Small Business Marketing Lessons # 2 of 45 – How to Find Clients

Image by EmaStudios via Flickr

Welcome to the 2nd of 45 lessons on how to market your small business.

How to find clients is a question on the mind of every business owner and it is also one of the most important factors in a marketing plan. Without clients a business simply would not exist.. so how do you go about finding new clients?

In today’s lesson we are going to study how to find clients and how to market to them so that you have unlimited new prospects.

In order to know where to find your clients or prospects, you need to know all there is to know about them.

Who is your client?

Discovering the demographics of your business’s clients is essential for your business to develop and grow. Just for a moment consider your clients. Now answer these questions:

what income bracket do you think your customers are in?
what is their gender?
where are they located – in your local neighbourhood or across the globe?
why would they buy your product or service?

Once you build up a profile of your typical customer, it will lead you to them. You will know where to find more of them to sell to and you can raise your profits. Once you answer the above questions, you also need to consider:

what do they spend their free time doing?
where do they hang out – both online and offline?
what types of media and publications are they reading?
where do they live?

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What do your customers want?

In order to stay on top of what your clients or prospects are looking for, you should be reading whatever publications your customers are reading. Being current with trends in your business niche is key to knowing what your customers are looking for, so that you can provide it to them. Whatever your niche is, stay ‘in the know’ and look to your competition to find answers too.

Another question that will lead you to your market is to discover what key issues or problems your clients have. Put yourself in their shoes to think about this. Also visit the online forums for your niche to discover what questions are being asked. Offer something that is going to improve their life or solve their problem.

Use the following to discover what the needs of your customers are:

regularly visit the online forums for your business niche. Study what your prospects are asking in the forums.
find a way to host a question and answer session with your clients, even if it’s on your Facebook Fan Page – let them ask the expert what they need to know.

Don’t be a business that is caught up in prescribing the customer products without finding out what they need and want. There will be many missed opportunities and it could even lead to bankruptcy. Your profits will grow exponentially with selling customers what they do want, not what we want them to want.

Where to find your client

In order to find your clients online think about the following and make that a place that you are too:

what blogs do they read?
where do they go to discuss what I am able to sell to them – ie which online forums or review sites?
what publications do they read?
what communities or forums are there for this topic? (you could always create your own on your site)?
if you are working offline – where do they drink their coffee or shop or spend leisure time?

Once you know what your clients and prospects are up to – you will crack the code of successful small business marketing and reap the rewards of uncovering the answer to your business’s biggest question.

Here’s the link to Small Business Marketing Lessons #1 of 45 just in case you missed it first time around.

Case Study: Creating High-Profit Sales Videos For Free, In Just A Few Hours

It should come as no surprise that YouTube is the #2 search engine on the Internet. That’s why videos are such an amazing way to create awareness and generate killer traffic for your business.

With the instructions in this article, we’ll guide you step-by-step into making your own slick viral videos within just a few hours.

First, take a look at this completed example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxnH8QP3ZTE

This video was produced by Storagepipe Solutions as a means of showing the benefits of their enterprise online backup & archiving systems. And it’s an ideal illustration of how your final video will look.

Step 1: Write the script

Notice how the video is very entertaining, and doesn’t go into boring semantics or technical details. Instead, it’s very light-hearted and playful. The main focus of the dialogue is around the customer’s backup-related problems…. and NOT the company’s product.

You want to leave the viewer wanting more. Your goal is not to make the sale in the video. Instead, your aim should be to generate curiosity and get the viewer to ask for more information.

Also, the video should be brief. No more than 2 minutes at the most.

Step 2: Record the script

Go into a quiet room and record the script using your PC microphone. You can improve the sound by filling the room with large soft objects such as stuffed animals or pillows. This will help dull the background echo.

The best free audio recording software for this is Audacity.

Step 3: Create the storyboard

You don’t have to be Picasso to illustrate your video storyboard effectively. Just make the nicest, cleanest drawings you can on paper. There should be one image for every 10 to 15 seconds of the movie.

Take each of these drawings and scan them as image files on your machine.

Step 4: Compile the movie

When you bought your computer, it probably came with some form of video editing software.

Windows users can create their own movies for free using the built-in Windows Movie Maker. All you need to do is import your audio and image files into your Windows Movie Maker session, and rearrange them however you like.

