Seth Godin on Why You Need A Home Business

Seth Godin on why YOU need a home based business! Your day job ain't that secure any more and things are changing fast. Don't become the next casualty!

Want to know how to jump on board with some of the internet's top marketing genius's who are earning multi millions? Jump over to HERE now!

5 Ways to Leverage Your Social-Media Following to Close Sales

Like all savvy business owners, you’ve invested significant resources into building up a social network you are proud of. You’ve got a wide fan base, enough “likes” and “followers” to make you feel validated, and have begun to generate engagement among your consumers. You’re on every major platform and a few of the newer, more experimental ones. You’ve seen and done it all - now you simply have to sit back and relax, right?

While the benefits of having an extensive online social presence are numerous, many businesses – particularly small businesses – are not utilizing their networks to their fullest potential. Social media is about public relations, yes, and there is long-term value in keeping an open dialogue with your customers. But there can also be intrinsic value in your social network – opportunities to make money that you might be missing. Here are five simple, low-cost ways you can generate sales directly from your social network.

1. Instagram pop-up sales

If your company isn’t on Instagram, you should consider it. Independent business owners can offer products direct-to-consumers within seconds by snapping a photo and posting it, along with a price, to their social network. In this manner, even a one-person operation can generate sales through social media. Small brick-and-mortar operations can also use this method to reach a wider audience than they might be able to locally. You needn’t base your entire business model on Instagram. Try offering flash sales on overstock through photos.

2. Facebook 'members only' coupons

Facebook is probably the most widely used social platform among corporations, but many of these companies aren’t sure how to use Facebook to gain more customers. Try offering members-only coupon codes that promise a discount to loyal followers. If you offer meaningful coupons, you can refresh relationships and directly drive sales. You will likely also pick up some new customers in the process.

3. Kickstarter campaigns

You may not consider Kickstarter to be a social media platform, but don't overlook its potential as a sales-generation tool. Gaming companies, in particular, have discovered that they can use Kickstarter, in conjunction with their other social media tools, to generate sales of a game before they even develop it. They then have a committed return on invest in advance, something almost unheard of for small corporations. It’s a great way to test your market before committing significant funds to production and advertising.

4. Blog tours

Some niche markets have already begun to harness the power of bloggers in moving their products. With a little research up front, you will find a group of bloggers willing to feature your product over the course of a few days or weeks. Some PR firms are even starting to offer this service as part of your social media package. Not every business model lends itself to a blogger campaign, but if your products or services seem to fit, especially if your company runs its own blog, this can be a powerful way to generate sales at a minimal cost.

5. Twitter contests

Smart companies have turned Twitter into a money-making machine by making their followers part of the creative process. Mom-and-pop shops can ask their fan base to vote on product designs, color schemes and slogans to generate interest. Ultimately, the consumer feels involved enough in the merchandise to purchase it.

Take another look at the toolbox of social media that you already have at your disposal before investing in costly ad campaigns. Your network is full of consumers who already like your brand. With a little time and effort, you can generate new sales in an unconventional way.

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Les Brown: Why People Fail

Only 1:35 seconds, but you need to see this!

Meme Marketing: The Right and Wrong Way to Leverage Internet Obsessions

It doesn't matter if you're an avid tweeter, a Tumblr addict, a Redditor or a BuzzFeed junkie, there's one thing you can't avoid on the Web: memes.

Memes are everywhere, and just about anything or anyone can become one. Grumpy Cat, Alex from Target, Overly Attached Girlfriend, Success Kid — all of them started out as normal, everyday people (or animals), but were somehow catapulted into the Internet spotlight seemingly overnight.

So what exactly is a meme? According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, a meme is "an idea, behavior, style or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture." The term was actually coined in 1982 by writer and evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins.

But while the term itself has a much broader history, you most likely know memes as those funny pictures with puns and jokes overlaid on top in bold, white lettering. Other examples of memes are viral videos like the series of "Harlem Shake" videos that took over the Internet in early 2013. 

Memes may not seem like much to most people, but to marketing professionals, memes have all of the potential in the world. Why? Here are four major reasons: 

• They're already viral.Whatever you're trying to market, you want people talking about it. Since memes already saturate the Web, latching on to such content can be a great way to get your brand noticed online.

• They're easy to make. Anyone with an Internet-connected device can make and upload a meme in just a few minutes. Whether you use an existing meme or create your own, it doesn't matter. The end result is a free or cheap way to increase your chances of going viral.

