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A Pie Chart Can’t Do This
Feb 6th
I like charts, graphs, and diagrams because they make sense. Sure, your can skew them all sorts of ways, and sometimes they can get a bit out of hand, but they make sense.
Arrow going up? Great! Series of bars getting shorter? Not so good. Easy.
But I have to admit that Venn diagrams don’t do a lot for me. You’ve got one thing, and another thing, and then in the middle you get this football shaped combination of things that have things.
Yep.
Still, Venns offer a certain graphic advantage that a line or bar graph can’t, like this cartoon that’s some sort of cutesy bear or mouse. Let’s see a pie chart do that!
View full post on Small Business News, Tips, Advice – Small Business Trends
10 Marketing Books You Can’t Live Without
Oct 30th
If you were marooned on a desert island, with only marketing books to read, which would you want with you?
Our Book Editorial Team here at Small Business Trends recently reflected on that very question.
If you had room for just 10 marketing books in your survival kit for that desert island, the 10 books below would be a good start. Inside these choices you will come to understand how prospects and customers think, and what influences them. You will be able to find and identify a profitable niche, create a product mix, price it and ultimately promote it profitably. Check out our picks of the top books about marketing below (in no particular order):–
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“Brandwashed: Tricks Companies Use to Manipulate our Minds and Persuade Us to Buy”by Martin Lindstrom
If you read Lindstrom’s first book, Buyology then Brandwashed will give you more inspirational examples that you’ll be able to adapt and implement even if you’re a small business without a multi-million dollar budget to test your customers’ brains. Lindstrom takes us behind-the-scenes of big brands’ war rooms and shows how they use nostalgia, fear, peer pressure, celebrity, and the inclusion of magical ingredients and elixirs to influence what we buy.
Read our review of “Brandwashed.” (Or get at Amazon)
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“Riches in Niches: How to Get Rich in Your Niche” by Susan A. Friedman
Finding a tight market niche where you and your business stand out is, by far, the most challenging aspect of marketing for most people. You may not have heard of Riches in Niches, but it’s the go-to book that marketing experts give their clients when the subject turns to how to find a profitable market niche.
Susan Friedman coins the terms “nichepreneur” and guides business owners through her GEL formula Friedmann’s proven technique that shows service professionals how to find the professional niche that makes the best use of their skills while yielding maximum profit.
Get “Riches in Niches” at Amazon.
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“Neuromarketing: Understanding the Buy Buttons in Your Customer’s Brain” by Patrick Renvoise , Christophe Morin
Now that it’s scientifically proven that we make our buying decisions using our primitive brain, this marketing book will help you put that knowledge to use and start writing better sales and marketing ads and copy. Renvoise and Morin cover big picture communication principles and tips on details as small as leaving a voice mail message.
In short, the marketing advice covered says to appeal to emotion, present information in a variety of media, be brief, tell stories and approach your marketing from a buyers point of view.
Get “Neuromarketing” at Amazon
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“Visual Marketing: 99 Proven Ways for Small Businesses to Market with Image and Design” by David Langton and Anita Campbell
If you’ve ever found yourself without a good marketing idea or concept for your small business, this is the marketing book for you. Langton and Campbell (CEO of Small Business Trends) waded through thousands of examples and chose 99 for any small business to use as an example or brainstorm starting point.
You’ll find thought-provoking marketing and PR tips, ideas, and creative “stunts” that you can easily adapt to fit your marketing objectives. This marketing idea book doesn’t stop with direct marketing or advertising. It also includes creative ways to use new technology and social media.
Read our interview on “Visual Marketing.” (Or get at Amazon)
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“Constant Contact Guide to Email Marketing” by Eric Groves.
Email marketing and Constant Contact have been synonymous for years. Eric Groves has taken all the lessons learned from the thousands of customers who have successfully used the Constant Contact email marketing system and combined them into this set of collective best email marketing strategies.
If you currently use Constant Contact as your email marketing system, this book is a must-read so that you can get the most out of it. This marketing book isn’t just for Constant Contact customers, though. It’s for any business that wants to do email marketing right.
