If you’re a startup owner and you want people to find you, then social media must be a solid part of your strategy for attracting and retaining customers. Think about it, how often do you use Google or another search engine to find a business? The more online presence your company has, the better chance you’ll have of attracting customers. Today’s environment is all about making it easy for the right customers to find you. For example, if you’re selling organic baby food, then making sure that you gain exposure to new moms and moms-to-be is key.

One option is to increase your web presence by building up your network on social media; when customers “Google” your company, they’ll be able to visit several places for information. Also, you’ll have more avenues to get feedback and connect to your customer base. While you can spend money on traditional advertising; if you have a small budget, it makes more sense to leverage social media and save the cost of having to run ad campaigns. To build up your “base” on your company’s Twitter page or Facebook fan page, reach out to bloggers in your industry and related associations to see if they want to try out your product. If they like it, “word of mouth” will spread and they’ll recommend it on social networks and their followers/members will also try out your product.

The following 10 steps will help get you going with social media for your startup. The good news is that as you learn more- you can always incorporate more social media elements into your overall business strategy. But for now, here’s your primer. Also check out Wicked Start’s social media whitepaper (PDF download) for more details:

1. Embrace social media: As a startup, you’re in a great position use social media into your business strategy from the get go. You’ll be able to build a customer centric culture that enables direct two-way interaction with your customers and prospects. Social media helps create transparency, thus building greater trust with the consumer.
2. Create a Facebook Fan Page: If you have a personal facebook account- great! However, for your business, you can also create a fan page. This ‘fan’ page will showcase your product/service and engage with your customers directly. It’s here that you want to upload your logo, a brief statement about your mission, and anything else that your prospective clients might find useful. For example, take a look at Wicked Start’s fan page
3. Create a Twitter Account: Head to Twitter and set up an account for your business. This will allow you to send out short messages- or tweets- of 140 characters or less to your followers. Tweet links to blog entries, press, a promotion, something cool or innovative that is happening at this very moment, also ‘re-tweet’ someone else’s tweets if it’s relevant and profound. For example, take a look at our Twitter page
4. Set up a YouTube Channel: Video is a great way to connect with customers, it significantly enhances your search ranking when potential customers try to find you on Google or Yahoo. Video creates a more personal connection with your customers and can demonstrate success stories or how your product works. You can create your own ‘channel’ for your business by simply going to YouTube to set it up. For example, take a look at our YouTube channel
5. Start a blog: We’re all familiar with blogs but now is the time to start a blog for your business. This is how you will solidify your credibility in the marketplace as an expert in your industry. No one has your voice or your authenticity- so you own that! Write about product attributes or experiences that show your expertise. Commit to writing 1 blog post a week, or more if you have more to say. Setting up a blog is easy- you can do it for free at Blogger or check with your web hosting service. For an example, look at our Wicked Start blogs (we use a Word Press plugin for blogging functionality)
6. Start a monthly newsletter: Starting a monthly newsletter with tips and inspiration or how-to stories can be a great way to connect with potential customers. Getting started is easy. There are several services out there that could be of value to you, however, I’ve been using Constant Contact for several years. They’re reputable, solid, and have an easy to use interface with templates to get you started. Once you have your newsletter in place, put a link on your homepage so website visitors can sign up to receive it. For a newsletter example, look at one of ours
7. Digg it: Drop in on “conversations” pertaining to your industry so you keep on top of what’s going on. You’ll hear what experts, consumers, and advocates have to say. Go and Digg!
8. Answer Community questions: Search the internet and keep a list of blogs and communities relevant to you industry. Then, answer questions to help consumers make a better decision or share an experience so someone can learn from you. If you find something really interesting for your users, you can post it in a blog, tweet it or post it on Facebook.
9. Set up Google Analytics: This is the ‘behind the scenes’ way to track web traffic- or visitors- coming to your website. For example, you had 1,000 visitors on your site yesterday and you see that 500 of them came from a blog entry that you wrote. Of those 500 visitors, 50 of them made a purchase on your website. This means that 5% of visitors who clicked over from your blog entry made a purchase. If you really want to get professional, optimize your website pages by tagging it with relevant terms that will help you get closer to a #1 Google search ranking.
10. Commit 1 Hour a Day! If you can commit an hour a day to your social media strategy, you’ll be able to get through these steps successfully. If you can do more, even better. Remember that this strategy takes time to develop. Be prepared to spend several months to get going.

