By now, you may have read about No Impact Man recently featured in the NY Times. He (along with his wife, toddler, and dog) has stated his commitment to live with no net environmental impact for one year.

To do this, we will decrease the things we do that hurt the earth—make trash, cause carbon dioxide emissions, for example—and increase the things we do that help the earth—clean up the banks of the Hudson River, give money to charity, rescue sea birds, say.

In mathematical terms, in case you are an engineer or just a geek who likes math, we are trying to achieve an equilibrium that looks something like this:

Negative Impact + Positive Impact = Zero.

No net impact. Get it?

This interesting and thought-provoking experiment in modern-day living has piqued people’s interest across the blogosphere. It seems to becoming a blogging version of reality TV. I am not sure that the couple realized the intense scrutiny they were putting themselves under with this experiment. Under their Blog’s FAQ section, a reader asks:

“You are going to such extremes with your hygiene- have you altered your methods of birth control? obviously condoms are most effective, but clearly most disposable. medication certainly comes in all sorts of packaging.”

and Colin aka NoImpact Man’s response:

“We’re already a little mortified that discussion of our bathroom habits is all over the blogosphere and now reporters are asking us about them. Would you excuse me if I demur from discussing our birth control methods?”

The blog is just the beginning. After this year of No Impact, there is a contract for a book and a movie. And since No Impact Man and his wife are both writers, this coming year of no impact will have quite the impact on their fame and fortune once this year is complete.

Hugs and success, Wendy Maynard
Your friendly marketing maven

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I got a call today at my main business, Kinesis - we focus on branding campaigns (identity, marketing strategy, websites, etc.). It was from a woman asking for just a little bit of web design work. She wanted a small banner ad. I told her it wasn’t the best fit for us to do the work and I happily gave her the names of two different freelancers I know.

Why did I do this? After all, my business is certainly capable of doing the work for her.

I did it because what she wanted was out of alignment with the positioning of my company. We are streamlined to best serve professional service businesses with annual revenues of $2.5 - 50 million. We usually start with developing a solid branding strategy and radiating out from there. We work with these businesses over multiple years to provide their marketing and creative services.

What we’ve found is that taking on a small project like the one the caller described is inefficient for our design team. And takes time and energy away from the creative services that we provide to our other clients. When we put the same time and energy into our existing clients, the result is more business from them and bigger projects because we have the time to help them brainstorm new marketing ideas.

I bring this point up because many business…especially those with one to five people get hung up on trying to take on everything instead of carefully defining your market strategy, positioning, and ideal targeted customer. When you take on too many things that aren’t a good fit, you spread yourself too thin and you dilute your expertise.

Don’t be scared to say “no” when a prospect is not a good fit. But, say no nicely by having a list of people and companies that you know WOULD be a good fit. In the example I gave today, the freelancers I passed this woman on to are very nice, easy to work with, competent, and happy to take on small jobs like the one she needed.

I’m happy, she’s happy, my clients stay happy, and the freelancers will be happy. And, when these freelancers get a call from a prospect who is not a good fit for them because the project is too comprehensive for their abilities, they will happily refer them to my company. It’s a beautiful thing…all the way around.

So, be sure to incorporate referrals into your overall marketing strategy. You’ll find you’ll make more money and be less stressed out.

Hugs and success, Wendy Maynard
Your friendly marketing maven

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To succeed in marketing, constantly appeal to your target market.

A perfect example of a company who has this dialed in is Skype. They have really made the IM scene sexy. They provide their core service for free, but offer all kind of fun for-fee additions like Wee-Mee in its WeeWorld, the Klonies, emoticons and so on. Yahoo Messenger has even more of these fun features like sound effects, audibles, Avatars, and IMVironments.

These types of features are very appealing to the international community of teens and 20-somethings. And in a competitive environment, you not only have to appeal to your target audience but you have to keep adding the latest and greatest to keep them enthralled with your services.

No matter what your business, you can take the basic premise of these companies’ marketing strategies to heart. Keep ‘em delighted to keep ‘em loyal.

