Add Video to Your Marketing Strategy

Are Your Customers Satisfied?

If you’ve got a good product or business and a gift of gab, you should have no problem attracting customers.  But the question here is, how often do you get repeat business from the same customer? 

It’s one thing to sell lots of items but it’s also equally important to have customers who want to keep coming back.  Why?  Because exisitng customers are more profitable than finding new ones.

Once you make the sale, the business connection between you and your customer is just beginning.  This is the time you spend on nurturing your relationship so that your customer will want to do more business with you and even provide referrals. 

One of the things I recommend is to take a look at the successful business women around you  and see what makes their customers attracted to them. 

Remember this:  a satisfied customer is more likely to be a loyal customer and a satisfied customer is a reflection of who YOU are as a woman in business.

What is Your Marketing Soul Plan?

Every woman in business needs a marketing plan if she wants her business to grow and become successful.  Your plan should outline details of what you want to achieve and how you plan to achieve it. 

According to Business Coach, Kendall SummerHawk, there’s something called a Marketing Soul Plan—which is just as vital.  Here are some tools Kendall says you need for this particular plan:

Marketing Soul Plan Element #1: Clarity

There is no virtue in trying to help women entrepreneurs who don’t value what you do. Instead, choose a tribe of women entrepreneurs who are hungry and eager to have their problem solved and are generous in paying for that help.

Marketing Soul Plan Element #2: Money

Who else wants to be a Spiritual Millionaire? I do, and I am well on my way to achieving that goal with my woman-owned business. If you’re one of those woman business owners who have been holding back from allowing money to flow abundantly into your business (and hence, your life) then it’s time to do some soul-searching to clear out your old money stories.

Yes, it’s okay to be spiritual and rich… so how much do you want to make in the next year? Choose a number to include in your Marketing Plan that is both a stretch and realistic. Write it down, and then decide how much you want to create every 90 days and write those numbers down too. Stay focused on your Marketing Plan numbers as you decide how you spend your time each day.

Marketing Soul Plan Element #3: Boundaries

The road to success isn’t paved with good intentions (or affirmations); it’s lined with great boundaries that honor you and your Soul’s Divine Mission. What are five boundaries that you’ve been soft on? Those are costing you big time in lost focus, lost income and a lost sense of your own personal power. List them out in your Marketing Plan along with one small action you, as a woman entrepreneur, are a commitment to taking to clean up each of them.

Marketing Soul Plan Element #4: Perfectionism

Perfectionism is fear in disguise. It’s simply a smoke-screen that women entrepreneurs’ egos create to keep them playing small or hiding out. Include in your Marketing Plan this statement: “I agree, commit and promise to take action before I feel ready, before I feel that I know enough and before I know how it’s all going to turn out!” Then do it and see how much you leapfrog ahead of where you are now.

Marketing Soul Plan Element #5: Receiving

There’s no point in practicing gratitude and attraction principles if you aren’t also practicing receiving. If you believe that the universe wants to give to your woman owned business then you must be skilled at receiving. So where do you start to practice receiving? How about starting by raising your fees, asking for a referral or even just accepting a compliment with a gracious “Thank you?”

Kendall SummerHawk, the “Horse Whisperer for Business” delivers savvy ways for entrepreneurs to turn hectic businesses into 6-figure successes. Get her “7 Quick and Simple Tips to Brand, Package and Price for More Money, Time and Freedom” at http://www.kendallsummerhawk.com.

Celebrate Baby Boomer Diva Day

Women and Social Media

42 million women in the United States (roughly 53% of the 79 million adult women in the United States who use the Internet) participate in social media at least weekly. As they spend more time with social media, women are spending correspondingly less time with traditional media: 39% less on newspapers, 36% less time reading magazines, and 30% less time watching TV.

That’s according to a recent social media survey by BlogHer, the women’s blog network, along with iVillage and Compass Partners.

Women’s behavior online tends to be less transactional and more relationship-driven. They spend more time on social networks building relationships, communicating with friends, and making new friends. Married women use social networks to share pictures and treat their network profiles as family home pages to share with friends and relatives. And because they use social networks to be social, a dollar spent marketing to acquire a female user goes a lot further than on a male user.

Learn more at the All Women’s Social Media Summit October 17, 2009 in Raleigh, NC where top female social media and marketing experts will share their expertise and tips on how to get the most out of social networking.  

To get some great video tips go to:  BoomerDivasTV

You Have the Right to Relax

For many women in business, being busy is sort of like a bragging right–the hustle and bustle of life in the fast lane is a marker of success in your career.  But research on stress suggests that the best way to trul succeed in life is to master the art of RELAXATION.

You have the right to relax.  If you don’t learn how ro do it, it can take its toll on your health, personal and professional relationshops, productivity and overall well-being.

Relaxation is free and not only can save your helath but also your sanity.

Here are some tips:

Figure out what’s fun:  Define what relaxing means to you and go do it.  It could be a bubble bath, a long walk, prayer and meditation, going to the gym or doing absolutely nothing.

Schedule some down time:  Learn how to enjoy being alone with yourself.  Turn off the computer, your cell phone, iPhone, iPod and discover what happens when you’re not distracted by external forces.

