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Creating a killer LinkedIn Profile

How to create a killer LinkedIn profile and company page

LinkedIn is, what I think one of the most overlooked social media platforms out there. A lot of business owners have a LinkedIn profile that they set up when they were back at their corporate job and maybe have updated it once or twice. Well, I am here to tell you WAKE UP and make sure you have updated your LinkedIn profile! In this blog we will be covering:

  • What you should include in your personal profile
  • How to create a company page
  • How you can add connections and build your network.

What Do I Need To Supply For A Linkedin Profile Page?

Top 9 things that you NEED to have in your profile

1. YOUR Picture

  • Do NOT use an avatar or cheesy image of yourself, people want to see YOU
  • You can use a current up-to-date headshot, or an image of yourself with a natural background, not a party or fuzzy image or a selfie. Take your time on this photo! 

2. Headline and Header

  • Think of this as the first impression, this is what people are going to see with your name and picture.
  • Have your headline be intriguing, eye-grabbing, relevant and clear.
  • Include your company name and then your title or what you do. 
  • You can now have a customized banner (1400×425), which you can create in Canva. This header should be relevant to who you are and what you do. Have fun with it. 

3. Summary (Good for SEO)

  • Tell your story, what’s your WHY. Keep your summary in the first person.
  • Personalize your summary.
  • Your summary should be engaging, relevant and conversational.
  • In this area, it is great to demonstrate that you are an expert in your field/industry. Add media (Videos, PowerPoints, Presentations, PDFs. etc.)
  • Remember SEO when you are writing your summary. It is important to include your keywords in this section along with long-tail keyword phrases to have a higher rank within LinkedIn searches but also Google searches. Here are two pieces we did on finding your keywords so you know what you should be writing about. Finding Keywords and How to Use KWFinder.com 
  • As I mentioned before add media to your summary! There is not a limit, I mean you don’t want to add your WHOLE YouTube Channel, but I would say between 2-5 videos, or maybe big presentations you have done, recorded webinars, things that give your audience value. Something they can learn from looking at your LinkedIn profile! AND this helps you stand out from everyone else. 🙂
  • We have spoken about what’s your WHY, creating that personal brand, your core values, brand message, you want to make sure those come through in your profile. People should be able to read your summary and understand who you are and WHY you do what you do.
  • Talk to your target market, at the end of your summary have a call-to-action

4. Experience

  • Start with the most recent position or company and give us details! What is your role, responsibilities, etc.
  • List the experiences you have had with each position or company
  • List our accomplishments and challenges you have encountered, what was the outcome?
  • Remember your target market and speak to them when you are adding your services and details.
  • You don’t need to list EVERY job you have had from the time you turned 15! Stay relevant list that last few with great detail.

5. Education

  • Where did you go to school? You can list high school and college
  • Remember to list your degrees, diplomas, certifications etc.
  • It’s important to also include dates and locations.

6. Volunteering & Causes

  • People LOVE to see that you are involved in your community or a certain cause. Cause marketing is HUGE!
  • List the non-profits you have helped, maybe sit on the board or have organized events for.
  • What causes do you donate your time, money and energy too?

7. Skills & Endorsements

  • We get asked this question a lot, should we include the skills and endorsements in our profiles? The answer is YES!
  • People have recognized you for a skill that you have, acknowledge it.
  • LinkedIn will have those endorsements show up by the ones people have selected the most. You can always go in and edit or delete these as you find needed.
  • Think of your keywords when adding your skills, you will notice in the image below, the last skill on the bottom right corner says DOGS, um, I do social media and digital marketing, BUT in my past experience I was a Vet Tech at an Animal Emergency Center, so I may think of deleting that one just because it is not relevant with what I am doing now. 

8. Recommendation & Awards

  • We always encourage our clients to have people give them recommendations on LinkedIn and include them in your profile.
  • List any awards you have won through work, community, networking.

