small-business-blog

Business Plan Writing Versus Business Plan Development

Sun, 13 May 2012 11:28:38 +0100

I met with a potential client that was referred by the local bank who was looking to have their business plan assessed before submitting it to the bank for a small business loan. They had found a company online that only developed business plans and sent me a copy. The client had already spent over $1K on the plan and owed $1K more. The plan was poorly written and did not even include the required sections a bank will look at in order to determine credibility of the business. The numbers in their financial plan did not add up and supposedly they had an accountant develop them. I am shocked at how many times that this happens. If you think you are getting a good deal on a business plan - then it falls under it is probably not. I am not even sure if this client's business plan would have made it past the branch.

The issue with most start-up businesses is they have a concept for their business, but are not aware of the detail that has to go into a business plan or what the bank or investor is looking for. This was a highly sophisticated business model and there was no marketing plan, sales plan, or operations plan. The company spent more time embedding graphical pictures in the document and even one of the charts was illegible because the font was white on pale grey.

I provided a copy of my own business plan to the client to give them an idea of what would be required by the bank. They were in shock and when they talked to the company that wrote the plan outlining what was included in my plan - the business plan company told them that was a strategic plan, not a business plan. If they wanted this kind of plan - that would cost them 10K. These business plan companies exist everywhere and are truly taking advantage of small businesses and start-ups who are not aware. In this case, even if the client had all of the necessary pieces for their business plan and the company was just providing writing - this was still a travesty.

There are some businesses that have all of the pieces for a plan and are just looking for someone to write it, and then there are others that need a business plan written but are not sure what is required. In both cases - if you are just going to a company that writes business plans and does not have people on staff that are business people to go through it and provide feedback and help, then you are most likely going to spend a couple thousand dollars and have a mound of paper that you can use for a paper weight.

Something also to make sure of when finding someone to develop your business plan - make sure they know what is required for your type of business. The layout of a business plan for a retail store, a web company, and a manufacturing company are very very different and if they are providing one size fits all - this will land you in a mound of hurt. You need to be working with someone who understands your business model and what the bank or investor will require.

Even for a company that writes a business plan, if they are going to provide you with adequate service - they should have some level of template/questionnaire that they have you fill in about the required sections of a business plan. If as a business, you are not able to provide the information - they should send you back to someone who can help you develop the plan, as they are just taking your money without any regard of whether you will get financing or not. If you are looking to have your business plan developed from scratch - then there should be a consulting engagement at the beginning to review your business and find out what areas need to be developed. This company should either have people on staff to provide consulting to help with this or refer you to someone that has this level of experience and expertise.

So many companies I talk to are looking to a bank or an investor to provide them with $100's of thousands of dollars, but yet they are looking to scrimp on the one document that lies between them and the funds. If you are already an established business and have a record with the bank then this is a different story - in many cases you are looking to add funds for a particular reason (equipment, renovations ...etc) - then we are talking a business case versus a full plan. If you are a start-up and you have never had funding and the bank, lender, or investor is not familiar with your business and you are looking for over $50K , if you pay less than $3K for a business plan for most businesses - then you will get exactly what you paid for. The more sophisticated the business - the more detailed the plan especially the financials. You also want to make sure that the person that is helping you develop the financial model has experience or is working with an accountant. This can either be one they work with or your own. It the plan does not support the financials - you will not get your funding.

A good business plan does not ensure funding, as the bank, investor, or lender has to feel secure in the idea and that they will get their money back or see a see a return on their investment. On the other hand, a poorly developed and written business plan will ensure you do not get the funding, even if you have a viable idea. If you are not able to portray this in your business plan - you have lost your one shot with that bank or investor.

A True Small Business Success Story in Durham Region

Fri, 04 May 2012 20:50:58 +0100

This will be a little different than my usual small business blog article. I hope the content is as inspirational for the reader as the person that inspired me to write it. The focus of this article is about a small business success story in my local area. This is about a company that has been in business for almost 40 years and was started from the bottom up that had less than 20 employees which proves you do not have to be large to be successful.

I had the distinct pleasure of attending a regional Economic Development event in my community the other night where the keynote speaker was Ron Compton, the former owner of the local cable company (Compton Communications) who recently sold his business to Rogers Communications. He received highest amount that has been paid for any local cable company in Canada based on a per subscriber basis. Without understanding the demographic, someone might say so what? This cable company exists basically between two rural communities and for the most part is in a farmer’s field. His competitor in this area was big blue Bell Canada.

This is a man that did all of the right things and focused on working on his business for the last 3-4 decades versus working in his business.

