Tag: entrepreneurship

Virgin Atlantic is a small airline with a big personality. This is how it lures customers from the big guys.

You may think Virgin Atlantic is a huge airline worldwide, but they’re not. Maybe they’re the No. 2 airline in the UK, but they don’t even hold a candle to United, American or Delta here in the U.S. Read more…

Recommended: 10 Ways To Motivate Yourself To Do The Impossible

1. Everyone hates status meetings.

2. When it’s eerily quiet on the line, you know the other callers are talking shit on mute.

3. And as soon as you get off the phone, you do this so you can chat about all the stupid stuff said on the call.

4. You see these buzzwords in emails almost every day.

5. Read more…

Recommended: How To Make A Case for Facebook Marketing

In case you hadn’t noticed, the hashtag has pretty much taken over social media.

With sites like Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and Instagram all using this format to organize content, it should be clear that this once forgotten character on the keyboard has finally made the big time.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of people out there who just don’t seem to understand the new trend. Read more…

Recommended: How to solve one marketing puzzle

Do you follow a brand in social media? Are you glad you did? If that’s the case, they are doing either one of three things:

. Connecting with one of your passions and/or interests.
. Entertaining you with their engaging personality.
. Providing interesting and/or important information to you. Read more…

Recommended: 3 Habits Of High-Performing Teams

Social media-a requirement for inbound marketing success-holds real influence that continues to rise. A captivating social media presence is essential in the current business environment. Neglect social media, and your business will suffer. You will not be able to optimize your content marketing, website traffic, or lead generation and conversion without social media best practices.

Provide Real Value

Winning social media marketing requires active listening and genuine participation. Read more…

Recommended: The Choice: Google+ Vs. Facebook

Want to spread the word about your business? Did you know you can broadcast your product or service to our large audience across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and 40Billion for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to broadcast your small business, startup company, product, or service to 2,500,000+ social users on 4 social networks – including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and 40Billion – at once.

For over 4 years, aspiring entrepreneurs and startup companies have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers. Read more…

When should you start thinking about outsourcing some of your tasks? As a small business entrepreneur, time is always scarce, and you find that you just can’t do everything yourself the way you would like to. Maybe you’ve thought about outsourcing, but it’s not a simple decision because you need to compare the cost and quality of the person or company that will be working for you.

A simple search for companies using the terms “virtual assistant” and “outsourcing” will reveal a plethora of firms and virtual assistants that offer outsourcing services for everyday business tasks – such as customer service, tech support, bookkeeping, accounts payable, accounting, and even social media marketing. Read more…

Recommended: Facebook And Marketing: 4 Useful Tips For Success

Many of us dream of leaving the workplace while in our 40’s or 50’s instead of sticking it out until age 65. Early retirement is a tempting goal, but it can be tough to achieve.

There are four major obstacles to early retirement:

1) You have less time to earn money. If you start working at age 20 and retire at 65, you have 45 years to produce income. Read more…

Recommended: What Entrepreneurs Need to Know About Equity Crowdfunding to Raise Money

Hiring staff can be difficult as a new manager, and making bad choices can be disastrous. These 5 easy steps will help you find the right fit for your company:

1) Determine what you need.

Many people make the mistake of not clearly defining the skills needed before starting to interview. This can lead to hiring people because you like them or they’re impressive in an interview. Read more…

Recommended: Using Social Media Influencers as a Marketing Strategy for Better ROI

Is your business on Facebook?

Do you need to convince your boss-or a client-that Facebook is a worthy marketing investment?

And speaking of social media advertising, don’t forget online marketing sites. You can visit 40billion.com which is a fastest-growing network of entrepreneurs and crowdfunders. Read more…

Recommended: Target Marketing – Everything You Need To Know And More

Most brands have a “pretty decent” email marketing program, but could it be better? Take a look at these 11 things to try and improve your engagement.

1. Take a hard look at your preference strategy.

There are three tips on capturing preferences: ask them, observe them and group them (into categories). Read more…

Recommended: How To Challenge And Beat The Big Boys In Local Sales

You have a great business idea, and you’re lining up the resources to make it a reality. But if you don’t establish solid corporate and accounting strategies from the start, you could be putting your business in peril before you ever get off the ground.

Follow these four steps to get off on the proper financial foot…

1. Read more…

Recommended: Lead Generation: 19 Tips For Better Results

Want to get the word out? Did you know you can broadcast your crowdfunding project or campaign to over 2,500,000 active users on 40Billion, Twitter, Facebook, and Google for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to promote your message, brand, product, service, fundraising campaign, crowdfunding project, or small business to the world.

Are you trying to raise money on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or GoFundme? For over 4 years, aspiring crowdfunders and startup entrepreneurs have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers and investors. Read more…

In reading the start-up and tech blogs these days, one would think investors are chomping at the bit to fund startups like yours. But as is true with most situations in life, you shouldn’t believe everything you read.

There are certainly examples of big and fast rounds and companies where money landed in a founder’s lap. Read more…

Recommended: Social Advertising Is Here To Stay. Learn To Live With It.

