How to Grow Your Business with Masterminds – @top5percentinco

By Rich Brooks 04/28/2015

Have you ever felt like you’re stuck with where your business currently is and are in need of a push in the right direction? Maybe you’ve been searching for other like-minded and driven people to inspire and drive you to restrategize and brainstorm where you want your business to be in 1 month, 3 months or even a year, and what steps you need to take to get there.

Perhaps a Mastermind group is exactly the type of environment you’re seeking. Think of it as a networking group of like-minded entrepreneurs all struggling with different roadblocks in their businesses, but who also bring creative energy and ideas to share among the group in a supportive way. Using different platforms such as live hangouts, online forums and in person meetups, Masterminds offer daily support and encouragement from peers that are all seeking advice and wisdom from others that share the same mindset and drive for success.

Dean Patino runs the Mastermind group associated with Entrepreneur On Fire, as well as his own business dedicated to helping entrepreneurs generate recurring revenue for their online businesses.

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How to Run a Successful Facebook Group – @katelerickson

By Rich Brooks 04/15/2015

At least once on our lives we’ve all found ourselves in a forum or other type of online group in an effort to search for other like minded business owners hoping to share ideas and experiences that you can use to grow your own business. But have you ever considered starting your own group?

The idea may seem daunting. There are so many platform choices to consider – Facebook, LinkedIn, a straight up forum, just to name a few. And how do you ensure you have enough interested people to make up an audience? How can you continue to engage and keep your members interested? Do you need a moderator for the group?

Kate Erickson is the content and community leader for Entrepreneur On Fire. Her passion and talent for creating engagement and participation within the community has helped make their forums and business pages wildly popular and successful in their niche.

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How to Unleash Your Business Avatar – John Lee Dumas

By Rich Brooks 10/13/2014

How many times have you hit that fork in the road when trying to solve a business decision? Are you worried you’re not reaching the precise audience that’s right for your business? Have you ever envisioned what your one, ideal audience member would look like if you put a face and backstory to them?

Creating an avatar of your one, perfect listener allows you to narrow your niche to the most precise audience member that you’re trying to reach. Your avatar is your targeted demographic that allows you to focus exactly on the people that benefit most from your message. Once you know who that person is, it allows your business to find its direction and become a magnet that people are drawn to.

John Lee Dumas is the Entrepreneur On Fire, whose podcast was recognized as Best Of iTunes in 2013. John’s podcasts aim to teach upcoming entrepreneurs to take their leap towards success by hearing the stories of failures and lessons learned from other well-known entrepreneurs.

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How to Launch a Successful Podcast with John Dumas

By Rich Brooks 08/04/2013

A podcast can help attract an audience, extend your reach and establish your credibility.

In this week’s episode, John Dumas shares how you can plan, launch and promote a successful podcast. There is an amazing amount of resources he talks to help make launching your podcast even easier, which are all listed down below.

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Big Ideas:

A podcast allows you to make a deeper connection with your audience than a blog, because they can hear your enthusiasm and passion.
A podcast allows you to literally get inside your ideal customer’s head while they’re doing simple tasks like commuting or climbing the stairmaster…letting them focus on what you’re saying.
A podcast is a subscription based model, meaning you can deliver fresh content to them without them having to return to your website to see if there’s anything new.

Show Notes:

The Agents of Change Digital Marketing Conference: Join dozens of marketing experts for the 2nd annual Agents of Change conference! In Portland, Maine, or online!
Voice123: A site to find professional voice overs. It’s like 99 Designs for VOs.
Fiverr: A site where you can find almost anyone to do almost anything for five bucks. Beware: you often get what you pay for.
Audacity: Free software for editing a podcast.
GarageBand: Mac-based software for editing a podcast. (What we use here at The Marketing Agents.)
Adobe Audition: Professional-level software from Adobe. It also comes as part of the Creative Cloud which gives you the full Adobe suite for $50/mo.
Call Recorder: An app that lets you record your audio and video on Skype for podcast interviews.
Libsyn: Hosting for your podcast.
Amazon S3: Another hosting option for your podcast. Might be a better option if you do video podcasts.
Entrepreneur On Fire: John Dumas’s popular podcast about the entrepreneurial journey.
Podcast Launch: John’s amazing ebook that walks you through every step of launching your podcast and getting into New & Noteworthy.

Rich Brooks

Podcaster