9 Killer Tips for Building and Selling Your Business

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Many Cinderella stories are about entrepreneurs reaching levels of success that even they themselves didn’t think possible. These are brave souls who built fascinating products, learned priceless lessons, and eventually sold their businesses in an inspiring way. Some took decades to reach their goals and others, to their own surprise, did it in a record time!

Gentry Underwood launched Mailbox App in January 2013. Finding that most people were tired of searching through lists of emails to find what they needed, he developed an app that simplified and streamlined the inbox. After a brilliant pre-launch video that went viral, he managed to created a virtual waiting list of users, who were eagerly awaiting their turn to download the app. He then sold his app to Dropbox for $100 million just 37 days after launch.

Everybody has a friend that at some point said something like, “I had the idea for Facebook. If only I had acted on it” or “That baby carrier was my idea all along”. The reality is, most ideas are not worth the paper they’re written on. The brilliance is usually in the execution of an idea and not in the idea itself.

I know from experience that procrastination and self-doubt are the killers of success. To build is to start executing on an idea. Henry Ford said it best: “You can’t build a reputation on what you’re going to do.”

Earlier this year I got to know Ash Metry, an entrepreneur who sold his company roughly two years after launch and later started an agency focused on high end wedding advertising. I asked him to share few lessons he learned.

This is what he shared about building, growing and selling his business:

BUILDING

1. Achilles Tendon – This is a lesson that I will forever remember. What’s worse than putting your eggs in one basket is putting your eggs in somebody else’s basket!A structure is as strong as its weakest point. If you are planning to dedicate the next few months or years building a business, it better be standing on solid ground. You will likely have to rely on other businesses in the chain of delivering your product (or service). You must ask yourself, “What will I do if my provider stops offering this product?” or “What will happen if the terms of this service change?”

Many years back during MySpace’s height of popularity, page backgrounds were popular. To get the cute or flashy background, you had to know how to write code. As a result, websites popped up that offered MySpace backgrounds of all kinds. Now that MySpace has changed its format and lost popularity, you can hear the crickets chirping on those website. Even though MySpace was popular at that time, the dependency was on something very specific that MySpace did. When they changed the way they did things, all these services became less relevant and eventually died.

Being a reseller or an affiliate is a great way to test a market before jumping all in, but it may not be the best way to grow a large business. There are many great service providers with stable, proven affiliate programs; however, growing a business around being a reseller/affiliate is ultimately putting yourself under the mercy of somebody else.A good exercise is to write down all the critical points that must take place once a customer places an order. Is there a contingency plan for each of these steps?

2. Killer Branding–When I first started observing the market I wanted to get into, I noticed that all of my competitors did a very poor job branding their businesses. I wanted to create a brand, not a ‘company’ or a ‘service’. I wanted the first impression and the customer experience to be awesome.

Take enough time picking your domain name, your logo and your colors. Steve Jobs was a big believer in branding. When he was approached with the design of the new Powerbook G4, a revolutionary new laptop, Jobs had a concern. Even though the Apple logo was facing the user when the laptop was closed, it was upside down when the laptop was opened! Jobs believed that it was important that the brand is well represented in coffee shops all over the world by having the logo look right to everybody around.

3. Target Market–Many entrepreneurs have built successful businesses around something they are passionate about and eventually gained enough momentum and audience to turn a profit. I didn’t necessarily want to start there. I loved the tech/dot com world, so I knew anything I would do online was going to be fun! So instead, I picked a target market and decided to spend most of my initial time understanding it.What I recommend doing is to think about a group of friends, neighbors, or a group of people that have something in common and ask, what could make their life better? (You can even browse Facebook groups for ideas)

GROWING

Once you have something that’s working, it’s time to scale and take it to the next level. Here are three things to remember.

  • Out-of-this-world Customer Support–Believe it or not, subconsciously customers will remember WHO you are before they remember WHAT you do. This ties in to your brand but will come out in the way you present yourself in emails, social media, blogs and most importantly customer support. The way you interact with the people who purchased your product makes all the difference. How you project how you care about people (customers or window shoppers) will make people love or hate your brand. Remember that people are quicker to complain than they are to praise.
  • Tune out the noise–That’s a tough one! Being successful relies heavily on instinct and intuition. You’ll come up with great ideas, be offered well-meaning suggestions, and sometimes feel you’re spinning in circles. Learning to filter out the noise and choose the right ideas that best fit your company’s direction is crucial. Many times I had to throw away good ideas simply because timing was bad, and that’s OK!Focus on doing what you are set out to do, but doing it well is key! It’s better to build something that few people absolutely love rather than building something that many people just like.
  • Strategic Partnerships–In many ways it’s all about who you know and the relationships you have. A single relationship can catapult your business 10 years into the future just because you happen to engage the right person at a coffee shop. Some of it is chance, but a lot of it is just…lifestyle. So remember to shake hands, say hi, tell people why you do something before you tell them what you do!A great example is TOMS who identify themselves as “We’re in business to help improve lives” not as “We sell shoes.” If you have business partners, remember that friction between partners is bound to happen especially as the business starts growing. Partnerships that complement each other’s skillset but share the same vision and values have the best chance of survival.

