That differentiator is what you sell.

The most successful coaches in the industry sell their services bound up in comprehensive, proprietary intellectual property. The rest sell general “coaching.” There’s a big difference between selling general coaching services and selling a very specific system that produces a very specific result for a very specific client.

Book Yourself Solid is that kind of system. It’s why I’ve been so successful.

If you don’t have a system like that to offer potential clients, what do you have that they’d be compelled to buy?

You ARE compelling on your own. That’s for sure. But, is it enough to have a never-ending stream of new clients clamoring for your services? Maybe…but usually not.

Here are three solutions. Choose which is right for you and you’ll see an immediate change in your client-flow and as a result—your cash-flow.

SOLUTION ONE

Create your own extensive, comprehensive intellectual property that makes a major statement in your industry.

This is what I have done with Book Yourself Solid and it’s one of the main reasons I have been so successful.

Dale Carnegie’s leadership and public speaking coaching business all stemmed from his seminal work, How To Win Friends and Influence People. Without this crucial piece of intellectual property, his hugely successful training company wouldn’t have got anywhere near the amount of traction it has.

Ken Blanchard is another example from the same industry. On the back of the success of his short book, The One Minute Manager, he now runs a worldwide coaching and training company.

But you don’t need to have an international best-selling book to get these results; we can look at other examples.

Who is the world’s most successful sleep coach for babies and toddlers? You might not know the answer to that, but Kim West dominates the industry based on her proprietary Good Night, Sleep Tight solution.

Bikram Choudhory is another example. He created a copyrighted, proprietary yoga system based on existing principles and became a huge commercial success in the health & wellness industry.

Admittedly, this approach isn’t for everybody, but if it IS for you, then you’re backing a winner.

Here’s a potential downside: it will probably take you years. If successful, these will be years very well spent.

Ultimately the market-place will decide if the intellectual property you create is actually worth paying for, but in the meantime, let’s see if you are, at heart, an intellectual property creator, or if your true calling is to be a coach.

Written Exercise:

• Right now, take a pen and paper and jot down a title for a four-part program.

• Within that program, create seven unique components for each part, each one addressing an urgent and compelling need for your target market and delivering a single big result for your audience.

• Each of the 28 steps should contain new insights and actionable content. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel at this stage – most skilled intellectual property developers are adept at repurposing (but not stealing) existing content – but your result should be brand new to the marketplace.

• Once you’ve done that, can you formulate, on no fewer than, say, two pages, a comprehensive year-long marketing campaign to get people into your programs based on this intellectual property? You’ll first have to design the format, delivery, pricing and structure of these programs.

It’s a lot of work, huh? But don’t beat yourself up if it doesn’t come naturally. Whilst content creation is something that can be learned, it isn’t necessarily going to be the best use of your time and resources.

Many of my Book Yourself Solid Coaches, for example, are fantastic at the coaching and consulting side of things, but haven’t the inclination or skill-set or desire to go about creating proprietary intellectual property. Instead, they use mine.

Decide if this course of action is for you. If it is, then run with it. As I said before, the market will ultimately decide if it wants to pay for the fruits of your labor.

But if you don’t try, you’ll never find out.

SOLUTION TWO

This solution allows you to use other people’s intellectual property. You can’t, of course, do this by stealing it (but I know I don’t have to tell you that).

Coaching franchises exist that will give you the tools and marketing materials you need to sell their products to your audience.

In buying into a coaching franchise, you’ll be given the opportunity to use materials previously developed by somebody else, and sell them to your own clients under that original brand name.

In return for a lump-sum payment and an on-going monthly fee, plus a percentage of your sales, you’ll be given the right to sell the franchisor’s materials to individuals or companies within a defined geographic area.

There are several opportunities like this available, ranging from sales training schools to marketing programs and entire top-down business coaching.

The franchisors — and this differs from organization to organization — should be keen to make sure that you have the necessary tools to sell their products and programs. After all, the more money you make, the more money they make.

The most successful coaching franchises have a strict Red Velvet Rope Policy in place, which means they put a barrier to entry in place to ensure that only the most committed coaches become franchisees.

This barrier is usually financial. The two leading business-coaching franchises will not let you become a franchisee unless you are prepared to make an initial investment of the better part of $100,000.

That means that only those who have the means apply.

The advantages of this system are that you have the materials already created for you. Some of them will even allow you to rent a virtual office assistant to answer the phone on your behalf.

This is a viable solution for many new coaches out there who feel comfortable within a more corporate structure. With monthly financial reporting to head-office, the accountability factor is high.

Also, in order to succeed you’ll have to reach for the skies with your pricing, as the continued cost to remain a franchisee are usually considerable.

SOLUTION THREE

The third solution is to license the use of somebody else’s proven intellectual property. This is different to the franchise model, as it is often against a one-time investment and you will have the right to re-fashion and repurpose the material as you see fit.

Sometimes, you can even put your own name to the material, mix it up with your own ideas and intellectual property and rebrand it as something that you can legitimately call your own.

All of my Book Yourself Solid coaches, for example, have a full legal license to use all of the material that I have put together over the last decade, including course structure, marketing material and even promotional graphics. This is in return for a one-off investment and a period of intensive personal training with me.

I’m fully aware of my bias to this solution because it’s the one I offer. I do so because I think it’s most profitable for the coach (and the fastest way to get in the game). Another advantage of this method is the advantage of transferred credibility.

Surgeons, musicians, hypnotherapists, athletes and life-coaches boost their credibility by making reference to their mentors. If you’re looking for an NLP trainer, you’ll be reassured to know that your trainer has studied personally under Richard Bandler. If you’re looking for a chess teacher, then a student of Kasparov is almost as good as Kasparov himself.

So it is with Book Yourself Solid coaching. Teaching a system that is proven to work and that is internationally respected will confer the benefit of recognition and credibility to your own practice, even if you’re just starting out.

IT’S NEVER TOO LATE

So there you have it, the single biggest difference between very successful coaches, and coaches that are just getting by: intellectual property.

You mustn’t forget this as you forge ahead with your career as a coach. It should be the cornerstone of the services that you offer and the brand that you create for yourself.

If you’re just starting out, or you’re already a coach without recognizable IP, it’s never too late to start.

Choose one of those three options above:

• Create your own IP
• Become a franchisee

or

• License proven material

And don’t stop until you hit the top!

I’m always looking to speak with good, motivated and passionate coaches about joining my team as a Certified Book Yourself Solid Coach. To find out more about that, click the link below:

Book Yourself Solid Coach Training – more details

In the meantime, stay safe, stay strong and think

A video about my mentoring program, The Alliance, has been shared a lot, despite very little promotion on my part.

Here’s a breakdown of why it works.

There are five key points to making your stuff shareable. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a video, a blog post, a sales page, or an e-book; these principles apply.

1. Give people something to talk about.

There’s this (wrong) idea being bandied about that the only way to get a reaction is to be controversial.

Certainly, that can work, but if you’re not in the business of picking fights in order to provoke a reaction, try being remarkable instead. According to my friend, Seth, that means people are able to remark on what you’ve done. It doesn’t mean that you have to paint the Sistine Chapel. But you do need to make something that is really marketable.

The first seven seconds of the video fit the bill and got people talking.

Admittedly, it pokes a little fun at some of the all-too-common Internet marketing techniques, but it’s done with tongue firmly in cheek and in the best of spirits. You can hardly call it controversial.

Instead, it’s what’s called a “pattern interrupt.”  You make the viewer (or reader) think they’re getting one thing, and then, with a sudden change of direction, you make them laugh, think or feel different then expected. It disarms them.

Which brings me neatly to point two.

2. Make people feel comfortable.

People are going to share the stuff they like, stuff that makes them feel good. Nobody wants to share a cold or flu virus, and nobody wants to share something that makes them feel queasy.