9. Interests and Groups

  • As a bonus to your profile included interests you have
  • Also, include groups you are apart of on LinkedIn

Now, that we have your personal profile taken care of it is time to move into business. You can still post business related topics to your personal profile, but there are so many perks to having a business page on LinkedIn. In the video below I show you how to create that company page, so if you don’t have a company already take a minute to create one and then we will talk about “WHY” you need to have one and all the benefits!

LinkedIn Business Page

You want to make sure you optimize your company page to build brand recognition. We spoke last week about being consistent across the board with your social media and that remains the same with your company page. You want to make sure you have the right size header, logo, etc. Here are the sizes you need to have on your company page:

 

  • Company logo – 300 x 300
  • Cover image – 1536 x 768
  • Overview tab image – 360 x 120
  • Hero image – 1128 x 376

Here is an example of H&R Block’s company page, it is consistent with their brand, brand colors, logo, header, overview image, about us and more!

About Us Section

This is the MOST important piece of your company page, you have 2000 characters to use up. Think of your story, WHY your business does what it does, who do you help, speak to your target audience and use your keyword phrases. This is where your audience gets to really know WHO the company is. They are taking a peek inside and understand more of the foundation of your business. What makes your company stand out from the others, how did your company come to fruition, what is your business’s mission and vision, etc? More details the better.  You want this section to be eye-grabbing and you want your audience to fall in love with your business, your brand, you want them to want to find out more. . .  you want them walking away liking you, building that trust. You do not want them walking away feeling like they were being “sold” or not understanding what your business does.

Also remember in this section you want to add your website, your main office –  with this piece most of our clients, including us work from our homes and do not want our address out to the world, I love coffee dates but don’t want people knocking on my door 🙂 You still need to enter your full address, but on the public page it will just say headquarters in CITY, ST not your address. In the video above I show how this process works! Also, you will enter the number of employees you have, the year you were founded, company type and BONUS – Specialties! You can use keywords in this area of specialties or a very clear short statement of what you do.

If you have LinkedIn upgrade package you can also add jobs and life section, we won’t really go into those today, just because most of our readers just use the free version of LinkedIn, just like us! The next thing we want to add as an extension of your company page is:

Add Showcase Pages

Creating a showcase page is adding to your company page, it is an extension. You can highlight a specific product or service your business offers. This allows your brand to come to life a little bit more. Before LinkedIn had a services/products tab, but they do not have that anymore. They now offer the showcase page/ It is an independent page with its own “About Us” section, logo, cover, website, etc. It also will have its own followers and you can post your own updates to this showcase page to show that service or products own personality. These updates you post would only be about this service or product.  You can also monitor its own analytics, so you can see how that showcase page is doing.

We created a showcase page just for our small group online coaching: As you can see this is just for our small group coaching and its website url is to that page on our website, then to the right you see that is says “This is a Showcase page by: Social Speak Network” which links back to our company page. This is a great way to talk about your key services or products. I would like 3-5, it adds so much value to your company page.
social speak showcase LinkedIn page

This is so freaking cool right?!?! Yes, it is! Now that you built your awesome Showcase pages I am sure you are wondering where does it show up and how do people see the connection between your company page and Showcase pages??? Well, it is pretty simple your Showcase pages show up right under (Well after the ads) the About Us section. This is just such a cool way to promote those key services or products. Think of these Showcase pages as website pages, they are meant to stay on your company page and be updated as needed. These are NOT pages to create events or short-term marketing offers or campaigns. These Showcase pages are going to help build trust and relationships with your audience. This is what is looks like:

Great job on getting your personal profile set up, your company page and showcase pages created, now it’s time to feed them! What I mean by this is CONTENT!

Start Posting Valuable Content:

Content stills remains a key component of these pages. If you took the time to create these pages, and make sure they look pretty and match your brans, why wouldn’t you want to do more with them? They need to be thought of the same as you think about your Instagram Business profiles or Facebook Page, you post to those daily or weekly correct? Your LinkedIn profile, Company Page, and Showcase pages should be thought of the same way! WOW, we just added a lot more to your list! Don’t worry you can add your company page and showcase pages to Buffer or Hootsuite, so you can schedule your posts to go out through one of these tools to help save time, but also to be consistent. You may need to upgrade your package with these two tools if you have already used the 3 free social profiles. Each of these is free to post through up to 3 profiles, so you may already have Facebook, Twitter, and your personal LinkedIn profile, you will need to increase your account so you can add more.

