19 Nov
Grow Your Expertise, Start Your Business

How Can I Monetize My Skills and Expertise?

Are you the one people always call for advice on a certain subject? The truth is when you are an expert in your field; people value your knowledge and opinion. The question is how will you monetize your expertise and create multiple streams of income.

Online courses, seminars, workshops and keynote speeches are some of the many way to create income streams. The goal is to create ways that allow you to be recognized for the things you are good at while you teach your audiences new skills. Your knowledge is why your friends and family trust you, so spend some time creating your offerings.

Being knowledgeable is one thing; knowing how to utilize, package and monetize that knowledge is another thing. Choosing the right strategy to diversify your skills. Then spend time in discovery and experimentation until you get it just right. By all means, don’t forget personality is as much science as art.

Monetize Your Expertise

Here are a few steps to help you strategically monetize your expertise in a profitable way.

1.    Audit Your Experience

Monetizing your skills and expertise goes beyond knowing your expertise or your field. It involves knowing yourself. You must know your strengths and how it compliments your expertise. As such, audit your experience. What skills do you possess? How will those skills solve other people’s problems?

The key to this step is to realize what you have in terms of skill and talent. Are you an accountant with great organization skills? Or are you a good marketer with super sales techniques? Perhaps you are a successful entrepreneur who is excellent at public speaking. You are an expert already, so how will you present that expertise? After you audit your skills and knowledge, combine what you have into a perfect and easy-to-consume product(s).

2. Who is your Target Market?

Before deciding what to do with your skill and expertise, you have to closely analyze your target audience. While you want to create a product from your talent and knowledge, you also want to create a product that your customers would appreciate. 

You have to figure out those who need your expertise and focus your energy on producing for them and selling them. 

For example, a writer can write any type of content, but if his target audience wants useful information and wants it fast, then a blog post would be most convenient.

Figuring out who your target market is would help you create the perfect product and content. It would also help you market yourself and your business strategically.

It is unwise to market an online class to busy execs. Consultancy or short, summarized content would be more suitable for their needs and schedule.

3. Creating your product

After analyzing yourself and the market, you are finally set to produce value. At the core of monetizing your expertise is creating value. People would pay for the amount you add to their lives and business.

Other than being conscious of your strengths and taste in the market, you must also ensure that your service or content offers value. 

A book, online course, or keynote speech, whatever you are selling, must change your customer’s life for the better. If it isn’t doing this, then your product is useless, and you have to go back to the drawing board.

4. Marketing

Irrespective of what your monetization strategy is, marketing plays a significant role in the level of your success. You must be able to convince your audience of your skill and the value of your product.

All marketing avenues are fair game, from online ads to free videos on YouTube and publicizing your portfolio. The key is to establish yourself as an authority and back it up with quality.

People wouldn’t buy anything you are selling until they are convinced that it is valuable. It is your job to do the convincing and no one else’s.

Conclusion

The process of monetizing your expertise is very technical and intentional. You can’t just wing it and hope for the best. Without adequate planning and in-depth analysis of yourself and the market, failure is a very likely outcome.

To get the best value out of your expertise, you have to offer the best value possible. With in-depth planning and execution, you can create multiple channels to monetize your skill and expertise with ease and convenience.

30 Oct
Digital Marketing, Entrepreneurship, Social Media

How to Use Social Media for Small Business

Currently, there are over 3.72 billion active social media users across the world. Given its grand scale, it is high time that business organizations should consider making use of the lucrative social media platforms to improve the overall ROI.

Allison Todd –the Chief Strategist & Founder at SiMar –a leading social media marketing agency, explain social media’s importance for small businesses in the given post.

Social media is indeed a great way to connect with people who are already aware of your brand. At the same time, it also provides an excellent opportunity to reach out to new potential customers and make them aware of the products & services that your brand has to offer. Unlike the common belief, nothing is overwhelming about social media for you to worry about.

Tips for Small Business

Even when you are starting, some simple social media tricks could help you out. The leading digital marketing experts at SiMar –a reputed digital marketing agency, lay out some of the essential social media tips for your small business. Here are some:

Start with a Proper Plan

Social media tools are immensely simpler to use. You can start over by using organic posts for free to kickstart your social media marketing campaign for beginners.

Like every other reliable business marketing strategy, your social media marketing campaign should also start with a proper plan.

When you are preparing the right social media plan, here are some additional tips:

  • Set specific social media objectives. For instance, you can consider acquiring customers or raising conversion rates instead of just looking for more likes.
  • Research the competitors. Relevant competitive analysis can help you to know about working for other businesses in the given niche.
  • Conduct a proper Social Media audit. As a part of the audit process, we recommend this to look out for impostors that might be stealing your social media reputation.

Decide the Right Platforms for You

There are several social media platforms out there. Some of the famous ones are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and others.

Depending on your social media marketing goals, you should select the right social media platform to execute the same. 

Know Your Audience Well

As you wish to target the respective audience through your social media marketing campaign, we  recommend identifying your target audience first.

With the help of relevant social media analytics, you can look forward to analyzing the end consumers’ behaviors and preferences.

Upon customizing your social media marketing strategies based on the users’ interests, you can look forward to gaining optimum success.

Expand the Audience

Once you are aware of the target audience, you can rethink the social media plan. It is time to look out for innovative ways to reach out to more target audiences in the given market. 

Conclusion

As a small business, you must pay attention to the right social media marketing strategies for optimum results.

Managing your social media can be a daunting task, and it’s good to know that there are helpful materials to guide you in using social media for your business. Here are some helpful materials to help you in incorporating social media to your business.