Bryan Janeczko is a StartOut cofounder and founder of Wicked Start, the startup incubator with online tools to plan, fund and start a business.

When it comes to pricing your product or service, if you’re in the tech industry; it may actually pay to offer value for free. Before you label this as a “crazy idea,” spend a moment and look at the vast array of successful technology products that we depend on but are 100% free. Just a few off the top of my head: Google, Tumblr and Eventbrite. An equal number of very profitable companies also provide free models and have paid tiers where you can sign up for a base account and then pay for additional features such as more hands-on customer service and greater digital storage space.

The overwhelming reason why tech companies go “freemium” is that this model attracts a lot of attention. If someone is giving you a free sample or even better, giving you the entire product for free, wouldn’t you be curious to give it a try? After all, what is there to lose?

So how do you make a profit from free? Consider making your revenue from other ways besides directly from your consumer. There’s a lot of hidden value in simply having a large number of people using your product or service. Is there profit potential in user data? Can you sell advertising space? Can you entice customers by first offering them a great base model for free, allowing them to trust your business so that eventually they’ll be happy to pay for more “souped-up” paid models?

I’m not advocating that you “give the farm away,” just to consider a carefully planned out strategy that could boost your publicity by allowing customers to “test drive” your offering first before they pay – or even for an unlimited time. Depending on your approach, you’d be surprised at just how much value you can generate by giving it away for free!

Bryan Janeczko is a StartOut cofounder and founder of Wicked Start, the startup incubator with online tools to plan, fund and start a business.

Having started businesses myself I know how costly it can be to start up. That’s why when I find a free entrepreneurial tool, I don’t hesitate to pass it along to those working to launch their own businesses. The five resources below are my absolute favorite free tools for small business marketing and I don’t even factor in the price when I make that judgment; some of these tools are so essential to my marketing strategies that, paid or not, I’d still recommend them!

Pew Research Center

The SBA had a great blog post last week about free market research tools from the U.S federal government. Another free resource for industry statistics, national survey results and demographical data is the Pew Research Center. Their fact tank focuses on public opinion polling, media content analysis and social science research so it’s a great place if you’re looking for free, empirical data about what people think about certain topics (this can help you develop your “ideal customer”). Remember market research isn’t only valuable to your marketing research, statistics and data are also vital to business plans and investment pitch decks.

Eventbrite

Eventbrite is great if you’re hosting any type of event. Last year, we hosted an entrepreneurial panel and we used Eventbrite to efficiently and easily sell tickets, keep track of our comprehensive guest list, market the event on social media, send out email invitations and by customizing an event page on Eventbrite we automatically had a link we could send to interested guests to check out before they signed up. This one is highly recommended!

HARO – Help A Reporter Out

There is such a thing as free PR (public relations). HARO works as a feed where reporters sign up their story ideas. If you’ve subscribed to HARO, you’ll get a daily email of journalists looking for sources, interview subjects and examples for their media pieces. If you’d like more publicity and want a reporter to write about your business, sign up for HARO and be on the lookout for journalists interested in covering your industry.

Porter’s Five Forces

Before you put your new product out into the market, you have to make sure whether or not it stands a chance to be profitable. The Porter’s Five Forces Analysis is a powerful tool that can help you understand how strong your competitors are, how much influence buyers and material suppliers have on the future of your product, whether or not your product can be easily substituted by a competitor’s offering and designation of any potential threats of competitors coming to your market space. This business jargon sounds very “marketing 101” but these basics are important and combining these factors into a careful assessment will give you a foundational analysis which you can use to determine your most successful marketing strategy.

Google Sites

I strongly believe that almost all services, products and companies need a website. If you haven’t finalized your business yet, throw up a “splash page” which is a minimal site that lets the public know that your offering is “coming soon.” To do this fast, easily, effectively and for free, check out Google Sites. You can browse through eye pleasing templates and create your own URL in a matter of minutes.

Bryan Janeczko is a StartOut cofounder and founder of Wicked Start, the startup incubator with online tools to plan, fund and start a business.

