2. FEATURE: How Can a Newsletter Skyrocket My Business?

Taken from my book ‘Get Paid For Who You Are‘

The number one goal of your website, if you wish your contacts to grow robustly, is to capture your visitor’s email address—like getting the phone number of a girl or guy you like, or the card of someone you meet at a conference. Then, through your newsletter, they can get to know you. You might even include personal snippets in addition to the value and advice you offer. Over time, every two weeks, 26 times a year, you can visit their inbox and earn their trust — a much stronger connection than can be achieved in one website visit. This way, you can use your newsletter to turn a 30 second website visit into a life-time relationship.

Your newsletter will help you to:

Be there when people need you

When some people visit your website, they’ll be curious but not ready to buy. If all you have is a website, they’ll satisfy their curiosity and move on. But if they subscribe to your newsletter, chances are your name will be on top of their mind, or your newsletter will hit their Inbox, just when they need you and are ready to take the next step.

Increase referrals

When you send out newsletters, your customers do some of your marketing for you by forwarding your newsletters to friends. It’s a referral system that requires no extra effort from you.

Free up your time

One of the big benefits of having a newsletter is that it works while you sleep. When a customer comes to your website and subscribes to your newsletter you won’t even know about it. The same goes for payment. If you charge for your newsletter, payment happens automatically.- you won’t know about it until you see the deposit to your bank account. You can also automate the delivery of your newsletter. If you’re using an “auto responder” you won’t even know your newsletter has gone out except for the influx of sales and money rolling into your bank account.

Cut your costs

Imagine how much it would cost me to mail postcards to 70,000 people in 90 countries or — even crazier — call all of them. I’d have to pay thousands of dollars in printing and shipping, not to mention the “cost” to the trees. But how much does it cost me to send an ezine (internet magazine) to 70,000 people this afternoon? Zero (given I pay a fixed annual cost for the service).

Create an instant market for new products or services

A newsletter database gives you a built-in market for any new product or service you develop. I built my newsletter for three years without having a product to sell. When I developed my first MP3 (a format for compressing audio) product, I told my newsletter subscribers and received $5,000 in sales in 48 hours. It was very exciting!

***

Take Action

1) Which reason most resonates with you?

2) If you have a newsletter, what’s it called? Share it with us at the blog.

3) If you don’t have a newsletter, what would be one or two possible topics for your newsletter if you had one? Tell us at the blog.

Love and gratitude,

P.S. You can find ideas on how to set up your own newsletter in 7 days in my book, “Get Paid For Who You Are.”

P.P.S. If you have any comments on this newsletter, we’d love you to share them here.

* * *

2. FEATURE: Ways You Can Help a Cause – AND Yourself!

Taken from my book ‘Get Paid For Who You Are‘

1. Donate your product or service

The most basic way to support a cause is to donate your product or services. This product or service can be given to staff members, volunteers, beneficiaries, or even board members.  For example, if you’re a coach, like me, it’s pretty straightforward – you offer your coaching services. The staff members of nonprofit organizations are usually paid only modest salaries, so your coaching services could be a nice fringe benefit.

2. Offer your product or a service as a prize

You can offer your products or services as a prize for a sweepstakes or competition.  In fact, why not reach out to 10 to 20 local nonprofit organizations in this way and start building relationships. For example, an accountant might donate 10 free tax returns to a charity raffle or auction.

3. Offer your product or service as a premium

You can also offer your product or service as an incentive when people sign up to the nonprofit’s mailing list.  If you go to the Sierra Club’s website at Sierra.org, they often offer a free rucksack when you become a member.  If you happen to produce rucksacks, backpacks, caps or T-shirts, you could go to groups like the Sierra Club and donate your product. In exchange, they could acknowledge your company on their website and much more, which we’ll cover later in this chapter.

4. Speak at their events

5. Give a percentage of your profits

6. Logo Exposure

You can also offer nonprofit organizations exposure for their logos. Tell them that you will put their logo on your website, business card or newsletter, with a call to donate. The logo will also link to their organization.

7. Invite your customers to donate

8. Newsletter exposure

Offer to include occasional stories about them in your newsletter. You might write about an interesting event they are holding, or feature a case study of someone they have helped – just as a news item next to your feature article. And of course – add a request to donate to their cause.

9. Media exposure

You could issue press releases about what the nonprofit is up to and how local businesses are supporting local causes. You could agree to mention them in every radio, TV and print interview you do.

10. Microgiving call

Invite all your customers and newsletter subscribers to join on a conference call designed to raise money for charity. You might have a prominent member of the community or a local celebrity join you as co-host. Discuss an interesting topic, and every 10 minutes invite people to go to the website and donate. Of course, you can also do something like this in person and offer to host physical fundraisers.

***

Take Action

1) What cause are you interested in supporting?

2) Do any of these ideas sound like something you would love to do?

3) Share your cause at the blog and what you want to do for them.

4) What’s your dream list of what a non-profit could do for YOUR business?

5) Post on the blog here!

Love and gratitude,

P.S. You can find ideas on how to approach causes you want to support in my book, “Get Paid For Who You Are.”

P.P.S. If you have any comments on this newsletter, we’d love you to share them here.

* * *

2. FEATURE: Chose a Website Design That’s Perfect For You

Taken from my book ‘Get Paid For Who You Are‘

Your website is your face to others on the internet. It’s important to choose a design that’s right for you.

Think about the “look and feel” of your website. Do you want your website to be packed with information or spacious and elegant? What is the mood that you want people to feel: hopeful and motivated to take action, or peaceful – knowing everything will be okay?

For instance, Leanne Ely’s menu planning solution site (http://savingdinner.com) has a breezy cheerful style with a superhero-dressed shopper flying along behind a loaded grocery cart.

That wouldn’t work as well for Anette Meier, who makes baskets by hand and markets them on her site (www.ahmbaskets.com). For her, an artsy look and font function better.

Take a moment right now to write down what you’d like your customer to feel when he or she comes to your site.

Now it’s time to surf the web to find other sites that mesh with what you’re looking for. Which sites appeal to you? Or do any of their elements appeal to you? You might find one website that makes you say, “I want those colors!” and another that makes you feel, “I like the simplicity—it’s very elegant.” You might find yet another and think to yourself, “I like how there’s a border around the whole site.” Make notes that you’ll be able to give to the designer who will design your site if you don’t intend to do the mechanics of design yourself.

Also, take a look at the images on the sites and if you like any of them, right-click the image, select “Save Target As,” and save the image to your hard drive. This doesn’t mean you’ll use that exact image — especially if it’s copyrighted — but you can show it to your designer so they know what you’re looking for. For example, you might realize that you want to use a silhouette of a woman leaping for joy on the beach to give customers a sense of what it feels like to work with you. When you’re ready to buy an image, go to www.istockphoto.com, where you can buy the rights to use an image for as little as one dollar.

During your browsing, you’ll also want to save logos you like. Obviously you won’t use other businesses’ logos, but you may find a logo that you could use as a template for your own — one that has a typeface you like or a symbol you’d like to incorporate. Keep it in your file and when the time is right, share it with your designer to give them an idea of what you want your own logo to look and feel like.

***

Take Action

1) Write down what you want in your site design-wise.

2) If you do have a web site, see if your current design matches the image you want to portray.

3) If you don’t have a web site, use this information when you get your site up.

2) Share one word that you’d like your site to embody at the blog.

Love and gratitude,

P.S. If you have any comments on this newsletter, we’d love you to share them here