How to Identify Your Target Audience and Ideal Customer

One of the most important issues to address in your business life is how to identify your target audience and ideal customer. Without honing in on a specific target audience, you run the risk of missing the mark. There are several easy steps to identify your target audience and ideal customer.

Set Your Goals and Keep Your Goals

One of the best ways to identify your target audience is by setting goals for your business. Once you have set identifiable goals, your ideal customer will present him or herself.

Keeping true to those goals will ensure that your target audience and the ideal customer will return time and again.

Measure Your Goals

Once you have established what your goals are, it is important to revisit those goals and measure them on a regular basis.

A great way to measure your goals to see if they are up-to-date is to utilize social media. Have your customers or clients take a survey or enter a contest to see whether or not your company is meeting and exceeding their needs.

Make sure to communicate with customers on social media. Respond to their comments, and communicate via Twitter. See what the competition is doing and what trends are trending. Follow those trends.

Choose a Niche

Once you have set your goals and have established ways to measure those goals, make certain that you stick within your niche. Often times, business owners tend to waiver outside their niche. Sometimes creative ideas just seem to flow and flow; however, you must be true to your niche at all times. This is how you will be able to identify your target audience and your ideal customer. How to identify your target audience.

Create a Sub-Niche

Once you have created a niche, see if you can break it down further and create a sub-niche. A niche would be something like divorced women and a sub-niche would be divorced women with small children. Perhaps your business is a life coaching business that empowers divorced women with smaller children to educate themselves so that they can provide for themselves and their families.

Once you start your new business, you will begin to notice who is responding and who is not responding. In this way, you can measure your target audience a little better and hone in on your ideal customer.

For example, you may notice that divorced women with older children may be in a better position to use your products and services as compared to divorced women with younger children. Your target audience may present itself a little bit differently than you had planned.

Stay flexible, keep an open mind, but once you have established your ideal customer, make certain to keep it there and dedicate all your time and effort to that target audience and its ideal customer.

How to identify your target audience.

How to identify your ideal audience.

5 Ways Vision Boards Help You Reach Your Goals

Do you set goals for yourself, either in your personal life or for your business? If not, how do you know you’re growing or making progress? When was the last time you allowed yourself to daydream about the type of life you want? What is your WHY, the reason behind all the long hours you spend on your business?

Creating a vision board has become a popular activity in recent years, especially as the New Year approaches and people think about the past year and the New Year’s resolutions they want to keep. A vision board is simply one tool that helps you visualize your dreams and your goals. How so, you ask? Let’s explore 5 ways vision boards help you reach your goals…

Vision boards make you focus on what’s important to you.

Whether you combine a personal vision board with a professional one or keep them both separate, thinking about what you want in life or in business forces you to prioritize what’s important. Do you want to buy your first house or move to a warmer climate? Putting a photo of your dream location by the beach will inspire you to work harder and not undercut your prices. If you want to move, you alone can make that happen and you’ll make better business decisions based on that desire to move.

Visualization stimulates the creative side of your brain.

Placing your vision board within sight of your desk or computer serves as a daily reminder of what you want to achieve. Some believe keeping it open by your nightstand helps stimulate your subconscious before you go to bed, which makes you motivated upon waking. With your creativity soaring, keep a notebook handy to jot down any ideas you have for a new course or coaching program you want to create.

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Focusing on goals makes you recognize new resources or opportunities.

Visualizing yourself living in a warmer climate (or whatever your primary goal is) will motivate you to work towards that goal but you’ll also notice new opportunities or resources which can lead you to reach your goal. These resources may have always been present but now that you’re focused on your goal, you will see them in a new light: as a way to help you reach that intended goal.

Break out of your comfort zone by stating a big, scary goal.

Are you stuck in a rut because you’re afraid to break out of your comfort zone? Acknowledging big goals – as scary and outrageous as they may be – will help you step out and take on new challenges, all in the name of reaching that scary goal. If your goal is to speak in front of an audience of 5,000 at your favourite conference, then you’ll start to see more opportunities for smaller speaking engagements. These smaller gigs will give you lots of practice and build your name recognition so when the organizers of your favourite conference advertise they’re looking for speakers, you’ll be well prepared to submit your name.

Seeing a big goal forces you out of the daydream and into action.

Nothing happens without some action on your part. Vision boards are not magic tricks; they are instead a tool that spurs us into action because we finally have clarity and know what we want out of life. Visualize your ideal life then approach each day with action steps that will lead you toward that ideal life.

Aside from these reasons, creating vision boards can be a very relaxing and fun family activity. So grab some glue and some old magazines and start daydreaming!

