FTC to host workshop on lead generation | News | Dodd Frank Update

Generating leads while remaining compliant with consumer financial laws has been a topic of great interest in recent months.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will be hosting a workshop focusing on the
growing use of online lead generation in various industries, including consumer
lending and education.

As explained by the FTC: “Lead generators identify or cultivate consumer interest in a product or service, and sell the consumer ‘lead’ information to third parties. For example, as consumers search
the Internet for goods and services, they may express interest in specific topics, such as educational programs, mortgages, or small-dollar loans, and submit their personal information to the lead generator. The consumer leads sometimes contain sensitive personal and financial information that may travel through multiple online marketing entities before reaching the desired
business.”

The workshop, titled “Follow the Lead: An FTC Workshop About Online Lead Generation,” is free and open to the public and will take place Oct. 30 at the Constitution Center on 400 7^th St. SW. The
FTC is seeking research, recommendations for discussion topics and requests for panelists. Such information should be emailed to leadgen@ftc.gov by Aug. 25.

The workshop will address issues such as:

How online lead generation works and its variations, depending of the
industry;

• What types of lead generation conduct may be lawful under the FTC Act’s
  prohibition against unfair or deceptive practices;
• Best practices for entities that generate and sell consumer leads; and
• How consumers can avoid unlawful.

Find Out More

Always Go For A 2nd Turn Down - You May Be Surprised At The Outcome!

Top 10 Small Business Tax Tips For 2015

By Jeremy Marsan On December 30, 2014 

 

Tax season is around the corner and whether you’re filing as an LLC or S Corp, you want to get the most savings possible. To figure out the best ways to save in 2015, we asked accountants and finance experts for their best small business tax tips. Here’s what we found:

Tip #1: Get the most out of your auto/gas deduction

The government lets you deduct business-related car expenses, which you can calculate using two different methods. Try both of them and see which one gives you a larger deduction:Standard Method: in 2015 it is 57.5 cents per business mile plus tolls and parking (up from 56 cents per mile in 2014)Actual Method: add up all actual automobile expenses – including gas, repairs, oil change, car insurance, car washes, etc. – and then multiply it by your business percentage (business miles/total miles for the year).Note: Your commute from home to work is not deductible. But once you get to your office, traveling to a client counts as deductible business miles. Traveling back from the client to your office is deductible, but then from your office to home is “commuting” and is not deductible. - See more at: http://fitsmallbusiness.com/top-10-small-business-tax-tips-2015/#sthash.xPE2OLem.dpuf

- See more at: http://fitsmallbusiness.com/top-10-small-business-tax-tips-2015/#sthash.xPE2OLem.dpuf Read more:Top 10 Small Business Tax Tips For 2015

Marketing 201 | SBA.gov

Marketing 201 | SBA.gov
As you learned in Marketing 101, marketing is the process that companies use to get consumers interested in the items they're selling. Marketing is advantageous to your business for many reasons. Here are just two of the benefits.

• You alert customers to a product that suits their wants and/or needs.
• Marketing will net your company profits, which will allow you to continue to do business in order to meet future customers' needs.

Marketing efforts are the most successful when they focus on what the consumer wants, not on what you THINK the consumer wants. Having trouble finding out information about your target market? Read this article to learn helpful hints and tips for researching your market.

How Can I Make My Customer Happy While Still Staying True to My Business?

The American Marketing Association (AMA) defines marketing as "the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution of ideas, goods, and services to create exchanges that satisfy individual and organizational objectives." Sounds complicated, but in order to be a successful marketer and businessperson, you'll need to follow a few simple steps:

1. Define a target market.
2. Discover what products customers in your target market want to buy.
3. Set a price for these products.
4. Advertise your product to your customers.
5. Make your product available to your customers.

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What Activities Are Included in Marketing?

Marketing activities are numerous and varied. They include everything necessary to get a product off of a sketch pad and into the hands of consumers. Marketing includes activities such as:

• Designing a product to appear desirable to consumers
• Performing market research and pricing
• Promoting the product through public relations, advertising, marketing communications, and sales and distribution

Marketing requires the orchestration of everyone who plays a role in the common goal of pleasing the customer. If you're a small business owner with no employees, you may need to mentally break down the silos separating core business functions and think more holistically in terms of marketing strategies. Back to Top

How Can I Incorporate Marketing Into My Company?

