Motorcoach Marketing Winter 2018

MOTORCOACH

ISSUE 05/ FEBRUARY 2018

MARKETING WINTER 2018

Marketing and Sales Information Designed for the Motorcoach Industry

5 Ways to Sell Yourself and Your Business

Without Feeling Slimy

10 winning ways

to keep up with industry trends

Why Competition May

Be the Best Thing for Your Business

Why keep marketing

From JOB to JOY: How

to be the top one

Matter What Your Job Is

even when busy needs

to Find JOY at Work, No

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28 12 18

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2018 GOMOTORCOACH AUCTION SUCCESS/ The GoMotorcoach Auction took place at the UMA Expo in San Antonio on January 7...

07 08

After Investing $5 billion to develop a range of hybrid and electric vehicles...

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What is the most important thing you can do to improve relationships with your customers? The answer is...

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AUCTION WINNERS/ WHY COMPETITION MAY BE THE BEST THING FORYOUR BUSINESS/

NON-MONETARY REWARDS FOR EMPLOYEES: WHEN BONUSES AREN’T ENOUGH/ Companies struggle to pay people what many feel they are worth. This long recovery...

HOW TO MAKE SURE YOUR CUSTOMER SERVICE TEAM IS SKILLED, EMPATHETIC, AND ENGAGED/

WHY SHOULD YOU KEEP MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS EVEN WHEN YOU ARE BUSY?/

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Are you ready to start Guerrilla Marketing? Are you looking for ideas how to take your...

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As a marketing agency it is frustrating when we come across a potential client, that we know we...

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BIG TAX BREAKS FOR SMALL BUSINESSES/ Many small businesses experienced a boom during the years before the financial collapse of this recession...

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10 WINNING WAYS TO KEEP UP WITH INDUSTRY TRENDS/ Staying up to date in an industry that’s constantly shifting isn’t easy, but being aware of changes as...

GUERRILLA MARKETING/

5 WAYS TO SELL YOURSELF AND YOUR BUSINESS WITHOUT FEELING SLIMY/ As a small business owner, you are connected to your business in many ways that have the potential to...

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INFORMATION AND TRAINING FROM GO MOTORCOACH/

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FROM JOB TO JOY: HOW TO FIND JOY AT WORK, NO MATTER WHAT YOUR JOB IS / The security guard welcomed me with a smile, offered the comfort of a seat and the convenience of...

PRODUCTION Production deliverabilities layout&design: Phone: 360.468.3699

Email: info@deliverabilites.com www.deliverabilities.com

ADVERTISING Motorcoach Marketing Council opportunities: Phone: 360.840.0779

Email: chris@gomotorcoach.org motorcoachmarketing.org

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The Motorcoach Marketing Council/ From the Executive Director.

2018 is off to a great start! We participated in both ABA and UMA again this year, and set more records with our live and silent auctions. In keeping with new beginnings, we also presented the first of many Marketer Of The Year awards at the UMA Expo. The purpose of this award is to spotlight one company every year who committed to making marketing a priority, implemented marketing strategies, and achieved success in their organization as a result. This year’s winner, Silverado Stagelines in California, was chosen by a slim margin from a pool of entries representing many companies that had all made significant strides forward in the last year.

As you know, 2017 was a busy year for us as a council.

Because our mission is to help operators sell more charters to more people for more money, we have continued to reach out to more and more of you through our digital objectives (like this magazine), as well as the educational opportunities afforded us through our relationships with national and regional associations.

grateful for that. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you. Our board president, Mr. Jeff Rogers, also surprised us this year at the live auction; he bid on, and won, the 2018 Prevost H3-45 coach. He represented his entire company in doing so, and his enthusiasm for the motorcoach council and the entire industry did not go unnoticed. We want to thank First Class Tours from Houston, Texas, and the Prevost organization for their willingness to support the auction, the council, and our objectives.

We’re looking forward to the opportunities we’ll have to sit and talk marketing with you this year. We will continue to look for ways to help you as we strive to develop tools that will make it easier to sell more charters, to more people, for more money. See you out there!

We are proud to say that the needle has started moving.

While we wish that every operator would commit to making marketing a top priority in their business today, more and more companies are doing just that. It’s true that operations will always win when it comes to claiming our attention, but when companies choose to invest time and resources to give marketing the attention it deserves, they start to see results.

Those results motivate them to continue with their marketing efforts, and other companies are inspired to follow their lead. This raising of the proverbial bar has been the focus of our efforts as a council, and we are so proud to see this goal coming to fruition.

As you probably know, we are a nonprofit board run by the industry and for the industry. Our board members include representatives from associations, as well as a volunteer force of operators. We make a concerted effort to keep demands low in terms of the time and attention we require from board members, but we continue to be amazed as we witness their commitment to our organization. We’d like to extend a special thanks to our treasurer, Michelle Petelicki, who once again chaired our auction committee this year. In true-to-form fashion, she orchestrated a remarkable event and managed to break almost every record in the book. She gave up time from our business and her family during the holiday season, and we are incredibly

Chris Riddell

MMC Executive Director.

