[Samsung Galaxy Note III]

Small business owners seeking greater mobility and productivity now have another option. Samsung finally introduced its new Galaxy Note 3 phablet device at the IFA technology show in Berlin.

Company representatives said they listened to customers when designing this new update of the popular hybrid between smartphone and tablet.

“They wanted larger screens and wanted to do more with them,” said Menno Van Den Berg, Vice President of Samsung Electronics in the Netherlands, at the company’s second Unpacked event of the year this week.

The event was webcast live over the company’s Samsung Mobile YouTube Channel. The Note 3 should be available in the U.S. in October. It will be available in three colors: jet black, white, and what they’re calling “blush pink”.

An Overview of Samsung Galaxy Note 3

The new Galaxy Note 3 will have a full HD 5.7 inch screen. The rear-mounted camera is 13 megapixels and is capable of shooting full HD high resolution video at 60 frames-per-second. The device also has a 1.9 megapixel front-facing camera.

Although this is the biggest screen available on a Note device, the new Note 3 is actually lighter than its predecessor and no wider than before. Interestingly, the Note 3 has a backing resembling leather and is ridged on the side so dropping it seems less likely. When it’s combined with an optional flip wallet for convenient carrying, a “window” in the carrier that shows the time, date, and other pertinent updates is larger than before. And you can actually make and receive calls within that window without removing the device from its wallet or case.

Other important features include:

• High CRI LED Flash with Smart Stabilizer on the rear-mounted camera,
• 3GB of RAM,
• Extended battery life: Samsung says the battery on the Note 3 will give you 40 percent more video playback time,
• Faster and “more seamless” LTE

A New Stylus Helps Organize Information

The S-Pen Stylus has a variety of functions to help busy business owners keep information organized. David Park, from Samsung’s Electronics HQ and Marketing divisions, explained the its features during the Samsung presentation in Berlin.

The new “Air Command” feature activated simply by tapping the stylus over a floating dot on the screen will bring up an action menu. That menu allows you to jot a quick note, like a new contact’s phone number or email address.

Pre-loaded handwriting recognition software allows how to write down contact information with the stylus and then transforms that information into a new contact profile.

Or you can write down a phone number and then call that number using the Note’s phone function directly from your handwritten memo.

You can use the stylus to circle information you want to save while surfing online and the Note will organize that information into a file called a “scrapbook.” Scrapbooks, like other files, are searchable.

Samsung says you can even use the stylus to organize your files. For example, by drawing a dollar sign on business file, you can then use the symbol to search for the specific file later.

The company says the Note will also let you create special notebooks called S-Notes that contain specific designated information, like business files, that you may want o keep separate from the other files on your device. These S-Notes can be placed in your Evernote account so that you could easily access them from any device in the future.

Here’s more on the device from TechnoBuffalo.

The post Samsung Introduces the Galaxy Note 3 in Berlin appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Anyone can start a business, but it's hard to be an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs are achievers but their achievements don't come without pitfalls. What makes entrepreneurs tick? What is it about them that makes them so ambitious, confident, and, well…different from others? Let's find out.

Habits of Relentless Entrepreneurs that Separate them from the Rest

The Start Habit

Entrepreneurs just start. They might not know what's coming up ahead. They might not know what they are getting into. And they have no idea how they will succeed. But they'll start anyway.

Gordon Segal, founder of furniture retailer Crate and Barrel, started off without knowing much about the retail business at all or what it entailed. His underlying philosophy:

What have we got to lose?

If you think that this "start no matter what" syndrome happens only when you grow older, think again.

Tyler Dikman started selling lemonade when he was only five years old. By age 10, he was performing magic at birthday parties and investing his earnings in stocks. By 15, he started Cooltronics.com, a huge computer supply business. Cooltronics.com earned him over $1 million in revenue by the time he was 17.

The start syndrome is, in fact, at the core of many entrepreneurial stories. Sony's first product was an automatic rice cooker before it became a technology leader. Microsoft, Apple, Google and many other admired companies today took the time to find their main product or service but got started anyway.

Next time you get the nagging "when do I launch" question, the answer is "now."

The Habit of Hustle

Entrepreneurs revere sales. They are born hustlers. While some shy away from selling, entrepreneurs consider it an art. And for most, it is a habit they developed early. The habit of hustle is ingrained in the very psyche of the entrepreneur, either naturally or by choice.

John Paul DeJoria, founder of John Paul Mitchell Systems, a branded hair care product for salons, lived out of his car and sold Christmas cards and newspapers when he started out. Even after starting his company, he still sold shampoo door-to-door. Today he is worth $4 billion.

Sheldon Adelson started selling newspapers and later operated a vending machine business. He packed hotel toiletries, and dabbled with mortgage brokering. Today, he owns the Sands Hotel & Casino and also The Venetian mega-resort.

The Habit of Failure

Entrepreneurs can face failure. Thomas Zurbuchen of the Center for Entrepreneurship, University of Michigan, writes, “Entrepreneurship is about hope.” You'll see this hope reflected in the lives of many entrepreneurs and founders who started businesses against all odds and even in the face of failure.

It's this hope that keeps entrepreneurship alive and encourages entrepreneurs to innovate, create and make a difference in millions of lives.

Here are some stories:

• Harland David Sanders, founder of the iconic Kentucky Fried Chicken brand, had his chicken rejected by more than 1,000 restaurants before eventually launching his franchise business. Today Kentucky Fried Chicken is a household name.
• R.H Macy had a history of failed business ventures and investments before founding Macy's, destined to become the biggest department store in the world.
• Soichiro Honda was rejected for an engineering job at Toyota before going on to found Honda Motor Company.
• And Walt Disney was fired by a newspaper for having no imagination or good ideas before founding his world famous company celebrating the power of imagination.

The Habit of Dealing with Uncertainty

Entrepreneurs can handle uncertainty. They launch businesses where none have existed before, create products and services with no idea how they will be received, deal with the uncertainty of irregular cash flow, work with new people and discover and market to customers with whom they may not be familiar.

Almost every business success begins with uncertainty. Only 80% of businesses actually succeed and manage to attain profitability. So we can imagine the uncertainties most entrepreneurs face.

The Habit of Management and Delegation

Entrepreneurs delegate. For them, it is a matter of survival. And that delegation involves inspiring leadership in others too.

Entrepreneurs lead by example. They know what must be done because they have done it and must now teach others the same skills. An entrepreneur’s leadership comes from the knowledge of how to build and sustain a profitable business. Most have had no option but to get their hands dirty building their businesses.

Unlike some managers, they have learned from experience and must now share that experience with others if their businesses are to be sustainable.

Do you see yourself as an entrepreneur? If so, what habits would you like to cultivate within yourself?

Superhero Businessman Photo via Shutterstock

The post 5 Habits Of Relentless Entrepreneurs appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Managing a small business is not an easy victory for all. It demands a different view of life and a unique way of setting goals to ensure success. Some people are happy to work for others and satisfied to earn a monthly salary. They belong to one category while there are many who do not feel comfortable working within confines. Those belonging to the second category seem to have a bright future in entrepreneurship.

For a better understanding of this concept, we’ll split the discussion into two parts.

Navigate Your Way to Becoming a Successful Entrepreneur

Are You Ready to Become an Entrepreneur?

Are you interested in owning a small business and want to manage it all by yourself? Are you proud of your management and leadership skills?

Entrepreneurship is a good career decision if you’re answer to those two questions is yes. At the same time, it is true that more than management and leadership skills will be necessary to taste success. Ask yourself some of the questions below to find out whether you have what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur:

1. Are you willing to take risks and fight all odds?

2. Will you be able to live with an unpredictable, unsteady source of income?

3. Are your family and friends supportive of your venture?

4. Are you well equipped to protect yourself and your family against potential financial ups and downs?

5. Do you accept the fact that you are answerable to your clients?

If the answer to the above questions is yes, you have an entrepreneur’s blood running through your veins.

What are the Essentials You Need to Learn?

As an aspiring small business owner, you need to learn certain essentials of small business management and entrepreneurship. Learning them can help you in three ways – save you time, cut down on your business start-up costs and save you money. Below are five essentials for managing a small business:

1. Do Not Expect to Earn Big Bucks at the Start

A small business is an investment and it’s advantageous to take fewer risks in the beginning. Big profits will elude you at the initial stage of the business, but with slow and steady progress, you can achieve big things.

2. Steer Clear of all the “Bells and Whistles” Early On

It is definitely great to start a business with the latest computers, best machinery, equipment and new vehicles. But unless you earn enough to purchase all these, it is better to opt for cheaper alternatives. Subcontract services and hire-purchase machinery and equipment.

3. Be Prepared to Perform Multiple Roles at the Start

Be prepared to be a multi-tasking professional to develop your business at the start. Be prepared to perform roles such as that of the production manager, marketing manager and that of the accountant by yourself. It’s wise to wait until you make money before establishing a full-fledged staff dedicated to handling different aspects of the business.

4. Be Ready to Lead a Low-Profile Life

Until you are established, managing a small business can be akin to leading a low-profile life. It’s best to avoid organizing a party at a posh 5-star beach resort for your clients and publishing big advertisements in leading newspapers. If you indulge in extravagances early on, you will run out of money very fast.

5. Become Skilled at Accounting

A part of your multi-tasking duties when managing a small business is going to require you to apply your accounting skills to manage cash flow and bank transactions (you can consider hiring a specialist service to manage the area of taxes.)

There are many avenues that offer tools vital to success for the prospective entrepreneurs. Look for good small business programs that offer extensive training to aspiring entrepreneurs.

Hard work, perseverance and determination pave the way for success in a small business. Be confident and optimistic and step forward to fulfill your dreams.

Roadmap to Success Photo via Shutterstock

The post Your Roadmap To Becoming A Successful Entrepreneur appeared first on Small Business Trends.

The following examines what it takes to be a social business.  As you go through, think about how mature your business is (or is not) when it comes social media.

We bring you one of the most discussed sessions during this year's Social Biz Atlanta Conference. Below is a text transcript, along with the full video of the session at the end.  The session featured:

• Teresa Caro, SVP of Social and Content Marketing, Engauge (pictured, lower right)
• Bert Dumars, Vice President, Principal Analyst Serving CMOs at Forrester Research (pictured, lower left)
• Adam Naide, Social Media Leader & Digital Marketing at Cox Communications (pictured, upper left)
• Art Hall, Director at Alvarez & Marsal (Moderator) (pictured, upper right)

* * * * *

Art Hall: [Introductions]  Burt was with Newell Rubbermaid and functioned in a marketing and in a eCommerce role as he oversaw all of the Newell's branding and now has taken a job at Forrester Research. Burt is going to talk on corporate social media maturity.

Teresa will talk about how Enguage adopted Forrester's model into some further categorizations to help us to understand how companies can evolve to becoming a social business. And last but not least, we will turn it over to Adam Naide [of Cox Communications].

Bert DuMars:  We have been calling this an age of post-digital. Digital is not a silo anymore, nor is social, nor is eCommerce – it is all part of marketing.

CMOs who are ahead of the game are senior marketing executives who … are bringing in digital experts, analytics scientists. They are bringing in email marketing specialists; they are bringing in all of these different roles and and rolling that into the market organization.

There is also this other big trend going on and it is called digital disruption. … Salesforce.com [is] a digital disrupter to Oracle and SAP. They came in from underneath and they built, and they built, and they built from the ground up and now they are a major competitor to these multi-billion dollar software companies coming from nowhere.

This is happening in all kinds of industries. Look at what Netflix is doing, look at [its] new series, House of Cards. House of Cards is doing amazing work that is digitally disrupting the whole world of media right now, even as we speak.

We have all of these different changes going on and what is going to happen with social is you are [either] going to be a part of the organizations that are disrupting through social, through digital, through ecommerce, through product development, through customer experience — or you are going to be … running as fast as you can to keep up with the disruptors.

With that I am going to hand it off to Teeresa so she can go into some depth about the maturity model, and what Enguage is doing.

Teresa Caro: One of the things that we do with our clients is look at their social maturity. We really enjoy how Forrester looks at it — we use their five stages that came out in 2011 and then we apply it to different aspects of their organization.

We look at their current state and we look at where they want to be from a desired state prospective, and we put together a road map. Now what's interesting is if you look at different aspects of the organization, you look at how an organization defines their brand, or how they govern social, or how innovation comes along, or content. You look at all of those different facets, and there are about 7 or 8 different categories.  If we look at that across an organization, and their current state maybe, in some cases at really a testing stage; or maybe a collaboration stage; or maybe even further along — but it will be all over the board because social is just one of those things.

It was tried out in the PR Department, or their advertising department. We know we needed a Facebook page, ‘Oh hey, Twitter is really great at pushing out press releases.’ Then it evolves over time and terms of the organization and depending on the size, and how fragmented that organization is in the first place, that tells how social evolved.  And so we come and try to gain alignment and in all of those pieces.

Let's take governance, for example. So if you look at your business and your organization and how you handle social, a lot of the times it starts off as a free for all. A land grab … of ‘social's mine, no it's mine, no it's mine.’

That is really how a lot of organizations start.  PR think it's theirs, advertising think it's theirs, human resources thinks it's a complete nightmare, because their employee are on there talking about things, customers service think it's theirs.  Well, for all intents and purposes everybody is there.

Let's use Dell as an example. Everybody likes to use Dell, but they have been the ones that have been promoting their six-year evolutions more than any other company. They went from "Dell Hell", where they were like, ‘Oh my goodness, what is this social thing. Everybody is talking about their computers blowing up.’   To now, in the past couple of years they have been pushing it out to the rest of the organization and everybody owns it.  Everybody has been through their certification process, everybody is on the same page  – so governance is a really fascinating way of looking at your organization and social maturity.

Another fun one is content marketing. If you look at content in general from a maturity standpoint, it starts off as you are not doing anything in social and you are just doing push advertising, with no extension in to the social space. How many of you remember for several years back Ford had this really fantastic commercial with Kermit the Frog in it and forgot to buy they keywords for Kermit, or for "green," or for any of those things? I think their competitors ended up buying them and it was a missed opportunity.

It is the same thing for social.  There are so many times that advertisers are creating these great campaigns and forgetting to do the social extensions, but for the ones who remember the social extensions it is huge.

Red Bull, another great example — they did such a great job with their content they now they sell it. The fantastic example not many of us will ever achieve … but it is certainly something fantastic to aspire to.

Adam Naide:  I have been at Cox for a year and half now, and previously I was leading social media at CNN … when social got off the ground.  I am actually really glad that I came from that content experience because when you think about what people engage most around in social, what are they talking about? They are talking about the news, they are sharing content, they are talking about what is the water cooler, right?

Starting with the news brand like CNN it really helped me to understand the way content is used. Now I am at Cox where we have access to all of the best content.  Just to give you an example on the consumer side, we did content social media partnerships in the past year with some of the best for content that you probably would find like, Walking Dead on AMC, True Brides, Game of Thrones, Dexter, Homeland the Olympics.

You think about where entertainment and where people's passion is … and so much of it is about entertainment. It's sexy, it is fun.  Let's face it, most people hate their cable company, they just do. It is a fact of life. But the good news is that I've got all of the best toys to play with, so I can use these toys, and I can leverage these great partnerships that we have with our programmers and our content partners, to bring you closer to the content you love.

Social media starts with passion. If you are not passionate about your business and what you do, no one else is going to care. I can't tell you how many times when I meet with people, and they might be in transition, or 'hey look at my resume,' and I say, ‘I don't understand what it is that you do?’  You have to be passionate, you have to tell your story. I don't care if you are a big company, small company, B2B or B2C – you have to have the passion.

Second of all, people really overthink this stuff. Your brands need to be human. We need to act like humans. As Teresa talked about, we really operate as a partnership between customer care, public affairs and marketing. My job every day is to keep us grounded.

No one wants to talk to a press release. We want to talk to people.  So to start with, 'Hey I am sitting down, and Art and I are having a conversation and what it that I want to tell you?' That is where I think social media really shows the power, it is about brands as humans, brands as story tellers.

Art Hall:  [Regarding B2B, you] need to find out where your audience is. Your audience may not be on Twitter, it probably most definitely will not be on Facebook. Your audience is probably sitting on LinkedIn. Your audience is probably sitting on forums and communities.  Your audience may be local, or hyper local, depending on the size of your business and who you are trying to reach.

You may have a physical aspect to your business — in other words, face to face meetings with people is critical to you conducting business. You need to figure out how to integrate that in. You need to figure out how to integrate what social fits and works well for you with a physical presence, and how they work together.

There are a lot of examples of big corporations that are really desperately trying to figure this out right now. Look at Audi. There was a whole article about Audi, because their physical presence does not equate to the brand experience expected. So they are redesigning all of their show rooms in the United States right now, because of their physical not matching up with the social, or the digital, or the brand. So you have to think about that as a B2B player or a B2C player as well.

Editor’s Note:  The above transcript has been edited for readability, and small parts have been left out. For the entire session, please see the video below.

The post Becoming a Social Business: How Mature Is Your Company in Social Media? appeared first on Small Business Trends.

I’ve never been much of a sports guy, probably because I’m terrible at them.

I was six feet tall in 7th grade and everyone thought I’d be great at basketball. After I filled out a bit in high school, it was assumed I’d be a natural for football. For a while, it was even suggested that maybe my long legs might work for hurdling.

I managed to prove them all wrong.

So when I started working in sales and travelling and meeting with clients, I thought maybe I should take up golf because, you know. . .everyone in business golfs, right?

Let’s just say – it’s a good thing I can draw.

The post Won’t Be Seeing You “Out on the Green” [Cartoon] appeared first on Small Business Trends.

GoDaddy, which calls itself the largest Web host and domain register on the Internet, announced a new brand strategy to appeal to “courageous” small business owners and entrepreneurs.

The announcement was accompanied by a new website and a new TV ad spot. Instead of the “GoDaddy girls” wearing skin-tight T shirts, the new ad features Belgian martial arts expert and film star, Jean-Claude Van Damme, along with a fictional bakery owner.  It debuted on prime time television on the NFL football season opener Thursday night. It can also be seen on YouTube.

CEO Irving Blake said in an email Thursday to GoDaddy customers that it’s an outgrowth of research that the company conducted.  In his email Blake explained to customers:

“One of the clearest lessons we’ve learned is that the one word to describe you best is ‘courageous.’ You go after what you really love, you chart your own course, and you create something (often from nothing) that usually makes the world a better place. Whether it’s a neighborhood pizza shop, an organization to help those in need, or a company poised to launch a new industry, you believe where others don’t. You have the guts to strike out on your own to make your dreams — however bold or humble — a reality. That’s courage, and it’s worth every ounce of support we can give.”

Transformation: Image and Business Model

GoDaddy has been in the midst of a transformation, as we wrote earlier in May.

This time last year, the company was welcoming its third CEO in less than 12 months.   Controversial founder and CEO Bob Parsons (who still owns part of the company) had departed.  New investors — KKR Capstone, Silver Lake Partners and Technology Crossover Ventures — reportedly bought 65% of the company for over $2 billion in 2011.

In addition to the management change, the company is in the midst of broadening its service offerings.  To achieve that, GoDaddy has been on an acquisition path.  In July of 2012 GoDaddy acquired Outright, a bookkeeping software application. Last month the company took another step by announcing the  acquisition of Locu, a local search listings service. The company says the Locu acquisition will help more than 30,000 restaurants, spas, salons, accountants, photographers, home-remodeling companies and other small businesses boost their digital presence.

Simpler Website, Less-Polarizing Ads

Since 2011 GoDaddy has simplified its website.  A year ago the site was jam-packed with upsells for domain name services.  It had a lot of technical language unintelligible to small business owners and marketing managers.  Now the website is simpler and easier to digest, emphasizing the basics for a Web presence:  websites, hosting, domain names.

Another change is a focus beyond the online digerati such as online-only entrepreneurs and domainers.  GoDaddy now is specifically reaching out to Main Street small businesses, in addition to online entrepreneurs.

For example, the new GoDaddy 30-second ad with martial artist Van Damme features a solo bakery owner. The baker glances at the online orders piling up on his website, while kneading bread dough. The baker calls on his inner Van Damme to get motivated to meet the orders. Van Damme plays several instruments in the ad, each with a fast beat, while doing the full splits he’s known for.  At the end Van Damme says, “It’s go time.”

Absent from the ad are the busty women that put the GoDaddy brand on the map, but turned off some women business owners.

Another recent GoDaddy video on YouTube features employees referring to local small business owners like craftsmen, divorce lawyers and plumbers.

GoDaddy‘s sales topped $1 billion last year.  It employs 3,900 people.

