Business

6 Indispensable Factors For Attractive And Strong Content Marketing In 2017

August 10, 2017 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

This is a guest contribution from Junaid Ali Qureshi

As digital marketing and new social media platforms take over the internet, the need for establishing a strong and attractive content marketing arises. The content posted by a business brand offers an insight of the brand to the audience. It conveys the personal message of the brand and gives away information regarding the latest products and services.

If your content marketing is attractive and strong, it means it is able to direct a large number of people to the online brand stores. It also helps in increasing the sales of your product. The effectiveness and success rate of the content marketing shows how important it is for a business to succeed. Thus, to make your content marketing strategy strong, here are few factors that you need to keep in mind.

#1: Increased dependence on visual content

Image source: http://www.jeffbullas.com

Since the content plays such an important role in increasing the return on investment of a brand, it is necessary that you consider the type of content that is achieving great success in the recent times. In this regard, the social media company Dubai managed to share its statistics with us. They suggest that short videos are taking over the written content marketing strategy.

Visual content has become a necessity and every content marketer must consider this fact and give it its due importance. After inquiring more from the media company, we came to know that the infographics, high-quality images, videos, comics, graphics and slideshows are the types of visual content that are doing well on the internet. As far as the videos are concerned, here are few tips that you need to consider to generate unique videos:

Invest in interactive and informative videos
Make high-quality videos with good audio and understanding
Use latest tricks like 360-degree view and live streaming videos
Explain what you are doing in the videos.
Give a view of the behind the stage scenes to the viewers
Make sure the video target the right audience

#2: Is your content interactive?

Image source: https://www.slideshare.net/

When we double check the content, we need to make sure that the content showcase an interactive platform. Including interactive stages in the content has now become an essential factor of content marketing.

The consumers now like to play a major part in the industry by contributing their opinions and sharing their ideas. Presently, the interactive content is used less but it is expected to become dominant soon. As this style of content is not common yet, it gives you the edge of doing something different and unique.

Make use of this opportunity, make your content interactive and engage as many people as you can. Moreover, also ensure the looming presence of your interactive content. Whether it is a quiz, an image or a contest which engage the audience, it must be easily visible to the viewers. The viewer/ potential customer-to-be, by all means, must be able to clearly view and understand your content.

#3: Quality of the existing and new content

Image source: https://www.bluefountainmedia.com/

Whatever you do, compromising the quality of the content is out of the question. A poorly written content leads a business to nowhere. It fails to attract the traffic flow and reflects a bad impression of the brand on the audience. This is why, while making your content strategy, you need to ensure that the content that you post is high-quality content.

You need to use a unique style, whether it is a story telling style or a simple documentation style, the content must be great. It must engage the viewers so that the content is able to generate leads. This leads to increase in the sales and the return on investment.

Thus, make sure your content is grammar mistake and spelling-error free. It must be readable, easy to understand and well-written. The new content creation and blogging have become an essential part of inbound marketing as well. Presently, according to HubSpot research, 53% of the marketers consider content creation their top priority in inbound marketing. (Source: https://www.hubspot.com/)

Another thing that you can do is repurpose your present content as well. The content curation and syndication regulations allow you to republish the interesting content that brings benefits to the business. Producing new, original, evergreen and attractive content is outstanding but if you are facing problem in doing so, why not repurpose the already present content for a while?

#4: Promotion of the content to the right audience

Image source: http://bootcampdigital.com

The next factor that largely affects the strength of a content marketing strategy is the targeted promotion of the content. Generating high-quality and authentic content is not enough. The marketers need to make sure that it is directed to the right audience as well.

You can pick the right audience by collecting data on the geographic, demographics and on the behavior of the audience. And once you have collected the data, find out the most common issue and the problem that are prevailing among the audience. This data is sufficient to find out about the type of audience you are dealing with. You can then tally the feature of your product that benefits them the most and market accordingly.

Joe Pulizzi, the founder of the Content Marketing Institute stated that there has been a shift between the content creation and promotion. Five years ago, 80% of efforts were focused on creation and 20% were focused on the promotion. But with the passage of time, and as the internet has become dense with content, the percentages flip-flopped.