What are things you should talk about on each of these pages? I think we need to split these up into three different sections, each area such as your personal profile, company page, and showcase page will have their own personality. You need to treat them as their own entity. Each page audience will be different, they may be similar or you will have people that you are connected with on LinkedIn and YOU and then they follow your company page and maybe one of your showcase pages as well. So, they will NOT want to see the same content on each page. Let’s start with your personal profile first, this is what most people will see, because like all the social media algorithms you will get more engagement with your personal profile than your company pages.

Personal Profile Tips:

  • Post valuable content, NO political or religious posts
  • Post Daily
  • Share your businesses blog posts with clear call-to-action
  • Share your personal story
  • Stay away from posts you would put on your personal FB – LinkedIn is a little more professional
  • Share tips, techniques, tools, videos that align with your business
  • Talk about your role in your business, your journey, who you have helped, your WHY

Company Page Tips:

  • Post focused, clean, relevant, and valuable content
  • Share your blog posts
  • Talk about your content upgrades with call-to-action
  • Share your YouTube videos
  • Curated content – articles, videos, images from other companies that align with your business.
  • Feature an employee or a person that works with you
  • Behind the scenes – stories, pictures, videos
  • Test your audience – post an appropriate funny video or image and see the response, mix up your content to see what your audience is engaging with the most.
  • Branded images via Canva that have a quote or stat
  • Events – talk about local events that are going on or events you will be attending
  • Local – if you are a local business share local news
  • Speak to your target audience – ask them questions and get feedback

Showcase Page Tips:

  • This is about that one service or product
  • Stay focused on the topic at hand
  • Post maybe 3 times per week – people tht follow your company page or personal profile will already see what your business is doing so posts on your showcase page need to be specific to that service or product. You don’t want to overwhelm your audience.
  • Videos you have done on that service or product
  • Client testimonials
  • Share stories of your struggle, your journey or clients journey and how this service or product has helped them.
  • Share stats and success stories

As you can see these are all similar but different at the same time.

How to Grow your Profile and Company Page

One of the features I like most about LinkedIn is you can add connections to grow your online community. Before, people would just add anyone and everyone so they built quantity connections, rather than quality. Yeah, it’s great to have a large number of connections but we want to focus on adding the quality connections. A key piece to adding quality connections is to have a little note, an intro when you ask somebody to connect with you if you don’ already know them.  You may see LION next to peoples names, this stands for LinkedIn Open Networker, meaning they are open to connecting with everyone, I don’t see this being used too much anymore, which I like. You will get asked to connect with people you don’t know and that is OK, check them out, look at their profile and see who they are. I like to think of LinkedIn is an online networking group.

In this image below you will see that someone asked me to connect with him, I do not know him personally, but he did send a message along with the connection. LinkedIn will also show you “People you may know” similar to Facebook. These people show up based on your profile and mutual connections.

Here are a few ways to be able to connect or invite people to connect with people on LinkedIn:

  • If you know a specific name of the person you want to connect with, you can search for them and find their profile and then click connect.
  • You can also upload your email list or contacts from Gmail, yahoo, outlook, etc.
  • Then as I mentioned above looking at the “People You May Know” section and asking people to connect through there.
    NOTE: If people have asked to connect with you and you have pending invites they will appear on the top bar on your LinkedIn account next to “Network”

Again, we highly recommend before you go connection crazy that you craft together a short, simple to the point message of why you want to connect with that person and send it along when you ask to connect, let me show you:

What’s Next?

It is such a great feeling when you have your LinkedIn profile updated to 100% and then when you create your company page, Showcase pages and have started to add connections, but what will make people want to connect with you? CONTENT! Be sure to be consistent as we have spoken about. In our next blog, we will be talking about groups, article and how to prospect on LinkedIn to take your profile to the next level!