The post GoDaddy Debuts Van Damme Ad To Appeal to “Courageous” Small Business Owners appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Welcome to our latest curated list of events, contests and awards for small businesses, solo entrepreneurs and growing companies. To see a full list or to submit your own event, contest or award listing, visit the Small Business Events Calendar.

Featured Events, Contests and Awards

Small Biz Big Things Hosts Seth Godin in NYC
September 17, 2013, New York, NY

Join us at Small Biz Big Things in New York City for an evening of learning, networking, fun and discussion as we explore how small business owners can do very big things through innovation.
The way we work and play has changed. Big companies who have not innovated have failed. Small companies who have innovated are thriving.

Laggard companies are being crushed. Companies who can strategically innovate are being created and growing.

Will your business thrive? Will it survive?

Seth Godin will do a rare Q&A session, answering your burning questions about small business, marketing and doing work that matters.

Carly Strife, of Barkbox (and previously with Uber) will present her real life, hands on experiences, and best practices in how small companies can profitably innovate and grow in the midst of challenging market forces and intense competition.

WomanCon 2013
September 25, 2013, New York, NY

This fresh, one-day conference brings together amazing women entrepreneurs, both on and off the stage. Our incredible speaker lineup will help you learn how to get funding for growth, make your brand stronger, and turn your idea into a company. Pitch journalists live on stage with our media panel. You'll also hear the REAL behind-the-scenes stories from founders including JJ Ramberg, Janine Popick , Pamela O'Hara and more.  SEATING IS LIMITED.
Discount Code
SBTRENDS ($50 off)

More Events

• Content Marketing World
  September 09, 2013, Cleveland, OH
• Small Business and Entrepreneur Leadership Conference
  September 09, 2013, Galveston , TX
• Servant-Leadership: A Better Way To Lead & Manage At Work Or Home
  September 10, 2013, Atlanta, GA
• The Science of Buying Signals
  September 10, 2013, Online
• Leading in Local: SMB Digital Marketing
  September 11, 2013, Austin, TX
• After Hours LIVE! Business Networking Event with Live Music
  September 12, 2013, Pittsburgh, PA
• The Social Shake-Up
  September 15, 2013, Atlanta, GA
• QS MBA Tour
  September 15, 2013, New York City, NY
• ThinkSales Sales Leadership Conference 2013
  September 17, 2013, Johannesburg, South Africa
• 2013 Incite Marketing and Communications Summit
  September 18, 2013, Online
• Human Potential Forum 2013
  September 18, 2013, New York, New York
• How To Build & Lead An Effective Team
  September 19, 2013, Atlanta, GA
• Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland Policy Summit
  September 19, 2013, Cleveland, OH
• “Legislative Breakfast” Networking and Panel Discussions
  September 20, 2013, Coraopolis, PA
• September Business Networking Mixer
  September 23, 2013, Online
• Entrepreneurial Woman’s Conference – 27th Annual
  September 26, 2013, Chicago, Illinois
• “BizBlast @ Noon” Networking Lunch Event
  September 26, 2013, Pittsburgh, PA
• The eMetrics Summit Boston
  September 29, 2013, Boston, MA
• Conversion Conference East 2013 Boston
  September 30, 2013, Online

More Contests

• Women 2.0 PITCH Las Vegas 2013
  September 15, 2013, Las Vegas, NV
• The Citi Salutes: Realizing Your Dream Business Competition
  November 08, 2013, Online

This weekly listing of small business events, contests and awards is provided as a community service by Small Business Trends and SmallBizTechnology.

The post Check This Out: Conferences, Webinars, Contests and Awards appeared first on Small Business Trends.

If you didn’t get time this week to keep up with the latest, we’ve got you covered. The Small Business Trends editorial team has the latest and shares the news stories you as a business owner or entrepreneur need to stay on top of.  Here’s the weekly recap.

An Acquisition, a Rebrand and a Shutdown

This is what the Microsoft acquisition of Nokia means. Despite detractors, this could be a good thing for big Windows users (read lots and lots of small businesses.) If you’ve longed for a Windows smartphone to match the operating systems on the other devices in your office, Anita Campbell explains why this is good news.

GoDaddy Puts Out Van Damme ad, changes focus. You may ask, what does Belgian martial arts expert and film star Jean-Claude Van Damme  have to do with small business? Read how the Web hosting giant is promoting outreach to “courageous” small business owners.

MyOpenID service will close down for good. The company that pioneered use of Open ID standards has decided to end its MyOpenID single-sign-in service. Larry Drebes, CEO of Janrain, Inc., says his company is focusing on new projects.  By now most people use single sign-ons, even if you’re not familiar with the term.  When you sign in with your Google, Facebook or LinkedIn login to another site, you’re using single sign-on, and they use the OPEN ID standards.  So there’s no longer any need for a separate service called MyOpenID.

Gadget News

The Samsung Galaxy Note 3 is here. After plenty of leaked photos on the Internet, now we know a bit more about the latest Samsung device. It should be coming to the U.S. in October and could be great for small business productivity, but the price remains uncertain.

The Nexus 4 is now $100 cheaper. Here’s an overview of what your business will be getting for its investment in Google’s budget smartphone. The phone compares well with many of its ilk including some that are a bit more expensive. But remember it lacks 4G LTE.

Services & Resources

MYQROsites are a new approach to mobile. The service lets you create and customize mobile websites for a fee. You can also use the service to generate QR codes. They are  square 2-D barcodes that can be scanned with your camera phone directing customers to your website.

Marketing overseas is an option for small businesses too. The U.S. government provides resources to help your business accomplish this. But you must know where to look. In this update from the U.S. Small Business Administration, we learn what’s available and how to get started marketing your business abroad.

Entrepreneurship

Lenovo’s CEO will share his $3+ million bonus with employees. Split among 10,000 factory workers, that’s $325 per person at the Chinese computer manufacturer and equal to almost a month’s pay.  That’s a rare move for a large-company CEO, says Anita Campbell.  More could take a page from small business owners, who have a tendency to share profits.

Where we stand with small business recovery. It’s been four years since the economic recovery began. So where do small businesses stand? Better off than they were when recovery began, says Professor of Entrepreneurial Studies at Case Western Reserve University Scott Shane.  But there’s room for improvement, because we haven’t equalled pre-recession levels.

Customer Service & Marketing

Sage went on a tour to visit customers –  here’s what you can learn. Sage North America’s 50-day Sage Listens Tour has come to a close. Using the Tour as a backdrop, we came up with 7 lessons small businesses can learn about customer relationships. And you don’t need to trick out a pricey RV or spend 2 months on a tour.

Keep your online marketing strategy up to date. Online marketing plans especially are not things you can set and then never update. Instead, they must be adjusted periodically with changes in your product, audience, or the marketing. Amie Marse shows you how.

Operations & Infrastructure

It’s officially hurricane season. Is your small business prepared? More severe storms in recent years mean businesses all over the Eastern seaboard must prepare for the worst. But, of course, the increased use of outsourced workers or virtual employees means your business doesn’t have to be in the path of the storm to be affected. Ted Devine, CEO of Insureon, has more.

BYOD can contribute to your network congestion. The days when your office had only one device per user are gone. Part of the reason is the tendency for workers to bring and use their own devices (BYOD). Security is one issue with BYOD.  But congestion on your network is another, says Craig Sutton of Sutton Brand Management.

Rules & Regs

Stay up on the rules for criminal background checks. You want to be responsible, and hire the best people.  That means you will be doing background checks, and that may include criminal background checks.  But recent changes at the EEOC could put your company at risk of a discrimination complaint. Employment attorney Robert Ottinger shares what you need to know to protect your company from legal trouble.

Notify the state of changes in your business. If your business is an LLC, be sure you are following the rules. You are required to inform the state of certain changes you make to your business. Changes in company name, even in registered office information or business address, must be reported. Nellie Akalp, CEO of Corpnet.com, has more.

The post Small Business News: An Acquisition, a Rebrand and a Shutdown appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Grumpy Cat is everywhere. This kitty marketing machine has worked her way into nearly all facets of popular culture, but the sour-faced feline turned marketing powerhouse isn't done yet. Now Grumpy Cat can even deliver a weather forecast right to your mobile device.

The Weather Kitty app is a free mobile app for Apple devices (and soon will come to Android devices as well). It gives users a look at the forecast in their area with a photo of a kitty that changes based on the weather and time of day. If it's warm, for example, users might see a cat outside enjoying a sunny day. Or they could see a cat curled up inside if the forecast calls for rain.

Grumpy Cat Weather App: The Grumpiest Forecast Ever

The Weather Kitty app's tagline, "Smile every time you check the weather!" isn't exactly in line with Grumpy Cat's philosophy though. So the app also offers an in-app purchase called "The Grumpiest Forecast Ever."

In the Grumpy Cat version of the app, Grumpy Cat can be seen with her signature scowl, along with grumpy captions like, "Your Forecast – 100% chance of failure," or "Get me out of here," if the forecast calls for snow.

The Weather Kitty app features over 100 different cats, which are split into different themes including outdoorsy cats and summer fun cats. Grumpy Cat is part of a premium version for $1.99 that also includes an Add Your Own Kitty theme and a Yoga Cats theme.

The app launched in early August as the follow up to the Weather Puppy app. Miami-based duo Shiv Takhar and Suraj Hemnani are responsible for the pair of weather apps.

For Weather Kitty, Grumpy Cat was able to draw attention to the app from the cat's many dedicated fans, further demonstrating her marketing power.

For Grumpy Cat and her owners, this is just the latest in a long line of projects. Grumpy Cat fans already have a YouTube Channel, an upcoming movie, a book, a coffee beverage, and a number of other themed products and features to satisfy their want for all things Grumpy Cat.  Grumpy Cat would make a great case study about how to market an Internet meme.

The post Grumpy Cat Now Delivers Weather Forecasts to Your Phone appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Whether you want to admit it or not, as an entrepreneur, you’re in the business of sales. You’re constantly selling to customers, investors, even your employees, on the idea that your company is viable and your products worthy of being purchased.

That’s why the book, Pitch Anything: An Innovative Method for Presenting, Persuading, and Winning the Deal by Oren Klaff, is relevant to you.

Pitch Perfect

Klaff knows a thing or two about how to pitch. As Director of Capital Markets for investment bank Intersection Capital, he’s got a long scorecard of helping businesses raise tens of millions of dollars from investors. He’s given and witnessed pitches.  He has identified key strategies for helping anyone — whether you’re raising money or just trying to win over a client — give a more successful pitch.

Getting Into the Psyche of Your Buyer

Too many people, says Klaff, focus on talking too much about themselves, delivering endless pitches and generally ignoring what their audience wants to know.

In Pitch Anything, he talks about the “crocodile brain,” which is the primitive part of the brain your target uses to react to your pitch initially.

The croc brain is picky and a cognitive miser. Its primary interest is survival. It doesn’t like to do a lot of work and is high maintenance when it is forced to perform. It requires concrete evidence — presented simply in black and white — to make a decision. Minor points of differentiation don’t interest it. And this is the brain to which you are pitching.

Klaff provides strategies for appealing to this croc brain using the acronym STRONG:

• Set the frame
• Tell the story
• Reveal the intrigue
• Offer the prize
• Nail the hookpoint
• Get the deal

You’ll have to read the book to learn more about each of these phases, but here are my big takeaways:

• Keep your pitch to 20 minutes. If that seems impossible, you’re overinflating your own worth to your audience.  You should be able to succinctly explain your “big idea” in 5 minutes.
• Don’t dive too deeply into the technical. You want to bait your audience and get them interested. Later they’ll have questions about the details.
• Own the room. Klaff talks about framing, which essentially is having the upper hand in a given situation. If your audience is late or not paying attention, command respect. Leave if you have to.

Who Should Read this Book

If you are a startup looking for investors, this book is heavily geared for you. I’m not seeking funding and I still learned plenty from this book.

If you’re like me and dread sales meetings and pitches, you’ll gain some great strategies in this book that you can put into play immediately.

The post Learn to “Pitch Anything” Through Persuasion and Presentation appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Small Business owners and entrepreneurs on the go already look for mobile devices to make their lives easier.

But in addition to smartphones and tablets, there’s a new gadget in town: the smartwatch.  The watch allows users to check updates “hands free” without even touching your phone.   Samsung has introduced its version of the smartwatch, called the Galaxy Gear.

Galaxy Gear Introduced as Companion to Note 3

The Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch introduced last week at an unboxing event in Berlin is the next step for these devices.

The new smartwatch was unveiled along with Samsung’s Galaxy Note 3, a next generation of the company’s so-called “phablet” device (larger than a standard phone, with features like a tablet).

The watch is expected to work as a companion to the phone-tablet hybrid. A 1.63-inch display allows you to check updates from your phone at a glance to your wrist, and use about 70 pre-loaded apps, mostly with gesture commands.

But what may be the best features allow you to initiate a phone call from the watch or take video or photos from a wristband camera both in conjunction with your mobile device.

Make Calls or Take Video

Using the watch’s S Voice feature activated by double-clicking a button on the side of the display lets you make a call or dictate a text message to your mobile device hands free.

The 1.9-megapixel camera on the wristband can take photos or short videos that can be stored temporarily with about 4 GB of storage on the watch or sent directly to your mobile device.

It’s not clear how wide the appeal will be for smartwatches.  As one commenter here at Small Business Trends predicted on an earlier article about smartwatches, it may be that the only people who are interested in smartwatches are the same people who bought a calculator watch a few decades ago when those were hot.  Time will tell.

Image: Samsung

The post Samsung Galaxy Gear Smartwatch Features Camera, Voice Function appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Small businesses can use social media to boost sales and gain attention from potential customers. Unfortunately, a lot of small businesses make mistakes when trying to harness the power of social media. Some of those are rookie mistakes that are easy to avoid, if you just are conscious of them and work to handle them differently.

Below are 5 of the biggest small business social media mistakes to avoid.

1. Trying to Do Too Much

Using social media well takes a lot of time. That’s a resource that small businesses rarely have. It’s usually best to focus on doing one or two things well instead of using every social media platform available to you.

Instead of doing a bad job on five social media platforms, focus on one that you already know how to use. If you have time later, you can always decide to branch out.

2. Wasting Resources on Ineffective Social Media Campaigns

To use social media properly, you need to know what works and what doesn’t. That means you have to measure the success of your strategies.

If you find that your Twitter posts don’t inspire customers, then stop wasting time on them.

If you see that your website gets a lot of attention after you post a video on Facebook, then you should spend more time and money doing that, instead.

3. Missed Branding Opportunities

Your company needs a coherent branding term that takes advantage of social media. When you set up profiles, make sure you fill out every piece of information. Most social media sites will give you the chance to include your logo, images, website links and business description.

Taking advantage of these branding opportunities will help customers identify your business. Filling out your company’s profile can also help people find you online. If you skip any aspect of this, then you’ll lose at least one sale. That’s one too many.

4. Speaking Without Listening

Social media isn’t about you constantly sending messages to your customers. It’s about starting a conversation.

That means you have to pay attention to what people post on your profile. You should thank people for their kind words and address comments from disgruntled customers. It doesn’t look good for bad comments to sit on your page. If you address those comments with positive, affirmative messages, you can educate your target audience and placate unhappy customers.

This is also a great opportunity for you to learn more about what your customers want. If you don’t pay attention to them, you’ll never learn from their suggestions.

5. Leaving Social Media Profiles Unattended or Inactive

Social media is a commitment that requires a little time every day. If you don’t have time to submit a post or send a tweet, then you shouldn’t even bother getting involved.

Yes, people expect businesses to have profiles on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms, but it’s better to disappoint them than to ignore them. When customers see an inactive profile, they could assume that you’ve gone out of business. When they find out that you don’t have a profile, they think, “Why doesn’t so-and-so have a Facebook profile?” It might bewilder them momentarily, but it doesn’t keep them away permanently.

What other small business social media mistakes have you seen?

Images via Shutterstock: Struggling, Trapped, Fail, Talking, Napping

The post 5 Small Business Social Media Mistakes appeared first on Small Business Trends.

When it comes to content marketing, it can often feel like more is better. More content means more sharing, and more sharing means more exposure and engagement, right?

Turns out, not so much. In fact, even among notoriously short tweets, those that are under 100 characters tend to see more reader engagement than longer posts.

The question of whether the long form article is a dying art or not is best left to another post. What's not debatable is the fact that a clear and concise piece of creative brief content often does far better than one that's lengthy and weighed down with unneeded drivel.

Are you prone to producing long treatises on your blog? Are your Facebook posts more verbose than vivacious?

If so, check out these three ways to keep your written content naturally brief, without losing key information.

Producing Creative Brief Content

Cut to the Chase

A few different studies have found out that Web readers just don't have the attention spans they used to. While we could spend a good amount of time lamenting the effects of social media and video games on society, I think that time is better spent getting to the point. (Who knows, maybe my brain has been similarly addled by today's world of instant gratification).

Make sure that every post focuses on one thing. You don't need sweeping introductions, miles of back story and giant tangents.

Have another great idea? Make it another post. Want to include a bunch of history? Make it another post. Get my point?

Have Faith in Your Readers

See that right there? I cut a whole sentence or two out by letting you infer my point about splitting multiple ideas into new posts by letting you draw your own conclusion about it.

You don't have to lay out every single thing for your readers to get it. If you do a good job with the lead up, your readers will carry the idea through to the finish line.

Be Immediately Interesting

You have a very small window of opportunity in which to grab your potential readers' attention. That means that your introduction needs to offer up just enough information to hook them so they'll keep reading.

So that part about cutting to the chase? It's slightly less true when you're writing first lines.

The one thing you don't want to do is give your reader enough information to get a full picture of your post before they click your "read more" link. If you're wondering how this helps to shorten things up, here it is: With your super interesting hook, you get to skip the lengthy lead-in.

The post Brevity Is the Soul of Wit and Content Marketing appeared first on Small Business Trends.

It's great when a new book on programming or technology surfaces online, so I was pleased when I discovered High Performance Browser Networking: What Every Web Developer Should Know About Networking and Web Performance by Ilya Grigorik (@igrigorik). Grigorik is a Google advocate and open source evangelist who has spoken at several O'Reilly conference presentation.

I learned about the book while researching for an article on analytics and mobile devices. I was really impressed with an O'reilly video in which Grigorik outlined critical browser performance issues with mobile development. The result was my seeking an online version of his book.

Good Networks Need Speed

The reasoning for this kind of book comes partly from the growing demand for mobile devices and the increasing capability of apps.   It also stems form a growing number of plugins that connect browsers to useful applications. Business owners who have used Evernote or a Chrome plugin can see how a good application embeds itself into daily business activity.

The book is meant for developers, but its readability makes it worth the page turns. A small business owner who wants a deeper understanding of how the Internet works will gain solid networking insights.  The text is written to help you understand what happens beyond just what is seen in a browser. Acronyms are shown alongside diagrams to visualize functions and ideas better.

Take this explanation and visual for a TCP (transmission control protocol :

All TCP connections begin with a three-way handshake. Before the client or the server can exchange any application data, they must agree on starting packet sequence numbers, as well as a number of other connection specific variables, from both sides. The sequence numbers are picked randomly from both sides for security reasons.

[Figure 2-1 from High Performance Broswer Networking]

Examples like this are a boon for those interested in app development, but need to consider how Internet protocols can impact decisions for future development or security. When Grigorik talks about latency – packet delivery between a browser and server – a reader can appreciate its impact if mobile devices are involved: Mobile devices have higher latency rates than that of desktops.

This means a business developing a system to share data or files must consider how the volume of information transmits. That may seem straight-forward information given the recent rise of mobile devices. Yet Grigorik provides the elements behind that statement so that the reader knows what links to latency regarding those concerns and a few business examples to back it up, such as the following aside:

Latency is an important criteria for many high-frequency trading algorithms in the financial markets, where a small edge of a few milliseconds can translate to millions in loss or profit.

Good Networks Are Also Supported by Good Decisions

The book gets divided into the nuances of networking protocols, such as Transport Layer Security, types of networks such as wi-fi and mobile, and API-related protocols. Grigorik has spoken a lot about the developer experience, and this book delivers state-of-the-art considerations that developers usually see, such as real-time notification, WebSocket, and WebRTC.

The end result is a better understand of standards that can alter a project, because the segments contain terrifically researched information.

Any reader will feel better about the decisions behind the details, even if those technical details really require someone who is beyond creating "hello world" programming messages.

There are some books that get the basics perfect, but the reader must find resources to get into the nitty gritty. Even if you are not a developer, you may want to give High Performing Browser Networking a browse to increase your Internet sophistication so that your plans contain the best sophistication possible.

The post Read “High Performance Browser Networking” for A Better Internet Experience appeared first on Small Business Trends.

No business grows by itself. Businesses are well-oiled machines (hopefully) that have people, infrastructure, and a set of systems working together to produce things or services of value.

