Social Media and Your Business

Social media is, well, everywhere.  For those of us over 30 (ok, me) who felt like we pretty much knew what was going on with the Internet, the meteoric rise of social media came kind of out of left field.  (Why is my 21 year old babysitter teaching me about My Space?)  It was kind of embarrassing.  But once you get over the initial suspicion that it’s just a lot of hype, you start to see what, concretely, it can do for your business and career.  (Not to mention the ability to keep up w/ legions of friends on FB who are all out doing really exciting things as you sit at home watching Project Runway while your kids sleep.  Actually that’s the downside of social media.)

Anyway, there are a million articles every day about how to harness social media for your business, but here’s a really good primer on specific tools that can help small business owners like you:  http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/the-world/article/the-5-social-media-tools-small-businesses-need-right-now-amber-macarthur.

And for all you RDs out there wondering how to use social media (notice I didn’t say ‘if’) for your business, Skelly Publishing just launched a new CPE program on social media and the RD.  It was written by Jenny Westerkamp and RD who, for those of you who don’t know, launched All Access Internships with Katie Hamm (a dietetic intern), primarily marketed via Facebook.  It’s also filled with tips and ideas from other RDs who have used social media successfully.  It’s a great read that’ll leave you with lots of new ideas and tools to start using social media to your advantage!

Using a ‘blog business card’ to get new clients

As a relatively (ok, extremely) new blogger, I love digging through info to make my blog better.  I stumbled across this excellent blog post and immediately saw the applications for RDs and CDEs in private practice.  It’s a great way to showcase your expertise and stay top-of-mind to anyone you meet, minus the so-last-millenium business card.  The Skelly Publishing blog will soon be taking its own advice–stay tuned!

Where’s your Website?

A recent study by Ad-ology had some head-spinning statistics: only 46% of small business owners had a website!  Does anyone find this as shocking as I do?  Since I started Skelly Publishing, I’ve made it my mission to bring all RDs online.  Seeing a statistic like this makes me sad, because it’s so crucial to have a website–even if you’re just trying to get more writing, media or speaking gigs, and don’t have a ‘business’ per se.  Here are my top 3 reasons why every RD and CDE needs a website:

1. It’s effective: created well and promoted effectively using SEO, websites are the #1 most effective way small businesses can compete w/ huge, better-capitalized brands.  Don’t take it from me: this is what a recent survey of small business owners said.

2. It’s international: with the advent of telehealth, RDs and CDEs can now provide coaching and education to clients and groups all over the world.  The starting point?  your website.

3. it’s cheap!  As part of our Web Skills continuing education program revamp, I tested a number of off-the-shelf website builders.  For $4.99 a month, you can create a professional looking website from Homestead (Intuit).  How can you possibly justify NOT having one?

You can read the post about this study from the Entrepreneur Daily Dose blog–it’s got even more reasons you should get your website 1) up and 2) optimized to bring more clients in your door.  (My favorite quote from the post:  “In the Discover study, 46 percent of respondents said it’s a myth that every company needs a website.And they’re right–companies that don’t want to be successful certainly shouldn’t spend the time and money to develop a company site. So every company doesn’t need one.”

Funny–and so true.

Your Resolution: Getting More Clients!

So many RDs are in private practice, either part- or full-time.  It can be a frustrating thing to try to build a business when most RDs don’t have any formal training or experience in marketing or entrepreneurship.    One of the most important business-building tactics an RD can use is to increase the referrals she gets from other healthcare providers, especially MDs.  But what’s the best way to do that?

