Four Free Marketing Methods
Every successful entrepreneur knows that the most important part of any business plan is the marketing strategy. Too many would-be business owners get so caught up in product development that they overlook the importance of how that product is going to get into the hands of consumers. The question investors ask budding business owners is what’s your distribution? which is a way of asking how will you market this?
In the 21st century we have so many different means of communication available to us that it is overwhelming at times to try to choose which medium will best serve your business. People are hit by marketing messages 24/7 and tune out over 95% of what they see or hear. More money is wasted on bad marketing strategies than almost any other part of business, so for young start-ups, it’s best to test with free marketing methods.
One free method of marketing is to affiliate yourself with a business network such as your local chamber of commerce. When there are events, you can share your business cards and brochures with all the other members present. They in turn will likely give you their information, but you may be just what one of these people is looking for or find a partner to joint venture with that will give you leverage to get more exposure for your product.
A second free method of marketing is to write and submit press releases. The internet has made this method so easy, cheap, and fast that offline papers often turn to the online databases to find news. The announcement of your new product and how it solves a problem is definitely newsworthy. Never write them to sound like commercials, it should always sound like news or it won’t get published. Once you’ve written it, you can send it to any of the many online press publication sites, such as OpenPR.com.
Free marketing method number three is to participate in online forums and utilize your signature line to talk about your business. Never openly talk about your business in a forum unless it’s to directly answer somebody else’s question, and never post garbage like ‘me too’ just to get your signature seen in a thread. Contribute good quality and choose a forum that interests potential clients so you’ll know you’ve got a winner.
A fourth and one of the best ways to market for free, is to simply offer some free incentive for people to try your product. This can be entry into drawings for hot prizes, gifts that bear your company logo or message of some sort, free memberships, consultations, information, or bonus additional products with purchase.
Giving things away for free tends to enhance the perceived value of what you offer while at the same time winning the trust of your clients. As people see your interest in delivering real benefits and not just taking their money, you will see more buyers and more frequent action from the same buyers.
Marketing doesn’t have to cost big money, often the best solutions are very inexpensive. Test your strategies for free as often as you can until you are sure of the market’s response, so that once you know how much it costs you to get a buyer you can spend that amount over and over while always gaining more and more profits.
Tyler Ellison is a successful entrepreneur who teaches automated marketing strategies at his site http://www.youcanworkthenet.com and encourages others to join the community at http://www.littleguyco-op.com .
Big Profits With A Little Marketing
Whether you’re starting a business, struggling to keep it afloat, or enjoying steady profits, a little marketing can go a long way toward growing your market share. I should know — I’ve used article marketing to grow my business, and I’ve been amazed at the results.
Marketing yourself with articles is easy, but it does require a little time and effort. Spending an hour a day once or twice a week at your computer writing about your website, product or service can suddenly mean a huge influx of profits!
There are a few things to keep in mind when you write your articles. One of the most important things you can do for yourself when you start your marketing campaign is speaking to your market.
There are literally thousands of content sites on the Web that specialize in a particular area, and it’s almost guaranteed that some of them are posting articles about the very things you do. Still other sites are divided into sections that allow visitors to search through headings and subheadings to find what they’re looking for.
Since specialized newsletters, e-zines and content sites have already done this hard work collecting people interested in a particular topic, why would you want to go and rewrite the Constitution?
It’s very important when you submit your article, whether through a service or using your own software program, you spec it accurately to represent what you’re writing about. One day you may write about business management, and the next about keeping the books. Each of these articles will fall under the category of “business,” but you have the option to further specify “management” on one and “accounting” on the other. These more detailed specs will allow people who are looking for advice on how to track their income and expenses a greater chance of finding your article among dozens of others.
You also need a catchy title. The title is the first thing a person sees when he or she looks at your article. The title will often be the link that a viewer will (or won’t) click before she even sees your first paragraph. Think of your inbox. If you have 100 emails, how do you decide which to open first? You look at the title or subject line. The very same principle holds true in article marketing.