Hugs and success, Wendy Maynard
Your friendly marketing maven

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Ali Brown’s Blueprint for Online Success: A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned Alexandria Brown, a.k.a. “The Ezine Queen.” Why do I mention her?

Because I’ve been receiving Ali’s ezine for over 2 years. And, I purchased the first version of her Online Success Blueprint. This is her second round of the Blueprint - version 2.0, if you will. This is Ali’s 2nd year of honing this program to perfection, and I can honestly and confidently tell you — there is NOTHING else out there like this! It works - I built my online site (GoMarketingMaven.com), ezine, and infoproducts based on her recommendations.

I have also ordered a number of Ali’s other products and been part of her online membership group. Ali is a very sharp cookie and has a great skill for distilling a large amount of info into an easy-to-understand format. The woman made over $1 million last year - she definitely knows what she is doing.

“I’m making an *additional $25,000* each and every month — just from following your Online Success Blueprint to create and sell 2 new information products!”

“Your Online Success Blueprint DOUBLED my email list in 3 months — more than I’ve been able to do on my own in 3 YEARS!”

“Ali, your Blueprint increased my email list by 12 TIMES, upped my opt-in rate from .1% to over 34%, and I’m really enjoying all this new free time!”

These are testimonials from her site. You can see more here.

If you are considering picking up one for yourself, you’d better do so right now, because there are only 47 copies left. This one-of-a-kind, 7-step program walks you through her entire system to use the Internet and information products to skyrocket your profits AND your free time. At least you deserve to get the scoop and see if this is a good fit for you here.

Because once these last 47 copies are gone, they’re GONE.

You can see everything you get right now - just click here.

Hugs and success, Wendy Maynard
Your friendly marketing maven

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Offer proof to your prospects. Testimonials are one of the most powerful and cost effective selling tools you can implement in your arsenal of marketing. Why? Because you are offering social proof to your prospects from their peers attesting that your services/products actually work. If you say you are good at what you do, it’s self serving. But, if others say you are good…it’s credible.

Providing testimonials from current and prior customers of their actual problem and the specific results from your company enhances your company’s credibility. It’s not enough to say that you solve problems - you have to show your prospects the direct results of other people. Testimonials offer proof that you are the real deal.

People receive a lot of information and they are often skeptical. But, they will be more inclined to buy from you if you show examples of their peers who have achieved positive results. An effective testimonial is filled with specific benefits and substantiates the claims you are making. Whenever possible, testimonials should offer tangible, quantified results. (ex: I lost 65 pounds, I raised my income by 42%, I saved $300, and so on.) To show it comes from a real person, a good testimonial includes a first and last name, a city and state, a business name, their industry, and a website URL.

Be sure to ask people for a photograph. You can add their picture next to their testimonial in your office or a in brochure. It’s a great strategy for your website’s testimonial section. And, you can take your website to a higher level of interactivity by including audio and video for an even greater impact. If you want to include audio testimonials on your site, I recommend Audio Acrobat for an easy-to-use recording system.

If you are offering a new product or just starting your business, you can contact business associates and offer them a free session or product sample to try. In exchange, ask them for a heartfelt testimonial. Most of the people you contact will be delighted to do a trial run of your offering and provide a testimonial.

On your website, your brochure, and in your presentations, provide testimonials from current and prior customers of their actual problem and the specific results from your company. These third-party endorsements work to sell for you - even when you are not around. Your testimonials also help close the sale with prospects. Depending on your type of business, you can even cover your walls with pictures of happy customers. Or you can create a notebook that shows pictures of customers with your products.

Even after you’ve been in business for a while, don’t stop collecting testimonials. You can use an autoresponder service like Professional Cart Services to automatically follow up with a customer who has purchased something from you to ask them how they are doing. Ask them to provide a testimonial. Incorporating a testimonial into an advertising campaign and/or direct mail marketing is also very effective.

You’ll find that incorporating the power of social proof to your marketing arsenal will help spread word-of-mouth advertising. It will also help you easily close sales. Often, a person will review your testimonials and be prepared to buy before you’ve even met. The reward of collecting testimonials is always worth the effort!

