This will take you about 20 minutes to read. So make sure it’s for you.

Here’s how you can tell:

• You’re a solopreneur (or freelancer) overwhelmed with marketing yourself. Where does this writing frenzy end, you wonder. And will it actually bring you business?
• You’re a mid-sized business with budgets out of agency range, in a market where CMO talent is rare to non-existent. You do the best you can with what’s available.
• You’re a thought leader with lots of experience in the field but without the personal branding tool kit. You have results nobody can possibly contest. You want more spread for your magic.
• You have precious assets that could sell internationally. If only you had marketing that doesn’t scream Eastern Europe.
• You’re a productivity addict and sooo into crisp, punchy copy.

Have you checked any of the boxes?

Read on, I might just have good stuff for you.

Before we get to it, you know there’s a part 1, right? Read that first here.

You need a routine

Something you do every morning.

Do it for enough days (66 they say) until it’s a habit and you no longer spend a dime of willpower on it.

Here’s my sequence: drag out of bed, brush my teeth and my nose (a must if you’re the sinus infection-prone type, a savior, I promise), then off to yoga for 30. In the living room, that is.

I already know what I’m doing. I have a playlist on my subscription site. I don’t need to think. Just do.

Then put the kettle on and make cocoa. With it, I go to the laptop, straight to 750words.com. I pour my mind out there for 750 words. Hence the title. No thinking required.

Occasionally I catch a streak and I copy-paste stuff at the end in my writing docs.

But mostly, it’ll be ranting about something. Mantras like “I need to figure this out.” “I need to do this better.”

That sort of thing. Yes, it’s probably Favella (you know who she is, ’cause you’ve read Part 1, right?).

It needs to come out there, so it doesn’t pop out later.

– Bring it on, Favella, it’s your time to shine. Then go back to your box, will you?

Sometimes I also meditate for 15, right at the end of the yoga thing. Or after the words.

Which is when I go to breakfast and may binge on youtube.

Once I check that, I sit at my desk.

Want some extra points out of reading this? Take a pen and paper and list yours.

You need to track your day

No guilt-tripping. Just knowing.

You need to know, on average, when you actually start work.

For how long you focus. When you actually start having ideas. That kind of thing.

For years I used Chrome’s browsing history, estimating here and there.

One of my teachers recommended RescueTime.

I didn’t get much use of the free version, to be honest. On a spree, I got one year’s subscription at a discount. I’m beginning to see the light.

I have a goal for deep work for four hours per day.

Because, it turns out, we only have four hours of quality work per day in us anyway.

It’s all in this book I got as compulsory reading from a strategy masterclass. It’s completely worth your time. If you don’t have seven hours to give it, just go to the mattresses:

Don’t plan for more than four hours of quality work per day. You just don’t have it. Or you’ll be a zombie the next day.

I don’t always meet my number. But I see what I do by the hour and can update my turnaround times.

You’ll need those, too, by the way.

They’re numbers and come as answers to the question of “How long does it take me to do X?”.

Because you’ll need systems. You can’t reinvent the wheel over and over again.

Give each day a theme

Marketing is on Wednesdays for me. It’s the only day I deal with marketing stuff.

On Thursday, if I have a marketing idea, I put on the to-do list and I look at it next week. It gives me some structure.

Not much gets done without.

And even on marketing days, if I don’t do much because the task is vague and I can’t get it together, I still acknowledge it was a marketing day and I did not get things done.

It’s called holding space. Hello, creation jargon!

No names dropping, but big fancy CEOs have been doing it for years.

You need 3 to 5 recipes on heavy rotation

Because you’ll need to have meals taken care of. And unless you have a chef or a family-run restaurant around the corner, I strongly suggest meal prep.

I learned that from my health coach client and have been thanking her ever since. You do the cooking once a week, maybe Sunday. And you put everything in casseroles, ready to serve.

My go-to’s: roasted veggies. Eggplant, sweet potatoes, beets, carrots, or pumpkin. Cut them in cubes, with oil, salt, and pepper at the minimum or more herbs if you’re a pro, and shove them into the oven.

Add a side of greens with seeds and vinaigrette and roasted meatloaf.

(Got me here, I love pork. I run on pork, chocolate, broccoli, roasted veggies, and lentils, actually.)

And grains. Rice, lentils, buckwheat, or you name it. And boiled eggs a bit runny in the yoke (you get that if you boil them for 4-5 minutes).

And apple galette.