Read more…

Recommended: 4 Signs That You Should Quit Your Failing Startup Business

Brand ambassadors are better advertisers than even the most strategized and marketed advertising plans specifically made for your business by agencies. Brand ambassadors are 70% more likely to be seen as a good source of information by people around them.

In fact, when you think about the fact that 80% of all consumer purchases include word-of-mouth (WOM) recommendation during the whole buying phase, businesses would realize that brand advocacy is a necessity and would even be the best investment to get into because of its very promising ROI (return of investment).

Studies show that a 12% increase in brand advocacy, on average, generates a 2X increase in revenue growth rate plus boosts market share.

The question is – how does a business turn their customers into brand ambassadors?

Brand Ambassadors Have the Voice.
This is common sense but a brand advocate has a voice on both sides – the product or service (operations) and the consumer. Read more…

Recommended: 4 Ideas for a Customized Marketing Strategy to Reach the Right Audience

Most experts agree: 2017 was the year for influencer marketing. Most marketers planned to launch at least one influencer marketing campaign in 2017, and more in 2018. The reasons that this particular marketing strategy is surging right now are many. The first, and probably the largest reason is social proof.

According to research firm Yankelovich, Americans are exposed to 5,000 advertisements a day. Read more…

Recommended: 6 Marketing Tips to Bootstrap Your Startup

Do you follow a brand in social media? Are you glad you did? If that’s the case, they are doing either one of three things:

. Connecting with one of your passions and/or interests.
. Entertaining you with their engaging personality.
. Providing interesting and/or important information to you. Read more…

Recommended: 5 Ways to Start a Business Part-Time While Holding a Day Job Full-Time

Want to get the word out? Did you know you can broadcast your crowdfunding project or campaign to over 2,500,000 active users on 40Billion, Twitter, Facebook, and Google for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to promote your message, brand, product, service, fundraising campaign, crowdfunding project, or small business to the world.

Are you trying to raise money on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or GoFundme? For over 4 years, aspiring crowdfunders and startup entrepreneurs have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers and investors. Read more…

As a small business, or a one man (or woman) show, marketing can be downright difficult to tackle. Where do you start? What would a realistic marketing plan be? How can you get the most out of your time? These are all questions that small businesses face. Here’s how to rock it out as a one-person marketing department.

Set Realistic Goals:

We’ll just throw this out there – you’re not going to have the capabilities of Proctor & Gamble when it comes to your marketing efforts. Read more…

Recommended: When To Start Outsourcing Some Of Your Busy Work

You may have heard the term “relationship marketing” being tossed around recently. Relationship marketing refers to everything you do to develop strong, lifelong relationships with your customers. From influencer programs to referral campaigns to affiliate marketing, relationship marketing builds brand awareness and positions your brand as your customers best option. Read more…

Recommended: 7 Strategic Tips to Boost Your Business Content Marketing

Does your name matter? It might, in the case of your new business, if you want people to remember it. Judging from the long list of businesses a simple Google search yields when you query “naming your company,” it matters a lot.

While there are several technical strategies that can be used when choosing a name for your new venture, you can just as easily flip through the business section of any newspaper to get an idea of how other entrepreneurs are doing it.

However, don’t take this decision lightly. Read more…

Recommended: How to Become a Twitter Marketing Expert Quickly

Hiring staff can be difficult as a new manager, and making bad choices can be disastrous. These 5 easy steps will help you find the right fit for your company:

1) Determine what you need.

Many people make the mistake of not clearly defining the skills needed before starting to interview. This can lead to hiring people because you like them or they’re impressive in an interview. Read more…

Recommended: 4 Simple Ways to Improve Your Marketing Language

Do you follow a brand in social media? Are you glad you did? If that’s the case, they are doing either one of three things:

. Connecting with one of your passions and/or interests.
. Entertaining you with their engaging personality.
. Providing interesting and/or important information to you. Read more…

Recommended: 5 Counter-Productive Things You Should NOT Do Every Day

You’ve heard it many times: reuse, reduce, recycle. Did you know that this piece of advice doesn’t just apply to aluminum cans and plastic water bottles?

You can repurpose your influencer marketing content to increase its value to your campaign. Think of it like a neighborhood recycling program: You’re preventing waste while putting resources back into the community – or, in this case, your company.

1. Read more…

Recommended: Turning Holidays Gifts Into a Marketing Tool – 6 Ideas

Want to spread the word about your business? Did you know you can broadcast your product or service to our large audience across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and 40Billion for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to broadcast your small business, startup company, product, or service to 2,500,000+ social users on 4 social networks – including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and 40Billion – at once.

For over 4 years, aspiring entrepreneurs and startup companies have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers. Read more…

What do smart entrepreneurs do different to ensure their business stays profitable? They do the simple things right. Simple things really, like finding cheap ways to get exposure, or hearing their customers out, or networking in the right places. Number one marketing tip is don’t just think outside the box, get rid of the box! Be creative. Read more…

Recommended: Boost Summer Sales With These 4 Tips

Here’s why your company’s Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, and other social media campaigns aren’t performing as well as they could be.

Over the past five years, social media has become an increasingly important part of many companies‘ marketing strategies. Read more…

Recommended: 6 Tips For An Effective Text Message Marketing Campaign

Starting a blog is just the beginning. Publishing a blog post? You need to let the world know that your awesome blog exists!