The third thing to remember is, writing is fun and you can do it! Everyone knows something about something, so the secret is writing about what you know. Many people fear the “blank-page” syndrome — when they site down to write that little cursor just blinks at them accusingly and they quickly get up to do something more fun, like the laundry.
There are plenty of tips about how to get over these fears, but the most important thing is to just forget you’re “doing a chore” and start by writing one paragraph describing your business. It’s likely you’ll be surprised how easy it is to keep going.
Do you have a website? Talk about how you started it. Do you offer freelance writing services? Tell readers about projects you’ve completed recently, and maybe give them pricing information.
When you start writing and submitting your work, once or twice a week, consistently over time you will see more visitors to your site. We all know that ultimately, that means more sales.
Johnny is a musician and writer, and a big fan of www.articlemarketer.com, an online article distribution service. For more smart ways to speak to your market, visit http://www.beatintheblues.blogspot.com and http://www.articlemarketer.com/smartway.php.
http://www.articlemarketer.com
Marketing Made Easy: Let Your Fingers Do the Talking
As the owner of a small website, I know how easy it is to get lost in the mix. Sometimes you just want to throw your hands in the air and say, “I give up! Pass me a margarita.”
But before you go reaching for the tequila and salt, let me tell you something. It’s not as hard as you think to get links, get noticed and start actually “doing business” with your online business. That’s the idea after all, right?
Here’s how I approach the problem: I write two or three short 500-800 word articles a week about my business, and then I submit them using an online submission service. The service is budget-friendly, super-easy to use and extremely effective. After just two days, I looked for my article and it was posted on more than 50 websites.
That means each of those sites contains a link back to my site, and more inbound links means — you guessed it — better search engine results positioning. Before I knew it, I was getting more than 200 hits a day on my site. “Unbelievable!” I thought, but it was true.
Here’s the idea. You write a few short articles each week — or as many as you can churn out, the more the merrier — and submit them either using a service or software you’ve purchased that serves this purpose. (Psst! Guess what? A service is a thousand times easier.)
You can select a category for your article, such as Business, Fashion, Marketing, etc. and then select subcategories that will pin your article to even more specific needs if you like. The benefit to categorizing your article is that it will show up in front of people who are looking for your product, service or website. If you write about Children’s Fashions and you turn up in a newsletter about lawn care, people aren’t going to read your article or click on your link.
The way you choose to submit your articles is also important. Software is an option, but I don’t like it because it is quickly (some would argue immediately) outdated, clunky and hard to use. First you have to install it, then you have to figure out how each aspect of the program works, then you have to write your articles — the fact is, most people aren’t going to bother once they’ve got the thing installed.
The thing I love about online submission services is that they do the heavy-lifting for you. All you have to do is write your articles and submit them, and they do the rest. Different services have different features, of course, and you should do the research to see which one is right for your needs.
iSnare is one service that offers “distribution credits” to its authors. Submission is free, but in order to have your article distributed, you must purchase these credits. It’s $10 for five credits, $18 for 12, $38 for 28 and so on. They distribute articles to more than 150 article email lists and over 40,000 publishers, plus hundreds of article sites. They have good reviews from satisfied customers on their website.
ThePhantomWriters is another option. Be sure to include “the” in the title, because there is another website called PhantomWriters that offers writing services, not article distribution. ThePhantomWriters service operates on a sliding scale. It costs $35 to submit one article, and then the next three are $27.50 each, on down to $20 apiece for 10 articles. This is a little steep for my budget, so I moved on pretty quickly from Phantom.
The service I prefer is Article Marketer. They are very professional and courteous, and they tell me when I have something to fix about an article before it can be distributed. At $79.99 for three months or $239.99 for an annual subscription, I can afford to write as many or as few articles as I want. I get unlimited submissions with my subscription price.
