Cut And Copy

By Mike McCoy

 Most people don’t realize that potential investors are all around you —there is no shortage of money—and the more prepared you are, the more compelling your investment opportunity becomes. Raising capital from investors or acquiring the proper resources you need is a right of any entrepreneur and one of the best ways a growing business can assure its success. Know how to compel others to invest rather than you chasing the money. Here are top 5 things you can do right from the beginning to build value in your business and help you become more attractive to the money:

1. Develop a healthy relationship with money and know that you deserve to have it. Money is just energy and capital is just one of the many resources necessary to grow your business. If you become too attached to this process or have a sense that your self-worth is tied into the money, you may actually repel investors.

2. People invest in PEOPLE so make sure you’ve taken the time to attract the right mentors and advisors to support you during this process to help you attract the resources you need. There are others who have made this journey successfully before you so find out who they are and attach them to your project somehow. Investors and sponsors are more inclined to put their money into a project with a management and advisory team that has a proven track record. If they’ve done it once, they are more likely to re-create their success.

3. Do what you can to prove out your concept by developing your markets, monetizing some aspect of your business, building a database of prospective customers, forming strategic Alliances and Joint Ventures, and obtaining purchase orders and letters of interest whenever possible. Investors and sponsors are more inclined to take notice if you can show that there really is interest in your products and services.

4. Obtain as much protection for your Intellectual Property (IP) as possible. Having a patent, or the opportunity to patent your IP, is generally the most attractive opportunity to an investor. If not a patent, make sure you have the opportunity to create future IP such as trademarks and copyrights to show that your products and services will not become obsolete. Protect what you can up front to assure interest from investors but if that’s not possible, make sure you have a plan to do so in the near future.

5. Make sure you are passionate and invested in this process yourself and be able to clearly articulate that to investors. Investors want to know how much time and money YOU’VE invested, how passionate you are, how far you’re willing to go with it and how stable you are emotionally and financially so that they know you will have staying power.

Application of these items can be done over time and will help you become super-attractive to money and other resources!

I help people tap into their passion, package their ideas and talents to create multiple revenue streams. For more information got to www.passion2prosperity.com

Your Source For Business Marketing Strategies Online

Mobile Marketing = One to One Marketing
By Alvin Cosav

 Everyone wants to feel special. Many marketers bank on this innate human desire to sell products, services and goods. The most successful marketers would tell you that the way to sell is to personalize the selling process; for example, use the one to one marketing technique.

What is the one to one marketing technique?

Have you ever entered a boutique and have a one dedicated sales representative personally attend to you? Or have you ever patronized a shop for so long that when you enter, youre greeted warmly and affectionately; then you and the storekeeper have a little bonding chit-chat to catch up with the hustle and bustle of your lives? Or have you ever been to a hotel where your every need is anticipated and foreseen? In all situations, the service given to the customer is very personalizedand it obviously makes the customer feel very important. Because the customer feels very important, the customer in turn continues to patronize and even recommends the business.

The one to one marketing technique uses the human relationship aspect in order to sell. The sales strategy relies on the human tendency of wanting recognition and important. It sounds harsh and deceptive, because it sometimes is. But at least when marketers or sales people present you with an object to be sold, its not done in a rash or crude manner.

Todays technology has enabled one to one marketing to take a step or two further into the future. One to one marketing is no longer limited to the actual store set-up because individuals can now receive a dose of one to one marketing wherever and whenever, via text messaging.

Prior to the innovation of text messaging companies had to use generic means to offer and update customers of new products and services: customers were segmented according to set classifications and characteristics in order to market a product or service better or successfully. The glitch was that every other customer in a set cluster got the same message and offers from the company just because he or she was grouped in the said cluster without regard for possible idiosyncrasies or differences in preference.

Text messaging has enabled large companies to individualize and tailor their marketing messages and objectives to their customers more efficiently. The marketing messages sent over text is based on the preferences of each individual customer. These preferences are taken from the content of his/her application information, complaint, request and consideration that has been recorded and exchanged by the customer and the mobile service provider. In a sense, the customer is the one who chooses which marketing campaign gets sent over to his/her phone via text message.

A successful one to one marketing campaign applies individualization to every single product and perspective of communication: its not limited alone to marketing-initiated communication. The appeal of an effective one to one marketing campaign relies on the adjustability and flexibility of the campaign to comply with the ever-changing interests, demands and needs of the customer and the market in general. If the product or strategy has to be modified, a great one to one marketing campaign will readily take this challenging agenda.