So how do you do that? That department is called “marketing”. Blog marketing could sound like too much of a technical word and many small business bloggers don’t even want to hear about it.
Of course, there are advanced marketing techniques that you need to learn, and master someday. Read more…

Recommended: How To Keep Your Employees Motivated

In case you hadn’t noticed, the hashtag has pretty much taken over social media.

With sites like Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and Instagram all using this format to organize content, it should be clear that this once forgotten character on the keyboard has finally made the big time.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of people out there who just don’t seem to understand the new trend. Read more…

Recommended: 5 Essential Business Plan Topics When Raising Venture Capital

Most brands have a “pretty decent” email marketing program, but could it be better? Take a look at these 11 things to try and improve your engagement.

1. Take a hard look at your preference strategy.

There are three tips on capturing preferences: ask them, observe them and group them (into categories). Read more…

Recommended: Is Google Threat to Social-Media Marketing?

Content marketing is becoming increasingly popular with each passing year. Businesses see the benefits that competitors are enjoying from publishing highly valuable content, and are looking for ways to do the same themselves. Churning out great ideas is often more difficult than anticipated, and companies that enter content marketing for the first time often have some unrealistic expectations for the type of results it will provide as well as how quickly those results will come.

There is a lot of information out there that can help businesses to set realistic expectations for themselves when they first start content marketing. Read more…

Recommended: 6 Ways to Boost Your Inbound Marketing with Evergreen Content

Crowdfunding is a collective cooperation of people who network and pool their money and resources together, usually via the Internet.

It seems like everyone is using crowdfunding to kick off their new business venture, be it a new coffee shop, or gadget. With the tough economic climate, crowdfunding has become a popular and alternative method of raising finance for a business, projects or ideas and has become popularized online by sites such as Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and GoFundMe.

Now anyone with a computer or mobile device and an internet connection can research, review and become an investor in a business with a push of a button. Read more…

Recommended: 5 Counter-Productive Things You Should NOT Do Every Day

Google loves big brand names, and for good reason. But that doesn’t mean smaller companies don’t stand a chance when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO).

In regard to natural search results, the better the results Google can deliver, the more people will use its service. Read more…

Recommended: 8 Key Steps to a Successful Crowdfunding Campaign

Imagine you’re leading a brainstorming session at your company. You want to come up with growth strategies for your startup, so you gather your team in a meeting room, generate lots of ideas, and choose the most promising one. Many small business owners use that approach, but unfortunately, it often doesn’t work. Read more…

Recommended: 5 Tips for Digital Marketing Success

To be an innovative entrepreneur, you want to foster creativity in your daily life so that your mind is ready when opportunity arises.

Unusual combinations, sometimes called “remote associations,” are related ideas that may seem unrelated at first glance. They are the essence of creative thinking.

To cultivate creativity, you want to increase your chances of stumbling on an unexpected link. Read more…

Recommended: How To Make A Case for Facebook Marketing

Let’s face it. Facebook and Marketing work very well. Are you getting so tired of reading article after article of people writing about how marketing on Facebook is a waste of time? Whether you are a B2C or B2B company it doesn’t matter. If you are not getting results from Facebook you need to change your strategy plain and simple. Read more…

Recommended: The Real Reasons Why VC Investors Delete Your Emails

Are you finding that your website bounce rate is higher than you expected? Are you struggling to put your finger on what could be causing it? There are many factors which may make your bounce rate high or low but the main factor to work on is your website itself.

And speaking of improving your bounce rate and get more from your marketing budget, don’t forget online marketing sites. Read more…

Recommended: Instagram And Marketing: Tips To Succeed

Want to get the word out? Did you know you can broadcast your crowdfunding project or campaign to over 2,500,000 active users on 40Billion, Twitter, Facebook, and Google for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to promote your message, brand, product, service, fundraising campaign, crowdfunding project, or small business to the world.

Are you trying to raise money on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or GoFundme? For over 4 years, aspiring crowdfunders and startup entrepreneurs have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers and investors. Read more…

As a business owner or startup entrepreneur, you are responsible for building an effective team and enabling your employees to do their best work. To do that well, you need to have perspective, which is the ability to create a point-of-view based on imagining yourself in another’s shoes.

Awareness about ourselves and others is difficult to gain. Read more…

Recommended: 8 Key Steps to a Successful Crowdfunding Campaign

Business owners often struggle with a perpetual to-do list for running their companies, and it seems to be getting longer all the time. Digital marketing, in all its varied forms, is becoming increasingly important as more and more of your target audience is searching for and finding products and services on the internet. Read more…

Recommended: 4 Steps To Close Up Shop When It’s Time To Call It Quits

What should you do as a small, independent retailer when a major food chain, big-box store or national franchise becomes a direct competitor? All along you’ve been specializing in items that aren’t in the mainstream but sell well, and then some big outfit like Walmart or Amazon decides they’re going to hone in on your action.

When this happens, what can you as a specialty retailer do to remain in business and retain your dominance in any niche market?

