Going the Distance: Four Ways to Build a Better Customer Loyalty Program for Your Brand

It’s easy enough for a customer to join your loyalty program, especially when you’re offering an incentive such as discounts. All your customer has to do is give out some basic information, and voila! They’re in the fold, a brand new loyalty member with your company. From there, it’s happily ever after. You offer the perks; they stand solidly by you, bringing you their continued business. Simple. Or is it? In reality, just how many of those customers are act ively participating in your loyalty program? Do you know? Sure, loyalty program memberships are on the rise according to market research company eMarketer, having jumped 25 percent in the space of just two years. However, that figure may be a bit misleading. The truth is that, while loyalty program sign-ups may be more numerous, active participation in such programs is actually in decline. At the time of the study, the average US household had memberships in 29 loyalty programs; yet consumers were only active in 12 of those. That’s just 41 percent. And even that meager figure represents a drop of 2 percentage points per year over each of the preceding four years, according to a study by loyalty-marketing research company COLLOQUY.

When discounts just aren’t enough

So what’s a brand to do? How can you make your loyalty program worth your customer’s while—as well as your own? After all, gaining a new loyalty member doesn’t mean much if your customer isn’t actively participating in your program. Consider this: Does your customer loyalty program offer members anything different from what your competitors are offering? Chances are your program includes discounts. That’s a given. And what customer doesn’t appreciate a good discount? But when every other company out there is providing this staple benefit in comparable amounts, it becomes less and less likely that customers will remain loyal to any one particular brand. Frankly, it’s all too easy for customers to get lost in a sea of loyalty member discounts. They’re everywhere. In fact, just under half of internet users perceive that all rewards programs are alike, according to a 2015 eMarketer survey. The key to success, then, is to differentiate your business from the crowd. If you can offer your customers something unique and valuable beyond the usual discount, chances are they’ll be more likely to stick with your brand. Here’s some inspiration from companies who get it.

Virgin: Reward more purchases with more benefits.

That’s not to say you need to get rid of discounts entirely. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth. Customers still love a good discount. The goal is to be creative in terms of the loyalty perks you offer. Take the Virgin Atlantic Flying Club, for example. As part of its loyalty program, the airline allows members to earn miles and tier points. Members are inducted at the Club Red tier, from which they can move up to Club Silver and then Club Gold. Here, it’s not just a discount. It’s status. And people respond to feeling important, elite. Still, even where the rewards themselves are concerned, Virgin is motivating loyalty customers with some pretty attractive offers. At the Club Red tier, members earn flight miles and receive discounts on rental cars, airport parking, hotels and holiday flights. But as members rise in tiers, they get even more. At the Club Silver tier, members earn 50 percent more points on flights, access to expedited check-in, and priority standby seating. And once they reach the top, Club Gold members receive double miles, priority boarding and access to exclusive clubhouses where they can get a drink or a massage before their flight. Now that’s some serious incentive to keep coming back for more. Discounts are still part of the equation – but they are designed with innovation and personal value in mind, elevating them to more than just savings.

Amazon Prime: Pay upfront and become a VIP.

What if your customers only had to pay a one-time upfront fee to get a year’s worth of substantial benefits? It may not sound like the smartest business idea at first glance. But take a closer look. Amazon Prime users pay a nominal $99 a year to gain free, two-day shipping on millions of products with no minimum purchase. And that’s just one benefit of going Prime. It’s true that Amazon loses $1-2 billion a year on Prime. This comes as no surprise given the incredible value the program offers. But get this: Amazon makes up for its losses in markedly higher transaction frequency. Specifically, Prime members spend an average of $1,500 a year on Amazon.com, compared with $625 spent by non-Prime users, a ccording to a 2015 report from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners.

Patagonia: Cater to customer values.

Sometimes, the draw for consumers isn’t saving money or getting a great deal. The eco-friendly outdoor clothing company Patagonia figured this out back in 2011, when it partnered with eBay to launch its Common Threads Initiative: a program that allows customers to resell their used Patagonia clothing via the company’s website. Why is this program important to customers? And how does it benefit Patagonia? The company’s brand embraces environmental and social responsibility, so it was only fitting that they create a platform for essentially recycling old clothing rather than merely throwing it away. The Common Threads Initiative helps Patagonia build a memorable brand and fierce loyalty by offering its customers a cause that aligns with deep personal values. OK, so their customers get to make a little money, too. Everybody wins.

