Play to Your Strengths and Delegate the Rest

Many professional and personal development plans focus mainly on building acumen in areas where we either are deficient or are not truly interested in.  That strategy can often lead to spinning wheels and not really improving your performance. Consider the professional athlete.  Michael Phelps does not try to win gold medals in every sport at the Summer Olympics.  He concentrates his time and energy towards the area where he has natural ability and the greatest chance of being successful. It may seem counter intuitive, but you often may get better results by playing to your strengths and delegating the rest.

Everyone has a natural aptitude in some area.  It could be math, writing, artistic endeavors, or any number of things that come up in the work place and during leisure time.  Often we don't know where our true passions and talents lie.  A major clue is to watch for signs of excitement when you are engaged in an activity.  If calling customers or interacting with your employees makes you feel energized and fulfilled, that is a great sign that people skills are something you are naturally good at.  Start making a list of things that are easy for you, things that make time fly for you, things that make you smile, and things that are interesting for you.  This is a great starting point for finding your strengths.

There are some other tools that can help you determine what your natural strengths are.  Multiple Intelligences has an on-line assessment tool that can help you find the areas where you have a natural tendency for excellence. A great book that helps focus your energies on strengths is Now Discover Your Strengths by Donald Clifton.  Several years ago, I used this book to hone my idea of where my talents were and where I could make the most use of them.  The lessons I learned after taking the assessments and reflecting on the results have enabled me to make a move to a new career and business.

We all know that your day is not only full of things you like to do.  There are still necessary things that have to be done in order for a business to run smoothly.  You can take advantage of services such as Administrative Business Consulting in order to remove those items from your day and keep you focused on your favorite things.  Outsourcing your administrative tasks can put more time in your day to focus on building those strengths in to an unstoppable force for good in your business.

No matter how hard you work on areas where you do not have a natural aptitude, you probably will never get beyond average in your performance.  However, by working on building your natural talents will allow you to reach higher and higher levels of achievement and success.  You will find your professional and personal life to be more rewarding and satisfying in the long run.

Tips for Better PowerPoint or Google Presentations

A successful presentation is often reliant upon having an effective visual aid, such as a PowerPoint or Google Presentations. If the slides are too wordy or uninteresting, you run the risk of losing the attention of your audience. Here are some simple tips to keep in mind while building your presentations.

Write your script before creating your presentation. This will help you keep track of your main points and figure out how best to show that in a visual way. As with any good speech; make sure there is a beginning, a middle, and an end. Laying it out as an outline can help you come up with the bullet points you will use on your slides. You want your audience to appreciate each slide and be anxiously awaiting the next one.

The screen should show only the point you're currently making. The audience will ready every slide as it is displayed, they will read ahead and not pay attention to you if the next three points are showing. Structure your presentation so that bullet points are revealed one at a time as you reach them. If you have charts or videos to emphasize a point, put them in a separate slide so they command full attention. Remember that your role as the presenter is to control the flow of information so the audience can feel the full impact of your points.

Remember that the presentation is not meant to be a stand-alone document, not every word you want to say has to be included on the slide. You will end up with large blocks of text that will be difficult for the audience to read and follow. Having your whole presentation script on the slide also tends to cause the speaker to turn his or her back to the audience and read, which is both rude and boring (the exact opposite of effective!). The slides should illustrate your presentation and reinforce your points. The paragraphs should be kept to the speaker's notes area that the audience does not see.

Presentation software has many options for adding visual flashes to your slides including things like fades, swipes, and flashing texts. Avoid the temptation to add these items in for the sake of themselves and instead concentrate on simple design basics to make impact.

• For the body and text use easily read fonts such as Arial, Helvetica, or Calibri.
• Only use decorative fonts (calligraphy, art nouveau, etc.) for slide headers.
• Put dark text on light background or light text on dark background.
• Align text either left or right.
• Avoid clutter on your slides.

There are many pre-formatted designs available in presentation software, and they can provide a good design starting point. You can also send your scrip to support service providers like Administrative Business Consulting and they can create an effective presentation for your information.

With these few easy tips, you can create a presentation that wows the audience and lands that sale.

Getting the Most Out of Your Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing has been the hot topic for small business owners and large corporations alike for the past few years. The rapid growth of facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and other platforms has opened the door to potential customers and lured many to the uncharted waters of using social media to build business. But how to make use of these opportunities can be the hardest question to answer. According to Sonia Simone of copyblogger.com, there are 7 essential elements to make your social media marketing for effective.

     1.  Get your website or blog set up - Your home page is where you control the user's experience and where your authority in your field comes through. Build a site full of high quality content that has a clean design and a professional appearance. This is where customers will go to get tips and more information about you and your business.

     

     2.  Establish a human face for your business - You need a human face to make your social media marketing plan work. While you want the content of your posts to be friendly and inviting, you do not need to share everything about the "real" you on your business accounts. Keep your updates to authentic subjects that relate back to your core mission as a business and be sure and consider your audience before hitting that final post button.

     3.  Combine efforts with other businesses that appeal to your customers - A big part of social media is getting people with like interests together to share ideas and thoughts. You can seek out established bloggers and posters to share your content with. Building on and promoting their content could help you cultivate important professional relationships and win new customers.

     4.  Pick a primary platform to use - Your customer base and product will drive this choice, and it may not be the one you personally enjoy using the most. If you are selling a service or product that has an easily visualized end result, Pinterest might be a fantastic choice for you. But if most of your customers are active on facebook, your initial efforts should center on that platform. Once you've masted one, then move on to others. Don't overwhelm yourself at the beginning.

     5.  Manage your time - Decide up front how much time you want to devote to social media, otherwise you may be seduced in to wasting your productivity constantly checking and rechecking your platforms. Remember element 1, your home page, and that this is where the majority of your time and effort should go. You can contract with support specialists like Administrative Business Consulting to manage your social media program. They will create a set number of monthly posts on a contract basis and take this task off your plate.

     6.  Put Content first and conversations second - While social media provides a way to have on-going conversations with customers and potential customers, but you can end up spending hours a day chatting with no real productivity. It is important to keep an ear on what customers are saying, but if it feels like goofing off it probably is. Spend the majority of your time on content with value.

     7.  Don't forget about your Search Engine Optimization - Social media marketing is a complement to search engine optimization, not a replacement for it.