Vision Boards Help You Reach Your Goals

vision boards help you reach your goals.

How to support other women in business!

Do you support other women in business? Do you know how you can, even if you are not an entrepreneur?

Supporting someone doesn’t mean you have to make a huge commitment on your end. A support group does not necessarily need to be made up of the people you know, it can also come from complete strangers.

Here are four different types of support you can provide, when think you can lend a helping hand — big or small.

Emotional Support

Starting a business is not easy, for anyone. It comes with stress, anxiety, and loneliness to name a few things. Emotional support is important, it makes a big difference in someone’s life when they know others will have her back and be her shoulder to cry on.

Instrumental Support

When you are providing instrumental support it will involve taking care of another’s urgent and immediate needs. This can be as simple as stepping out to grab her lunch, or as big as investing in her business. Both are equally important.

Informational Support

Being able to provide non-judgmental guidance, advice, or mentorship, without expecting a return. This type of support is especially needed from those who have been there and done that, and have a long-time thriving business and can impart wisdom.

Accountability support

I love having an accountability partner, an outside point of view and a person to hold me accountable for my goals. Can you be that person for someone? Providing a gentle push forward, and remind them to stay on track and are capable of moving forward and finding success?

Even if your business has nothing to do with the woman’s business you’re supporting, I am willing to bet you are able to fill the void of one of the above to support another woman in business!

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Support Other Women In Business

How to Craft Great Blog Titles

I’ll let you in on a little secret. The most important part of your blog post is your title. Here’s how to craft great blog titles.

How well you write, how well-researched your content is, or how pretty your images are means nothing if you can’t get readers to click through and start reading your post. And the single most important thing when it comes to getting readers’ attention is having a great blog post title.

It’s also the most important on-page factor when it comes to SEO. So, if you’re hoping for lots of free traffic from Google and all your favourite social media sites, you need to be good at crafting great blog post titles.

Start With Your Keyword

The key with great blog post titles is to strive for a balance between a title the search engines will like and one that your readers will find interesting and engaging enough to make them want to click on it. To get that balance just right, I like to start with a keyword or key phrase that I want to rank for in the search engines.

Open up your favourite keyword research tool – like the Google Keywords for example – and play around with it until you come up with the keywords or key phrases you want to rank for.

For the sake of illustration let’s say our keyword example is “best blog hosts” and the post will be a review of five of the best hosting companies for WordPress blogs. “best blog hosts” is the keyword we want to rank for in this example.

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Make It Interesting

Now that we have the keyword, it’s time to make it interesting for our readers. There are plenty of different ways to turn our example keyword into an interesting blog post title. Here are a few ideas:

· The Three Best Blog Hosts Reviewed – Read This Before You Sign Up

· Looking For a New Home for Your Blog? The Best Blog Hosts Reviewed

· My Top 5 Best Blog Hosts Revealed – Here’s Who I Recommend

· Wondering Who The Best Blog Hosts Are?

· Is Your Host One The Best of The Best Blog Hosts List?

Do you see how this works? Start with the keyword and then try to think about why your readers would be looking for this information. Focus on what’s in it for them by sharing content that will help them out.

Stay Authentic and Stick With Your Style

Last but not least, stay authentic and stick with your own style. This is particularly important if you’re an established blogger. Don’t just copy and paste the blog post titles above. They may not reflect the style and tone of voice of your blog posts. In other words, they may not be you. Balance the need of the search engines to easily find what you’re content is about, the need to keep things interesting for your readers, by using your own voice.

You may find it helpful to write a few different blog post titles down and then chose the one that resonates most with you (and hopefully with your readers).

Download the FREE Blogging Bundle

Also, if you haven’t already, be sure to read 52 Blog Ideas for your business, who couldn’t use 52 blog ideas?

7 Ways to Make Quick Cash

If you’ve decided that it is time to leave the 9-5 and you are going to work from home running your own business, you may need to have a form of income while you finish creating products and developing your business. Here are 7 Ways to make quick cash, while you get your business off the ground.

7 Ways to make quick cash

Provide a Service

If you plan to make your own products and sell them, you likely have skills that other people will want to use. Try finding out if anyone needs the types of service you could offer. Perhaps you’re good at graphic design, database management, transcription, or something else entirely. Put it out there and people may buy your time.

Get a Part-Time Job

If you can’t wait for services to take off, and you need to leave the 9-5 right away, you can get a part-time job. Sign up to be a substitute teacher or a temp at an agency, or head over to your nearest fast food place and you’re likely to be hired on the spot.

Get a Work-at-Home Job

There are also work-from-home jobs that you can get pretty quickly if you have the experience, education and skills. Look for call center work, and you could be bringing in money within the month.