American Airlines: Gamify your loyalty program.

If you’re going to offer your customers a loyalty program, why not make it f un? After all, engagement is key to building a strong relationship with your customer. And what better way to achieve that goal than making a game of it. American Airlines had this very thing in mind when it created its AAdvantage Passport Challenge following its merger with USAirways. The goal: find a new way to engage customers as big changes were underway. Using a custom Facebook application, American Airlines created a virtual passport to increase brand awareness while offering members a chance to earn bonus points. Customers earned these rewards through a variety of game-like activities, from answering trivia questions to tracking travel through a personalized dashboard. In the end, participants earned more than 70 percent more stamps than expected – and the airline saw a ROI of more than 500 percent. The takeaway: people like games.

Stand out from the crowd.

Your approach to your customer loyalty program should align with your overall marketing approach. Effective branding is about standing out, not blending it. Being memorable is key. To this end, keep in mind that loyalty programs are no longer a novelty. That means that yesterday’s strategies won’t work moving forward, so look for ways to rise above the noise, setting yourself apart from the cloying drone of countless other cookie-cutter programs.

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10 Things You Pay for From Traditional Marketing Agencies

In today’s business world, it’s no longer the big fish that eats the small fish; it’s the fast fish that eats the slow fish.

In the same way the information revolution has changed how customers and market share are won, it has also reshaped the old systems that once governed how companies operate and how people work. The future of business is more flexible, faster, leaner and smarter.

This is not just about adopting a telecommuting policy or forgoing the purchase of that expensive copier. It’s about changing how business is done, both in philosophy and in execution.

The penalty of clinging to old business practices is losing clients that no longer can justify bills with unneeded overhead baked into them. As leaner and smarter companies emerge, the old juggernauts who are slow to change are quickly dying.

Marketing agencies

At the top of the scale of corporate bloat are marketing and advertising agencies. While not all industries can shed their physical offices and adopt a virtual model, the dominance of digital marketing coupled with the very nature of marketing’s day-to-day business operations afford these agencies a clear-cut path to modern efficiency.

However, in reality, few have changed. The majority of marketing firms hang on to these old systems of operations, passing on the burden of their expenses to their clients.

The traditional marketing firm still maintains an expensive posture to attract its clients.Why? Most find changing their methods of operations to be just as hard as adapting to today’s Web culture and the new rules of doing business. Too much has changed too quickly. In clinging to old methods – even those of its own self-promotion – the traditional marketing firm still maintains an expensive posture to attract its clients with their lavish offices and costly travel. These companies force work into physical locations, perpetuating the punching of clocks and shuffling of paper, while carrying years of old business operations in the form of debt, all of which must ultimately be paid for by the client.

There’s a reason why marketing companies are dying left and right, beyond becoming irrelevant in the digital age. Today's clients no longer accept invoices inflated by bloated operations, particularly when virtual companies can do more at a fraction of the cost.

The rise of the virtual company

It took time for companies like Amazon, Netflix and Apple to revolutionize and overtake industries that were once based in bricks and mortar. Replacing the physical form was a challenge in reconditioning the mind of the consumer and in reshaping traditional systems, such as fulfillment, customer service and exception handling.

2010 will see the emergence of the virtual company in full force.These initial obstacles were quickly overcome as consumers realized the advantage of lower prices by way of lower overhead, mutually beneficial partnerships and geographical barriers being torn down and giving way to an expanded market. Today, that same virtual model that started strong in the retail sector is being adopted throughout all applicable industries. As a result, virtual companies are growing at record pace.

2010 will see the emergence of the virtual company in full force. The convergence of technology, communication, new service-based companies and systems that meet the demands of companies that no longer carry the burden of bloated operations will allow more companies to work smarter, faster and from anywhere.

As virtual companies continue to refine their systems and clients continue to realize the value in receiving better service for less money, the virtual company will gain strength and overtake the outmoded traditional business models. This not only improves efficiencies but tears down geographical barriers to markets and talent.

As we enter the age of the virtual company, let’s review ten things you pay for from traditional marketing agencies:

1. Facilities

Office space is typically the largest expense on the books for marketing agencies. These obligations range from rented space in a shared office park to owning (and owing for) real estate, freestanding buildings and parking facilities.