If you need some help setting up or company page or creating the right size graphic, please let us know!

Interested in learning more? Take a look at these articles:

Creating a Newsletter with MailChimp

How to Set up your WordPress Website on Bluehost [Ultimate Guide for 2018]

Instagram: An Introduction to Instagram for your Business (Plus Download)

 

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Social Media Audit

Social Media Audit

How many of you created your business Facebook page well over a year ago? Or have had a Twitter account for more than a couple years? With social media being around for over 10 years, it is important to make sure your profiles are updated with your current brand image and message. It is key to be consistent in the digital marketing world from your website, social media profiles, to your marketing materials. Everything should have your brand colors, brand message, website, and logo.

In this video, we run through each platform on how to check your profiles to make sure they are updated!

Interested in learning more? Take a look at these videos: 

Tools for Entrepreneurs

Setting Your Business Up On Autopilot

Setting your Social Media Goals [Video]

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Christina Savage: How to Jump off a Metaphorical Cliff and Land on your Feet (Guest Blog)

By Christina Savage
Owner & Technical Consultant
Christina Savage, LLC

In late summer 2016, I jumped off a metaphorical cliff. I quit my six figure, salaried management job to start my own software consulting business from the ground up.

As a single mom of a 9-year-old son and the sole earner in my household, taking this leap posed a significant risk. Given this fact, you’d think I would’ve created an elaborate business plan, but I didn’t; I just rolled up my sleeves and got started.

But, why?

After years of working in high-pressure software and IT management roles, I was ready for more autonomy and flexibility. I wanted to build something all by myself. Starting a business is, in my mind, a creative process – and I desperately needed to create.

How I got started

In the software world, there’s a saying, “fail fast, fail cheap.” I knew that if I over-thought things, I’d never start. So, I just started getting things done. As an example, I didn’t create a fancy brand; I just used my name as my company name.

christinasavagewebsite

Here a few practical steps that will help you start a service-based business:

Buy a domain name

I bought my domain name from GoDaddy, but there are a lot of domain name registrars out there. It’s fast and easy and will typically cost you less than $20.

Name your company and register it with the state

I formed an LLC by registering it with the state, paying the fees, and filling out the required paperwork. Visit your state’s Secretary of State website to find out the process. Depending on your line of work, you may also need a business license.

Set up a mailbox

I bought a P.O. Box at my local post office, but I’ll likely move to a virtual postbox in the future.

Set up a business phone line

I knew that I didn’t want my personal cell phone number posted publicly, so I set up a Google Voice number. It’s free and forwards all calls to my cell phone. If you plan to build a business with more than one person, be sure to look into other VoIP options like Grasshopper or Fluentstream.

Create a logo

I hired my graphic designer friend to create a logo for me. I love it and I have it on everything – my website, my business cards, my invoices—you name it.

Hire a professional photographer

I hired a professional photographer to take headshots and I used them on my website and LinkedIn profile. Professional photography makes a huge difference, especially when you work with people who find you online.

Launch your website

Even though I’m technical and I’ve worked on a lot of websites in the past, I’m not a website designer. I knew that I’d spend too much time banging my head against the wall over my website theme and design if it was too customizable, so I just went the quick and easy route and chose Squarespace. It’s affordable and really easy to use. In the future, I’ll likely move to WordPress because I think it will scale best for me and offer me better SEO, but for now, Squarespace works.

christinasavagewebsite

Set up your email

I’ve always been a fan of G Suite because I love the Google platform. I’m a huge proponent of a paid email platform, as opposed to using a personal @gmail.com account. It’s one of the most critical tools in your business. Plus, G Suite makes it easy add and manage users and it offers some of the best collaboration tools on the market. My Google Drive files are well-organized, allowing me to keep my personal and business documents separate, but to also access my documents at any time, from anywhere, and on any device.

Get your financial tools in order

Set up a business bank account. Be sure to keep your expenses separate from your personal expenses. If you decide to move to an S Corp or other type of entity in the future, you’ll need to keep these separate anyway.

It’ll make accounting a lot easier, too.