After listening to him, it was obvious that the key areas of success for him were:

Constantly re-investing in his business by making sure that his equipment and infrastructure were up to date. For anyone who does not know the telecom world, this is key, as technology changes so rapidly.
Focusing on customer service. As a small business going up against the giant who is known for poor customer service – this was his key differentiator.
Hiring the right employees. He chose employees based on their character and values versus just technical skill. Technical skills can be taught – character and values are innate.
Not being afraid to push the envelope and think outside the box. Small cable companies were getting outrageous bills from many of the channels and were paying more than the big cable companies. Part of the reason was the billing costs associated with dealing with all of the small companies. As part of an association of the small cable companies where he held a board position he took on the task of stepping up and negotiating a deal where the channels billed him and he took care of billing the smaller cable companies so they all could get a fair and equitable price.

Having moved here from the city myself, I will admit I dreaded having to buy from the “local” guy. I had to give up my email account and the features and packages were not quite as numerous. That all changed after I met the first employee who came to do the installation. He was there when he said he would be, he stayed until he was assured everything was working, and I actually knew something about him when he left. In the time I have been a customer of this company, I have only had 2 reasons to call. In both cases, I talked to a human the first time that was who I needed to. The first time, the individual I talked to was actually the same person who came out to my house hours later. I had decided a wireless modem would be “neat” but then I found out there were a lot of my neighbours that were home-based businesses and we competed for the same signal every day. The modem was exchanged and have had excellent bandwidth ever since. The second was a billing question, and I received the same helpful courteous service.

A few weeks back I received a call from Compton Communications telling me that the battery was dead on my modem. They called me; I didn’t have to call them. If there was a power outage this would be a problem and they were willing to come almost immediately to change it. I called them and asked if I could come by and pick up the battery as I wasn’t usually home during the day. The tech on the phone knew that I had worked in telecom because we had chatted before and that I could change it myself. I will admit I forgot about it and today was going down the winding road in farm country where their office resides. I walked in and started to tell the young man behind the desk why I was there and he knew exactly who I was and reached behind the desk for the battery that had my name on a sticky. I know to appreciate this now because when the large carrier has completely integrated the company – I will receive the same poor service that I did in the city from them. Unfortunately customer service is not a priority with them and other large carriers and don’t think this small business owner didn’t know this when he made this a top priority. We put up with it because we don’t have a choice because they are all the same. This man’s company has definitely changed my perspective on customer service importance as I too had just learned to expect and accept poor service because I painted them with the same brush until I dealt with his company.

This small business owner did everything right. You can tell when you talk to his employees that they respect and admire him and that is so important. His employees respect the business he has built and as such represent him well to customers as his employees are truly the face of Compton Communications.

Ron Compton was not a business owner that has took all of his profits out of his company and lined his pockets to the detriment of the business and his employees. He has continued to spend money on infrastructure in a highly capital intensive business and if you do not keep up with the technology, you cannot compete. This is another reason that he most likely received such as high price for his business. What company, even a large company like Rogers wants to buy a business that gives them subscribers but ends up costing them more than the revenue they gain from subscribers because they have to upgrade the network?

No one when they start a business probably thinks about the day they will sell their business or hand it down, but the fact is – you should run your business every day like that day is around the corner. If you actually do that, it might help you with making some of the key decisions that when or if the day comes you too will get what you want for your business.

As I listened to his presentation – he reinforced some of the points of what are the right things to do in order to be a successful small business owner.

Be a leader in your business and community
Hire competent people that have the same value system that you want to portray for your business and to your customers.
Trust the employees and the managers you hire and focus on being the visionary not the task master and dictator. Delegate the day to day to others and focus on how to grow your business and continue to make it successful. Early on you have to be involved, but as you hire and grow, you need to learn when to let go.
Be the visionary for your business for the future. What works today may not work tomorrow and you have to address this before it happens. You need to learn to work “on” the business versus “in” the business day to day.
Pay your employees appropriately and treat them with respect. If you do that you will have loyal employees and they will represent your business well.
Re-invest in your business to make it successful. If you are just working “in” your business to make a pay cheque and you take everything out now without thinking about the future – you will give up the larger future payout.
Know your customers and what you need to keep them.
Provide quality products and services.
Differentiate yourself with excellent customer service. Most people are even willing to pay more if they are satisfied with a product or service and receive great service whether they are calling about an order, a bill, or a product issue. They are all the same to the customer so the service they receive should be good throughout your business.

I have been asked before on how I would define a successful small business and there are many different answers for this. After the other night, as I pondered Ron Compton’s presentation and his history I am left with this as my answer:

If you enjoy what you do every day while you are doing it.
Learn from others that have come before you and learn how to apply that to your business
Surround yourself with a good network of advisors and partners
Take risks and learn from your mistakes
At the end when you do decide to sell or pass your business down, you have no regrets and know that the business you built added value to your family, your community, your customers, and yourself

Should I Create a Marketing or Business Plan First?

