If your business has moms as your ideal clients, here are some facts you should consider:

• According to statistics published in June 2001 by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, many families will spend over $165,000 on a child from birth to eighteen years of age. Just imagine if there are several children? That’s a significant amount of income.
• In the U.S., moms spend over 3.7 trillion dollars a year on consumer goods according to BSM Media. This includes shopping for kids, husbands or significant others, older parents, adult children and themselves. They exercise tremendous responsibility with their buying power as they take the time to carefully think through a purchasing decision before actually making the purchase.
• According to Whirlpool (1995), 88 percent of women are responsible for caring for their families. These moms are married and single. For single parents, the responsibility increases because they are the sole provider. Every decision from health insurance to home loans to buying groceries falls on them.
• As a result of being the provider (sole or in partnership), moms are actively seeking out information on various topics so they can make an intelligent decision and use their buying power effectively.
• As a caregiver, moms are responsible for everything from vaccinations to summer camps. Their choices shape the next generation. Making the best decisions possible involved stepping up and finding out the best way to give their families what they need.
• Older moms also have to consider the best way to care for their aged parents. As people live longer, there are a greater number of middle age parents who are trading the care of their now grown children for senior parents. They are left with making the decisions about insurance, living accommodations and managing health concerns which is not easy.
• Moms have an extraordinary buying power resulting from their roles as caregiver and provider for the ones they love. They are stepping up to meet their responsibility with intelligence and strength.

Taking all of these things into consideration when you formulate you online marketing strategies will help you figure out the problems your ideal client faces, as well as how you can be a solution to those problems. As you can see, moms at different stages of their lives have vastly different roles and needs. The more you know about your ideal client the better able you are to tailor your products and services toward those needs.

Everyone, but moms especially want to feel like there’s a real connection with the people they do business with. Listen to my free teleclass Art of Connection – Networking with Soul, Intention & Purpose. You’ll learn how to get BEYOND networking and truly connect with potential customers. Click here to listen.

The truth is that success for entrepreneurs depends on whether you see and are open to new opportunities.

A key to making the most of new opportunities is not to restrict your relationships to people inside your industry or field. It’s important to develop relationships outside your field or industry for two reasons:

• It helps you avoid feeling isolated. You could easily be sitting at your computer in your sweat pants all day and not see anyone. So much of business is conducted on the computer, cell phones, text messaging and through social networking. To be healthy as human beings, we need face-to-face contact. We need to be truly immersed in relationships with other people.
• It fuels your creativity. When you connect with a real live person something magical happens. You can learn from each other. That is the fun of it. Women naturally like to support each other. Just getting out of our own shell and being out there is so valuable.

How can you identify an ideal supporter for your business?

Look for someone who’s had similar experiences. Someone who’s faced similar challenges. Someone with whom you can share what you’re going through. Often, that person might have figured out a solution that will work with you and you can share what you’ve found to work so you can support each other.

What often keeps many entrepreneurs from fully opening up to others is fear. The fear is manifest in thinking: “I don’t want to share all I’m doing with her. She’s in a different business. It’s competitive. She’ll take my customers.” It’s not good to have that philosophy because you’re missing out on a more abundant mindset.

You’re going to find that your business isn’t right for everyone. Rather than just turning someone away, it’s so much better if you can refer them to someone that can help them.

It creates a good impression that you did something to help them. They, in turn, will refer others back to you. That’s the beauty of it. It’s kind of a pay-it-forward thing. It comes back in a good way. It makes business a lot more fun which is actually very important in the long run.

One of the 7 Deadly Sins that Women in Business Make is not having your antennae up at all times. The result is you aren’t making the most of opportunities that come you way. If you’d like to find out what the other 6 sins you might be making are and how to avoid all 7 of these costly mistakes, check it out here.

I love the entrepreneurial women who come to Metromom. You’re driven, evolving, interesting, and interested. You are all great women who are very committed to having a business but also very committed to being the parent who’s involved with your family.

Success is something you very much want to create on your own terms. Being an entrepreneurial woman gives you the best of both worlds.

Having been a mom and a serial entrepreneur for over a decade, here are three great benefits I see in the mom entrepreneur lifestyle:

Benefit 1: You have flexibility in creating a schedule that supports you as a parent.

It gives you the chance to have a career on your own terms. When you’re corporate, you’re often at the mercy of whoever your boss is, their hours and their demands. By having an entrepreneurial business, you get to make the decisions when you work. This allows you flexibility to attend your kids’ events, carpool and do the things important to you like participating in homework and other projects.