It’s that time of the year, when all the trends for the following year come out… Soothsayers, psychics, and data crunchers alike are helping to predict and guide you through what the new year is about to bring.  But, what I find important is that understanding trends that are relevant to building and growing a great business. And, this year is no different than last year, with technology leading the way, only it’s at an accelerated pace. Clearly, technology has dramatically changed the way we do business, the relationships we manage, and speed with which we can create and bring a product or service to market.

I’m particularly fond of the top trends found in Entrepreneur Magazine for two reasons: #1- There’s a direct application to how you can leverage the trend for your startup success; and #2- I’ve seen from multiple sources several of these trends percolating, which means that Entrepreneur has done a great job distilling the insight.  I believe that the biggest trends to think about are:

1)   Big Data: With technology evolving at lightening speed, there is more data than ever circulating in the cloud, out of the cloud, or in the library. As all things- from pollen counts to tagged Facebook photos-  become bits of data and moves online, that information needs to be catalogued, managed and analyzed.  This can help fuel new product development in all facets of life from manufacturing to taking tests since there will lots of data to crunch and help customers make decisions.

2)   Domestic Manufacturing: There has been a rise in domestic manufacturing. Partly, it’s due to feeling good about “made in America”, however, with the advent of 3D printing (on demand manufacturing of basic household plastics and items from buttons to toasters), highly skilled labor, lower production costs, manufacturing in this country is super appealing. Businesses can customize more quickly and can provide superior customer experiences.

3)   Funding: Crowd funding is only gaining in popularity with a proliferation of new online platforms to facilitate funding of new ideas. These platforms are making it easier to raise capital to fund and grow new businesses. Right now, these platforms are donation based only, meaning that you can’t receive equity. However, the savvy entrepreneurs know that this can be a great way to give away future products or services and secure a potential customer based in advance of a product launch (think of this as pre-selling.) The SEC is even considering legislation to allow crowd funding for equity (more to come on that one.

Think about these trends for your startup as you plan for 2013. What trends can you leverage to your benefit?

Bryan Janeczko is a StartOut cofounder and founder of Wicked Start, the startup incubator with online tools to plan, fund and start a business.

There are a plethora of blog posts, podcasts, webinars etc. telling you what to do if you want to convert prospectives into customers i.e., make the sale. In my opinion, there’s also a lot you can learn on what to do by studying what NOT to do. So here are my three basic rules on how not to screw up the sale process:

1. Don’t Ambush a Stranger

This pretty much boils down to: “Stay away from cold calling potential customers”. Don’t buy lists of contacts, no matter how “reputable” the source is. When was the last time you decided to give telemarketers calling at dinner the time of day? More importantly, when have you ever hung up the phone with a happy feeling after being asked to buy something from a stranger over the phone? I recommend that you prohibit yourself from directly contacting anyone who hasn’t explicitly agreed to be contacted or hasn’t consented to getting more information. You don’t want to turn your potential customer away even before they’ve established interest. Instead, meet prospectives at industry conferences, neighborhood locales where your target customer would frequent and even reach out your personal circle to see who else would be interested. After your initial introduction, then you can feel free to follow up with a friendly phone call or email.

2. Don’t Obscure Your Actual Value With Bells and Whistles

Unless you’re actually selling bells and whistles (ex: party store), focus instead on showcasing your actual value rather than trying to “trick” customers into buying with elaborate promotions, flashy events and inflated promises. The customer’s buying decision will always boil down to: what’s the value in it for me? Some of the most successful companies are exceedingly simple in the way they market themselves with their only emphasis on how their product will improve the customers’ lives ( no matter how small or large the offering is, you’re trying to make the point that what you’re selling will ultimately make some aspect of your buyer’s life better). If you’re promoting like crazy with very little results, consider “cutting the fat” in your marketing and only call attention to your value.

3. Don’t Sell A Solution If Your Customer Can’t Identify A Problem

Customers will buy a product or service because it solves a need that they have. Don’t waste time forcing a solution on a prospective if they themselves cannot understand what needs to be fixed. This goes along with the first tip about not cold calling. Before you even approach your potential client, identify that they would actually have an interest in what you’re offering. For example, if you talk to a prospective and they’re generally happy with a competitor’s product and you can’t offer them a better price or better value, politely thank them for their time and go back to brainstorming how you can outshine the competition next time. Do not spend your precious time trying to persuade a customer who isn’t looking for the solution you’re selling.