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 21:41:23 +0100

I do find that questions that I see posed on social network sites or asked by clients are usually where I tend to get my inspiration to share lessons learned and today is no different. Someone posed a question on LinkedIn on whether it would be more beneficial to spend time on a Marketing Plan or a Business Plan and I cringed when I started reading where some readers said they would definitely spend time first on a Marketing Plan.

I am not sure why so many small business owners choose not to write a business plan when they start their business. If I were a betting person, I would think the answers range from I have my business plan in my head to I do not need a business plan because I do not need financing. There is also the thought that writing a business plan has to be an onerous task which is does not have to be at all. If you need a business plan for a financial institution, you do need a very complete business plan, but if you are just documenting your business to make sure you have all the pieces in place – a 40 page plan is not needed. It can be as simple as an outline.

If you are someone that believes a marketing plan is more important than a business plan, think hard before you follow that thought. If you do not have a clear outline of your business strategy, how are you going to create a marketing plan? A marketing plan is a piece of your business plan puzzle, but cannot be thought of in isolation. I cannot even count how many times I have gone to see a client who has been sold marketing that is not helping with their business. They were convinced by a graphic designer, web developer, or a writer that knows absolutely nothing about their business that a website, brochure, or a direct mail campaign is going to solve all of their problems and that is why they are not making money. They then spend the money to find out that there business has not increased at all. Many times, they then become disenchanted with marketing completely and become stagnate. The reason why they usually fail is because the marketing was done in complete isolation from the business plan You should not go out and spend money on marketing until you have your business strategy in place otherwise that money will most likely not be a good investment in your business.

If you truly understand what is required for a business plan and what having one will do for you, the answer to this question will become clear. A marketing plan is not a general plan that is a cookie cutter across all businesses. You have to understand your target market. You have to understand how they buy and how to market to them. A website for a manufacturing company is quite different than a retail chain. Direct mail or telemarketing may work well for some industries and others it does not. By not understanding your business and your customers properly, you could end up wasting a lot of money on the wrong marketing. A marketing plan is in support of sales and your go to market strategy. You need to understand what your target financials are for the year to know what you need to spend to get there and what types of marketing for your business will offer you the best return.

So before you hire someone to help you with marketing or spend a lot of money on a marketing plan for your business, make sure you can articulate a basic business plan. This can be done in simple outline form and does not need to be a novel. It also needs to be developed and written in such a way that it can be easily updated, as your business should not remain the same for years. Your business has to change with the times and you need to be able to capture those changes as your business grows, so that your business plan is current.

Here is a list of the questions you need to be able to answer about your business for a basic plan. If can answer all of these then you are 80% there. When you then decide you need a loan or investor financing, you are not spending your time scrambling to put the large plan together – you already have the main items. Once you have this complete and you understand your direction – now you can develop a Marketing Plan that supports your Basic Business Plan.

A Basic Business Plan

What is the mission of your business?

What are your business goals?
What is your vision for the future?
What is your value proposition and what makes you stand out from your competition?

Who is your target market ?

What is the size of that market?
How much of that market can you truly address?

What are the products and services you plan to sell?

What are the features and benefits?
What need do they solve for a customer?
How do your products/services differ from your competition and how will you sell against them?

How do you plan to market your products and services?

Will you have a web site?
What marketing materials will you have?
What market mediums will you utilize for your business to build awareness and drive sales? (Events, Direct Marketing, Social Media, PR, etc)
How much will you spend each year on Marketing?

What is your go to market strategy?

How will you sell: direct, indirect, online, mixed channel?
How will you price through each channel?
How will you support your sales channels?

What is your operational strategy?

How will customers order products and services?
How will you deliver products and services?
How will you support your products and services?
How will you manage inventory, returns, restocking?
What systems will you use in your business to manage it?

What is your human resources strategy?

What does your management team look like (strengths)?
What is your organizational structure?
What are your HR policies and procedures?
What is your compensation structure, job descriptions, benefits for employees?

What are your financials?

Income statement and balance sheets - how are you trending?
What are planned volumes/ revenues?
What are your margins?
How is your cash flow?

Am I Getting The Bang for the Buck for My Marketing Spend?

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 20:47:01 +0100

One of the reasons small businesses struggle with spending money on marketing is because they are not sure if they are getting the bang for the buck. There is only so much money to spend, but how do you know if you are getting a return on your investment? If you asked most business owners if the money they disbursed on marketing was well spent, they most likely could not tell you.

