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So Totally Business Savvy, Episode Ten.
Hello, everybody! Welcome to So Totally Business Savvy. If you can tell, I’m very excited about this particular podcast because we’re going to be talking about WordPress, one of my babies. I love WordPress. I’ve been using it for a long time. But we’re going to be delving into how you can use it as a solo entrepreneur to spread your message and to build your career. But even if you are a fulltime professional you’re going to get something out of this, too.
“WordPress for the Solo Entrepreneur” series, a series of podcasts dedicated to you.
Welcome everybody! Once again, my name is Dean Soto. This is a business podcast that is predominantly geared towards solo entrepreneurs, small businesses, or people that are thinking about moving out on their own. Today, we’re going to be talking about WordPress—a powerful tool that has been around for a number of years now. It dominates the Web in regards to getting your presence out there, building community, building authority, and so on.
So, this is going to be a series that I’m going to put out, called “WordPress For The Solo Entrepreneur.” Like I said, it’s going to help out in so many different areas. You might not be a solo entrepreneur and that’s fine, don’t worry about it. You’re going to get something out of this, too, I promise; but that’s who we are niching it to.
But before that, I want to talk about three different things. First and foremost, I made a 6-day course, a newsletter course. So go to my site, Prosulum.com, and sign up for my 6-day course.
I get these questions all the time: How? What’s the first step? What do I do? How do I start a business? I don’t know where to begin? So I took all these questions and I made it into this 6-day course— from how to build your online Web presence, to how to incorporate, to project management, all the way to just helping you build a full-fledged business within six days.
Now you probably could do it in six days (I probably wouldn’t recommend it) but it’s absolutely possible to do it that quick. The great thing about it is that the majority of the things I espoused, the tips and tools of the trade, are free. There are some that are not but they’re low cost, at least. I’m affiliated with some of them. I use every single one in there, and have used others at some point in time. I have used it or I wouldn’t advertise if I didn’t. It is awesome. I highly suggest that you sign up.
Next thing, if you are in the Orange County area, I highly suggest that you show up in what is called “Connect OC.” It’s going to be on September 9th. About 500 plus people will be there for social networking in the traditional sense after getting out and meeting people. So, 500 people at the Costa Mesa Hilton, on September 9th. It is totally free; the only thing that you have to pay for is parking, but even parking goes to charity. We haven’t picked the charity yet, part of the planning committee of “Connect OC.” It’s pretty neat to see something like this big; I’ve never been a part of organizing something this big. So it’s pretty cool.
I highly, highly suggest that you go and meet a lot of great people. If you are looking to build your network of people (which is always important), you’re not going to get anywhere without doing that. And if you do come as a result of this podcast, please see me and introduce yourself; I would love to meet you. My name is Dean Soto, if you didn’t know.
The last thing was, I think I’m going to change how I promote my approach to my Pro Sulum site. I’m actually going to put out a survey. I want to know who listens to my podcasts, who reads my blog, what age, what you would you like to see and hear more of, and so on. If you want to leave a voicemail feedback and say, “Hey I would love to hear a little bit more of this or of that,” 714-643-5301 that’s the voice feedback line. The survey’s going to go out in just a little bit, I think probably in the middle of this week.
All right, enough of that. I want you to first join my 6-day course. That will be awesome. But if you have no idea what WordPress is, if you have absolutely no idea, go to WordPress.org right now and just take a look. You can pause this and I will still be here for you. But if you do know what WordPress is, fantastic!
I can’t imagine having what is called a “static” HTML site for business. A static HTML site means that basically, nothing is ever updated. You have to know HTML in order to put content on the site. Usually, a Webmaster is hired because most of the time, the business owner doesn’t know how to code an HTML and that’s the only way that you can update anything. So you’re spending money on someone who knows how to code an HTML. I’ve seen a lot of sites that are pretty, pretty nasty and there are a lot of them that are still out there.
But anyway, WordPress is extremely powerful for your business and for your career. In this episode, we’re going to talk about branding—getting yourself up there and letting people know who you are, kind of like what I’m doing right now. This podcast is powered by WordPress through a plug-in called PowerPress.
But “branding”; you know, what WordPress allows you to do is … “you know” a lot. My VA which was hilarious… Actually if you’re going into the transcripts of this, my VA takes “you know” out, which is fantastic. That kind of tells me that I say “you know” a lot. But if I take away “you know” I’ll probably replace it with something else. I wonder if she’s going to take out “you know” on this transcript? You know what I mean? You know, you know, you know, you know?
Okay, done; done!
Branding. WordPress is a blogging platform. That’s what it originally was. Blogs specifically, are ME. They are all about me; me, me, me. “What do I like to do? What are my opinions? What color hair do I have? What I did I do today? What did I drink today? and so on. It’s all about me and that’s not a bad thing, don’t get me wrong.
