Here’s an interesting notion:  Do you realize that there are mistakes you can make at various stages of your business’ growth that can be slowly killing it for months or even years if you don’t watch for them?

Well, these mistakes do exist and they are not just reserved for the rookie companies.  Many working businesses, including those you might think are “successful” because they’ve been around for 10+ years, are often still making them… and are possibly losing a lot of money and/or wasting a lot of time in the process.

Although some of these big and sneaky mistakes seem aimed more at service type companies, they really do fit the bill for almost any type of industry.  I’ve done my best with the listings below to give examples to prove it.

Underestimating Project/Service Time- This is a big one and it pertains to service companies as well as companies that sell a product. This is a service company’s bread and butter. If you don’t estimate your time to perform each and every service in your repertoire, you will get burned and there is little you can do about it but bite the bullet and learn from it.  The best way to estimate time is to do it once yourself or watch your best employee do the task and then throw in a little fudge factor on top of it. For product companies, time becomes an issue with logistics so be aware!

Not Knowing YOUR Company Numbers/Incorrectly Setting Prices- Notice I emphasized the word “your”. It’s a common mistake to use a competitor’s as your pricing gauge without actually knowing why they use those numbers.  Think about the nightmare you will get yourself into if you take a competitor’s price, cut it by 10% and then start selling. What if the competition has a bad pricing structure and is barely making money or even losing money?!?!  What if your costs are more than theirs?!?!  You can use competitor as a starting point but you can’t base your whole strategy on it.

Different industries have their own variables as far as costs go and you need to be aware of them for your project or product pricing.  What you pay for a product you are going to sell is not the only cost to have in your head when you are pricing products.  How much your labor and materials cost for a service is only a piece of an hourly rate.  Employees cost more than just salary and not every employee is part of your labor cost. Every company has insurance to pay for. There are tons of overhead expenditures that need to be part of your price. Oh, by the way, the big one that many people forget about in their price is the quality factor. What you include as “standard services” or “standard product features” as well as job site etiquette or in store service or warranties all need to go into your pricing. I’ll get to more on why in the next segment.

Not Charging for All of Your Time & Costs- This seems like a stupid statement to some but I bet most business owners will admit that they have given away a little too much of the farm at times. Hey, there is nothing wrong with giving a little extra here and there to show you care. But either way, that’s not what I’m talking about here. What concerns me are those that put a lot of quality into their work or products or stores and do not cover the cost for it. As an example, say you run a service company and your competitors don’t do a certain standard service that you do. You can’t just undercut their price to steal a job; you need to have that cost covered in your rate and advertise the fact that it comes with the price upfront. Stores undermine themselves, for example, when they put more people on the floor for customer service but don’t charge for it. These things cost you money and when your competitors don’t do them it costs them less money.  Put out better service and then under price them, and your competition just has to wait a little bit for you to fall on your face so they can swoop back in.

As a business owner you need to believe that you are providing your clients worthwhile wares that deserve to be paid for. If you get the chance to explain why your prices are higher, then take that opportunity and do it.  If they don’t like the fact that you include things that others charge extra for later or that you treat them better, then they are most likely completely price shoppers.  You don’t want them as regular customers anyway.  Trust me.

Not Getting Paid Fast Enough- That’s right, the old cash flow issue.  As long as you are actually making enough money to pay the bills, this problem can be solved, prevented or at least made to be not as bad as it could be.  Here’s the deal:

First off all, bill customers very promptly. It is very common for a small business to not have the procedures or systems in place to get invoices generated and out the door in a timely fashion (see the next segment for more). Again, this would seem unlikely since that’s the reason why we are doing the work- to get paid. But it is very easy for the people responsible for getting this info to the billing people to be too busy to get it there or not have enough organization to give it to them the right way.

The second part to slowing down or stopping a regular cash flow crunch is to make the quickest payment deals possible with customers and the slowest possible with vendors and employees.  If there is any way not to pay employees any more than twice a month, you better do it.  Contractors always have an issue with this. If you must pay weekly, then tell them before they are hired that they will be getting the first week held back, essentially buying you a week. It will help, I promise.

Part three involves credit. If your company can get a credit card, then get it. This allows for certain important things to be bought (that you can afford) that might come up during a cash flow crunch.  Better yet, especially if you have no choice but to deal with 45+ day customer payments, do your best to get a company line of credit.  This is a must if you plan on selling to the government or doing commercial service work. These clients often have 60 to 90 day wait periods.

