I've talked about the power of online videos before (see "Related Posts" below) and I recently put my money where my mouth is by creating a video for El Museo del Barrio, a museum dedicated to fostering Latin American art. Artists Ruben and Isabel Toledo (he's a talented illustrator and she's designed dresses for the First Lady) offered to teach a class of 10th graders how to paint portraits, and the fruits of their labor were to be auctioned off at El Museo's Gala Benefit last week. I jumped on the bandwagon with my trusted Flip HD Mino videocam and this is what I came up with. All the editing was done with MovieMaker, which is part of the MS Office bundle. It was tons of fun shooting and editing the clip, which is now also featured on El Museo's Facebook page, as well as on YouTube. Take a look and catch the master illustrator in action!
Here's another clip for my client Jennifer Bradford Davis, a fabulous interior designer who created a marvelous table setting for the Lenox Hill Neighborhood House Spring Gala at Sotheby's. The tricky part with this shoot was editing with music in the background, but somehow it all worked out. Jennifer looks absolutely beautiful and the table just sparkles.
If you'd like information on how to shoot & edit an online video, or would like me to create one for you, please contact me.
I recently had the opportunity to speak to Shoba Purushothaman, the CEO of The NewsMarket, a site makes video press releases available to news organizations as well as bloggers to download for free. So say you're writing a post about ...
They started producing short "how to" videos of models applying make-up, cooking, putting together outfits and doing other things that gorgeous, thin creatures do with their spare time, and it's caught on like wild fire with young girls ...
There may be a lot of jewelry stores in New York City, but I recently encountered one that's breaking out of the staid, conservative mold that the industry is known for and testing out new media tools. Located in New York's financial ...
In this entry on combination exercises they added 5 of Sheryl's videos to go along with the topic of the post. Once you click on the image, a window will pop up with the video. To monetize it further Sheryl is using Google Adsense to ...
Last week I gave a "Blogging for Business" presentation (one of my favorite topics!) at the Women's Center for Education and Career Advancement (WCECA), a nonprofit organization located in downtown Manhattan, and met a fabulous group of budding "fempreneurs" (pictured right). Arlene wants to start a film production company to make video resumes for actors, Idalis is creating a line of makeup bags, Shevon is developing a line of vegan, gluten free foods, and Yanique makes eco-friendly home furnishings. Maresa and Leonette are both starting coaching practices to help women in transition, while Kim is in real estate management. These are just some of the businesses that are being "incubated" at the WCECA.
Established in 1970, the WCECA's main objective is to provide marketable skills to women of color who are in "marginable and tenous places in the paid labor force." To this end, they created a program called "New Directions" for low income women with the aspiration and commitment to start their own businesses. Participants meet twice a week for twelve weeks, and learn how to" build and run a successful business, create a sound business plan and prepare for the obstacles and rewards of entrepreneurship." Workshops include business plan writing, marketing, networking, legal issues, financial management and business strategy. High tech mediums like Internet blogging and online marketing are also covered. This valuable course, which is offered twice a year, is totally free of charge. Most of the women who participate find out about it through word of mouth, and the class size is usually 10-15.
Kathleen Vaughn (sitting front row, far right in the picture), who has been with the Center since Sept. of last year, is the program coordinator. "Ours is an organization founded by and for women, so we are very attuned to the challenges women face today," she explains.
Kathleen says that one of the biggest challenges women entrepreneurs face is putting together the (dreaded!) business plan, so three to four of the classes are focused solely that. They are taught by an instructor from American Express who keeps the ladies on track by assigning homework they have to send to her via email.
"We address the professional and personal needs of budding female entrepreneurs. In addition to tech skills we also provide guidance on goal setting, stress management, personal health and nutrition and planning for change," adds Kathleen, whose dedication to the women is evident. Before introducing me, she read an inspirational poem to get everyone in the right state of mind. And when she went away to Vermont for a week she hired one of the past participants, who has a pet sitting business, to take care of her kitty.
After the class was over I walked out with a warm feeling and a spring in my step, happy to have helped other mogulettes-in-the-making move a little bit closer to their dreams.
There may be a lot of jewelry stores in New York City, but I recently encountered one that's breaking out of the staid, conservative mold that the industry is known for and testing out new media tools. Located in New York's financial district, Greenwich Jewelers was founded back in 1976 by Carl and Milly Gandia. Six years ago their daughter Jennifer came on board, and her sister Christina followed four years later. The younger Gandias have been slowing modernizing every aspect of the business, adding a computerized inventory system, building e-commerce capabilities unto the website, and - the latest - creating the video ad on CitySearch.com (see below).
The girls hadn't meant to follow in their parents footsteps. Sure they helped out at the store during holidays and summers while growing up, but after majoring in marketing communications at FIT, Jennifer pursued a career in fashion, while Christina put her marketing degree from Fordham to work in the financial field.
However, 9/11 changed all that. The store was just blocks away from the World Trade Center but miraculously nothing was harmed. The building however, did retain some damage, and they were told they'd have to relocate. At that time Carl and Milly flirted with the idea of retiring early, but then they got a call from a client who had found space for them. "They felt a responsibility and a desire to help the neighborhood and stay and be of service to the people here that had been so loyal to them, so they decided to reopen," explains Jennifer.
A difficult 10 months followed, and the family came together to design and build the new store and get it back on its feet. After that Jennifer found herself at a crossroads. She had been working in fashion PR for Nars Cosmetics and knew she wasn't interested in continuing there. "I didn’t want want to get to a higher level in the cosmetics industry or in marketing for a large company, so I took time off to do something I'd been wanting to do, which is live abroad, and give myself some time to think," says Jennifer.
She spent a year in Spain but by the 3 or 4th month it hit her - after peering into countless windows and evaluating products in as many jewelry stores she knew what she was meant to do. "I realized I was very interested in the family business and I wanted to be a part of it, so as soon as I got back I started working at the store. The first couple of years was about learning the "ropes" and watching what was happening. I had some ideas I implemented right away - basic operational things like a computerized inventory system and getting slightly more aggressive with the marketing, though nothing sophisticated - just direct mail and local print ads," says Jennifer.
Little by little she started getting to know the clients and what they were looking for, and she formulated a vision for the business. Luckily she and her sister see eye to eye on this. After briefly working in a finance job Christina gravitated back to jewelry. She took a position at Temple St. Claire, a designer of fine jewelry, but soon after joined the family fold. Together the siblings are seeking out smaller artisan lines that have a point of view and are unique and of excellent quality. Last year after a year's worth of careful planning they revamped the website to accommodate e-commerce capabilities and show more products.
