Name: Desiree Stafford
Business Name: High Personal Impact, LLC
In a few words or sentences, tell me about your work:
I help entrepreneurs make more money doing what you love with less effort, so that you can enjoy your life.
Tell us three words that describe you:
independent, genuine, ambitious
Last week, controversial comments made a while ago by Mike Jeffries, CEO of Abercrombie and Fitch, resurfaced. He said:
“In every school there are the cool and popular kids, and then there are the not-so-cool kids. Candidly, we go after the cool kids. We go after the attractive all-American kid with a great attitude and a lot of friends. A lot of people don’t belong [in our clothes], and they can’t belong. Are we exclusionary? Absolutely.”
And then came this little gem about the company’s hiring practices:
“… we hire good-looking people in our stores. Because good-looking people attract other good-looking people, and we want to market to cool, good-looking people. We don’t market to anyone other than that.”
Here’s why I love what he said. It’s very simple:
And here’s what became even more engrained in my mind last week: How a person operates in the world dictates their brand. It’s important to take a stand, but there is a difference between that and being hateful. There is a difference between creating a brand that is aspirational versus exclusionary.
So thank you Mike Jeffries, for being absolutely clear on where you stand, because now I get to vote with my money.
I’ve never seen the CBS TV show, “Person of Interest.” However I understand that the main characters are crime fighters who home in on a Person of Interest who has acted in a way that puts them front and center on their radar as an individual who is likely to commit a future crime.
Did you catch that? The Person of Interest acted in a way that put them front and center. Their behavior, they way they operate in the world, their actions, but make them a Person of Interest, a person worthy of being aware of.
So I ask you, wouldn’t you love to be a Person of Interest (in a positive way, of course!) in the mind of your potential clients?
If so, are you doing things to be a Person of Interest in the minds of others? How are you putting “you” into your business? The fact is that it takes effort and commitment to be interesting and build the reputation you want. No marketing system or big wiz bang coaching program is going to help you get more clients if you are not behaving and operating in a way that makes you interesting, which is arguably the first step to being memorable and ultimately trustworthy. Being interesting is up to you. What’s usually missing from service-based businesses is the true spirit of the business owner. So here are just a few things that you can do to be a Person of Interest through your actions and bring more “you” into your business.
I just read in the May issue of Inc. Magazine about online services that allow you to schedule a call with business people like Mark Cuban and Gary Vaynerchuk, among many others, or even makeup artists or music experts. In many instances, you can book them by the minute. For example, Mark Cuban’s rate is $166.67 per minute, which is the equivalent of $10,000 an hour. Many others are more in the affordable $4-$8 a minute range. Check them out here: Clarity.fm and LiveNinja.com.
Most business owners will tell you that they get the vast majority of their leads through referrals and word of mouth. While that is probably true, those leads and referrals come in because you’ve done something to build a relationship with the person who is referring you. In other words, you’ve built your reputation and some buzz around what you do. If you’re ready to ramp up your efforts to build more buzz about your business, here is a 3-step strategy to do just that. (more…)
