Is Your Trade Show Booth A Boom Or A Bust?

Everyone's been to a trade show and seen "that booth." The one sitting all by itself in the corner with a couple of bored-looking people behind the counter; the booth that looks like it was inspired by Lucy Van Pelt's psychiatry kiosk in Peanuts; or the exhibit so overflowing with goods that customers can't effectively walk from here to there. A bad trade show booth stands out in the crowd, but it doesn't pull in business! Here are six signs that can warn you your new booth is about to go bust!

1) Foot Traffic

Trade shows and expos are all about foot traffic. When you get the kind of foot traffic corresponding to your target customer base or people who come in with intelligent, reasonable questions, you can feel pretty confident that your booth is doing exactly what you designed it to do. On the other hand, if your foot traffic consists mostly of people wandering through seeking directions to the food court, restrooms, or worst of all, another booth, something is probably badly out of whack with your exhibit. Of course, it's also possible that you might be set up in the wrong trade show for what you're trying to accomplish.

2) Signage

Good signage is as easy to pick out as poor trade exhibit signage. Good signage features clear, concise messages in colors that don't conflict or "clash" with one another and is readily visible from a reasonable distance away. If your signage goes in for a lot of neon or opposing colors such as red and blue, has the entire Encyclopedia Britannica written on it, or is hard to see two booths away, something's off. People avoid booths with bad signage whether consciously or not. Make sure your sign is sending all the right messages!

3) Space

If all you're distributing is flyers and leaflets, you won't need a very elaborate setup for your trade show booth. A simple "lemonade stand" booth should be more than adequate. Showcasing your main products, especially if they're large or bulky, calls for a different approach. Using the available space to your best advantage is just as important as any other aspect of your trade show exhibit. Because it's the first thing prospective customers notice, wise use of your space can help generate foot traffic and sales or contracts for you!

4) Decoration

Your decor should be appropriate to what you're selling. While this shouldn't come as any surprise to anyone with a basic grasp of aesthetics, there's always someone who insists on setting a big-block 454 engine on white plush carpet or showcasing cosmetics and other beauty products against a backdrop of Astroturf. The visual indigestion this can cause subconsciously steers people away from your booth because the contrasts are too extreme. This doesn't mean your space shouldn't be inviting, but the decoration you choose should enhance and highlight your product, not create a lot of visual white noise that distracts from it.

5) Customer Base

Knowing and understanding who your customers are and their common patterns and behaviors makes a big difference in choosing every aspect of your trade show booth. People in outdoor or labor-intensive fields such as construction are more likely to feel at home in an environment that mimics their usual working conditions while blending them with a "softened," more comfortable spatial dynamic. Similarly, people who work indoors such as attorneys, writers, and office personnel will be more comfortable in homely but businesslike surroundings. Knowing how your customers think and act is a key part of making a great trade show booth.

6) Demographics

This is considered differently from customer base, because as much as we'd all like to pretend it's not so, age and other socioethnic factors do play a role in who buys what. If your target customer is a middle-aged Caucasian male, odds are you'll set up your merchandise, information, and other aspects of your both a little differently than you might for a young African-American woman. Study your client demographics carefully, and then implement your design accordingly.

7 Secrets to Marketing Your Law Firm

1. Have a Marketing Plan Target

When doing your advertising ask yourself this question.

    How much revenue has any advertisement generated for me?

If you unable to answer this question, Massive action should be taken as you are throwing money away.

As long as you stick to this marketing process you will see great results in your advertising

2. You must focus and plan

    You must know your daily target.
    You also must be very focused
    You also must be very specific.

What do want to achieve?

    Everyone wants to attract more clients, more clients can be only two people, would that help you achieve your goals for the year?
    Focus on what you think the client would need and offer solutions. Your focus should not be solely on what your firm does but the solutions it offers to its clients.
    Whenever you place an advert online or offline, your firm's name should not be at the top of the advert. The solution to your clients' problem should be at the top so that you can easily win them.

In this case the customer can contact you directly.

3. Grab Your Customer using A.I.D.A

    Grab the Attention (A),
    Demonstrate some Interest (I)
    There must a Desire (D)
    The client must Act (A)

Here are some examples:

A- Attention

E.g. "Discover How Not To Be Harassed by Your Landlord"!

I - Interest

At this stage the client must find this message interesting.

"You do not deserve to be harassed by an aggressive landlord."

D - Desire

This is where you can say

"We have a 10 page booklet for you on how to avoid such harassment. This booklet contains information that we have advised over 1000 people in the last 5years."

A - Action

You write something which will push them to take action

"Get your Free guide Now by... "

You then capture their name, email, telephone number and so on.

4. Measure Your Marketing

Measuring your marketing leads to increased profits. When you advertise and you forget about it without measuring them you are throwing money away. It could be that advert is not generating any profits.

Take care of your existing clients. It is always better to keep an existing client than try to get a new one. Build better relationships with your existing clients by following up or you would lose them.