But according to Jennifer, their most effective marketing tool to date has been their ads on Citysearch. "That was a turning point for us. Before that most of our business was very local - it was just people in the area that knew about us. There was some word-of-mouth but not outside our immediate area. Citysearch was fairly new at the time and I noticed they were doing advertising so I looked into it. We started out at a small level - like $100 a month - for a listing with just a small blurb about us. Then people started leaving reviews about their experience with us, and it started a snowball effect. We had people coming from places that we’d never seen before - uptown, Harlem, Connecticut. It really expanded our reach. It showed us the power of the internet and what it could do for our business. That continues today - it's still our greatest source of marketing. And it works because it isn't anything we’re doing - it's the reviews that we get. Obviously we're giving people a good experience and they feel compelled to write about us, but it’s the forum aspect that brings people into our store.
When Citysearch launched the video service, Greenwich Jewelers was one of the first ones they contacted. There are a couple of options and price points to choose from - you can either shoot it yourself or have them send a crew and produce it. For the latter they'll send a cameraman over to your place of business to shoot for about an hour and you'll end up with a professionally edited 60-second clip. They also provide you with the HTML code so you can set it up on your website and/or other other sites like YouTube.
If you've been thinking of using video as a marketing tool but don't know quite how, this may spark some ideas. Gone are the days of the cheesy late night Crazy Eddie commercials. With the internet it's easier than ever to make and distribute video, and savvy businesses like Greenwich Jewelers are taking advantage of this.
By the way, they've just launched a new campaign where they're giving away a piece of jewelry every month. All you need to do is sign up - no purchase necessary! This month it's a pair of beautiful NuNu earrings (shown right). Deadline is May 31.
Remember back when we had to do homework in school? It would go something like this: We'd attend a class where the teacher would lecture on a specific topic, (ah, how I miss Biology and Accounting - not!) then there would be several chapters of new material to read followed by an exercise related to it. By the end of the semester - whether we liked it or not - we would have gained knowledge on a whole new subject matter.
That's kind of what I'm experiencing with my action partner, Nicole Rose (that's her below, photo credit: David Garvey, www.dgimagesltd.com). What's an action partner, you might ask. Well, before I go into that, let me give you a little background. I met Nicole about 4 1/2 years ago when we both attended a course for entrepreneurs. She was just launching ODM, her graphic design and web development company, and I was in the initial stages of exploring the possibility of working for myself. It would take me a few more attempts before I took the plunge, but Nicole has had her business up and running since then. We've bumped into each other through the years at various networking events, but when I saw her in January I was going through a bad case of "generalized business plan preparation anxiety", so I asked her for a little guidance. She pointed out that she was actually in the process of revising her own plan, so why not work on them together?
We immediately agreed to meet the following week. After our first session, however, doubts started popping up. Was I ready to divulge every little detail of my master plan to someone else? Were our businesses too similar? Wouldn't we be going after the same clients? Wouldn't that be a conflict? Trust has always been an issue for me - it took me years and a few painful market downturns to finally admit I needed to hire someone to assist me with my investments. I do my own manicures and pedicures because "no one can do them better them me" (yeah right). And I could have avoided one or two painful heartbreaks had I listened to my friends' dating advice. But I am getting better at it. I brought up my concerns to my new action partner, and Nicole, so much the wiser, confidently allayed my fears. She didn't see conflicts, and, realizing I had much more to gain than to lose, I jumped on the bandwagon.
Little did I know how effective our arrangement would be. We've had about 7 meetings so far, each time tackling a different section of our business plans, sharing our "homework" and giving each other feedback. If we feel stuck on something we ask for help and usually find a solution between the two of us. Then we plan our assignments for next time. Having that task in mind helps to spark ideas during the week, and even more stuff pops up when I'm doing the research and writing it down, so it's like my brain is on steroids. This week I came up with a novel approach for art galleries to promote their openings, which will help me target them as clients, and I've added a few more elements to a proposal I have for a magazine I'd like to prospect. Sometimes these new ideas seem too big for me, like a beautiful gown that doesn't quite fit. But I'm not judging them. My task is to put them down on paper and then let the Universe conspire to help me "grow into" my fancy dress.
Nicole and I have also decided to swap some services, like she'll help me with the design of my logo and signature, and I'll help her with her e-newsletter and online social networking strategy. We're doing this as if we were each other's clients, so we get to test out our services and give ourselves feedback on the process. Nicole, for example, has amazing customer service - from her follow-up communications to her proposals - even the recording on her voice mail makes her look and sound professional.
On my own, working on my business plan felt like lifting an 800 pound gorilla. But together with Nicole and our weekly meetings I'm making major progress. In fact, it's been such a positive experience that I've taken on another action partner (yes, I admit it, when it comes to business, I've become a polygamist!). Constance Gustke is a writer and journalist who, like me, got her start in Wall Street but has since moved on to cover design, technology and the luxury lifestyle market. We both have separate web business concepts that we'd like to develop, so for the past three sessions we've brainstormed and plotted and mapped out ways to make things happen for us. Constance calls us the "Laverne and Shirley of the 21st century."
So if you want to get things done, my advice is don't do it alone! Find someone you have something in common with and then, buckle up for the ride! Do you have structures in place to help you with your projects? Please share them!
Dan Greenfield of the "Bearnaise Source" wrote a post recently (Putting a Face on Social Networks: Corporate Facebook Pages) about how major corporations are using widgets especially made for Facebook to send traffic back to their own sites. Blockbuster lets Facebook users create their movie "wish list" and get updates on upcoming films; with Verizon they can download music videos to their cellphone and send them to their friends; Sprite lets them create a character, add features to it and interact with others. Why are all these companies jumping into the widget bandwagon, and more importantly, should you also jump in?
First of all, widgets are not thinga-ma-gigs, doo-hickeys, or chachkas, as my friend Andrew suggested when I brought up the topic. They are mini applications that allow users to do a particular thing. Also known as gadgets, add ons or plugins, they are short pieces of HTML code (relax...it's not as geeky as it sounds!) that you can easily add to your website. With blogging software like the one I use you just cut and paste the code into a page element and presto! It appears as if by magic (and if I can do it so can you!).
Back in October I briefly touched on how startups are using widgets to drive traffic to their sites (Startup Camp and Conference) but it's definitely worth revisiting because these little "apps" have big benefits. They make your website "stickier" by making it more dynamic and interactive. Widgets can be entertaining, informative or engaging (or all of the above) but the bottom line is they give your readers a little somethin'-somethin' for spending time on your site.
While I'm still searching for that "killer app" that's going to shoot my page views into the stratosphere, I've slowly been adding a few here and there. If you scroll down my sidebar you'll see them: "Subscribe to this blog", "Subscribe to my RSS feed", "Latest News: WomenEntrepreneur.com", "Search This Blog", "Mogulific Books", "Amazon Deals" and the "Meetup Link" - those are all widgets. And I'm no web developer...