This means that the present year and those that are yet to come are all going to be about promotion of the content. And every content marketer must look forward to new ideas to do so.

#5: Influencer Marketing

Image source: http://visual.ly

An influencer marketer is a person who is popular in different social circles and has a list of fans and followers. This individual can help a lot in content marketing. As people like to accept what the third-party recommends, using influencer marketing techniques will greatly enhance the business advertisement.

Data collected from different agencies that offer social media services Dubai shows that social media platforms are presently flooding with influencer marketers. This marketing trend is among the latest ones but it must be considered by the content marketers if they will to succeed in the competition.

Elephantation, a renowned digital marketing company, considers influencer marketing an essential factor and today they are succeeding at a great pace.

Do you want to slip some great tips regarding running the influencer marketing campaign down your sleeves? Here is your chance to do so:

Build good relations with the influencer so that you know he is on your side. This helps in ensuring the good quality of the content
The content must have an engaging and interactive story
Don’t forget to add a call to action in between
Make sure you are achieving your goals through the content
Do show empathy to the influencer’s schedule

Follow these tips and you’ll do great with the influencer marketing strategy.

#6: Consistency in delivering the content

Image source: http://blogpros.com

The stats from content marketing institute suggest that 85% of the top performers deliver content consistently. But it is because of the consistency in the job that the respective brand is able to make its position in the global market. The audience reviews one article and soon afterward they forget it.

Consistency in posting content, whether written or visual, keeps the brand in front of their eyes until they actually know it by name, product variety, and quality. Thus, on whichever platform you are posting your content, make sure you do it regularly.

Now, when we say regularly, how often should you post content on the website or the social media platforms? Well, the content posting schedule depends on the marketing team of the brand. But if you ask us, if you are running an active marketing strategy and your brand is a new one, you should post new content weekly. If in case you have a popular business brand at hand, monthly content posting would do.

Also, don’t forget to take feedback from your viewers. This helps in finding out whether your content is good enough and doing its respected job of attracting the viewers or not. You can also find this by conducting an analytic program. It gives you the data regarding the performance of your website/ social media and how well the content is doing there.

Taking these 6 factors into account for a successful content marketing strategy is enough. Even a startup can succeed by making sure they have focused on these factors. The content marketing institute shares the base points of a good content marketing strategy. It includes having one content type, one main platform, consistent delivery and a long period of time to make sure it flourishes. So make sure you do everything in your power to make your strategy succeed and give it enough time to flourish.

About The Author:

Junaid Ali Qureshi is a digital marketing specialist who has helped several businesses gain traffic, outperform competition and generate profitable leads. His current ventures include Elephantation, eLabelz, Smart Leads.ae, Progos Tech and others.

How To Play More Offense For Your Business

August 8, 2017 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

The more offense you play for your business, the more successful you will become. All of the top entrepreneurs dedicate a portion of their time each day to play offense.

Playing offense does not mean writing the next blog post. It doesn’t mean engaging with your audience, creating videos, or doing anything else associated with being in your business.

Playing more offense involves you taking an aerial view of your entire business and asking yourself important questions. Is this working? What should I be focusing on? What small changes can I make that would yield dramatic results? How do I grow this?

This offense results in more directed action with a clearer path to victory. Instead of constantly creating content and marketing yourself, you now have more specific aims that you believe will create the most impact.

You may feel like you’re already on the right path, but taking 30 minutes to conduct that aerial view every day will open the door to old opportunities and platforms that can still lead to great results.

Write Down Everything That Constitutes Your Business

This is a one-time, time extensive task. You’ll occasionally go through this list as your business continues to grow. However, you need to take this step before you can truly play offense. Here are just some of the parts of my business:

Virtual Summits
Blog Posts
Guest Posts
Training Courses
Free Videos
Books
Public Speaking
Breakthrough Success Podcast
Coaching
Redistribution

Sometimes I focus so much of my time, attention, and energy on my virtual summits that I forget about other areas. When I took the aerial view, I rediscovered that I needed to pump out more content for my readers (plus, I LOVE writing content, and realized that I’d separated myself from my biggest passion for too long).