Bryan Janeczko is a StartOut cofounder and founder of Wicked Start, the startup incubator with online tools to plan, fund and start a business.

Bear in mind that although there is a handful of pricing model “archetypes;” the best pricing model is like a ready-to-wear coat taken to the tailor and adjusted to fit your exact body type. You may really be enamored with the success of another agency’s performance-based pricing engine but your business may be lacking the same factors that would produce the same efficiency and success. In other words, your company’s pricing equation includes other unique factors that when calculated, will necessitate the use of a different pricing structure. Every new business has a “Pricing Model” equation, here are the 4 main factors you need to sum up:

1. Are you selling diamonds or gravel?

It’s a no-brainer that you’d be charging more per product if you’re operating as a high-end jewelry boutique versus a pet store selling aquarium materials. Yet how you market your product isn’t always so obvious: you could position your gravel as “luxury sedimentary minerals taken from a remote dry creek bed and suitable only for the rarest of tropical fish.” Just because you’re selling gravel, doesn’t always mean that you can’t price them as diamonds. So consider what you’re providing – is it luxury? efficiency? convenience? productivity? There’s a price tag that customers will expect to pay for each of these value points and it’s your job to determine what that price tag is.

2. What are your competitors charging?

A good way to discover what your product should be valued is to research what similar products go for. Now you may say “my service/offering is so unique that I don’t have competitors.” While I find this highly implausible, I would suggest that you look at every other company in your market to understand what their pricing equation is. Most likely their target customers, production costs and marketing strategies will be similar to yours and you’ll have an appropriate gauge to see whether or not you’re overcharging or undervaluing. Also, if your competitors are charging a lower price than you, they’ll have a pricing advantage. Think about how you compare to others.

3. What is your customer willing to pay?

Is your ideal customer a spendthrift seeking the best bargain? Or does your ideal customer have a large disposable income? What rationales are behind your customer’s purchasing decisions? Are they trying to “buy into” luxury or will they only buy once they’re sure that it will provide them significant and irreplaceable value? The best way to understand what your customer is willing to pay is to ask them. Provide your first clients with a test trial or a free sample and then ask them what they would be willing to pay for your offering. This may seem a bit too direct but your customers will appreciate your candidness and your desire to actually listen to them. Also, you’ll gain insight on how you can improve your offering so that your customers would be willing to pay your ideal price.

4. Cover your behind…er…costs!

This is purely an operational factor but many new business owners forget that they need to price their product so they’ll eventually make enough to cover their overhead expenses, expected cost hikes in materials, labor and resources and future business initiatives. Your pricing equation should begin at the financials section of your business plan. Can you afford to charge $25 for a bracelet when it costs $30 to produce it? Even if you think you’re covering your initial costs, will you be running a promotion in the first weeks that will significantly slash your revenues? How can you make that up by adjusting your pricing model?

Oh, the monthly email newsletter. I could probably write an ode to this tried and true marketing device for no other tool provides such consistent marketing value. I use my newsletter to keep clients excited with fresh content, alert users of updates, promote items and to create a community for my customers to engage in. Most companies, both large and small, understand these benefits and publish a daily, weekly or monthly newsletter (a few of my own favorites come from Sprouter, Quora and Skillshare). Unfortunately many execute their newsletter strategies poorly and their attempt to “reach out” comes off as a nuisance. To get people to subscribe, stay interested and attracted to your offering, stay away from these Major Email Newsletter Mistakes:  

1. Dressing It Like Spam

Infographic provided by Flowtown

Spam is of course, any kind of unsolicited content. Although you may have a genuine intention of providing real, valuable content, very few people open email that appears suspiciously like spam. Make sure to package your newsletter so that it doesn’t look a generic message that has been “pushed out” to a bulk mailing list.

How to do this? Pay attention to what you put in the subject line. Never actually use the word “newsletter” as part of the subject. Instead, create a type of headline with  bite-sized pieces of “bait”, or interesting information that will later be expanded in the body of your newsletter . Make sure that your “sender” is a real person because any email that looks like it was sent by a robot will be perceived as sketchy. In the actual newsletter, make the “unsubscribe” button clear and accessible. If someone doesn’t want to subscribe anymore, thank them, ask them you can improve and let them go. Forcing someone to stay on your mailing list by not allowing them an easy way to “opt out” is straight up spamming and why send your newsletter to someone who won’t read it?