There are some marketing components that it will be hard to determine the actual dollar figure return because they are necessary and needed for your sales efforts. These include components such as marketing materials (brochures, case studies, white papers). On the other hand there are ways to ensure that you budget and spend wisely:

Keep your marketing materials fresh and up to date with your current branding and positioning and create PDFs that can be downloaded and emailed to prospects.
If you have to print use print on demand and only print the quantity you need, so you are not left throwing out of date materials out. Do not listen to the printer that tries to convince you to print 5000 because the per unit cost is cheaper. Think how long it will take you to use that many brochures.

For the many of other types of marketing that you will use to drive leads for your business, it is fairly easy to determine whether you are getting a return on the money you have spent. At a bare minimum you want to cover your costs.

In order to follow the logic, let us use a direct mail campaign example.

We are going to run a direct mail campaign that is focused on an offer on a particular product. This is going to be sent to 2000 targeted recipients with a call to action.
Keep track of all of the costs. This will include design, printing, and postage for the campaign. The cost of this entire campaign was $4000.00 ($2.00 per piece)
The price of the product is $1000.00 and you make $600.00 on each sale.
From the campaign, you received 40 leads for your sales reps to follow up on. (2% response rate)
Lead acquisition cost is $100.00 (Costs / Number of Leads)
Out of the 40 leads, 15 actually turn into sales which in turn gave you $15,000 in revenue and you cleared $9000.00 in profit.

Where most businesses fall short is in actually tracking the metrics as well as proper lead follow-up. For direct mail, telemarketing, advertising, and event marketing, there is no excuse to not know how many leads you receive from the campaign or an event. It is important for every campaign or event you have that you create a way to capture and track every lead. You also need to develop a process of how leads will be handled and this should be done before you ever spend a dime. Develop a head of time an estimate of how many leads that you need to get to break even and ask yourself if that is even achievable before you begin. If it will take a 10% return for a direct mail in order to achieve your goal that is unrealistic.

Once you have a list of leads, they need to be categorized and entered into a spreadsheet, database, or CRM system. You have paid good money for those leads, you would be remiss in not capturing and tracking them. Typically you would categorize leads into A, B, or C leads based on the potential to close and time frame and develop a process for your sales force to follow for each lead type. For example, the A leads should be followed up on within 24 hours with a direct call from a sales rep. As the leads close, you are now able to attribute the sale to a particular marketing campaign or event and track your cost for lead acquisition and your actual return on your investment.

There are other marketing components such as your website that may have to be measured a little differently and over time. If you are not utilizing forms , ecommerce, or other methods of capturing leads, it may be more difficult to determine the number of leads that you received from your website. One way is to make it a policy for those that answer the phone to ask callers how they heard about your business and track the information. A good rule of thumb is that you will want to recoup your initial investment in a website in 3-6 months at the most. If a web developer has convinced you a website is going to cost you $10,000.00, then you need to ask yourself if that site is going to pay for itself in getting you enough leads in the next 6 months to cover that investment. If the answer is no, then you might need to rethink the functionality and amount you are spending.

In addition to the actual dollar return on investment, be sure to calculate other benefits achieved. I belong to a Board of Trade that costs me $200.00 a year plus around $20.00 an event so I spend around $400.00 annually. I have only gotten 1 direct client so far, but the contacts I have made through other members and partnerships that I have made are worth far more than a few direct clients. So be sure when you are calculating your return for each item at the end of the year, keep in mind the qualitative as well as quantitative return.

Can Networking Help Me Increase Sales In My Small Business?

Sat, 31 Mar 2012 21:12:28 +0100

If you are looking for a quick fix to increasing your sales funnel, then networking is not for you. When most people think of networking, they automatically think the focus is to go and “sell” themselves and their business. If this is you, then you need to rethink.

The goal of networking is to build trusting and long lasting relationships which over time will definitely will increase sales for your business, but probably not in the way you first thought. If you watch someone at their first networking event, they are usually the person who has a stack full of business cards, marketing materials, and maybe their product if they can carry it. They will also be the one up in your face telling you what they do and thinking if you need their product or service – surely you will call them because now they have given you all of their materials. Little do they know, those materials will find their way to the nearest trash can that is passed on the way out.

In many cases, the individuals that you meet at a networking event will not end up being your direct customer, but will end up adding more value than any acquisition of a single customer. The best people to meet at a networking event are those that will end up providing referrals to your business. They will do so because they have built a trusting relationship with you so they in turn trust that you will provide quality products and services to those they refer to your business. This type of sale is worth its weight in gold because it is qualified and comes with an instant stamp of approval from the referring party.

Another type of valuable networking relationship is a partnership that you forge with those that provide complimentary products and services. This type of relationship is a win/win for both companies because overtime business will go back and forth between the businesses.

This is not to say you will not obtain any direct customers from networking, but if this is the reason you joined and you are expecting a quick turnaround, then you should definitely look for another way to generate leads. If this was the primary goal, then it would most likely not be a cost effective one. Once you sell to someone, unless you have a product or service that has a recurring revenue model – this is a one-time sale most likely and then what? If you are spending a few hundred dollars a year to belong to a group, what you really want is to cast the widest net and this is through referral business, as it is repeat and ongoing business.

