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Let’s start with the components, the “Four P’s of Marketing”

1.Price

• Price impacts revenue, Price*Quantity
• Price Level impacts demand, Higher prices=Lower demand, Relative prices with competitors effects demand.

2. Product

• Physical features of the product, specifications, and the intangible aspects of the service (warranty)
• Things you do to make the product more attractive to buy (ie. packaging)
• Value: What is the ratio of benefit to cost for the consumer?
• Differentiation: Are the things that make your product unique real or psychological?

3. Place

• Where will you sell the product?
• Where are the customers and how do you reach them?
• Channels of Distribution: All the middle-men used to deliver your product.

4. Promotion

• Delivering your message to consumers.
• What most people think of as “Marketing”
• 3 purposes: Inform, Persuade, Remind
• Identify target audience
• Determine communication objective
• Design message
• Select communication channel
• Manage implementation
• Mass Selling, Advertising: which you pay for and Publicity: which is free
• Sales Promotion: In store effoerts to get the customer to try the product (ie. contests, coupons, free samples…etc)
• Personal Selling: Direct contact with a potential customer.

Once again I leave this as sort of a “Bare-Bones” post becuase I want you to think about this stuff and how it all works together. If there are any areas you would like me to describe in detail, let me know and I will post a follow-up on this subject.

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There is a group of business people out there known as Stock Promoters. It is their job to help publicly traded companies with little to no volume on their stocks gain attention in the trading world.

I bet you are already thinking that this can go two ways (at least) right? So let’s think about it.

When a Stock Promoter is hired to help a company market it’s stock to traders and investors who’s best interest is in mind? We would like to think both right? May be the company is quietly increasing its net worth and its profitability ratios are outstanding and its management is top notch…etc. In this case its to the benefit of both the investor and the company. Obviously this company was just not on the right persons radar and never got noticed.

On the other hand, what if the company is not so hot? What if the company ‘knows’ it too. but they hire a Stock Promoter anyways and instead of helping a company get deserved recognition, he/she is pumping ill-deserved hype into the market for a company in which no one in their right mind should invest. This hype drives the price unrealistically high and it inevitably falls, and hard.

So, there are just two of the many dilemmas faced when looking at a stock that is being promoted by a  Stock Promoter. It all comes down to personal research, some marketers are out there to do good and some are out to make a buck just like every other  industry. Do your research and you won’t get burned.

This was a short post because I wanted to leave a lot to the imagination. If you are a marketer, think about the different ways there are to promote a stock. If you are an investor/trader do the same, but with a Caveat Emptor attitude.

I’d love to hear the thoughts of my readers, please leave a comment if you have any stories to share on this subject.

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So how do you decide if your business will succeed?

Step 1: Study the market in which you will be entering.

• Find the market price for comparable products.
• Find the average volume of sales for a comparably sized business in your market.

Let’s first talk about lending. Most likely when starting a business you will have to obtain start-up capital from a lender. One of the first things potential lenders are going to ask is if you have done a Break-Even Analysis. That is how you can prove to your potential lender that you will be able to pay back the money borrowed and this one is easy.

Once you have studied your market and found the average selling price (SP) and the average volume you are on your way. The other informatin you will need is your Fixed Costs (FC) and Variable costs (VC). Variable costs are costs that change with the number of units produced.

Lest’s say you determine that your FC will be $10,000, your variable costs are $5 per unit, and the SP is about $10. How many units will you have to sell in order to Break Even? Here we go…

The Break Even Quantity (BEQ) is found where your Total Costs (TC) are equal to your Total Revenue (TR). Total Revenue is found by multiplying the SP by the number of units sold. In this case we will use the avgerage volume of sales, since that is a realistic number. Let’s say you determine that the average volume of sales for your product is 2,000 units per 2 months.

your BEQ => FC+(VC/Unit)= Selling Price/Unit => $10,000 + 5(U) = SP(U)

After a little algebra, this gives us a break Even Quantity of 2,000 units. So, it looks like we can break even in this business in 2 months.

But, you need money to live on too, lets say you know you will need $25,000 over the next 6 months. So, let’s add in a $25,000 Profit Goal (PG). How do we determine how many units to sell now?

Well, first we ned to determine your contribution. Contribution is found by subtracting the variable cost per unit from the selling price per uinit. SP-VC=Contribution => $10-$5 = $5 Contribution.

Now that we have the contribution, we can find your Adjusted Break Even Quantity.

