Welcome back!

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A complimentary pair of earrings for all online and phone orders of $50 by just mentioning “Cindy Tonkin” in the comments field when you’re ordering. Find out more at www.CreativelyBelle.com or phone 0414 502 887

 

January has been a month filled with DVDs, movies, books (story, story, story) and art works for me.

Perhaps you, like me, are thinking we all need to do more of what we love. While I do enjoy working with my clients, I'm thinking about a "long service" leave for myself - where I do client work, but little of the other business proactive stuff I'm always busy with for the next 3 months or so. Who knows how that will turn out?

Of course some things continue: Ludic Creative has our first 2007 Story telling workshop on Sun Mar 11 2007 in North Sydney, and we're also gearing up for Life is not a rehearsal workshop on Sat April 14th 07.

It would be a pleasure to share an afternoon with you, and play and learn, so here's a special ezine readers offer: The courses are usually $150 each. You can bring a friend for free (i.e. 2 for $150); if you enroll in both seminars you'll get 2 seminars for you and a friend or colleague for $200 (that’s a reduction of $400, or about 60%). To take advantage of this offer, just enrol here, and put "ezine" in the discount code section.

And if you're into jewelry, or need a gift for someone, here's another offer: a complimentary pair of earrings for all online and phone orders of $50 by just mentioning “Cindy Tonkin” in the comments field when you’re ordering. Find out more at www.CreativelyBelle.com or phone 0414 502 887. Belinda Stinson designs the jewelry and is a subscriber to this ezine (and a colleague from way back!)

Enjoy 07.

Cindy

In this month's ezine we have:

• Improving your consultancy: marketing through freebies (and a gift for you), getting a name for yourself, resolving for the New Year and getting media attention
• Managing better: Starting the day off well counts, learn from the Beatles
• Fascinating: find out how rich you are in the grand scheme of things, some works by Escher
• Fun: See some impro in Sydney

Your Consulting
business

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Download your copy of Ten more ways to promote your consulting business till end Feb.

 

 

 

Marketing by giving it away?

in December I updated my Ten more ways to promote your consulting business as a precursor to putting it on Google Books. It includes some tips on writing ebooks.

Then I came across this article where a science fiction novelist gives away ebooks of his work for nothing. He claims it has increased his sales of the actual book, increased his profile and given him opportunities to speak and write (what we'd call "consulting") that would never have happened otherwise.

So I'm wondering if that model can apply to consultancy as well. In my Consultants' Consultant role I'm very much aware that the major market is new consultants. Once people are established they don't often look for ways to innovate - they concentrate more on the business of getting business and delivering to clients. So I'm going to try it and see what happens.

Please download your copy of my book Ten (more) ways to promote your consulting business here. I will leave this up for February, and then remove the link, so download it now. If you would like to buy the hard copy of the book (or some coaching by phone or in person), then go to my online shop.

Amazon brings business too

Another Management Consultant is making money writing book reviews for Amazon. He's gotten so famous people ask him to review 40 books a day, invite him to dinner and to play golf in exclusive places.

He's made $20,000 USD in the past few years - not a lot of money (and he donated it to Habitat for Humanity), but it's a hobby, and it has certainly increased his availability rating (see Consulting Mastery for more info on what that means). He's just been doing more of what he loves. What do you love?

If you're still resolving...

If you're still resolving for the New Year, consider, at David Maister's suggestion, replacing resolutions with gratitude.

And if the resolutions are around getting more media attention read this article from the Raintoday people.

Managing better

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Begin as you intend to continue

Interesting research from Wharton School of Business. A study in a Call Centre showed that the mood people bring to work affects their mood all day more than anything that happens with customers.

They suggest that this could be because people are trained to deal with negativity from customers, but not trained to deal with problems in traffic jams or late trains. (And I'd be wondering about the other "at home" issues like kids and spouses and flatmates). Gives a bit of a twist to the idea of holistic work practices.

Another interesting conclusion was that people in happier moods were only more productive because they tended to take fewer breaks. They didn't put any more calls through to the manager, nor handle a significantly greater number of calls.

I'd be interested to see how this rings true (or not) with your own clients or staff?

The Beatles - what you can learn

And check out the lessons you can learn from the Beatles as a team and a brand.

Fascinating

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How Rich are you

Go to the global rich list, and enter your annual salary (in pounds, US Dollars, Euro and a few other currencies, but not Australian). The site will tell you where you sit within the context of world incomes. I was surprised, and perhaps you will be too.

Escher - not just complex mathematical pix!

I found this online gallery of M.C. Escher's artwork. There is a great photo on the home page which gave me some insight into where those famous stair pictures came from. There are also some beautiful etchings in the gallery!

And Fun, fun, fun

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And impro, of course

Scared Scriptless' Theatresports® is back for 2007 at the Clarence Hotel, Petersham (in Sydney) every Friday till the end of December. Doors open 7:30, show starts at 8. Drinks at pub prices, food available. I'm often in the show! Love to see you there.

I would be interested to hear from you if any of these ideas spark something good for you and yours!

C

Cindy Tonkin The Consultants’ Consultant
Certified Management Consultant

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This month's images are original mixed media images created by ©2006 Cindy Tonkin. See more here.

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