BUT what a lot of people fail to forget is including these call to actions in their individual personal emails.

Forgetting this, they’re missing out on a massive marketing opportunity. Think about it, how many emails did you send and reply to yesterday? That’s what, 10, 20 people (or more) you could potentially be targeting every day!

You probably have a signature right now, go and check, what information do you have. How can you turn that around to get more traffic to your website, more leads on your mailing list?

Well let me help you with some ideas on how you can promote your business TODAY!

1 – Your website

For sure, the most important element of your footer should be your website, whether it be directed to your homepage, your blog or your products page… Just make sure it’s there and make sure people are being directed to the place you want them to be when they click on it.

Mine links to my home page but the image offers them to sign up to my free marketing tips.

2 – Social Media

Make sure you’re including links to your social media profiles! it’s one of the first things I look for these days.. is that person on Twitter? or do they have  a Facebook page. Saves me going to Google! one less step to finding you. Make it easier for people to find you! It will help grow your followers & likes!

You can include either text links or social icones.

Also check out Wisestamp. It’s a great plugin that creates email signatures for you! and it has a free plan. Although, it doesn’t work on the Mac yet….

4 – Your Book or e-book

Have you recently published a book? Share it! if it’s on Amaz0n make sure you use an affiliate link back to your own book too so that you earn affiliate commission on your own products!! <cheeky>

5 – Events, webinars, workshops

Do you have an event or a webinar coming up soon? Don’t be scared to change your signature to reflect that! remember, your email signature is a GREAT way to get the word out there!

6 – Special offer

Have you got a new product, or a special offer on a product you already have? Use that in your signature! get it out there… the potential for new customers is massive with the power of email.

7 – Offer a free consultation

Having a tough month? clients gone quiet? sales relaxed? Why not offer a special offer in your signature!

Here’s what mine looks like….

Having a blog has proven to be beneficial to businesses as you are consistently providing fresh content for potential customers to find in search engines such as Google.

Blogging also allows you to demonstrate that you are passionate about what you do, prove you are an expert in your field and it also provides a way of adding personality to your business. Let’s face it, people buy from people.

The best thing about WordPress is that it’s FREE, however for someone who is new to it, a little scared of technology it can be a daunting task.

That’s why I have put together a WordPress Course for Beginners. A course designed for complete beginners and those who have never used WordPress before.

You will receive a lesson teaching you the basics of what you need to know, from setting it up with your hosting company, overview of the dashboard, how to install themes and how to maintain your site.

If you think it’s too early to start thinking about Christmas, you’re wrong! Yesterday on Facebook someone said they get annoyed when people start talking about Christmas too early. How can you get annoyed when you talk about Christmas? (unless you hate it or haven’t got kids) and if you have a business, can you really afford NOT to talk about it? You have to plan for the holidays right?

So perhaps people are feeling the pressure more than normal? is your diary full for the rest of the year? and for the beginning of the new year? thinking how on earth are you going to take time off over the Christmas period to spend with your family?

Why not consider outsourcing? Below are tasks that you could outsource to ensure the lead up to Christmas and beyond is stress free:

1 – Custom Holiday promotions

You know you should be doing this but you just don’t have the time to implement your ideas. Hire someone to send out your Christmas cards or broadcasts to promote your Christmas offers, create Christmas themed promotions. Some of my clients are already doing this, sending out special offers for christmas and into the new year.

2 – Organising and maintaining your mailing list
Do you have your contacts written on bits of paper, note pads, or business cards scattered all over your desk or shoved in a drawer or box?
Why don’t you get someone to collate all of this information, input them into a spreadsheet or contact management system (CMS). Not only for the holiday period but to keep you organised for life! A clear desk = a clear mind.

3 – Sending out Christmas Promotions
Now you have your branded custom promotions, do you have the time to send them out?
Once you have your mailing list sorted, a Virtual Assistant can save you the time and hassle by sending them out for you. This might be by newsletters or even a physical card, even creating and print the labels, saving you the bother.

4 – Planning your christmas party
Thinking of hosting a christmas party or a christmas themed workshop or webinar?
A Virtual Asssitant can organise and plan the party, design and send out invitations, collate RSVPs, producing literature and even sourcing the venue. All you have to do is turn up!