5. Have marketing messages at the window of your premises.

As people walk by your office they must see what you are offering. They will stop by and enter or make the phone call, in this case using a free phone number will be appropriate. When you adopt this strategy you are bound to receive more profits by the end of the year.

When they come into the office there is no need to display magazines unrelated to their situation. Posters should be displayed inside for them to have a read whiles they are waiting.

6. Take advantage of the Internet.

According to the law gazette one in five people are looking for solicitors online. This is where you definitely need to have a website which is catching. People only have 3 seconds to take action online. So your website should be easy to navigate.

7. Ask for Help

If you do not know how to apply all these techniques request help from those who can as this can save you a lot of time and effort. It is imperative that you seek outside help and you must do it very FAST.

MY RECOMMENDATIONS

    Invest some time into your marketing every week. This should not be ignored.
    If you are not on the internet get online. Do not put all your eggs in one basket by only using offline marketing. Put some measurements in place and consistently take action.

How to Use a Free Home Listing to Sell or Rent Your Home

Selling your home can be an expensive venture, whether you attempt to sell it on your own or hire a realtor to help you. However, if you make use of a free home listing website, you will increase your odds of selling your home for less out of your own pocket. You will be able to gain the same exposure other homes listed on pay sites have without the fees associated with sites that require you to pay to list your home. This can be a great advantage, especially if your home takes a long time to sell.

In some areas of the country, the housing market is still quite slow. This can mean your home will be on the market for far longer than you would like. However, if you don't put your home out there, you will never know if someone is interested. You can't sell a home that isn't even listed for sale. This can make you wary, though, when it comes to paying to list it.

When you use a site for free home listing, you will be able to let the general public and potential buyers know your home is on the market. You will be able to provide all the details that will let them know what your home is like and whether it might be a good fit for them. As long as you are honest about the condition of the home you list, you can expect to gain leads from this posting. If you have any features that are particularly appealing, be sure to mention them.

These listings aren't just limited to selling a home either. If you have a rental property, you will be able to offer it up for rent on these sites as well. This can be a useful asset. When you are a landlord, you don't want to have to spend a lot of money advertising your location. Using free listings can be a great way to let people know your home is available for rent without spending money.

As you attempt to sell your home or even rent it out, you will need to advertise to let people know it is available. With the help of a free home listing, you can let everyone know just what you have to offer without spending a lot of money on ads. Any way you can get exposure will increase the chances of selling or renting out your home more quickly.

Mistakes to Avoid In Business Card Printing

In the wake of modern times when competition among businesses is getting stiff day after day, the need for entrepreneurs to have attractive and appealing business cards in order to attract more clients comes in handy. Nevertheless, not many entrepreneurs are aware of the things they ought to avoid while making outstanding cards which will appeal to clients. It is worth noting that a well designed card will inspire a client to take interest in knowing more of an entrepreneur and the kind of good and services they offer. However, this has remained a piped dream to many entrepreneurs, thanks to the fact that they keep on making some common mistakes while printing their cards. Among these common mistakes that many people make when it get to business card printing includes.

Forgetting to indicate their physical address in their cards
This is something many entrepreneurs forget to do while printing their cards. They fail to come into terms with the fact that, omitting physical address is a send of to clients for it indicates that the entrepreneur is running an enterprise that is not reputable. To avoid making this mistake, one should ensure that they indicate their physical address in their card before giving it to a prospective client.

Leaving the card with a blank back
This is yet the other common mistake made in business card printing. Many people are yet to understand that, the back of a card is its prime real estate. They are required to use this space to market themselves alongside offering every relevant detail regarding their enterprises. They should also use this valuable space to give information that will prompt a prospective client to learn more of their operations.

Minuscule print appearing on the card
This is probably the most common mistake that many business owners are used to making while printing their cards. Apparently, there are some cards that have very large graphics such that, they take nearly half of the card's space. Similarly, there are other cards that have tiny letters, such that one will have to strain their eyes in order to read the content. Regrettably, no one will be interested in such cards and they will end up in the trash. In this regard, one should ensure that letters used to write their card's content are of standard size.

Having avoided these common mistakes in business card printing, enterprise owners are bound to have appealing cards that will prompt prospective clients to be calling them more regularly.

Designing Custom Made Neon Signs For Your Business

Good clear signage is all important to a retail business. Customers need to be able to find you easily, potential customers need to be attracted to your store rather than your competition's by a sign that stands out from the rest. It needs to be simple and striking, visible day or night and convey the nature of your business. A tall order perhaps, but one that can be delivered by a custom-made neon sign.

Neon signs have an attraction of their own that hasn't ever quite been overtaken by the advent of LED signage. The appeal of neon lies in its warm glow, its hint of nostalgia for better times and its wide range of colours. But despite its association with past decades, neon can also be thoroughly modern.

The flexible glass tubes used to create custom-made neon signs can be bent and shaped to form almost any shape and design you can dream up. The creation of neon-signs is an art form more than a science and the resulting signs can be individual and unique. Exactly what you are looking for when you seek to differentiate your business from the crowd on the high street.

