Process Prodigy – Work Less, Make More Money & Create Outrageously Effective Systems for Your Business

Systemizing Your Business: Media Magic

By Sandye · Comments View Comments

Tuesday, September 1st, 2009

By Sandye Linnetz, Systems Goddess for Process Prodigy

What’s your system for getting media coverage? Do you have steps to follow and a checklist of to-dos so that you make the most of your marketing time? Process Prodigy has expert information, suggestions for implementation and follow-up, and a great template for you to use as a “get media coverage system”… now I want to add the magic.

Remember when you were a kid and your parents and teachers taught you the “magic words”: Please and Thank-you? Well, they still work and I strongly suggest that you use them when dealing with your media contacts. After all of these years – and with your current need for media coverage, however, you’re ready for some new magic words.

There are variations, so choose and modify the ones that feel right for you and your company. Memorize the sentence, teach it to your team and use it every chance you get. It works!

I don’t want to waste your time, so…
• What do you consider worthy of writing about?
• What would I have to do that you would consider worthy of writing about?
• What can I say that would compel you to write about my company?
• What are you working on that I may be able to add to?
• What topics are you interested in writing about?

Once you have chosen your magic words, ignore the rest. Make appointments with the appropriate reporters and editors. When you are with them, say the Magic Words clearly and then… shhh! Listen for the answer. Be interested and when it’s called for, ask for clarification. Make the conversation about them, not you. (That, alone, will be a welcome relief for most media contacts.) Take mental notes. Repeat back what you heard to make sure that you understand. (This also reconfirms for both of you that if you fill in the blank, they will fill in the blank.) Before leaving, let them know that you’ll get back to them as soon as possible.

Now move into action. Write down the contact information and what you need to do. Give yourself a “by when” and calendar it. Create a plan and generate it. Give ‘em what they want… and you’ll get what you want… every time. That’s the magic!

© 2009 Beth Schneider, Process Prodigy, Inc.
Want to reprint this article? Feel free as long as you include the following:
Beth Schneider, President of Process Prodigy Inc., www.processprodigy.com, along with her team of highly sought after operations consultants, reveal the insider secrets billion-dollar corporations pay thousands of dollars for. Specializing in process creation, Process Prodigy tools and techniques have helped entrepreneurs increase productivity by as much as 600%, and revenues by as much as 250%. Visit www.processprodigy.com/ezine and grab your FREE systems starter kit valued at $297.00

Categories : Marketing, PR

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5 Ways to Drive Revenue to Your Business

By Beth Schneider · Comments View Comments

Wednesday, July 15th, 2009

By Beth Schneider

Take a deep breath. Do you smell that? That’s the unmistakable smell of summertime! And you know what that means, it’s vacation time. Time to put your feet up, relax and enjoy the sun with friends and family. Whether you decide to head north, south, east or west, now is a great time to focus on driving revenue into the business. Way back, when I was in college, one of my professors told us that, “what we do today will determine the kind of vacations we take tomorrow.” Almost 20 years later those words still stick in my head so I thought you’d like my system for driving revenue into your business – any time of year.

1. Create a Marketing Schedule – Our most successful consulting clients don’t just say they are going to do specific things like send out an ezine, host a teleclass or launch a product. They create a schedule. Grab a calendar and plot out when you’ll write your ezine, when you’ll send it out and what content should be included. Having a schedule will keep you and your team accountable which means it will actually get done, which means people will have the opportunity to buy from you. Who knew a calendar would be that profitable!?

2. Be Prepared for Inquiries – I was browsing my twitter stream the other day and there was a conversation going on about how someone cancelled 100 magazine subscriptions because the company couldn’t get their act together. Don’t let this happen to you. Make sure you know you lay out the steps and know how to handle client inquiries. When people are handled quickly and efficiently, they are more likely to buy from you.

3. Have a Follow-Up System – Not too long ago I had a conversation with someone who’s services I was interested in. I said the magic words, “Let me give you my credit card.” We agreed on a date I would give up the cash and she would start the service. That was over a year ago and I’m still waiting for that follow-up phone call. How many times have you spent a bunch of cash and taken the time to go to an event. You come home with a boat load of business cards and new connections and then don’t do anything with them. Before you ever leave the house, decide how you are going to connect with people after the event.

