Laura Roeder » Entrepreneurship

How to Have High Value Relaxation

Laura — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 18:44:49 +0000

Click here to view the embedded video.

This video talks about high value work, high value relaxation, and why you want to avoid the “gray zone” in between. Here’s another video I found of Eben Pagan discussing the productivity pyramid and other concepts that were discussed this weekend.

P.S. On a totally unrelated note, I announced a new program this week called Zero to Awesome: WordPress Advanced.

How to Have High Value Relaxation is a post from: Laura Roeder

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Let Them See You Naked. (On Video.)

Laura — Mon, 10 May 2010 14:02:24 +0000

Guest post by Elizabeth Potts Weinstein

So, tell me, why aren’t you doing video?

You have lots of excuses.

The thousands of ideas. The seemingly complex technologies. The lighting and sound and finding a quiet place in your office. The camera choices and the software options and the editing time. The hassles of uploading and hosting. The morass of promotion.

There’s tons of excuses for not doing video.

But those are not the real reason.

You’re not doing videos because you’re afraid of everyone seeing you naked.

On video there’s nothing to hide behind. It’s your verbal stumbles and nervous laughter and futzing with the neckline of your shirt. It’s your face, your wrinkles, the miscombed part in your hair. Your crooked smile and teeth and glasses. Your weird mannerisms. Your messy office.

You’re not doing videos, because video is you.

But let me tell you my secret.

Letting everyone see you naked, in all of your imperfections, is exactly what make video so delicious.

I’m naked in every video I’ve posted online. In all of my dorkyness, everything I would love to improve via diet and exercise and a few intensive sessions with a voice and acting coach. Every bra strap foible, the phone ringing in the background, the fire trucks sirens on the street outside my apartment, the way I keep forgetting my train of thought, the annoying way I play with my hair.

That vulnerability, that being real, that glimpse into who you really are, that is what will endear your audience to you.

Video is the most intimate connection you can have outside of meeting each person face-to-face. As leveraged as online video is, it’s one on one – it’s your viewers, sitting in their homes or offices, by themselves, watching you.

The more real you are, the more yourself, the more you speak your truth and let your idiotness and weirdness and imperfections show, the more your audience will fall in love with you.

So the first step is to just freaking get over being naked and decide to strip it all off – regardless of how you think you look underneath.

Meanwhile – have you done video yet? Why not? What’s holding you back? What questions do you have about online video?

I’d love to hear from you below!

Note From Laura: If you want to create informative, engaging videos like mine, Elizabeth’s workshop “3 Days to Video” is the best way to learn. But get your booty in now because it’s only available until May 12th!

Her virtual 3-day workshop covers every step, from figuring out your topic, to shooting your video, to editing, to uploading, to promotion. You’ll leave with your finished video, online and ready to go! Click here to reserve your seat by May 12th.

Elizabeth Potts Weinstein empowers solo-entrepreneurs to make a greater difference in the world and become more successful & fulfilled, by doing what is a natural extension of who they really are. She’s also a mom, attorney, author, speaker, coach, radio show host, twitter chat host, video blogging addict, tweetup connoisseur, aspiring adventurer, amateur pole dancer, people loving introvert, and truth evangelist. If you want to follow her on her adventures and learn how to find other like-minded people who are speaking & living their truth, find her at http://twitter.com/ElizabethPW or at http://ElizabethPW.com.

Let Them See You Naked. (On Video.) is a post from: Laura Roeder

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If people think you’re strange, they’re right

Laura — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 13:00:10 +0000

This is a guest post by Johnny B. Truant

I coined an axiom recently. Not many people get to coin axioms, so I’m pretty happy about it. Coining an axiom isn’t as glamorous as coining a phrase, but it does tend to get more long-term sociological respect.

I call my axiom “Johnny’s Rule,” and it’s this: If you’re the first person in your group to try a given thing, you’re going to look like a total idiot.

As axioms go, it’s not terribly sexy… but it’s dead on.

If you follow Laura, you’re trying to get your own thing going. You’re trying to start a side business, a replacement business, or to build your own social media empire. Maybe you even bought a product. Maybe you took one of Laura’s courses. Maybe you’ve had a bit of success. Maybe you’re even getting kind of excited.

