Small business improvement ideas

Impress Your Clients With Personalized Calendars

September 26, 2012 Leave a Comment

One of the most effective ways to stay connected to your small business clients is by giving them a promotional product they will actually use, with your logo on it. Giving your customers a personalized calendar is one effective way to communicate important information about your company. You can use also use a custom calendar as a unique marketing tool to attract new customers. Choosing a relevant, and visually stunning, calendar is one very effective way to connect with clients.

But what types of things should you personalize on your calendar?

Important Dates

Creating personalized calendars for your customers lets you share important company dates with your clients. For example, if you typically have an anniversary sale, you could include it on the appropriate date in the calendar. Your customers will see the date for your sale and potentially make plans to attend. These customers might even tell their friends and neighbors about your big sale.

Contact Information and Hours

A calendar is an effective tool for reminding your customers of your company’s contact information and regular business hours. Put this on every page of your calendar, making it simple for your customers to see the information they need immediately. If your company has certain days with unusual hours, such as national holidays, you can include this information on the proper dates in the calendar.

Advertise Products with Pictures

With a monthly calendar, you’ll have at least 12 pages you need to fill with pictures. Use this space to advertise your products or services. If you operate a catering company, fill your calendar with pictures of delicious-looking food. If you sell coats, include pictures of models wearing your products. Resist the urge to use beautiful pictures that have nothing to do with your company.

Consider including your company logo on each picture you use. This will help your customers’ house guests identify your business at a glance. You should place this logo in an unobtrusive location at the bottom of each picture.

Calendars Make a Memorable Gift

Most people have a countless supply of notepads, pens and other gifts from other companies. If you get a quality custom calendar, your small business can stand out next to the typical business freebies most businesses give away. Good news: Many people still rely on print calendars to schedule their important daily events. Your customers will appreciate your calendar and might even display it on their wall for their guests to see.

And don’t be stingy! Give each customer a few extra calendars if they ask for them. They just might hand out your calendars to their friends and family, potentially increasing your customer base.

If you need a new, useful product to give your customers, consider giving away a personalized calendar. Your high quality, custom calendar will impress your customers with your thoughtfulness and visually advertise your business at the same time.

Patents for Small Businesses

September 11, 2012 2 Comments

Patents for Small Businesses Apple versus Samsung has been one of the biggest patent fights I can remember, with it looking like Apple is the big winner right now. But patents matter to small businesses too.

Let’s start with a brief history lesson.

Patents have come a long way since their first appearances in 18th century America. Simple rights to a specific invention or idea – anything from a more comfortable horse saddle to a more efficient way to grind salt – have become massive, company-wide lawsuits and enormous high-stakes battles to the rights of a new idea and improvement. Any company with a focus on a new and improved way to be more efficient, profitable, and simply “better” in an area absolutely needs to know how the modern system of patents has changed, and how it can affect your business today.

What is a patent?

Simply put, a patent could be described as a piece of intellectual property. Anything – an idea, an invention, an improvement, a business method – can mostly be interpreted as an idea that can be reserved by the makers or pioneers of it. The idea of patents is centuries old, and has been useful for countless businesses and inventors to market and sell their ideas.

In the past 10 years, we’ve seen a big change. Patents and rights have become so blurred in so many gray areas that it can be extremely easy to accidentally step one someone’s toes, so to speak, and essentially “take” their patented idea. This has happened so many times in recent business history – whether accidentally or intentionally – that companies like Samsung have been on the losing end of a billion-dollar lawsuit over something as minute as the ridges of a smartphone.

How can you keep your small business safe from costly, bankrupting patent lawsuits?

First, you need to know down to the letter which patents your company owns (if any) and precisely what you are entitled to develop under your patents.

Second, spend a little time and money researching which patents competitors – big and small – have regarding the topic in question.

Third, never assume smaller companies won’t be tenacious in protecting their patent ideas. There are even websites and programs you can use to search for patents on ideas and inventions you are considering, as well as business insurance options that will protect you from unknowingly overstepping patent boundaries.

Last but not least, always be aware of new and developing companies within their trade to know who has the patent to what.

Spending a little time and money up front, to remain up to date with the latest patent news could save you thousands of dollars in a legal battle, and avoid your business from going down in flames thanks to a nasty legal battle.

The Positive Power of Being Strange [video with @bigwags]

August 28, 2012 11 Comments

Recently I watched the most amazing 20 minute talk by Mike Wagner of White Rabbit Group, based in Des Moines, Iowa. It’s a city much like my Milwaukee, so Mike’s lessons were particularly relevant to me.

Watch the Positive Power of Being Strange

My lessons from the video:

1) I’m not the only weirdo in the world (and maybe this is why people choose to hang out with me) – Duh, this is obvious really. There are plenty of strange people in the world. What’s new is my thinking that maybe the fact I’m strange is actually WHY people choose to hang out with me. Maybe that’s true for you too. Do you look at the world differently than most of your friends? Good for you! Embrace it!

2) I need to be more intentional about my friends to get new ideas – Many of my friends and people I read online are people who are just like me. I need to force myself to get into more groups of people unlike me. I have an awesome networking group that is filled with people unlike me. We have a lot of tradesman, a realtor, a business banker, and even an interior designer. This helps – some – and I need to be more intentional about this, instead of only focusing on groups of people just like me.

3) Seek out the strange – In this video, Mike talked about riding the bus and finding the most strange person on the bus, and starting a conversation with them. I’m going to try this at the coffee shops I go to, and I’m going to go to new coffee shops too. And I might even take the bus now and then to get there. And I’m going to start partnering with more strange people – instead of people who are a lot like me.

YOUR TURN: Did you watch the video yet? What did YOU learn?

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