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Forming Strategic Partnerships for Your Small Business

All Categories, Business Productivity, Marketing, Networking, Social Networking No Responses »

Jun 022010

Successful small business owners and entrepreneurs have learned that having a solid and profitable business, first starts with a strong structural foundation. Smart entrepreneurs realize that forming strategic partnerships is a contributing factor to their overall long term success.

What exactly is a strategic alliance?

Strategic alliances are practical arrangements between two or more entities which are created to achieve mutual goals through collaboration. It is a way to connect with others and work together to reach a common goal while still maintaining individuality.

You can look at a strategic partnerships as a way of developing a team effort allowing all parties involved to reap the rewards and benefits. This type of alliance is simply a business-to-business collaboration. A strategic alliance can often be established more formally as a joint venture or partnership.

The most common partnerships can be defined as; promotional alliances in which each party promotes the others products or service for a set period of time, marketing alliances can be formed to market complimentary products, and pricing or cost alliances can be created to cut cost, share expenses or eligibility to receive discounts. There are a variety of strategic partnerships that can be designed to meet the needs of both partners.

What are the benefits of creating these alliances?

For most small business owners and entrepreneurs, the biggest benefit of creating an alliance is to quickly and easily be able to expand into a new market. Another great benefit is having the accessibility to additional resources, a network of new people and potential contacts and being able to develop new business opportunities with new products and services.

How can I find strategic alliance partners?

Starting within your current network of contacts and customers is best since you have already established some form of relationship or connection with them. You can also locate other businesses or entrepreneurs who provide products or services complimentary to your own. Depending upon your goals and needs, partnering with your competitors could be a good option as well.

Before you set up your alliance, you will have to establish your terms and create a plan that clarifies exactly what you need and want to achieve. Both parties must mutually agree and fully be aware of what is expected on both ends.

When choosing a strategic partner, you will want to make sure you first conduct your research. You will have to check their credibility, business integrity, make certain they are trust worthy and determine whether they are a good fit for your business to eliminate any possible conflicts.

To learn more, Smallbusinessnotes.com shares a useful article with tips to help you learn more about How to Set up a Strategic Alliance

12 Reasons Your Small Business Needs a Twitter Presence

All Categories, Marketing, Social Media, Social Networking, Twitter 1 Response »

May 102010

As a small business owner, you’ve undoubtedly heard that your business needs to have a strong Twitter presence. So, you have dutifully signed up for a Twitter account, have a some followers and have even sent out a few Tweets. Now, you’re wondering how in the world Twitter will actually help your business.

Here are 12 reasons why your small business needs to be on Twitter:

1) Build Authenticate Relationships. Twitter allows you to begin building authentic relationships with your prospects, clients and customers. As a small business owner, strong customer relationships are one of your greatest assets.

2) Share Your Expertise. If you provide valuable, interesting and compelling Tweets, you will begin positioning yourself as an expert in your particular field and industry.

3) Generate Traffic To Your Website. As you build a strong presence on Twitter and offer valuable Tweets, your followers will begin to take notice of you. Consequently, they’ll naturally want to visit your profile to learn more about you and your small business.

4) Obtain Qualified Leads For Your Business. If your Twitter profile gives your followers a compelling reason to visit your landing page or website, they will take action. Make sure that your landing page is set up to collect their name and email address (in exchange for a free downloadable offer) to begin building your list.

5) Allow Others To Spread Your Ideas. As others retweet your quotes, ideas and strategies, your ideas are spread to hundreds, even thousands, of fresh, new eyes around the world.

6) Extend The Reach Of Your Brand. If your Tweets are filled with expert tips, advice and strategies, Twitter becomes an amazing tool for establishing a strong presence for your brand.

7) Discover The Latest “Buzz” About Your Company. What’s the buzz about you and your company? If you subscribe to http://www.TweetBuzzer.com you can keep abreast of everything that is said about you in the Twitter world.

Get In Front Of High Profile Individuals. There is simply no better way than Twitter to connect with high-profile individuals. As long as a high-profile individual follows you back, they have access to your Tweets. Think of all the possibilities!

9) Track Your Competition. Twitter is a wonderful way to keep an eye on what your competitors are doing. As a marketer, it’s imperative to understand what is happening in your industry, and your competitors are a great place to start.

