Social media sites can provide a treasure chest of new clients and exciting new projects for you if you know some of the tools to open it. If you are looking for regular work, it is possible to attract various great clients through social media in an efficient way, without wasting valuable time.

By now you have hopefully properly set up your various social media profiles, including providing a link to your work, which is all explained in detail in my ‘10 Steps’ ebook.

Here are 10 ways to use social media sites to get the attention of potential clients for you:

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1. Share updates on what you are working on. For example:

‘Well, now I can put my feet up! I’ve just added the finishing touches to my music poster: http://www.mywork.com’

2. Share pictures of your work or your awesome-looking workspace. This will get people excited about your work, especially as they can see it, and showing your workspace adds credibility and a personal touch to your self promotion. Twitpic is one such service that allows you to share pictures on Twitter.

3. Ask for feedback on the progress of your own work, by sharing a picture or link.

4. Post any recent updates you have made to your portfolio.

5. Express your joy at positive appraisals from colleagues, clients, fans. For example:

‘Got a great testimonial from my client about my last design project. So happy! [link to testimonial]’

6. Get a friendly conversation going with a potential client, or ask them a relevant question.

7. Get chatting about industry related things with anyone. New ‘tweets’ or updates that will interest potential clients will keep you visible.

8. Share news that will build your credibility as a professional, such as being interviewed for a blog or magazine, winning a new project, or when posting a new article to your blog.

9. Arrange to meet potential clients face-to-face using social media as a first point of contact. Nothing beats a one on one over coffee if you think you could bring something to the table with this person.

10. Ask a question to do with your work that generates discussion. Particularly on Facebook, this is a good way to get ongoing visibility on topics that will get noticed by potential clients if they are connected to you through this platform.

Remember that engaging with others on these sites is less about ‘selling’ and much more to do with getting into conversations and building relationships. So keep this in mind when making use of these ideas.

Another thing to keep in mind is to not restrict your online networking to only one person or one network. Keep an open mind and join other networks and talk with people in related but different industries. You never know what might turn up in the form of new work by engaging in different areas occasionally.

This might be all good and well, but if you have any interest in staying afloat in the industry over a substantial period of time, it is essential to understand a system that allows for winning new projects and selling products regularly over the long term.

Marketing expert Michael Port introduced to me the concept of the ‘sales cycle’, which takes the essential elements of self promotion, and places them within a system that you can use to set out a strategy of effective long term self promotion.

A sales cycle simply highlights the key stages that need to be incorporated into your campaign of promoting yourself and your work in order to secure bookings with new as well as previous and ongoing clients.

The crucial elements of a successful promotion strategy for not only service professionals but all businesses and corporations are:

Getting your product or service noticed.

Attracting potential customers or clients.

Becoming credible.

Building trust.

Developing a strong relationship with those contacts.

Bringing clients to take action in using your services.

I have used the concepts introduced by Michael Port and formulated a straight forward sales cycle that brings in all these important elements to allow you to attract great clients and regular work (as well as sales if you have a product).

The ten steps described in my new ebook address and put into action all of the stages of the cycle I will describe below.

These stages are what a client moves through when deciding whether to use your services or buy one of your products. A potential client or buyer can drop in and out of this cycle, and they don’t necessarily have to start from the beginning in order to hire you.

Addressing all the stages in your campaign is important in ensuring a steady stream of work and sales if you sell products.

You’ll need to keep this cycle in mind as you go about promoting yourself if you want to see optimum results in attracting new work from clients or in selling to customers.

The stages are as follows:

Stage 1. Get Seen

Perform tasks that will get your name in front of your target market.

This covers any activity that introduces new people to your work, or reminds people of it.

By itself, activity addressing this stage will potentially bring new fans, clients, advice givers, collaborators, buyers and more, to you and your work.

This can include social networking, bringing people to your website, setting up referrals, writing articles, sending out mail promos, leaving blog comments, guest blogging and so on.

Of course, there may be instances where others will do the work for you, such as featuring your work on their blog having seen your work, or someone sharing a link to your site on Twitter, for example.

It is possible for you to get work with clients or sell products through this stage alone. This is also possible at instances anywhere into the cycle. However, stopping at this stage in the cycle, will make it harder for you to secure long term work and/or sales at a consistent rate.

Stage 2. Link Up

Secure contacts that you can build a relationship with.

This is where you establish a secure link with a targeted contact that will enable you to communicate with them over time and build a relationship with them.

A secure link can be in the form of attracting a Twitter follower, adding a Facebook friend or fan, and ultimately and ideally, adding targeted people to your mailing list.

