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My hair and your marketing

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My hair and your marketingLast week a friend dropped by unexpectedly after work.  The first thing she said was, “I really like your hair that way.  It’s smoother.  It looks good.” 

Seriously?  I laughed and said, “You’re kidding.  This is ‘bed hair!’  I went to the gym early, then went directly to my desk, where I’ve spent the entire day.” 

“No, really,” she said.  “I really like it that way.”

Well, of course, being a pushover for compliments, I deliberately blew my hair straight and smooth. 

Two days later I attended an open house at her business.  Her assistant, whom I hadn’t seen in a few months, waved hello, then walked over to chat.

“Something’s different,” she said.  “I think it’s your hair.  I really just want to mess it up, make it look windblown.”  She actually reached toward me, like it was all she could do to keep her hands off my hair!

Really?  One person likes my hair flat and smooth; the other likes it spiky and tussled.  Which just goes to show you:  you can’t please everyone.

My hair and your marketing 

What does my hair have to do with your marketing?  You can’t please everyone either. (I don’t know about you, but I hate that.)

That’s why it’s so seriously, definitely, unbelievably important that you know clearly who your target market is. 

You have to know your market inside out.  You have to know both what they want and what they need (which may not be the same thing!).

  • Know how they think
  • Know what they feel
  • Know their values
  • Know where they shop
  • Know what they read
  • Know where they hang out
  • Know how they spend their time
  • Know what keeps them awake at night and
  • Know what brings them joy.

Because knowing all this will guide everything in your business.  First and foremost, it will guide what products and services you offer.  Then it guides your pricing.  After that, it will guide your marketing strategy, marketing energy and marketing dollars.

Your marketing success depends on it

Nothing is more important to the success of your business than knowing who your target market is.  It’s the only way you can differentiate yourself and get any marketing traction.

Here’s an example:  let’s say you’re a financial planner.  You sell a huge variety of financial products, anything from mutual funds, stocks and bonds, retirement investments, annuities, life insurance and more.  Most everyone over the age of 22 needs something in that list.

If I ask, “Who is your target market?” and you tell me, “Everyone needs financial planning,” you are going to run yourself ragged trying to meet both men and women from age 22 to 95 and still only be marginally successful. 

  • Your marketing pieces will be watered down and generic.
  • Your educational events will lack focus and guidance.
  • You’ll be attending a gazillion networking events – everything from “Meet Ups for Young Professionals” to “Silver Seniors Breakfast Club.”

And more than that, the people you meet won’t know for sure that you truly understand their priorities and the challenges they face.

But if you tell me your target marketing is “Baby boomers who are getting serious about retirement plans” that paints a whole different picture.

  • Your email marketing can contain articles with specific advice for someone in that age range.
  • You will use images that baby boomers relate to.
  • The background music at your educational events will be Creedence Clearwater and Van Morrison.
  • Your prospects will know you understand their needs and priorities.

I have a client who owns a retail store selling environmentally friendly baby products, everything from diapers to soaps, to toys, to strollers.  She knows her customers inside out.  Though they come from hugely diverse socio-economic backgrounds, they have one common value:  green!  They believe their children are safer with environmentally friendly products.

  • The store owner knows their values, knows what they think, and what they believe.
  • She knows what they read and where they show up.
  • She’s built a huge following on social media and has a loyal and growing customer base.

Close your eyes and open your mind

Right now, close your eyes and envision your three most profitable customers.  These three people will typify the three IDEAL market segments you want to attract.    Create a Persona (like a caricature) for each one – yes, give them a name.  Create a background story for each of them.

If you don’t already know this information, then find out more about who your customers are, beyond their relationship to you.  Then use this information to clearly define your target market.  And use THAT information to make your marketing decisions.

Because…just like me and my hair, you just can’t please everyone.

P.S.  So, I’m not really obsessed with my hair, I promise, but…I’d really like your opinion.  Not that I do polling to make sure I please people or anything like that.  I mean, I’m my own person.  I have to please myself first, right?  But still, if you’d like to vote on which hair style you like best, just leave a comment :)!

