Tag: supportsmallbusiness

When you decide to add social media to your marketing campaign, you need to create an Internet marketing strategy. You need a plan in order to assess the viability, know what to do and stay focused on your goals.

Your plan can also help you save time by ensuring you follow a systematic approach to the tie you will invest in social marketing and network. The social networking part can easily take you off track and eat up your time if you do not pay attention to the overall picture of what you are trying to accomplish.

Here are the basics steps to any social media plan we setup for clients:

Assess

Look at what is available in your market, what competitors are doing and find out if your customers in fact using these social media channels. These answers may help you determine the goals

Purpose

Define your main purpose for using Social Media and identify the various social media channels to use.

Goals

Set at least 3 SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, Timely) goals and create an action plan to help you reach these goals. What steps will you take to reach these goals.

Content

Create a plan for what content will be published – blog posts, tweets, facebook page updates, youtube videos. This plan should include the topic of content and also how often and via what channel it will be published

Keywords

Part of the content planning would be finding the keywords your customers use when searching for your service or product online.

If your business has some technical jargon that customers rarely pick up on – it is unlikely that is how they will search online for the solution to their problem (your service or product). It is imperative to find keywords they are using and add these targeted key words into your content..

Optimize

Look at all the platforms available and link them together as much as possible to help you save time. ie. Link your blog to twitter and your facebook page so when a blog post is published it will automatically feed an update to the other networks. Be certain to make a flowchart so you understand what automatically goes to what network in order to avoid any cross posting.

Track

As much as you can track your results do it. Keep a record of your contacts/ facebook friends/page likes/twitter followers/linked in contact /newsletter subscribers and results on Google for your name, business and keywords. Check the results every month and see how it changes. Read your analytics on your website and adjust keywords/tactics to fit with what is working well or not form these reports. With social media marketing, businesses may set goals related to brand identity and levels of engagement.

Schedule

Take time to schedule in all the aspects of your plan and work at it to keep on top of it and following the plan. Stay focused and use your time wisely.

Following these steps will help you network much more effectively and in a way that does not find you looking up from your computer wondering where the last hour went. Stay focused!

Firms usually experience many difficulties, when it comes to boost their profits in moderately competitive markets. In such circumstances, you as a businessperson need to develop or outline a well-defined marketing strategy to have a commanding edge over your competitors.
 
Marketing strategy defines the products, services and position of a company in the market. The sales and marketing plans of the company show how good the firm is in formulating and implementing its marketing project.
 
You need to consider a number of factors before designing the marketing strategy and its impacts. Such a strategy takes into account all the basic factors of business. The portfolio of products and the expected move of competitors in the market are some basic factors that can make your marketing strategy fruitful.
 
Factors To Consider:
 
Following are some of the factors you need to consider before outlining a marketing strategy:
 
Identify the Target Market: Your product might be the most amazing in terms of features and usefulness. However, the effort you put in the promotion and related functions are sheer waste of time, if you are not focusing on the appropriate target group.  
 
You can easily define your target group. In fact, you need to develop your product or service keeping in mind the target group from the very start. All you need to do is just enrich your marketing plan with innovative ideas.
 
Identify your USP: Unique selling proposition or USP defines the uniqueness of your product, which is difficult or impossible for your competitors to imitate. The success of your business depends on how long and how well you keep your USP unduplicated.

Thus, make a strong USP and enlighten the target audiences with the benefits of your products and services.
 
Determine the firm’s market position: Your efficacy in positioning the product or service in a competitive market determines your success and helps you to draw an effective marketing strategy.
 
Next, positioning is all about determining how you want to present your product in comparison with your competitors. In short, it is the identity of your product in the market. For example, you may present your product as a high-end, high quality product or a budget product.
 
Identify the Key Benefits: Highlight the special features of your products or services, if any. You may present your offerings successfully in the market by focusing on such key features.
 
Set a Target Budget: The amount you may afford to spend for the promotion of your product is called target budget. You can use both free and paid media for promoting your products or services. Advertising, Internet marketing, Public Relations, Direct Marketing and Personal Selling are some of the commonly used promotional methods.
 
Evaluation and Follow Up: Keep a strong hold on the chosen marketing methods. Verify their effectiveness. Alternatively, you may experiment with other media and methods too.
 
Overview:

Marketing strategy is just a component of the overall corporate strategy. It incorporates all the plans and actions that include the firm’s major goals and policies, which are critical for the success of a business.

