5 Little-Noticed but Important Ways Business Owners Can Keep Employees Happy

Running a small business can provide a lot of joy to the one running it, but that doesn’t mean doing so is a cakewalk. The struggles of improving cash flow, growing a client base, planning and waging effective marketing campaigns, and maintaining a happy and healthy workforce takes continual effort, and it can be exhausting. For many small business owners, the punch list is truly never fully punched, which means some aspects of the list must take precedence over others.

Happy employees high-five

Believe it or not, tending to how your employees feel is one of the most vital parts of running a successful business.…

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How Coupons Work for Small Businesses

Whether you are a small business that is just getting started, or you’ve been around the community for a little while, getting people in the door to buy your product or service can be a tricky thing. It’s important to spend money to make money, but when you have tight finances and your product is already costing you a good chunk of your budget, how to you make money?

Using coupons for shopping

You’ve tried to run specials before as well as get coupons out, but your success rates have been low and not many people even knew you were running a special. You not only wasted valuable advertising money, you also wasted time and effort, and the people who did take advantage of your coupons or specials didn’t make up for the cost of putting those specials on.…

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3 Marketing Areas to Think About When you’re Doing a Store Remodel

If you’re thinking about remodeling the storefront of your business, there has likely been some kind of event that has pushed you to making this decision. Whether you need more space, want to make better use of the space you have, have gotten negative customer feedback or anything else, choosing to remodel your business space can be hugely beneficial or a huge setback depending on how well you execute your plan.

Store remodel and redesign

One area that many businesses neglect to think about when beginning a remodel is how to spin this news from a marketing perspective. If your customers are going to be affected by this decision—which they will be—you have to think about how to make this remodel still work for your business, your customers, and your bottom line.…

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Understanding a Direct Mail List

A direct mail list is a great opportunity for a business to get, retain and create new customer. However, there is not a lot of clarity in terms of which lists work best, or how to actually find good lists. Another element of mystery is how you can find out whether or not your mailing list investment has paid off.

Direct e-mail list

Unfortunately, entire books could be, and have been, written on these different subjects so it would be impossible to cover all that ground. For now, therefore, let’s just take a look at the main types of mailing lists. And, for information, you can buy mailing lists here.…

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Looking for the Best Commercial and Personal Storage Solutions?

Today, storage is a vital part of business and domestic life. The private and public sectors alike are regularly looking for storage facilities. As a result, there are now plenty of personal and commercial storage options that you can choose from. Let’s take a look at some things you need to know about.

Portable storage for personal and commercial uses

About Storage Solutions

First of all, if you are looking for commercial self-storage, there are a number of options out there for you to use. The most important thing is that you can find a spot in which all your excess inventory can be stored safely and securely.…

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How your Organization Can Benefit from Hosted PBX and VoIP

Almost every realm of operations today, be it storage or connectivity, finds a virtual extension thanks to the advent to remote storage spaces available in the form of Cloud. This has brought to users the option of hosted PBX and VoIP services. Choosing a hosted PBX and VoIP for your organization has numerous benefits for your business operations, especially in case of small and medium businesses. Compared to the cumbersome paraphernalia brought in by traditional PBX set up that consumes a massive portion of an organization’s IT resources in terms of upkeep, operations and maintenance, the hosted version presents itself an a viable alternative.…

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How to Make Negotiation your Super Power

Negotiation is a tool we all need at every turn. Business, better salary, leave permission, angry spouse, rebellious kid, street vendor; you name it. Mastering the art of negotiation can make your life much easy.

Businesswoman with negotiation super power

Especially in business negotiations, there is a lot at stake and you simply cannot afford to lose.

With so much pressure riding, it is important go in prepared and use some tips and tricks to ease your way into the talk.

Here are some lessons I learnt from my personal experience and research on how to nail a negotiation.

1. Give succinct anecdotes to prove your point

People like stories from the past to relate to.…

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10 Tips on Building Your Email Marketing List (and Why it Matters)

As digital marketing has evolved we’ve seen more and more companies looking to maximize their audience reach and response through new channels, particularly social media. And while that makes sense – an ever-expanding amount of consumers are spending more and more time on social platforms – at the same time, businesses shouldn’t neglect ‘older’ methods which may still be just as effective, in particular, email.

Email marketing

Why email? In a study published by McKinsey and Company last year, they found that despite the rise of social networks, email “remains a significantly more effective way to acquire customers than social media – nearly 40 times that of Facebook and Twitter combined”.…

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Crowdfunding for Property Investors: What you Need to Know Before you Begin

Crowdfunding for real estate offers a new way for investors to get into the property market. The basis behind crowdfunding is for developers and real estate investment fund managers to raise capital from multiple investors for investment purposes.

Crowdfunding for property investors

Investors have the advantage of owning a share of a large property investment that might otherwise have been out of reach. Another significant benefit is the ability to get started in the property investment with a relatively small investment.

For example, some online crowdfunding portals will allow investors to get started with as little as £50. Others may require a larger initial investment to get started, with many ranging between £5,000 and £50,000.…

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5 Reasons Why Your SMB Should Invest In The Local Community

Small businesses owners face many challenges, especially in the beginning. You have to find a way to make your business thrive, often on a limited budget. For most business owners, the budget gets focused largely on improving your product or service, your staff, and marketing.

Businesses should support local communities

One aspect that often gets overlooked however, is using some of your money to give back to the local community. While you may think that there is not enough room in your budget to do this, we have a couple of reasons why you might want to reconsider and find some room.

1. Exposure

Marketing is a big part of any business, and rightly so.…

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