Another powerful reason for making the switch from using
the unlimited autoresponders that come free with your web
hosting account to paying a monthly fee for an autoresponder
service is tracking capability.

The autoresponders that come with your web host don’t have
built-in tracking capabilities. Tracking customer response
with a paid autoresponder service can lead to more effective
advertising campaigns.

Is anyone reading your newsletter? How many visits are
you getting to your websites from your newsletter and
autoresponders? Without the tracking capabilities of an
autoresponder service, you’ll never know.

However, with paid autoresponder services, you receive
these essential tracking capabilities. You can track all
the clicks made from your newsletters and autoresponders.

Sometimes, you can even run split tests to see which ads
or offers appeal to your subscribers. For example, one half
of your list could receive an offer at one price and the
other half could receive a different price offer. You can
measure the response as an aid in determining your product’s
price. You could run other split tests in order to make other
marketing decisions.

So, by paying a modest monthly fee, you can have unlimited,
autoresponders working hard at tracking responses for you.
Yes, a paid autoresponder service can help increase profits
by helping you determine the effectiveness of your
communications.

RESOURCE BOX:

J. Stephen Pope, President of Pope Consulting Inc.,
has been helping clients to earn maximum business profits
for over twenty-five years.

For profitable Work at Home Small Business Ideas, visit
http://www.yenommarketinginc.com/

To see how autoresponder services can improve your profits,
visit http://www.yenommarketinginc.com/autoresponders.html

Every small to mid-sized business owner would love to know how to effectively keep a pulse on their marketing and customer service efforts. The common barrier that all companies run into is how to cost effectively measure and control this process.

How will you keep track of the marketing and sales efforts of every department so you don’t create redundant work for everyone? From the inception of a marketing campaign to the lead; from the lead to the opportunity; from the opportunity to support issues, how are you monitoring this process universally at your company today?

Think of it: you could pin down how many times you talked to a potential customer; how many times you shook their hand; how many deals you’ve won or lost. After all, if you cannot measure your marketing campaigns and support issues, you will not be able to effectively improve or control your business processes, making it difficult to drive your business to the next level.

The answer to this business process challenge for most companies has been to use CRM software (Customer Relationship Management). Using a CRM enables you to manage relationships with the people you meet and service.

But before you run off to look into the CRM solution for your company, you must consider the five following most common pitfalls associated with this methodology in order to plan accordingly so you can effectively build the relationships that drive sales.

Culture Change:
Upper management must believe in why this initiative is taking place. They must express to the rest of the company how important the process is so that everyone in the company takes an active role in making the CRM solution a success

Buy-In:
In order to understand how the system will function, it’s critical to put together a company “task force”. This group should consist of the employee’s that will be using the CRM on a daily basis in order to put together a list of requirements. Make them feel apart of the process so they will welcome the change once the CRM is put into place and be excited to use it.

Training:
Proper training on effectively using the CRM is crucial to your success.

Consistency:
Honoring and respecting the CRM is key. The more information you put into the CRM, the better your reporting will be.

Accountability
Enforce policy by making the users accountable for quantitative results they produce. Let them know that performance will be measured by the informational reports that come out of the CRM, such as whether people are hitting quotas, setting realistic projections, or addressing customer support issues in a timely manner.

Achieve break through performance to the common barriers of cross-communication in your organization. Cost effectively measure and control the most important asset every business owner must understand: your customers. After all, if you are not effectively measuring weak areas, you will not have the critical information you need to improve and control.

Anthony Licate is the President of Spidernet Technical Consulting, LLC (http://www.spidernetconsulting.com), a computer consulting firm located outside Philadelphia, PA. If you have further questions regarding whether a CRM is right for your company, feel free to email him at: aj@spidernetconsulting.com or call: 215.508.1036.

Marketing your small business is easy. Really. It can be frustrating when it seems like your efforts aren’t paying off. By following these three strategies, you’ll be on your way to marketing success.

1. Know your niche. Choosing a target market will help you focus your marketing efforts. If you aren’t sure who to market to, how will you effectively choose advertising outlets and marketing activities?

Knowing your niche will also help you create products and services your potential customers are interested in. Hang out where they hang out and ask them what they need. Create products and services to meet those needs - voila! Sales will follow.

2. Start an e-zine. And if you already have one, actively promote it.

If you build a mailing list, you will have a group of people who have told you they are interested in your products, and, you can consistently market to them over and over again. The key is to actively promote your list, and get as many subscribers as possible. A great way to entice people to sign up for your list is to give them something in return. For example, you could give away an e-book, a report or an e-course.

