Category Archives: General

Join The 12 Week Challenge And Set Up Your Health & Wellness Business

Written on March 24, 2010 by Lea Woodward
Filed in 12 Week Challenge, General

If you’ve been struggling to set up your health & wellness business, we’re launching something which might help!

The Vibrapreneur 12 Week Challenge is a free, open-to-all program which will walk you through the steps needed to set up a successful health & wellness business. At the end of the 12 weeks, we’re hoping that everyone (yes, even you!) will have landed at least their first client and will have established a solid foundation for a successful business.

To find out more about the challenge, go here – but don’t forget to come back here and let us know in the comments that you’ll be taking part! We’ll be featuring participants & their progress each week on the site so we’d love to know if you’re taking part…

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Wait! Don’t Create Your Website Until You’ve Read This

Written on March 16, 2010 by Leigh
Filed in Business Matters, General, General Marketing, Getting Started, Online Marketing

Image by Graphixel

Think Before You Create

I know, I know.. the first thing you want to do when starting a new business is create a website. Before you just throw something up, put some thought into what exactly you want it to say. Think about what you want your clients to see, feel and do when they arrive. Sketch out a basic idea of what you would like your site to look like and include. Anyone can create a basic website, but a professional looking site with the right content and language for your target market will set you apart from the rest. This is extremely important in creating the right brand and image for your business.

In this digital age, your website is your storefront, make it look good.

One of the most important things to consider is making sure your site is easy to navigate. If your client isn’t sure where to go or gets frustrated clicking away to pages that don’t contain anything, they will not come back. Flow is extremely important. Getting your visitors/potential clients to the information they need will keep them coming back.

Consider WordPress

WordPress is well known as a quality, easy to use blogging platform. Not many people know that it can also be used to create professional looking websites for small businesses. And you can edit content very easily without always having to contact your web designer when you want to change something. One of the best new themes that allows you to edit content and style easily is the new Headway. It is the newest and easiest to use theme out there. And you can customize it to look any way you would like. More on Headway later..

Give It Some Personality

Make your website stand out in the sea of bland, manufactured business sites. It should look professional but it should also be interesting and eye catching. Inject a little bit of your personality into your design, content and overall feel of your site. This will be part of your brand. Are you more serious or playful? Prolific or brief and to the point? What colors do you want to use? A web designer can help you with some of this but you should have a general idea of what you want your website (storefront) to look like… if only to give the designer a starting point.

Hire Out or Do It Yourself?

Be careful with this. Some people know enough to create their own websites and they look great. However, I think most of us do not know enough about web design and creation to really build a solid and professional looking website. If you hire out, it doesn’t necessarily have to be expensive. You can simply hire someone to do a little design to make things look nice and then add the content yourself. Look around at other sites that draw you in, that make you want to visit again, and use them as a loose model.

Creating your own website or hiring someone else to do it also depends on what type of business you are running. If you’re a coach, there are certain ways to structure your site that helps point visitors in the right direction whether that be your e-mail sign up sheet, a product, etc. Someone who has had experience in this may be helpful. However, if you’re simply selling wellness products on your site, you may be able to do it yourself. Use your best judgement and just make sure it’s attractive, easy to navigate, and points your visitors in the right direction.

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Four Powerful Ways To Get More Clients

Written on March 2, 2010 by Leigh
Filed in Business Matters, General, General Marketing, Online Marketing

If you’re starting up a wellness business and have tried all the usual methods to get clients, you know, word of mouth, your lists, your web-site, trade publications, advertising… and are still struggling, consider the following ideas. Keep in mind that these work best if you’ve already pinpointed your target market.

Change Up Your Marketing

If your current marketing strategies don’t seem to be working, change them! Many of us in the wellness field do not particularly enjoy marketing. That’s usually because we’re doing marketing that doesn’t really come naturally. Marketing is simply finding people with a problem, and let them know, in an unobtrusive way, how you can help them solve it.

For example, if you get nervous passing out cards to everyone you come in contact with, consider trying something else that seems more natural. Perhaps this may be meeting someone in the same field just by coincidence, and creating a partnership where you refer clients to each other. Or, you could also simply attend the same events that your clients would and chat people up while you’re there. More on this later…

Put Yourself in Your Client’s Shoes

Figure what makes your clients really tick, and find out where they hang out. Think long and hard about who they are, what are they struggling with, and what would seem appealing as a solution. Often, we tend to work with clients similar to ourselves, so consider thinking about what you would want in a coach or wellness expert.

Expert Endorsement

If you can find someone really well known to mention you or your products, it’s a quick and relatively easy way to get lots of exposure. Be sure and have your product/ideas ready to go before you contact them. There are many ways you can go about this. Sometimes the best way is to just introduce yourself, express admiration for their accomplishments, and establish a connection. Then, you can offer them your service for free, in exchange for their review.

Help Others

Within your network, be sure and be helpful to those around you. Don’t be stingy with what you know and what you share. This is more of a personality trait that’s either there or not, but it can also be learned and everyone can always improve. When you’re generous with your offerings, it comes back to you ten fold, including some clients.

What’s your favorite way to get new clients? We’d love to hear from you in the comments.

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Your Wellness Business: Stay Local or Go Global?

Written on February 16, 2010 by Leigh
Filed in Business Matters, General, Lifestyle Design, Online Marketing, Social Media

When starting your own wellness business, it’s helpful to do some thinking around if you want to stay local or if would you like your business to be more widespread. A lot of it depends on what your life preferences are and what kind of business you would like to run. Here are a few key questions to ask yourself as you consider:

What is Your Ideal Lifestyle?

Do you thrive in being active in your community or would you like to travel the world? If you’re a homebody that likes to keep a tight knit circle of close friends nearby, you may do well with a business that mainly local. If you love to travel and live in different parts of the world, you might want to consider designing your business in a way that allows you to live that lifestyle. Considering these things up front can save you a lot of time and effort later on. It’s often easier to structure your business from the beginning according to what you want than to change it once it’s up and running.

What Kind of Marketing are You Comfortable With?

Are you a real people person who loves face to face contact? Or do you prefer online networking? Some of us thrive on personal connection to those in our immediate surroundings. There are others that are comfortable establishing connections on line first before meeting in person. Then there is a mixture of both. Deciding what kind of marketing tactics you enjoy can help you decide if you’d be better suited to staying local or going global with your business. If you enjoy attending local conferences, events and gatherings and really getting a feel for your community, a local business is probably your best choice. If you love to travel and enjoy networking with people from various parts of the world, a more expanded business may be your cup of tea.

Who Will be Buying Your Services?

What is your business and what are you selling? Is your expertise is best suited to those living in your local area or can people everywhere benefit from your services? Think about who you are targeting and what is the best way to reach them. Then you can decide if you have enough potential clients in your area or if you need to branch out. For example, if you are a personal trainer, your business will most likely be local. If you offer wellness coaching however, this can often be conducted over the phone or via Skype.

Where Do You See Your Business in the Long Term?

Where do you see yourself in one year and in five years? Where you’d like to end up in your business can help you decide where you like to start. If you’d like to have a business that serves clients all over the country or even globally, go ahead and set up your business with this goal in mind. If you’re pretty sure that you’d like to stay small and local, keep this in mind when setting up things in the beginning.

That being said, you can always start small and expand. All that really matters is that you start something.

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