Read our review of “Constant Contact Guide to Email Marketing.” (Or get at Amazon)
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“Referral Engine: Teaching Your Business to Market Itself” by John Jantsch
John Jantsch, author of Duct Tape Marketing, has interviewed hundreds of entrepreneurs and used their stories as a best-practices collection of dozens of referral strategies as actually implemented by real business owners like YOU.
This marketing book shows you hundreds of different ways to develop a referral system that will pay off. Referral Engine is unique because it gives you dozens of referral systems ideas based on different types of businesses – instead of just one system that you have to adapt to your business. You’ll find many creative ideas to jump start a killer referral strategy.
Read our review of “Referral Engine.” (Or get at Amazon)
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“Attention! This Book Will Make You Money: How to Use Attention-Getting Online Marketing to Increase Your Revenue” by Jim Kukral
Attention marketing is all about attracting attention to your business and your brand — in such a way that you turn that attention into revenue. This marketing book gives marketers, entrepreneurs and sales people an educational and motivational guide to using creative and attention-getting strategies to market your brand or business stand out from the crowd.
Attention! This Book Will Make You Money is filled with case studies, references, and proven examples of what works in the world of online and offline marketing.
Read our review of “Attention!” (Or get at Amazon)
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“Found Money: Simple Strategies for Uncovering the Hidden Cash Flow in Your Business” by Steve Wilkinghoff
You don’t often see the words marketing and accounting used together. Found Money will remind you that one of the “four Ps” of marketing is “product” and managing a profitable product mix. In this marketing book you will learn how to look at and analyze your product mix for profitability.
Business owners and managers who have P&L responsibility will learn about the critical profit drivers that affect their business. You also will learn how to get your employees excited and engaged about the financial drivers that impact profitability.
Read our review of “Found Money.” (Or get at Amazon)
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“Art of Pricing: How to Find Hidden Pricing to Grow Your Business” by Rafi Mohammed
Pricing is often overlooked by business owners and marketers as a powerful differentiator and profit builder. In this marketing book, pricing will transform from a financial conversation revolving around margins and costs to a fun and intriguing marketing conversation about influencing choices and buying decisions by simply manipulating your price.
You will learn about the psychology of pricing and how to attract the largest number of customers in your market segment by simply creating a pricing structure that makes it easy for them to choose you.
Read our review of “Art of Pricing.” (Or get at Amazon)
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“Outrageous Advertising That’s Outrageously Successful: Created for the 99% of Small Business Owners Who are Dissatisfied with the Results They Get From Their Current Advertising” by Bill Glazer
Bill Glazer has built a multi-million dollar business and reputation by using outrageous direct marketing strategies to attract and retain an insanely loyal and profitable customer base. Don’t dismiss his techniques for being exclusively for business to consumer businesses like retail. They are equally effective for every type of business – including industrial and high-tech products.
This marketing book is practical and hands-on. Readers will get examples and templates that they can use to build your own outrageous advertising program. The most valuable parts of the book are the worksheets that guide you through creating your own campaigns.
Read our review of “Outrageous Advertising.” (Or get at Amazon)
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“POP!: Create the Perfect Pitch, Title, and Tagline for Anything” by Sam Horn
This marketing book outlines those special aspects that make an idea, message, or product stand out, and gives readers a simple and proven process—POP! (Purposeful, Original, Pithy)—to create one-of-a-kind ideas, products, and messages that pop through the noise of today’s crowded marketplace.
This is a quick and practical marketing book filled with great ideas that anyone can use to come up with tag lines and titles like a pro. In one example, Horn recommends using a cliché database on the web to search out and adapt for your tag lines.
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Wondering why there are no social media marketing books on this list? That’s because there are so many excellent ones that we’ve created a separate Guide to Best Social Media Books. And don’t forget to check our Guide to Top Sales Books.
Finally… be sure to browse through the 225+ small business book reviews here on Small Business Trends. All reviews are written by our Book Editorial Team.
10 Marketing Books You Can’t Live Without
View full post on Small Business News, Tips, Advice – Small Business Trends
5 Elements of a Can’t Miss Business
Mar 4th
5 Elements of a Can’t Miss Business
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
jeff_golden via Flickr
I suppose anyone that starts a business feels they have what it takes to make it a success.
