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In today’s competitive world, one of the easiest, creative and most proven methods to attract more clients to your business is to be recognized as an authority or as an expert in your industry. There are easy marketing techniques that utilize the right balance of educational information and self promotion to elevate you to expert status.

By positioning yourself or your company as a leading provider and sought out expert, you will be able to:

• Command greater fees and charge more for your services – people will want to pay more to work with one of the leading experts in the industry.

• Achieve greater visibility, respect and support from your industry peers, partners and clients – deals will start coming to you and people will begin to seek you and your company with opportunities for business and business growth.

• Create a community of people who will not only champion your products and services through promoting you to everyone they know and referring you to anyone who asks, but will buy from you over and over again creating a loyal following!

While there are many things you can do to accomplish this – speaking engagements, board appointments, and editorial opportunities, most of these take a lot of time and a lot of money. THE fastest, easiest, and most cost effective method to BLAST you to expert status by publishing an e-mail newsletter or “ezine” — pronounced “e-zeen”.

Here are 10 powerful reasons to start your own ezine right now.

1. Exponentially BLAST your business to new heights with increased sales, online and offline through enhancing your credibility and providing you opportunities to enter into new markets.

2. Establish yourself as the industry expert and attract more qualified leads, speaking engagements, editorial opportunities and potential strategic partners.

3. Create a community of people who will not only champion your products and services through promoting you to everyone they know and referring you to anyone who asks, but will buy from you over and over again creating a loyal following!

4. Maximize your sales efforts by demonstrating your unique value proposition to your clients each time you send out your ezine while justifying your profits!

5. Increase your brand awareness and corporate positioning by effortlessly spreading the word about your business. – Great content will become viral!

6. Achieve greater visibility, respect and support from your industry peers, partners and clients – deals will start coming to you and people will begin to seek you and your company with opportunities for business and business growth

7. Save thousands of dollars in design, printing, postage and labor. Sending out your newsletter electronically eliminates all those expenses. (NO stamps or envelopes to lick and NO printers to hire.

8. Increase customer loyalty by communicating on a regular basis. If your customers don’t hear from you regularly, they will forget they are important to you and an ezine can increase your client communications seamlessly.

9. Promote your products and services on a regular basis and when the time comes for your clients to buy, your name will be at the tips of their fingertips and they’ll buy from – YOU!

10. Share your knowledge and expertise by reprinting your tips and articles in other publications, trade magazines, association newsletters and local papers for additional exposure and traffic.

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Many business owners enter into business with best intentions to create a great business model leading to wealth, happiness and a legacy. But often, the endeavor becomes work and the owner is forced into working in the business versus working on the business. According to Michael Gerber in his wonderful book “The E-Myth, Revisited”, Gerber explains how most people go into business for the wrong reasons. They usually possess a skill or trade that they have mastered and often believe they can go into business for themselves. This results in he or she being the one who is actually getting the work done. Although they desire freedom, most create a nightmare of long hours, personal accountability, and resource limitations. According to Gerber, the role of a business owner is to create a business that works independently of himself and becomes a living, breathing entity. In order to accomplish this, the business owner must be able to automate his systems, train his employees and utilize revenue strategies that will enhance his current position.

1. Selling Physical Products and or services

Whether you are selling b2b or b2c, your product and/or service is why you are in business. Creating a turnkey approach that can deliver your product and/or service, with or without a business owner’s involvement, should be the number one focus. Simply by creating, testing and documenting systems to support your business model and service delivery, a business owner can lay a strong foundation for continuing process and delivery of products and/or service.

2. Recurring On line Revenue

A recurring revenue model is a model in which your customer continues to pay a fixed amount each month for a period of time. For example, a membership site where you offer a website that is rich with content, how-to guides, blogs, and free resources in your niche market. Let’s say you charge a membership fee of $ 29/month for access to this website and have 100 members, you would be generating $2,900 a month or $34,800 a year in additional income for very limited cost.