I also rediscovered my podcast outros need major updates. I didn’t see any traction from my previous outros because I mainly promoted my Udemy courses, but now I’m promoting more stuff on my site and a few tools which I use and am an affiliate for.

I also rediscovered that I could get more exposure by writing more guest posts and getting interviewed on more podcasts.

Discovering and doing are two different things, and if your schedule is constantly filled with in-business work, you never find the time to take that aerial view and ask yourself, “What should I really be doing?”

Then you need to rediscover and start implementing instead of letting these important tasks continue to remain unattended.

Writing down all of this information is so important because with tens of thousands of thoughts running through out minds every day, it’s easy to forget.

Start Delegating More Of Your Tasks

Delegating your tasks to others will open up hours of extra time. My freelancers are critical to my success because they subtract various tasks from my day. Over the long-term, I can easily see having a team of hundreds of freelancers, but I’m not there yet.

Some people may be interested in delegation but haven’t started yet. If that’s you, my friend Nick Loper from Side Hustle Nation has some great advice for you.

The two main ingredients you need to get started delegating are a log of where you’re spending your time and a well-documented process.

The time log will tell you where the biggest opportunities for outsourcing lie. What’s sucking up the most of your day? Is that something you HAVE to do, or could someone else reasonably handle it with a little training?

Next, you’ll want to have clear process documentation and instructions. This is like your recipe for completing the task, and the more detailed the better. Don’t leave anything to chance here, even though you probably take for granted some of the steps, especially if you’ve been doing the task yourself for any length of time.

How I normally create the process documentation is I take a screen capture video of myself doing the job and talking through the steps. Then I write out the steps in a Google Doc so I can share both a visual and written version with my assistant.

Delegating more of your tasks will also give you more time to play offense. Take some time to think about some of the important parts of your business, how you can take action, and then just do it.

Checking on your freelancers is part of playing offense because you want to make sure they have work, and more importantly, that your freelancers are effectively getting their jobs done. You should have more 10-15 minute meetings fill up your schedule to ensure that you and your freelancers are both on the same page. These meetings do take up some time, but they work like a charm for keeping everyone on track.

In Conclusion

I thought of ways that I could extend this blog post beyond my usual 1,000 word marker, but I decided against it. Playing offense for your business simply comes down to…

Taking the aerial view of your brand
Discovering/rediscovering what you need to do for the optimal impact
Start taking action

I could have said it in several different ways, but that’s the premise to working on offense. Taking action just comes down to putting the tasks on your schedule. If a task isn’t on the schedule, it doesn’t get done. If it’s on the schedule, it has a much higher probability of getting done.

What are your thoughts on playing offense for your business? Do you have any tips for us? Have a question? Sound off in the comments section below.

How To Optimize The Back-End Of Your Book

August 1, 2017 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

books

When most people think about a book as an asset, they think of sales, authority, and connections. If you don’t think of your book as a gigantic sales letter, then you are leaving a lot of revenue on the table.

Let me explain.

A reader who completes your entire book is a very warm lead for other products and services that you offer. It would be a shame to not provide several calls-to-action at the back-end of your book.

It’s acceptable to provide CTAs at the back of your book because they are optional and don’t add to the main content within your book. People will only decide to learn more about your offers at the back-end if they are interested and really enjoyed the book.

What Could You Offer At The Back-End?

Before we proceed, it’s very important to decipher what a back-end is NOT. A back-end offer isn’t your landing page where you ask for an email address.

You can provide a link to your landing page at the beginning of your book to capitalize on Amazon’s book previewer option.

This option will result in more customers, but more importantly, non-customers (which you can convert later) to subscribe to your email list.

Here are a few products/services that would make a great addition to the back-end of your book.

Coaching: You’ve shared a lot of great advice in your book, but some of your readers need a nudge in order to take action. That’s what you’ll offer with coaching.

Training Course: A frequently updated, more detailed analysis of the ideas in your book and the ability for readers to ask you questions.