But please be warned: Some widgets are addictive! I could have easily spent the afternoon on Widgetbox's Take A Shark Break, where you get to choose from four different sharks and four different ocean environments. The shark will follow your mouse as if it were its next meal - I could play shark & mouse forever! And that's great news if you want visitors to spend more time on your site.
Here's a few websites that have plenty of widgets to choose from, and they even allow you to customize them. By the way, they're all free: Google Gadgets Widgetbox Yahoo Widgets
Do you have any favorite widgets you'd like to share with us? Please do!
If you're having a hard time keeping track of all the great websites you'd like to follow and don't have the time or inclination to program your own del.icio.us bookmark page, a new website called Alltop.com will do it for you. Created by uber blogger, entrepreneur & venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki (How to Change the World), the site aggregates news feeds from the top sources and groups them into 18 categories. There's a page for Politics, Sports, Fashion, Celebrities - even Ego (Rosie's there, Donald's there, you get the picture...). Their tagline reads: "all the top stories from all the top sources", so for each website listed you'll see the most recent 5 entries, making it really easy to scan through the page and select the story you're most interested in. Brilliant! And I am happy, thrilled, overjoyed to report that Guy (one of my heroes!) has included my blog, Mogulette-in-the-making, in the small business category!!
It was the bright orange suede vest that first caught my eye, among a sea of entrepreneurs in corporate attire at the recent Small Business Summit in New York. Then came the bright blue striped bell bottomed pants. Who was the funky mama among all the "suits"? When I finally saw her face I felt a tinge of recognition. It was Laurel Touby - one of my role models, a huge inspiration to me, the type of fempreneur that I aspire to be (for more on Laurel see my post: "Mediabistro: Timeline to Success"). She looked like a hippie bohemian artist that somehow got lost on her way to Soho or the West Village and mistakenly landed instead at a conference for entrepreneurs.
There was no question - I had to go up to her and say "hi". Any shyness that I might have felt went completely out the window as I stretched out my hand and introduced myself. She was very friendly and approachable, listening as I told her about my blog, among expressive gushes of admiration. The petite blond multi-millionaire later spoke at one of the panel presentations (she's the one that stands out with the funky, boho-chic outfit above on the right) about her company's rise to success and gave a few insights as to how she made her business grow.
"Listen to your clients", was one of the first things Laurel said, which was made easier for her since she started out by giving cocktail parties for journalists. Every month she had a steady stream of followers that were very willing to tell her what they needed. They were the ones she listened to when she received her first infusion of venture capital money and was deciding how to spend it. And it worked - she sold her company for a cool $23 mil last year. That's one piece of advice I definitely will follow.
Among the familiar faces I bumped into at the show were Laura Allen from 15secondpitch who participated at one of the panels, Lena West, who writes the TechForward blog I mentioned on my last post, Stephanie Cockerl who does wonderful things to optimize blogs (www.nextsteph.com), Kevin Kennedy of Webgrrls and of Ulas Neftci of Baruch's Small Business Development Center. All in all it was a fabulous day of schmoozing, networking, meeting fantastic people and picking up a few new best practices. I was even able to get a picture with my idol!
Update: Nelly Yusupova of Webgrrls wrote a great summary of the panel entitled: “How to transform your business in 40 minutes”. Visit her blog to get all the details.
Isn't it great when things just happen unexpectedly in your favor? That's exactly what Janice Cusano (that's her on the right), recently experienced. This former professor, who left academia last year to pursue her passion for designing jewelry, ended up selling one of her pieces on none other than Facebook, the subject of my past few posts (I swear guys, I'm not getting a penny from them! I wish!). Her story had a few good tidbits, so I thought I'd share the serendipitous series of events that led to the sale.
A couple of weeks ago, Janice was looking to revamp the photos on her site (see it on Etsy). Her friend Kathleen offered to take new pictures for her, which she then posted on her Flickr account because it was easier than sending them by email (the files were pretty big). She also placed one of the pictures on her Facebook page, (the turquoise and coral piece on the left).
Later that same night, an old friend of Kathleen's from college (who wouldn't have been in contact with her if she hadn't found her on Facebook) saw the necklace and sent her a message saying she'd love to buy it, so Kathleen sent her the link to Janice's Etsy shop, and bingo--she made a sale (she bought the earrings below on the right).
Janice also noticed that there were 48 page views of the photo within an hour of Kathleen posting it on Flickr and Facebook. Pretty good exposure!
The funny thing is, Janice doesn't even have a Facebook page for herself (but thank God her friends do!). Because of her former life as a professor, Janice has had a long-standing bias against Facebook. When the site first started out it was only open to students, so there was a stigma attached to it for those in the academic field. Last year when she was still in her teaching position she did a search and found only one other professor that had a public Facebook page. In her profession, Facebook was a non-no because that's where all the students are, and "poking" wasn't exactly conducive to a professional relationship. Plus Janice likes to keep her personal life separate from her students (now former). However, she's slowly warming up to the idea, as more professionals join every day. She also sees how traffic has increased on her Etsy site because of Flickr and Facebook. (On Etsy you can check to see how many people are viewing each page and where they come from).
Janice finds other benefits from online social networks. "Not only has (Flickr) distributed my work far and wide, I have been able to build community in more specific ways that I hadn't by blog hopping. For example, I am a color fiend and symbols are important in my work. I joined the group 'Blue and Green' and met some incredibly like-minded artists who I connect with on many levels. I actually connected with one contact I had met at a show last September! Every time this happens, I feel a little less out in the cold."
That chance encounter online gave Janice the inspiration for a series of posts related to large jewelry on her Goddess Findings blog. The picture of her contact on Flickr showed her wearing a chunky necklace that Janice liked, so when she reached out to say "hi" she also complimented her on it and asked her to submit a photo and talk about what that piece means to her.
Janice adds that artists can put pictures of their studios, their work-in-progress or things that inspire them, which gives buyers a better sense of who they are. "On Esty you see what they have for sale, but the visual images on Flickr are stronger", she says. By showing people another facet of your life, you create more of a connection.
How are you using new media in your business? Please share your story with us!
I promised you guys I would write a post about LinkedIn and here it is. I would have been perfectly happy just using Facebook as my business networking site of choice but so many of my friends nixed it, saying that they just used it for connecting socially. My LinkedIn profile had been half-finished for months until I realized that when I google myself (which many people seem to be doing lately), my LinkedIn page shows up as the second item on my results page. A site that can get that kind of ranking definitely commands my attention. And if people are going to be clicking into it, I better make sure the content has all the important information about me and what I do. So I dedicated the past few days to finding out how to use LinkedIn for business, and how it compares with Facebook. Here's what I've uncovered so far...