Spiky

Spiky

Smooth

Smooth

The Alpha Mare: Women and Power

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Women and powerAs women, we want others to see us as understanding, compassionate and fair, right?

Powerful?  Don’t go there.

Fearful of perceptions and stereotypes, even the strongest women sometimes perceive power as being negative.   Anxious we’ll be labeled as demanding or hard to please, we often feel hesitant to assume appropriate power.

I’ve seen women walking on eggshells with their staff, or nearly held hostage by employees, fearful of articulating responsibility and expecting accountability.  I’ve seen women make excuses for employees who do not live up to expectations, don’t produce enough or simply do mediocre work while the company suffers and the bar gets lowered for everyone on the team.

I’ve seen women taken advantage of by vendors, contractors, even clients who are tough negotiators.

We’re raised to be nice girls.  We don’t want to make waves.  The result?  Because power can be scary, we abdicate and give away our legitimate power in ways we can’t even see.  We struggle with setting limits, expressing expectations and taking care of own needs.

I think we develop this negative association of power from what we see in movies, literature, television or in the news.  Power is dramatized or heightened to get headlines and top ratings.  We only notice power when it’s overused, misused or abused.

When power is appropriately used, it’s often invisible.  

So we avoid our power, until we come face to face with the reality that we have given away our genuine power, settled for someone else’s version of what we should or shouldn’t do, or behave as though we have no choice.

When we abdicate our power, we create a vacuum of leadership, without recognizing that our team members and staff would respect a more assertive, confident position.

What’s the answer?  My best lessons about authentic, appropriate power didn’t come from business books or business training.  My best education about power came from … horses!

When I finally learned to ride, at the ripe age of forty, I learned that in every herd of horses, there is a dominant horse, the horse recognized to be in charge. This horse is always a mare.  She’s known as the Alpha Mare.

Her duty is to tend to the safety and well-being of the entire herd.  She signals the entire when to move, sleep, eat, drink or run for safety.  She disciplines unruly youngsters, teaching them respectful behavior.

The Alpha Mare has a great responsibility; the herd depends on her to make wise choices and enforce reasonable rules. The entire herd looks to her for leadership, structure and discipline.

Alpha Mares don’t squirm over their legitimate power and they don’t worry about what the other horses think of them.  They certainly don’t try to avoid or give away their power.

They embrace their power.  They lead. 

How can we be more like the wise Alpha Mares?

First, we can to shift our perception of power from negative to positive.  We can and let go of the fear of what others think of us, express our expectations and get comfortable setting limits and boundaries.  We can use our power to lead.

As business leaders, we have the power to facilitate teamwork, to inspire employees to discover their talents and pursue their dreams. We have the power to influence others, to lead others to achieve what they might not accomplish otherwise.  We have the power to create jobs and to improve our communities.

Power isn’t bad — abuse of power is.

It’s an honor to be like the Alpha Mare!  Embrace your power and use it for the greater good.

A Tribute to Women Entrepreneurs: Celebrate National Entrepreneurs Week!

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celebrate national entrepreneurs weekLast month my fair city endured a nasty ice storm, complete with bitter cold temperatures.   Though not as hard hit as other cities caught in this polar blast, we still had tree limbs falling on roofs and blocking streets, and plenty of car crashes.  Schools, churches and businesses closed down.

With the roads that dangerous, I had to reschedule a meeting of twelve women business owners.  I phoned each of them to arrange a new date.

Guess where I found most of them? 

Eleven out of twelve were at work!  The only one at home has three small children and school was cancelled.

Some had no electrical power at their office and were working by candlelight, bundled up in quilts! 

Apart from being concerned for their safety, I have to say I was both amused and inspired.

The situation made profoundly clear to me the mentality of the small business owner:  we have work to do and the show must go on.  We have clients who need us, we have promises to keep, and we have employees who depend on us.

Some women entrepreneurs run businesses that must operate, regardless of weather, 365 days a year, twenty four hours a day.

During the storm, I talked with the owner of a home health and hospice business.  Though the power at her office went out, her business did not miss a beat.  “We saw every patient we could get to,” she told me.  “Our first priority is patient care and we can’t let the weather stop us.”

