One challenge that many conscious entrepreneurs have when they start creating authentic marketing is lack of self confidence. They often wonder, “Why would they listen to me?” Maybe you can relate to this feeling. It’s really a fear that what you know so well is not valuable to your potential audience.

This is one of the saddest things I hear. It’s sad because your passion, your purpose, and your unique knowledge is what is so compelling about you. It’s what attracts your most perfect customers to you.

Sometimes we know this, but we still have the fear. Then what?

My suggestion is this: Sit quietly and close your eyes. Imagine the best customer you have ever attracted, the one who really gets you, values your advice and services, refers you to all their colleagues, and happily pays your fees. Really get a picture of them in your mind.

Now imagine sharing your true passion, your authentic self, and your most powerful offering with them. Imagine their delight! How does that vision feel?

Now let me tell you that I know from experience that all of your business relationships can be like this. When you market from the heart and confidently share your authentic self, your perfect customers are magnetically drawn to you. When you are delivering your valuable gifts to your perfect customers, the experience is uplifting, fulfilling and can be very lucrative too!

So go forth and attract by sharing your true passion with the world!

Have you downloaded your free Magical Marketing Toolkit yet?
Start attracting your perfect customers here.

Last week I attended the Sonoma Big Ideas dinner featuring Terces Engelhart, an old workshop buddy and branding client of mine. Terces spoke about how love has transformed her business Cafe Gratitude over and over again.

One of the cards in the game we designed together asks the question, “What do you love about yourself?”(The Worth Card from the Abounding River Game is depicted to the left.) This, Terces tells us, has become a question each of their employees gets to answer every day at work. This is a key to the success Cafe Gratitude is experiencing, even in a changing economy.

We all know that self love is the first
step to attracting what we desire,
we just don’t always practice it!

When I work with clients on their branding, we do a process called “Branding from the Heart” which is designed to help them tap into what they love most about themselves and about live in general. This true heart’s passion becomes the grounding for the creation of their business brand. When my clients succeed at communicating what they love most about themselves in a way that their perfect customers can identify with, business explodes.

Cafe Gratitude is an expression of the founders’ fondness for contribution. When Terces and her hubby Matthew first came to me with their business idea, I could tell they were truly passionate about the impact they were about to make, and that they loved this about themselves. Working with them was inspiring because it reminded me to focus on what I love about myself and my life, and to integrate that into my business.

So, what do you love most about yourself?

Take some time to reflect on this today and give yourself the space to receive your own self-love. This will uplift you and make you immediately more attractive to what you desire.

For over 10 years I have been instructing my clients to be authentic in their marketing, including their online marketing. Time and again I have heard folks telling me that they were advised that it’s not professional to reveal personal things in a business setting, especially marketing, because it could turn prospective clients off.

But for our prospects get to know, like and trust us, or even recognize us at all, we must share things about ourselves that come from the heart. And social networks offer a great forum for sharing our true selves to the world. But a lot of my customers are concerned about privacy. They want to know…

How authentic should I be?

I was watching a video of Elizabeth Potts Weinstein, the Truth Evangelist, and she was making videos from her car, wearing a T-shirt and no makeup, just telling it like it is – even sharing about the details of her separation from her husband and raising their child. Those videos were very compelling to me, but I thought, “Wow, do we need to be THIS authentic?”

On the one hand, her videos put her on my radar and got her into this article! On the other hand, I don’t think I should show up on my videos the way I usually dress (ie in my PJs!) and I don’t always share my views on everything, or talk about my family in my marketing. I do, however, share about magic, the unseen realms, and social transformation in my marketing, conversations not usually had in the boardrooms of America (yet!)

Of course there are some people who will be turned off by my honesty, but when I’m being true to myself, that’s OK. I’d rather those who are not a match for me keep their distance, and those who are simpatico with me to be drawn in.

I think there is a balance to be struck here, and it’s as much your authentic truth to NOT share some things as it is TO share some things. I use my intuition to tell me what I need to say or do for public consumption, and what I don’t. I suggest when thinking about what to share and what not to share in your marketing, take some time to listen to your gut. Be willing to make mistakes along the way. The ultimate goal is to create a presence that is a dynamic representation of you and magnetic to those who are seeking what you have to offer.

For my entire life I have yearned for positive social change and actively participated in movements for the environment, peace, and freedom. I have also been in the marketing trade since beginning my training as a teenager. And though I have donated my design and marketing services to causes I believe in, not until about a month ago did it occur to me that a new paradigm for marketing could uplift and transform the world, one heart-aligned soul at a time.

Most of my peeps are still resisting sales and marketing because the world is so full of hype and fakery, and that’s how marketing is seen (for good reason.) When I was working in Manhattan in the early part of my design career, I found out that the traditional model of marketing was about targeting and brainwashing folks away from their intuition. Boy, that was NOT a fit for me, which is why I left New York after only a few years.