Virtual marketing companies shed this expense because the nature of the business simply doesn’t require it anymore. Marketing is digital, and print is dying. All the infrastructure that was once housed in a physical location is now replaced by a range of new digital services. Communication is conducted through e-mail, mobile devices, video conferencing and client dashboards rather than on-site meetings and client lunches, the costs of which are ultimately passed back to the client.

The marketplace demands geographic barriers be removed to hire, collaborate and partner with the best talent in the industry. The virtual company’s employees work remotely within a virtual space that accomplishes anything that a physical location provides and more. They are mobile and available at a moment’s notice to meet with clients. Even remote offices, meeting spaces and presentation rooms can be rented by the day or hour, as needed, so as not to waste money on a fixed building that sits there to house all the bloated systems and conventions the traditional marketing company clings to.

2. On-site employees and physical work systems

For many office-based companies, the days of having people gathered in a building to work is gone. For these businesses, the act of keeping people around was just another form of time card punching, rooted in old systems founded on the demand for people to be present and available to coworkers and customers from 9 to 5.

Happy employees do better work, particularly the ones responsible for great creative work.Virtual companies don’t operate according to fixed 9-to-5 schedules. Instead, their systems and employees are faster, more flexible, working within tighter deadlines and using new, more robust project management conventions.

Telecommuting is more prevalent today than ever, for reasons that go beyond avoiding the cost of expensive office space. Happy employees are ones that are not trapped in cubicles, hustling through traffic, burning 30-40 hours and hundreds of dollars a month in commuting to a fixed place to do work that can be done anywhere. The fact is, happy employees do better work, particularly the ones responsible for great creative work.

Moreover, work systems based on having everyone in a centralized office all day are terribly inefficient. To see this, you have to look beyond hard costs and expenditures and consider the man hours wasted on meetings, scheduling, water cooler talk, Web surfing – the list goes on and on.

Replacing the physical office environment are proven virtual office management and collaboration systems like Basecamp, video conferencing, cloud computing and mobile Internet connectivity. Most importantly, the philosophy behind the work is based on maximizing project development efficiencies rather than filling up a 40-hour work week simply for the sake of adhering to convention.

3. Utilities

From security systems, electricity, heating and A/C to cleaning and facility repairs, the auxiliary costs of maintaining a facility can be extraordinary. This is an expense that virtual companies leave behind and don’t pass on to their clients.

4. Landline phone systems

In an age where business is a 24-hour, anywhere and everywhere proposition, corporate phone systems are an enormous waste. Everyone has a cell phone, and most working professionals carry smartphones. For many, the superfluous office phone collects dust, and voicemail systems are rarely used. In a time when most households are shedding the costs of landlines in favor of more flexible and leaner mobile options, many businesses still lag behind.

Agencies that continue to operate from a physical facility must pay to maintain and upgrade expensive landline systems, adding yet more extraneous dollars per hour to their clients’ bills.

5. Office furnishings

Expensive offices, conference room tables, desks, chairs, bathrooms, kitchens, interior decoration and even trophy cases displaying purchased accolades are omitted from the overhead costs of all virtual companies.

6. Computing infrastructure and LANs

So many companies still keep gobs of file and printer servers along with data backup systems, server redundancies, uninterrupted power supplies, routers, switches, cabling, internal e-mail systems – the list goes on.

For virtual companies, the idea of a LAN (local area network) has been replaced by cloud computing, with Web-based service providers, project management, collaboration systems, and applications. These systems are accessible from anywhere in the world, offer true collaboration with anyone and are always backed up and protected.

What’s more, project management in the virtual space allows for new and innovative work habits that promote speed, efficiency and flexibility in ways old companies employing old work systems simply cannot keep pace with.

7. Paper

So many of the slow, dying companies we see today still live in an office with paper circulating all the time. Believe it or not, nowhere is this more true than at your local marketing agency. Also included in this paper-filled world are printers, copiers, fax machines, shredders and a never-ending variety of supplies, all in support of paper trails that lead from the office to the client and back again before ending in nicely climate-controlled filing cabinets.

Virtual companies exist in a paperless world, and the best work circles around those that stay in a paper-driven office. The benefits of going (and staying) completely digital are immense. Digital documents are searchable, sharable, versioned, more secure and viewable on nearly any device. The more files that are kept, used and cataloged in digital format, the more efficiencies will increase overall.

