The business building classes don’t have modules like the other ones, so I can’t organize them all nice and neat. Instead, even though business building has reading like all of the other classes, it only exists to answer questions. It’ll be interesting to see if this ends up more on the positive or negative side, since it can go either way right now. I’m hoping that every class isn’t about the same generic questions (web site, identifying your niche, what to put on your business card - yeah, really. who doesn’t know what to put on a business card?) and, over the course of the 12 classes that I’m required to take, a whole gamet of subjects get brought up. While I was breezing through the reading (I know! I haven’t read it yet! I’m so fired!), I caught myself wishing that Business Building would be in module form, since the subjects that were written about were interesting and varied. I think I’ll take some notes while I do the reading, and then I can come to class with some specifics. “Great idea, Michelle!” “Well thank you, Michelle. I wholeheartedly agree with you.”

What’s nice about this class is that Jim takes an inventory at the beginning of the class, and asks each student what they want to discuss. Then he’ll see what the most requested topic is and starts there. This led us to speaking about attracting clients, which resulted in talking about identifying your niche, pricing, web sites and business cards. Jim threw out some questions you should ask about yourself about your target audience, so you can best identify your niche and attract those clients. I actually never thought about focusing on the publications that your target audience reads and pitching an article, or giving a presentation to a networking group, so I found this helpful. While I know my target audience and I have a good idea of what my niche(s) will be, I’ll definitely do a bit of brainstorming on my own to find out how to find those clients.

I also liked Jim’s suggestions on pricing, and keeping a list of how much materials or tools cost you, and how much you want to mark it up. I’m also going to have to figure out how much my time costs me, and the mark up on that as well. While I did have a pricing sheet for the services I want to offer, it was literally me picking out prices out of thin air and figuring they were “reasonable”. But, with a real price list (my cost / client cost) I’ll be able to know how and why I give discounts as well as being able to account for any cost increases I make throughout my career.

All in all, it’s good to be back! I hope that everyone had a wonderful holiday season and a great New Year.

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Today I’m grateful for learning about taking things a little at a time. I got a lot done over my break by working on my Welcome Packet for 30 minutes at a time, a few times a week. While I’m not quite finished, I have a solid rough draft and am on my way to reaching out for a Peer Client!