SELLING

When I first started, selling the business wasn’t exactly on the forefront of my mind. However, taking vacations and living the 4-hour work week was! Here are 3 lessons I learned.

1. Automate the NOW – Build your business model with scalability in mind. If your business will require 10 times your current time and effort from you if it grows 10x times in the future then you should revisit your business model. It’s okay to do some things manually yourself at first, but if the entire business model relies heavily on you then it will be harder to go on vacation. It will also be more difficult to get a potential buyer or investor to feel confident in replacing you without interrupting the entire workflow and ultimately affecting revenue.

2. Build TOMORROW’s roadmap–Dream and write it down! Where do you see the business in 1, 2 and 5 years? What are the low hanging fruits and easy ways to expand your business. Thinking of all the future possibilities is helpful whether you decide to sell or not.If you keep the business then you’ll get to execute on your dreams one at a time. If you sell then your roadmap shows your potential buyer that you see a future for the business. Nobody wants to buy a sinking ship and there is no better person to know how far a ship can travel than the person that built and captained it.A roadmap for tomorrow will help give confidence and will help potential buyers see future possibilities.

3. Hire a Broker–When it’s time to sell, find a business broker to help you. Professional brokers are already connected to buyers and investors. Their entire business depends on presenting your business in the best possible light to the right buyer. They also know how to present financials and prepare you for the type of questions a buyer will likely ask. However, be prepared, their fees will vary and can range from 5-15% of the final sale price.

By John Rampton
Entrepreneur and investor@johnrampton

The opinions expressed here by Inc.com columnists are their own, not those of Inc.com.
PUBLISHED ON: NOV 8, 2014

Why Hire a Local Website Designer in Minneapolis, MN?

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With the excitement of Summer (sadly) winding down, it’s time to put all of your focus back on your business. The easiest way to give your company some much needed attention is with a NEW WEBSITE. In order to create a new website, you need a LOCAL Web Design Company. But why should you choose a local compan
y and not one half-way across the country (or even the world)? We will break down the main reasons why!

  1. Loyalty
    • Everyone knows that the general rule of thumb is that neighbors are usually more loyal to you than someone who is on the other side of the country. Supporting your community with using a local company improves your loyalty as well. If other local businesses notice that you supported a local business, you are more likely to gain their business.
  2. YOUR Competition is Always on Their Minds
    • If you and your web design company are in the same area, then they know who your competition is. Local web design companies know how competitive or uncompetitive your local competition is. For example, would a web designer in California know about the Grand Finale Car Show that is coming to Downtown Anoka this September?
  3. Meetings are More Likely to be Face to Face
    • Most likely if you hire a web designer out-of-state, you will never come in face-to-face contact with them. But if you use a local web design company, the chances of having face-to-face meetings with them improves drastically. When clients are face-to-face with their web designers, the whole process tends to go more smoothly.
  4. Get to Know You on a More Personal Level
    • Since you have chosen a web design company located closer to you, you are able to have more contact with them. If you were to choose a worldwide freelance development service, or something of that nature, you would only be a number to them. Local businesses will know YOUR name!
  5. Quality is Always Better
    • Now that you have a great relationship with your web designers, they will not want to disappoint you with low quality work. You will be able to check on them more frequently to be sure your site is getting done right.

If you or someone you know in the Minneapolis, MN area needs a website or some SEO help call us today!

Online Marketing Strategy for Small Business

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The internet is the highway. Your website is the car. SEO and Online Marketing is the fuel. Without fuel, your website will be sitting along the side of the highway, looking pretty, but going nowhere.

 

It hasn’t been long that online marketing and content creation has been taken seriously. Within the past couple of years, corporations and small businesses began to see the value in content creation and invested accordingly. This trend continues to grow, and it certainly isn’t a phase. Millions of new blog posts will be created throughout this year and next, all with the intention of boosting their online marketing strategy for small business.

Lately the focus is driving more toward local goals. From Google rankings to Facebook, the internet is driving more local traffic to viewers. The internet is an incredibly valuable tool to get a business’s content into the hands of potential customers. Online marketing is often the fastest, and often the most affordable, way to attract potential customers from very specific target markets. But with increasing competition, online content creation isn’t enough to drive sales. A truly custom online marketing strategy designed for your specific business is crucial in today’s market.

