Five Steps To Overcome Marketing Overwhelm

Two of the most common questions I’m always asked about marketing are, “Where do I begin? There’s just too much to do!” and “How do I keep from getting overwhelmed by all of the different marketing messages and resources out there?”

In today’s world of information overload and too many choices, I’m always inclined to have people go back to basics. As Julie Andrews once sang in The Sound of Music, “Let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to start…”

I find that most people tend to take on way too much at once. We have so many options thrown at us and see everyone else moving full steam ahead, it’s hard not to feel like we just can’t keep up. No one wants to feel like they are missing out on opportunities. Putting one foot in front of the other, coupled with a little bit of strategy and focus, will get you moving right along before you know it.

Here are five steps that you can take to get out of overwhelm and into focused productivity:

• Revisit Your Message: Go back to basics and spend some time refining your authentic message. If you aren’t attracting all the clients you want, chances are your message isn’t as authentic or clear as it could be. Who are you and what do you stand for? What is the benefit that people get from working with you? Take some time to write out 30 benefits/results that people achieve by hiring you. You might be surprised at what you discover.
• Step Away From The Keyboard: You will never function at optimum potential if your gears are always in full steam ahead mode. If you are working in your business 24/7, you never give your engine a chance to reboot. It is imperative that you create the time and space away from your business to allow your creativity and brilliance to flow. You may find that you get some of your juiciest ideas and intuitive hits when you aren’t pushing to “make things happen.”
• Get Some Help: Make a list of all the things you are currently doing in your business and then go through and put a check next to the ones that aren’t making you any money (like checking emails constantly, filing papers or picking up the mail). Delegate these first. You can’t afford NOT to outsource and delegate. Even if you hire a college student or find an intern to spend six hours a week working with you, you’ll free up those six hours to work on the high payoff items that will actually make you more money – the things that leverage your core gifts, like working with clients, creating a new product or writing articles.
• Develop A Marketing Action Plan: Once you have freed up those extra six hours in your schedule by getting some help, use at least three of them to brainstorm and develop your marketing action plan. You know the saying, “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there.” Spend some time plotting out exactly where it is you want to go and then map out the tasks you need to take to get you there. Dedicate this time each week to tackling a handful of tasks that are on your list.
• Develop Laser Focus: In other words, focus on one thing at a time. When you find yourself scattered all over the place, bring your attention back to the present and focus on one task at a time. I find that creating a list of the five most important priorities (high payoff, of course) and focusing on those first and foremost before anything else is most effective. Set a timer and start with number one. Don’t move on to the second task until have you have completed the first, and so on.

Keep in mind that you are exactly where you are supposed to be at any given time. My Dad always used to ask me, “How do you eat an elephant?” The answer: one bite at a time.

©Liz Dennery Sanders 2009

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I’m A Goddess, You’re A Goddess Too!

Celebrity Event Planner Extraordinaire, Marley Majcher called me out on her highly entertaining blog, “The Goddess Speaks”, as the Goddess of the Week. You can check it out right here at http://www.thepartygoddess.com/blog.

You, too, can become a Goddess of the Week – just download the application on Marley’s blog and send it back to her asap (scans preferred). Hold on to your rabbit’s foot and start counting four leaf clovers, because you may just be chosen as the very next Goddess.

©Liz Dennery Sanders 2009

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Take The First Steps To Build A Powerful Personal Brand

Are you ready to stand out in today’s overcrowded marketplace? With the millions of messages we are bombarded with on a weekly basis, it’s more imperative than ever to brand your unique brilliance in order to get noticed and gain visibility. Successful brands reflect the unique authenticity of their creators. They exude their creators’ essence in every way.

In a nutshell, your personal brand is your promise of value. It is your own unique combination of strengths, skills, values and passions – and it is what you alone offer the world. These attributes, coupled with your vision for your life, reveal the core around which you have built your brand.

