Larson & Associates

It has been a dream of yours for years, starting or running your very own business. It is a dream that is shared by many people. Even with the economy in in the dumps there is never a good or a bad time to take the plunge

I have 5 things you should consider to hit the ground running. When getting started, you will have a better idea upfront whether your plans will fly or not by answering these 5 simple questions. If you want to succeed, here they are.
 
To discover how to start, run, or manage your own business, start here.
 
1. Find Out What People Really Want
 Go finger but all to many business owners don’t even think about this. Before starting out, find out what your customers or clients really want. What do you think they will buy, and buy it from you? Take a look around and see what other businesses in your industry are selling. Can you make enough of a change to make you unique or make it look new? Ask yourself how can you make it better, faster, less expensive? If you give people what they want, find ways to let them know and you should do fine.
 
2. Solve People's Problems
 Look around you. Everywhere people are trying to solve problems, their problems. They could care less about your problems but I can tell you a secret, you solve their problems and your problems will go away as well.
 
3. Learn How Business Really Works
 To be successful, it's a good idea to have basic business knowledge on the inner workings of a successfully run business.  Successful business owners learn about things like bookkeeping, advertising, and marketing and  sales and marketing, taxes and financial planning are also good things to know a little bit about.  I'm not talking about becoming an expert in all areas;  but a good foundation so you'll know if the business advice you're getting from the so called experts makes sense to youyou’re your business or not. It's your business. What can you learn and know can only help you to succeed.
 

4. Great Customer Service
 Like I need to say anything? Great customer service is important to the success of your business. What you do after the sale is even more important than the initial sale. Decide upfront what your return and refund policies will be. Who much atomomy will your associates have in dealing with customers? How will you handle customer complaints? Once you find out what the lifetime value of a customer is, you will soon see it's in your best interest to keep them happy. Your customers and clients are the life-blood of your business Don't be afraid to try different and unusual ways of keeping their interest in you and your products or services. How can you improve your customer service today?

 5. Don't Be Afraid to Start Small
 Many of the large corporations you see today came out of very humble beginnings. You see them now as big companys, but most started as a small acorns growing into the Oak Trees they now are. Use all the resources you have at hand to bootstrap your business start-up. Today's most successful entrepreneurs went from adversity to success by being resourceful and using what they had with great care.

Even if you feel you have nothing when you start out, if you can keep these 5 rules in mind and you will keep yourself out of most problems. One good idea lead to the nets bring you to business freedom.
 

Larson Notes&Satire:  Take some time to look around. Opportunities may be as right in front of your nose. Ask around. Be curious. Talk to people. All you need is one, just one good idea If possible find yourself a business mentor no matter how old you are. Seek out someone who has been where you are now and can help you discover how to start, run and manage a successful business.

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

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Howard Larson
Larson & Associates, a Division of US Telemarketing Group LLC
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans


https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

In bringing in new customers you need to move away from thinking like you are in charge of your message. With the advent of Social Media Marketing you need to engage your prospects. If they don’t like it, you had better not like it.

So what is a poor marketer to do?

Ask yourself a few important questions:

1) What are you trying to say about your product or service that will help to influence the customer to buy from you and not your competition?

2) Can you help customers identify which of your products or services will fit their special needs?

3) In what way can you address unseen objectives that might stop the sales process?

4) Are there others out there in your network that can justify and validate your product or service?

5) What will keep you at the top of your customers mind as they go through the sales process?
6) In the fast paced world of today will let you gain customer loyalty

7) Keep your basic message consistent. Nothing ruins a good marketing campaign more than inconsistency. You might be tired of your message but for most of your target it is new.

Larson Notes&Satire:  Can your marketing program cut the mustard? Keep a clear message that moves with the customer in ways they need, not you. You don’t count.

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson & Associates, a Division of US Telemarketing Group LLC
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
http://teamcircle.ning.com/profile/HowardLarson

https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

In today’s world of lead generation you need to take a hard look at how you are generating interest in your company. As dumb as it is, you might be surprised to find that some prospects are prompted to consider using you thru twitter posts, let alone longer blogs or facebook fan pages.

As a B2B marketer I spent my time, aside from dong active lead gen, trying to figure out how a person (or company) makes a buying decision. Perhaps Hank Trisler said it best when he said “People buy on emotion and justify with facts.”

Larson Notes&Satire:  I spend alto of time posting my successes. Why? Because if you are in a similar industry where I have had success and I post about it, you might start thinking, mmmmmmm they did it for XYZ Company, maybe they can do it for me.

