Project FED Nigeria

  The biggest mistake most people make when selling products is that their service ends when the check clears the bank or the product is delivered. They don't follow up with their buyer to see how things went. They don't ask if they need anything else or if there is anything they can improve. And, because of this, they lose out on bigger sales that could have been made with a little follow-up. Service Makes a Difference In 2015, I was working for a custom card printing company. They had corporations that would literally spend thousands on orders for cards that they were going to send out to their customers. When I first started working at the company, it was a little slow in the mornings. Things would heat up, though, by the end of the day. I spent each morning going through my accounts, checking to see which had shipped and which had delivered. When customer orders were delivered, I would send them a brief email asking them how the product turned out. Was it to their satisfact...

Today I promised that I would be providing you with some extra special freebies, and so I am. Way back on the first Friday Freebies, I gave you a list of the first five tools you needed to start making money online. On that list was Blogger , Google’s free blogging platform. I explained that the reason I recommended it was because Google owns it and will promote your blog above other blogs if you use it. However, I didn’t give you any tools or tips to help you start taking advantage of that blog. Introducing the Better Blog Toolkit That’s what today’s post is going to do. I’m going to give you 5 free tools to help you get your blog going and write blog posts that people will enjoy reading. 1.       The 8 Question Blog Outline This is an 8-question format that I use to put together my blogs. I also use it to write full-length novels and non-fiction books.  It’s designed to lead your reader through the “hero’s journey” from needing a solution to fi...

There have been many shifts at Project FED, all for the betterment, but not all of those shifts came where I expected them. Celebrating a Personal Success Last week, I landed a brand-new client that will, if all goes well, pay significantly better than the client I lost. That means that I have less time to devote to Project FED but no less commitment to seeing the project succeed. These additional funds will allow me to hire someone to help keep things going with my direction. I won’t see the pay for some time yet, but at least it is on the horizon. Celebrating Our Supporters Last week, I introduced Father Lucas , who is our Chief Operations Officer. The week before I introduced Rita Larrivee , our Chief Financial Officer. This week, I want to introduce our Chief Executive Officer, the Lord God Almighty, Christ Jesus. Without Him, I would definitely not have the energy or the resourcefulness to do what I’ve been doing. I’ve blogged about how He taught me to “ Say it with SA...

On Marketing Monday , I talked about the importance of listening to your audience. Today, I’m going to talk about the importance of listening to experts in your industry. The Fastest Way To Get Somewhere: Let Someone Who’s Been There Guide You If you were in Texas and you’d never been to New York, it would be insane to hop in the car and just start driving. You’d likely get lost along the way. You might know it was East, but you don’t know how far East you need to go or what the turns are on the interstate that you need to make to get there. Trying to start a business and run it without consulting experts who have built the kind of business you want to build is just like that. You don’t want to do it without consulting those who have been there or you’re more likely to fail than you are to succeed. The Secret to Building Lasting Wealth: Seek Wisdom Seek the wisdom of those who know how to get where you want to be in life. Learn from their experiences so you don’t have to make...

Once, years ago, I took a job for $14 an hour. It seemed like good pay compared to the jobs closer to my home. I thought I was getting a good deal. But there were costs to this opportunity that I wasn’t evaluating which – in the long run – actually meant I was being paid less than minimum wage for that job. How can this be? Let me show you how to calculate that in real numbers. Opportunity Costs Are Something Businesses Looks At Before Investing Most big businesses know about opportunity costs . It's something they use to evaluate whether or not to invest in one opportunity over another. They don't teach employees this same skill. It's not to their advantage to do so. But it is something I feel strongly every person should know how to do for themselves. Time: How Much Time I Was Spending at the Job and Commuting. The job was a typical 8 hour a day job with an hour lunch. However, I didn’t have a car. So, that meant I was stuck at work during that hour. I only lived 30...

