Using A Product Launch In An Offline Business

Marketing A Brand New Business

Two years ago Nathan Schokker started his business Talio – which provide integrated facilities management and commercial concierge services [http://www.talio.com.au/]. In this episode of the show I wanted to know from Nathan: – * what strategies he used to start marketing Talio when it was first founded * what he found worked for getting his first clients * what kind of marketing strategies he is doing these days * any strategies that did not work as well as he hoped (this may surprise you) It was great to talk to someone who is still in the new growth stage of their business (and is still excited about it!). We discussed social media, relationship building and referrals. If you would like to hear from Nathan in the future please leave a comment below and I will bring him back on 🙂 [https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/16.0.1/72x72/1f642.png]

Using Instagram For Business

While I technically do have an Instagram account, I haven’t logged in to it for at least 2 years. It’s just not the social network for me. After all who wants to see photos of my meals everyday? At least that’s what I thought Instagram was, photos of everyones meals #nomnom and travel photos #yolo (<–are we still doing that??) However Anthony Thompson from Crush Social [http://www.crushsocial.net/] stopped by the show to tell me all the things businesses can do with Instagram [https://instagram.com/crushsocial/]. crushsocial [https://i0.wp.com/marketingideaspodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/crushsocial.png?resize=300%2C76]https://i0.wp.com/marketingideaspodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/crushsocial.png And it doesn’t require photos of your food! Anthony was kind enough to share * how to get started  (you need to download the app) * what kind of content a business could put on Instagram * how to make best use of your profile * how you can connect with your customers and influencers * details of how he helps his clients use Instagram to drive business in store If you have any questions, please ask below or if you are on Instagram go straight to Anthony [https://instagram.com/crushsocial/] and ask him directly 🙂 [https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/16.0.1/72x72/1f642.png]

Getting Free Publicity

Screen Shot 2015-04-13 at 2.12.36 pm [https://i0.wp.com/marketingideaspodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Screen-Shot-2015-04-13-at-2.12.36-pm.png?resize=599%2C464]https://i0.wp.com/marketingideaspodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Screen-Shot-2015-04-13-at-2.12.36-pm.png To be fair, these two examples are not related to my day job of helping businesses with their email marketing [http://kissautomation.com/] but they were related to my personal experiences. Replying to callouts on SourceBottle has also resulted in me being quoted in various articles on online marketing and marketing and business in general. There is an advantage to hiring a publicity expert – They (hopefully!) know what they are doing and probably have contacts to journalists. However it can also be pricey. ONE WAY TO GET FREE PUBLICITY IS BY BECOMING AN EXPERT SOURCE AND PLATFORMS THAT MATCH JOURNALISTS TO EXPERTS.     MY 3 FAVOURITE PLATFORMS ARE: SourceBottle [http://www.sourcebottle.com/] – I love Source Bottle. I use SourceBottle to find sources all the time and the quality of experts is always high. Signing up is free and you receive emails twice a day from reporters/bloggers/writers looking for experts to quote. ProfNet [http://www.prnewswire.com/profnet/profnet-experts/] – The support team at ProfNet are super helpful and it is free to sign up as an expert. Help A Reporter Out [http://www.helpareporter.com/sources] – These guys are probably the most well known platform. They are a paid platform, however they do have a free option.

Why Would You Share Income Reports

One technique that has become popular over the past couple years is businesses sharing income reports. That is, reports that show exactly what the business earned and spent within a specific time frame (generally a month). Types of business this has become popular include tech startups, bloggers and podcasters. Sharing Income Reports [https://i0.wp.com/marketingideaspodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/IncomeReports.png?resize=800%2C1200]https://i0.wp.com/marketingideaspodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Sharing-Income-Reports.png Why do businesses share their income details? Talking about income and money has in the past been a big taboo and personally I don’t see it becoming main stream. However people who share income reports say it provides transparency that their audience appreciates and gives their business a credibility and trust worthiness that leads to people buying from them. Dan from WP Curve [http://wpcurve.com/income-reports/], a WordPress startup that provides tech support to people who use WordPress says > Put simply, our business would not exist in any recognizable form, without our monthly income reports. He says by sharing their income reports, WP Curve has built a reputation and a brand based on their transparency and has directly contributed to many awesome things. Along with transparency to their customers, sharing income reports probably feeds the human desire to peek behind the curtains a little. To see what other people are doing in business, how they are doing and how much money they are making. They can also provide motivation for people looking to start their own business, or people in similar markets looking to build their business. A potential downside of sharing your income report is the opportunity for people to steal your ideas and build identical services. However it remains to be seen if this is really a huge problem. For example many similar WordPress support sites have sprung up since WP Curve started sharing their stats however none have reached the heights that Dan and Alex has. In his article Why Some Bloggers Transparently Report Their Income [http://www.simonowens.net/why-some-bloggers-transparently-report-their-income], Simon Owens interviewed content marketer Alexis Grant about why she shares income reports one part of her business and not another. While Grant is happy to blog about revenue from affiliate marketing and advertising, she doesn’t share income generated from the client side of her business. The reason for this she says is “But I wouldn’t do this for the client side of my business, specifically because I just feel like some of our clients pay us more than others.” As Simon notes, “it essentially removes her bargaining power” [http://www.simonowens.net/why-some-bloggers-transparently-report-their-income]. If you’re interested in learning more about income reports and the kind of detail that people share, here are some examples: Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income [http://www.smartpassiveincome.com/my-income-reports/] shares the details on his different websites and where the income comes from Along with their own monthly income reports,WP Curve [http://wpcurve.com/monthly-reports/] have also put together a list of businesses that share income stats, including Entrepreneur on Fire, Baremetrics and Empire Flippers. On Bloggers Passion [http://bloggerspassion.com/bloggers-income-report-how-much-money-do-top-bloggers-make-and-how/], Anil Agarwal has created a list of bloggers who share their income reports. This includes a food blog, a number of travel blogs, internet marketing blogs and Anil’s own income report. WpLift.com have compiled a list of WordPress focused companies that share income reports [http://wplift.com/transparency-in-wordpress-income-statistics]. This includes theme developers, support services and plugin developers.   Articles mentioned: WP Curve – http://wpcurve.com/income-reports/ Simon Owens – http://www.simonowens.net/why-some-bloggers-transparently-report-their-income

Using A Product Launch In An Offline Business

James Schramko of SuperFastBusiness.com [http://www.superfastbusiness.com/] lays out the EXACT STEP-BY-STEP BLUEPRINT of how he made millions of dollars in one weekend using a launch sequence. What was the business? A car dealership Think it’s not applicable and you can’t do it. Think again. I truly believe this strategy could be used by most businesses. Listen to this episode and if you can’t see how it applies your particular business, then get in contact with me and I will help brainstorm how it can used in your business.