Daily Biz Solutions

All business revolves around the concept of providing a product or service to an end user, the consumer. Whether these are private consumers or other businesses that are being marketed to, the marketing must be done in a way that is not only going to deliver the right message but in the right way as well. Traditional advertising may be familiar and “safe” but is it still effective?

According to the various marketing experts across the industry, traditional marketing like newspaper and television spots are quickly falling out of favor and being replaced by more personalized and more cost effective marketing types. One new type of marketing that could move to the forefront is mobile marketing. Smart phones are quickly becoming the go to device for more and more people. More than 150 million people have used their smart phone or tablet for banking and other tasks. That is 150 potential customers for targeted ads that directly target them by location, interests and other factors.

Video marketing is another newer media that is going to explode in the coming years. For the year 2011, video marketing had increased by more than fifty percent over previous years and is projected to reach over eleven billion dollars in ad revenue within the next five years.

No matter what kind of marketing is used it has to be geared to the consumer so that it is attracting the right attention and getting the right response. The absolute wrong campaign gets feedback in the form of angry emails, phone calls and letters but how does the right campaign get gauged? At the end of every year (or shorter time periods) the business has to stop and assess whether their marketing campaigns are working or not. That is often done by a number of ways including monitoring key metrics for online marketing such as traffic to web sites vs. conversions, sales numbers and more. A campaign that is not effective across the board is costing money, regardless of its type.

Companies that deal with every type of marketing for both business to consumer and business to business relationships have to be especially careful that they are watching their metrics. What works in one situation may not be as effective in another. It is important to have a marketing partner that knows the industry and the future of marketing. Partnering with companies that have their fingers in a variety of new platforms and industries, such as http://www.Extraprise.com, is a key way to expand your customer base, no matter what you are selling.

Marketing is important for every small business. After all, if you don’t promote your products and services, how will customers find out about your company and decide that they want to do business with you? Marketing can be expensive, but it doesn’t have to be. Fortunately, there are plenty of low-cost marketing strategies that can be effective for small businesses. Here are a few you may want to consider.

Use Simple Website Tools   

Having a custom website created can be expensive, but it’s not the only solution to establishing a successful online presence for your company. You can utilize a user-friendly ecommerce website builder to add online selling functionality to your informational website. This will allow you to make products and services available to prospective customers via the Internet 24 hours per day, 7 days per week.

Engage in Professional Networking

The old saying that “who you know matters more than what you know” has a ring of truth to it. People are much more likely to do business with companies where they have personal relationships with the owner, the manager, or one or of the employees. Take the time to get out in the community and get to know people who are potential customers for your company or who may be in a position to refer customers to you.

As a small business owner, it’s essential for you to have an appropriate system in place for your company’s payroll. For any small businesses that have employees, payroll is a very important function. Not only do you have to get employees set up to be paid, you must make sure that you are keeping proper payroll records, ensure that you are properly withholding and filing payroll taxes, and keep up with changes and Internal Revenue Service reporting requirements.

Payroll compliance is too important to be left to chance or to deal with the possibility of avoidable human error. Trying to hand-calculate payroll unnecessarily complicates the process of getting your employees paid and increases the possibility of experiencing problems related to calculation errors. While some small business owners think that taking a “do it all yourself” approach to payroll processing is a way to save money, doing so can actually cost you a great deal of time – and possibly lead to expenses associated with fines if mistakes are made.

For most small business owners, it simply doesn’t make sense to try to do their own payroll calculations. Even if you come up with a spreadsheet that works for you, you’ll have to keep up with all state and federal laws impacting payroll taxes and make adjustments every time the federal withholding tax tables change, in addition to state changes. That simply isn’t the best use of an entrepreneur’s time, and it requires specific expertise.

Rather than spending your valuable time dealing with an unnecessarily complicated approach to payroll, it only makes sense to utilize professional payroll services as a way of saving your valuable time and ensuring that the calculations are based on the latest expert knowledge of payroll tax rates, calculations and reporting requirements. You’ll likely find that using this type of service saves you time, money, trouble and aggravation in the long run, freeing you up to build your business instead of bogging you down in complex calculations and regulations better left to expert services.

Small business owners can benefit from using various types of computer software to keep up with administrative and operations tasks. Using appropriate software applications can help make sure that things go smoothly, providing entrepreneurs a way to maximize the efficiency of their day-to-day business operations.

• Accounting Software: Keeping up with accounting records, including invoices, receipt of payment, payables, payroll, taxes and more is something that many small business owners find to be challenging and stressful. These tasks are inherent to any business enterprise. Even if you use a professional to process payroll and handle your tax filings, it’s to your best interest to use an accounting software program to ensure that you are organizing the necessary information properly and keeping records in an appropriate manner.

• Distribution Software: If your company ships products to customers, it’s essential to have a good distribution software program. This type of application will provide you with a way to keep track of your inventory, as well as serve as an all-in-one shipping management system. This type of program will allow you to be certain of what products you have available to sell, as well as keep up with what has shipped and to whom, and to track delivery, including monitoring shipping progress and verifying receipt.

These aren’t the only types of software applications that you might need, but they’re two of the most important.

Managing virtual employees is different from managing workers who are in the same physical location where you are located, but it is not impossible – and doesn’t even have to be difficult. It just requires a bit of a different mindset and additional reliance on technology.

Communication is Key

Just as is true in a traditional office, effective workforce communication is an important key to successfully managing a virtual workforce. It’s just that communication comes about a bit differently in a virtual work environment than it does in a traditional office setting. conference calls can be a powerful tool for maintaining effective communication with workers who are based in remote locations. Conference call technology allows you to gather your team around a virtual conference table rather than bringing them into a physical conference room for the purposes of interacting.

Bring Your Team Together Virtually

Whether you need to introduce new policies to your team members, conduct group training sessions, or brainstorm for strategies to help build your business, you can accomplish any of these tasks via conference calls. With conference call technology, you can hold staff meetings that are just as rich and productive as would be possible in any office location. Quality conference call services make it possible for team members to come together in a formal, work-related setting no matter how geographically diverse their physical locations are.

Affordable Solution

With a [conference calls unlimited] plan, you don’t have to worry about spending too much on the telecommunications technology that allows you to bring your team together to engage in meaningful dialogue. When it comes to having access to the technology you need to effectively lead your virtual team, the tools that you need are here and available right now. No longer do business owners and managers have to wait for technology to catch up with their needs. You have access to the technology you need to build and manage a virtual team.