Benefit 2: You can work in nontraditional hours.

You get to choose when you work. Some people function better early in the morning, others in the evening, so you get the choice to schedule your time when you know you’ll be most productive.

Benefit 3: You have the opportunity to create a business that pays you what you’re worth.

You get to be your own boss. That certainly is a great perk of being an entrepreneur. I personally believe our goal in business is to do the activities we love to do. When you’re doing the activities you love doing, that’s where your energy is going to be its best and when you’re going to be the most attractive. Interestingly, that’s also when you’re going to be able to command the most money.

Being an entrepreneur is not necessarily easy. You’ll have a different set of challenges to overcome. I think one of the hardest is the isolation from working by yourself at home. That’s why I encourage women to connect with other like-minded entrepreneurs in my Action Club.

I’d like to hear what ways being an entrepreneur has benefited you and your family and also what challenges have come up that you didn’t expect. So please leave a comment below and let’s start a conversation. Or we can connect on Facebook , LinkedIn, and Twitter.

But how does this translate to your life as a mom entrepreneur?

When you’re not eating health that translates into a lack of energy you have to conduct your business. If you’re not feeling at your best it’s going to hold you back from being out there as fully as you want to be, especially as a woman.

I love what I do – it has so much potential. But there have been times in the past when I just wasn’t putting myself out there as fully as I wanted even though I know I’m meant to be out there speaking in a public arena in a very big way.

Part of why I have not stepped into it was I just wasn’t feeling as great as I wanted to feel. It hit me that I wasn’t fully living up to my purpose. Who am I sabotaging but myself? It was really an “aha” moment and it’s become the “why” for me when I need motivation. Besides, I really want to set that example for my children.

Yes, I still have dessert and of course chocolate, but 80% of the time, I’m much more conscious. The upside is much more important for me. I think, “Do I want to sit around in sweat pants all day long and not be out there giving my gifts as fully as I know I can give them?” No, I don’t.

Once you recognize your powerful “why” it’s important to you to take care of yourself mentally, physically, and nutritionally first thing in the morning, it really gets everything working and your body moving ahead so you have the clarity, energy and focus to hit the ground running that day.

It’s a key component. Once you realize you can succeed in one area of your life, you’ll become successful in all the other areas as well. When you’re feeling good about yourself and empowered, really taking control, that naturally comes across to your friends, family and clients.

All of a sudden, you get this entirely different mindshift in the way you’re looking at your business and carrying yourself. And that’s the kind of person that attracts other into your life and business.

(Often what gets in the way are “limiting beliefs”. If you’d like to learn more about overcoming these, check out my ebook The Motivated Mindset.)

Have you had an “aha” moment that’s totally changed your life and business? Please share it with us.

Once you get your mind wrapped around that mindset, your business can really start to take off in a big way. However, if you’re having trouble with this concept, try this simple exercise:

Write a product review of yourself!

That’s right. You know doubt have thought about the products and services you provide and the benefits that your clients can receive from them. But have you everlisted the benefits that you as a unique individual bring to them?

Ask yourself these questions:

• If I’m a commodity, a product that’s in demand, how do I present myself to the rest of the world in such a way that’s going to be attractive?
• What do I have to offer that’s a benefit to people in my client circle but also to people that I could potentially invite into a joint venture?
• What are my good qualities, the things that make me good at this business?
• What have other people said about me – about the way I do things or the things that they like about me?
• Now write your answers down objectively like a product review about your favorite body cream. Take the personal out of the equation and concentrate on what make you unique.

When you’re done with this exercise you’ll see right away where you need to improve and what you’re really good at, which is a great ego boost. Then you can use this information to your advantage when you’re working with your clients or prospects.

When you choose to buy from someone or work with someone, isn’t it the quality and energy about that person that is so attractive? It’s often not a tangible thing that they’re doing. It’s who they’re being. So use this exercise and make yourself memorable in a way that makes them want to come back and do business with you.

If you’re struggling with mindset issues like this, check out the MINDSET BUNDLE – What It Takes to Create, Attract and Manifest More Profits and Have the Business that You Really Want for 3 teleclasses filled with wisdom that will help you create a positive mindset shift. Or if you’d rather read about it, check out my ebook – The Motivated Mindset: 23 Take Action Tips on Creating a Positive Shift in Your Thinking, Your Energy and Your Bottom Line.