Set up a cloud-based accounting software. I use FreshBooks and absolutely love it. It’s made for entrepreneurs and small business. It allows me to track my time in real time (I typically charge hourly), quickly generate invoices, and automate payment reminders. It’s also integrated with my bank transactions and credit card gateway. Plus, their support is outstanding. Having FreshBooks allows me to spend only 10 minutes per month on invoicing.

Finally, consider getting business insurance. Many clients may require it.

Start using a CRM

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software is a central database to track client communication. I consider it the ‘brain’ of my business. Most CRMs integrate with website forms, sales and marketing tools, accounting software, and reporting dashboards. My CRM allows me to track my prospects, organize my projects, build reports, and market to my clients. It’ll also allow me to easily onboard and communicate with future employees.

These initial steps took me about two weeks. It doesn’t take much. Just start!

 

How I grew (and the emotions that ensued)

Once I set up my systems and processes, I had to figure out how to get clients. I’ve never considered myself a salesperson and I’m not into self-promotion. However, the primary skill that’s contributed most to my career success has been my ability to build and maintain relationships.

I’ve kept in touch with everyone over the years—former coworkers, employers, employees, clients, and vendors. So, when I started my business, I reached out to everyone. I scheduled coffee meetings and a lot of phone calls. This quickly led to a couple of key software partnerships, including my CRM software partner – a referral source that contributed 48 percent of my revenue last year. Other significant projects and clients came from referrals from friends and former clients.

I don’t mean to make this process sound easy. It took a lot of work and even more persistence. There were many days when I literally had no projects. I spent about eight months dipping into savings before my revenue became significant.

I also had a lot of job offers and people trying to get me to come work with them. As someone who’s used to saying ‘yes’ to almost everything, I had to say ‘no’ to a lot of great opportunities and stay focused on my goal of building a business.

systematize your business

What I’ve learned

Once the momentum starts, it keeps going. There will be many days in your journey when you have no idea where your money will come from next month—when your projects wind down and you have few opportunities in the pipeline. It’ll be scary, but you need to keep moving forward. Schedule more coffee meetings, attend a local networking event, reach out to an old colleague, or teach yourself a new skill. If you keep the momentum going, your business will continue to grow.

business organization

Structure your day. Even though you may want to sit around in yoga pants all day—and will probably do that most of the time—you need to stay focused. If you work best in the morning, do your most important work before noon. Schedule your meetings, calls, and business development tasks in the afternoon.

Do great work. You have to put your clients first. Make it as easy as possible to work with you. From your contract to the way you accept payment, it needs to be easy. I accept credit card payments from my clients and I wouldn’t dream of passing through the transaction fees. I invoice clients once a month, my time records are clear and detailed, and I give my clients 30 days to pay. Trust is key.

Systematize everything. Even though you may be starting out as a solopreneur, you may bring on employees or consultants in the future. The more clearly-defined systems and documentation you have in place, the easier onboarding and offboarding will be. Even if you just need to hire a consultant, you’ll save yourself so much time and money if they can easily review your documentation and devise solutions for you. Trust me on this.

Say yes. In the beginning you’ll say yes to almost any work that comes your way. As you grow, you’ll need to start learning how to say no and specializing, but the work you do in the beginning will teach you so much. You’ll also get used to facing brand new problems. Every. Single. Day.

You’ll have to tackle projects you’ve never done before. I’m not sure this ever stops. You’ve gotta be confident that you are smart and you’re a problem solver. In the words of Marie Forleo, “everything is ‘figureoutable.’” Don’t shy away from hard things. Focus and figure it out. You’ll get there. I promise.

You’re going to wear #allthehats. I run my business by myself. I’m the business development rep, sales rep, sales engineer, proposal writer, project manager, technical lead, researcher, marketer, visionary, customer service rep, tester, bookkeeper, and accounting department. I even did my own taxes the first year. Because I worked for small, lean businesses for years, I had experience in all of these areas. If you don’t feel comfortable doing these tasks, delegate or outsource them so you can focus on the highest and best use of your time.