4. New Client Set Up – Ever been in a situation where the sales person follows you around? Everything is, “yes, we can do that”, “let me help you with that”, “what questions do you have?” Well, it’s all those things until you give up your money. Then it’s like you pulled out your Harry Potter invisibility cloak and totally disappear. Don’t do that to you own clients. It’s really easy to get caught up in the excitement of a new client. After you are done doing your happy dance, take those new clients through a specific set of steps to make them feel like the VIPs they are. Things like sending them a welcome kit, telling them how their meetings will work, explaining your contracts, sending a welcome gift, etc. This step is so important that I’ve included a new client set-up system as part of the core systems for the Outrageously Effective Systems www.processprodigy.com/oes club. It’s the key to getting clients to trust you and refer additional business to you.

5. Ask For Referrals – The easiest way to get new clients is to ask your happy clients for referrals. Most do this randomly. Instead of being haphazard about it, plan a specific time when you will ask for referrals. If you are a coach who sells coaching packages, maybe after the 4th call, you always ask for referrals. If you sell products, add in a message in an autoresponder series that asks people to become an affiliate. The key is to pick a specific time to ask for referrals and then ask. Being strategic doesn’t have to be hard. Spend a few minutes preparing what you want to do so that you can easily execute. Then when you find you have extra time and money on your hands go head to the beach.

Want to reprint this article? Feel free as long as you include the following: Beth Schneider, President of Process Prodigy Inc., www.processprodigy.com, along with her team of highly sought after operations consultants, reveal the insider secrets billion-dollar corporations pay thousands of dollars for. Specializing in process creation, Process Prodigy tools and techniques have helped entrepreneurs increase productivity by as much as 600%, and revenues by as much as 250%. Visit www.processprodigy.com/ezine and grab your FREE systems starter kit valued at $297.00.

Categories : Coaching, Marketing, Time Management, Uncategorized

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The Secret to Getting More Out of Your Marketing

By Sandye · Comments View Comments

Tuesday, July 14th, 2009

By Beth Schneider and Sandye Linnetz

You know you have to market your business, right? How else is that huge rush of client going to magically show up at your door step? But did you know that marketing by itself is not enough? Creating and using an effective system for marketing in your business is the key to having both more time and more money for playing the market . . .and shopping at one!

A rush of clients is great. But isn’t a rush of clients that magically gets handled and doesn’t overwhelm you sound better? The freedom to walk out of your business for an hour or a month – and know that it will run smoothly and profitably on it’s own- is available through the systems attached to your marketing efforts.

Here are the steps we took one client through to greatly increase his profitability and find the hidden money in his business. The best part is you can use these same steps to increase the cash flowing into your own bank account.

Step 1. Notice the breakdown One of our one-on-one consulting clients at Process Prodigy is a brilliant marketer – really a star in his field. He’s a great copywriter and comes up with fabulous products that people want, BUT the system behind all of that brilliance was broken! Consequently, he and his staff were stressed, overwhelmed with the amount of work to do and constantly rushing at the last minute to put out fires and complete projects and tasks that should have been finished days or weeks before. He was saying, “yes” to almost everything and figuring that “somehow it will all fit in.” The problem was that, at his company, they had no schedule or calendar and he was way over extended; things were being double booked and too many tasks and projects were getting lost in the shuffle. This is a common breakdown that you problem can see in your own business, but don’t quite know how to handle it.

Step 2. Lay out the Big Picture We started by creating a calendaring system. We scheduled all of the upcoming newsletters, coaching promotions, live events and various product launches. Laying things out in a calendar made it easy for his whole team to see what happens and when. Do you have this view for yourself? Lay out a calendar for yourself, you’ll be amazed at how much gets accomplished just because you have a plan.

Step 3. Connect the dots Once you know what to focus on, then you want to lay out all of the pieces, the steps to get each job done in a smoothly organized, highly profitable way. Essentially you lay out “how” things get done. This will empower the right team members to follow the right steps to get things done your way and you don’t even have to be there.

Step 4. Give it away Don’t plan on doing it all yourself. Give out assignments to the right people on your team. For our client we created a detailed spreadsheet of what needed to get done, who was responsible and the date it needed to be completed. At a glance, the “what”, “who” and “when” was perfectly clear.

The results? Success was immediate. After less than four hours of working together on his new marketing system, my client “found” $100,000.00 that had been slipping through the cracks without a system in place. When you create a system and put a system into use, it works, so you have more time and money not to.