Mastermind: You can gather a few readers together who help and keep each other accountable with your occasional input. Masterminds result in less revenue than coaching but you can mastermind several people at once, while coaching involves a 1-to-1 relationship.

Done-For-You Service: Your reader loves the value you provided but would prefer that you do all of the work. This is where a done-for-you service comes in. When you start out, you’ll have to do the work on your own, but as you grow, you’ll hire more freelancers to do most of the work for you. Charging a premium will ensure that you continue to make profits and accept clients even with increasing freelancer costs.

Your Other Books: As your readers just finished reading your book, chances are they’ll be interested in more of your books. This will generate the least revenue but also be the easiest source of revenue. Including the same back-end offers in these books will make your readers more aware of them and turn them into customers. This is more of a long-term strategy for acquiring high paying customers

Provide Memorable Links

If a reader is interested in one of your back-end offers but doesn’t remember how to access it, you’ll lose out on a potentially lucrative sale. It’s true that a reader can simply go back to the book, but since most readers never get past the first chapter, imagine how few readers decide to crack open the book a second time.

This is why you should make the links as memorable as possible. For instance, you can use yoursite.com/mastermind to lead people to the mastermind offer. This is an easy URL to remember compared to yoursite.com/2017-book-mastermind-for-success. There’s a big difference.

For the sake of argument, let’s say the reader is willing to crack open the book for a second time. The main problem is that some readers will put it off as it’s a seemingly easy activity that rarely gets put on the schedule. The bigger the time gap, the more likely readers are to forget about their desire for your product or service…or go with someone else instead.

Make it as easy as possible for someone to buy something from you.

Create A Facebook Group

Some of your readers will go through your back-end offers and decide that none of them apply…for now.

But if you continue to build a relationship, over time you can get the same people to become your customers. So how do you build the relationship?

Start off with the essentials like consistently providing content and engaging with your audience, and then move to something slightly more advanced like a Facebook Group.

Create the Facebook Group and (this is important) include it in the same place you make the back-end offers. This way, if people aren’t immediately convinced, they can opt to join your Facebook Group (it’s free so they might as well join) and become part of your community.

As these readers continue to see you more often, they’ll think about your back-end offers more and more. This is how you turn a no into a maybe and then a yes.

Sprinkle Offers Throughout Your Book

While you showcase your offers at the back of your book, you can also sprinkle them throughout your book. Now it’s time to re-visualize your book as a gigantic sales letter. When appropriate, you can talk about success stories and experiences directly related to your product.

In a book about productivity, for example, I might talk about the level of productivity I needed to create one of my productivity courses. Choosing this topic gives me the ability to describe some of the benefits of the course without being salesy.

I can also share stories of people who went through the course and transformed their productivity – I can share what they did and, specifically, how the course helped.

Finally, you can start every chapter with a quote. In my Content Marketing Book (coming out in late October or early November), I began each chapter with evergreen quotes from my virtual summit.

I’m also leading off with quotes from my Content Marketing Plaza course to drive more attention to that. Then I’ll feature CMSS, The Plaza, and a few other products at the back-end of my book.

In Conclusion

Writing a book is exciting. However, if you miss out on including back-end offers, you will miss out on thousands of dollars (or even more). Most of the people who read your book from start to finish will adore your knowledge and will want more.

That’s where your back-end offers come in, and at the very minimum, these readers will join your Facebook Group. Make sure the URLs are easy to remember so your readers have an easy time taking action on your back-end offers.

When sharing the URLs, consider that some can get outdated. For instance, contentmarketingsuccesssummit.com currently leads people to the summit that took place a few months ago.

In 2018, that same URL will lead people to the next CMSS.

I want to consistently lead readers to the 2017 version which is why I’ll incorporate contentmarketingsuccesssummit.com/2017 as the link. I want to lead readers to the 2017 version because that’s the one I currently have, and the book is based on the summit.

What are your thoughts about including back-end offers in your books? Have any tips for us? Do you have a question? Sound off in the comments section below.