I put a lot of care and attention into getting the tone of this video just right. Everything from the visuals, to the timbre of my voice, to the background music (or lack of it) was designed to put the viewer at ease.

If you can put your audience at ease, then they’ll be receptive and open to sharing your message with their network.

3. Respect your audience.

How many times have you visited a sales page and left feeling a little dirty, a little taken-advantage of?

One of your biggest bugbears, if you’re like most of the people I polled on this, is visiting a web page with a video that doesn’t let you pause, play, rewind or fast forward.

By providing my audience with full control over how the video plays I’m saying, “I respect you.”

If you feel dirty watching it, you won’t forward it. Conversely, if you feel respected, you’re likely to forward it to people you respect.

4. Be unconventional by being yourself.

According to popular wisdom, because attention span has never been shorter, if you’re trying to sell somebody something, you have to hit them between the eyes with loud headlines, catchy bullet points, flashing colors and loud noises.

The video I made to promote the Alliance doesn’t do any of that (expect for the bit at the beginning to point out what you’re not going to see).

It runs 23 minutes and 23 seconds (yes, exactly) and the viewing stats are excellent with many, many people watching it all the way through. Most of the video is just me as me, addressing the camera. There’s no fancy lighting tricks, no kittens falling off tables and no laughing babies.

And you know what? People are watching it and sharing it.

If I’d listened to all the “gurus” and followed their advice, you’d see a very different video out there. You would have seen a video that didn’t represent me, my brand, and what I stand for.

I’ve always been a little skeptical of my industry with all its hype and anti-intellectualism.  Don’t get me wrong, I admire many of its leaders and you know how much I love and respect the people I serve.

Nonetheless, I do my best to be true to my beliefs and what I feel is appropriate. That’s all each of us can do. And that truth is a moveable line so I’m careful that it doesn’t creep in the wrong direction. When it does, I try to quickly move it back to it’s rightful place.

Trust your gut. The best way to be distinct is by being more yourself, more fully self-expressed.

5. Be useful and relevant.

Finally, you have to provide useful, relevant and timely information. That’s the real key. Truly relevant and useful material is always shareable.

It’s December and many small business owners like you are looking at their accounts and performance over the last twelve months, and starting to put a plan in place for 2012.

If you watch this video, even if that’s ALL you do, you’ll have a very clear, very concise overview on the EXACT areas on which to focus, both professionally and personally, to achieve your goals.

That’s timely and relevant.

Of course, I’m telling you about my program as well. But if it’s not right for you, you’ll still get value from watching the video (I believe).

Take a look at the video I put together, and see how it ticks the boxes above:

1. It gives people something to talk about (especially the first seven seconds).
2. I make you feel immediately comfortable so that you want to stick around.
3. My love and respect and gratitude for you shines through from the very beginning.
4. It’s unlike many of the sales videos you’ll have seen recently.
5. It’s useful and relevant.

Keep thinking big about who you are and what you offer the world. Much love and big hugs to you this fine day.

Of course, ultimately, it doesn’t really matter which words you use but, rather, that you make a distinction between meeting new people and staying connected with the people you already know.

If you make this important distinction, it can help you stay focused on each area specifically and deliberately. To that end, there are four simple but meaningful daily action steps that will build your network and get you booked solid.

For the better part of the last year, I’ve been building a software platform called Solid.ly that will help you do your networking and direct outreach. You can sign up for the beta.

In the meantime, here is a TEMPLATE, created by my client, Lauchlan Mackinnon, that you can use, not only to manage your networking and direct outreach but also to help increase the number of referrals you receive.

Direct Outreach with the List of 20™

Again, think of direct outreach as reaching out to the people you do not yet know but would like to know.

I am not talking about the Oprah’s of the world, although hanging out with Oprah would certainly be good for business. No, I am talking about the people that are closer to you—people in your industry who can open doors for you, people that you can actually, and relatively easily, get to.