Good Examples of a Web Marketing Tool

A web marketing tool (otherwise known as an internet marketing tool) is anything that you can use to enhance your internet marketing efforts and results. There are many such tools available these days as web marketing is becoming more and more of an essential process to all businesses.

A web marketing tool can be a website, a software program, an e-book, a course, a training program, a system, or even an expert who can guide you along the way. These tools range in price from completely free to very expensive. Choosing the right one depends on your business, the amount of time you have to invest, and the amount of money you can afford to spend on the tool, in addition to other aspects.

Web marketing can be comprised of many different marketing techniques, or it can consist of just one or two. This also depends on where you’re at in your business. If you’re just starting out, you should just stick with one part of the process until you fully understand that and have it working to your advantage. Then you can move onto the next area. Also when you are just starting out, you might be on a budget and focus on the free or low-cost tools. Here are a few examples of a web marketing tool that you will need, no matter what your business.

First and foremost, you’ll need a website. There are certain sites that will allow you to create one for free and teach you how to do it as well. There are some restrictions on features, but if you’re just starting out, these will work fine until you’re ready to move on to more advanced options. When you are, you can get into all kinds of SEO software, systems, and consulting tools which will bring your website up in ranking.

Second, you’ll also want to look into autoresponders.

There are some free versions of these as well. But you can get a much more reliable service by investing 15 to 30 dollars a month on an autoresponder. This is a crucial part of your business because it allows you to build a list of customers and potential customers and to keep in touch with them on a regular basis. Some of the many autoresponders are GetResponse, ResponseMagic, AWeber, Oprius, and Icontact. They capture the data of visitors to your website so that you can email them with news, special offers, and updates about your business.

Another key web marketing tool is the keyword research tool. Keywords are important no matter what kind of marketing you do, so having a good tool will help you zone in on the best keywords for your business. You can use any of the free keyword research tools offered by Google, Yahoo, or Bing, or you can invest in some other tools that are on the market.

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New York, NY (PRWEB) May 05, 2013

Massey Knakal Realty Services is pleased to announce the release of their exclusive First Quarter 2013 Property Sales Reports. These unique, industry-leading, reports provide a comprehensive study of the investment sales market by product type in the New York City marketplace (Manhattan, Northern Manhattan/Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens).

As we anticipated at the end of 2012, the spike in sales activity caused by capital gains tax policy last year has led to a slowdown in activity thus far in 2013. stated Bob Knakal, Massey Knakal Chairman. The good news, however, is that the dollar volume of sales and number of buildings sold were ahead of expectations. We view this as a positive sign for the marketing the balance of 2013, added Knakal.

During the first quarter of 2013, there was $ 6.5 billion in New York City sales, a 36% decrease from 2012 and down 7% from 2011.

The New York City investment sales market saw 559 properties sold in 1Q13. Indeed, the hyper-activity from 4Q12 stole activity from this quarter with 4Q12 setting an all-time record in number of properties sold and second best quarter in dollar output. NYC dollar volumes exceed $ 6.5B for the quarter with 1Q13 marking the return of the billion dollar deal.

The purchase of 30 Rockefeller Plaza and 550 Madison Avenue were the first billion dollar sales since the Google purchase in 2010, and the first time since the downturn multiple properties exceeding $ 1B sold in the same year. These two sales accounted for 44% of total dollar volume in Manhattan.

Within the different market segments Massey Knakal tracts, Northern Manhattan outpaced the Bronx for the first time in properties sold due to several multi-property transactions taking place.

Brooklyn led all markets with 214 buildings sold in 1Q13, while Queens had the lowest annualized turnover with 0.93% of the total stock of property

The highlights from each report include the following:

Manhattan (south of 96th Street on the east side and south of 110th Street on the west side)

According to social media statistics published by SlideShare.net, there were 400 million online users on Facebook and 75 million users on Twitter during January 2010. This speaks volumes about the growing popularity of social networking sites in today’s world. Business houses are now effectively using these sites to promote and market their products and services. Many networking sites allow users to upload videos, blogs, documents, journals, forums and classifieds. These sites therefore provide a perfect platform for social media marketing.

Setting Up Your Network for Social Media Marketing

Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Flickr and Bebo are some of the popular sites that are being increasingly used for marketing purposes. It is relatively simple to set up your network on social media sites and once you reach the masses, the outcome of any social media marketing campaign is remarkable. Here is a 5-step process to set up your social media marketing campaign:

1.Set up your business page on Facebook and put as much information about your business as possible. Start a forum category and engage in sharing ideas with people.