3. Recurring Off Line Revenue

This revenue model is a recurring revenue generated by an on-going sale of your product, similar to the “CD of the Month Clubs” before ITunes became a big hit. Is there a way you can send your product each month to your customer as part of a membership? For example, a retail client of mine with an ice cream store used this approach to create a “flavor of the month” club. For a recurring fee, a new flavor is shipped out each month to all customers. Even if you do not have a product, is there information such as tips or “how to’s” that you can send out each month that will bring value to your customers.

4. Home Study Courses

Chances are you are an expert in your niche or have valuable knowledge on a topic, that you can create a home study course to sell to your customers. In addition to becoming an alternative revenue stream, having a home study course offers you a product to sell to your current customers. For example, my “Build a Better Ezine” product is a home study course I offer to business owners who want to learn how to create their own e-newsletters. You write it once and sell it on-line over and over again and again in a perpetual cycle.

5. Workshops and Training Sessions

Similar to offering a home study course, another powerful revenue strategy is to offer workshops and training classes in your area of expertise. This is very simple to launch with limited cost and can easily be held in a virtual environment. If you are providing an educational format and your content has value, people will pay to learn what you are teaching. Not only will this provide you additional income, it will open the door for keynote speaking engagements and media interviews since you will also be positioning yourself as an expert.

6. Affiliate Revenue

There are many other businesses that are offering products or services to the same target market as you and that do not compete with what you are offering. By becoming an affiliate reseller of their product, you create an additional product to sell to your customers and paid a commission on the sale from your affiliate partner. Search for products that your customers would be interested in and offer it to them under your recommendation.

7. VIP Programs

The last strategy I will discuss is creating a VIP program. A VIP program is a special incentive that you offer to your top clients who will pay extra to be part of this exclusive club. This program can be anything you would like it to be based on your business goals, however you want to make sure that you are offering true value to these VIP customers. For example, perhaps they get first access to your product launches as a reduced rate, or they are part of a special coaching program you offer or you create a special experience. For example, Yanik Silver, founder of Maverick Business Adventures offers a once in a lifetime business experience centered around learning, fun and special keynote speakers. This program isn’t for everyone, you must meet his requirements to be part of his VIP program.

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Every marketer, business student and entrepreneur has been taught the 4 “P’s’ of classic marketing – Product, Pricing, Promotion and Place as the marketing model designed to be used by business to define their marketing strategy. The marketing mix has been around since the beginning of time and used as a tool to identify customer’s wants and needs and how to address the competitive landscape. But what about the 5th “P” in the marketing mix – Positioning?

Positioning is the bridge that connects the other 4 “P’s” together around a central theme and creates the brand equity that is so critical to the success and growth of any business and therefore the most important component to the marketing mix. Many companies approach their client base with a “one size – fits all” approach to their product or service but in today’s environment, this approach will not work. Each customer that you service in your business is unique and has different wants and different needs. Although your product may cover a wide range of attributes that may service the majority of those customers, a successful marketer knows how to use positioning as tool to customize a solution for all. Here are 5 things that you need to position to be successful:

1. Yourself – business is based upon relationships and people want to work with credible individuals, not big corporate entities. Use personal branding techniques to position yourself as an expert in your field with credibility and integrity, will yield increased sales. People will buy from people they trust.

2. Audience - your customers need to understand if they are in the right place and that there is a fit for your product and services. Skillful marketers can position the audience so they belong to target market and community and customized marketing messages specific to their needs and wants.

3. Brand – creating an image or perception in the minds of your customers is one of the most powerful positioning techniques. A brand position permeates through an entire organization and is supported each and every time a customer interacts with your organization.

4. Product – refers to what the customer thinks about your product – for example; lowest price, highest quality best service, easy access ect, when they are making a purchase decision. Your product position will directly connect to your value proposition and how you differentiate yourself from your competition.

5. Offer – refers to your approach to the sales process. Successful offers focus on the outcome your client will receive not the service or product offering. Your offer should be a combination of what outcome (benefits) your customer can expect and the way (feature) they will receive your product.

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