Small Business Consultancy - Business & Marketing for Small Business - Blog

Seth Godin: Sliced bread and other marketing delights

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 21:47:32 -0800

Great TED talk with Seth Godin on marketing - really worth listening!

4 ways you can ignite innovation - Article by CBS MoneyWatch

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 20:13:07 -0800

Innovation is great fun to study, filled with inspiring stories -- 3M's invention of Post-it note glue, Xerox's development of the graphic user interface or the many stories about Steve Jobs' last few years at Apple. Equally interesting is the fact that most approaches to innovation backfire, resulting in the entrepreneurial spirit
being broken by people who are trying to make it flourish.
1. Focus on the immediate need, not the long-term problem.
2. Highlight scarcity.
3. Create a common enemy.
4. Focus on what can be done with "spare parts."

Innovation cannot be managed -- a lesson China, and most big companies --
need to learn. It can, however, be lead, and here are four ways to do just
that:

Free Lecture Notes - Economic Analysis for Business Decisions

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 19:16:43 -0800

MIT is offering their lecture notes for free for many of their course. I have highlighted here Economic Analysis for Business Decision but ths site have many other courses available, and all for free.

Access course here: Economic Analysis for Business Decisions

19 Reasons To Do a Press Release

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 05:08:52 -0800

Press release might not get you inches of for national paper but they will enhance your online presence as well
as add new content to your site. And it might be picked up by someone who will get you those columns on a paper whether online or paper.

Press release is also marketing to your current customers and your employees what you are doing. You can send out your press release to your customers (Email marketing), your employees, add to your website, add to online press release distribution website and many more.

What can press release be about? There are tons of reasons why have an press release and here are few;

* New Products
* Business Start-Up
* Partnership
* Strategic Alliances
* Restructuring The Company
* Going Public/Going Private
* Executives Comment On Business/Economic Trends
* New Branch Offices
* New Divisions Established
* Headquarters Relocating
* Major Anniversary
* Major New Client Acquisition
* Company Name Change
* Winning Major Awards Or Receiving National Recognition
* Company Presenting An Award
* Receiving Important Accreditation or Certification
* Major Company Milestone
* New Board of Directors
* New Website

Any there many more reasons why to do Press release. If you are not a writer yourself then it is better to outsource the writing part to specialist.

Learn from the worst marketing mistakes at CES from CBS MoneyWatch - Worth Reading

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 19:22:57 -0800

Great article by CBS MoneyWatch about marketing mistakes by companies. Read the article to ensure you are not repeating others mistakes! Read article here.

Many companies fail in marketing by sending the wrong message or having a campaign that does not reach target audience. It is not easy to juggle marketing, sales, advertising, SEO, finance as a solopreneur or small biz owner. We know, we have been there too! If you need help with your marketing let us know and we can help you with Email Marketing for example. We are trained experts for Constant Contact.

5 Tips to Improve Your LinkedIn Profile

Mon, 09 Jan 2012 06:44:43 -0800

Here are five ways you can improve your LinkedIn profile to increase awareness about you and your business.
Starting point is of course your Profile page in LinkedIn. Consider your profile as your business card and/or advertising of your services. Take it seriously and make it as best as you can. Profile page can bring thousands of new business, and take away as well.

Picture
The thing that many people get wrong is surprisingly simple thing to fix, profile picture. Check quickly your connection in LinkedIn what kind of profile photos they have. Find many good ones? If you connections are like many others you did not find too many good ones unfortunately. I have seen pictures that have obviously taken on party night out, one with friend (so you do not know who is who) or at beach! These really do not portrait you as professional unless your job is to party or hang around on beach. I would advice you to take professional photos, it does cost but payback is most likely much higher than one off cost to take these pictures.

Connections
Do you have everyone you know in your LinkedIn as well on FB or Twitter? Can you think of other people you know but are not yet as connection? Think about networking event you attended recently, did you get business cards there? Add those. And in case you have not being to networking event - Go to next one in your area pocket full of business cards. You can also see who your connections are connected if you find someone you know.

Recommendations
Get some and give some! This is important and great advertisement of your skills. Ask few people if they are willing to write recommendation for you and offer to write one back. I would advice to ask only from those people who you are happy to recommend and can easily write up recommendations of.

Keywords
Use keywords wisely. What keywords do you use for your business website? If your business is about business plans, make sure you add business plans in your profile. Sounds simple but think these out, what keywords would people using when they are looking for you or services you provide? What is your core skill? Make sure it stands out easily in your profile from your other skills. People have very short attention span so make sure keyword is the first they see!

Ask
What others think about your profile preferably from someone who do not know you that well. Ask what they think your core skill is or what your business is all about. If they do not pick it up, most likely others wont either.

LinkedIn is great tool for marketing for you and your business so do take some time to perfect it. And do let us know about your !

9 (+1) Twitter Accounts to Check Out

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 19:58:18 -0800

As Twitter gains momentum and active users it can become more and more difficult to weed out the best people to follow. We went through our list we follow and want to share 10 great Twtiiter accounts to follow.

@NYTSmallBiz
A place where small-business owners can compare notes, ask questions, get advice, and learn from one another's mistakes.