Recognize when stress is winning:  Whether stress comes from work, family or elsewhere, it’s bad for your health.  When it starts gaining ground in the form of headaches, insomnia, or arguments, it’s time to take a break and re-group.

Keep your eye on the prize:  Think about what relaxing will do for you–and focus on the rewards.

Bea Arthur: Branding of a Diva

One week ago actress Bea Arthur died at the age of 86. 

While most of us remember her as Dorothy on the hit TV show The Golden Girls, members of my baby boomer generation recall her earlier role as Maude–on the show with the same name.  Bea played a feisty, no-nonsense, wife, mother, grandmother and, let’s not forget, women’s libber.  Little did I know back then that her portrayal of Maude would have a major impact on who I would become as a 50-something woman in business. 

Did you know Bea got the role of Maude at the age of 50?  Her characters of Maude and Dorothy were the brandings of a Baby Boomer Diva.

The objectives that a good brand will achieve:

• Deliver the message clearly
• Confirm your credibility
• Connect your target prospects emotionally
• Motivate the buyer (or in this case, the TV viewer)

The “Maude” character was a woman who always spoke her mind–sometimes to a fault.  She also stood up for what she believed in and demonstrated that you can match wits with your husband and still keep things exciting in the bedroom.

The “Dorothy” character was a woman who was determined not to allow a little thing like aging and menopause stand in the way from continuing on her journey of living and loving life to its fullest.

Bea Arthur, meanwhile, was a woman who showed America that she was vintage like fine wine and getting better with time.  She had talent and was a woman on the move and making a difference–much like the fine women of Boomer Diva Nation.

She, like the members of BDN, helped re-define what it means to be a TRUE DIVA:  D-ivine, I-nspired, V-ivacious, A-nointed.

Thanks Bea for being a trendsetter!

Thrive or Survive?

One Sunday in church my Pastor asked a question: “Do you want to survive or thrive?” It got me to thinking about my life and my business.

As a baby boomer woman in business, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s never too late to set goals. So what if you didn’t achieve your original goals when you were in your tween years. If you’re reading this, it means you’re not dead yet. It means you still have a purpose and a mission to be accomplished. Just because you may have reached the “grandma age” doesn’t mean you have to cancel out those things you didn’t get around to doing. You just didn’t get around to doing them YET. As long as you’re still breathing, you still have time.

As baby boomers and beyond, we’ve been given more opportunities to accomplish the goals and dreams we’ve set for ourselves. So why can’t we take advantage of them right now?

Here are some of my tips for setting and accomplishing your goals at midlife:

1) Make each goal something you really want, not something that just sounds good: The truth of the matter is, you’re not getting any younger so you want to make what you do, from here on, mean something. But don’t do it just because. Some people like to play “follow the leader.” Because Mary wrote a book and it was a best seller, you think you can too but maybe that’s not really your calling and maybe your book won’t sell as well. Concentrate on doing something you are passionate about. Trust me, you’ll do a much better job at reaching your goal!

2) Don’t let your goal conflict with other goals: Your goal may be to purchase a million dollar home but if your salary is only $50,000 what sense does that really make? You should first focus on how you can increase your income or come up with creative ways to do some million dollar improvements on your current home.

3) Develop goals for both personal and business: If you have big dreams for your business, why not have equally important goals for your personal life. All work and no play can create something called S-T-R-E-S-S and stress kills. Develop a plan to ensure that you will spend quality “me” time to give yourself an opportunity to be renewed in mind, body and spirit. That way you’ll have more energy to continue pursuing your business goals.

4) Set high goals: The higher the goal means you’ll work HARDER but the REWARD will be that much sweeter!

5) Create a Vision Board: How do you know where you’re going if you can’t SEE where you’re going? Habakkuk 2:2 in the Bible says: “And the Lord answered me and said, “Write the vision and make it plain upon tablets…” My vision board hangs in my bedroom. It is one of the first things I see every morning. It reminds me of the goals I’ve set and what I must do in order to achieve those goals. A vision board keeps you focused.

Even as a baby boomer, who’s also a wife and grandmother, I still believe in dreams and I’m a witness that dreams still can come true!

The Four P’s of Business

If you’re a woman in business you are probably operating on, what I call, a “low-to-no budget.”  Many of us have to wear several hats under the marketing umbrella, therefore, knowledge of each area is important to develop a focused effort.

A focus on what the customer wants and needs is essential to successful marketing efforts. This customer-orientation should go hand-in-hand with the company’s objective of maintaining a profitable volume of sales. Marketing is a creative process combining all of the activities needed to accomplish both of these objectives.

The American Marketing Association’s definition of marketing is:

“The process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion and distribution of ideas, goods, and services to create exchanges that satisfy individual and organizational objectives.”

Providing the features and quality customers want is a critical first step in marketing. You will be facing an uphill battle if you provide something you want to produce and then try to convince someone to buy it.

Once you have a product, you need to determine a price for the product, let potential customers, know about your product and make it available to them. These are often called the four “P’s” of marketing:

Product

Price

Promotion

Place (how you distribute it)

If you cover the four P’s well, you should have no trouble achieving a fifth P: profits.