For example:

• If you want to get booked to speak, you might want to reach out to certain meeting planners.
• If you want to get booked to write articles, you might want to reach out to certain editors.
• If you want to develop your reputation as a blogger, you might want to reach out to influential bloggers in your field.

Create, what I call, a List of 20™. This list is made up of 20 people that you’d like to know but do not yet know.

Of course, if 20 people do not come to mind right now, just start where you are: one, two three, whatever.

Why 20? Constraining your list to 20 people ensures that it’s small enough to focus carefully on each person but still large enough to keep your focus ever expanding on new opportunities.

Reach out to one person each day.

What do you do with this list? Simple. Reach out to one person on this list each day. NOT to ask for a favor or to meet for coffee but to express appreciation for them and their work.

• Write a blog post about them or comment on a blog post that they wrote.
• Retweet a few of their Tweets or Tweet about them or to them.
• Even better, write a SHORT (under 5 lines) email or handwritten note to them telling them why they rock (FYI: long letters make us think you’re going to be a time suck or, worse, might be a little bit crazy).

The key is not asking anything of these people.

Winston Churchill said, “It’s a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link in the chain of destiny can be handled at a time.” I believe building relationships is the same way.

So, if there is someone you’d like to get to know, don’t call them and ask to meet for a cup of coffee. You’re probably not (yet) relevant to them unless they have some prior connection to you or have a higher professional status then they do. Remember, “Only one link in the chain of destiny at a time.”

After you reach out to the person on the top of the list, put them on the bottom of the list. The person that you reached out today goes from number one to number twenty. The person who was number twenty becomes number nineteen and the person who was number two advances to the number one spot.

(The TEMPLATE, created by Lauchlan Mackinnon, will help you keep it organized and flowing until the beta of Solid.ly is open.)

Then, tomorrow, reach out to the next person at the top of the list. Do this every single business day. This way, each day you are connecting with, at least, one person on your List of 20™.  Over the course of one month, you’ll have connected with every person on your List of 20™.

Can you spare 10 minutes a day?

How long should this take you? About 5 to 10 minutes a day.

Of course, if you develop a strong connection right away and your relationship starts to build quickly then you take them off your List of 20™ and add them to what I call your Network of 90™.

Networking with the Network of 90™

Remember, for the purpose of this exercise think about networking as ‘developing deeper relationships with the people you already know’.

The reason I suggest you keep a Network of 90™ is because it will help you focus on a specific, manageable, number of relevant contacts. These are people you already know (or have met) that you’d like to stay in touch with and continue to build stronger relationships.

If you focus on the most relevant ninety people in your network along with the twenty people on your List of 20, then you stay below Dunbar’s number of 150 which is a theoretical cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships.

You don’t need to know a million people, just the right people who can put business opportunities in front of you. Your job is to earn that business.

Now you’ve got your Network of 90™. And, as you might remember from the beginning of this article, I suggested that you do four things each day to build your network and get booked solid.

The first was to reach out to one person on your List of 20™ each day. The second, third, and fourth daily action steps will bring you closer to the people in your Network of 90™.

Share who you know.

Start by introducing two people in your network who do not yet know each other but might find each other relevant (personally or professionally) and appreciate the introduction.

You might have two people in your Network of 90™ who are scratch golfers and they live close to each other. Golfers are always looking for a 4th but they want somebody at their own level. So you might introduce them.

If you are nervous about whether or not you should make the introduction, you might ask each one individually, “I would love to introduce you to a good friend of mine who is also a scratch golfer, would you like me to?”

Or, maybe you know two people that are in the publishing industry or two people in the real estate industry. Both would present excellent opportunities for making an introduction.

Generally, business owners and executives want to continue to move forward in their careers and, to do so, they know it’s essential to meet new people. As a result, 9.9 times out of 10 they are going to say “Oh, yes, please do introduce me. Thank you!”

Note: When you make the introduction, share only professional, public contact information unless it’s requested that you share private contact information instead.

Share what you know.