I have been networking steadily for the last year and I find now this is really starting to pay off. I belong to a Board of Trade and another Area Networking Group. I am joining a Local Networking Group in my community and try different types of networking events on a regular basis. You CAN increase your sales through networking – but is not something to try for the impatient.

If you are new to networking or are considering networking, here are some tips to keep in mind.

Attending one event at a networking group will not get you to your goal. You will need to continue attending over a period of time to really get to know the right people.
Research the networking group before you go to make sure that people that attend that group are those that include your target market or those that sell or come in contact with your target market. If you sell to businesses and the group is full of real estate agents and financial planners, this is probably not the right group for you.
Know how to define your target customer and do not say everyone because you know that just is not true. Imagine in your mind if you could define the best customer target for your product or service what would that perfect customer look like. Are they a certain type of company, size of company, a specific age group, or are they from a certain demographic region?
Before going to an event, be able to articulate what your business does, who is your ideal customer, and what makes you unique or stand out from others that are in a similar business. This could be as simple as providing superb customer service. You should be able to say this in 30 seconds.
Take business cards with you and make sure that your business card contains at minimum the following information:

Name

Company Name

Logo and Tagline (if exists)

Address (if a customer comes to your location)

Phone

Fax

Description / Bullet Points About Business – if not obvious by company name

Do not take and hand out marketing materials at a networking event unless there is a table set aside for this purpose. Remember, people are not there to buy. If someone wants to know more, then follow-up and email them additional information. This is a good way to stay connected.
Do not give your business card to anyone that has not asked for it, otherwise you will just go into their global spam email database. Collecting business cards which are not of use is not the purpose of networking.
When you ask for a card, be sure to write on the card why this contact is important.
If you receive a card, follow-up with an email to the person you met and if worthwhile, schedule a time to meet outside of the group.
Do not get discouraged. It will take sometimes up to a year to see the reward of networking, but is one of the best ways to get quality leads and build lasting relationships.
Get involved and participate in committees and smaller venues within a networking group, as this will help shorten the cycle. It is easier to get to know smaller groups of people that you work with and see on a more regular basis.
Provide discounts to those in your networking group, as this is a good way to help get you noticed.
If you provide services that can be utilized by others, donate time to speak at events put on by your networking group. This helps build awareness and credibility.
Make sure that you have a website and marketing materials so that your network can point or send them more information on your company and products and services.

When Is My Small Business Ready to Hire Sales Personnel?

Sun, 18 Mar 2012 15:43:20 +0100

15 Questions to Ask Yourself

This is a question that has come up quite a bit lately with several of my clients. The business has grown to a point where the business owners need to focus working on the business instead of in the business making sales. They now feel that they should grow their business and hiring feet on the street will get them there.

The real answer to the question of when are you ready to hire is that usually when you have to ask you are not ready. It is primarily because your current infrastructure does not support having a new sales person who is a new employee and even though they may come from your industry, they are not familiar with your particular business and it will take a few months for them to hit the ground running. It is a fallacy that hiring a sales rep will automatically free you up to do the things you want and need to do in the business, in fact for the first few months it will most likely increase your workload until the individual is comfortable with your products and services, business processes, and the culture of your business.

Before you consider hiring your first sales rep be able to have an answer to the questions posed below. There is more to it than just having the funding for a head count.

Have you defined the characteristics of your perfect target customer?
Have you decided what products and services that you will have the rep sell?
Does your current pricing model and margins support having a sales rep sell them?
Do you have a commission model that supports your margin structure, but is set based on gross sales not net so that a rep can calculate a targeted income based on the sales they make?
Have you determined a monthly and annual quota for the sales rep that is obtainable based on your sales cycle and history?
Have you documented your sales processes and do you have steps defined that make up your particular sales cycle along with being able to weight them against the likelihood of closing?
Have you determined what skills and qualifications that a sales rep for your business must have and developed a job description? Are you looking for a farmer or a hunter? Do you want an experienced sales rep with industry experience, or are you looking for someone to help groom for your business?
Have you determined what the key performance indicators are for the position in order to obtain the revenue goals that you expect both qualitative and quantitative?
Do you have a sales contract that outlines the expectations of the position and the key performance indicators to judge the position against?
Do you have a performance evaluation process in place for your sales personnel?
Do you have reporting in place that the rep will have to provide to you on a regular basis such as forecast, pipeline, activities, and contact reports?
Have you defined one person to manage the sales rep and do they have the time to meet weekly with the rep along with having the ability to provide guidance and feedback?
Do you have marketing materials in place to support the sales rep in their efforts such as a web site, communication pieces, and presentations?
Are you spending money on marketing to build awareness and bring in leads to the company versus thinking that a sales rep’s only function is to cold call and go out blindly and find new customers?
And once everything else is in place, do you have the money to pay a sales rep a base salary, commissions, and reimbursements like mileage and cell phone usage if you are not providing a car or a cell phone.

