Small Business Advice Daily: How to Become a Facebook Marketing Star

Small Business Advice Daily: How to Become a Facebook Marketing Star

Marketing Flyer for Small Business

This marketing flyer / letter is from a real person providing personal and concierge services.  If you live in the Chicago area - Jody's contact information is at the bottom.  It is also a classic example of marketing ones product and/or services.

   Your Left Hand

There are times in everyone’s life when it is just impossible to get everything completed on your or your family members ‘ 

“To-Do List”.  Let me help make your day more enjoyable and manageable by offering my Personal Assistant/Concierge Services providing the following services:

Grocery shopping, personal shopper and gift shopping

Organize your household, office, closets, personal needs, or just help  dispose of unnecessary items in your home

Run errands, banking deposits, pharmacy, library, video store, dry cleaners, or  

Post Office to name a few

          Make doctors’ appointments

                Pay bills and file and track insurance claim forms

Personal and Business correspondence including tracking special occasions and sending cards out

          Locate qualified repairmen and services

 Wait for installers and deliveries

          Make travel arrangements, assist with parties and help plan events

         Holiday planning, gift wrapping and delivery

Any other services that may be desired

        

I am committed to assisting you in an efficient manner so you can focus on the more important things in life.

Jody Nesva,

847-208-1227

Extra Money from Stock Dividends

The last year has been personally the most difficult financially we've ever had.  Between laid off from my job last January (and only a few contract jobs since), a fire in a rental property, a new furnace, and higher than usual medical costs, we are rapidly burning through our savings.  Unfortunately, despite post-graduate education and many years of work experience, I've been unable to land a position.  I'm overqualified for the basic ones - employers know I'll cut and run if something better comes along - and I'm not specialized enough for what the market demands right now.

What to do?  My wife doesn't make much, I just lost my health insurance, my unemployment will run out shortly, and we've cut all fat from our budget.  We basically live on macaroni and cheese with tuna.  We are considering selling one of the two rental units - that would at least give us a little breathing room - but dislocate one of our daughters and cause family friction.

I've got some small investments outside of IRAs (don't want to touch those) and have decided they can provide some income by either selling for cash or by reallocating from growth to income.  As a quasi-knowledgeable investor, I feel comfortable in researching and doing this.  One of my better sources for information is The Motley Fool's web site.  Do a little poking around there and you'll find a list of the S&P 500 highest 50 dividend stocks.  Many are common recognizable names that pay regular dividends to their shareholders.  Open up an account at a low-cost broker such as Sharebuilder, buy some stock, and have some extra income, via dividends, flowing in.

A word of caution to all: DO YOUR HOMEWORK FIRST BEFORE INVESTING.  I am NOT a registered financial planner, broker or claim to be so.  Investing involves a certain level of risk, as 2008 clearly demonstrated.  But these are difficult times and investing and dividends can be a viable option.  Also, dividend income typically means taxes too, so consulting your accountant is encouraged.


Luck to all in 2010, may all our ships come in to port!


- AJ 

Free Office Software

WARNING: Read this article only if you want to save money on basic software for your business.

For those of us involved in small business ventures, expenses are an ongoing concern. One easy way to save hundreds to thousands of dollars in software expenses is to take advantage of the increasingly common and available Open Source software.

You may have heard of Linux or Gimp (a PhotoShop-like program) or MySQL (database) – each of these is an General Purpose License (FREE) product that rivals its paid counterparts. While some of these products are preferred by more advanced users, the most common programs used are discussed below.

We've mentioned in previous postings the value of OpenOffice software vs. shrink-wrapped, over the counter products such as Microsoft Office. I realize that almost everyone is familiar with Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and the common user interface.

Does Word's interface resemble the above? What you see is OpenOffice's Writer product. All common features and interfaces are much like their counterparts in the MS Office suite.

“The most widely used alternative to Microsoft Office is an open-source program called OpenOffice, which is sponsored by Sun Microsystems. OpenOffice is an entire office collection that consists of a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing, database, and some other applications. It also features Base as an alternative to Access, along with two additional applications - Draw and Math.

OpenOffice tries to match all the major features of Microsoft's program. OpenOffice can read files created in Microsoft Office, and it can create new files that can also be opened by Microsoft Office or specific files that can only be open in OpenOfficeOrg. Therefore, you could take home spreadsheets created at work using Excel, and edit them on your home computer without having to buy Office, or you can create Microsoft Office files at home and take them to work.” ¹

The cost for this? FREE. Read that line again: the charge for these necessary programs is NOTHING, NADA, ZILCH, ZIP. FREE.

The latest versions of the product include compatibility with Office 2007 suite and XML support. Multiple languages are also a feature available in all versions of OpenOffice.

One drawback of OpenOffice is lack of an email client and organizer similar to Outlook. Other free programs are available for email and will be discussed in a future post.

Convinced yet? For more information and to download the products, go here:

http://www.soft32.com/Download/Free/OpenOffice_for_Windows/4-125111-1.html

http://www.openoffice.org/

By the way, this entire article was written using Open Office Writer.


- AJ

Disclaimer

This article is the opinion of the author and Thesmallbizpro. Neither the author nor Thesmallbizpro is affiliated with Sun Microsystems or any other open source developer or distributor, and receives no pay or  compensation in any way, shape or form for this article.

Reference

1http://www.soft32.com/download_125111.html

Nofollow Questions?

Nofollow, an HTML attribute, was designed by in early 2005 Google’s Matt Cutts and Blogger’s Jason Shellen and originally intended to stop comment spam on blogs.*  Nofollow was NOT meant to block access to content or block search engines spiders from indexing sites and content. 

