maintain objectivity and common sense. For example, you’re afraid that if you do not get that job promotion then you will be stuck at your job forever. This depresses you, however your thinking in this situation is unrealistic. The fact of the matter is that there all are kinds of jobs available and just because you don’t get this job promotion doesn’t mean that you will never get one. In addition, people change jobs all the time, and you always have that option of going elsewhere if you are unhappy at your present location.

Some people get depressed and have a difficult time getting out of bed in the mornings. When this happens, a person should take a deep breath and try to find something to do to get their mind off of the problem. A person could take a walk, listen to some music, read the newspaper or do an activity that will give them a fresh perspective on things. Doing something will get your mind off of the problem and give you confidence to do other things.

Be smart in how you deal with your fears and anxieties. Do not try to tackle everything all at once. When facing a current or upcoming task that overwhelms you with a lot of anxiety, break the task into a series of smaller steps. Completing these smaller tasks one at a time will make the stress more manageable and increases your chances of success.

Take advantage of the help that is available around you. If possible, talk to a professional who can help you manage your fears and anxieties. They will be able to provide you with additional advice and insights on how to deal with your current problem. Eventually, you will find the answers you are looking for.

BIOGRAPHY:

Stan Popovich is the author of “A Layman’s Guide to Managing Fear Using Psychology, Christianity and Non Resistant Methods” – an easy to read book that presents a general overview of techniques that are effective in managing persistent fears and anxieties. For additional information go to: http://www.managingfear.com

Special Guest Post by:  Patricia Fripp, CSP, CPAE

Looking for more business? Marketing and PR expert Gary Purece gave me some advice that can help you as well. He told me that successful marketing means that you identify prospective clients and position yourself in the market so that they choose you over your competition. When I sit down with clients who want to position their marketing, I seek the answers to these four basic questions:

1. Who Is Your Potential Client? Who wants to buy or could be stimulated to want to buy? Who is in a position to buy what you sell? What geographical and financial factors affect this ability?

A good way to identify future clients is to listen — really listen — to those you have now. Their comments, especially negative ones, will help you tailor both your product and your approach to other prospects.

2. Why Will They Want To Buy? What emotional and physical factors will influence them? I just worked with an East Coast psychiatrist who ran a practice with ten other psychiatrists and wanted to position herself. Our conversations quickly disclosed that her community was predominantly upwardly mobile professionals. Many of the women had delayed having children. Due to fertility drugs, a high percentage of families had twins, triplets or more. We decided to focus her practice on these kinds of families. Hers was the first practice in the area to do that.

How did we do this? First, we realized her potential audience was geographical, that is, in her community rather than regional, national or international. These prospects also had distinctive demographics. By appealing to a unique aspect, we hit on her core group. She is now hugely successful in her practice.

3. What Angle Should You Take? How is your product or service unique? Why is it perfect for your target audience? How is it different from everyone else’s? How will it fulfill your core group’s needs in a way that no one else can?

This is positioning you in the market. (Remember how Avis advertised: “We try harder”) For example, when other advertising consultants do presentations, they talk about budgets, print versus TV, soft versus hard sell. I position myself by emphasizing that you start by targeting your audience, positioning your product and creating distinctive selling propositions. Lots of mom-and-pop businesses, confronted by super stores, cannot compete or even survive unless they find a unique niche to fill.

4. How Are You Going To Sell It? We all know people with great ideas, products and inventions. They spend a fortune developing this product, but it sits there because they have no idea what to do with it. Is there a system in place to put your product in customers’ hands and return their money to you? Or do you need to create one?

Market to your core group, and position yourself among the competition. That is million-dollar marketing.

* * *

Patricia Fripp, CSP, CPAE, is a sales presentation skills trainer, keynote speaker and executive speech coach. She is the co-author of Speaker’s EDGE: Secrets and Strategies for Connecting with Any Audience and past president of the National Speakers Association. pfripp@ix.netcom.com“>pfripp@ix.netcom.com – 415-753-6556 — www.fripp.com

Business dining over the holidays?  The way you mind your manners could be a career builder or career buster. Never underestimate the impression you leave with proper etiquette.

