Connect Engage Inspire Podcast As you might have noticed over today and yesterday, EVERYTHING HAS CHANGED! Our website's layout, design, concept and brand are totally different. So what's it all about? Last week we talked about the zigzag brand of Firepole Marketing, and how our brand and sweet-spot has changed since we started a few years ago.
You read a post on marketing. It tells you to do something. You do it, but don't get nearly the same level results... Why is that? Whenever possible I try to get my readers to send me an email with any questions or problems they might have.
You see these small Ads on your smartphones; you see large businesses and retail stores with their attractive ads... and you wish your small business ad was up there as well, but aren't sure where to start in mobile advertising. You have this sense of urgency about jumping into the bandwagon and don't want to miss this window of opportunity.
Connect Engage Inspire Podcast Want to know what we're struggling with right now? What business issues we're having? What are our closest peers struggling with? Instead of teaching you something, like our usual podcasts, today we're actually going to share with you what we're struggling with. Now, why would we share this with you?
Connect Engage Inspire Podcast Today's episode is about partnership and customer service standards. Why do some of our customers get treated amazingly, and others not to the same degree? It all boils down to the concepts of Partnership vs. Customer Service. Now, we at Firepole, bend over backwards for most of our students, but some of them we don't.
Connect Engage Inspire Podcast Everyone gets into their online business with expectations - often lofty ones. It makes a lot of sense - hundreds of thousands of people make their living (some quite extravagant!) online - and there is always someone ready to teach you their method of making millions.
Connect Engage Inspire Podcast Fun, surprising fact: We've succeeded in spite of our brand, not because of it! Sound crazy? Maybe - see for yourself... As you know, we're relaunching our podcast as Connect, Engage, Inspire, and we're also bringing everything in terms of messaging, design and customer experience, up to speed with what we are currently about and moving away from what we thought in the past.
Connect Engage Inspire Podcast Yes, we've rebooted our podcast, for the third time! That's right - starting today, our totally new podcast series, Connect, Engage, Inspire, is live. On our first episode, Danny talks to Kris Gilbertson, the podcasting expert on the web, about our connection, struggles and how start a podcast of your own that will really be successful.
One of the most cost effective ways to build awareness of your business and credibility in your market is media coverage, but too often you send out pitches and nothing happens. Crickets. Even with a great story, you may not get the call from your local TV station or Forbes because your website, while optimized for your customer leaves the media cold.
Yes, you can. You want to get your message out around your city or state, but like many entrepreneurs - you're short on cash. You could do you do whatever most people do and put it off until later. OR you could get a little creative.
In my 16-year freelance writing career, I've always advocated taking small steps. Planting seeds here and there that will grow into assignments later. Taking care not to become overwhelmed. But with my new e-book Write Your Way Out of the Rat Race... And Step Into a Career You Love, I knew my old "baby steps" approach wouldn't fly.
Do you ever get up in the morning dreading the day? It's tough to roll out of bed in the morning when you know you're not doing as well as you could be. Like if you're dreading the day because you haven't reached your revenue goal this month, and you have five days left until the end of the month, and you're only 50% there?
If you're a business owner, you can probably think of a time when your back was against the wall. When you look back on it, you didn't know how you'd pull through or even if it was possible. Maybe you were hit with unexpected expenses, equipment failure, or the departure of a key employee.
You thought if you built a business and did great work consistently and reliably, that should be enough. Instead, you've learned that the positive word of mouth of a few happy customers doesn't cut it. The steady stream of new customers and sales you need to keep afloat just isn't materializing.
Ask the Readers I've got an interesting Ask the Readers Question for you this month. A couple of months ago, we discussed - at length! - how to increase traction on webinars - and I know that for us at Firepole, it was hugely valuable and illuminating.
You've probably already done a few exercises that help you discover your ideal client. (You've also seen it called your Customer Avatar; Customer Persona; Right Person, etc.) You know it's vital to identify that one person to talk to. Trouble is, many of my clients aren't crazy about those exercises!
Managing your social media life isn't an easy task, especially if you're using it to attract and connect with as many people as possible. While social media is a great tool for all marketers, it takes patience and persistence to take advantage of its full capabilities.
Getting your pricing just right is tricky. There are big downsides to keeping your prices too low. But it's easy to raise them too high for people to buy anything anymore. There are some basic ways to look at pricing and pick the "right price." Everyone repeats those methods whenever pricing is discussed.
Ever send a pitch email to a blogger in your field asking them to share one of your blog posts - and get no response? Or maybe you emailed an entrepreneur you really admire and asked if they'd be up for meeting for coffee - and all you heard was crickets?
Marketing Insights with Firepole Marketing On today's episode of the podcast, Danny talks to author and blogger Nir Eyal about unconscious behaviors we engage in without even thinking! When you use something all the time, you never think about what really goes into using it. Your actions become habits, and it all becomes automatic.
Picture this: I hit publish on a video that told the entire internet at large that I am working on doubling an email subscriber list in 30 days, from 15,000 to 30,000 subscribers. My hands are a little sweaty, my heart is racing, and I hope I didn't make a huge faux pas in front of my existing audience by making such a bold goal public.
Best of the Web The golden glow of summer is fading and now it's time to get down and dirty for the fall-time crunch! Fall and busy are usually synonymous, and it couldn't be more apt, because we're back to work at hyper-speed here at Firepole Marketing.
Despite our obsessions with smart phones, social media, and all things digital, one of the oldest forms of commercial marketing can still produce huge dividends. Can you guess what it is? Paper. Many of us have long since given up on using snail mail to get leads.
Many marketing experts urge you to use guest blogging as a way to grow your email list (Danny and me included). But it can be just a huge waste of time if you don't get results - especially if writing each post takes you more than a couple of hours.
Ask the Readers But it doesn't mean we're happy about it. This is a bit of a challenging Ask the Readers post - and the input we get from you on it will likely influence our policies down the road - so please read, consider, and let us know what you think!