There are no risks for your contacts here. People are not expected to hand over their hard earned cash at this point.

Before securing a link with the right people, it helps to demonstrate a positive reputation, credibility and value as a creative worker. This includes things like being the author of a useful and original blog, having an accomplished portfolio of work, showing client testimonials and adding good, readable content through Twitter and Facebook.

These are the things that will provide an incentive for people to secure such a link with you.

Stage 3. Keep in touch

Work on developing a trusting relationship with your contacts.

This is the stage that cultivates trust, rapport and a long-term relationship between you and your target contacts that you have already created a secure link to.

This involves tasks that maintain visibility in front of contacts at the very least, but also tasks that build trust and familiarity, and allow positive interaction with your key contacts.

Such tasks include sending blog post updates to members of your Facebook fan page, ‘tweeting’ through Twitter, interacting with people on social media sites, sending out status updates on Facebook and broadcasting a newsletter containing tips and new updates to members of your mailing list.

Stage 4. Strike a Deal

Create an offering that will lead to work.

The next step is to move your potential clients or buyers into the next stage of the cycle, which is in hiring your services or buying from you. Although creating an offering in this way is an element of selling products, it is also an important step to take in selling your services.

For most creatives, an offering in this way would simply involve reminding your contacts that you are available for work, and that any referrals that can be sent your way would be appreciated. ‘Calls to action’ in the form of a link on your site that suggests prospects ask for a quote is another example of an offering.

What your offerings are is up to you here and will depend on your area of work.

An offering to attract work, such as a discounted service, or offering tickets for an exhibition, for example, as well as discounts on any products you sell are also options here. They are not essential, however, because the important thing is that people are simply aware of your work. This alone can lead to paid projects.

Prospects who would like to work with you will hire you if they want to, or they may act as vital referrers.

It is important to be aware of this cycle as you go about the steps discussed in my ebook, if you are interested in consistently and effectively selling your products or services.

Your thoughts as comments are always welcome!

This doesn’t just apply to creative professionals, but anyone looking to further their careers.

Many people think of networking as something that is manipulative; something that involves engaging with others in an attempt to gain some kind of a strategic advantage for the success of their own careers.

The questions we might ask as we go about networking and marketing our work with a typical networking mentality might be:

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How can I attract attention to myself?

How can I push my own agenda?

How can I get an edge over my competition?

How can I dominate the marketplace?

How can I manipulate them to work with me?

How can I really impress?

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Fortunately, the way in which networking has progressed, especially in the digital age, in which everyone’s credibility is glaringly exposed, we no longer rely on deceptive cheesy grins to win over new contacts.

Making a connection with other people is now the way forward. One’s perspective needs to shift from one of scarcity, to one of abundance, respect and care.

The questions asked by the modern marketing action hero include the following:

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What can I offer other people?

How can I make others feel comfortable?

How can I best express my sincerity and generosity?

How can I help others?

How can I draw out the best in people?

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The key ingredient in all this is that in order to find real success in both your online and offline promotional efforts of making meaningful connections, you need to make a true connection with other human beings. Asking questions like these will equip you with the tools you need to get started truly connecting.

Get out there, start connecting, and success will follow!

Your thoughts are welcome!

Today’s article clarifies using MySpace as one base from which to effectively promote your services and products, and to eventually create and build large networks of relevant people, which is described in detail in my new ebook on self promotion.

Many people associate MySpace with established and emerging musicians and bands. Many musicians use MySpace for greatly boosting their online presence. However, the hugely popular site actually presents a massive opportunity for businesses and professionals of all other backgrounds and industries to promote themselves and create contacts.

The audience you have access to through MySpace can be a lot different to other social networks like Facebook and Twitter, which creates all kinds of additional benefits to just using something like Facebook.

Not only do a lot of people on MySpace tend to be media and trend-savvy, communicative and young, but there are also large numbers of people engaging with MySpace who are searching for talent, expertise and new ideas.

This includes more and more potential clients for professional creatives.

As well as this, there are many other reasons to make use of MySpace as a self promotional platform, including the flexibility behind the design and customization of your profile, which allows for truly original layouts, additional elements like video, driving traffic to your blog and portfolio, and the ability to connect with and communicate to relevant people to expand your business.

Here is how to get set up on MySpace so that you make the most of it for establishing an online presence within a powerful online network:

Create Your MySpace Profile

Even if you have your own personal MySpace profile at the moment, it’s best to set up a new one that centers on your business or work.

