I’m speaking at Blissdom Canada!

September 14, 2010 By 5 Comments
Blissdom Canada

The first ever conference focusing on women and Social Media in Canada is happening in Toronto next month, and I’m delighted to be a part of it!

If you haven’t registered yet, run grab your seat now at BlissdomCanada.com.

I’m going to be in my element speaking as part of the panel on Work/Life Balance: Peaceful Coexistence Between Life and Laptop. As a mompreneur committed to making her family priority #1 while running a successful business, I have spent many hours of my life coaching women who are trying hard to have the best of both worlds. It’s tricky, but it CAN be done!

Are you planning on going? Please drop me a comment below so I can be sure to connect with you when we’re there! And if you have some particular challenges you’d like to hear the panel address, share them and I’ll bring them up.

Filed Under: business how-tos, motherhood, social media, speaking Tagged With: , , ,

How to Handle Your Taxes

August 19, 2010 By 3 Comments
quickbooks graphic

Hey mompreneurs: Does tax time terrify you?

Does the thought of getting everything in order for your taxes make your heart stop?

Well, you’re not alone. And it’s a good idea to solve this problem before the holidays and tax time roll around. I’m always on the lookout for good resources to support mom entrepreneurs, and I’ve found a webinar I know will benefit many work at home moms.

My colleague, Rebecca Tervo, CPA, is offering a free teleseminar to help you get your financial books in order so you know exactly where you stand when it’s time to do your taxes.

How would it feel for you to go into the end of 2010 confident and secure? You can learn how in Rebecca’s  FREE webinar, “No More QuickBooks Fear”, where she outlines exactly what you need to know in QuickBooks, including what to track for taxes. This will be a jargon-free zone! No accountant talk, no weird terms you don’t understand. Just clear, simple explanations of the different sections in QuickBooks and what they mean for your business and taxes.

Rebecca has helped me get setup with my own QuickBooks account, and I really appreciate her professionalism coupled with an easy-going nature.

Click here to register.

Why not tell a mom entrepreneur friend about this webinar?

Does tax time terrify you?

Does the thought of getting everything in order for your taxes make your heart stop?  There IS a better way!  My clients feel great when tax time rolls around because they know that their books are in order and they have a clear picture on EXACTLY what they owe and how much money they’ve made.

How would it feel for you to go into the end of 2010 confident and secure?  You can learn how in my FREE webinar, “No More QuickBooks Fear”, where I’m outlining exactly what you need to know in QuickBooks, including what to track for taxes.  This will be a jargon-free zone!  No accountant talk, no weird terms you don’t understand.  Just clear, simple explanations of the different sections in QuickBooks and what they mean for your business and taxes.

Here’s the link to get signed up:  http://members.tervofinancialfitness.com/nomoreqbfear/

See you next Wednesday!

Rebecca Tervo, CPA

Tervo Financial Fitness, LLC

email address: rebecca@tervofinancial.com

website:  www.tervofinancial.com
twitter:  www.twitter.com/rebeccatervocpa

linked in: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rebeccatervocpa
facebook: http://www.facebook.com/tervofinancial

Filed Under: business how-tos, small business Tagged With: , , , , , ,

How to Monetize Your Passion

August 9, 2010 By 1 Comment

I just love talking to mom entrepreneurs about passion, work and money all in the same sentence :) .

So tomorrow, I’ll be doing just that. As part of the WoMEN: What Mom Entrepreneurs Need Teleseminar Series, I’m going to interview Rich German, author of “Monetize Your Passion: Follow Your Heart and Create Life’s Ultimate Win-Win-Win.” And Rich knows how to do just that.

We want to share with you how to do the same. Join us for the call tomorrow to learn:

  • Rich’s own story about how he turned his passion into a lucrative business
  • The top three hurdles that stop most people
  • The #1 key to turning your passion into a successful business
  • One baby step you can take to get started turning your own passion into a business

Make sure you hurry and click here to register for the call so I can get you the details before the teleseminar starts tomorrow at 12p ET. (Can’t make it live? Still register and I’ll email you the replay.)

Wondering if it’s really possible to make money with YOUR passion? Leave a question or comment below, and Rich and I will do our best to address it during tomorrow’s call.