My entrepreneurial colleagues discuss at length the various tactics they use to bring clients in the door, most of which involve significant time and money, with inconsistent or suboptimal results.  That’s why I love finding resources that make dietitians and CDEs more efficient and effective at business-building, without tapping into their limited financial resources.   Jessica Setnick, a private practice RD in Texas, has created a great webinar that shows you EXACTLY how to vastly expand your referrals–for FREE and without even leaving the house!  Skelly Publishing is now offering her webinar for 1.5 CPEs, and I’m telling you, every RD in private practice should listen to this webinar.  She even provides downloadable SCRIPTS and forms you can use when you contact an MD, even one you don’t know, and she divulges secrets she’s used to create a thriving private practice for herself.  But don’t take it from me, read some of the testimonials from private practice RDs who have listened to the webinar.

Check it out, if it sounds interesting.  And if you’re looking for other ways to get business-building ideas, here are a few:

–Join Nutrition Entrepreneurs–a Dietetic Practice Group of the ADA.  Definitely the most valuable $20 I spend every year, hands down.

–Join the Registered Dietitian Business Owners group on LinkedIn–it’s a great resource of dynamic professionals.

Self-Promotion and the RD

There’s quite a heated debate on the NE (Nutrition Entrepreneurs) listserv right now about self-promotion.  Quite simply, the question is whether listserv members should be able to promote their products/services in emails to the listserv.  We ran a survey (I’m on the Executive Board of NE) and the results were pretty clear cut in favor of allowing some degree of self-promotion as long as it’s an appropriate response–or at least related–to a question being posed by another listserv member.

RDs not feeling comfortable communicating their achievements, skills, and businesses has always been a big sticking point with me, and (as you may know) is a key reason I started Skelly Publishing.  But the recent NE listserv debate has me wondering: what constitutes effective self-promotion?  And what is it about self-promotion that turns off a certain segment of RDs on the NE listserv?

To help solve this question, I’ve tried to reframe it so that it’s not about the RD doing the self-promoting, but rather about the consumer–the one hearing the message.   I think the answer to this lies in the answer to the following question: Does the consumer feel used?

Here are two examples, pulled from the recent listserv debate:

Example 1:

–someone posts an email asking for info on wt mgt programs for kids.

–an RD who owns and licenses a wt mgt program responds and offers her program

According to strictly-interpreted listserv guidelines, this is inappropriate self-promotion.  But, does the consumer feel used?  No, because she’s looking for a wt mgt program for kids!  And, since listserv guidelines state that you should reply to the entire listserv unless the query asks for private responses only, posting this response to the listserv is entirely appropriate.

Example 2:

–Someone sends an email looking for a source to help her incorporate her business.

–An RD who has published a book on getting started in business provides some info about incorporating and then promotes her book so the RD can get ‘other business-related skills’

In this instance, I would say the consumer does feel used.  The point of her post was to get specific sources for incorporation.  If she additionally wanted to obtain business skills, she would have asked for that.

Case in point: I’m sitting in the lounge of my gym right now (my office away from my home office) and there’s a guy I met here who started chatting me up a few months ago.  Turns out he sells an online fitness program and was trying to get me to sell it under him (not sure but sounds a bit pyramidal).  In the course of this, he asked for my cell phone number, saying ‘we need to get you and your husband down to my restaurant (yes, he also owns a restaurant in my town), for a free steak dinner.’  I wasn’t thrilled about giving out my cell phone, but at my gym (it’s more like a club) it’s really not cool to seem unfriendly.  Sure enough, I started getting endless texts from him (text blasts) inviting me to see this band they were having, or some other event.  No free steak dinner, though .  As you can imagine, when I see this guy, I literally run in the other direction.  He’s relentless about pushing his agenda.  Result?  I feel used.

I give this example because I think some RDs overcompensate for what they perceive as a ‘shrinking violet’ issue in our profession by being overly promotional and salesy.  What they don’t realize is that their consumer feels used. I think they mistakenly believe that in the business world, people are promoting themselves in this way all the time, so it’s ok.  The truth is that in the business world, people do promote themselves, but by stepping up and claiming what’s theirs, not by annoying people with endless–ineffective, by the way–salesy tactics.