And, while you may indeed possess the next big idea, it’s likely more important that you understand a thing or two about the dynamics of bringing any idea to a market.
Below are 5 attributes that business owner should consider and embrace as they plan to start or pivot their business in the direction of can’t miss success.
1) The owner is the customer
Understanding the characteristics, desires and behaviors of a narrowly defined target market is very hard work, but essential to your success. Every marketing book or expert will tell you this, but few can give you the magic tablet that allows you to go deeply in the psyche of your prospect.
You can acquire some measure of knowledge from various research techniques, but nothing beats living, breathing, and feeling the same things your prospects do. Some of the surest successes in history have come from founders who created a product or service to meet a personal need and discovered a business by virtue of doing so.
2) The market understands the offering
Some entrepreneurs dream of locking themselves in a padded room for a year or so and emerging with the world’s greatest innovation. Sounds romantic I know, but if your innovation simply solves an incredible problem people don’t yet know they have, you may wind up burning through the money before they get it.
Better to innovate around a proven market, borrow genius from an unrelated industry, or discover an unmet need in a mature market crying for a solution.
3) The market already spends money here
Sometimes marketers shy away from competition. If market research shows that there’s too much competition in a given area or industry, the thinking is that the market is saturated and there’s probably no room for your start-up there.
To that I say nonsense. While it may be true that your neighborhood couldn’t possibly stand another coffee shop, I’ve found the success of several businesses in an industry, even in the same direct community, can spell opportunity.
If people are already spending money on a product or service then two-thirds of your work is done. They understand and value the offering enough to whip out their wallets. All that’s left for you to do now is show them how much better you can make the experience. Few businesses really provide great service. In fact, stealing market share in mature markets is one of the easiest paths for smart start-ups to run.
4) It’s an innovation that simplifies
Much of this article has focused on entering proven markets. While that’s absolutely the advice I’m giving here, know that you must do so with a significant point of differentiation that market easily understands and appreciates. In most cases this can be done by looking at the way most folks in the chosen market operate and find a way to simplify your offerings around breaking the mold.
For example, if people in your service business operate by proposal and bid, come up with a fixed price. If the traditional operating method is custom work, come up with a series of pre-packaged offerings that meet most people’s needs without the custom hassle.
There’s a popular pizza restaurant in Berkeley California that has one unique pizza on the menu each day. They make it up in big batches and serve thousands a day at $20 per pie.
5) Nothing is precious
Here’s the one that can snag small business founders. If you’re in love with your bright shiny baby start-up and all that it offers, you may become blind to the reality the market suggests.
Keeping an open mind and a willingness to discover what the market really wants and adapt accordingly is one of the core advantages of your smallness – remember to use it.
Talk to your customers, talk to your competitors, talk to your employees and remember nothing is precious but what the numbers prove to be so.
View full post on Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing
You Can’t Get More Niche Than This
Sep 9th
Oddly enough, the pig below isn’t the only porker to don wellies. This could be the ultimate niche product.
View full post on Business Pundit
How to Do a Short Sale if You Can’t Pay Your Mortgage
Apr 29th
This is a guest post by James Hua of The Intelligent Investor.
You can save a few hundred a month by buying discount items on Ebay or Amazon and by searching for the hottest deals. Saving a few hundred bucks a month is a ton over a year and its effects are even greater over 10 years. But what if that’s not enough? What if you need to somehow impossibly cut back your expenses like $1000-$1500 because you lost your job or your savings have depleted?
The mortgage payment is America’s single highest expense.
Honoring your word is sacred. You signed on the dotted line and said you would pay your debts. Abraham Lincoln spent 17 years paying off debt he borrowed to start a business in 1833. The virtues of repaying debt and honoring your commitments are self-evident.
However, at some point you have to acknowledge when the snowball gets irreversibly big and you have to make a decision between food and the mortgage. Most people choose the former.
I do not advocate walking away from your mortgage for the sake of it, but if you can only hang in for 3-6 months, you might have to take a close and hard look at the situation and start preparing accordingly. While you might not need a short sale, you might need to prepare for one or at least look at this option. Downsizing and renting can potentially save you thousands of dollars per month.
How do I get started on a short sale?