Filed Under: business coach, business how-tos, reasons to work, work/family balance Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Spend Your Precious Time Wisely

July 12, 2010 By 3 Comments
mom entrepreneur delegate business success

OK, mompreneurs:

I know you’re busier than ever now that summer’s here. You’re the party-planner, play date coordinator, your children’s favorite toy, the vacation organizer, and a zillion other roles on top of your usual routine of wife, mother and business owner.

Some of the mom entrepreneurs I coach have been feeling a little overwhelmed trying to get it all done. I’ve had some panicky moments myself, due to the fact that my family’s travel season is in high gear and I’ve already taken three weeks off of work. I have even more planned :) .

The only way I can enjoy my time off with my family is to rememom entrepreneur delegate business successmber that I am not the only one who can do some parts of my job. If we mom entrepreneurs are going to successfully run a business while also thoroughly enjoying the freedom and flexibility that mompreneurship provides, we have to delegate.

    Here are a few of the things I have successfully delegated for the summer (and beyond):

    • Setting up my QuickBooks and making sure my bookkeeping is in order so tax time is easy this year
    • Getting a marketing strategy and marketing plan in place
    • Creating a press kit to help me be “media-ready” for some fantastic speaking opportunities and TV appearances
    • Vetting and gathering information for each of my guest experts in the WoMEN: What Mom Entrepreneurs Need Teleseminar Series
    • Loading new info products into my shopping cart

    Can you hear me breathing a sigh of relief over here? I am grateful to the team of mompreneurs who support me in my business. They do what they do much better than I do, and I get to focus on the parts of my business that only I can do. AND I get to get away from my work and spend my precious time with my family, making memories that I know will last a lifetime.

    Take a look at your calendar or your to-do list right now. What is ONE THING on your list that must be done, but that someone else could do for you?

    Do you need a recommendation for a VA (virtual assistant) who could help you get some things off your plate? I work with several and can highly recommend them. Leave a comment below if you’d like details.

Filed Under: business coach, business how-tos, mom entrepreneur coach, motherhood Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Five Things You Must Do to Run a Successful Small Business

May 27, 2010 By 5 Comments
EVO Speaker Button

I’m super excited to be speaking as part of a panel at “EVO ’10: The Evolution of Women in Social Media” Conference at the end of June. Since my work as a mompreneur coach focuses on helping moms create successful businesses, I have been asked to participate in the Secrets for Small Business Success Panel.

In preparation for this, I’ve put together Five Things You Must Do to Run a Successful Small Business for you below. And if you haven’t already, please check out the EVO ’10 Conference–it’s in Park City, Utah, June 24-26. I would love to meet you there! Be sure to leave a comment below and let me know if you’re planning to attend :-)

1.  Choose a narrow target audience. This is counter-intuitive for most of us, since common sense tells us that the more people we can make our biz appeal to, the more people are likely to spend their money buying our stuff. Not true. We’re in a global, internet-related community now with gazillions of offerings to choose from. Small businesses cannot compete effectively on that scale. Be the big fish in a little pond!

2.  Get engaged with your audience. Once you narrow your target market down, you’ll be able to find your audience better, to join the groups and communities they belong to, to appear in blogs and media they consume. Be an active participant in these forums and be authentic. Over time, you’ll build relationships that increase the like/know/trust factor. We are savvy consumers now and are much more likely to buy from people with whom we have relationships than from the person with the biggest ad in the newspaper. Build strong relationships with your target audience and the business will follow!

3.  Create pain-killers, not vitamins. As you listen to your clients (by tweeting with them, reading and commenting on their blog posts, attending their networking meetings, taking polls or surveys, etc.), pay attention to what they describe as their top challenges, biggest struggles, ongoing issues, pain points. Create your business products and services to solve those pains! We’re more likely to pay for solutions to our problems than for things (like vitamins) that we know are good for us or that promise to “improve our lives.” Be the solution!

4.  Give, give, give. When faced with fierce competition, find ways to provide more value to your clients. Don’t discount your prices and reduce your rates. Doing so decreases your value. Instead, find ways to make whatever you’re offering even more valuable to your clients in a way that serves you both. You’ll stand out from the crowd and develop loyalty that will cause your clients to stick with you and tell everyone they know how great you and your offerings are!