(FC+PG)/Contribution = Adjusted BEQ => ($10,000+$25,000)/5 = 7,000 Units.

Can you sell 7,000 units in 6 moths based on your market research?

I hope you enjoyed this post and found it useful, if you have any comments or questions please post them and I will be glad to help.

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Twitter is a great place to network not just for business, but for fun. There is so much more to Twitter than posting your thoughts, it’s there so you can see the thoughts of others too. Twitter helps people from all over the word answer that one question all friends ask each other, “What are you doing?”. It’s a simple question, but to those who take an interest in your life it can really mean a lot to be able to keep up with you and what you are up to. Through Twitter, you can easily make new friends and develop relationships if you just put in a little effort. I love meeting new people and I try to follow everyone who is following me, with the occasional exception of “that guy” (see this post by @johnChowDotCom) to see what others think. Twitter is doing a pretty good job of dealing with those shady fellows.

I have my own system through which I choose my new twitter friends. But how do you do it? I think there are a lot of equally good ideas on how to choose your Twitter friends and I’d love to hear them, Just post a quick comment and tell me how you follow.

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Some people are out there seeking thousands of so called “friends” and then dumping their product or service on them without even getting to know them. Think of it this way. You get on a plane and the unavoidable boredom that ensues from avoiding whatever horrible movie is playing leaves you with the option of sleeping or making conversation with the person next to you. What is the first thing you do? Introduce yourself? Hi my name is Rich, blah blah blah… Then what? Do you immediately start telling this person about your business and how they should buy whatever you are selling? Hopefully not, more than likely you find a common interest pretty quickly, like why you are headed to your destination. From there the conversation usually steers itself and if you suddenly changed the subject to “buy my stuff” your conversation would probably come to an abrupt end leaving an uncomfortable remainder of the flight.

Instead, the wise person would wait for a signal, some indication that the person with whom you are speaking may be interested in you product or service. At that time you may decide to engage and throw your pitch. Brain sugery right? Hardly, most of us have a fairly tuned social acumen and understand this concept.

So why am I telling you what you already know? Because it seems that when some people get online, their social acumen is inadequate at best. When you are on a social networking site like Twitter, for example and someone decides to follow you, don’t just follow them back give them a reply and get to know them a little before you tweet your product. It’s a simple thing and if you want to be respected, you have to show that you care about your audience. I admit I don’t talk with everyone I follow, but I try to find a common interest and make the effort as often as I possibly can. The social networking arena is no different from “real life” in that it is still real people interacting, just like two people sitting next to each other on a plane. The key to this is to be yourself. Your real friends know you because you don’t put up a front for them. If you pretend to be someone you are not, you will be discovered and when that happens, you’re done.

So, let’s take a trip back to grade school and remember the Golden Rule, shall we? Treat others the way you want to be treated, its that simple. If you treat your friends online as if they were friends you have over to your house, you will gain much more respect than just turning your friend list into a mailing list.

That’s it folks, its that simple, really. Now get out there and make some friends and most of all HAVE FUN!

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How do you keep your business mediocre? That’s what everyone wants to know right? Well, Don’t fret folks I’m here to tell ya.

I have been able to look inside of this company that has a structure much like the one about which I last posted. The owner, unfortunately has never read anything about building a system through which her employees could learn the business and be successful and as you can imagine there are just too many variables for On-the-Job-Training to build successful people. I’m gonna try to get across how it all went down without dropping names or brands, so bear with me.

This company had only one area in which it is focused. It was working, but it wasn’t great there was definitely room for growth and expansion not only for new offices, but new opportunities. So, when another opportunity came around the owner decided to go with it, the model had already been proven ( I have seen how successful it can be first hand) and the overhead was minimal. A few people were sent off to “train” on this new product and after a few days of chaos and confusion, the 3 employees, all very new to the business returned. They had learned a lot considering there was no formal training whatsoever and everything came from watching someone who knew what they were doing. The problem is, while for the most part that form of training, if you can call it that may be sufficient (minimally IMHO) for the current work going on in the company, it is simply dangerous for this new venture because of potential loss of confidence in the brand and ultimately to potential lawsuits. I won’t try to explain why, that’s not the point here. So, after only about a month or so this new venture, which is potentially much more profitable as well as another avenue through which the company can grow is canned. The employees were not producing enough and the whole thing was shut down. There is a little bit of political stuff going on, but 90% of the problem lies with the fact that there was no system for them to follow. No roadmap to lead them to their destination.