Just like purchasing a home, it takes time to work a short sale – in many cases, even more time. Be patient and take it one step at a time. This can often take 90-180 days, and if successful, could be well worth your time.
1. Contact your bank – before the end of the road, you want to make sure that you’ve given them notice (i.e., speed bumps). Calling 30 days before you can’t make payment might not be helpful. See if there are loan modifications or refinancing programs that might help alleviate the burden. If you can’t find a viable and durable solution, then consider short selling your home. Request a short sale package to get the process started.
2. Find a short sales agent – it pays dividends to make sure you work with a realtor that has time of the day to answer your questions and go through the process with you. A short sale requires more time, thought, and effort to execute properly to bring all the relevant parties such as buyer, seller, lender, agents, title and escrow companies. Use an agent with good follow up.
3. Third party negotiators – sometimes (although not all) sellers in a short sales employ negotiators that charge a separate fee in addition to the realtor commissions (buyer’s and seller’s agent commissions). The beauty of this for the seller is that it does not directly cost the seller anything. It ultimately comes from the bank’s funds (or proceeds). However, there are plenty of short sales in which a “third party negotiator” is employed and the listing agent shares their commission with the negotiator.
I tend to like these arrangements where the seller’s agent and negotiator split the selling agents commission. Much of the work and brain damage comes from negotiating with the bank and making sure the borrower has everything right. If the seller’s agent does not do any negotiating besides list the property below market, they don’t earn their keep. In these arrangements, the listing agent can split their commission 35/65, where the agent gets 35% and the negotiator gets 65% or 50/50, etc.
Feel free to ask your agent whether they play to employ a negotiator and what the commission split is and why. While some agents can get prickly, you have every right to know if you plan to hire the agent.
4. Pricing – some agents will deceivingly tell you to list your property at a fire-sale price. They say this will help get an offer on the price after which you can send to the bank to move the short sale process along. If the agent tells you to fire-sale the property, do not use this agent. While this may not be fraudulent or negligent behavior, it shows inexperience. All banks that approve short sales employ a valuation method often know as a broker’s price opinion (BPO). This valuation gives the bank a reference point on the value of the property and whether the short sale makes “business sense” to approve.
For example, if the contract price is $300k, but the BPO comes back at $600k the bank will likely not approve a 50% discount. However, if the BPO comes back at $350k (a 14% discount) then may approve this just to get the property out of their hair.
Time is precious. Don’t waste it on apparent solutions that will not avail. In 2009, the banks were seen approving discounts of 15% or greater for homes. In 2010, banks have gotten tighter on their discounts and are typically seen approving discounts on short sales of 7-10%.
The goal: Price realistically and close to the market. You want the deal approved so you can get rid of debt and move on.
What is a Deficiency and Why is it Important?
As part of short sale negotiations you should know whether the bank will maintain their deficiency rights. A deficiency exists when a bank receives less money than it is owed. For example, you owe $400k but the bank only received $300k. $100k is your deficiency.
In cases where the bank maintains their full deficiency rights you may want to think twice about the short sale because you are still fully responsible for the deficiency. I have cases where borrowers negotiated this out of the deal. This is highly recommended if possible.
Do I have tax consequences with debt forgiveness?
It depends. Pre-mortgage crisis the answer was generally, yes. Now, it depends on the situation. According to the IRS:
If you borrow money from a commercial lender and the lender later cancels or forgives the debt, you may have to include the cancelled amount in income for tax purposes, depending on the circumstances. When you borrowed the money you were not required to include the loan proceeds in income because you had an obligation to repay the lender. When that obligation is subsequently forgiven, the amount you received as loan proceeds is reportable as income because you no longer have an obligation to repay the lender. The lender is usually required to report the amount of the canceled debt to you and the IRS on a Form 1099-C, Cancellation of Debt.
However, with the Mortgage Debt Relief Act, certain debt forgiveness may be excluded from income. In general, the property has to be used as the owner’s principal residence (aka owner occupied) and this applies to debt forgiven from 2007 through 2012.
I hope this article has been helpful to those working on a short sale and informative to those you may have to do one in the future as a last resort. Selling your home like this isn’t easy, but it might be the best thing in your situation.
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View full post on Business Pundit
