Archive for Articles

Mar
30

Don’t Make Me Think

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Do your website visitors stumble over your website?  Would you like to make your site more user friendly?  Well I have a great book recommendation to give you: “Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability”  (2nd Edition) by Steve Krug

Its a book designed for the non-techie business owner that shows you how to create a website that is easy to navigate for your visitors, and helps you to design your site for the best user experience.


It’s a fun and fast read, great images and layout.  You can finish it in a couple of evenings.  It’s one of my top recommended books for anyone who owns a website.

Leave your comments below

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Feb
07

The Best Superbowl Commercial

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Each year when the Superbowl airs, we like to watch for the best Superbowl ads.  I found that this year had a lot of negative ads, which made me feel flat and empty.  But my favorite one was the Volkswagon commercial “The Force”.

It’s a great commercial because it uses memorable storytelling to convey it’s message.

What was your favorite Superbowl Commercial? Comment below…

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After getting a ton of responses to my survey last week on: “Your Top 2 Challenges with Growing Your Business”,  I got together with legendary copywriter, John Carlton, and asked for his opinion on the reasons why people have trouble moving their business forward.

In this interview, we talk about the things entrepreneurs do to succeed online.

- We talked about Branding vs. Direct Response.

- We talked about how your family and friends, while meaning well, can actually shoot down your ideas and actually harm your business. You need to protect yourself against that.

- We talked about finding a niche, and how to make money in your niche.

- We talked about how people fail to use a ‘call to action’, fail to give people a way to buy from you.  Listen as John teaches the 5 simple themes that entrepreneurs use to succeed.

- How do you stay focused and stay on task to bring yourself the most profits.

- Who you should hire first, and how to get the most leverage there.

- Overcoming information overload. It’s the thing all entrepreneurs need to battle!

And a lot more about entrepreneurs, and what the best ones do to succeed.

This is a high energy, information packed interview.  In fact, after we did the interview, I thought it was so good I was on cloud 9, thinking how much this information would help people.

You can listen online, or download it to your computer

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Right Click Here to Download the mp3 file

As a working freelance copywriter, John is one of a handful at the top of the game — commanding fees that cause unprepared clients to choke, getting booked up to a year in advance by the largest mailers in the world, and consistently writing pitches that sell like crazy.

As a teacher of writing sales messages for businesses, John is responsible for helping a verifiable mob of otherwise clueless entrepreneurs and small business owners get their act together.

I have had the benefit of being in one of John’s ‘Hot Seats’.  His ‘Hot Seats’ is where he gets you in front of a group of people, and he reviews and grills your business.

I will be speaking at John’s Action Seminar event at the end of this month in San Diego.  We will be helping folks take Action, and move your business forward.  That is why it’s called the “Action Seminar”.  You can read more about the event, and how it will benefit you below

 

Go Here now to find out more:

www.ChristinaHills.com/actionseminar

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I’d like to connect with you on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

You can find me on Facebook Here: http://www.ChristinaHills.com/facebook

(hit the ‘like’ button when you get there)

You can find me on Twitter http://www.ChristinaHills.com/twitter

(if you follow me, I will follow you back)

and we can connect on LinkedIn http://www.ChristinaHills.com/linkedin
Go ahead and send me an invitation to connect.
(yes I am still learning how to use LinkedIn too)

And here’s why I am thinking of it now…

I just got back from Portland  at Brendon Burchard’s studio shooting some video with my colleagues Paul Colligan, Amy Porterfield and Haley Hohengarten.  We are creating this for Mike Koenigs’ Social Media Marketing Machines program.

And in these segments we are teaching about Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and of course WordPress.

Then it dawned on me:  I have not invited you to connect with me there on those channels. (Duh! Silly me..)

If you are not yet on any of the channels: Facebook,  Twitter, or LinkedIn I suggest you open an account and get started.

REMEMBER: it’s more important to get going, than to get it perfect!

So let’s connect!

Categories : Articles, Social Media
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With the Holidays over,  you are probably busy  coming up with your plans and strategies for the new year.  You probably have many ideas of new businesses and websites you want to build, and new revenue streams you would like to start.

Well in order to get these things done, you need to get more productive and efficient with your time.


In my personal quest to accomplish more in 2011, have recently found an app for the iPhone called “OmniFocus“.  (I can’t remember exactly where I first heard about it.  Most likely it was from Paul Colligan who knows everything about the Mac and Apple products!)

Anyways, this iPhone App is a great way to get all those ideas, those  little sticky notes, OUT of your head, and into a place that you can reference and categorize them.

OmniFocus is inspired by  the methodologies of David Allen’s  book “Getting Things Done”.  I had bought the book years ago, but had trouble getting through it.  I liked his concepts, but the pen and paper approach to capturing todos just didn’t work for me.  I kept losing all the little scraps of paper I would jot my ideas down on.

Well with OmniFocus, you can toss out all your paper notes, and keep everything quickly accessible from your iPhone, your iPad, and your iMac.  If you use more than one Apple device, then you can have them all sync together.  I use it mostly on my iPhone and have found great relief from all the ‘todo’s cluttering up my brain.

Watch this short 4 min video below on how OmniFocus works:

OmniFocus is designed for you to use as a way to keep track of all your todos over your different projects. (You can learn more about OmniFocus from the OmniGroup website or search for it in the Apps Store)

It also has a dimensional aspect to it, in that it will organize things in a specific context.  For example things you want to work on at home, phone calls you need to make to people,  things to do while at your computer, or errands you need to run.

It can also use the GPS Mapping to keep track of things you need to do when you are in a certain location of town. And you can view your todo actions based on date that they are do.

I think you will really love this little App, it’s super fast to learn, and totally worth it!

Categories : Articles
Comments (19)
Dec
22

My Christmas Video to You

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Hi There!

I’m sure you’ve probably been as busy as I have been this Holiday Season.

I don’t always get the time to do all the things I have ideas for, but I wanted to say thank you to you. So please watch this short video from me. My daughter and I shot this for you backstage during our last performance of the Nutcracker here in Grass Valley a few days ago…

Have a Very Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and a Prosperous New Year!

With Blessings,
Christina

Categories : Articles
Comments (47)

What are people saying about you on the internet?  How do you track that?  Well, one great way to stay on top of your buzz, is to create a “Google Alert”.  You can create a Google Alert  for your name, your website, your area of expertise.    Just go to www.Google.com/alerts and set that up.

I’ve created a short video to explain this and to show you how:


I would create an alert for your:

  • name
  • business
  • area of expertise (although you may need to come up with more niche terms if you get too many results)

Put your thoughts/ideas down below….

Categories : Articles, Google Tips, Videos
Comments (17)
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