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson & Associates, a Division of US Telemarketing Group LLC
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
http://teamcircle.ning.com/profile/HowardLarson


https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

When looking over the potential of your company’s expansion never assume that a brand or company with higher awareness and exposure than yours is already under consideration.

You might need to identify various audience segments and cross them off your leads list but in doing so you need to better understand when and where marketing functions can play a stronger nurturing roll in new account acquisition.

In a report from McKinsey&Company it seems that the number of companies that come under consideration during an active evaluation for service expands rather than narrows as companies look for the best possibilities for what they really need. This change in thinking behavior from what was relevant even 2 years ago shows and creates a tremendous opportunity for marketers by allowing them (or you) the opportunity of more touch points to influence the all mighty customer.

Larson Notes & Satire:  So yes you have more and greater opportunity to get new customers but remember you also have new and greater ways to lose customers. And remember it is easier to keep a customer that it is to go out and get a new one. Keep your defenses up high and controlling and keeping what you got, so you don’t have to get twice as many new accounts.

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson & Associates, a Division of US Telemarketing Group LLC
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
http://teamcircle.ning.com/profile/HowardLarson


https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

14 stats that mattered most for media and marketing in 2011.

1.) 50 million -- The big number from the Census everyone was talking about was the number of Hispanics, which crested this milestone for the first time. Later the Census and the New York Times found that even more people in the U.S. (51 million) are at or near the poverty line.

2.) 50% +1 -- Sometime this year the children being born in the U.S. tipped to majority-minority, according to Brookings Institute demographer William Frey. It'll take the population as a whole decades before the white population is not the majority, but the newborns are there now. Diversity marketing is in for a makeover.

3.) Half of kids under 8 (and 40% of 2- to 4-year-olds) have access to a smartphone, iPad or some other mobile media device.

4.) In October 2011 Facebookers in the U.S. spent 136,000 aggregate years on the site, according to Comscore. That's more time than… well, all of recorded history.

5.) The U.S. added just 11.2 million households between 2000 and 2010, the -- slowest household formation rate we've seen in a long time. This impacts industries like construction and any sort of household goods and services and is helping to keep the recovery slow.

6.) When asked all the reasons they subscribe to a local paper, 85% said local news, but nearly four in 10 said "habit," according to the Ad Age/Ipsos Observer American Consumer Survey.

7.) Nuclear families account for just one-fifth of all households but more than one-third (34%) of total consumer spending. Nationwide there are 1.3 million fewer of them in 2010 than there were in 2000.

8.) One in three consumers can't afford your product: The 2011 Discretionary Spend Report from Experian Simmons finds 34.5% of households have less than $7,000 to spend on non-essential goods. Just over half have less than $10,000 to spend on entertainment, education, personal care, clothing, furniture and more.

9.) How big is big? The big four agency holding companies have nearly twice the revenue of the next largest 46, $40.1 billion to $21.5 billion.

10.) Don't count out old media. Fifty-seven percent of millennials indicated in a study from OMD that TV was the first way they hear about products and services.

11.) Is this surprisingly low, or high? In a survey from Insight Express' Digital, 56% of mobile users admit to using their phones to text, call, etc. while on the throne.

12.) For the first time in American history there are now a million more females than males college graduates, according to the Census.

13.) In 2011: The twin birthrate is up 76% since 1980, reaching a new record of 33.2 per 1,000 in 2009

14.) The non-U.S. portion of P&G;'s measured-ad spending rocketed to 71% last year from 22% in 1986. Sixty-three percent of the company's revenue came from outside the U.S. in the year ended June 2011.

Larson Notes&Satire:  What does all this mean to you? Look it over again. Where does your service or product fit in to the grand scheme of things?  Who do you sell to? Do you need to add Spanish to your company’s way of doing business? Would a 6 year old want to buy and if they tied how are you going to handle that? Do you take a new look at old media I.e. TV as a marketing tool? Do I hear cable? Should you be looking at selling overseas and does China fit or India? Selling to the “minority market? If so, which one?

Again what does this all mean to you and your company?

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson & Associates, a Division of US Telemarketing Group LLC
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates

https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

Think about it. Why did you buy the last product or service you bought?

Two things come to mind with that question. First off you bought or purchased, you were not sold, and second you must have had a reason to buy or at the start of the sales process, you must have had a reason or need to buy or at least have a need.
 
Every successful salesperson I work with has a few impeccable traits. They don’t get greedy, they don’t sell to people that don’t have a need and they find either the pain of not buying or the reason or the gain of why the prospect should buy.

That need or gain or the pain of not in your opportunity is what makes you becoming the sales doctor you have become. What do you know about the industry you sell into that causes people the most pain and how can you become the Good Doctor?