The following represents a comprehensive list of marketing ideas that we’ve compiled for you to help you understand customer needs and ways to satisfy those needs. General Ideas | Target Market | Product Development | Education, Resources, and Information | Pricing and Payment | Marketing Communications | Media Relations | Customer Service and Customer Relations | Networking and Word of Mouth | Advertising | Special Events and Outreach | Sales Ideas | Marketing Performance

General Ideas

• Engage in at least one marketing activity every day.
• Determine a percentage of gross income to spend annually on marketing.
• Set specific marketing goals every year; review and adjust quarterly.
• Carry business cards with you at all times. You never know who you’ll run into!

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Target Market

• Stay alert to trends that might impact your target market, product or promotion strategy.
• Read market research studies about your profession, industry, product, target market groups, etc.
• Collect competitors' ads and literature; study them for information about strategy, product features, benefits, etc.
• Ask clients why they hired you and solicit suggestions for improvement.
• Identify a new market.
• Join a list-serve (email list) related to your profession.
• Subscribe to a LinkedIn group or a list-serve that serves your target market.

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Product Development

• Create a new service, technique or product.
• Offer a simpler/cheaper/smaller version of your (or existing) product or service.
• Offer a fancier/more expensive/faster/bigger version of your (or existing) product or service.
• Update your services.

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Education, Resources, and Information

• Establish a marketing and public relations advisory and referral team composed of your colleagues and/or neighboring business owners; share ideas and referrals and discuss community issues.
• Create a forum or environment for employees to offer their suggestions.
• Attend a marketing seminar.
• Read a marketing book.
• Subscribe to a marketing newsletter or other publication.
• Subscribe to a marketing list-serve.
• Train your staff, clients and colleagues to promote referrals.
• Hold a monthly marketing meeting with employees or associates to discuss strategy and status and solicit marketing ideas.
• Join an association or organization related to your profession.
• Get a marketing intern to take you on as a client; it will give the intern experience and provide you with you some free marketing help.
• Maintain a consultant card file for finding designers, writers, and other marketing professionals. Hire a marketing consultant and conduct several brainstorming sessions.
• Visit another city or county to observe and learn from marketing techniques used there.

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Pricing and Payment

• Analyze your fee structure and look for areas requiring modifications or adjustments. Establish a credit card payment option for clients.
• Offer a discount to regular clients.
• Learn to barter. Offer discounts to members of certain clubs/professional groups/organizations in exchange for promotions in their publications.
• Provide cash discounts.
• Offer financing or installment plans.

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Marketing Communications

• Publish a newsletter for customers and prospects (it doesn't have to be fancy or expensive).
• Develop an online brochure of services.
• Produce separate business cards/sales literature for each of your target market segments (for example, government and commercial and/or business and consumer).
• Create a poster or calendar to give away to customers and prospects.
• Print a slogan and/or one-sentence description of your business on letterhead, fax cover sheets and invoices. Get your business out on the Internet.
• Create a signature file to be used for all your email messages. It should contain contact details, including your website address and key information about your company that will make the reader want to contact you.
• Include testimonials from customers in your literature.
• Test a new mailing list. If it produces results, add it to your current direct mail lists or consider replacing a list that's not performing up to expectations.
• Announce free or special offers in your direct response pieces. (Direct responses may be direct mail, broadcast faxes, or email messages.) Include the offer in the beginning of the message as well as on the outside of the envelope for direct mail.

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Media Relations

• Update your media list often so that press releases are sent to the right media outlet and person.
• Send timely and newsworthy press releases as often as needed.
• Write a column for the local newspaper, local business journal or a trade publication.
• Circulate reprints of published articles.
• Publicize your 500th client of the year (or other notable milestone).
• Create an annual award and publicize it.
• Get public relations and media training or read up on it.
• Appear on a radio or TV talk show…that said, we don’t want to see you on Jerry Springer or Judge Judy.
• Create your own TV program on your industry or your specialty. Market the show to your local cable station or public broadcasting station as a regular program, or see if you can air your show on an open access cable channel.
• Write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper or trade magazine.
• Take an editor to lunch to see what they're writing out and explain how your business might fit in.
• Get a publicity photo taken and enclose with press releases.
• Consistently review newspapers and magazines for possible PR opportunities.
• Submit tip articles to newsletters and newspapers.
• Conduct industry research and develop a press release or article to announce an important discovery in your field.
• Create a press kit and keep its contents current.