Step 5: Publish the movie

Once you’ve published your video using Windows Movie Maker, you can open an account with YouTube and upload the video for the world to see.

Extra Tip:

If you don’t feel very confident about your voice talents or drawing abilities, there are many outsourcing sites online that will help you find a professional artist or voiceover actor at a reasonable price. Getting the components of your videos professionally made should cost less than $250, but the results will be much nicer.

The best thing about this video-making technique is that it can be applied to just about any product or service. If viral videos can make big-business backup and archiving sound interesting, just imagine what it can do for your exciting business ideas.

About The Author: Patrick Jobin works for Storagepipe Solutions. This company uses viral videos to promote their line of server online backup products and their online backup partner program to businesses.

Local Search Engine Optimisation Essentials

Local search engine optimisation is quite a different kettle of fish to global. In this post I’m going to take you through what you need to consider when setting up your website to perform well with the search engines for local searches. You’ll need a slightly different SEO strategy and approach.

What NOT to do

Let’s start off with the things that you shouldn’t be doing:

Having an unhappy customer could well be to your detriment now. If you have any negative online reviews about your company, they could show up in the results when you are Googled. But if you have plenty of positive ones, then one or two unhappy customers could well be hidden under the mass of happy reviews.

If you have been using more than one name for your business, such as ‘Clarke’s Cakes’ in conjunction with ‘Clarke’s Bakery’ this could confuse Google and will spoil your search power.

Using different addresses or telephone nos. will also have the same result – your search power will be diluted. Wherever you are listed, be sure to put the same telephone no. Make it a local one too.. as then you will be tied into the local area. Keep all contact information consistent including addresses. PO Boxes are not great to use due to credibility issues with your online customers. A local street address is preferable.

What to do

You may have noticed that over the last year or two entering a local search in some cases brings up a Google Map - you need to get on this map. To do this, you need to claim your Google business listing. Not only can this get you into the no. 1 spot on the page when the map is shown, but you can get extra power to your site.

Be sure to put a “meta description” on your website’s homepage. This is what will show up under your website’s entry in the search engine results. If you are a bakery in San Mateo - then put that. Also put it on your website home page title field too and add the City or State while you there too. Think about other related keywords here too. You can reuse these in your local business directory listings too.

Think about your keywords here. You need to think hmm… bakery – that means you will need to concentrate on using the following:

cakes
bread
catering
donuts
birthday cakes.

It seems that not only is Google picking up on who is linking to you as a website, it is picking up on citations too. So if you are a bakery in San Mateo, it is searching through local information to see who has mentioned you and then giving your business extra power if you have been mentioned by other websites in San Mateo.

Reviews are important for you as a business. If there is an industry review site such as TripAdvisor for the travel industry, you need to really get your customers using that. The more reviews you have the better, and better still to get those coveted 5 star ones. Google will take into account the quantity and quality of reviews. So.. you could encourage your customers to leave reviews by supplying free internet access in exchange for a review on TripAdvisor from your hotel lobby area.

Customers just love credibility. They won’t just give their money to anybody. Google is taking this into consideration and those sites that have photographs and videos of their products or business premises are performing better than those who don’t.

As with all website, Google is still checking the age of the domain and is factoring that into it’s algorithm. If your domain is going to expire within the next year, then extend it for another 5. The longer the domain name is registered for the better, as Google is judging that to mean that you are not intending to disappear overnight. Many shortlived spam type websites will only invest in a domain for 1 year as they want to see if they can make money before investing anymore.

Another little tip is to add coupons for discounts on products too. There are plenty of sites now that will link back to you because you are offering coupons. Free link power!

Be sure to keep your address and telephone no. consistent. Google appears to be checking this before deciding on what order to bring up the search results. The telephone no. should be a local one preferably to tie your business into the local area.

Oh and by the way.. sorry for the lack of posts lately.. I took on a big consulting project and it’s been zapping my time. I’m doing my best to get back on the blogging program though.

Building Backlinks to .edu Blogs

Building backlinks to .edu blogs is one sure way to increase the ‘opinion’ that Google has of you when your site is crawled by the Google spiders. .edu sites have more of an authority value than a regular .com site, so not only will you get the kudos for having a backlink in the first place, it will be magnified by it being a .edu link. You want Google’s opinion of your site to be the best it can, so that you result better in search results.

