Annie Mueller

Get your business growing online.

7 Aug 2010

Creating great content and simplifying social media so small businesses can succeed… one sentence at a time.

In over 6 years of freelance writing, I’ve never had an unhappy client. Ready to find out more? Request a quote or b2b price list?

Or sign up for the e-newsletter and free “Simple + Successful Business Blogging” ebook.

No Comments

20 Frugal Marketing Ideas for Small Business

In: Writing

31 Aug 2010

1. Giveaways

Use your website, blog, or your presence in the local community to publicize a give-away. You don’t have to have hundreds of people participate, and you don’t have to give away anything expensive.

It can be a product or service you offer, or it can be something completely different, a fruit basket or book or gift card to a local coffee shop. It doesn’t really matter what, and the value could be less than $20: people still love giveaways. Even if you only have 10 or 15 people participate, that’s 10 or 15 who will be excited about you and your business, and 1 winner who will talk about the prize she won.

2. Flyers on every bulletin board

Old-school, maybe, but still a cheap and effective way of promoting your business. Make your own flyers or brochures at home. Use your desktop publishing software; make them clean and simple, easy to read, uncomplicated. Print them out and visit every grocery store and coffee shop and bookstore in the vicinity.

Make sure that you offer something interesting to people: you could have a detachable coupon, a funny question, a web address with the promise of discounts, or a great photo that leaves them wanting more. Make your contact information obvious and easy to remember. Be sure to check with management, too, before you put your signs up.

3. Niche social networking

Yes, yes, yes, everybody knows about social networking and has multiple accounts at all these social networking sites. That’s great, but sometimes the big sites are so big that it’s hard to make any waves. That’s where the niche social networking sites fit in beautifully.

Why? You pick the right one, and you’ve already got your target audience right there. All you have to do is participate, and you can start making contacts, meeting people, and promoting your business to a group that you know is already interested in the same topics. There’s a great list of niche social networking sites with reviews at Social Media Answers blog.

4. Business cards as coupons

Go past the traditional name, address, etc., and offer a discount, deal, or promotion on the business card. Make the coupon the main information offered, and then put your contact information, website, etc., below the “big deal.” People are more likely to follow through when they have something to gain.

5. Contest (photo, essay, caption)

Relate the contest to the service and/or product you provide. You could have an essay writing contest, a photography contest, a caption-that-photo contest, a name-the-ice-cream-flavor contest. Whatever.

Do something that relates to your business. Promote it with those flyers you have on bulletin boards across the area, and offer a cash prize. $50 is great, and makes it worthwhile for people to participate.

6. Local government meetings

Get to know your Mayor, Board of Aldermen, and city administration. These people know who’s who in the area, and it benefits you and your business to be a familiar face to them. Don’t be pushy, and understand that they are busy people. Simply start attending meetings, paying attention, and listening for ways to help. You’ll find opportunities to meet the people in charge and you might also find yourself able to help out in some way.

7. Trade for promotions

Talk to other businesses, unrelated ones, about trading promotions. Neither one of you has to spend any money, but you both gain new customers. You can offer complementary discounts, e.g., “Purchase my product and get 10% off at The Other Business I’m Promoting.”

8. Swap online ad space

The Internet obviously has huge potential, but getting ads can be costly. Target sites that are either local or that appeal to the niche market you’re after, and ask about swapping for online ad space rather than paying cash up front. If you have a decent website or blog of your own, you can simply swap web ads. Or you can offer to swap something else, something you’re good at, the products you have, whatever you can think of.

9. Talk to the Chamber of Commerce

Look up your local Chamber of Commerce and go have a friendly chat. Introduce yourself, tell them about your business, and ask how you can get help in promoting your business to the local community. That’s why they exist, and they’ll be happy to give you some ideas.

10. Donate to the community and non-profits

You can donate your time, your energy, raw materials that you might have around anyway, services, and other resources that are readily available to you but, perhaps, difficult for others to get a hold of. Find out what’s happening in the community and offer to help in some way that relates to your business. Find a non-profit you love and offer your business services to them for free.

11. Be an expert resource

Let your local newspapers and regional publications know who you are and what your business is, and that you’re available for interviews on your area of expertise anytime. Local journalists always need good sources and experts to quote, so send a friendly letter with your contact information, and be sure to return their calls promptly.

12. Participate in your target group’s events

You do know your target market, right? Well, once you know, find out what they’re doing. Where do they go? What movies do they watch? Where do they eat, hang out, go on vacation? Follow them. Hang out. Get to know people. Talk. Give away business cards.