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Customer Service and Customer Relations

• Ask your clients to come back again.
• Return phone calls promptly.
• Set up an email or fax-on-demand system to easily respond to customer inquiries.
• Use an answering machine or voice mail system to catch after-hours phone calls. Include basic information in your outgoing messages such a business hours, location, etc.
• Ask clients what you can do to help them.
• Take clients out to a ball game, show, or another special event - just send them two tickets with a note. Hold a seminar at your office for clients and prospects.
• Send handwritten thank you notes.
• Send birthday cards and appropriate seasonal greetings.
• Photocopy interesting articles and send them to clients and prospects with a hand-written FYI (for your information) note and your business card.
• Send a book of interest or other appropriate business gift to a client with a handwritten note.
• Create an area on your website specifically for your customers.
• Redecorate your office or location where you meet with your clients.

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Networking and Word of Mouth

• Join a Chamber of Commerce or other organization.
• Join or organize a breakfast or lunch club with other professionals (not in your field) to discuss business and network referrals.
• Serve on a city board or commission.
• Host a holiday party.
• Hold an open house.
• Send letters to attendees after you attend a conference.
• Join a community list-serve (email list) on the Internet.

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Advertising

• Advertise during peak seasons for your business.
• Get a memorable phone number, such as 1-800-WIDGETS.
• Obtain a memorable URL and email address and include them on all marketing materials.
• Provide Rolodex cards or phone stickers preprinted with your business contact information.
• Promote your business jointly with other professionals via cooperative direct mail.
• Advertise in a specialty directory or in the Yellow Pages.
• Write an ad in another language to reach the non-English-speaking market. Place the ad in a publication that the market reads, such as a Hispanic newspaper.
• Distribute advertising specialty products such as pens, mouse pads, or mugs.
• Mail bumps - photos, samples and other innovative items to your prospect list. (A bump is simply anything that makes the mailing envelope bulge and makes the recipient curious about what's in the envelope!)
• Create a direct mail list of hot prospects.
• Consider non-traditional tactics such as bus backs, billboards, and popular Web sites.
• Project a message on the sidewalk in front of your place of business using a light directed through words etched in a glass window.
• Consider placing ads in your newspaper's classified section.
• Consider a vanity automobile tag with your company name.
• Create a friendly bumper sticker for your car.
• Code your ads and keep records of results.
• Improve your building signage and directional signs inside and out.
• Invest in a neon sign to make your office or storefront window visible at night.
• Create a new or improved company logo or recolor the traditional logo.
• Sponsor and promote a contest or sweepstakes.

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Special Events and Outreach

• Get a booth at a fair/trade show attended by your target market.
• Sponsor or host a special event or open house at your business location in cooperation with a local non-profit organization, such as a women's business center. Describe how the organization helped you.
• Give a speech or volunteer for a career day at a high school.
• Teach a class or seminar at a local college or adult education center.
• Sponsor an Adopt-a-Road area in your community to keep roads litter-free. People that pass by the area will see your name on the sign announcing your sponsorship.
• Volunteer your time to a charity or nonprofit organization.
• Donate your product or service to a charity auction.
• Appear on a panel at a professional seminar.
• Write a How To pamphlet or article for publishing.
• Publish a book.

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Sales Ideas

• Start every day with two cold calls.
• Read newspapers, business journal, and trade publications for new business openings, personnel appointments, and promotion announcements made by companies. Send your business literature to appropriate individuals and firms.
• Give your sales literature to your lawyer, accountant, printer, banker, temp agency, office supply salesperson, advertising agency, etc. (expand your sales force for free)
• Put your fax number on order forms for easy submission.
• Set up a fax-on-demand or e-mail system to easily distribute responses to company or product inquiries.
• Follow up on your direct mailings, email messages and broadcast faxes with a friendly telephone call.
• Try using the broadcast fax or email delivery methods instead of direct mail (broadcast fax and email allows you to send the same message to many locations at once).
• Use broadcast faxes or email messages to notify your customers of product service updates.
• Extend your hours of operation.
• Reduce response/turnaround time. Make reordering easy - use reminders. Provide pre-addressed envelopes.
• Display product and service samples at your office.
• Remind clients of the products and services you provide that they aren't currently buying.
• Call and/or send mail to former clients to try and reactivate them.
• Take sales orders over the Internet.

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Marketing Performance

After implementing a marketing program, entrepreneurs must evaluate its performance. Every program should have performance standards to compare with actual results. Researching industry norms and past performances will help to develop appropriate standards. Entrepreneurs should audit their company's performance at least quarterly. The key questions are:

• Is the company doing all it can to be customer-oriented?
• Do employees ensure the customers are satisfied and leave wanting to come back?
• Is it easy for the customer to find what he or she wants at a competitive price?