Recently I have begun to develop ways to market that actually help you and your perfect customers find each other through your intuition! It’s all about sharing your passion in a way that promotes everything you’re up to. It’s irresistible to your perfect customers because you are simpatico, aligned, and destined to work together.

When you keep sharing your passion and relating it back to your offerings, it can really transform your lifebecause you start attracting people who can help you move forward on your chosen path.

So how can marketing transform the world? Social Media is a great place to share your passion, and even that can uplift another. We understand that by showing our light, we give permission to others to share theirs.

But there’s a way to take it one step further and really uplift another person, on purpose. We can actually promote them. Imagine if we make that shift to stop continuously promoting ourselves and take some time to promote other people who we know are offering great things to the world. Think of how that can make someone’s day and how that can exponentially effect the others in their lives.

And think about how that will affect the light in which others see you. They will see you as an uplifter, as one who openly promotes their colleagues, as a giving person. You will be uplifting yourself as you uplift the world. And an uplifted world is surely a transformed one.

I would love to hear your comments about this new paradigm for marketing. Are you willing and ready to start uplifting others online?

For those who desire training in how to use social media to attract perfect customers and uplift the world, please check out the Summer 2010 Training Session for Social Networking from the Heart athttp://www.socialnetworkingfromtheheart.com

Back in the 90s when I first started creating websites for clients, there were very few businesses online. The biggest business was Amazon.com and most of the businesses going online wanted to copy whatever Amazon.com did, including making their pages both busy and ugly. Now obviously Amazon.com was successful as they are still one of the largest online retailers in the world. However, does that mean all websites that came later should mock Amazon? I always said no. That’s why my slogan back then was “Abolish Boring Websites!”

The fact is, much of the website trends then and now are not appropriate for conscious entrepreneurs trying to get an authentic message out to the world. We don’t want thousands of options, or ugly sales pages with big red flashing headlines, or hypey advertising claims designed to scare people into buying. We want our website to attract rather than attack our perfect customers.

 So what are the components of a Wildly Attractive WebsiteTM?

1) It Starts with an Attraction Plan. To ensure your website will attract your perfect customers, you first want to define who your perfect customers are, what makes you and them tick, and what you want to offer. This process is different from choosing a niche to target. Rather, you are getting in touch with what is perfect for you. Your Attraction Plan will serve as the basis for everything that goes on your site. You can download your free Attraction Plan instructions at http://www.magicalmarketingtoolkit.com

2)Your Authentic Message Comes Next. How do you want to serve your perfect customers? What is your mission? Craft your website message from the heart and really share what is most important to you. Remember that “like attracts like,” so by sharing yourself authentically in your website, your most perfect customers will be intuitively drawn to you.

3) Beauty is Important. When someone comes to your website, you want it to FEEL like you. The colors, shapes, symbols, style combine to offer a certain experience, or vibration, for the visitor. Since your site represents you when you cannot be there to represent yourself, make sure the site design is a beautiful expression of you and your message. Just as you would not attend a business networking function in your PJ’s, don’t let your online presence be frumpy.

4) Make it Google Friendly. Google searches are the #1 way customers find their vendors these days, so you want your site to be Google-Friendly. By selecting keyword phrases that are authentic, accurate and compelling and using them frequently in the Title, Meta and Image Alt Tags, Headlines, URL and Links, you have a better chance of coming up well for searches of that phrase. Also post your site to popular online directories and social networks to help your ranking.

5) Change it Regularly. Many solopreneurs are opting for sites that they can easily update themselves, like a Droopal or Joomla site. Others opt for an integrated blog like WordPress. These options allow you to update your site frequently. This will not only help to keep the interest of your customers, but the search engines reward new content with higher ranking.

6) Brag About It. Though it’s easier to get good Google ranking than it was in the past, you still want to spread the word about your site through marketing. The best places to brag about your website are at in-person and online networking spaces. Meeting people in person is still a vital element to your online marketing plan. Social networks also offer an incredibly viral platform in which to spread buzz about your site. Make sure you let people know how to find your site and what benefit they will receive when they do that (a free report or audio?).

7) The Question of Investment. Some business owners are surprised to find that a professionally designed and programmed website can cost them several thousand dollars or more. When compared to some of the free and inexpensive options for creating a site yourself, this expense seems unnecessary at first glance. I think of a website like a restaurant, a store front, or an office space. When a new business creates a public space, they either buy or rent a building and then they design it to be attractive to their customers. They select the right colors, fixtures and furnishings. They create signage that stands out while displaying the brand identity nicely. They make the space a professional representation of their product or service, and they can spend tens of thousands of dollars to do this. Consider your website to be your online public space and invest appropriately to represent you and your important heart-felt mission. When you attract your perfect customers online, this initial investment can be recouped quickly.

Over the years I have created dozens of Wildly Attractive WebsitesTM. You can see examples at http://www.wildlyattractivewebsites.com. To discuss how you too can have a Wildly Attractive Website, call me for your no-cost, no-obligation 30 minute website analysis.

Call Julia at 707-823-3316 to set up your appointment.