Business Tips Archives - Page 3 of 4 - Her Business Directory™

How to Reach the Right Market for Your Product or Services

"Identify your niche and dominate it. And when I say dominate, I just mean work harder than anyone else could possibly work at it". - Nate Parker Niche marketing is far and away one of the best ways to reach a targeted market looking for specialty products and services. When you can market to a highly targeted group of people and offer them the information, products or services they’re looking for, you’re going to do well. The key, therefore, is to find those niche markets which are looking for answers. Keyword Research Most often keyword research is the best place to start. However, keyword research doesn’t have to be a systematic non-creative process. Rather, keyword research can be a brainstorming tool. The first step is to start with potential keywords or phrases you’re interested in. Use the keyword tools to generate a list of viable keywords and keyword phrases. In addition, research the viability, supply and demand for your topic keywords. Start by t…

Five Strategies to Quickly Get More Clients

More clients means more money, right? It also means more awareness and rapid company growth. However, it can be a challenge to ramp up your client list quickly. It takes a solid strategy and a proven plan. Here are five smart strategies to get more clients fast. #1 Partners! Partnerships can help you double your list overnight. Multiply your list and you multiply the number of opportunities you have to turn prospects into customers. And there are a number of ways you can make a partnership work for you. For example, you could promote a partner’s e-book or product on your website in exchange for them promoting your e-book, product or service on theirs. You could swap reviews or even exchange advertisements. However, one of the best ways to optimize a partnership is to cross-promote each other’s opt-in list and free giveaway. Then, when people sign up, you have permission to communicate and market to them. Have a product promotion ready to go and really capitalize o…

How to Raise Money in Difficult Times

Just because the banks aren’t giving out loans as easily as they used to doesn’t mean you have to give up on your dreams to start a business. Raising funding just requires a little bit of creativity and a whole lot of perseverance and determination. Here are a few ideas on how to raise funding in difficult times. * Sell your stuff. Small business experts from around the world are recommending aspiring business owners stop knocking on the doors of banks and start looking around their homes, garages, closets and attics to find valuables to sell. Ebay, garage sales and consignment stores are all great places to sell your stuff and raise the money you need to see your business dreams become a reality. * Partner up. Be creative and seek business partners. Forging mutually beneficial business relationships can really help you get where you need to go with little or no funding required. For example, if you’re looking to open a marketing business but need a website up and run…

What Your Potential Clients Wish You Knew

Your market is out there, and they are looking for you! It doesn’t matter if you’re a health coach for seniors, a dating coach for middle-aged women, or a business coach for crafty people. You have a large audience, and they are eagerly anticipating the help only you can provide. But you’re missing the mark in some important areas, and it’s causing them to turn away in favor of another coach. Make it Easy for Them When you’re selling your products and services online, the one rule you must abide by is to make it easy for your customers to buy. It sounds simple, right? Yet you might be shocked how often coaches (and others) break this rule. They don’t make the “buy” buttons obvious. They don’t make contact information easy to find. They don’t provide clear calls to action on their website. They don’t create easy website navigation so readers can quickly find what they need. They don’t offer the next logical product via a well-planned funnel.…

Creating Your Action Plan and Online Business Timeline

Most businesses start out with a dream and an inspiration, but that is where it ends. Even the most innovative businesses can wind up closing their doors because a good action plan and a focused timeline were not in place at conception. There are many benefits to creating your action plan and online business timeline. When you have an action plan put into place and follow it regularly and continue to focus on your business timeline, things will run much more smoothly for your new business, your employees, and your customers. Tips to Create a Powerful Action Plan * Streamline Your Path – If you have a dream and a vision – excellent. Now, you must have knowledge of where your business is heading down the line. It is important to focus on a streamlined path when you first start your business. Otherwise, you are likely to find that your business is “all over the place.” Be sure to be specific in where you expect your business to go in the first twelve months. * Put …

The Story You Tell

Storytelling can be a powerful component in a marketing strategy. It can be the driving force behind developing, and more importantly, establishing a brand that connects and resonates with your target audience. The story you tell, and the method in which you use to weave that story throughout your marketing campaigns will be based on your overall goals but one thing remains the same: Your story will be designed to introduce your brand to the world in a way that helps you stand out and apart from the competition. Storytelling is a testament to our hard work; it highlights the efforts we’ve taken to create an outstanding brand, and it helps deliver large pieces of content in a way that people can connect to. It’s also the easiest way to express emotions and illustrate your commitment to providing value. There’s nothing more powerful than a carefully crafted story that fulfills the needs of your core market. Have you ever used story-telling to launch a produc…

