5-Step Guide to Success In the Digital Era

Technology makes the work of marketing department quite simple. They needn’t put extraordinary efforts to reach potential customers or to establish the brand. The majority of the work is done by a powerful tool, the social media. However, experts say that making the optimum use of new-age digital tools s a tricky business. Not everyone is proficient in it. How to take the maximum advantage of it? Here is a five-step guide.

Make a wise use of social media

Remember, there is no point in following the trend always. You have to be logical and rational. It is a common observation that people start online venture when they don’t have sufficient resources to handle the load. Don’t get carried away with the statistics about business ventures that made a fortune by leveraging social media. Yes, it is true but not fully. As a matter of the pact, most of the business ventures that rely heavily on social media close within a year or so.

Do not believe much in the search results

Sounds strange, uh? When everyone is going crazy about search results and visibility, you can choose a path of showcasing your product exclusively in the virtual world. Special brands know the secret, and they leverage it . When you restrict the access to your product, service or brand, it becomes precious.

Derive a marketing strategy that suits you

As per experts, it isn’t a wise thing to copy a digital marketing strategy from others. Each business is different and so is the marketing strategy. What proves excellent for others may not be effective in your case at all. Hence, set the goal before you start. Share the content about your product, service or brand on the social media.

Choose right marketing channels

Digital marketing is a vast niche with so many choices. You should choose channels that are most appropriate to you. Search engine, social media advertizing, mobile marketing, and paid marketing to name a few. You should be quite clear about the use of the right channel.

Monitor the strategy and tweak if necessary

Nothing is constant in the world, including the digital marketing strategy of your company. You should monitor the effectiveness of it and make necessary changes wherever needed. There is no point in spending huge money on a strategy that doesn’t perform well. Give some time to establish it. If you feel that it isn’t performing even after that, then revamp it.

4 Exit Strategies for Entrepreneurs

Building your business is the fun and easy part of the process. Selling it is the difficult and fraught ‘end game’.

The Chinese proverb, ‘start with the end in mind‘ is never more aptly applied than when you are looking to dispose of your business and the end game is discussed at length with personal stories from leading entrepreneurs in my book, Drive Like a Real Entrepreneur, the process is split in to 8 constituent parts, being: Deciding to sell, Finding the buyer, The negotiation, Reasons deals fail, Pitching the price and the deal, Due diligence, Looking at the deal in its totality, What next?

So 4 exit strategies may be:

1. Trade sale

This is effectively selling to an organisation, in the same field or industry that may be seen as a market leader and takes your business in as a division, because of its customer, geographical or supply chain. The sale should be trouble free as the buyer knows your ‘game’. They will be experienced and keen to make savings in overheads to extract more gross profit. Be aware that that process must mean they will be keen to pay a suitable price.

2. Management buy out

Possibly the most seamless transition for your customers and suppliers because the same people will go forward running your organisation, it is just that it will be without you. Make sure that you can extract yourself from the organisation and that you become one of the least important people. Your key staff will love you for this, but they may be less able to carry this off, than you think. Be aware that they may not have the entire funds, need some financial help and that the commitment to buy is a heavy load for them to bear. What did you bring to the party, perhaps sales and market knowledge so ensure that this is in place.

3. Sell to a competitor

Selling to a direct competitor is interesting not because of the actual concept but being in a position to approach them to say, ‘we are up for sale’. This is probably fraught with difficulties because trust and a rigid confidentiality agreement is required. Again improving purchasing power and overheads will be the end game and will provide a suitable return for the buyer. Factor this in to your negotiations.

4. Sell to a complimentary business

Selling to a complimentary business is interesting in itself. It may be that you have a customer base that can take on board this new company’s products which may be complimentary, an example would be of course, tax and accounting and then leading to financial services. Perhaps even in building materials that need plumbing and or electrical supplies.

Whatever happens next, take care ensuring the trustworthiness of the buyer, their intentions post sale and that there is something left in the deal for them. It is not just about you.

Good luck!

Marketing tips for startups that bootstrapped their way to success

When building your startup, you have two options; raise funds or bootstrap. The business plan way of raising money for your venture still has its place. However, intense competition among startups makes raising funds a long shot for most entrepreneurs.