5.  Pick a platform/niche. The key is focus. So many small business owners try to be everything to everybody, and wind up trying to piece-together a “business” that is really just a hodge-podge of skills and things they know how to do to make money. Being a business owner requires vision, strategy, planning and marketing. All of this is nearly impossible to accomplish if you’re trying to sell several different offerings to many different groups of people. Instead, opt for being THE ONE your audience looks to when they need a solution to their problems. Build your visibility, credibility and recognition as AN EXPERT on one platform (solution to a problem) first. When you dominate that and have a loyal following and full pipeline of clients, you can add another piece to the platform or expand your niche. But you must focus first, expand later!

What is one thing you believe is critical to your small business success? Or tell me how you’re applying any of the tips I gave above. And hey–did you check out EVO ’10 yet? It’s gonna be one fun tweet-up! Please leave your comments below.

Filed Under: business coach, business how-tos, small business, small business coach Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Take Back Your Time Program

April 27, 2010 By 2 Comments
managing time

The #MomBiz Salon was fun-filled last night. For those of you who weren’t able to join us, our topic was Time Management, and I shared tips and strategies to help mompreneurs take control of how they spend their time.

One of the biggest challenges the mompreneurs on last night’s #MomBiz Salon said they faced was establishing boundaries around their time and sticking to them. Several moms even admitted they had no idea how to do this. Other moms said they were struggling to grow their businesses since there weren’t enough hours in the day to do even the existing workload, much less adding more to it! We talked about the possibility of hiring a virtual assistant (or VA) to help with this, and discussed the ins and outs of delegating your work so you can run a successful business.

I know that the number one challenge for mompreneurs is always TIME and never having enough of it. Nearly every mom entrepreneur I coach struggles with this issue!

That’s why I have created an online coaching program for mom entrepreneurs who need help with time management, but don’t have time to commit to live coaching programs to make the healthy changes they need to make. The program, called “Take Back Your Time,” is a four-week program that delivers two e-course modules to you each week for four weeks. Each of the modules offers a lesson and some questions for you to answer so you can immediately apply the lesson to your life. You can simply do the work yourself, or you have the option of submitting your responses/questions to me for feedback. It’s a great way to get real coaching support on your personal time management challenges, and you can do it on your own schedule (like when the baby wakes you up in the middle of the night and you can’t fall back asleep :) .

Details of the Take Back Your Time online coaching program:

Agenda:
Week 1: Learning to Let Your Values & Priorities Drive Your Choices
Week 2: Creating the Right Boundaries & Routines to Give You Enough Time
Week 3: Finding More Time by Automating
Week 4: How to (and What to) Delegate

When: Start anytime, and you’ll be enrolled for four weeks

Where: Wherever you can login on a computer

How: Register here for the Take Back Your Time Program.

You will be taken to a login page at www.jigsawbox.com/signup/mombizmakeover to create your account. That will allow you to make your payment arrangements and give you immediate access to your private online coaching program, which is delivered via a platform called JigsawBox.com. You’ll receive two modules each week, and can submit your questions to your coach (me!) for feedback during your 30 day program access.

Why: Because the sooner you acknowledge how you’re making choices about spending your time and the sooner you decide to OWN your choices, the happier you’ll feel with what you get done in a day!

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Fee: $79 for all eight lessons (two per week) and personal email coaching with Lara during your program term
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Wanna hear some great tips on time management and how you can control your time better? Click on the link below to listen to an hour-long Group Coaching Call I do with some mompreneurs who want to learn to take back their time!

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Take Back Your Time Intro Call

Please note: This is a full-length coaching call so it may take a minute to load in your browser.
Go check the kids, grab a glass of water and it should be ready to go!

Filed Under: business coach, business how-tos, mom entrepreneur coach Tagged With: , , , , , ,

How to take back your time

April 27, 2010 By 1 Comment
managing time

Well, it’s just a few hours before the #MomBiz Salon twitter  party that I so enjoy hosting.

And here I am, trying to manage my kids who are exhausted at the end of the day, spend a little quality time with my husband who is just home from work, and ready myself for my next scheduled “office hours” at the end of a long day of mothering. My two preschoolers and I spent the day grocery shopping, running errands, playing in the back yard and enjoying the 65-degree weather at the park today, so we’re all kinda pooped.

I bet your life sounds kinda similar, huh?

This blending of roles and responsibilities is not only normal for us mompreneurs–it’s healthy. Although it may sound a little chaotic, today represents the normal “flow” of my schedule. I planned it to look the way it looked. It follows the normal routine of our week. And it’s my job to make sure that I spend my time doing what is most important to me. That doesn’t mean it’s not hard sometimes, or that I’m never tired, or that I don’t still get overwhelmed and stressed out with all there is to do in my life. But as a general rule, I love my life and I honor my top priorities in how I choose to spend my time.