You may be worried that you can’t write well, or that writing isn’t exactly your favorite thing to do. No worries. If you’re not a writer, there are article banks where you can pick up great content that your niche will love. Do an Internet search on “article bank” and you’ll find hundreds of sites that provide great content.

3. Be consistent. You need to be in front of people on a consistent basis so that they will get to know you, and they will remember you when the need for your products or services arises.

If you decide to do an e-zine, publish it consistently. If you decide to write articles, do it on a regular schedule. Whatever efforts work for you, do them regularly.

A good rule of thumb is to spend about 1 to 2 hours per day on your marketing activities. This will ensure that your name is consistently pushed out into the market.

4. Choose marketing activities that you love. For example, if you love networking, make that a part of your marketing activities.

If you choose marketing activities that you love, you will be continually motivated to carry them out. You do not have to engage in activities that aren’t authentic to you. There are plenty of activities to choose from.

Create a marketing plan using the tips above and act on it consistently. Remember, people will purchase products and services from those they know, like and trust. Allow people to get to know you by engaging them on a regular basis. Before you know it, your efforts will be paying off, and you’ll have a powerful business.

Copyright 2006 Jennifer Givler

Jenn Givler is a Business Empowerment Coach who teaches entrepreneurs how to create a Powerful Business. Get her free e-book Be Empowered! http://www.jgivlercoaching.com/newsletter.htm

Online customer service is still one of the most frequently overlooked aspects of running a successful online business. Yet, in the highly competitive world of Internet business, it could be (and should be) the one thing that sets you apart from your competition!

Most Internet businesses that have a drive to succeed focus all of their time and resources on building a great site, and then trying to drive tons of traffic to that site. Honestly, these are two incredibly important factors for success. After all, a site won’t be successful without tons of new potential customers hitting it, and you want that site to convey a professional image of your business by its appearance and ease-of-use. However, you must keep in mind that you are operating in a highly-competitive environment. You probably already know that there are tens, if not hundreds, of other businesses that offer the same basic goods and/or services that you do! They are battling you for the same exact keywords, and constantly enhancing their site to make their visitors’ experience better than yours.

So, how are you going to differentiate yourself from your competition? What is going to set you apart? What is going to help you get, and keep, more customers? The answer lies in the online customer service that you provide! Before I get into how to provide excellent online customer service, let me explain why providing online customer service is so important.

On the Internet, customer loyalty is incredibly difficult to obtain unless your site is associated with a popular retail store (e.g. Walmart.com, BestBuy.com), or has developed a successful reputation and goodwill over a long period of time (e.g. Amazon.com). The fact is, Internet customers are much more likely to shop around from site-to-site because it is so EASY. In the brick-and-mortar world, shopping around for an item means getting in the car and driving from store to store, not to mention, parking at each location, and then going in to find the item. That sounds like an entire afternoon project, just to purchase one item! That is why most people don’t do that, especially for a low cost item. They develop loyalty to one store for a variety of reasons that matter to them, and they buy the item almost exclusively from that store. Think about your personal life. Don’t you usually buy groceries from the same store week after week because it is easier than going somewhere else and having to learn where all your favorite items are located?

The Internet works very different. I can wake up in the morning, and before I finish breakfast I can browse the top ten sites listed on Google for the item I’m looking for. Its so easy to shop around! I don’t know anything about any of those sites so how do I decide which to buy from? Sure, I’m looking for the best price, and I also want a site that looks credible so I don’t perceive that I may get ripped off. That may narrow my list from ten to five sites. They all offer my item at about the same price, they all have professional looking sites with easy-to-use shopping carts, and I found them all in the top ten search results on Google! By common Internet business logic they’re all doing it RIGHT! But, only one will get my business today. And who’s to say that even if I have the best experience possible with the one I choose, that I’d ever buy from them again. Remember, it’s so easy to shop around, and there are still several other good-looking companies that offer similar items.

The difference is in the customer service. That is the one way that a website can set itself apart in this competitive world. It can take the best website, full of stylish graphics and rich content, and make it more than an image on a computer monitor. It can give it a personal touch. Its that personal touch that will differentiate yourself from your competition. Potential customers will want to buy from you, and customers will want to keep coming back. They know you… and you know them. Your business has become more than just an image on a screen to them.

So, how do you provide great online customer service?

Traditional wisdom says to include your telephone number and email address on your site in highly visible locations. Unfortunately, doing just that doesn’t go far enough, and probably will only offer minimal benefits. To call you, a dial-up user may actually have to log off your site just to get in touch with you, and you’re trying to keep them on your site! Even with a high-speed connection, a phone call may not be the most convenient thing to do, especially if you don’t have a toll-free number. And if you do, phone calls are costing you a lot of money! With email, your customers can contact you, but how long will they have to wait for a response–an hour, several hours, a day, a week? You may have a great policy about quick follow-up, but do your customers know that? They just sent you an email and they don’t know when they’ll hear back… if ever. Plus, posting your email on your site opens you up to getting tons of spam.

