Get this before it is gone….
http://quarkpromote.quark.com/products/Business_Cards.aspx
QuarkPromote has some really nice business cards.
They are running a special $20 off deal + free shipping.
You can also one of their designs printed at a local print shop for the same low price.
Most cards are priced at $55 and hence, after $20 off and with tax you might end up paying $47ish.
There are some cards that are $44 and hence with the offer, you can get it for $24ish including shipping!
Most of us take business cards for granted. They are there to provide basic information about us. If you have a non-native name, business card helps to get it across (wonder if I should add ‘pronounced as’ to my business card!). Basic contact information – telephone, email etc.
There are many companies that are trying hard to help move to electronic contact cards, with the first step of scanning 100s (sometimes 1000s) of business cards people have collected. Evernote is one that I have tried to organize my contacts, but was not worth the trouble. Nothing to do with the program itself, just that, luckily, my life is not that complicated to learn yet another new tool to organize it (yet!).
And then, here comes a guy who can really get a crowd!
More than saying that you need to spend $4 for a good card, he is saying – why is a Business card just a contact info! Shouldn’t it be your personal marketing material!
I am not sure about foiling, embossing, die-cutting, pop-ups, 6 color printing – but I do like the idea that the card should attempt to leave a positive impression about you – even if it is only for a day or a week.
Next time, you order your business card from VistaPrint or Kinkos– just pause a bit and see if you want an extra line in it that could turn it into a marketing material!
Extract from : http://www.email-marketing-options.com/
Great site for comparing the growing number of email marketing providers.
The ratings for the 5 main comparison categories are each based on several factors. Each individual factor was assessed and given a quantitative score. Individual scores were weighted and averaged to obtain a final main category rating. The factors used to rate each category are as follows:
Creating an Email:
Great blog from "Paul, your uber geek"
http://blog.webdistortion.com/2009/02/16/10-stonking-email-marketing-systems-reviewed/
He has done a good review of some of the common email marketing solutions for SMB market and published a nice summary.
Here is my take on the companies Paul has covered in his list.
| Campaign Monitor | Never heard of them before. In my brief review, found it more appealing for developers who can create their own HTML email outside and use this for sending and analyzing reporting (something that new SMBs getting into email take a long time to appreciate) Here is what the 'easiest email builder' from them looks like :-)  |
| Signup.to | Like the way they split and guide users right from their home page - new to email or upgrading from other simple solutions. Claim to have simple email editor.  |
| iContact | I have blogged about these folks in the past. I like their simple interface and nice enhancements to RSS feeds etc.  |
| DotMailer | When I see SalesFore integration or any other CRM integration other than ACT or Outlook, I can tell that they are up market for the SOHO SBO market I typically cover in my blog. They do have a 'Lite' version (all the way to 'enterprise' version). " dotMailer Lite is for those with less than 500 contacts in their database, who want a very easy-to-use platform, and access to advanced ROI-boosting features as their business and their needs grow." |
| Pure360 | Never heard of these folks either. Though the home page is very welcoming for SBO/SOHO who are new to email marketing, couldn't find much details about their offerings. Looks like a email delivery system that youy install in your corporate office or add-on to existing system - beyond what I am interested.  |
| MailChimp | My favorite, primarily because this blog you are reading is automatically mailed as email through MailChimps blog-to-email integration. If interested, read my earlier bog about using MailChimp to manage blog+email+facebook+twitter. One Click Blog+Email Marketing+Twitter+Facebook  |
| ConstantContact | Most widely known email marketing system in US (probably because of the insane broadcast marketing they do). Have designer friends who help their SMB customers use ConstantContact to email. A bit difficult to customize templates, but they do come with many templates to get started. Still a bit advanced for SBOs starting with email marketing. Since the pricing is not that bad to start, one could start and over time learn and improve the art of effective emailing.  |
| VerticalResponse | Have blogged about them earlier as well. Email & DirectMail together Main attraction is the combination of email and direct mail service. |
| MadMimi | Never heard of them before. Looks like a fat application and is not web based. Looks simple even though. Check if out if you are interested in standalone apps. |
If you still not into email marketing.. please read my earlier blog "R U into Email Marketing - why not?"