Text messaging is great in the one to one marketing perspective because its quick and easy to use or access. Aside from the default marketing knowledge that mobile providers have to base their one to one text marketing campaigns on, customers can further customize their preferences by setting up their options with regards to the information theyd like to receive or not. One to one marketing via text messaging gives the provider a chance to virtually attend personally to the customer and at the same time an opportunity for the customer to give feedback and help individualize or personalize the marketing campaign.

Alvin Cosav works for SJA Mobile as a consultant for mobile marketing strategies. He has extensive experience in mobile marketing. mobile applications from various industry-leading organizations in the mobile industry.

6 Steps For Collecting Testimonials That Aren’t Stupid
By Karen Scharf

 My friend Sam is designing a new web site, and in reviewing available content I noticed there were no testimonials.

Sam told me he never bothered collecting testimonials since he always thought they were “stupid”. He claimed that reading testimonials never inspired him to make a purchase since they always sounded like they were made up anyway.

I’m a firm believer in using testimonials on your web site. Done correctly, testimonials should:

provide social proof - the credibility that your prospect needs to feel comfortable purchasing from you

position you as the expert, leaving you as the only choice for the product or service your prospect is looking for

answer any questions that your prospect has floating around in his head - even though he won’t come out and ask you, he does have questions

The problem many web site owners have with testimonials - the reason Sam didn’t want to use them on his site - is that most people go about the process in the wrong way.

Once Sam decided to include testimonials on his new web site, I knew he would have to create a “testimonial collection plan.”

Testimonial collection plans help to compile inspiring, effective testimonials that motivate site visitors to make a purchase.

This plan is easily adapted to your own web site endeavors:

Step 1

Compile a list of current and past clients that you would like to have testimonials from. Most small business owners simply choose their “high ticket” customers or the customers they are currently working with.

Review your clients and judiciously choose the ones you want to duplicate. Sam based his decision on the industries he most wanted to work with, the size of the company he preferred, the corporate culture he felt comfortable with, etc.

Many prospects are stirred by testimonials from people who are “just like them”. Be sure to stir the prospects who you most want to target.

Step 2

Go through your initial list and ask “What specific, quantitative benefit did I bring to this particular client?”

What is the purpose of this step? Testimonials are more effective when they’re specific. It’s OK to guide your customers in providing specific testimonials, so generate some ideas for steering your customers toward specifics.

Step 3

The third step is to generate a list of questions that the clients can respond to. When formulating your questions, keep your quantitative benefits from step 2 in mind.

You can craft different questions for each of your customers, and the logical answer for each of the questions points to the benefit that you originally identified.

For instance, if you know your product saved the ABC Company considerable downtime on the production floor, your question could be “How many man hours were you able to recoup with the Super Duper Luper Widget?”

Never use a question that could be answered with a simple yes or no. And keep in mind that some of your “guided answers” might require multiple questions.

Make it as easy as possible on your customer - don’t make him think or do the math. Here are a few ideas you can use to craft your own questions:

Prior to using the Super Duper Luper Widget, how much money were you spending each month on qizmoshmaltzkies? After using the widget, how much were you spending?

What problem were you experiencing that made you contact our company?

What results have you seen on your bottom line after putting the widget into use?

What was your income/sales/profitability prior to contracting with Sam’s Service? What is your income/sales/profitability level now?

What is the most important thing you learned from working with our company?

What single feature of the Super Duper Luper Widget has made the most impact on your business?

What aspect of our company were you most pleasantly surprised about?

Why would you recommend the Super Duper Luper Widget to other xyz manufacturers?

Step 4

Once you receive the responses you will have to edit them. You want each of the testimonials to be specific, brief and persuasive.

So take out any of the information that other prospects wouldn’t care about. Replace industry jargon with universal terms that all prospects could understand. And swap out a few of the generic words with strong, convincing power words.

Step 5

The next step is to run the newly revamped testimonial by the customer to make sure it has approval. You can do this the easy way - simply call each of the customers.

But rather than saying “Your testimonial wasn’t good enough…” start your conversation with “We loved the feedback you gave us about our company! Thank you so much.

Unfortunately, we don’t have room to reprint it word for word. Do you mind if we paraphrase it like this instead…”

Step 6

The final step is to plaster the testimonials all over your web site. Use them as headlines, in the sidebars, and even in your new email marketing campaigns.

I can’t say that testimonials are the only way to make your sales skyrocket. But they are definitely a good starting point, and an easy step for you to add to your marketing strategy.

Karen Scharf is an Indianapolis marketing consultant who works with small business owners and entrepreneurs. She offers several whitepapers, free reports and checklists, including her FREE Can-Spam checklist and FREE email pre-flight checklist to ensure your emails get delivered, get opened and get read. Download your copies at http://www.ModernImage.com.

small business marketing

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