And if you’re like most entrepreneurs, you’ve told someone about it and they’ve totally patronized you. Or they’ve suggested you not get your hopes up, and definitely that you shouldn’t quit your day job. Maybe you even made the mistake of saying you wanted to make money online — with “make money online” being the three dirtiest words you could say to most people — and had someone tell you that you were a sucker, that it’s all a big scam.

Well, remember Johnny’s Rule: If you’re the first person in your group to quit a job, you’re going to look like a total idiot to the people around you.

For that matter, if you’re the first person in your group to run off to New York to be an actor, to start a pet-sitting company, to homeschool your kids, or to attempt to build a new piece of software, people are going to think you’re a complete dope.

So you’re probably thinking: This really is one great, inspirational blog post, Johnny.

But look… remember what a “rule” is. Remember what an axiom is. It’s something that is always true. Always. Meaning that no matter what, if you’re the first, people are always going to think you’re stupid — regardless of the idea’s actual merit.

If your idea is terrible, you’re going to look like an idiot, yes.

But the same goes if your idea is the best idea ever. If what you’re doing will be of revolutionary benefit to you, or change the world, or save lives, or reinvent an industry, you’re going to look like a total idiot to the people in your group if you’re the first one to try it.

Bill Gates, trying to sell an intuitive operating system for an incomprehensible computer without having any great programming know-how? Idiot.

Steve Jobs, challenging the world Gates built? Taking on the PC world? Moron.

Thomas Edison, continuing to experiment with lightbulb filaments after failing nearly ten thousand times? What a total dumbass.

And the Wright Brothers, attempting flight? They were clearly out of their minds — and they knew it, because even after they had successfully flown, people kept telling them that building a flying machine wasn’t possible.

Look, I’ve got news for you: You’re not normal. You have weird ideas. You have a messed-up perception of what you’re “supposed to” do in this world, and how you’re “supposed to” live, and what it’s possible for a person to do. If you weren’t weird, you’d obey the rules. You’d stop doing such stupid things, and having such idiotic ideas.

But so-called “smart” ideas don’t change the world. They perpetuate the status quo. They reinforce the rules that they were born within. If you’re in a situation you don’t like, doing absolutely everything in the sanest, smartest way possible is a great way to guarantee that you stay there.

If people think you’re strange, they’re right. If people think you’re a little out of your mind, they’re right.

It takes unconventional decisions to create change in your life or in others’ lives. Stepping outside of boundaries and comfort zones is the only way to see anything different, and to create new results.

If you keep doing this entrepreneur thing, people are going to think you’re stupid, crazy, reckless, foolhardy, and naive.

And that’s cool. Because the willingness to be all of those things is what it’s going to take if you’re to ever succeed.

About the Author: Johnny B. Truant is one of the creators of Question the Rules: The nonconformist’s punk rock, DIY, nuts-and-bolts guide to creating the business and life you really want, starting with what you already have, which is available now, and stupidly cheap through tomorrow only – Saturday, May 1st

If people think you’re strange, they’re right is a post from: Laura Roeder

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Free Webinar – How I Built a 6 Figure Business From Scratch in Less than One Year

Laura — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 15:52:16 +0000

OK folks, because YOU asked for it, I’m doing it again! Join me for a webinar sharing my full story of how I built a 6-figure business from scratch in 2009 using social media alone (with ZERO paid advertising.)

I’m going to tell you the truth about what it really takes to get to six figures quickly – and share the mistakes that I made so that you won’t do the same! Go behind the scenes and see REAL conversion and traffic numbers, straight from my analytics account. I’m sharing more detail than I’ve EVER seen anyone else reveal about their business.

“Laura gave her listeners an amazing, engaging pep talk filled with valuable information about Twitter, blogging, branding, relationships, how to change direction, how to be valuable, what to sell and how to sell it. I could’ve listened to her for hours…I walked away excited and energized, thinking “I can so do this!” just with what she shared so freely and openly, and my imagination was on overdrive brainstorming about several side-projects I’ve been mulling over. This isn’t your typical sales spiel, folks. Laura Roeder is the real deal. Check her out. If you have the kind of dreams she did, you have to hear her story for yourself.” -Michelle Quillin, for New England Multimedia

I’m also going to be closing out one of my most popular programs, and giving you a special deal on that. But I’m going to make you wait for the webinar to find out which one.

