LinkedIn – Page 62 – 40Billion Blog for Startup Entrepreneurs and Small Businesses

The Unexpected Benefits of Crowdfunding

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. Not only are they likely to purchase from you in the future, they also are a source of great feedback.

You get amazing feedback by putting yourself out there. Read more…

4 Mistakes That Hurt Your Crowdfunding Campaign

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…

Viral Video Marketing 101

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…

7 Steps to Boost Content Marketing Success

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.

How to Manage Your Digital Marketing Without Falling Behind

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. Marketing experts recommend employing a hearty dose of social media, blogging, local SEO (Search Engine Optimization), and review site management to grow your client/referral base.

With everything else you have to deal with, how can you stay on top of Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin multiple times a week, not to mention a weekly blog, email campaigns, videos creation, and reputation management? If you recognize the value these activities will bring to your business, but don’t have the resources to hire someone to help you with it, consider these 5 tips to make it work efficiently for you.

4 Growth Hacks to Turbocharge Your Small Business

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. And extra time is not something that entrepreneurs come by very often.

Here are 4 simple marketing ‘hacks’ that will help boost your small business marketing efforts and make your life as an entrepreneur a little easier.

* Identify your strengths

There are a ton of options for marketing your business – newsletters, social media, attending events, etc. Read more…

8 Social Marketing Fails to Avoid

1. Little or no social media or blogging activity.

Why start a blog and never publish? Why start a Twitter account and never tweet? In social marketing, you have to show up and be active. Yes, starting that Facebook page was a good idea, but unless you are going to be consistent in posting and using it, just forget about it.

You can save time by using sites like 40Billion.com, which specializes in broadcasting and promoting posts to its large network of several million users across the most popular social networking sites for small businesses – including Twitter, LinkedIn, 40Billion, and even Facebook. Read more…

6 Creative Ways of Marketing Your Startup on a Budget

There are endless ways to finance your ideas, but there’s nothing like marketing a startup with a modest budget. Limited funds give you an excuse to flex your creative muscle and truly share your vision with the world.

Don’t rely on the same old banner ads and Google reviews. Instead, try these seven marketing strategies to place the spotlight on your business.

1. Share your story

Instead of just introducing yourself as an entrepreneur, develop a narrative that differentiates your company from others and sparks conversation. Read more…

10 Content Marketing Ideas to Promote your Small Business or Startup Company

Small business marketers who use content marketing are able to reduce the cost of leads, increase awareness and position themselves as leaders.

In recent years, marketers have been forced to think differently about how they engage with potential customers, particularly small business marketers.

Every year, customers have increasing control over what marketing messages they wish to consume. Read more…

4 Ways to Market Your Bootstrapped Startup Online

Some marketing strategies become less effective and some more effective. As a startup with limited resources, you need to pay especially close attention to what’s current so you can get the most bang for your marketing budget. You already know that you have to setup social media accounts. But here are few other ways you may not have considered.

1. Make an Explainer Video

Everyone knows that video production is effective for business, but many startups dismiss the idea because they believe it’s expensive. Read more…

10 Content Marketing Trends You Need To Know For Success

Content marketing online is continually changing and evolving. If you’re behind the content marketing curve, now’s the time to get caught up – here are 10 content marketing trends that are relevant today.

1. Social Media Content is King

Social media marketing is the most popular content promotion tactic by a mile. 87% of B2B content marketers are active on social media, while 81% have articles on their websites.

Lately, sites like 40Billion.com have made social media content marketing easier for businesses by broadcasting and promoting their articles to its large network of several million users across the most popular social networking sites – including Twitter, LinkedIn, 40Billion, and even Facebook. Read more…

11 Ways to Write a Compelling Crowdfunding Campaign

One of the most important aspects of your crowdfunding campaign is the story you tell, as it has a direct impact on the overall impression that your project conveys. In the end, this is what will get someone to become your supporter. Your choice of words can actually make a huge difference in your campaign’s results.
Before getting started, you have to decide if you or your team are the most suitable to do the work. Read more…

Email Marketing Tips for Small Business

Keeping the doors of your small business open can depend upon your ability to market to potential clients. Email marketing has been a mainstay strategy throughout the technological era. Prior to this, companies were limited to direct mail for advertising. Using the postal service could cost a small fortune and your materials might end up in the trash as junk mail. Read more…

7 Ways to Grow Your Business Through Marketing Partners

You can attract new customers, increase sales and grow your pipeline instantly by partnering strategically with other businesses. There are many mutual benefits that make the work required to build a strong marketing partnership worthwhile. There is the implied endorsement that goes along with it as well.

Strategy is a key to a success. Many business professionals attend local networking events with the hope of finding others they can partner with in order to grow more quickly. Read more…

Recommended: 6 Tips To Achieve Marketing Goals

6 Marketing Tips to Bootstrap Your Startup

Every day we are bombarded by brands fighting for our attention; how can you possibly make your startup stand out? Marketing your startup in today’s competitive business economy is undoubtedly difficult and expensive, but there are steps you can take to make sure your startup gets a good chance at success.

Before you start, make sure you have a firm grasp on two key things. First, you want to make sure that all of your marketing strategies identify and build upon what makes your business unique in your space. Read more…

New to Crowdfunding? Here’s What to Expect.

With the popularity and success of crowdfunding as a new way to fund new projects, it’s easy for other aspiring entrepreneurs to believe that sites like Kickstarter are their golden ticket to launching a business. But the reality is, crowdfunding isn’t always as simple as it seems.

Whether you’re looking to raise a small amount of startup cash or acquire a larger sum through equity crowdfunding, there are a few challenges you might face during the process that you may not have expected.

Choosing the right platform

The first step is to choose the right platform. Read more…

Recommended: 8 Social Marketing Fails to Avoid

4 Steps to Crowdfunding Success

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…

5 Crowdfunding Steps Proven To Raise Money on GoFundMe

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…

5 Crowdfunding Steps Proven To Raise Money on Indiegogo

Is Crowdfunding Right For Your Small Business?

What is Crowdfunding?

Over the past eight years, crowdfunding has emerged as a popular tool for individuals to raise financing for business ventures.

Entrepreneurs typically raise small amounts of money from a large number of backers, or “the crowd,” usually via the Internet. Backers receive some sort of reward or, less commonly, an equity- or royalty-based financial return. Crowdfunding platforms – including Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and GoFundMe – have raised billions of dollars, and the industry is still growing with niche service providers such as 40Billion which focuses on crowdfunding promotion for small businesses.

For small and new business owners looking to raise capital, crowdfunding is an increasingly popular option. Read more…