Increasing Your Sphere of Influence Using Online Tools As a Small Business Strategy

Increasing Your Sphere of Influence Using Online Tools As a Small Business Strategy

Building a large sphere of influence in any business is an important piece of the puzzle when trying to brand yourself as an expert in your market niche. There are many areas that one need to focus on that will allow anyone who has enough patience to create a large sphere of influence.

I find that many business people prefer to learn how and then turn it back to the professionals after they have fiddled with it a while and realize the time involved is more than they bargained for. It takes a serious amount of time, at least an hour or two every day including weekends. I have found that 14 hours a week is a minimum investment. Understanding your small business strategies will help you know when to hire a pro or at least get their advice.

Once you begin to build your influence, you become a resource within your industry or market niche. This is important because if you are not a resource to others you are just a face in the crowd. I use the old Yellow Pages analogy in my seminars. In today's world of instantaneous information gathering the Yellow Pages have become a dinosaur. Businesses buy an ad, it gets printed and then delivered to someone's porch and there it sits until the resident happens to use the front door. When they see twenty pounds of newsprint quality books what do they do? They pick them cursing the company that put them there and then set them in the recycle bin. Do businesses want to be in recycle bin? Of course not. Then why do they keep doing the same thing over and over again? Remember Einstein's definition of insanity?

Having the ear of others changes their perception of you and your business, they won't think of you as having an agenda but as a solution to their needs and the needs of others. others. How do you get their ear? Start with a blog. Having a blog, as part of your website is important. Creating good content is the key to blogging. You can optimize all you want but if you don't have good quality content it won't matter. So make sure your posts are timely, newsworthy (don't just self promote) and have value for you clients or customers. A good post can hold someone on your site for 10 - 15 minutes and make them want to do business with you. My partner in Bayes Squared, Mike Bayes also owns an SEO company and his motto is "A blog a day keeps page 3 away." Meaning a good quality blog will be found and read and get you Google page rank up. It's not all that easy but it's a start.

Ever thought about charging more for the services you offer? The more perceived value others have of you the higher the price they will pay for you. Perceived value comes from having influence.

Organization is a major key to any online work. I went back to my trusty old Franklin Covey Day Planner because it is easier than trying to keep track of everything in my smart phone. I have a set routine for each morning, each week and each month that pertains to my online presence and how people see me. It takes 2 to 3 hours a day to complete everything for my 3 companies. Sounds like a lot, but it is well worth it. But you can't organize until you have a few other things in place.

Start thinking about what market your business falls into. Have you broken it down into a marketable niche? Do you know who you are trying to reach and what your message is? Do you even know what they want or do you have a product or service that you know everyone needs so they will just come beating down your door to get it? Have you done your research?

Yes? Good, then it's time to write your blog, do a series same day every week or twice a week. Don't miss one. If people like what you have to say they will expect a regular schedule.

Do videos of yourself or your product. Get them on You Tube and Face Book. Tell people about them. Video interview leaders in your niche or let others interview you. Videos get prospects involved. That's why YouTube is so busy. People love videos. Here's a tip: don't go to professional. The more natural the better - think organic.

Always get you audience involved. Use call to actions, give away reports, white papers or guides. Make them do something that involves your website, blog or social media outlets. Do polls and surveys and post the results.

Ask webmasters if they would like free articles for their site written by you. Never assume they won't. Many will.

Do Joint Ventures with the big guys who have large lists! This is one of my favorites. I work a business owner who has tied in with a site in his niche that has a mailing list of over 400,000 contacts. Every time they run one of his articles it goes out to their entire list. What is only 1% read his article? That's 4,000 readers, what if 1% went to his site - 400 visitors. What if 10% read it and then 10% visited his site? That's 4,000 visitors. Get the drift? Numbers mean influence.

This barely scratches the surface of what it takes but it's a start.

Remember it takes time. If you have the time - Great. If not find a good small business strategies company that can help you with it.

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