Go to www.myspace.com and select a profile type. You’ll find a few options, including a music or comedian profile, which will offer slightly different features according to your vocation. If you don’t match any of the extra profile types on offer, it is best to go for the personal page profile, which is the standard option.

Go through the sign up process, which you will need a valid email address for. You will be asked to verify your email and add pictures to your profile. If you have some pictures that showcase your work on hand, upload those to the site. You can change your main profile picture at any time, but now would be a chance to upload a logo or picture of you in keeping with your consistent brand.

Set your MySpace custom URL to include relevant keywords, or your name by clicking the pick your MySpace URL link in the top left of the MySpace dashboard area. Think about this carefully, as this cannot be changed in future, unless you open a new page from scratch.

The next thing is to fill in your profile details by clicking Profile > Edit Profile.

Put some thought into filling in all your details including your interests as this will all add to your personality and brand and will appeal to those prospects and users who could potentially add you as a friend, contact you, and so on.

Putting in these details will also bring people to you, as the keywords you put within fields such as ‘interests’ are searchable by people on MySpace.

Think about which keywords relating to your work you could incorporate into these details pages.

As with Facebook, you might want to hold back on your year of birth for security. Don’t forget to include a link to your website. Also consider incorporating your web link into the design (discussed in the next section), like you might have done through your Twitter background.

Designing your Profile

Next, you need to set about designing your profile so that it looks professional, is appealing and reflects your brand and your style. You want your profile to be an extension of your base site, and reflect the style that runs through your portfolio and brand.

MySpace is one of few social media sites that enables you to use code, including CSS to customize your profile. This means designing the various sections you want to put into your profile, through Dreamweaver for example, and pasting the code into the available profile boxes.

This allows you to make some very special and dynamic MySpace profiles with slide shows, Flash and more.

I would recommend taking advantage of the flexibility this provides, and either designing your own profile or getting someone to help you with it, although bear in mind that legibility and simplicity will benefit your profile.

If you don’t have to ability to input your own code into your profile, you can use any of the various third-party profile editors on the web, such as Mashcodes or you can use the very good MySpace Profile Editor within MySpace itself.

The Customize Profile link, which is located on the top right of your screen once you have clicked Edit Profile from your homepage, will take you to the MySpace editor.

The editor is very intuitive, and you shouldn’t find it too difficult to work your way through designing your profile.

When you get to customizing your modules, which are the individual blocks within your profile, make sure the Add to Friends link stands out, as this is something you want people to easily find as you build out your MySpace network.

Consider taking advantage of images, text and video to drive visitors to your mailing list landing page or blog, and/or base site. Effectively you are incorporating a call to action into your profile, which you can do in several places, which will attract people to your blog or base.

You’ll see many professional MySpace pages using this.

Adding Music

If you are a musician, you need to have prepared mp3music files to upload through the music player available with the musician’s profile.

There are also several other music widgets available for your profile, (have a look at the mp3section at Widgetbox) that you can get online.

Widgets come in the form of code that you incorporate into your profile by dropping the code in your About Me section.

Adding Video

If you have video to showcase, or have videos that you might be sharing as part of your marketing campaign through sites like YouTube, you need to follow these steps in adding it to your profile:

1. Click Video from the top navigation menu.

2. Click Upload.

3. Browse for the file and click Upload Video.

4. Under your newly uploaded video, click the Add to Profile link to bring the video to your profile.

The methods on building up a substantial network and promoting your products and services through MySpace effectively, are covered in Step 6 of the new ebook: ’10 Steps to Powerful Online Self Promotion for Creatives’.

Does everyone think these are the best ways to optimize your presence on MySpace for effective online self promotion?

To go with my recently launched ebook on self promotion, I’ve put together a list of various marketing mistakes to take note of.

Here are 10 mistakes you should avoid as a creative freelancer or professional:

1. Not establishing a target market before promoting.

One of the main things that creatives and other freelancers overlook when taking action in attracting new clients and getting their work seen is the importance of knowing who it is that you are producing work for.

If you produce work to please anyone and everyone, with no target market in mind, you will have trouble maintaining high quality, focused work. You will also create too much work for yourself, and you will have difficulties promoting it. If you have no idea who you are promoting to, your strategy of promotion will be aimless, fluffy and ineffective.

You need to decide on a group of people you would be passionate about creating work for. This is the group of people who will come to enjoy and experience your work upon its completion.

2. Ignoring the smaller details on your portfolio sites.

A lot of us neglect the smaller details when we go about showcasing what we have produced to share online. This includes providing good high resolution images in your portfolios, having links that work, aligning things properly, avoiding site clutter, and keeping words spelt correctly and sentences grammatically correct.

