I’m updating this in the Spring of 2020. Many of us are dealing with the shutdown and losing clients. There are still many places out there looking to outsource.

California has AB-5 which is hurting the freelancers and contractors. If you live in California, you’ll understand. Contact your representatives and tell them the impact it has had on you.

Set up routines. They will help you stay productive, and they will keep you more positive since you’ll feel like you’re doing something.

And start reaching out to your network. Check in on people to see how they’re doing. You may be that voice of hope that they needed.

Ok, back to the blog.

We’re now a few weeks in to 2020. Have you updated your marketing plan yet? If not, now is the perfect time for planning your marketing strategy this year.

Before reading today’s blog, pull out some paper and jot down the ideas that pop into your head. You may remember something that you want to plan on, and I don’t want you to forget any of it.

Your Plan for January

This is normally the time you’d get the stuff done that you didn’t get around to in December. But being as it’s almost the end of the month, I’d recommend spending the last week of the month planning.

However, if you’re in the life coaching, financial, diet or health niches, now is actually a better time to target your tribe rather than at the beginning of the year.

Why?

Most people have given up at this point.  So if you can find a way to target that pain and provide motivation to recommit, you’re providing them with a lot of value.

You can offer a special program to help people recommit to their goals, and find paths to achieving it. And it’s good to remind them that they still have time before Spring and Summer.

Your Plan for the First Quarter

Start off your first quarter with a big success and it will add momentum to your plans for the rest of the year. If you were building up your fan page on Facebook, you now have better demographics of people who know like and trust you.

Decide first what your goal is. Do you want to increase revenue? Conversions? Increase your brand awareness?

A lot of this will depend upon your calendar for the year. If you’re intending on releasing a product in April, you will want to spend the first quarter building up relationships with people who could be promoting your product.

You also want to have a plan for building up the excitement with your current tribe that you’ve been building up on social media.

Figure out your important date, and then work backwards to identify all the mini-milestones you’ll be hitting (or needing to hit) to get there.

From there, you will want to take a look at your systems. Do you have the procedures in place to hit those milestones?

I’m currently reading Atomic Habits by James Clear. He makes some great points about how you can clean your house, and it’s clean for a moment. But until you have the systems in place to maintain it, you’re going to end up drowning in clutter again in a short period of time.

I’ll detail some things to put into your plan below.

How should you do this?

It really depends upon you, your team, and your level of comfort.

I know some people do well with Trello. I use Evernote. And this year, I set up Bootcamp and Wrike to test out. 

I use Evernote to track my goals, and do a daily diary of what I did and how effective I was.

I still use Michael Hyatt’s Daily Focus Planner. I like the way it gets me to do weekly reviews as well as identify how to break up my big goals into quarterly achievable goals. It’s helped me get my routines which are essential during these interesting times.

So that’s why I say it should work for you and what you’re trying to accomplish.

Plan for the Year

Maybe we should have started with this. However, I suspect looking shorter term helped remind you of longer term, right?

And that’s why I wanted you to be taking notes while reading this.

So for the year, think about how you can target holidays or other big days for your business. Maybe you are a marketing consultant who also promotes other people’s products (and if you don’t, you should).

So you’ll want to track release calendar sites to find out when there will be some good promotions, and you can plan your email and social media campaign around those dates.

Now is also a great time to create your content calendar. Maybe you have a different theme for each month, or you have a theme per day, and you want to capture as many ideas as possible so it’s easy to create.

Just like with the first quarter, it’s time to plan backwards with mini-milestones and review your processes.

What Should You Plan

• Content calendar
• Ad spend
• Ad strategies (Facebook, banner, solo, Google, Bing, etc.)
• Holiday strategies
• Release dates
• Outreach (webinars, live q&a sessions, ask me anything, etc.)
• Expanding or contracting your social media – focus on what works for you, and always be testing
• SEO – what keywords do you want to target this year

If you need any guidance on this (or want someone to do it for you), contact me and I’ll see what I can do to assist or find you the right person.

Happy New Year! Notice the image is blank? Yup. That’s your blank slate for 2018. It doesn’t matter what’s in the past. You’re starting off fresh right here and right now.

First, have a clear vision for where you want to be in one year. Do you want to double or triple your current income? Spend some time really thinking about this because it will impact the next step which is creating your marketing plan for 2018.

I’m currently of two minds about BIG goals and achievable goals. Brian Tracy always said that you need a goal that you believe you can achieve, otherwise you’ll talk yourself out of it. But I just finished listening to 10X by Grant Cardone. Grant counsels to shoot for the stars. Then if you hit the moon, you’ll still be happier than if you shot for the atmosphere and achieved it.