13. Submit press releases

Press releases are brief information bytes that can be picked up by any number of news publications, both online and offline. Submit your press releases via any of the free sites, and be sure to do so anytime you have something somewhat momentous to talk about. [Need a little help? I write press releases.]

14. Be newsworthy

But in an unassuming way. Help an old lady across the street, host the girl scout’s annual campfire cook-out, bring in a great speaker for your church. Do things that people notice. Then submit a press release about it.

15. Everybody loves cookies

So make some, or get someone who loves you and can cook to make some, and then go drop them off where you think they’ll have the most impact. Police station, fire house, barber shop, insurance company. Pick one or two. Add a stack of your coupon business cards to the plate and leave them with a smile.

16. Visit your city’s economic development director

You’ll need to make an appointment, and be specific and courteous. This person receives a lot of work and is busy; don’t ramble on about your childhood and your future, simply introduce yourself and your business and start a conversation about how your business and your city can help each other. Be willing to give first.

17. Create videos

If you’re handy at all with a video camera and have a decent sense of humor, come up with some funny stuff and make brief, commercial-like videos to upload on your YouTube account, which should be linked to your business website. The videos need to relate to your business, somehow, and they need to make people laugh.

18. Patronize the same businesses

Get to know the people who work around you, whether in related or unrelated businesses. Don’t view everyone as competition. Visit the same businesses on a fairly regular routine and people will begin to recognize you, and you’ll start getting to know them.

19. Volunteer

At church, at civic organizations, at community events, at your children’s activities. Offer a morning or an evening to help out. You’ll meet people, people will talk to you, and you will be creating more contacts which is what networking is all about.

20. Be friendly and helpful

Always. Just be a nice person. Open doors. Wait your turn. Turn off your cell phone in the movie. Let other people go first. Talk to people. Smile. A little goes a long way, and people notice when someone is happy and helpful. I got a job offer once because I gave a quarter to the man in front of me so he could pay without pulling out his credit card. A quarter. It was a short-term job for a student, but I made a few hundred bucks working it for a month or so. From the investment of a quarter and a smile.

Any other bright & frugal marketing ideas that small businesses can use?

No Comments

Small Business Blog Writing that Works

In: Blogging

30 Aug 2010

Any business can have a blog, so make yours better…

1. Produce longer content.

Numbered lists, short posts with big photos, a little linking and one-sentence reviews with the embedded YouTube videos: short content. Balance the little stuff, the shallow stuff, with some big, deep, heavy, valuable, longer content. Actual articles, with good quotations and relevant research cited, or with a logical outline and argument, development of an idea longer than one paragraph. You know. Stuff like that. Like those essays you had to write in college. Opening paragraph with thesis, main idea, supporting ideas, evidence, refutation of opposing ideas, summary, conclusion… Yikes. Seems like a lot, and sometimes it is. But if you think about it and give yourself time to do a bit of brainstorming and researching, and you’re used to popping out regular (shorter) posts, you can do longer posts as well. Just think of them as a series presented in a single post… might help.

2. Link within context.

Don’t make a big deal out of your links and don’t link to irrelevant junk that you haven’t really looked over yourself. Link through the appropriate (couple of) words within the related sentence and move on. If people like what you’re writing about, are interested, and want to read more, they’ll follow. If not, being flashy and obvious isn’t going to convince them. And if visitors try a link or two and find them to be boring or broken, well, you’ll have a lot of work to convince them to try again.

3. Use professional pictures.

Or at least professional-looking pictures. There are thousands available with Creative Commons Licenses, many of them taken by actual professional photographers. Some are taken by talented people who just like to take photos and let other people use them. With that great a wealth of photos around, there’s no excuse for using sloppy looking photos or graphics with your posts. And as far as using your own, that’s great if you know how to make them look decent as well. Crop the unnecessary edges, lighten or darken if needed, fix the red-eye. Don’t get too crazy happy with the effects, with one caveat: turning a not-so-great photo into black and white will not make it a better photo, but it will make lots of people think it is a better photo. Just so you know.

4. Give proper credit.

For photos, for research, for data, for statistics, for opinions, for graphics, for videos, for music, for articles, for ideas. Sure, not all of that stuff is copyrighted and you could probably get away with using and not crediting more obscure items, but it would still be 1) unprofessional, 2) stupid, and 3) just wrong. So don’t do it. Give credit where credit is due.

