Best Practices for Smart Entrepreneurs
It is important to assess your business model on a regular basis to identify the strengths you can capitalize on and weaknesses that leave you vulnerable. My question to you in this post is: What would happen if you were suddenly unable to work?
Publishing your expertise is an excellent way to create passive income and to market yourself at the same time! *Passive income works when you don’t!
My wife Laurie recently brought home a copy of Food & Wine writer Lynn Ogryzlo’s new book, Niagara Cooks, a beautiful collection of recipes and stories that celebrate the culinary mastery of agriculturally based Niagara cuisine and I used it to illustrate to my culinary marketing class at Niagara College the significance of such an effort in determining the destiny of their careers.

Not only is Lynn’s book an excellent vehicle to market herself and her expertise, it also represents her commitment to community, promoting the good life that we all experience in Niagara which tells us so much about the author. Bravo!
For any entrepreneur with a unique set of experiences, ideas & advice that can impact a reader’s success or… signature products that are exclusively yours, publishing them in print or on-line can be a great venue to reach potential clients and to positively position yourself as an expert in your field.
So where and when should you begin?
My advice to my culinary students… and to any business owner interested in writing a book of their own, is to begin collecting their past publishable material immediately for future use, and then begin following these six steps:
1. Start by journaling on a daily basis, even for just a few minutes to ensure that you have record of your thoughts, ideas, dreams and accomplishments. Keep a notebook dedicated to writing close by at all times.
2. Identify areas of your career that you enjoy, that you excel in or have been recognized in and that you have a passion for to build possible themes around.
3. Closely examine everything that you do that would be of interest and benefit to a particular target audience as potential topics to write about.
4. Get comfortable carrying a digital camera to document special moments with special people that can never be re-captured.
5. Identify possible people who can assist you with this endeavour - people that you can partner with such as a writer, a photographer, a printer or publisher, even investors, to ensure that a lack of resources doesn’t stop you from moving forward.
6. If you are truly serious about this project, create a timeline that you feel is reasonable for your first draft (it can easily be 2-3 years depending on how much time you can commit) then identify a series of monthly and quarterly milestones by which you can measure your progress and stay focused.
Publishing your expertise is no small challenge and requires a full time, on-going commitment but the benefits can be truly motivational… Good luck!
For more on growing your business in new and exciting directions, check out my articles: “Mapping your Success through your Vision & Mission Statements” and “Develop a Winning Formula for your Competitive Advantage” both found here on my website… Larry