Or… More importantly, the bad impression you leave with improper etiquette.

This time of year, a few useful etiquette pointers might save the day. Or your career, Or at least the dinner.

How do you rate at a holiday (and everyday) dining situation?

1. Where should you find your bread and butter plate?

a) To the right of the entrée plate

b) To the left of the entrée plate

2. True or False – Bread should be cut into small pieces with a knife.

3. True or False – It is best carry a drink in your left hand at a cocktail party.

4. True or False – You place your napkin on the chair when leaving the table during a meal and when finished dining.

5. How do you place your utensils so that the wait staff knows that you are finished with your meal?

6. How do you hold the glass when drinking red wine?

7. Should you cut your salad?

ANSWERS

1. B – The bread and butter plate is to the left of the entrée plate.

2. False – Never cut bread or rolls. Break off and butter, or dip in olive oil, one piece at a time.

3. True – place your drink in your left hand, so your right hand is always available to shake hands. If you do it this way, you’ll never have to wipe a damp hand before you shake again!

4. False – If you leave the table briefly during the meal, place the napkin on your chair. At the end of the meal, put your napkin neatly (but not folded) to the left of your entrée plate on the table.

5. Place your utensils in the Finished Position, which means the knife and fork are together, facing in the same direction.

6. When drinking red wine, the glass is always held by the stem, but the hand can come closer to the bowl. When drinking white wine, the hand should never come too close to the bowl of the glass.

7. Yes, you should cut your salad, but only 2-3 cuts … just enough to make bite-sized pieces. If you want it chopped, order it chopped! 

Special Guest Post By: Jennifer Pellet

When your hear “Internet presence” you may think “web site.” But more and more business owners are finding that the most effective and economical way to establish contact with potential customers is by blogging.

The CEOs of Sun Microsystems, Craig’s List, Working Mother Media, and Adobe are just three of an increasing number of major companies with CEOs whose blogs about business are winning raves. But blogging can be even more effective for smaller companies, notes Anita Campbell, editor of Smallbiztrends.com, who says a blog “is one of the best public relations and marketing tools out there for a small business owner.” Still wondering how posting your opinions online can help your company? Here are five ways blogging can boost your business.

Get Noticed. It’s a little known fact: search engines love blogs. Google and other search engines rank listings by link popularity, freshness of content, and ease of indexing—all of which mesh well with the features built into blogging software. “Search engines love fresh content,” says Campbell. “If you write only once a week, that’s 50 updates a year, which is probably a lot more often than you would update a web site.”

Build Your Reputation. There’s no better way to show off your expertise than regularly sharing some of your insights and experiences with a Web audience. “One of my favorite small business blogs is one by Lincoln Sign Company that tells the stories behind some of the signs they’ve made and addresses some of the questions its customers ask
most often,” says Campbell. “That’s a more informative and entertaining way to present information than you could ever offer with standard verbiage on a web site.”

Connect With Customers. Blogs are all about interaction. Blogging software enables viewers to comment on posts, so you’re not just speaking into the Internet ether but opening a dialog. “Creating that conversation in the blogosphere—the community of 40 million-plus bloggers—is essential,” says Darrell Zahorsky, the small business information guide for About.com. “It’s when others post thoughtful comments or link to your blog that you see the most benefit.”

Market Economically. Blogs are far simpler and less expensive than setting up a site. In fact, you can start a blog for free at sites like www.blogger.com and www.wordpress.com. And even more sophisticated services such as typepad.com can run as little as $29 a month. “Even if you want to go so far as to get a custom design and add on bells and whistles, you can have a wonderful blogging presence for as little as $500 to $1,000 a year,” says Campbell.

Get Press. Journalists regularly troll blogs looking for trends and expert sources to interview about them. And, if publishing articles in a trade journal or newspaper is your goal, a blog is a great way to hone your skills and for editors to assess your writing ability.