10 Steps for a Successful Online Business

Clarify Who You Help: Determine your Ideal Customer Avatar (ICE). This should be a fictional person who represents the demographics of the majority of your target market. Maybe it's a 40 year old female accountant. Name her (maybe Elaine!) and aim everything you do towards her.

Commit to Lead: Don't let fear, comparisons, negative self perceptions or anything else stop you. Decide and declare that you are willing, ready and able to lead customers, employees and the world to your business. Believe in the capacity and value of you and your business.

Capture Attention Online:

1 - Subvert expectations to get views

2 - Reward customers with your content (food, money, laughter!)

3 - Show prestige or expertise to build trust

4 - Use the Problem, Solution, Problem formula

5 - Recognize your followers publicly

Convert Vistors to Subscribers: Provide a lead magnet that offers subscribers a quick win. It can be a discount, freebie, anything that addresses an immediate and pressing need that your target audience has. Growing your email list (your community!) should be a daily priority.

Convene & Cultivate Community: Present new opportunities to connect with your audience and teach them a new reality by

1- Focusing on 1 new belief at a time

2 - Telling stories

3 - Addressing their doubts

4 - Giving them the first step to connect

5 - Championing their cause

Champion their cause: No matter your business, find a way to make it a cause worth championing. No matter how un-heroic you might think it is, show the bigger picture of why your business exists and make it a cause that your target market will feel compelled to support.

Create Raving Fans: Take your avatar (Elaine) and upgrade them to a new raving fan avatar name (Rhea!). Tools that tranform customers into raving fans include over-delivering on your promises, being radically transparent and regularly going live to interact with your audience.

Condition Your Audience: Teach your audience to consistently open, read and click on your emails. Tell a story, teach a lesson, apply it and call to action! Do this with a consistent email format for all your emails. This helps blend promotional emails in with your others.

Commit to Monetizing: Affiliate marketing is a great way to start making money. It's a no risk way of earning money just by promoting products/services to your audience. Know your audience well, find something valuable to offer them and you won't lose them, you'll make money.

Create Consistent Content: Learn from other content creators, use a content creation calendar, repurpose your past content, create a consistent rhythm and spend 5x longer promoting your content than creating it.