In your lifetime, it is very likely that you have been exposed to giveaways advertising in some way. Specialty advertising products are free gifts that you, as a business owner, give away to your current or potential customers. This form of marketing is a very popular.

Everywhere you look, you can see advertising giveaways in some form or another. These items are literally everywhere. Using specialty advertising products is a very effective way to create brand awareness.

Products Used for Giveaways Advertising

Popular specialty products used for advertising include calendars, coffee mugs, calculators, key chains, bumper stickers, and the list goes on. There are literally thousands of items that can be used for this form of advertising.

But is this method of advertising effective? The answer is yes! Promotional items are relatively inexpensive and a great way to continuously remind your customer about you and your business. Using specialty advertising products to promote your business is definitely effective, especially if you select promotional items that are useful and directly relate to the service that you offer. Continue reading ...

Article by, Nicholas G. and courtesy of Associated Content, Inc.

Posted by Candice Arnold on November 30, 2009 at 11:02 AM | Leave a Comment (0)

I was doing some reading last week and came across a great piece by Zen Habits that gave 16 Ways To Get Motivated When You're In a Slump. The key point in staying motivated that the post makes is their first point which is to focus on one goal. There is a lot of power in being able to have that singular focus.

The reason that this post resonated with me right now is that I feel that I have personally been in violation of the one goal rule. I took a step back and looked at some of the different ventures that I am involved in and wondered to myself how I had gotten in the position that I currently stood. I realized that if you aren't careful, it's really easy to overload yourself with projects and ventures as an entrepreneur.

This brings me to the topic of one goal. Success stories begin with this concept. You hear of people and organizations who are successful because they have that laser focus on one goal that they want to achieve. You don't hear of people like Bill Gates or Lance Armstrong being successful at multiple things at the same time. They may have success in one arena and then once they have gotten as far as they can (or want to) with that arena, they move onto something else.

Entrepreneurs have a hard time with staying focused on one goal typically because of money. We figure sometimes that the more things that we are involved with, the more of a chance we will have at stumbling upon success. The problem with the many irons in the fire mentality is that it never works out to the kind of financial and business success that we are looking for in the first place. In the end we master nothing and then end up starting over.

There is a lot of power in one goal for the simple fact that it's simple. One goal allows us to avoid over-complicating our lives and gives us the space to focus on that one goal that we feel is most important. The power ultimately lies in our ability to master that goal that we have and when we master something, we are able to create the highest potential value in the marketplace for our clients.

What's your one goal?

Brandon Allen is a business and vision coach with The Business Blueprint. Brandon focuses on helping businesses get clear on their vision, mission, core values and leadership. Brandon is the author of the small business blog Build Your Soul Purpose ( www.buildyoursoulpurpose.com).

Posted by Candice Arnold on November 19, 2009 at 7:18 AM | Leave a Comment (0)

Internet Affiliate Marketing is a $60 billion industry offering people the opportunity to either earn an additional income, or replace their existing income. Does it work? Can you really make money doing it? Short answer, YES you can, but it is not as easy as promoters would have you believe.

A fair few promoters would have you believe that you could start earning money as soon as you bought their product, NOT TRUE.

Many of the products on the market today DO NOT work, not because they are flawed, but because they give false hope, by promising instant wealth, and the majority are far too complicated to set up unless you know what you are doing. If you are new to the concept, with little or no knowledge, of the affiliate business and you buy one of these products chances are you won't even impliment any of it, your are not alone, 98% of newbies fall at the first hurdle. Continue reading ...

Article by, Joe Anderson and courtesy of Associated Content, Inc.

Posted by Candice Arnold on November 18, 2009 at 6:40 AM | Leave a Comment (0)

I often receive special offers from AT&T via text message, naturally, but all other retailers send their coupons and sale announcements by email. I have often missed out on sales and coupons that I might have used because I didn't check my email soon enough. My phone, on the other hand, is usually somewhere close by, so any message sent to there is apt to be read right away. And how cool would it be to get a 15 percent off coupon from Macy's texted to you ... when you're already in the mall?

According to Helen Leggatt in her article, Consumers Unhappy With Lack of Mobile Marketing Messages, marketers are missing out on a great opportunity to promote their brands and increase revenue. And since consumers are saying they want to be marketed to in this manner, it seems like the obvious choice.

Leggatt cited statistics gathered from HipCricket's annual survey, which found that more than 80 percent of the 511 people who participated in the survey would welcome mobile marketing messages from their favorite brands. Many survey respondents said they visited retailers' mobile Web sites in search of information, coupons or promotions. And over 90 percent of the survey respondents who recalled mobile marketing offers they received also remembered the specific calls to action.

Although, according to HipCricket, mobile marketing has increased from 28 percent in 2008 to 34 percent in 2009, it still hasn't caught on as quickly as one might expect given consumers' demand for it. If brand recognition is important, then it appears that mobile marketing is definitely the way to go.

Posted by Candice Arnold on November 9, 2009 at 7:31 AM | Leave a Comment (0)

When you initially start a small business, you wear many different hats to keep things going. As your small business grows, you can't do all of the things inside of your small business as you used to be able to. This is a great thing. The next step is to start hiring/building a team to help you run your business. The challenge is that a lot of entrepreneurs aren't initially strong at the management aspect of their business. One condition that I see a lot of entrepreneurs suffer from is the curse of knowledge.

We have all worked for or with someone who suffered from the curse of knowledge. This is the boss/entrepreneur who assumes that everyone clearly understands their complete vision after talking with them for five minutes or assumes that you know what they are thinking just because you work there.

Even though I had experienced the curse of knowledge many times, it was articulated to me in a concrete manner by the book Made To Stick by Chip and Dan Heath. In the book they give an example of a test that was run where they had one person tap a song that he had in his head on a table. While this person was tapping out his tune, another person sits there and tries to guess the tune that is being tapped. Rarely did the listener guess the right tune much to the frustration of the tapper. The tapper couldn't understand why the listener didn't get it. It seemed so obvious to the person in charge of tapping the tune. This is the same plight of the leader/entrepreneur.

The vision in our mind is so clear that we think that everyone just gets it. In order to build high performing teams for your organization, it's important to get past the curse of knowledge so that you are able to get everyone associated with your business, whether it be internal or external team members, on the same page and driving towards a common goal. Business owners who are able to do this find that their business is able to get high results much faster and easier than business owners who ignore this.

What tips can you give for articulating the vision of your business? How has this worked for you in the past?

Brandon Allen is a business and vision coach with The Business Blueprint. Brandon focuses on helping businesses get clear on their vision, mission, core values and leadership. Brandon is the author of the small business blog Build Your Soul Purpose ( www.buildyoursoulpurpose.com).

Posted by Candice Arnold on November 5, 2009 at 8:26 AM | Leave a Comment (0)