Next, each day, share some useful or helpful information with at least one person in your Network of 90™. The easiest way to do this is by reading articles in online magazines, journals, and blogs, the ones that are most relevant to your network.

When you see an article that is relevant to one of the people in your network, send it to them via email and say:

Hey, Jennifer, I just read this article and I immediately thought of you. It’s about ‘this’ and I know you’re very interested in ‘that’ so I thought you might find it valuable. Have you read it? What do you think?

Now you can get into a conversation with her about the subject matter and, as a result, develop your relationship.

Let’s recap quickly on what we’ve learned thus far. Each day:

1. Reach out to one person on your List of 20™.
2. Introduce two people in your Network of 90™.
3. Share some information that is useful to one person in your Network of 90™.

Share your compassion.

And, finally, share compassion with somebody in your network every day by calling or writing. If you get their voicemail simply say:

I was thinking about you and I know that you are really working hard on your business right now. I just wanted to say if you ever need any support I am here because I just have so much respect for what you are doing.

Or, if you know somebody is going through a tough time, sometimes the most relevant thing to do is to just go and sit with them.

We make the assumption that networking is quid pro quo and that our reputation is based only on the work we do, but it’s not. It’s based on who we are and how we take care of the people around us.

If you take these four simple (yet meaningful) steps every single day and stay relevant to the people with whom you want to build better relationships, then you are going to be top of mind when they think of someone who provides the kind of products and services that you do.

Worried? Don’t be.

This is pretty simple to do, isn’t it? Worried about tracking it all? Don’t be.

Solid.ly will be here soon and you can sign up for free access to the beta now.

In the meantime, use this great TEMPLATE.

Many thanks to my favorite client, Lauchlan Mackinnon, for creating it (all my clients are my favorites).

Perhaps you think that your service may not be as easily defined as a packaged product or program, and necessarily has a high barrier for entry. You might be underestimating what you have to offer.

Let’s take a quick look at the benefits that you get from producing information products:

• Products create opportunities for multiple streams of passive or leveraged income.
• Having a product enhances your credibility with your prospects, your peers, meeting planners, and the media because it establishes you as a category expert and sets you apart from your competitors.
• Products can help you book more clients because they speed up the sales cycle. Since your services have a high barrier to entry, your potential clients may need to jump a few high hurdles to persuade themselves they need to hire you. Having a product to offer based on your services gives potential clients the opportunity to test you out without having to take a big risk. Then if they connect with you and are well served by your product, they will upgrade from the lower-priced product to the higher-priced service.
• If you use public speaking as one of your marketing strategies, having a product at the back of the room when you speak gives you credibility, and you also have a relatively low-cost way to introduce prospects into your business and generate ancillary revenue at the same time.
• Products leverage your time. One of the biggest problems service professionals face is the paradigm of trading time for money. If all you ever do is trade your time for money, your revenues are limited by how much you charge per hour.

Start with the End in Mind

You may be in the beginning phase of building your business and just be setting out on the course to book yourself solid, but as Dr. Stephen Covey says, “Start with the end in mind.” If you want to seriously build a long-lasting career as a service professional, you’ll want to start thinking just as seriously about creating information products.

Don’t let the idea of creating products intimidate you:

• Keep it simple.
• Don’t overwork it or feel that it needs to be perfect.
• Don’t worry about being wildly original.
• Tips, guides, or resource manuals are great formats.
• Continually strive to add value to your clients’ lives in any way you can.

When considering how to create an information product, start by examining the different possibilities and ask yourself, “How can I leverage my existing knowledge and experience to create a quality product that I can produce and launch in the shortest amount of time possible?”

Be sure you don’t overlook any content you may already have created.

For example, if you’ve written an article, you have content that you can leverage into multiple product formats. You can quickly and easily turn your article into an e-course, use it as the foundation for an e-book, print book, or program, or present it as an introductory presentation or teleclass.

A single article can be leveraged into any or all of these formats, making it possible to create an entire sales cycle from a single source of content.

Case in point: this blog post is based on a chapter in Book Yourself Solid.

