Welcome to Season 1 Episode 1 of the Creative Business Success Podcast! In this episode, I talked with Angela, a personal stylist from St. Louis. She’s been struggling with finding her ideal clients in order to grow her business, though. In this episode, I worked with Angela to find opportunities to identify and connect with her ideal clients, create mutually beneficial business partnerships, and get the word out about her services.

Here is a cheat sheet of some of the episode highlights:

Angela’s intro, 0:50

Her local marketing obstacles, 1:41

Creating mutually beneficial partnerships, 2:28

Expanding your network, 3:14

Thinking outside the box, 4:37

Going beyond your current audience, 5:28

What to do with all your new options, 7:37

Finding partnerships for workshops, 7:49

Expanding your testimonials, 8:28

Check out Dubsado to improve your workflow, 9:46

PR reach, 10:25

Emily Richett’s PR webinar, 11:46

Why we all need an outside perspective on our business, 13:20

Where to connect with Angela, 15:29

Let’s dive a little deeper into a few of these local marketing obstacles and solutions, though!

As an entrepreneur and especially a solopreneur, it is SO easy to get in the “it’s just me, myself, and I” mindset. That’s just not true! There are so many others out there who would love to collaborate with you if you’ll just ask. For Angela, I suggested finding some partnerships in her local area, but depending on your type of business, you could do this online too. In this case, Angela could reach out to travel agents to offer packing services to their clients and wedding coordinators to offer wedding party styling services, just to name a couple.

Get creative with your partnership ideas, too! If you’re having trouble thinking of any, ask your friends and family what other kinds of services they think would complement yours and start there.

This one may seem kind of obvious, but it’s surprising how often we overlook it. Angela was focusing on young moms as her primary personal styling audience. The problem is, young moms often don’t have much time or disposable income, which means they can be a hard sell. Instead, I suggested that she consider reaching out to business women and groups that cater to them instead. These women often have the money for a great wardrobe, but don’t want to waste the time picking out an outfit every morning. Angela’s personalized lookbooks would be perfect for this audience, as it would give them a quick way to choose an outfit without sorting through their closet fifty times!

When you start to think about who needs you AND has the ability to hire you or purchase your products, you’ll find your sweet spot (or two!). Don’t get stuck in the rut of who you’ve already been reaching out to – go beyond it.

In Angela’s case, she had some great testimonials on her site, but they’re easy to pass over. Instead of relying on text-based testimonials, I suggested she consider getting video testimonials as well. This is perfect for her services because they are so personal and visual. Showing HOW she helped a client dress well for a particular body type is powerful. Video garners much more attention than text these days, so she can use it in other applications besides just her website. Those testimonials could become Facebook ads, be...