8. Support staff and personnel

When agencies pay for an office, furnishings, phone systems, computing infrastructure and everything in between, they also require additional personnel, time and resources to support those systems, including office managers, receptionists, IT staff, cleaning crews, landscapers and security, to name a few. Thus, these already excessive expenses are further exacerbated and passed on to the client.

9. Restricted geographical barriers

If there’s one thing the Internet has brought to the economy, it’s the expanded marketplace. The business systems of virtual companies are not only set up to take on clients without most of the additional expenses suffered by traditional companies but to hire the best talent available anywhere.

Truth is, many marketing agencies are restricted to their local markets. While these firms would in theory jump on a plane to take on a client nearly anywhere, most find in practice that only local clients are cost-effective given the traditional systems still employed.

10. Debt

The result of all of this expense in a world that is quickly shifting to leaner and smarter operations is that this much of the excess is carried forward in debt that comes at a premium paid to a bank in interest. That ongoing obligation is passed to clients along with the cost of all other inefficiencies.

Virtual companies that start fresh, using smart, lean and flexible systems of operation don’t carry years of bad investments in outmoded, expensive systems on their backs. In fact, as traditional marketing agencies continue to lose clients and market share to these more adept modern firms, the additional debt taken on to stay alive will eventually lead to the extinction of the slow, bloated traditional marketing company as we know it.

photos: Flickr: Christ0ff, chrisdlugosz

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Shut Up and Blog Already

You know you should do it. You know other people who do, and they make it look so easy. And yet you can’t think of anything more intimidating than staring at a blank page and a blinking cursor. You can find reasons all day long to rationalize why you haven’t yet started your own blog, but none of those justifications are going to help your business grow. It’s time to stop being your own worst enemy and start understanding why the excuses that are holding you back are all in your head.

1. I’m not a writer.

So you’re not a writer – at least not by trade. Big deal! Neither are many very successful bloggers. They’re entrepreneurs, artists, community activists, foodies, moms and even CEOs. Instead, what they have in common is passion. Always keep in mind that what you have to say is far more important than the mechanics of how you say it. A blogger’s purpose first and foremost is to entertain and engage. If your punctuation is less than perfect or your sentence structure leaves something to be desired, no one is going to report you to the grammar police. But if there is no conviction behind your words, no one is going to invest their time in reading your blog week after week. Your writing style should be easy and informal. Don’t approach the task of creating a post like you’re writing a research paper. Instead, imagine you’re sitting down to dash off a quick e-mail in response to someone who has asked you a question about your chosen topic. Keep your entry brief and conversational. When you’ve finished writing, read your post aloud to yourself. If you trip over words or phrases because they feel unnatural or clunky, go back and simplify them. Always keep in mind that what you have to say is far more important than the mechanics of how you say it. No one is grading your blog with red pen in hand. Authenticity and personality count far more than perfection any day of the week. Just loosen up and let your own voice come through. Not only will this make your writing more approachable, it’s the very foundation of building credibility and trust. After reading one post, your readers should feel as if they’ve met you; if they continue to follow your blog over time, they should feel as though you’re a familiar friend.

2. I’m not a designer or a programmer.

Stop right there. Nope – not another word. Can you use a word processor? Can you open a web browser window? Can you attach a file or a picture to an e-mail? If you answered “yes” to all three of these questions, then congratulations, my friend, you have all the technical and artistic know-how you need to be a blogger! There’s no reason to let technophobia hold you back from reaping the benefits of blogging – not when you can take advantage of user-friendly, do-it-yourself tools like Google’s Blogger. Blogger is designed to give anyone the power to publish. The interface is so intuitive and easy to navigate that you can have your blog up and running in just minutes, and best of all, it won’t cost you a dime. Simply choose from an assortment of templates, select your preferred combination of colors and fonts and away you go. Creating posts is easy, too, and you can even enhance them with links, photos and video. You also can assign each article to a subject category of your choosing to help your readers find related content according to their specific interests. Of course, you’ll get an even greater return on your time and effort if your blog is hosted on your own website, since your visitors can read your latest entries and peruse your archives without ever leaving your primary site. Still, there’s no cause for concern. Simply partner with a good web development firm like Fame Foundry that can help you integrate your blog into your existing website in a way that’s consistent with your brand and provide a content management system that’s just as easy to use as any of the free do-it-yourself tools. No matter which approach you choose, you’ll be surprised to find how simple it is to get your blog up and running and how little time it takes to publish new content.