2018 GoMotorcoach Auction Success/ The GoMotorcoach Auction took place at the UMA Expo in San Antonio on January 7, 2018.

Because it generates the funds necessary to continue to provide education, tools and resources for use within our industry, this annual fundraising event is crucial to the Motorcoach Marketing Council’s mission.

that the express purpose of the council is to help the motorcoach industry grow, and this objective has had to be accomplished in spite of limited funds. “The council operates on an annual budget of roughly $150,000 dollars, and we take our responsibility to make that go as far as we can very seriously,” said Rogers.

It has been exciting to participate in previous auctions, and this year’s event was no different.

“Because of many fantastic donation items and enthusiastic bidders, the auction was a great success. A big thank you to all those who so generously donated items to the auction, and a special thanks to the members of the United Motorcoach Association who participated in the bidding process,” said Michelle Petelicki, Treasurer of the Motorcoach Marketing Council.

Over the last few years, the council has worked tirelessly to deliver education, develop tools, and provide resources more in an effort to improve the industry’s image and help operators sell more charters, to more people, for more money. “This auction is one of the major ways we are able to get the funds we need to continue to do what we do,” said Rogers. “We are an organization funded by the industry and for the industry, and our goal is to continue to produce tools, trainings, and resources that will make every operator’s marketing efforts more effective,” he continued.

Representatives from Prevost helped us secure the big ticket item this year: a gorgeous Prevost H3-45 coach. This is the second year that a fullsized coach was included in the auction, and it created quite the stir among bidders. After all was said and done, the coach went to the Rogers family with First Class Tours of Houston, Texas. “We were thrilled to have a Prevost coach as the headline item at this year’s auction,” said Christian Riddell, Executive Director of the Motorcoach Marketing Council. “When big companies come in and back what we’re doing, we can’t help but feel grateful for the support that comes from within this great industry,” he added.

Jeff Rogers, President of the Motorcoach Marketing Council, has previously stated

The Motorcoach Marketing Council wishes to extend a heartfelt thank you to everyone that donated items, engaged in bidding, or otherwise helped with the auction in any way.

We look forward to this event each year and truly appreciate the opportunity we have to rub shoulders with such incredible people.

If you’d like to learn more about the council and support its cause, see the available tools, trainings, and resources, or watch a video of this year’s live auction, please visit the council’s website at www.motorcoachmarketing.org.

Auction winner - First Class Tours/

STRATEGY

Why Competition May Be the BestThing forYour Business/

BY JILL KRASNY

You need some critical mass to legitimize what you’re doing.

After Investing $5 billion to develop a range of hybrid and electric vehicles, Nissan-Renault claimed the title of the leading manufacturer of zero-emission cars. CEO Carlos Ghosn has found that it can be lonely at the top.

Speaking at the Frankfurt motor show earlier this year, Ghosn said he welcomes competition from

other automakers because a bigger field would help jump-start the market. “The more companies that buy into electric cars, the better it is,” he said.

If competition is good for a billiondollar automaker, why not for your start-up? Although most entrepreneurs dream of having a

having a market all to themselves, research shows that you’re probably better off with some company. Professor Michael Porter of Harvard Business School has written extensively about industry “clusters” and has shown the benefits that competition brings to similar businesses within an industry.

don’t think a market is ever too crowded,” Feld says. That is, of course, as long as your product isn’t just another “me too” offering. “Most start-ups are competing with the status quo,” says Feld. “Instead, build a company that does something unique.”

“If nobody is competing in your space, there’s a very good chance the market you’re going into is too small,” says Ben Yoskowitz, an angel investor and founding partner at Year One Labs, a start-up accelerator in Montreal. “Any reasonably good idea has 10,000 people working on it right now. You may not even know they exist because they’re as small as you.”

Apoorva Mehta hopes to do that with Instacart, the San Francisco-based sameday grocery delivery service he founded in 2012. A former Amazon engineer, he now competes against his previous employer and a handful of other companies that offer a similar service.

James Park, co-founder and CEO of Fitbit, is well aware of his competition. His company, which makes a wireless tracker that lets users monitor their physical activity, competes against similar devices made by Nike and Jawbone. Those big brands, Park says, have actually helped his business by lending it an air of credibility and generating some buzz in the press. “More players in the market implies that wearable tech is a mainstream activity and that consumers should be comfortable adopting it,” Park says. “You need some critical mass to legitimize what you’re doing.”

Brad Feld, managing director at the Foundry Group, a Boulder, Colorado-based VC firm, has some rather cryptic advice for start-ups worried about competition: “Be obsessively focused on your competitors while ignoring them.” In other words, know your rivals’ products, market positioning, and financial status, and how they engage users, but don’t constantly react to every move they make.

Nor should you be deterred from entering a market that already has some competitors. “I

Instacart differentiates itself by using personal shoppers to pick up a customer’s groceries from multiple stores and deliver them in about an hour. “Competition has shown us there’s a demand for our services,” Mehta says. “Our product is faster, and we have more selection than Amazon or PeaPod. Competition combined with having a better product means we’re going to succeed.” A little cockiness never hurts, either. 