Knowing this there is only really one more part to the equation you need to keep doing and that is finding more people to talk to about helping them.

Larson Notes&Satire:  Most sales people I talk to, do not like to do what I like to do, that is COLD CALLing people that they have never ever talked to before. But ask yourself, how are you going to sell more of what you sell if you don’t get yourself in front of more people who have a deep need for what you got to sell?

We find that more and more sales people who what to be the good Sales Doctor want a leads company to get them in the door so they can to their “thing”. How ‘bout you?

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson & Associates, a Division of US Telemarketing Group LLC
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
http://teamcircle.ning.com/profile/HowardLarson

https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

Why do you think that businesses are not getting the kind of results out of Social Media Marketing that they are expecting?

Quite simply they are reacting rather that evolving. Social Media Marketing is too new to be totally understood. Every day there are new players entering the marketing in ways which we cannot imagine, and that is not to ever consider the plans of Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter as the look to secure their importance and the beach head they have established in SMM.

I’m here to tell you to keep the basics of good selling and marketing at the forefront of your plans because even with new tools (and all there are, are tools) the old ways are still really the only way.

The question you need to be asking yourself is, are you a reacting company or are you evolving?

In the mad rush to “do” Social Media Marketing have you lost your way? Are you in a state of flux in the redefining of your goals from hard hitting working sales into retweets, getting more of the 3Fs, and just trying to be linked?  If you all you want to do is be linked up, go out and join your local Chamber of Commerce and they will be happy to shower you with love. Then sit back and see what happens. My bet is nothing. No knock on Chambers but yes, been there done that, and SMM is just the same thing only online.

In many ways SMM is the same thing only online. Nothing really has been invented, just redefined to happen at the speed of cyber. What once took 1 month or 1 week, now can take 1 day or 1 hour, but the rejection is still there.

As SMM evolves todays successful sales and marketing people are using techniques of earning their prospects purchases. They are using the new tools of Google, Facebook and blogs to answer their prospects needs and problems. Do I hear the word “probing”? When prospects understand their problems clearly they are more ready and willing to be excreted towards the answers you and your service/product provides.

Larson Notes&Satire:  If I did not know any better this sounds like sales 101. Yes fans nothing new here only a new way of doing it. You still need to probe, probe, probe to find the needs and wants, the pain of not buying from you, your customers and prospects need to get an answer for.

If you don’t know or understand the basics you will not understand selling and marketing in the new cyber world we are all expected to be working in.

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson & Associates, a Division of US Telemarketing Group LLC
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
http://teamcircle.ning.com/profile/HowardLarson

https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

According to Facebook there are now only 4 degrees of separation in the world. And you know they might be right.

For years, there's been a theory that every person is only separated by six degrees, or relationships. I found it sometimes hard to believe when one year when not thinking hard I found that I was only 3 degrees of separation from the President of the United States. Like WOW!

Then in comes Facebook, with its data of over 700 million people and their al their relationships and interconnections with friends. Facebook is saying we're all just four degrees of separation apart people are around the world.

Larson Notes&Satire:  THAT does not do you any good if you don’t do anything with it. You need to be there, and everywhere all at once. It might be easier said than done but it is getting easier to be everywhere and anywhere all at the same time. Yes maybe you now can be 2, 3 or more places at the same time.

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
http://teamcircle.ning.com/profile/HowardLarson

https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

As a lead generation – telemarketing company we are in a constant dilemma as we shift though and search for prospects, leads and customers for our clients.

We are suppose to be the miracle workers, finding golden nuggets where normal sales people cant or aren’t able to.

It’s a not nice world out there. We don’t always get want we want nor are we able to get the desired result we are looking for.

That is why I love the rule of #2. The rule of number 2 states that every account is already owned by someone. Muhammad Ali after fighting Joe Frasier once said “You got to beat the champ, you don’t just trade punches you go to beat him.”

The same holds true in sales. You got to beat the current supplier not just match his price or service.  You have got to be better; you got to beat the champ.

In the land of Customers and Prospects maybe what we should expect more is engagements. Yes that might be lowering our expectations but we need a legitimate place to start the dialogue to becoming a customer. Don’t think I am trying to lower the bar on my work expectations. No, what I am saying is that we are going after the bull’s-eye but when we do find a company willing to start the engagement process that is not a lose.

It is far better to have a prospect you are engaged and conversing with than no conversation at all. Your real problem is to be able to measure the level of conversation. As long as you are communication with the prospect you have or should have some level of progress along the sales cycle. And while there is no true gauge for measurement every marketing and sales program should have distinct goals.