As a business owner, you need to be working on your business not in it.

Hiring a team, and helping them grow, is one of  those things we do to work “on” our business.  And it’s one of the hardest things to do in business.   Tough or not, there are rules for hiring and building a team:

1. Don't hire friends and family – without thinking twice

Ask Nellie Akalp, CEO of Corpnet.com, about this one, and you’ll likely get an earful.  She wrote a piece on the worst business advice for small business owners, and the first one she points to is "hiring people you know."

Business owners often look for immediate help from among their friends and family.

Here’s the thing:  you are in business and not in a family get-together. Hiring people you know isn’t a good enough reason by itself to hire. While there's a strong element of trust here, there may be nothing in terms of validated skills and attitude — key parameters that go into decision-making to hire people to work for your business.

Further, if you have to fire the employee (which could happen), a drama ensues instead of an exit interview. It may be quick and easy to hire family and friends, but far harder to disentangle.  Imagine what it will feel like if you have to fire your friend or a close family member.  That alone may cause you to look elsewhere.

2. Write a good job description

A weak hiring process leads to mistakes that can be expensive.  Why?  You’ve wasted time recruiting and interviewing, only to bring someone in who it turns out was a bad fit.  The person doesn’t last long — either leaving in disappointment or being let go.  Before you know it, you’re recruiting again.

Meanwhile, the work is not getting done. Existing employees are feeling overburdened.  Yet, you’re back to square one.   The entire process ends up consuming more time and money than if it had been done right to begin with.

Start with a thorough job description  – not some vague sense of what you want.  Now, I know this sounds like common sense, but let me tell you, this is often treated as unimportant busywork.  It’s anything but. You need a job description not just for you, but for others.

• Other managers and coworkers within your company need the job description. They may have differing ideas on what is required for the position. Don’t assume everyone (a) knows, or (b) agrees.  Putting together a job description and discussing it internally helps get everyone on the same page.
• The candidate needs the job description.  In my former life as the head of Human Resources for a unit of NYSE company, on occasion we would have someone take a job, only to turn around and leave within the first 60 days.  Why?  Sometimes it was due to not fitting into the company culture.   But just as often, the job wasn’t as the person envisioned.  The duties, it turns out, were actually different from those they expected.
• You need the job description for you. Until the job description is put together, you may not consciously think about what you need, especially if it is a new position.  The act of creating and reviewing a job description will force you to pinpoint your true needs.  When I’ve gone through the exercise, I’ve ended up at times with something quite different. For instance, instead of needing a marketing person, I might have realized I actually needed a sales person.

Writing job descriptions is tedious, I know.  But think of it as creating a solid foundation for the rest of the recruiting and hiring process.

3. Hire for attitude

Mark Murphy, the author of Hiring for Attitude, reveals in a study that tracked more than 20,000 new hires, that 46% failed within 18 months. A surprising insight from the research was that 89% of the new hires failed because of attitudinal reasons and only 11% had to quit jobs because of lack of skills.

Mark further states that while technical skills can be easier to assess for employers and easier to learn for new hires, attitude is a gray area, which is hard to assess.  Also, you can't train people on attitude (at least not as efficiently as you can train them on skills). Mark helpfully provides 6 tips on hiring for attitude as an afterthought.

Bottom line: yes, skills are very important.  But skills aren’t the only thing.  Skills are what you use to weed out the candidate pool.  Attitude is what you use to select the right person from among the qualified candidates.  And attitude is something that you can assess during the interview process.

4. Learn how to interview when hiring a team

Most businesses just don't get it. Interviewing is a skill that must be practiced and learned just like any other skill. Behavioral questions that employers ask during interviews are not always the right mode of asking questions and are plagued with mistakes.

Carrie Sloan of Fox Business points to a few confessions HR experts made related to their mistakes in interviews.

I prefer to think of the interviewing process as a mutual information sharing session, rather than a test.  Each side — interviewer and interviewee — needs to gather enough information to decide.  The interviewee needs to decide that the position and company are right for him or her.  And the company, of course, has to decide the candidate has the qualifications and attitude, and will fit into the company culture.

Try to structure the interview so that each side gets enough time to talk.  Don’t dominate the interview  in your zeal to tell the candidate all about the company.  Ask open ended questions to draw the person out, not just “yes or no” questions.  You’ll learn the most by observing and listening to the answers to those open-ended questions.

It’s best to jot down questions ahead of time, after reviewing the person’s resume. Don’t try to wing it. You may overlook key items you need to know.

Besides, you’ll be too busy thinking up the next question, to read body language and listen.  That’s what you really need to do in an interview.

Include others in the interviewing process, too.  Schedule candidates to spend a half hour each with key coworkers and managers on your team.  Have a team debrief after the interview, to get input and try to reach consensus.  Then your existing team will be invested in the success of the person who ultimately gets the job.  If you bring someone in without consulting others, in some organizations the existing people will resist that new person.  You want to give that new hire every possible chance for success.

5. Find “passive” candidates

By passive candidates, I don’t mean passive personalities.  The Adler Group recently conducted research on LinkedIn where 83% of employed professionals classified themselves as "passive candidates," i.e. ones who aren't looking for jobs.

As such, the entire recruitment industry technically operates on only 17% of all available and employable personnel pool. For small businesses, that's a huge pool of employable talent that's missing from the regular hiring process!  You should try to tap into that pool.

On Ere.Net, Lou Adler – the CEO of Adler Group – points out  a few ways.   For instance, he suggests creating an “ideal persona” for the job including demographics; career and personal needs; and the most likely companies to source from.   Also, in the first 5 minutes be prepared to tell the person about the terrific advantages of working with your company:  career growth, cultural fit, life/work balance, and the great team you already have.

Those sorts of things help you entice the “not currently looking” candidate.

6. Build your team with a vision, clarity of purpose, and training

You developed a proper system to hire people and then put them to work. Yet, work barely happens.

The real key to hiring a team is what you do after the job offer is made:

• Employees need to know what’s expected of them.  Are you guilty of not using clear instructions?  Does your business lack documented processes and systems?  Does confusion reign?  Training and systems are crucial.
• They need to see the big picture.  Explain the vision and try to help employees see it – describe it again and again.  We learn through repetition.
• They need positive reinforcement.  Do you always point out what’s wrong, instead of what employees did right?  Is recognition for a job well done unknown in your organization?
• Employees need a sense of purpose.  Help them see that they are doing important work that matters.  Your job is to help them feel  needed, excited, motivated.

Team building isn't a job, it's an art. It's a fragile skill that has people involved, including a collective set of emotions, desires, self-propelled goals, varying purposes, and different personality types.  It takes work.  People have feelings and ideas and desires — and you have to figure out how to read them and try to accommodate them, so you can retain them.   It’s not an easy thing.  It’s not a one shot deal.  It’s what you need to do everyday.

You will have times when you backslide, because no manager is perfect.  Don’t beat yourself up. Come back the next day and try to be a better leader.

Which of these rules do you follow? What does your process for hiring a team look like from the inside?

Team image via Shutterstock

The post 6 Rules For Hiring a Team appeared first on Small Business Trends.

While the global economy continues to see limited growth, there is one area that is continuing to see a massive expansion – mobile eCommerce, often referred to as mCommerce. It has been estimated that around 48% of consumers use their mobile devices to browse for products and mobile traffic is believed to surpass desktop traffic by 2015.

When a mobile user reaches your site, what is their experience? Is it smooth or complicated? To dig deeper, you have to immediately start optimizing your site for mobile.

Do you face difficulty measuring your mobile site? Is it not generating enough leads? How do you intend to provide great mCommerce capability? If you are equipped with endless questions, let me help you evaluate your mobile commerce site to ensure that your business also sees the right level of growth.

Understanding the following metrics is sure to make your site mobile-friendly.

Get Insight into the Mobile World

Before understanding the metrics, you should know exactly what to measure. To accomplish this, make the most of the analytics tracking software popularly known as Google Analytics. The software helps you to track campaigns, bounce rates, cart abandonment and even those products that bring in maximum revenue. You must first understand the way overall traffic pattern emerge from the performance of mobile.

The following three metrics will help you track user acquisition from different sources:

• Number of visits: How many people visit your website from a mobile device?
• Number of unique visits: How many different people have visited your website?
• Total page views: How many times are pages on your site viewed?

The most interesting thing you can track is how acquisition metrics change over time. You can see how the ratio of mobile to desktop traffic changes.

Learn User Behavior

The following three metrics will track users behavior to provide insights into whether a site is moving towards its goal.

• Page per visit: How many pages are viewed during a single visit on a mobile device?
• Time on site: How much time does each visitor spend on your mobile website?
• Bounce rate: How quickly do users turn away?

You can classify the mobile users into three categories of interaction:

• Browsing while bored: These people seek entertainment while waiting in line at the bank or in public.
• Browsing something urgent: These people seek sensitive information about a particular situation such as the next movie showtime or the nearest restaurants.
• Repetitive browsing: These people seek time sensitive information such as sports scores or stock quotes.

Understanding the mobile visitor's 'user mode' sheds more light on the behavior metric over time. This is critical as mobile shoppers have several restrictions. Their experience is impacted by the device they use as well as the bandwidth of their Internet connection. So it is important to understand whether you are managing these aspects or ignoring them completely.

Get the Conversion Rate

The following two metrics track user conversions and the value of each of them. The results show how mobile visitors contribute to a site's bottom line.

• Conversion rate: How many visitors proceed to the next step, such as registering or requesting more information or whether or not to purchase selected products.
• Average order size: This tracks what the average dollar amount per order is.

Concentrate on Optimizing the Design of Your Site

Richness and grandness will certainly not work with mobile websites. Mobile websites need to be precise to achieve better visibility. Remember that browsing a site on mobile devices can only be faster if the Internet connection is fast. Therefore, design the content and other elements of your site with an aim to make it mobile-friendly.

As each mobile device has it’s own characteristics, it is crucial to adapt to a responsive design template. All mobile devices differ in terms of the type of site content as well as volume. For instance, an iPad screen is more comfortable in displaying rich visual content when compared to the iPhone. Therefore, to offer easy browsing functionality, your site should be optimized so it can be viewed properly from an iPhone.

Responsive design can ensure that the entire site, including the home page, can be built, designed and used anywhere, anytime and on any device.  Not only this, a site built using responsive design is also capable of detecting the nature of inbound traffic generated by your site in smartphones, iPhones, tablets or iPads.

Evolving mCommerce promises online business retailers promising outcomes in the coming years. So as you track metrics, you can get a comprehensive understanding of how a mobile website attracts customers and directs them to consider taking an action and then moving them to complete that action.

Tablet Shopping Photo via Shutterstock

The post Evaluate Your Website to Learn More About Mobile Shoppers appeared first on Small Business Trends.

If your business has iPhones, iPads, MACs or other Apple devices lying around the office in good working order but no longer used, take note.

Those devices could be turned into credit for newer Apple electronics thanks to a new program.

Apple Offers Reuse and Recycling Program

Apple is now allowing customers to send in iPhones, iPads, Macs and even other PCs, either laptop or desktop, to be evaluated to determine if they can be reused.

If so, Apple contractor PowerON will determine the fair market value for the device. Users will receive an Apple store credit in the amount usable for new technology at any Apple Retail Store or the Apple Online Store.

If the device is not reusable, Apple will still recycle it at no cost.

How to Participate

If you would like to determine whether there might be value in any of your office computers and mobile devices, you can start by visiting the Apple recycling program page on the Apple website. Once there you can determine whether your device qualifies for the reuse and recycling program.

If so, PowerON will provide a prepaid option for you to ship the device and after final evaluation, your Apple Gift Card will be sent to you if it qualifies for trade-in value.

Media reports say some Apple Retail centers are also allowing customers to walk in used iPhones for possible trade-in at the stores, as well.

For more information on the program as a whole, visit the Apple website and check for further details.

The post Apple Lets You Trade In Your iPhone, iPad or MAC appeared first on Small Business Trends.

The ”I Have a Dream” speech was delivered by American activist Martin Luther King, Jr. on August 28, 1963, in which he called for an end to racism in the United States. It was delivered to over 250,000 civil rights supporters from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. It was a stunning sight.

Do you have a dream to start your own business?  I did. But, starting your own business is a very serious commitment today. It's not easy to do, sustain, pull off and you may not be cut out for it.

As I look back on my own endeavor and path, after voluntarily leaving corporate America in 2006 and launching my business in 2007, I probably should have asked myself some additional qualifying questions before taking the leap. It's a decision, I would absolutely make again.

It has been a challenging, winding and gratifying road and I know it is a decision that was right for me at the time, but it's not right for everyone.

There are a few key reasons why new businesses fail: Lack of experience, insufficient capital, competition no dedicated sales and marketing plan.

If you really want to leave your day job and take the leap into starting your own business, do a comprehensive self evaluation. Going into this kind of commitment with open eyes, comprehensive preparation, all the tools and resources needed to succeed, will greatly impact getting through your first year and hopefully beyond.

Below are 5 key questions to answer before launching your “I have a dream” business:

Is This Really What I Want To Do?

It's so important to be deeply committed and passionate about the kind of business you want to start or be in. Be brutally honest. If you don't love it don't do it.

Is My Idea a Marketable, Bankable Idea That Fills a Viable Niche

Make sure there is a viable market and niche for what you are offering that you can make money with. If it’s too narrow it might be hard to market. Going big doesn't always work, so going smaller with a dedicated market niche can be very successful.

Am I Qualified to Take on This Endeavor?

Basic skills normally only go so far. Make sure you have no skill gaps when it comes to knowing everything about your product or service and how it can help people. Become an expert and leader. Focus on exceptional and unexpected customer service that people will talk about.

Do I Have a Dedicated Business, Sales and Marketing Plan?

Being good at what you do is not enough. A simple business blueprint that outlines what you do, how it works, how much it costs, how people can find you is a must. Incorporate results and testimonials with a realistic sales, marketing and social media strategy and always invest in some professional branding.

Do I Have the Capital and Cash Reserves to Get Me Through the First Year?

The biggest reason businesses don't make it past the first year is they are undercapitalized and don't have the realistic cash reserves to live on while the business is growing. Know how much you need monthly for the first 12 months and if you don't have that in reserve, rethink the launch.

From one of the most successful professional athletes of all time Michael Jordan:

I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can't accept not trying.

Launching your own business requires consistent, strategic trying, so make sure you’re in.

Don't romanticize starting a business, professionalize it. Put everything in place to set you and your business up to progress and grow. Be realistic, pay constant attention to what is working and what is not and don't be afraid to change things up or walk away.

Here are some essential resources about starting and running a business from the SBA and SCORE that can be crucial your first year.

I had a dream, took the leap with faith in February 2007 and through commitment, consistency and the willingness to change and learn, I am still standing and continuing to move forward.

If you are ready to take the entrepreneurial leap and have prepared yourself to succeed, by all means go for it.

Dare to dream – it’s quite exciting really.

Dream Photo via Shutterstock

The post 5 Questions to Answer Before Launching Your “I Have A Dream” Business appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Small business owners and other entrepreneurs on the go will soon have an even better solution for taking important reading material with them. Amazon has introduced another Kindle e-reader, the new Kindle Paperwhite.

In an open letter to visitors of Amazon’s main site last week, CEO and founder Jeff Bezos explained:

The new Paperwhite is our best ever, with a new higher contrast display, the next generation of our built-in light, a powerful new processor, and the latest touchscreen technology.

New Kindle Paperwhite Offers Many Features

There are a few of these features that immediately jump out in hands on reviews like the one below.

First, Amazon has improved the lighting technology on the new Kindle Paperwhite. The new device is said to offer a brighter display for reading, even in sunlight, without being hard on the eyes.

Second, the new Kindle Paperwhite offers 25 percent faster processing speed than its predecessor translating into more rapid page turning more closely simulating the experience of paging through a book or magazine.

Other features include a Smart Lookup function which Amazon says allows you to look up a word, character, setting or other detail in the text via Wikipedia without ever losing your page.

Amazon also touts features like Page Flip, intended to let you, as the name implies, flip through an ebook page by page, chapter by chapter or skip to the end without loosing your spot.

But most important of all may be the device’s ability to retain a charge, translating into the amount of time you can go on reading remotely without needing to plug in.

Amazon claims the new Kindle Paperwhite can go up to eight weeks without recharging. (That’s based, of course, on a half hour reading wireless per day, so the average user may certainly need to charge it more often.)

The new Paperwhite will start at $199 with added features and connectivity available at an additional cost. The device should be available by September 30.

The post Amazon Introduces New, Improved Kindle E-Reader appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Capital expenditures – purchases of assets that will benefit a company for at least one year – dropped dramatically during the Great Recession. Federal Reserve data show that capital spending of non-financial companies declined by 35 percent between 2007 and 2009, when measured in inflation-adjusted terms.

Capital spending has recovered, but the level in 2012 remained 11 percent below that in 2007, when assessed in real terms.

Sluggish investment by small business is at least partially responsible. The latest Wells Fargo/Gallup Small Business Index, a quarterly survey of approximately 600 U.S. small business owners, shows that the fraction of small business owners planning to increase capital spending over the next 12 months remains weak by historical standards. While more small business owners were planning to increase capital spending than decrease it in every quarter between 2003 and 2008, the fraction of owners planning to increase and decrease capital spending has been roughly equal since the end of the Great Recession, the survey reveals.

The National Federation of Independent Business's (NFIB) monthly small business survey shows similar patterns. In July 2013, 23 percent of owners planned to make a capital expenditure in the next three to six months, four percentage points below the fraction that planned to make a capital investment in July 2007.

Actual spending patterns remain equally weak. According to the third quarter 2013 Gallup/Wells Fargo Small Business Index, more small business owners reported that they had decreased capital spending over the previous 12 months than increased it, a pattern that has prevailed since mid-2008. Fifty-four percent of the small business members of the NFIB reported in July that they had made at least one capital expenditure in the previous six months, less than the in 58 percent that reported a capital purchase in July 2007.

While the data are spotty, small business's capital spending plans appear weaker than those of big business. In the first quarter of 2013 – the latest period for which big and small company data are available – 38 percent of the chief executives of major corporations surveyed by the Business Roundtable said they expected to increase capital spending over the next six months. By contrast, only 22 percent of small business owners told surveyors from Wells Fargo/ Gallup that they planned to increase capital spending over the next 12 months, when contacted at a similar time.

One reason for weak small business capital spending during the current economic expansion has been the continued poor financial position of many small companies. The fraction of businesses that reported having increased capital spending in the Gallup/Wells Fargo Small Business Index quarterly survey correlates 0.92 with the fraction that reported good or very good cash flow, and correlates 0.93 with the fraction reporting good or very good financial situation, over the 40 quarters between third quarter of 2003 and the third quarter of 2013. Because a lesser fraction of small businesses has been strong financially since the Great Recession began, a lesser fraction of small businesses has had the money to make capital investments, contributing to subdued capital expenditure levels.

Getting the share of small businesses in a good financial position back to pre-recession levels may be necessary to return overall capital spending to 2007 levels.

The post Small Business Capital Spending Remains Weak appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Twitter, with its defining characteristics of conversation, makes our life easier in today's world. It is one such platform, where individuals can gather and talk about what's going on around the world – be it politics, sports, entertainment or emergencies.

But this popular social media channel was difficult to follow conversations on.

Twitter Conversations

With the aim to make its followers again fall in love with this social network, Twitter revamped the way Twitter conversations unfold in your timeline. This introduction has been marked as good news for its mainstream users who, for a long time, had been asking for a sensible way to follow longer conversations.  It has also released an update for iOS, Android and Web application with a new interface for conversations to take place and enhanced the sharing and abuse reporting capabilities.

This is undoubtedly a great update for the users who can now see the entire Twitter conversation between the people they follow in their timeline against the standalone @replies that have been sent. This will allow context-free tweets and users will get a better understanding of what's being tweeted back in forth in a conversation.

Conversations are an important part of the Twitter world as it's essentially how users interact with each other and build threads around any topic of interest. While Twitter's native app allowed an individual to track and follow conversations if they happened to appear in their timeline, those apps did not make Twitter conversations an integral part of the user's timeline.

With this new interface, conversations will appear in a chronological order in your timeline. The first three tweets that are a part of the conversation will be connected with a blue colored vertical line (as pictured above). In a nutshell, users can view more than one tweet at one time. Most importantly the entire Twitter conversation thread can be checked with a simple click on any one tweet. Users can also see the replies given by other people they do not follow.

Does Twitter Have a Plan for Android, iOS and Web Apps?

Yes, it most likely does. The biggest advantage with this update is that the iOS and Android apps also allow users to share any Twitter conversation with anyone over email. Android apps allow the users to share their tweets through direct messages and offers a 'report tweet' button in the app as part of the update.

