Starting a Small Business

• How to Write a Great Business Plan
  Sure, you might be able to start a simple business without a business plan if you are not looking for funding, but writing out a business plan is an important step to help you clarify your offerings and goals with your business. I have seen many businesses fail from a lack of focus and direction.
• How to Choose the Right Colors for Your Brand
  From your website to your business cards, the colors you choose shape the opinions people will form about your business. Even if you are hiring someone else to create your branding, you should read this article to know what to watch out for.
• 10 Things to Do Before You Start Your Start-Up
  Planning is an essential part of starting a new business, so do your research before you start your business to save you from a lot of costly mistakes down the road.
• How to Write a Marketing Plan
  Even the most innovative products on the market can die a slow and painful death from a lack of sales. The difference? People who meet their sales goals have a clear marketing plan, which enables them to make the right move at the right time.

Your Home Office

• The Basics of Home Office Design
  Some people can just grab a laptop and go, but I find that I am more productive when I use a space that is designed for working. Mine happens to be in half my bedroom, which would kill some people but it is a good location for me. The goal is to design a space that works for you and meets the needs of your business.
• How to Set Up a Home Office
  This one goes into detail about tax deductions for home offices, which is an important consideration for those who work at home.
• Deducting Your Home Office Expenses
  Knowing what you can and can’t deduct off your taxes before you set up your home office will empower you to make more financially sound decisions for your business setup.

Running a Small Business

• How to Run a One-Person Business
  If you’re looking to run a one-man (or one-woman) show, you’re going to need a variety of skills to get the job done.
• 25 Ways to Jump-Start Your Business
  Has your business become stagnant? Get it going again — fast! — with these hints and techniques.

Sales and Marketing

• How to Improve Your Cold-Calling Skills
  I know that I generally do well on a sales call, but I only make warm calls (and I dread those anyway). The ability to turn a call into a sale without seeming like a pushy salesperson is a valuable business skill that everyone should have.
• How to Manage a One-Person Sales Force
  An efficient system is vitally important to a successful solopreneur business. This article will show you how to get there.
• How to Make Money on Etsy
  Are you a crafty person? You can make a great living on Etsy, selling your handmade goods, if you start with some sound business principles and some marketing know-how.
• How to Use Social Networking Sites to Drive Business
  The key to successfully using social media is to drive sales for your business is creating an efficient system so that you are not wasting all of your valuable time online.
• 7 Common Sales Mistakes, and How to Avoid Them
  By learning from others’ mistakes in sales, you can set your business up to be more successful from the start.

Your Web Site

• 7 Deadly Website Sins
  Before you spend money (or hours of your own time) on a web site for your business, read this article to educate yourself on the issues you should avoid.
• How to Design a Great “About Us” Page on Your Website
  This article is a great read for two reasons: 1) The About page is an important piece of your web site; and 2) The process of writing the About page will get you thinking about your marketing messaging, business goals, and how you will sell yourself both on- and offline.
• 10 Vital Items You Should Give Your Web Designer
  I’m not a big fan of the term "web designer" being used here, but gathering this type of information and handing it over to your designer/developer/marketing lead will save you from having to redo the site a day after you finished the first version.

Small Business Inspiration

• And the Money Comes Rolling InMarkus Frind started Plenty of Fish out of his home, in his spare time, and now his site serves up over 1 billion of pages a month and he pays himself $5mil USD a year.
• How Would You Like to Make $6 Million Sitting on Your Couch?
  Paul Mann runs Fetch! Pet Care, a service with thousands of employees all across the nation that brings in over $6mil in revenue yearly — and he does it all from his home.
• How to Make a Million in Your Pajamas
  If you think you can’t make "real money" working from home, think again — not only are entrepreneurs making sustainable income from their homes, they are increasing their profits by saving on overhead for their business.

That, dear readers, is what I would call a marketing fail. You don’t need a degree in marketing to tell you that people can’t buy from you if they don’t know what you are selling.

Example #2: The picture above is from the side of a local barbecue trailer near our downtown. This trailer was parked on a major thoroughfare in Eugene, which also happens to be a one-way street. A large percentage of the population of this city drives down this street every day, and since they are all driving the same direction, they can all see the side of this trailer. I drove past it several times before I finally stopped to figure out what the truck actually said (and snap this photo on my phone). The problem is that the business has chosen fonts with non-standard letters, displayed in a non-standard fashion (the half-circle), with letters that are outlines instead of solid colors, and the whole thing is too small.

What do these two example have in common? Rather than worry about branding, a tagline or the colors in their signs, they probably would be doing considerably more business if they just put their name and offer in a black, Arial Bold font on a white background. As it is now, I doubt I am the only one who can’t read these signs while driving my car, so they are wasting time and losing money with them.

I think people get so hung up on the look of the marketing piece that they never stop to think, “Hey, does this make sense?” If you are paying someone to stand on a street corner with your sign or paying for a premium high-traffic location, is the wording on the sign clearly visible to everyone passing by? Oregon is known for its rain — is the sign clearly visible in all weather conditions? Is the sign simple, contain a clear call to action, and does it actually bring in any customers? If the sign is for outdoor use, is it quickly readable from a distance? Is the name of your company in large, clear print? Think about it — when you are driving your car, how much time do you really have to glance at a sign? There is a reason why all the street signs in town are in a boring font on a solid background.

As I couldn’t leave this article with just two local marketing don’ts, I found this picture of Mattress Mania on 11th in Eugene. They are a good example of what a brick-and-mortar sign display should be when they are in a great location with heavy car- and foot-traffic: clear, easy to read, visible in most lighting conditions, and instantly recognizable as to what they offer. Combined with their zany commercials on local TV, they have created a simple, effective, and clearly recognizable marketing campaign.