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Booklet Tips From Paulette

Writing, producing, and promoting tips booklets for marketing, motivating, and making money.

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Who Was the Last One You Told About Your Booklet?

The ongoing discussion about the likes and dislikes of marketing sees no end to it anytime soon. You either like it or you don't. You find new ways to do it or new ways to avoid it. It gets easier for those who have trouble with it when you think about marketing as:
  • sharing
  • giving
  • helping
  • educating
Yes, that's really what marketing is. It's letting people know what you've got so that it can be useful to them in some way, either in their person or professional life. It's sharing a resource that helps them by expanding their education. You've given them the gift of a new tool. It then becomes their choice as to whether they want to invest any money in it now, later, or not at all.

And if you think you don't have time to do any of that, just think back on the last conversation you had about your booklet. You know, the one where it flowed out of you very naturally to tell someone what you're doing or just completed. That person could be a friend, family member, neighbor, co-worker, colleague, or complete stranger. You didn't schedule the conversation. It happened in the natural flow of your life. That's all this is.

Go tell someone about your booklet. See what happens.

Until next time,
Paulette - who encourages "visiting" that ends up helping all concerned

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign

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Thursday, June 25, 2009

Pricing Presentation - Booklets and More

There is a psychology to pricing. It is also both an art and a science. Our friend and colleague, Marcia Yudkin, has once again, presented very useful findings on how your sales are impacted by how your pricing is visually presented. See what you think and test it out for yourself.

===================

The Marketing Minute
by Marcia Yudkin, Marketing Expert and Mentor
http://www.yudkin.com/markmin.htm

*******************

A price is a price, right? Not really, according to Cornell
University researchers, who tested whether restaurant owners
would profit most when menu prices were formatted as $20.00,
20.00 or twenty dollars.

To their surprise, the 20.00 format netted the most, with
customers spending 8 percent more when menus used numerals
to represent prices, minus any dollar signs.

Without the dollar sign or the word "dollars," diners were
apparently reminded least that what they were ordering was
making them a tiny bit poorer.

Specialists in the field of "menu engineering" have also
discovered that menus bring in more revenue when they insert
prices at the end of each small paragraph describing the
item, rather than all lined up in a column that can be
quickly scanned from top to bottom.

Likewise, those who study these things tell us that we
tend to perceive $23 to be less than $23.00.

One more finding: When looking at menus, we take prices
like $20.00 as indicative of higher quality food than
prices like $19.99.

*******************

MARKETING COACHING CLUB: I didn't master marketing through
academic study. A key element of putting all the pieces
together on my own was listening to recorded "hot seats"
where a marketing wizard or two would apply timeless
principles for getting customers, packaging an offer or
closing the sale to a particular person's project.

You can listen to my own kinder, gentler version of "hot
seats" in a membership program that brings you a Feedback
FeastĀ® on CD each month, along with a second CD where I
interviewed an expert on a related marketing topic.

Whether you look at the price as $37, $37.00 or thirty-seven
dollars, my CD Club is great value for your marketing
education. Sign up now so you won't miss any months!

http://www.marketingformore.com/cdclub.htm

*******************

MORE MARCIA...

Marketing Mastery CD Club:
http://www.marketingformore.com/cdclub.htm

Mentoring Program:
http://www.marketingformore.com

Naming & Tag Line Service:
http://www.namedatlast.com

Press Releases & Distribution:
http://www.pressreleasehelp.com

*******************

If you enjoy The Marketing Minute, please forward it to
friends and colleagues. It comes to you every Wednesday
from publicity and marketing consultant Marcia
Yudkin, author of Web Site Marketing Makeover and
10 other books. P.O. Box 305, Goshen, MA 01032.

For a free weekly marketing tip, subscribe:
http://www.yudkin.com/markmin.htm

====================

Until next time,
Paulette - who is about to test these findings, and who is grateful to Marcia Yudkin for her wisdom

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign




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Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Booklets and Blunders

Have you ever goofed in your business? C'mon, even a small goof? If you think you haven't, you're either smoothing over something (aka telling yourself a bit of a story) or you're one of the very cautious people who takes as few risks as humanly possible once you've taken the risk of getting out of bed in the morning.

The fact is (and yes, it's a fact) that there are endless possibilities of ways you can blunder with booklets and, well, in your business overall. It can be everything from a typo, an upside down page at the bindery, a wrong color on a customized job, a misplaced whatever, and on and on. We need not spend more time or real estate focusing on what can go awry.