READ THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE ONLINE CLICK HERE

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INSPIRATION

NON-MONETARY REWARDS FOR EMPLOYEES:WHEN BONUSES AREN’T ENOUGH/ BY: Bryan Birtles

Consider that, “When offered, monetary rewards are lumped in with individuals’ salaries and compensation, so they are not often regarded as gifts.

Companies struggle to pay people what many feel they are worth. This long recovery from the 2008 recession has caused financial strain for many businesses, so the monetary awards that were once there have been replaced with unmet expectations for the hardest working employees.

Consider that, “When offered, monetary rewards are lumped in with individuals’salaries and compensation, so they are not often regarded as gifts.

They are additional earned income,” Says Scott Jeffrey of University of Chicago’s School of Business in his paper, The Benefits of Tangible NonMonetary Incentives.

In such instances, non-monetary reward programs can provide effective alternatives without compromising morale or straining operating budgets.

But companies often miss the opportunity to offer rewards with a much smaller financial footprint while promoting the company’s overall goals and objectives and boosting morale and positive competition among staff teams.

These incentives can be easy to implement, maintain and track. Some of them can be woven into current internal communications (whether that is a newsletter, monthly email or quarterly report). Others may be dovetailed into a special event, or travel to a conference for a team who has reached measurable goals.

Implementing a non-monetary reward program can build loyalty, culture, and communication between internal networks while it reduces conflict

Implementing a non-monetary reward program can build loyalty, culture, and communication between internal networks while it reduces conflict and conflictrelated competitiveness between management and staff—all at little cost to the company.

and conflict-related competitiveness between management and staff—all at little cost to the company. In some cases, events, conference bookings, the printing of certificates (or ordering of plaques) and scheduling time off for deserving staff can be planned and executed outside of staff time.

Below are some successful examples of Non-Monetary Reward Programs.

Training and Development

Professional

Every employee understands that they need to continue education in their field to stay useful to the company and competitive in the marketplace.

Professional development opportunities send the message to employees that the company recognizes the values of its staff and is willing to invest in improving their skill sets and helping them move forward in their career challenges.

Health Savings or Improvements to the Current Health Plan (or Retirement Plan)

Be sure to take account of how the workforce is broken up and ask what reward program would best suit them.

Health benefits are often a major consideration for employees as they look at jobs on the market.

Offering expanding or expandable health programs can go a long way to advancing the retention of those employees as they continue to provide value to the company. Health plan consultants can provide options for creating health plan tiers for long-time workers.

Flexible Hours or T

Employees have liv company. People v community groups, sports or charities t Giving staff flexible (or time working f them to better serv increases their des the company, boost staff as they to contr personal lives.

Staff Recognition P

Staff recognition one of the most o methods.

It’s considering the d many companies in order to remain recognition progra to be a formalized implemented reco through informal in a company new the same benefit w already-stretched w

If a more formal r warranted, a staff e social event with with verbal praise quarterly earnings, k high enough to las reporting period.

Contribution Progr

Front-line employee be some time befo

Time Off

ves outside of the volunteer with their churches, children’s that they believe in. hours and time off from home) allows ve those needs and sire to do more for ting morale among ribute more to their

Program/Event

continues to be overlooked reward understandable, dizzying pace that need to maintain competitive. But a am does not need d process. A wellognition of staff praise or mention wsletter can provide without taxing the workflow.

recognition plan is event (barbecue or families) complete can close out the keeping the morale st through the next

ram

es know that it will ore they are able to

sit at the table where key decisions are made. Management may recognize that it is the observations of those on the front lines who can report trends as they appear in the marketplace. Creating a contribution program for general staff and management to engage with each other can help to narrow the chasm that can lie between them. Successful examples of contribution programs include in-house lunches with both staff and management sharing the tables, where the needs of staff and the needs of management can be aired in a casual, relaxed setting.

Informal Contact among Staff Set lunches between staff can be useful, but cannot be a constant. Companies with shoestring social budgets can choose more informal contact methods between management and staff. Management can opt for casual walk-throughs to engage in cordial conversations with individual staff members. Another practice is having management take small groups of staff for coffee outside of the office. This can help to ease out of the formality of the workplace while still allowing for the flow of needs and ideas.

advantages of in-house staff. Regular “assignments” (jobs broken up into phases) can be treated individually and the goals and expectations for both the staff and the company can be laid out at commencement and completion of each assignment. This gives staff considerable opportunity for communication as it breeds creativity among the workforce.

Be sure to take account of how the workforce is broken up and ask what reward program would best suit them.

People of different ages have different life priorities, so engage them to rank those offerings. Creating an informal email survey and distributing it among the staff should suffice. It will lay the groundwork for what processes can be implemented quickly and which are best left unexplored.

Remember: Providing avenues for employee loyalty, respect, communication and recognition has become a hallmark for the best companies that employees can work for, but you don’t have to be the biggest fish in the pond to stand out as one of the most sought-after employers out there. 

Independence and Autonomy Although this may be the most difficult element to implement, autonomy is seen as one of the strongest morale boosters among workers. An independent workforce can function with the creativity and flexibility of a contracted workforce, with all of the

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In CaseYou Missed It/ Important Articles Written Exclusively for the Motorcoach Industry.