Beginnings Launched in 2003, LinkedIn is now the sixth-biggest US social network, according to a recent article I found commenting on rumors about News Corp.'s interest in buying the company. They also say that it logged the biggest growth among its peers in October and topped the expansion rates of both MySpace and Facebook, according to Nielsen. LinkedIn attracted about five million US visitors in October, up from 1.7 million a year earlier, and the company estimates it has 17 million users (compared to 59 million for Facebook and something like 300 million on MySpace).
Basic Features LinkedIn offers some of the functionalities I covered in my 'Facebook 101' post, like you can fill out your 'Profile' to let people know what schools you went to and the companies you've worked for. (The more keyword rich you make this part the better the chances of ending up on more search results.) However, LinkedIn has a system that rates your contacts by degrees of separation: 1 degree means you know them and they know you, 2 degrees means they are a friend of your friend, and so on.
The section called 'Recommendations' allows you to leave or request endorsements from your contacts, which you can only do informally on Facebook by posting messages on people's 'walls'. Facebook also lacks the 'Q&A' section, where you can either ask or answer questions and interact with the entire LinkedIn population, not only your contacts, which can be helpful in getting exposure for your business and driving traffic to your website.
I asked Howard Greenstein, co-founder and NY Chapter Leader of the Social Media Club, (photo below) how effective the site had been for him. He says he recently identified a person he needed to connect with, got a quick introduction from a contact and then hooked them up with a company that wanted to business with them. He likes how with 'Q&A' you can send a question to your friends to get recommendations on potential hires. "Some companies are encouraging their salespeople to find LinkedIn contacts in firms they're trying to sell to. Corporations are realizing that there's value in being outward facing, and that making more connections can expand their bottom lines," he adds.
Howard believes that people keep stronger business contacts on Linkedin vs Facebook so there's potentially more interesting data for companies to leverage. LinkedIn recently announced that they're opening up the site to outside developers to create unique applications that are specifically tailored to business users. Howard expects that in the near future the online social network will look for additional ways to make it easier to find people in your 2nd & 3rd degrees.
New Features Here's some cool things that will soon be available on LinkedIn (from the company's Dec. 10 press release):
Partner Applications:
"LinkedIn’s first publishing partner, BusinessWeek, is developing an Intelligent Application that will reside on the BusinessWeek.com website. The application will enable readers of BusinessWeek.com to access their professional network to look up profiles of people and find connections at companies featured in articles."
Conference Calendar application:
"The conference calendar application has a view of upcoming events and people in one’s LinkedIn network who are attending upcoming conferences. Dates are color-coded to indicate how popular the conferences are amongst a user’s professional network, and users can see suggestions of people they may want to meet at the conference based on common network connections. The demo may be viewed at: http://blog.linkedin.com/blog/2007/11/linkedin-news-r.html."
Up until now it had been difficult to differentiate friends from business contacts on Facebook. However, that's now changing with Facebook allowing businesses to set up their own"fan" pages, as they explain in their Nov. 6 press release:
"Just like a Facebook user, businesses can start with a blank canvas and add all the information and content they want, including photos, videos, music and Facebook Platform applications. Outside developers have created a range of applications to enhance Facebook Pages, such as booking reservations or providing reviews of restaurant pages, buying tickets on a movie page or creating a custom t-shirt. Companies launching applications for Pages include Fandango, iLike, Musictoday LLC, OpenTable, SeamlessWeb, Zagat Survey LLC and Zazzle."
This move towards a more business friendly environment has ticked off many old time Facebook fans, and some are jumping ship.
So what will it be for businesses, Facebook or Linkedin? The race is on... What do you think? Share your thoughts!
I've been running around left and right trying to get my little operation into high gear and as usual fretting about the future, until I read an article (The Accidental Entrepreneur) in this month's New York Enterprise Report. It was about how Laurel Touby sold her company, Mediabistro, for $23 million this past July. It took her just 13 years...but she didn't make a profit for the first 9 of them, and she didn't generate any money for the first two. That really helps to put things in perspective!
I remember going to a few of her events and have seen her company grow right before my very eyes. Her story is so inspiring to me that I wanted to piece together all the details of how she did it, so I looked up a few other articles on the sale and put together a time line:
1994 - Laurel, a struggling freelance writer, starts organizing after-work cocktail parties for journalists - 10 people showed up at the first one but within months that turns into one hundred (FYI...today that database is about 700,000) - however, she wasn't making money from it
1996 - Started an email newsletter with job listings (still no money)
1999 - Started charging HR people $100/month to post jobs - got 8 checks the first month, then 16, then 25, 35, 45 (ka-ching!) - that's when she ditched her freelance writing and decided to make this a business
2001 - Received $1 million in funding in March (a big ka-ching), then 9/11 hit (took back some of that ka-ching - read Laurel's account of how they managed to pull through after the terrorist attacks: The Strength to Lead in the Face of Crisis, from The Huffington Post)
2002 - Laurel follows a colleague's suggestion to add courses for journalists to her list of services, and later that year launches a premium content subscription membership (ka-ching, ka-ching)
2003 - Became profitable
2006 - Got approached by buyers
2007 - Sold Mediabistro to Jupitermedia in July for $23 million, pocketing $12.4 million (she owned 62% of the company's stock) (a really big ka-ching)
As senior vice president, Laurel will still oversee Mediabistro but now she will also report to her new bosses at Jupitermeda. NY Enterprise Report asked if her life has changed now she's wealthy and her answer was "no, I still take the subway. Maybe I’m eating out a little more often. The one thing I’m going to spend the money on is a gigantic loft apartment so I can have all my journalist friends over for dinner." Sometimes the more things changes the more they stay the same...
My take home message out of this? Create a community of like-minded souls, find out what they need, and deliver it to them. It's that simple. Do that long enough and eventually the money will come.
One of the things I admire about multi-millionaires like Donny Deutsch, the advertising tycoon turned TV personality, is that they may have pot loads of money in the bank (he sold his advertising company for close to $300 million bucks) but yet they still go to work every day. As host of The Big Idea on CNBC, Donny helps others make millions too. It's "must see TV" for budding Mogulettes.
Donny was keynote speaker at the NY XPO for Business luncheon at the Jacob Javits Center this week and he stood in front of a dining room the size of a football field to give the audience a few golden nuggets of wisdom in his own charming, irreverent way.