I think it helps to know yourself. If you’re just getting started, the doubling your income will seem awesome. Then your brain will realize you can do it, and you can then go for the 10x. Or maybe you’re the type that is all in, gung-ho, running faster than your guardian angel can fly. In which case, yeah, go for the 10x goal and let it motivate you.  Or do both and see which feels better.

How To Achieve It

Ok, so you have your big goal for 2018. Now it’s time to do reverse planning. Don’t panic!  Actually, let’s play a Jedi mind trick to make it easier, and it will help you to believe you really can achieve it.

First, let’s say you want to earn $120,000 this year and you’ve never made more than $50,000. Divide 120,000 by 52 weeks and then by 7 days a week and then by 24 hours in a day and you get $12.74/hour. That doesn’t seem so scary, now does it? Especially since $50,000 is $24/hr.  (ok, you’re not really going to work 24 hours a day 7 days a week, but work with me here. You can make $12.74/hour, right? It helps your lizard brain calm down when it sees that it’s not a big deal.  The lizard brain tends to freak out over the big numbers like $120,000).

Put in your numbers and manipulate it until it looks achievable. Then post that somewhere and say “I can easily do that.”

Your Marketing Plan for 2018

Ok, so how are you going to get that $12.74/hr? By finding your ideal clients who want what you’re offering.

Defining Your Client

Ok, let’s start out with your ideal client. Perhaps you’ve done this. If so, pull it out and dust it off. Is your ideal client really still your ideal client?

Well, how would you know, I hear you ask.  Pull out your financials and your client list from 2017. You may want to put this into a spreadsheet. But what you are going for is who are your top grossing clients.

Now, I have to ask…do you like working with them? Or do you cringe when they call?

If you can, try to identify some special qualities about your favorite clients. What makes them mesh well with you. And what are the qualities of the worst clients?

Going forward in 2018, how can you get more people like your favorite customers and weed out the bad ones?

Evaluate Your Offerings

Next, it’s time to research which of your products or services is bringing in the most money. This could astonish you as well. Maybe the data is telling you that it’s time to pivot and adjust what you’re offering. Or it’s telling you that you’re marketing your stuff to the wrong people. In which case, you need to do more research as to who your ideal client should be.

Or maybe it’s time to sit down with your ideal client and find out what they really need. Then you’re in the perfect position to give it to them and be their expert.

Another thing to consider is that you’re too general in your offerings. Maybe you have a sales training program and you’re trying to sell it to everyone. But if you found out that you work best with a certain type of industry (software, real estate, etc.), then maybe it’s time to rebrand it as the solution for that industry.

Now, here’s where I always used to get stuck when my mentors would tell me this….You can still sell it to other people. You’re just spending your marketing dollars to that one niche. You can also expand later.

Maybe you wrote a book on Facebook ads and then rebranded it as Facebook ads for Mortgage Professionals.  You could also then release it as Facebook ads for Financial Advisors without too much editing, right? But, if I’m a mortgage professional, I’ll be more inclined to buy a book that’s just for me rather than a generic Facebook ads book.

Get More Customers

Now comes the fun part of your marketing plan for 2018. Where are you going to find your tribe?

It’s time to decide where you’re going to spend your advertising budget (and how much, and how often) to let people know that you have the exact thing to solve their problem. But remember, you want it to seem easy to the potential customer to say yes.

I was talking with a mentor the other day about some words on a sales page. He said you never want to tell people they’ll learn something. They want things to magically happen. Just something to think about.

Also, if your ideal client doesn’t hang out on Facebook, don’t advertise there. It may seem obvious but sometimes my clients get swept up in the “But everyone is doing it.” and I have to try not to say the standard “If everyone jumped off a bridge…” because that’s not helpful.  So I’ll just say you want to fish where the fish are biting.

Resources

Check out all the books by Mike Michalowicz. He does have a goofy sense of humor, and The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur does get a little down and dirty with its potty analogies. However, you will learn a ton about building up your business.

My friend Richard Butler just released his new program Mastermind 1 on 1. I know Richard and got early access to review. I was so impressed and learned a ton. Usually I’m telling you that we already know stuff….we just need to be reminded of it. In this case, I learned a lot of new ways of thinking.

Richard interviews the experts and you get 9 hours of video success talks with some of the leading experts in the Internet marketing industry

Who Are the Experts

Here’s a rundown on the panel of experts:

• Alex Jeffreys – from dead broke 10 years ago to owning one of the fastest growing companies in North America
• Erik Stafford – the man who walked away from 3 successful businesses he built – he deleted customers, lists, products – why he did it and how it helped him
• Reed Floren – never had a job in his life, but continues to earn day in day out from the internet. Find out his secrets
• Felicia Slattery – from college professor to one of the sought after speakers and trainers in the business – find out why you have to know how to communicate even if you will never be on stage
• Stuart Tan – one of Asia’s leading professional trainers, to date he has trained over 500,000 people. He talks about NLP and how to program yourself for success
• Mark Lyford – from living it up in the Bahamas to spending a couple of years in jail, his story is of a survivor and go getter. Learn from him on what it takes to keep on going.