Failure to Have Solid Systems and Procedures in Place- Too many procedures (known as “red tape”) is the reason why many people start their own business in the first place. Unfortunately, having no procedures and systems in place at all is not an alternative. Depending on the type of industry, business owners must come to a happy medium or chaos and the unknown will ensue. Some basic examples where procedures or systems are needed include billing, collections, payroll, hr (interviewing, hiring, vacations, benefits, job responsibilities, etc.), manufacturing, operating equipment, maintaining equipment, inventory, sales calls/visits and logistics to name a few.

Even a one person show needs to have some admin procedures in place.  This will make it easier to hire temps and subcontractors and control what they are doing for you.  Without at least a watered down version of a system or procedure to do everyday work, you will be to blame for causing many major headaches as your company grows. I can’t emphasize how important this is for when you bring on new employees. I’m sure you heard this before, but I am also a big proponent of having an employee handbook even for one employee. It’s amazing the trouble people can cause business owners just because they allow you to pay them.

Spending Advertising Money Just to Say You Advertise-  I would almost rather see my clients not advertise then to spend without regard to tracking the results. There is no point in a marketing campaign if you do not put things in place that allow you to measure how well the plan is working.  The other wasteful part of marketing that many people make the mistake of doing, is not tracking their previously successful campaigns.  Why some people think that just because a $400 dollar a month ad worked once very well for one busy season, that it will automatically work every year after that is beyond me.

Spreading Yourself Too Thin- This is a classic mistake made by every entrepreneur. The key is to figure out when you are at that “wearing too many hats” point and start getting some help.  The solution here is to know your strengths and to be able see when you are not performing the duties that demand these skills. If you are the best sales person on the company, you can’t get caught up in day-to-day operations. If you do, sales will slip and eventually you won’t have any operations to worry about.  Think about this to help you figure out if you are spread too thin: Did you really go into business for yourself to work 80+ hours a week?

Not Getting Help Soon Enough- Set goals to know when to hire people to take over where you are light on knowledge. Not getting help or waiting too long can kill a company. Most people who start a business do it because they are good at the technical end or the sales end.  If you know the best way to make a widget, then your strength is in production and that is where your time should be spent. Hire an outside company or consultant to take care of the sales and marketing and then hire inside when you can afford someone full time.  Don’t be something to your company that you are not. It will only hold you back.

The three big issues people like to tackle themselves but usually are least knowledgeable about are legal issues, accounting/bookkeeping issues and daily operations issues.  The odds are that these three things are your weakest link so if you don’t have a partner that has the background for these subjects, then be prepared to get help as soon as possible.  It’s preferable that you do this before you start a business.

Although looking for these problems at any time is a good idea, the end of a year or season is an excellent business interval to make sure you are not making these errors.  Take the time, or make the time, to fix these problems. If you don’t know how to reverse the problems, then get some help.  If you really don’t have enough time to either figure out if you have these issues or know they are there and can’t break away long enough to do it right, then get some help.

Forum marketing is one of the best ways to advertise your online business for little or no money down. Knowing how forum marketing work is your key to having a successful forum marketing campaign. It is more than having a great signature line that will drive a few people to your site but the potential for your forum marketing campaign is so much bigger.

Forums can really help you get your new product off the ground. It also solves almost all the problems that are associated with launching of a new product. Do you think that it will solve all your marketing worries though? Well let’s take a look at some of the things that you will no longer have to worry about.

1. Testimonials

When you launch a new product, a lot of consumers want to see testimonials of others that have tried the product and loved it. This is especially true if you are promoting a pay per click program. People want prove that others have made money doing this. If you offer no testimonials, you will make little or no money. So here is where the forums come into play. You can post to a few of the members that you have built a rapport with and ask them if they would try your program. All they would have to do is write an honest testimonial on how the product worked for them. There you go, and the testimonials are now born. So that is problem number one that is solved with forum marketing.

2. Not sure if your product is any good?

Ask a few people in the forum to try the product free of charge and give you an honest report on how well the product worked or if it didn’t work at all. These people will also point out any flaws that may be in the product. This gives you a chance to fix the flaws and launching the product great idea huh? So as you can see forum marketing has now solved two of the main problems with launching a new product. These are also just two of the transparent benefits to using forum marketing. You are discreetly promoting your product while at the same time earning your members trust.

3. Traffic

When you have a signature line, this will allow you some traffic but not a lot. In order to generate more traffic to your site without spamming, reply to other posts. This will increase the amount of times your signature line appears and more likely than not a forum member will click on that link. This is a great way to generate a client base for your new product.

So as you can see forum marketing saves you a lot of time and hassle when you are trying to launch a new product.