A couple months back I wrote about letting Google know about your business. As part of the Google local service I covered in that blog, Google has expanded some neat reporting capabilities.
One of the interesting report is to know where people are trying to drive from to your business. Especially great for SMBs with retail front-end.
Of course, if would be nice to get this report for your competitors as well so that you can see if that extra dollar on rent on a prime location really matters :-)
If you haven't already added your business in Google local, pleaseeee, do yourself a favor and get that going - or email me and may be I can add your business for free if I have time :-)
PhotoXpress is claiming to be world's largest free stock photo site for commercials / professional use.
There is a reasonable selection of images for some of the SMB business I searched for - health and wellness, restaurant, cafe, bakery...
Images are print quality (300dpi at ~10" x 12") and are useful as long as you don't crop / scale as a large background image.
Defn worth checking it out for your next in-house project. Keep this in mind when you work with external designers as well and let them try to pick from these before going through expensive stock photo sites.
There are many online print providers today. Most, if not all of them seem to be an extension of their core print business (like VistaPrint). Exceptions include HP's Marketing Splash, who seem to have a print relationship with Staples.
While most of these sites focus on providing us a good enough design to start with, customize and print, a few web sites are still catching up to that. These site, rather focus on attracting customers who already have a design handy in a PDF format - probably from a friendly designer or from a previous job through an agency.
It is scary to upload a PDF, designed for a different printer, and expect to meet same color and other quality standards. So, please use caution or speak with them before placing final order.
Ask for press-proofs and negotiate cost to zero or use it towards final print cost.
Ask for reject/return policy and make sure you have a say in rejecting prints if you are not satisfied.
If you are in the mood to add up some good Karma, you may want to send few copied of your previous print work to them and ask them to match it or at least let you know if they can't before they start the full production run.
Thankfully they hid this link below the fold line of their web page. This is pretty lame. You may be better of using PowerPoint to create your design and uplod to them. They do provide some stock photo options which I usually find as an easy way to make a pretty design. I can only assume that their editor might help you avoid typically RGB/CMYK problem that non-designers are not familiar with and end up using colors in PowerPoint or Publisher that won't print properly.
Finally, one vendor offering all the three major marketing channels for SMb market.
Almost every SBO starts with a business card, then look for a friend (or dare to use GoDaddy on their own) to get a simple web site running. Then, once the business essentially start taking less of their 48hr per day routine, their ears open up to their friends and family members who had been tell them about using email to get to grow their business through their loyal customers.
Typically, three different vendors offered these three different channels. However, there is agrowing trend for a single vendor offering direct mail, email with landing pages.
VistaPrint is the latest big consumer vendor who jumped into this bandwagon by offering very limited, but essential email solution for SBOs wanting to try their hands at email.
http://www.vistaprint.com/emailmarketing
Their email solution seems to be primarily targeting eBlasts and not eNewsletter. In my opinio0n, eBlasts are easy to get going on a weekly basis. Their templates are also pretty good looking, unlike the standard email look and feel. Ulike ConstantContact whose HTMl template editor will require you to look for the geeky friend, VistaPrint, while very limited in feature, is way easier to get going.
Last month it was FedEx - with just one day free service. Now, it is Office Depot - extending the offer for a while month and more.
I am assuming that these companies can absorb this cost as part of their marketing budget aimed at getting customers to walk into their store, often upgrade to a better quality resume paper, pay more for double sided prints etc. Office Depot has thought this a bit more than FedEx did. Office Depot also offer free fax (up to 5).
25 single sided Black & White prints and 5 domestic faxes doesn't add up to a huge amount - and probably the least anyone hunting for a job in this market is willing to pay for.
In any case, it is a good gesture that also reminds folks to think about sharpening the resume and get some of the paper work for job hunt taken care of. While at the store, it might help to keep the eyes and ears open for other folks walking in for free resume printing and establish some network. You might find some one who turned down a job you might take!
The popular four email vendors (ConstantContact, iContact, VerticalResponse, MailChimp) addressing SMB market together claim some where around 2million customers. Even if we consider all of theses to be SMBs (and not consumers or large companies), this is a still a small percentage out of the registered 25million SMBs in US.