Change

Let’s Raise Our Prices

Let’s face it: change sucks. It’s often scary and inconvenient, and in many cases, it means we have to stretch. Just like the rest of you, I’m familiar with the “change is good”...

Yep, you heard me…on three…go! OK. Prices raised. See you next month! If only it was that easy! I was recently asked to address a group regarding the shortage of...

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The Council’s Mission

The Key Is In The Drip

For any of you that have attended a meeting where I have been asked to speak, you can probably recite in perfect cadence our mission: to help operators sell more charters...

Erosion is a pretty strange way to start a marketing column, but let’s be honest…it’s probably not as strange as potatoes! I was recently driving from the Pacific...

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What is your USP?

Compiling Your Marketing Tool Kit

When we talk about marketing and sales there are always lots of acronyms. SEO, ROI, CPC, PPC… and while you don’t need to know what they all mean, USP is...

Marketing is a big umbrella; everything from websites to t-shirts falls under it, and sometimes it can be difficult to know where to start. As I work with more and more...

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STRATEGY

How to make sure your cus team is skilled, empathetic

stomer service c, and engaged/ What is the most important thing you can do to improve relationships with your customers? The answer is as obvious as it is overlooked: improve customer service. No matter how great your product is or how talented your staff is, one of the things that customers are most likely to remember is the direct interaction they have with your company.

Bottom line, your customer service team is often the face of your company, and customers’ experiences will be defined by the skill and quality of the support they receive.

A strong company will already have great customer relationships. But a smart company will always be asking “What is good customer service?”

Good customer service centers around carefully listening and attending to your customers’ needs and desires. If you are not constantly on the lookout for opportunities to improve your customer service, then your relationships will stagnate.

Here are a few customer service tips for identifying ways to better serve customers: 1. Strengthen your customer service skills First, it’s important to make sure that your customer service team has the right skills for your managing customers’ needs. No amount of CRM software can

compensate for shortcomings in this area.

But what skills should you be looking for in a customer service rep?

Empathy, patience and consistency. Some customers will be irate. Others will be full of questions. And others will just be chatty.

You must know how to handle all of them and provide the same level of service every time.

Adaptability. Every customer is different, and some may even seem to change weekto-week. You should be able to handle surprises, sense the customer’s mood and adapt accordingly. This also includes a willingness to learn– providing good customer service is a continuous learning process.

Clear communication. Ensure you convey to customers exactly what you mean. You don’t want your customer to think he’s getting 50% off when he’s actually getting 50% more product. Use authentically positive language, stay cheerful no matter what and never end a conversation without confirming the customer is satisfied.

Work ethic. Customers appreciate a rep who will see their problem through to its resolution. At the same time, you must have good time management skills and not spend too much time handling one customer while others are waiting. Stay focused on your goals to achieve the right balance.

Knowledge. Ultimately your customers rely on you for their knowledge of your product.

Stay informed enough to respond to most inquiries and know where to turn if the questions become too detailed or technical for you to answer. But don’t be afraid to say “I don’t know” either. Customers will appreciate the honesty and your efforts to find the right answer.

Thick skin. The customer’s always right… right? The ability to swallow one’s pride and accept blame or negative feedback is crucial. Whether your team works directly with customers or looking for feedback on social media, they’ve got to keep the customer’s happiness in mind.

Not sure if your reps have the right customer service skills? Survey or interview your customers to understand whether your service team is showing each of these traits. Running a customer feedback survey through your CRM program, at the point of sale, or when you send customers an invoice is a great way to see where your team’s skills do and don’t measure up.

2. Look at every touchpoint A bad customer experience at any point in the customer lifecycle can ruin your relationship. In addition to making sure the right skills are demonstrated, you need to be sure they’re being demonstrated consistently. Pay the most attention to key touchpoints, but make sure you have a full view of the customer experience, or you risk lapses in service that can really hurt business.

3. Improve your customer interactions If your staff has the necessary skill set, that’s a good start. But they still need to relate to your customers. Here are some tips for making sure customer service is both thorough and well received: Ask reps to try to identify a common ground–like shared interests–with the people they help. Having this point of understanding makes conflict easier to overcome by humanizing the relationship, and it endears customers to your rep (and ultimately your company).

Practice active listening so your customers

feel heard. Clarify and rephrase what the customers say to ensure you understand them. Empathize with and reflect their feelings by saying things like, “That must have upset you” or “I can see why you feel slighted.”

Admit your mistakes, even if you discover them before your customers do. This builds trust and restores confidence. It also allows you to control the situation, re-focus the customer’s attention and resolve the issue.

Follow-up after a problem is solved. Make sure the issue stays fixed and that your customers were satisfied with the service.

Sending an email, or even a feedback survey is an excellent way to let the customer know you’re still on their side.

4. Enhance strategy

your

customer

service

Your staff may have the skills and knowhow to interact with your customers. But what organizational strategies can you employ to please customers? Practice proactive customer service by making your customers happy before they come to you with problems. Here’s how:

local customers and offer video calls (such as Skype) for those farther away. Work early and late when needed, especially if your customers are in different time zones. Even providing customers with your physical address helps build their trust and reminds them that your company exists off the internet as well.

