Category: Sales & Marketing

BusinessKnowHow: What’s the hardest thing about starting a business? For many new business owners, the answer is “Finding customers.” Having a great product or service that you are sure many people will need isn’t good enough. Customers won’t find you or your web site just because you have started selling a product or service. Indeed, most business owners have to go on regular and frequent fishing trips to find customers and keep new business coming in their doors. But how do you do that? Here are several suggestions to get you started.
Develop a plan. Consider who would make the ideal customer.
Realize there is no one path to success. Sales often happen because prospective customers hear about your products and services in several different ways and from several different sources.
Work your local newspapers. Daily and weekly newspapers are an incredible source of contact information and leads to potential customers.
Watch for events that may bring your potential market together. Contact the organizers of the event and offer to give away your product or service as a prize during the event in exchange for having the group promote you in their promotions.
Attend meetings and seminars that your prospects might attend. If you’ve been doing that and haven’t made contacts that could lead to sales, look in the newspapers to see what other organizations hold events that might attract your target market and attend some of those meetings.
Follow up after meetings. Contact the people you’ve met to see if they may be prospects.
Ways To Find Customers [BusinessKnowHow]

USATODAY: Now my friend was going to a social event, but in business, every entrepreneur needs to have his or her “elevator pitch” ready. Whether you’re networking at a business function, exhibiting at a trade show, trying to raise money, or meeting a prospective client, the first question they’re going to ask is “What do you do?”
You’ve got to have a clear, concise way to answer that question — and that’s your “elevator pitch.”
It takes quite a bit of thinking to decide which aspects of your business to mention. Even more frustrating, you have to decide which parts of your company to leave out. Often these can be the things you’re most excited about — a new technology, a great location, the fact you get to go to Europe on buying trips. But if they’re not central to the core of your business, then they don’t belong in an elevator pitch.
The biggest mistake most people make when answering the question “What do you do?” is that they take that question too literally and start describing exactly what they do. I remember one woman who sold advertising who described in detail what she did: came to the client’s office, picked up their ad copy, went to the printer, sent back proofs, and on and on.
Your elevator pitch must not only be short, it must be clear. Unless you’re in a highly technical field, your neighbor or grandmother should be able to understand your business well enough to be able to describe it to someone else. After all, you want Grandma out there marketing for you too, don’t you?
Your elevator pitch should touch — very briefly — on the products or services you sell, what market you serve, and your competitive advantage.
A good ‘elevator’ pitch will lift your business [USATODAY]

BusinessKnowHow: Press exposure can significantly impact a small businesses’ success. Press releases are not just for big businesses; many small businesses find press releases to be an inexpensive way to gain exposure and attention. It is not uncommon for reporters from magazines, newspapers or blogs to scan press releases as a means to locate content.
Here are some tips to enhance the exposure and quality of your press releases:
1. Relevant
First and foremost, it is important to decide what information should be included in your press release. Information that is newsworthy and relevant will have the best chances of gaining the attention of an editor.
2. Customize
Giving your press release a personalized touch, especially for bloggers and online journalists, can be helpful in gaining attention.
3. Summarize
By creating a succinct summary of the announcement, editors will not need to reword, or condense a lengthy release. The first paragraph or two should clearly state the announcement, so that if an editor’s space is limited, they can simply use the summary in their publication.
4. Swag is Good
The press loves freebies, and by offering them, there is a chance potential customers will keep your name in their mind.
5. Thank You
If you are interviewed or receive an especially complimentary review be sure to thank your press contact. As strange as it might sound rarely are the editors thanked for the coverage they provide.
6. Honesty
The more truthful the release the more likely that it will get ink. Avoid using superfluous adjectives that inflate the use of your product or service. Keep your press release factual.
7. Keywords
Be sure to use keywords and keyword phrases in the press release so that it will be easily located by reporters looking for specific material.
8. Demand Attention
Carefully select the title for of your press release so that it attracts attention. The title should contain key points related to the announcement. A good title is critical. If the title does not gain the interest of the editor, it will not matter what the body of the release says.
8 Steps to Positive Press Exposure [BusinessKnowHow]

Business 2.0: Two years ago the Wellington-based winery Stormhoek hired MacLeod to promote its products on his blog Gapingvoid.com, where he publishes advertising and technology commentaries and stream-of-consciousness cartoons.
CEO Jason Korman had seen the blog and thought targeting MacLeod’s readers, many of them tech geeks, would be a natural: They shared the same single-minded passion as wine enthusiasts.
As Stormhoek’s representative, MacLeod offered a free bottle to any blogger who asked — as long as he or she was of legal drinking age and had been blogging at least three months.
Recipients didn’t have to mention the wine, but many of them did; nearly 100 bloggers posted related items or comments in just six months. MacLeod then used his blog to organize more than 100 “geek dinners” in Britain, France, Spain, and the United States — gatherings of tech workers and influential bloggers who were plied with Stormhoek wine.
A recent dinner in San Francisco, for instance, attracted local technorati like former Microsoft evangelist Robert Scoble (Scobleizer) and RSS pioneer Dave Winer (Scripting News).
While the blogosphere’s reviews of Stormhoek have been mostly good (“drinkable” and “pleasant,” with the odd “disappointment”), MacLeod’s results have been amazing. Stormhoek sales have jumped nearly sixfold, from 50,000 cases a year worldwide to almost 300,000. The winery expects to sell a million cases annually within three years.
How a small winery found Internet fame [Business 2.0]

Marketing Idea Blog: Despite some companies’ best efforts, women are still hungry for products and services that address their needs and solve the problems that are important to them. Here are some things to remember – “What women want,” if Mel Gibson will allow me to borrow a phrase. Coincidentally, they all begin with the letter C. So let’s ditch the Four P’s and lay out the Four C’s: the Four C’s of marketing to women.
Community. Women want to belong to something larger than themselves. If you can create a place where we can gather, you’re ahead of the game.
Conversation. What happens when women gather? They talk. In addition to being part of a community, we want to contribute to the conversation going on within that community. We want to share our experiences, report our problems, offer encouragement and support.
Convenience. From stay-at-home moms to high-powered corporate leaders, from students to grandparents, we all want to recapture more of our precious time and spend it on something we love doing rather than on something we have to be doing.
Cost. Hey, we’re not stupid. We know when something’s a good value, and we know that “cost” isn’t just the price. So don’t just paint it pink and mark it up 20 percent – figure out a way to make it unique to women, or find a way to promote it that pushes our buttons – we’re smart, we’ll get it!
Four C’s of marketing to women [Marketing Idea Blog]