Statistics provided by Constant Contact  

2. Buying Email Contacts

Never buy aggregate lists of email addresses so you have more people to send your email newsletter to. Don’t even email people on lists that you get for free. The golden rule is, if someone didn’t actually “opt in”, don’t send them anything. Every so often, I’ll get individuals who email me back asking how we got their information. II always respond honestly by stating that our mailing list is derived from 1) our users 2) contacts who I’ve met at networking events who said that they’d like to get my newsletter 3) those who actually sign up for our emails on our site; I also offer to quickly remove them from our mailing list.

These individuals are always grateful for this information and although they may have forgotten that they signed up months ago, about 90% of the time they agree to stick around. Lesson is, don’t be tempted to mass email strangers because they will ask where you got your contacts from and having to explain that you had to pay for your audience will be embarrassing and damaging to your reputation.

3. Forgetting the Power of Aesthetics & Presentation

So once your reader has clicked into your newsletter, you’re done right? Not exactly. Put just as much time and energy into your visual look, images and format as you would your text content. Choose HTML layouts that are clean and pleasing to the eye. Your content could be as enthralling as a James Patterson novel but who would want to read it if they have to fight through a sea of distracting blue hyperlinks, distorted pictures or worse – a layout as dry and uninteresting as that of a press release.

Not a HTML maven? Email marketing tools like Mailchimp, Mad Mimi and Constant Contact offer award winning design templates that you can easily pop your content into. Be mindful of rapidly waning attention spans -always space out blocks of text with images. Employ simple yet good-looking “call to action” buttons such as ones that direct readers to “learn more” or “read on”. Also trust me – your newsletter will look different depending on whether it’s opened in Gmail or Outlook. Mailchimp offers a nifty “Inbox Inspection” to view your email in several mail clients or you could also do a test run and send your newsletter to friends at different emails to compare what looks wonky in which inbox.

You can’t do it all alone! This saying is especially true in small business marketing. There are many situations where partnering with another service or company to jointly “hawk your wares” would produce better results than if you were to simply market on your own. If you’re operating a local restaurant and your sales have slumped in the past couple of months, consider reaching out to other community eateries to host a “Restaurant Week” promotion where your neighborhood’s restaurants all offer special discounts within a certain time frame.

Many cities recognize “Restaurant Week” an effective marketing strategy that attracts a considerable amount of interest because businesses are pooling together more value for their customers. Participants of the 2011 Louisiana Seafood Restaurant Week saw an 85.7% increase in sales during their campaign- that’s effective marketing!

Of course you don’t have to put together something as elaborate as a week long event to reap the marketing benefits of strategic cooperation; consider looking for a partnerships first.

When I co-founded NuKitchen, a gourmet meal delivery service based in New York, I partnered with Related, a property management company for luxury condos. One would think that food and real estate, being the two separate industries that they are, would not work well to market together but my partnership with Related proved otherwise!

My company began offering food samples in the lobbies of Related’s New York buildings. Related was happy to allow us to showcase our gourmet offerings because our service was an amenity for their customers. We gave them an extra value point that helped them gain new customers and better their reputation. We also provided an exclusive discount to the residents of Related’s buildings, which meant that just by offering a few free meals (and at no other cost), we had access to hundreds and even thousands of new customers. Our partnership with Related proved to be vital to our success: it helped us establish our beginning customer base.

I remember a few months ago when I was watching TV and a new Charles Schwab commercial came on. I can’t say that most ads about investment banking are really that riveting but this one surprised me. The ad featured a young man who sported iPod headphones and encouraged viewers to “Talk to Chuck”. In the marketing sense, this evolution of “Charles” to “Chuck” is evidential of an effort to re-package the services that the company has been offering for over forty years in a fresh way and to a “modern” demographic. Charles Schwab, it would seem, has shifted its brand DNA.

What exactly is brand DNA and why is it important?

Branding, when boiled down to its core is all about trust. Before your customer buys your product, she or he will cycle through a list of “trust questions”: Can I trust that this product will taste good? Can I trust that this product will make me look 10 years younger? Can I trust that this company will keep their promises? It’s important that your company’s brand inspires the amount of trust it takes for your customer to overcome her doubts during the buying-decision process. You want them to buy your product! That’s why branding is important for all businesses, even the companies that are just starting out.

