Book Review: Marketing Shortcuts for the Self-Employed

If I could eat this book, I would. It’s like chocolate for the entrepreneur.

Marketing Shortcuts for the Self-Employed is the 2nd version of a book written by Patrick Schwerdtfeger, called Webify Your Business. Although the name suggests otherwise, Marketing Shortcuts for the Self-Employed is really all about marketing your business online.

The following review contains my honest opinions and I was not compensated for them, nor will I receive any commissions if you buy the book. I was given a complimentary copy of the book to review.

This Is Not Just Another Marketing Book

I’m sure a lot of you are tired of new marketing books. I was, too. When I first received a copy of this book, I let it sit on my desk unopened for about a month. It sounded interesting, but after having read three other books on marketing this year, I was a bit marketing-book’d out, you know what I mean? The PR pitch was convincing, though, and since Patrick had contacted me personally I felt a little intrigued.

The Gist

Marketing Shortcuts for the Self-Employed (hereafter referred to as Marketing Shortcuts…) is packed full of short, 2-3 page chapters that go into detail on a very specific topic related to online marketing. It’s intended to help you create and execute an effective, comprehensive online marketing strategy for your business. No topic is left unexplained; Schwerdtfeger takes readers all the way from figuring out whether our business models are even sustainable, to developing our brand messaging, to making sure that our websites fully communicate that brand message, and on to using inbound marketing tactics to drive people back to our websites, the ultimate point of sale.

The bulk of the book (chapters 26-78, all 2-3 pages long) includes very specific steps you can take to develop an online presence that actually gets you clients. Chapters 1-26 are about developing a sustainable business model, ensuring that your brand’s value proposition is clear, and building a killer website that acts as your sales team. Chapters 79-80 wrap it all up. The book may be 80 chapters but it’s only 247 pages long cover-to-cover.

This book is perfect for both the beginner and experienced entrepreneur. I happen to work in marketing and still feel that this book taught me things that I may not have learned except through horrible trial and error, and so many of the techniques he mentions (especially Twitter techniques) had me wanting to bang my head against a wall, saying, “Ugh, I wish I had done that before!” To me, that’s a book well worth it!

Must-Read Chapters

Follow Schwerdtfeger’s suggestion, which is to read the entire book start to finish and don’t skip around, because it’s essential to creating and executing that perfect marketing strategy. You’re also supposed to actually stop and do the checklists at the end of every chapter. If you’re like me, though, you’re going to read through the entire thing first, do the checklists that you need to do right now to move forward in your business, and then go back and do the rest.

Either way, when you pick up Marketing Shortcuts…, do not skim through these crucial, business-building chapters:

• Chapter 4 Problems + PAIN = Profit
• Chapter 5 Value Proposition
• Chapter 7 Target Market
• Chapter 10 Write a Business Plan
• Chapter 15 Website Sales Function
• Chapter 20 Expand the Frame (Read through again and again until you really get this)
• Chapter 79 Wow Your Audience
• Chapter 80 Consistency Wins

What Wowed Me

I haven’t been wowed by a book in a long time. This book wowed me, personally, because it crushed some of my preconceived notions about marketing tactics. There are a lot of chapters with very detailed information about topics such as online classified advertising and publishing articles online that I originally felt I already understood very well – that is, until I read his examples of how to use them, and then my opinions were changed.

I have several pages dog-eared, and I underlined many points throughout the book. Among them, from Chapter 4 Problems + PAIN = Profit:

Second, people need to be in pain because of the problem. This is important. There are lots of problems that nobody cares about. Many problems don’t result in pain. And because of that, people aren’t willing to spend their hard-earned money to fix them. You need to find the people who are in pain. Who is suffering? That’s your target market. That’s your audience. That’s your ideal customer. That’s who is looking for you and is ready to spend money on your product or service.

Because of the way that the book is designed, this notion of pain was carried all the way through to the chapters on websites. After reading the book, I realized that my brand new website wasn’t focusing at all on any sort of pain. It didn’t speak to a target client’s particular problem – instead, it presented a solution without talking about the pain and using the words my clients would use to describe their pain. I resolved that after reading Chapter 4 and all of the website chapters (and subsequently, got my first unsolicited contact; whether that was coincidental or not, I’ll never know).

What Didn’t Wow Me

I wish I could say, “Honestly, I didn’t like this part or that part” but that would be untrue. I really enjoyed this book start to finish and, now that I am finished, I open it every day to put something new into practice.

The only chapter of the book that doesn’t apply to me is the chapter on Facebook Places and Deals, and that’s only because I don’t run a brick-and-mortal business. The rest of the book is completely relevant to me.

I hope you get a chance to read Marketing Shortcuts for the Self-Employed. If you have read Webify Your Business before, you might want to pick this up as it apparently expands a lot.

Link to Book’s Website & Sample Chapter

http://www.80shortcuts.com/

Watch this 2 minute video on the book