• They're incredibly shareable. Since most memes are images or videos, they're ideal for sharing on social media. Every major social network from Facebook to Pinterest supports image and video files, so using memes increases the chances that your content will be shared across many platforms and channels.

• They make campaigns more relatable, especially to young people. Marketers and advertisers are constantly looking for ways to interest young people, and memes are a great way to do just that. Additionally, memes are generally funny, and incorporating them into your campaign can show your potential audience and customers that you know how to have fun, making your brand much more relatable.

For these reasons, it can be tempting to use already-created memes to your advantage in your marketing strategy. This is often referred to as "memejacking," and if it's done right, it can really push your social marketing over the edge. But memes can be tricky, and if you mess up, it can be pretty embarrassing.

Here are three important steps to memejack the correct way:

• Understand the meme, first. If you're unsure of the correct way to use a meme, don't just try it anyway. Go to KnowYourMeme.com, search for the particular meme you're interested in and read up on it before you even get started. If you use a meme incorrectly, it can seriously backfire and make your brand look out of touch.

• Don't waste time. Some memes stay popular for years, and others fall flat after a few months or even days. If you're going to memejack, do it as soon as possible. Otherwise, you could end up using it too late.

• Make sure it's appropriate. If your business has a very serious reputation, and therefore a very serious audience, using memes could actually offend people — the exact opposite of what you want.

There's also a big distinction between using a meme that already exists and creating your own memes. So how do you know which path is the right one for your business? It all depends on your existing clout on the Web.

If you're a new company looking to go viral, using existing memes is probably the way to go. They're already popular, and if you use them correctly, it's a great way to get noticed, especially on social media. Having a great sense of humor on the Internet can earn you more followers, who will in turn share your content with their friends.

If you're an existing brand with a lot of followers, creating your own memes (so long as you have a great concept for them) could help you outshine your competition. You already have a lot of influence thanks to your follower count, so you have a better chance of making your memes go viral. Plus, your followers already see you as a brand they can trust, and creating your own memes will show that you're funny and relatable, too.

No matter how popular your brand is already, if you use memejacking the right way, it can seriously boost your business.

Need some examples? These three companies have all taken memes to the next level:

• Denny's: One of the few brands that does Tumblr marketing well, Denny's succeeds mostly because it embraces the use of memes wholeheartedly. The restaurant chain regularly shares hilarious images. A notable example? Denny's made a parody of advertisements for the gold iPhone 5 by sharing a picture of pancakes with the text "Pancakes" stylized like the iPhone advertisement, with smaller text reading, "Always available in golden." (You can see more of the company's memes here.)

• Wonderful Pistachios: The snack food brand has created several commercials that are based on viral videos, including one with "Keyboard Cat," a viral video and meme that dates all the way back to 2007. The company's Super Bowl spot featured South Korean singer-songwriter Psy and played off his hit 2012 music video for "Gangnam Style" (which now has over 2 billion views on YouTube).

• Seamless: You've probably used the Seamless website to order takeout before, but if you're not following Seamless on Twitter, you're missing out on some great laughs. The account regularly makes food jokes and puns, but Seamless really shone during this year's Academy Awards season when it shared its own "#OscarNomNoms" memes, which turned Oscar-nominated movie posters into food puns like "The Wolf of Waffle Street."

But not every business has had such good luck with memes. If you really want to try memejacking for your next marketing campaign, make sure you don't make the same mistakes these marketers did:

• FAFSA: This summer, the Federal College Financial Aid Twitter account posted a tweet that read, "If this is you, then you better fill out your FAFSA" with a still from the movie "Bridesmaids" that read "Help me, I'm poor." However, given how many people struggle with student debt, the tweet was very poorly received. FAFSA later deleted the tweet and shared an apology. "We apologize for the insensitivity of our previous tweet. Our goal is to make college a reality for all. We're very sorry," the organization wrote.

• Kia/Cheezburger, Inc.: This memejacking fail is particularly disappointing because the Cheezburger Network is a collection of meme websites — as in, the organization should've known better. The company teamed up with Kia (yes, the car company) in 2012 for a campaign it called "Season's Memeing," which encouraged users to create Kia-themed memes in an effort to win a gift card. Many of the memes that were created didn't make sense, and the Internet was none too pleased.