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Sell Stuff on eBay

Have too much stuff in your house? Try selling some of it on eBay. You can also buy from stores on sale and then sell for a higher price on eBay. Believe it or not, everyone isn’t able to get to the same sales you can.

Sell Stuff on Amazon

Sort of the same idea as eBay, but you may not be aware that you can sell your old books and pretty much any items that Amazon sells, right from your home office. You can even ship some qualifying items to their fulfillment service and you just collect checks. Look up “fulfillment by Amazon”.

Have a Yard Sale

One of the fastest and most tried and true methods of bringing in a little cash is the old-fashioned yard or garage sale. You can still do that, and if the weather is not right, look on Facebook for groups dedicated to online yard sales in your area to make quick cash.

Babysit or Dog Sit

One of the fastest ways to make a buck is to babysit or dog sit but make sure you do it in their house or you’ll have to worry about licensing. Tell everyone you know that you’d like to babysit or provide animal care or both in their home and your fee. You’ll be amazed at how many will jump at the chance.

7 Ways to make quick cash

9 Ways to Show Your Expertise When First Starting Out

When you first start out wanting to work from home and start your own business, it can be frightening and even seem impossible. It’s the old conundrum about how you can get experience without having experience. 9 Ways to Show Your Expertise When First Starting Out
But, when you start an online business, you can make your own experience and prove your expertise with just a little work. So, to help you, here are nine ways to show your expertise when first starting out! 9 Ways to Show Your Expertise When First Starting Out

Blog Regularly Toward Your Audience

Start a blog on your website and blog directly to your audience with many forms of content, discussing many issues that the audience has. It’s a great way to get traffic, but it’s also a great way to demonstrate expertise.

To help you get started with this, download my FREE Business Blogging Bundle

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9 Ways to Show Your Expertise When First Starting Out

Write a White Paper about a Problem

A white paper is a long report that addresses a problem and then offers solutions to the problem. If you write a paper or two about individual problems your audience has, you’ll be able to show your expertise even though you’re just starting out.

Publish a Book about Your Expertise

Writing a book and authorship is always a great way to show your expertise. Direct the book to your target audience and answer questions they may have. Address one problem and solve it and then you’ll get more respect that you do know what you’re talking about.

Make Checklists to Help Your Target Audience

If you know the types of things that your audience has questions about, you can create helpful checklists, cheat sheets, or tip sheets that are available for view and/or download on your website or blog.

Share Answers Freely on Social Networks

Social networks like LinkedIn, Facebook, and even forums and message boards are great places to answer other people’s questions in a way that highlights your expertise.

Become a Contributing Writer

Blogs, websites, newspapers and magazines all want more content and will take well-written, expertly delivered articles. Some of these will even pay you for the content. Write originally for each and rely on your bio to send traffic your way

Get on a Speaking Circuit

Create a couple of presentations that you could easily turn into public speaking fodder. Practice by putting that information on video on your blog, YouTube, and other places that take video. Make a “one-sheet” which is one downloadable 8×11 sheet that tells about what you’ll speak on and your prices.

Create a Dedicated YouTube Channel

Many people have become famous because of YouTube, and you can too. Use YouTube as a way to demonstrate your expertise on the topics of interest to your audience.

Host a Free Webinar or Teleseminar

Technology enables you to do a lot to spread the word about your knowledge and expertise. You can do “how-to” videos, and tip videos and more to show the world and most importantly, your audience, what you know.

These ways to show your expertise when first starting out don’t require you to have a huge client roster, or even a following yet. Doing them and I promise, it will help you gain a following, improve search engine optimization (SEO) and help you build the work-at-home business of your dreams.

Jump into the TVS Leave the 9-5 Workshop Group and tell us how any of these Nine Ways to Show Your Expertise When First Starting Out has helped you! Or better yet – do you have any other tips you can share? We’d love to hear them!

9 Ways to Show Your Expertise When First Starting Out

Hello, September!

Are you ready for sweater weather? September has arrived!

Home Business or Work-at-Home Job – Which Is Right for You?

With the 2020 pandemic rocking the world in ways, no one saw coming – more and more people are working from home. Either with their home business or work-at-home job. Some people started a business or the 9-5 corporations started having the work from home option now available.

Now, many don’t want to go back to the corporate cubicle or have always wanted to work from home for a variety of reasons. Maybe you just had a child and want more work-life balance, or perhaps you have an illness that makes it difficult for you to get out of the house. Or maybe you just like being home and want the freedom to work your way.

Whatever the reasons you want to work at home, you’ll need to choose whether or not you want a job from home, or you want a business from home. Here are eight questions to help you decide.