Improve Your Content Marketing Strategy Using the Buyer’s Journey

July 25, 2017 by Marc Guberti 2 Comments

This is a guest contribution from Nicole Stelmar

A consumer goes through three different stages before making a purchase: awareness, consideration, and decision. These three stages make up the buyer’s journey.

Why does this matter to content marketers? Each stage of the buyer’s journey presents an opportunity to reach potential customers and lead them down the path to making a purchase.

Unfortunately, many marketers overlook the first two stages and focus only on content for buyers in the decision phase.

In order to reach prospects in each stage of the buyer journey, it is important to understand what content resonates most with consumers in that stage. Here are some tips and examples on how to create effective content for each stage of the buyer’s journey.

Awareness Stage

The awareness stage is the first stage of the buyer’s journey—also known as the top of the funnel. In the awareness stage, the buyer encounters a problem that they need solved. The prospect is seeking information about a product or service without the intent of buying. They desire to find free, high quality educational content that will lead them to a conclusion.

Prospects will browse a wealth of information before they find what they need. At this point, their value as a lead is low because they may not notice you. However, if they find that your content is helpful and interesting, they are one step closer to buying.

Unfortunately, many businesses tend to overlook this part of the process. They don’t see it as a worthwhile investment because it may not guarantee a lead. However, neglecting the awareness stage is a mistake.

This is an opportunity to gain a connection and trust with your audience through quality content. Think of this stage as a first impression. A prospect will quickly sift through information to solve their problem as quickly as possible. You want your content to be intriguing and helpful so that you stand out among the crowd.

The types of content that interests prospects at this stage are blog posts, social content, and ebooks. Diversify your content with research reports, editorial content, whitepapers, and statistical reports that educate the buyer.

Let’s look at some examples of content for your customers in the awareness stage. First up is a research report from TransUnion’s SmartMove division. By providing its potential customer base with its own research, SmartMove is establishing itself as a trustworthy and authoritative figure within their industry. This will attract customers in the awareness phase as they are looking for more information on their newly identified problem.

The second example comes from right here at MarcGuberti.com. By offering potential customers free access to 27 Ways to Get More Retweets on Twitter, Marc is giving users in depth knowledge of Twitter best practices. He is also establishing himself as an expert in digital marketing and entrepreneurship.

Consideration Stage

Once your prospect is informed, you must convince them that your product solves their problem. This is known as the consideration stage.

The goal in this stage is to help the buyer identify exactly what they need to solve the problem that first brought them to the awareness stage. The second goal is to convince the buyer that your product or service fits their particular needs. In addition, you need to show them why your product or service is superior to that of the competition.

As the funnel narrows in the consideration phase, so too must your focus. Buyers in the middle of your sales funnel begin to trust you as an authority in your subject. Your goal is to show them that you are an expert in your field or industry.

And you can optimize for this advantage through the use of expert guides, webinars, live interactions, and white papers that compare your features and benefits with those of your competitors.

Odoo, a provider of management software, published this white paper, which compares its services to three competitor services. This allows Odoo to clearly demonstrate why its software is superior to competitors’, making a potential customer’s consideration phase much easier.

Another example comes from Source Capital Funding, Inc., a finance company and money lender. Source Capital Funding, Inc. provides its customers with a how-to guide for securing a hard money loan.

After their customers have identified their need (the awareness stage), they want more information on how to solve their problem (the consideration stage), which is exactly what this guide addresses.

Decision Stage

The decision stage is the most critical point of the buying process. Thus far, you have presented yourself as an expert and intrigued consumers with relevant information. You have also persuaded them that your product fits their needs and solves their problems.

In the final phase, you have brought the prospect to the tipping point where they are making their purchase decision. If you have done your job in the previous two phases, all you need to do now is close the deal.

At this point, they know they want to buy the product, but you need to convince them to buy the product from you. This decision requires content that will connect with them and help them to make their final decision.

The content you provide to close the deal will greatly depend on your industry or field. Many companies flood the market with flashy calls to action, newsletter sign-ups, and other attention-grabbing features.

However, these are services that are meant to benefit you, instead of the buyer. The strongest content that reins buyers in is that which that gives them real incentive. Features like trials, webinars, free downloads, demos, and case studies will compel your audience.