Marketing 101 | SBA.gov

Marketing 101 | SBA.gov
In order to successfully grow your business, you’ll need to attract and then work to retain a large base of satisfied customers. Marketing emphasizes the value of the customer to the business, and has two guiding principles:

1. All company policies and activities should be directed toward satisfying customer needs.
2. Profitable sales volume is more important than maximum sales volume.

To best use these principles, a small business should:

• Determine the needs of their customers through market research
• Analyze their competitive advantages to develop a market strategy
• Select specific markets to serve by target marketing
• Determine how to satisfy customer needs by identifying a market mix

Marketing programs, though widely varied, are all aimed at convincing people to try out or keep using particular products or services. Business owners should carefully plan their marketing strategies and performance to keep their market presence strong. Conducting Market Research Successful marketing requires timely and relevant market information. An inexpensive research program, based on questionnaires given to current or prospective customers, can often uncover dissatisfaction or possible new products or services. Market research will also identify trends that affect sales and profitability. Population shifts, legal developments, and the local economic situation should be monitored to quickly identify problems and opportunities. It is also important to keep up with competitors' market strategies. Creating a Marketing Strategy A marketing strategy identifies customer groups which a particular business can better serve than its target competitors, and tailors product offerings, prices, distribution, promotional efforts and services toward those segments. Ideally, the strategy should address unmet customer needs that offer adequate potential profitability. A good strategy helps a business focus on the target markets it can serve best. Target Marketing Most small businesses don’t have unlimited resources to devote to marketing; however, the SBA wants you to know that you can still see excellent returns while sticking to your budget if you focus on target marketing. By concentrating your efforts on one or a few key market segments, you’ll reap the most from small investments. There are two methods used to segment a market:

1. Geographical segmentation: Specializing in serving the needs of customers in a particular geographical area.
2. Customer segmentation: Identifying those people most likely to buy the product or service and targeting those groups.

Managing the Market Mix Every marketing program contains four key components:

1. Products and Services: Product strategies include concentrating on a narrow product line, developing a highly specialized product or service or providing a product-service package containing unusually high-quality service.
2. Promotion: Promotion strategies focus on advertising and direct customer interaction. Good salesmanship is essential for small businesses because of their limited advertising budgets. Online marketing is a cheap, quick, and easy way to ensure that your business and product receive high visibility.
3. Price: When it comes to maximizing total revenue, the right price is crucial. Generally, higher prices mean lower volume and vice-versa; however, small businesses can often command higher prices because of their personalized service.
4. Distribution: The manufacturer and wholesaler must decide how to distribute their products. Working through established distributors or manufacturers' agents is generally easiest for small manufacturers. Small retailers should consider cost and traffic flow in site selection, especially since advertising and rent can be reciprocal: a low-cost, low-traffic location means spending more on advertising to build traffic.

The aforementioned steps combine to form a holistic marketing program.
The nature of the product or service is also important in citing decisions. If purchases are based largely on impulse, then high-traffic and visibility are critical. On the other hand, location is less of a concern for products or services that customers are willing to go out of their way to find. The Internet makes it easy for people to obtain goods from anywhere in the world, so if you’re worried about reaching a certain market, selling your product online may do wonders for your business.

More Layoffs Comming - Fight Back

It has been announced that at 20 major companies have announced layoffs since the election. In talking with other business owners, I get the feeling that there will be many employees converted to part-time and part-timers will have their hours reduced. While this is sad and was predicted, it is also a time of great opportunity and let's be very clear ...no employee is safe in this environment. If you have a job keep it, but prepare for the worse and start your own business immediately. Every household in this country need a business, for tax benefits and opportunities business presents.

Who is laying off? The Blaze Reports.

Contact Jerry W. Williams for making a plan.

7 Mistakes Business Owners Make

Now is the time to put the past behind and to look forward to a new or fresh revival for your business.

View the Freshly Posted and FREE Video for gental reminders of common mistakes made by Business Owners and entreprenuers make. Click her: Dynamic Business Concepts

View it here also.

Emergency Preparedness | SBA.gov

Found this article on the SBA website. It is vey timely because to the weather expected on the East Coast.