Think about your whole business brand when you are designing a custom neon sign. Should it be simple - just the business name in your brand colours? Or graphic, showing your highly recognisable logo? Fun, with a cartoon representation of your main product offering in bright neon shades? There are so many options that it can be quite bewildering.

Take a step back from your shop front or business entrance before you finalize a design. Look at the signs on each side of you and further down the street. What are they saying, how are they presented. Make a note of the colours used and the formats. Are they using neon or LED signage? Illuminated signs or not? Your custom- neon sign is bound to be visible and stand out, but with just that much more thought you can make sure that it really does serve to attract passers-by to your store rather than the competition.

Lastly, seek out a designer that specialises in neon. It's no use getting a design produced by a graphic designer and expecting it to be translated exactly into neon. A custom neon designer will know how best to work with curves and colours to make a really effective sign that conveys your business brand and looks attractive.

Business Drops - The Ins and Out

The majority of leaflet distribution happens in a residential area with leaflets being put through each letterbox, however business drops are different, a lot different. Whilst it seems like a simple to do process, take some leaflets and go deliver them to each business in the local area. It seems simple right? Well no. The logistics are entirely different to residential door drops.

Firstly, when planning a route for a residential map you just simply looking at a map and plot where your going to go, you can even use Google Street view to see what types of houses you'll be delivering to. However when you are distributing to businesses, you can just decide where your going to go as there are different industrial estate, shops, high streets, office blocks and retail parks everywhere. You can just pick and chose where you go, as many of these locations are in completely different areas, therefore you then have to drive to the other area which increase the price of the distribution as well as being incredibly time consuming.

Secondly, business to business distribution can be very complicated. Some businesses might just want to target offices where as others want to target industrial parks. For example a sandwich delivery van business would want to target areas where there are a high level of employees, therefore a couple offices wouldn't be any good for their leaflets to be delivered to. Other companies may want to target home run businesses like for example a company offering serviced offices at a cheap price, they would want to try and entice home run businesses into renting one of their offices therefore they would need to try and get their leaflets through the right doors, however it is very hard to try and find home runs businesses.

Another hurdle in business to business distribution is how you actually give the leaflets to each business. Office blocks wouldn't have post boxes so you would have to climb the stairs going from office to office delivering your leaflets. This would be massively time consuming and tiring. as this you would also have to hand each leaflet to a receptionist hoping that they give it to the person in charge and do not throw it away straight away, its a good idea to be prepared to talk about your business and what your offer as its more than likely that you will get asked.

Video And Email - A Perfect Marriage

Media Marketing you may say began with the "written word" in newspapers. Then came the "spoken word", Radio. Movie Film, the "visual world", was soon discovered and the radio "spoken word" fell in love! They married and the blessed event gave us the "Television". We all know how important the media of TV has become in marketing products.

Now the "written word" is still with us in newspapers, magazines, and more currently Emails. Young Video (an offspring of Movie Film, the"visual world") ran away and married Email and what a surprise to media marketing. They got along like gang busters! Their statistics have hit record highs. All kidding aside, these are the facts.

Research Statistics show that:

    Video Emails inspire a response within 48 hours 80% of the time (Jupiter Research)
    Video Email marketing offers a return of 280% higher than traditional email. (Gartner Research)

Business Owners, Network Marketers and anyone in Direct Sales must consider the most familiar and cost-effective media in which to advertise their product or service. People of all ages are familiar with email. It has been found that 1.9 million people use email (Email Marketing Reports 2009).

Radio, TV, and newspapers, are still viable marketing tools but the cost verses the results are outweighed by the inexpensive mass mailing results of email. Add Video to email and your profits can only increase.

People respond and trust sellers who show a video of themselves or their businesses. Even inexpensive self-made videos have an audience as proven by YouTube. Don't be afraid to jump in and use Video email when emailing your customers. Businesses and Network Marketers show their professionalism when they treat their customers to regular intervals of Video Emails. People are more likely to view your video than read your text message so if you want your message seen or heard, Video Email is the best way to market your business, service, or product.

There are several good companies online that have Video email. There are also companies that offer more than Video email. Internet and Network marketers may be interested that there are companies who also pay referral compensation. You could use their Video products to market your businesses and make money at the same time.

There are several uses for Video Email that would serve your business and create a closer relationship with your customers. Sending your customers Video appointment reminders, Video product information, Video Thank You's, Video Survey's, Video Announcements, and Video Updates just to mention a few examples, these video emails will keep your customers informed and your customers will feel part of your business family.

Using Video Email regularly, you will find a greater response to your emails that will also result in higher profits. Higher profit margins are great, but the best benefit of having Video Email is the customer service you are providing your customer. Your clients or customers will appreciate the communication and attention you give. Your customers will be more likely to refer your business to anyone looking for your service. Businesses everywhere recognize the value of referrals!

The economy is not going to get better anytime soon. Big businesses are not willing to takes risks by hiring employees when President Obama is against big business.

So, people looking for work have turned to internet marketing opportunities online. The global business I am working with gives anyone the best advantage to gain a full-time income with part-time effort. It has been a life changer for me.