One of the first things he said was make failure your friend, which I loved to hear because I have such fear of not doing things perfectly with my business. The biggest growth, he added, comes when we fail - we grow from the stupid things we do - it's a mathematical certainty. If you're afraid to fail you can't be great. You have to know that your product or service may bomb...but if it does, so what? He likened it to dating - if you get shot down once you go on to the next. (This month's Entrepreneur Magazine has two stories on finding success after failure: click here for more)
More of Donny's tips: Surround yourself with people that are smarter than you are. Many entrepreneurs hire people that maybe have 5% of their own qualities. He suggests finding partners and giving them a portion of your business - as long as you keep 51% of it. Small business owners usually hang on tight to their companies - we need to let go!
About success he says do what you love. If you're passionate about what you do then it's not work. If you're not passionate about your work, then find something else!
Do it differently - if your product or service isn't unique, you can't win.
Put your money where your mouth is - show customers that you believe in yourself. People love underdogs. Show your employees you care for them, for their success. If you root for them they'll root for you!
And finally, hate is good. You need an enemy. When you pitch to a client, tell them how you hate their competitors!
When he finished his speech I made a b-line to the front of the room to get a chance to introduce myself. Dressed in blue jeans and a sweater, Donny looked like the average (but really cute!) guy next door as he graciously listened to a long line of fans wanting to shake his hand. I literally had about 15 seconds to tell him who I was and what I did in a compelling way, and I think I did an o-k good job but there's definitely room for improvement. That's when I wished I had rehearsed Laura Allen's 15secondpitch a little more.
Laura was also at the conference (check out her batch of pictures here) giving a talk on how you can use her pitching methodology not only to introduce yourself but also when you develop your web copy. The same principles apply there as well: don't give them a laundry list - be short and to the point! On my way out I bumped into an old colleague from my days at CNNfn, Pat Kiernan. He was making a special appearance for NY1, our local cable all-news station, where he is a familiar face every morning, delivering the morning news in his signature deadpan way. It was a thrill to see him and catch up on what some of our co-workers are doing since CNN's financial network shut down 3 years ago. (That's me next to Pat, and behind us, no - you're not seeing double - it's his life sized replica!)
Inspiration for a business can come from very unusual places. For Laura Allen (that's her below on the right) , co-founder of "The 15secondpitch", it came from a friend looking to meet date-worthy women. She turned her knack for connecting people into a profession. How'd she do it? Read on!
During the dot-com boom Laura worked at Cheetahmail.com, which somehow managed to survive the bust and was acquired by Experian in 2004. She'd been the first hire there so she was given a lot of freedom at the company, but eventually she got bored with the corporate structure and the rules, so in 2000 she left. Just as Laura was figuring out what to do next with her life, 9/11 happened. The internet industry was devastated, leaving behind a trail of laid-off techies.Looking for ideas on what to do next, Laura and her partner, Jim, who is a database programmer, attended a networking event in Los Angeles. It was there that they met their friend David, a good looking, single, MBA grad and fellow job seeker, who asked Laura to give him a hand meeting cute, single women at the conference. He found he got a much better response when Laura introduced him, and Laura had a ball "pitching" him to the ladies.
Jim, on the other hand, was not having much luck at networking and was thinking there had to be a better way to make connections, and when the two exchanged stories, they stumbled upon the idea for a 15-second pitch.
When they got back home they immediately checked the domain name, and finding it still available, they registered it that night.
Another problem with networking events is that you end up with a bunch of business cards, and afterwards you can't remember who most of those people are. So, they thought, why not create a card that contains a pitch which explains what their company is about? They went to work to turn the idea into a business, and spent the first two years building a website where people could create 15secondpitch cards.
Then in 2003 they decided Laura would teach a workshop on how to create a 15secondpitch. A friend in New York let her use her conference room, and she advertised her 2-hour course on a forum she found in Fast Company called "Company of Friends", that reached a few thousand people just in NY and NJ.
The event was free and about 15-20 people showed up. They each told their story and one guy shared that he'd been trying to get in touch with a VP of Coca-Cola for the past two years. Then another guy said his uncle worked there, and that he'd connect him. That's when Laura saw the power of what she calls the "third party pitch."
Heather is another of Laura's "third party pitch" success stories. She was a reporter who had perfected her "I'm a journalist" pitch, but there was only one problem - she no longer wanted to be a reporter. Her dream was to become a wedding planner. Laura advised her to keep her day job and start moonlighting on the side. They created a wedding planner pitch that same day, which she later shared with her husband. He in turn started telling his colleagues about her, and one of them had just gotten engaged, so he asked Heather to plan his wedding. Three weeks after creating the 15-second pitch Heather landed her first job through a "third party pitch"!
The other thing that worked for Heather was creating an image when describing her services. She went from saying "I'm a reporter but I want to be a wedding planner", to "I have an eye for detail so I'm starting a wedding planning business." Painting a picture in people's minds helps them understand what you do, especially with tech jobs - it's easier for people to buy into an idea if you make your pitch descriptive, giving examples, telling stories, making it rich with details.
Anyway, back to the workshops. In 2005 Laura decided to start charging for her seminars, but she needed money for marketing, so she went back into the corporate world, saving the money coming in from her day job and from teaching the seminars at night. After about a year she got laid off, with 2 weeks severance pay, plus unemployment benefits. Laura was thrilled. With the money she had put away she started marketing her monthly workshop, and shifted her business model more towards corporate clients like Merrill Lynch and non-profits like Cine Women.
The website has now gone through three major revisions, and they added a pitch wizard a year ago to automate the process of printing the pitch cards. Laura just re-launched her blog last week to focus on how to put together a killer 15secondpitch, and how to use it after you create it. In January they'll be unveiling their latest product (you heard it here first!), an e-learning platform that allows people to sign up for classes and follow at their own pace. Users will be able to create a 15secondpitch plus other related content using a tool that's partly automated and partly customized by Laura.
The 15secondpitch is used by lawyers, VC's , real estate brokers, freelancers - it's especially good for freelancers because their existence hinges on how well they can pitch, and they need to be constantly pitching new business. Marketing consultants, career coaches, college grads, financial planners - they can all benefit from it.
Here are 4 things Laura says an effective 15secondpitch should include:
Who you are - Tell then your name AND the name of your company!
What you do - avoid the "kitchen sink" pitch - don't tell your entire career history - focus on one thing and be specific. She's suggests preparing a separate pitch for everything you do.
This week I finally forced myself to sit down and learn how to use Facebook. For months I've been receiving emails from my friends asking me to join their list, and I had accumulated about 36 contacts but had no idea what to do with them. So after putting it off for forever, I finally to bite the bullet.
Why am I so interested? Well I spend a lot of time networking and making contacts, so anything that lets me do this more efficiently I'll definitely be interested in. What I found is that Facebook is like networking but on steroids.