Another women owns a CPA firm.  Her clients had payroll and tax deadlines to meet.  “We have to be there for them,” she said.  “We have to get these computers up and get to work.”  She quickly borrowed two generators and bought another.  She needed three to generate enough power to run the heat, the lights, and ten computers. 

I’m convinced that women entrepreneurs share some sort of common DNA, despite their diverse backgrounds, personality types and skills.  This DNA is what people in the horse industry call “heart.” 

Thoroughbred breeders tell you that a horse with heart has this rare combination of energy and courage.  It won’t give up, won’t quit, no matter what the challenge.

Heart has nothing to do with the size, beauty or pedigree of the horse.  It’s an internal quality — a generosity of spirit that compels it to keep trying, to master the challenge no matter the effort.

Women business owners have heart!

That’s why I’m happy to see February 15—22, 2014 designated as National Entrepreneurs Week. 

Entrepreneurs (men and women) don’t get nearly enough credit or validation for the courage it takes to fly without a net.  We take for granted the tremendous pressure an entrepreneur feels for being responsible for the livelihoods of their employees and being responsible for the bottom line.  Not to mention, their own families!

The women business owners I know are not greedy capitalists, thinking only of their own profits or how to get rich.  They are driven by a genuine passion that even they can’t often find words to describe.  They are determined to do an excellent job at whatever they do.

Their work ethic is unmatched. 

Most people underestimate the diversity of expertise an entrepreneur needs – they have to be competent at an incredible variety of skills.  Unlike large corporations that have specialized departments to handle specific responsibilities, women business owners have to be knowledgeable about everything — from accounting to employment law, from management to marketing, from technology to teamwork, from website design to strategic planning.

Keep an eye on your local media and I’ll bet you this:  you’ll rarely see women entrepreneurs in the pages of your newspaper or featured in television interviews.  They don’t often seek recognition.  They humbly go about their daily lives, putting one foot in front other, doing the best they can to take care of their families, their customers and their employees.

I hope you’ll join me in taking this one week to appreciate and honor every woman entrepreneur you know (including yourself!) for the contribution she makes to her family, to her community and to the  economy.

Here’s to you, women entrepreneurs!  Take a bow. 

Take care,

Darcie

 

e-book for women entrepreneurs

e-book for women entrepreneurs

 

 

P.S. 

My new book affirms the heart of women entrepreneurs, using metaphors and stories to teach new self-awareness and business skills. 

Because every woman entrepreneur deserves to achieve HER version of success!

Pick Up Your Drum & Dance

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The text message arrived early New Year’s day.  “N’attends pas que les événements arrivent comme tu le souhaites.  Décide de vouloir ce qui arrive…et tu seras heureux.” 

This was a New Year’s wish from a long-time client, a native of Switzerland, who enjoys sending messages in French as much as I love untangling them.  This one translates as, “Do not expect that events arrive as you want. Decide you want what happens … and you shall be happy.”   

In other words, choose happiness.

What makes the quote even more meaningful is that the original words were spoken by Epictetus, a Greek philosopher, who began life as a slave.  (He’s perhaps best known as the guy who said, “We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen more than we speak.”)

I was touched by my client’s thoughtfulness and a bit surprised.  This particular client is perhaps the most driven, most determined I’ve ever worked with.  He (my only male client!) is a perfectionist, with very high expectations.   I actually like that about him (most of the time), because he epitomizes what I so often try to teach women.  Think big, and do not apologize for your ambitions.

Twenty-four hours later, I smiled with joy from start to finish as I watched the movie Sweet Dreams, set in Butare, a rural village in Rwanda.  The country has made tremendous economic progress since the tragic genocide of 1994.  Yet 85% of the people are subsistence farmers, so the struggle to survive and provide persists.

The movie tells the story of Rwanda’s first and only female drumming troupe, Ingoma Nshya.  Dancing and drumming are beautiful traditions of the Rwanda’s people, but drumming was for men only — till now!

The drumming troupe is open to women from both sides of the genocide — the orphans, widows, wives and children of both victims and perpetrators.