Stick to your vision. As I previously mentioned, I received many job offers and invitations to discuss employee-type roles. It’s flattering and sometimes tempting, but I’m proud of what I’ve built—there’s no salary that could pull me away from doing my own thing.

Track your progress. For me, tracking my revenue is an easy metric to monitor. It took me 8 months to start making consistent and sufficient revenue. I gave myself many pep talks and I had to look at my consulting revenue chart every single month to prove to myself that my revenue was trending up. These trends showed me that I actually had a viable business and that I wasn’t blindly following a dream. Supportive friends and family are also key!

Where I am now

More than a year-and-a-half in, I’ve got 28 clients in 12 states and three countries. I’ve provided consulting on CRM, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), call center, and help desk software. I’ve written enterprise software manuals and marketing collateral, and I’ve managed a few big projects. And now, I’m starting to narrow my focus to the services I enjoy the most.

growthchart

I’m starting to consider re-branding and doing some marketing campaigns. To date, I haven’t done any marketing besides partnering with a few software providers.

I also started working with a CPA to reduce my tax liability and I put myself on payroll (yikes!). Finally, I’m focusing on larger, longer-term projects and building a recurring revenue model.

My current areas of focus are intended to help my business grow and reduce the chance that I’ll burn out over time. Next year, I may be focused on completely different objectives. It’s critical to be able to pivot and scale as your business grows.

“A year from now you may wish you had started today” – Karen Lamb

If you’re eager to start your own business, just start with the steps outlined in the “How I got started” section. Take one step forward every day. You may be surprised where you’ll be a year from now. Good luck!

Any questions? Comments? Get in touch! I’d love to hear from you.

Interested in learning more? Take a look at these articles:

How Social Speak was Born

5 Social Media Goals To Get You Started

Defining Your Core Values

 

How I jumped off a metaphorical cliff to start a successful software consulting business, #business, #momprenuer, how to start a business, steps to start a business, how to become a mompreneur, tools to use to start a business

How I jumped off a metaphorical cliff to start a successful software consulting business, #business, #momprenuer, how to start a business, steps to start a business, how to become a mompreneur, tools to use to start a business

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Search Engine Optimization, Keyword Research, and Blogging for your Business [April Overview]

SEO and blogging

In this overview we review the topics covered by Social Speak in April, 2018.

Additional posts referenced in the video include:

Search Engine Optimization, Keyword Research, and Blogging for your Business, Video Overview of Blogging and SEO
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Tools for Entrepreneurs

tools for entrepreneurs blog image

As an entrepreneur, it is important to find tools to help us stay organized, creative and on top of our social media. In this video, we will go over 10 tools to help you save time, work smarter, not harder.

Interested in learning more? Take a look at the following videos:

Creating the Right Mindset as an Entrepreneur

Setting your Social Media Goals

Core Values, Why They Are Important To Your Business

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Learn how to make your blog posts look pretty

How to make your blog look good with header tags

Have you had a chance to read Caitlin’s blog post from Tuesday? She really helps break down the process of writing a 2500 or more blog post. The key to writing a good, long blog, is to break the content down nicely into chunks and make it look ‘pretty’. In this video, we walk through the backend of WordPress to show you how to add your Header 3 Tags, break up your content and more! The font and color for your header tags can be changed within your theme settings.

Interested in learning more? Take a look at the following videos:

Creating Infographics With Canva 

How to Create a Landing Page Using Mailchimp

Finding Topics Your Tribe Will Love

 

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Creating the Right Mindset as an Entrepreneur

mindset for entrepreneurs

As an entrepreneur we wear a lot of hats, sometimes we can get lost in what we are doing or what we are supposed to be doing. In this video, we will talk about 6 Tips for Creating the Right Mindset.

