The event was fantastic, filled with panel discussions, workshops and keynotes by the thought leaders in our industry and I left with a ton of notes and a commitment to be more connected for my clients and me.  Today I find myself scouring through my notes and starting to outline my plan of attack.

In the event you’re doing the same, here’s a post I found today that I found very helpful in my follow up to Blog World.

Together with a recently laid off HOB colleague, we started our own marketing consulting company. The funny thing was every time we met with a client, they were confusing marketing with P.R. (at the time, P.R. was still very much about media outreach and begging for coverage.) So we decided we would be a P.R. company, why not?

By 2005 my partner and I had broken off into my own small companies, each concentrating our better strengths.  It has been an amazing ride, I must say.  In the beginning I was so scared, yet it was always a great scared.  I felt empowered even when I was broke.  With no steady paycheck I have depended on my clients paying me in a timely fashion, which sometimes is not so timely.  I have had several holidays with no cash (clients tend to hold off on payments around that time of the year) but it’s never been so bad I felt like giving up.

I have been reflecting all this week as it’s my anniversary and I am so proud of what I’ve accomplished. A good friend asked me over lunch last week what surprised me most about this journey and I listed these:

• The fact that I am actually good at this
• That I am doing it alone without a partner
• The list of things I still want to conquer (such as speaking, writing, etc.)
• How much fun I am having, still

Have you taken a leap of faith? What has surprised you about your journey?

We adopted Dusty in March 2006 knowing full well he was at least 7 and there was no way to know his history.  He had a bum leg and we came to discover he also had Tracheal Collapse, a common ailment in Poms.  The leg never bugged him and the limp he had initially seemed to just disappear.  The collapse was awful…always honking and spitting up, but he dealt with it.

This week he went from normal to dismal in one day.  His heart became enlarged and a lung filled with fluid, making it difficult for him to breathe.  We spent our last day with him just showing how much we loved him and today we made that horrible trip to the vet.

Thankfully, we have another little Pom rescue, which I actually did rescue from traffic, to love on and spoil.  I am a rescue dog owner and always will be.  I would not trade our 4 years with Dusty for anything.  There are so many loving animals out there who need us and I encourage everyone to think Rescue first. Even if you want a specific breed, they are out there!  Although, muts are super lovable, so don’t overlook them.

Happy holidays and please, love on your pets this season and think rescue…always.

It got me thinking about this.  The client who wants a big article in a glossy mag or to be on Oprah (for the latter, you’d better rescue a small nation) wants to be on those platforms because they believe that’s where the majority of their customers will be and they want the biggest bang they can get.  Interestingly enough, there’s a little thing called the Internet and your customers just happen to be there, a lot, every day, even the days Oprah is not broadcast.

So, why not concentrate on the things you can control, which is not the glossy or Oprah, and create reasons for your customers to find you?  You call it corn, we call it content!

I love content!  I am one of those dorky creative types who loves to create…well, anything!  When someone needs to name their business, car, child or whatever, I love to help them figure one out!  So with my over active brain and my Flip video, I now get to make content for my clients.  Fun for me, great for the clients.  We are no longer begging for attention, we are creating it ourselves, authentically, with the right messaging.  They are not all winners, but they are all search results!

My advice to anyone seeking publicity is to never poo poo a small publication that is not in your geographic area, because they are most likely online and that is your geographic area.  Feedback that praises your company, no matter where they live, is helpful to someone who may be seeking out a service or product like yours.  Using feedback from your current, happy customers, you can create videos, articles, how-tos, haikus – anything that will appeal to new customers.  Go for it all, something will appeal to someone and if you do it right, they’ll share it with everyone!

I want to be able to travel the world and speak for a living. I want to inspire others and be inspired by those I meet. It would be a dream come true to make a living by speaking, sharing ideas and writing. And mentoring others would be icing on the cake.

This may sound weird but every time I get a new legal pad to write on, it makes me feel so full of promise and possibilities, like it’s just waiting for me to fill it’s clean, white pages with all my fantastic thoughts and big ideas! That is how the Womens Conference made me feel and so now I must get to work on my new dreams!

“Success is the ability to move from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.”
– Winston Churchill

Check out The Business of Being Creative, subscribe and let me know what you think.

I want to share a great story about a stand-up guy at my Volkswagen dealership. I am currently leasing my 2nd Beetle convertible and have about 8 months left on my lease, but of course I would love a new upgrade! So after I received an e-newsletter from my dealership about their loyalty programs for current owners/lessees, I email my guy, he said I could use the big incentives toward my down and he suggested I come in…so hello of course I went that night. I explained I wanted the same payment, with no money down and he went to work w/ the finance guy. After about 15 minutes, he returned and said, sorry but if we do this now you’ll be upside down, come back in about 4 months and I am sure we can make it happen. What? No hard sell to give you a huge down payment? I was a little bummed about not driving my new white Beetle home, but thrilled to know that in no time I would be (on my terms.) Not sure if my guy is an exception, or if having 3 leases from one dealership is a huge bonus, but either way, I know where I am getting my next car. That is great service, going on 5 years, and I am not only a loyal customer, I am now an advocate. If you want to contact my sales guy, email me.

When we talked he told me how they wanted to be in this print pub and that trade mag, argh I’m thinking, so I bring up online media and social media and how it’s really all the same now. He explains to me that they have the online stuff nailed (what?) and they really just want print. Plus, research proves that only 40% of their target customers are online. This blew me away. Why would you NOT want to reach 40% of your target? I very politely explained we were not the best P.R. company for what they were looking for, he was very polite too. Before we hung up, I asked him how he’d found us…to which he replied, “your website.” Touche.