Eliminating “Just”

“Just” can be such a limiting word.

“I’m just a mom.”

“I just make scarves.”

“This is just another day.”

“It’s just a job.”

“He’s just a writer.”

“She’s just an adviser.”

 

Eliminate the “just”s, and eliminate your limitations.

“I’m a mom. I am the most important person in someone’s life.”

“I make scarves. They become reminders of my love for whoever I give them to.”

“This is another day. Anything is possible.”

“It’s a job; another step on the way to my dreams.”

“He’s a writer. He feeds souls with words.”

“She’s an adviser. She motivates, empowers, and propels.”

I don’t just make jewelry. I create art that women can wear. My pieces will help you express your unique individuality, stand out from the crowd, and receive plenty of positive attention and compliments.

Do you think in terms of “just”? How much of a difference would it make if you were to break the habit?

A New Destination for Marketing Articles

My fabulous fellow business owners,

I’m super-psyched that you’ve enjoyed reading my blog. I’ve been overwhelmed by the positive feedback you’ve given me, and touched by every word of thanks you’ve ushered my way. Each comment, message, and tweet gives me a glorious warm and fuzzy feeling I can’t get from anything else. Even sexy-time.

While I’ve decided to steer this particular blog into more of a customer-friendly direction, there was no way in heck I could leave you guise behind.

I considered it, but your messages and words of thanks changed my mind.

You needy mother-cluckers, you!

So I’ve created a new web space for all of those business-oriented blog posts that you’ve come to love. While it’s directed towards beaders in business, most of the articles will apply to any handmade business owner and aspiring entrepreneur. I hope you’ll join me over at BeadingForBusiness.com. I’ve got some big plans for the new space; you can expect a good time.

I didn’t know I needed THAT

I make and sell handmade jewelry. The thing about selling a non-necessity like jewelery is, well… it’s a non-necessity. No one ever really NEEDS a new necklace or pair of earrings. Come to think of it, most people don’t really NEED a new smart phone, pair of dress shoes, or package of cookies either. Turns out, people buy a lot of things they don’t really need.

When people want something badly enough, they will convince themselves they do in fact NEED said thing. It’s up to the sellers to convince their potential customers that they want what they have to offer.

For example:
Susan Smith WANTS to go on a vacation. She sees some brochures and advertisements for a cruise line deal and these images and messages further deepen her want for the vacation. Eventually, the presence of these advertisements make it more and more likely that Susan will convince herself that she not only WANTS this vacation, but NEEDS it. She will tell herself that she has been working way too hard lately, and could use a break. She will convince herself that a vacation would be just the thing to reboot herself, and she would return feeling more productive and ready than ever.

In the above example, the cruise line company increased Susan’s desire for a vacation by placing their ads in front of her often enough for their message to sink in.

Relax. Enjoy. Take a break. You need this.

Susan is the company’s target audience (working, upper-middle class income, with vacation time to utilize.) The marketing campaign of the cruise line turned Susan’s original want into a specific NEED for their product. Susan no longer just wanted a break from work, but to go on a cruise during her time off.

Consider the above example when promoting your own products.

When marketing your products, be they jewelry, bath and body, or baked goods, market your items in such a way that places the emphasis on WHY someone would want them. Discern what your target audience’s desire is, and explain to them how your product fulfills that desire. Turn your non-necessary items into the solution to a problem.

How to Get Your Copy of My New eBook

Last Monday I offered you all a chance to win a PDF copy of my latest eBook for free. The lucky winner has been selected, and will be sent her free eBook later today. (Congratulations Wendy Mueller! Thanks for entering!)

But what about the rest of you? You really need to get your hands on your own copy.

Basically, if you like reading this blog, you’ll like reading this eBook. If you don’t like reading this blog…

…WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU DOING HERE!?!?!?

*ahem* Just sayin’. Why waste your time reading crap that you don’t even like? I’m not a fan of the vampire romance novel, so I generally avoid those kinds of books. Simple selection based on personal taste.

But now, if you DO like reading the crap I conjure up on this WordPress blog, then you’re only 3 dollars and 99 cents away from EVEN MORE crap to consume in-between business-minded posts.

Where you can get your copy (for, literally less than the price of a latte):
On Amazon for your kindle
At Barnes n’ Nobles for Your Nook
Or, BETTER YET, Instant Downloadable PDF here, here, or here.

Here’s a peek at the Table of Contents, just to show you some of the stuff I go over in this eBook:

Basically, you’ll be getting the same kind of helpful ideas, hints, and tricks you’ve gleaned from this blog. I start from the beginning and get into more advanced marketing techniques, so no matter where you’re currently at with your business, there should be a nugget or two in this eBook for you to challenge yourself with.