What matters and what will always matter is what happens next. How do you handle it? What do you do about the blunder? Some blunders provide the chance for a larger sale, a better relationship with the client, a new skill to be able to upgrade a product, a different way of streamlining your business.

Yes, things happen. What you do about them is really all that matters, even when you've done your best to have it all go smoothly in the first place.

Until next time,
Paulette - reminding myself that most things are forgotten and don't matter five years later

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign

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Thursday, June 18, 2009

Learn About Bits and Booklets from Costco

Because you are such a wealth of information, frequently the big challenge is deciding what to include in a tips booklet, whether it's one you're doing yourself, or a page of 5 tips in a Collection of Experts. After all, you've got all this stuff to share with the world, and want to give people the best of what you've got.

NEWS FLASH: The very best you can give your people is a small taste of what you have so they can digest that, feel great, and want more from you.

It's the Costco phenomenon. If you're unfamiliar with Costco, it's a large warehouse store where people pay an annual membership fee to be able to shop there for many different food and non-food products in bulk that often cost less than you'll find at other places. On Saturdays (and maybe other days of the week, too, I don't know), you can sample small bits of various foods Costco sells. It's all cut into small pieces, and each week it's a different range of products.

Why do they do this? So you'll literally get that taste in your mouth and want (to buy) more. Makes sense, doesn't it? After all, they sell thousands and thousands of items, yet they give small tastes of just a few each week. You can, too.

Give people a small taste of what you have so they will want more. It works for Costco and will work for you, too.

Until next time,
Paulette - who appreciates a business model that works

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign

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Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Blogs, Booklets, and PDF Tool

Two new resources to share with you today. One is about production and the other about promotion.

For production - www.mergePDF.net

It's a free and very, very, very easy tool to combine PDFs into one PDF, in about a quarter of a second. So, no cost, no time, no brainer. Why this is useful? What about bundling some of your booklets, special reports, or other products currently in PDF format to make one larger product -- one with a higher value and higher price? By the way, the topic of Bundling Your Products for Bigger Bucks is what our Expert Interview is about in July at www.PublishingProsperity.com However, I digress. Another reason to bundle your PDFs is that you can deliver multiple PDFs as one as a download through your shopping cart. I like that, and you will, too.

The other resource is for promotion. Since you're reading this blog, it means you have some level of interest in blogs, and, hopefully also about promotion. Cathy Stucker, the Idea Lady, has developed a great (also free) service related to blogs. You can be a guest blogger, request blog contributions, or ask for product reviews. Check it out for yourself at http://BloggerLinkUp.com

Until next time,


Paulette - who is very excited to discover both these resources because of the positive overall impact on business

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign

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Thursday, June 11, 2009

Booklet Author with Great Vision

See for yourself what one booklet author has done to leverage her expertise and her exposure. Standolyn Robertson is the immediate past president of the National Association of Professional Organizers. Marcia Yudkin and I share Standolyn as a client. Get to know both of them if you don't already.

-------------------------

The Marketing Minute
by Marcia Yudkin, Marketing Expert and Mentor
http://www.yudkin.com/markmin.htm

*******************

I was startled to see Marketing Minute subscriber Standolyn
Robertson (ThingsinPlace.com) quoted in Backpacker Magazine.

Standolyn helps clients get organized, a service I associate
with homes and offices, not hiking and the outdoors.

Backpacker's topic was how to get things done at work so you
can head out to the trail ahead of the Friday afternoon rush
hour, as well as how to keep one's camping gear ready for
action in a single closet.

Intrigued by this unexpected matchup, I asked Standolyn if
she'd received other surprising publicity mentions, and she
said she's given interviews on some aspect of organizing
to publications for dieters, single fathers, radio
broadcasters, the inventory industry, and job-hunting
engineers.

Are you thinking too narrowly about who might find your
expertise relevant?

When it comes to articles, press releases and content on
your own site, try going beyond the obvious examples and
connections.

Invite friends from different professions over for a
brainstorming party in which you suggest farflung contexts
for what you each do. Laugh at the improbable - then
consider whether there's a viable publicity strategy there.

*******************

THIS WEEK'S SPECIAL: My most popular publicity service -
a press release makeover turning your draft into a polished,
newsworthy media magnet - is ridiculously underpriced at just
$195. Through June 16, when you place an order for a press
release makeover ($195) or for a release written from scratch
(only $395), you also receive a one-hour audio recording
explaining the ins and outs of the press release distribution
process.