Cater to your customers. Make sure you are fully meeting your customers’ needs.

Consider assigning reps to specific customers so they can build a relationship.

Offer VIP treatment for your best customers to let them know they are appreciated. What special services might your customers like?

Set up focus groups, interview customers, or run a survey to get ideas.

Create communities. Your customers will feel even more valued if you treat them as important members of a community.

You can bring various customers together in numerous ways, including webinars, interactive websites, social media, trade shows and conventions. And don’t forget that while your customers come to these forums to learn from you, you can learn as much–if not more–from them.

Get personal. Your customers want to feel like they have access to real people, not bots and FAQs. Offer more than just automated email responses, and do not let your telephone prompts or website send them down a rabbit hole. Take full advantage of social media (such as Facebook, Twitter and Yelp) and write responses when your customers post on your page. Post photos and bios on your website. This shows your customers that you are real people working on their behalf.

5. Make sure your reps are engaged

Be available. Part of the personal touch is making sure your customers can reach you.

For example if your business is primarily online, meet in person occasionally with

You’ll want to know how your customer service team feels about working conditions and compensation, opportunities for career advancement, training and their peers. Our

You can have the best customer service skills and the best training in the world, but if your reps are checked out, it won’t matter at all. Improving employee engagement is another way to make sure customers have a great experience. Dissatisfied employees are unlikely to come forward with their problems, so consider an anonymous suggestion box or an employee engagement survey to see what makes your employees tick.

employee engagement template offers a good overview. We’ve also compiled benchmark engagement data to help you understand how your employees’ engagement compares to other companies.

Since engagement can vary from industry to industry, you may also want to look at more specific data through a service like SurveyMonkey Benchmarks.

6. Give your customers a way to provide feedback No matter how proactive you are, you’ll never be able to get in front of every customer issue. To make sure you learn about the good, the bad, and the ugly experience your customers have, create an easily accessible way for customers to give feedback.

Whether it’s a phone survey at the end of a service call, an email survey sent directly from your CRM tool, or a form on the “Contact Us” page of your website, creating

a means for customers to give feedback makes it easier for you to learn what needs improvement. It also helps keep unhappy customers from voicing their displeasure on highly visible places like your social media pages.

Whatever steps you choose to take, remember feedback’s importance to customer satisfaction. Unsure what your strengths and weaknesses are? Don’t know why the numbers are dipping? Make an effort to get closer both to your customers and your reps.

Not only will you discover touchpoints and skills that need improvement, but your customers will see that are dedicated to providing top-notch, proactive customer service. 

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GoMotorcoach

do•it•for•you

NO TIME FOR MARKETING? NO PROBLEM... WE CAN DO IT FOR YOU.

MARKETING

Why should you keep marketing your business even when you are busy?/

By JOANNA GODDEN CMKTR, MCIM

As a marketing agency it is frustrating when we come across a potential client, that we know we can help, but are told ‘we are so busy, business is great we don’t need to do any marketing!’

It is often hard for business owners to see the value of ongoing marketing

when the sales are coming in. But the one thing we be sure of in these modern political times is - change.

So what if there is a major market change, will they have the necessary marketing muscle to ride out the storm? It is generally accepted that those companies that don’t cut their marketing budgets during

recessions are the ones that survive or even grow their way out into recovery.

So, to try and explain why you should keep marketing your business, even when you are busy we have put together this blog post.

While researching this piece I came across some great text Marketing is food, not medicine.

In other words marketing is the nourishment you need to keep your business healthy, it’s not just a quick medicine to apply when things are going wrong.

An athlete doesn’t sit on the sofa and eat junk food all day and expect to keep in peak physical condition and you too should be employing a great marketing regime to keep your business healthy.

So why should you keep marketing your business even when you are busy?

Every business is different but consider the time span of your conversions. How long does it take your business development team to find, nurture and convert prospects? You are busy now but need to market to keep filling

your pipelines.

You need to keep the momentum going. The old adage of ‘if you want something done, ask a busy person’ couldn’t be more fitting.

Keep those sales coming in, staff will be engaged and morale will grow. There is a huge difference between being so busy because the work is flying in and the business growing, to being busy trying to get the business to survive. Not to mention that clients find reassurance in using a company who is perceived as being successful.

Use this busy time to gather as many client testimonials as possible. You may think you don’t have time right now but it is much harder to get a client to agree retrospectively.

Marketing prevents ‘reputation rot’. Your clients will know of your reputation as it stands now.

Perceptions don’t change even though you may be developing as a company and going from strength to strength. You need to keep telling them of your successes or the way you are changing.

Marketing helps to shape your customer base as your needs change. By bringing in more potential business than you need gives you lots of options. You can be more picky about the jobs you accept. It allows you to go for the more profitable projects or enables you to choose the work you find most enjoyable.

Ultimately it gives you the chance to grow…

Continued marketing secures your company future. As we mentioned at the top of this post, the only thing you can predict is change. A strong pipeline will give you good foundations,

while a flexible and responsive marketing function will help you adapt to market changes.