It’s actually a very, very good thing if you want to brand yourself because the first thing people want to know when they come to your website is:
“Who are you?”
“Why did I stumble upon your website?”
“Why did I Google your website?” and so on.
“Who are you? I have no idea who you are.”
“Why am I here?”
“Why should I come here and listen to what you have to say or read about what you have to say?”
So, when you’re building your brand—especially for a solo entrepreneur, for someone who is either in the business for himself or heading a small company—this is tremendously important because people want to know other people. They don’t want to know companies.
When you see large aerospace companies or large marketing companies, what do you see when you go to their site? You see “We’re the leading aerospace company and here are our press releases, here is what we just did, here’s this and that.” It’s an entity in and of itself. You do not see people behind it. You might see people in pictures but you don’t know who they are, you’ll never know who they are. They might be engineers; they might be couple of different marketers or writers, and so on. You’re never going to know who they are but they’re shooting airplanes off of bridges and so on. You see all these awesome pictures, but it’s meaningless.
Blogs and content management systems like WordPress allow people to know who you are very easily. They allow people to go into a deeper relationship with you and a deeper relationship with your brand. I’m not saying that if you’re an owner of a small business, you’ll be pointing out your walks on the beach every Saturday night—it’s not necessary to do that. But being able to regularly update content, being able to give your opinion, and so on, will show people a little bit more about you. Ultimately, we as human beings want to connect with other human beings.
Being your self is extremely important. Being yourself even in your business is something that’s going to drive people to you; it’s something that’s going to keep people when they do come to your site, keep people coming back to you.
The other thing about this is that you get to be you. You don’t necessarily have to be your company; you can be you in a blog. There are a lot of different companies that do this, like Mailchimp; they definitely get to be themselves. If you’ve ever gone to Mailchimp, they’re hilarious in some of the things that they do. Mailchimp, FreshBooks, they are very much personal-type people. In their blogs, they give their opinions, they review other products, they review Paypal; they review different sites, different tools, and give their opinions about it. It helps people to build relationships with individuals within that company.
And so, it is extremely powerful that you or people in your business get to be yourselves because being yourself lends better than trying to be like someone else or trying to be a big company. People know when you try to be a big company and I fell into that. I still kind of fall into that every now and then with my business.
If I am myself—which might be a good thing for some people; or it might not be—I’m going to have more people come back to my site. Nobody likes people who are fake and inauthentic. So, be yourself; and using WordPress would allow you to do that. Very cool, I love that fact.
Another thing is, more than anything, “You” are your “brand” and this is kind of same thing as being yourself. We love Apple and when we think about it, we think of Steve Jobs. When we think of Microsoft, we think of Bill Gates. Those are people within the entity. Yes, they’re the owners; yes, they are the founders; but they are people within the entities of Microsoft and Apple, and we resonate with these specific persons because they interacted and gave their opinions.
“You” are “the brand” more than anything and more than anyone. The brand doesn’t live without you, that’s why it’s powerful to use WordPress and let people know who you are.
The other thing is, “Why should they be listening to you? Why should I listen to you? You are asking for my time, what value are you going to bring back to me?” Time is getting more and more expensive and scarcer because attention is becoming scarcer. When you have someone stop by your site, unless they find something valuable (which is usually something you’re passionate about and something that is very, very much your brand) they are going to leave if they don’t find that. And that means less sales; that means less conversions; that means less of a community. Definitely, you don’t want to do that. You don’t want to lose people just because you don’t know how to brand yourself and tell people why they should be listening to you.
So what is the benefit for them? Is it that they’re going to get WordPress tips like I’m giving you now? Are the stay-at-home moms going to get tips on “How to keep the house in order and still have fun?” or tips on “How to raise the kids in a way that is conducive to having a work life?” and so on. What’s going to benefit them?
For Pro Sulum, it is that people can come here and find out, “What are the beginning steps? What do I need to do in order to get from point A to B in my business? How do I start? What tools do I have?” What is the benefit for the people who are coming? Is it something that’s exciting? Is it something that’s entertaining? I’m probably not that exciting; and if you want to leave feedbacks that I’m not that exciting, that’s fine; I don’t care.
But something has to excite, right? You’re not listening to this podcast just going, “Oh, yeah.” If I was like the Bueller guy, “Yes, so, the…” Actually, I don’t think he talks like that. But if I was just kind of go, “Oh, yeah, I really like WordPress and it’s just great and it really helps me to get my brand out there.”
No, I have to talk like this because this is who I am, and hopefully, it’s exciting! Hopefully, you are getting something and starting to think, “Wow, I could use WordPress to propel myself into a solopreneur career, at least to get my brand out there.”