So the first thing to do when you open an account is to invite your friends, which is easy - you can import your email addresses from whatever email provider you use – they’ll receive an invitation, and once they accept they'll be on your list. Another option is to click on "Find Friends", and enter your email address and password, then you'll get a list of all the contacts you have in Outlook or Yahoo and you can simply checkmark the ones you'd like to invite.
To check on your progress you can click on the "friends" tab and you'll instantly see how many people are connected to you. When you click on your friend's profile – presto! Instant access to all their friends. You'll see where they went to school, where they’re working, where they used to work… etc.
Say you’re looking to target a specific company for business; you can look through all your friend’s and family’s contacts to see if there’s anyone connected to that company, or industry. If you want to get in touch with your friend’s friends, you can ask for an introduction or directly request to be their friend.
Facebook has something called a poke which you can send - and they're intentionally vague on its definition of this so that you can make it whatever you want it to be. Or you can send them a message. By default anyone can message anyone, but depending on your preferences you can adjust your privacy settings so that only your friends can see your profile, or only your family, or both, or you can leave it open to the Facebook universe.
On the main section of your personal page you'll find a news feed – and no, it's not world news - it's actually a constantly updating list of updates on your friends' activities on Facebook. So if they've added pictures, or joined a group, or added a new friend, it'll show up. On the right hand side you'll see birthdays, notifications, upcoming events or friend requests.
You can also put up a "wall", which is where people can randomly leave comments…if it’s your birthday your friends can leave you a little note, or if you’re sick they can leave a 'get well soon' message…or, for businesses, you could ask people to leave a testimonial for a product or service you’ve provided. (There’s also a super wall and a fun wall, which allow for added functionalities.)
If you're a small business, freelancer or solo practitioner you'll want to check out their classified section, called “marketplace”, where you can post your services or browse through "for sale" items. On a recent visit I found ads for a jazz piano teacher and a ride to Yankee stadium.
You can post an event or browse events - and check out what events your friends post or are attending.
You can post a Facebook Flyer announcing something special going on with your business. They start at $5 to display your Flyer 2,500 times and go up as you increase the run times. It will appear in your homepage but you can also post it on specific networks.
There's also a tool to create polls, and you can target Facebook users based on gender, age, school, location, or profile keyword. This is especially useful if you need to compile market data/research on a product or service.
You can join groups, or create one if you don’t find what you’re looking for (stay tuned for the Mogulette Facebook group, coming soon!). Members can add videos or pictures to the home page, and easily interact with the whole group through the group discussion forums, where you can ask the group questions and have ongoing dialogues.
For book lovers there's the virtual bookshelf where you can let people know what books you’re reading and find out their favorites.
There’s still a lot more that I need to look into, but at least this will get us started…
Here's some related articles I found on using Facebook:
How can a company with no business plan, no offices, and no track record become a multi-million dollar business? That's exactly what I asked Rosalind Resnick, who took her company, NetCreations, from a two-person home based startup in 1995 to a public company generating $58 million in sales. She recently addressed a group of internet entrepreneurs at an iBreakfast meeting I attended. After listening to the program director, Alan Brody, give a short introduction about her, I knew I needed to find out more, so I asked her for an interview. She graciously accepted, and I've posted the details below.
Where did you get the idea to start an email marketing company?
NetCreations started out as a Web design firm in 1995. Pretty quickly, we began to see that our clients needed more than just cool Web sites – they needed a way to get people there. We pioneered opt-in email marketing as a way to connect marketers with the consumers and business people who wanted more information about their products and services but didn’t want to waste time surfing the Web trying to find them.
Did you have a business plan?
No. We didn’t have a formal business plan until our company went public.
How much money did you start out with, and where did it come from?
We started with $1,000. My partner and I contributed the capital. What did you use the money for?
The money was just to open our bank account. My partner was a Web designer and programmer who worked at our local ISP [internet service provider] so he had the technical skills that we needed. I was a journalist who had just written a book about doing business on the Internet so I did the sales and p.r. and brought in the clients.
What happened after that? How did the company get sooo successful in such a short time? Did you ever imagine it would grow as much as it did?
Our big break came when a circulation manager from Ziff-Davis tested our lists in the fall of 1996 and got a response far better than anything he’d ever achieved through postal mail or telemarketing. Once we realized that we were in the direct marketing business and that companies like Ziff-Davis needed to be able to mail to millions of names in thousands of different categories, we started putting together a partner network of high-traffic Web sites to build our database.
What were the most crucial factors that helped your company achieve success?
Building a partner network of Web sites that sent email addresses to our database and partnering with list brokers, ad agencies and resellers to market our lists to Fortune 1000 clients
What mistakes do you see startups making the most?
Failure to plan. While some companies fail because they lack capital, many more startups go under because their founders lack management experience or because their business models don’t add up. What advice do you give your startup clients?
Don’t be afraid to try new things and make mistakes. As long as you learn from your mistakes, you’ll be all right.
It's interesting to see how by building a partner network you can grow your company faster and larger than just by yourself. That's definitely something that Mogulettes-in-the-making need to think about: who can refer clients to me that isn't in direct competition with me? Pet care providers can team up with pet stores, life coaches with career counselors, children's entertainers with babysitters, I could go on and on.
Rosalind is now using the valuable knowledge she gained from her experience to help small businesses become successful through her company, Axxess Business Consulting. She's also one the experts "on call" at Entrepreneur.com, where she and a handful of others answer questions related to startups. And as if that weren't enough, on top of that she writes a blog, Vest Pocket Consultant, with more information on small business. Thanks Rosalind!
Did you know that 3 out of 4 companies are started by women, but only 10% of venture capital funding goes to women-owned businesses? That's pretty sad. Here's another one: women own more than 50% of the wealth in the U.S., but only 8% of those funds are allocated to investing in start-up companies. If you're a small business looking for alternative ways to finance your growth, funding from private investors, aka angel investors or venture capitalists, could be an option for you.
Traditionally this segment of the market has been dominated by men, but an organization called Springboard Enterprises is changing that. For eight years this nonprofit, which was founded by Kay Koplovitz, has been helping female entrepreneurs get access to money through the equity markets, while at the same time encouraging women to invest in women-led companies. I was lucky to have been invited to a recent luncheon sponsored by Springboard, and the key note speaker was Christie Hefner, CEO of Playboy Enterprises (below left), who gave us a fascinating account of how she got started in business. She studied law and journalism in college back in the 60's when it was all about anti-establishment, so the last thing on her mind was going into the corporate world. However, after working as a journalist for some time her dad, Hugh Hefner, urged her to move to Chicago and join his company, where she would start from the ground up. There were a great many high caliber journalists that contributed to Playboy, and the young Ms. Hefner was very much attracted to the intellectual challenges the magazine presented, so she signed on.
