Lucy Loves Business – Page 3 of 27 – Brilliant Business Things

Looking from the other side (for easy Marketing content)

When something is your Thing you look at it from ‘your’ side–the side where you know how it works well, what to do to get the results, and usually the ‘easy way’. So when you’re putting together marketing material, you need to look from the ‘other’ side.

What I know about flow

I would love to tell you that I wake up in ‘full flow’ every single day and do my Thing with no distractions, interruptions or procrastination on my part. I would love to tell you that–except, of course, it’s not true.

What is true is that I know what to do, or at least what usually ‘helps’, to shift me into flow mode. It’s not always the same set of actions, but there are a few things I can choose from.

Give them what they want (but make it what they need)

You should always be listening to your market and offering products and services they want. That’s common business sense. That said, sometimes you may know that what they (your market) ‘want’ is not what they ‘need’. The trick here is a to strike a balance and meet them where they are, then gently ‘steer’ them to where you know lies a better answer.

What you didn’t know you knew (and why I love interviews)

Interviews are an amazing way to discover what you didn’t know you knew already. Provided you’re OK to think on your feet, or OK to ‘go with the flow’, you’ll find out you know a lot more than you think you did. I come up with all sorts of statements, stories and a-ha moments simply as part of a conversation. This is why I rarely say no to an interview.

The long way round

Sometimes we know we’re ‘almost there’, but instead of taking the step to the left, we take about 47 right turns to end up there instead. And that’s OK.

Sometimes you’ll meet people who found their Thing, worked out their business model and got their positioning or niche right in one go. And then there will be other people (I was one of them) who took quite a few steps to get there. And shorter isn’t always better if you paid attention along the way.

Show how easy it is (simple content marketing tip)

Your Thing is super-easy for you, that’s why it’s your Thing! And a really easy way to create content is by sharing instructions–a checklist, some tips, a ‘How to’ that shows people how easy it is when they do this the way you do it.

About your about

I’ve carried out some not-very-scientific research of About descriptions from websites and other places, and I conclude that we definitely want to hear about your Thing, but we also want to know about you…

I don’t know (so tell me)

If you can answer questions people ask about ‘things’ or solve a problem people have, then you have a very valuable Thing. The point, of course, is to let people know that…

Too much personality

Almost all of the time I’m a huge advocate of putting more of YOU in your business. But sometimes you can make your business SO much about you that you’re forgetting it’s actually not about you at all.

Let me explain…

Seasons greetings (all year round)

As I write this, it’s December and so there’s a very obvious seasonal feel to a lot of marketing messages everywhere I look. But it’s not just the Christmas and New Year holidays that can lend themselves nicely (sometimes too nicely!) to promotions and connected offers.

The Thing about Magic

The other night I went out for dinner with a group of people and experienced some serious magic. It wasn’t in fact the cooking (although my Pork Belly was very yummy) but proper “How the hell did he do that?!” close-up magic. The sort of magic where I was incredulously shaking my head shrieking “How is that possible?!” (yes, I was the one choosing the card that ended up in the wallet–in a zipped pocket, in a ticket case–when I had been holding the wallet in the palm of my hand AND it had my name written on it in my handwriting?!).

Old School talking to people on telephone

Go ‘Old School’

Now look, I know it’s not the ‘cool’ thing to do marketing-wise… that would be funnels and split-testing landing pages and the live videos on Facebook… BUT a good old-fashioned phone call can go a long way.

As can ‘real life’ networking.

Or what about a letter in the post?