Here are the first steps to discovering your brand brilliance:
1. Uncover Your Descriptors – these are adjectives or attributes that best describe you. These are not only the most visible part of your brand, but also what make it memorable. Take some time to come up with 10 adjectives that really resonate with you. Then ask at least 10 friends, family members, co-workers etc. to do the same. The external feedback from other people who know you is important as the key to branding is ultimately what is perceived by others. Make a note of those adjectives that are most frequently repeated. These are the attributes that you’re expressing most consistently and are pivotal to your personal brand.
2. Identify Your Values – these are your guiding principles, the rudder of your ship and the North Star on your compass. One way to determine if something is a value is to see how you feel if someone were to violate it. For example, as an entrepreneur, one of my greatest values is Freedom. I enjoy setting my own course, being in charge and not answering to anyone in authority. If I were to take a heavily micromanaged corporate position, I would be utterly miserable. Another way to identify a value is to think about what makes you angry. When a value is violated, we often feel angry, resentful or disappointed.
3. Know Your Target Audience – Who do you want to help? Who would you most like to work with? These are the questions you need to be asking yourself before you begin communicating your brand benefits. It’s important to know the WHO before you can talk about the WHY. You certainly can’t be everything to everybody (nor would you want to as you would be completely exhausted!), so it’s crucial to identify your ideal clients. Start by considering who are your favorite clients right now. What do they have in common? What are their key needs in life?
4. Identify Your Passions – What is it that gets you out of bed in the morning? What topics could you talk about joyfully for hours on end or activities do you most enjoy participating in? Your passions provide the juice for your brand – the steam that keeps your engine moving, long after you’re ready to give up.
5. Define Your Vision For Your Life – Not just where you want to be a year from now, or even five years from now, but who do you want to BE in this lifetime. Imagine that you are a ghost at your funeral and everyone there is talking effusively about your wonderful life – a total celebration of you. What are they saying about you? What contributions did you make?

While these are just the first steps to building a powerful personal brand, they are the most important, so it’s worth taking some time with them. In order to make an emotional connection with your target market, it is imperative that your brand brilliance – your unique authenticity – shines through in everything you do. These steps are the foundation of your brand house. Without them, you are merely a house of cards.

©Liz Dennery Sanders 2009

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Stand On The Gas

This evening I attended a fundraiser for Shane’s Inspiration, an organization dedicated to eliminating bias against children with disabilities. Their mission is to create Universally Accessible Playgrounds and programs that integrate children of all abilities socially, physically and emotionally, fostering acceptance, friendship and understanding.

My father-in-law was honored with a Visionary Leadership Award for the time he has dedicated to championing Shane’s Inspiration as the President of the Board of Commissioners of the Recreation and Parks Department of the City of Los Angeles and Chairman of the Los Angeles Parks Foundation.

I had the great pleasure of meeting and speaking with one of the other honorees, the lovely and inspirational Cody Unser. At 12 years old, Cody was paralyzed by Transverse Myelitis, a spinal cord inflammation. When she was just 13, she and her mother formed the Cody Unser First Step Foundation, which is dedicated to providing quality-of-life programs for those suffering from paralysis.

Over the past decade, Cody and her foundation have formed a TM research consortium spearheaded by Johns Hopkins Hospital, and after becoming scuba diving certified, formed “Cody’s Great Scuba Adventures,” which buddies children and adults of all abilities with divers to get certification. Cody is a political activist who has testified before congress and lobbied nationwide for stem cell research, following in the footsteps of her friend,  the late Christopher Reeve.

The daughter of two-time Indianapolis 500 winner Al Unser Jr., Cody follows her Dad’s words of wisdom to, “Stand on the Gas.” At 22 years old, she believes in continuously moving forward and living life to the fullest, no matter what the perceived limitations. Her desire to turn obstacles into opportunities is truly an inspiration to us all. Thank you Cody.

©Liz Dennery Sanders 2009

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Welcome to the shebuzzblog!

Check back here often for tips, tools and resources to build your buzz, position yourself as an expert in your industry, charge what you’re worth and attract more clients with greater ease.

©Liz Dennery Sanders 2009

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