Do you feel you can say the same thing?

Tonight’s #MomBiz Salon will center on a conversation about time management. Most of us feel like we don’t have enough time, and while that’s totally normal, it can also cause us to feel rather powerless about how our life goes. We’ll be talking about several strategies mompreneurs can use to spend their time powerfully during the #MomBiz Salon tonight, so I hope you’ll be joining us.

In addition, I have created an online coaching program for mom entrepreneurs who need help with time management, but don’t have time to commit to live coaching programs to make the healthy changes they need to make. The program, called “Take Back Your Time,” is a four-week program that delivers two e-course modules to you each week for four weeks. Each of the modules offers a lesson and some questions for you to answer so you can immediately apply the lesson to your life. You can simply do the work yourself, or you have the option of submitting your responses/questions to me for feedback. It’s a great way to get real coaching support on your personal time management challenges, and you can do it on your own schedule (like when the baby wakes you up in the middle of the night and you can’t fall back asleep :) .

Here are the details of the program:

What: Take Back Your Time online coaching program

Week 1: Learning to Let Your Values & Priorities Drive Your Choices
Week 2: Creating the Right Boundaries & Routines to Give You Enough Time
Week 3: Finding More Time by Automating
Week 4: How to (and What to) Delegate

When: Start anytime, and you’ll be enrolled for four weeks

Where: Wherever you can login on a computer

How: Register here for the Take Back Your Time Program.

 You will be taken to a login page at www.jigsawbox.com/signup/mombizmakeover to create your account. That will allow you to make your payment arrangements and give you immediate access to your private online coaching program, which is delivered via a platform called JigsawBox.com. You’ll receive two modules each week, and can submit your questions to your coach (me!) for feedback during your 30 day program access.

Why: Because the sooner you acknowledge how you’re making choices about spending your time and the sooner you decide to OWN your choices, the happier you’ll feel with what you get done in a day!

Fee: $79 for all eight lessons (four per week) and personal email coaching with Lara during your program term

BONUS: Register for the “Take Back Your Time” program by midnight Thursday, April 29th, and get access to a one-hour, live group coaching call with Lara on Friday, April 30th at 10:30am PT / 1:30 pm ET for Take Back Your Time program participants! This call alone is worth $125, and it’s my gift to you if you make a quick decision to get started with your program this week!

I hope you’ll join us at the #MomBiz party tonight! Please leave your comments and questions about time management below and I’ll do my best to address them!

Filed Under: business coach, business how-tos, mom entrepreneur coach Tagged With: , , , , ,

Meet the Alpha WAHM

April 7, 2010 By 2 Comments
AWBook-Graphic-Cropped

We call ourselves lots of different things: working mothers, mom entrepreneurs, mompreneurs, WAHMs, etc., and there are many women out there who don’t like to define themselves with any of these labels. Karri Flatla, author of Alpha WAHM Blueprint: An Empowerment Guide for Work-at-Home Moms, has created a new moniker that’s hard not to love: “Alpha WAHM.”

In support of this fantastic mompreneur who is clearly dedicated to making the lives of working mothers a whole lot better, I’m happy to host Karri on the Mom Biz Coach Blog today. Read below my interview with her about what it means to be an “Alpha WAHM.” And why not share the love by picking up a copy of her book for a friend?

1. What is an Alpha WAHM, and how is she different from the average WAHM we know?

To be “Alpha” is to both be empowered and be willing to empower those around you. Unfortunately, I think the term has been given a bad name by the media, and so I attempt to redefine what it means (and doesn’t mean) to be an Alpha WAHM in my book. Here’s a short excerpt (pg.31) that explains what I believe an Alpha WAHM does willingly each day:

  • Learn from men and how they do business
  • Take charge of her life and how she feels about it
  • Take informed business risks
  • Put work first when it makes sense for the wellbeing of her and/or her family
  • Apologize for hurtfulness or relationship neglect
  • Take the lead when a leader is needed in the household or in business
  • Seek to conquer her fears and gain strength from the journey
  • Know the difference between ego and spirit
  • Flex with change when it serves her core mission/purpose (greater good)

2. How does an Alpha WAHM honor her family as her top priority?

By respecting the individual (and sometimes inconvenient!) needs of each member. Easier said that done, I know. However, you get what you give and then some, so if you want to create an environment that nurtures not only your personal growth and development but also the evolution of your business, you *must* account for the wellbeing of each member of your family.