There are more experts as well. It’s time to grab this while it’s discounted, use code launchspecial to get an instant 25% off.

Why Is It So Great

It’s better to learn from other people’s mistakes. Ultimately you’re going to make your own mistakes. But wouldn’t it be better to avoid the basic ones because you learned from people who already made them?

Then you can become an expert when you make your own mistakes and get interviewed or publish a book.

Richard has a great style for interviewing them. He knows when to let them talk and when to bring them back around. Not once did I feel bored. In fact, I got so caught up in watching them that I forgot to do some of my actual work. So make sure you pace yourself.

There’s a full 30 day money back guarantee so it’s risk free. Just make sure you start watching a video after you buy it.

I’m guilty of buying and not using the product myself. Don’t do that. Normally I’m the one telling you to buy the just in time products and not the just in case products.

This is a just in time.  We’re in the third month of the year. If you’ve been working steadily and not seeing any results, you may be getting disappointed. That’s when it’s essential to fill your mind with positive thoughts and increase your belief that you will achieve it.

These experts have all been where you are. The difference is they persisted despite mistakes and setbacks. So go buy it and give yourself the support you need to succeed.

I found a newly released product called Simple Crazy Traffic.  It’s being offered right now at US$9.95 with a full money back guarantee.  I’ve bought other products that claim they have something new to teach me on paid advertising.  I was schooled in the arts with this one.

So that’s why I’m recommending that you pick it up at their launch price. Dave has found some really great new sources of paid traffic. And let’s face it…when you’re starting out, using paid advertising is a great way to test your sales funnel.

Sure you could wait until people find your site organically. But you may not have enough people to be testing the language and flow.

Check it out and see if it will help you boost your traffic.  I can’t wait to test it on my smaller sites.

Have you ever looked at your to-do list and thought “I really don’t want to do any of that.”  And you know that it will help you further your business, But you just can’t bring yourself to actually do the work?  Yeah, I’m guilty of that.

I know I need to write blogs regularly about internet marketing for this site so you can have fresh and exciting things to read when you visit. I’ll get five ideas while I’m figuring out something like setting up LinkedIn ads. But how to get it out of my head, through my fingers, and into this blog.

Voices In Your Head

So what really stops me from writing? I know that I can write 500 words in fifteen minutes if I’m inspired. One of my most popular rants on lodestone-cs.com was after I’d gotten really annoyed at two large companies. Another popular post took three days to write and polish.

I think the voices in my head stop me the most.  You know those delightful thoughts….

“Why would anyone read what you wrote.”

“You’re no expert in that.”

Yeah, lovely thoughts.

Time to Stop the Bad Thoughts

But here’s the thing. You have to find a way to silence those thoughts. You really do have important things to say. And while you may or may not be an expert….your viewpoint could be just the thing to help someone else. How many times have you read three or four different things on the same subject, and it was one that really opened up your mind.  You could be the key for someone else.  And isn’t that why we do this? To help others?

Also, to a 1st grader, a 3rd grader is a genius.

You don’t have to know everything. You just need to know more than your target audience. And I hope that’s a key for you. You don’t want to target people who already know what you do. You want to target those who don’t.

I mean, would you argue physics with Dr. Stephen Hawking?  (well, I probably would but I don’t have a lick of sense sometimes when I get a bee in my bonnet).

So what do you do?

Here’s what I do. Figure out something that works for you.

1. Set a timer and say you’re going to write for 15-20 minutes. Write an outline. Write thoughts.  You can always edit.”I
2. Thank the voices and then say you appreciate the thought. And then go back to planning your blog.
3. Pretend that you have a dual-cassette tape deck in your head (this is for we older people).  Pretend that one STOP button is on the left side of your forehead and a PLAY button is on the right hand side.  Press the STOP button to turn off the negative tape. Then press PLAY to start the positive tape that says “I’m so interested in this. I know it’s going to help others.” Then start writing.
4. Breathe in and say “I calm my mind” (in your head…I can’t speak when I have lungs full of air that I’m holding onto). Then breathe out and say “I smile”. And then smile. Then go write.

The bottom line is no matter how you reset your brain, you then need to start writing.

But I’m Waiting for Inspiration

Inspiration happens when you’re actually in the middle of what’s happening. Don’t let the blank page syndrome get you.  You know what you want to write about, so start writing something. Anything.

In college, when I’d have a term paper to write, I’d type in “A brilliant and witty opening sentence followed by some awesome thoughts.” and then would start writing my main points. I forgot to delete it once and my Philosophy prof wrote “We’ll see about that.”

As I always say to my daughter (who is now away at University in another state and I miss her quite a bit)…..You got this.