Define Your Product or Program

Choose the one product idea that you’re most passionate or excited about right now—and most important, one that is in line with your current business needs. If you’re starting out and need to build your subscriber or follower base, you’ll need to create a lead-generating product first, a product that you give away to create connection with a potential client.

You will then leverage that free lead-generating information product into other monetized information products over time. If you already have a lead-generating product and you’re ready to produce higher-priced information products like an video program or a book, then go for it!

As you define your product, you will need to consider not only the type of product you will create but to whom you’re selling it, the promises it makes, the benefits and solutions it offers, the look and feel you want your product to convey, and the ways in which you can leverage the content.

It’s important to be clear about your intentions for your product or program, and it’s critical that your product or program meet the needs of your target market. No matter how much you might love to create something, if your target market doesn’t need it you’ll be defeating your purpose.

A Written Exercise to Get You Started

For now, keep it simple. Just get your ideas out of your head and onto paper.

1. What type of product or program would you most like to create? What would you be most passionate about creating and offering to your target market?
2. To whom would you be offering this product? (target market.)
3. What benefits will your target market experience as a result of your product?
4. How do you want your product to look and feel? What image or emotion do you want it to convey?
5. How might you leverage the same content into a variety of different formats and price points for your sales cycle?

Five Steps to Developing Your Product

I have identified five simple steps to developing your product.

Step 1: Choose the role you are playing

Step 2: Choose your product framework

Step 3: Choose a title that sells

Step 4: Build your table of contents

Step 5: Create your content

While teaching my process for creating information products to my clients, Jamie McKean, recorded a mind map of the lesson. It outlines the five steps and their many component parts.

DOWNLOAD THE TEMPLATE, follow the process and you’ll be well on your way to hearing the beautiful, melodic ka-ching, ka-ching sound of your web-site-turned-cash-register as the orders come rolling in.

If you found this helpful, please share it with others that will also find it helpful. Keep thinking big about who you are and what you offer the world.

UPDATE: Here’s another worksheet just created by another one of my clients, Lauchlan Mackinnon, to give you a more linear perspective on the process.

Don’t let it program you into a small thinking, fear-driven choices.

You can buy into groupthink and de-individualism or you can be in an individual who charts your own course. Which will it be?

Any progression, global, local, or personal, is about being fully self-expressed in the face of all the forces that conspire to pacify your drive, your hunger to be the most you can be. It starts inside you. And that’s how it should be.

This is your time—to think bigger about yourself and what you are capable of. Because, if not now, when?

Yet it is inevitable that your transformation will set an example for others.

As people experience personal revolutions, they will join with others to bring about bigger, more sweeping changes.

Hopefully, and ideally, this is a revolution that will bring us together to achieve something even bigger—the changes we need to make a better world.

In the meantime, you will achieve more than you imagined possible when you reject doom and gloom groupthink and de-individualism and choose to think bigger about who you are and what you offer the world.

Most people consider a web site to be one thing. It’s not.

On the contrary, a web site is made up of a collection of pages that live on the same domain and are related to each other.

For each page on your site, you should be able to answer the following three questions with complete clarity:

1. Who is coming to the page?
2. What do you want them to do?
3. How are you going to get them to do it?

Knowing the answer to each of these three questions will ensure that the content on each page of your site is perfectly designed for the type of person who visits the page.

Why? Because you will consider what kind of story you’re going to tell, and how you’re going to tell it, to get your visitor to reach the goal you’ve set for that page.

Content and Structure

The content and structure of your web site includes the information you wish to convey and how you organize and label it for easy navigation.

As you consider your content and structure, your focus should be on your target market. It is especially critical when you’re working with a designer to think like your target audience.

Think like your audience. What do they want? Design to meet their needs.

Your content and structure are key elements in determining whether your web site is effective. The content has to be relevant to your target market and the layout should make it obvious where the visitor needs to go and what the visitor needs to do.

