I had the opportunity to interview 2 highly successful entrepreneurs who are both masters of LinkedIn. They share some pretty amazing tips and tricks that have helped their businesses prosper. Take a look inside to check out these intterviews and to learn how to use LinkedIn for business! Continue reading
Monthly Archives: July 2012
Week 5 & 6 Marketing Recap
A complete Week 5 and 6 recap of my marketing efforts for http://GraphicDesignWars.com. I cover my market research activities and the benefits of hiring help!
Why Your Business Is Not Making Money
Not making money in your business is down right painful. The agony of seeing more money flow out than come in can make the most stoic among us question their self worth. I’ve been there. Going weeks on end without a new client. Paying through the nose just to keep the business afloat or to make payroll. It’s sickening. But one day I took a step back and realized, I’m making some classic errors that can easily be avoided and corrected. Continue reading
If I Could Only Afford To Hire Someone…
Are you a solopreneur? Are you up to your eyeballs with “to-dos”? Just not enough time in the day, ever? Yep, I know the feeling. If you’re in a relatively new business and you’ve yet to hire employees or even a personal assistant, getting everything done in a week is virtually impossible. No matter how many time-management blogs you read, you’re still at a disadvantage when you decide to build a business by yourself. Ok girls and boys, don’t worry, there’s a GREAT solution to this challenge. Time to think like the future millionaires that you aspire to be.
Stop working by yourself and find people that can help you build your empire! Here are some tips that’ll help you build a team of business partners (not employees) at a very reasonable cost. Continue reading
Google Analytics: Cheap Date or Long-Lost BFF?
Ever had a friend tell you that you’re getting chunky around the midsection or point out a huge booger in your nose? If you’re like me, your first reaction is probably sheer embarrassment. After a few seconds though, you normally appreciate the comment because you know that good friends have a way of being honest to us when we need it, not just when we want it. They manage to bring us back to reality and keep us focused on our goals. I guess what I’m trying to say is…. without BFFs, we’d probably all be fat, snotty-nosed slobs.
In the online marketing world, Google Analytics is the quintessential best friend. It keeps it real at all times and will never sugarcoat the truth. Take a moment and get (re) acquainted with your best friend. Continue reading
Tweet Your Way to Insanely Valuable Market Research
If you haven’t already read my post about an unbelievably easy way to conduct market research and how it boosted my selling overnight, you may want to check it out. It covers a fair amount of background on using LinkedIn to learn customers’ buying habits. This post will be short and sweet and will focus on a simple Twitter tip that you can use to get inside their head.
As most of you know, Twitter is a.w.e.s.o.m.e! It’s a 24/7 real-time public broadcasting system and it can be used in a multitude of effective ways for businesses. In the case of conducting stellar market research, we’re going to focus on a proven, fundamental concept that’s used with a Twitter twist. Continue reading
Social Media = A Market Researcher’s Wet Dream
So you think your product/service can dance?! No, but seriously, you probably do think that your product or service adds value to your customers. While there’s a good chance that it does (because you’re a rockstar millionaire in the making!), to uninformed, potential customers, there’s also a chance that you’re full of shit. Potential customers are trained to smell out good deals and bad ones so if you’re not speaking their language when you communicate through marketing or when trying to close a sale, you’re likely going to miss out on revenue dollars. Continue reading
How the Freedom of Information Act Could Net You $150,000!
“Gov’ner, I demand immediate access to this information!”
A while back, my team submitted a proposal to Chesapeake County, Virginia for a disaster recovery mobile application that the county was looking to create. I’d never built a mobile app so I put on my HR hat and found InfinixSoft down in Buenos Aires. These guys are rockstar iPhone/iPad app designers and we quickly struck a deal to bid on the project. Two short weeks later, we’d submitted a bid for just under $30,000 to build the app.
A month following our submission, a received horrifying, yet vastly insightful news. Not only did Chesapeake County decline our bid, they awarded the contract to a company who priced their services at over $150,000! We were wayyyy off the mark in terms of pricing, but because I was able to get a hold of the winning contract that our competitor submitted, we never underpriced our services again!
Duh! The Unbelievably Simple Principle that Entrepreneurs Overlook
Courtesy of The Simpsons
Early in my marketing career I read an excellent book by the very knowledgeable Shama Kabani called The Zen of Social Media Marketing. I highly recommend picking up this book if you’re new to social media marketing. In her book, Shama talks about a fundamental marketing principle that has stuck with me every day and is the foundation for all of my online marketing efforts. It’s the A.C.T. principle.
A.C.T. stands for Attraction, Conversion, Transformation, and it’s important to understand the concept entirely if you’re going to maximize your marketing strategy.
For every potential customer in your market, they must be pushed through the ACT funnel if you are going to maximize the revenue and significantly grow your business. No step should be omitted.
Why Social Media Day Miami Sucked… For Me
Before I get blacklisted by everyone at the event, let me first say that this is a self-reflection and has nothing to do with the quality of the event or the information presented at the event. I do feel compelled, however, to share insights that may ultimately make future events, such as Social Media Day Miami 2013, better for people individually; certainly for me.
This won’t apply to everyone, but I’m almost certain that many attendees who read this will agree that in retrospect, they made the same mistakes that I’m about to outline here.
