Norreys BizWorks

By Bill Norris, Ph.D.

Throughout the human, animal and plant world communication is the do-or-die necessity. Plants communicate through pollen, birds make known their presence with bird calls, wolves with a howl, horses with a neigh, and humans with a voice. Equally critical, a business must get the word out about products and services. Modern civilizations do it by mass media – print, radio, TV, and Internet. That’s called “marketing.” But micro-businesses generally lack the capital to afford those costs. They must resort to guerrilla marketing, low cost but effective methods that produce results. Guerrilla marketing requires more of you, your time, energy, imagination and discipline! Effective guerrilla marketing can be done with simple “sweaty equity,” by getting out there and doing it yourself. Strategies often include:

• Business cards, brochures, fliers and handbills
• Email addresses for email promotions
• Incentives for customer referrals

Print is still an effective way to communicate, but to save money in the distribution cost; you will have to distribute the brochures or fliers personally in doorways, car windshields, and bulletin boards in coffee shops, grocery stores, and cafes. An effective, economical technique is emailing your satisfied customers and occasional visitors with special offers, seasonal deals, and special events. Begin building your own email list. Everybody who comes in your shop or who inquires about your services should be asked for their email address. The people who know your products and services are your best prospects. And for the same reason, incentivize your satisfied customers to make referrals for you is an effective way to increase sales. People influence their friends buying habits.

A major hurdle for the small business owner is maintaining the discipline to get the marketing done. Easy excuses… not feeling well, bad weather, do it tomorrow…undermines effective marketing plans. So, develop a strategy, fix a schedule, and stick to the agenda religiously. That is the way to deliver results.

By Dr. Bill Norris

As it is necessary to understand the direction and strength of the wind, before sailing, one must know the contrary winds in business. Charting the business strategy requires detail information about the competition. Too many entrepreneurs launch out with a dream, but never bring it down to the real world where men, women and children make the decisions “to buy or not to buy.” What are the qualities and flaws of the competitive products or services? Where and how are they sold? What are the prices and discounts? Who sells them?  The provider’s reputation, financial strength, history and sales staff provide important clues to the nature of competition a product faces. The best ways to research include:

• Search the Internet for information, critiques, or evaluations of your competitors;
• Purchase the product or service for your personal evaluation;
• Find out what potential consumers think about it;

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By Dr. Bill Norris

Before setting out into the great sea, it is wise to chart the waters. What’s the destination? Where are the currents? Where are the shoals? What’s the fastest route? How’s the weather? There are a lot of pitfalls at sea and just as many in launching a small business. The essential chart to success is a business plan.

In an ocean of blue sky and blue water the chart is essential with maps, radio, GPS, and compass. A new business requires its own plan. So many entrepreneurs set out enthusiastically on an idea, without thinking through the elements for success. Charting a business strategy requires knowledge of the:

• Corporate structure
• Purpose  of the entity
• Goals of the owners

Will the corporate structure be a C-corp, and S-corp, a partnership, a limited liability corporation, or a non profit entity? There are reasons why one or the other is best for you. The C-corp is the common stock corporation that has stockholders, pays taxes on profits and pays dividends on those profits to the stockholders. The S-corp is owned by individuals, not corporations, passing all profits or losses to the stockholders. The partnership limits the liability of the owners and pays them profits. The limited liability corporation can be owned my individuals and companies, passing through profits and losses without paying taxes at the corporate level. For those that want to depend on gifts, grants, some government contracts and donations, the nonprofit structure is the way to go. After incorporating as a nonprofit a 501c3 form must be filled out and returned to the Internal Revenue Service in order to qualify the company to reward donors with tax credits.

So, the structure of profit corporations is based on the purpose of the organization, who the owners are and the best advantages for them in avoiding liability and benefiting from profits or losses.

The products and services of new businesses are central to the success of those businesses. They must be:

• Appealing products and services
• Priced competitively for the customers
• Reliable, beneficial and fulfilling

Assets for any business are products and services that are in demand. The process of creating demand for a product or service is slower, more intensive and more expensive. The more appeal the product has the faster it will fly off the shelves. Understanding the competition is critical in positioning your product so it will move. And having a higher price on a product is not necessarily a hindrance to success. A better marketing strategy can make up for cheaper prices. The feature of reliability in a product or service, its benefits, and the fulfilling role it plays for the consumer, the better the competition