I’ve been talking to too many service professionals who have their sights set on greatness.

They have some ambitious goals for their business.

They want some serious income. But the problem is…

They aren’t taking themselves seriously.

Because to grow your business with online marketing, you gotta take yourself seriously.

What does that mean, exactly?

You have to hustle. For example, you must hustle your buns to write your newsletter every week. Even when you are tired. Even when the day exploded on you and you’d rather have a cocktail and let someone rub your feet.

Your awesome CONTENT (read: blog posts and articles) is your ticket to your tribe reading what you have to say, opening your emails, and buying from you online.

You can’t simply say “I’m selling this—you want in?” and wait for the people to line up around the block. You have to build relationships with people online! And one of the best ways to do that—still—is by sending a regular newsletter.

Now, this may not be for you right now if you are still hustling to find your first 10 clients. I get it. Your first 10 clients don’t come from email or your website – they come from sales conversations with people you probably already know.

But after that, the whole “asking for business online” thing—and getting it—requires you to put the hours writing (or shooting video—but there’s writing there, too). There’s no way around it.

You have to get your message right—in your own words. Copywriters are sexy, it’s true. And who doesn’t dream of outsourcing all their article writing and sales copy and emails to some sexy, gifted word gnome… who makes you look fabulous and sells your stuff like hotcakes?!

Darlin’, I love you… and I gotta bust your bubble here. This message stuff is at the heart of your business. And it’s just too dang important to hand off to someone else.

Also, good copywriters aren’t cheap. Also, good copywriters will ask you how many people are on your list and whether you email them regularly to pitch offers—and they won’t let you hire them if you aren’t taking your list seriously (because there’s no way you can make back the investment on hiring them).

You have to make time for marketing. It’s all about how you set up your week. Do you tend to clients all 5 days of your workweek? Don’t! Set aside one day a week for writing your newsletter, meeting with referral partners and planning.

Fridays are “catch up” and meeting days. And if you have a specific writing project in mind, you might need to set aside 2-3 hours on Saturdays. Weekends have a different energy to them – use it as focused time to get your project done.

It’s great that there are courses out there teaching you how to “do” social media in 5 minutes a day. But it takes more than that to successfully market your business. Don’t fool yourself, darling.

Your business really takes off the moment you commit to doing whatever it takes to make it work. When people tell me that they are “too busy” to send their newsletter, what they really mean is that it’s not a priority.

They say they want more income, but they aren’t willing to do what it takes to create it. Which is fine… but let’s just call a spade a spade.

August 2014 Issue