I want to share some tips to help work-at-home entrepreneurs fit it all in: Don’t wait for an 8-hour day to accomplish something in your business. Say you only have two hours in the evening.  Because you know that’s all you have… FOCUS and get something done.

• Since your hours are limited get really, really strict with how you spend that time. So if you have three hours on a Sunday morning and one on Wednesday evening and two on Thursday, that gives you six hours in week to work with.  That means you have to really smart about what are the meaningful tasks that are going to move your business forward.
• Plot the meaningful tasks by the month. If you have six hours a week to work with, that amounts to 24 hours in a month. How can you break your meaningful, revenue generating projects up into chunks that you can accomplish in small increments of time?
• Let go of all the extraneous stuff you have no time for, I call these “time vampires” because they literally take the life out of your business. Don’t confuse being busy with being productive. They are not the same thing.

When you finally have a well thought out plan, you’re going to be so excited about doing it.  When those small chunks of time come up, you going to know exactly what to do and you’ll truly accomplish something meaningful that moves your business forward.  You’ll be able to let go of the indecision and noise that has been getting in your way.

You know…I think there’s a real benefit sometimes to having less time because we’re forced to be very, very smart with our time. Work-at-home entrepreneurs often don’t have the luxury of eight hours a day, so you have to be really clear about what moves your business forward.

If you’d like some help in figuring out what these meaningful tasks are and how you can chunk them up into doable pieces, check out my new ebook, Productivity, Efficiency & Profit. Discover how to create a to-do list of High Return Tasks and add some PEP to your business.

I recently blogged about how making changes in your life and business is rooted in your positive thinking. Since it takes 21 days to make or break a habit, you can’t expect to make changes overnight.  But, if you can just create a few new habits, such as labeling and designating places, limiting the amount of space things take up, you won’t spend so much time looking for things.

Have you ever thought about using the Law of Attraction to organize your office?

The Law of Attraction means: what you think about is what you bring about. There are a lot of ways that comes into organizing your mom entrepreneur office.Give yourself a positive mindset. If you are constantly thinking, “I’m so disorganized,” or you’re allowing other people to tell you “You’re so disorganized,” you need to put up a wall and defend yourself. You should immediately replace it with, “I’m in the process of getting it all together and knowing where I put it.”

Visualize how you want your life to be. Take a little time, sitting down with a pencil and paper and draw, write or sketch whatever your vision of what you want your life as a mom entrepreneur should be. Give yourself permission to think outside the box. Too often we give ourselves limitations because we think something isn’t possible.

When you become very clear about your goals – make a goal poster or picture pages where you actually put that vision in front of yourself with a picture of your face on that page. You won’t believe how important and powerful that can be. Subconsciously seeing that picture every morning will help you make it happen. You’ll just be amazed how fast things can change.

What you’re bringing to yourself, as a mom entrepreneur, is so important. Just think of yourself as a big magnet. Magnets have two sides to them. They have the attracting side and the repelling side. You really need to be conscious of what you’re attracting and making sure you repel those things that are not beneficial to you, whether it is people, activities or negative self-talk.

For more get it done tips on organizing your office, check out my archive of blogs on the subject.  There’s a lot there to help you to get more organized and create more revenue producing time for your business.  Let me know what organizing tips you especially like to use.

Maybe you don’t know HOW to get it done or your own perfectionism is holding you back. Or it could be that juggling all the details of running a business is too overwhelming?

Not getting things done can really cost you a great deal not only in lost revenue but also on your emotional well-being. So, how can you break out of these familiar scenarios and make changes that will really impact your bottom line?

As I’ve started ideas from scratch and figured out how to do them the hard way, the one thing that keeps me going is hanging onto (and following through with) the belief that your success depends on association with other entrepreneurs who have great ideas, a broader, more creative perspective and who are already achieving the kind of lifestyle you visualize for yourself.

It’s when you create accountability with others who will keep you challenged to do your best that you’re able to take your business to the next level. It can be very powerful to commit to someone else to get something done.

Don’t look for “YES” people.  Find someone you can really connect with who will give you honest feedback and motivate you when you need it. Share your specific goals with them. Knowing that someone is holding you accountable will keep you from procrastinating and will ultimately support you to achieve your vision of how you want your business to be.