Digital Engagement Package A

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management skills
11 May
Grow Your Business

Two Major Online Business Services That Would Give Your Business a Boost

There are many aspects crucial to the success of your business. Some of these aspects can’t be efficiently integrated into the rest of your company. A lot of these services are available online to help your business at affordable prices. The two major online business services that would give your business a boost are marketing and professional training. Contrary to popular opinion, these services can be outsourced. It’s one of the best ways to cut costs.

There is a long list of business services available online such as virtual assistant, social media manager, business coach, web designer, app developer, etc. However, when it comes to importance and priority, marketing and professional training takes the cake, even over some of the other services stated above.

Marketing

Marketing has always been an integral part of business success. However, the intricate process of advertising, getting feedback, and landing new clients is quite different from the process of production. Over the years, research has shown that hiring a marketing agency is more efficient than setting up a marketing department especially in the early stages of your business.

Today, marketing agencies are going over and beyond, offering a broad range of services from market analysis, market strategy, online adverts, ad tracking, etc. Their services and packages provide a distinct level of flexibility that makes them a very useful tool for an entrepreneur. Outsourcing the marketing of your business’s products and services is not only cost effective, it also frees up your time to concentrate on other aspects of your business.

Professional Coaching

Another online service that would give your business a huge boost is professional coaching or training. Putting your team in the right mindset and equipping them with up to date skills isn’t something you can take lightly or do on your own. 

There is a wide array of professional coaches with the necessary skills and expertise to up-level your team, ensure they are producing at their optimum level. Many coaches offer this service online, taking care of your team so you don’t have to worry about their performance needs. With your team well-coached and informed, they are prepared to adapt to change and position your business the way you envision.

Online agencies, like SiMar Inc., provide the services needed for your business to scale and grow. They offer a combination of services to handle all your outsourcing needs. It’s not only more cost effective but it’s also easier to manage. Although, you can hire more than one agency to assist with your projects, it could be an administrative nightmare, therefore you might want to give great consideration to your to an all in one type of package.

Position 2 Profit with Allison Todd is a great place to begin the small business conversation, identify your next steps and understand your business needs with a group of like minded micropreneurs .

06 Mar
Grow Your Business

How Social Is Your Business?

It’s March, 2019, raise your hand if you are still saying you don’t have time for social media? How social is your business? Perhaps you don’t see the value in social media for your business.  And, if that’s the case, I would love to persuade you to reconsider. 

Without a social media strategy you are under-utilizing social media. How will you achieve your goals without identifying your target audience and knowing what they want? And posting to be posting will soon overwhelm you.   Plus, you are trailing behind your business competitors.  Even worse, leaving revenue behind.  

Social media gives you an all access pass to directly connect to prospects, customers, business partners and brand champions. Facebook has more than 1.8 billion monthly active users. But, it takes more than a Facebook post or an active Twitter account to call yourself an active social media marketer. You must get involved and connect with your target audience. Use your expertise and conversation skills to make each moment count. Doing so will boost your brand in the digital market.

Whatever your choice, it’s essential for businesses to begin using more social media. If you are selling products or services, you will find the largest blend of demographics on social media. Thus, being able to sell almost anything once you find your audience. To see the results you need, you’ll meed a bit of patience and perseverance. Build a community around your business. Then learn more about them.  It’s super important that you are taking advantage of the marketing tools available to you.  I love Hootsuite because I can schedule and go.  The Repost App is another favorite.  

Either way, if you are ready to get social with your business, I am here to help. My social media mastermind is designed to keep you in front of your audience and humanize your brand. Let’s tell your story and ensure your audience learns more about your brand value? Schedule your discovery call and let’s grow. 

23 Jan
Grow Your Business, Start Your Business

Starting a Business with Zero Experience

Don’t let the fear that comes from no experience stop you from starting your business.  The art of becoming an official entrepreneur is both exhilarating and demanding.  There are many emotions that emerge while building your business.  But, don’t be discouraged, there are many solutions!  In fact that are some challenges you may be able to avoid.  Below there are three challenges that occur as a result of little to zero business experience: 

Unstable Cash Flow
People often start their business with ideals of cash flow but no real plan that guarantees return on your investment.  It’s important that you have an accessible cash flow with the ability to cover expenses.   Equally important is that you are tracking your business cash.  Business doesn’t run without cash flow but you would be surprised how many entrepreneurs do not know how to manage their cash.  Remember managing your business budget allows you to have a financial overview of what your business needs.  Without the ability to do so, your business is limited with more promise of loss than growth.  Don’t put the open sign up and open the business doors if you don’t know what it will cost you. 

Time Management 

Have you ever started your day knowing what you want to get done and gotten distracted by emails, addressing challenges or dealing with the non-stop ringing of the phone? You are not alone.  Many entrepreneurs struggle to manage their time with too much to do and not enough time in the day.    However, to increase business success, you must be able to effectively manage your time.  It is vital to manage time wisely.  Start managing your time, by managing your day.  Spend time scheduling your day, BEFORE, you plug in to the digital world.  Then, hop on the computer and schedule your day.  Finally, follow your schedule and manage your time.  Once you have developed the habits of effective time management, you will find you can deal with almost anything.

Lack of Knowledge

The greatest challenge begins with a lack of knowledge.  Failure to understand your market, your audience and current trends can lead to numerous challenges.  One of the major facets of business success is knowledge, research and more knowledge.  In order to effectively manage and GROW your business you must KNOW your business.    Without acquiring good business knowledge, you won’t acquire good business profit.  You must be willing to do your business research before you can be of service to your customers.  Being unfamiliar with your market niche can create unwelcomed business chaos.  In order to equip yourself ongoing knowledge, you are equipped to manage business operations, business inventory and business teams, your business could face many difficult situations.
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