In this recording, created for my Marketing for More
mentoring program, I answer common questions about
distribution options, timing and what to expect from sending
out a release.

Get informed as you reach for publicity, till June 16 only:

http://www.pressreleasehelp.com

*******************

MORE MARCIA...

Marketing Mastery CD Club:
http://www.marketingformore.com/cdclub.htm

Mentoring Program:
http://www.marketingformore.com

Naming & Tag Line Service:
http://www.namedatlast.com

Press Releases & Distribution:
http://www.pressreleasehelp.com

*******************

If you enjoy The Marketing Minute, please forward it to
friends and colleagues. It comes to you every Wednesday
from publicity and marketing consultant Marcia
Yudkin, author of Web Site Marketing Makeover and
10 other books. P.O. Box 305, Goshen, MA 01032.

For a free weekly marketing tip, subscribe:
http://www.yudkin.com/markmin.htm
===================

Until next time,
Paulette - happy to spotlight a booklet author and glad another colleague did, too

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign

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Tuesday, June 09, 2009

Booklets - Got Media?

You may be familiar with a free service called HARO (Help a Reporter Out) by Peter Shankman. They recently celebrated their first year anniversary in providing queries from journalists looking for people to interview. It's been a raging success. (www.shankman.com) In fact, your booklet many have benefited from one or more interviews you got from this service.

This week, the blog version of that service has been started by a long-time colleague, Cathy Stucker. You'll find details and free sign-up at http://BloggerLinkUp.com/ There's a reason Cathy bills herself as The Idea Lady. This is yet another glowing example of one of her many excellent ideas.

Until next time,
Paulette - greatly admiring and appreciating these services and the people behind them

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign


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Thursday, June 04, 2009

Where and How You Learn

Last week in New York, I taught three workshops and I learned from each of them. Some of that happened simultaneously, in fact, since my audiences and clients are always teaching me stuff I had no reason to know before they shared their knowledge. You may be like me, that your best learning is not necessarily in formal situations or when something is intended as a learning experience. I'll hear a phrase that someone uses to identify something, and realize it's the perfect label. That's how Collection of Experts got its name. Or someone will ask for the Word document format of a Collection of Experts so they can go sell it on mobile hand-held devices like the Kindle or Sony Reader or Moby Reader, all of which I basically know nothing about.

I heard a particular colleague speak last week for the umpteenth time. I always learn something new from him, no matter how many times I hear him speak or read anything he writes. After all, how could I possibly learn all that he has to share when I hear him an hour at a time in classes, or read articles or his book. There is always more.

Next time you worry about giving away all your knowledge in your tips booklet, think about the reality of that, would you? Is it really possible to share everything you know in a tips booklet? No, of course it isn't. Your people will learn something from you every single time they have contact with you in any format you present your knowledge.

Until next time,
Paulette - fascinated by how and where the learning presents itself

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign

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Tuesday, June 02, 2009

How Americans Do Business Relationships

A few weeks ago I had coffee with a consultant I met at a seminar. The consultant's specialty is in doing business in Mexico and helping others do business in Mexico. Over the years, I've known a number of consultants whose focus is on international business and what's involved in it. One thing that keeps jumping out is the difference in how Americans do business compared with many (most?) other countries.

This consultant explained it to me at a very basic level. It made so much sense. As Americans, we often see that there's a tree and go in to grab whatever fruit we see on that tree. You've likely heard the phrase "low hanging fruit." That usually applies to where to put your sales efforts. Go after whatever seems the easiest sale to make, the easiest fruit to pick. This colleague said doing good business in many countries looks more like going in, planting the tree, letting it mature, and then carefully harvesting the fruit it bears so that it continues bearing fruit over a long period of time.

Although I am not particularly known for my patience in many things, the seed planting and then harvesting carefully over time sure seems to make a whole lot of sense when it comes to building a long-lasting business relationship. In fact, it makes sense for building any kind of relationship, don't you think? It gave me great pause, as I've just returned from attending a publishing conference for the seventh consecutive year, where many relationships are taking every bit of seven years to produce fruit that can be harvested.


Until next time,
Paulette - wondering why I'm so surprised by all of this!

www.CollectionOfExperts.com
www.PublishingProsperity.com
www.tipsbooklets.com
Follow me www.twitter.com/pauletteensign

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