2.Upload launch video clips and demo videos of your products on YouTube and promote them through other social networking sites.

3.Set up your profile on Twitter and search for the users interested in similar business ideas. Tweet regularly about your business updates and add as many contacts to your profile as you can. You can advertise your business among all these added contacts.

4.Make a new profile on LinkedIn and fill it with complete business related information. Many users conduct LinkedIn searches for individual and business purposes. This will enhance your social media marketing prospects and let the LinkedIn users know what you are about.

5.StumbleUpon is a great place for sharing different websites. Submit your business pages at StumbleUpon. This is one of the largest sources of driving traffic to your website.
Add links to your website pages that enable you to connect with all these social media sites with one click. Similarly, provide back linking in your social networking profiles to your business website home page. This inbound and outbound linking can tremendously boost your social media marketing efforts.

In the face of increasing competition in the business markets today, reaching the masses is mandatory for any entrepreneur.

Every business man thinks of spreading their business throughout the world. This can be successfully done only through online business. So everyone should have their own website created to promote their business throughout the world. Denver Internet Marketing agency is the best one which can help you whole heartedly and honestly to attract potential customer across the world as well as the natives to your site. They also offer us the wide range of spectrum of services through their Denver Internet Marketing. They use search engines to fine tune your existing marketing strategy. For local internet marketing they use new technological tools in promoting their business. First of all your webpage must be beautiful and attractive to attract the visitors. This can be done easily with the Denver Internet Marketing agencies. They are capable of designing superb webpage which can be successfully compatible with all the latest web browsers and search engines. To buy your product or use your service this marketing channel can advertise using innovative techniques. This is very helpful to you.

The main problem that is faced by all the websites are that they dont have visitors often visiting their sites and not able to tune enough visitors to their sites. To overcome the problems the Internet Marketing Denver helps you a lot. It makes the search engines understand about your site and direct the referrals to your site. When compared to conventional media the internet reaches the people very fast. This helps for the quick development of the site. The information you provide in the site can be altered according to your requirement. For this you can take help of the content management system of the Internet Marketing Denver. They also offer services like affiliate marketing, advertising, SEO, link management, banners and also local marketing. If you want any of these services you can get by hiring it for lower cost. Social Media Strategy uses a twitter to establish online relationship and help the potential customers to go through your website.

Denver Online Marketing agencies render very best services in overcoming the competition by driving traffic to your site. Based on your product and services they will recommend the suitable marketing services to promote their business. By having only some pages doesnt mean having a successful site. You have to create many pages with unique specifications. Having attractive webpage is not enough to make visitors visit your site often ongoing analysis is very important will help you in ranking first position in the online business.

They will provide detailed reports about the site on monthly basis which can help to overcome the mistakes in promoting the business. It also shows the position of your site in the rank and helps in improving our position by promoting our business successfully. They also tell about the keyword which is often used in the search engine. They also use funnel web and web trends to look after the traffic daily visiting the site. This helps to update the contents regarding the keyword which is often used in search engines. All the owners of the site want more traffic diverted to their site. Denver Online Marketing agencies helps us in that.

A hotel marketing plan is your action plan to fill the rooms of your new hotel. A marketing plan focuses on the four Ps (Product, Promotion, Price and Place), but doesn’t neglect customer retention and key partnerships. All of these elements should be specific to your hotel’s intended customers and the geographic area.
 
1) Product – Your hotel’s services
 
For every hotel, the basic product offered is the same service – use of a bed for a night. Beyond this similarity, there are endless ways to differentiate your service. Services can include entertainment (i.e., in-room cable, on-premises nightclub), food (i.e., chocolates on a pillow to a five-star restaurant), communication (i.e., free local calls, wireless internet), and health (i.e., a pool, fitness center, spa). Consider whether unusual services will be a draw for your customers or if you are better off providing the tried and true. Whatever you choose, present the information clearly and in just enough detail so that readers understand the level and type of service provided.
 
2) Promotion – How to get the word out
 
Promotion is how you make your people aware of your hotel and its unique value proposition and convert them into guests. The promotional tools you use depends entirely on the customers you seek. Rather than thinking about how other hotels seek customers, think from the customer’s point of view. How do your desired customers seek hotels? Make sure yours can be found where they are looking, whether this is in travel books, magazines, websites, or elsewhere. Remember that the most powerful type of advertising is the kind that money cannot buy – press.