Roger Haumann is a self-employed contractor by day, and blogger by night. He is a regular contributor to http://www.articlemarketer.com, an online article distribution service. Visit http://www.articlemarketer.com/howto.php to learn how to get noticed online.
http://www.articlemarketer.com
7 Factors Of An Effective Advertising Campaign
You’ve probably heard the old saying – I know that half of my advertising dollars are wasted, if I only knew which half! Although it’s not possible to know all the factors that go into effective advertising, there are a few elements that are crucial to an ad campaign that is profitable. If you strive to achieve as many of the following 7 factors as possible, you can be confident that you’ll have a winning campaign.
1) Choose an appropriate medium to convey your message. This is so obvious, but you’d be amazed at how many people don’t use common sense when buying media. If you’re trying to reach a 14 year old, don’t buy an ad in the daily paper – buy the radio station that plays hip hop music! Try to target your advertising as much as possible. Think about the person you’re trying to reach with your message. The more you know about that person, the easier this will be.
If you’re selling clothing to working women, buying TV is probably not a good idea. They’re probably so busy doing household chores and taking kids to various activities, they probably don’t have time to watch much TV. But billboards and radio are great because she’s probably on the road a lot and those media fit for that audience.
2) Don’t believe that everyone uses media the way you or your spouse does. Just because you don’t like a certain program on TV doesn’t mean that your potential customer doesn’t like it – they may be big fans and never miss an episode.
Don’t assume that everyone reads the newspaper because everyone you know does. Ask for information about the medium’s audience – let your rep show you exactly who is watching/reading/listening/driving by/surfing their medium.
3) Don’t judge the price of the ad by the dollar amount alone. Just because an ad is expensive doesn’t mean it isn’t a good buy – and the opposite is true also. If an ad is cheap, but no one reads or sees it, it’s worthless to you. If an ad is reaching tens of thousands of people for $1,000, it might be a good buy if those are the people who are in the market for your product.
Try to gauge the real value of an ad by the cost per thousand or cost per rating point (for TV, radio & cable). If you’re not familiar with those terms, ask your ad rep – they will be happy to fill you in. (And if they aren’t, find a new rep.)
4) Develop a relationship with your customers and prospects. This is another thing that should be obvious, but very few companies actually do this. Proctor and Gamble has found that this is what makes them money. And it makes sense. If people trust your brand and feel that they know your company, they’re far more likely to buy your products. This is actually easier to do as a smaller business than a large one – and many local businesses have done this for years.
It may be schmaltzy, but when the local furniture store owner is on camera for all his TV commercials, people develop a relationship of sorts with him or her. They feel like they know that business. Anytime you can link a personality – even if it’s not a celebrity – to a business, that makes that business stand out. This is an important element that there’s not nearly enough room to cover – so think this one through for your business and come up with ways (and they can be very simple) to develop a relationship with your customers and prospects. An email newsletter is a simple, cheap and very effective way to do this, by the way.
5) Have a hook. Give people something that makes them remember you. Big companies spend millions on this – and for a good reason – it sells stuff. Whatever you do, don’t say “for the best in service and quality” – no one will believe you! If you want to convey that message, have one of your customers give a testimonial on camera – have them describe how you provided them with great service and quality. Give details.
A hook needs to be simple, memorable and if possible, fun or heartwarming. The Taco Bell Chihuahua is a good example – the Pillsbury Doughboy is another one. Do something different and let people know about it. Give them a reason to choose your company over your competitors.
6) Be relevant. Talk to your prospects in your advertising – let them know that you feel their pain and are going to help them make it go away. If you’re talking about something they can’t relate to, they’ll ignore you. There are way too many advertising messages in the world today – and people have learned to tune them out unless they click with something that is important to them. You know how this works – you do the same thing.
If you’re sick of how your car is nickel & dimming you lately, you suddenly are much more aware of ads for cars. Find out why people buy your product and talk about how you will give that to them. It’s really pretty simple – but an overwhelming majority of businesses totally miss this.