5 – Virtual Assistant for life – not just for Christmas
So now we have Christmas sorted, what about the new year and beyond?

You should also be thinking about the new year and not take it for granted. Try to stay in control and thinking about getting the support off someone who loves doing all the finer detailed tasks you hate.

Think of the relief you’ll have when you know your New Year is organised even before Christmas begins!

Quite regularly I have to send out mass emails to journalists (amongst others) for clients and let’s face it, having an email ‘dear editor’ is a sure way of getting them to ignore your email amongst the other hundreds they must have each day, so I’ve always personalised my emails to gain maximum responses and to make it look more professional, and how I do that is by mail merge using Gmail, and I want to share with you how I do it.. It’s VERY simple!

So first you need to create an email template in Gmail so you can save for later, this is called a ‘canned response’.

1 – Creating a canned response in Gmail

Login to your Gmail account.

Click “Settings” on the top right of the Gmail page, then click the “Labs” link near the top of the page.

Scroll down to “Canned Responses.” Select “Enable” to activate the plug-in, then scroll down to the bottom of the page and click the “Save changes” button. Wait for Gmail to reload.

Click the “Compose Mail” button on the left of the Gmail screen. A new “Canned Responses” link will appear at the top of your email.

Click the “Canned Responses” link, then click “New canned response.” Create a name for your Gmail template and type it into the dialog box that appears, then click “OK.” Type the text for your Gmail template, with any formatting you with to use, into the email window.

Click the “Canned responses” link again, then click the name of your template underneath the bold “Save” text. Confirm that you wish to overwrite the existing template by clicking “OK.” Your template is now ready for use. Click “Discard” at the top of the screen to return to the main Gmail screen.

Now you’re ready to prepare for the Mail merge

2 – Creating Mail merge using Gmail….

In the template email you’ve created in the above steps, replace the terms that you want to personalise with. For example, if you want to personalise the name of the email, replace the name with “$%Name%” or “$%first_name%“ (this must correspond with the field in the spreadsheet you’re about to create)

Next, open Google Drive (used to be Google docs) and create a new spreadsheet. In the first row of the spreadsheet, insert the terms that you use in the Gmail template. At the last cell, insert another field call “Email Address”. Then populate your spreadsheet with the details of who you’re sending it to.

The next thing we are going to do is to add a Google script that will merge the content from the spreadsheet to Gmail and send the email out.

On the Spreadsheet, go to “Tools -> Script Gallery”. In the pop-up window, search for “mail merge”. There are several mail merge script that you can use, but the one we are using for this tutorial is “Yet Another Mail Merge”, it’s usually right at the very bottom…

Scroll down to the end of the list till you locate it. Click Install. Google will then prompt you to grant access to the script. Once that is done, it will bring you back to the Spreadsheet. You should now see a new “Mail Merge” option in the toolbar of your email.

Now click “Mail Merge -> Standard Merge”. A window will pop up to prompt you to select the template. Click on the template that you have created and saved earlier.

Click “Send Mails”.

That’s it.

Your email will be sent to all the recipients in the list with their details merged. You can go a step further and even add things like membership number, affiliate ID, anything that you want to personalise.

Dead simple huh?!

I just wanted to share with you a couple of really cool plugins for WordPress that I have come across (thanks to Alicia Cowen for the tip!)

First is my very Favourite plugin!! is WordPress Affiliate Platform. If you’re familiar with Affiliate Programmes this might excite you a little.

If you’re not familiar with affiliate programmes, well basically Affiliate marketing is a way of selling products and receiving a commission in return. So you sell someones product from your website using a unique URL and you generate commission in return. Great way to get extra income.

Well, the WordPress Affiliate Platform is a way for you to offer your visitors a chance to earn income by selling YOUR products! cool huh?

No need to spend $99 a month to use 1shopping cart (sorry guys!) for the small ONE OFF fee of $49.95 you can set up your own affiliate program right from your wordpress site! and believe me, it’s SO simple to set up! bye bye 1shopping cart, this is the way forward!

PLUS it integrates seamlessly with Paypal, Mailchimp and Aweber!! LOVE IT – yeah ok you’re using 3 systems now instead of 1 but you’re saving your pennies and my opinion it’s much more flexible than using 1shopping cart, they’re so restrictive in design! bugs me.. and a lot of my clients are already using it and love it.