Some SEO gurus even say that the value of one .edu backlink is worth 20 standard backlinks. Google is now apparently judging links on whether they are in the same niche, and if they are, then more value is given to the link. So today, I’m going to show you how to find .edu sites to link to in a particular niche. Not to mention, we haven’t covered any SEO at all on this blog yet.

So to attain some .edu backlinks you will need to follow this next section. Let’s start with an example: if your website is in the sporting niche, you would type the following into your google search area:

site:.edu blog sport

You can then view all the blogs that Google has with an .edu suffix in the sports niche. I then prefer to refine the results by clicking down the left hand side of the page on the option More search tools.

Then I select Past 24 hours so that I am presented with recently updated blogs. I don’t want the old blogs to post on, for one I don’t know if they are in operation anymore, and for two it could well mean that people are not moderating comments on those blogs anymore.

That’s another thing too, some of these comments areas will give you a ‘follow’ and some won’t. Having a mixture of ‘dofollows’ and ‘nofollows’ will aid your linking strategy.

So now, if you make relevant and interesting posts under any blog posts that you find that allow comments, you can benefit from the work by Google. Keep in mind that the IT departments of some of these education establishments are getting more savvy by the day, and they know that .edu is sought after backlink, so you really will have to write something that they will approve.

Good luck with it and let me know how you get on.

10 Essential Online Marketing Tasks for The Small Business

Following are the top 10 essential online tasks of small business marketing.

Last week, somebody who I met in social media world asked me what my top 10 marketing tips were from my book. This has inspired me to write this post. The following are tasks that I feel every business should attend to in order to commence their online marketing campaign.

1. Create your elevator speech

Creating your elevator speech is essential so that you give a concise and consistent message as to what your business provides or sells in your marketing efforts.

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2. Ensure that the signature on your email is current and useful.

This is one of your marketing techniques that is free to use and can bring you extra traffic to your website. Even if you don’t have a website yet just include your contact details. Also include the following:

Facebook profile link (for example mine is http://www.facebook.com/amelia.champion) You can find it by clicking on your profile and taking the url from the address bar on your web browser. It is best to take this address when you have first logged in. It’s possible that it may give you extra characters or words in the address, but just remove them so that the result is an address similar to mine but with your own name. Test that you have the right address by typing it into a new browser window.

Twitter ID

telephone no.

tagline (use either this post – How to Create a Tagline or Lesson 1 Elevator Pitch to help create this)

Linked-In profile

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3. Create a Facebook fan page for your business

Here is the link to create a fanpage.

Add a profile picture, whatever information that you can including your elevator pitch and a link to your website.

make a first entry on your page such as ‘Welcome to your company name fanpage.

Suggest the page to your friends and contacts

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4. Create a Twitter ID

go to twitter.com and sign-up creating an ID that is related to your company name
add a background – unless you are experienced with graphics, you might prefer to use mytweetspace.com which provides a tool to create your own backgrounds with text
obtain followers - to start getting followers, I suggest that you follow a few people in your field - use Geofollow which is a location based twitter directory. You can then be sure to find companies within your area. If it is not important with your business model to find your clientele from a particular location, then you can search using a keyword related to your business.

5. Add your business to local business directories

use local directories such as yelp.com, google maps, Bing, you can find more on my post about promoting your business locally

6. Create a blog

Search engines love blogs because their content is often fresh and that is one of the points that they grade websites on and how important they are. Having a blog is also a good way to bring new awareness about your business and it can instill some loyalty in your customers as it’s an opportunity for them to get to know more about you. Customers will especially appreciate your blog if you provide them with some useful information that helps them.

One essential task of having a blog is to keep blogging. Even if you only do this only once per week, it is something that needs to be done. Otherwise your blog will appear like a ‘ghost town’ with nobody home.

To create a blog, you can create one for free on WordPress.com or Blogger.com for freely hosted, or install WordPress software from WordPress.org onto your website. If your website is hosted by godaddy.com you will be able to install it from the backend.

Before investing the time and effort into a blog, find out the advantages and disadvantages of free hosted sites and having your own blog that you host yourself. I’ll cover this in my Free 45 Lessons of Small Business Marketing series.

