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Do You Need a Business Plan?

Not everyone who starts and runs a business begins with a business plan, but it certainly helps to have one. If you are seeking funding from a venture capitalist, you will certainly need a business plan that is comprehensive, well thought out and demonstrates sound business reasoning. If you are approaching a banker for a loan for a start-up business, your loan officer may suggest a Small Business Administration (SBA) loan, which will require a business plan. If you have an existing business and are approaching a bank for capital to expand the business, they often will not require a

Pros and Cons of Discount Pricing During the Holiday Season

Other Marketing Strategies

As small business owners, managers, and marketers one of the issues we must confront each holiday season is whether or not to give price discounts as part of your planned marketing programs. The uncertainty can seem enormous. How much should the discount be? When should you run it? In what situations should it apply? Will I profit? Here are some considerations when making those decisions in order to increase sales during the holiday season: Ways to Think About Profit Whenever you give a discount you should do so because you think that the additional sales and word of mouth/attention it

Explode Your Holiday Sales with an Internet Marketing Campaign

Internet Marketing Strategies

Are you planning for explosive sales this year through an effective, organized Internet marketing campaign or are you maintaining your status quo and hoping for the best?

Finding Business Opportunities in Government Auction Sales

Online Auctions

Most people are completely unaware of the bargains that can be found in the most unlikely of places: the government! We’re used to reading about the Pentagon paying $59.00 for a wrench, about the national debt rising higher and higher, so it’s excusable to not think of government and “sales” in the same sentence. Yet nearly every level of government from city and town on up through county, state and federal, has possession of excess property that must be disposed of. If this can be accomplished and money raised at the same time, why not? We want government to be

6 Website Redesign Steps to Follow

Website Design

Achieving a successful website presence that deliver the results you seek, is never just about how “pretty” your website looks, it’s also about how well it performs and how useful your website is to your visitors. In order to achieve success with your website redesign here are five steps to follow.

7 Tips for Balancing Life and Work During the Holidays

Work Life

With the holidays fast approaching, thoughts turn to work-life balance more so than any other time of year. If you are like many of us, you must keep up with your work responsibilities while fitting much more into your personal life. This can get crazy stressful if you let it, especially if your home is also your workplace. Whether you are a work at home mom, small business owner, or employee, here are some tips for balancing life, and avoiding or reducing stress this holiday season. 1. Accept that life is an eternal work in progress. It is not supposed

5 Tips for a Successful Ecommerce Website Design

Website Design

The success of taking your retail business online starts with a solid marketing strategy and most of all an ecommerce website design, built for success. Here are five tips for making your ecommerce website design a success.

What to Do When You Can’t Close the Sale

Sales

We’ve all been there. After countless calls, meetings and an endless amount of work, you just can’t get the customer to say “yes” and move forward. There can be hundreds of theories and ideas as to why this happens more times than we care to admit. Let’s put all the theories aside and get to a solution you can use right now to determine if the customer is serious. The problem in these types of situations is as a salesperson, you’ve invested time and effort and the last thing you want to do is quit and walk away. You are

How to Influence Employees to Get Things Done Correctly on Time

Managing Employees

Can you influence employees and achieve results without authority? The simple answer is yes. The challenge is how to do it. Each of us have a limited amount of authority. And the positional authority that comes with our title enables us to have some influence, but far less than what is required to get the work done. In order to get things done on time and with the highest quality expected so you can meet the demands and expectations of our customers and those with whom we work, we need to rely on others. And to do that, we need

Should You Start a Daycare Business When Times are Tough?

Business Ideas

Given all these economic and political uncertainties, is it the right time to start a day care business? Should you start a day care business now, or wait when the economy is good and everything is peaceful?

Are You Prepared for the Fast-Paced Online Business?

Online Business

Your website cost a small fortune to build, and everything looks fantastic. All the tools work as they should, internal links work, content is all set — and your online business is ready to go. Everything is perfect. Or so it seems. Every hyperlink may be in place and every graphic perfect but before you venture forth for one more day of cyber-business as usual, check to be sure that you are not the weakest link in your online business. Just like the (now defunct) game show which will unceremoniously cast you out of the game for hemming and hawing,