Sorry for the late delay, in our latest blog post we touched upon the importance of using a blog to brand yourself online.

I found this interesting quote from Steve Campbell of the Social Branding Blog (someone worth listening to!)

“My blog is my main hub. It’s the site that all of my social profiles link to and it is where I do the majority of my personal branding. Blogs are great because if you update them frequently they do really well in search engines and you can show off your expertise in your field of interest. I think everyone should have a blog, especially if you are developing your brand and trying to stand out from the crowd.”

So I thought I would think of some easy bullet points on why a blog must be your MAIN online branding hub:

- Centralized brand-building target for visitors from your social media profiles

- Grow your brand by more easily attracting visitors from search engines

- Show off your expertise

- Stand out from the crowd, only limited by your imagination and the blog software

- Develop your own voice, even if inspired by others, without the baggage of others

- You’re more likely to bond with bloggers if you are one too

-Blogs are open and don’t require membership to impress, unlike forums, clubs and professional associations, However,  blogging in a closed community is a great way to endear yourself to that community

- If you buy your own domain name and host your own blog, you own it completely and can reuse the content any way you –    like without having to worry about what some company thinks

- Similarly, your blog exists as long as you choose i.e. you’re not depending on others – blog network or social network –  who may disappear at any moment and take your blog with them

So then, with these in mind what are you waiting for? Get blogging!

If you are interested in getting your own personal blog, get in contact and we can help you out with a custom design only for you!

Email: liam@atkinsbiz.com

Firstly, some may not know but, what is a blog? A blog is a website that allows users to reflect, share opinions, and discuss various topics in the form of an online journal while readers may comment on posts.

Great, so what is personal branding? Personal Branding can be a powerful tool for success. If you are marketing yourself or your professional services, a strong personal brand will draw people and opportunities to you like a magnet.

Personal Branding is about honing your skills, narrowing your focus, and getting clear on what you’re passionate about.

Branding is not just about you being better than your competition. It’s about getting your prospects to choose you as the ONLY solution to their problem.

Having your own personal blog, with your name as a domain name for example www.liamatkins.co.uk, is a great way to build on your brand. It allows the world to know your thoughts and puts you head and shoulders above the rest in your field.

We can design a a personal blog for you, for less than you may think. Giving you complete freedom over your website with our open source software which dramatically reduces the costs.

Our packages include a domain name, web hosting for the blog and 3 email addresses with webmail login, similar to Gmail and MSN for yourname@domain.co.uk. This package is now available for only, get this, £450!

No monthly fees, just a straight fee of £450,
…and then £40/yr for hosting after the first year.

If you’re interested in getting your own branded blog, send me an email on: liam@atkinsbiz.comor call: 01424 755 574.

A content management system – or CMS  – is a web tool that enables you to update or make any required changes to your website, without any help, special software or hourly design/update fees from your web designers.

The CMS is a a very cost effective tool that makes reviewing and updating your website not only easy but also very convenient — it saves you a lot of time!

A CMS is needed for a modern website

In this modern age of information and technology, the internet serves as an ideal platform for promoting any business.  Many business people and companies invest a significant amount in designing their office sites online. This task very often calls for hiring the professional services of a trained and qualified web designer – like The Atkins Biz Network.

As your business grows and develops, you will feel the need to add more useful information and new products and services, and thus will have to make the necessary changes on your website. Not only will this turn out to be time-consuming, but over a period of time will also prove to be an expensive affair.  This is where the CMS comes into the picture.

Advantages of a CMS

Once you integrate a CMS into your website, you can benefit from it in numerous ways. First, you can add and delete information on your own, when required. This also eliminates the need to wait for a professional web designer to make the changes and thus saves a lot of your valuable time. This consequently, also is an economical and flexible solution to the high fees of the web designer.  Secondly, having a CMS allows you to run your online business with minimal staff, since most CMS’ on the market are very user-friendly.

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We can provide you with a very cost effective CMS system, based upon the blogging platform WordPress. Not only does it provide you with a great customisable website, it also provides an environment for your own business blog. – Something which we recommend to all clients as a way to increase popularity and interest to your website and services.

Please drop us an email should you have an interest in our CMS systems:liam@atkinsbiz.com

Liam.

Word of mouth advertising….

“An unpaid form of promotion in which satisfied customers tell other people how much they like a business, product or service ”

Companies value word of mouth advertising for several reasons, especially in smaller towns. First of all, if you tell someone how much you like a business, that word of mouth endorsement doesn’t cost the business any money. Magazine, television, radio and Internet ads can be expensive, but word of mouth advertising is usually free. The less money the business has to spend on advertising, the more profit they can make.
Word of mouth advertising is also valuable because it tends to produce good results. People are sometimes skeptical of standard advertising. Maybe the ad doesn’t appeal to them personally, or they feel like the company is trying to trick them into buying a product that they don’t want. A word of mouth testimonial from a friend can be trusted, and it’s more likely to produce results.

Even more valuable are the word of mouth endorsements given by people who are presumed to be experts. Companies often offer free products or services to experts in an effort to gain free word of mouth advertising. Reviewers are sent products, or given early tickets to a movie for example, and the word of mouth advertising that is generated when they write a review more than pays for the expense to the company.