7. Get a LinkedIn profile

Having a profile on Linked-In is now a strong marketing tool for small businesses and for individuals. It can be used in many ways to promote your business.

complete your profile as much as possible
add a link to your Linked-In profile from your email signature and to your Facebook profile or fan page
join industry or location business groups or start your own and invite your contacts
network within the groups and provide useful comments and information when you can

8. Use Alexa.com

If you already have a website or blog, visit alexa.com to see where you are in the big picture. Alexa gives a ranking to each website and using this ranking will give you some idea of how well you are doing with promoting it. You can also use google analytics or statcounter.com to monitor your visitors and see which pages or links they are coming from.

Alexa has a toolbar that provides useful information and links. As a benefit, it can also improve your own website Alexa rank. To make the most of this, install the toolbar on all the computers in your building with your website or blog as the homepage. This will boost your rankings. Here is a link to install the toolbar.

9. Foursquare

If you are unaware of Foursquare, read my post on how it is helping small businesses . Add your business to Foursquare and if you have a bar or restaurant then you give ‘specials’ such as a free drink to the most frequent customer, or think of a special that would work and be appropriate for your business.

10. Study the websites of your competitors

Take a look at the successful websites or blogs of your competitors and see what you can learn.

What do you think works well on their site?
How do you think they are getting their visitors?
What do they post about and what type of writing or voice do they use?
How often are they posting and who are they directing their posts at?
Study what keywords they are using by going to their homepage and clicking on View, Page Source on Firefox and on Internet Explorer, click on the left hand mouse button and Select View, Page Source.

Do you have your own top 10 essential marketing tasks that you want to add to the comments area below?

Small Business Marketing Lessons # 1 of 45 – Elevator Pitch with Example

Welcome to the first of 45 free lessons on how to market your small business.

Each post will take the form of some theory and guidance followed by a task.

What is an elevator pitch?

An elevator pitch is an overview of your business that can be conveyed within 30 seconds (30-80 words) during the ride of an elevator. It should leave your listener wanting to know more. Elevator pitches can be written for products, people or businesses.

Why would you want an elevator pitch?

There are a variety of advantages in defining your elevator pitch or mission of your small business and much of your marketing efforts will be based around this. Without one there is a chance to miss out on vital opportunities for business when you network and it’s very easy to miss the point with your marketing copy.

Imagine unexpectedly meeting a hot prospect at the gym or in the mall and him or her asking you what you do. This is your prime chance to tell them, and you don’t want to leave yourself in a position where you are not prepared to make the most of this opportunity. Remember the proverb ‘He who fails to prepare, prepares to fail.’

Even if you don’t feel like you need to do this with your business, if you haven’t done it already, go through the exercise anyway just to cement your mission again. There could well be something that you learn from this that hasn’t been obvious in the past.

Advantages of defining the elevator pitch

you will be fully prepared and will know what to say if for example you meet an old friend or if an unexpected business opportunity arises in conversation
you will be crystal clear about what you business is about – and this is at the core of all of your marketing efforts
business cards, email signatures, profiles, articles and your about page will all have clarity
easier to create your tagline
it will be easier to write content for your website or blog
optimising your site for the search engines and gaining traffic will be improved if you know what your keywords are and who you are writing for
media contact will be improved
business partners and other bloggers will have clarity

How to Define Your Elevator Pitch

Solve a problem or need - basically the internet is a huge answer machine. Which questions and needs will your business answer?

Who are your audience - what is your demographic? Consider what they need to know.

Why would your client choose your business or want to know about it – what will they get from you or how?

Be clear and precise - don’t leave people wondering what you mean.

Be passionate and convey some energy

If possible inject some humor or personality into your pitch.

And once you have your pitch?

What else do people need to know – ready yourself with the next level of information so that if people ask more, you already have it ready.

Write your pitch on a card and keep it handy next to your computer.

Example of an elevator pitch

I’m not a big McDonalds fan, but I thought I’d use them for the example of an elevator pitch. It could no doubt be improved with a touch of humour or personality injected.

For people who are in hurry, McDonalds provide food quickly for a small budget, with a selection of meals for children and adults, even for those with a preference for healthy choices.

Task: Write your pitch

Once you have done this print it out. You may also want to look for opportunities to include it in your blog or material. Keep it handy at all times when you are working.

Please do add it to the comments below – it’s another marketing opportunity and a backlink to your site after all!

