Business Calendars.

One of the biggest challenges for start up entrepreneurs is staying organized and on top of things. With so many tasks and follows up to make running a business isn’t as easy unless you have a virtual assistant or someone that takes care of your scheduling.  One of the oldest strategies in the book that is used today is scheduling your work tasks, appointments, meetings and follow-ups on a business calendar. In fact most successful entrepreneurs will tell you that it is important to create and use a business calendar to stay on top of your business needs.

In the online world there are so many different options to choose from, the most common is your outlook calendar, I phone calendar or Google calendar. With smart phone usage there is an increasing trend of entrepreneurs scheduling and using calendar apps that automatically syncs with their computers or laptops. Scheduling appointments has never got easier yet many startup entrepreneurs make the common mistake of not staying organized.

This is one of the most crucial basic business elements that many overlook. Not having a business calendar also gives your customers a poor impression of how you do business. Follow ups, scheduling times and sticking to them as well as showing up on time for meetings are all positive signs that you take your business seriously. If you want your potential customers to buy into you, you must make it easier for them to believe you are organized.

A recommendation is to manage your calendar weekly and to project and plan your meetings at the start of your week. Leave room to manage some free time in between appointments so you don’t feel so compressed for time. Most importantly look, tweak and manage your calendar accordingly at the end of each night. Colour coding the different type of appointments if its a phone call, meeting, conference or a follow up might also give you a  general idea on your week. The more you put into your calendar, the more you get out of it to help you stay productive.

Tips on working from home to increase productivity.

There are more entrepreneurs today who work from home. In fact this number is increasing every year. The challenge I find most home based business owners have is actually working a full schedule from home with so many distractions. In fact it becomes harder when you have to balance your work schedule and your home life. This can impact your productivity.

The following are tips from successful home based business entrepreneurs on how to increase productivity.

• Set a schedule and fit in a business calendar of all your accountabilities.
• Every night write out a list of goals for then next day.
• Dress the part the way you would for a normal job.
• Take a break after every few power hours of work.
• Stay committed and disciplined on tasks and accountabilities.
• Create and follow a daily routine.
• Create minor rewards during the day for accomplishments
• Avoid distractions.

Perfecting these tips will help boost your results and you will start to get more out of your work schedule.

Email marketing for offline businesses.

We are starting to see trends where offline businesses that don’t even have a web presence start to perform email marketing. I was reminded of this when I was asked for my email information recently at a retail store that had no presence online. If your an offline business wanting to accelerate your business start collecting your clients email information.

If you’d been collecting your clients’ names and email addresses (with their permission) when they came up to the cash register to pay, this is all you’d need to do:

1. Spend about 10 minutes writing an email message, where you give great content and reward clients a discounts on certain services.
2. Send the message out to your list of clients. Provide a call to action and give out your phone number or offer coupons.

Your phones should start ringing off the hook! What was looking like a slow month will soon be booked solid — and all you had to do was put together a simple email message, which took you 10 minutes to write.
Of course, you don’ t need to sit down and actually send a separate email to each and every one of your customers. That could literally take you days!

But with services like mail chimp, constant contact, a weber, you have the power to send out an email promotion to your entire list automatically.
As you collect the names and addresses of your contacts, you just add them to a database. Your email management program will merge the email addresses with your message and sends it out to your whole list at the click of a mouse. It can even personalize each message with the person’s first name… or with whatever personal information you want to include!

When you’re ready to mail, you just have to write the letter once, and the program will insert the personal details for each person into each email, so it looks like you wrote each one individually.  The biggest tip offline businesses need to start doing is collecting consumer information. You are losing money every time you let a client walk out of your offline business without gathering relevant contact information.

Using Testimonials

People buy people now more than ever. Credibility is something that is very crucial to your sales process.

Never underestimate the power of a good testimonial! Posting reviews and comments from satisfied customers on your website is a terrific way to increase your credibility in the eyes of visitors and encourage sales from first-time buyers.

An effective testimonial can convince your reader that your product really DOES do exactly what you promise — especially if you run a small business and don’t yet have a widespread reputation.

Here’s how to gather quality testimonials and benefit from them immediately:

• If you already have some positive feedback from clients, ask their permission to include their comments on your site. Try to choose testimonials that are packed full of concrete benefits that tell your customers exactly what they can expect to gain from purchasing your product or service.
• Every testimonial should also have a first name, last name, and location — they help prove the recommendations are coming from real people.
• To encourage new testimonials, add a link to your site attached to a form that allows customers to give you their vote of confidence. For example, “Click here to tell us what you think!”
• Create an autoresponder that contacts your buyers after they’ve purchased your product to ask them how they’re enjoying it.
• When customers send you glowing praise in a letter or email, contact them and ask for permission to add it to your site.
• If you don’t have any testimonials yet, offer your product free of charge to a group of customers in exchange for their thoughts on the product.

Once you’ve accumulated some good testimonials, include them on your site:

• Put your best testimonials on your homepage.
• Insert some testimonials in the middle of your salescopy.
• Create a page on your site that features only testimonials.
• Put testimonials on each page of your website.

Testimonials will have higher impact if there is a visual. Video, Audio and picture are very effective if perfected. The more natural the presentations looks and feels the more engaged your audience.

It’s that simple!

Consumer Influence

Branding Slogans

Flexibility in Business…

Website Message Clarity.

Successful Productivity Tips For Entrepreneurs.

Should your business have a marketing budget?

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