Are You Self-Motivated?

If you want your own business so that you can set your hours, you will need to be very self-motivated. You’ll need to take time out of your day for marketing, interviewing clients, closing the deal and then doing the work too. You’ll be 100 percent responsible for delivering the work, billing and collecting. You’ll even be responsible for deciding the methods you’ll use to do the work. To do that you’ll need to be a very self-motivated individual.

What Skills Do You Have?

Take a piece of paper and write down a list of the skills you currently have, based on what you’ve already done in the past. Can any of these translate into a business? Label them appropriately. Do any of these translate into common work-from-home positions such as call center agent or transcriptionist? Some skills cross over into both, but which side of the list gets full faster?

What Sort of Lifestyle Do You Want?

With a work-at-home job, you’ll be required to “show up” for work on time each day that you’re scheduled, and you may have little control over that schedule. What’s more, with work-at-home positions it’s a lot harder than typical jobs to call in sick, whether it’s you or a child who is sick. Often the first 90 days you cannot miss your schedule at all if you want to keep the position. Are you ready for that? Or, would you prefer a more family-oriented type of schedule that can be adjusted more easily and is more deliverables-based than hourly-based?

Do You Already Have a Business Idea?

If you have already researched a business idea, and feel as if you want to do that instead of working for someone else, can you pull it off? What steps do you need to take to make it a reality? Are you the type of person to be able to organize and take the steps needed to get your business off the ground? Can you find and afford help if you’re not sure what to do to get the business going? Does the thought of all this stress you out?

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How Do You Feel about Punching a Clock?

For some people the idea of clock-punching is relaxing, for others it feels like a nightmare. Neither feeling is right or wrong as it takes all types of people to make this world work. If you know upfront that you are fine with punching a clock and you’d rather someone else tell you when to be someplace and what to do, then a work-at-home job is best for you. If that feels like a prison to you, then a business is probably better if you can do what it takes to get it going.

Do You Have Money to Start a Business?

Starting any type of business, even an online business, requires an investment not only of time but also of money. Have you worked out a business plan and do you know how much money you need to get started? Do you have that money available? If not, do you have a way to get it? Perhaps working at a job first, while you save for and work on your business on the side, is the way to go if you don’t have the funds to start.

Do You Need Training and Education?

Both working at a job and owning a business sometimes require skills that you don’t have yet. But that’s okay. Decide if you want to invest in the training yourself to get your business off the ground, or if you would like to try to find a work-at-home job where they will train you from the ground up even if you have little experience and due to that the pay may be low.

What Is Your Biggest Dream for Your Life?

When you think of the future, what do you see? Does it sound relaxing to get up in the morning, have some breakfast, and move to your home office where you sign in to work at your job, taking a break when needed by telling your manager that you have to use the restroom, or go eat lunch and so forth, then when you get off work you’re totally and fully off? Plus, each week you collect a certain paycheck?

Or, do you like the idea of being able to do what you want when you want (and likely working more hours than you ever thought you could) without the surety of income each week, but knowing you’re forging your future?

Whatever you decide, neither is right or wrong. They are both good choices for you. Whether you want a work-at-home job so you can sign off after the day and focus 100 percent on your family, or whether you want a business that will cross boundaries into family time and vice versa but that puts you 100 percent in charge – both are good choices and choices that you are fortunate to have in this age of high-speed internet.

TVS has launched the Inspired Action Mastermind!

A premium mastermind for mission-driven, service-based women entrepreneurs who are ready and willing to put in the work it takes to reach the next level!

Inside the Inspired Action Mastermind, we are an intimate group of entrepreneurs, all of which are committed to the success of one another’s businesses. It is a mastermind that provides the support and guidance you need to help you move your business forward. Because, when you’re in the right mastermind group, you can start to see your business and yourself through someone else’s eyes as you support one another and leverage each other’s experiences.

If you are ready and willing to shift your mindset and tackle all the hard questions to accomplish your dreams, then join us.

Learn about the Inspired Action Mastermind

4 Easy Tips for Brainstorming Blog Post Ideas

Have you actually spent the time to sit down and start brainstorming blog post ideas? There is nothing worse than sitting in front of your laptop, attempting to write a new blog post with nothing but a blank screen staring at you. We all have those days where inspiration just doesn’t strike and we can’t come up with a single workable post idea.

Or maybe you’re in a rush and you need something quick you can write and publish to stick to your blogging schedule and keep your readers happy. You don’t want to spend a bunch of time trying to come up with something to write about.