A few years later, during the 80's, Playboy went into financial trouble, and after a management shake-up Ms. Hefner, then just 29 years old, suggested she become president and work alongside the CEO, whom she admired greatly. Soon after taking the post, they started dumping losing lines of business and focusing on "managing for cash", keeping track of cash on a weekly basis, as opposed to quarterly as had been done in the past.
Some time later she got a call from Michael Milken, the "junk bond king", who invited her to meet with him in his offices. After asking her a few questions about the magazine, he announced he could raise half a million dollars from her. Ms. Hefner was dubious at first, concerned about taking on a heavy debt load, and not knowing exactly what to do with all that money. Milken's response: "First raise the money, then figure out what to do with it!"
That she did, first of all by seizing an opportunity in cable TV, realizing that channels could become a destination in and of themselves, as opposed to just tuning in to watch a particular show. To this day Playboy TV, which she says is targeted to couples, is in 100 million homes and is their biggest profit center. Ms. Hefner pointed out that magazines need brands and content that live beyond its pages, and they have been one of the few able to successfully take a brand into a whole new medium. Case in point: they have Playboy the magazine and Playboy the channel, unlike Time Magazine and CNN.
In 1992-93 she met Jim Clark, who had created Mosaic, which would later evolve into Netscape. Those were the early days of new media and Ms. Hefner was trying to figure out what the world wide web meant for Playboy, so she asked Jim for help. He suggested she build a site and put Playboy on the web. Playboy.com is now their fastest growing profit center, and where they monetize traffic in a variety of ways: e-commerce, international deals, social networking, etc. The internet, she says, is a transformative technology, and she quoted a few stats: 15% of newlyweds met online, and more text messages are sent and received every day than there are people on the planet. For the future? She sees a move toward more user-generated content, which is why they've launched PlayboyU, a college-only, no nudity social network.
It was quite insightful to see how Ms. Hefner, by asking experts for help, was able to take her company to places she might not have ever envisioned. That's a big lesson for someone like me, who often thinks I can do everything myself!
That help is what Springboard's founder, Kay Koplovitz (that's me next to her on the right), offers. By putting together a team of investors for female-owned startups, Ms. Koplovitz, along with the company's president Amy Millman, has made many a dream come true for women launching their own businesses. Sounds like a familiar theme - I definitely want to follow in their mogul-ific footsteps!
I just came back from two days of intense information swapping with a couple of hundred other internet startups and I have to say I felt as if instead of New York I was actually somewhere in Silicon Valley. Labeled the "Start-up Camp: An Un-Conference" by its organizers, the event was unique in that the participants decided what topics to cover in many of the break-out sessions, as opposed to having an agenda forced upon you. Those that had a subject they wanted to discuss (me!) went to the front of the room, announced the title of the issue they wanted to cover and posted it on a large board. Anyone interested in joining the discussion would gather around at a designated area. We spent the whole afternoon going from table to table, and conversation to conversation, to chat with other business owners, and figure out solutions together.
I like this format because, in launching their own businesses, entrepreneurs usually accumulate a ton of information on various topics, so in a sense we become experts ourselves, and that allows for a very useful - and lively - exchange.
My big question was how to use online social networks (blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn or others) to market our businesses. I found out that companies online are coming up with applications, or software, they can customize to attract potential clients. One startup called 8 Coupons is looking to devise a widget that people will place on their Facebook page to let their friends and contacts know what discount coupons they're using in their neighborhood, and in that way drive traffic to their site, which offers the coupons themselves. (For more on how to use Facebook for business see Marci Alboher's recent post, and check out the November issue of Inc. Magazine to see how 5 companies are using widgets as a marketing tool - unfortunately the article isn't available online as of yet.)
Another way to use social networks is to have people leave testimonials about you on LinkedIn, or, you can respond to questions that people pose in the "Answers" section - you'll get top billing as an "expert" if you reply to enough of them. This is one subject that's evolving as we speak and it's definitely peaked my interest, so stayed tuned for updates. From there we went on to something called "speed-geeking", which is similar to speed-dating but instead of potential partners showcasing their romantic talents, entrepreneurs tried to get 3-4 participants to "fall in love" with their business ideas for 7 minutes, at which point a horn would blow and the crew would move on to the next startup-in-waiting. I was able to see first hand which pitches worked and which didn't, and to realize that I have some work to do with regards to my own pitch...(yikes!).
There were almost two dozen hopefuls vying for the Best Startup prize, with some very innovative ideas. The winner? A company called UpNext.com (that's the creator on the left) who offers 3-D mapping of Manhattan with a social networking component. The 2nd place prize went to BricaBox.com, makers of website building software, and a company called BeenVerified, which verifies that you are who you say you are online, won 3rd place.
As I walked out I stopped by to chat for a few minutes with John Havens from BlogTalkRadio and gave him my quick thoughts on the event (click here if you'd like to listen to the 7-min. podcast).
I got home exhausted but with my head full of ideas. Get ready for Mogulette Camp!
I've had a great experience using Blogger to create my blog, so when I found out I could also use this type of software to build a website, my ears pricked up. Nowadays it seems like everyone has to have their own site, so companies are scrambling to come up with ways to make programming more user-friendly, and that's good news for solopreneurs, freelancers and small business startups like us.
One of the companies my business counselor, Karen-Michelle Mirko, from the Lower Manhattan Business Solutions Center suggested I check out is SquareSpace. They have various packages to choose from but the basic one starts at 7$/month and you get a wide variety of layouts, hosting, visitor stats, and the ability to place ads with Google Adsense, so you can make money. The business packages start at $25 and also include domain mapping (that way your url will show your own domain name), polls, and a FAQ page, among other things. The only problem is tech support...they're only accessible through email - no live assistance - which might become a problem in an emergency, if people can't download your site for some reason.
Another blogging software company to consider is WordPress. It's very similar to Blogger except that they allow you to add additional pages, which Blogger doesn't at the moment. You can get your site started for free but in order to use your own domain name it's $10/ year, which is nothing. Unfortunately they too only offer email support, and they don't allow you to place ads, although they're apparently working on a premium upgrade to bypass this.
Other companies to look into: TypePad, SiteRubixand Microsoft Office Live. One caveat is that this type of software is best for service firms that are interested in generating leads. If what you want is to sell products you'll need e-commerce functionality, which is more complicated. For that you can try GoDaddy, Kingdom 247, Template Monster, or 1&1.com.