I might not leave my fulltime job but if I want to be a public relations consultant, or an IT consultant, I can start doing that and start blogging about the latest viruses or I can start talking about the latest in public relations. I don’t know what the latest in public relations is; but all those things! I can start doing that right now to build my brand. What makes me different? What makes me exciting? What value can I bring to other people? Are they stuff that’s practical? Are there “how to” tips?
I’ve had blog posts such as “How to build a full-fledged WordPress business with less than $200” and I think it’s pretty exciting, awesome, and practical. Imagine, if you wanted to start a business 10, 20 years ago you had to have a lot more money than $200. But now, you can easily start a business for less than $200. We can definitely go a lot more into this in my 6-day course which I highly recommend that you sign up.
So is it something that is practical? Is it inspirational? I don’t know if I have a lot of background on me. I am still in my fulltime job but I was able, through this, to allow my wife to stay at home which has always been a dream of ours. Yes, it’s tough; yes, it’s hard; yes, I still have a long way to go with my solopreneur/full-time but it has allowed me to make my wife’s dream come true. Personally, that is inspirational to me to allow my wife to live the life that she wants to live and to give my children the life that she and I wants them to have and likewise I do. It is completely amazing!
Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t make $1M but I’m able to make a little bit more cash during the week, during the month, that allows me to help her maintain that dream. So yeah, I’m about to cry.
Anyway, I think it’s something that’s inspirational. Why should I listen to you? Is it something that’s exciting? How’s it going to benefit me? Is it practical? Is it inspirational?
So what do you have to offer that others don’t? You know, there are tons! I definitely say, “you know” a lot. My Toastmasters people are going to hate me. You know what I mean? You know? But what do you have to offer that other people don’t?
A lot of people are doing the same thing that I’m doing. A lot of people have business podcasts and WordPress podcasts. But I am me, I have my own unique points of view and I like to do things differently—a lot differently. Some people might like to do business in the traditional sense, hire 15 people, go get some sales people and so on. I’d like to be by myself and I have one personal assistant who helps me with everything and she lives in the Philippines, that’s what I like to do.
Not everyone does that and I use WordPress like crazy. I love WordPress, I build blogs, I tear them down; build them up, tear them down. I’ve never had a blog that has lasted more than a year. Hopefully, this one lasts, but I love the fact that I just love to build blogs up and tear them down and see how they work. I’m very much a tinkerer, that’s what I bring to the table. I know the ins and outs of WordPress, I love it.
Now I don’t like coding. A lot of WordPress people out there like to get into the code. I don’t like that. I want to be as practical as possible to show everyday people how to use WordPress, how to cheat the system, rather than knowing HTML to generating their own HTML and insert it into the spot that they want to do. It makes things easier. And that’s my thing, that’s my little baby.
And then the business side of things; I like business. Business was my Bachelor’s Degree and the only reason I took it was because it was the easiest—but I ended up loving it. Now I’m actually in business, it’s very cool and I’m glad I did. All that stuff makes sense now.
So what are you doing that’s making you different? What makes you unique? Typically, it’s just “you” that makes you unique but there are certain spins that you have toward that specific subject that’s really going to energize your niche. It’s going to energize the people who are listening to you, so you make the subject unique and different.
Say your blog is about PR; about public relations for government, public relations for private equity firms or whatever, but your spin is more of a social media using only Facebook-type PR; or your spin is going out and taking your flip cam and talking to everyday people, asking about what they really like about the government’s organization of which you are a part of and is trying to get their name out there. What is it that makes you totally spiced up on a subject?
For me, I’m still kind of finding that. Don’t get me wrong, I love this podcast; this is definitely one of the ways but I’m still finding in. I am very much a generalist and it’s hard for me to niche down. I love project management, I love WordPress, I love different things and so I think, “I can go out there and do everything for everybodyyyy!” But no, that’s a recipe for disaster.
So what makes you different for your little target market? That’s who you need to be cognizant of. You know, you might have something completely new and that’s always the case. Podcasting was not always there. At some point in time, podcasting became podcasting. So someone had to do something new. Put it on a blog and so on. You might corner your market with something completely new that others don’t. That’s awesome and totally a unique thing as well.
Now, the true power of… Using WordPress to build your brand is in the syndication – where your message can go. Now 10 years ago, only large companies could be everywhere. Now, anyone can be anywhere. Building your personal brand was extremely difficult. Personal branding was non-existent aside from high-priced consultants who paid PR people to help them to brand themselves. Now everyone, everyone for less than $200, can brand themselves and have their business. All it takes is a lot of hard work. Before, it took money and a lot of hard work. Luckily, the money is gone; now you don’t need to have the money.