Oh, and did I mention it’s less than 4 dollars? I did? Well then, there really isn’t that much else for you to consider, now is there?

Release the Pressure by Lowering the Stakes

The stakes tend to be pretty high nowadays for a lot of things. If you’ve thought about trying to run a business or start your own blog, they could be enough to scare you away. The pressure to be amazing is daunting… and is the root cause of a lot of our procrastination. We are afraid to start something because we’re afraid it won’t end up as good as we want it to be.

How to lower the stakes:
That thing you want to do but feel like you have to do it really well?

Do it.

Do it so often that it no longer becomes such a big deal. If you can, do it a little bit everyday until it becomes a habit and who cares if you’re as amazing at it every time as you initially thought you should be.

Think about how nervous you were that first time you stood up to belt out your favorite karaoke song in front of everyone. Talk about SCARY, regardless of how many apple martinis you may have downed. NOW: think about the 100th time you’ve stood on that stage to sing the same song. Not as scary anymore, right? You may have even gotten a little better at singing. But even if you haven’t, the pressure to be as amazing as you thought you needed to be has loosened, if not disappeared completely.

Now about that business and/or blog. Same technique applies.

If you’ve been hanging around here awhile, you’ve probably noticed that I blog a lot. I generally schedule a new post to go up 6 out of 7 days of the week. I haven’t been around that long (about 2 years), but I’ve already published well over 400 posts, along with a scattering of guest posts on other blogs to boot. Not every post is amazing. Some of them turn out to be downright duds. But that’s okay, because I’ll be posting a new one shortly afterwards.

Same applies for your business. Not every item I list is amazing, but by listing as many as I do I don’t feel the pressure that each one has to be. Not every craft show is going to be a smashing success, but if you do enough of them every year one single show won’t have as much pressure for you to make it one. Not every Facebook update is going to go viral, but if you update on a daily basis, you’ll start to get a better handle on which ones grant a larger reach.

I know what you’re thinking: Quantity does not beat quality. Maybe not, but it sure beats doing nothing. And, dare I suggest, that the great quantities you produce will give you the room and practice to create better quality right along with them. It’s simple, really. The more you do it, the less pressure you’ll feel each time.

Create a Tribe of Followers by Being Different

Being different is tough, especially at first. Selling something unusual, that won’t appeal to as broad an audience as a bronze-toned owl necklace might, is a challenge to get off the ground. But, I’m here to tell you, when you DO get your unique products found by the people who love them, they will be fiercely loyal to both you, and what you are selling.

It’s like the marketing geniuses say: If you try to appeal to everyone you’ll end up appealing to no one.

Say you are a photographer, and you want to start selling your pictures on Etsy. You might take a look around, and quickly see that a lot of sparkly pictures of carnival rides sell well, and are sold by several of the photographers within the marketplace. You now have two choices: try to compete with these already established sellers by selling very similar items to theirs, or, sell something completely different. Monty Python style.

What if: you took some inspiration from these sellers (such as carnival rides) but put your own spin on it? For example, scary images of carnival rides completed with splattered blood and frightening clowns would appeal to the horror-loving crowd. Or, stylized, pastel-colored renditions of these rides could work well for children’s nurseries. See what I did there? I just carved out two possible niche markets that a photographer could be aiming for, rather than the very general definition of anyone who shops on the internet.

Not everyone thinks my eye rings are cool – and that’s a GOOD thing!

When you establish a niche market by selling something unique and different, you will be able to more effectively target your desired audience with the appropriate marketing. You will be able to identify where they hangout online, what they “like” on Facebook, and which local events they might be attending. Since you are making items that your target market is more likely to LOVE, they will also be more likely to become loyal followers of you and help spread the word. By merely selling something unique, your tribe of initial customers will help do a lot of your promotion for you. Who, after all, doesn’t want to be first to tell the world about an awesome new product they just bought?

Please Don’t Feed the Edgerank Spammers (…or become one)

Those of us who operate Facebook business pages get the delightful insight of seeing how many of our fans get to see our posts. We bang our heads against the wall, and scream along with death metal music to express our frustrations. We work our hardest trying to come up with awesome crap to post, only to have it seen by a mere percentage of the people who obviously want to see it since they clicked the “like” button.

Well, not necessarily.

When I first joined Facebook I added “Willow” in as one of my favorite movies. Action, romance, fantasy creatures, and an adorable baby – what’s not to like? I added it merely to populate a blank profile page with my personal interests. I wasn’t really aware that I was actually “liking” a business page that would start to populate my feed with pictures and quotes and trivia about the movie. Likewise, I am not interested in when Metallica is going to be playing in Tennessee (as much as I like the band), or that my favorite books are being re-leased for the Kindle.