3. I wouldn’t know where to begin.

One of the best things about blogging is the fluidity and flexibility of the medium. As a blogger, you are your own writer, editor and publisher. That means that there are no hard-and-fast rules to which you must adhere. Think of your blog as a blank canvas that’s waiting for you to add color, shape and texture. As a blogger, you are your own writer, editor and publisher. There are many different ways you can approach blogging – each one of them just as valid as the next. You might choose to use your blog as a platform for reporting industry news and forecasting trends, for providing useful advice and how-tos or for journaling your personal experiences in order to help others who are trying to achieve similar goals. Some very popular blogs like Catalog Living are nothing more than an ongoing series of images with funny captions. One of the best ways to get started is not by writing at all. Instead, it’s by reading. If you’re seriously considering starting your own blog, you should make a point of reading other blogs every day – blogs that talk about subjects that relate to your business and industry, blogs written by your competitors and even blogs that have nothing to do with your particular field but that you find enjoyable and entertaining regardless of the subject matter. Subscribe to the RSS feeds for these blogs and set aside a few minutes each day to scan through the latest posts. You don’t need to read every entry, just the ones that strike you as most interesting. Look for commonalities among the blogs you read daily for pleasure. What do you enjoy about them most? When you find an article that you can’t stop reading, take a moment to analyze why it is so compelling. Is it the writer’s voice, their unique approach to their chosen topic or the way they’ve organized their argument? Pay attention as well to the headlines that catch your eye and think about what makes them captivating. Over time, as you assimilate these observations, you will achieve clarity about what you want your blog to be and how to craft posts that will keep your readers hooked.

4. I don’t have time.

Blogging is a medium created by and for the culture of the Web, which is one in which attention is always at a premium. As a result, it is the ideal information exchange platform for the time-starved – both writer and reader. Blogging is not an exercise in filling up a page. Your job is to take one very narrowly defined topic and put your unique stamp on it. Blogging is not an exercise in filling up a page. More than newspapers, more than magazines and more than trade journals, blogging is about specificity. Your job is to take one very narrowly defined topic and put your unique stamp on it. Some of the best, most powerful blog posts are also the shortest. At Fame Foundry, one of our favorite bloggers is Seth Godin. His entries are rarely more than five or six brief paragraphs in length (some are as brief as five sentences), but every last one of them hits home. We are devoted followers of his blog because we know that in exchange for just a few minutes of our time each day, we’ll walk away with profound insights that inspire us or reinforce our belief in the way we do business. Blogging is not your full-time job, nor should it be, so follow Seth’s example. Use the time you do have to string together a few sentences, but make each one of them count. Keep your topics focused and your points sharp. Short, compelling posts will make your work as a blogger manageable while keeping your readers coming back for more. Also, remember that writing is like running. The first time you strap on a pair of shoes and hit the pavement, every step is painful and every breath is labored. But the more you do it, the more effortless it becomes. Whereas once you might have thought you’d never complete a full lap around the block, soon you’re taking on a 5k as though you’ve been a runner all your life. The same principle holds true for writing. With practice, you’ll get better and faster. It might take you two or three hours to write your first entry, but once you get a few under your belt, you’ll find you can crank out a post in just an hour, half an hour or even 20 minutes. The creative process that at first feels arduous and awkward will soon become routine and, believe it or not, even enjoyable.

5. I don’t have anything interesting to say.

Don’t think of your blog as a podium; think of it as the microphone at the center of a town hall meeting. You aren’t there to deliver a monologue; you’re there to start the conversation. Your job is not to sell; it’s to educate, inform, entertain, excite and provoke thought while leaving room for others to join the discussion. Here’s a piece of age-old writing advice: Write about what you know. When you write about what you know, you’ll write with passion and authority. Your writing style will be more natural and conversational, not like you’re writing a term paper. You’ll have the confidence to make big, bold statements, and you’ll never run out of things to say. Here’s a piece of new-age blogging advice: Write about what you know, but do it in a way that’s different from anyone else. With hundreds of millions of blogs in the world, it’s likely there are many others that cover the same general subject matter as yours will. What will set you apart is the way you apply your unique cache of experience, expertise and perspective to that subject to create original content that is useful and interesting to your readers. Let’s say you run a bakery. Baking is a science, and you are an expert in that science. As a result, you have a limitless source of material. How many people understand the fundamentals of baking a basic pie crust? How many would love to know how to make use of that bread machine that’s been collecting dust in the cabinet since their wedding shower? Are there other blogs in the world about baking? Of course. But none of them have your distinct voice, your particular experience and your individual point of view. Maybe you own the neighborhood coffee shop. Nowhere is it written in stone that you must write about coffee. Your blog could be about the neighborhood you serve – what’s going on, the issues people are concerned about and the events that are happening around you. For you, a post could be nothing more than a collection of photos from the neighborhood chili cook-off. Does that have anything to do with what you sell? Nope! Are people interested in it? You bet! The loyal local following you could build with this type of blog is something that even Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts would envy.

