10 Ways for Small Businesses to Dominate Local Markets

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There are several ways small businesses can better position themselves to compete in the local market. Most small businesses need more consistency throughout the year to survive in the increasingly competitive marketplace. Fortunately, there are several ways small businesses can better position themselves to compete in the local market.

1. Small business tips online.

According to a study from Bazaarvoice, roughly 39 percent of in-store shoppers research a product online before buying at a physical location. This means that your small business must have an online presence in order to compete locally. How can your small business improve its online presence?

2. Improve your local SEO.

Focusing on improving your small business’ local SEO will help generate more traffic to your website and ultimately, more leads and sales for your business. With roughly 97 percent of consumers going online to search for local businesses, why wouldn’t you make SEO a priority? Additionally, Google is placing more emphasis on local search with prominent local results floating at the top of targeted search queries. With that said, Google has altered their local results to focus on the top three businesses for a specific search. This means, while difficult, getting your small business inside the top three results can result in tremendous return on investment. To get started, make sure you register your business with Google and Bing Places. Other considerations to improve local SEO include, hyper-local content creation onsite and offsite, outreach and publisher partnerships with local websites, optimizing your website (NAP, keywords, etc.) and strategic social media management among others.

3. Increase online reviews.

Online reviews are a critical part of your local search rankings, not just on Google and Bing, but also sites like Yelp and Facebook. Additionally, online reviews are the modern version of word-of-mouth advertising and can persuade new customers to use your small business, or to not use your small business. In fact, roughly 67 percent of consumers reported that their purchasing decisions were influenced by online reviews. Thus, it’s important to perpetuate reviews from your customers, especially if you know they had a positive experience. Consider adding calls-to-action on your receipts or training your employees to ask for reviews on your Google+, Facebook and Yelp page.

4. Use email marketing.

Email marketing is an undervalued resource for small businesses. It gives you a scalable tool to communicate with current, previous and potential clients. In fact, it seems like most small businesses put more energy into social media than email, even though email marketing is estimated to yield three times higher results and a 17 percent higher value in conversion. Consider using a free email marketing resource like Constant Contact.

5. Target paid local results.

With local search getting increasingly difficult, it might make sense for your small business to consider pay-per-click (PPC) options like AdWords. PPC is when you pay for each individual customer that visits your website after clicking a specific advertisement. The best part is, you can optimize PPC campaigns to target affordable, yet actionable keywords in specific geographical areas. PPC lets you get your advertisement in front of highly targeted keywords in your local market, which will increase your conversions.

6. Small business tips offline.

Brick-and-mortar locations are the staple of small businesses. Even in the increasingly digital world, there are several offline tactics that can help small businesses excel.

7. Become active in the community.

Small businesses are often considered to be “backbones” of their respective communities. As a result, local companies can differentiate themselves by staying active in local affairs. In fact, 82 percent of consumers consider corporate social responsibility as an important factor when making purchasing decisions. As a start, you can join your local Chamber of Commerce to find relevant events in your target market. If you really want to make a splash, consider sponsoring a local event or charity. Social activism in your local community is an excellent marketing tool and a great way to gain positive PR.

8. Target local government contracts.

The government sets aside specific contracts for companies that are designated as small businesses. If your business qualifies, you should consider going after local opportunities. Winning a government contract can provide a stable and consistent revenue stream to supplement other clients. The SBA states that the law requires the government to award 23 percent of their contracts to local businesses, which amounts to roughly $115 billion annually. Winning these contracts are not a given, and you’ll need to devote time and energy into understanding and finding opportunities, as well as creating compelling proposals. However, the risk vs. reward is substantial if you’re able to win a government contract.

9. Focus on the customer experience.

If small businesses are the backbone of a community, then customers are the heart of small businesses. As such, it is vital that your small business focus its efforts on providing the best customer experience possible. Cox reports that 90 percent of U.S. consumers frequent small businesses at least once a week. Furthermore, 63 percent of the respondents said that they feel a strong need to support local entrepreneurs. This is mostly in part to the convenience, customer service and social equity of local businesses compared to corporations. As a result, small businesses can dominate their local market by providing incredible customer service, convenient operating hours, a friendly atmosphere and the inclusion of customer opinions and feedback into strategic decisions.

10. Don’t be afraid of change.

Change is one of the hardest things for small business owners to accept. However, an inability to adapt to changing trends can kill your small business quicker than any competition can. In fact, autonomy and flexibility are two benefits that small businesses have over corporate competitors. The bureaucracy of larger companies can make it difficult for pivots or strategic changes, but as a small business with a typically flat management style, you are able to adapt on the fly. CRM and other integrated data systems can provide small businesses the insight needed to see trends in their operations. This will help you capitalize on opportunities and prepare for imminent threats.