Your first reaction might be to lower prices in order to compete with the big stores. Read more…

Recommended: 4 Ways To Overcome Fear And Be More Confident

Video is rapidly growing and quickly becoming a staple of marketing strategies. If you have not yet incorporated video marketing then you are simply behind the curve. Not only that, but you are losing out on the various benefits that having a video strategy provides.

Importance of Video:

The reason video is such a powerful medium lies within its ability to engage, educate, and influence potential and existing customers. Read more…

Recommended: 8 Best Practices to Optimize Your Video Landing Page

The old saying that we “treasure what we measure” – and vice versa – turns out to be highly relevant in networking.

In a world where the news media regularly reports the latest sports scores, stock market numbers and the weekend’s top-grossing films, wouldn’t you think business networkers would just naturally track how much they’re getting from their efforts?

While systems for following up, staying in touch and tracking results are key to networking success for both men and women, they’re especially vital for women. Read more…

Recommended: How To Avoid Summer Slowdowns, And Keep Growing Your Business

The biggest problem that many small businesses throughout the United States face is how to secure startup or initial funding from traditional lenders. Since the 2008 financial meltdown, banks are under a lot of pressure to make safer loans, resulting in stricter underwriting guidelines and fewer loans being approved.

With the advent of crowdfunding providing a more accessible option, the amount of small businesses with crowdfunding campaigns has significantly increased. Read more…

Recommended: 22 Things Advertising People Learn to live with

Want to spread the word about your business? Did you know you can broadcast your product or service to our large audience across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and 40Billion for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to broadcast your small business, startup company, product, or service to 2,500,000+ social users on 4 social networks – including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and 40Billion – at once.

For over 4 years, aspiring entrepreneurs and startup companies have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers. Read more…

If you want to reach local customers and keep them coming back to your business, text-message marketing is one of the most effective strategies for doing so. While email marketing messages are opened by a small percentage of recipients, text message ads are typically viewed by almost all recipients.

SMS messaging is also an ideal way for sending coupons that will get noticed and used, at a much lower cost than printing physical coupons. Read more…

Recommended: 6 Ways to Create Content that Attracts Audiences and Customers

Despite the importance of Social Media, Email Marketing is still the most powerful tool to connect with people. Everyone has at least one email account these days, whether it be for business or personal reasons. According to The Radicati Group, more than 34% of the worldwide population uses emails – Which accounts for nearly 2.5 billion people. Read more…

Recommended: How To Promote Your Startup On A Shoe-String Budget

Social media can be a slippery slope. Stretching yourself too thin by trying to be on every site can result in disengaged users. Failing to engage users on the right platforms will only amount to yet another lost marketing opportunity.

Here are 13 best practice tips when using popular social networking sites.

FACEBOOK

Facebook is by far the biggest and most popular social media platform. Read more…

Recommended: How to Get More Out of Your Social Media Marketing This Year

1. Everyone hates status meetings.

2. When it’s eerily quiet on the line, you know the other callers are talking shit on mute.

3. And as soon as you get off the phone, you do this so you can chat about all the stupid stuff said on the call.

4. You see these buzzwords in emails almost every day.

5. Read more…

Recommended: Avoid These Four Social Media Marketing Mistakes

Black Friday might hold first position, but there are eight other special holiday shopping days that can help you build business before Christmas this year.

In addition to below mentioned 9 holiday shopping days, don’t forget to use online marketing sites for your year-round promotion. You can visit 40billion.com which is the fastest-growing network of entrepreneurs and crowdfunders. Read more…

Recommended: 3 Social Media Tips For Business Owners

Virgin Atlantic is a small airline with a big personality. This is how it lures customers from the big guys.

You may think Virgin Atlantic is a huge airline worldwide, but they’re not. Maybe they’re the No. 2 airline in the UK, but they don’t even hold a candle to United, American or Delta here in the U.S. Read more…

Recommended: How to Brainstorm Breakthrough Ideas for Your Business

Want to spread the word about your business? Did you know you can broadcast your product or service to our large audience across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and 40Billion for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to broadcast your small business, startup company, product, or service to 2,500,000+ social users on 4 social networks – including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and 40Billion – at once.

For over 4 years, aspiring entrepreneurs and startup companies have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers. Read more…

With Twitter having more than 300 million user accounts, it has become an important network for companies to reach out to their customers. There are well-established and successful brands that have come up with best practices companies could emulate to attract a loyal following and transform customers into brand advocates.

Here are ten marketing lessons for successful utilization of Twitter:

1. Read more…

Recommended: The Unexpected Pros And Cons of Business Competitions

In reading the start-up and tech blogs these days, one would think investors are chomping at the bit to fund startups like yours. But as is true with most situations in life, you shouldn’t believe everything you read.

There are certainly examples of big and fast rounds and companies where money landed in a founder’s lap. Read more…

Recommended: 5 Essential Business Plan Topics When Raising Venture Capital

The new marketing concept of brand journalism is the practice of covering your business and industry like a reporter. In other words, you’re transforming your marketing efforts into publishing efforts.

The big guys in your industry are likely already fully entrenched. In fact, some are practicing this new style of content marketing so effectively you probably haven’t even noticed that their content is marketing driven.