6. I can’t come up with enough good ideas to keep it going.

If you sit down in front of a blank page and wait for great ideas to come, chances are, they won’t. You’ll just find yourself staring at the cursor, anxiety building as the minutes tick away. Instead, to be a successful blogger, you should be constantly mining the world around you for inspiration. Just as reading other blogs can help you develop your voice and sharpen your point of view, it is also a bottomless wellspring of creative fuel. To be a successful blogger, you should be constantly mining the world around you for inspiration. As you browse through your RSS feeds, you might come across an article that you disagree with completely. Why not share your take on the subject? Or perhaps you stumble upon an interesting observation and find a way to tailor it to be relevant and relatable for your particular audience. You might even find ideas spread across four or five different articles that you can weave together into a comprehensive how-to guide for your readers. No matter the source, you’ll likely find that inspiration rarely strikes at your convenience, when you have time to sit down and write a post. To make sure you never let a good idea go to waste, keep a running idea log. This doesn’t have to be anything formal – just a simple text file or even a handwritten journal will do. The most important requirement is that it can be kept within easy reach at all times. Jot down any and every idea as it comes to you, even if it’s not fully developed. Include the link to the article that inspired you and make a few basic notes about what you want to say on the subject to help jog your memory later. When it comes time to write your next post, simply choose a topic from the list and pick up where your notes left off. You’ll never find yourself wasting your precious blogging time just hoping and praying to land on a great idea.

7. No one will read it anyway.

For a while, it might feel like you are talking to an empty room. You’ll be tempted to throw your hands up and quit, but don’t. Persistence is your friend. Successful bloggers stick it out. You must begin with reasonable expectations and realize that it might take a year or more to build a following. However, even while your readership is low, your efforts are not in vain. Persistence is your friend. Successful bloggers stick it out. Think of your initial weeks and months of writing as laying the foundation for your blog. Your first entries will be fundamental in establishing who you are and what you stand for. You’ll likely find yourself referencing these foundational posts again and again, and by linking back to older articles, you’ll encourage new visitors to delve into your archives and see what else they might have missed. It’s also important to understand that your job is not done when you hit the publish button. Traffic building is just as much a part of blogging as research and writing. Post links to your latest content on social networks like Facebook and Twitter. Also be sure to include social media badges on your posts to make it easy for your readers to share content that they like with their friends and followers. Another way to bring more eyes to your blog is by becoming an active participant in the community that exists around your topic. As you are scanning through your RSS feeds each day, look for opportunities to post insightful comments with links back to your blog when relevant. You should also approach the owners of more well-established blogs and volunteer to write a guest post, which will give you exposure to their regular readers. Likewise, invite other bloggers to write for you. They’ll promote their gig, and you’ll benefit from their connections. Finally, remember that blogging isn’t just a numbers game. If the purpose of your blog is to help your business grow, it’s not about the volume of readers but the quality of your readership. Are you reaching people who might have a need for your product or service? Are those readers actively engaged? Do they make a point of reading each and every new post? Are they sharing your content with their circles of friends? A small community of dedicated followers who fit within your target audience and evangelize for you is much more valuable than thousands of disengaged subscribers who might only occasionally read your articles and will never buy from you.

Sit down. Start typing.

You’ll never blog if you don’t try. Start reading. Start writing. Before you publish anything, ask friends, colleagues and mentors to review your drafts and give you their input. Your initial attempts may never even see the light of day, but that’s okay. These practice runs will help you dust off your writing skills, define your content niche and get the ideas flowing. If you need a push in the right direction, let Fame Foundry help. We can work with you to launch your blog and help you develop relevant, original content that will establish you as the voice of authority for the tribe of people who share a passion for what you do.

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