Attention to these finer details will have an effect on how viewers regard your professionalism and your general care about your own work. This can sometimes be the difference between someone choosing to hire you and someone quickly leaving your portfolio or site.

3. Not being contactable.

I still too often arrive at the personal sites of various creatives and find it hard to find out how to contact those behind the sites. The bare essentials of your online presence are your work being showcased clearly and properly, and a way to be contacted. The latter is often hard to get to, so make it obvious how to be found on the front page of your site/blog.

The best way is to set up a contact form, so that you don’t have to worry about email spammers taking your full email address through your site.

4. Not having a referral policy.

When it comes to attracting referrals as you network and interact with your contacts later on, having an official referral policy in place is one of the best ways you can attract more clients and more work. At least making a point of asking for referrals when dealing with clients is important also.

In the business world, 80% of companies get 70% of their business through word of mouth marketing. This can apply to creative professionals too. You will be surprised how many referrals you can make just by asking, especially when you find referrals for others.

See my previous post on getting referrals for more information on this.

5. Having an unfocused marketing strategy.

It can be easy to lose your way when trying to get the word out about what you do. Sometimes marketing activities don’t happen for weeks and months because there is not strategy in place. It is therefore important to lay out some kind of schedule in a calendar that will help you dedicate some focused marketing time each day or week.

Apart from scheduling a marketing regime in a calendar, there are other ways of creating focus within your marketing strategy. Writing a blog is one way of staying focused and building regular exposure for your own work, for example. Providing updates to a mailing list is another way of staying focused, hugely benefiting your promotional strategy in the process.

6. Not being set up effectively for promotion on social media sites like Facebook.

People’s views on social media appear to be fairly split, with one group seeing the self marketing value of networking sites like Twitter and Facebook and others ignoring it. In either case, it is crucial to get set up effectively on these sites, so that your work and services are promoted in the best ways that they can be. Many people miss out on the opportunity to take advantage.

Sites like Facebook, which attract huge numbers of people every day, come with a range of tools that will help you promote yourself that people are very often unaware of. Many people often overlook the various ways these sites can really help you promote yourself, such as one’s ability to showcase artwork to targeted people, or importing a blog through your wall on Facebook.

I’m giving away a free chapter of my book through Inspired Mag on setting up properly on Facebook.

7. Not securing the relevant contacts you find.

People visiting your sites and those that you can interact with on social media sites, as well as clients, previous clients, referrals and fans are very valuable to you. For the benefit of your long term marketing success, as well as selling products and selling your services in general, you need to secure these contacts to you so that they are contactable and within your professional network.

This means directing people to your mailing list and making people aware of your social networks like LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. With contacts in place in these ways, you are able to maintain visibility in front of them over time, which will help you attract regular work and exposure.

8. Lacking credibility as a professional or expert.

For success as a creative who wants lots of work with great clients, you’ll need to be perceived as credible, likable and trustworthy within your field and within your ever-growing network.

Having a personal brand and giving off the right attitude both contribute to this, but there are a few other important things you need to consider if you want to appear credible and trustworthy, including having a unique domain name for your portfolio site, providing a high quality of service and providing testimonials of your services on your site. Several more ideas are provided in the book.

9. Not maintaining whatever self promotion steps we have already taken.

You might know about and put into action all kinds of successful promotional methods that get your work noticed and contribute to a strong brand. However, without proper maintenance, these efforts will be short lived and you are likely to see success in patches, as opposed to work coming in consistently.

Keeping things automated through delegating tasks is one way of keeping the momentum going and so is keeping a schedule together for posting blog updates, keeping your portfolio fresh and engaging on social networking sites.

Maintenance also includes tweaking, tracking and tuning the various activities you are involved with as part of your promotional strategy. It’s key to get regular feedback from what you are doing so that you know what to work on and improve and so that you know you are on the right track with what you are doing. Google Analytics is an excellent free service for tracking website stats that you can incorporate into your various sites and blogs.

10. Ignoring the importance of appropriate web etiquette on the sites we visit.

Internet etiquette, or ‘netiquette’ in general, is something everyone should be aware of before setting out on a journey of effective self promotion. These are practices used to make the internet experience a pleasant one for everyone you deal with. Often people try to market what they have, and annoy others in the process by being too aggressive and persistent without focusing on developing relationships.

Particularly when you are engaging with social media, where you want to build relationships, you need to communicate with people in a way that is respectful, professional and responsible and appropriate to the site in question.