Online marketing is a hot new expertise for a reason. There is an incredible amount of value that the right SEO and Online Marketing Professional will bring to your table. But if you’re looking to get ahead of your competitors and boost sales on your own, here are a few tips to stay focused on with your efforts.

CONTENT MARKETING

Content marketing is the meat of your online strategy. Quality, useful and tempting online content isn’t a perk or a trend, it is a necessity. The content you create should be clear, concise, at expert level for your industry, and offer the solution to the problems of your target market.

The initial content you create will go directly onto the pages within your website. It can be highlighted with strategic keywords to help catch the attention of search engines, but still written for your human viewers. In other words, don’t try to trick the search engines by simply overloading your online content with keywords. Google and Bing will know what you’re up to and kick you off of their internet playground for not playing fair. So write for your audience, but keep Google and Bing in mind… as if you were leaving a trail of breadcrumbs for them to find you.

Start blogging. If you aren’t a blogger, hire one. Get guest bloggers who write within your industry. Target the blogs that will engage your potential customers. Then take you content to your audience. Get and stay active on forums and online discussions where you can talk directly with your customers and network with others related to your business.

Be sure to share chunks of your content marketing efforts on your social media avenues. Brag about your blog on Facebook. Tweet about your latest coupon. Pin images of your products on Pinterest. Email educational tips and tricks to your subscribers. Get creative on new ways to share everything you know about your industry utilizing your content marketing.

INFLUENCE & NETWORKING

Stop for a moment to think of the first person who comes to your mind as an influential person within your industry. Can you think of one? Can you think of two? Can you think of ten? Every industry has a certain number of people who command respect and have incredible potential to influence buckets of followers. They often tend to be experts within the industry, therefore their opinion is valued, trusted, and relied upon as reference.

Steve Jobs had an obvious influence on technology. Pop Stars, like Beyonce or Taylor Swift, have the potential to sway waves of fashion trends in the blink of an eye. Famed athletes can endorse any product, from athletic gear to cereal, with outstanding promotional success.

Okay, so you might not get Taylor Swift to endorse your product. But there are ways to get people that are within YOUR industry to take notice. It starts by engaging them on their platforms. Follow them on Twitter and Facebook, and subscribe to their email lists. Comment, share, retweet… stay consistent until you get on their radar. People like to work with other people they recognize or have heard of. After a bit of engagement effort, it will seem a lot more natural when you invite them to talk directly or take a look at the complementary product you want to send them.

The larger their influence, the harder it is to network and build relationships. But they are truly valuable to stay steadfast in your goals. In the meantime, continue to work the same angles with similar people that might be on a less popular level, but still beneficial. Reach out to bloggers- They love samples. Invite them to try yours and write a few reviews. Offer discounts or even kickbacks for any sales that generate from their blog posts. Whatever you do…network, network, network.

 

ONLINE REPUTATION

Yep, it’s time to talk about your rep. Online reputation management, to be exact. Yes, your reputation matters by referral and word of mouth, of course. So stay on your best behavior, offer quality service and products, and encourage your happy customers to brag all they want about you. Word of mouth is a tried and trusted method of increasing business, so keep those efforts up.

But we’re talking specifically about your ONLINE REPUTATION. You’ve got great content and a schnazzy looking website, which is a great start. But when a potential customer takes the next step into digging around, the very next thing they’re looking for are your reviews.

Generating positive reviews about your company, your products, and your service is VERY IMPORTANT to an online marketing strategy for small business. This is especially true for those looking for local customers.

You’re probably aware that disgruntled customers are more likely to take the time to get online and leave a few very detailed tales of a poor experience they receive with a company. So even if most of your customers are simply tickled pink with your service, it only takes a couple of complaints to tarnish your reputation. In order to counteract negative reviews, you want to take an offensive position and stack the deck with positive ones. Your rep is at stake and has the potential to bring in, or scare away, future customers. So the next time your customers are beaming after working with you, ask them to show their appreciation with a review- On your site, on Google, on Yelp, on Facebook… whichever online format is easiest for them, and/or most commonly linked to your site.

You can also consider Reputation Loop as a tool to maximize positive reviews, and minimize the negative.

 

BUILD YOUR EMAIL LIST

If you’re not building your email list, you are consistently losing pieces to your puzzle. It is so important to stay engaged with your customers on a regular basis, even when they aren’t currently working with you. Find the balance between being a disappearing act, and being that annoying fly that just won’t go away. Somewhere in the middle is the perfect formula to remind them that you’re there when they need you.

Stay in touch with your customers with exciting updates to your company or product. Send them reminders for maintenance items that relate to your industry. Share your latest discounts, coupons, and upcoming events. You can even create pop-ups that offer free give-aways to entice them. Anything that lets them know you still appreciate their business and keeps you on their mind.

