As you know, my virtual assistant practice is evolving into consultancy for small business owners and online marketers who need technical assistance with new media and virtual events in their marketing. Adding audio and video to a marketing mix will make your message anything but vanilla. Another essential part of an online marketing plan is a business blog, because one’s blog is the hub of marketing. A blog is like the central filing cabinet for your content.
* Feature experts (Interview them via teleconference or webinar)
* Host a webinar
* Host an online radio show
Thanks, Denise, for an insightful post! As usual, her content on blogging is of great value. I suggest you follow Denise!
Have you thought about using a different medium for getting your message to your target market? What challenges are you facing in trying new marketing tactics? Please feel free to comment below:
Are you looking for new ways to reach your target market? Any one with a business should be! Internet Marketing provides many channels for distributing your content and getting it into the hands of your target market.
Many business owners mistakenly believe that “content” means only articles or just written text. Not so at all. The Internet marketing definition of content has come a long way compared to just a few years ago. In addition to articles, blogging, video, audio, podcasts, reports and ebooks can propel your website to the top of the search engine charts and make it interesting to customers who are tired of the same old text content format.
But before we get into details of distribution, let’s talk a bit about brainstorming content ideas. Because this is often the tripping point for many business owners, here are a few tried and true strategies to generate content ideas:
Ask your audience. Simply set up a poll, survey or questionnaire on your website. Getting readers to participate can be tricky, but it’s not impossible. To know what your customers want to read about, make the poll or survey mandatory in order to access certain areas of your website.
Research your frequently asked questions or ask your virtual assistant to go through the questions they hear the most from customers and website visitors. This is great material for content.
Visit online forums and chat rooms and read the most popular threads. The threads people are passionate about are sure to make for excellent content topics.
Create lists or step-by-step content. People enjoy and value lists or step-by-step type articles. They’re easy to digest, share, and keep for future reference making them very valuable to your readers.
The Internet can be an impressive research tool. Visit industry or competitors’ websites to discover what’s being talked about. Determine if your target market can benefit from your personal take on the matter and then follow through by writing content crafted around the hot topic.
Here is one of the beautiful facts about using the internet to market your content – it’s very easy to re-purpose content from one form into another. For instance, one can take an article and break it up into several blog posts. Or, use the article as a script and record an audio version of the article. Or, if the article was educational in nature, create a training video from the content. Keeping that in mind should take the content brainstorming to another level.
Take 15 minutes right now to sit and brainstorm or research or mind map your content ideas. This is your first step to an internet marketing plan.
What are ways that you brainstorm? Please leave me a comment below.
Future posts on this blog will contain resources and tips and tricks for your internet marketing success.
The flight plans are written and tested, and now EProduct Flight Plan is ready for take-off!
The EProduct Flight Plan was created by my joint venture partner, Mary Motz, and me to help entrepreneurs get their products selling on the web. If you are new to the internet marketing arena, have a digital product you’d like to sell, but you’re not sure where to start, then EProduct Flight Plan is for you!
EProduct Flight Plan give you super-simple checklists and pre-flight plans to get your EProduct (i.e. digital products, like an eBook, an audio of a training, or a virtual event like a teleclass or webinar) launched and selling.
Here’s what our EProduct Flight Plan covers:
E-Commerce 101 – facts you must know in order to understand the online sales process
Secrets of choosing the best eCommerce tools for your budget, product type & business goals (there’s no such thing as one-size fits all)
Pros & cons of using a traditional web page vs. WordPress for your sales page
Messaging: the importance of mapping out your communications before you start selling
The must-have items of message copy you need completed and ready to go before you sell.
How to work with a VA to be sure there are no “missing links” in your selling process
Getting the word out… learn to leverage all your communication channels to reach people “where they are”
And here’s what you get:
The 90-minute teleclass recording
Carla’s Exclusive Resource Rolodex – a listing of tools and services to check out for your e-product project
Mary’s Shopping Cart & Payment Process Demystifier – your quick guide to shopping cart and payment processing options
A Sample Flight Plan – An example project plan flowchart for getting a product online, along with a blank flight plan for you to complete for your project.
A Pre-Flight Task Checklist – Did you forget anything? You won’t with this handy task checklist.
As the end of summer approaches and folks return from vacation, your business marketing tasks will ramp up. Recognizing the challenges that business owners face in finding time to get the marketing done, Wilson Virtual Assistants is presenting some new service offerings using Multimedia.
What do I mean by Multimedia? Think audio and video. With audio there are several options like audio recording a blog post, creating a podcast, or creating a teleseminar series. Add in video with options like video blog posts, webinars, maybe even live-streaming an event. Sound challenging? It doesn’t have to be. I can consult with you to teach you the ropes, or manage the tasks start to finish – you choose.
When you expand your marketing with multimedia, your message reaches more folks. How? Syndicating your posts, podcasts, audios and videos via social networks and the many sharing sites on the Internet, you’re touching a wider audience.
Future blog posts will include tips and tricks for producing your own multimedia – some video posts and some audio – to demonstrate the ease with which you can add multimedia to your marketing mix. If you have a specific question you’d like me to answer in a future blog post, please post a comment below, or email me at carla@wilsonva.com.