Visitors to your site want information and resources that will assist them in their work and their lives. If they can’t find what they need, they’ll get frustrated with your site and with you. The result is a lost connection.

Make your site easy to navigate and easy to use, and you’ll establish an immediate rapport with your visitors because they will feel that you already know and understand them.

Make the web a better place to work by sharing this post with your friends.

I read through some of the interviews and they’re quite good; very good, in fact. Featured are Michael McLaughlin, Kevin Hogan, Bob Bly, and yours truly, among others.

Just goes to show you, that developing skills as an interviewer, and using those skills to produce information products based on interviews with experts in your field, can be a career making initiative.

BMW has a simulated assembly line. Job candidates get 90 minutes to perform a variety of work-related tasks

If you’re hiring for contract work, you can do the same. Give a small assignment or project with very specific details, and watch your potential new hire work. See how they deal with the critical issues that make up your matrix.

In fact, you can even work in the kinds of obstacles and issues that come up in your business. If flexibility is a big part of your culture, start them on a project and call them the next day with changes or additions to the project. See how they handle it. If they are going to do customer service for you, ask some real customers to give them a hard time and see how they handle it.

Companies that hire smart often start their recruiting close to home—promoting their own employees and drawing from their pool of contractors. That way they already know how a person works and what personality traits are going to show up on the job. And, when going outside the organization is necessary, smart leaders look to their networks. Brian Scudamore, the CEO of  1800-GOT-JUNK?, emailed me recently asking for leads to fill the COO spot at his company — and they have 200 locations across three countries.

I once hired an assistant who had all the right skills—tech savvy, bright, experienced, and so on. But he didn’t like to reflect on his communication style, an outgrowth of what I found to be his somewhat blind and arrogant attitude.

When I would try to speak with him about problems that others were having with him, he would point out all the tasks he had accomplished. He wasn’t open to hearing about any ways in which he might change.

Sure, he was doing the tasks of the job, but he was bringing down the general morale with his prickly presence. Even though he got things done, it wasn’t worth it to keep him.

Just like you shouldn’t marry someone because they’re good on paper but impossible to live with, you shouldn’t hire someone just because their resume suggests they have the requisite skills but are a pain in the ass to work with.

Even when you get booked solid, getting more clients continues to be important.

To help you, in either situation, I’ve put together a “Get More Clients” resource page of blog posts that will give you simple and effective tips for generating leads and booking more business.

As always, my blog is free of charge to help you get clients and think bigger about who you are and what you offer the world on a daily basis. If you have a question, feel free to ask it in the comments section. I review all comments and respond personally.

And, if you find value in these resources for getting more clients, go ahead and share them with a friend on Twitter or Facebook. I’d certainly appreciate it.

Your marketing works when you know:

1. Who your target clients are.
2. What they are looking for.
3. Where they look for you.
4. When they look for you.
5. Why they should choose you.
6. How you want them to engage with you.

Key #1: Who Is Your Target Client or Customer?

Identifying and gearing your marketing to a specific individual (or organization) allows you to make the important emotional connection that is the first step in developing a relationship with your potential client. When you have made the effort to speak and write directly to your ideal client, she’ll feel it. She will feel as though you truly know and understand her needs and desires—because you will. That task alone will go a long way toward building the trust you desire with the clients you seek.

If you’re not super clear on whom specifically you’re targeting, whom you want to reach out to and attract, it’s going to be hard to develop a sales cycle that works because you’ll be chasing after every potential opportu­nity and you won’t be making a strong connection with anyone.

Key #2: What Are They Looking For?

You’ve got to understand what your ideal clients or customers are looking for—the kinds of products or services they think will solve their problems or help them reach their goals. It’s very important to be clear on your answers because if you don’t know what your potential clients are looking for, you won’t know what kind of product and service offers to make in your sales cycle. We usually make offers that we think are relevant. It’s time to put your target market first and work to truly understand what they know is relevant. Then you can decide what you’re going to offer them that will meet their needs, according to the amount of trust that you’ve earned, at various stages in your sales cycle.