If you have answers to all of the questions above or have a plan of how you are going to address them, then you are ready to hire your first sales personnel for your business. Hopefully this provides you a list of things to think about which will help you determine if and when you are ready. As you work down the list, it is important to document your answers as this will help you not only for hiring the first sales rep, but for every sales rep you hire as you continue to grow your business.

Why Not Knowing Your Target Market Can Cost You

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 20:41:25 +0100

How many times have you been asked who your target market is and depending on whether you are business to consumer or business to business, you have answered – anyone or any business? The reality is that this is not true and is usually where a start-up or small business owner can get in the most trouble and end up spending time and money that does not provide you the return you want or need.

What is your target market? If you could select a business or consumer that was a perfect fit for your product or service - this is your target prospect. Once you understand their characteristics, you can then apply those broadly to come up with your target market. As you will find, this will narrow every consumer or business to the types of consumers or businesses that are best suited for your product or service.

Here are some questions that can help you in determining your target market. By not asking the right questions, you can be potentially be targeting the wrong audience.

Business

Consumer

What size of business would most benefit from the product or service? (number of employees, revenues)

What is the sex of the consumer that would benefit from your product or service?

What industries are the businesses that would most benefit from the product or service?

What is the age or age range of the consumer that would benefit from the product or service?

What geographies are the businesses that your product or service is going to be sold? (local, regional, national, international)

What socio economic bracket would benefit most from the product or service?

Is the product or service applicable to public as well as privately owned businesses?

What geographies can this product or service be sold?

Determining your target market will now help you determine how to market and sell. If your target market is manufacturing companies that are less than 100M in revenues that are owner operated in Ontario, do you not believe that how you would market and sell to them would be quite different than just any business worldwide? If your product was best sold to consumers between 18 and 35 from households in Ontario where the income was 50K and higher, do you not believe you would market and sell differently than you would to anyone of any age anywhere and any socio economic level? The answer to both is absolutely.

Target markets will help you determine what marketing mediums you will utilize and even what branding you will use. If your target market is manufacturing companies and you are spending much of your marketing spend on Facebook and Twitter, there is a very large chance your return on your investment is less than 1%. If your product is a retail product targeted at 18 to 35 and you are not utilizing social media, you are missing out on reaching a good percentage of your market that use social media to help them make buying decisions.

Target markets will also aid in determining how you sell the product. Does your target market expect to purchase products online? Does your target market usually buy the types of products you are selling directly or through distributors? Is your product one that would benefit from being in certain retail stores? If you are selling products in a manner that your target market is not use to buying an equivalent product or service, then this could be a very costly mistake, as you are spending money on the wrong channels.

Defining your target market can help in making you stand out from your competition. Your product or service may be able to provide value to other markets that your competition does not which can give you a competitive edge.

Once you know your target market it is very important to understand the size of that market and whether you have competition in that market. Understanding these two components will help you in determining your potential for revenue. If there are only 3000 companies that fit your target market and there are 3 competitors, this is quite different than there being 150,000 and you being the first to market.

Needless to say, focusing on the wrong target market or too broad of a target market can end up costing you in time and money. The more you understand who your real target market is and focus on how to market and sell to them, the more success you will see in your sales efforts.

12 SEO Basic Tips For Small Business Websites

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 13:22:13 +0100

Search Engine Optimization is written a lot about, but seems to be greatly misunderstood by most of how it works and what has to be done to make it work for your small business web site. Though I had search engine optimization in my website from the beginning, I couldn’t understand why my rankings were not improving. As a small business owner myself, I looked at the different tools and I couldn’t understand why they cost so much and why SEO professionals charged so much. It was not until I started using a tool and spending time on my website for a few hours each week making changes and seeing the results, did I truly understand. It can become a full time job keeping your ranking in search engines.

I have a friend and partner that I work with that owns a web development company that sends me articles on SEO regularly and am amazed that change occurs almost daily so there is a need to keep up with it and is so important that you have the basics down when you have a website developed. I have compiled a list of facts and tips about SEO that might help you when you are trying to decide how important this is for your small business website. I eventually would like to create a Tips and Technique Guide , but for now here are 12 Basic Tips to help you with your SEO.