Here lies the difference. Previously, this specific feature was available on third-party apps and this is not the end, there will be more updates. The new change has also brought the ability to report abuse or a spam tweet directly from Twitter to the Android app and Twitter Web interface. Although some of you had seen this feature on Twitter for iPhone before, it will be rolling out gradually to other users as well.

The apps now come in handy on phones with limited internal storage. But how, is probably your next question in mind. Twitter has reduced the size of its Android app for entry-level Android Smartphones. The twitter app is now half the previous size making it faster to download and providing more space for other apps in the phone.

The change in the Twitter conversation pattern will theoretically introduce endurance into the mix and thus keep people more engaged in micro conversation within real-time discussions. The video below explains more.

Images: Twitter

The post Talk and Tweet More With Twitter's New Conversation Thread appeared first on Small Business Trends.

The mobile market is becoming hugely important for online publishers. After all smartphone shipments now outpace those of “regular” phones worldwide and the mobile market is projected to generate $400 billion in sales by 2015.

So Twitter’s announcement today that it plans to acquire MoPub, a mobile ad exchange startup, makes perfect sense.

TechCrunch reports the purchase price will be $350 million.

What the MoPub Deal Means

MoPub offers publishers the opportunity to monetize their sites using direct ads, house ads, an ad network and real time bidding through the “MobPub Marketplace.”

The company claims it already serves thousands of mobile publishers.

Twitter plans to continue expanding MoPub’s existing advertising offerings to mobile publishers. At the same time Twitter hopes to integrate MoPub’s real-time bidding into its own ad platform.

In a post on the official Twitter blog, Kevin Weil, vice president of Revenue Product explained:

The two major trends in the ad world right now are the rapid consumer shift toward mobile usage, and the industry shift to programmatic buying. Twitter sits at the intersection of these, and we think by bringing MoPub's technology and team to Twitter, we can further drive these trends for the benefit of consumers, advertisers, and agencies.

In a similar post announcing the planned acquisition on the official MoPub blog, CEO Jim Payne said the move would be a benefit to mobile publishers too. Speaking to the company’s customers he wrote:

It's important to underscore that our commitment to you, the publisher, will not change. In fact, it will be strengthened. Twitter will invest in our core business and we will continue to build the tools and technology you need to better run your mobile advertising business.

Founded in 2010 by former employees of Google and AdMob, MoPub has nearly 100 employees worldwide and is focused on the mobile advertising market.

Founded in 2006, Twitter is a global microblogging platform with approximately 400 million visitors and 200 million active users each month.

Image: MoPub

The post Twitter Announces Plans to Acquire MoPub for $350 Million appeared first on Small Business Trends.

If you've ever bought or sold a home, you're familiar with the concept of "curb appeal." A home with curb appeal looks inviting from the street, with fresh paint, attractive landscaping and a well-maintained appearance making you want to go inside. The same concept applies to your retail store and with eCommerce growing by leaps and bounds, curb appeal is more important than ever in attracting customers to a brick-and-mortar location.

But too many small retailers neglect the concept of curb appeal from the get-go. Others let their once-sparkling storefronts disintegrate through lack of maintenance.

How can you ensure your store has curb appeal?

The secret is to look at your store through your customers' eyes. Pretend that you've never been to your business before and take a tour.

Create Brick and Mortar Curb Appeal

Start with Parking

Drive to your store. Is the signage easy to see? If you had never been to the store before, would you be able to find it? Does getting to the parking lot involve a life-threatening left turn across six lanes of traffic, or is there an easy way to get in? Is the parking lot well-lighted and safe, or scary and dark? Are there plenty of parking spaces?

Take in Your Surroundings

Stop and look at your shop from the outside. Is the area outside your store clean and inviting?

Recently, I saw a new cupcake shop with a cute logo and yummy cupcakes in the window, but the whole effect was ruined by an overflowing trash can and disgusting food trash right outside. I didn't go in. (The shop has since gone out of business…surprise, surprise.)

Yes, this technically isn't your responsibility, but you can call the landlord or take a broom and trash bag outside yourself.

Watch the Signs

Do your store name, signage and displays clearly indicate what you sell?

Last month I saw a new business with a great graphic displaying its name, "The Joint." That's a clever name for a medical marijuana dispensary, I thought. Then I got closer and realized it was actually a chiropractor's office.

A logo or display of a spine or skeleton would have helped a lot here.

Make a Display

Do your store's window displays draw you in? Do they convey the "brand" of your business (old-fashioned, chic, streamlined, modern, fun, creative)? Are your hours of operation easily visible to someone driving by?

Use signage, lighting and open or closed doors to tell people whether you're open or not so they don't waste time parking and get out only to be disappointed.

Put Out the Welcome Mat

When people enter your store are they greeted immediately? Does someone look up and smile at them, or do clerks continue their conversations or shoot them daggers for interrupting their day?

Since you can't test this yourself, have a friend or family member your staff doesn't know try it and report back.

Create an Experience

When someone enters your store does it feel as inviting as it looked from outside? Are there pleasant sounds and smells?

Depending on what you sell, you may want to add background music, scented potpourri or other sensory attributes to make customers relax, stay a while – and spend more money.

Sell It

In-store layout and signage are a science unto themselves. Paco Underhill is a retail expert whose books offer fascinating tips about increasing your retail sales through layout. One of his tips: Most people are right-handed and naturally go to the right when entering a store. Put your high-margin items there to get customers touching them.

Speaking of touching, did you know customers are more likely to buy something if they touch it? Those "Please don't touch" signs near your breakable items might be a mistake.

Keep It Clear

Inside your store, can customers easily find what they need? Are sections of the store marked so they can see where to go? Is in-store signage, such as prices and sale items, clear and easy to read?

When a hot new gourmet grocery opened in my area, I was excited to try it. But the prices on the shelves were in such tiny type, I couldn't easily compare and I never shopped there again.

Check It Out

Last, but not least, how enjoyable is the checkout experience? Is the line to wait clearly marked so shoppers don't waste time? Do clerks acknowledge people waiting in line? (Just quick eye contact and a smiling, "Thanks for your patience. We'll be right with you" can make all the difference). Do you place tempting impulse buys near the register to entertain customers and make more sales?

Visit any Sephora store for an example of how this tactic can make shopping more fun for customers, and more profitable for you.

Give your brick and mortar store a curb appeal checkup at least once a year to keep it inviting – and to keep things selling.

Curb Appeal Concept Photo via Shutterstock

The post Give Your Brick and Mortar Store Curb Appeal appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Small business owners may soon be getting the tools needed to add even more mobility and productivity to their operations. Microsoft, which last week announced its plan to acquire mobile phone maker Nokia for $7.2 billion, has released its Windows 8.1 update directly to PC manufacturers ahead of its mid-October availability at the consumer level.

Writing in the official Windows for Your Business Blog back in June at the time of Windows 8.1′s unveiling, Erwin Visser, General Manager of Windows Commercial Marketing at Microsoft explained:

We built Windows 8 to bring the most powerful and modern computing experience to businesses and to help professionals stay connected to their colleagues and clients from anywhere, anytime. Windows 8.1 advances this vision and introduces new manageability, mobility, security, user experience and networking capabilities that will be available later this year. And our goal for Windows 8.1: offer customers the best business tablets and versatile, next generation business PCs driven by the most powerful operating system designed for modern businesses.

The release of Windows 8.1 allows PC manufacturers to adapt their new hardware devices to the operating system. You can see a brief preview of the updated Windows 8.1 available on the company website.

What Windows 8.1 Offers

Aside from the return of the iconic start button, Windows 8.1 offers some minor tweaks to the way the operating system works. See a full review of the refreshed desktop environment below.

But Microsoft insists the big news for businesses is how the Windows 8.1 environment increases both mobility and security in a world where multiple devices are a business reality.

First, the new Windows more fully integrates SkyDrive, Microsoft’s soon-to-be-renamed cloud storage service, making it easier to store files in the cloud and access them from any device.

For businesses with security concerns over mobile access to private networks, Microsoft says Windows 8.1 will also offer features like easy but secure sign in to virtual private networks like your company’s intranet site.

Better controls will also allow IT departments to limit access to company data through personal mobile devices. Microsoft says the system will allow personal devices to access and store company content but will also provide an efficient means to remove that content later without affecting personal data.

ComputerWorld.com reports that the full version of Windows 8.1 will be available at the Windows Store on Oct. 17. The update is free for customers who have devices running Windows 8 now. The operating system will be available for retail sale the next day for people running older versions of Windows.

The post Microsoft Releases Windows 8.1 to Manufacturers appeared first on Small Business Trends.

With all of the forward thinking hype surrounding social media marketing, its older brother, the email campaign, is often seen as something of a relic of a past. But for small businesses, email campaigns are still an important part of any marketing toolbox and may even drive more sales than social media campaigns.

Consider the following if you're contemplating launching a new small business email marketing campaign.

Email Marketing and Social Media

A recent study of online marketing techniques found that email marketing generated new customers for online retailers at a rate of roughly 7%, while social media had a conversion rate for new buyers of less than 1%. That's a huge finding and it's a little bit surprising to everyone who's been saying email is old news and social media is the way of the future.

I'm by no means saying that you should deactivate your Facebook account and pledge to never post another photo to Instagram again. There's no one way to market online that will cover all your bases. Those forms of online marketing that rely on social networks do work, and they're a great way to build a brand image and interact with customers even if they don't always directly translate into immediate conversions.

That said, social media should be thought of as more of a long game, big picture strategy, with email working to gain more short-term conversions.

Tips for Small Business Email Marketing

Of course, like any online marketing, you need to have a strategy for your email campaign. Throwing together some text and sending it out willy-nilly is not the way to get that 7% conversion rate.

Try some of the following tactics to grow your subscriber list and send out high-quality emails that will actually be read:

Subscription Calls to Action

Post subscription calls to action on your blog, at the end of website pages and even on your social media pages. It's no use sending out awesome written content if it's not going to land in any inboxes.

Content That’s in Demand

Send the content subscribers want. Upon sign-up, allow subscribers to choose whether they want deals, business updates or tips about products. This ensures that subscribers will stay subscribers, and it gives you an idea of what kind of content is most popular.

Editorial Calendar

Create an editorial calendar. Know well in advance what you're going to send out so you don't find yourself scrambling to produce something.

Brevity

Keep it brief. Make sure that readers can quickly scan your content and get all the major information. Ideally, they'll be interested enough to read the whole thing, but no one is going to commit to reading a big block of text without some idea of whether or not it's relevant.

Check Spam Regulations

Don't land in spam folders. Before you send anything out, make sure that it complies with all of the major spam regulations so it doesn't get automatically funneled away from inboxes.

If you’re looking for more tips for getting an email campaign off the ground, Forbes's offers a guide to email marketing for small businesses.

Email Photo via Shutterstock

The post Why Email Marketing Is Small Business's Best Friend appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Katherine Coles started early as an entrepreneur. She started her first business at age 12 offering yard services to her neighborhood.  She solidified her reputation when she founded her high school pom pom squad and college sorority chapter, both of which are still in existence today. She later tried her hand at a gift basket service and a color consulting company, and eventually got to Mad Marketeer, her current venture.

Mad Marketeer is an online marketing agency that targets smaller organizations with enough sustainable infrastructures and solid revenues to need marketing solutions, but without the budget to hire a full-scale marketing agency. It provides services that are geared to meet these needs and are packaged into bite-sized, affordable programs perfectly suited for small firms.

Finding a Niche in Nonprofits

Mad Marketeer has found a niche to focus on within smaller to mid-size organizations.  This is due in part to Katharine's life long dedication to "giving back."  From serving as a Court Appointed Special Advocate for abused children in Northern Virginia to mentoring inner-city children in Boston to providing inspirational education programs to at-risk children in Southern California, Katharine is committed to improving the community.  And she does so at Mad Marketeer by providing corporate solutions for nonprofits at prices they can afford.

Guidestar states there are more than 1.8 million nonprofit organizations registered in the U.S., including public charities, private foundations and other types of nonprofit organizations.  Seventy four percent of all public charities and 83% of all foundations are "small," meaning they have less than $500,000 in expenses and few paid staff.   This is quite a strong target audience for Mad Marketeer to appeal to.

Mad Marketeer has worked almost exclusively with nonprofits since its founding in 2007. Its website division, PowerSite123, has been working with nonprofits for over 14 years.  In fact, their flagship program, NonprofitSite123, was developed specifically to meet the website needs of nonprofits as they tend to lead with the heart but struggle due to lack of business understanding.

Mad Marketeer has recently secured two large clients,  The Farrah Fawcett Foundation and United Way, both of which are nationally recognized nonprofit organizations. They also released a service assisting nonprofits in managing their Google Grant and have made the shift from project-based pricing to a more retainer-based model, which has proven successful.

What sets them apart from other digital marketing firms is that they go a step further by educating nonprofits and other small businesses on how to make better marketing decisions.  This gives their clients a sustainable foundation for furthering the success of their business independently.

A completely bootstrapped venture, they have started looking to become affiliates with companies offering products and services that compliment their own.  One such partnership they have launched is with another startup, Zuznow, which offers clients technology to transform websites seamlessly into mobile form factors.

Zuznow, founded by husband and wife team, Racheli and Chen Levkovich, provides a platform for automatically converting websites into a fully reflective mobile website for any device.   According to the 2013 eNonprofit Benchmarket Study, mobile listings are growing at about double the rate of email lists, with a median increase of 32% in 2012. Blackbaud and Common Knowledge say 73% of nonprofits allocate half of a full time employee to managing social networking activities and 43% budget $0 for their social networking activities. While non-profit organizations may not always recognize the value of SEO (search engine optimization), blogging, social media or other online marketing tactics, they at least understand the importance of an interactive, functional, easy to navigate, well-designed and easily maintainable website.

With current revenues of over $250K annually, we can expect Mad Marketeer to continue to add value to non-profit marketing in the coming months.

Niche Photo via Shutterstock

The post Mad Marketeer Finds a Niche In Nonprofits appeared first on Small Business Trends.

The new iPhone 5c may be the choice for the budget conscious entrepreneur. But Apple says the new iPhone 5s, also released on Tuesday, demonstrates the full range of possibilities available from smartphones today.

In fact, if this smartphone lives up to its billing, it could offer small business owners the most powerful phone yet for working on the go.

In an official release posted on the Apple website the same day Apple unveiled both new phones, Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing explained:

iPhone 5s is the most forward-thinking smartphone in the world, delivering desktop class architecture in the palm of your hand, iPhone 5s sets a new standard for smartphones, packed into its beautiful and refined design are breakthrough features that really matter to people, like Touch ID, a simple and secure way to unlock your phone with just a touch of your finger.

New iPhone 5S Under the Hood

At 7.6 mm thick and 112 g in weight, Apple’s new flagship phone is both thinner and lighter than its predecessor, the iPhone 5. The device comes in silver, gold and a color Apple calls space gray. But otherwise reviewers have commented how much it physically resembles the earlier phone.

Still, both industry watchers and company officials say it’s what’s under the hood, so to speak, that makes a difference.

Reviews and specs say the new device has a 64-bit processor, the fastest yet available on a smartphone. The faster processing is said to allow faster search and download of any content you need while mobile.

A better camera and better flash are expected to allow better still photos and higher quality video for shooting products, video content or anything else for your business.

New fingerprint recognition software is said to allow more security and convenience. A user is supposed to be able to unlock the phone by placing a finger on a round button below the four-inch display screen eliminating the need for a pin number.

The new iPhone 5s will go on sale Sept. 20 and will be available from carriers AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon and in the Apple Online Store and Apple Retail Stores.

Costs will be $199 for 16 GB, $299 for 32 GB, and $399 for 64 GB models.

Image: Apple

The post New Flagship iPhone Sports Powerful Processor appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Brands. Stories. Profits.

Story telling is powerful.  Stories help with branding, i.e., making an impression that stands out and sticks in our minds.

And businesses are getting better at telling stories through content – whether through video or in text form. Stories that follow a brand’s theme can be told over and over.

Let's look at some of the best stories in the business and unravel how some brands do storytelling in style:

Triumph Over Conformity: Apple Declares War on IBM

Apple is a legendary marketer, and the company exhibited a genius for storytelling early on. Thirty years ago, in 1984, Apple launched an iconic – almost cinematic – Super Bowl ad that blew customers and industry watchers away. Using fascination and mystique, the ad literally launched Apple into the big leagues.

At the time IBM was the dominant player in the computer world. Apple, by comparison, was a small player – little more than a startup. But it was going after IBM.

The company did this with a dark, science-fiction style ad directed by now legendary filmmaker Ridley Scott.  It was an artistic allegory that didn’t even show a glimpse of the company’s latest product, the Macintosh. Instead, the ad merely said:

“On January 24, Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh. And you’ll see why 1984 won’t be like ’1984.’"

The ad was an in-your-face assault against conformity playing off the idea of George Orwell's famous novel. It aired just once, and was incredibly expensive, costing nearly a million dollars at the time. Yet it made an impact.

The message was clear to the world: Apple intended to take on IBM – the “Big Brother” that controlled the computer industry.  Apple had cast itself as the individual against a conformist system.

Nike: It's All About Attitude

Nike doesn't sell shoes. It sells attitude. And it’s another example of a brand with a story-telling approach to marketing. Nike creates community around these stories and around its continuing theme of promoting attitude. Want proof? Head on over to the company’s LiveStrong YouTube Channel and you'll see how Nike showcases stories of people struck down by cancer. And how it builds a community of support for those who are struggling with the disease.

So far, the LiveStrong Community has racked up more than 2 million views on YouTube, more than 1.5 million likes on Facebook, and more than 250,000 followers. And through the community, Nike demonstrates how a good story goes social and how social media can be used to generate support and even raise funds for those who are suffering.

Volkswagen: The Force

What can one video do? It can tell an effective story, of course.

And how well can it do that? One look at The Force Campaign and you'll be inspired to create a story for your own business.

The video does a great job highlighting a single product feature – the remote start system of the 2012 Volkswagon Passat. You can’t help but laugh when the little kid dressed in the Darth Vader costume thinks his efforts using “the force” actually started the car.

Aside from airing during the 2011 Super Bowl, the advertisement has gotten more than 58 million views on YouTube to date.  Today, Volkswagen’s website features a “Story Board” a blog of sorts with narratives contributed by both the company and customers. In this way, Volkswagon has invited car owners to contribute to the story as well.

Threadless.com: What Do Designers Think?

Threadless is a community built around designer, designers who submit their creations to Threadless to be printed on household items, clothing and other goods.  It’s literally a brand built on stories.  Not stories of beating the bad guys, building unity or attaining some great achievement, but real stories from designers who share details about their lives, work, inspiration, and more. The stories connect with customers because of the "sneak peak" behind how the company works. Videos embellish the true story of Threadless and how it works hard to produce quality products for its customers.

Threadless recently launched a series of mini-documentaries, artist interviews which highlight individuals and the stories they have to tell.

Lego Story

Another example of a well-crafted story, this time narrated through animated characters, is that of "The Lego Story."

The video itself tells the company’s story not so much to convince but to share. It takes us back to the company’s origins in 1932, and gives us a glimpse of founder Ole Kirk Christiansen, and the principles and values he brought to the business he built. It also reveals the company's commitment to children's entertainment and education.

HSBC and American Express Open Forum

Brand stories are not always narrated and showcased through video. The written word still works well for some brands.

Across its global sites, HSBC curates and publishes content on financial markets, financial news, global business expansion, and much more. For some select markets, HSBC still publishes paper-based content such as booklets for its elite banking customers.

Another great example of how content marketing is utilized for brand image is American Express Open Forum, which focuses exclusively on entrepreneurship and technology. It leverages the power of community and the power of user-generated content to create a compelling brand story for its own lineup of products.

While we only mentioned large businesses and popular brands and their story telling successes here, the message is out. Anyone with a business can create a brand and build it using storytelling.

For some inspiration, you might want to check out these 50 Brands with Amazing Brand Stories. If you think there are no stories to tell in B2B, you might want to check out Eloqua's 5 B2B Brands That "Get" Storytelling.

As a small business, do you leverage the power of telling stories? Do stories create impact and value for brands?

Please share your ideas with us.

What’s Your Story Photo via Shutterstock

The post Telling Stories Through Content: How 7 Brands Do It With Style appeared first on Small Business Trends.

For small business owners seeking a lower cost iPhone, take note. Apple unveiled the iPhone 5c yesterday. The long awaited budget iPhone will start at just $99 with contract and will go on sale Sept. 20.

The New Budget iPhone Up Close

Aside from the price, the dressed-down version of the popular smartphone offers other departures from the norm. The phone has a plastic shell, but Apple has glossed over the cheaper covering by offering it in five bright colors: white, pink, yellow, blue, and green.

