Volunteer Your Way To Offline profits

[Dana_W]

Here's a tip for all those looking to make connections with offline businesses.

Volunteering to share your knowledge with nonprofit organizations is a GREAT way to make connections. Example: a local university near me runs a nonprofit center which serves children with autism. My son has a form of autism. I went to talk to them about getting services for him; they mentioned that their budget has been slashed, and we started talking about press releases and social media marketing and website traffic.

So I ended up talking to the woman in charge of their marketing and fundraising, and today I went in and showed her how to set up Twitter accounts, Facebook accounts, and Linkedin accounts, and how to use these sites to drive traffic and create brand awareness.

She told me she has a couple of friends who could use my services. And this is just from my first DAY there.

If you have skills that you want to sell to offline businesses, that means that you have skills that are valuable to nonprofit agencies who are eager for volunteers and assistance. Your church, your synagogue, the local chapters of the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation, Habitat For Humanity, animal shelters, etc. etc.

Don't go in expecting anything from them, just go in and offer to volunteer your services.

If all that you get is the opportunity to use your services to help people in need - that's not so bad. After you've helped them out, don't hesitate to give them your business card and saying "If you know anyone who could use my services, I'd greatly appreciate you passing this along to them."

If you do this a few times you will make some excellent connections, and also get some very good references that you can use to snag paying clients.

[TeamGlobal]

Hi Dana,

Excellent advice!

Any way you slice it using your talents and knowledge to be of service to others is a win-win situation.

Thanks for sharing.

All The Best,


Tony

[Mark Riddle]

Dana,

You can donate your services for them to use as fund raisers, many have silent auctions at their benefits and not only is it great to donate, it helps to position yourself as the go to person in the area.

And if your business does trainings and workshops, give a workshop for the cause and let them collect the fees for your workshop.

Mark Riddle

[Dana_W]

WOW, is that a brilliant idea! Seriously! I love the idea of offering my services to be auctioned off for fundraisers.

[Shannon Herod]

that's how I actually got started in the off-line world.

I try not to do any off-line stuff, but it seems like I'm doing more and more of it lately.

Anyway, I got started by doing a website for a friend.

I got his website on the front page of Google for a bunch of the local search terms, and at the top of Google maps.

So, everyone he sees he tells about me. So I'm always getting calls about people wanting me to do websites for them.

I'm just too busy, so I mostly outsource the work.

But, I will do the Seo stuff myself.

Just so I can make sure bydeliver on the promise that they will get ranked for local search terms.

But, in retrospect it is super easy to get websites ranked for local search terms. They're just so super specific it's pretty easy.

Anyway, have a fantastic day

Shannon Herod

[stateless]

I tend to think that if you're generous to others in life, they feel the need to scare with you also, and that can bring good things, like business and friendships your way.. so great advice.

[Dana_W]

So Shannon, do you website design yourself? I don't do website design but I know a lot of people I can outsource it to. The services that I can personally offer are social media consulting - teaching people how to set up Twitter accounts, Facebook, etc., and how to use them effectively, writing and submitting press releases, and teaching people how to get picked up by mainstream media.

[Anthony J Namata]

Dana,

I couldn't agree with you more, volunteering ones services is such an amazing thing to do. It always pays in the end. I volunteer my services as a proofreader and it always bags me paying clients along the way.

You go girl!

Anthony