Let’s recap. We identified the breakdowns, created a big picture plan, laid out the steps and then assigned the team to make sure everything got done. Writing an outstanding blog or article may make you feel good – and your mother proud – but, if you don’t point it anywhere and no one reads it – If you did a fabulous job of pointing and didn’t give contact info. Get the point? Marketing matters – truly matters, but it is marketing plus systems that equals a successful business.

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Want to reprint this article? Feel free as long as you include the following:

Beth Schneider, President of Process Prodigy Inc., www.processprodigy.com, along with her team of highly sought after operations consultants, reveal the insider secrets billion-dollar corporations pay thousands of dollars for. Specializing in process creation, Process Prodigy tools and techniques have helped entrepreneurs increase productivity by as much as 600%, and revenues by as much as 250%. Visit www.processprodigy.com/ezine and grab your FREE systems starter kit valued at $297.00

Categories : Marketing, Uncategorized

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Systemizing Your Business: Are You Advertising Your Marketing Plan?

By Sandye · Comments View Comments

Friday, January 2nd, 2009

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Thoughts from your Systems Goddess, Sandye Linnetz, Process Prodigy

Is marketing in your advertising budget??? Or is advertising in the marketing budget??? Are they the same? Related? What??? If you are having trouble differentiating between the two… read on.

By definition, ADVERTISING is a transitive verb which means:
To describe or draw attention to (a product, service, or event) in a public medium in order to promote sales; the paid, public, non-personal persuasive message or promotion by a sponsor or firm of its products or services to existing and potential customers.

MARKETING is a transitive verb which means:
To advertise or promote something; the systematic planning and implementation of business activities to bring together buyers and sellers for the mutually advantageous exchange or transfer of goods or services.

Ah, now we begin to see where the confusion enters the picture. It appears that the two verbs are not only related, but seemingly almost the same. But NO, my friends, the two are quite different and understanding that difference may just be the key to being successful in BOTH arenas.

Consider that advertising is more directly related to lead generating while marketing is a foundational business tool we can use to see that those advertising dollars are wisely spent – by first getting pertinent information about your customers so that money is spent in appropriate areas. Although many of us would like to believe otherwise, not everyone is a potential customer for your business. Therefore, doing the research and analysis first – Who are our customers? Where are they? What and why do they buy from us? – is essential. Knowing who our customers are; the customers’ demographics, preferences and buying habits, allows us to advertise in ways that can almost guarantee desired results.

I’ve talked about Michael Gerber and his book, The E-Myth. His organization uses the term “marketing” to mean: understanding who your customers are, why they buy, where they are located, and what your overall strategy should be to meet the needs of those customers. That process, as described, is the foundational step that needs to be taken well before advertising happens, so marketing then, is not part of advertising, but the first step – the strategy behind – the advertising plan.

Advertising is a single piece of the marketing puzzle; frequently the most expensive piece. For that reason alone, care must be taken to first do effective marketing/research and planning. Advertising is the piece that, if done well, gets the word out to the customers about who and what YOU are and what you have to offer. We’re talkin’ ad placements, commercials (in all mediums from radio to TV and beyond), direct mail, Internet… get the idea?
The marketing plan (or “marketing process” as we at Process Prodigy prefer) also encompasses market research, sales strategy, media planning, customer support, distribution, and community/public relations. It is when the whole marketing plan is in sync… when everything is working smoothly and effectively – each piece on it’s own and as part of the bigger picture, that we can declare a successful process at work. And that successful process is the payoff for hours and hours and hours of research, planning and implementation.
So, I guess you can advertise your marketing plan… but not market your advertising??? You get it, don’t you?

© 2008 Beth Schneider, Process Prodigy, Inc. Want to reprint this article? Feel free as long as you include the following: Beth Schneider, President of Process Prodigy Inc., www.processprodigy.com, along with her team of highly sought after operations consultants, reveal the insider secrets billion-dollar corporations pay thousands of dollars for. Specializing in process creation, Process Prodigy tools and techniques have helped entrepreneurs increase productivity by as much as 600%, and revenues by as much as 250%. Visit www.processprodigy.com/ezine and grab your FREE systems starter kit valued at $297.00.

Categories : Advertising, Marketing

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