The second is from the same developers and it’s WP E-store. Again, completely by-passing the big e-commerce platforms, for the same price as the Affiliate Platform you can get your hands on this amazing powerful yet simple plugin to sell products right from your website.

You can develop a whole shop front, or you can add buttons and products within pages or posts simply by using shortcodes.

Again, it integrates amazingly well with Paypal and Aweber and you can set your own autoresponder based on individual products (something 1shopping cart can’t/won’t do!) and subscribe people to your lists in Aweber on a per product basis!

Go and check them out and see for yourself.

Got any questions about these two plugins? just ask and I’ll be more than happy to answer any questions for you.

With zillions of websites out there all competing for attention, if your website doesnít have buzz your visitors will drop in and, within seconds, drop out again and surf off elsewhere. Visitors only stop to read when the page really connects with them, makes them feel energised as well as informed.

What makes a site buzzworthy?

It’s hard to quantify, but it’s safe to say that a combination of: -

• eye catching design
• dynamic page layout
• clear navigation
• audio clips
• news boxes
• free give-aways or bonuses
• regularly updated pages
• quotes and recommendations

as well as great copy, all go together to create a site with the X factor.

If your site has buzz, not only will your visitors stay around long enough to find out what you’re offering them, but they will tell others about you too, and this builds your traffic, so you get noticed and it puts you in a great position to get ahead, as well as bringing you an important return on your investment.

Websites that have the greatest marketing successes are buzzworthy, they have that almost indefinable X factor.

How do you get the X factor?

Well, buzzworthiness is a bit intangible, but you recognise it sure enough when you see it. A website with the buzz stands out, it makes you feel that the content is written with you in mind and most important of all; it makes you stay and browse the site, not just the first page!

If your website content is not oriented towards your site visitor then they will leave, and fast check your page bounce rates if you are not convinced.

You need to focus your page content not only on the product or service you are offering but also promote the benefits of what you offer.

Here are some tips for a website with buzz:

• Remember to choose an eye catching design, mediocre isn’t buzzworthy
• Make the copy (the words on the page) exciting as well as interesting
• Be newsworthy, be doing or offering something different.
• Be seen as notable, influential and knowledgeable.
• Offer something useful and free.
• Look outstanding
• Be dynamic
• Just be exceptional

Remember to be yourself, your ‘voice’ needs to shine out of your website giving it your own special personality.

Remember to speak to your visitor not at them. They don’t want to be sold something on the first page, they want information. Tell them about how your service or product benefits them, what you can offer them, and how much you can help them achieve their goals.

If you focus on what your site visitor wants then they will stay to find out more, and you may just have found a new customer.

If you focus on ‘selling’ yourself or your products without showing that they are of value to your website visitor, then you will lose your visitors interest and a potential client.

First of all, do away with wearing pyjamas to work. Whoever said that what you wear doesn’t matter is a lie. What you wear reflects the way you are feeling, to a large extent. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you should wear a suit around your house, unless, of course, your clients are coming to your home office for appointments. It just means that, by wearing your pyjamas and joggers all the time you will not feel as though you are really in the mood to put forward your most productive self. Shower in the morning, put on some clothes that do not have jumping sheep on them, and sit down at your desk feeling like a professional.

Next, think about the time you do your work as a schedule that you need to plan out. If you find that you are planning your work around doing everyone else’s dirty work (or washing!), then you are not dedicating yourself to your job. Your schedule should include the time you get up, when you will start working, and when you will take your breaks. Make sure that the time scheduled for work is fairly uninterrupted. This may mean investing in a second phone line, and moving your home office away from the television or other parts of the house where you may be distracted.

Make sure that the people you are committed to understand that you are on a schedule. If someone calls to ask you out to lunch, think first about whether or not you would be able to do this if you were working a regular job. Scheduling leisure time on schedule days off means that you are putting time and effort into your work, and this will be reflected in your income.

For me, the biggest challenge of working from home is actually getting my family to understand that I am actually working in a job! Because I am ‘at home’ they don’t get that I’m working sometimes, so I have to gently remind them that I’m working from home and not just being at home for the fun of it