If you are lucky enough to have a marketing budget, spend it to give your company a boost.

If you don’t, when budgets are allocated, marketing may be reduced. Seeing your company promoted builds staff engagement, enthusiasm and gives them a sense of pride.

Your shareholders and other stakeholders will see your management team as proactive and forward thinking.

Continuing to market yourselves will enable you to give back to the community. While you have

the volume of sales you need, you possibly have capacity to consider giving someone much needed work experience or shift your marketing to more PR based activity and support local charities.

So you still think you have got all the business that you want?

Do you have happy customers and happy staff – great news…. however, this is not the end of your business journey but a milestone from which you can move forward.

So keep feeding your business the good stuff and sprint into continued business success.

It is often hard for business owners to see the value of ongoing marketing when the sales are coming in. But the one thing we be sure of in these modern political times is change.

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STRATEGY

Big Tax Breaks for Small Businesses/

BY C. Yoder

Many small businesses experienced a boom during the years before the financial collapse of this recession. Those healthy profits produced big tax bills. Now, with a lean economy, reclaiming some of the taxes paid in the good years is not only possible, it’s easy.

Tax Breaks for Small Business The Kauffman Foundation reported that although 70% of small business owners had no plans to increase employment in 2010, 85% believe the United States is a great place to start a small business. So while optimism is increasing that the economy is bottoming out, there are real benefits available right now that some struggling entrepreneurs may have overlooked.

A case in point: your business income tax refund. You might not have deserved a refund during the boom years. But special economic recovery laws now allow you to reach back to those good years, recalculate those tax bills to reflect current losses, and walk away with an instant refund.

It’s not too good to be true – but like other direct taxpayer benefits, such as the gas-forclunkers program, it may be too good to last too much longer.

A Check from Uncle Sam “Congress hit the nail on the head here,” said Don Schippa, of Tax Research Services, of

Detroit. “Business owners are getting their own money back. It’s literally a check from the government. It can be very timely for people who are pinched a bit right now.”

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 allows businesses to chose to “carry back” 2008 operating losses for up to five years, and Congress recently extended the tax break for the tax year 2009. Before the legislation, the limit was 2 years. The longer carry-back period gives small businesses the ability to obtain “immediate refunds” of earlier taxes, which the U.S. Small Business Administration estimates will amount to $3.4 billion this year.

Tax Math 101 The calculation is simpler than it sounds. First, figure out your business income and expenses.

Subtract your business expenses from your business income and the result is the net profit (or net loss) from your business. If your deductions exceed your income, you may have experienced a net operating loss. This is the amount deductible from the profits reported in the five preceding years.

“So many businesses are hurting right now that any additional burden hurts, and any additional remedy really helps,” said Dillon Taylor, assistant chief counsel to the Office of Advocacy of the Small Business Administration. “There are businesses that are struggling right now that could be helped.”

For typical small businesses, sales have declined by almost 4% in 2009, sales per worker dropped by $5,000 and gross profit margins slipped 3% from 2007, according to a November study by Sageworks, Inc. Income Averaging in a Slow Economy “It’s an excellent vehicle right now that was limited in the past to two years. Now they’ve extended to five years, and the intent is to catch those businesses that were successful in the past,” said Schippa. “This allows you to income average—spread the high and lows of the economic downturn.”

Private estimates of the overall savings of the tax break run as high as $33 billion. The break can mean significant refunds right now, along with the prospect of reduced refunds in later years.

Typical losses that business owners can use are those incurred in trade or business, or losses due to theft or disasters, losses on rental property, among others, according to Accountantsworld. com.

Claim Your Refund If you have more than one business, you must figure your net profit or loss for each business on a separate Schedule C form.

To claim the benefits of the carry-back, business owners need to either file a revised 1040X, or a Form 1045, designed just for the net loss carrybacks. Generally, using the 1045 requires the IRS to respond more quickly, often within 90 days.. 

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The Kauffman Foundation reported that although 70% of small business owners had no plans to increase employment in 2010, 85% believe the United States is a great place to start a small business.

So while optimism is increasing that the economy is bottoming out, there are real benefits available right now that some struggling entrepreneurs may have overlooked.

In regards to the Motorcoach Marketing program, we love it. So far, we have made the 1000 postcards, and we did some full page handouts. We just got a stand up banner.

When I get some time, I’ll be making new rack cards for both offices. We made 500 church theme postcards and 500 in the safety theme.

We sent out the church cards through a local mailing company to every church within 50 miles. So far, we have had a great response and 4-5 people booked trips from it. I plan on using the safety ones soon by sending them to our new customers. All of our staff and drivers love the modern design and the finished products. Only one of my staff has watched the videos so far, but we will be working on that next month. So far I’m very happy with the service. It works well and looks great!

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STRATEGY

10 winning ways to keep up with industry trends/ By verticalresponse.com

Staying up to date in an industry that’s constantly shifting isn’t easy, but being aware of changes as they’re happening can keep you ahead of the curve. To help stay on the ball with industry challenges, opportunities and trends, check out our recommendations below.

1. Subscribe to trade journals What better way to be in-the-know about specific issues in your industry than to subscribe to a journal that’s devoted to covering them?