7) Make sure you know what you’re trying to get your prospect to do. Do you want them to come to your store and buy a specific product? Or do you want them to call your business to get an estimate on a project so your sales person can close the sale in person? The more specific you are in your call to action (please make sure to include one!), the more likely your audience will do what you want them to do.
All of the elements that go into your advertising – the media, the creative, the copywriting, the call to action – create a synergistic result. The more focused you are with any of those elements, the better your results will be. It’s always crucial to measure your ad results. Determine what you want to achieve and include devices that will allow you to determine whether or not you achieved your goal. Then you can tweak results from there.
Kevin Sinclair is the publisher and editor of Be Successful News, a site that provides information and articles on how to succeed in your own home or small business. http://www.besuccessfulnews.com/
Real Estate Email Marketing
Email marketing for real estate agents is one of the fastest growing fields in both the email and real estate spheres. It’s like a match made in heaven: as a real estate player, you need to promote your homes for sale, your real estate courses, housing finance products, and much more. Meanwhile, thousands of potential customers are looking for those offers. And, according to a recent study cited by Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates, 75% of people check their email every morning, even before they get to their voice mails.
There’s more. People seeking real estate want to see pictures of the properties out on the market. Real estate email marketing is perfect for that, in that you can send pictures of available properties in your messages. Technically, you can include as many pictures as you’d like. However, it’s ideal to include between 1 and 5 pictures, so your real estate email isn’t too long, too crowded, or too large in file size.
The best email marketing campaigns include one large picture of the outside of the property, and 2 or 3 smaller pictures of the inside of the property. The top real estate email marketing programs offer pre-made templates with sample pictures in the right spots, so all you have to do is click and replace with your own property picture. You can also feature several properties in your email. The great thing about this approach is that the emails are highly customizable, and you can change them as often as you’d like, so as to achieve the perfect fit for each campaign.
But real estate email marketing is not just for realtors looking to sell properties. Maybe you run a real estate course; maybe you provide financing; or maybe you supply a different real estate service all together. Whatever the case, the great thing about email marketing is that it integrates your online promotion and sales process in one step. For example, say you teach a course on how to make the most commission from your sales. When you use email to promote your course, your potential customers can click a link right on your email, and be directed straight to course signup form on your website.
Don’t sweat if you don’t have a website. The best programs offer full, end-to-end solutions. So in addition to propelling your email campaigns, these services will also help you create and maintain a professional-looking website with all the features you need. Best of all, you won’t need to break the bank or learn any complicated programs to get your website and email marketing up and running.
Another great benefit of this is that it helps you identify qualified leads. For example, say you sent out a message featuring several properties recently made available. First, you’ll be able to see exactly who opened your email, and who went back to see it several times. Clearly, if one of your customers opened your message several times, he or she is at least partially interested in one of the properties featured. For you, that means it’s time for a follow-up call. It gets better. With the top programs, you’ll even be able to see exactly which property this person is interested in. For example, if you included pictures of properties A, B and C, and you included a link under each property saying “Click here for more pictures of this property,” you’ll be able to see that your customer, John Smith, clicked to see more pictures of of property A at exactly 3:45 pm. Now, indeed, it’s time for a highly educated follow-up call, perhaps offering an exclusive early tour of property A.
When it comes to real estate email marketing, the benefits are endless. On top of it all, with the best programs, you’ll have a dedicated account executive who knows the email marketing industry inside and out, and has lots of experience working with real estate professionals. Couple your own industry marketing savvy with your account executive’s email savvy, and you’re sure to have a winning formula. You’ll soon be seeing more sales and more customers as you learn, first-hand, about the effectiveness of such a powerful online sales channel as real estate email marketing.
Sources: Microsoft Inc.
Robert Burko, President and CEO of EliteAnswers.com, helps real estate agents create, send and track professional and effective email flyers through the EliteEmail.com platform: http://www.eliteemail.com/. EliteEmail.com is proudly part of the EliteAnswers.com (http://www.eliteanswers.com) family.