Creative Partnerships for Small Business Developement

One of the fastest ways to establish your small marketing business is to establish a partnership with other small businesses, says Duct Tape Marketing blogger John Jantsch.

His ideas for like minded partnerships as well as outside the box partnerships can be found here.

For more information on this subject consider ordering a copy of Lorraine’s book : Confessions of a Networking Junkie

Entrepreneurial Behavior Can Be Learned.

In a recent post on Duct Tape Marketing, small business expert John Jansh argues:

Many of the traits that make up the entrepreneur are ingrained as habits, I suspect, knowingly or unknowingly, by our well intentioned parents and caregivers.

So this raises an interesting question.  If you didn’t grow up in an entrepreneurial environment, can you be a successful entrepreneur?  I think you can, but you have to recognize the skills and traits you didn’t see modeled when you are young, and find a way to model them now.

For example – i come from a family of teachers and social workers.  I know how to tell a good story, and break down complex ideas into manageable bites, but I still wrestle with skills which come easily to the natural entrepreneur.  So how do I compensate?  I hang out with entrepreneurs who do have that background, and hang out with the, observe how they approach their business.

Read the rest of John’s post

Clients Want Shortcuts

In this day and age, we are all over stimulated and bombarded with information on every front.  Want more clients in this cluttered environment? Walt Goshert, small business marketing expert suggests creating building a step-by-step process into your marketing strategy that your clients will find you easy to work with and a refreshing change from the constant information overload.

Read more.

E-course for Small Business Marketing

Use the power of the internet to build your small business by offering an ecourse. An ecourse demonstrates your expertise on your specialty by teaching others about it. eCourses help establish you as a subject matter expert, keeping you in front of prospective clients, and increasing your chances of future business.

Read more.

The Importance of Planning for Small Business Marketing

Marketing Planning is more important to a small business than to a large company according to small business marketing expert, Nate Stockard. He believes larger companies have more leeway to make mistakes in their marketing campaign while small companies can blow their budget with one mistake if proper planning is not done.

I have always believed planning made a difference, regardless of the size of the budget.    As a Brand Manager at Bryant, I always had less funds then the Carrier team,  so we spent more time planning and finding creative ways to get noticed.   The result, our awareness grew significantly faster.

Since we couldn’t afford to buy big ads, we worked harder to develop stories about our products nationally and our dealers locally that would run in the paper and on the radio next to the ads Carrier bought.    Buying an advertisement is easy, getting a story placed takes planning, but there is a pay off!

That same strategy is an integral part of my marketing today as a small business owner.

What about you?   How much planning do you do?

Read More

Need help with your marketing plan?  Roundpeg can help!

How is your Marketing going in 2008?

I discovered Randy & Donny, The Marketing Twins, recently and really enjoy their blog posts.   Recently they asked “how is your business going?”

The year is half over, so how is it going? Have you met your goals? Are you having the referrals, leads and profits you expected?

My own mid year review was interesting.  My project mix doesn’t look at all the way I planned.  And that would be fine if sales were on pace, but they ae not, so it is time to rethink my marketing, adjust my messages.  Small web sites have become our bread an butter and that type of work is coming to us fairly easily.

But our marketing advice clients are down, so it is time to focus more on marketing advice and less on web design, if I want more of that type of business, and I do!

And if you are interested, the Twins have shared a systematic marketing approach to put your sales on track. Read full article

A Simple Cost Effective Small Business Marketing Plan

In the Smart Biz article by Charon Smith, a Small Business Marketing Expert, a simple cost effective marketing plan is laid out.

First and most important thing for a marketing plan is establishing a core message which will be communicated consistently on your website, business cards, and other marketing materials.

Read the following top four basics needed for your marketing plan!

A Simple Cost Effective Small Business Marketing Plan

In the Smart Biz article by Charon Smith, a Small Business Marketing Expert, a simple cost effective marketing plan is laid out.

First and most important thing for a marketing plan is establishing a core message which will be communicated consistently on your website, business cards, and other marketing materials.

Read the following top four basics needed for your marketing plan!

Meet Your Challenges Head On

The post by Shari Voigt  follows the lead of Michal Gerber by encouraging  business owners to take some time to work ON your business, not just IN it.  Read more

What is the biggest challenge your small business is facing? Do you set aside time to work on it regularly? It often helps if you have an accountability buddy someone who will check in with you regularly to be sure you are working toward your goals!

What Frustrates You?

As a small business owner what elements of marketing do you find most frustrating?

According to Infusionsoft, 65% of small business owners cite an inability to consistently and efficiently follow up with leads as the top concern.  Now the survey was done by a eMarketing company, so the results might be a little self serving, but it’s their survey.

So here is there list.  What do you think … Would these make your top ten?

1. Too difficult to follow up with cold, warm and lukewarm leads consistently and efficiently
2. Can’t properly track and manage prospects and customers
3. Need to integrate online and offline marketing efforts
4. Poor email deliverability
5. Too much manual grunt work in the sales and marketing process, no automation
6. Can’t track sales activity
7. Lack of centralization, too many different programs and systems
8. Too costly to maintain servers and IT staff
9. Too difficult to manually manage multichannel campaigns
10. One-dimensional marketing

Vendor Management for Small Business Owners

Forming good relationships with key vendors can save you in many different areas of your business.  At the same time poor vendor relationship can hurt you and your business. Read more to find out why this type of relationship is crucial.

All Your Marketing is Connected

To get the most out of your marketing investments, each piece must work together, reinforcing the customer experince and strengthening your brand image. 

In an article by Jay Ehret, he called it the marketing multiplier effect. Each marketing spot: branding, advertising, word of mouth and customer experience is connected in some way. Read more to find out how!

How Much Should You Charge For Your Services?

For business owners or those in the service industry, determing your rates can be tricky. You want to make sure the price is right. If you ask yourself, do I charge too much? or not enough? read this article by Walt Goshert and find out how to set rates that benefit you and your customers.

 

 

Lead Generation Strategies for Small Business

How do you get Suspects (people that you ‘think’ may want your product or service) to become Prospects or maybe even customers?   Author Jeff Parohas believes there are three main mediums to begin this process  public relations, advertising and referral marketing.

READ THE BASICS

For a small business owner, I always reccomend spending more time and resources on PR and Referrals.  I think it will pay off in the long run!

Practice Customer Loyalty

Do you have a customer loyalty program?  If the purpose is to make customers more loyal to you, author Steve Yastrow has another suggestion.  Focus on becoming more loyal to your customers!    Full Article