As any small business owner knows PPC advertising is a huge market on the internet today. PPC marketing is best well suited for those websites that have not yet established themselves in the world of the search engines.  But PPC does have a downside as well. PPC can cost you thousands of dollars in marketing dollars if you do not take time to carefully plan out your PPC marketing campaign. Against popular PPC marketing is not just selecting a few keywords and designing your advertisement, actually there is much more involved. There are tips though that you can use to reduce your PPC marketing cost and create a great marketing campaign as a result.

1. Competitors

The best way that you can start off your PPC marketing campaign is to check out the competitors.  Look and see what kind of strategies that they may be using to market their business. There are tools that you can purchase that will help you have a fair idea of the advertising strategies of your competitors.  The most important thing for you to pay attention to when you are looking at the competitors ads are the keyword placement, ad body, and where the ads are being placed on their site.

2. Keyword Variations

It is important for your PPC marketing campaign to incorporate proper keywords in suitable variations throughout your website. If your keywords are not placed properly then all your other efforts will be effortless.  You need to take considerable time when you are creating your keywords. Careful research of what keywords people are searching for will aide you in your keyword search.

3.Keywords to avoid

If you begin your PPC campaign off by using hypercompetitive keywords you are setting yourself up for spending tons of money and your marketing budget will dry up quickly.  However there are a lot of low cost keywords that you can use with proper matching techniques that will be able to save you money in the long run.

4. Call to action terms

Your call to action terms is very important to your PPC marketing campaign.  If you use words such as click here or buy here customers will not be as apt to follow the directions because they feel it is just a high priced gimmick.  However if you use the words sale, discount, or even buy 1 get 1.  These are terms that the customers are looking for and are more apt to click on the links as long as you deliver what you promise on the other side.

5. Honest

It is ok to make a mistake but be honest and correct it and apologize to your visitor. Also when you are using PPC marketing all your information should be honest with no false information. The false information will turn your customer away. It will also leave your site with a negative reputation. If you are practicing dishonesty in your site you are only going to accrue the cost with no returns in the end result.

6. Review your ad performance

Make sure you check on your PPC ads on a daily basis. This will allow you room for fixing any errors that you may inquire.  It will also allow you time to optimize your site if you are not seeing the results that you are seeking.

Making money with your PPC marketing campaign can make you tons of cash if it is done correctly. The more time and effort that you put into the PPC marketing campaign the more revenue you stand to generate in the end.

Forum marketing has recently become an integral part of each and every successful internet site marketing campaigns. It allows you, the web master, a free as well as easy access to people who may be possibly interested in the product or service that you are trying to promote. It requires little to no investment to join this remarkable program. But just like with all small business practices on the internet it does have some definite pros and cons.

The first and probably the best pro of forum marketing is the highly targeted nature that this program has. When you speak to a certain forum that deals mainly with the program or product you are selling you have the attention of the people that are most likely going to purchase your product. This will save you wasted time and effort on other advertising campaigns that you may have tried in the past. Also another great advantage of the targeting factor is that for everyone one poster there can be up to 10 lurkers, or silent watchers, at any time. These silent watchers will usually purchase your product or service as well.

Forum marketing is not only a great advertising program that will bring in customers but also a great place to test marketing and product development. All you need to do to begin is to keep tabs on the complaints and product reviews that can be found throughout the forums. Once you have found the targeted product you can then test market it by either asking the forum posters about their opinions on the product or even giving out a few prototypes for people to try out and evaluate on.

The final pro of forum marketing is there very little cash or time involved. The forums are available at no extra cost to you so you do not have to spend a lot of money on marketing. Also even though you will have to spend some time on posting in the forums this marketing campaign can be down at your own leisure. Therefore this is definitely not a full time job and requires less than a half hour of your time each week. It can take up to several months to get the product up and running but it’s well worth it when you consider the initial investment that you contributed.

There are very cons to forum marketing but they are still equally important as the pros. The first con and probably the most notable is this is not a program that you want to assign to an outside company. You have to personally take your time and bond with the posters before they will even consider purchasing your product. Because of this is not a practice for someone who made the traffic and sales right away.

The second con is that you as the owner of the product will need good people skills as well as the ability to appear trustworthy in the internet world. If you do not have either of these skills, you may want to practice in other forums before even attempting to promote your product.

In order to determine if forum marketing is for someone they will need to weigh both the pros and cons that it entails. Most importantly if you do not have the time or people skills that forum marketing involves you may want to consider finding other ways to promote your product. If you feel you do possess these skills then forum marketing is a definite solution to your product promotion.

Blogs have become very popular, and they are even becoming more popular then website.  A blog is a great way for a person to get their ideas, opinion or even business online without a lot of different hassles. There are many reasons why a person would choose to blog over creating a website.