I also think many RDs believe ‘everyone knows how to promote themselves but us.’ By giving this example, I want to show that–although others may feel more comfortable being salesy–it doesn’t mean it works! In fact, it’s a detriment: had this guy simply been friendly and conversational, I probably would have patronized his restaurant because I thought he was a nice guy.  But you can imagine I’m never stepping foot in there now (unless it’s a really good free steak).

It’s a major problem, because RDs risk turning off potential clients by either being too timid, or overly blowhard.  What’s hte happy medium? Given my background in marketing, I would suggest asking these two questions before I open my mouth:  How do I uncover the needs my consumer has, and–once I’ve done that–what products/services/knowledge do I have that will help meet those needs?   If I don’t have any products/services/knowledge to meet those needs, then perhaps I should continue asking questions and getting to know my consumer, rather than relentlessly plugging myself or my product.

And since I know you’re reading this because you’re interested in self-promotion (hey, it was in the title), Skelly Publishing offers a free 1-CPE webinar on effective self-promotion with RD career coach Jean Caton.  Check it out (if you don’t feel used).

Our New Year’s Resolution.

Happy New Year everyone.  Last night we had some friends over for dinner and we got to talking about happiness.  Not to get too existential on you (esp if you’re nursing a bit of a hangover) but it’s something I think about a lot.  Namely, what is it that leads to happiness?  I confess that this became more poignant for me when I lived in NYC (previously I lived in DC for many years, then relocated to NYC for 8 years and finally, to the LA area a couple years ago).  When I lived in NYC, I was struck by the number of people who were extremely well-educated, financially and professionally successful (by any definition of the word), with lots of friends and seemingly the perfect life, who were, well, unhappy.  At first I was shocked, then just sad.  I may not be many things, but I do know how to be happy.  (Although being around lots of unhappy people all the time can get kind of depressing.) And, really, with all the money and status in the world, if you’re not happy, what good is it?

(I promise I’m getting to my point.)   I talked in a previous post about how Skelly Publishing is all about empowerment.  To me, empowerment is a key generator of happiness, because it leaves you with a sense of control over your destiny.   To feel powerless is not a happy feeling, as we all know.  Over the years, I’ve spent a lot of time talking to dietitians and other health care professionals, and they’ve poured out their frustrations with their jobs, incomes, opportunities, and the frustrations with the health care industry in general.   Which led me to try to distill the things I think dietitians and other health care professionals need to be happy–at least professionally: 1) a sense of making a difference–a real difference–in a patient’s or client’s health and well-being, 2) feeling respected and appreciated for the skills we have and what we bring to the table and 3) appropriate compensation, and the ability to continue to be fairly compensated as skills and responsibilities increase.

It’s pretty simple.  But it’s not happening.  I talk to a lot of RDs who are missing one or more of the above, and it shows.  If you are an RD and are reading this, you know that, by and large, RDs are about the nicest and most positive people you’ll ever meet.  I absolutely love working with them.  But it makes me sad to see them struggling with jobs and careers that aren’t working as well as they could.  They tend to put on a happy face, and soldier forward, but they deserve more.

Back to the point of my post: last night got me thinking about Skelly Publishing’s New Year’s resolution, and here it is: we promise to continue creating CPE opportunities that help you achieve the three things listed above–that will help make you professionally happy and fulfilled.   It’s something we try to keep top of mind when we develop CPE programs–that is, will they meaningfully enhance PRACTICAL skills that RDs can use right away?  Will they increase job and career satisfaction?  Will they leave RDs empowered to pursue the opportunities and compensation they deserve, and that move the profession forward?  We really hope so…because if not, what’s the point in providing CPEs at all?

This isn’t a sales pitch.  There are lots of great CPE providers out there, and if you get your continuing education from them, and it helps your practice, that’s all I care about.  But respect yourself, and your needs.  Figure out how to achieve professional happiness–however you define it–and don’t settle for less.  You deserve it.