In an official announcement on Apple’s website yesterday in conjunction with a special keynote announcement at Apple’s Cupertino, CA, headquarters, Philip Schiller, the company's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing said:

"iPhone 5c is everything iPhone 5 was and more, in an all-new design packed with great features, iPhone 5c is designed with a beautiful polycarbonate enclosure that looks and feels so solid in your hand."

Reviewers agree the phone is in many ways a recasting of the iPhone 5 at a cheaper price. Features include:

• 4-inch diagonal widescreen multi-touch display
• A 8MP iSight rear-mounted camera capable of shooting 1080p HD video
• A FaceTime HD camera in front
• A slightly larger battery which Apple claims in specs will be good for up to 10 hours of 4G LTE data download (but obviously battery life will depend on what you are doing with the phone)The new phone runs Apple’s new iOS 7 operating system and will be available from carriers AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Verizon and from the Apple Online Store and Apple Retail Stores.Though the phone starts at $99, this will get you only a 16 GB model. The 32GB version of the phone will cost you $199. For more watch the below review from CNET.

Image: Apple

The post New Budget iPhone Unveiled Starting at $99 appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Catchy title, huh?

I will warn you up front that this article is going to be a tad technical, so bear with me. Since this site gets a broad audience with a wide range of technical skill levels, let me take a moment to describe what Layer 2 and Layer 3 mean, for anyone who does not know.

Layer 2 and Layer 3 refer to different parts of IT network communications. The 'layers' refer to how you configure an IT network, and the standard for network communications called the OSI model.

The reason we are having a discussion about layer 2 or layer 3, is that your choice of either layer has advantages and disadvantage in terms of scaling and costs. So let's dive in and take a deeper look.

The Functions of the OSI Layered Model

The OSI, or Open System Interconnection, is a networking model comprised of seven ‘layers’. It's a controlled hierarchy where information is passed from one layer to the next creating a blueprint for how information is passed from physical electrical impulses all the way to applications.

This standard is a guide that allows engineers to keep communications organized.

Layer 2 is the data link where data packets are encoded and decoded into bits. The MAC (Media Access Control) sub layer controls how a computer on the network gains access to the data and permission to transmit it and the LLC (Logical Link control) layer controls frame synchronization, flow control and error checking.

Layer 3 provides switching and routing technologies, creating logical paths, known as virtual circuits, for transmitting data from node to node. Routing and forwarding are functions of this layer, as well as addressing, internetworking, error handling, congestion control and packet sequencing.

To summarize:

Layer 2 Data Link: Responsible for physical addressing, error correction, and preparing the information for the media
Layer 3 Network: Responsible for logical addressing and routing IP, ICMP, ARP, RIP, IGRP, and routers

Pros and Cons of Layer 2 Vs Layer 3

Some advantages of Layer 2 include lower costs, only requires switching, no routing gear is necessary and offers very low latency. Layer 2 also has some significant disadvantages such as the lack of router hardware, leaving them susceptible to broadcast storm and the additional administrative overhead of IP allocations due to flat subnet across multiple sites.

Layer 2 networks also forward all traffic, especially ARP and DHCP broadcasts. Anything transmitted by one device is forwarded to all devices. When the network gets too large, the broadcast traffic begins to create congestion and decreases network efficiency.

Layer 3 devices, on the other hand, restrict broadcast traffic such as ARP and DHCP broadcasts to the local network. This reduces overall traffic levels by allowing administrators to divide networks into smaller parts and restrict broadcasts to only that sub-network.

This means there is a limit to the size of a layer 2 network. However, a properly configured layer 3 network with the correct knowledge and hardware can have infinite growth.

A Layer 3 switch is a high-performance device for network routing. A router works with IP addresses at layer 3 of the model. Layer 3 networks are built to run on on layer 2 networks.

In an IP layer 3 network, the IP portion of the datagram has to be read. This requires stripping off the datalink layer frame information. Once the protocol frame information is stripped, the IP datagram has to be reassembled. Once the IP datagram is reassembled, the hop count has to be decremented, the header checksum has to be recalculated, a lookup for routing must be made, and only then can the IP datagram be chopped back up and inserted into frames and transmitted to the next hop. All of this takes extra time.

Not Which is Better, But Which Layer is Needed for the Job

As you can see, the question is not really “is it better?”. The real question is, “what do I need?”.

What most businesses need is control. Routing controls happen at Layer 3.

But the downsides of Layer 3 are speed because of all of the additional overhead, and that can be deadly in multi-site networks where fast communications among tens or hundreds of computers, servers and routing equipment are necessary for such things as Ip-telephony, or even shared internet access.

Enter Newer Technologies Such as Metro Ethernet Work Using Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS)

Multiprotocol Label Switching is a mechanism in high-performance telecommunications networks which directs and carries data from one network node to the next. MPLS makes it easy to create “virtual links” between distant nodes. It can encapsulate packets of various network protocols.

MPLS operates at a layer that is generally considered to lie between traditional definitions of layer 2 (data link layer) and layer 3 (network layer), and thus is often referred to as a “layer 2.5″ protocol.

It was designed to provide a unified data-carrying service for both circuit-based clients and packet-switching clients which provide a datagram service model. It can be used to carry many different kinds of traffic, including IP packets, as well as native ATM, SONET, and Ethernet frames.

It also allows you to maintain controls on your end points using Layer 3 switching, so with the best of both worlds Metro Ethernet services can provide the speed between locations and allow network quality of service transparency desired by small businesses all with a smaller financial footprint.

Where you might normally use Layer 3 to manage traffic in ALL locations over internet connections… with the Metro Ethernet you can use Layer 3 only as needed at end points which saves you on equipment costs and IT support costs. And you gain speed.

The post Is the Extra Layer Better? Layer 2 Versus Layer 3 Networking appeared first on Small Business Trends.

To be an entrepreneur you must make sales. Your business cannot survive without them.

Most businesses flounder not because of a bad idea or because of a lack of sustainable demand for products and services. Instead, they fail because of a lack of proper marketing and sales efforts. Marketing is a multichannel endeavor while sales has just one purpose: to bring in more client and customers.

The ability to sell isn't taught in school and it doesn’t come with most college degrees. No wonder entrepreneurs struggle to keep the revenue coming in.

Sales Blunders You Should Never Make

1. Start Without a Plan

Selling should be a planned and organized effort. You can't take chances with success. The trick is to work backwards. A 5-year revenue goal breaks down into an annual revenue goal, which then breaks down to a monthly goal, a weekly goal, and eventually a daily target.

Let's say you plan to bring in $100,000 in revenue in 5 years. It works out as follows:

• To reach $100,000, you need to make $20,000 per year.
• Which leads you to $1666.67 per month.
• That requires making $416.66 per week and $83.33 per day.

The point is that by calculating the revenue you need by day week, month and year will help you plan realistic sales goals to deliver what you need.

2. Lack the Proper Tools

If you are in business, you have to sell. Make sure you have the right tools to help you accomplish this. You'll need customer relationship management tools to handle your ongoing interactions with customers, clients and prospects. This will help you keep track of sales, leads and when a followup is needed. And you'll need technology that lets you access information on the run and check on data about your clients at a glance. It’s also almost mandatory these days to have a website allowing people to learn quickly and easily what you do and how you can help them.

Having said that, the most important tools you can take with you is your presence of mind, wit, and a sense of humor.

3. Talk Instead of Listening

The first rule in sales is to listen to your customers. Say hello. Sit across the table. Ask questions. Sit back and listen. In time, you'll get the opportunity to suggest, talk, recommend, and explain. Until then, try to listen to what your clients have to say. Ask them what troubles them? What keeps them up at night? What are their biggest problems? How much does solving those problems mean to them and their businesses?

Sales isn’t always about making a pitch. Sometimes all you have to do is to listen and then ask.

4. Waste Time on the Details

When you get the opportunity to talk, explain, recommend, suggest or show off your expertise, don't make the usual mistake of launching into gory details of how your solutions work. For instance, when helping to create a digital marketing plan, don't bother explaining how AdWords works, how social media works, and how link-building, or blogging outreach programs work.

Clients aren’t paying for explanations. They are paying for solutions. So don’t give them details they don’t want or need. Tell them how you can solve their problems. It’s the only answer the really care about.

5. Take No for an Answer

Countless sales opportunities are lost when entrepreneurs simply take no for an answer. But what prospects are really saying is that they don’t understand how a new solution can help them. They lack the experience to see the value you offer.

In the digital marketing example above, a potential client might say:

This won't work.

It's too complicated. There are way too many things to do.

It's not how we do things here.

We've been running newspaper ads for all our lives, and they work fine.

At this point many entrepreneurs might give up. What’s the point, they ask themselves. They’re not interested. But instead, why not answer their objections? For instance, as a response to the statements above, you might say:

It works. I'd like to show you examples. Please decide after that.

Yes, it's complicated. Why don't you just leave it to me (us)?

Let's start something new. If the same old thing was working for you, you wouldn’t be talking to me today, would you?

Newspapers are dead. They might work fine but they are expensive. Allow me to show you how smart marketing is done.

Never back off. Never allow clients to push you away with unreasonable responses.

6. Belittle Competitors

Never, ever bad mouth the competition. It reeks of insecurity, and it tells the client that you aren't sure of yourself, your products and your business.

Instead, when asked about the competition, you might politely say something like:

Oh, they are awesome folks. We love them. It's just that they cater to enterprises better and we do a great job with small businesses.

7. Ignore the "One Call, Three Referrals" Rule

Your sales meeting with a potential client might end in a variety of ways.

First, of course, you might make the sale. But, if not, the meeting may result in an opportunity to meet again in the future. It might also end with an opportunity to collect some possible referrals if the potential client says emphatically they aren’t interested in your service.

As an entrepreneur and leader of your business, it is your responsibility that on of these three outcomes occurs. So be sure to ask for one of the three before you leave a sales meeting.

8. Forget to Follow Up

Statistically, only one out ten potential clients will buy from you after the first meeting or conversation. For the rest you will need to do followups. Forgetting to do followups with these people is leaving money on the table. Be sure to schedule meetings with these potential clients to speak again about your product or service.

Again, thinking statistically, if you met 10 clients every single business day for twenty days out of the month, you'd be talking with with 200 potential clients. Assuming only 10% of these clients buy from you, that leaves a list of 180 clients each month or 2,160 clients a year representing a huge additional sales potential.

9. Refuse to Do Right By a Prospect

There are times a prospect wants products or services you don’t offer. Other times your price is simply too high to fit a potential client’s budget.

You see the client still has a problem, but you can’t profit from solving it. Some would say it’s time to walk away.

But wait. Aren’t there companies that gave you referrals even after they told you they couldn’t use your services? How do you feel about these companies today?

So why not bring in a competitor who can solve the prospects problems? You won’t be losing an opportunity. You will be making a friend.

10. Say Yes to a Deal You’ll Live to Regret

There are times when a client wants something unethical, requests that you do some work for free, asks for inappropriate personal and professional favors or tries to talk you down in price beyond what you can afford.

Don’t say yes just to make a sale. There are plenty of fish in the sea.

Which of these blunders have you been guilty of?

Mistake Photo via Shutterstock

The post 10 Sales Blunders No Entrepreneur Should Ever Make appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Google Plus added an embedded post feature this week, following the lead of social media rivals Twitter and, more recently Facebook.

For social media marketers and networkers embedded posts can be a way of extending the shelf-life of the typical social media post.

For bloggers and website publishers, it is a way to share your social media content directly on your site. It also offers a way to curate content from various sources on a single page or in a post.

How to Embed a Google Plus Post

Directions for using the new embed feature can be found on the official Google Developers blog.

To embed a post, find the downward pointing arrow icon in the upper right hand corner of the post you want to share. Select “embed” on the pull down menu and a dialog box should open with the embed code inside.

Copy the code and place it into the HTML of your site where you would like the post or posts to appear.

For the adventurous, the Google Developers blog offers some more advanced approaches for embedding a Google Plus post on a website and gives some examples.

How the Google Plus Embed Posts Feature Compares

Like Twitter, Google seems to have designed its social media embed feature primarily as a way to draw website visitors back to the Google Plus page. By contrast, the Facebook embed feature seems focused on projecting posts beyond Facebook’s main site onto other publishing platforms including blogs.

As with the Facebook feature, Google Plus allows videos to play within the embedded post on a publisher’s website. You can also follow, comment on, and “+1″ an embedded post.

But clicking on an image will take the visitor back to Google Plus.

And, most importantly, as with Twitter, there seems to be no way for visitors to share the embedded post on their websites without returning to Google Plus for the embed code.

By contrast, Facebook allows visitors to grab the code directly from the embedded post, something that may ultimately make Facebook’s embedded posts much more shareable. Time will tell.

Do you see value in embedding posts from your or someone else’s Google Plus account on your blog or website?

The post Google Plus Introduces Embedded Posts appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Basecamp is often at the top of lists when it comes to a web-based, collaborative project management tool. I've always loved its simplicity and the fact that little to zero training in the actual software is necessary in order to get things moving.  At the same time, I've found that they often err on the side of oversimplifying, and there are a few features I'd really like to have in my toolkit. That said, I wasn't looking to adopt a complex tool like MS Project either.

I recently heard about WorkZone, which is supposed to offer a bit more flexibility, and I thought I'd give it a try. To cut right to the spoiler alert, I was impressed. While the learning curve is a bit steeper than Basecamp's for administrators, the additional features are worth it. Better still,   admins get the ability to shut off features they don't want to use, keeping the learning curve as short as possible for team members.

WorkZone: The Basics

The WorkZone interface is simple for everyday use by your team members. The top menu is free of clutter and intuitive to understand:

Admins will be spending a bit of time in "Setup," but most team members will be doing most of their work from the "Project Tracker" tab. They will land on that page as soon as they log in, and it's delightfully simple to look at.

In the top left, they see this:

As you can see, they can easily switch views to see a list of tasks everybody's working on, see it as a Gantt chart, see a list of products, or look at any recent activity that the team has been up to.

The Task list takes center stage, and it's pretty self-explanatory, as this screenshot shows:

You can easily see who is responsible for what, and when projects and their tasks are due. The status column lets you know if something has fallen behind.

The red comment balloons in the PROJECT/TASK column pictured above, let you know that there are new comments to look at. To see the comments, all you have to do is click on the task to open them up and see them:

This interface makes it clear when new comments are in the system, and makes it simple to add comments to tasks, projects, and documents whenever it makes sense. Users receive email updates when comments are added to ensure that the messages don't get missed.

You'll also see a blue "email" button on almost every screen that you can use to keep in touch. If you set it up as an admin, the users will also get automatic email alerts about upcoming tasks and more. (We'll get to that in a minute).

Some might complain that this interface is a bit stripped down, but I actually like it that way. It removes the clutter of social networks and focusses on the two most important things: who is talking and what they are talking about.

This screen also directs users straight to any documents they need, and project or task information.

Once they've completed a task, all they need to do is return to the Task List, click the box in the status column, and mark it as complete:

What I really love about all of this is how simple the interface is. It would take little or no training to teach your team to use this interface.

The other key section for your team is the "reports" tab. If I had one complaint with WorkZone, it would be that the sidebar looks a bit more intimidating than it actually is. These reports give you all the same information that you can find in the Task List, but make it easy to sift through the information to find something specific.

This reports area is one of the features that some other platforms out there could really use, but that they have neglected for fear of cluttering their interface. I personally think it's worth the trade-off.

The most useful feature here is the "To-do list" which your team members can use to see what they have ahead of them. This is the same information they're getting from the task list, but meant specifically for them.

If you enable it, they can also use it to see what other team members are working on.

Reports like these are what make WorkZone especially helpful when you're dealing with a large number of people and projects, where it starts to get difficult to determine who is doing what and when. And if you’re wondering about price, it starts at $200 per month.

Benefits of This Project Management Tool

So, in the big picture of things, what is WorkZone useful for?

All in all, I would say WorkZone is most suitable for entrepreneurs and managers who want something relatively simple, but who are looking for a few more capabilities than other collaborative platforms that have stripped down their interfaces. For example:

• Task dependencies– WorkZone allows you to schedule tasks so that if deadlines don't get met, subsequent tasks get pushed forward. This is one thing that Basecamp is missing in its arsenal.
• Subtasks– While management should never go crazy with subtasks, the inability to create them is a design flaw for many of us in management. There are some tasks that you just can't plan properly without breaking up into smaller goals.
• Cross-Project Views– The Task List may be simple, but it doesn't limit your view to a single project at a time. Software built with a single-project focus is really only useful for startups, and isn't always the best choice for a business, even a small one, that has multiple projects to work on at a time.
• Time-Tracking– WorkZone makes it relatively easy to see where time is being used, and by who, so that you can allocate resources accordingly. It's no substitute for a time tracker app like Toggl, but it's nice to have time tracking fully integrated with your project management software.

Putting it all together, I wouldn't necessarily make the controversial claim that WorkZone is better than Basecamp — but I would say that it's a better choice for entrepreneurs and managers who are dealing with something fairly complicated, but who still want a simple, collaborative interface in their project management tool.

The post How Does WorkZone Stack Up? A Review appeared first on Small Business Trends.

There’s now another new program to turn your working smartphones into credit towards purchase of newer models. If you have used iPhones, Samsung phones or one of more than a hundred other qualifying smartphones hanging around the office, it may be time to collect them.

Less than two weeks after Apple announced expansion of its electronics recycling program to include trade-in of smartphones at its retail stores, mega retailer Walmart has followed suit.

How the Walmart Trade-In Program Works

Walmart says its new smartphone trade-in program set to begin Sept. 21 – the day after the recently announced iPhone 5c and iPhone 5s go on sale – will be limited to its U.S. locations.

But that still includes more than 3,600 Walmart and Sam’s Club stores. The retailer is trying to position itself as the most cost effective location to purchase and upgrade mobile devices.

In an official announcement introducing the program, Steve Bratspies, executive vice president of general merchandise for Walmart U.S. explains:

More and more, customers are choosing where they purchase new smartphones based on where they’ll get the best value for their trade-ins. Our goal is to give them more value for their old devices and the lowest price for their new one…

Walmart will offer between $50 and $300 worth of store credit toward purchase of a new smartphone with a two year contract from carriers AT&T, Verizon Wireless or Sprint.

The company says it will also offer credit for smartphones available with prepaid plans like StraightTalk.

To participate, take used smartphones to an associate in the electronics department at a local Walmart or Sam’s Club for evaluation. Walmart also provides credit for trade-in of used tablets, laptops and other devices through its online “gadgets to giftcards” program.

Best Buy offers a similar online trade-in option for lightly used electronics devices.

Image: Walmart

The post Walmart Offers Smartphone Trade-In Program appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Merchants and retailers are often on the front lines of managing payment card fraud. Online businesses face a unique challenge because all purchases are made as a "card not present" transaction. But there are red flags to look out for and security measures to put in place that will help minimize losses from online credit card fraud.

Steve Chou, co-founder of Bumblebee Linens, has had years of experience dealing with online credit card transactions in his e-commerce business. We reached out to him to share some of his "insider" tips and expertise, along with additional pointers. Below are 10 tips to prevent online credit card fraud:

1. Be wary of expedited shipping when billing and shipping addresses differ.

When the "bill to" and "ship to" addresses are different and the customer is asking for expedited shipping, there’s a high possibility for fraud, Chou explains. Also, when the "ship to" address is not the same as the billing address for the card, you are at greater risk of it being a fraudulent transaction. Different billing and shipping addresses are not always a sure sign of fraud (for example, honest customers may order items as gifts). But for all large orders that fit this profile, always call to try to match the phone number as well.

2. Make sure IP location and credit card address match up.

Chou recommends watching out for IP addresses from overseas that don’t match the address on the credit card used in a payment. You can manually research an IP address at a site like IP-Lookup.net.

One way to cut down on the number of these kinds of transactions is to restrict all IP addresses that originate from countries where you don’t offer shipping. Simply program your site to prevent such visitors from checking out in the first place. Some e-commerce software platforms provide settings for you to block IP addresses, without requiring custom programming.

3. Watch out for suspicious email accounts.

Some email addresses can be a dead giveaway tipping you off you’ve received a fraudulent order, says Chou. Always check the email address used when placing that order. Does it read something like bgh3423679@yahoo.com? If so, it’s a red flag.

4. Do some research on that suspect address.

One way to detect a possible fraudulent credit card transaction is to research the billing address or shipping address being used for the order. Fortunately, there are tools that can make it easier to do this. Chou suggests using Google maps or Zillow to try to assess whether the address is legitimate. You can use a service such as ZabaSearch to make sure the person actually lives at the address in question or use address verification services offered by payment brands.