But subscribing alone isn’t enough; you have to actually read the thing – albeit in print or online. I prefer print. My monthly ritual is to

take a stack of trade journals to a local cafe, turn off my phone, grab my highlighter and notepad, and read all of them at once. Others prefer to consume magazines and journals in bite-size chunks.

Whatever your approach, make sure the information is getting in your brain rather than simply lining your shelves or taking up space in your inbox.

2. Keep up with consumer magazines Even if you’re reading a magazine that’s not specific to your industry, you’ll be looking at it through a very different lens than other readers.

And if you see something that’s

very relevant to your line of work, you can get even more insight as to how your field is viewed from an outsider’s perspective.

3. Scan and engage in forums and discussion boards Perhaps scanning an applicable subreddit each day is enough to pique your interest and get your brain buzzing about possible changes in your industry. Oftentimes, engaging in discussion in a relevant LinkedIn group or a private forum from a professional group can be more enlightening. Even though discussion boards can be difficult to sort through unless they’re heavily moderated, you can sort through

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then yes – it’s a trend you’ll want to follow closely. Blogs and news sites will also often analyze key statistics and research that’s relevant for your industry, and break it down into bite-size chunks, in a form you can understand.

5. Read newspapers and news sites Although newspapers and news sites are sometimes overly simplistic, and journalists sometimes cover industries they’re not knowledgeable in, beat reporters can spot industry trends as well as anyone. My personal favorite news app is Circa, which is free in the App Store and on Google Play. The tech section, edited by the former Deputy Editor of The Daily, Nicholas Deleon, is one I scan regularly for industry news. Circa allows users to “follow” certain areas they find intriguing for regular updates.

6. Listen to/watch podcasts and videos Listen to an hour-long podcast, or even a 20-minute one, and you’ll have a deeper understanding of the topic at hand. Video and audio interviews with industry leaders can be especially enlightening. Even if you find yourself disagreeing with the information being presented, having a common vocabulary can help you better communicate with others in your field, and express your reasoning in a way they’ll be able to understand. We recently wrote a post about 9 business podcasts we recommend giving a listen.

7. Network Discussing your industry faceto-face with colleagues can be particularly enlightening. Get out to conferences or local events, and

sign up for trainings. This is an easy way to keep up-to-date with what’s happening. Make sure to speak with colleagues as well as expert panelists. These two groups often have very different perspectives.

8. Talk to your customers In the past few years, I’ve gotten phone calls from both FreshBooks and Basecamp to help their customer service or sales teams better understand how people are using their products. Although scanning social networks and sending out surveys can be insightful, talking to people one-on-one is invaluable.

Discussing concerns with prospects can be equally enlightening.

9. Observe your competitors Sometimes you’ll want to zig when others zag, but looking to see what your competitors are doing can sometimes help you figure out if they’re responding to what you see as an emerging trend. Though you may sometimes be unable to decipher the method to their madness, it can’t hurt to take a look.

10. Track trends in your own business Got something that used to sell well that people are barely looking at now, let alone buying? Noticing clients and prospects asking specific questions that they never used to ask? Puzzling over these changes can help you predict potential threats – and opportunities. 

READ THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE ONLINE CLICK HERE

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MARKETING

5 Ways to Sell Yourself and Your Business Without Feeling Slimy/

By Alyssa Gregory

As a small business owner, you are connected to your business in many ways that have the potential to make it very difficult to keep your personal life and business life separate.

Although this is especially true for sole proprietors, it is also often the case with other (larger) small businesses. Your business, after all, is your baby and chances are you are much more emotionally invested in it than you even realize.

There are plenty of advantages that come from this dynamic -- you are passionate about your business, you work long hours and will do anything to get the job done, you are willing to make sacrifices for your work, you are loyal to your customers and clients. But there are also disadvantages -- you rarely take breaks, you tend to lose your objectivity when talking about business matters, you do it all in your business and often have difficultly delegating and letting go.

One other significant disadvantage, particularly for small business owners who are not sales savvy, is the need to be able to sell your products and services. And because you personally are so intertwined with your business, this means selling yourself. This makes many small business owners uncomfortable; it often feels unnatural.

But if you are not advocating for yourself, you can’t expect anyone else to do it for you.

The good news is there are ways to sell yourself by being proactive about exploring new opportunities, forging new relationships and positioning yourself in a positive light that eliminate any apprehensions you may have about sales.

see what you have to offer by compiling and offering testimonials from your happy clients.

You can collect these words of praise and display them on a page on your website, or you can provide them to potential clients on an individual basis.

You can make these testimonials even more useable by creating case studies that drill deeper to your clients and how your products and services have helped them reach success.

Keep in mind that client testimonials don’t have to be formal letters of recommendation either.

You can collect and ask for permission to use casual compliments and customer feedback as it comes in from clients. You can record audio or video testimonials, and even prepare a standard testimonial form for clients to complete at the end of a project to make it easier for them to provide feedback.

2. Develop a Professional Website Your website is one of the best online promotional tools you can maintain for your business. Make the facts of your past successes accessible and easy to absorb for prospective clients. Include examples of past work, project case studies, and testimonials. You can also include client references, detailed information about your work process, and answers to frequently asked questions.