When talking with SOHO (Small Office, Home Office) and SBO (Small Business Owners), most of them seem to have heard of ConstantContact and are aware that a Google search on 'email marketing' might list the new players in this space. Some have tried these services and some plan to.
However, very few of them seem to know that there are four distinct ways to use emails to promote your business.
eNewsletter
This is by far the most common form of email marketing. Unfortunately this is also the one that requires more marketing / writing skills. It is true that writing a short promotional statement is harder than writing a long story of why you are great! However, many newsletters tend to go off talking about the business and miss the point of talking about customers's specific interest in your business.
If you do want to use the traditional eNewsletter, keep it short, know what the customers is seeing in your business compared to your competition and make them feel good about of their choice of coming to you for their service. Use relevant, business centric, photos to keep the reading interesting.
eBlast
This is probably the easiest to do. Almost all SBOs think about promotions, think about letting customers know about their recent product/service addition and think about letting people know about recent price reduction.
A short email that is designed to catch attention (20% off on...), even when not well written or designed is sure to catch attention of your email readers. Such emails are also target for SPAM filters. However, if you have done your work to opt-in your customers and use some SPAM check (check our www.spamassasin.org), then eBlasts are very effective.
Some of the vendors provide integration of PayPal or other online purchase. If you have an eCommerce site, you can capitalize on impulse purchase and get people to click and buy right from the email.
eCard with coupon
Oh my! By far the most effective email you can craft. When getting your customer emails, at least for your most loyal ones, start getting their birthdays. If not, at least find out about their special holidays (their original nationality or religious holidays). Without being direct or specific, send an email to them - 'On your special day, we wish you... and here is a coupon to make it more enjoyable'. Send it a couple of days before. This is a personal card with a gift personalized for them.
What it takes is a keen eye on each of your top customers, their buying habits, their personal likes and dates. Such personalized eCards can turn them into your best marketers.
Some email vendors provide easy way to add a coupon to the email. Look for a vendor with such features. Even if you don't use it right away, don't lock your templates and email addresses with a vendor who is not forward looking.
Survey
This is the one you should avoid unless you have mastered the art of asking for people's opinion by genuinely making them feel to be part of the final out come of the survey. For SBOs, with real fronts, I would strongly recommend talking to the customers directly instead of diluting relevance of your email by sending surveys.
Hope you are geared up to move away from eNewsletters to eBlasts and eCards :-)
MarketSplash.com, looks like a HP venture, is offering 100% free business card - including Shipping!
https://www.marketsplash.com/freecards
Yes, not VistaPrint Free, but really Free :-)
Could see 74 or so business card designs. Some of reasonably good designs.
Have a interesting choice for Logos. You can obviously upload your own logo, but also use their service to pick one from a huge collection or design a new logo - super for people who are starting new business or tired of their lame logo and want a real identity logo. Could be an integration with HP's Logo Works
The design choices are quite limited - even more so than VistaPrint. But for most users, this is already plenty. If people want more design, they could use million other software solution, including Word and upload their own design for printing.
The print cost seems quite competitive compared to VistaPrint and the shipping cost are real world - unlike VistaPrint who must be make all their money just on their shipping margin!
Looks like the online print market is getting more crowded. Many big players are joining the party. when people are thinking 'Print is Dead' it is amazing to see all these new services. May be it is because of the threat to their print industry, companies are venturing to new ways to attract customers to print.
In any case, check this out and hopefully you get to design a new business card - new logo - all totally free!
These 2 were good enough for me to dig further into their offering.
As small business owner (SBO) with retail front, yellow pages and signage are the immediate marketing expense. Beyond that, the work takes over us and we never have time to reflect on further promotions.
Once in a while, the franchisee guy knocks on the door, possibly from ValPak or local newspaper and convinces us that $100 or so can gives us a lot more weight to get more customers and win over the new competitor next street.
Local.com seems to be offering more than just web listing and banner ad. They appear to me like an affordable ad agency who could refresh the store brand and put us on the Google and other Internet world.
