In the hype of being prolific writers, many creators are making this mistake — I learned about an interesting concept the other day: Machine-friendly crops. These are crops that are easily harvested with machines, so farmers prefer to plant them as opposed to some food that requires manual harvesting. The result? We end up eating the same foods and miss out on others. This…

Thought leadership and the future of marketing — In Oversubscribed: How to Get People Lining Up to Make Business with You, Daniel Priestly says that every start-up should begin with a team of at least four people. 1. Key Person of Influence (a well-known and trusted figure in the industry who can open doors and make deals happen). …

An intuitive process to publish original, thought-provoking articles and digital content — I often write about the difference between regular content marketing and thought leadership marketing. While regular content creators focus on writing generic SEO-friendly content, thought leaders seek to make an impact with deep, practical, original content. But how do you create such content? Do you have to spend a lot…

Four principles for writing a blog post that makes an impact — Search online for “the anatomy of a great blog post” and you’ll find generic advice from HubSpot and the likes about the number of words, the types of headlines and subtitles you should use, the SEO elements you must include and the classic structure of introduction, body, conclusion, and call…

There’s a better way to make an impact and grow your business — Brittany Hennessy, author of Influencer, defines “influencer” as someone who has “social currency,” meaning that when she speaks, her audience listens, acts, and buys. Many influencers create a cult following around their lavish lifestyle (whether fake or real) or their physique. A few of them will feature their art or…

Five storytelling techniques that will make your writing better — Where do writers come up with ideas for stories, books or articles? Well, every writer is different. In fiction, a lot of authors will tell you that the idea just came out of the blue one day. JK Rowling, for instance, thought about Harry Potter for the first time while…

My experience trying a different approach to book marketing — I’ve written many books, but had never made a dent in the publishing world. Until now. For previous books, I’d tried the usual marketing advice of building an author platform (which is useless by itself, by the way), and trying to reach influencers and reviews from important publications. Those didn’t…

After years as a business consultant and marketer for both solopreneurs and B2B companies, I had an aha moment: the reason many solopreneurs and small businesses struggle is because they are playing by the rules of big companies. So I began interviewing successful entrepreneurs and decoding their secrets. That’s when…

Instead, use this 6-step process to succeed as a writer — In his book Platform: Get Noticed in a Noisy World, Michael Hyatt recommends authors and other creatives to build a platform before launching their products. His advice? Stuff like: Build a great product Create an elevator pitch Start a blog Write guest posts Get on Twitter Set up a Facebook…