Carolyn's Corner

Bonjour amis! Welcome to the first edition of Carolyn’s Corner.

‘Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. To keep our faces toward change and behave like free spirits in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable.’ Helen Keller.

Everyone around me seems to be embracing change and embarking on a new adventure at the moment. Friends and clients are moving overseas and interstate, ending relationships, starting new ones, restructuring businesses, taking up new jobs and selling up real estate. It’s truly hard to keep up with!

And the winds of change and adventure are breezing through my family too. After 13 years in our beloved Coogee Sydney, my son Billy and I are bidding farewell to set up home in Melbourne. Then on the 23rd of August we’re leaving to live in Aix-en-Provence France for four months. Billy will be attending school while I’ll be running the business and writing. (We’re calling it Our French Adventure.)

On the personal front, the to-do list is as long as my arm and includes everything from selling my Sydney home, finding homes and schools in Melbourne and France and learning at least a smattering of French!

And to be able to work remotely there’s been lots to sort out too. What work can I continue to do while I’m away? What work will need to be referred on to my trusty alliance partners? What agreements and processes do we need in place to do this? Who will handle the mail, bills, new business enquiries, phone calls and the postage of books and products ordered online? Who will keep the website and database up-to-date? How can I use Skype, blogs and social media to keep connected to clients when I won’t be able to see their smiling faces over a real coffee?

The idea of being able to run a business from anywhere in the world, is one that appeals to many business owners and future blogs will be dedicated to this concept. If you’re on an adventure and happen to be running a business remotely, please share your ideas, experiences and stories. Jusqu'à ce que nous nous réunissions de nouveau (Until we meet again)!

Comments (3) | Trackbacks (0) | Permalink

What Rubbish! Right On!

In my last email I wrote about the importance of getting back to the basics when it comes to marketing your business. I had many email responses such as this one… “We haven’t had a chance to get onto Twitter, for the simple reason that we’ve been applying the basic disciplines you suggest, which has given us more business than we can poke a stick at. While our competitors are shrinking or closing, I’m looking at having to put on more staff. Thanks for all your help.”

If you’d like to hear me speak on how to market your business by getting back to the basics and purchase an advance copy of my new book Marketing your Small Business for Dummies (not yet released in bookshops), please accept my invitation to attend the Australian Business and IT Expo (ABITE) being held next Wednesday and Thursday 28 & 29 April at the Sydney Exhibition Centre, Darling Harbour.  I’ll be speaking at 11am on the 28th and 10.45am on the 29th.  If you’d like to attend and send the offer to your friends, just email me and I’ll send you a FREE pass.

Now onto the topic of my email... how to get back your marketing mojo and the BHAG!

Over the past few weeks I’ve had the privilege of chatting with many small business owners who seem to have lost their marketing mojo. The reasons for this varied greatly. For one guy, it was a realisation he was no longer doing what he loved and that he’d lost his passion for the business, making it nigh on impossible to be effective at marketing.  For yet another it was a feeling that he was just another ‘me-too’ business offering the same thing as all his competitors, making it difficult to stand out from the crowd and attract more business. For another it was that she had absolutely no potential business in the pipeline and paralysis had set in. Ouch!

If you’ve lost your marketing mojo, take heart. You’re not alone. When I lose mine, I don’t frantically run around trying new marketing tactics that will never work. I take time out. I sit with it and take stock. I remind myself why I am in business – to help people build successful businesses that allow them to lead the life they want. I talk authentically with friends and mentors whose opinions and advice I value. Then I come back with renewed enthusiasm and passion and I set myself a BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal). And then I work like mad to make it happen!

My current marketing BHAG is to have my new website launched by 15 May so that it’s all ready for the official launch of Marketing your Small Business for Dummies on 1 June. (This by the way is no small task when you have 6000 subscribers to transfer over to a new database, around 100 pages of content and articles to update and refresh and three new products and services to launch.) Exciting, exhausting and happy times ahead!

When it comes to marketing your own business, if you need to get your mojo back why not set yourself a BHAG? If you’re willing to share your own BHAG with me by sending me an email, I’ll send you a free copy of my book, Small Business Big Brand.

Cheers...

Carolyn Tate
Director Connect Marketing
carolyn@connectmarketing.com.au
Phone +612 9340 7210

PS June, July and August are the launch months for Marketing your Small Business for Dummies. If you're interested in enquiring about having me speak at your event please call me on 0412 806 950.

Subscribe to RSS Feed

Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0) | Permalink

What Rubbish! Right On!