Worth checking it out!
http://www.verticalresponse.com
For many SMBs, after Yellow Pages (and an attempt at ValPak), direct mail and email marketing takes the next chunk of our (so called) marketing expense (or as my friends call it - the risk money!).
Often, different vendors and services have to be used for print and email marketing. In most cases, the contacts we mail email/postcrd are indeed different. People often buy zone addresses for mailing postcards, while emails are the next step n the customer relationship - it goes to those we already know and trying to get them to come to our shop instead of the Other store!
In some case, a combined offering from a single vendor makes sense. Firstly, I hope to pay a bit less if both service are from single vendor. Next, the hassle of talking to two of these guys about something I am no expert takes the pride away from me - twice :-)
So, when I saw VerticalResponse.com offering Direct Mails in addition to email, I started checking them out.
The overall design is pretty lame.... having said that, it is still probably worth checking it out.
Their general approach to designing a postcard is that -'a picture is worth a thousand words' & 'you know your marketing catch phrase'
If indeed, you could select an appropriate photo (they claim to have 75,000 free stock photos). The images seems to be a subset from JupiterImages.com, whose yearly subscription starts at $1200. So, there is some value for these nice free stock photos. However, 75000 seems to be a small subset of the millions of photos at JupiterImages. So, if you are lucky to find a useful photo for your marketing promotion, you are good to go - mostly.
The next challenge is to make your text that you can type over the selected photo. It is easy enough to 'click anywhere on the photo' and enter your text. They have 75000 fonts - NOT! They provide a very limited set of 8 fonts. Making your text pretty to grab the attention between mail-box and trash-can - good luck with that!
Yeah! - screen shot from their tutorial, seem to be taken from a Apple computer - this is one luxury SMB owner!
They do support standard and extra large (6x9) postcards.
I don't see any obvious place to buy a list. They expect us to upload contacts - "contacts of who" I ask!
My favorite is the clever option to switch to black & white. Will be nice if the price difference and the effectiveness of using a B&W are made obvious up front.
Good Luck if you want to give this a try!
WebVisible, Inc is integrating (teaser) service within Microsoft Office Live. Specifically targeted at SMB customers using Office Live services.
http://www.webvisible.com/smbprods.asp#search
Marketing for any type of business is a very creative process. I have seen some local business really take of when one of the owner (or typically their wife or aspiring son) steps in with some creative email, flyer or promotion.
Even getting word out in local magazine (Top 10 best Indian Restaurant in Denver) requires some creative thinking before trying to execute on it.
Internet and Social Media has opened up a HUGE marketing opportunity.
If people thought email and other direct marketing is way better (and trackable) than broadcast marketing - 'Crowd marketing' (a fancy advanced version of viral marketing) is the next wave to take it even further.
With all these new effective tools, marketing is becoming even more complex to execute wisely. It is heartening, when after spending $180 with a walk-in franchisee guy from ValPak or DenverPost, only to hear from a friend that they got more traffic from Facebook over a sustainable long period of time.
So, I try (with great difficulty) to keep in touch with what my friends in business do and also what some of the prominent vendors offer. If it is free, I usually give it a try.
Here is one you may want to check it out on Saturday night...
http://www.webvisible.com/smbprods.asp#search
Like these designs for your business!
Check out Inkd.com folks. They have some nice collection of high-end designs (original print designs!). Brochure designs at about $100 - not bad for some good design.
These designs are in original Adobe file formats, like Illustrator!
So, not for the aware SMB owner or marketer. It will be hard to customize the designs without owning the high-end design applications like Quark,Illustrator or Photoshop. Even then, as I have experienced many times, you can easily destroy the intend of the design by attempting to add more text and images than the design has.
They do have the name of the designer who created a particular design and you can contact them to get something in a format you can use to make minor changes - like a Word document???
As a small business owner, I hope everyone is experimenting with email marketing. Even before Google Ads, I would recommend SMBs to start testing some email campaigns.
Opportunity to reflect back on what and why of your business
Just spending couple of hours on creating and distributing emails, makes you really thing the value you are offering, the customers you are targeting and the competing voice you have over the crowded market offering.
If any, trying email marketing makes you step back from yuor grinding work as a SMB owner and reflect on what you are really into.