  1. Make sure you are passionate about what you are doing.
  2. Everything is possible – truly believe that!
  3. Be accountable to yourself
  4. Give Back
  5. Have a positive attitude
  6. Work for it

Interested in learning more? Take a look at these videos:

Setting Your Business Up On Autopilot

Core Values, Why They Are Important To Your Business [VIDEO]

Social Media Audit

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How Social Speak was Born

how social speak was born

At the end of 2017 we, Caitlin & Amber, said that 2018 was going to be a year of change. Sometimes you just know in your gut that something is going to change. We knew this change was going to be for the better, we just didn’t know what the “change” would be!

For 7 years of being in business together and on our own for 10 years, we have worked hard at building our client’s brands, products, online communities, and businesses.

We are really good at what we do! The only problem with building everyone else’s businesses is you tend to put yours on the back burner.

Oh, we will make those videos later, we will write those blogs next week, oh, yeah that’s a good idea to have a coaching program – maybe next year . . . .

Long story short that “next year” came it’s called 2018!

We LOVE, LOVE, LOVE working with our clients and most of our clients have been with us since the beginning.

In December, Caitlin and myself had a talk about what we wanted to do differently in 2018.

How could we take our business to the next level?

We love being a resource to our communities and we both know so much about social media and digital marketing. We wanted to up our game and be able to provide MORE to our tribe!

Um, LIGHTBULB moment, it clicked for us.

What about if we create a website, a new educational platform, where our tribe can go for FREE, YES FREE, to search and find all the information they wanted to learn about social media and digital marketing . . .

Sounds great right?

Caitlin and I like to jump in feet first and not look back. When we have an idea, we are set on it we are making it happen!

We created a new website called Social Speak Network with a TON of information for our peeps, but we wanted to take it one step further . . . with all this awesome content, videos, and downloads, people were still asking on the “How-to.”

They love all the content but wanted to learn more hands-on how to implement it into their business and be held accountable for their digital marketing strategy.

That’s why we created our “Small Group Online Coaching Program” – a 6-month program for 3-5 business owners to really dive deep into their social media and digital marketing strategy, learn how to be successful online, grow their tribe, and learn new things!

Now, this is something that totally feeds our soul!

We are so very passionate about teaching others about social media and digital marketing and all the fun and cool things you can do! Isn’t awesome when you find your true meaning, your purpose, what you are supposed to be doing?

We want to help you create that too!

So, what does this mean for you???  What are we looking for? 

-> We want to invite you to our Facebook Group, this is the starting point, we post great information every day, you can ask questions, engage with other business owners and grow your tribe through this group!

-> We would also love your support if you would subscribe to our YouTube Channel 

-> We would LOVE to offer you is a FREE 30-minute consultation to answer any social media or digital marketing struggles you have been facing. You can email us at SocialSpeakNetwork@gmail.com to set up a time!

Interested in learning more? Take a look at these articles:

A day in the life of an Entrepreneur

Reaching and Attaining your Goals

How To Work SMART In 2018

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How to Set up your WordPress Website on Bluehost [Ultimate Guide for 2018]

Bluehost how to set up hosting get started

In 2018 there are hundreds of different hosts you can turn to for your wordpress website. Some are more difficult to create than others, but we’ve decided after working with many of these hosting companies that Bluehost is the solution you should consider for your small business website in 2018.

This post covers the steps to easily set up your website and hosting on Bluehost.

What is hosting and why does hosting matter?

You can think of hosting as the house for your website files. It is what ensures your site is seen by visitors. Choosing your hosting company wisely can reduce potential headaches as some hosting companies provide more:

  • Customer Service
  • Easy to adjust memory limits
  • Backups
  • Minimal downtime.

After years of working with many different website hosts, we have experienced the best service with Bluehost for small business websites.

Why Bluehost for your WordPress Website?

Bluehost makes each step in your website journey easy. Without hidden fees, you know exactly what to budget and the support is incredible both with chat and phone service. Some additional features we love about Bluehost include:

  • Free SSL Certificate for the main domain in the account
  • Free email that you can set up with a variety of services (or just link it to your gmail account with Imap or POP3).
  • One click install of WordPress files
  • Easy to schedule backups
  • FTP access (which GoDaddy WordPress hosting, for example, does not allow)
  • Only costs $3.95 per month when you sign up for a 36 month hosting plan.