In either scenario, it’s nice to have a list of blog post ideas ready to use. And that’s what we’ll work on today. I’ll walk you through a simple little brainstorming exercise that will result in dozens of blog posts ideas you can use over the coming weeks and months, or whenever you need a little extra inspiration.

Grab a notebook and pen, and let’s start brainstorming a whole list of future blog posts. I prefer to do this exercise with pen and paper, but if that’s not your thing, by all means, use a word document, spreadsheet or whatever program you prefer for brainstorming topic ideas.

30 blogging for business masterclass, woman working on her laptop with a cup of coffee wearing a pink skirt and high heels, brainstorming blog post ideas

Step 1 – Log Into Your Blog and Make a List of Your Categories

Start by making a list of all the categories on your blog. You may have a pretty good idea of the main ones or the ones you use the most, but there may be some you are forgetting.

Log into your blogging interface and look up the categories you have set up. Copy them down in your notebook, leaving at least 10 lines of space below each category.

Step 2 – Come Up With At Least 10 Blog Post Ideas Per Category

Now that you have your list of categories, come up with 10 blog post ideas for each category. Don’t censor yourself, just jot down the first things that come to mind. Remember this is a brainstorm. The idea is to generate ideas. You’re free to tweak, edit, and reject them later. For now, get them on paper and come up with a long list of potential post ideas.

Step 3 – Rinse and Repeat As Needed

One of the best things about this technique is that you can repeat it whenever you need a new batch of blog post ideas. By the time you get back to this brainstorming technique (which means you’ve used up all the previous ideas), it will be easy to come up with fresh blog post topics for each category. And since you’re focusing on coming up with ideas for each category, no area of your blog will be neglected over the coming weeks.

So grab your notebook or download the worksheet for today, whichever is best for you and give it a try! See if this simple idea doesn’t help you generate a long list of future blog post topics.

Download this FREE Excercise Worksheet

Also, if you haven’t already, be sure to read 52 Blog Ideas for your business, who couldn’t use 52 blog ideas?

Now, hop into the Workshop and tell us the categories that you have on your blog! Then go through and make suggestions to others, who have posted theirs, and let them know what you would like to see!

P.S. Do you know someone that would benefit from this 30 Day Blogging Masterclass? Send them over to the sign-up page to join us.

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Brainstorming Blog Post Ideas

Get into the Entrepreneurial Mindset to Leave your 9-5

Have you ever thought about starting your own business, but “stuff” just got in your way? There are several ways to get into the entrepreneurial mindset. Also, there are just as many ways to clear the road to become an entrepreneur.

Get into the Entrepreneurial Mindset

Consider these personality traits:

Leadership qualities
Creative thinking
A feeling that there is something more
Innovative ideas

If you show any or all of these qualities, you could very well be on your way to owning your own business because you do have that entrepreneurial spirit.

How to Clear the Road toward Entrepreneurial Success

Going from the 9:00 to 5:00 grind to the entrepreneurial spirit may not be the easiest path, but it is something you can achieve. However, there are several steps you need to take before forging head first into business ownership.

Find Clarity – Getting clear on what it is you want to achieve is an integral first step. It is not as simple as coming up with an idea and writing it down. You have to write down your goals, but even more importantly, you have to break them down. Being specific is not an option; it is mandatory. You need to have clear, specific goals when it comes to starting a new business.

Create a plan – Once you are clear on what your goal for your new business is, you have to create a plan for success. Write down what your goal is, how you will achieve that goal in smaller steps and then break that list down even further.

Take action – Next, it is time to take action steps. Action steps need more than just thinking about taking them. Declare aloud and to everyone you can what your action steps are; in this way, you are accountable to your word.

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Delegate – If you are starting a new business of your own, do not be afraid to delegate tasks, even if you do not have a business partner or associates yet. One day delegating will be a task you will have to learn anyhow.

Allow family members and friends to help take the load off somewhere else while you learn all you need to know about your new business endeavour.

Letting go – Sometimes in order to create something new, we need to let go of something old. In order to clear the path to create a new business, something else will have to fall by the wayside. Your home may need to be a little cluttered or less clean. You may have to let go of a favourite sport or activity for a while, but it is well worth it in the end.

Keeping your day job is important until you are secure financially in your new business endeavour. It may be a difficult road to travel, but having an entrepreneurial mindset is a gift. Once you open it, you will be happy that you did.

TVS has launched the Inspired Action Mastermind!

A premium mastermind for mission-driven, service-based women entrepreneurs who are ready and willing to put in the work it takes to reach the next level!

If you are ready and willing to shift your mindset and tackle all the hard questions to accomplish your dreams, then join us.

Learn about the Inspired Action Mastermind