1. Easy to use

Blogs are simple and easy to use. You will not need to be a computer geek to understand how to create a blog.  They can be accessed quickly and any changes that may have to be done can be done really easily. If you compare this to how hard it is to access a website and changing all those confusing HTML’s you can see why blogs have been so popular

2. Change

You are able to change your website quickly without a lot of hassle that a website may give you. You can make your changes in your blogs in seconds compared to the hours that it can take to update your website. When you are updating on a daily basis, this is a great reason to use a blog versus a website.

3. Delivery

The information you post on a blog can be delivered quickly compared to the hours it would take using a website. If you follow all directions when you are updating your blog you will have the information out to your readers in no time because the search engines pick up the new information quickly. With a website it can take hours or even days for the search engines to update your new information

4. Organization

When you add new information to your blog there is less headache involved in the development stages. When you are organizing your site, it does not have to be perfect as the software will come behind you and organize it for you. With a website you have to organize all the different information by yourself and anyone who has developed a website that this can be very confusing and time consuming.

5. Communication

It is easy for your reader to post any comments or questions on your blog. These comments are an important way to stay in contact with your business clients, friends, or even followers. With a website you will not have this option

6. Cost

Most generally blogs are free to the user so the most cost to you is your time. Blogs are a great way for a company to save on advertising costs because on a blog they can advertise for free. Again with a website they do not have this option

7. Search Engines

Search engines love blogs. They are so key rich that the web crawlers will attach themselves right away. With a website it takes time to create keywords that search engines will love.

These are just a few reasons why blogs have become so popular over website.

When you are a new website owner and you are looking at forum marketing it can be difficult to find a proper lead generating forum. This is especially true if you happen to be looking for a specific niche that you can tap into by using forum marketing. The first thing you must do before you find any of these niche sites you need to realize that forum marketing is a skill that must be learned how to be done. If you start out by spamming the boards you will be instantly banned from the forum. There are certain strategies that you need to learn before you even begin to practice forum marketing. After you have achieved this there are 5 common forums that business owners are finding useful in their forum marketing campaign.

1. Conquer your niche

This is one of the more popular forum marketing sites. The creator of this site is Russell Brunson who is one of the top internet marketers. Russell’s forum has been at the top of the charts for several years now.  One of the greatest benefits of this forum is that it has a referral program as well as an ad rotation. What this basically means is that you will get paid while you are surfing and interacting on the forum. So not only will you get paid for the clicks you will receive from your signature line but you will also get paid for posting. This is a great way to earn a double income.

2. Warrior forum

This forum is one of the biggest online for forum marketing. You will find home based workers from all over the world located on this forum.  This forum also has a built in ad program that you can use to promote your product.

3. Better networker

This forum was created by Mike Dillard who is one of the best internet marketers and has been for the past 5 years. His forum is growing daily with several home based business owners joining. This site provides the business owner with a homey and friendly atmosphere which puts them more at ease than just about any other site that is out there.

4. Rich Dad

This site is dominated by real-estate workers, entrepreneurs and other business owners among others. This forum is mainly filled though with people who have bought one of Robert Kiyosaki’s books.

5. Work at home forum

This is the one forum that first appears on the search engines. It has work at home businesses from all over the world as members. It is not as popular as the other four but is equally as important.

There you have it the top 5 forum marketing forums that are available to you. Do not forget to honor the rules of the forum that you choose.

Forum marketing is a popular way for you to promote your product or idea. Also when you are promoting on a forum, it can be a great way to generate traffic to your site. Once they visit your site, you can then give them more information on your product or idea. It is important to understand forum marketing especially establishing relationships before you begin posting on any forums. So if you are looking at a forum to promote your site, be sure how to begin before you do.

A forum is a type of community like a neighborhood of sorts with the other posters being your neighbor. If you think of them in this matter, it will help you establish a relationship with them better. They use the forum boards as a way of coming together to discuss a certain topic or problem. You can use forums to get information, ask questions, make friends, and also promoting yourself and your business. You never want to just start a forum and begin promoting your business right away this will just drive your potential customers the other direction. Before you begin to promote your product, you need too first establish yourself in the forum. There are usually three basic ways for you to go about this.

1. Register

You need to register yourself in the forum of your choice.  You should avoid making your signature line right away till you have better promoted yourself. After you have registered, you need to create a profile about yourself. This should be a good explanation about you as well as the business that you operate. Now that you have registered and set your profile take a few days to look around the forum before you post. Read other neighbors posts and get a feel for their ideas and concerns. This is also a great time to get yourself acquainted with the rules of that particular forum.