10) Conduct Market Research. Big companies pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to perform market research. But, through Twitter, you can perform market research for free! Through the use of quizzes, polls and surveys, you can discover, first-hand anything that you want to know about your target market.

11) Keep Current Within Your Industry. As a small business owner, it’s essential to keep current with the latest trends in your industry. You can subscribe to the Tweets of bloggers, PR professionals and others Twitterers connected to your industry to stay fresh and updated.

12) It’s FREE. As a Shoestring Marketer, there’s nothing better than tapping into a low-cost, high-impact marketing tool to help build your small business.

So, take the time to build your Twitter presence, tap into its power and build your small business on a shoestring marketing budget!

Jessica Swanson, “The Shoestring Marketer,” has helped entrepreneurs, all over the world, explode their businesses using cutting-edge, proven and completely FREE marketing strategies. To download your FREE Marketing Kit, which has helped thousands of small business owners, just like you, learn the exact techniques for marketing their businesses for NO-COST, visit: http://www.ShoestringMarketingKit.com

Creating a Community Around Your Business

All Categories, Business Productivity, Network Marketing, Social Media, Social Networking 3 Responses »

May 072010

Have you ever wondered how you could build a community around your business? It would be nice to have a bunch of people who willingly come together and share their thoughts and opinions about your business, wouldn’t it? Before you think it’s impossible to create such an environment around your company, let me explain.

A community can be defined as a group of people sharing the same interests and ideas. That’s what makes social media so amazing because it allows people from all over the world to come together online and communicate with each other about the common interests they all share.

It’s really easy to get people to come together and communicate about your business. Just like in real life, you engage the people who share your same interest then you start a conversation. Of course online, your conversation would be in the form of content. It’s up to you to determine in what way people would like to receive content from you, for example: video, articles, tweets…you get the idea. Content is what brings people together therefore, it creates a community.

If you have established your business online even if it’s to the smallest degree, you’ve probably already connected and have some sort of relationship with people who believe in what you are doing. Well guess what? These are the people who are a part of your community!

Now all you have to do is continue to focus your content at speaking directly to your community. So many times I have seen bloggers and internet marketers try to reach such a broad group of people and it comes through in their writing as generic and bland. You can’t please the masses, you have to connect with people who share your interests.

When your able to share your experience with your community and give content to them that creates interaction and sparks communication, they will be willing to engage because they know you understand their needs and offer solutions.

Creating a community doesn’t have to be difficult. You don’t even have to start your own social network (unless of course you want to!) You could however, start a group in an existing social community like TheCEOMamma Network.

Your Blog is also a great way to share your content and encourage interaction with your readers. You can get really creative by asking questions to your readers and requesting feedback or opinions. Having a Facebook Fan Page for your business makes a great community environment as well. It will require a bit more moderation and active participation on your part, but it’s still a good way to build relationships.

Believe it or not, Twitter can be great for creating your business community too! You can quickly share information and links with other people who share your interests. It gives you a way to invite them into your space and allows them to learn more about you and what you do.

As you can see, creating a community around your business is not only easy but can be fun as you connect with like minded people and grow your business at the same time!

Are you building a community around your business? How are you doing it? Share your tips in the comments below.

How to Create Connections to Expand Your Social Media

All Categories, Marketing, Networking, Social Networking, Twitter 5 Responses »

May 052010

Let’s be honest, we ALL want a ton of loyal followers and raving fans chasing after us online helping us expand our business, right? Wouldn’t it be great to wake up each morning to find that over night, a flood of new people joined your fan page or your twitter account had a sudden rush of new followers? I’m pretty sure it’s safe to say that this is the exact feeling most entrepreneurs would love to experience (myself included).

Even if you spend a large amount of time on social networking each day you still may not be getting the kind of followers and fans you want. The reason could be a few things but the main one could be your just not creating the right connections.

Let’s take Twitter for instance, if you are on there and your not actively seeking people to follow, more likely than not, you won’t have anyone following you back. If you do have followers and neither of you share anything in common, how exactly will you benefit from each other? Before you can establish the right connections on Twitter, you have to follow the right people.

Who are the right people and right connections? I’m glad you asked!

The good news is you can start creating the right connections today by simply tweaking your strategy. Before you jump back on Twitter or Facebook, you’ll want to think about the type of people you want following or connecting with you. Think about who you want buying your product, who you would love to work with, the type of people you’d like to partner with even consider the people you can learn from.