How to Create a Tagline for your Business

If you have ever wondered how to create a tagline or even why you would want to, here is something to ponder. Creating a tagline is essential for your business. Not only does is it a marketing tool that can state clearly on your marketing efforts what you are about, but it is a chance to stand out from the crowd and let them know what you do differently. It’s especially important if it isn’t obvious what your business does from the name.

To create something that will work for you, keep these points in mind:

be clear about the purpose of your business
what value are you offering to the customer ?
what is something special that makes you stand out from others?
how can you get your message across in a clear and precise way that won’t leave others wondering what you mean?
be passionate and convey some energy if possible

For example for a bakery, you might choose something along the lines of: Fresh hot breads that make your mouth water.

This tagline brings across the fact that you supply breads, that they are made on the premises most likely otherwise they would not be hot and fresh and that they taste so good they make your mouth water.

Places that you will use your tagline are:

your blog header
your email signature
forum profile signatures
your business card
your website about page
any paper products that you use such as receipts, envelopes, letterheaded paper

In my next post we will look at the why and hows of creating your elevator pitch.

Promote your business locally by using local search facilities such as yellow pages & google maps

Use these free techniques to promote your business locally and it is quite possible that in a week or so you will be at the top of local search results on google.

Google maps – google maps has a strong search engine optimisation strategy inbuilt. It’s free to add your site. You just need to enter your business, address and contact information. There is even a field where you can add a youtube video. If you add a coupon too, this can be a nice invitation for new clients to use your service or business.

Yahoo local – yahoo also has a local search facility that is free.

Bing – both maps and a local listing is offered.

Yelp – many businesses are already entered into the database. If yours isn’t you can add it. Claim your business and then you can see stats on how many people are viewing your business and you can add newsflashes and private message customers. Customers can add reviews too.

Yellow pages – a free listing is available at their website.

Local directories online – such as craigslist.org and local directories. Type ‘business directory’ into google search engine followed by the name of the city ie ‘business directory philadelphia’ you will see what is available. Add your business and all contact details including email and website address. Also add any reviews that you have if there is a possibility for extra information even if it’s just a one-liner.

See my squidoo lens on internet marketing for local business for more information.

Use Shopping Sites to Promote and Sell Your Products

Using price comparison sites and shopping sites can expose you to new customers who could buy your products. This can also boost traffic to your site too and get your site and brand more well known.

To use a shopping bot you will need to build a feed. Then your products will be listed and they will be displayed when a user searches on particular keywords or they navigate through the menus to the areas selling your products. All products available will be listed with prices. On some sites, the lower the price, the higher your listing will be. On other sites, your product’s listing position will depend on your merchant rating, which changes depending on how many products you have sold.

Some sites will charge a one off set up fee and then will charge per click through. Other sites are free but then will charge per click through. When a customer clicks on the product, they will be taken through to either your website or your merchant store. Be sure to optimise your products with keywords and ask your customers for reviews on your product and service. You don’t even have to have your own website for some sites, as the site will set-up an online store for you.

Google Base – you can create a product feed and supply this to google base. This will give you some good visibility as products on google will usually be displayed on the first page of a keyword search. This is what feeds the google products site.

Yahoo – you can build your own online store.

Pricegrabber – to list your product here is free.

shopping.com – as you sell more products, your merchant rating will rise and you will be seen by more people.

http://www.nextag.com– this site asks for you to bid how much you would pay for a lead.

Ebay – well known marketplace where you can set up either an auction for your product or a ‘buy now’ option. Online store.

Amazon.com/marketplace – amazon is well liked by google and comes out well in search results. Online store.

Facebook marketplace – on this application a potential customer can ask to see items that are within so many miles of him. Currently free to list items for sale. Facebook account needed.

Use Twitter to Build Your Business and Get Followers Fast

Use Twitter to Promote Your Business

Twitter is the most publicised micro blogger on the web. It started as a site where people blogged events in their personal lives or thoughts. Now it is still used for that but is also used as a marketing platform for businesses to promote themselves at no cost. With just 140 characters per tweet post, it is possible to send website links and or links to useful information for others to click on and read. It can bring traffic to your website.

Many businesses have employed twitter to astronomically grow their clientele base and profit without needing a budget.

How many people see your tweets is mostly dependent upon how many followers you have. A quick method to gain followers in your target market is to use www.twellow.com. Sign up and browse the directory and follow some of the people. Once you have them on twitter, you can also follow their followers who are likely to be in the same target audience.