When promoting a product or service, the old method of directly advertising what you have, has now gone out the window with Web 2.0 (the new phase of collaborative information sharing the internet is now going through). If you forget all else in marketing yourself online, remember this:

Relationship building and rapport come first, promotion comes second.

What does everyone think?

All these issues are addressed in my new book, ’10 Steps to Powerful Online Self Promotion for Creatives’, launching Wednesday March 10th at a reduced price for three days only.

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Sign up to the weekly tip mailing list to be alerted of the when the book becomes available.

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Get fixed up here:

*Your information will never be shared or sold

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Congratulations to all winners and thank you ALL for taking part, and for such excellent and sometimes very funny comments.

The winners of the book are as follows – please contact me, otherwise I will be contacting you all individually with the free book on Wednesday/Thursday…

Heidi Burton
Nadja Johansen
Jason Philip Smith
Steve Ward
Samantha Johnson
Zack Rock
Nate Watkins
Alex Sanso
Lisa Ellwood
Liz Sterry

Well done!

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In the run up to my new ebook’s launch on Wednesday March 10th, I’ll be giving away 10 books for free.

The offer is exclusive to fans of the Red Lemon Club Fan Page.

To have a chance of getting your hands on a free copy of the book: ’10 Steps to Powerful Online Self Promotion for Creatives’, which will also help people who want to make more sales, and bring greater exposure to their businesses, you need to do the following:

1. Make sure you are logged in to your Facebook account.

2. Go to the Red Lemon Club Fan Page, and become a fan if you aren’t already.

3. Write a wall post or comment stating why you want the book.

..And that’s it!

The ten winners will be announced through the fan page, as well as this site on Tuesday March 9th.

Good luck!

What is the #1 area you need help with, in terms of promoting your work online?

Many of you responded with some great questions. This post will take a selection of them, and I will do my best to answer them. If you have anything to add, don’t hesitate to contribute within the comments section of this post.

If you are interested in my recently completed guide on effective online self promotion, go here.

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Here we go…

Reader Question:

‘How much time should I be putting in each day/week/month into promoting myself?’

RLC Answer:

‘That’s a good question, and not an easy one to answer. I think we can safely say that for most creative professionals, the ratio of self promotion to working is very small, so must of us should think about upping the amount of weekly promotion we put in compared to the amount of creative work we do.

Levels of marketing vary according to the method used. For social networking promotion, I recommend spending a few minutes a day engaging with people, and for sending out newsletters to subscribers, once every two or three weeks.

Generally you will need to tailor your self promotion time to yourself but aim to spend a proportion of what you do, unless you have help or representation, on some self promotional activities every week. You will find out what suits you through taking action and getting feedback from what you do.’

Reader Question:

‘I guess for me, my troubled area is how to engage prospects, readers (etc) to take action, to send me an email to buy ads on my blog, or to give me a call to book my services.. Even to subscribe to my newsletter, or to respond to my tweets.

So is it a matter of words? Content? Price?’

What compels someone to take action?‘

RLC Answer:

‘My best piece of advice here is in making sure you place a ‘call to action’ at any opportunity you have that is appropriate. A call to action is something that leads your site visitors etc to taking action, such as you saying that you are available for hire, and then adding a link to your contact address.

You’ll be surprised how often people are swayed into taking action, when they are reminded and shown how to do so, and how many people forget to use one.’

Reader Question:

‘I’d like to find out more about adding subscribers to my currently tiny mailing list. How do I attract more new clients to my list?’

RLC Answer:

‘If you have a blog, nothing beats good, regular content that demonstrates your expertise and credibility on some topic, and having a mailing list that is tied to this great content, such as by having a newsletter that gives away exclusive information that relates to the content you provide on your blog or site.

Make sure your opt-in page or form is clearly linked to, or clearly shown on your various sites, including your blog. This means placing it ‘above the fold’ (within view when the web page is fully scrolled up) and perhaps giving something away for free to people who sign up as an incentive.

Take advantage of the various other channels on the net to promote your list, including leaving the link in forum signature boxes, social media, blog comments, leaving a link on articles and guest posts on other blogs you write, and so on.’

Reader Question:

‘I have noticed the highly increasing popularity of Tumblr and I was wondering if I should recreate my blog in blogger to a Tumblr one if that might increase followers and visits to my work?’

RLC Answer:

‘Tumblr’s system is very straight forward and a well designed one. If you don’t plan on being too in control of your blog’s design, it could be an option, but generally your blog popularity will come down to the quality of the content on your blog, you having a well-defined blog niche, and the extent of your efforts to bring targeted traffic to it.’