So here's a list of things I look for when deciding which programming software to choose from:
do I like the templates they offer? can they be customized? can I change the color on their fonts and backgrounds, etc.?
how many pages can I add?
how many email addresses will I get? (you'll want to set up different ones to target different types of clients)
can I place ads with Google Adsense?
what kind of customer support do they have?
can I use my own domain name?
what plugins/widgets are available?
do they offer down-loadable file backup so that I have copies of all my files?
Do you have any experience - good or bad - using website development software? Please chime in!
Here's a question every inquiring Mogulette mind wants to know: How do I make my product or service stand out? Well, according to branding expert Romana Mirza, it all begins with you (that's her in the pictures, giving the Mogulettes a presentation). She says that a company's image is a reflection of it's owner, so one way to start is by asking yourself, what words describe me, and my business?
Take a look at Target, for example. Webster's definition of the word is "something aimed or fired at" or, "a desired goal". Brilliant! When I go shopping, I want to be able to find what I'm looking for, or "target" the products I want. The metaphor of the red bull's eye is also pretty effective, and quite unforgettable. I guess that's what branding is to me, having my product or service leave a lasting impression. Remember the old Blackglama fur ads? Glamorous women like Liz Taylor, Jane Fonda, and Carol Channing - naked, except for the black mink coat - with a caption that read "What makes a legend most?". Sexy, and fabulous. In the same way, the "Got milk" ads made drinking milk sexy, and Nike's "Just do it" made sweating sexy, and definitely unforgettable.
But for our brands to become this memorable, it takes some deep soul searching along with a heavy dose of investigative work. That's what Romana does at her recently launched brand strategy firm, Studio Pinpoint - help clients bring out what's unique about their company. She suggests focusing on three areas:
First, your work. Ask yourself: What do you do differently? What do you offer that others don't? What is your personal and unique contribution to your work? What do you want your company to stand for?
Then, your clients. Ask them: What do you think I'm about? What special qualities do I bring to the process/outcome? What did you like about our experience together? And finally, research your competition: What's their brand positioning? Key messages? Product presentation?
Armed with this information you can then pass it along to those helping you with your marketing: logo designer, copywriter, web designer, so they can come up with a message that clearly and accurately portrays you and your product/service - to make it....memorable!
Need a little hand-holding to narrow down your target market? Are you finding it difficult to get information on your competition? You can now book a half-hour one-on-one session with a librarian at the Science Industry and Business library (remember "SIBL"? see related post), for free of course, and they'll help you with the above plus: business leads, industry research, marketing strategies, potential client lists, vendor lists, etc., etc., etc. I've already set my appointment for next week!
Moving on to video, Cornell University has compiled an extensive list of video clips with entrepreneurs which is available to the public on a wide variety of topics. There's 1310 clips just on startup business planning! What's also great is they have it listed by business name and category, so you can actually choose a company in your industry and hear how they got their start, or what resources they used to get off the ground.
I read the print version of these two fascinating articles by NY Sun writer Liz Peek about women entrepreneurs but they are also happily available digitally:
Natori Celebrates 30 years at Breakneck Speed profiles Josie Natori, who started trading stocks at 22 and went on to build a fashion empire that generates $150 million in retail sales a year (one day that could be us!!)
Lulu Wang Throttles Back is a about a self made millionairess who went from rags to riches and is now cutting back on her corporate duties to follow her passion for vintage race driving.
Bonjour Mogulettes! I'm back from my trip totally inspired by the style and flair of Paris. The French love to surround themselves with beauty. Everywhere you turn there's a statue, a building, a park or some other enchanting thing to enjoy. All the seats in the outdoor cafés look toward the street so you get prime viewing of the lovely ladies walking by, who get dressed up even to go shopping. It was cold and drizzly but I hardly noticed because I was so excited to be there. My last visit was over ten years ago and the city seemed even prettier than I remembered, so I quickly embarked into a whirlwind of tours and sightseeing.
On the outbound flight I sat next to a lovely Parisian jeune fille (that's young woman - I can't stop plugging in le francais!) and by the time we landed at the Charles de Gaulle airport I had a long list of places to visit. One of those was Les Jardins de Luxembourg, where I stopped by on my third day and was immediately smitten. Dainty little flower beds and softly gurgling fountains give this little jewel of a park an air of peace and tranquility. A large circular pond sits in the middle surrounded by a gallery of statues, which upon closer inspection I realized were all of French queens and illustrious women. Trés mogulett-ish! (Want to see more pictures? Visit my Flickr page).
The park seemed surprisingly full of people for the middle of a work day, reflecting perhaps the fact that unemployment is high in France. That topic came up the following day when I joined a handful of "locals" for lunch. The ladies (pictured below) were all Anglos - either American or British - but have lived in Paris for years. They talked about how in spite of the lack of jobs it's very difficult to set up a small business in France because of the high taxes and piles of paperwork that entrepreneurs are burdened with. We're lucky to have all the free resources and support that we have here in the states - we need to take advantage of that!
The trip ended all too soon but I returned with renewed energy and positivity. When I first started considering the idea of going to Paris the thought of spending time and money on something other than my work was terrifying. How dare I take a vacation? Coming up with a budget and getting support from my friends helped me to put things into perspective and overcome my fears. Now I clearly see the benefits of taking time off - had I not gone I'd probably be feeling pretty frustrated right now, but by spending time in such a beautiful city I came back feeling abundant, and if I feel abundant, I'm more likely to attract abundance into my life.
"Abundance is not something we acquire. It is something we tune into." --Wayne Dyer
Video is agreat way to showcase your talents and share valuable info with others. Here's a sampling of clips I shot and edited on the latest social media happenings.
Digital Media Workshops
If you live in or near NYC and have an interest in digital media and Web 2.0, don't miss the Small Business Tech Tutorials! Workshops include blogging for business, SEO, online video & advertising basics, site customization & monetization and much, much more. Sign up for Workshop Updates
Are you looking for ways to give your business maximum exposure at minimal cost?
Let me help you devise a winning social media marketing strategy to get your products and services noticed.
Here's a partial list of services I provide: -create content for your website and/or blog -optimize your content for search engines -promote your site through blog outreach strategies -utilize social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter to gain exposure -create online videos to spread the word about your products & services -devise widget strategies -monetize your site through affiliate product sales -track and analyze your traffic data thru Google Analytics
I just got a new gig as guest blogger at More.com, a magazine that I absolutely love. It's got great articles, how-to's and tips for ladies in the prime of their lives. Every week I'll be writing a new post on social media tools for business, so please visit and leave your comments. I need your support!
Mediabistro, for $23 million this past July. It took her just 13 years...but she didn't make a profit for the first 9 of them, and she didn't generate any money for the first two. That really helps to put things in perspective!