 

FACEBOOK ADS

We love Facebook.

Downtown-Design-Online-Marketing-FacebookFacebook is more than a social monster that keeps people’s faces glued to their smartphones. Facebook is a very economical method of reaching specific target markets, and usually with fast results. It is, in fact, one of the most economical and targeted paid advertising mode available.

Did you know Facebook not only allows you to target your audience by age, gender and location, but also based on their purchase habits, interests and even the pages they like?

Facebook is a great way to test out multiple ad strategies with small budgets, until you find the ad formula that yields the results you’re looking for. For instance, try two or three ads, spending $20-$30 each. Make small adjustments to the text you use, the specials you offer, and the pics you choose. Eventually, you’ll start to see a pattern and decipher what is catching the eye of your target market. Once the results are in, format a new ad campaign based on that strategy and invest with a larger budget, gradually increasing as you start seeing the return on investment.

 

The significance of the online marketing strategy for small business is incredible, and is only increasing. If you want additional business TOMORROW, it’s important you start taking advantage of online marketing, advertising, and promotional avenues TODAY. It takes dedication and commitment to give your online marketing strategy time to yield results. And it is important to set check points along the way so you can reevaluate your strategy based on short term feedback, helping narrow the path of success for the next online marketing steps. But stay the course and with enough attention on the data that comes your way from these efforts, your online marketing can offer amazing promise for your business!

Which tip do you think you’ll try first? Which ones have you tried so far? Ask us questions and offer feedback!

Small Business Marketing Mistakes: A Quick Read

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Common Small Business Marketing Mistakes that are easy to avoid

Marketing is a job of it’s own for a reason.  Here are a few mistakes to skip:

Marketing your small business can seem daunting, and for good reason.  It is a full-time job of it’s own.  It can be tough to know how to get your message out to your target market, regardless of your level of expertise.  So, to get you started, here are a few simple mistakes to avoid.

Online Marketing: You don’t know what you’re doing, but do it anyway.

No, no, no.  We’re proud that you’re willing to give the unknown a shot.  But online marketing is a very important key tool for small businesses of today.  Going online and filling your social media profiles with self-bragging and links, hoping you’ll get clicks and likes, will not help you.  In fact, it can hurt you.  If you don’t know what you’re doing, you need to learn.  Or hire someone who does know what they are doing.  It will be worth either your time or money to make sure you’re doing it right, BEFORE your efforts work against you.

Marketing Shmarketing.

Business is going well and so who needs marketing?  I didn’t do it before and things are going great, so why fix what isn’t broken?  Well, Marketing isn’t for the “Now” it’s for the “Future”.  Marketing is an investment into tomorrow, next month,  next year, and beyond.  Marketing now is for the purpose of getting and keeping your brand out there and in front of your customers.  Marketing is effort made today to keep your brand in the spotlight permanently.  You may have great business today, but if it suddenly slows down and now you need sales TODAY, well, it’s too late to get marketing to work to get you sales TODAY.  Market today for the sales tomorrow.  Make sense?

Social Media Frenzy!

You’re not sure what all the hype is about, but you know it’s trending so you gotta be on it!  If there is any new social media site, you have decided you must be on it.  The problem is… your target market isn’t.  So now with every status update and post, you’re simply wasting your time.  And time is money!  Social media is important.  But on this topic, it’s important to go with quality, not quantity.  Choose the social media sites that are relevant to benefit your industry.  Your metal roofing company isn’t likely to be found as a tip on Pinterest, but could benefit from an ad on Facebook.  Your posts on LinkedIn aren’t going to help your local bakery, but are certain to bring in business from Four Square or even Twitter.

What are your measurements?

What good are your marketing efforts if you aren’t aware of what is working and what isn’t?  There aren’t really any excuses here: Social media sites and even your website designer will have analytics built in to get reports from.  You can easily see what’s been working and what failed miserably.  And all of the positive and negative results will help you build even better campaigns in the future.

All those eggs and you only bought one basket.

Facebook is your favorite!  So all of your time and ad money has gone strictly to this format.  You’ve decided to ignore your other platforms of press releases, additional social media sites, search engine advertisements or even old school printed mailers.  Oh boy…  Hey, we’re glad that your Facebook ads generated a lead or three.  But what happens when you’ve already reached a majority of your target audience?  It’s important to diversify your marketing efforts rather than focus and flood one avenue with your brand.  That way, if one avenue happens to dissolve (how’s MySpace working these days?), you’re already working other options.

It’s important to have a marketing strategy, even if it’s a simple one.  If you’re unsure of how it works, either invest the money into someone who does or invest the time into learning to do it for yourself.  An uneducated marketer is a dangerous one.  But just a few efforts in the right direction, combined with avoiding these simple mistakes, can make for some pretty great results.

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