@OPENforum
Welcome to the Official American Express OPEN Twitter Page where you can tap into the collective ingenuity of other business owners.
This is provided by American Express but they do offer great articles and resources for small business.

@mashbusiness
News about small business, advertising & marketing, money & finance, plus careers and business apps from @Mashable. Tweets by @ToddWasserman.
Very good source of business information.

@jeffbullas
Social Media Marketing for Business, including Blogging, Facebook, Twitter,YouTube, LinkedIn, Google+, Search, SEO and Content Marketing
Great articles on SEO!

@lollydaskal
Dedicated to bringing Heart Based Leadership to organizations and individuals. Consultant | Trainer | Coach | Speaker | Founder of #LeadFromWithin
Though provoking tweets, one of our favorites.

@yahooFinance
Y! Finance is the #1 financial news website. 100% feed free tweets
Know what is happening Finance wise.

@CNNMoney
The world's leading business and finance website and the online home to @FortuneMagazine and @Money Magazine.
Same reason as YahooFinance.

@techCrunch
Breaking Technology News And Opinions From TechCrunch

@wwf
Simply put: WWF is in the business of saving our one and only planet.
And we like to help them!

@pinnacleplans
Plus 1 is US! If you are not following us yet find us on Twitter so we can follow you too!

Who do you follow that you would like to recommed to us? We love to hear it.

Great FREE Business Resources

Wed, 28 Dec 2011 23:40:05 -0800

Here are four great free resources for business owners. Check them out today. You do have to give information of you in order to access these but it is small price to pay compared to what you get.

"13 Business Blogging Mistakes & Their Easy Fixes"

Find out how to publish a successful business blog.Creating remarkable content is a critical component of inbound marketing, and also one of the best ways to generate a steady flow of fresh content is by publishing a business blog. Whether you've only just decided to launch a blog for your business or you've been blogging for a while, 13 Business Blogging Mistakes & Their Easy Fixes will help prevent you from making the most common business blogging mistakes and teach you how to fix them.

"Let's Talk Social Media for Small Business"

Feed the Social Media "Beast" and you'll see it pay dividends.Not long ago, social media seemed so new and different that it was treated as an appendage of sorts—a kind of marketing that should be tried only by "experts."

While that view still exists to some degree today, it's become clear to many that social media is no longer marketing's new thing. It's now simply part of the way we do marketing today. Traditional marketing tactics such as advertising, referrals, and public relations are still very important, but social media tactics have now become a part of everyday marketing's fabric and need to be considered at the strategic level of your marketing decision-making process.

So, rather than asking yourself if you should or should not use Facebook or Twitter, the question is: "How can Facebook and Twitter help you achieve your marketing objectives?" It's the same as asking how direct mail or having two more salespeople might fit into the plans. From this integrated viewpoint, social media participation can start to make more sense for each individual marketer's needs and goals.

With this free eBook you will also receive weekly marketing news, tips, and advice you can use courtesy of Duct Tape Marketing.

BtoB Magazine

BtoB Magazine, the magazine for marketing strategists, delivers timely editorial on all disciplines of business-to-business marketing.

BtoB Magazine is the only publication dedicated to all disciplines of business-to-business marketing. In print, through enewsletters and at BtoBonline.com, BtoB Magazine provides more than 100,000 senior marketers, with the information and analysis they need to develop a winning integrated marketing strategy.

E-mail Essentials eNewsletter

E-Mail Essentials is a weekly eNewsletter (Tuesdays) that offers keen perspective on what counts and what works in email metrics and campaigns right now.

Email and e-commerce veteran, Sherry Chiger, offers benchmark metrics, close analysis and real-life case studies of email marketing that measures up.

We Have Shiny New Forum!

Mon, 26 Dec 2011 21:34:55 -0800

We just published Forum on our site! We want to get direct interaction with you, the readers, and help you with those tricky business questions.

We want forum to become place to get answers, get support and encouragement and also just to waste little time on non business related things. We all know somethings you just need to get you mind of from your business and do something completely unrelated.

Do let us know if you have feedback of our Forum.

It might be bit daunting to be the first to start the conversation but don't be afraid - we will be there with you!

Five Great Twitter Tools

Fri, 16 Dec 2011 19:28:25 -0800

Buffer - Be awesome on Social Media

Buffer makes your life easier with a smarter way to schedule tweets. Work out all your tweets at one point in time during the day. Then fill up your Buffer with your tweets and Buffer schedules them for you. Simply keep that Buffer topped up and you will then be tweeting consistently all day round, all week long.

Hashtracking

Track Campaigns. Measure Reach. Calculate Influence. Create Beautiful Presentations. Hashtracking is in Beta stage right now but looks very promising.

MentionMap

MentionMap provides a ‘live’ analysis of what a particular person is talking about on Twitter and who they are talking to.

Timely

We help you schedule tweets for maximum impact. It is very simple to use with big impact.

Tweetdeck

TweetDeck is your personal real-time browser, connecting you with your contacts across Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, Foursquare, Google Buzz and more.

I could have easily have 10, 20 or even 50 best twitter tools as there are numerous tools out there but decided to highlight just few this time. I will make more similar posts in coming days to watch the space!

What Twitter tool do you use or recommend? I am still looking for one tool that would do everything.