General Preparedness Information

• Create a preparedness program for your business
• Identify critical business systems [PDF]
• Create an emergency communications plan [PDF]
• Test your business systems
• Enroll in the Red Cross Ready Rating Program
• Build a disaster preparedness kit
• Learn about SBA's Disaster Assistance programs (online course)

The resources below can help you develop a plan to protect your employees, lessen the financial impact of disasters, and re-open your business quickly to support economic recovery in your community.
Emergency Preparedness | SBA.gov

Double Your Revenue Immediately

By: Jerry W. Williams

A few years ago one of my mentors, Jay Abraham, was talking about the fact that in many businesses the sales person or customer service person was too timid or too bashful to suggest an add-on sale or an up sell because of the fear that it may cost the sale they are presently sure of. The fact is that it may be a disservice may to not mention that another service is available or another product could be a benefit to the product or service being purchased.

This can be best explained by examples so here are a few; I went into a national pizza chain the other day, after preordering over the phone. They were in such a hurry to get me out of there that they didn’t ask if I wanted a soft drink with my order. When I phoned in they didn’t even offer or suggest any other product for my order. I made another to pick up soft drinks.

These examples can go on endlessly but for simplicity suppose that you ordered a carpet cleaning because of the coupon for the service. The carpet cleaner is doing you a disservice if they do not mention that “it is a good idea, while we are here to also scotch guard for protection. It will cost more if we have to come back.”  The fact is that the add-on sale is the most profitable sale you can make.  

Suppose that the value of an add-on sale is $50.00and your employees only make one additional sale per day. Just that small sale amount of $50.00 per day, 5 days a week will add up to $13,000.00 per year in additional revenue. If you have 3 employees and they all do 1 add-on sale per day that is $39,000.00 per year extra.

So how do you get your employee to produce the add-on sale? You give them an incentive. Make them a partner in that sale by offering a commission or bonus for that sale.

They were happy to ring up the sale and happy to remind the client of complementary products. It also was a way to get more money into the pockets of the employees.

Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jerry_Williams

Top 10 Reasons Referral Marketing is So Effective

By Howard Partridge  - 7 Secrets of a Phenomenal L.I.F.E.

Definition of ReferralMarketing: “The process of building a network of sources that will refer multiple clients to your business.”

Top 10 Reasons Referral Marketing is So Effective

1.       Your Network is unlimited – As you begin to build relationships with powerful referral sources and you get your clients to refer you, the network continues to grow with no end in sight.

2.       Higher Quality Clients - Since Mercedes Clients seek out a referral, you get higher quality clients just from being a “referral based.” Referred clients usually don’t even ask about price. They are more concerned about quality than price.

3.       Pre-Qualified Clients- By education your referral sources, your prospective clients will be pre-qualified; therefore, they will already know you charge more.

4.       People Trust Referrals- Wouldn’t you agree that referrals already have a level of trust for you? Sure they do. They trust you because the person they trust knows you.

5.       Reduces Competition- With referral marketing, you are no longer fighting for the best ad placement, or getting copied. Relationships are hard to duplicate.

6.       Low Cost- With the right referral marketing system, you won’t spend money on expensive advertising. The cost is very low for referral marketing. Even with a Referral Reward Program (which I highly recommend), the cost is still extremely low compared to most advertising.

7.       High Returns- The returns can potentially be huge. In many industries a 4-to-1 return on investment on advertising dollars would be outstanding. In other words, if you invested $1,000.00 in advertising, you would get an average of $4,000.00 in return. With referral marketing, if you pay a 10% referral reward and everyone cashes in on it, you will have a 10-to-1 return. In my reward program, /I get a 20-to-1 return.

8.       Returns Guaranteed- With a referral reward, you don’t pay it until after the product or service is paid for. With traditional advertising, you put your money on the line and Hope for a return.

9.       Small Time Investment- The biggest objection I get to referral marketing is “time.” See reason #10 to overcome that challenge.

10.   EXPO-NEN-TIAL MULTIPLICATION!! – …If you can invest just 30 minutes per day calling on powerful referral sources ( companies that are in a position to refer you on a regular basis), do think it is possible to generate just $1,5000.00 in new referrals in a one-month period? Not too difficult for most small businesses.

To find out more about how to use a referral system in your business join us for the (Zig) Ziglar Born to Win Business Growth Workshop October 4^th, in Columbus, GA. The Author, Howard Partridge and Tom Ziglar will teach this and much more! Business Growth Workshop information on $97.00 with a money back guarantee if not satisfied.