Here are four tips on how you can get started:

1. Read more…

Recommended: Instagram And Marketing: Tips To Succeed

Social media can be a slippery slope. Stretching yourself too thin by trying to be on every site can result in disengaged users. Failing to engage users on the right platforms will only amount to yet another lost marketing opportunity.

Here are 13 best practice tips when using popular social networking sites.

FACEBOOK

Facebook is by far the biggest and most popular social media platform. Read more…

Recommended: 4 Easy Financial Accounting Tips for Small Business Startups

There’s good news and bad news when it comes to marketing your small business. The good news is that as a small business owner, you are the perfect person to promote your product or service. You’re knowledgeable and passionate, which are two of the main ingredients in an effective marketer. The bad news is that marketing can take up a lot of time and money. Read more…

Recommended: How To Make A Case for Facebook Marketing

Everyone is busy in creating his own content marketing strategies. Companies have sensed the importance of this form of digital marketing and have been trying their best to create high quality content.

Here are 7 important steps in content marketing that every blog should include. It is a true assumption that the content promotion strategies very much depend on the nature of the business, but the following points can be applied to any kind of content.

1. Read more…

Recommended: 6 Tips For An Effective Text Message Marketing Campaign

Want to spread the word about your business? Did you know you can broadcast your product or service to our large audience across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and 40Billion for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to broadcast your small business, startup company, product, or service to 2,500,000+ social users on 4 social networks – including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and 40Billion – at once.

For over 4 years, aspiring entrepreneurs and startup companies have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers. Read more…

Location-based mobile marketing promises the sky: high conversion rates, surgical targeting, and rich consumer profiles.

But does it deliver? According to many accounts, it does.
Not surprisingly, retailers, brands, and agencies are scrambling to hone their location-based approaches. These encompass everything from “geo-aware” and “geo-fenced” ad campaigns, to hyper-local efforts keyed to Wi-Fi hotspots, and algorithmic location-based targeting of audience segments like soccer moms, bargain hunters, coffee enthusiasts, etc.

In a report from BI Intelligence on location-mobile marketing, key stats on the location-based services marketplace that indicate it’s supremacy in mobile marketing, explain how the most important techniques (such as geo-aware, geo-fenced, audience-based local-mobile campaigns) work, examine the cornerstones – such as data and audience building – to a successful location-based mobile strategy, look at who has the valuable location-based data, and analyze the six most effective local-mobile marketing tactics. Read more…

Recommended: Content Marketing Made Easier With These 5 Tricks

Word-of-mouth advertising is 10 times more effective than a traditional ad. Contrary to popular belief, less than 10 percent of those sought-after personal recommendations happen online.

In addition to word of mouth marketing, don’t forget online marketing sites. You can visit 40billion.com which is a fastest-growing network of entrepreneurs and crowdfunders. Read more…

Recommended: Top 3 Crowdfunding Tips to Get Funded

Video is rapidly growing and quickly becoming a staple of marketing strategies. If you have not yet incorporated video marketing then you are simply behind the curve. Not only that, but you are losing out on the various benefits that having a video strategy provides.

Importance of Video:

The reason video is such a powerful medium lies within its ability to engage, educate, and influence potential and existing customers. Read more…

Recommended: How To Dominate the Market – 8 Tips

In the competitive and increasingly saturated B2B market, it’s never been more important for you to have outstanding marketing strategies. Finding a digital marketing agency that specializes in B2B is a great way to boost results, as long as they are right for your company and sector.

How not to do it…and what to do instead

The most dangerous move you can make is choosing the first digital marketing agency that you come across. Read more…

Recommended: Word-Of-Mouth Marketing Is Still Very Effective

This post on how to raise money successfully using simple crowdfunding steps answers common questions for startup entrepreneurs and small businesses thinking about using crowdfunding to raise funding.

I have been in the crowdfunding space since 2008, after experiencing first-hand one of the biggest problems plaguing new businesses: There was a $40 billion gap in funding every year! That year, I founded one of the first crowdfunding platforms for U.S. Read more…

Recommended: 4 More Ways to Create a Brand That Customers Remember

Are you debating whether your small business should invest time on Twitter?

Do you wonder how Twitter can help your business?

By being an active part of the Twitter community and sharing the right mix of content, you can reach a larger audience, generate more leads and become the go-to source when customers are ready to buy.

Twitter has evolved a lot since 2007. Read more…

Recommended: Keeping Up with the Changing Face of Advertising

Want to get the word out? Did you know you can broadcast your crowdfunding project or campaign to over 2,500,000 active users on 40Billion, Twitter, Facebook, and Google for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to promote your message, brand, product, service, fundraising campaign, crowdfunding project, or small business to the world.

Are you trying to raise money on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or GoFundme? For over 4 years, aspiring crowdfunders and startup entrepreneurs have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers and investors. Read more…

As a small business, or a one man (or woman) show, marketing can be downright difficult to tackle. Where do you start? What would a realistic marketing plan be? How can you get the most out of your time? These are all questions that small businesses face. Here’s how to rock it out as a one-person marketing department.