So, what’s better than telephone and email? Here are three tools that can increase your sales, build your customer loyalty and retention, and save you money.

1. LIVE CHAT: Putting a live chat system on your website will have incredible benefits. Picture a potential customer browsing your site and having a question about placing an order. Again, we’ve discussed that phone and email aren’t the best solution for this scenario. Now, picture having a large, noticable live chat button right there on your site. The visitor clicks it, enters their name and question, and they are IMMEDIATELY connected to you or one of your employees. Now, you know who they are, and they know who you are–you’re beginning to develop that personal relationship we talked about. You can help them with their order, answer any questions they might have, or upsell them to a different product. All this, and they never left your website. Next time they need something, there’s a good chance they’ll want to come back to your site and talk to you again.

2. KNOWLEDGE DATABASE: A knowledge database is a collection of self-help articles that a customer can search through to find answers to their questions. Let’s face it, as easy as you make your website to navigate and use, you’ll still have people that have questions, problems, or concerns. With a knowledge database, the customers can quickly and easily browse for answers to their questions, and get help quickly and effectively. Its like FAQs, only turned up a notch.

3. TICKET SYSTEM: Using a ticket system is the best way to support current customers, and to answer questions from potential customers. A customer or potential customer creates a ticket and submits it to your company. Your company receives the ticket and can route it to the appropriate person or department for follow-up. It is quick and easy, and the customer gets an answer from the most qualified source at your company for the problem they had. Tickets also allow you to track your customers to get to know them better, and track your issues to find out what you could be doing better. Tickets are far more organized, secure, and useful than email–both for the company and the customer.

Search engine optimization and site design are important. But you’re operating in a highly competitive environment, and you need something more to set your business apart. Something to make your website more than just a simple collection of graphics and content on a screen. You need a personal relationship with people viewing your site. The kind of relationship that will create new sales, and encourage repeat purchases. This can be acheived through effective online customer service.

Please feel free to reprint this article so long as you include the resource box listed with the article.

Dan Cavanaugh is the Senior Marketing Director for CSLive, a fully integrated and affordable online customer service system, featuring live customer chat, a ticket system, knowledge database, live web meetings, internal messaging, and much more. To find out how easy and affordable it can be to provide great customer service on your website, click here: http://www.CSLive.com

Conference calling can save you money. There is no doubt that in
the sales business, every second counts. Whether it be training,
sales meetings, or other needs, pulling your employees away from
the sales opportunities even for these important tasks, cuts down
on the time they can be making you money. If you take the first
step and try using conference calling, you may just find yourself
saving money and making money. Let’s point out some of the
features and benefits of using conference calling here:

Consider the costs of training individuals. You need to fly
them to your location. You need to invest the money in teachers,
a place to teach them, and the products used. Then, you still
need to pay for their lodgings and maybe even their food. This
is costly. Even if it is a simple one day training, you still
have invested quite a bit of money. Now, what if you could get
all of the training in that you need through a conference call?
You still provide the training experience to your potential new
sales team, but allow them to remain at their current location.
With conference calling, you save money by not having to move
people around while still delivering a one on one training
experience.

Secondly, you keep your employees were they need to be- on the
sales floor. You don’t have to invest in much time away from the
business at all. You do the training through the conference call
and they are right back to work after the call. Not much time is
wasted then, and profits can immediately improve.

You can hold many people on the call at the same time. There
is the potential for many people to get on it and therefore, you
can address a large group of people or only a few.

Consider using conference calling for your sales meetings as
well. Again, you provide the information that is needed to reach
your sales team while keeping them on the floor, working those
sales. It just makes sense to use conference calling to save
yourself travel time and money as well. Plus, you can have
associates across the state, country, or even the world plug in
to the call. All of their input can be provided, then to all
other associates.

As you can see, there are many reasons to use conference calling
in the world of sales. Let us face the facts that time is money.
You save both when you incorporate this system into your
training, sales meetings, and staff meetings. Your employees can
take what they have learned and apply it only minutes later when
they get back to work. This effective means of communication is
also quite affordably priced. When you factor in the amount of
money you are saving from travel expenses, it gets even better!
Conference calling is a simple system that can potentially save
you quite a bit of money! See how it can benefit you, right now!

Tom Parker has put together a website to help people who want to
have a conference call and made it affordable for everyone!
http://www.affordableconferencing.com is your place for
reliable, affordable, reservationless teleconference lines for
easy hosting. Go and check out the rates and get your
conference started today! http://www.affordableconferencing.com