Life as a small business owner can be difficult. With the saturation of local markets and the increasingly globalized economy, the external pressures forced down on small businesses can seem insurmountable. However, there are several strategies that small businesses can focus on to improve their competitive position. Remember to market yourself online, continue to improve your relationship with customers and never be afraid to change.

Original Article written: Derek Miller

Culled from: Enterpreneur.com

Tips for Startup Success

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 Everyone has to start somewhere. Whether he or she works for the largest corporation or the hottest start-up, every entrepreneur starts at square one. Though many paths lead to success, some are more direct and have fewer bumps along the way. No one, of course, finds success without encountering a few obstacles.

Below are three tips to help your startup process and find success.

Dream big and map it out.

When you are contemplating making the entrepreneurial leap, remember this: It doesn’t take any more effort to dream big than it does to dream small.

Perhaps you doubt your ability to make great things happen. Maybe you don’t want to appear greedy or materialistic. Or, you may feel that you don’t deserve all that being an entrepreneur has to offer. Regardless of the reason, you can’t listen to that voice in your head telling you to play it safe and not dream big.

With a big dream motivating you, it is easy to want to go all-in right now. However, before you quit your job, develop a detailed plan for your business. Most entrepreneurs are visionaries with the drive to get things started. But they are easily bored and quick to move on to their next project. By creating a detailed plan for your dream, you learn to hold yourself accountable to yourself and that accountability brings progress. Without a plan, your big dream is just a day dream. With it, it becomes a reality.

Identify your priorities, but be flexible.

As you put your plan together, you'll find it obvious what tasks contribute the most to your business’s success. These are the tasks that must be pursued relentlessly.

One reason entrepreneurs fail is that they fail to properly prioritize their work. By separating the good from the best, you create the focus that would not exist if you pursued everything asking for your time and attention.

As you begin building your business, take time to identify the essential pieces of your business that will sustain your venture and provide the necessary cash flow.

Also, be aware that if you do not prioritize correctly, you run the risk of taking on too much and doing nothing well. Every venture has critical pieces that create the successful outcome. It is when you focus more on the support tasks than the critical ones that you begin watering down your best work.

Designing eye-catching packaging for your product, for example, that will help you stand out from the competition, but if you have neglected the necessary legwork to get your product on the shelves in the first place, your efforts will all be for naught.

Fail fast and fail often.

Most entrepreneurs are not risk adverse. If they were, they would still be playing it “safe” in their 9-to-5 jobs. However, in order to be successful, you need to experiment and take chances that may frighten you at first.

If you are reading this in the hopes of not making any mistakes, then you’ve already made your first one. Do not look at mistakes as something to be avoided at all costs, but as unique learning opportunities custom-tailored to you, your circumstances and your business. The more lessons you can learn from in the quickest amount of time, the more you can shorten your learning curve and place yourself in a position to grow your business.

By adopting the mindset of “fail fast and fail often,” you'll begin to leverage the power of iteration -- the process of repeating and refining a process in order to meet a goal.

The ultimate goal for your business is to stay alive and ultimately to thrive. In order to accomplish this goal, you must iterate until you find the “breakthrough” that makes your business a self-sustaining entity.

When you are starting a business, speed is critical for success. The more tightly you can run experiments and the faster you can iterate the more chances you will provide yourself to find that winning combination. It is that winning combination that helps you become scalable. And scalability is what allows you to realize your big dream.

So, do not be afraid of making mistakes. You have to try, make mistakes, learn and try again. If you try, make a mistake and give up, you will never be the success you could have been.

Original Article Written by Michael Noice

Culled From Entrepreneur.com

How to Plan for the Next 5 Years

• Review your goals every day.

Goal setting is like getting on the scale -- you’ll see greater success if you do it every morning. As entrepreneurs, dreaming big is standard practice. The distinguishing factor between the big dreamers and the big doers is that the doers take action.

Entrepreneurship Development for Managing a New Beginning

Event Description

This is training on Entrepreneurship. It is designed for your employees who have not attained retirement age, but have to leave the employ of Guinness Nigeria for various reasons. This programme will teach them how to establish and run their own businesses. Also, an aspect of it is devoted to educating those who may want to seek for paid employment. In it we will take participants through an orientation of “entrepreneurial personality” which, rather than be characterised by a propensity for risk taking, among other things, will focus success on one thing “opportunity focused.”