• U.S. Department of Health and Human Services:The organization made a huge meme mistake when it borrowed the "doge" meme (you might recognize it as a picture of a Shiba Inu dog with colorful text overlaid that says things like "wow" and "such doge"). In its attempt topromote Obamacare, the organization not only used the meme inappropriately, but also posted the wrong picture. The overlaid text said, "So health insurance," "Very benefits," "Wow," "Many coverage," "Much affordable" and "Such Healthcare.gov." It's no wonder it fell flat.

If these memejacking horror stories didn't scare you away, there's some good news: Thanks to the overabundance of memes on the Internet, no matter what your company does, there's probably one out there that's perfect for your marketing campaign. And whether you create your own or you jump on another meme's bandwagon, just make sure that the rest of the Internet is laughing with you, not at you.

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4 Basic Steps to Turn Web Visitors Into Brand Ambassadors (Infographic)

The brand ambassador is a highly coveted but oft-elusive tool in the marketer’s arsenal; the golden snitch of the marketing world, if you’ll forgive a "Harry Potter" reference.

If brand ambassadors are what you crave, you’re in luck.

In just four easy steps you can take someone from casual visitor to your online properties to a bona fide brand ambassador who inspires others to share in their love of your brand.

What are those four easy steps? It’s in the infographic from Seychelle Media.

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8 Online-Marketing Terms Business Owners Must Know

If you’re like most small-business owners, you spend your day providing a great customer experience that sets you apart from your competition. The quality of your service is key now that digital word of mouth is the most effective form of advertising. This doesn’t leave much time to stay current with the latest online-marketing developments.

To help navigate today’s brave new world of digital marketing for small business, as well as outline principles that are critical for your success, I’ve outlined eight terms that should be in every small-business owner’s vocabulary. Understanding the “why” and “what” will improve your marketing efforts and ability to attract and retain valuable customers.

1. Online presence

What: Your online presence is everywhere your business info can be found online and on mobile apps.

Why: In today’s connected world, establishing a proper online presence is absolutely critical. Consumers use the web to make their final decision. According to a Nielsen study, four out of five Yelp users visit the review site before making a purchase.

Whether looking for a new business or researching a known one, potential customers will use search engines and social platforms to find the information they need. To help get you started, here are 24 free places to list your business online.

2. CTA 

What: A call to action prompts a customer to do something (for example: “Call now.” “Click here for 10% off.”). Testing different CTAs as part of your marketing will help you find out which is the most effective for your business. 

Why: As a small business, it doesn’t matter how enticing your online presence is if you do not present a clear call to action. Even the most interested consumers need a clear next step and possibly an incentive to move forward.

3. Conversion

What: Conversion is the step from your marketing effort to a customer taking action. A conversion could be an email or call, but most often a direct purchase.

Why: The goal of your marketing should be to drive conversions. You need to decide in advance how you define a conversion. This way you know what to track and what you want to achieve.

You want to minimize drop off between someone seeing you online and actually making a purchase. Remarketing can help with this.

4. Remarketing

What: Remarketing is following up with consumers that have interacted with you or your marketing before. For example, sending email or a text messages to existing customers with the goal of building loyalty or getting referrals, feedback and reviews.

Why: Remarketing to your existing customer contacts is one of the most important online-marketing activities for small-business owners. These customers already know your business and are much more likely to engage and convert via effective marketing. 

5. Referrals

What: Referrals are new customers that have been directed to your business by other customers or companies.

Why: A trusted recommendation is more powerful and effective than any type of advertising. By using targeted-remarketing messages you can encourage this type of digital word of mouth.

6. CAC 

What: Customer acquisition cost refers to the dollar amount spent to acquire a new customer. For example, if you work with a marketing service that you pay $1,000 and because of their work they deliver five new customers, the CAC of this marketing effort is $200.

Why: Your end goal is new customers and revenue. It is important to understand how much each of your marketing efforts cost to achieve that goal. This will help you evaluate your marketing efforts. Make sure you know about the CAC when working with a marketing service.

7. CLTV 

What: Customer lifetime value is the dollar value of a customer relationship -- based on the total profit you expect to earn from that client over their time with your business. So if your service costs $50 and customers generally buy this service five times throughout their lifetime, the combined dollar value of all these transactions, or CLTV, is $250.