3. Be Willing to Help Others

Here are a few ways to comfortably adopt a sales-driven mindset without feeling like you’re selling out.

Another way to establish your worth and sell your business is by being willing to share your expertise and help others. This can mean offering help to colleagues with challenges they are dealing with, promoting others through social media, and sharing tips, articles and other items of value for free.

1. Use Client Testimonials or Case Studies

4. Provide a Guarantee

You can make it easier for potential clients to

One way to show your confidence in your

business is to provide some sort of guarantee or warranty for your services. If you are a plumber, for example, you may consider providing a limited time warranty that will cover the work you do and some of the potential problems that may occur. You can even use this idea to create preventative service packages which you can sell to clients.

Depending on the type of business you have you can also provide a money-back guarantee for your services. You will want to make sure you clarify the terms of the guarantee to avoid any potential conflicts later on.

5. Encourage Word of Mouth We all know the power of word of mouth marketing. Do your clients tell their own colleagues about the work you do and regularly make referrals? Don’t be shy about asking your

clients to recommend you to others.

You may even want to offer an incentive for referrals to encourage recommendations. And always say thank you to the introducer for any connections made.

These simple actions can help you sell your business more effectively without having to adopt harder hitting sales tactics that may make you uncomfortable. And the more you do these things, the easier it will be for you to be proactive about promoting yourself and your business. 

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MARKETING

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INSPIRATION

From JOB to JOY: How to Find JOY at Work, No Matter What Your Job Is /

By Marguerite Orane

The security guard welcomed me with a smile, offered the comfort of a seat and the convenience of a magazine while I settled yet again for a long wait at the government office. He did this every time. The TSA officer at the airport in the Virgin Islands thanked each passenger for his or her patience in the long airport security line and wished us safe travel. With a half-oval smile and eye contact. Every passenger.

These are just two of the most joyous employees I have ever met even though their jobs are amongst the most mundane.

The February 2012 issue of the Harvard Business Review reports that “happy employees have 31% higher productivity, their sales are 37% higher; their creativity is threes times higher�. Happiness is a huge value proposition to the

organisation. But do you as an employee have to wait for the company to make you happy?

Did that security guard and the TSA officer depend on anyone to make him or her experience joy in their work?

From JOB to JOY. It’s only one letter, yet it’s a huge chasm for many people. “Job” typically denotes drudgery, boredom, suffering, penury, lack of freedom, painful necessity and everything that’s totally antithetical to joy.

Moving from JOB to JOY just doesn’t seem possible. Yet, as the security guard and the TSA officer demonstrated, it can be.

Retirement is one route of course.

Stay in the job long enough, hang in there, and at some point, you will leave and be rewarded with joy. That’s the theory. Yet many people who did not have joy in their jobs find that retirement is similarly joyless. Sometimes hold-onto-the-job-at-all-costs retirement planning is upsided by a sudden separation such as redundancy, severance or dismissal. People who have been forcibly released from their job and who state years later that it was the best thing that ever happened to them fascinate me.

I look at their smiling faces, 10 years younger, and have to agree.

That wakeup call forced them to examine their life, its meaning and understand that “sans” job, they are still worthy, loved and valuable to themselves and the people who matter.

But you don’t want to wait for retirement. You want joy now.

You could change your job and move to a company that is more conducive to employee happiness. No guarantee of joy here as you have no control over how soon this ideal job/company will appear, where it will be located or whether it really is all it was made out to be in the job interview process. It’s risky.

The good news is that you do not have to wait for retirement or a new job. Here are three ways that you can take control and bring joy to your current job situation right now: Identify the value that your current job brings to you and be grateful for it. Collective groan - gratitude again? I have done it every day for the past 8 years and it really works! At least try it. Before you head out for work each morning, find one thing to be grateful for about your job.

Read it aloud. Hear yourself speak those words of gratitude. Also think about the value you create for others at work. You may feel frustrated that you cannot get things done as you like. But you do help people, customers and fellow employees in ways that may seem insignificant to you, but could be very meaningful to the person being helped.

Detach emotionally from the job: It is not who you are, it is just something you do. Change how you speak. Instead of saying “I am Manager of ... at XX Company” try

LinkedIn will update the home screen of Sales Navigator’s mobile app to focus on a person’s “next best action,” said saying “My job at XX Company is manager of ....”. With this semantic change you have moved from being the job to having the job.

And by the way, stop complaining about the job!

Take care of the other areas of your life such as exercise, nutrition, rest, social connections, family, love.

Your job is not the totality of your being. There are many other facets of your life in which you find joy.

Notice that people who are not happy in their jobs, tend not to be happy in other areas of their lives?

It’s no accident.

From JOB to JOY means changing one letter: “Y”. How interesting that “Y” stands for YOU (and perhaps “B” stands for BOSS?).

When you bring YOU to your job, you have the power of choice. You may now choose to change your current job if you find that it is difficult for you to bloom in that particular environment. Or you may choose to remain. Whatever your decision, be joyful in it. 

READ THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE ONLINE CLICK HERE

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