So, onward they go, after losing 2 of their most hopeful employees. A response to a lack of confidence in the leadership of the company. So, there you have it. All it would have taken to take this person’s company to the next level was a SYSTEM. If you want to have a mediocre business, follow this example, you can’t lose. However, if you want to build your business the right way you need a system. If you have not seen my last post check it out, it’s just a little something to help you get ideas and give you something to think about.

The bottom line folks, is to be a leader.  Take charge of your responsibilities and do it right. Position yourself as a leader and people will follow you. They will be the ones who bring your success; you’re level of commitment to leadership however will determine its magnitude.

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A good system is one that is completely duplicatable. Your SYSTEM must allow for a person with no experience to be successful by simply following your SYSTEM step by step. This will in-turn allow those you teach to pass on the SYSTEM to others creating tremendous profits for you with the least amount of personal effort.

Lets look at a company type that takes in new employees with little to no sales experience and hands each new employee the company’s SYSTEM. The end goal is to move from sales person to a leader of sales people and eventually to a business owner with his/her own team of workers. This idea carries forward and the original owner now has many business owners and even more sales people generating profit.

The system will teach the new employee all the techniques required to be a good sales person for a given product, techniques that work because they were developed though trial and error. Now the new employees don’t have to spend time, energy, and money trying to learn these techniques themselves.

But teaching is not a SYSTEM; this is only the beginning.

Where the teaching becomes a SYSTEM is in its ability to bring a new, inexperienced employee to business owner with as little effort as possible by laying down a step-by-step process that is completely duplicatable.

Each new position in the company comes with a new set of tasks and obstacles that the employee must overcome. The successful system will target and neutralize the obstacles FOR the employee. This is attainable by implementing the successful techniques for each position in the SYSTEM.

In the business type used in this example the new sales person reaches a predetermined goal and is awarded Leadership. The employee now must learn how to not only teach others HOW to sell, but must also learn how to be good leader in general. For example, keeping his/her team motivated on slow days. A good SYSTEM will have the teqhniques necessary built-in. Once the Leader has proven he/she can be aneffective leader and is able to follow the SYSTEM in place, a new position is awarded, one with more responsibility and more challenges. At each step along the way the owner of the business is not relying on his/her ability to be a good teacher, micromanaging the employee, or fixing mistakes because the SYSTEM is doing the work FOR the owner. This allows the owner to focus on the expansion of the business and keeping it up to date, rather than worrying about how to “fix” an employee.

Bottom line folks is that a good SYSTEM is fool-proof and 100% duplicatable. As long as the individual is folowing the system exactly as it is intended, success will come.

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In second row, 30 yard line watching the Gators win 63-5 over Kentucky.

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I use (or have used int the past) some networks to keep in touch with friends, some to get back in touch with old friends, some to network with business people, and even a couple to make money. The one thing I could never find though, was a social network with the entrepreneur in mind. Not as broad as business, not just marketing, not just whatever tiny niche site you like, but a site that understands how leaders think.

As I said they all have their place, but I wanted one that was Just for entrepreneurs. A place where entrepreneurs can meet and discuss all types of issues, but also a place where they can express themselves and make friends. Many of the business related social networking sites I have seen are full of people just spamming each other with business opportunities, regurgitating the same crap you see everywhere. Most of them are failing miserably and it is quite obvious why. I strayed from those “spammer” sites immediately because they are an absolute waste of time.

I wanted a site where the people that joined were REAL entrepreneurs, leaders, not just followers and wanna-be’s hoping for a few AdSense clicks or whatever by spamming everyone they can get their hands on. These people are NOT entrepreneurs and not the kind of people with whom I would like to network.

So, after searching and finding nothing good I decided to take my own advise and “Be a leader.” and I designed just such a site.

Enter Entrepre-Network. A social networking site specifically designed with the entrepreneur in mind. This is not a place to advertise and recruit. It is designed to link people who share a common interest and common values. As entrepreneurs, we are fundementally different than people who work a 9-to-5 J.O.B. so we need a social network to call our own.

Entrepreneurs are vast and eclectic and know how important a little piece of information can be. It could be the difference between success and failure and we understand how valuable linking with others who share the same problems, goals, triumphs, and defeats can be; as I am sure we have all had a little help from someone who has already made a mistake we were about to make.

Entrepre-Network is in pre-launch and will be the premier social network for the entrepreneur.

Come on by and be one of the first to join.

http://e-network.ning.com

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