In a shameless plus plug for my Get it Done Challenge, one of my favorite clients and friends (Susie Shina) shared her experience with having accountability:

“I would have given up if I hadn’t joined Kim’s Get It Done Challenge. Let’s face it accountability is tough when you work from home with no one to report in to… before I know it I’ve spent a couple hours on Facebook. That’s why I benefited so much from the Virtual Work Day during the program. I actually liked the fact that I had to report in and I appreciated the insight it gave me on how I work the most efficiently. Each member of our group was given the support needed to figure out the best way to Get It Done for our own personality, project and type of business.”

No matter how much support and accountability you have from others, here’s another truth, you also need accountability to yourself. It’s your business, your ideas, projects, your vision, your products, and your services. You’re the one making them happen, so it’s got to have your stamp on it and you’ve got to make sure all the details are running smoothly and on time.

As we go into the new year, are you set up with the support you need? What will you be doing differently?

I remember years ago, a good friend told me, “You have different friends for different things. I may be the friend, for example, that you talk with about your kids or get a pedicure with, but you have different friends that you enjoy different activities and talk about different things.” And really, it’s actually quite similar in business, especially for entrepreneurs.

Women entrepreneurs need business girlfriends to talk business with. We need that connection to keep ourselves inspired and motivated. So how do you find those people?

The first step is to set your intention. You have to think, “I want to meet somebody who’s an entrepreneur and a mom like me. Somebody who really gets why that’s important, and we can talk about why the two go together.”

For example, a few years ago, I was going to a live event. And at that time I was involved with a direct sales company. I set the intention before entering the event that, ” I’d really love to meet somebody at this event who gets the internet marketing thing but also really understands what I’m going through in my direct sales business.” And wouldn’t you know, the woman I sat next to was not only involved in the same direct sales company that I was, but she only lived half an hour from me. We became very, very close friends. And this happened because I went with clear intentions of meeting someone like her.

How does setting your intention work? You become clear about what you want to attract in your life. It starts heightening your senses and you’ll start to notice opportunities. It’s like when you decide to buy a VW bug and all of a sudden you see tons of VW bugs everywhere.

The second step is to put yourself out there. You need to get out of your office. Take advantage of opportunities at local networking events, because that’s where you’re going to find like-minded entrepreneurs.

It can be hard for women entrepreneurs to put yourselves out there to find like-minded women, because you’re at home juggling your business and kids. So being able to get out of your office and meet with other people is a huge thing. When you do go out, even if it’s a school function or the grocery store ask people, “Hey, do you know any mom entrepreneurs?” They might connect you with someone wonderful.

What’s working for you? How and where have you connected with those that really “get” you?

So in order to get comfortable with selling, this first step is all about preparation. You must have this clarity before you can even have a sales conversation. And that means defining your ideal client in great detail. I’m talking in terms of:

• How old are they?
• Are they married?
• Do they have kids?
• Where do they live?
• Do they own a business?
• Do they have a job?
• Are they looking for a job?
• Do they have a disability?
• Do they go to church?
• Do they vote?
• What kind of magazines do they read?
• What stores do they shop at?
• What industry are they in?

You need to get very specific in defining your client so that you can visualize him/her. Visualize what they look like, what clothes they wear, where they went to school, what kind of house they live in, what hobbies they have, etc.

Many successful entrepreneurs so clearly visualize their ideal client that they name the person. Make your ideal client real to you. It’s when you have that clarity that you’ll notice that person anywhere you go. And your selling efforts will be effective because you’ll know exactly how your product and services will benefit your ideal client.

Where do entrepreneurs find ideal prospects? Once you’ve identified your ideal client, you’ll know where to network whether online or offline. You’ll know what industries, companies, and associations to target when you’re doing your research. Also, look for others who serve that community and see how you can partner them or share referrals.

Don’t try to be all things to all people because you don’t want to miss out on a piece of business. When an entrepreneur is laser focused, people will say, “Thank G-d, we finally have someone who understands our struggles and pains and gets what we’re trying to accomplish.” It doesn’t mean you won’t sell to anyone else. It just allows you to attract the person who wants to buy.

Part Two will continue on another aspect of preparation entrepreneurs need before beginning to sell, so be sure to follow the whole series. I’d love to hear any comments or questions you have. I want to support you in your journey toward being comfortable with selling.

If you haven’t checked out my good friend, Carolyn Herfurth’s, Biztruth Bootcamp yet, I encourage you to do so. She’s dedicated to helping small business owners and entrepreneurs take the struggle out of selling and actually make it fun!