5. Take one idea further.

Instead of trying to promote fifteen ideas in one post or article, grab one idea – the one that is most exciting to you as you are writing – and just expand it. Write about it. Look at it from every angle. Give examples. Give illustrations. Draw a graph. Do some research. Brainstorm. Get deeper with one idea. By the way, since I just preached about giving proper credit, I want to come clean that this idea of taking one idea further came from a post I read several months ago. I just spent ten minutes searching for it and can’t find it… it was a guest post on a productivity blog, but that’s all I can remember except for the (well-developed, single) idea of the article. So, to the writer of that article, my apologies for lack of specific credit. If I find it, I’ll come add it.

6. Use recurring themes.

You don’t have to use memes or join groups; come up with your own themes, something in keeping with the focus of your blog (you do know what that is, don’t you?). People like what’s familiar and they like knowing what to expect. If you have a great post every Monday about, um, meringue pies, then you will get a following who come to your blog simply because they know and love the Monday Meringue Pie Post.

7. Pick a side.

Don’t be wishy-washy. Say what you mean, say it clearly enough that people know what you mean, and then back yourself up. Accept that there are enough people with enough diversity accessing the internet that you are guaranteed to displease someone, somewhere, on something you say. That’s okay. You don’t need to be mean, rude, disparaging, or get personal: you do need to be honest and have integrity. I’m drawn to writers who are honest even when I disagree with what they say. I just like the honesty and the willingness to put a view out there even though they know they’ll end up with lots of negative comments or questions simply because they stated their opinion strongly. I don’t like pandering. Nobody does.

8. Be professional.

As mentioned above, don’t be “mean, rude, disparaging, or get personal”; it is unprofessional, impolite, and juvenile. If you’re old enough to drive, you’re old enough to learn how to express yourself without using profanity, personal attacks, and/or inappropriate expressions. Sure, everybody is going to differ a bit on what’s appropriate and what isn’t, and obviously the focus, content, and audience will differ from blog to blog. But you know when you’re crossing a line, and so do your readers. When your writing is emotionally fueled, free from all logic, and backed up by evidence that is personal and subjective, you’re probably deep into unprofessional territory.

9. Use a consistent format.

Set your standards for your paragraph headings, image sizes, links, quotations and block quotations, and other little niceties of blog posting. Once you’ve decided on what you like, stick with it. It’s annoying when the format of posts across a single blog keeps changing, annoying enough to make me quit reading.

10. Throw in some extras.

Give people good resources that you’ve found. Offer tips. Offer ideas. Offer the research sites for further investigation into the subject you’ve just posted about. Offer the sites you’ve found that present completely opposing views. Go a bit above and beyond in what you write about, how you write, and how you respond to your readers. “Extras” can be as particular and personal as you want them to be. They don’t necessarily have to be products, or freebies, though of course people like those, too. Just take what you’re doing, and then take it a little further. Do that consistently. People will come to quality.

Here’s an extra for you today: a blogging questionnaire (pdf format) I use with my clients to help them establish a focus, themes, and editorial calendar for their small business blog. Look through it and answer the questions for yourself; it can help clarify what you should be blogging about and how best to promote your business via your blog.

No Comments
Tags: Blogging, small business, starting a blog

Are You a Crisis Creator?

In: Motivating

29 Aug 2010

Here’ an entrepreneurial epiphany moment brought o you by 3 preschoolers. [And the letter C and the number 4.]

My daughter and son and niece are swimming. Floatie-laden. I’m sitting beside the pool, trying to read. Suddenly: screams. Terror. Flailing arms. I jump up and nearly jump in when I realize no one’s drowning. The waves calm, the screams quiet, and turns out that there was a spider.

Oh.
I offer to get it out and am refused. They can handle it. I watch as, for the next 15 minutes, they wave the spider closer to each other, have a crisis moment, and take turns saving each other from the evil eight-legged beast. It’s fun to be the hero.

When you’re 3 years old, this is a good way to spend an afternoon.
When you’re over, say, 20, it’s not. When you own a business, it’s not. When you really are the one in charge, or when you want to be the one in charge, it’s self-defeating.

It’s fun to be the hero, but the real success is in doing the drudge work, hitting the routine day after day, keeping up, maintaining, moving forward (slow and steady), and overcoming the resistance you’re guaranteed to encounter.

No Comments
Tags: crisis, diligence, resistance, success, tyranny of the urgent

Older Entries