The response to my last email The Four-Day Work Week was mixed. Some people sent friendly but slightly sceptical emails questioning if it will really work, while many others applauded me and were kind enough to share their own Four-Day Work Week plan. I’m working smarter (not harder) ON and IN the business than ever before and while I admit it’s taking some getting used to, it really feels like it’s beginning to work (after just three weeks). I’ll keep you posted!

However, the subject of today’s email is about getting back to the basics of marketing. I am continually amazed by the number of marketers promoting website, social media, SEO, Google courses and programs to help you make your fortune. While many of these programs have merit and are indeed run by reputable business people, there’s often one critical missing ingredient – they all assume that you have something worth marketing in the first place and that people will actually buy it and be willing to talk about it to their friends and family!

No matter how great your website is, how many followers you have on Twitter or how well found you are on Google, if visitors fleetingly cross your path and don’t hang around, contact you, buy from you or tell anyone about you, then it’s likely you’ve ignored the basics of marketing.

Marketing really IS about how you position and differentiate your business and then package, price, distribute and promote your products and services so people are compelled to find out more. It’s about establishing your brand reputation and positioning yourself as the expert in your field. It’s about continuously listening to your customers and innovating to offer new stuff. It’s about using multiple tactics (NOT just the internet) to get the word out (I advocate at least four to six tactics for every business). Shall I stop now?

In my own business I am continuously focusing on the basics by seeking feedback from clients and my readers, researching the competition, re-defining ‘why ME and not some other marketer?’ and repackaging services such as the New & Improved 2-Day Small Business Big Brand workshop (being held April 21 and 22 in Sydney for just 12 participants) and launching new packages like the  Small Biz Copywriting Package and Skype Mentoring Program.

And one of my biggest selling packages, the Kick Start Marketing Plan is next in line for an overhaul along with the website which I am currently working on with my new web team at Piper Digital Marketing (check out their unique Small Business Intelligence Workshops being held on the sunny Sunshine Coast in QLD on 16 & 17 April – they actually DO focus on the basics!).

Sometimes I fear I spend so much time on the basics that the Twitter phenomenon might just pass me by! C’est la vie…

The problem with marketing today is that the basic disciplines have been forgotten and too many businesses and marketers are not asking the hard questions. Sure, the basics aren’t as sexy as being a facebook guru with 3000 friends, but if you want a business that will withstand the test of time, then frankly there’s no option but to focus on the basics of marketing.

Give yourself a free marketing health check with the Power Marketing Checklist and let me know your score. I’d love to hear how you’re putting marketing at the heart of your business by getting back to basics!

Cheers...

Carolyn Tate
Director Connect Marketing
carolyn@connectmarketing.com.au
Phone +612 9340 7210

Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0) | Permalink

What Rubbish! Right On!

The response to my last email Happy new decade… some big changes for the year ahead… was again overwhelming. I had an awesome 73 email responses (all positive and constructive, including Ian who suggested I lose the ‘Granny Green Clampit’ cardigan I used to wear at my workshops – consider it done Ian!) On the other hand I had 22 ‘unsubscribes’ to my email. Don’t know about you, but I really hate getting these. However, I’m learning (the painful way) not to take it personally. I reckon it’s better to have a response (any response), than no response at all.

Enough of my rants. Are you keen to hear about The 4-Day Work Week?

It’s all to do with my new way of working. While I’m not quite ready to leap into The 4-Hour Work Week (if you haven’t read Timothy Ferris’ book yet, do yourself a favour), I am ready for The 4-Day Work Week. I’ve given my business a heart, head, soul and gut instinct overhaul and come up with a pretty compelling four day plan for how I can get the business to support my personal dreams.

From 1 March, here’s what an ideal week will look like; Mondays are the day for working ON the business ie growing the subscriber list, finding my first licensee, refreshing the website, building product to generate passive revenue and meeting the movers and shakers to help make it happen. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are the days for working IN the business by selling my time, speaking at events, running my Small Business Big Brand workshops (just 3 spots left for this Friday by the way), doing Kick Start Marketing Plans with my wonderful clients and some project management. Fridays are the days where I don’t work IN or ON the business at all, but on my next top-secret creative project….

After years of banging on to my clients about setting aside time to execute the brilliant marketing plans I build for them, I’m actually doing it for myself – not just for marketing the business, but for other personal creative pursuits, like acting lessons, French lessons, Billy’s school activities and even having a social life!

My vision has always been to create a business that will allow me to live and work from anywhere in the world. Admittedly, it’s not been until now, that I’ve been able to devise a plan on how to do it (Perhaps I needed seven years in the trenches doing the hard-yards to actually work it out!).

If like me, you have personal dreams you want to fulfill, I encourage you to do an audit of your business and devise a plan - a plan that adds real value to your clients, while allowing you to achieve your personal goals in life, whatever they may be!