Here is a quick audio version of this blog post: (It took just less than 10 minutes start to finish to record, edit, and publish the audio to my site)
Here was the message as announced on our listserv this morning:
“Please join me with a hearty round of applause for Carla Wilson, who
passed the IVAA Certified Virtual Assistant examination with flying colors
…This designation is the industry standard for excellence. It is no small
accomplishment to have passed the CVA examination, which tests VAs at an advanced level as opposed to core competencies. The IVAA CVA examination is the only VA examination-format certification that tests a VA in many areas of a VA practice.”
I am one of currently only 18 other colleagues to have earned the CVA. I feel that earning the Certified Virtual Assistant designation illustrates my commitment to my business and my industry. I’m so proud of this accomplishment!
I am putting the final touches on our bonus materials for EProduct Flight Plan! EProduct Flight Plan is the 90-minute teleclass that my colleague, Mary Motz, and I will present on Wednesday, June 23rd at 12pm (EST).
This is about the resources, services, tools, timelines and checklists that will get your e-product off the ground and soaring online smoothly and successfully.
Our bonuses include:
My Resource Rolodex that lists the many tools (many are f*ree!) out there that will help you launch your next eProduct.
Mary’s Shopping Cart & Payment Processing Demystifier – your quick guide to shopping cart and payment processing options
A Sample Flight Plan – An example project plan flowchart for getting a product online, along with a blank flight plan for you to complete for your project.
A Pre-Flight Task Checklist – Did you forget anything? You won’t with this handy task checklist.
I’m happy to extend a 25% discount for you to join us.
On the ticket order form at the bottom of the screen, click
the orange “Enter Discount Code” link and enter the code:
I’m very excited to announce a new teleclass that I will be doing with my very good friend and colleague, Mary Motz, next Wednesday called E-Product Flight Plan. This is the first in a series of learning events we will be offering as the Virtual Learning Team!
Here is a short video introduction:
In this teleclass, Mary & I will be presenting a guide on how to sell your knowledge online. If you are a coach or consultant and have been wondering what you need to have in place in order to start selling your expertise on the web – you owe it to yourself to check this out.
This is not a marketing class – this is about resources, tools and checklists – the meat & potatoes of how to sell online. If you have an ebook, teleclass, webinar or coaching program (any non-shippable item) that you want to add to your revenue stream, this teleclass will save you time, guesswork and money.
Among the items we will cover:
* E-Commerce 101 – facts you must know in order to understand the online sales process
* Secrets of choosing the best ecommerce tools for your budget, product type & business goals (there’s no such thing as one-size fits all)
* Pros & cons of using a traditional web page vs. WordPress for your sales page
* Messaging – the importance of mapping out your communications before you start selling
* The must-have items of message copy you need completed and ready to go before you sell.
* How to work with a VA to be sure there are no “missing links” in your selling process
* Getting the word out… learn to leveraging all your communication channels to reach people “where they are”
* Your questions… we will address your burning questions on the call – be sure to include yours when you sign up!
“Business Class” passengers will also receive 4 PDF guides, along with a MP3 of the call. You can also opt to purchase a low-cost “Economy Class” (live call only) access ticket.
When: Wednesday, June 23rd, 12:00 Noon – 1:30pm Eastern Where: Teleclass – all you need is a phone!
Click here for full details and to register.When you register, use the discount code friends25 and save 25% off your ticket! Plus Early-Bird ticket pricing until Saturday the 19th will save you extra moola!
One of my clients, Stephanie Krzywanski, is a personal chef. She owns The Comfort Gourmet and creates custom meals for her clients. Her dream is to cook on TV. I know her talent and drive will make that happen, but in the meantime, she auditions for cooking shows and enters contests.
Knowing my penchant for helping folks use video in their business, Steph asked me to crate a video for her recent contest entry. This contest is called Real Women of Philadelphia and is sponsored by PaulaDeen.com and Kraft Philadelphia Cream Cheese.
In any case, check out Steph’s video below. As expected the recipe is quick and easy, uses just a few utensils, and is terribly addicting.
I was honored to emcee a recent webinar sponsored by Valpak and VisionMedia and presented by Steve Prager of Prager Microsystems. As tech-savvy as I am, I love to learn new things and Steve’s presentation doesn’t disappoint!
My friends at Vision Media and Prager Microsystems will be offering a great webinar on March 4 – and you don’t want to miss it!
Here are some details about the presentation:
Businesses invest millions of dollars each year in sales and marketing personnel. Top sales representatives often earn six figure salaries with business owners thinking nothing of the expense. What if however we told you there was a better way? A better way to reach your customers and prospects and speak to an unlimited number of them at once, all for less than the cost of just one new employee. Too good to be true? This webinar will focus on how to leverage internet technology to prospect better, sell better, and service better than even the most effective sales representative. Who truly is your most important sales representative? If you haven’t answered with “my web site”, then this webinar is something you cannot miss!
Key Takeaways:
How to leverage various online channels to market your business and generate new customers and prospects
Turn your web site into a 24/7 salesperson through the implementation of sophisticated marketing strategies
Outperform your competition by offering intuitive and interactive ways for the public to conduct business with you
Reduce cost of sales by utilizing new technology and cutting edge marketing techniques to reach customers faster
Most importantly, learn ways to turn your web site into your most valuable sales representative
Sound like something you’d be interested in? Please select the link below to register for the event on March 4 at 9am:
Are you looking for new ways to reach your target market? Any one with a business should be! Internet Marketing provides many channels for distributing your content and getting it into the hands of your target market.