5. Keep a log of credit card numbers.

Chou suggests keeping a log of whenever a customer tries to enter in a credit card number. If the number of times is five or higher, it’s likely to be fraud. Most credit card processors will allow you to review the batch transactions for the day. Scammers will attempt many transactions using multiple credit card numbers. Be sure to flag these.

6. Consider using a fraud profiling service.

Though it may not be necessary for every online store, a fraud profiling service such as MaxMind is another option, says Chou. These services cross reference IP addresses, names, previous purchases and more. Studying per-purchase behaviors allows these companies to give you a more informed assessment around each transaction, and to identify high risk transactions. Some e-commerce platforms such as Volusion offer add-on fraud profiling services that work with their software.

7. Restrict the number of declined transactions.

Chou explains when scammers try to make fraudulent transactions, sometimes this is done via a malicious software script where many credit card numbers are tried in succession. Since you may incur a fee for each declined transaction — even if it doesn't go through — the solution is to restrict the number of times a user can incorrectly enter in credit card numbers. Ban them once they exceed that number of attempted transactions.

8. Always require the Security Code.

This security code is typically a three-digit number printed on the back of the card (in the case of American Express, four digits on the card front). It is not stored in the magnetic strip or embossed on the card, so it can't be as easily retrieved by thieves unless the card is in hand. This code goes by different names depending on the credit card brand: Visa calls it a CVV2, MasterCard calls it a CVC2, and American Express calls it the CID.

9. Ship your orders using tracking numbers and require signatures.

A tracking number helps prove a package was delivered, of course. While this may not protect your business in the case of outright criminals, it may help if you get into a dispute with a legitimate customer who says they never received the package, but you are sure it arrived. For expensive items, always require a signature upon delivery.

10. Strengthen your website security measures.

Beyond the individual credit card transaction, pay attention to the security of your entire website and e-commerce processes. Cyber attacks on small businesses are increasing, mostly because small business websites are perceived as softer targets than larger corporations.

Make sure your systems and services are PCI-compliant (i.e., meeting the payment card industry's security standards for e-commerce transactions) at every step of the way. Visa and MasterCard maintain lists of certified PCI-compliant providers: Visa certified PCI-compliant providers; MasterCard certified PCI-compliant providers.  The major e-commerce software platforms or shopping cart providers will have information on their websites about being PCI compliant. In addition, Visa has an animated business guide to data security that I recommend you watch. MasterCard also offers online fraud prevention training for merchants.

Some e-commerce sites use a "trust mark" security service that scans daily to search for malware and vulnerabilities. Examples are Truste, Verisgn or McAfee Secure. These services help you avoid and/or catch problems quickly — in addition to increasing consumer trust.

Your e-commerce software platform — especially a hosted e-commerce service — may integrate advanced security measures and handle it all for you as part of their service. Don't assume — be sure to check.

No matter what software you use, always update to the latest version as it becomes available. Updates could include security patches vital to avoiding a breach of your site. One vulnerability on your server — even if it's not in your e-commerce software but in a different software program on the same server — could open a backdoor for cybercriminals to get into all your customer data and steal credit card numbers and other sensitive information. And that could cause you much greater losses and headaches than a fraudulent credit card transaction.

For more information on avoiding fraud at your business and online credit card fraud, you can check out Community Merchants USA's resources online.

Credit Fraud Photo via Shutterstock

The post 10 Tips for Preventing Online Credit Card Fraud appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Millions of followers on Twitter, and a similar number of fans on Facebook don't just happen by accident. They are the result of doing something right.

If you want to learn how to do  social media marketing correctly, start by watching the leaders, the power users, if you will.  Checkout their techniques and learn from the best.

Social Media Power Users Marketing Habits

1. Gary Vaynerchuck

[Image: Wikipedia]

Vaynerchuck is a passionate speaker, businessman, and a committed social media enthusiast. That should have been enough for us to learn from him but it doesn't end there. The man who took his family business from $3 million to $60 million in seven short years loves social media and he quips:

There's only one reason to be using social media: It's a good one.

Speaking to Dorie Clark of Forbes.com, he explains why he re-launched his blog at VaynerMedia, his social media consulting company:

The more content I put out, the more luck I have.

He also believes that:

Content Marketing is the cost of entry to relevance in today's society.

It's not good enough to just produce long-form content; you have to put out micro-content to drive awareness to it.

Vaynerchuck’s social media strategy is all about passion. He'd stay up late into the night, "bleeding his eyes out" to produce content that delivers value. He reaches out to everyone. He is everywhere. For him, social media is all about showering extreme gratitude on the community at large.

2. Sir Richard Branson

[Image: Twitter]

You'd think that the self-styled, self-made billionaire and Founder of Virgin Group wouldn't bother with social media, but he does. In fact, he is a celebrity entrepreneur who still makes time for social media in spite of having to manage more than 300 companies spread out over 30 countries with diverse business interests.

Branson believes that for a brand like Virgin, social media is a natural fit. He knows, and now believes, that social media changes the way his brands engage and interact with customers. For Branson, social media is a great way to interact directly with customers, pick up feedback, and have dialogues which would have been impossible otherwise. Each of his companies also uses social media, Virgin Airlines to improve the experience of their guests, for instance.

Most importantly, Branson leads by example by being authentic. He stresses that you can't force your way into the social media community.

3. Liz Strauss

[Image: Liz Strauss]

Would you get on social media when you are struck down by anything remotely life threatening? Cancer threatens Strauss, but she is now reclaiming her life. On her social media channels she exudes an intense energy and positive approach to life, even when battling a life threatening disease.

Strauss is the Founder of SOBCon, a high-profile business summit. She is also a social Web strategist and a prolific blogger. She is the seventh highest-ranking woman listed by Dun & Bradstreet while also being one of the most influential people on Twitter, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Her success, in life and on social media, comes from the fact that she's genuine. Her influence comes from the fact that she puts her heart in everything she does. She rocks because she brings value to others.

Can you do that?

4. Chris Brogan

[Image: Wikipedia]

For Chris Brogan, CEO and President of Human Business Works, a long-time social media influencer, and author, "Social Media is not a Vocation." It's all about purpose, tools, and a method. When asked in an interview for Blog Herald, Brogan reveals his secrets for success on social media.

He managed to grow a community thanks to the hard work involved in shining the spotlight on others, promoting others' work, and including others as a part of the story. He also believes in choosing channels, mediums, and conduits that you find most comfortable.

Just keep pushing.

5. Jeff Barrett

[Image: Facebook]

Barret runs Status Creative, a PR agency with a digital focus and a social engagement business. He is also a well-known social media influencer. Barret was recognized as one of the most influential Ad Execs on Twitter. He also contributes to Mashable and The Washington Times.

Barret believes in trends. He runs a weekly chat on Twitter which goes by the hashtag #BareItAll on topics around PR, technology and current events. Here's what he has to say about social media:

If you are trying to get coverage; a press release is good. But 100,000 people already talking about it is even better.

He also believes that "social media is not a billboard, it's a conversation." Hence, he tweets back. He responds. He stays active, and ahead of the game.

6. Paul Barron

[Image: Paul Barron]

What do restaurants have to do with social media? Ask, Paul Barron and you'll know. He started a "social revolution" in the restaurant industry and the $500 billion dollar market can't get enough of him.

For Barron, Founder of Fastcasual.com, the DigitalCoCo and author of Chipotle Effect, social media is an idea generator. It’s a trend mapping tool, and a strategic compass for a vast variety of information. He attributes his own success as a serial entrepreneur who started six successful media and technology companies to his effective use of social media. Paul gives to and receives from social media. He is a Top Restaurant Trendsetter on 2012, and one of the Forbes' Top 15 Social Power Influencers of 2012.

Who are your favorite influencers on social media and what did you learn from them?

The post Learning from the Best: Social Marketing Habits of 6 Power Users appeared first on Small Business Trends.

[iPhone 5C]

If you missed the news this week, there’s likely a lot you’ll need to catch up on. We’ve got you covered. Check out this quick run down of all the stories most critical to your small business. From the worlds of mobile and software technology, social media, marketing and finance, the Small Business Trends editorial team gives you the information behind the stories and more on how they affect you.

Smartphone News

The $99 iPhone shows new direction. The iPhone 5c is here. And, despite the new low price and plastic shell, many insist it’s just a recasting of Apple’s iPhone 5. But that new low price will definitely be a draw for many small business owners. Have a look.

The new flagship iPhone has a powerful new processor. And lest you thought Apple was only making budget phones now, the iPhone 5s may change your mind. Some call it a mere tweak at a high price, but with a better processor, better camera and other features, it could make working mobile much easier.

Apple launches in-store trade-in program. This is actually an expansion of an existing program already run by Apple through its website. That program offers trade-ins for a lot more than just smartphones. Still, it could be convenient to upgrade your iPhone with a simple trip to your nearest Apple Retail Store.

Walmart starts a trade-in program too. The mega retailer joins the party, launching a smartphone trade-in program less than two weeks after the well-publicized similar move by Apple. It seems those used smartphones in your office are of some value after all.

More Mobile Gadgets

Galaxy Gear is the latest smartwatch. Move over Dick Tracey! Samsung’s first stab at the smartwatch market has a camera on its wristband and will let you make a voice call…assuming it’s tethered to your smartphone. The question is whether it’s a gadget your small business really needs or could just as easily do without.

The new Kindle Paperwhite arrives. Amazon says the new device offers 25 percent faster processing speed. That means faster page turning and an experience closer to that of reading a traditional book. But what will be most helpful to the mobile entrepreneur may be the extra long battery life.

Software Rollouts

Windows 8.1 heads to developers. The new Windows upgrade has more than just the return of the iconic start button. There’s also greater integration with Microsoft’s SkyDrive cloud storage. Read about what’s reported to be an easy and secure sign in to virtual private networks and better control over company data.

New Apple mobile operating system due Sept. 18. The new iOS 7 for the latest crop of Apple smartphones will be available before iPhone 5c and iPhone 5s hit retail shelves or online stores. But what may be more interesting than what is featured in this new mobile operating system is what was left out. See details and a video walk-through here.

Social Media News

Twitter will acquire mobile ad platform MoPub. Specifically, the microblogging platform says it will acquire the mobile ad exchange for $350 million. Twitter hopes the company’s expertise will help bolster its own ad platform. That could include integrating MoPub’s real-time bidding technology.

Google Plus enables embedded posts. The new Google Plus embeddable posts are certainly an attempt to follow in the footsteps of Twitter and Facebook. But that could be a good thing if building your Google Plus network is important to your business. Here are the basic features and what’s similar and different when compared to the Twitter and Facebook features.

Marketing

Grumpy Cat forecasts the weather. There seems no end to the marketing potential of the sad sack feline who goes by the nickname Grumpy Cat. Of course, this kitty, real name Tardar Sauce, isn’t just a face. She’s become a meme. And the mere mention of her famous Internet moniker can sell anything from coffee drinks to weather apps like this one.

Finance

Capital spending remains weak. Capital expenditures refer to spending on assets that will benefit a company for more than a year. And they’ve declined by 35 percent since the Great Recession started says Scott Shane, Professor of Entrepreneurial Studies at Case Western Reserve University.

Image: Apple

The post Apple Phones, Trade-In Programs, a Kindle Refresh and More appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Business users may be waiting to get their hands on the iPhone 5c and iPhone 5s unveiled by Apple in a special announcement Tuesday. But before that, Apple iOS 7, the new operating system on which both new phones run, will be ready for download.

The Apple iOS 7 operating system will be available next week as a free software update for iPhone 4 and later, iPad 2 and later and for the iPad mini.

It will come loaded on all subsequent Apple mobile devices including the two new smartphones set to go on sale Sept. 20.

What’s Missing from Apple iOS 7

An official announcement from Apple lists a huge number of features available on the new Apple iOS 7. See a walk through of the operating system for iPhones and tablets in the video below.

But what may be more important for business users is what will be missing.

A so-called “iCloud keychain” originally present in the beta edition of the operating system was expected to allow more integration with the cloud. But that feature was yanked before release of the Gold Master edition of Apple iOS 7 to developers this week, reports MacRumors.

It’s possible the feature is planned for release with OS X Mavericks, the next version of the operating system for the Macintosh computer later this year.

The keychain was intended to allow Apple’s iCloud to remember account names, passwords and credit card numbers and have Apple’s browser Safari insert them at the proper time giving users convenient but secure access to all their accounts while mobile.

The keychain feature suggested more integration with iCloud across all the Apple devices you or your business might be using. And that integration could eventually work seamlessly with Apple’s new TouchID software also introduced at this week’s product and software event.

With the touch of a finger, a small business user or a small group of trusted employees could access your business files and accounts from anywhere with relative security.

Obvious Parallels with Windows 8.1

There are obvious parallels here with Windows 8.1, which just shipped to hardware developers.

That software provides greater integration with Microsoft’s own SkyDrive cloud storage system and secure sign in from any device including one-click access to virtual private networks.

Of course, devices running Apple iOS 7 should be able to connect to iCloud using instructions found on the Apple website.

But a more convenient integration would be a huge plus for small businesses seeking to access the cloud from multiple devices and searching for an alternative to the Windows environment.

The post New Apple Operating System Coming Sept. 18 appeared first on Small Business Trends.

"The only limits are, as always, those of vision."– James Broughton

How do the most successful companies in the world of business leverage technology for business benefit? How does their journey through the social media landscape allow them get more out of the social Web?  And how have they transitioned from providing customer service to consistently delivering great customer experiences that lead to loyalty and brand advocacy?

Below we delve into the minds of industry thought leaders in the SlideShare at the bottom of this article.  The quotes are the outgrowth of the thought-leader interview series I’ve hosted for the past two years here at Small Business Trends.  We grabbed some of the best quotes we could remember — inspirational and thought-provoking quotes.

From Terry Jones, founder of Travelocity, to Laura Thomas of Dell.  From Christian Taylor of Payvment to Jon Ferrara of Nimble.  From Loni Stark of Adobe to Cindy Bates of Microsoft.  Some quotes introduce us to new concepts like Zuora CEO Tien Tzuo’s thoughts on The Subscription Economy.  Others reinforce tried and true ideas, like Brian Solis on what happens when we lose our footing.  These and many more thought leaders voice their ideas to  inspire you, and give you insights for your business.  We invite you to take advantage of the wisdom this collection of business leaders shared with us over the past two years — and in keeping with the times, we’ve also made it easy for you to tweet shortened quotes if you like:

"Email lights the fire and social fans the flame." Tweet This Quote from Gail Goodman, CEO of Constant Contact

"If somebody in a business exhibits that natural tendency to interact in social media, let that person lead it."  Tweet This Quote from Laura Thomas of Dell

On social customer service: "I’ve found that customers want the right experience, at the right time."  Tweet This Quote from Frank Eliason of Citibank

"A social business [has social] embedded into the company's workflow… into the soul of the company." Tweet This Quote from Sandy Carter of IBM

"Ecommerce on Facebook is not just throwing a store up on Facebook." Tweet This Quote from Christian Taylor, founder of Payvment

"It's not just about how to listen, but to have a good team that can act & capitalize on opportunities." Tweet This Quote from Cory Hartlen of Salesforce

"The new generation of customers now using social media…want to hear directly from the brand." Tweet This Quote from Tu Nguyen of  Gongshow Gear

"Once something goes up on social media, you don't have control over it anymore.” Tweet This Quote from Chris Bucholtz of CMSWire

"Attention is scarce and when attention is scarce… there is flight to quality." Tweet This Quote from Loni Stark of Adobe

“Influence is the ability to change someone's thoughts or actions… you can't do it by force.” Tweet This Quote from Michael Wu of Lithium

“[Ask] how do we tie social, social metrics and social analytics back to… business objectives”  Tweet This Quote from Justyn Howard, founder of SproutSocial

“Today's marketers … are the people building community and engaging customers in a dialog…” Tweet This Quote from Kevin Cochrane, CMO of OpenText

On the so-called death of email: “…people are spending as much time in the emails as before.”  Tweet This Quote from Rich Rao of Google

"I think we are going to… see new cloud businesses blossoming… a revolution in entrepreneurship."  Tweet This Quote from Cindy Bates of Microsoft

"A lot of the small businesses that survived the downturn [did so] using technology."  Tweet This Quote from Connie Certusi of  Sage North America

“Small businesses… can now afford to use the best in class software… in the cloud.”  Tweet This Quote from Chris Cabrera, CEO of Xactly

"We expect from every website what we get from the very best website & get frustrated when it isn't."  Tweet This Quote from Terry Jones, founder of Travelocity

"The cloud can offer the ability to compete with larger companies with lower cost."  Tweet This Quote From Steve Cox of Oracle

"Information on an iPad is a living, breathing thing. On paper it is dead…."  Tweet This Quote from Jim Fowler, InfoArmy founder

"When you lose your footing you start to lose your relevance."  Tweet This Quote from author Brian Solis

"Small businesses are still struggling with marketing. Focus on fundamentals…like directories…"  Tweet This Quote From Tom Byun of Yahoo!

"Expectations every quarter are raised to a new bar with a new device coming out or a new application…."  Tweet This Quote From John Hernandez of Cisco

"I like to think of marketing automation as the orchestra conductor." Tweet This Quote from Phil Fernandez, founder of Marketo

"People’s tolerance for a product that…doesn't look like it works very well is small & getting smaller."  Tweet This Quote from TA McCann of RivalIQ

"It was buyer-beware — now it is more seller-beware.”  Tweet This Quote from Simon Berg, founder of Ceros

"The new way of thinking starts with the customer."  Tweet This Quote from Tien Tzuo, CEO of Zuora

"Workflow automation, by itself, is [not] going to be a competitive advantage going forward."  Tweet This Quote from Umberto Milletti, founder of InsideView

"The whole customer journey and experience is radically shifting. And most companies aren't prepared."  Tweet This Quote from Jon Ferrara, founder of Nimble

"Customer experience…is all of the different ways you interact & all of the different touch points."  Tweet This Quote from Ginger Conlon, Editor of Direct Marketing News

“When you look at a customer’s lifetime value … customer service is almost more important than sales.”  Tweet This Quote from Matthew Trifiro, CMO of Heroku

“Early customers are crucial … [they] are going to help you figure out who your market is.”  Tweet This Quote from Pam O’Hara, founder of Batchbook

"Collaboration is … built into almost every single business process you can think of." Tweet This Quote from Daisy Hernandez of SAP

"The best form of sales is really education…." Tweet This Quote from David Cummings, co-founder of Pardot

"Customers exist in a context of a life cycle – acquisition, transaction, delivery, support &  advocacy."  Tweet This Quote from Jeff Nolan, Ping Identity

"Consumer switching hasn’t necessarily been a new thing. But it has reached a new plateau."  Tweet This Quote from Robert Wollan of Accenture

"Big data is a new term and a not so new term…."  Tweet This Quote from Tamara Gruzbarg of Gilt

“Most people hate the idea of giving up value that they know they already have acquired.”  Tweet This Quote from Bruce Bedford of Oberweis Dairy

“Social… has drastically changed the relationship that businesses have with their customers.”  Tweet This Quote from Sean Whiteley, formerly of Salesforce.com

"Your job is to take care of the customer; your job is to make that person leave happy."  Tweet This Quote from John Pepper, CEO of Boloco

"Customers still call our president… It is really important [to be] connected to the customer."  Tweet This Quote from Annie Tsai, DemandForce

"Customer experience is not only about what the customer gets, it is about…how you get a win/win situation."  Tweet This Quote from Ed Kolsky, founder of ThinkJar

The post Customer, Tech and Social Strategies: 41 Talented Leaders Voice Their Thoughts appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Social media has so many metrics to track – how do you make sense of them all?

Even more confusing, there are so many tools out there:

• Some tools are suited to helping you update your social presence by reading and scheduling social messages, and collaborating with a team to respond to messages.
• Other tools are focused on measuring your performance on social media.  They give you great metrics and reports.

Today we’re going to focus on the latter — tools that are particularly strong when it comes to metrics and analytics about your performance.  Here are 8 social media analytics tools that will help you measure how well you are performing and whether you are making progress:

Adobe Social

Adobe Social is a part of the umbrella suite of products under the Adobe Marketing Cloud.

This is one of those multi-purpose tools.  You can post updates to social channels with it.  You can place and manage promoted Facebook posts from within Adobe Social.   You can use it for listening to buzz and following conversation trends on social sites.  You can collaborate with a team.

On top of that, it provides social analytics. One of the notable features is its predictive analytics. According to the site, “you can see how well a post will perform before you publish it. Adobe Social also gives you recommendations on ways to improve your posts.”

