Marketing Shortcuts for the Self-Employed: Leverage Resources, Establish Online Credibility and Crush Your Competition
Author: Patrick Schwerdtfeger
Hardcover: 257 pages
Cost: $14.33
Published: June, 2011
When reading Marketing Shortcuts for the Self Employed, there is one thing you have to keep in mind. These are marketing shortcuts! There is no in-depth, how-to info here, but a collection of 80 shortcuts designed to help you jump start your online marketing efforts. That’s not a bad thing as Marketing Shortcuts will give you plenty of fodder to push your online marketing in the right direction.
While not every business will find every one of these tips beneficial, there is very little here that almost any business can’t implement. I appreciate that Schwerdtfeger focused the first ten tips on defining your business model, as this is a crucial aspect of online marketing that many upstart businesses skip right over. Just because starting a business online is easy, success isn’t. And without the foundation of a good business model, your online business will suffer the same fate as offline businesses that lack the same foundation: failure.
Schwerdtfeger then moves into tips for planning your internet presence and building your website (and blog.) Each of these sections is filled with shortcuts that will help you set the framework of building a successful business.
While the first three sections of the book are valuable for any business, those of us who are already running successful online companies will find the real value of the book in parts four through six. This is where my pages start getting dogeared (my highlighter took a temporary hiatus, or played a very clever game of hide-and-seek!). These sections cover areas that you can use to your advantage for building links and building brand awareness, how to draw targeted traffic, and leveraging social media channels such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
Again, keep in mind that these are nothing more than quick tip shortcuts. It’s enough to get you started, but I urge caution. Some strategies noted in the book can actually cause harm if care is not taken in implementation. When it comes to the SEO and social media tips, you would be wise to seek counsel to ensure that you don’t do anything that can hurt your efforts. Also recognize that you can go far, far deeper in these areas to increase your value than what you will get by doing only what this book suggests.
If you’re already knee deep in online marketing you may not need to read Marketing Shortcuts. On the other hand, I’m sure even the most experienced veterans will get an idea or two that perhaps they haven’t thought of or simply realize that a greater effort in a particular area may be warranted. With 80 chapters, each is no more than a couple pages long which makes Marketing Shortcuts very easy to read, scan and refer back to for a quick reminder of what more you can do to gain advantage over your competition and grow your business even more.