Those who want your product or service. Knowing what you offer, who are the individuals who will receive the most benefit? Are they women, are they mothers, are they mothers of children of a specific age… really narrow it down. These are the group of people you will need to start connecting with.

Those in your industry. Find and establish a rapport with people in your specific industry. Get over the competitive mentality, there is plenty of business to go around. It’s okay to “share” friends and followers of these people. Your not stealing business from each other, your simply broadening your network. Besides, people will do business with whomever they are drawn to and that’s a fact.

Those who are experts in other fields. Be open to partnering with experts in other industries who compliment your business and vice versa. Imagine how explosive it would be if you designed websites and you partnered with someone who has a web hosting company. The two of you could refer clients to each while both of you benefit from the almost effortless increase of income. Step outside of your comfort zone and reach out!

Those who are highly influential. I’m sure there is someone you know who inspires you on a regular basis. That person (or people) who has built your ideal business and has been your motivating force during your business journey. These are the individuals who already are, where you want to be! Connect with them, follow them, learn from them. You never know what could come of these types of connections.

Those who are your raving fans. These are the people who encourage you to keep going. They are not necessarily customers (maybe they can’t afford your product), they are everywhere you are (they could find you in the dark), they are the ones who comment on your posts often and share your links without being prompted (they totally support what your about). They are the ones who seem almost able to see your vision as you see it. You must connect with these people because they are the ones who truly believe in YOU! They sometimes get lost in the crowd or may even be considered the underdog BUT they are your virtual cheerleaders and even if you don’t realize it…you inspire them! They genuinely appreciate ALL that you do.

Making the right connections requires activity on your part, especially if your just starting out (or restarting). Put forth the actions now and you will reap the rewards soon enough. It doesn’t have to be a difficult chore if you start building relationships with the right people now.

So, take these tips and get to work!

Next up, I’ll share with you how to create your own network community designed around your business!

Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Building Your Presence Online for Maximum Visibility

All Categories, Blogging, Networking, Social Media, Social Networking 7 Responses »

May 032010

Since the explosive growth of social media over the years, many entrepreneurs have learned how to take advantage of using various free marketing platforms like Facebook and twitter, to make themselves increasingly visible online. Social media marketing is by far the easiest and cheapest way to establish your online presence. But let’s be real, some people are clearly way better at building there presence online than others.

You may be wondering if there is some sort of trick to this social media frenzy or an exact blueprint to follow that will guarantee success (I know I did when I first started…no such luck)!

During my many hours of research on social media marketing, I did however, learn a lot. I started reading the blogs of the people who seemed to have it all – a large blog readership, massive amounts of followers across their networks and lots and lots of references to their information being reposted and retweeted by others.

I subscribed to those that were interesting to me and who are in my industry. After a short time of following my new favorite bloggers, I began to feel connected to these individuals as if we knew each other in “real life”. I started feeling comfortable commenting on their blog posts and sharing my opinion with them, I even found myself sharing their links with my personal friends whom I thought would appreciate and get the same value from this great content I had discovered!

Then, low and behold…I had an ‘AHA’ moment!

My favorite bloggers built their presence online by simply possessing a deep passion for what they do. Each article, blog post, product or piece of advice they shared originated from an idea or talent they enjoy sharing with others. Simple..huh?

Do you know what else I realized? Their success didn’t happen over night either. They were consistently writing and sharing value with their followers day after day (and they shared that same valuable content even when they didn’t have any followers…imagine that!)

The key points I learned when I set my desires on building my business around my online presence…be passionate about what your doing, be willing to give 100% all of the time and practice discipline and consistency on a daily basis…even when you think nobody is watching!

Are you ready to build your powerful presence online?
Check out a few of my tips you can use to help you get started!

Determine your specialty. What are some of the things you are really good at? Think about the skill or training you received from a prior job or career. Where do your passions stem from? Ask yourself, “what value can I bring into the lives of others?” This is a really important factor when determining how you will build your presence online because this is the way you will develop your brand and what you will be known for online.

Who is your audience. So you’ve figured out your specialty and your passions. Now you’ve got to figure out who wants to be connected to you based on what you can offer. It may sound a little selfish but you’ve got to give before you can get! If your a financial advisor specializing in small business, your ideal audience would be small business owners and entrepreneurs. Cater to serving the audience who can most benefit from what you offer and make sure you can give them what THEY need.

