If you’ve gotten big results for your clients, a case study is a powerful way to talk about those results. With specific takeaways, a persuasive story structure, and compelling characters, they demonstrate your expertise and help you get clients without a single “close” technique needed.

But what I like most about case studies (besides the way they do the selling for you, bringing ready-to-sign-up clients straight to your door) is how useful they are. See, I like content that you can use in lots of different ways and as content-chameleons go, case studies are among the best.

Take case studies when you speak

If you’ve got a speaking engagement coming up, print out your best case study and hand it out. (You can even leverage this case study to get more subscribers–tell people in exchange for their email address you’ll send them even more useful case studies.)

People tend to keep these printed case studies and I’ve even had clients get clients *years* after handing a printed case study to someone with no additional contact.

Include a case study in your newsletter

Case studies make great newsletter content because they’re interesting. They paint a picture of your client struggling with something your readers struggle with (or they wouldn’t be on your list) and how they overcame it.… Keep reading

There’s a virus afoot. No, not a computer virus. Or a bird flu virus. But rather a Sameness Virus.

Most of the articles you’ll read on blogs, article libraries, in ezines, and being posted at sites like EzineArticles.com are very much the same.

In fact, if you spend a lot of time browsing content, you might start to feel like the article writers took the old Sesame Street song a little too much to heart and decided the worst thing that could happen to their article was that it “wouldn’t belong.”

You probably think you’re immune. After all, you can see all the nuances that set your content apart. But, here’s the thing: just because you know your articles stand head and shoulders above the rest doesn’t mean your readers can see the difference.

It’s not really your fault that your articles suffer from the Sameness Virus–you’ve been doing things exactly as you’ve been taught. You’ve written that cornerstone article, the one solidifying what you accomplish for your clients. And then you’ve supplemented it with more content answering the questions clients most frequently ask. You’ve posted all these articles on your website, you’ve submitted them to article sites, and you’ve published them in your newsletter.… Keep reading

In my last newsletter, I mentioned I’d made some plaques for a seminar I attended and that I had some left over. I offered ’em up to the first three people who emailed me. And they went so fast. (Like, really, really fast.)

I wish I could send one to everyone who wanted one! So, here’s the next best thing: you can download the pdf file and make your own.

These postcard plaques make great business card substitutes–they’re an easy size to give out (they’re even easy to mail!) and people love to get them. As evidenced by the number of people raising their hands and asking me to send them one!

Put your artwork on the front and your call to action on the back for a fun, easy gift that new business contacts will love to receive. Need branded artwork? Send me an email, my team will be happy to help.

Here’s how I made ’em:

… Keep reading

This week, I was at a small event hosted by Fabienne Fredrickson where a lot of people were talking about how they have plenty of clients, but they’re not the right clients.

They mentioned clients who whine, who don’t take action, who don’t pay on time, or who don’t pay at all.

(Am I the only one who hears complaints like that and thinks: “Why are you working with these people?”)

I have a theory about this. Sure, there are probably five or six truly crappy clients out there, and, as Jim Rohn used to say, they get around ;-). But, I think most of the people who seem like not-so-great clients are actually just not the right fit.

I’ll give you an example. I have a client who was struggling with a client list of people she just wasn’t enjoying working with. There wasn’t anything inherently wrong with her client base, but she wasn’t feeling excited about her work, and her clients weren’t getting the fabulous results she knew she could get for people.

So, we talked, I looked at what she was putting out there–her marketing and branding–and she discovered her Brand Siren.

What we uncovered is that she’s an Edith, but she was working with lots of clients who needed her to be a Judy.… Keep reading

I’ve been working on a novel for about a year now and it’s unlike any project I’ve tackled before (for a lot of reasons). It’s obviously also very different from the professional copywriting for small businesses that I do.

It’s kind of strange to slip into of this world of fiction only to slip out again and into writing non-fiction. But it’s a good strange.

In fact, I’m finding that the fiction that I’m doing is making me a stronger non-fiction writer as well. I’m paying more attention to each word that I use and at first that felt clumsy and self-conscious (whereas I used to just let the writing flow) but now I’m seeing that this extra attention is resulting in much stronger sentences.

I’m using verbs more instead of leveraging adverbs and adjectives to get my point across. And I’m spending more time trying to make a sentence a real sentence instead of just shrugging my shoulders and saying, “Eh, but what I want to say is best conveyed by a fragment.” (Sometimes a fragment *is* necessary, but somehow, knowing that I’ll have to defend every fragment I use means I use fewer of them.)

Maybe you don’t want to write fiction, but you need cross pollination nonetheless.… Keep reading

When I created Sales Page Play Dates, I got a lot of questions. People wanted to know why they should invest in learning to write better copy.

“After all,” one person said, “I’m just doing this in the meantime until I can afford to pay a professional.”

A lot of people weren’t clear on why they should learn to write their own copy other than that they couldn’t afford to pay a copywriter to do it for them.

I love to write. You know that about me already. And I didn’t always.

I had to learn to love to write. When I was little, one of the reasons I didn’t love to write was that I wasn’t very good at it. I’d read these wonderful stories and then I’d write one of my own and I’d see just how terrible mine was in comparison to the “real” story. And that made me dislike writing even more.

It’s hard to like something when you’re not so good at it.

Especially when you’re comparing your own first drafts to someone else’s final drafts. (Yikes!)

Sometimes we think we should be able to do this. After all, you know how to write, right?… Keep reading

I work with a lot of clients in a lot of industries (over 90) all around the world (on 5 out of 7 continents). They have lists of all sorts of sizes ranging from the teeny (under 100) to the very large (in the millions).

What does every single one of those clients fear when they hire me? Unsubscribers.

By my second suggestion at our first meeting, they’ve said at least once: “We can’t do that. People will unsubscribe!”

To which I tend to say, “That’s the point.” Because that’s why they’ve hired me.

If you want to move forward, you’re going to have to let some of the people on your list go. Without fail, there are people right now on your list who are a bad fit. You’ve outgrown them. They’ve outgrown you. Your perspective has changed. Theirs has shifted.

Whatever the reason, they don’t belong on your list anymore.

Let them go.

The faster you get this done, the easier it is.

Here are three great ways to do it:

1. Send a mass email explaining exactly where you’re headed and what your philosophy currently is. Then, invite people to resubscribe if they want to continue hearing from you.

Have you ever stood in front of your closet with absolutely no idea what to wear?(Please tell me it’s not just me!) Usually, this isn’t because our options are naked or PJs, but rather because nothing quite strikes our fancy or feels quite right.

Similarly, those days when you feel like you have nothing to write or talk about, when you feel stuck on what kind of content you should be creating, it’s unlikely that you’re actually completely out of ideas. Rather, it’s that none of your ideas feel quite right. You might not know where to start or what to do next, you might be feeling like you’re not getting the results you want and so you’re struggling to say something spectacular enough to get you noticed, or you might just plain be bored with your content and want to throw it all out and start fresh.

Whether or not you can relate to feeling like you have nothing to wear, I’m betting you can definitely relate to that “nothing to write” feeling. So today, let’s explore how you can prevent it.

See, just like having something to wear is about having a balanced wardrobe–one where you have clothes for the different activities and audiences of your life–having something to write about (or talk about, for those of you who mostly do multimedia content) is about having a balanced content mix.… Keep reading