Consider whether a public relations strategy can help make this happen.
 
3) Price – The right rates for your hotel
 
Your marketing plan must show where you want your pricing to fall within the market’s range. The choice of price ties directly to your hotel’s profitability, but also to the brand you are trying to build in the minds of customers. If you bill your hotel as extremely upscale, but price it in the middle of the pack, customers may not believe your assertions that you are the next Ritz-Carlton. Pricing is about finding the right price to both represent what your hotel is and to cover costs, leaving room for profit.
 
4) Place – Where customers and your services meet
 
Place is more than the choice of location for your hotel. “Place” in this context means distribution, and this is the choice of how customers will book hotel rooms and receive other services you provide. This can be through websites, travel agents, or a dedicated sales staff, each of which have their own cost and benefit tradeoffs. Distribution of services continues inside your hotel and involves both your staff and your means to communicate with your guests (i.e., phone systems, TV ordering, even doorknob signs).
 
5) Customer Retention
 
Most of the cost of providing service to a customer is in getting them to buy for the first time. To keep a customer returning should be significantly cheaper than getting a new one so explain your retention strategy. For example, loyalty programs provide incentives for repeat visits and customer relationship management (CRM) software can save data on the preferences and activity of individual guests to make returning more enjoyable for them.
 
6) Partnerships
 
Finally, consider how you will work with your hotel’s neighbors, local government, and other stakeholders to build business. There may be potential for you to either get guests from or send guests to many local businesses, improving the experience the overall experience for those customers. Consider mentioning a few key partnerships that will pay off because of their importance to both parties. Don’t stretch yourself too think by proposing to partner with every business on your street. Describe any successful legwork you have done to inquire about the possibility of making those partnerships a reality.

Essentially the most successful folks in the sales business understand that sales is more about listening and less about speaking. Figuring out the suitable effective listening techniques is the important thing to creating a profitable career in sales. These listening techniques are what give successful salespeople their edge over their rivals within the sales business.

To a great salesperson, first among the many effective listening techniques is how one can ask the appropriate questions. It’s comparatively uncommon to discover a customer who will provide you with the information you have to know of their own accord, and you might want to know the appropriate questions to ask with a purpose to receive the information that you just require. The secret is to formulate questions that stimulate your client, making them think. In this manner, you possibly can encourage your customers to provide you important information that you would be able to make use of once you make your value statement.

Generally speaking, there are two important categories of questions that you could put to your customer:

Open-ended Questions – These are questions that ask for greater than simple yes or no answers, and so they typically begin with phrases just like how, what or why.

Close-ended Questions – These are questions that merely require a yes or a no in answer. Questions of this kind normally begin with is, would, do or are.

A great salesperson always finds a way to link his value statement to the needs of the customer. When you perceive the needs of your buyer, then your sales engagement with your customer will probably be that a lot better. That is the reason why you need to make use of a proven strategy with regards to effective listening techniques.

The open-ended question is among the best tools in the salespersons arsenal, and you can use why, how and what questions to draw your customer into pondering more deeply a few explicit topic or subject. This may vastly improve your understanding of your purchasers businesses, and will undoubtedly contribute to your bottom line in the long run. As long as your purchasers really answer your questions, they are going to inevitably reveal information that might be extremely helpful to you.

Shut-ended questions, alternatively, are often conversation killers. Your clients are more likely to merely dismiss your questions and answer you with a perfunctory sure or no without even giving your questions a lot thought. Along with that, close-ended questions not often help you gain greater perception into the wants and workings of your clients businesses.

In fact, close-ended questions are helpful in sure circumstances, but more often than not, they aren’t the kind of question that you need to be asking.

By making use of effective listening techniques alongside a very good questioning technique, you will be able to extract a wealth of knowledge from your clients that they’d otherwise not voluntarily inform you. It is then up to you to make use of the information you glean out of your clients to enhance your value statement and gain the edge over your competition.

We hope that you find this article of value about effective listening techniques. For more information on how to discover your listening style, you may go to this website, http://www.better-sales-and-selling.com.

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Real estate agents should find effective tools that can help them in marketing their real estate properties. Postcard marketing is the strategy that real estate agents should employ in their business. Postcard marketing is the versatile marketing program that requires small budget but generates strong positive response rates. Let’s have a look at few at postcard marketing ideas for real estate agents:

Testimonials

Postcard marketing campaign can highlight the client success. Gather the information, report, pictures of people who have succeeded in finding their dream homes through your real estate service. Such people can encourage more people to try out your service. Your postcard will also encourage people to contact you who want to buy a new home.

