Becoming an Attraction Marketer – Building Phase 2 of 3

Attraction Marketer – Building Phase

Dr. Hale here.   There are distinct stages or steps that you go through when you decide to become an Attraction Marketer.   You can read the first posts in the series here: It is the Overview and the Formative Phase post here.   BTW there was a section in the Formative Phase post about why I have divided the process into phases.

PREREQUISITES 

If you successfully completed Phase 1 of becoming an Attraction Marketer, you have at least a pretty good idea of the following:

• Your Niche
• Your Unique Selling Proposition (USP)
• An Idea About what you will be selling
• You have researched you Niche
• You have a very good idea of who your Avatar is.
• You might have a blog site name and a tag line in mind.

None of this is carved in stone, but you should have something your are at least someone comfortable with before you move on to this step.

Phase 2 – The Building Phase – Developing an Internet Home Base.

As I said in the Overview, for an emerging Attraction Marketer the basic decisions that must be made early on are very similar to those that a person who is planning to open a store must make.   I listed the prerequisites above, now we need to build, buy or rent a building (or at least part of one.)

Sidebar:

NOTE:  One of the “problems” associated with the Internet and hypertext linking is that processes are not linear any more.  Material about any phase of a project is available ALL THE TIME through search engines like Google and emails and Facebook posts makes us aware of free training every day.

This is just Dr. Hale speaking, but I would suggest that once you start the process of becoming an Attraction Marketer, you actively avoid training that is not relevant to the Phase you are currently working on.  For example, you will get more out of Blogging training if you know what YOU will be blogging about.  So wait until you get there.  You will get much more out of Paid Advertising Training if you know what you are planing to sell.  As far as I’m concerned the phrase “I’ll just learn it now and somehow it will make sense later” leads to quicksand and overwhelm.  You will be actively building misconceptions that you will have to undo later.

Your Home Base – Selling Your Main Product – YOU!

Attraction Marketer – Formative Phase

Tis is a mindset issue, as you design and go through iterations (you will build, revise and build again) you need to keep in mind that the sign out front is YOU.  You are not another McDonalds that looks like every other McDonalds.  You are a unique personality and you need to let people know that.  Franchisers buy McDonalds Franchises because customers know, like and trust McDonalds.  The food may not be the greatest, but you can go into any McDonalds and pretty much know what you are getting.   People  DON’T know you and they don’t know what to expect.  It is your job to tell them.   Note that if you really expose yourself some people are going say “No Way Dude!” and other are going to say “At Last! Someone I can relate to!”   If you are nameless and faceless everyone is going to say the same thing: “I wonder who is behind this and if I would like them if I knew them?”

If you are just one of the people in this picture – NO ONE IS GOING TO NOTICE YOU!

Your Name and Picture – FRONT AND CENTER.

It should be obvious, but if you are going to brand yourself as someone to know like and trust, you are going to need to let people see your SMILING face.

 PLATFORM – Which one?  WordPress.com, Blogger, Typepad, WordPress.org??

There are several free sites where you can start a blog – WordPress.com and Blogger are two of the big ones.   I can’t recommend any of these to people who are building a serious business on line.  There are two main reasons:

• You don’t OWN your site.  They real owner can shut you down on a whim.  (I’ve read stories of bloggers making an impassioned plea to support the fight against breast cancer and being shut down by automated software since they are obviously a porn site.  When you have been tagged as a porn site, it is very hard to get things back on an even keel.
• The sites are very limited.   Blogs can be customized and personalized.  The free sites have very strict limits as to what you can do.  I know one very large paid site where you have very limited control over the header and no control at all of the sidebar.  (The area to the right of this text.)

Recommendations

I am going to make some recommendations here without going into a lot of detail about the why’s.  This post would be a book if I did.

• Buy a Domain Name from GoDaddy.com.  Don’t buy any of the upsells.  Pay for at least two years (Google likes that).  Use you name as your Domain name (add “blog” or “marketing” or some word like that if you name is taken.)  A case can be made for using a keyword filled domain name.  When you use your name you have the flexibility to change your focus without losing all the momentum you have gained.
• Buy Hosting from HostGator.  Buy the “Baby” plan for at least two years.
• Install the Open Source (free) version of WordPress from WordPress.org – this is by far the most flexible version.
• There is an eBook in http://HalePringle.com/Resources called “Annotated WordPress Setup.”  If you are tech savvy it might help.  Mostly I recommend that you outsource this.  oDesk dot  come can set you up with someone who will do a nice job for between $50 and $70.
• Buy a header graphic.  I have had good luck with LogoNerds.com   For $44 I got a logo and a header for my blog.
• Identify 5 to 7 major categories you are going to use to group your ads together
• Put links at the bottom of each page to a pages with “privacy policy”, “Terms and Conditions”, and “Liability”

In http://HalePringle.com/Resources there is an eBook with a checklist for your blog’s look and feel.

 Create Some Pages

• I recommend you convert from the default of putting a page of blog excerpts as your home page to a static home page. (Under Settings –> Reading.  You will need to create an empty page called Home and an empty page called Home before you begin.  The static home page means that when someone lands on your blog using just your blog name they will see a consistent, crafted message where you describe what you do and what is in it for the visitor if they stay.
• Blog Page – this will contain excerpts from your recent blogs and a way to get to earlier posts.
• Start Here Page – if your target is beginners in some field
• About Me Page – let people know the real you – the whole you.
• Work With Me – A page that asks for some information and tells people how you can work together.
• Resources Page – A page to sell or get products to the uses.
• Contact Us Page – A place to send you an message.

A Few Posts in Each Category

Get started and blog, as soon as you can.

Attraction Marketer – Sales Funnel

Add a Sales Funnel  –>

You will need

1. An Ethical Bribe – a free product you can use to exchange for an email address.
2. An Autoresponder – an account with a company like aWeber who specialize in building email lists.
3. Squeeze pages or sidebar widgets where you collect the name/email address and deliver your product.
4. A way to sell other products – in your email system or on your site.

Of course that is a VERY sketchy overview of a huge field.

We’ll talk about the Ethical Bribe and list building in another post.

Then we’ll move on to Phase 3 – advertising or promoting your blog

There you have a Quick Overview of the Becoming an Attraction Marketer – the Building Phase (2 of 3) 

Until next time, you have a Great Day!

↓ ↓ If this post gave you some ideas – Go ahead & comment below.  ↓ ↓

Hale Pringle Ed. D.

Hale Pringle – Hale Yes!

Skype hale.pringle

Email: HaleYes@HalePringle.com

P.S. If you are working to move your business online and it all seems overwhelming, I can help!  Take a look at http://HalePringle.com, or sign up for the free coaching call. You can email me or give me a Skype call. I’ll give you the benefit of my years of experience and many thousands of dollars in training and searching the rabbit hole called Internet Marketing and Network Marketing. I can help you with Lead Generation, the feeling of overwhelm, blogging, and even career change. Add that to the finest mentoring on the Internet (Ann Sieg’s Team and Inner Circle) and you have a Winner!