So syndicate your content. You might be blogging, you might be podcasting. You can submit those podcasts. Yes, you can, to YouTube, and just have kind of either slideshow or like a picture of your brand’s logo and it just be audio, you can do video podcasting, you can syndicate your written content to a whole host of different places for articles and so on, almost automatically. Things like TubeMogul, especially for video. TubeMogul, you can shoot it out to YouTube, to Veoh, to Vmeo, especially with their paid version. But with their free version, you can do all that into Daily Motion and all these different sites where people are going and searching for certain things. When they see your video, you can draw them back to your blog, draw them back to whatever it is you that you want them to see. That is awesome!
Not only that, there’s plug-ins out there such as Make Me Social which you can automatically submit yourself to social book marking places. So there’s Make Me Social, there’s a bunch of different plug-ins that you can use to automatically submit yourself to Digg, into Delicious, into Reddit and so on. It is pretty amazing what is out there right now that allows you to be everywhere and that was hardly the case even five years ago.
So syndicating your content is a must and is “key.” The four plug-ins that I use personally to syndicate content are: TwitterSifu. I love Twitter; it has helped me to build some awesome relationships. One thing that TwitterSifu does is it automatically tweets your last post. You can configure it to whatever you want.
Essentially, for example, I’ll give you my configuration. My figuration is only use the last 30 days worth of blog posts. Every 12 hours, you can automatically post a tweet going back to one of those blog posts—any of those blog posts within the last 30 days. But what the cool thing is, within that 12 hours, it randomizes the time in which it posts.
So for example, I have it set for 12 hours: it could post an hour into that 12 hours, or it could post 8 hours into that 12 hours; so it’s never at the exact same time. I like that because I’m grabbing a different audience every time and it really helped my re-tweets of my blog posts and so on. Of course, you have to have a good content and you can’t be spammy, but it really has helped. So TwitterSifu.
The other one is AddToAny or ShareThis or any other social bookmarking-sharing plug-in. When people come to your blog post, this will allow them to choose from a whole list of different social networks to share these tools with. People can submit your blog post to any of the social networking sites. It makes it easy for people to share which means more people… When you have someone to share something, people who trust them are going to come to your site and that’s a great thing.
The other one I used is TweetMeme. TweetMeme is awesome because a lot of people used it to share on Twitter. Not only that, it helps to automatically identify different hash tags and so on, and we’ll go into that when we talk about social media and how to use social media in an effective way as an entrepreneur.
The last one is a FeedBurner FeedSmith, any type of FeedBurner redirection. Now I don’t suggest using FeedBurner to host your feeds. It takes some know-how, but if you want to be in control of your feeds, use FeedBurner’s MyBrand. You can use FeedBurner and still have control of your feeds. But FeedBurner FeedSmith allows you to redirect your feeds to FeedBurner. But really, as far as syndication, that’s all that I use as far as plug-ins for WordPress are concerned.
I use TubeMogul whenever I do some video stuff; I use iTunes obviously, for my podcasting and I’m trying to get out anywhere that I can with my audio and I’m going to try and actually put my audio onto YouTube and all those other things through TubeMogul as well.
So with that, I think we’re going to end this. All right; so a couple of other topics that we are going to discuss are: “How to Use WordPress to Build Your Authority” which is extremely important, “How to build a Community” which I’m still trying to do—so this is kind of a theory-type thing. I’ve always had trouble building a community because it’s hard to be myself, I don’t want to be fake. But build a community around something that you love. We’re going to talk about that probably in the third part.
We’re also going to talk about collaboration. How do you use WordPress for collaboration with teams? How to use it for Webinars so that you can build your email list? How to use it for joining content with other people? You can almost build an entire magazine or entire staff of people who are going to write for you and build articles for you and really just get your presence out there. You can hire virtual assistants to do that, to write content for you. You can hire everyday-people that you know are good writers, or maybe even hire a co-host for your podcast and share any type of revenues that you make with them. The content and the possibilities are endless. Those are the couple of things that we’re going to talk about in the future.
So if you have any feedback at all, please let me know. My name is Dean Soto. Once again, 714-643-5301. This podcast is So Totally Business Savvy. Please leave me some feedback, questions, WordPress questions. I love WordPress! If you have theme questions, how to build your themes, we’ll talk about that too, as well; How to build your themes – I also go into that on my 6-day email course, so if you’d like to sign up, go to Prosulum.com.
If you have any questions regarding WordPress and how you can use it to just really dominate your career, dominate your brand, that’s what I am here for.
One example of a really good WordPress site that I brought out recently was Tednguyenusa.com. He’s PR consultant, he works for the Orange County Transit Authority. We built his site within… I’m not joking, I think it was about three hours. So if you really want to see how powerful WordPress is to get your message out, he’s definitely the guy to go and check out. Trust me.
With that, I’m going to let you guys go. Also, you can email me at dean@youcanworkless.com. I look forward to hearing all of your questions.
All right, guys; have a great one and until then, keep following your dream!