Set Realistic Goals:

We’ll just throw this out there – you’re not going to have the capabilities of Proctor & Gamble when it comes to your marketing efforts. Read more…

Recommended: Why Small Businesses Should Not Hire These 3 Types Of People

In addition to the money provided by backers, crowdfunding can generate other, unanticipated benefits for small businesses. Two such benefits are 1) new customers and supporters, and 2) access to additional financing and specialized services.

New Customers and Supporters:

Everyone who contributes to a crowdfunding campaign is a potential new customer and loyal advocate for your brand. Read more…

Recommended: 5 Crowdfunding Steps Proven To Raise Money on Indiegogo

Are you stressed out at work? Do you feel like you’re reaching a breaking point? Are you having a hard time juggling business and family demands? It happens to many of us. The anxiety, negative thoughts, perspiration, and despair caused by stress are normal, but you should not let them prevent you from succeeding and being your best you.

To cope with the stress and stay focused, you’ll need to incorporate a stress relief routine in your workday. Read more…

Recommended: How to Brainstorm Breakthrough Ideas for Your Business

Wouldn’t you like to have a celebrity recommend your product or service? This type of endorsement has been known to boost businesses and sales. But dealing with influencers, such as celebrities, can be tricky because they tend to get thousands of free sample products in the mail from businesses hoping to get their attention. Read more…

Recommended: Avoid These 13 Content Marketing Mistakes

Do you follow a brand in social media? Are you glad you did? If that’s the case, they are doing either one of three things:

. Connecting with one of your passions and/or interests.
. Entertaining you with their engaging personality.
. Providing interesting and/or important information to you. Read more…

Recommended: How To Promote Your Startup On A Shoe-String Budget

If you want to reach local customers and keep them coming back to your business, text-message marketing is one of the most effective strategies for doing so. While email marketing messages are opened by a small percentage of recipients, text message ads are typically viewed by almost all recipients.

SMS messaging is also an ideal way for sending coupons that will get noticed and used, at a much lower cost than printing physical coupons. Read more…

Recommended: Great Digital Marketing For Bootstrapped Entrepreneur

Want to spread the word about your business? Did you know you can broadcast your product or service to our large audience across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and 40Billion for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to broadcast your small business, startup company, product, or service to 2,500,000+ social users on 4 social networks – including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and 40Billion – at once.

For over 4 years, aspiring entrepreneurs and startup companies have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers. Read more…

Equity crowdfunding is the process whereby everyday people (the “crowd”) invest in an early-stage company, which is not listed on a stock market, in exchange for shares in that company. These shareholders have partial ownership of the company and stand to profit if the company does well.

For the first time, the JOBS act is allowing unsophisticated investors to purchase your stock. Read more…

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Brand ambassadors are better advertisers than even the most strategized and marketed advertising plans specifically made for your business by agencies. Brand ambassadors are 70% more likely to be seen as a good source of information by people around them.

In fact, when you think about the fact that 80% of all consumer purchases include word-of-mouth (WOM) recommendation during the whole buying phase, businesses would realize that brand advocacy is a necessity and would even be the best investment to get into because of its very promising ROI (return of investment).

Studies show that a 12% increase in brand advocacy, on average, generates a 2X increase in revenue growth rate plus boosts market share.

The question is – how does a business turn their customers into brand ambassadors?

Brand Ambassadors Have the Voice.
This is common sense but a brand advocate has a voice on both sides – the product or service (operations) and the consumer. Read more…

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The Holy Grail of social media outreach is engagement, which goes beyond broadcasting to interacting with your fans. While some businesses might use 40Billion, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and other social networks to drive traffic to their own websites, the more that people are engaging with your posts and sharing your content with their own networks, the more brand loyalty you can build.

While there’s no tried-and-true formula for everyone to maximize engagement all the time, outreach on social media doesn’t have to be like blindly throwing darts at a board. Read more…

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In addition to the money provided by backers, crowdfunding can generate other, unanticipated benefits for small businesses. Two such benefits are 1) new customers and supporters, and 2) access to additional financing and specialized services.

New Customers and Supporters:

Everyone who contributes to a crowdfunding campaign is a potential new customer and loyal advocate for your brand. Read more…

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On some of the most popular crowdfunding platforms – such as Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and GoFundMe – less than half of the campaigns hit their funding goal. How do you make sure your crowdfunding campaign isn’t a failure? Here are four potential mistakes to avoid.

#1: Starting off too slow

If you want to hit your fundraising goal by the end of the campaign, experts recommend focusing on raising 30 percent of it in the first two or three days. Read more…

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Marketing is simple. It can seem mysterious and highly technical: Experts talk at length about the techniques they use. People scream from the rooftops about how you’re doing it wrong. Books upon books and blogs upon blogs make it seem like an immense subject.

It’s not that difficult. You market to people and you get leads in. Read more…

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Want to get the word out? Did you know you can broadcast your crowdfunding project or campaign to over 2,500,000 active users on 40Billion, Twitter, Facebook, and Google for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to promote your message, brand, product, service, fundraising campaign, crowdfunding project, or small business to the world.