Reader Question:

‘What is the best method of putting together a portfolio these days, Html, WordPress, Flash, CSS3?’

RLC Answer:

‘There are so many ways, and by all means use any of these, although lay off the flash unless really necessary!

I personally recommend WordPress.org for your blog, but it can also be used as a portfolio site as it is quite straightforward and very efficient once set up, and the design is very customizable. I would emphasize simplicity in any portfolio site you set up.

My new ebook lists all kinds of ways and options you can choose from in creating a site that works for you.’

Reader Question:

‘Even though I’m very new to the industry, are there promotional tactics that can help me and my work to appear more professional? (A “fake it till you make it” sort of tactic)?’

RLC Answer:

‘If you stick to the very basics of professionalism in all that you do as a creative, you’re sure to impress and basically look good to potential clients.

This includes communicating positively and eloquently with readers and prospects, but also in concentrating on little details that make a big difference, such as spelling mistakes, and fuzzy, unprofessional design on your sites. Make sure you always focus on consistency as you transmit the brand you are representing.’

Reader Question:

‘I know that writing articles and social networking are good ways of bringing traffic to my sites. Do you have any other ideas?‘

RLC Answer:

‘There are several ways that creatives can use the web to bring targeted traffic to their work and their blogs if they have one. Article writing on topics that relate to your own work or blog is one good way. Social networking is a great way of bringing in traffic, if used effectively and you have substantially sized networks on them.

My 10 Steps book lists over twenty other ways of driving traffic, including writing for ezines, posting classifieds, podcasting and writing free press releases. Collaboration with others is an often overlooked way of getting traffic to each of your sites as well.’

Reader Question:

‘The number one area I could use help with is interconnecting my various accounts so that one post is distributed on multiple sites. What are the best ways to do this?’

RLC Answer:

‘This is a great way of saving time and multi-tasking, so that promotion doesn’t take up any more time than it needs to.

Ping.fm and Tweetdeck are two examples of platforms that allow you post to multiple online destinations, so that you spread the word of new posts etc quickly and efficiently. What ways work best for you will take a little experimentation, but the tools to do so are available.’

Reader Question:

‘I’m quite self-promotionally active online, but I need some suggestions on how to cut down on my time spent on the internet. What do you think I can do to cut down?’

RLC Answer:

‘Tackling time wasting is something I’m keen to address in all the self promotional methods I share and I think it is important to cut down as much time as possible spent on the computer as we go about promoting ourselves. This is why having at least a vague internet use schedule is important, as well as doing any work that doesn’t require a computer away from the computer!

I have written a post that discusses some ideas on saving time as we go about our daily business on the net.’

Reader Question:

‘The #1 question I have about promoting myself online, is what is the appropriate way to send your site to a targeted person, like a creative director at a company you are particularly interested in working at.

Is putting together a self-promotional mailer something that has gone by the wayside due to digital advancements or is it still considered a good idea?’

RLC Answer:

‘Marketing to specific people is something that is addressed in my various posts and in greater detail in my book. The key thing is to always build a relationship with someone before blatantly marketing to them.

This can happen in various ways, including in building rapport with them via email and engaging with people on social networks like Twitter. Once you have build rapport in this way, you can go ahead and share a little more about what you do.’

Reader Question:

‘I’m worried that my social media accounts on for example Facebook and LinkedIn aren’t properly optimized for promoting myself as best as they can so I was wondering where I can find out more about this?’

RLC Answer:

‘One of the things you need to be careful about is in the way you mix business with pleasure on any social media accounts you have. Make sure that any contacts you have on these platforms who are potential clients, for example, sees the professional brand side of you, as opposed to the party-animal side of you.

There are ways of making sites like Facebook an excellent self promotional platform, with security measures you can take to keep certain information from certain people, so that you maintain a professional image. I run through creating ideal social media accounts for self promotional purposes in the ebook.’

Reader Question:

‘The #1 area I need help with is finding the ‘best’ and most appropriate places online to promote my art/illustrations and my online store, in order to generate sales. And how can I avoid getting lost among the thousands of other new creatives trying to do the same thing?’

RLC Answer:

‘This will inevitably require a bit of research on your side, and it is best to always have your target market in mind when going out and promoting your sites/work on other sites. Always think about who exactly you want seeing your work, find them, and reveal your work to them (using non aggressive, relationship-building, marketing methods).

You can perhaps use online forums to not only market your work but in finding suggestions from others on which sites to use for promotion.’

Reader Question:

‘Should I work on getting my own website together before diving into promotion?’

