I attended a presentation by Kurt Shaver’s at the Bay Area Consultants Network. His topic: ” Get LinkedIn to Sales”.

That’s Kurt to your left. Why is he smiling? He knows the secrets of making LinkedIn work to find customers. Below are a few things I learned from Kurt.

Improve Your Profile

He gave great tips on how to make it easier for people to find you on LinkedIn, the first step if they are going to hire you.

• Use a great photo – a headshot that fills the space, is flattering, and that shows you as the professional you are
• Use keywords to describe yourself and what you do (that’s what people are searching on)
• You can reorder the sections of your profile by dragging and dropping
• Make sure your summary is keyword  rich and describes your accomplishments
• Ask for recommendations

Making changes to Your Profile

I spent about a half an hour and made some significantI changes to my profile .

I  moved sections around and I added a video clip to my profile.I have more updates planned.

See the results on my LinkedIn Profile

Want More Sales?

Kurt teaches how to get more clients using LinkedIn. Find out more here. He has a series of online workshops coming up in August. I give him two thumbs up.

Watch this short clip (49 sec) of Kurt to get a sample of his high energy and high impact training style.

 

Writing a book is a great way to get known as an expert. In today’s world, you can publish it yourself. Many authors who have gone through the experience of traditional publishing are joining the ranks of the self-publishing world.

Jim Horan, author of The One Page Business Plan, was a speaker at the Bay Area Consultants Network and one of the keynote speakers at the BAIPA Get Published Institute. He has been a member of both groups. I bring this up because his affiliation with both groups was critical to his becoming published. These groups and those like them are there to support entrepreneurs in building their business. I happen to be on the board of both of these groups because they are sources of inspiration, support and I meet wonderful people at the meetings. Our speakers are thought leaders, mentors and people who have blazed a trail and want to encourage the success of those who follow.

Today, I will focus on BAIPA and why you could benefit from becoming a member and attending meetings. I was introduced to the Bay Area Independent Publishers Association in 2010 by a friend and author, Bill Buchanan

I attend my first Get Published Institute in 2010 and was hooked.

Before joining BAIPA, I worked with authors who self-published. My contributions included book layout and design, as well  marketing coach and branding expert. Most authors will tell you that the writing of a book is the easy part. Publishing and marketing are much harder. I help authors overcome many of the hurdles encountered from manuscript to published book. My clients have successfully self-published books and multi-media projects. One client self-published a workbook and multiple DVDs. We are currently developing  additional  projects for publication in 2011.

Today I attended a panel of authors representing the Redwood Writers. My friend, Catharine Bramkamp moderated the panel, that included Patricia V. Davis, the author of the award-winning Harlot’s Sauce: A Memoir of Food, Family, Love, Loss and Greece, and The Diva Doctrine: 16 Universal Principles Every Woman Needs to Know. The discussion was lively and what was abundantly clear, if you are going to write and want to get published, you will learn what to do and what not to do if you join a writers group or a publishing group.

The world of publishing has been transformed by the internet, Amazon and the rise of new media channels. Publishing is going through major changes similar to the those we experienced in the realm of  graphic design. With the rise of services like Create Space, Lighting Source and SmashWords, publishing is moving away from the Big Publishing House Platform just as printing moved away from service bureaus and print shops into the hands of desktop publishers in the late 1980′s and early 90′s. We still need talented experts, but many steps in the process have become accessible by the general population. These monumental changes were started with the wide spread availability and affordability of desktop computers with Apple leading the way.

The birthing of a book takes time, attention and usually more than one person. Find a coach, a writing group or peers to support you when you get stuck, for inspiration and learning how to get your ideas out of your head and into the world.

BAIPA is one great group of independent publishing professionals and those who want to be published. We meet monthly on the second Saturday in San Rafael. Come and learn.   I joined the board of BAIPA as part of the program committee. You can read more about this in the Sonoma Index-Tribune. I’ll be speaking about Video for Publishers at the April 9th meeting. If you are in the San Francisco Bay Area,  I invite you to come learn about how you can share your ideas and publish them.

 

6 Secrets to Successful Schmoozing- Yahoo! HotJobs.

This article is by my friend, Susan RoAne, author of “How to Work a Room.” Before I met Susan, I was painfully shy. 15 years ago, I saw her demonstrate how to make connections with a room full of people, one person at a time. We reconnected this past year through another mutual friend. I was delighted to share her mingling expertise with the Bay Area Consutlants Network as one of our presenters last year.

Because of what I learned from Susan, I find it easier to connect with people everywhere.

Thanks for making a big difference in my life.

 

Just created my first Camtasia Video. Lots to learn and I am determined to become a master of computer video capture. It is part of a presentation to the Bay Area Consultants Network.

 

On Friday, I attended a meeting of the Bay Area Consultants Network, (http://www.bacnetwork.com). Our featured presenter, Katie Gutierrez, owner of Assistant Match, (http://www.assistantmatch.com/), explained how consultants use virtual assistants to increase profits and productivity. The audience was highly engaged as evidenced by the lively exchange of questions and answers. Katie was able to dispel many common misconceptions about working with a virtual assistant. She inspired many of the sixty plus attendees to evaluate how we might be losing money by not hiring a virtual assistant. Working with a VA (Virtual Assistant), we could also get more time and balance in our lives as well.

Delegating aspects of our business that can be handled more effectively, more quickly and with less angst is quite an appealing possibility. Katie gave specific examples of how her clients have double and sometimes tripled their income by strategically handing off administrative responsibilities so they could focus on what only they can do. She likened using a VA to getting back a full two hours per day. If you multiply your billable rate (i.e. $100 per hour) by those two hours per day ($200), it is easy to see the cost benefit of using a trained expert who is billing you about $35 per hour. $200 per day times 5 workdays per week = $1000 per week less $350 paid to a VA, and you have $650 in your pocket. In a year you could earn $32,500 more than you would without paying a VA to assist you just two hours a day! You get more done and still make a profit. Better yet, you get to focus on what you love.
Katie’s own VA lives in Michigan, while Katie is in California. She answers phones, checks and routes email and many other tasks that free Katie up to work on her business. Some clients’ work with a VA on a single project, some utilize their services on a regular basis. Working with a VA you have the flexibility to adjust the number of hours as your needs change.

Using an employment service like Assistant Match reduces the risk involved in finding the right match for your needs. A quality employment service screens their employees, doing background checks and thoroughly interviewing candidates, categorizes their talents and abilities so you can find the right person for the right job.

I have a background in human resources, (a Masters of Organization and Human Resource Development plus holding the position of Director of Human Resources for Watermark and later Sutter Home Winery). I know how critical it is to match people and jobs. Working with an agency makes sense since the agency has a far greater pool of talent than I could access on my own. I utilized the services of an employment agency to help me fill the on-call and seasonal warehouse jobs while at Sutter Home. This saved the company time, money and aggravation and I ensured the jobs were filled with qualified people. Sometimes, the person we think is a good fit isn’t. The job still needs to be done. When you work with an agency, they can find a replacement for you from their other qualified candidates and minimize your down time.

What could you do with two more hours every day? Better yet, what could you do with the added income you can generate when you have two more billable hours every day?

Visit the BACN website for a summary of this meeting and for additional resources for independent professionals.