For the most part, you will be better off bootstrapping your startup until you have some traction to raise the eyebrows of keen investors. Marketing can make or break your startup.

Establish Networks & Connect

Prepare a list of professionals to connect with them, dig-out your full resources to get a contact detail of professionals. The best source is internet where you will find bunch of professionals.  Join relevant groups on LinkedIn, YCombinator, and Reddit to connect with people that can help you. Conferences are also great; just attend the right ones.

Get Customer Input

Get feedback for your product before you build it. Interview your prospective customers to determine their problems. Then, provide different solutions and identify the ones the prospects seem to favor. Finally, ask the prospects if they will be willing to pay for the solution.

Listen to Customers

Listen to the needs of your customers. Use your customers to determine what to provide and how to provide it. Before you make a full offer, test the waters with your customers and let them drive your offer and marketing strategy.

Use Partnerships

Use partnerships to grow your business. When promoting your startup or product, identify other people in your space that can help you get the word out. Partnering with an established company can help to build credibility for your startup.

Use Influencers

Identify a number of key influencers in your industry and form a good relationship with them. Focus your efforts in building a relationship with influencers that have followers and that can market your startup to the right audience.

Trending Topics

Generate buzz for your startup by riding on the coattails of a currently trending “hot topic.” 99designs used this strategy to create buzz on their startup. When GAP unveiled a logo design, which was heavily criticized on the web, 99 designs took advantage of the happening with a crowdsourcing competition to show what its community can deliver.

Use Email

Use email to reach your prospects. There are many cost-effective email solutions that will work for your startup. MailChimp has a free plan that allows sending emails to up to 12,000 subscribers per month. If you can invest in paid email solutions, you can set up autoresponders and run more elaborate email campaigns.

Use Video

Many startups tend to forget the power of video. YouTube is a must if you are bootstrapping your business. Video can not only build your brand, but also get subscribers and visitors to your website. Sevenly.org leveraged YouTube to generate over 40,000 unique visitors in less than 30 days.

 Focus on Benefits

People always buy the benefit, not the feature. Do not lose sight of your business value proposition. You do not have to be better, different or expensive in the market. What matters is how you frame the differences in terms of the benefits, associated risks and value that resonate with your customers.

Cold Calling

Do not be afraid to do cold calling. If you have a great product that will be useful to your target market, call people and ask them to use it. Liam Martin got initial traction for his business through cold calling.

4 Reliable Ways To Fund A Start-Up

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The majority of startup ideas get stuck at funding. At the end of the day, capital is highly important. It is like the lifeline for the entrepreneur. Whatever revolutionary the business idea may be, it can’t be brought into the reality without finance. Particularly, in India the situation is different. Entrepreneurs still rely on the conventional methods. The concepts of angel funding Mumbai, or seed funding Mumbai, are still in the beginning stage. When the right source of money is tapped, it is possible to take the business to towering heights. Smart entrepreneurs do it rightly in the first attempt.

Compare all sources

When you want to start a business venture, always look at every possibility of raising funds. Do not leave any stone unturned because you don’t know where is the key to success? Be careful while choosing one as a wrong decision may take you to square one. Mentors suggest a few useful sources to entrepreneurs in Mumbai.

·        Bank loan or credit: You should have a clean and creditable history before you move ahead with this option. You may get funding easily if everything is fair and positive. However, things are not that simple if the credit history is not spotless.

 Search for startup incubators in Mumbai: Many people prefer incubators or accelerators who offer funds to startup companies. They are associated with organizations that work for community development. Even big business groups also provide it. They offer free of charge (or at nominal charge) resources, consultation, and office setup. Some offer seed funding as well.

·         Find out Mumbai angel network for funding: Nowadays, several groups of individuals offer startup support to entrepreneurs. These investors are generally big business owners who form a syndicate and build a huge corpus for funding new ventures. However, it is very much important that you find the right group and showcase your business plan effectively.

• Self-finance your business: If you are an established entrepreneur and starting up a new venture, then diverting funds from another business is a good idea. The government offers tax benefits to such business ventures, e.g. excise duty or sales tax is levied for a limited time.

Funding a startup is not rocket science if you follow the right path. Detailed analysis crystals down two or three right choices for you. Select the one that fulfills your needs to the most.