Understand what keywords your prospects will search on to find your company, products, or services. If you do decide this without understanding their search strings, your website will most likely not be found by the prospects you want.
Do not just add 150 keywords and hope someone will find you as this will not happen. You need to have 10 or so keywords that you want to rank the highest on and work on those. There is no way to write/optimize text, titles, descriptions, or other SEO options for 150 words.
Create meaningful meta descriptions for your web pages, so that when they are found in the rankings, it will give people enough information to click on your link versus your competition.
Know what keywords your competition is using. This is as simple as going to their page and right clicking the mouse and view source. Look near the top of the page and you should see a list of keywords. This may not work for some sites that are using certain content management systems, but for the majority, this will be easy to see. If they are ranking higher than you, then they are utilizing good organic SEO or are paying for other advertising to rank higher.
Utilize backlinks on your site. A backlink is a URL from another website to yours. The best backlinks are from relevant sites such as partners, customers, or complimentary services, products, or information related to your site. You can get backlinks from adding your site to directories and social media sites as well. Make sure they are relevant.
Have relevant titles on your page that include keywords. You can use more than one keyword by separating with | marks. Is a good place to include geographic locations you want to target as well if you are focusing on local or regional areas.
Make sure you utilize headings and different heading levels in your pages and use keywords in them as well.
Keep your content fresh. Whether this is modifying a page, adding new pages, posting a new blog article, this will help. After a while the content gets old and your pages won’t get re-indexed by the search engines. Besides that, you want users to keep coming back to see new content.
Take advantage of other items that can help increase your traffic and rankings such as social media, video, and Google maps. Have like, share, and plus buttons on your pages from Twitter, Facebook and Google+. Have a video made and add it to your site or link to it from YouTube. On your Contact Us page include a Google Map from your Google Places.
Use bold and italic fonts in to highlight keywords or emphasize key points. This is looked at by search engines. A tip that has nothing to do with rankings but aesthetics and good web design is to make sure your fonts are large enough to be read and are a colour that is readable.
If you have pictures on your website, make sure you use alternate text. If the picture is relevant to a keyword, include the keyword in the text. The alternate text needs to reflect the picture.
Use Google Analytics and understand how to read it or have someone interpret the results for you. It tells you where your traffic is coming from, what pages prospects are visiting, what browsers and mobile devices they are using, and whether they were referred to your site from another or whether they searched using a keyword or keyword string. This information can help determine what changes you need to make to your site.

This by no means is not an inclusive list and will not make you an SEO expert, but if you make sure your website is submitted to the main search engines (Google, Yahoo, and Bing) and use the tips above this will put you ahead of the game. If you understand the basics, then you can utilize a tool out there on the market, most of which are offered now as Software as a Service to help you increase your rankings by following their recommendations. If this is Greek to you, then hire an SEO professional to help you. To know if paying $200-$500 a month is worth it – you need to ask yourself what a lead or sale is worth. If your traffic and your revenue increases from using a tool or a professional and covers the cost, then you have your answer.

Small Business Websites – How Not to Get Burned

Thu, 15 Dec 2011 12:25:47 +0100

You have decided that you need a website for your small business and now you have everyone who can spell web approaching you to develop your website. Some are graphic designers, others are IT developers, and are even others picked this up as a hobby and turned it into a business. As you weed through the fog, you find some that are truly full service web development houses. The problem is that the average small business owner will go for door number one or two because the price appears to be better. The truth is, that can truly be a mirage. With a website today, you truly get what you pay for, because there is much more to a website than a pretty graphic or well developed form with a backend database. So before you think about saving a buck and going with your friend that develops websites on the weekend, or the graphic design house around the corner that created a great brochure for you last year, think again.

If you were to select an accountant for your small business, you would research their specialities, look at their designation, find out about their background and if they have a proven track record with clients. All of this seems to fall by the way side when choosing a firm to develop a website that truly represents your business online. Think of it this way before you act. Since most customers research companies they buy from online before making a business decision, do you want the first impression of your company to be made from the website you got for less than a thousand dollars from your neighbor with the revolving picture that is irritating and keeps search engines from optimizing your site?

One of the most important things to keep in mind is to not focus on the price being quoted for the initial website, but how much is it going to cost you over time for every change that has to be made. Websites are not stagnate today and if you think you are going to have a website developed and then never touch it again, that is not the case. You may find out that you got the initial site for a great price, but over time as you want to change or add a page, after 6 months you have paid more than any of the more expensive quotes.

Before you approach anyone to develop a website, you need to have a web plan. The web plan is your business plan for your website and will end up saving you money in the end. The web plan should contain everything that is needed to develop a website for your business, which is much more than a pretty design and how many pages. It provides the requirements for a website for your particular business along with the skills that the web development group should possess for your specific website.

A web plan is your web insurance policy. The same plan should be provided to several web development groups. The quotation that you receive should be tied to the web plan and your requirements. As with other professions, you will find firms who will commit to having the skills and ability to develop the website and they do not. The web plan will cover you, because if they develop a website that does not meet the requirements of the plan, then you have a document to hold them accountable for the requirements at the price quoted.