For example, Community Tax, an accounting firm, offers its potential customers a free consultation. This is a great way to attract customers in the decision phase who are just about to make their purchase decision by giving them one more reason to try out Community Tax. Free trials and consultations help make the purchase decision that much easier for the buyer.

This example from DotMailer, an email marketing platform, not only gives potential customers a two week trial, but customers can also choose to sign up for a free demo as well. The hope with this type of trial is that customers will like the service so much that they will be quick to purchase after the two week trial period.

Post-Purchase

You have successfully led your buyer through each stage of the buyer’s journey, and he has purchased your product. Now what? It’s time to nurture the relationship you have developed with your buyer. Don’t make the mistake of only focusing your content on customers who haven’t purchased yet. In that case, you would be missing out on a large group of potential repeat customers.

As with the three stages in the buyer’s journey, there are certain types of content that work best for customers post-purchase. Content in this stage can have various purposes: to engage with the customer, to make them feel heard, to gather feedback, to turn them into a repeat buyer, and/or to encourage them to be advocates for your product/brand.

So post-purchase content should also serve as a way of:

Reducing returns
Reducing customer service questions
Minimizing service costs
Diminishing potential bad word of mouth (or bad online reviews)
Retaining future sales

In order to achieve each of these, it’s important that you vary your post-purchase content as no piece of content will cover all of those goals. Focus on post-purchase follow-up emails, feedback surveys, extensive user guides, and suggestions of similar products specific to that buyer. This allows you to engage with your buyer in ways that make them feel appreciated and more likely to purchase again.

For example, check out Nordstrom’s post-purchase email. In this example, Nordstrom nurtures the relationship with the customer by giving them three opportunities to share their thoughts on the product and speak with customer service (“Write a review”, “order satisfaction survey”, and “Live Chat”). By making the customer feel like their voice is heard, he or she is more likely to purchase again after receiving such excellent customer service.

This final example from theSkimm could fall under the post-purchase email category (as it is an email sent post-purchase), but instead of looking for feedback, theSkimm is hoping to convert users into brand ambassadors. This tactic goes beyond encouraging repeat buyers and instead focuses on creating advocates who acquire new customers for you.

In Conclusion

The process of creating content that resonates with consumers is an art. And each stage of the buyer’s journey requires unique content in order to effectively move your potential customer along to the point of purchase. By tailoring your content to customers within a particular stage, you will succeed in converting more leads into customers. Just let the buyer’s journey be your guide!

About The Author

Nicole Stelmar is a Managing Editor at 365 Business Tips, a website focused on providing business owners all the information they need to successfully start and run their business. Nicole specializes in helping clients improve their digital presence through SEO and content marketing.

3 Ways To Fit Something Into Your Budget

July 22, 2016 by Marc Guberti Leave a Comment

budget management

Let me know if this has happened to you:

You discover a tool that can help you grow your business. You do some research and decide it’s an awesome tool that can increase your productivity. You’re all in.

But when you go to purchase the tool and see the price, your jaw drops. It will cost you at least $200/month.

You REALLY want this tool, but you simply don’t have room in your budget. Your only hope is to create a void in your budget so you can afford the $200 expenditure.

But how? Here are three ways to make it happen:

#1: Side Hustle

When your income increases, so does your budget. Once way to increase your budget on your own is to side hustle.

Continue to do what you’re already doing: working at your current job or building your online business. But start side hustling for the extra money to buy that $200 tool.

Side hustling lets you make quick revenue from part-time work. Some side hustlers soon find their hustles can even offer a full-time income.

If you discover your side hustle is earning you more revenue than your current job, by all means, consider switching over. But for our purposes, we only need to make enough cash to buy that $200/mo tool.

Freelance work, affiliate marketing, and consultation sessions are three side hustling ventures you can easily pursue. And here are 99 more ways your can side hustle for extra cash.

UPDATE: Are those 99 side hustle ideas not enough. Here are 25 additional side hustle ideas.

Choose an activity that won’t require too much of your time and lets you turn over a quick revenue. The best part of side hustling is the fact that it’s all done on the side.