But you get bored of things. So you may need to shuffle up. That’s what zucchini bread is for. Oatmeal with cinnamon. Or sea bream in a salt crust.

You get the idea.

You need a power playlist

Or at least one song to play on repeat when you’re getting a wave off the ground. Like some mantra, it will rock your mind and flip that inner switch.

Before you know it, you’re flowing into deep work.

Here’s a few of my lucky bets: Sailing ships from White Snake, Pink’s Who knew, ACDC’s Are you ready, the intros of House of Cards and Westworld, almost anything James Taylor, and the soundtrack of Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy.

And Mulan’s. (The cartoon from decades ago, that is.)

(Please don’t ask. I’ve been practicing a contemporary martial art for 18 years now. I can’t help it.)

Enough with the soft stuff, let’s go back to the main field:

Online courses market with best avatar results. Is that you?

After investing in them enough to pay off half of my remaining mortgage (I’ve just realized that OMG, I could have shaved how many years off my plan?) I have a thing or two to say:

No course gets you results if you don’t do the work.

You know that.

But also,

the course’s marketing is based on results from people who aced it. And they aced it for at least two reasons: they were the kind of person who benefit most from that kind of course, AND they did the work.

Not every business growth course is equal.

Some are for people or businesses who already have a hot Facebook community. If you’re not one of those, selling high tickets to a group of five, one of whom is your mother, might not work out.

Other courses are for people or businesses who have lists of emails they’ve groomed for years. At least 2,000 fans or so.

Don’t apply if you’re not there yet.

If the creator is for real, you’re not getting admitted anyway.

A word of caution about those dedicated Facebook communities.

Most people will look like they have it together big time. Few actually do.

They will post high flyer insights and outrageously priced offerings until you’ll read they have to live out of the car as of next month.

You can’t really blame them for wanting to look good to the course leader and to the community. Just don’t believe everything you read.

Stick to your guns and resist the temptation to doubt yourself.

Also,

Look up the success stories. Do they sound like you? Are they facing the same kind of to-dos you’re dealing with?

Then decide for yourself and save yourself the trouble. Fancy sales pages are there to lure you, of course. They’re written by professionals like me.

But save yourself the trouble and resist the bling thing.

Your WHY matters to you. Not necessarily to others.

I know there’s a huge crowd out there chanting to the Simon Sinek tune: start with your why.

And you do start with your why. It’s what sets you into motion.

But your clients might not be so interested. Not unless it’s deeply connected to what they want.

What do I mean by that?

Here’s what I want, as much as I can articulate it: I had the arrogant claim (that comes with these highly evolved times we live in) that I should love what I do every day.

So instead of working to make it till my next holiday, every day should feel like one.

Find what you love doing and you’ll never work a day in your life. Remember?

Well, kind of like that, but with real bills to pay.

We’re going to call that living the mission.

I want that.

And I have walked away from corporate scripts and titles to do that. Life has a way of rearranging itself so you do. And if you resist, it smacks you over the head. (I’m not reading this from the playbook, by the way.)

I’ll have my spirit awake and busy, FYI.

I want to live the mission and I want life to use me. It’s why I’m here.

Also, I have this outrageous itch to be able to connect and be great with whoever comes my way.

Not just my besties. Everyone. I guess I want to be able to walk into everyone’s world and talk to them like we’re equals. Maybe even jam.

Remember Al Pacino in The devil’s advocate? Street-smart like that, but on the bright side.

Also, not the kind that gets impressed with some pompous what’s-his-name because they’re flashing bling, wounds, or titles at me.

I’m here to be real and great with people.

And after 17 years or so as a corporate power dresser and marketing and sales wonder worker, I took a long hard look at what I can put out there into the world, rather than share other people’s pictures of cats.

It’s a mix of strategy, coaching, and copywriting. I call it positioning and copywriting for thought leaders.

Do you really care why I do it or do you want me to nail it for you and that’s enough? You tell me. For real, tell me in the comments. I actually really, really want to know.

Please don’t come to me with the usual suspects. You know them, the cardboard words. I don’t understand a thing.

Here’s how you know if you want to work with me.

Do you want aliveness?

Like, real-life conversation. People talking to people. With the occasional spice. I was going to say flamboyance. I say that. Sometimes. Not always.

So anyway, do you? If you do, we just might hit it off.

Oh, and don’t tangle up in The Force. Let if flow freely.

Which means all of what I’ve just said but also this: don’t hold up sh*t.

Go through it and clean your room.

Before you do, though…