Are you trying to raise money on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or GoFundme? For over 4 years, aspiring crowdfunders and startup entrepreneurs have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers and investors. Read more…

Social media can be a slippery slope. Stretching yourself too thin by trying to be on every site can result in disengaged users. Failing to engage users on the right platforms will only amount to yet another lost marketing opportunity.

Here are 13 best practice tips when using popular social networking sites.

FACEBOOK

Facebook is by far the biggest and most popular social media platform. Read more…

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Social media has become more important than ever for businesses. Social media is only getting bigger, and if you don’t embrace it now, you’re going to miss out on a lot of amazing opportunities to connect with your customers.

You have to utilize social media more this year. Read more…

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Do you want to learn how to present yourself and your business on LinkedIn?

Are you looking for a resource to guide your LinkedIn marketing efforts?

Whether you’re using LinkedIn as an individual or as a brand, the following tips will help you develop a LinkedIn marketing plan and find prospects and leads.

Create a Presence for Yourself

Make sure your LinkedIn account is secure. Read more…

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Are you the owner of a small business looking to increase your customers? How do you build a trusting relationship with your customers? Here is a proven strategy to build and maintain trust in your business, and in turn attract both customers and profits.

There are many different sources of trust, and sometimes people trust for the wrong reasons. Read more…

Recommended: Best Online Sites For Small Businesses To Advertise

Are you a small business owner who feels just wasting your dollars to advertise?

Do you want to know where actually the best places to advertise your small business online?

So, let’s get started.

In addition to sites mentioned blow, don’t forget other online marketing sites. You can visit 40billion.com which is a fastest-growing network of entrepreneurs and crowdfunders. Read more…

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The biggest problem that many small businesses throughout the United States face is how to secure startup or initial funding from traditional lenders. Since the 2008 financial meltdown, banks are under a lot of pressure to make safer loans, resulting in stricter underwriting guidelines and fewer loans being approved.

With the advent of crowdfunding providing a more accessible option, the amount of small businesses with crowdfunding campaigns has significantly increased. Read more…

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Want to spread the word about your business? Did you know you can broadcast your product or service to our large audience across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and 40Billion for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to broadcast your small business, startup company, product, or service to 2,500,000+ social users on 4 social networks – including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and 40Billion – at once.

For over 4 years, aspiring entrepreneurs and startup companies have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers. Read more…

Trust, attraction, and engagement… sounds like the recipe for a deep and lasting relationship, right?

Not surprisingly, consumers can experience and feel these same attributes for a product, and as a result, they form lasting, loyal relationships with the brands that serve them.

Unfortunately for brands, connecting to a potential customer at this level is difficult and time-consuming. Read more…

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Ever experienced fear or doubt about your abilities? To the degree you can overcome your insecurities, you will experience freedom to be yourself and reach your full potential as an entrepreneur. The most important thing to understand is that everyone experiences these scary emotions to some degree, regardless of how confident and self-assured people may seem.

Follow these 4 tips to overcome fear and get to that next level in your business goals:

1) Don’t forget that it’s normal. Read more…

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Risk taking is second nature to most entrepreneurs, but technology issues can make them turn cautious. Too often, business owners believe they don’t have the expertise or financial resources to take full advantage of technology. But, by limiting their use of tech, they also limit their growth opportunities in our always-on, always-connected world.

Turns out, many of these myths about tech may be based on misconceptions. Read more…

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Do you follow a brand in social media? Are you glad you did? If that’s the case, they are doing either one of three things:

. Connecting with one of your passions and/or interests.
. Entertaining you with their engaging personality.
. Providing interesting and/or important information to you. Read more…

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These days, the desire for speed, easy access and convenience are a priority with consumers of almost every generation. Technology is impacting every aspect of our daily lives, shifting how we gather information and research and affecting our purchasing choices and habits. We want access to information from our smartphones and we want technology integrated into our shopping experience. Read more…

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Trust, attraction, and engagement… sounds like the recipe for a deep and lasting relationship, right?

Not surprisingly, consumers can experience and feel these same attributes for a product, and as a result, they form lasting, loyal relationships with the brands that serve them.

Unfortunately for brands, connecting to a potential customer at this level is difficult and time-consuming. Read more…

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Want to get the word out? Did you know you can broadcast your crowdfunding project or campaign to over 2,500,000 active users on 40Billion, Twitter, Facebook, and Google for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to promote your message, brand, product, service, fundraising campaign, crowdfunding project, or small business to the world.

Are you trying to raise money on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or GoFundme? For over 4 years, aspiring crowdfunders and startup entrepreneurs have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers and investors. Read more…

Word of Mouth Marketing (WOMM) has always been a powerful way to influence business results.

Why should Marketers care about WOMM?

If you could master what has been identified as the most valuable form of marketing-the one that consumers trust above all others and the one that is most likely to drive sales for your company – would you instead choose to ignore it or leave it to chance?

Why would you simply choose to sit back and hope conversations will just happen organically about your brand? If you want to win the marketing race in 2017, you need to unleash the power of word of mouth. Read more…

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As business leaders and athletic coaches know, you need more than exceptional talent to succeed. To create a winning team, entrepreneurs can learn from great athletes who came together to reach their full potential.