Many people think they don’t have enough time to side hustle. But that’s a limiting belief. The reality is that we all have far more time than we realize. The way we utilize our time determines how much we actually get done and how we view our capabilities.

#2: Reduce Your Business Costs

If your budget is maxed but you still want to squeeze in an extra $200/mo, start reducing your business expenses.

The more business tools you invest in, the less often each gets used. Make a list of all of the add-ons you’ve bought for your business and analyze the utility of each. You may have completely forgotten about some of the things you’re spending on each month.

I hire several freelancers to help me out with my business. Even with all of their help (which does add up to a lot), I still find myself busy. So busy, in fact, that I often keep paying my freelancers without stopping to determine whether their projects are still in line with my current goals.

As my goals change, so too does the freelance activity I need to meet them. I had made the mistake of paying for work that was no longer relevant, and it took me some time to figure out what, and who, I should cut.

Money down the drain. Just because a freelancer is doing a great job does not mean he/she is helping you meet your objectives.

Pausing contracts with freelancers whose services no longer align with your current activity cuts recurring fees and lowers your expenses.

To optimize the use of your available resources, set performance parameters that reflect your efficiency goals and offer incentives when those goals are met.

Track the ways you’re spending your money and ask yourself if every dollar in your budget is actually moving your business forward in relation to your current goals. More ways to reduce business costs include:

Renting unused physical space in your office.
Consolidating your bank accounts.
Comparing insurance providers for the most competitive rate and asking your current provider to match it.
Don’t take on unnecessary debt.
Cut marketing costs by doing more in-house.
Increase social media use and reduce traditional marketing.
Use efficient time strategies with free productivity apps and software.
Focus on quality (the best way to please customers and increase your bottom line).
Maximize your current employees’ skills.

#3: Get Better Results With What You Already Have

Let’s assume your blog gets 50 visitors a day and earns about $300 per month. You make the money because out of those 50 monthly visitors, six of them will buy your $50 training course (and you make 100% of the profit).

But if you need room in your budget for extra $200/mo, you’ll need to increase your conversions rates. Your blog in this example gets a total of 1,500 monthly visitors, and with six customers, your conversion rate is 0.4%.

But if you optimize your blog to increase your conversion rate to 2%, your monthly customers will also increase — you now have 30 people paying for your training course.

Suddenly you’re making an additional $1200/mo, more than enough to start investing in that $200/mo tool!

You can also add another $50 course to diversify your products. People who wouldn’t have bought your first training course may find the second course is more in line with their needs.

People often focus so much on growth that they forget to monetize their current offerings.

In Conclusion

Always keep track of how much you are spending. Putting money into your business can lead to numerous results. But it’s easy to get so caught up in day-to-day operations that you don’t even realize you are no longer making a return on certain investments.

When you do make the realization, it can create miscommunications and misunderstandings. Set goals and expectations for each expenditure. And frequently check back to see if they are being met.

Many times you’ll get exactly what you wanted and more. But your expenditures should always reflect your goals. And as your goals change, so will the areas in which you spend.

The lag time between changing a goal and acknowledging how that change affects your spending is one of the main reasons why people continue to make unnecessary expenditures. My own lag time has decreased over the years, but it still exists.

The greater that lag, the more money you lose.

Recurring fees are the most damaging. They may be paid automatically and are easy to forget about, especially when each is fairly low. But those minimal fees add up, and your budget will soon be screaming for mercy.

So if you want to buy that awesome $200/mo tool, make room for it by eliminating unnecessary spending. Even better? Review your spending patterns frequently, even before you want to invest in something new and find yourself scrambling to make room for it in your budget.

How do you maintain your budget? Have any tips for us? Sound off in the comments section below.

How To Use Pokemon GO For Your Business

July 18, 2016 by Marc Guberti 4 Comments

Pokemon GO surged Nintendo’s business, and it has the potential to grow your local business too. Local business owners are already using the app in interesting ways to attract new customers.

As an outsider looking in, I analyze how businesses can use Pokemon GO to increase their revenue.

If you enjoy the video, please don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel.

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