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Make It Real June 2009
News and Views from Clarity to Business, LLC
Discover what you love. Build your business. Prosper. | |
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Greetings!
Happy Summer!
Here in Phoenix, where it's summer-ish half the year, we're old hands at the season. So if you live in a place just now coming alive with flowers and fruit and green, celebrate.
Speaking of celebrating: My book Passion, Plan, Profit, 12 Simple Steps to Turn Your Passion into a Solid Business is progressing nicely. The typesetter is almost finished and the cover is complete, which is exciting. It made me wonder about you all, my readers, who also want to write books. This month I feature two people who can help you write your book (see Client Spotlight below).
On June 25th at 3pm PST, I'll be teaching this month's last FREE tele-seminar: "What Marketing is Right for Your Personality." Email me if you'd like to attend.
Follow-up classes that go into more depth on blogging, Facebook, Twitter and other social media marketing methods start in July. Get details here.
In the meantime, stay cool, and clear.
Christy Strauch
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The myth of self-employment
 The writer of one to the blogs I read regularly has been talking about the security of self-employment. What sparked her posts was her favorite neighbors moving to Denver so one member of the couple can keep her job ("job gone in Portland, job available in Denver if you want it."). She's posted twice on how much more secure it is to be self-employed than it is to have a job.
Lest you scoff, this theory is also supported (empirically, even), by Thomas Stanley and William Danko, authors of The Millionaire Next Door. When you have a job, you have one client: your employer.Your risk is concentrated in one area; you have to keep your single customer happy, or get fired and lose one-hundred percent of your income.
When you have a business, the risk is spread over many customers (we hope), so losing one doesn't deal a death blow to your entire income.
At the same time, it's true that the small business failure rate is pretty high.
You know what else is high? The obesity rate in America.
How are these things related?
The prescription for weight loss is encapsulated in this short phrase: Burn more calories than you eat. That's six words. So simple, a second-grader could understand it.
The prescription for a successful business is almost as simple. Do a good job selling things people want, watch your numbers, and market. Thirteen words.
The paradox (for weight loss and your business) is that simple isn't easy. Simple is simple but can also be scary, painful, daunting, or feel downright impossible.
Is there a simple action staring you in the face right now that you could take to attract another client? This is one of the best ways we as business owners can spread the risk, even if we're scared.
For inspiration, check out the list on my blog of small businesses taking scary actions.
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TIP
 Take a Chance
Call two of your favorite clients and ask them for three referrals each. Get as much information from your clients about your prospects. Then, contact these six people by phone or email. Let them know why they should hire you, coming at it from the angle of "what's in it for them."
Then email me and tell me what it felt like to take this action. I'll feature you and your website and business in next month's newsletter. | |
Client Spotlight
Two of my clients work with writers who want to write books. Leslie Keenan works primarily with people who want to write non-fiction, and Lee Doyle works with fiction writers.
Both women are published authors in their own right, and skilled literary craftspeople. If you want to write a book, take the simple step of contacting one of them. Each will give you a FREE fifteen-minute consultation to discuss the book you want to write. Email Leslie or Lee now.
Funny thing. Writing a book has an even simpler formula than weight loss. In a quote attributed to the director Oliver Stone, the secret to a finished screenplay (or book), is "Ass plus chair."
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