Setting up your Hosting account on Bluehost for WordPress is simple. In fact, you can get everything all set up 5 minutes for only $3.95 per month!

How to set up your Bluehost Hosting Account for Only $3.95 per month

First step first, head on over to Bluehost.com*.

Step 1: Get Started on Bluehost Hosting

Click the Green Button that says “get started now” at Bluehost.com.

Bluehost how to set up hosting get started

You will be redirected to a page where you can select your hosting level. For most small businesses, the Basic Level at $3.95/mo will work to fit all of your needs.

Guide on how to set up bluehost hosting select account

 

I selected the Basic option.

Step 2: Choose your Free Domain

I love how Bluehost allows you to select your free dom

ain, use an existing domain, or even, choose to select a domain in the future. For many hosting companies, you need to select a new domain immediately or else you lose the credit, but with Bluehost, they understand that you may not have found the perfect domain yet.

Bluehost setup guide for 3.95 hosting

If you have already purchased a domain at Network Solutions or GoDaddy, for example, you can tryp your domain name into the “i have a domain name field” and Bluehost will set you up with a temporary domain as your build your website until the domain name has been transferred.

Again, this is super user friendly for website redesigns and if you are just getting started. PLUS, there is no additional fee from Bluehost to transfer a domain into the account.

One downside of using Bluehost to find your domain is that it doesn’t offer selections for similar domains from this page like GoDaddy does with it’s domain selection service. I would recommend checking that your desired domain is available on GoDaddy before trying to purchase it on Bluehost.

Step 3: Purchase your hosting

The first part here is to enter your contact and business details on Bluehost

This includes adding your name, email, business name, address, and phone number into the fields listed.

bluehost create your account today

When you enter your contact information, you can also use Google Single Sign-On if you prefer.

The second part of purchasing your hosting from Bluehost is to review your purchase information

In this part of the page your can select or deselect different add-ons. I honestly unselect all of these except the Domain Privacy Protection. This selection hides your personal/business details from being available online. Especially if your business is located at a home office, this is important to protect your privacy.

bluehost verify your hosting package

As for SiteLock security in your BlueHost account, I’ve found that if you keep your website files up to date, you don’t really need this. Should you get malware installed on your website, go ahead and add it later. If you are worried about site security and not knowing what to do if malware does appear on the site, please keep SiteLock checked.

The same is true for Codeguard.

Lastly, you will enter in your credit card details

Bluehost enter your payment information

Now click “submit” – pretty straightforward, right?

Now, here is actually a tip. You can get hosting on Bluehost for your WordPress website for as low as $2.65/mo!

What!!?!? That’s less than $100 for three years of hosting!

BlueHost special signup offer

Now this doesn’t always work, but if you keep the window open without clicking submit for your credit card information, a new popup will appear with your exclusive discount offer.

Sometimes you don’t need to even enter in any details and the popup will appear with the Bluehost offer for hosting for $2.65/mo.

Again, the trick is to be patient! Don’t click submit right away 🙂

Ultimate guide to setting up Bluehost hosting in 2018, #newwebsite, #website, Create a blog, $2.65 hosting special, hosting coupon for Bluehost

Ultimate guide to setting up Bluehost hosting in 2018, #newwebsite, #website, Create a blog, $2.65 hosting special, hosting coupon for Bluehost

Step 4: Installing WordPress

Guess what, the first prompt you see when you purchase the wordpress hosting is to Install WordPress!

Before you get to building your website, be sure to have a clear understanding of your brand, values, and unique selling proposition (what sets you apart from your competition). To help with this process, we’ve created the Your Business Your Brand Workbook that guides you through your target market, finding brand fonts, colors, and writing the content for your product and services pages. It is the go-to guide for getting your business off the ground.

Purchase Workbook ($9.97)

Interested in learning more? Take a look at these articles:

2018 Social Media Marketing Planning Guide [Curated Content]

Cost-Effective Ways to Market Your Local Business Online

Search Engine Optimization, Keyword Research, and Blogging for your Business [April Overview]

branding and business workbook

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