Sometimes that means putting work down even though you’re on a roll with something, because one of the children is sick or needs special attention. Sometimes that means going on a date with your spouse even though you’ve got a deadline on Monday. And sometimes that means plain old self care for Mom! A mom who feels taken care of will take excellent care of her family.

We all fall off the respect wagon now and then (I sure do!), but the key is to be mindful of the importance of investing a bit of you in each person you cherish. It doesn’t need to be a huge “deposit” each time; sometimes just a hug, a smile, or an ear is all that is required. Of course, relationships run on a two-way street; there is no honor in caring for everyone in your life but you, so always include Mom in the “circle of care.”

3. Can you give us a couple of secrets to success that your Alpha WAHMs have shared with you in your book?

Everyone who buys the book receives our bonus download, “This Way to Fulfillment: Entrepreneurs Open Up About What it Takes to Become a Successful Work-at-Home Parent.” In that report is a fantastic bit of advice from Craig Cannings of VAClassroom.com:

“I always start with the Passion question first and will not go any further if my answer is an emphatic NO. ‘Do what you love and you will never work a day in your life’ is an important principle to live by for us home-based entrepreneurs!”

This aligns perfectly with a core message of my book which is basically “live your truth and the money will follow.”

Doesn’t get much simpler than that, does it?

Karri Flatla has been a work at home mom for nearly 5 years. She started snap! virtual associates inc., a web marketing and copywriting firm, in 2005 so she could not only stay at home with her children but to avoid re-entering a workforce that squashed her creativity and smothered a deep need for independence. She is also the author of Alpha WAHM Blueprint: An Empowerment Guide for Work-at-Home Moms. Find out more about Karri and the work she does at www.alphawahm.com.

Filed Under: work/family balance Tagged With: , , , ,

What Corporate America Taught Me About Entrepreneurship

March 30, 2010 By 6 Comments
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Thanks to my beloved twitter, I connected with a fantastic woman named Sherri Garrity who runs a company called The Corporate Fugitive. What’s not to love about that name? Brilliant branding, eh?

Sherri, like me, escaped from Corporate America and started her own business in which she helps other entrepreneurs build their businesses while being their own bosses. She has a wonderful pay-it-forward attitude and put that to good use when she created her free “Best Small Business Advice Interview Series.” I’m honored to have had the opportunity to share my own story with her.

As some of you know, my background is in IBM, working in communications, PR, and e-business sales. Yep, that’s a pretty far cry from running a family and a business like I do now! But I learned a whole lot of best practices during my tenure at IBM that really help me as an entrepreneur. I share these, along with my observations about the difference between working for IBM and working for myself, on the 20-minute interview with Sherri.

You can download the interview for free on Sherri’s website: www.thecorporatefugitive.com.

If you worked in a large company before you became a mompreneur, what are some best practices that you learned there that continue to serve you as an entrepreneur? And what did you have to let go of when you decided to be your own boss? Please leave a comment below.

Filed Under: business coach, mom entrepreneur coach, small business, small business coach, work/family balance Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Blog Talk Radio Tips for Mompreneurs

February 18, 2010 By 3 Comments
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I’ve really enjoyed hosting my radio show, The Mom Biz Coach Show, on Blog Talk Radio for the last year or so. I have been approached by many mom entrepreneurs who want me to mentor or coach them on how to start their own shows, so I thought I’d put together a short podcast on one of the hottest topics: how to find and manage guests for your show.

Just click on the link below to hear my advice on the following topics:

How to find guests for your show
How to prep your guests for their appearance on your show
How to engage your guests in conversation during the interview
What to do if you have technical difficulties, or if a guest doesn’t show up

Click below to listen!

Blog Talk Radio Tips 021710

Got a Blog Talk Radio Show of your own? Share below your suggestions for newbies or how you handled a particularly challenging interview.

If you are ready to get your show started and would like someone to walk you through it every step of the way, I can help. Just click here to learn about my Podcasting Mentoring Services.

Filed Under: business coach, business how-tos, podcasts Tagged With: , , , , ,
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