2. Posting

When you feel you are ready begin posting on the forum but be sure you take it slow and easy. Start out by answering other neighbors’ questions and concerns. Do not by any means start your posting by immediately promoting your business. This can turn your neighbors away and can also get you banned from the forum for spamming.  Remember you want people to notice you not ignore you.

3. Reputation

Starting with your very first post, you can begin to earn your reputation as an expert on the topic at hand. In order to do this you need to be sure to help other people with their issues and answer their questions to the best of your knowledge. The more respect you earn in the forum the more clicks you will get on your website. There are several different ways that you can use to build your reputation on a forum. The first and most important thing you should though is introducing yourself. Tell your fellow neighbors a little about yourself but you do not need to go into great detail. When you post your questions try avoiding ones that someone can find on a search engine with little or no trouble. Be thoughtful in your questions and take time in formatting them in the correct way. When you are answering a question, be sure that you research your answer before you post it so that you will not gain an unreliable reputation.

Once you have established yourself in the forum, which can take up to a few weeks you can create your signature line and introduce it slowly. Reputation is everything when you are using a forum marketing approach. The better reputation that you have the better results you will have on your posts.

Forum marketing is one of the best ways to advertise your business for free on the internet. This is why you do not want to lose out on this great money making marketing program by not reading the rules that are posted in all the forums. These rules provide guidelines on what you are able to and not able to do on the internet. This will help you learn your limits when it comes to posting so you do not break any of these rules. It will also set limits on how aggressively to make your marketing campaign. Lack of reading these rules of the forums can lead to banning from the forums as well as black marketing of your name.

So reading the rules before you join any forum, it is very crucial that you read the rules and understand them clearly. This is also the first rule of your successful marketing campaign. You will find the rules for every forum right below the guidelines or general discussion section and are not very tedious or hard to understand. Along with the rules you also should follow some simple rules of etiquette.

1. Forums simply disagree or will ban you for any aggressive form of self promotion. Also you will get banned if you make any negative comments that may offend another forum member. The degree of strictness to these rules will vary from site to site. So reading the rules before you, post can save you a lot of problems later on.

2. Remember you joined the forum because of the issues being discussed so therefore you are not allowed to promote your business within the posting portion. Do not start promoting your product like no other product will beat it especially without using proper content first.

3. You need to read what is being discussed before you post. You need to pay attention to whether the posting is either formal or informal and respond accordingly. Also you need to get to know a few of the people on the boards and start a conversation with them before you approach the issue of your website which should be done in a subtle manner.

4. When you follow the conversations you have an added bonus. If you are following, you can follow certain questions that are being asked by other members. If any of these questions fall into your expertise, you can give them an answer to their question or problem. You may even be able to lead them to your site in a subtle manner that may deal with their issues.

Following the rules is a critical part of any forum but following etiquette is a matter of principal. If you follow these simple etiquette guidelines, you will become a well-trusted forum marketer in no time.

Forum marketing is a great way for you, the website owner, to promote your website, product or idea.  This is an effective way to create long term relationships as well as a very profitable site. Forum sites are all about opinions an idea as well as promoting your business. Forum marketing enables you to reach a targeted group of people that will help you market your product.

There are some tips that you need to be aware of to have a successful forum marketing campaign for you. These tips are very helpful in teaching you the proper way to promote your product in the best way.

1. Visits

This is the most important step in building your reputation. You need to make frequent visits to the forums that you have chosen and become an active respondent and poster. You need to actively take part in the forum and be able to provide your own opinion about topics that may be discussed in the forum. Also you need to be able to answer the other members’ questions without wanting anything in return. All of these while you are visiting, the site will help you grow your reputation as an expert on the subject that you are trying to promote.

2. Hiring Services

You can also consider, although it is not recommended, hiring a team of qualified writers. These writers can do the posting in the forums for you in a well-written manner. Outsourcing your posts should be done with extreme caution though because it can disqualify you as an expert therefore you will lose valuable sales. Most internet marketers recommend that you skip this step and do all the posting that is required in person. This will allow you to keep your status as expert and therefore you will receive more visitors to your site.

3. Signature

After you have posted at least 50 times in your post, you should create a signature line. This signature line will contain the link to your business. This signature link can become a permanent link that you can use for all your posts. This will allow the other members of the forum to click on your signature and visit your site. Usually when they click on your signature line they sign up on your site and also sometimes will purchase the item you are trying to sell. Signature lines are a very important part of forum marketing.

Forums are considered the greatest way to gain traffic to your site without spending little or no money on advertising. In order to be successful, you need to follow these steps. Once you do this you will be raking in the visitors as well as the income in no time.