It is often said in business that any publicity is good publicity. That is because publicity is essentially word of mouth advertising. If someone hears something about a business, even if it’s something bad, they will remember the name. They will likely be curious about the business because of the news. This is word of mouth advertising at work. Any time someone hears about a company and what they sell from a friend or from a news story, word of mouth advertising is helping the company become more familiar to people.
Companies sometimes encourage word of mouth advertising from their current customers. They may offer referral bonuses to current customers who bring in new clients. They may hold contests that get people talking about the prizes that can be won. They might have charity events, or other acts of public service. Anything that gets people talking about a company is free word of mouth advertising, and all successful companies know that free advertising can’t be beat!

But…you need something for them to talk about. That is where we can come in. We will help revamp your business, create a brand and help spread the word about how great you are! If you want some help with this, just email laurence@atkinsbiz.com.

“The concept of guerrilla marketing was invented as an unconventional system of promotions that relies on time, energy and imagination rather than a big marketing budget. Typically, guerrilla marketing campaigns are unexpected and unconventional; potentially interactive;[1] and consumers are targeted in unexpected places.[2] The objective of guerrilla marketing is to create a unique, engaging and thought-provoking concept to generate buzz, and consequently turn viral”. - Wiki

Guerrilla marketing ideas are the best in tougher times when you don’t always have the budget to stretch to local paper adverts, flyer distribution or radio slots etc. And combined with free social media marketing on platforms such as Facebook are often some of the most effective solutions. Particularly for the money you put in.
Guerrilla marketing examples will differ from product to product. They take a lot of thinking up, and a good creative side, but if you succeed the sky is the limit. So get your thinking hats on!

Do you need some help coming up with that killer idea? Get in touch and we will help out, and really get your business noticed.

Click here for some of the best geurrilla marketing ideas on the web!

You need to find a way to attract people’s attention to your business and its products, and help them make a conscious decision to purchase from you.

If you’re on a budget, that can be tough. It’s possible to spend a small fortune on marketing.

The alternative is to bootstrap it. This means marketing your new business on a very small budget. It’s about using creativity rather than cash to shout about what you’re doing.

Here are two in our series of 25 bi-weekly bootstrap marketing ideas:

1. Offer a discount card: These are the cheapest way to reward your existing customers for their loyalty, as you only give free product away to your very best customers. When they buy your product five or six times, they get the next one free. What a great way to say thank you. Copy big companies; Cafés have stamps and tokens when you buy coffee, to encourage you to drink there regularly. Remember to ensure your tokens aren’t easily forged, and that your loyalty card stamp is locked away every day!
2. Launch a competition: It’s cheap for you to give your services or products away, so do it regularly. Plug the competition on your website. Or better still, contact the relevant media that talks to your potential customer base and ask if they’d be interested in a giveaway. Also contact as many local papers/ magazines as possible, with the press release of the competion start, as well as the winner!

Nobody likes cold calling. So why do it, why bother?

We do it because it gets results simple.

Step 1: The Atkins Biz Network work with you to establish a target market to attack.

Step 2: We help you with scripts to get the best results.

Step 3: Our trainer can spend time with you or your sales staff training invoking reasons and creating confidence to make that call.

Step 3: If you are still struggling to make those calls allow us to do it for you.

In our experience luke-warm calls achieve better results than stone cold ones. To make a call warmer we can help you to write a mailshot to warm up the client base.

When we make a cold call we always expect to get something from the exchange whether that is an order, an enquiry, an appointment or even a confirmation that the client has no use for the product.

Step 4: This information can then be collated and used for future marketing campaigns and mailshots – the Atkins Biz would be happy to create a database to meet your needs.

A business with no sales wont be a business for long. Everyone knows that selling your product/service and a profit is what makes your business survive, grow and even prosper.
Correct Sales Objectives and Strategy to acheive these make a real difference.

Sales strategy
Step 1 – Define your Sales Objectives – what do you want to acheive. Look at what products/service have highest potential/highest profit etc…The Atkins Biz Network would help you ascertain these.

Step 2 – An objective may be to sell x product to y group. Your strategy plan describes how you are going to achieve these objectives.

Step 3 – When writing your plan you need to define; who is your market, what do they want what can you offer to fulfill their need at a profit.

If you are looking to write a sales plan or a fuller marketing plan speak to The Atkins Biz we are here to get you noticed

Welcome to the first marketing blog from the skilled small business enterprise marketers from The Atkins Biz Network. Remember to bookmark us to keep up-to-date with the latest hints and tips making sure your business will Be Noticed.

Add something new:

Constantly adding something new to your business always creates an opportunity to get more sales! Even things so simple as updating or adding new information on your website creates another selling opportunity when recurring visitors come. Always keeping it fresh and updated shows you are a dynamic and ever-growing business.

Make a difference!

Adding a new product, service, or merely information to the list of things you already offer often produces a big surge in sales. The added information increases your sales in 4 different ways:

1. It attracts new customers who were not interested in your current products and services
2. It generates repeat sales from existing customers who also want to have your new product
3. It enables you to get bigger sales by combining 2 or more items into special deals/packages
4. Lastly, merely the updated information will often increase your search engine ranking (remember that Google loves fresh and updated content), which therefore turns into sales!