The Wax Blog

31 Oct

Posted at 05:57h in Management Mondays by
I often get accused of having bad "work/life balance". I'm often told I need to get off the grid, stop being available 24/7, etc. I've already written about what happened the one time I succumbed to pressure and turned off my cell phone for a day, almost missing a HUGE opportunity. I've also written about why going off the grid for any length of time is dumb.  So today I've decided to explain to you why I think work/life balance is a crock.  I apologize if this sounds defensive but I'm feeling like maybe it's an opportunity to teach people that happiness is not based on how much "life" you have in proportion to how much you "work". The lesson I've learned is when work is fun and exciting and fulfilling, it's part of life. It's not something you have to do to HAVE a life. To make my point, I think you need to see how much time I spend goofing off. Probably 80% of these items are during the week, as Saturdays are reserved for spending time with my mom and Sunday mornings are sacred.  I do like to get ready for the week by working on Sundays, like I am now. So here are some stats about my life in 2011 - since I put just about everything on my calendar it wasn't too hard to add up. 

27 Oct

Posted at 07:20h in Uncategorized by
When you are incorporating news stories into your blog content, your approach truly matters. You are never going to successfully compete with the large media sites, so re-stating industry-relevant stories will never captivate your readers. You can use the news information in a number of different ways and your approach really depends not only on  your industry, but also how you’ve positioned your blog. You have to ensure that your blog posts contain news in a way that makes sense to your readers, not just for search or backlink reasons. Here are a few ways to incorporate news into your blog posts: 

24 Oct

Posted at 08:48h in Integrated Marketing, Small Business by
Andy Boyd is works in the credit card industry. But you can still trust him.  Do you own a small business? If so, there is a good chance you are facing an uphill battle when it comes to your marketing campaign. But as we all know, getting your message in front of the right people is essential to your long term success. The way that you do this depends on many factors including your industry, knowledge, and overall goals. Why not take marketing cues from companies that are currently running successful campaigns? For example, credit card companies are well known for marketing their products with a high level of success. By taking the principles of what they are doing and combining with your current strategy, you can formulate a plan that will yield the results you have been searching for. Here are three ways that credit card companies market themselves. As a small business, you can learn from these strategies.

21 Oct

Posted at 09:11h in Public Relations by
If you're like me, you probably have some anxiety about attending a conference, trade show or networking event. In 20 years I've probably had more training than the next person on the art of the schmooze, but I still get the willies sometimes.  A few years ago I learned a secret that might seem a little silly, but it really works. I have been fortunate to work with Carole Hyder as a client for a long time. Carole is an international teacher, author and businessperson who specializes in Feng Shui, the ancient Chinese art of balancing the energies in your home and work.  I've already written about the power of wearing red underwear  if you're going to be on TV but there's more fashion Feng Shui you can use for a really big day,  whether it's a speech, an important meeting, conference or anywhere you need to be at your best.   Whether it works because it works, or it works because it's all in your head (and really, what's the difference) it works. First let me tell you a little story and then I'll tell you how to do it. 

18 Oct

Posted at 12:41h in Uncategorized by
As a small business owner it’s easy to find yourself pulled in six (or six thousand) different directions. As a result, when you decide to start blogging it’s hard to know how much time you really need to invest.  Problogger Beth Hodgson hails from Canada, aka the Shizzle north of Hizzle.  We always worry about how often to post and sticking to a consistent schedule.  But consistency and frequency are not the only issues when you're managing your time as a mompreneur, small business owner, author or any combination of the three. There's another  problem – everyone does things at his or her own pace. It's hard to pinpoint the right number of "hours"  blogging should take. There's no set recipe. Instead, it's important to make sure you're maximizing the time you do have, no matter how large or small the bucket. Here are six ways you can make the most of your time for the smallest investment possible.

17 Oct

Posted at 05:42h in Integrated Marketing, Management Mondays by
In the 1990's I managed a group of scary alpha Gen X women. I witnessed these women becoming uber-successful in sales, start having their babies and slowly figuring out how to "have it all".  I watched them try to satisfy their ridiculously high expectations for themselves as moms, employees and wives,  with a great deal of  doubt, guilt and stress. As a single woman without any children (unless you count dogs) I was in some ways jealous and in some ways grateful I wasn't trying to hoe that tough field. However hard it was for them, that generation of women must have really figured things out because the millenium moms I'm dealing with now are nothing short of frightening in their ability to juggle kids, high powered jobs, husbands and still have time for running marathons, doing yoga and blogging. Instead of managing these women, today many of them are my clients, contractors and colleagues. I have to say I am impressed and not a little bit intimidated by their ability to juggle all these things. (Since there doesn't seem to be a definitive on the year that separates Generation X from Generation Y, I'm just going to say they're kind of on the XY cusp born in the '70s or later. )

12 Oct

Posted at 12:15h in Uncategorized by
Beth Hodgson is from Canada so she has to peg all her blog posts from US news. Otherwise they'd be too boring.  How important is it to write about current stories? Should all of your blog posts be relevance to news in your industry? These are great questions and  worth exploring. If you want fast answers, I can give you a few: [caption id="attachment_3718" align="alignright" width="300" caption="The only news in Canada is about hockey."][/caption]

07 Oct

Posted at 08:57h in Integrated Marketing, SEO, Small Business by
Thanks to Gareth Boyd, Beth and Brandy for their wonderful guest posts this week, allowing me to take my first real vacation in 10 years. The key to making money online is the ability to convert your traffic into sales. Contrary to popular belief, traffic is the easy part of internet business. The ability to convert that traffic into money is what sets the pros apart from everyone else. The following is a list of seven tips to analyse your traffic and increase conversions. 1- Use a heatmap program for your website. There are a variety of options, but a heatmap will show you where your clients are moving looking and where they're clicking.