Where is your audience. Before you can connect with them and invite them into your space, you have to find out where they hang out online. Yes, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are great places to expand your presence but they may not be the only places your audience chooses to congregate.

Introduce Yourself. Once you have determined your specialty, figured out who your audience is and where they are you can begin to introduce yourself to them (notice I said introduce yourself…NOT your business!!!) How do you introduce yourself? Simply by writing a brief yet compelling and descriptive bio of yourself and what you do. This way, you give people just enough information about you to help them determine if they’d like to connect with you.

Sharing value. The best way to build a solid foundation online is to of course…share your original quality content and handpicked resources. The best way to do this is to blog. Implementing the key factors mentioned above will come into play in your writing…be passionate about your topic, giving 100% all the time and being disciplined and consistent. These 3 factors alone will help you establish yourself online as the “real deal” and an expert in your industry.

Finally….don’t give up! If you are serious about not only creating your online presence but a community of loyal followers, you must be committed to making it work. Staying focused on your audience and keeping their needs in the forefront will assure you achieve the results you desire.

Stay tuned for my next post as I will share with you How to Create the Right Connections Online.

Working from Home in My Own Words

All Categories, Blogging, Marketing, Networking, Social Networking, Twitter 4 Responses »

Apr 222010

Guest Post By: Treshad Washington (My Son) In regards to Take Your Daughters and Sons to Work Day!

Hi my name is Tre and today I stayed home with my mom for take your kids to work day. Today I learned how my mom builds her business on facebook and twitter by making friends and talking to them. Every day she checks her stats on her blog and on hootsuite to find out how she gets traffic. She runs a Facebook fan page and shares inspirational quotes, blog post, and other information. She talks on the phone with people who want to learn how to start a business, and it’s called coaching.

Today I learned to blog and post on the fan page and I learned how to network on twitter and facebook. I helped my mom get friends on facebook and twitter so she could get more people on her website. I learned about her social network for other ladies in business. I learned how other women start their own business selling stuff online.

Now that I know what my mom does everyday, I think its cool to be a marketing consultant and coach. I think it is a tough job to keep up with and keeping track of what you are doing. I think you need a lot of time on your hands and patience.

Today I did a Facebook fan page quote that I found all by myself and somebody liked it, that made me feel special=[). If it was me doing all this marketing and networking I couldn't do it because you have to do a lot of typing and thinking and talking to people. My mom has to talk to people on the phone and help them and teach them about how to do their business. That's something I couldn't do because its scary to me.

In conclusion, I decided to never do marketing again because it was very hard, way to much work, and to much writing. Plus she made me write this blog post...just kidding!

by: Treshad Washington (my mom is TheCEOMamma >=])

Tips for Using Facebook to Market Your Business

All Categories, Marketing, Social Media, Social Networking 2 Responses »

Mar 292010

It’s no secret, everyone knows that Facebook is the number 1 social network online today. We are also fully aware that it is the most popular platform for internet marketers and entrepreneurs to use in building a business.

I have received a number of emails from my friends and followers, wanting to know how to use Facebook to market their business and how to create Fan pages. So today, instead of a regular blog post, I have decided to compile a list of valuable resources and information on the topic of: Using Facebook to Market Your Business!

This list includes a combination of articles, blog posts, video and websites that I frequent and learn from. Yes, some of the tools I share can be found here on my blog or my social network site because I do share valuable information too. However, most of the tools are from trusted resources I strongly recommend.

Articles, websites and Blog Posts:
How to Use a Facebook Fan Page to Market Your Business
Are You a FAN of Facebook Fan Pages?
Facebook – Are You Spamming Your Friends?
5 New Studies Show Facebook a Marketing Powerhouse
13 Ways to Move Your Facebook Fans to Action
What Facebook Can Teach You About Effective Blog Marketing
How to Market Your Business on Facebook
10 Tips for Creating a Fantastic Facebook Fan Page

Videos:
How to Increase Your Facebook Following
How to Successfully Market Your Business on Facebook
Facebook Marketing – 7 Amazing Ways To Promote Your Business on Facebook

Feel free to add any of your Facebook Marketing resources in the comments and be sure to share this post with others!

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