Customer Service

Business Blog Benefits

One very easy way to begin your offline consulting business is to offer a service to your local businesses that will have you creating blogs for them. We who are already familiar with the SEO (search engine optimization) and SEM (search engine marketing) value that blogs hold. Blogs are very easy and quick to create. In fact, if you create these small business blogs on Blogger.com (which is a Google property), they’ll get almost immediate attention paid to them.

If you’re already using ANY of Google’s accounts (Gmail, AdWords, AdSense, etc…) you can sign into Blogger with that same ID. You always have the option of starting a new account distinctly for the purpose of this business tactic. After all, Google accounts are free.

Choose the name of your client’s blog carefully. It will reflect the name of their business and be formatted something like this:

http://mainstreethardware.blogspot.com   or   http://sallysbeautysalon.blogspot.com

There are a few reasons why a blog is good for your client/customer:

• Even if they have an existing website, a blog is inherently equipped with more technically beneficial features.
• It gives them a high value backlink from an historically high site. (Thank you Google)
• Blogs equal targeted traffic.
• Targeted traffic equals leads.
• Leads equal customers.
• Customers equal a better bottom line
• Blogs do a better job at keeping them in touch with their customers.
• Blogs are dynamic and easily edited or changed to keep up with special offers and sales.

A great way to begin the conversation with your potential client, that small business owner down the road, is to ask him how he keeps in touch with his existing clients right now. If they stammer or stutter for an answer, you’re in the right place.

• Explain to them how they can stay in touch with their customers very easily and cheaply.
• Tell them about all of  the money getting benefits of a business blog.
• Educate them on auto-responders and how they can send out an e-mail blast right in the midst of a slow week or month in order to bring in more business.
• Describe how they can put advertisements on their site with a cooperative and complementary ad program with another business.

These ideas alongside your imagination and entrepreneurial spirit should give you enough to go out and start knocking on some doors or pick up the phone. There are dozens to hundreds of prospects for you to contact, depending on the population where you live; and don’t let that diminish your drive either.

You’re likely reading this on your computer, and you can therefore use that same computer to begin your search for the businesses that will ultimately make up the foundation and future of your business. The secret is to take action.

You’ve just been handed a simple, step by step method of getting a start in the offline consulting business. Pick an area to specialize in, pick a direction to take that specialty and PROVE to yourself that it’s as simple as making a choice. You CAN do this. Start today.

How ToMake A Living By Leasing Websites

Making a good living with internet marketing is nowhere near as easy as some people would have you believe.  To grow a sound and prosperous business requires a range of skills as well as knowledge and persistence.

Usually internet marketers are involved in selling e-books, videos, home study courses, reports, membership sites, CD’s & DVD’s.  It is not often that you hear about someone earning a living by leasing websites.

How can this be?

In the operational area of consulting to offline businesses, there is a huge opportunity to do just that.  It is now well established that this is a major growth industry.  At the present time, the large majority of small businesses either do not have a web site, or if they do, it is not bringing in new business.

Enter the offline consultant…

Becoming a consultant to offline businesses dictates that you need to provide them with an effective online presence that assists them to grow their business.  In order to do that you need to weigh the options available to you.

One opportunity would be to design an appropriate web site and sell it to the business owner.  In this scenario, this becomes a one-off transaction and he becomes the owner of the site.  The new owner also has the responsibility to maintain it on an ongoing basis.

A far better option is to prepare a web site for which you remain the owner.  Then lease the website to the business owner on a monthly basis.  You then retain control and can keep things to a proper standard…  More importantly, you then start receiving passive monthly income.  This is an important consideration, particularly when starting out in this area.

As your client portfolio grows, you will have a substantial monthly income.  Of course this income will be supplemented by other products and services that you may provide to your clients, but it will remain as the strong foundation of your business.

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Is Social Media The Answer For The Offline Business?

There are many tools available for an offline business to use to become more visible.  When offline advertising staples, such as newspaper advertising and direct mail, are not giving the best bang for the buck,  consultants are often called upon.  They are required to help transition the client onto the Internet for increased exposure.  Usually the first and most effective methods are the inclusion of the local business details in regional and metropolitan web portals that specialize in businesses on the local or regional level.

Another popular way that business can become more visible to its public is by trying to use the potential of Social Media.  There are a large number of ways that these tools can be used, but a careful evaluation of the needs and directive of the business must be undertaken.  Besides the huge potential for profit, there is just as large a possibility that it could become a disastrous situation.

The Social Media has been designed to promote networking and the formation of “cliques” and groups.  Here like minded people get to explore their common interests.  More and more, opinions are being driven through the various sites that become powerful forces in product selection. Consumers are finding the opinions of peers in their network just as powerful, if not more important than the information provided by the companies that physically manufacture and distribute the products they are interested in purchasing.

The strength of peer pressure and opinion offers a huge opportunity for the consultant to bring a client’s offline business into the spotlight.  The glare of public scrutiny can also cause serious problems if the approach is not upright and ethical.  For instance, some businesses have sent a “ringer” to join a number of groups to see what the members are thinking about various products.  If they are there to promote and push their make or brand, it will probably be identified.  The negative resentment of being made to be stooges by big business (no matter how big in actuality) can cause a drop in sales as people simply boycott out of principle.  The danger here is that sometimes a boycott can spread faster virally and cause serious damage to a bottom line.

If a business is going to join in the discussion, it should do so honestly and above board.  When a corporate representative is available to identify trends and help solve problems, there is a lot of good will generated. Word of mouth is strongly generated from such corporate involvement is usually quite positive.  There are even large multi-national companies monitoring the Social Sites on a continuous basis.

By listening and participating in  the discussions, they are in a much better position to understand  the trends and concerns of the consumer in a wide variety of areas.  The size of the company is not relevant.  The small offline company can join in the discussion and promote their products or services easily, but as mentioned, do it honestly and upfront, otherwise the chances of being burned are rather strong.

Some Social Structures like Twitter can be used to offer press releases, 140 characters at a time.  Depending on how the structure is set up, a Twitter account can be interactive with the consumers, or it can be strictly used as a one-way blast to all the followers with no responses offered.  Although this is a cheap way to offer product announcements, this works best when there is a real person also online. They must be identified with vested interests, often through the actual user name,  Their purpose is to identify trends and problems as they are voiced.

Some larger  corporations, with the resources to do it, will even approach a disgruntled consumer after they have been identified.  They take the time and effort to help move them to a corporate Customer Service platform where their issue can be properly handled and solved.  This in turn often results in happy testimonials about the way a company has gone out of its way to provide satisfaction being voiced back to the original group.

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