HOPSON POTTER BUSINESS

The small business administration gives away free seminars for those people who’d like to start a business and they often bring in experts from the local community to comment and speak. I have been asked to speak at these seminars and I must tell you it is quite fun to see all the entrepreneurs in the audience that are very interested in learning just how to run a business and get it done. I like to speak about local marketing because that is something I’m really good at and something I enjoy doing and talking about.

However, when you sit through one of these SBA seminars that are run for entrepreneurial startups you get the idea that they are trying to prevent people from starting businesses. It is almost as if they’re trying to dash their dreams. The SBA brings in people that tell them about all the bureaucracy, the licenses, and the rules and regulations.

They bring in accountants who are dry, poor speakers and IRS representatives, and all these people to scare them.

If we want America to fly again we are going to have to reduce the regulation on small business and not make it so tough and expensive for people to start their own companies. But that is another topic that no one seems to address including the Obama administration and even the new SBA administrator. 10% of the people in America own a small business you’d think that they would wise up and fix these problems. No such luck.

The SBA should spend more time explaining how entrepreneurs must include business planning, and marketing and customer service and not just all the rules and regulations and paperwork that one must fill out every time they turn around. In my professional opinion and I’ve thought a lot about this over the years for a least three decades; I believe that the SBA has always done a disservice to would be entrepreneurial startups in their seminars.

I’d like to see this problem fixed and I would go so far as to write the syllabus of what goes on in the seminars to prevent them from discouraging people away from their American dream.

Please consider all this.

There are a number of obvious advantages for marketers using Facebook applications to promote their company. One of the biggest advantages that both large companies and entrepreneurs have found is that they can promote their organization or new venture online using viral marketing rather than relying on SEO (which can be a much more complex thing to understand especially for newer companies without the resources to hire an SEO consultant). Another advantage of using Facebook applications to promote a product or company through viral marketing is that it can bring in large amounts of traffic immediately without having to wait for search engines to index onsite content and tediously building links in the meantime. Of course, clever marketers can find ways to make sure that their application helps with SEO as well as provide viral marketing.

Now for the bad news.

Companies trying to use Facebook Applications for viral marketing will find that the chances of reaching immediate success are not as high as they used to be. They have a number of applications that they must compete with and many Facebook users are less likely to try a random application, particularly if they do not closely know the person who invited them to use it. Marketers must also be honest with themselves about how likely the application is to help promote their company. If the application users do not feel motivated to visit the company’s website or call to purchase the products or services then the developers are wasting their time. The other major concern with using Facebook applications is that the traffic they bring in is limited to the lifetime of use for the application.

Successfully using Facebook applications to promote the flashy new product or innovative new venture they have created is actually going to require some careful planning and hard work.

There are a few simple but very important tactics that developers of Facebook applications should use to sell their product or promote their business: Know when to use a forced invite for the application: The company that started the Happy Hour application required users to invite others to promote their product found their strategy to be very successful. Of course, many other ventures soon followed suit. Unfortunately, this strategy doesn’t work for all audiences.

Believe it or not, many users are too lazy to take the two minutes to invite some of their friends to use the application and will actually give up on using it the second they realize they have to go through the hassle. The best solution is for developers to know who the target audience is for both their application and their company and know whether or not they will be turned off after being forced to invite their friends. If this is the case, the company should know not to force them to invite their friends to use the application at the beginning.

If they like the application, they will happily invite their friends to use it (and more importantly, go to the company’s website to learn more about the venture and the products that it is selling) Use news feeds responsibly: News feeds not only remind users to continue using the application, they also encourage their friends to use it if these feeds show up their wall. But if the application uses too many news feeds users will feel as if they are being spammed and may disable the application. Make sure the application encourages them to visit the company website or purchase its products.

Obviously, the application needs to have the name of the venture and the logo where it seems to make sense to use them. It is also advantageous to find ways for the application to interact with the company to facilitate future purchases. This can be done by offering coupons through the application or requiring the user to visit the company website to find information on how to use the application more effectively. Again, these tactics should not be overused. Most importantly, invite lots o

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A lot of people think that running their own business is a lot easier than working for someone else. What they don’t realize is that all of the little things that they never have to worry about when they are employees are going to be waiting for them as entrepreneurs. There is a lot of work involved in running a business, but this is hard work that is really going to pay off in the end, and if you want to give entrepreneurship a try, go for it. Just remember these five things:

- You are completely on your own. If you are the sole proprietor of your business, and if you have no employees working for you, you are going to be running things entirely on your own. Then, there is the problem of your friends and family members not understanding what you are doing, no matter how hard to try to explain things to them. Many people just don’t understand the mind of an entrepreneur, but as long as you have a dream, you won’t mind being on your own, at least in the short term until success begins to come your way.

- The work isn’t going to be easy. There is a lot of hard work involved in starting a business and making it a successful one, but the rewards can be really great. You will probably be working a lot harder than you ever did in your regular job, but you know what? If you are in business for yourself, you are doing so because you love what you are doing, and you won’t mind a little bit of hard work to ensure your success.

- It’s just like having a baby around. A business is much like a baby. You have to basically give birth to it, then nurture it and watch it grow. Your business will be the central focus of your life, and it will always be on your mind. But, just like a baby, if you follow all of the right steps, you can be sure that it will grow into something really great and eventually you will be able to share it with the baby sitters.

- Expect your life to change. When you are an entrepreneur, your entire life is going to be consumed by your business. You will probably become quite obsessed with making your business succeed, but this won’t matter, because if you are that obsessed, then you must really love what you are doing. Your business is going to be your way of life, and if you run it right, you will have your business for the rest of your life, (if you choose to).

- You have your freedom. Even though you are going to have to work hard, you will still have a lot more freedom than you would ever have with a typical nine-to-five job. You can create your own schedule, and if you want a day off, you have the freedom to do so without having to ask permission from anyone. And, this is often the ultimate goal of entrepreneurs, even more so than making money.

This article explains how commitment and perseverance will help you achieve your goals in business. Using an example from a huge fortune 500 company, you will see how most business owners give up and how you can avoid it.

If there is anything that I have learned over the years is that the most successful word in entrepreneurship is “commitment.” Did you know that 90% of all marketing campaigns fail, not because of the lack of quality, but because the marketer gave up too soon.

One huge example would be Marlboro. They were once pegged as a feminine-only brand. They just could not get male smokers to buy them. They were number 31 in the world for sales.

Then came the genius marketing team behind the Marlboro Man. Philip Morris sunk 18 million dollars into that campaign for an entire year.

…guess what, the following year they were still number 31, but the management knew they had the right concept and maintained “commitment” to the campaign.

Today they are number 1.

1 out of every 6 cigarettes sold in the world is a Marlboro. Even after dumping 18 million into a campaign they could have bailed at any minute, but they didn’t.

Now, this is not a tip about smoking so please don’t write me about it (I won’t respond). That’s not the point. The point is COMMITMENT. You have to stay committed to your goals, your plan, your vision.

Without commitment you have nothing but hope, and that’s not going to get you anywhere without some serious action. Commit to your business and what it stands for. Commit to you goals of financial freedom. If you don’t give up, you can’t fail.

Commit to your customers. Commit to your marketing.

Once you choose to follow that BIG word, everything else is just a speed bump here and there.