Articles on: Marketing

How to NOT use a Sales Letter

photo by Drawings of Light – Paul As a business owner you get lots of sales letters.  I could probably wallpaper a large room with the number of Credit Card offers I’ve gotten in the past year.  Most of them go directly in the trash (often unread) but I will occasionally get something that catches […]

Testimonials – Good vs. Bad and how to get them.

Not all testimonials are created equal.  Done well and used the right way, a strong testimonial can be an absolute gold mine and drive tremendous sales to your business.  Poor testimonials can be ineffective – or even turn people away. “If they’re offering a bottle for free, it must be good!”  – Jean from Springfield […]

Are you building a better mousetrap?

Photo by pasotraspaso Ralph Waldo Emerson is credited with the oft-quoted remark in favor of innovation: “Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door.”  100 years ago, before the inundation of the information age, this was probably a pretty good recipe for success. An innovative solution or product that […]

How big is your pipeline? Breakeven Analysis 101 part 2!

A few months ago I did an entry on using a simplified financial break-even calculation that a business owner could use for high level strategic planning based on what they’d like to make.  You can see the details here. As a quick summary, the revenue you need to reach a financial break-even point is your […]

Is the Price Right?

We had a great discussion this morning at a BANG! meeting about the need and the fear of raising prices.  The general consensus was that everyone had entertained fears that a price hike on their services would drive away clients. We also generally agreed that the reality, assuming you had quality service that wasn’t a commodity, […]

Stupid Questions and Existing Customer Marketing

Although it’s a short post, they make some great points about the criticality of Customer Service: