To Master Marketing, Use a Mentor - Here's Why By Marcia Yudkin At Isnare.com Ezine Articles

Are you unsure or frustrated in your attempts to build and grow your business?

Some business owners get stuck in the endless quest for the latest information. They attend seminars, purchase home-study courses, devour blogs and newsletters, but never seem to get started implementing what they are learning. After all, there’s always more to learn.

Others stop gathering information, but still don’t implement what they’ve learned because they can’t figure out where to get started, which steps to take first and which tactics to leave till later. Or they understand everything they are learning on a theoretical level yet can’t connect the dots to apply it to their particular in-progress business.

Still others get paralyzed by confusion because they can’t resolve conflicting advice. One guru says article marketing steadily generates traffic and clients, for instance, while another says article marketing is a complete waste of time.

A Mentor Solves These Problems

The way of out these impasses is a mentor – an expert who provides you with personal guidance on how to grow your business. The mentor has “been there, done that,” understands the terrain in which you are trying to succeed and enjoys helping others find their way.

Mentoring can happen in the context of a series of one-on-one coaching or consulting sessions or in a membership program where you get access to a mentor’s advice in a private, small-group setting.

Here’s why marketing mentoring cuts through overload and confusion, promoting intelligent action:

· Instead of floundering, you can ask questions and keep asking until you feel confident about what to do first, second and third. The more you take action, the sooner you succeed.

· You don’t have to wonder about whether you’re implementing things correctly – you can ask for and receive savvy feedback.

· In response to your request for feedback, the mentor can point out areas you didn’t ask about but that need to be redirected or revamped as you go forward. This saves you from learning through disasters and failures.

· You save time from not having to filter multiple, dispersed sources of information and to decide between conflicting advice. What you do is far more focused and effective than before.

· A mentor cheers your progress, nudges you off the starting line, puts setbacks in perspective and helps you analyze what unexpectedly didn’t work. Emotionally, you’re no longer struggling alone.

Avoid the temptation to think that if one mentor is great, two or three give you even more momentum. In fact, the opposite is true. Looking to more than one mentor at a time sets you up for frustration, overload and confusion all over again!

So select your mentor wisely. Be clear on the qualities you want in your marketing coach or advisor. Consider these qualities and qualifications as you search for the mentor who can spur you to intelligent action:

· A lengthy track record of success. This should go without saying, but lately you can find people setting themselves up as mentors who are barely out of the starting block themselves.

· Experience in coaching, teaching or advising. Some successful people know how to do things right but haven’t a clue how to communicate what they know in a helpful way.

· Confidence and caring. Good mentors direct mentorees without doubts and with the desire to see others succeed. Absent from the picture are competition, sarcasm, belittlement, disdain and contempt.

· Consistency and availability. Your mentor should have a stable temperament and a schedule that leaves time and energy for mentoring.

· Rapport with people like you. Some mentors work best with men or with women, with those in a particular industry or from a certain kind of background, or they prefer working with beginners or advanced students. Read their testimonials carefully and then go back and read between the lines.

If this makes sense to you, then I wish you success in finding the individual who can help propel your business beyond where you are today.

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