RLC Answer:

‘I think it is crucial to have some sort of what I call a ‘base’ in place before promoting. A base is your personal site that showcases your work, that you will bring targeted people to. This does not need to be a complex site filled with loads of information, at least initially.

Stick to something professional-looking and contains at least a simple display of your work and your contact details before promoting it. Then you can add to it later. Ideally, your own site should have an element of uniqueness, including having its own domain name and of a style that reflects your brand in general, although this is not necessary to get started. As I said, something simple and professional is key before going out and marketing.’

Reader Question:

‘The area I need help with most with regards to online promotion would be my forthcoming book. My project is not entirely finished yet, but would need help in promoting it to as many people as possible. What’s the best way to promote a book?‘

RLC Answer:

‘The sales cycle that I address in the book applies to both marketing your services, but also in promoting your own products. Book promotion is something I am going through at this moment, and I can say that the internet has proven to be an extremely valuable tool in doing so.

The key thing is spend time adding contacts to your own network who are likely to buy the book or at least spread the word about it for you. You need to build relationships with these people and keep them interested. Once rapport and a solid relationship has been established with your target market you can start revealing the book to them.

This is where mailing lists and social networks can help, but there are also many other ways of building buzz. The other important aspect about promoting something like a book, especially if it requires your own expertise on something is in building your own credibility and respect amongst others before selling it. You can work on this through a blog and in sharing content and engaging through social media, forums, article writing, video-casting, and more.’

Thanks for the questions everyone!

Closer detail on all these issues are addressed in greater detail and clarity in my new ebook:

’10 Steps to Powerful Online Self Promotion for Creatives’.

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In response to this, more and more of us are making use of the web’s resources to win clients, making the internet a very crowded and competitive place. The advantage of securing work that once came with proximity to clients, is being lost to the global nature of the internet.

The winning element in successful online self promotion amongst all this is the human element of your brand, as you go about broadcasting it across the web.

By this, I mean giving others a chance to get familiar with who you are in the way you express yourself and reveal your positive human qualities. Keep in mind that you should work to highlight the positive elements of your personality, but there is no harm in revealing some of your flaws, if they don’t directly harm your ability to develop.

Obviously your talent, unique work and various skills will be the driving force behind a great deal of your success, but when it comes to promoting yourself on the net amongst all the rest and making a powerful connection with people, it is your human qualities that will make a big difference. If you can provide a potential client with a window to who you are as a human being, and not just an invisible entity behind a computer screen, you are a lot closer to sealing the deal.

The flip-side to having a crowded and competitive marketplace on the web, is that the internet has opened up many means to express this human element of your brand.

Here are some ways to do so, that will work to your favour in appealing to clients, prospects, colleagues and fans:

Social Networking

Use Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and more to show a little of who you are. Don’t be afraid to make new friends and invite others to your networks. Use tweets and status updates to express yourself and interact with people. Be careful however with revealing too much information, and hold back from sharing things you wouldn’t want colleagues or potential clients to see. You need to accept the internet’s transparency, and reputations can be lost in an instant, so keep things you wouldn’t want people to see off the web.

Blogging

Starting a blog or contributing to someone else’s is an excellent way to share your passions and interests and opinions. Dedication to a particular topic by writing regularly for a blog really demonstrates commitment and passion. Contributing to blog discussions through blog comments on yours and other blogs is a means to build rapport with other readers and establish yourself as a personality within the community.

Forums

Join in the discussions taking place on online forums, especially as these are places where prospects look to hire new people. The more of a human presence you build on certain forums or message boards, the more support you will receive, not to mention increased exposure.

Video and podcast sharing

Getting your face on a video or speaking regularly for a podcast series that can be shared online is an extremely effective way of delivering some personality to an audience.

Article Writing

Not only is contributing articles to various sites a great means to drive traffic to your work, it can be a handy way of sharing your opinion, your personality and your expertise with targeted readers.

So, give a thought to transmitting your human side as you go about promoting your brand on the internet.

Positive human self-expression will get you noticed and remembered.

What do you think?

A referral is when your services are advertised for you through word of mouth through other people. For example, someone might have stumbled on your online portfolio, seen the quality and the professionalism behind your work and told a friend they knew who subsequently hired you.

In the business world, 80% of companies get 70% of their business through word of mouth marketing (Vince Golder). If you provide a service, you are a business and you should view yourself as such and see the importance of referrals. The Internet has enabled word of mouth marketing to be more effective than ever before.

This is why you need to take referrals seriously and why you need to be referrals-oriented as you go about using the Internet.