Adobe Social is not the best choice for very small businesses and solo entrepreneurs.  The website doesn’t have pricing readily available.  That usually means a solution that’s priced for larger enterprises, not for the most price-sensitive small businesses.

Social Motus

Social Motus is a relatively young application out of Australia.

It covers Facebook and Twitter — only.  You get tools to manage your Twitter and Facebook accounts to track targeted conversations, monitor your brand, prioritize your conversations, and even track conversion rates to funnel it all into ROI calculations.

Using Social Motus, you can monitor your brand, industry information, content performance, and niche updates 24 / 7, set up keyword match filtering, and assign monitoring or engagement tasks to your social media team. You can respond to priority messages from within the application itself.

The social analytics feature on Social Motus helps you to track conversions, shares, reach, clicks, and other metrics.

Cyfe

I love executive dashboards.  They help businesses stay on top of key performance indicators (KPIs) that matter.

With a dashboard, you can see how your business is doing at a glance.  You don’t have to jump around to a dozen applications to get an update of the status.

But a typical dashboard is an aggregator of data brought in from other sources.  A dashboard is really just a way of presenting data that has to be collected in other places first.  So that means, even with a dashboard, you need another application to collect social media data in the first place.   The benefit of dashboards is that they make sense of data — and present it in a meaningful way that’s convenient.

Cyfe is one such executive dashboard and it is priced for small businesses that have a need to view a lot of Web-based data  – stats on social media, Web traffic, server statistics, email marketing stats, and other relevant business data.  Imagine seeing graphs and charts on your computer screen first thing in the morning or glancing at them throughout the day.  It would help you stay on top of what’s happening in your businesses at any point in time.

Parts of the dashboard are plug-and-play. Cyfe offers pre-built widgets to sync up data from various apps you use and display it in your dashboard.  For instance, Cyfe can pull in stats from email marketing software AWeber, so you can monitor performance indicators about your email marketing right in your dashboard.

The number of applications you can sync to with pre-built widgets is still fairly limited.  But a message on the website says more are coming soon.

And never fear — you can create custom widgets to pull data from just about any data source on the Web to your Cyfe dashboard, if you’re willing to do some extra work to set them up.

One neat feature is that you can create public URLs and show a dashboard of say, stats about your website, to the world.  Or you can keep everything private, too.

Cyfe offers a free version and a premium version – some features discussed here are available only in premium (currently an affordable $19/month – less if you pay annually).

DashThis

DashThis is another dashboard application.  This Quebec-based application seems especially suited to agencies that manage the online presence for or help market for a number of different clients.  The focus appears to be on creating dashboards for Google Analytics, AdWords, Twitter stats, YouTube Channel views, landing page conversions, and more that are related to marketing.

There’s one big difference between dashboards and other types of social media monitoring tools.  The focus in a dashboard is tracking statistics and displaying them.  You’re not going to have the ability to, say, update your Facebook status like you would from within a multi-function tool such as Hootsuite.

DashThis.com gives you a way to assimilate, condense, track, and record your performance over time. It's flexible and offers a white label reporting function for agencies so you can brand your reports with your agency’s brand  (if you run a digital marketing agency).  The company also will create custom reports for you.

PageViral

If Facebook is a large part of your social media outreach strategy, and you’re very active on Facebook, then PageViral may be right up your alley.

With more than 1.1 billion users on Facebook, the social site can be a huge traffic earner, brand builder, and a lucrative channel – especially for B2C firms (businesses that sell to consumers, not to other businesses).  If Facebook is at the core of your marketing efforts, then you will want as much analysis of Facebook interactions as you can get.  And that’s what PageViral gives you.

Most of us are familiar with Facebook’s own internal analytics, called Facebook Insights.  Think of Page Viral as Facebook Insights on steroids.

For instance, the Page Viral website says you get “instant notification once your content is no longer visible on fans’ news feed.”  Try getting that from Facebook’s own Insights!

Page Viral gives you a single Facebook dashboard with data such as audience analysis, demographics, activity analysis, multi-lingual segmenting and sentiment analysis, decision analysis, content analysis, audience reporting and charting, metrics, and page evaluation.

If you have just a few hundred fans or a Facebook presence that is on life support, Page Viral will be overkill.  But for brands that are particularly active on Facebook, it could be worthwhile.

SimplyMeasured

SimplyMeasured is another tool that focuses exclusively on analytics and measuring – rather than on updating your social presence.  It does monitoring, competitive analysis, benchmarking, and analytics, providing reports and analytics data online as well as in Excel format.

SimplyMeasured offers granularity. You can drill down into specific data regarding a single Tweet, a Google+ update or a Facebook status update.

SimplyMeasured is targeted toward large enterprises and agencies that manage dozens if not hundreds of social media accounts.  The site calls itself “Enterprise Grade Analytics & Reporting.”  They say it is used by 30% of the top 100 Global Brands.  The service is pricey, starting at $500 per month, and up.

However, for small businesses they offer “free reports” that help you analyze, say, how your Google+ page is engaging, and which updates performed best.

Moz Analytics

Spending an insane number of hours on social media while indulging in small talk won't help if you don't know what kind of impact your "small talk," "managed engagement," and "brand conversions" have for your business. Marketing intelligence lies in how your social content helps you to bring the kind of results that you seek. That's when social search, conversation monitoring, and analytics tools come into play.

Moz's new analytics does more than just give social metrics and analysis; it ties it together with other facets of your marketing. Your social activity, link building, guest blogger outreach programs, branding, and other lead generation tactics flow into a single system giving you an overall view of how your content works for your business.

Moz started out as SEOMoz, then changed its name.  But the origins reflect that the company’s focus is much broader than just social — it’s on how your business performs online.

Moz offers other tools, which we have covered in our review of Moz search engine tools.

Presently Moz Analytics is in beta and you must request an invitation.

HootSuite

Hootsuite is one of those multi-function social media tools.  You can use it to update your status and manage your social presence on a multitude of social media accounts. It also offers analytics and reports, which is why I include it here.

You can post updates on a wide range of social media accounts: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, YouTube  - just to name some.  Hootsuite is also helpful to plan and schedule social updates in advance. For example, you can use the "auto-scheduling" feature for automated social media workflow.

On top of the updating functionality, HootSuite has built-in analytics and reporting feature for metrics such as engagement, follower/fan growth, and best performing updates in real time.  Reports can be sent to you via email.

Hootsuite’s reporting is very limited in the free offering.  Even at the Pro level it won’t be as in-depth as some of the other solutions we’ve covered today.  But for time-starved small businesses that only have a small amount of time to devote to monitoring their social media performance, Hootsuite’s analytics may be more than enough.

I once called Hootsuite “the gold standard for managing your social media accounts” in a small business — and I still feel that way.   For an in-depth look at the pros and cons, see my detailed review of hootsuite.

Conclusion

Of course, this isn't an exhaustive list.  Remember to check out our 20 Free Social Media Monitoring Tools, for more.

So, we are curious – what social media analytics tools do you use?  Please let us know in a comment!

The post 8 Social Media Analytics Tools – Including Ones You May Not Know appeared first on Small Business Trends.

I worked in a few businesses where you’d regularly have to don safety glasses and/or a hardhat and venture into the shop to discuss or observe some manufacturing issue. And every time I’d go out there, I’d see the “Days Without A Lost Time Accident” sign and, unless something had happened recently, think nothing of it.

Then, more than ten years later, I’m folding laundry and listening the radio and like a bolt out of the blue this cartoon appears in my brain fully formed. That happens pretty rarely and it’s always much appreciated.

Maybe I should hang a sign next to my drawing table – “Days Without an Epiphany Cartoon.” Then again….

The post Addressing the Real Problem – Not appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Looking for good small business events?  Or how about contests and awards for small businesses?   We’ve got a curated list for you.  To see a full list or to submit your own event, contest or award listing, visit the Small Business Events Calendar.

Featured Events, Contests and Awards

Social Shake Up Conference
September 15, 2013, Atlanta, GA

This isn’t Social Media 101: this is a celebration of how social media practitioners are creating exciting new ways to connect people within and outside the enterprise – customers, employees, managers and leaders. It’s an exploration of how we’re shaking up traditional organizations and communication channels to create a brand new form of business: the Social Enterprise. Sept 15 – 17, 2013

Hashtag: #socialshakeup

Small Biz Big Things Hosts Seth Godin in NYC
September 17, 2013, New York, NY

Join us at Small Biz Big Things in New York City for an evening of learning, networking, fun and discussion as we explore how small business owners can do very big things through innovation.
The way we work and play has changed. Big companies who have not innovated have failed. Small companies who have innovated are thriving.

Laggard companies are being crushed. Companies who can strategically innovate are being created and growing.

Will your business thrive? Will it survive?

Seth Godin will do a rare Q&A session, answering your burning questions about small business, marketing and doing work that matters.

Carly Strife, of Barkbox (and previously with Uber) will present her real life, hands on experiences, and best practices in how small companies can profitably innovate and grow in the midst of challenging market forces and intense competition.

WomanCon 2013
September 25, 2013, New York, NY

This fresh, one-day conference brings together amazing women entrepreneurs, both on and off the stage. Our incredible speaker lineup will help you learn how to get funding for growth, make your brand stronger, and turn your idea into a company. Pitch journalists live on stage with our media panel. You’ll also hear the REAL behind-the-scenes stories from founders including JJ Ramberg, Janine Popick , Pamela O’Hara and more. SEATING IS LIMITED.
Discount Code
SBTRENDS ($50 off)

Beating the Competition as a Small Business Owner
September 26, 2013, Online

Modern technology and empowered customers have changed the way small business owners market their business and communicate with prospects and customers. Hear from our expert panelists on how the most successful small business owners are navigating through these changes and how you can turn prospects and customers into raving fans. Panelists:
- Scott Klososky, Partner, Future Point of View, LLC
- Anita Campbell, CEO, Small Business Trends LLC
- Ramon Ray, Marketing & Tech Evangelist, Infusionsoft & Smallbiztechnology
- Robin Joy, VP, Mobile and Online, DocuSign

More Events

• The Social Shake-Up
  September 15, 2013, Atlanta, GA
• QS MBA Tour
  September 15, 2013, New York City, NY
• ThinkSales Sales Leadership Conference 2013
  September 17, 2013, Johannesburg, South Africa
• 2013 Incite Marketing and Communications Summit
  September 18, 2013, Online
• Human Potential Forum 2013
  September 18, 2013, New York, New York
• How To Build & Lead An Effective Team
  September 19, 2013, Atlanta, GA
• Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland Policy Summit
  September 19, 2013, Cleveland, OH
• “Legislative Breakfast” Networking and Panel Discussions
  September 20, 2013, Coraopolis, PA
• September Business Networking Mixer
  September 23, 2013, Online
• Entrepreneurial Woman’s Conference – 27th Annual
  September 26, 2013, Chicago, Illinois
• “BizBlast @ Noon” Networking Lunch Event
  September 26, 2013, Pittsburgh, PA
• The eMetrics Summit Boston
  September 29, 2013, Boston, MA
• Conversion Conference East 2013 Boston
  September 30, 2013, Online
• Demandcon Boston Sept 30-Oct 1st 2013
  September 30, 2013, Boston, MA/USA
• Context Conference
  September 30, 2013, Boston, MA
• SMX East
  October 01, 2013, New York, NY
• ONTRApalooza: Start, Systemize and Scale Your Business
  October 02, 2013, Santa Barbara, CA
• MiniTrends 2013: The Integration of Profit & Social Responsibility
  October 02, 2013, Austin, TX
• How to Build a Compensation Program & Solving Compensation Program Problems
  October 03, 2013, Orlando, FL
• MACsWomen’s Entrepreneur Summit and Business Expo
  October 04, 2013, Eastchester, NY

More Contests

• Women 2.0 PITCH Las Vegas 2013
  September 15, 2013, Las Vegas, NV
• The Citi Salutes: Realizing Your Dream Business Competition
  November 08, 2013, Online

This weekly listing of small business events, contests and awards is provided as a community service by Small Business Trends and SmallBizTechnology.

The post Take a Look: Latest Small Business Events List appeared first on Small Business Trends.

It’s time again for our weekly community news and announcement roundup. Whether it’s a new trend, a new website launch or a particular insight from entrepreneurs and small business owners across the Web, you’ll find it here. We’d love to have you participate. If you have a suggestion or a post you think would make a good addition to the kinds of stories we share here each week, check below to learn how you can get involved.

Now let’s get started.

One Online Entrepreneur Talks About Being Banned from YouTube (EasyM6)

We hear these stories every once in a while. Though those who tell them haven’t always lost their YouTube account. Sometimes they’ve been shut out of Twitter or banned from Facebook. But Liudas Butkus’s story of getting booted off the video site is an important reminder. Pay serious attention to a site’s terms of service and never count on a third party channel for your entire business.

Think Before Firing Under Performing Affiliates (Affiliate Marketing Blog)

And while we’re on the subject of giving people the boot, affiliate marketing consultant Geno Prussakov talks about how to deal with affiliates who aren’t bringing in sales. If you have an online business with an affiliate program in which only 5 to 10 percent of sign-ups are active, getting rid of the rest may not be the answer.

Choose the Affiliate Program Best Suited for Your Niche (SiteSpring)

From the standpoint of a website owner seeking  a possible revenue model, it’s also important to pick the right affiliate program in the first place. Blogger Salini Dinesh gives this overview of some of the programs you might consider. But when it comes to evaluating the best option, Dinesh insists it isn’t the affiliate network you choose, but how well it fits your niche.

Don’t Let Your Online Business Venture Put You in the Hospital (BizSugar Blog)

Crazy as it might sound, entrepreneurs sometimes push themselves too hard. Yes, it’s important to have the drive necessary to be a success. But it’s also critical to have some balance and stability. In this post, Dhiraj Das, founder of Linktons.com, tells us how driving himself too hard and with too many projects in his online venture became unhealthy.

Facebook Makes Promotion Efforts Easier. (Blue Powered by Cox Business)

Old regulations on the world’s biggest social media site were once pretty strict when it came to online promotions. Specifically, businesses were forbidden from hosting any contest or giveaway directly on Facebook. This forced most businesses to rely on third party apps, writes Adam Naide Executive Director of Social Media at Cox Communications. But all of that has now changed.

Social Media Success is Not a Matter of Luck. (Jenn’s Trends)

Last week, just in time for Friday the Thirteenth, Jenn Herman posted this clever warning. Don’t make the mistake of relying on good luck for social media success. Like every other business strategy, social media marketing is hard work. Don’t be superstitious about your social media efforts, Herman advises.

Mistakes Your Business Might Already Be Making With Social Media (XEN)

Assuming you are already using sites like Facebook and Twitter, here are things some companies still get wrong. Tech writer Kerry Butters shares some of the obvious mistakes. These are things like just failing to post enough or failing to respond to comments. But there are also subtler mistakes any business can make that negate the benefits of a digital presence.

Follow the Golden Rule (Ace Concierge)

Forget all the advice you’ve heard from social media gurus out there. Suzie Poirier insists the best tip for building a great community is the simplest. Treat others as you would like to be treated. Above all, Poirier advises, “acknowledge the voice of your community.” Have conversations with your audience. Thank them when they share your content with others.

The Absolute Number of Social Media Followers Doesn’t Matter

Author and social media expert Gary Vaynerchuk is all fired up in this video shared by Kumail Hemani of the BizSugar community. Vaynerchuk is commenting about the impact of a recent British Airways passenger who paid for a sponsored tweet to complain about the airline’s service. The number of followers you have on social media doesn’t matter, says Vaynerchuk. It’s whether your message reaches the right people.

Hope you’ve enjoyed yet another edition of the small biz community insights roundup.

We’d like to continue improving, so let us have your comments and tell us what you’d like to see in upcoming posts.

Also, if you’d like to suggest a story, please email us at sbtips@gmail.com or share it on BizSugar.com. If we think it would be interesting to our community, we’ll use it. Thanks for reading!

News Photo via Shutterstock

The post YouTube Bans, Affiliate Firings and More appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Instagram is a social channel that let’s you snap photos (and now video), add creative filters and share them with your followers. The photos can be posted not only on Instagram, but on social channels like Facebook and Twitter too.

Below are some tips from Instagram users for how to effectively use Instagram for business as a tool to build your brand.

Getting Started with Instagram for Business

1. Think before you click. Ask yourself the following questions: What is the purpose for using Instagram? What is the tone and style we want to portray through our images?

2. Become a regular user first. It’s always a good idea to experience Instagram as a regular user so you can see how people are using it. That will provide ideas for tying this platform into other social media marketing efforts.

3. Think about your product. What do you sell or what do you use to sell your services? Without being too promotional, you can get your followers engaging with your product. Instagram is about everyday people taking everyday pictures.

4. Establish a customer profile. Brands can establish their customer profile by carefully monitoring the types of content posted by their followers. For example, a brand noticing that a majority of its followers post images of shoes.

5. Coordinate with social media campaigns. How can you use Instagram in conjunction with your existing Facebook and Twitter activities?

6. Think strategically about your posts. Just because Instagram is a series of visuals doesn’t mean you shouldn’t think strategically about what you should post and when.

7. Choose your handle carefully. When setting up your Instagram account, where possible, use the same username as your Twitter account. So when your content is tagged and shared on Twitter the @username links to your Twitter bio.

Choose the Right Content

8. Show off your products with sneak previews. Clothing companies and even publishers may use Instagram to give "sneak previews" of new additions prior to launch date.

9. Remember that cuteness sells. It is a well-known fact that cute animals with funny quotes are among the category of images most likely to go viral. People like images that create a visceral reaction.

10. Announce new hires, promote your culture. Instragram is a great place to announce new hires, profile your staff and even promote your organization as a trendy, fun place to work.

11. Showcase your customers and service. Virgin America does a great job of giving their followers a taste of the company on Instagram. They showcase their customers and other fun things they are doing to make a person’s in-flight experience more enjoyable.

Use Instagram Filters Effectively

12. Begin with a thoughtful approach. You might not think that choosing one filter over another could lead to a noticeable shift in engagement, but it does. Using the right filter can create up to a 60% increase in average engagement.

13. Consider your location first. Instagram is great for making a standard scenery shot look much more appealing. Intensify the color with filters like Hefe, which can turn the average sunset into something spectacular.

14. Show a sense of style. Simple rule: If the photo does not look good before you select an Instagram filter, it will not look good afterwards. Instagram's filters help give your great photo an artsy and even professional look. However, you must make sure that the end product fits in with the style your company is trying to portray.

15. Lo-Fi is perfect for restaurants. The high saturation makes the colors immediately richer, and an average sandwich snap can have followers heading down for a meal in no time.

16. Experiment with retro. Instagram has a lot of filters which change photos into images of times gone by. Everyone likes a 'do you remember when…' moment. Think about the history of your brand, and use Instagram to show users a visual depiction of it.

More Tips for Using Instagram

17. Follow a defined theme. There are so many things companies can take photos of, so it is vital to think things through before you jump in. Stand alone style photos will not be as powerful as photos that are part of a collection or that follow a defined theme.

18. Show your brand’s personality. Businesses should look at their use of Instagram similar to the way they use other social media platforms. There should be a nice balance of showing the brand’s personality but also giving the followers information about the brand.

19. Don’t just advertise. Instagram is a great place to showcase shots of your products, services and how-tos. Of course, you don’t want to turn your feed into a series of display ads. Find a creative way to incorporate your products and brand into images people will want to see and share.

20. Calls to action work well. Don't be afraid to use calls to action on Instagram. Users will quickly scroll past messaging buried in the comments, but by placing your call to action on the image itself you're more likely to grab their attention.

21. Apply the 80/20 rule. Pictures of their products, products in use, happy customers and the environment in which the products can, and are, used are all sound marketing techniques. But those should only be a portion though of what a business shares to Instagram or any other social network. Approximately 20%. The other 80% of the content shared should be of other people, other things, other scenarios… things that relate to your business but aren’t images of your business specifically.

22. Examine your feedback. Definitely – you can learn a lot by what customers comment on and share, how they tag photos and more.

23. Invite guest contributors. Inviting users to contribute images to your Instagram feed is an easy way to collect content and generate buzz. Call for entries that fit a specific theme and ask users to include a branded hashtag in their posts.

24. Use hashtags for branding. Hashtags are rapidly becoming a cross-platform social media currency. They originated on Twitter and are now used on Google Plus, Pinterest, LinkedIn and Facebook.

25. Remain Loyal to your brand. Marketers who choose to add Instagram to their social media marketing tool box should remember to remain loyal to their brand image. Brands should never forget that everything they post represents their brand’s promise to consumers.

Introduce a Video Element

Finally, as we mentioned earlier, Instagram has recently added video to its features. Here Amy Schmittauer of Vlog Boss Studios shares some simple tips for using it effectively.