Search engine optimization professionals started using the NoFollow attribute to control the flow of PageRank within a website, but google since corrected this error, and any link with NoFollow attribute decreases the PR that the page can pass on. This practice is known as PageRank sculpting. This is an entirely different use than it was intended originally. NoFollow was designed to control the flow of PageRank from one website to another.*

However, while search engines supporting the attribute exclude links that use the attribute from their ranking calculation, search engines treat the NoFollow attribute a little differently.

• Google states that their engine takes "nofollow" literally and does not "follow" the link at all. However, experiments conducted by SEOs show conflicting results. These studies reveal that Google does follow the link, but does not index the linked-to page, unless it was in Google's index already for other reasons (such as other, non-nofollow links that point to the page).
  
• Yahoo! "follows it", but excludes it from their ranking calculation.
• Bing respects "nofollow" as regards not counting the link in their ranking, but it is not proven whether or not Bing follows the link.
• Ask.com ignores the attribute altogether.*

While NoFollow has supporters and detractors, no solid evidence exists on its potential harm or usefulness.  In general, the consensus tends to favor the use of NoFollow on internal links pointing to user-controlled pages.  Our opinion is to implement NoFollow; if negative results ensue, the process can easily be reversed.

A simple tutorial we found for implementing NoFollow is found here: http://webstractions.blogspot.com/2007/05/removing-nofollow-from-blogger-styled.html.

* (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nofollow)

- AJ

How do I start this business thing?

You've been laid off. Downsized. Replaced. Terminated. Your job moved to Pago Pago.

Or you're just sick and tired of the rat race and for your health and sanity, need to do something different.

Now.

Here are some simple steps to get started on the path.

- Start a personal budget immediately
- Eliminate those extras - the daily $5 lattes, the newspaper, weekly mani's and pedi's, eating out
- Defer payments on what you can - student loans, some insurance policies
- Determine your minimal living expenses and build in a 10% cushion
- Live within the budget you created

Now that you have an idea of what is needed to survive, start the process.

- Take a mental inventory of your skills and experience
- Connect with your network of friends, family, acquaintances, and industry contacts
- Ask yourself: What gets me up in the morning? What drives me?
- Do some research on your passion on the Internet, at the library or local community colleges
- Find your market niche

Ask if a market exists for your skills and passion. Do they fit together? If not, determine where the gaps are. Lack of skills? Take a class at a community college. Too few contacts? These are easily made through networking groups, churches, and social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook.

Start to write a simple business plan - nothing complicated - just enough to maintain focus. Business plans are living, breathing documents and will change as conditions do.

Obtain a taxpayer ID number from the IRS web site, if required. Sometimes a social security number is adequate.  For more information, here is the direct link to the IRS site: http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/international/article/0,,id=96696,00.html.

Begin your marketing campaign by determining an apt name for the business, a logo, and a catchy and relevant tag line. Nothing more is needed initially.

Register an Internet domain name using the business name if possible. If not, variations such as .net or .biz instead of .com or using '-' in the name are good substitutes. You may not need a web site immediately, but plan for the future and secure the name. Domain names can be purchased at a number of web sites including GoDaddy.com, netsol.com or register.com. At the same time, create a Twitter and Facebook account too. LinkedIn is another popular consideration. Be consistent using the same name on all accounts.  Email accounts are a must as well.  Google, Yahoo, and Hotmail all provide free email accounts.

Register your business - http://www.bizfilings.com/ is a good place to start - set up the accounting system - Intuit.com has a free basic package - and get whatever (if any) business insurance is needed.  We addressed insurance coverage in an earlier article.  If the business needs registration, bonding or licensing, ensure that is completed prior to launch.

Get business cards with your name, company name, tag line, logo, etc. Cards can be customized at Staples, OfficeMax or any office supply store.  A good source for free office products including pens, business cards, checks and more is VistaPrint. Always have cards on hand to pass out. Always! Remember, you are marketing a product or service and need to take advantage of every networking opportunity.

Determine your pricing structure, the cost of your product or service, and how the idea can turn a reasonable profit.  Test market the idea.  Use your friends and family as guinea pigs.  Take this time to work out kinks in the process and make perfect your vision.  When gaining feedback, use a written form for each tester and compare results to discover what may be a common (and major) issue or concern.  Make the needed corrections and prepare for launch.

Write and distribute a press release.  Depending on the nature of the market and product, this may involve signage, postings, adds or press in the local paper or an Internet release.  Prweb is a well-known and respected Internet press agency.  Ensure that your phone, fax, and email are working and the response process is timely and consistent.  Customer service really counts here, especially so in the early stages.

The business is now off and running.  Prepare for the unexpected, good or bad.  If the research and preparatory work was done correctly, you will be pleasantly surprised by the results.  You may even need to hire additional help to keep up with the overflow.  We provide some ideas for inexpensive labor in an earlier article posted on this blog.

And finally, check back at thesmallbizpro blog for updates, tips, money saving ideas, and general information.  Feel free to leave a comment or ask a question.  We'll do our best to provide answers.

May your future be bright and successful!


- AJ

Twitter Stats

Shame on me for this - I inadvertently left out our Twitter statistics in the web site update post.

We can also report a fairly successful foray into Twitterdom.  Considering none of the group's four partners had any experience with Twitter prior to its launch in late October or early November, we are very pleased that we've gained 850 followers or so as of November 30.  Talk about the blind leading the deaf and mute, that's us for sure.  Much time has been spent learning the ins and outs of Twit-speak and forming relationships.  For those of you that spent time on our site, we thank you and look forward to a strong future together.  And for the newbies, we welcome you with open arms and ears.  We want to provide what information and services we can to make your lives easier.  Just ask and we'll do the homework for you.

Thanks again and warmest wishes for this Holiday season!!!


- AJ