Sometimes people “like” pages because they like a product or brand, and don’t initially realize that they are going to be receiving daily messages in their feeds from those pages. What Facebook does, in order to prevent people from seeing too much from pages they didn’t really intend to see updates from, is they only share content that those users frequently interact with. A post that receives more interaction from more people will be given a higher “edge rank” and be seen by even more people (unless of course, you pay Facebook money to up the rank without the interaction.)

Interaction on Facebook consists of comments, shares, and likes. Posts that receive more of these will be seen by more people. Hence, the temptation for pages to Edgerank Spam.

Edgerank Spam consists of posts that ask viewers to like, share, or comment for a reason that tugs at their heart strings. It usually has nothing to do with what the page is about. I know you’ve all seen them, they look like this:

“Like if you love Jesus! Comment if you’ve accepted Him into your heart!”

“Like to support our troops!”

“Share to save the polar bears!”

“Comment if you want Obama THROWN OUT!”

“Like for One Direction, comment for Justin Beiber.”

“Share this post and the image will transform! It really works!”

“Like if you HATE CANCER!”

You get the idea. The original creators of these posts often have no intention of spreading religion, preventing cancer, or providing support for injured soldiers. They simply want to up their rank on Facebook so they can get seen by more people and gather additional fans. In fact, building up business pages that are pre-loaded with fans and interaction is actually turning into a big business. Individuals are taking these pages, and selling them to businesses who don’t want to do the legwork building up their own fan base.

It’s pretty underhanded and sleazy, I know.

Please don’t feed the Edgerank Spammers. As much as this image tugs at your heart-strings, liking it will do nothing to help this child:

And please resist the temptation to create posts that spam their way to a higher rank by using this technique. It’s sneaky and icky. Instead, do the legwork. It’s harder, but it’s worth it in the end. If you write interesting updates and share valuable information via Facebook, your fans will naturally want to interact with you more. You want fans who really like you and your stuff, it does neither of you any favors to betray that trust.

Have some Facebook friends who are feeding the Edgerank Spammers and polluting your feed? Share this post to educate them!

How to Decide What’s a Big Deal

There’s this woman I work with, who, is generally a very nice individual. She is easy-going and open… until someone takes her parking spot.

We have a very large parking lot across the building where we all work. No one really has designated spots, they just start to feel “claimed” after certain people have been parking in them for awhile. Sort of like the desk you sit in on the first day of class, which automatically thereafter becomes “your” desk.

One day, in a fit of rage over her parking spot being taken, this co-worker asks me, “What would YOU do if someone parked in YOUR spot?”

My hesitant response: “Uhm… I would park in the next spot over.”

I didn’t want to belittle her concerns, but… seriously? It’s just a parking spot. Not like there aren’t several others to choose from only a few car-lengths away. I just don’t understand all of the wasted energy being wasted on something that isn’t a big deal.

Unless you count how much I stress over keeping my nails painted nice, or getting the dishes done before company comes over, or head-desking over a later-noticed grammatical error on a Facebook page status. Come to think of it, there are a lot of meaningless “parking-lot spaces” I worry over. I can even take a wild guess that a lot of you have some too.

Taking a step back, looking at the big picture, what are some of the silly things you stress over? That extra 5 lbs? Not showing up on the first page of your Etsy browse category? The reach status of your Facebook posts? Let’s take a moment to realize together, that there are a lot of silly things we worry over, which may be distracting us from some of our bigger goals and dreams.

What do you worry about, that isn’t REALLY that big of a deal?

Waiting for the Guarantee

There is no guarantee that you will succeed. There will never be one. You can wait, and wait, and wait for your window of absolute certainty, but it will never come.

I know it’s scary, but sometimes life requires the courage to take risks. You need to embrace the possibility of failure.

If you never take a chance, you will never see success from your efforts. That is the only guarantee.

Friday’s Featured Artist = YOU

So you’ve seen and enjoyed all of the fabulous Featured Artist posts that grace this blog every Friday. You’ve gotten to meet a lot of fantastic new handmade businesses this way, amiright? It’s always so great to share the love and discover new sellers.

But by now you may be thinking, what about my shop? Well… if you have an online shop where you sell your handmade goodies, I would LOVE to consider it for a Friday feature here on my blog.

All you have to do is fill out your responses to the interview questions in the form below, and I’ll contact you when your feature is posted! It’s really just that simple. Why on earth would you pass up an opportunity for this kind of free promotion for your shop?

I’m looking forward to your responses!

Your Name(required)

Email(required)

Website(required)

Can you sum yourself up in 3 sentences? Give it a go!

Tell us about what you sell:

What is your favorite thing about creating?

Where do you find your inspiration?

Do you have any advice for other sellers?

Do you have a coupon code for us?

Where else can we find you? (facebook/blog/etc)

Do you have an item you would like to offer for a giveaway?