Why: CLTV is an essential concept in marketing, because it determines how much you can spend on your marketing. Generally speaking, any marketing effort where the CLTV is higher than the CAC delivers a return on your investment and is something you should continue to invest in. So don’t just look at marketing in terms of costs but how it adds to your bottom line!

8. Cloud computing

What: Cloud computing, sometimes called software as a service or web-based software services, simply means business services such as email, storage or accounting supplied over the Internet. Using the cloud is increasingly popular with small-business owners because it’s more affordable and makes it easy to update the services.

Why: Using cloud computing for your marketing is a smart approach as it’s affordable and makes it easy to update and integrate any services. For example, customer-relationship-management software is a marketing tool that many large companies have been using for years, however it is now well within the price point and time-commitment range for small-business owners.

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What (Millennial) Women Want: One Marketing Strategy Doesn't Fit All

If you ask many of today's business-to-consumer companies about their target market, "women" and "millennials" are likely to come up a lot. The fact that marketers are going after these two segments should come as no surprise: The buying power of consumers who belong to these groups — especially those in the intersection — is rapidly growing as Generation Y continues to grow up and enter the workforce. But reaching female millennials successfully isn't always as easy as you might expect.

Where many marketers go wrong is casting too wide of a net with this group, and making broad assumptions about the individuals within them. In fact, two Advertising Week 2014 panels said that marketing strategies that rely too heavily on stereotypes about millennials and women are becoming less and less effective. Gabie Boko, executive vice president of marketing at accounting software provider Sage, agreed that these tactics need to be scratched from your playbook.

"When marketing to millennial women, one size does not fit all," Boko told Business News Daily. "Not every woman is a mom. Not every woman is a high-powered executive. Not every woman likes pink. Stereotyping in your marketing is one of the quickest ways to alienate potential buyers. Instead, you need to tap into their true buying needs and preferences."

"Marketers often loop all millennials into one large target group and make the assumption that they act and behave in all of the same ways, which is just not true," added Michael Dill, managing partner of integrated marketing firm Match Drive. "Millennials are like colors — they are all different shades, and marketers need to understand what particular shade they are selling to and why."

If you're trying to market to this fast-growing, highly coveted group, here are a few tips to keep in mind. [Marketing to Millennials: How to Capture Gen Y Consumers]

Research, research, research. In order to think beyond the stereotypes of millennial women, you need to do your research. Speak with them directly and learn about what they want — and whether that aligns with what your company offers.

"Narrow your focus to the women who will likely be the early adopters or best fit for your product," Boko said. "You must understand their community deeply and try to see your brand through their perspective. The effort you put into learning about and understanding the women in your market will show in your marketing."

Leslie Canter, a marketing representative for audience intelligence tool People Pattern, noted that listening to social media conversations is incredibly important in helping you learn about your target group and discovering what motivates these people.

"[Find out] what people are actually talking about," Canter said. "[In terms of] shopping habits, what really resonates and is important to these people?"

Think about the screen and context. One challenge brands face in reaching the millennial generation is the dramatic shift in communication habits ushered in by the digital age. Dill noted that marketers have had to rethink their traditional advertising and retail models and adapt them to the multiscreen world of Gen Y.

"When millennials watch TV, they don't just sit there, staring at the screen," Dill said. "They often watch two different screens or more, or they engage with their friends while watching. They stop, they go off and then come back."

Ilana Stern, founder of wedding fashion retailer Weddington Way, said that the context of brand connections — browsing on a smartphone while waiting for the subway versus shopping on a desktop during work, for instance — makes a difference in how you should choose to reach out to millennial women.

"Millennials are consuming content in a variety of [ways, and] their goals and mind-set change depending on the context," Stern said. "Brands need to meet them where they are, with simple and straightforward messaging and experiences that cater to these contexts."

Make a connection. As more millennials shift to online and mobile shopping, ensuring a seamless experience across all devices is important. But just as important is finding ways to authentically connect with millennials through your marketing efforts.

"Millennials interact with brands differently than prior generations," Stern said. "It's not about push marketing and brand endorsement. They value the opinions of their peers and community. Millennials wants to feel informed and involved, not just someone you're marketing to. Connect [with them through] values that drive them, such as happiness, passion, diversity, sharing and discovery."

"Millennials care as much for what a brand stands for as they do for the product that the brand makes," Dill added. "To millennials, both the brand story and the company's integrity matter a great deal.Think about [millennials] first, rather than thinking about how you want to sell."

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