A big thanks to the experts contributing to the above Instagram marketing tips:

- Greg Fry, Founder of Careers Coach 1, 5, 7, 8, 10, 14, 17

- Sharon Hurley Hall, Sharon Hurley Hall · Professional Web Content Writer and Blogger 2, 22, 24

- Carla Mai Froggatt, digital marketing manager for Steel City Marketing 3, 9, 13, 15, 16

- Genia Stevens, President and Chief Marketing Officer, Genia Stevens & Associates 4, 25

- Rachel Sprung of Rachel Sprung on Marketing 6, 11, 18

- Janelle Vreeland, Social Media Content Developer at HY Connect and author at Lonely Brand Blog 12, 19

- Katherine Leonard, Social Media Content Developer at HY Connect and author at Lonely Brand Blog 20, 23

- Mike Allton, The Social Media Hat 21

Image: Instagram

The post 25 Tips for Using Instagram in Your Business appeared first on Small Business Trends.

One of the dirty little secrets of the book publishing industry is that it’s easier to get published than ever before — but authors are mostly on their own when it comes to marketing their books.

That’s certainly true if you self publish.

It’s also true for books published through a traditional publisher.  If you’re depending on the publisher to market your book for you, while you kick back to collect royalty checks, plan to be disappointed.  Unless you are already a household name, it’s going to be up to you to actively drive book sales.  Your work doesn’t end once the book is written. In some ways, you’re just getting started.

That’s where “Your First 1000 Copies: The Step-by-Step Guide to Marketing Your Book” comes in.  This is a compact guide for authors who have recently written a book, are writing a book, or are planning to write one soon.

This resource book by author Tim Grahl is short.  Amazon says 147 pages, but the electronic epub-format copy I got listed it at 76 pages.  Regardless, you can read it in one sitting, in under two hours.

However, it’s not the kind of book you should read once and set aside.  If you do that, you will not get value out of it.  You’ll be skimming over points that you should be pondering and figuring out how to apply to build your book marketing strategy.

Instead, you should pore over this book — again and again. Squeeze every bit of juice out of it.  Make notes.  Set it aside so that the ideas sink in, then come back to it. As you re-read it multiple times, things will start to click.  You will get a sense for how to apply it to your own book marketing.

What’s Inside “Your First 1000 Copies”

The premise of Your First 1000 Copies is that you need a system for marketing your book.  Without a system, you’ll likely fail because your efforts will be sporadic or spent on the wrong things. You won’t maximize natural opportunities to sell your book.

This system is straight forward.  The author calls it the Connection System, and it consists of these parts:

• Permission – as in permission to communicate with your audience.  This typically means getting them to opt in to an email list.
• Content – this involves you as the author creating content (aside from the book you wrote) that you make freely and widely available, to engage your target audience.
• Outreach – once you have content and permission to communicate, you can connect with readers.
• Sell – using content and your email list to stay in touch and engage, and connecting with readers, is how you sell your book.
• Track – this involves collecting data and using analytics to see what’s working and what isn’t, and then adjusting your approach.

Nothing earth shattering about that, right?  Well, selling a book doesn’t necessarily need to be earth shatteringly different.  In fact, that’s really part of the author’s point.  He says book marketing is about “systems, systems, systems.”  It’s about setting up a system to market your book, and working that system with the right marketing tools, consistently over a period of time.

One of the things I liked about this book is the style.  It’s written in an easy to read style. It has anecdotes and brief examples using well-known authors. It tells you some of their experiences growing an email list or writing blog articles (or not).  Another helpful thing is that every section ends with the key points summarized in bullet points.

I consider this book a strategy starter.  In other words, it’s the kind of book to kick start your own strategy for selling your book.  You’re not going to get a “plug and play” or one-size-fits-all marketing plan all wrapped up in a pretty bow.  You’ll have to put that together.

But what it does do is lay out a framework for how to structure your marketing plan.  It gives you a way of thinking about your book marketing, and identifies the essential elements, so that you can create that marketing system.  It’s up to you to flesh out your plan and decide exactly what goes in it.

About The Author

Tim Grahl, the author of Your First 1000 Copies, is someone who knows what he’s talking about when it comes to book marketing.   Tim and his firm have worked with a number of best-selling authors:  Daniel Pink, Pamela Slim, Daniel Ariely, the Heath Brothers, Ramit Sethi and more.

It’s not that he just happened to work with a few authors.  Rather, authors ARE his business.  Tim and the firm he founded, Out:think Group, are 100% focused on helping authors market their books.  That’s their niche.  On his website it says, “We’ll teach you how to build a passionate fan base and sell a lot of books. We’ll also build the platform you need to make it happen.”

Tim and I go back a ways, before he got into author marketing.  We hired him, first for a few hours a month and then gradually for more time, to do our Web development here at Small Business Trends.  We worked with him until he and his firm made the shift into author marketing.

In the book he talks about the conscious choice he made to focus on author marketing. He orchestrated that shift with a visit to the South by Southwest Conference. It’s an inspiring story for any entrepreneur who wants to change his or her business model.

Resources for Authors

On the author’s website, he includes free resources for authors. One resource I highly recommend is “The Insider's System to Book Marketing.”  This is an 18-page PDF download that contains a checklist of what you need to have in place to market a book.  Thorough!

Tim is also the author of the My Books plugin for WordPress that helps you market your books on your WordPress site. While I haven’t used the plugin, I can attest to Tim’s skill.  He and his team created custom plugins for Small Business Trends in the past.

For some fun, check out the Book Launch Journal on his resources page.  It is a behind-the-scenes look at launching a self-published book. Not only is it fun to read, but it will give you clues about what to expect.

Who This Book is For

This book is ideal for non-fiction authors, especially those who write business or self-help books.

It is for new authors, those who are planning to write a book, those who are in the process of writing a book, and established authors who want to amp up the marketing for their existing books.

To get value out of this resource, you’ll have to be serious about marketing your book(s). You have to be willing to put in time and some money toward your marketing efforts.  The advice does not require spending huge bucks, but it’s also not about “free” marketing.  To market a book today, you need a strategy and must be willing to put resources toward achieving that strategy — people, marketing tools, technology.  That said, Grahl’s system can be used by entrepreneur-authors on a budget, provided you are willing to dedicate some money and a lot of elbow grease.

It’s currently on sale for just $3.99 for the Kindle version on Amazon.  That’s less than the cost of  a big Mocha Frappuccino at Starbucks.  Whereas the beverage will be gone in an hour, what you’ll learn from Your First 1000 Copies will stick with you.  Doesn’t your book launch deserve at least that much?   Get Your First 1000 Copies.

The post Why Authors Need to Read “Your First 1000 Copies” appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Yelp filed suit against a business (a law firm no less!) over what it claims are fake reviews the business created for itself.  While there have been stories before of companies “outed” for being behind fake review efforts, and even FTC complaints, Yelp filing a lawsuit is new.

Yelp claims that the McMillan Law Group, of San Diego, had employees create fake accounts to leave positive reviews.

Mike Masnick at TechDirt observes they allegedly were not very good at covering their tracks. He writes:

The filing details, rather comprehensively, how over a period of a few months, it appears that employees at the firm created accounts and immediately posted positive reviews of the firm, sometimes claiming things that are unlikely to be true. For example, certain users claim to be clients of the firm, which focuses on bankruptcy law, and then point out that the individuals in question have never filed for bankruptcy. There’s also an amusing bit in which four accounts are created, one after the other, from a McMillan IP address, each leaving very positive reviews within minutes of creation, then logging out right before another account is created. … Oh, and two of the accounts created one after the other started their posts with the identical sentence, including a typo:  They promissed [sic] me a fresh start through a Chapter 7 Bankruptcy and I got it.

Yelp also alleges that the McMillan law firm participated with a group of other San Diego law firms, to ‘trade” favorable reviews.

The basis for the lawsuit is that faking Yelp reviews violated Yelp’s terms of service document.  Such documents are typically written as if they are a contract you agree to by using the site.  Yelp says that it was a breach of contract to write reviews about one’s own business, to write fake Yelp reviews, and to trade reviews with other businesses. Yelp also claims that under California law it was false advertising – although the standing to claim that seems tenuous.

Quite likely, Yelp deals with thousands of fake reviews on its site monthly – probably weekly. So you might wonder why it chose to file a lawsuit in this instance.

Well, it turns out that the McMillan law firm beat Yelp in small claims court in May of 2013, winning a $2700 judgment and a write-up in the Wall Street Journal.

The law firm had sued to get a refund of advertising money paid to Yelp.  The judge in that case used strong words, likening the advertising contract written by Yelp, to a Mafia protection racket.   The law firm even has a page up on its website about the judgment it won, asking small businesses that have had issues with Yelp to contact them.

Yelp is appealing.

And apparently playing hardball.

Fake image via Shutterstock

The post Yelp Sues Business For Faking Its Own Reviews appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Content marketing – creating and sharing your own blog entries, videos, infographics and more to attract customer attention and drive sales – is a great strategy to promote your small business. However, great doesn't mean easy.

Many small business owners have discovered that consistently creating, sharing and promoting original, high quality content is a difficult, time-consuming task. Things become more complicated when you realize that to be an effective content marketer, you don't just need good content, you need a lot of good content.

What Is Content Curation?

That's where content curation comes in. Content curation involves gathering, organizing and sharing online content that you think your customers will really appreciate. This content doesn't have to be directly tied to your products or services, but instead speak to topics you know your customers are interested in.

For example, a wedding planner could collect all kinds of content about wedding dresses, fresh flower arrangements, cake design, etiquette and more. Even though the wedding planner doesn't provide any of these services, they're obviously topics of interest to their clients.

Today's customers are perpetually hungry for information. You don't have to do the work of creating this information yourself – but by providing organized access to it, you enjoy the benefit of having a reason for your customers to engage with your brand, often directly on your website.

Content Curation sites such as paper.li, Rebel Mouse, and Storify automate the content curation process to some extent. These sites make it easier to find content that will be interesting to your customers by searching websites and social media for the keywords and topics you indicate are most relevant. Some sites also offer the ability to include content recommended by other users.

Free or Low-Cost Content Curation Tools

Paper.li

Create a daily, weekly or monthly customizable newspaper delivered directly to your subscribers' inbox. Easy to use newsroom allows you to automatically draw content from the sites and social media platforms more relevant to your customers. Make sure to take advantage of the editor's note feature that allows you to speak directly to your readership.

Rebel Mouse

Organize and display all of the content from your social media presence in one central, visually compelling location. If you're like the typical small business owner, a significant amount of the content on your social media site is not material you created yourself, and is instead items you shared from other sources.

Rebel Mouse allows you to make the most of your Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google+, and LinkedIn content.  RebelMouse can be embedded in your company's website, adding a valuable element of dynamic content for SEO (search engine optimization) purposes.  Strategic use of the Event functionality can help you maximize the return from any events your business attends, participates in or hosts.

Scoop.it

Combine your own content with content you've found online or had recommended to you by other Scoop.it users on Topic Pages. Slightly more labor-intensive than Paper.li, Scoop.it allows business owners to send out a monthly newsletter at the free level; weekly newsletter functionality becomes available at the paid level.

Storify

Collect content from across the Web and publish what you've found on Storify's platform, which can be embedded in your own website.  Easily shared content is a great way to connect with your customers. At the paid level, Storify offers privacy settings which make it an ideal tool for internal communications regarding market research and other online inquiries.

Smart Digital Marketing: Clarity and Commitment Count

Content curation can be a valuable tool to add to your marketing mix. Before you move forward, however, take the time to think through what you're going to accomplish with your content curation efforts.

It helps to think of a content curation platform as a custom newspaper or magazine that you're creating for your customers.  You want to be very clear about what type of content you want to feature. What topics are you going to discuss? What type of tone do you want your publication to have?

Creating parameters for the content you want to feature will make the selection process easier. It's much better to be organized and systematic than it is to try to fly by the seat of your pants.

Commitment is the other consideration to take into account. Content curation platforms allow you to connect with your customers often – sometimes even daily. However, you need to objectively analyze whether that level of engagement is sustainable for your business.  Just because content curation is less work than creating original content, it doesn't mean it's no work at all.

Focus on quality. It's much better to create a good newsletter or magazine that's updated weekly or even monthly than it is to put something of lesser quality out more frequently. Smart integration of content curation platforms into your digital marketing toolbox can make the process relatively easy – and even a little fun.

Content Curation Concept Photo via Shutterstock

The post 4 Content Curation Tools To Consider for Marketing appeared first on Small Business Trends.

I'm one of those guys who regularly attends networking events. I also happen to be a content marketing specialist. After years of doing both, it finally occurred to me that there's an enormous amount in common between the two, which are discussed below.

1. Content Marketing and Networking Both Involve Storytelling

Content Marketing: Content marketing is all about storytelling. The stories brands tell are aimed at bringing real value to their audiences. They are about finding a need or problem and then satisfying that need or solving the problem. Hopefully, the stories are told with clarity, logic and maybe even in an entertaining or amusing way. Brands that craft compelling and engaging content win over their audiences, create loyalty and boost sales.

Networking: When you are at a business networking event, you should be in full storytelling mode. You tell stories about yourself, your business, your experiences. Those who tell their stories well are far more likely to make meaningful business contacts than those who have lousy stories to tell and/or deliver their stories in a boring or jumbled way.

2. Content Marketing and Networking Both Require Listening Skills

Content Marketing: Any content marketer worth his/her salt knows how important it is to be a good listener. Listen to what people are saying about you in the media. Listen to what's been said in social media. Engage your audiences in conversation. Listen to their stories. See what they like, what they want and, perhaps most importantly, what they don't like. Not only will it be appreciated, it will help forge a better relationship.

Networking: Attend a few networking events and you'll find there are precious few good listeners out there. There are so many people at networking events who are just there to hit you with their elevator pitch or regale you with their views of what's happening in business in the world. They clearly couldn't care about what you think or what you're about.

Listening accomplishes a few key things. For one, it shows the other person you’re not a complete narcissist. Secondly, you may actually learn something. Third, it makes you a whole lot more human.

3. Content Marketing and Networking Are all About Being in the Right Venues

Content marketing: The best content in the world is worthless if it is delivered to the wrong audience. If you've written a brilliant article on opera, it won't do you a lot of good if it's published in a sports magazine. If your brand sells luxury goods, then the content should be delivered to the appropriate demographic and should be designed and presented in a way that appeals to that specific demographic.

A great example of this is the Ralph Lauren Magazine:

Networking: There are millions of events out there that are are just for socializing. While those can be a lot of fun, they're the places to be if you are looking to make business connections. You need to do your homework. Research events where the attendees dovetail with your business goals,  whether they be potential clients, vendors or partners. If you are an entrepreneur or startup, that means being at events where you are likely to find VCs (venture capitalists).

Meetup and Eventbrite both offer excellent, searchable calendars for upcoming networking events. Similarly, virtually every industry has its networking events and conferences. Sure, they're fun to attend and socialize, but always keep in mind you're there to make contacts that can further your business interests.

4. Content Marketing and Networking Both Require an Engaging "User Interface"

Content Marketing: The best content is also worthless if it is presented in a bland, unappealing way. Some of the best content marketing is presented in a way that more than just presents a boring block of text. It's ugly. It's boring. It's not going to be read.

Content marketing is so much more effective when it is presented with compelling design, video, animation, fonts, etc.  Would you rather download a white paper that looks like a doctoral dissertation or would you rather interact with a content piece that's beautifully designed, interactive, engaging and entertaining?

Networking: I've been to dozens if not hundreds of networking events and it amazes me how many people present themselves as the human equivalents of "boring blocks of text." They show no personality, no animation, no nothing. I'm not talking about physical attractiveness here. It's all about how you present yourself, how you look someone in the eye, how you show real interest in the people with whom you are networking, how you can show confidence without crossing the line to arrogance.

5. With Both Content Marketing and Networking Once is Never Enough

Content Marketing: Content marketing is not a one-night stand. You can't just produce one piece of content and then rest on your laurels. The last person to get away with that was Harper Lee. If you'll recall, her first novel was the brilliant “To Kill a Mockingbird” and never again published another novel.

That may have worked out okay for her, but it certainly won't work for brands. To properly execute an effective content marketing strategy you need to be able to create quality content on a consistent basis. In this way you not only create an expectation in your target audiences – you satisfy it.

Networking: The same thing applies. Going to a handful of events a year isn't networking, it's party crashing. Networking on a consistent basis will accomplish a number of things for you. Obviously, the more you network, the more you hone your networking skills. But the real results of regularly networking include:

• Meeting a greater volume of the right people who can help your business.
• Make deeper connections with the people you meet.
• Learning more from other's knowledge bases and experiences.
• Finding quality people to hire (if your business is looking).
• Finding quality businesses to hire you (because you never know).
• Landing new business.

Ultimately, it shouldn't come as any shock that there are so many similarities between content marketing an face-to-face networking. Relationships are built on effective communications and success is built on a foundation of strong relationships.

Networking Concept Photo via Shutterstock

The post 5 Similarities Between Content Marketing and Face-to-Face Networking appeared first on Small Business Trends.

If you’ve ever thought about earning money from a website by including affiliate offers on it, but have been confused or have had limited results, you will want to read “Quick Start Guide to Affiliate Marketing.”

This compact Kindle electronic book is just 93 pages.  It packs a lot into those pages.

Easy to Scan

The book is organized as a long series of FAQs.  This is a great format because it lets you skip over the questions you already know the answer to, and jump ahead to those you’re just dying to know.

For example, it starts from a basic first question:  ”What is affiliate marketing?”  Now, if you’re reading the book, chances are you already have some idea what that phrase means.  I’ll bet you’re going to want to jump ahead a question or two.

If you’re like most of us, you will probably be salivating to read the section “How much do affiliates earn?”   And that section is indeed very interesting.

There’s a comprehensive section listing affiliate networks. These networks are where you can find multiple affiliate programs to apply to be part of.  Once approved, you can pick  and choose from among hundreds of merchants and start placing affiliate offers in your website, to start earning commissions.  The list is not limited to the United States.  Included are many country-specific networks.

And there are a lot of other excellent questions answered in very helpful ways:

• You will find a section on “What are the most profitable niches?”  What you’ll learn is that common wisdom on this question may overlook one important fact: reversal rates on affiliate commissions.  What looks like a profitable niche, with high payouts, may not be once you factor in high rates of reversals (i.e., backing out of commissions for various reasons).
• There’s a section, “Can I forecast my future affiliate earnings?”  The author gives a formula for calculating what you “could” earn on your website.  Your mileage may vary, of course.  Nonetheless, the calculation gets you thinking about the potential of your website, and the elements that could make the biggest difference if you improved them.
• Included are several questions that help you evaluate whether a merchant’s affiliate program is worth applying to in the first place.  The author gives very good insights into what you should look for — and what you should avoid.
• You will learn about such things as recommended affiliate marketing plugins for WordPress.
• There’s an interesting section on the 10 types of affiliate sites (coupon, data feed, display ad-based, and more).
• You will discover what “link cloaking” for affiliate links is.
• The author advises against paying a fee to enter an affiliate program. If you’re approached to pay merely to join, you’ve just met a con artist, he says.
• And — this was illuminating to me — some affiliates actually ask for and get an upfront payment from merchants to place their links.  Of course, you have to be an experienced affiliate marketer with a track record to get these types of payments.

These are just some of the things covered in this book.

About the Author

The book is written by Geno Prussakov (@ePrussakov on Twitter).  He is the founder of the Affiliate Marketing Days conference.

Prussakov is an expert in affiliate management.  What that means is, he usually works for the merchants that set up affiliate programs, not the Web publishers who run affiliate offers on their websites.

And that’s actually a good thing.

His background and experience gives him a bird’s eye view into thousands upon thousands of affiliates and their websites.  He knows, also, what makes a great merchant and how to choose one if you are an affiliate.

Realistic Expectations, No Hype

There’s a lot of sales hype out on the Web — the get rich quick type of hype.  You see it quite a bit around affiliate marketing.

You won’t find any of that in Quick Start Guide to Affiliate Marketing.  Prussakov goes to great lengths to point out that education and effort are critical to affiliate success.  Every so-called “super affiliate” gets to that exalted state onlyafter a lot of hard work.  They try, they fail, they learn, they improve.

You get solid, informed advice.

This book doesn’t give you a step 1, step 2, etc. approach to getting started in affiliate marketing.  Rather, it gives you “insider” tips and resources that will be crucial to your monetization strategies and success.

The book is ideal for Web publishers who already know a bit about affiliate marketing, but are determined to do better at it.  I strongly recommend it if affiliate marketing is in your plans.

The post “Quick Start Guide to Affiliate Marketing” Is Realistic, Not Hype appeared first on Small Business Trends.