If you heard all the buzz after the last time I shared this story or are like so many that emailed saying they missed it, this is for YOU!

This webinar is now over. Sign in below to get on the list for next time. You’ll also receive my free social media weekly action plan, The Dash.

Free Webinar – How I Built a 6 Figure Business From Scratch in Less than One Year is a post from: Laura Roeder

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Before, During and After: How to Know What to Focus on When Running an Online Business

Laura — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 15:20:20 +0000

Click here to view the embedded video.

Thanks to @WendyMaynard for her question!

Referenced in this video: Dean Jackson

Click Here To Read The Transcript

Hey, this is Laura Roeder and today I’m going to answer a great question I got from Wendy Maynard on Twitter, about managing your time with an Internet business between all the different tasks that you have to do and how I divide up my time. So Wendy asks, “Talk about how you spend your time as an Internet biz in terms of percentage spent on new product creating, email promos, existing programs planning, etcetera.” And then a few people said, yeah answer that one. So, great question Wendy.

Something that has really surprised me about this business model is sometimes I think wow, I have a writing business. I spend so much time writing and so much time creating content which is really writing in one form or another, whether it’s just an outline for me or creating a PowerPoint presentation or whatever it is. There is a lot of writing involved in this business model and as far as how to divvy up your time I really love a concept I learned from Dean Jackson which has been really helpful for me.

Dean talks about dividing your whole business into before, during and after the customer experience because something that I’m always aware of is I don’t want to become one of those businesses that spends so much time on sales, that spends so much time trying to get new customers that they forget their existing customers and their existing community. It’s really easy to go there and it’s really important that I not. So, this before, during and after is a great way to keep your focus divided and make sure that you’re both taking care of current customers as well as bringing in new ones.

So, for my business the before time is basically I do a lot of what’s called content marketing meaning I create videos like this one that give you content or bring you into my world, share my philosophy and all that kind of good stuff. So, for me before are things like making video blogs, writing my newsletter The Dash, all of the marketing efforts.

During are when people are actually in my programs, so I’m always thinking about how can I make that a better experience for them, you know, making the web site easier to navigate, making the video faster to download, writing emails that they will go out as they do the program to help them along the way and make sure that they’re on track.

And then after is really making sure that we have great customer service so that we’re attending to people after they’ve been through a program. What questions they have or getting referral business from them or telling them the next program that they might want to be in.

It’s really kind of – the after I think of it as kind of a combo as marketing activities and the more during like customer service activities. So I don’t have a clear guideline of like percentages of how I spend my time, but making sure that I’m somewhat evenly distributed from the before, during and after activities is really helpful for me. And making sure that I’m not neglecting one area of my business over the others because it’s all equally important. You have to spend time bringing new people in and you also have to spend time making sure that the people that you already have [0:03:09] are having a fantastic experience.

So again that concept came from Dean Jackson. You can Google him. He writes a great blog about real estate marketing. Everything he talks about is real estate but of course you can apply it to any business. So I hope I answered your question Wendy. That’s a little glimpse of how I divide up my time for all the different activities in my business.

Before, During and After: How to Know What to Focus on When Running an Online Business is a post from: Laura Roeder

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Being Useless, Switching to a New System, and Meet my Cat

Laura — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 20:57:04 +0000

This week I’m all over the internet – here’s the scoop!

First of all, check out the free report I just released – Why Being an “Expert” is Making You Useless on Twitter

In this report I discuss why I disagree with most of the “common sense” advice about twitter – and what you should be doing instead. Click here to see the five well-meaning mistakes you might be making in your quest for “expert” status.

I’m the featured guest this week for Yaro Starak‘s video podcast series.

In this video interview, I tell the story of how I first became and entrepeneur and how I transitioned from one business to another (while staying profitable). Also if you’ve never seen my cat Koopa she makes quite the cameo!

Lastly, here’s a short interview about my experience switching over to infusionsoft on The Launch Coach blog. There is already quite a controversy brewing in the comments, so check that one out if you’re curious about the pros and cons of different email marketing and e-commerce systems.

Being Useless, Switching to a New System, and Meet my Cat is a post from: Laura Roeder

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