Examples: In my case, they want a book that can help them get clients.  They want to read an article or report on how to use social media.  They want private coaching. They want to attend a marketing seminar. Etc.

Key #3: Where Do They Look for You?

Do you know where your target market looks for you? Do they search online? Do they read magazines? Do they call their friends for referrals for the kind of service that you’re providing? What other types of business professionals do they trust to get their referrals from? If you don’t know, survey your current clients. This should always be one of the first questions you ask a new client: “How did you come to find me?” If you don’t have any clients of your own yet, ask a colleague how her clients find her.

Key #4: When Do They Look for You?

When do the people (or organizations) in your target market look for the services you offer? What needs to happen in their personal life or work life for them to purchase the kind of service that you offer? How high do the stakes need to be before they decide to purchase the service you’re offering? They may be interested in what you do, and your offerings may resonate with them, but they might not need you at the moment they find you.

This is why the Book Yourself Solid Sales Cycle is so important. You’ll want to make it easy for them to step into your environment and move closer to your core offerings over time. When their stakes rise, they’ll reach out to you and ask for you. But you’ve got to keep the conversation going.

What are the situations that are likely to drive po­tential clients to seek your services, products, and programs? When do they look for you?

Examples: They’ve lost their job. They’re starting their own business. They’re so disorganized that they’re losing business. They are experiencing extreme discord in their relationship. They’ve just had a baby and can’t seem to lose their baby weight.

Key #5: Why Should They Choose You?

That’s a big question. Why are they going to choose you? Are you a credible authority in your field? What makes you the best choice for them? What is unique about you or the solutions you offer?

For this exercise, it’s crucial that you set your modesty aside and express yourself clearly and with confidence—no wishy-washy answers to these questions. Think back to the last time you went in search of expert help. When you first spoke to the service provider to inquire about his ser­vices, his expertise, and whether he could help you, the last thing you wanted to hear was, “Well, I kinda know what I’m doing. I might be able to help you. I’ll give it a shot.”

While it may feel uncomfortable at first, you’ve got to get comfortable saying, “The best thing for you is me!”

Granted, saying you are the best may be a bit too bold for you, but at the least you’ve got to be able to say, “You’ve come to the right person. Yes, absolutely, I can help you. I’m an expert at what I do and this is how I can help.”

Bragging is about comparing yourself to others and proclaiming your superiority. Declaring your strengths, your skills, your expertise, and your ability to help is not bragging. Expressing confidence is what your potential clients expect, want, and need to hear from you.

Why should your potential clients choose you? (Don’t you dare skip this one! Be bold! Express yourself fully. Remember, this is not the time for modesty.)

Key #6: How Do You Want Them to Engage with You?

Once potential clients have learned about your services, how would you like them to interact or engage with you? Do you want them to call your office? Do you want them to sign up for your newsletter on your web site? What is it that you want potential clients to do?

Naturally, you’d love for them to immediately purchase your highest-priced product, program, or service, but this is rare. Most of your potential clients need to get to know you and trust you over time. They need to be eased gradually toward what they may perceive to be your high-risk offerings. It’s often said that, on average, you will need to connect with a poten­tial client seven times before they’ll purchase from you. Not always, but if you understand this principle you will be on the road to booking yourself solid a lot faster than if you try to engage in one-step selling. “Hi, I’m a consultant, wanna hire me today?” isn’t going to be effective. That’s defi­nitely not the Book Yourself Solid way. Maybe we should call one-step selling one-stop selling because that’s what it’ll do—stop your sales process dead in its tracks.

How do you want your potential clients to interact or engage with you? (Note: Establishing a line of communication is the first step in developing a relationship of trust.)

In Conclusion:

Clearly defining these six keys will help you to determine what you want to offer your potential clients in each stage of your sales cycle and will help you craft the most effective sales cycle possible. Moreover, defining these six keys will also help you tremendously when implementing the Book Yourself Solid 7 Core Self-Promotion Strategies.