What Is Brand, Anyway? The Seven Layers of Brand and How They Fuel Your Business

Excerpted from Forging an Ironclad Brand: A Leader's Guide We all use the word "brand" as though everyone else's understanding of it were the same as ours. Yet chances are it's not, says Lindsay Pedersen, author of Forging an Ironclad Brand. "Logo is part of brand," she says. "TV and social media are parts of brand. Naming is part of brand. So are your product, your customer experience, and your SEO tactics. So are your font, your tagline, your business's personality, and the color of your employee uniforms. But none of those are, by themselves, brand." To make smart decisions around shaping and communicating your brand strategy, it's important to understand all the aspects. In her book, Pedersen identifies seven layers of brand: Brand Is What You Stand For. It's what you mean to your customer. It's the place you occupy in his or her mind. Everything your business does either reinforces your meaning, solidifying and growing its place in the customer's mind—or it we…

Three Marketing Strategies to Skyrocket Your Business

You have a website. You know you've nailed it with your sales copy. You have a variety of products. The only thing missing... a steady flow of potential clients in your market. Sounds easy, doesn’t it? The truth is, though, marketing is the one thing that holds coaches just like you back from success. Maybe you don’t know where to begin, or perhaps you’re afraid of putting yourself out there, or maybe consistency is your biggest problem. Learn how to set the right goals for your business! [bctt tweet="Marketing encompasses everything from who you are to who your ideal client is. A solid brand will instantly identify you no matter where you are." username="@HeidiRichards"] Whatever the case, if you want to grow your business, you must master marketing. Start with these proven strategies, and you’ll be well on your way to coaching stardom. Nail Your Brand Here’s the single most important part of any marketing plan—and one of the most difficult to pin down. I…

Passive Income – How to Make Money Without Lifting a Finger

A lot of people don’t realize it, but there is a huge difference between passive and non-passive income. With non-passive income, the second you stop working, the money stops coming in. With passive, you can do whatever you want and the money keeps on coming. [bctt tweet="Most people have the “job mentality.” In other words, they believe you always have to work to make money." via="no"] Nothing could be further from the truth. Money is only half the equation. The other half is time. Somebody who is makes one hundred dollars a year and works eighty hours a week is much less powerful than someone who makes the same amount but only works four hours a week. This is because the second person has far more time to be able to spend their money. So passive income should be the goal. This will free up your so you can spend it living your dreams, instead of doing mandatory income-producing work. What’s the best passive income strategy? There are a number that work. Here are th…

How To Work Backwards To Set Your Business Goals

Today I want to share my thinking process for setting smart business goals with you. I like to work backwards from a financial goal to daily to-do lists. Here’s how that works. It always starts with a money goal. It helps if that goal has a meaning beyond the dollar figure. For example, let’s say that I want to buy a new car. The payment is around $400. To account for things like taxes and just to be safe, I’ll bump the goal up to $600. In other words, I need to add an extra $600 (or more… more is always better) to my monthly bottom line. Once that’s done and I am seeing that level of income on a regular basis, I’m ready to order my new car. Once I know how much money I have to make, I can start to think about different ways to do just that. I could find more customers for one or several of my existing products. For example, if I have a $10 eBook, I would have to make an extra 60 sales per month. From there I can work backwards. If I know that on average one out of 10 em…

Why Business Planning Is The Secret To Success

Do you set aside time regularly to plan what you want to do in your business? If it’s not something you currently do, I strongly encourage you to embrace it for the remainder of this year as well as the one coming up. Setting aside time at the end of the year, to plan out what I want to do and more importantly what growth I want to achieve in the coming year has been crucial to my own success. Over the next several days, I want to share some of what I’ve learned - and hope you too will find it helpful in your business. Let’s start off by taking a look at why business planning is “the secret” to success. There are a few different factors that come into play here. The first is efficiency. When you go in with a clear plan, you can focus on what’s most important. Instead of spending time trying to figure out what you should be working on, what pieces of the puzzle are missing from your product funnel, or what you need to do to break through to the next income level, you know e…

Marketing Online of Offline – You have to Know your Audience!

It may go without saying that Internet marketing is one of the most popular advertising options available. The Internet reaches a worldwide audience and is available 24 hours a day. For this reason more and more potential customers are turning to the Internet for a variety of reasons including researching products and services and making purchases. As more and more consumers turn to the Internet for these reasons, it is important for businesses to establish an online presence. This is so important because failure to do so may result in their competitors gaining an edge over them in competing for sales. While it is important for business to begin Internet marketing campaigns it is also important for these same businesses to realize basic advertising principles still exist and they cannot neglect these principles. Most importantly those who advertise online have to be aware of who their target audience is and how to reach this audience. As with any marketing campaign, business…