Make sure you take into consideration the following if you would like to attract more people to refer your work:

1. Have a referral policy in place

This means actively making people aware that you are seeking referrals, publicizing this on your sites and email signatures, and let relevant people know at all opportunities. You might say that you will look for referrals for others in return for the referrals they can get for you.

You’ll be surprised how many people can find work for you, but who don’t because you don’t prompt them. You might even consider giving out awards to those who successfully provide referrals for you.

2. Have a unique selling point

Always be working on an image that sets you apart from the others and makes you memorable. This includes your own style, your website, what you know about and can provide expertise on, even the way you interact with others. Being memorable in this way will attract more referrals.

3. Act as a referrer for others

Going out and finding clients and work for others tends to bring with it good karma in the form of referrals back to you. You’ll find most people will try to reciprocate in finding referrals for you if they know you have helped them initially.

In my view, this is one of the best ways to get work. As Saint Francis of Assisi said: ‘For it is in giving that we receive‘.

4. Be professional

Transmit a professional attitude when coming into proximity with people who are potential referral-givers, especially the clients you work with. Clients who leave with a positive feeling with having worked with someone who acts honestly, maturely, effectively and politely are more likely to refer you.

If you over-deliver on being professional in this way you stand a chance of being memorable, and thus more likely to win a referral.

5. Make your work viral

The Internet has made it possible for news of the services or the work of creatives to spread very quickly. Make sure you provide the means for this to happen by linking up the work you showcase on the web to social media, and introducing your work to places that provide for interaction. These include online forums, discussion boards, blogs, and creative communities like Flickr, last.fm and Deviant Art.

By allowing word to spread of the work you do, you are fueling the potential for referrals to come back to you.

6. Work for a target market

By creating work that appeals to a particular market, as opposed to trying to win over everyone, you’re potential referrers are more likely to understand for themselves who it is they can refer to you.

I believe the main problem restricting getting more referrals is that people don’t know who you want as a client. Make sure you transmit an idea of who your ideal client is. You can even put this in writing on your site or when you ask for referrals.

What do people think? Am I giving people some ideas?

Every once in a while, I will get a discussion going on the RLC Facebook Page that aims to bring together a collection of Internet resources, ideas and methods real people have found useful for their own self-promotional efforts.

This post focuses on a handful of sites that enable you to showcase your work, while having all kinds of other benefits too.

The comments area at the end of this post aims to extend the discussion further, so don’t hesitate to send through some feedback. It’s great karma for you!

Society 6

A site for artists and creatives to promote their work, connect and interact with others. I like the layout and clean design of the site. I’m also a fan of the voting system, which allows people’s work to be bumped up to the front page if it is popular. Some good exposure is afforded shortly after submitting work to the site, and you can sell prints through here as well. Society6.com

Behance

The site provides a single point of contact for anyone involved in creative industries. The site is for photographers, illustrators and designers. The site is beautifully designed, with some great opportunities to share links, showcase your work, notify people of your working status, look at all kinds of stats, and interact with others. The site can even be used as your default portfolio page. Behance.net

Pinkmuse

Pinkmuse is a service for artists to present work, browse galleries, message, critique, buy, sell, and search art by specific criteria such as artist name, school, city, medium, colour, mood, genre, material, dimension and price. Pinkmuse.com

Carbonmade

Containing close to 160,000 portfolios, Carbonmade is a crowded online space, but is one of the main hubs of creativity on the web. This provides an excellent opportunity for further self promotion across all creative disciplines. Carbonmade.com

Artwanted

As recommended by illustrator Jade Boylan: ‘You get a great portfolio set up and fantastic page and visitor stats right down to individual image hits and artwork comments‘. Artwanted.com

Creative Shake

Artist Dave Hile has had good results from this site. ‘In the last 2 years it has generated around $30,000 and costs about $450 per year (it might be $600 the first year). That’s a good return on investment. I haven’t gotten a lot of jobs from it, but the jobs I did get were large ones’. The site is for all kinds of creatives willing to showcase their porfolios for a price. Creativeshake.com

FormFiftyFive

A site that scours the web for the best in photography and design work. Also a great place for network building, setting up collaborations, interaction and inspiration. Formfiftyfive.com

Everycreative

A really nice online resource to enable further networking, collaborating and pitching for designers and other creatives. You can also use the site in finding work experience and gaining valuable feedback and advice from established industry workers. This is a great one. Everycreative.com

Of course, you don’t need to sign up to all of these, but perhaps have a look through some of the sites here you haven’t heard of, try them out, and see if they mould to your own style of work, and fit in with your own self promotion strategy.