The only requirement?  They had to leave the categories of the past at the gate.

Kiki, the leader of the drumming troupe, tasted ice cream in another country.  No such sweetness was part of Rwandan life!  She decided to form a co-op and open Butare’s first ice cream shop.  They named the shop Inzozi Nziza (Sweet Dreams).

I wish you could see how these women work together, side by side, making all decisions together.  But more than anything I wish you could see the joy on their faces as they drum and dance.

These remarkable women have made a choice.  They chose forgiveness.  They chose happiness.

These two random events — the text message from a client and the movie the next day — had a powerful effect on me as they worked their way through my mind and my heart and wove themselves together.

Just last week I grumbled about having to pay the plumber $250 to fix leaky faucets.  The prior week I whined about losing tree limbs in the ice storm.  And yet I have a comfortable, warm home, plenty to eat, more clothes and shoes than I can wear in a year and the freedom to choose what I want to do and how I feel.

So the universe offered me a little gift of serendipity this year, saying one thing:  choose happiness.

Feel all your feelings, but don’t get stuck there.  It’s okay to feel disappointed, but move on.  It’s okay to feel discouraged, but try again.  It’s okay to feel angry, but let it go.  Choose happiness.

So as we enter this shiny new year, join me in remembering the former slave who used his experience to become a philosopher.  Join me in learning from the women of Rwanda who left the past behind and now blaze new trails together.  Join me in forgiving and feeling grateful.

Let’s choose happiness.  Pick up your drum and dance.

Take care,

Darcie

 

 

“Half my marketing dollars are wasted – I just don’t know which half”

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220px-John_WanamakerThis handsome gentleman is John Wanamaker, the man often cited as the source of that famous quote above.

Did you know he was an incredibly successful Philadelphia merchant in the late 1800’s? 

I take strange comfort in knowing that marketing strategies have stumped business owners for hundreds of years. 

John Wanamaker was known as modest, honest and the innovator of the “money back guarantee.”  He was also known as a merchandising and advertising genius. 

So if John Wanamaker was confused – before the options of television, the internet, mobile devices and social media were thrown into the mix — it’s no surprise that business owners today are seriously confounded!

Do you know which half of your marketing dollars are wasted?

The massive amount of choices you have about how to spend your marketing money and time mean one thing:  you absolutely need a marketing plan.

You have to be relentlessly strategic, or you’ll go broke just throwing money at marketing.

Creating a well-defined marketing plan will help you generate more leads and increase your sales.  You’ll accomplish these three critical benefits:

1)      Make better decisions about where to spend marketing time and money

2)      Save marketing dollars by spending them on what works

3)      Keep you focused and consistent, instead of “hit and miss”

Now is the perfect time to create your marketing plan for 2014. 

We’ve made it easy for you.  Our e-course “Become a Marketing Superstar:  How to Create a Marketing Plan Guaranteed to Increase Sales” comes complete with a 12-page customizable marketing plan template!

So don’t wait!  Be strategic and prepared to make 2014 your best year ever.

get the details here

 

Take care,

Darcie

 

P.S.  And…like John Wanamaker, we’ll offer you a money-back guarantee!

Women entrepreneurs: we may not have met but I think I know you

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orangesweater_highresEven if we haven’t met face to face, I bet I know a few things about you…

I know that you have courage you don’t give yourself credit for – I mean, you could have played it safe and chosen a “job” with a steady paycheck.  Or climbed the corporate ladder.  Right?

But that’s not what you wanted.

You wanted to be your own boss.  You wanted the flexibility of setting your own schedule, your own hours (even though that means some days you work till midnight!).

Or maybe you pursued your passion instead of tolerating a job that wasn’t satisfying for you.

I also know that despite the “marketing smile” you wear in public, sometimes you feel like a fraud, an imposter.  Sometimes you don’t feel as confident as you look.

Secretly you worry that someday, someone will “discover” that you really don’t know what you’re doing.

I also know that very likely you didn’t get special training in “how to be a woman entrepreneur” – and that’s true even if you have an MBA!  Because the real world doesn’t play out like what’s in the text books.

