Who is Jack, you ask?  Mr. Jack-of-all-trades.  We need to nip him in the bud right now.  If you don’t, he will kill your professional image and likely your chance of having a successful business.

I recently came across the following document that was used in lieu of a business card.

The red bars are to protect the person’s identity.  In the interest of time, we’ll ignore the grammatical and formatting errors.

What are your first thoughts when you see the myriad of businesses presented in this one document?  This may be an extreme case, but it happens all of the time.

Bottom line, when attending networking events and creating marketing materials, pick one business/ topic and stick with it!  You may have several businesses that are directly related.  A primary example of this would be someone who owns an internet radio station and online magazines- it’s all media.  You can feasibly present these together.  However, if you own a landscaping company, babysitting service and you are a makeup artist that holds passion parties on the weekends, you DO NOT want to present these businesses at the same time/ on the same marketing materials/ at the same event.  After all, who wants to know that their babysitter holds passion parties?  Who wants to buy makeup from their landscaping company?

In business, it is important to convey a sence of mastery in what you’re doing.  If you appear scattered, it will be nearly impossible to inspire trust in potential clients.