During Strategy Sunday , I talked about the lessons I learned from God just by listening. Listening to music, listening to His word, listening to the priest during the homily at Mass. Today, I’m going to discuss why listening to your audience is the most critical part of developing your marketing strategy. You Only Have One Perspective to Offer You know the reasons why you give gifts and what you hope to get from that exchange, but until you start actively listening to the audience you want to reach, you won’t know if this is common to everyone you are trying to reach or whether it is unique to you. You will miss out on important information that they could be sharing with you about how you need to position your products to win them with your marketing. You also won’t be able to borrow their exact language or make them feel like you are talking directly to them. 5 Ways To Begin Listening To Your Audience While I mentioned joining groups of the kind of people you want to targe...

Yesterday afternoon, I was exhausted. All week I'd been working with my new agency client to get acclimated to the two accounts I would be handling for him, putting together blog posts and new designs for Project FED, helping someone else coordinate an event, helping yet another person with the edits to a manuscript that we're co-writing, and working on a web design project so that the rent could get paid on time (it did). I'd done so much work that day, and I still had a lot that didn't even get touched. I was discouraged. I was feeling frustrated with my inability to get everything done that I wanted to do. I sat down to pray and I asked God for a new strategy. One that would ensure I got everything done without draining my batteries so completely. To my surprise, God didn't drop a strategy into my lap. He just told me to get up and go listen to some music. This isn't something I normally do. I usually work in the quiet so that I can focus and concentrate. I d...

Selling on social media platforms like Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Reddit, and Instagram happens everyday. People go there and buy products. But it’s important to remember that buying products isn’t the reason they go there. They go there to be social. That’s why it takes a different approach to be successful when selling on social media. Here are 5 tips to help you do it. 1.       Understand the Purpose of the Platform What is the platform’s purpose? Why does it exist? The purpose of the platform changes not only the type of audience you can expect to find there but what they will expect in terms of social interactions. You need a very different strategy on LinkedIn than you do on Facebook or Pinterest. 2.       Be Social, Not Salesy Direct sales tactics DO NOT WORK on social media sites because this isn’t a one-to-one conversation. It’s a one-to-many conversation. Imagine some guy coming to a pool party...

It’s Friday, and you know what that means: time for our favorite freebies. Last week, we pointed you in the direction of the five first tools you need. If you followed that blog post, you should have your brand new gmail account, your Zazzle affiliate link, your blog set up and ready for you, your Pinterest account, and a brand new Hubspot account waiting to be used. This week, we’re focusing on giving you the best training we could find to help you make the most out of all that work you did last week getting everything set up. After all, when you succeed in making money, it’s because Project FED is succeeding, too. 1.       Hubspot’s Social Media Marketing Certification Course https://academy.hubspot.com/courses/social-media Hubspot is a recognized in social media marketing circles, so a certification course from them will carry some weight if you can add it to your resume. Pair that with having been able to successfully build an affiliate account that s...

 It’s time for Thanksgiving Thursday where we pause a moment to recognize our progress and celebrate our successes and our supporters. We officially started Project FED 16 days ago, and while our website is still a work in progress we have a lot of reasons to celebrate. Celebrating A Sustained Success Despite it being two weeks since we last posted a video on YouTube , something I definitely need to correct, I am proud that we have maintained page 1 ranking for Google using the keywords Project Fed Nigeria. I believe this is due to the name of our YouTube Channel being Project FED Nigeria. I am going to test a few things out to see whether I am right about that, but if that is the case it is extremely helpful information to know as it will help us moving forward. Celebrating Support Last week, I honored our Chief Financial Officer , Rita Larrivee. While we don’t yet have any finances to manage, just knowing that she is ready to step up and handle the task when the time ...

One of the most important skills that someone who desires to build wealth must learn is how to distinguish between an expense and investment. The super-wealthy don’t spend money on expenses. Even when it looks like they are spending frivolously, they are investing in making themselves more money. An Expense An expense is something you spend money on that will not grow your bank account. It is a purchase that may be a necessity or it feels good in the moment but ultimately is not going to profit you. If you spend $600 on a purse, and you are spending it because you want to impress people, that’s an expense. It’s not going to make you money. It’s not going to help you get closer to your goals. It’s not even going to impress the people you want to impress. Buying a t-shirt or a purse or a pair of shoes that promotes someone else’s brand or carries their logo is an expense. The only thing it’s going to do is add dollars to their wallet, not yours. Truly wealthy people do not buy things to ...

“Teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” – Psalm 90:12 Last week, I introduced Time Management Tuesday , a time where I talk about how to make sure you are getting the most out of the time you are going to spend in this life. Today, I’m going to dive into the very first and most important step to take on this journey of getting control over the way you use your time. Get Clear About What Matters…and What Doesn’t “Begin with the End in Mind” – Stephen Covey I was 26 years old when I heard a voice tell me, as clearly as if someone had been standing beside me, “5 years. Make them count.” I knew in my heart I was being told that I had five years to get my life in order. I went home that day and took the list of 100 things that I’d wanted to do before I died and I tore it up and threw it away. Suddenly, none of those things mattered to me. I sat down on the bed and wrote a list of five things that actually mattered. I found out that day what my five big...

Last Marketing Monday, we covered the  basics of marketing . The first part of that is meeting your audience. Saturday’s Sales and Systems post discussed understanding why people buy and how to identify the kind of  needs that drive people to buy  from a site like Zazzle in the first place. Today, we are going to cover the steps to take in order to take what you’ve learned, identify a specific audience that you are ideally suited to serve, and the steps you need to take in order to connect with them and begin serving them. Identifying Your Specific Audience On Saturday, I mentioned that people who buy from Zazzle fall into one of three categories: People who are looking to stand out from the crowd and feel more significant, people who want to feel like they belong to a team or a family, and people who want to connect with someone else on a more personal level. The key to identifying a specific audience that you can serve is to think back to a time in your life when you wa...

  Every Successful Person Seeks Mentors I spent from the age of 4 until the age of 36 trying, and failing, to start businesses. I didn’t have mentors. I didn’t seek them out.  I did read books, but while books are good, nothing beats a mentor who has been where it is that you are trying to go multiple times over and knows where the pitfalls are and what challenges lie ahead. Mentors can also help you check your blind spots. We all have them. These are areas of our life or our behavior that we don’t see the way that other people do.  Just as we use a mirror to examine our back because our head can’t turn around far enough to give us a clear view of it, a mentor is there to act as a mirror and help us examine the areas of our life that we can’t see on our own. This is why every successful sports team has a coach. Think of mentors as coaches who are there to help you avoid the obstacles and get past the roadblocks on your journey to success. If you're going to succeed at mak...

On Sunday, I announced our strategy to help people make money by sharing the products we sell which support orphans in Nigeria . On Monday, I offered the basics of marketing . On Wednesday, I talked about the importance of building multiple streams of income in order to gain wealth and how sharing products for Project FED can be one of those streams. On Friday, I shared the 5 free tools that you need to get started , and today I'm going to start the training in sales that will help you make the most of what we have to offer. Before we talk about sales, it’s important to understand why people buy anything. Then, you can start to figure out how to get them to buy from you. Needs Drive Behavior All of human behavior is driven by our internal needs. When we need food, we are driven to eat. When we need water, we are driven to drink. When we are cold or wet or hot, we are driven to seek shelter. When we need to recharge our batteries, we are driven to sleep. Aside from the obviou...

On Monday, I talked about the Basics of Marketing . Today, I'm going to demonstrate that it does NOT "take money to make money" by letting you in on the first five tools you need to get started. These are completely free and will help you start making money online supporting orphans in Nigeria today with Project FED. 1.       Get a Free EMAIL address from Google Zazzle, Pinterest, and Hubspot – which we will talk about later - allow you to use your Google email address to register. That means all of the accounts you need to run your business can be managed with one email sign in, so that creates added convenience. If you already have a personal Gmail, that’s great, but DO NOT USE IT FOR YOUR BUSINESS . Create a new email just for this business. Keeping your business totally separate from your personal accounts will make your life so much easier when you start making money and you have to worry about taxes, income reporting, and other issues. 2.  ...