So what is a successful engagement? Is in increased sales? That would be nice and very trackable. Is it responses? Again very trackable and countable. As we move though the sales funnel we start to define more specifically if this is a quality lead or a “tire kicker”.  An email campaign, direct mail program, all help to keep you in front of and on the mind of the prospect. I would hope you are in for the long term and not a one close, one sale wonder. Email, direct mail, social media marketing are areas of engagement or continuing engagement. It is keeping the flow of conversation going until you not just bid on a job but get your first sale.

The number of channels you can engage prospects is ever growing. Not just Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter but MerchantCircle, Storeboard and the ning sites to name a few more. It is getting more complemented in some ways which it is important you keep track of what works and what does not work.

Larson Notes&Satire:  Telemarketing can only take you so far down the sales process.  Sure sometimes we get quote specs off a cold call right over the phone, we get appointments, but sorry more often than not we get companies in the ball game for them to do the job of closing the deal.

We have created a program that some companies follow and some don’t. Their choice of course. Most sadly take only a part of the entire program so they don’t receive the full benefit.

As stated best is a multichannel attack because one size or one approach does not fit all. Need help call us.

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
http://teamcircle.ning.com/profile/HowardLarson

https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

I have been playing a little bit, a very little bit with Yelp. It is not my main push as a marketing tool that being a B2B company but still I play just in case I have a client that needs to be there.

But how long will Yelp be around? Does it, can it make money?

Well, it doesn't! At least, not yet.

The company lost $7.6 million through the first nine months of the year on revenues of $59 million. They (industry experts) think if should become profitable, it will be due to advertising, specifically local advertising, which stands at at $40 million and is 70% of its total revenue through the first nine months of this year. Brand advertising stands at $13 million is 22% of revenue. And "other services," like Yelp Deals, remnant ads, and revenue from reservations is 9%, or $5.4 million.

Here are the most important details:

Revenue: $22 million in Q3 2011, up from $12.6 million in Q3 2010.

Yearly revenue: Yelp brought in $47.7 million in revenue last year. It brought in $58.4 million in the first nine months this year, compared to $32.5 million in the first nine months last year.

Profits: Yelp lost $3.8 million in Q3 2011, up from 2.9 million in Q3 2010.

Yearly profits: Yelp lost $9.6 million last year and lost $7.6 million in the first nine months this year.

Visitors: Yelp had 61 million monthly unique visitors as of the end of its third quarter.

Reviews: Yelp has 22.4 million reviews on the site as of the end of its third quarter.

Advertising: 71 percent of Yelp's revenue comes from local advertising, compared to 21 percent from brand advertising and 8 percent from "other services.
"Google in particular is the most significant source of traffic to our website accounting for more than half of the visits to our website from Internet searches during the nine months ended September 30, 2011," the S-1 filing reads.

CEO Jeremy Stoppelman owns 11.1 percent of Yelp. The company's investors own 61.1 percent of the company.

Yelp has $23 million in cash, down from $27 million at the end of 2010.

And here are some interesting tidbits:
42 percent of Yelp's customers are between the ages of 18 and 34, and 33 percent are between the ages of 35 and 59.
45 percent of Yelp's customers are college graduates.
Nearly half of all reviews (23 percent each) are restaurant or store reviews.
PayPal co-founder Max Levchin owns 13.8 percent of Yelp.
Yelp has spent $4.4 million on infrastructure this year so far, up from $2.9 million in 2010.

Yelp's business could be adversely affected by "earthquakes, fires, floods and other natural catastrophic events and to interruption by man-made problems such as computer viruses or terrorism."
Yelp says it does not intend to pay dividends in the future.
Yelp employees outside of Stoppelman only own 14 percent of the company. Stoppelman, his investors and Levchin own a collective 86 percent of the company.
Yelp's employee with the second-highest ownership is chief operating officer Geoff Donaker at 1.6 percent.

Larson Notes&Satire;:  My yelp numbers are going up? Are my prospects there? Yes, prospects can be everywhere. It is all in how to touch them in a way they want to be touched.

As Henry Ford once said, he knew half of every dollar he spent on advertising was wasted. He just didn't know which half.

So where should you be advertising and marketing everywhere and anyway you can be 90% effective. The key is to be as effective in each area you are involved in so you own that channel. A multichannel attack works because one size or one approach does not fit all. Need help call us.

“We don’t sell lists, we find customers.”

Want to be a Blogger but can’t write?
Try our ghost blog writing service!

Howard Larson
Larson&Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
http://teamcircle.ning.com/profile/HowardLarson

https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate

P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.