Maybe you’re not quite ready for The 4-Hour Work Week, but if you’re ready for The 4-Day Work Week, I’d love to hear how you're going about it.

Warmest regards

Carolyn Tate
Director Connect Marketing
carolyn@connectmarketing.com.au
Phone +612 9340 7210

Subscribe to RSS Feed

Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0) | Permalink

What Rubbish! Right On!

Happy new year! Like me, I hope you’re bounding into this new decade with renewed enthusiasm, hope and determination.

You’ll recall I ended 2009 with a warts and all stock-take of the ups and downs of my year in business. The response to my ‘Keeping it real this festive season and beyond’ email was both humbling and overwhelming.  I received 70 email responses (usually I’m lucky if get one or two!) One lovely reader, also called Carolyn, summed up beautifully the response from most readers - ‘I wanted to say thank you for the honesty of your email. It’s refreshing to read something so real and down to earth. It stood out - as it didn’t have any of the usual BS and hype one expects in most newsletters. 2009 has been hell for many (including me) and speaking your truth will give many the permission to also speak the truth. Thank you.’

While exactly 65 of the responses almost bought me to tears with their encouragement and gratitude for being so honest, a further five were not so positive, saying how brave I was to expose my flaws to the world (which by the way has made me even more determined to tell it like it is!)

So each month from now on, instead of sharing my marketing pearls of wisdom (which can be read any time on the website or discovered at my Small Business Big Brand workshop on February 26 – shameless little plug there…), I’m going to give you a scorchingly real account of the changes I’m making in my business. I would love for you to come on this journey with me and share your changes, triumphs and flops. Read on to find out about my first big decision for 2010…

While my company name is Connect Marketing it would be fair to assume most people think of me - Carolyn Stafford - as the brand. So I’m about to do what most brand experts would say is brand suicide… change my name to Carolyn Tate (the name I was born with). Why, after all this time would I go through the tedious process of changing my name and having to re-establish myself again? I could list a whole stack of rational and practical reasons why I shouldn’t change it. On the other hand I really only have one reason for doing it – simply because it just feels right!

Far too often in my life, I’ve made what I call head (ie rampant, monotonous thinking) decisions rather than heart and gut instinct decisions. No more.

As I launch myself into the new decade my new-old name will be there beside me gently reminding me that the riskiest thing in life is to take no risks at all.

If you’re on the cusp of making your first big change for 2010, I hope like me, you can put a little bit of heart, soul and gut into your decision making! Here’s to a bonza 2010!

Carolyn Tate
Director Connect Marketing
E: carolyn@connectmarketing.com.au
W: www.connectmarketing.com.au
P: +612 9340 7210

Subscribe to RSS Feed

Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0) | Permalink

What Rubbish! Right On!

I’ve been agonising over what to write in this last email for 2009. I could write an article giving you marketing tips for the festive season (yawn) or send you a pretty e-card wishing you a fabulous Christmas (yawn again) or I could keep it real and share with you, the ups and downs of my year in business so maybe you’ll gain some insights for your own business.

After seven years in business, I have to say 2009 has been the most challenging of them all. Maybe it’s a case of the seven-year itch? Or maybe I just need a holiday?

On the downside, I’ve had to get real about the fact that I’ve been attempting to do too many things and have lost sight of the big vision.  I’ve had to restructure the business model to make it more profitable and retrench my loyal, right-hand woman Doris. I’ve experienced the real disappointment of spending months pitching my services to the big corporates only to face rejection. I’ve attempted and failed at dipping my toe in the China market. And I’ve let my website get a bit old and rusty. (Now that’s a real admission coming from a so-called marketing expert!)

On the upside, I’ve been invited to speak at 18 conferences in towns and cities from one end of Australia to the other. I’ve hosted 10 events for over 500 people. I’ve run the 30 Day Marketing Challenge with 12 business owners and mentored and produced real marketing plans for a further 26 businesses. I’ve successfully set up the marketing program for one of my favourite clients (and it’s been a huge amount of fun actually practicing what I preach). And one week ago I emailed off the last chapter of Marketing your Small Business for Dummies (launching May 2010)!

I’ve had down times wondering if it’s all worth it and up times when I’m completely on path and in-the-flow. I just figure that’s what goes with the territory of being a business owner. And at the end of the day, I really do love what I do. Doing this 2009 stock-take has been quite cathartic. I know I’ll be standing for yet another year seven years - but only if I keep it real!

I hope you make the time this summer holidays to review and reflect on 2009, to create your dreams and to make it happen for real in 2010. Happy holidays!

Subscribe to RSS Feed

Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0) | Permalink

What Rubbish! Right On!