Do you know your customers
The initial hurdles are not the technology, not the time, not even the ideas - but 1) getting email contacts and 2) worrying if your email will be non-professional and may not make it to their inbox or worst they might have a poor marketing impact.
Start with the known, you know more than you think
Start by collecting email IDs from your most favorable customers - customers to whom you have something to say every week that they are really interested in knowing. Usually, these will be your repeat customers. Most often the real opportunity is in customers who came looking for something (a product, a price deal etc) and end up asking you or the store manager for it - perfect place to ask for the email telling them that you will contact them when you have it in your shop (of course you will tell them that you will specially procure it just because they asked for it - right!)
Some simple email marketing ideas:
Start by sending emails to them through your normal email account with your ISP. Nothing fancy, remember, for known customers, the content matters not the presentation (in theory, true for all your future email as well.
Ask loyal customers what they want in the email
The important fact here is to ensure that majority of your emails, if not all, are being opened. If you are using your ISP email account, you probably won't know if the receiver opened the email. But, keep an eye on repeat business from the customer. Ask them if they received your email offer. Openly ask if they like to receive some other information in the email.
Test your skills
Now, expand your email reach.
Getting hooked on this...
Most business owners, after the above simple start, really get excited about the change in their customer loyalty.
Next step, will be to learn some professional ideas and start using email service.
WARNING! - You don't want to be a marketer at the cost of loosing focus on being the owner of the business. There are many other parts of your business worth spending time on. So, automate this process with tools and tricks, and go back to what you do best (and why you are an SMB) putting a SMILING face to your customers and PITTY face to your vendors :-)
http://constantcontact.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/constantcontact.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=1966
Are you bored with the limited choice of color scheme provided by MS Publisher or other layout tool you use for your marketing materials?
MS Publisher 2007
Check out ColorLovers.com
You can type in 'cat' and get the community contributed choices of color sets and brighten up your pet shop or Day Spa marketing material.
Like this design! This tri-fold brochure design could even be used for other business types.
I would customize the template by changing the photo to say a Massage or Facial, change the color of the swish at the bottom to some earthy color or bamboo color and off I go with a Day Spa menu listing the products and pricing.
The bets part is, this beautiful design is available as MS Word file in addition to the professional Quark file type. So, even if you are familiar with any professional tools or don't own one, just take the MS Word format and get it printed at Kinko's.
Some of the matching design sets from their web site looks really cool as well.
Overnight Prints (a competing service to VistaPrint) is offering a drastic promotional discount for full color postcards for quantities more than 1000.
I have played with their service before, not ordered any.
The designs a little lame compared to what I see in VistaPrint, especially compared to VistaPrint express designs.
However, if you are thinking about postcards to get attention to your Sprint specials, give this a try.
I can see some good looking postcard designs in their Free Sample section.
However, when I try to customize the design, I get very lame selection of background images which looks nothing like the samples they are showing.
Any how.. not one of my best recommendation, but at half the price, you may find some suitable background design for your Sprint Lawn Service promotion!!
http://news.van.fedex.com/freeresumeprinting
May not be much in savings here, and the fact that you have to do it at their store location and NOT through online order says a lot about their marketing vehicle at work rather than really reaching out.
In any case, I appreciate Kinko's for the awareness and being a part of the community.
This is a good opportunity to ensure that one more Todo in the checklist for job search is taken care by Tuesday.
And Yes... I still like to call them Kinko's instead of FedEx Office Print Service :-)
Spotrunner.com
http://www.spotrunner.com/Ads/Ads.aspx?keywords=spa
I had checked them out 3 years back and found their business model really intriguing. They seem to be still in business and doing reasonable good - especially in this economy!
TV ads are often considered expensive and also not as effective as direct marketing, especially for small business.
Against a million dollars ad from other big companies, how could our 8 seconds ad stand up. What is point of showing my ad at 2am in the night against other no-so-appropriate ads.
But, Spotrunner might make this a slightly better option to consider.
If we could make our business look professional, credible, established - all for $500, why not give it a try!
Spotrunner's approach
They have pre-created TV ads (ad spots). You can personalize the following:
Clipping of a Spa TV ad I searched for:
You should give this a spin. Who knows what $500 can do for your business!
SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
http://bx.businessweek.com/small-business-administration/
I know, one more web site to read in the morning!
Here is their introduction text and the type of topics covered. I am sure you will keep this in the top 10 web site you visit every day.
Introduction Text:
The Small Business Administration is the largest financial backer of small businesses in the country. Its mission is to maintain and strengthen the U.S. economy by helping small businesses. Except for disaster relief loans, the SBA does not grant loans--it guarantees them. But this independent federal agency
Topics Covered (sample):
Didn't know that there are coupons from Dell specifically for Small Business.
If you are in the market for computers and peripherals, check this out.
Got this from http://www.xpbargains.com/st_deals.php/Dell_Small_Business_coupons.htm
Most search engines, at least the ones that matters like Google, Yahoo, MSN, ASK crawl day and night looking for new content to grab!
So, it might come as a surprise that there are companies out there that charge $5 to $100 to get your web site to these search engine.
- Isn't this automatic, is it worth to pay for these services!
Three levels you can jump through...
1) Get a reasonably popular site to link to your site
This is the minimum you SHOULD do. Find trade association web site and get your web site link into their directory. For Spa businesses, they could consider Spas, Day Spas and Spa Travel Day Spa Association.com.
You can try to link from web site directories like DMOZ/Open Directory, Business.com, Best of the Web.
2) Use a free Search Engine Submit service, from someone like http://www.submitexpress.com/submit.html
They provide some level of advice to make sure your web site has the minimum details for the search engine to effectively know about your site.
3) Ask your web hosting or web designer to submit your site. Often, there are some valid SEO (Search Engine Optimization) tips that need to be followed to ensure that most of your content is indexed by the search engines. If you depend on your web site for lead generation, you should strongly consider using external help.
If your business is not here!!!! think hard - WHY NOT!!!!
There are many places where you could have your coupon, some for free some as part of other services.
But, in GOOGLE for FREE - isn't this the best place to get started
How to
Start with entering your business information into Google Maps.
http://www.google.com/local/add
Enter or Upload your coupon information.
http://code.google.com/apis/coupons/Coupon_TSV_Feed_Documentation.html#Posting_Your_Feed
If you are LOST, you are not alone
Coupons are still buried deep inside Google. Getting your address on the Map is easy, but printable coupons are good to go with some additional help.
Check this blog for more details on Google Co-Op
http://blumenthals.com/blog/2007/11/26/subscribe-to-google-coupons-on-your-main-search-page-results-via-google-co-op/
This is the cool place you want to hang out this Saturday night... On Monday, instead of a hang-over, you could have a brand new web site that you can be proud of creating all by yourself.
Office Live for Small Business
'Just design your Web site, get a Web address, set up a custom e-mail account, and your online doors are open for business.'
http://www.officelive.com/free-website
They have pretty decent templates.
If you use Microsoft Word, their web site editor will be a very familiar. Themes by industry type is a useful place to start which provides stock photos and colors to take you in the right direction.
Useful features include Maps & Direction, link to your blog and subscribe to your email. Every site should have these three which indirectly dictates that you keep your content fresh through your blog.
Don't miss out a productive Saturday Night Out :-)
If you have retail store front, even before you put your business in local yellow pages, make sure to add it to Google Maps - $0.
http://www.google.com/local/add
Your business can be found on Google map, just like this, for free!
Two steps
Find it now
Now, search for your business type on the map, somewhere within 25mile radius 'Day spa near Centennial, CO'
Wah!.. your business appears with the push-pin which then brings this popup with your phone, address and web site link.
If you street has been 'Street Viewed' by Google vans recently, then people can even checkout your office retail front!
Wish we know when the satellite or Google vans passes by our business - we could put our best front that day :-)
ValPak is a common house-hold mailbox brand!
About 3/4 of us hate receiving this.
THESE ARE TESTING TIMES
Almost everyone today is looking for deals and ValPak is posed to get more response rate now!
For SMBs, ValPak is also a cost effective way to reach large targeted audience.
Also make sure to spend that little extra with ValPak and participate in their digital coupon program.
