10 Social Media Laws

If you have a small business or are thinking about opening up one, it is vital for you to know how social media works. Nowadays social media is part of our life and one of the best ways to advertise your business. Knowing the following laws of social media, will help your business elevate its audience and take its customer base to a higher level.

1. The Law of Listening

2. The Law of Focus

3. The Law of Quality

4. The Law of Patience

5. The Law of Influence

6. The Law of Value

7. The Law of Compounding

8. The Law of Acknowledgment

9. The Law of Accessibility

10. The Law of Reciprocity

To learn more about these 10 laws, visit the following site http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/218160

Minority Outreach Program extends services of South Carolina Small Business Development Centers

SC Small Business Development Centers is home to a new and much needed program created to assist minorities in starting or growing small companies. Leading this new initiative is Minority Outreach Manager Garry James.

"We can help walk you through the development of your business plan which will assist in determining whether your idea is feasible or not. We can also assist in exploring ways to expand existing businesses and help determine markets for your products that you may not realize exist. One amazing area where we help is in government contracting. This is called procurement. We have procurement specialists with a wealth of knowledge and experience who help small companies secure state and federal contracts." - Garry James
 
For more information on this, please visit  - http://midlandsbiz.com/articles/9349/

Calling all small business owners in York County:

With the holiday season around the corner, take advantage of this opportunity to promote your business and attract more customers. On November 17, the York County Regional Chamber of Commerce will kick off its "buy local" campaign to promote locally owned businesses in York County. To find out more about this event, click on the link below.

http://www.yorkcountychamber.com/cwt/External/WCPages/WCEvents/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1345

If we all Shop Small, it will be Huge!

This Saturday November 26th, will be the 2nd annual Small Business Saturday! This is a day dedicated to supporting small businesses on one of the busiest shopping weekends of the year. So make the most of the day. From Twitter posts to posters, the link bellow has all sorts of tools to help your business get new customers and have a great Small Business Saturday!!

Small Business Saturday.com

BIG NEWS About the SBA 504 Refinance Program!

This could be a huge benefit for small business owners who need to consolidate debt or refinance a loan in order to increase working capital.

The funding was approved last year, but it has taken a while to develop the program and set requirements to qualify.  The criteria for qualifying for these loans for existing businesses has just been finalized. This video will give you the whole scoop!  Click here for the 504 Refinance Program Video

ELIGIBILITY REQUIREMENTS (updated by 504LoanExperts as of October 12,2011):

Refinance proceeds to be used for:

1.Owner-occupied commercial real estate.
2.Machinery and equipment.
3.Itemized Business Expenses (such as salaries, rent, utilities, inventory, paying-down payables and other obligations of the business).
4.Closing costs associated with the project.

Loan being refinanced must have been current for the past year with no past dues more than 30 days (loan deferments and/or modifications are now eligible for refinancing as long as borrowers have not been past due on these newly modified terms).

Debt must be two (2) years or older prior to the date the application is received by the SBA.
Small business concern must have been in business for two years prior to the submission of the application.
In addition to a cash contribution, the borrower’s 10% contribution may be satisfied by its equity in the Eligible Fixed Asset(s) serving as collateral for the Refinancing Project or by the equity in any other fixed assets that are acceptable to SBA as collateral. (An independent appraisal of the fair market value of the project assets and any additional assets offered as additional collateral must be provided, dated within 6 months of application submission — we will engage the appraiser).

No refinancing of loans with an existing federal guaranty (includes 7(a), 504 and USDA loans).

Once the SBA has satisfied the immediate demand, it will open the program to the other small business that have balloon notes and ultimately to small businesses that would realize a substantial cash flow benefit as a result of this program.

Marketing tip of the day

Tired of doing marketing research online? Well here is another option – leave the computer and hit the stores! Once you are there, don’t focus on you but focus on the customers. Look at what customers are buying, what are stores offering that’s attracting customers? What ideas can you get from them? What are stores offering as promotions and discounts? With this data you will learn a lot.

Having behavioral data is the best way of improving your knowledge of what people want and a great way to learn more about your target.

By doing this you will see some interesting customer behavior that you wouldn’t be able to find online, so if you’re tired of doing online marketing research... leave the computer and hit the stores. This way you will learn new things about your customers you would never find online!

It’s more than just the sale.....

Usually business owners or marketers feel like their job is to get prospective clients to fall for our marketing and purchase our product. The reality of marketing goes way beyond this.

Good marketers know that they need to manage the entire customer experience and not just a sale. By doing so, not only will you attract clients to purchase your goods and services, but you will keep them, communicate to them and leverage them to be loyal clients in the future. 

As a business owner or marketer, you should always focus on creating happy clients. That’s what it’s all about!  Don’t just focus on the front end but also on the after sale.  Focus on building long lasting relationships with your existing clients and you will see how they do the marketing for you. They will become some of your greatest marketing assets.  

How are you communicating to your clients? Are you just trying to sell them more? Focus on the complete messaging before, during and after the purchase. If you fail to do so, you will see that attracting and retaining clients will become more and more difficult with time.  

By focusing your marketing communication throughout their patronage with your company, you will maintain your current client base as well as setting your company up for word-of-mouth referrals and future growth.