The execution of establishing a brand takes everything from chatting to fans on social media, featuring polished and effective packaging, sponsoring efforts in the community, being customer service jedis and possessing that “one-up” over your competition. Yet all these endeavors need to be propelled by a single momentum- a focused brand “identity” or brand “DNA”.

To understand what your brand DNA is, there are three fundamental questions to ask:

1. What does your service/product do?

Your brand truly hinges on what you’re selling. A company that sells gluten-free and healthy baked goods surely would have a different “identity” and way of communicating to their customers than let’s say an accounting firm.

2. Who is your customer?

In marketing, there’s a concept of the “Target Customer”. This is basically a profile of someone who would be best inclined to wanting, needing and buying your product. Don’t be tempted to say “anyone”, it can’t be everybody and anybody because that answer won’t help you much. Think again of what you’re selling and notice how a “Target Customer” would differ for gluten-free bakery and the accounting firm.. Be specific in describing this customer. What is this individual’s gender? Lifestyle choices? Household income? For Charles Scwhab, their renovated “Target Customer” is someone who would prefer to “Talk to Chuck”, not Charles – perhaps a younger individual in his or her thirties.

3. What is your “edge” over your competition?

You may be offering something faster, cheaper, better, shinier, with better customer service or a product that’s entirely new and unprecedented. Whatever you can do better than your competition, identify it so you can showcase it through your brand.

These questions seem very simple but they’ll give you direction on how to begin to nurture a brand identity. The goal is to make your company’s name and everything that your business represents (your brand) synonymous with the value that your product provides, what your “Target Customer” would want to buy and what your competitive edge is.

In the past, I’ve had disappointing experiences hiring the wrong firms to manage my startup’s SEO needs and it wasn’t fun. Not only that, it was an extremely frustrating time because I had paid a considerable amount of money for a what I thought was going to be top notch guidance. As much as I liked chasing “professionals” for reports that I never got, deficiencies in communication and lackluster SEO results, I had to let that firm go. But it wasn’t all bad, despite wasting time and money, I did come out of that process wiser. To help you avoid the pitfalls I went through with hiring the right SEO firm, read my “tips, tricks and red flags” below:

Establish Consistency
The SEO firm I described above had a great reputation and that was why I placed so much trust in the hands of their professionals. At the time my startup was just getting its bearings and I didn’t know much about SEO nor did I have very much time to research SEO so during our initial consultation, I deferred a lot of direction to the manager of our campaigns. I didn’t know the turnaround time for results so I didn’t explicitly set up a schedule to go over progress consistently with the firm, thinking that they would just fill me in when needed. That was a bad idea. It got to the point where I would lose touch with them for weeks and I’d have no idea if anyone was working on my campaign. If you’re paying a professional, it’s important that you create a schedule in the beginning and ask them to send you timely reports. It’s not being pushy, requiring that you’re updated every two weeks or every month with statistics lets you know that you’re paying for results.

Ask A Ton of Questions
You should be curious about SEO, at least to the extent that more knowledge will help you understand how to better your site exposure. A good SEO firm will take the time (as in calls, emails and even in-person meetings) to guide you through even your most basic questions. Not only that, a great SEO firm will provide and explain to you the different avenues that your company can use to improve, for ex: how to get more relevant users so that not everyone is immediately “bouncing” or map out site usability direction so that more visitors will lead to conversions. A fantastic SEO firm doesn’t keep knowledge away from you, but is willing to enrich you with information that would be conducive to your success.

Plan to Match Performance With Compensation
I’m not downright advocating Pay for Performance SEO because SEO is a complicated process with many factors and a campaign can take even a year to show results. But don’t flat out pay the full fee that the firm asks for before you investigate into the level of effort the campaign will take. Also understand when you’re expected to see results (if results do occur) and what your unique measures of success are. Simply put, spend some time to work out a tiered compensation plan with your SEO firm. Most firms will ask for a down payment, ask them what you’ll get in return for that fee and also talk about bonuses for when good work produces exceptional results. But remember, nothing is instant in the world of SEO. Gauge with metrics over time and you’ll see what works over the long run and what are happenstance flukes.