Hugs and success,

Wendy Maynard
Your friendly marketing maven

P.S. Want to learn more marketing tips for your business? Then it’s time to get a copy of the Maven Marketing Home Study System! It’s everything you need to know to attract the best customers for your business. You’ll learn how to get new customers calling YOU and lots of valuable strategies to help you fill your sales pipeline quickly.

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I came across a few blog entries that speak volumes with their images. Have fun visiting the following:

Bald Celebrities photoshop gallery on Worth1000

Kisses from flickr: Everybody Loves Kisses

American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME) Top 40 magazine covers of all time

David Ichioka’s Sleep Pictures

An online gallery of the fashionable stewardesses of the past

Complete coverage of the February 14 San Francisco Pillow Fight

Sculptural pieces created with paper by means of scoring and folding

Tampon Crafts for any time of the month

2006 Championships of Sand Sculpture Competitions at Harrison Hot Springs

Portraits of Primates by Steve Bloom

Hugs and success,

Wendy Maynard
Your friendly marketing maven

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By now you’ve probably seen the movie “The Secret.” Or at least you’ve heard of it. Oprah has been raving about it. I love the message of the movie because I’ve discovered that most of the successful people I’ve met or read about use the Law of Attraction (this is The Secret) to focus their attention on the things they want to have occur in their lives.

Yesterday, Jerry Adler of Newsweek wrote an article that ponders:

The latest self-help sensation claims we can change our lives by thinking. But this ‘new thought’ may just be new marketing.

The article continues…

Self-help books roll off the presses with the regularity of politicians’ biographies, and sell much better; Wayne Dyer all by himself has written 29 of them with sales estimated at 50 million. But Byrne [the author] had something else going for her. “It was an incredibly savvy move to call it ‘The Secret’,” says Donavin Bennes, a buyer who specializes in metaphysics for Borders Books. “We all want to be in on a secret. But to present it as the secret, that was brilliant…”

What it doesn’t contain, though, is a secret. That should be self-evident to anyone who has ever been in an airport bookstore. The film and book are built around 24 “teachers,” mostly motivational speakers and writers (dressed up by Byrne with titles like “philosopher” or “visionary”) who have been selling the same message for years.

I have to confess. I love the movie, The Secret. Why? Because I think it serves as a powerful reminder that we often use self-defeating talk to keep us stuck in our comfort zone.

My belief is that while the Law of Attraction may not be a mystical force of the universe, we can change our thinking to focus on the things we DO WANT. In this way, we can bring these desires into our lives. Our attention and actions become centered on the object of attention and then we make small movements each day that move us closer. Finally, these small actions cumulate into the desired thing becoming real.

And so I’m curious to hear from you. Is The Secret nothing but a brilliant marketing ploy to sell some more woo-woo self-help mumbo jumbo? Or is it something that you use in your life with success?

Hugs and success,

Wendy Maynard
Your friendly marketing maven

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Ali Brown’s Blueprint for Online Success: I’ve mentioned Alexandria Brown, a.k.a. “The Ezine Queen.” Well, she’s really shaking things up with the “big boys” of the Internet marketing world. Why? Because she’s so open and honest about what WORKS (and what doesn’t work) when it comes to using email, the Internet, and information marketing to transform your business.

Instead of dangling exciting “magic pill” solutions in front of you, or selling “the next big thing”, Ali tells it like it is. After hours of editing, polishing, and coddling, the brand new 2007 Version of her “Online Success Blueprint-in-a-BOX” is READY! You can see everything you get right now - just click here. This is Ali’s 2nd year of honing this program to perfection, and I can honestly and confidently tell you — there is NOTHING else out there like this! Her program is honestly changing lives. But don’t take my word (or even her word) that this stuff works. Ali has *dozens and dozens of client success stories* that will blow your mind!

Listen, you’ll want to jump on this FAST, because Ali is only releasing *147 copies* of this version of the program. You’ll have to see what I mean — get the scoop, see all those success stories, and reserve your copy NOW. You can learn more here.

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