Who is your ideal customer?

Last summer, one of my networking groups, Northeast Tarrent Networking (or Net-Net) worked through the workbook for the great Book Yourself Solid by Michael Port and Tim Sanders. It's a step-by-step guide to getting as much business as you can handle. One of the first exercises the workbook has you do is to define who your ideal customer is. Which of your customers do you care most about, which do you most enjoy enjoy working with?

So who do you like? When you network they ask what kind of referrals you're looking for, what's your answer? Who's your ideal customer?

Special offer from Keener Financial Planning

My friend (and co-facilitator at our Southlake Leads group) Jean Keener announced today that her company, Keener Financial Planning, has a special offer for anyone who's beginning to put together their own financial plan. She'll do an overview for you, with a look at insurance, saving, how to start investing and more. This financial check-up is normally $540, but for the rest of the month the price is only $249.



Jean is smart and runs her business with scrupulous integrity. Give her a call!

Twitter for business

If you use Twitter for your business (and there are many, many reasons to), make sure you read the very informative article offered by Twitter itself on the subject, Twitter 101 for Business - A Special Guide. The article points out that the most immediate benefit is...well, its immediacy. A restaurant goer tweeted that her party was having to wait longer than they liked for a table, and within a few minute a restaurant staffer found her, apologized for the wait and offered her party a free appetizer. Imagine getting immediate feedback from your customers and being able to respond that quickly!

The article also points out how Twitter lets you build a relationship with your customers, one in which they feel like they have an effective way to give direct input. That kind of connection can be a potent tool for creating loyalty. The customer feels like they have a say in how you do business, in how they're treated. That's something you're not going to get from an ad, no matter how effective it is.

YourBusinessChannel expert Mark Shaw has some advice about how to tell if Twitter will be useful for you as a business tool:

Updated website

Okay, finally. Finally. Our redesigned website is up.



There'll be more changes coming, but it's functional. What do you think?

(And yes, that really does say Bad Joke. I love riddles and bad one liners, and I thought my valued customers might appreciate a chuckle break.)

Charles Brown's Twitter workshop

If you ask entrepreneurs and small business owners in the Metroplex to name an expert on using social media for business and they'll say, "Charles Brown." (I know this to be a fact because I've tried it.) And they're right.

I was fortunate enough to meet Charles a while back. I remember it clearly: It was the first time I had ever met another writer at a networking function. He was impressive from the start, an attorney and talented writer who had a passion for supporting small businesses. His focus has refined even further now, and he specializes in making Twitter, Facebook and other social media work for business. Or, more accurately, he specializes in showing people how they can make it work for their businesses.

Charles spoke about social media to the Southlake Chamber Leads group that I facilitate. He was dynamic and extremely informative -- the buzz that one appearance created is still spreading. (From my perspective as facilitator, his talk became the standard others are measured against. And a tough one, too!) I kept hearing his name anytime anyone mentioned using social media for their business and, like I said, I really did start asking, just to see if his reputation was what I thought. It was!

So he's the man to ask. And I mention it now because your chance to ask him is happening next week.

On Tuesday, Charles is offering a low-cost, hands-on workshop showing you how to generate leads using Twitter. Among other things, he'll demonstrate how to:

• Build trust and credibility before you attempt to sell.
• Drive massive, targeted traffic to your website, without relying on search engines. [N.B. -- this is a very good thing to know.]
• Use Twitter as a free market research tool.
• Plus a whole list of other things.

All that for fifty bucks!

The workshop is at the Fort Worth Business Assistance Center, 1150 South Freeway in Fort Worth (I-35 South @ Rosedale). You can register or get more information at Charles' blog (which is an altogether fine place to get a bunch of useful information on other topics, too), or email him at chbrown@webmarketing.

This is the best chance you'll have to get the best advice around. Seriously. Take advantage of it.

New website coming soon!

Original Production's website is changing! We'll be introducing our new, updated and fantastically useful website in the coming weeks. Stay tuned for more information, and special offers!