Dominique Moceanu won the Olympic gold medal in 1996, as part of the U.S. Women’s Gymnastics team known as the Magnificent Seven. Read more…

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Black Friday might hold first position, but there are eight other special holiday shopping days that can help you build business before Christmas this year.

In addition to below mentioned 9 holiday shopping days, don’t forget to use online marketing sites for your year-round promotion. You can visit 40billion.com which is the fastest-growing network of entrepreneurs and crowdfunders. Read more…

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Social media can be a slippery slope. Stretching yourself too thin by trying to be on every site can result in disengaged users. Failing to engage users on the right platforms will only amount to yet another lost marketing opportunity.

Here are 13 best practice tips when using popular social networking sites.

FACEBOOK

Facebook is by far the biggest and most popular social media platform. Read more…

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You’re an aspiring entrepreneur, so why are you working for an entrepreneur? Is working at another startup a route to nowhere or a good career move? It just might pay to work at someone else’s startup before starting your own. Here are 3 reasons why:

1) Startups can take a chance on talent.

Getting a first job is key to launching your career as an entrepreneur. Read more…

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Today, nearly every business is attempting to become a content marketer. The results aren’t pretty. The noise is deafening and while there’s plenty of great content, every industry is being bombarded with junk-cheap imitations of the idea of content marketing-create original, compelling, helpful content. Read more…

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Want to get the word out? Did you know you can broadcast your crowdfunding project or campaign to over 2,500,000 active users on 40Billion, Twitter, Facebook, and Google for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to promote your message, brand, product, service, fundraising campaign, crowdfunding project, or small business to the world.

Are you trying to raise money on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or GoFundme? For over 4 years, aspiring crowdfunders and startup entrepreneurs have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers and investors. Read more…

Don’t you love when brands interact with you in a human, authentic way that leads to a satisfactory experience? That is, your problem is solved, and your needs are met.

What do we do when we have such an experience? Well, we talk about it. That is word-of-mouth buzz from social interaction that’s authentic and customer-service focused.

Here are 2 ways to generate this type of buzz for your business’ brand:

1) Communicate in a contextual way.

If a customer posts a negative message about your product or sends you a direct message on social media sites to request support, that immediately provides you with context for response. Read more…

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Crowdfunding is a way of raising money for a new venture by soliciting small donations from many people online. The biggest platforms in the industry are Kickstarter and Indiegogo. In the last five years, crowdfunding has grown from a tool for off-beat bands to raise money from fans for an album they can’t afford to produce to a way for some really high tech inventors to get access to capital for their new, innovative startups.

Following is the checklist of 8 steps to prepare for your campaign.

1. Read more…

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It’s that time of year again when you and a lot of other entrepreneurs may be looking at former 9-to-5 colleagues with some envy, as they plan their annual two-week vacation with family or friends.

Can you afford to take two weeks away from your business and have it run as smoothly as it does when you’re in it? If you can, that’s great. Read more…

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Marketing is the lifeblood of any startup – without it, the company will be sure to sink.

Here is a list of the top ten marketing tricks:

Social Media
1. Boost your posts.Give your social media content a boost. Read more…

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It’s easy for new entrepreneurs and even seasoned business owners to be frazzled and to panic when mistakes happen. As your business grows and employees and partners are stretched thin, the risk of mistakes, errors and accidents increases. Mistakes happen, but they can destroy your brand’s reputation – whether your company has made a billing error, sent an embarrassing email with leaked confidential information, or recalled a bad product.

When mistakes happen, what should you do? Here are 3 suggestions for how to deal with unexpected disasters and keep them from destroying your company:

1) Act quickly and fix it. Read more…

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Every business owner knows how to wear a lot of hats. When first striking out on your own, you have a hand in finances, marketing, product design, and everything in-between. But as your company grows, you need to empower your employees to feel that same sense of independence.

Autonomy is one of our fundamental human needs – an essential component of a healthy workplace – our need to be driven by personal interest and enjoyment.

Employees that feel empowered are happier, more motivated, more committed to their jobs, and less stressed. Read more…

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Want to spread the word about your business? Did you know you can broadcast your product or service to our large audience across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and 40Billion for only $20, or as little as $5 a day? Buy a promo ad to broadcast your small business, startup company, product, or service to 2,500,000+ social users on 4 social networks – including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and 40Billion – at once.

For over 4 years, aspiring entrepreneurs and startup companies have used 40Billion for affordable promotion across popular social networks in order to reach more potential customers. Read more…

Coming up with ways to interact with your audience daily can start to make you feel as though you’re stretching your creative capacity a little thin. Yet developing strategies to engage with your audience and keep them coming back for more is critical to long-term social success. Connect with customers for the long haul with these 6 content strategies that will spur conversation and tell a story over time:

1. Read more…

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Let’s face a simple fact, boys and girls: advertising on the social channels is here to stay and, increasingly, social butterflies who want to get noticed will have to spend money on it.

This will come as a discouraging news for the legion of social media mavens who like the free nature of the social channels but reality is reality and marketers, organizations and business who really want to advance themselves will need to get serious about spending money on social advertising.

We all know the major social networks need to produce revenue to remain viable and we’ve long ago realized ad sales is really the most successful revenue generator or any mass media. Read more…

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