Day 53: Key Marketing Message

I have been diligent in focusing on this effort to make sure I am sending a consistent message to the market.  To help me achieve this my coach is walking me through a process where I define my target audience, what they need or are looking for, and unique capabilities that I bring to my practice.

Target Audience
Emerging leaders, in manager and director roles, earning 150K+ per year in medium to large companies with revenues greater than 1M USD.

What do they care about?

• Outside Perspective
• Professional Development
• Trusted Advisor
• Effectiveness (Do, Say, Decisions)
• Achieve significant results
• Establish credibility in a new role

Why do people come to me?

• Hold them accountable
• Gain goal clarity
• Enhanced Self-Awareness
• Professional Development (Conflict Mgmt, Productivity, Communication, Executive Presence)
• Achieve significant results

Who is my competition

• Coaches
• Consultants
• Trainers

How am I different from my competition?

• Customized Approach
• Systems-Based
• Focused in Scope
• Hybrid Coaching/Consulting Model

Marketing Message

Executive Coaching and leadership development firm focused on helping emerging leaders create impact within their organizations.  We create an environment, acting as a trusted advisor, that enables our clients to:

• Gain an outside perspective
• Clarify goals to drive significant results
• Augment professional development
• Increase effectiveness

We utilize a personalized, systems-based approach that considers the whole individual.  Our coaching experience layers a hybrid coaching/consulting model, 15 years of management consulting experience, and accountability to deliver measurable outcomes for the individual and organization.

I can't wait to see what my coach has to say!

Day 52: Preparing for Sessions

In keeping my commitment I am writing my blog first thing to ensure it does not get lost in the activities of the day.  I now have 3 individuals that I am coaching and I enjoy every minute of it.  Actually that is the highlight of my day when I get to help others have impact in their personal and professional lives.  I am also mentoring a group on project management skills to get a project up and running with a local non-profit.

I think it will be important to get a standard approach to my in between work.  As I get additional clients I will not have the luxury of time to review all the details of our past sessions.

I am focused on completing my marketing materials so that I can be prepared for my next coaching session on Friday.  That includes scoping out the competition and writing a draft of my marketing message.

Wish me luck!

Day 37-51 Falling Behind on Posts

I have gotten really behind in my posts, but never fear I have been busy working to build my business.  I will try not to get bogged down in detail and just focus on the highlights.  I am also committed to keeping up to date with my posts in the future.  This will now become part of my daily ritual before I login and check my email.

In working with my marketing coach we have made some great progress.  One of our key focus is to solidify my key marketing message.  I have been focused on completing a worksheet that helps me to think in terms of what I have to offer, why my customers come to me, and what makes me unique.  While simple in approach it is powerful in its results.  It has helped me refine my thinking and ensure that my messaging is in alignment with customer expectations and my brand.  The last thing you want to do as a business owner is to send mixed messages.  My next session is May 11 where we will discuss the worksheet.

I have been working diligently to advertise my business and expand my network.  I am happy to report some progress in this area.  First, I have solidified my relationship with SeattleWorks, a local non-profit.  Offering my services for free is a way for me to break into a niche.  It is interesting how things come about.  I would have never considered this before and yet I may have stumbled upon something that is really in my sweet spot.  I am consulting with a project team to help them put together a plan for the second phase of their project.  It is so rewarding to help others have impact in the organizations in which they work.  I have also established a relationship with the University of Washington, Evans School to offer coaching to MPA students.  I had two students sign up and actively working with one.  It was great to refine my approach and get more comfortable in my coaching shoes. Lastly I have signed up with PerksConnect to offer my services at a discounted rate to physicians within the United States.  I have sent out my first offer in hopes that I will drum up some business.  I am learning as I go and this is a great way to get the word out to a large number of people.

I was also invited to write a guest blog for Noomii.com regarding my experience with UserTesting.com.  It was a lot of fun and enabled me to expand my network with the co-founder of Noomii.com.  If you are interested in reading the post it can be found here:  http://www.noomii.com/blog/3619-feedback-user-testing-website.

You can tell that I have been busy in my absence.  I am excited to be back on board with my daily posts.

Day 36: Website Update

Based on all the great feedback from a couple of days ago today I spent working on updating the website to incorporate all the feedback I received.  This turned out to be much more work than I expected, however I am pleased with the outcome.  I think it is a much more streamlined and inviting site that caters to my audience: the time starved executive and HR managers.

Go to http://www.assuredleadership.com and take a look.  What do you think?

Day 35: PowerOn Leadership is Born

I was finally able to connect with the graduate students and kick the process off.  I am so excited at the prospect of working with them.  I am confident that it will be a positive experience for both parties.  I sent them a customized version of my new client welcome package and we will begin our work next week.

I also spent some time brainstorming new topics for my newsletter and really desire to incorporate current events as the backdrop for my topics; making them more present and relevant.  I am really excited about the prospects for the coming issues.  I also spent some time talking about this with my marketing coach in trying to determine the right cadence for the newsletter.  I first attempted monthly and that seemed too frequent given the amount of time it takes put them together.  I tried quarterly and yet that seems way too infrequent, almost to the point that someone may even forget that they signed up for the newsletter.  She provided some good insight on how I could work a little smarter and generate content from existing sources rather than have to create all my own content.  I love this idea and am hopeful that it will enable me to return to the monthly frequency.

Day 33: Working Remotely

For the rest of this week I decided to work remotely at our condo in Lake Chelan.  It is an attempt for me to get out of the office and do some brainstorming.  I thought the change of scenery would do me good and open up my mind to thinking big!

I spent most of the morning traveling.  It was nice to be able to spend some time alone with my thoughts.  It was a 3 hour drive from Seattle and there was very little traffic on the road so I was able to move at a good pace.

I have a lot planned for this week while I am out of the office.  I thought this would be an ideal time to spend time researching some sites that I had been wanting to take a look at, do some reading, get some writing done, and most importantly do some brainstorming.

I have high hopes that this will be a productive week.

Day 32: First Wall

Today was completely unproductive.  Everything I tried just wasn't working.  I tried to record a podcast and my heart just wasn't in it.  I tried to write in my blog and found I had writer's block.  Nothing worked so instead of trying to force it I decided to just get out of the office and clear my mind.  And that is what I did.  I went home and did some painting to get the creative juices flowing.  I have to say that it worked to unlock the block I was feeling.