What are the basics that your web plan should cover?

What are the goals of your website?

Who is your target market?

What are your corporate branding guidelines?

What is your corporate messaging?

What pages will be required?

Do you require a domain and hosting?

What functionality will be required in addition to content

Forms

Databases

Security

Ecommerce

Mobile Device Support

and much more

What keywords will prospects use to search for you?

What geographies do you want to market to?

Determine who will be maintaining content for your website long term?

Will this be yourself or someone else?

What methods of search engine optimization are required?

How will you handle the leads that you acquire through your online presence?

What skills should your web development group possess today?

If you do not have corporate branding yet, you will need to make sure that there are marketing professionals that can help you develop a corporate look, develop a logo, and help you with how to position your company on the web. They would work with a graphic designer who should be on staff as well.
You want to find a web developer that uses Content Management Systems (CMS) for developing the site. These systems allow for ease of maintenance and will keep you from being held hostage by a web developer every time you want a change down the road. Even if you do not want to maintain your website yourself, your costs will go down, as you do not need a web developer to add a page, or add text to a page.
You want to make sure that there are people who can write for the web and who understand search engine optimization. There is more to it today than just writing text on the page, you need to have the page written, so that search engines will find it along with the content providing value to the reader.
If you are a Canadian small business larger than 50 employees, there is a government requirement that you have a website that is considered accessible. What this means is that it is designed in such a way that those with disabilities can read your website. There are a set of requirements that have to be adhered to such as size of text, readability, navigation to name a few. You want to make sure that the web development group develop to these standards.
If you have an ecommerce site, does the web developer have expertise in integrating shopping cart solutions and payment services and can they help you set up your online store?
Do they have Search Engine Optimization (SEO) experience? Will your site be optimized for SEO when it is complete? Can they provide ongoing support, as SEO is something that has to continually be done in order to ensure you stay ranked on the search engines? You should be provided with reports from Google Analytics or another tool.
If you plan to utilize Social Media, whether that is Facebook, Twitter, or a Blog, you need to make sure that your social media is integrated into your website and that your pages are designed to work with your website along with your corporate branding applied.
Do they provide hosting with provide annual service plans to support your website? You are going to want a plan that you pay annually or monthly that provides so many hours of changes and possibly SEO, in addition to backups and other hosting services.
Does the web development group have experience in developing websites for your industry? A company that has a focus on B2C companies such as real estate is not the right company to develop a website for an industrial or technical company.

So before you decide to go with the lowest price for having your website developed, make sure you understand whether you are going to get what you require for your business. You also want to make sure the web development group has skills required on staff or partners with external resources in order to develop the website you require. It may seem to you that a website is easy to develop because there are 5 web development groups within a half a kilometer radius, but the fact is this is not the case. If a web development group will quote you a price on the phone based on a certain number of pages without understanding your business, then buyer beware.

How A Business Assessment Can Help Focus Your Direction

Sat, 03 Dec 2011 20:15:19 +0100

Many times within a life of a small business, the owner will wonder why they are not receiving the growth they expect or the business is just not running the way they expected. The owner may want to look for additional financing, but they know in order to secure the funding, they are going to need to improve the bottom line. It also could be that they know change needs to take place in the business to be more in line with the times, but are not sure where to start, or the owner could be looking to sell their business in the next few years and wants to make sure they receive a better return than if they sold today.

When you are running a business it is very hard to look inward to what are the exact causes that could be impeding your growth or are causing your business to be stagnate. For example, if you have different products and services within your business, it could be that one of the lines of business that you focused on in the past may have to take a back burner to one that will generate a better return and has a better chance of moving the business forward. If you are working the business every day, sometimes it might be hard to let go and actually see this and you continue to spend money on the wrong things and cannot understand why you are seeing the growth you

A business assessment will let you look at your business with a fresh set of eyes. It is an investigation tool to help you determine areas in your business that need improvement in order to help further growth. A business assessment provides an inside view of your entire business in each of your company business areas: Finance, Sales, Marketing, Operations, and Human Resources. There can be one or several reasons that growth is being hindered in your business. A business assessment will help pinpoint and determine the root causes that could exist in each area which is affecting the overall growth of your business.

If you are looking to invest /finance additional growth in your business, you want to make sure that you get the return on the investment and spend the funds in the appropriate areas. This is also true if you are looking to sell your business over the next several years. You want to make sure the focus on the right areas, so that your business is profitable and sustainable and you are able to sell the business and get receive not only the money but know you created a business that will provide the next buyer with a business that survives another generation.

For more information on business assessments, contact us atsales@rkfischer.com