5 Tips for Small Business Owners Who Want to Start Strong

Posted by Marcel Sim under Starting Up,
December 1, 2008

Article Contributed by Kelly Kilpatrick

Starting a business strong can be a challenging endeavor for small business owners and entrepreneurs. There are many factors at play when getting your fledgling business off the ground and running smoothly and effectively.

After looking past all the logistics, there are some key things you can do to help your business connect with people on a more personal level and keep them coming back to you in the future. The following five tips are some suggestions on how you can do just that.

1. Have a great website and related blog. If you aren’t on the web yet, you must do this right away. Being listed in the appropriate local directories and being available to your customers 24/7 is one of the greatest functions of the internet. Maintaining a great site with appropriate blog entries to enhance your page will help to ensure your success.

2. Forge relationships with complementary businesses. It only makes sense that you should try to work with other businesses that complement your own. For example, if you are starting a photography business, you should get to know event planners and other people that can recommend your services. You can do the same for them as well. No business is mutually exclusive; take advantage of what the referral system and word of mouth can do for you.

3. Donate goods and services. You can gain much-needed exposure when you employ this tactic as part of your business plan. Donate to silent auctions, give services for free to get your name out there. Your name recognition and reputation will grow rapidly if this is done in the right venues.

4. Become active in your community. Get involved in what is going on in your locale and people will know that you care about the community where you’ve decided to start your business. People will take more of an interest in your business if they know you have a vested interest in the community.

5. Make good on your promise(s). If the opening of your business intends to fill a void in the business community, make sure that you make good on that promise. Customer satisfaction and perception is essential to gaining positive feedback and word-of-mouth, which can make or break a new business.

About the Author
This post was contributed by Kelly Kilpatrick, who writes on the subject of business school rankings. She invites your feedback at kellykilpatrick24@gmail.com

1 Comments

Comments

Good points, thanks for sharing. Take really good care of all of your customers, and reward your best customers, I may add. Without your customers, you don't have a business. Attracting and keeping customers is harder than keeping a customer.

Posted by: GlobalBX at December 2, 2008 7:36 PM

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