I know that you have dreams for your business, that you want it to grow, but you’re already working so hard that the thought of getting “bigger” feels like one more burden.

I know that sometimes it feels like every time you take step forward, there’s a step back.

I know sometimes you just feel stuck.  And alone.

I know this because I’ve worked exclusively with women business owners for sixteen years – in every industry you can imagine – from retail to doggie day cares to professional service firms to manufacturing companies.

I also know that most businesses reach a stage where they need very specific tools and concrete, practical directions.

And in that stage I know that the woman entrepreneur has to take a long hard look at herself.  She has to increase her business knowledge and her leadership abilities.  She has to move from “doing” to “leading.”

And I know for certain that’s entirely possible.

I’ve seen it happen, and been fortunate to be a part of that transition.  I know that when you learn the tools and processes necessary to get through this stage of growth, you can get unstuck and grow.

Getting bigger doesn’t have to mean working harder.

Your business can thrive and your life can become less stressful.  Your business can grow and become less dependent on you.  Your life can look like YOUR version of success.

Here’s what else I know:  I have no silver bullet, no quick fix, no magic wand to wave, no pixie dust to sprinkle.

If that’s what you’re looking for, then you can stop reading right here.  I don’t offer hype, oversimplified solutions and sound bites.  I don’t over-promise and under-deliver.

What I do offer is step-by-step learning.  It’s not sexy.  It’s not glamorous.

It’s the truth — the real deal.  I can show you the road map to get from where you are to where you want to be.

But I can’t do it alone.

You have to participate.  You have to be willing to risk who you are for who you can become.

And I know that’s not for everyone.  You have to want it.

Are you willing to learn the tools and the leadership skills necessary to grow?

If your answer is “Yes!” then I hope you’ll apply.

I’m now accepting ten students to take my seven-session e-course called THRIVE!  How to Get Unstuck and Grow your Business. 

If you are one of those ten, here’s what you’ll get:

  • Five online e-courses (lessons on planning, structure, financials and accountability)
  • Two 45-minute one-on-one coaching sessions (following sessions 3 and 5)
  • Tools that enable you to work “on” your business not just “in” your business
  • Interactive templates (so you don’t need to reinvent the wheel)
  • Guidelines that will show you how to transition from “doing” to “leading”
  • Knowledge on how to move from chaos to order
  • Instructions on how to standardize processes and procedures
  • Leadership skills to help you increase employee commitment, engagement and accountability

And if you do the work, here’s what you REALLY get:

  • The increased confidence that education and tools can bring
  • The peace of mind of knowing your company will be less dependent on you
  • The financial success to live the life you really want

And here’s the best part — since it’s online learning, you have lots of flexibility on when you view the courses.

  • The e-courses are sent to you weekly — curl up and view them at your convenience, any time before the following session.
  • Your coaching sessions are scheduled a week in advance.

Think it over.

Ask yourself this:  “How much can my revenues increase in just one year if I can get unstuck and grow this business?”

Compare that with your investment in the seven-session online course:  $1295 and your time (45-60 minutes per session).  If you do the work, the skills you learn will last a lifetime and you will recover your investment a hundred times over.

As with all my training, I offer a 100% money-back guarantee.  If you’re not completely satisfied, I’ll refund your payment.  No hassles.  No hurt feelings.  No risk.

So I hope you’ll take this opportunity to learn substantive, practical, essential business skills that will give you the confidence you need for your business (and you!) to THRIVE!

Only ten places are available and the deadline for application is Monday, January 6, 2013.  The e-course begins on Friday, January 10.

yes, i'm in

 

 

And as a special bonus, the first five women to enroll will receive FREE my e-course How to Create a Marketing Plan Guaranteed to Increase Sales (a $74 value), which includes an incredible 12-page interactive Marketing Plan template.

It’s your decision, but I hope you say, “I’m in!” and we’ll go down this road together.

yes, i'm in

 

 

Take care,

Darcie

 

 

P.S.  Oh, there’s one more thing I know:  if you’re willing to learn, you CAN go from feeling like an impostor to feeling like a smart, capable, unstoppable woman entrepreneur.

yes, i'm in