Baseball Season

Baseball season is coming up, and it reminds me of a presentation that Robert Middleton, of Action Plan Marketing, made at the 2002 National Resume Writers' Association conference.

Robert had a client acquisition strategy he called "Marketing Ball." He said you need to have a system to get consistent, powerful results with your marketing.

One of the things that struck me most in his presentation was that "If you try to hit a home run, you'll strike out." Instead, you need to make base hits.

First, you need to say "the thing" that gets prospects saying, "That's interesting. Tell me more." Middleton said, if you get that, you get to first base.

Next, you try to get to second base. The way to get there is to give people more information.

To get to third base is the sales process. It's capturing their interest and having them want to move forward.

Middleton said the hardest part for independent professionals -- like resume writers -- is getting to second base.

As resume writers, we try to hit home runs -- like getting a client to agree to a $1,000+ project (resume, cover letter, bio, branding work) without doing the work of base hits.

Remember that on Opening Day.

Article on Justifying Conference Attendance

I came across this article today on "How to Justify Conference Attendance" and it caught my attention because of the survey I'm conducting on professional conference attendance among resume writers. (Remember, if you want the link to take the survey, e-mail me at RWDigest@aol.com -- and be sure to sign up for the Resume Writers' Digest mailing list using the form in the upper-right hand corner of the blog.)

Of particular use is the worksheet to estimate costs to attend -- and then some suggestions for improving ROI.

Free Teleseminar: Eight Ways to Enhance Your Personal Brand

How do you correctly apply personal branding to two of the hottest online networks (LinkedIn and Facebook)? This teleseminar -- scheduled for Thursday, March 13, 2008 at Noon Eastern time -- will give you the information you need to get up to speed quickly.

The one-hour teleseminar will be lead by William Arruda, founder of Reach, the leading global personal branding organization. The presenter will be Jason Alba, author of "I'm on LinkedIn- Now What?" He also co-authored "I'm on Facebook-Now What" and is CEO of JibberJobber.com.

There is no cost to attend -- but enrollment is limited to the first 200 participants. Register here.

Malcolm Gladwell on Psychological Testing

I came across an article on author Malcolm Gladwell ("Blink" and "The Tipping Point") that led me to his online archive of articles from The New Yorker magazine. There I found an interesting article on employment testing -- specifically, the role of the personality test in the selection process.

Personality testing is a $400 million-a-year industry, and there are more than 2500 kinds of tests out there.

Gladwell points out that one of the fundamental flaws of personality testing is in individuals' lack of consistency:
We have a personality in the sense that we have a consistent pattern of behavior. But that pattern is complex and that personality is contingent: it represents an interaction between our internal disposition and tendencies and the situations that we find ourselves in.

Gladwell's articles are often quite lengthy, but worth the read. I'd recommend this one in particular.