Employ postcard for website marketing

Postcards even effectively generate high website traffic to your homepage. Capture a screen shot of your web site and list down URL and print it on your postcards. Then distribute postcards to your target audience. This way your target clients will visit your website regularly to know more about your special offers, home listing or may sign up for a mailing list.

Unique designs and message

Make sure that your postcard design and message appeal your target market. Your postcard should be inspiring so that people who want to sell or buy new house can contact you.

Offer something different

Several real estate agencies offer free consultation services to their clients. But you need to think about the special services that you can provide your prospective clients. For instance, downloadable buying and selling guideline for different types real estate properties, offer them weekly updates for real estate transactions according to the needs of specific client. This way you can dramatically boost your real estate business.

Thus, real estate agents should be creative in designing their postcard marketing campaigns. Real estate clients need trustable agent for their real-estate property dealing. Your postcard will show them that you are trustworthy. You can recommend them to visit your website where they can see former client’s reviews about your service. Update your website on a regular basis. Even update your target audience by sending postcards periodically. Your customers need your support and encouragement. So, if you design your postcard according to above mentioned guidelines we guarantee at the end of the day you will surely realize that postcards are really very cost effective and powerful marketing strategy indeed. Try it, its worth!

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Baltimore, Maryland (PRWEB) May 02, 2013

Today the District Export Council of Maryland/DC (DEC) announced the inaugural Celebration of International Trade 2013, being held Tuesday, May 21 at the Maritime Institute and Conference Center in Linthicum Maryland. Geared towards manufacturers and professional service companies interested in entering or expanding into the lucrative international export market, the all-day event is a one-stop shop for any business looking to navigate the extensive business opportunities of foreign trade.

Maryland has been engaged in the global economy for many years and this Celebration of Trade event is an opportunity to recognize the important role that trade plays in our States economy. Record Maryland exports in 2012 and record trade for the Port of Baltimore reaffirms the States role as a major player on the global stage offering export opportunities for Maryland businesses large and small, said Governor Martin O’Malley.

The opportunities for small and medium size businesses to sell their goods and services in front of international markets has exploded in the past decade and the outlook for future growth is enormous, said Carl Livesay, DEC Chairman, adding, This conference is an affordable, unprecedented opportunity to connect with leading trade experts and obtain critical resources needed to succeed in a global marketplace.

The day-long conference, sponsored by the DEC and a dozen corporate and government agencies, features two dozen 90-minute workshops on topics including guidelines for exporting, risk mitigation, government resources, international finance and diversification.

Bob Walker, Deputy Secretary for the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development (DBED) will provide opening remarks regarding the international trade and the State of Maryland. Laszlo Horvath, CEO, Active Media will provide the morning keynote on Search Engine Optimization: Voodoo Magic or Science. This is a must see presentation for anyone attempted to export by leveraging the internet and electronic commerce.

According to Signe Pringle, DBED International Program Director, 2012 was a record year for Maryland exports. This proved that our businesses realized the need to look beyond the borders and compete in the global market place to access the 95 percent of the worlds consumers.

In 2012, Maryland companies exported $ 11.78 billion in goods and services, an increase of 9.2% over 2011. The top five countries in order were Canada, Saudi Arabia, United Kingdom, China and Japan. To accelerate the growth in exports, DBED has launched new programs and offers services to help Maryland businesses diversify their markets such as the ExportMD stipends that help companies participate in trade missions and trade shows.

For a complete program schedule and list of speakers at the Maryland Celebration of Trade, visit http://www.MDDCDEC.com

Sponsors include Maryland DBED, UPS, McCormick, McGladrey LLP, Maryland Port Administration, Ports America Chesapeake, TeleCommunication Systems, U.S. Commercial Service, Wells Fargo, Whiteford Taylor & Preston, BB&T, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Foreign Trade Council, World Trade Center Institute and media partner CityBizList.

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The Maryland/Washington DC District Export Council, Inc. is one of more than 50 District Export Councils (DECs) in the United States. DECs are organizations of leaders from local business communities, appointed by successive Secretaries of Commerce since 1973, whose knowledge of international business provides a source of professional advice for local firms. Working closely with Department of Commerce U.S. Export Assistance Centers (“USEACs”), DEC members volunteer their time to sponsor and participate in numerous trade promotion activities. Like the USEACs, they are especially focused on assisting small and medium sized exporters.