Small Businesses and Solo Entrepreneurs need to build their brand identity just like the large companies. People are more likely to do business with you if they feel comfortable with you and feel like they already know you.When you sneeze do you ask for a ‘Kleenex” or a tissue? Are you thirsty for a ‘Coke’ or a cola? Consumers buy these products just because they are familiar with them. When you’re a small business owner or solo entrepreneur the product/service is you. It is imperative that you build brand identity that creates familiarity of you within your ‘niche’ market. Building your identity is important because people support businesses and products that they are comfortably familiar with and avoid the unknowns.Here are some successful strategic branding ideas.Personal experience creates a strong bond between you and your customers. Your customer service needs to be extremely personal so it creates an viral cycle. The personal experience your customer receives will lead to ‘word of mouth’ publicity.Create a consistent and repetitive association of you in your prospects mind. This can be achieved by using jingles in audio advertising mediums, and logos, photos, slogans and/or positioning statements in print advertising mediums, press releases, brochures and especially your business cards. Remember there is a back side to your business card and that is valuable space to be used for brand marketing. Be consistent in the look of your marketing/advertising so it brands you and your company. People will be acquainted with you based on that alone.Get a professional web site with headers and footers that continues your business identity using the same logos, photos, slogans and/or positioning statements as you use in print.Write articles with content that is educational and valuable for your customer. Put each article on your website and invite visits to your site through your resource box. Use your resource box to build brand identity.Use article directories to publish your articles, with your resource box pointing back to your website, to build name recognition. This is absolutely FREE advertising and a must for branding your business and yourself. When you sign up as an author you have an opportunity to add your photo or logo in your profile. Make sure you take advantage of this opportunity for increased identity branding.Brand your business by associating with and complimenting other successful products to develop a quality reciprocal link and partnership brand strategy on the Internet. This will increase your exposure and business identity. There are products you can use for this such as Arelis (http://axandra.com/index.htm) and Zeus (http://www.cyber-robotics.com)Build brand identity and stay in constant contact with your customers and prospects by using an auto responder service. Communicate frequently with your customers and prospects giving useful and personal information. Always use your same logos, photos, slogans and/or positioning statements.Frequency is another branding strategy. As an example, create a postcard marketing campaign where you send out pertinent information about your market or how you go above and beyond the ‘typical’ customer service. These direct mail postcards should be sent out at least once per month, if not more, and have your photo and/or logo prominently placed.Your brand is your promise. Make sure you, and anyone associated with your business, can stand behind what you have promised in your efforts and be able to deliver on that promise. If you don’t live up to it promises your customers and prospects will feel alienated from you and your company. This will damage your relationships and your overall brand.A consistent look for everything you do will design your business identity. Successful small business owners and solo entrepreneurs know the importance of ing their identities into the consciousness of their niche. When they are ready to purchase they will already know you and are willing to buy your product or service. Never under estimate the power of branding.Here are a few article directories for your article submissions:webreference, site-reference and articledashboard.

Finding a web designer is the easy part- all you need to do is perform a quick search online and bingo, you’re presented with pages and pages of them in the search engine results. The hard part is choosing the right web designer for your individual project. Every web design project has a specific set of requirements and every web designer has a unique set of skills that may, or may not, be suitable for your needs. In this article, I’ll list some key factors that will help you find the right web designer and how you determine if they have the necessary skills to undertake your web development project.Research the Web Designers Website and Online PortfolioEvery web designer should have a functioning website and an online portfolio of their work. If they don’t, you can scratch them off the list. After you have found some web designers in your area, or anywhere else for that matter, you should research each of their websites and check out samples of their work. Different web designers take different approaches to their work and use a variety of technologies. You should read up on their skills and approach to web design, to make sure they suit your requirements. Viewing completed websites and samples of the web designer’s work is also essential to get a good idea of the design style and skills they have. Make sure the websites function correctly. If some of the web designer’s recent samples are not working, there is a good chance that, if you use them, your website might have the same issues. Look at the design style of their portfolio samples. Most web designers tend to stick to a particular style. If you like the look of their websites, and their website text sounds appealing, you’re onto a winner. Take the next step and call them, or send a project brief through.Speak to Your Chosen Web DesignersAnother key point to determine which web designer is best for you, is finding out whether you can communicate with them. You will need to explain your vision to the designer and they should be able to respond with ideas and suggestions for your project. If you call your designer and there is, for example, a language barrier between you, that could be a problem throughout the development process. Talking to a potential web designer also gives you a good idea whether you are going to get on with them or not. If you call to speak with your chosen web design company and you are put on the phone to a rude or uninterested individual – in my books, that would not be somebody you would want to deal with on an ongoing basis. If they are enthusiastic, keen and communicate well you are more likely to have a successful ongoing professional relationship.Qualification and ExperienceQualifications and experience are not always essential but they do give you some security that the web designer knows what they are doing and has the skills to undertake your project. It’s really up to your judgment whether you want to use a web designer with no experience but you never know, they might be a young gun with tons of talent and is just waiting for that first project to unleash their skills on to. Whether you prefer your web designer to have qualifications or not is also up to you. Qualifications just mean they have had some formal recognition of their skills. My preference would be experience beats qualifications any day. Your web designer may have undertaken a six month course which has got them a certificate of some sort but that does not make them a good designer. There is so much information online and ways to hone your design talents now, that needing somebody to teach you is not essential.Creative VisionIt is very important the web designer you speak to understands your creative vision. To create a website that truly serves a purpose and business goal, the designer need to understand the nature of the website and relate to your overall vision. Take note on whether the web designer offers any ideas or suggestions when you’re talking to them. This is a good indication of whether they understand the project and are enthusiastic about it.The Right TechnologyDifferent web projects need different technology behind them. Not all web designers have all the necessary skills for some types of web development. For example you may need a full content management system with database driven content and advanced search engine optimisation. This is something not all web designers can provide. Most designer’s will tell you straight away if they are unable to complete the project, due to technical limitations. It is up to you as a client to inform the designer of all the feature’s you anticipate your website to have so they can tell you whether they can complete it.A Reasonable CostThe cost of the web project is normally the key factor in how people choose their web designer. The scope of your project and what budget you have can limit what designer you choose. If you have a very small budget but want to build the next Facebook, any sane web designer will tell you they can’t help you. However, it is always good to get a few quotes and see which designer can offer the best package, for a reasonable cost. If they’re too expensive, it might be because they are a larger company with more overheads, or they are simply very good at what they do. If they are cheap, do a bit more investigation before committing – Cheap web design may end up costing you more in the long run, as it probably won’t serve its purpose very well and you will need to get it rebuilt. The cost of web design is often open ended… ‘how long is a piece of string?’… A good web designer should be able to explain the reason why they have quoted a certain price, and discuss what they can do within your budget – Just because you have received an initial quote that may be higher than you originally anticipated, talk to your designer about it. Quite often, there could be features or aspects of the quote than can be removed, or modified, to get the project back within your budget – If you don’t ask, you’ll never know.

Back in early 2006, Jeff Walker launched a course called
Product Launch Formula. Product Launch Formula taught
a very detailed, step-by-step approach to launching any
product via the internet.Jeff even provided case studies that showed how to use
his Product Launch Formula to treat a major affiliate
promotion campaign like a product launch.Product Launch Formula taught a proven method of launching
a product, and in the process, convinced several THOUSAND
aspiring entrepreneurs that the time was finally right for
them to launch their product.The only problem was that many of them decided to release
products all at the same time. Another problem was that
many of the product launches were in the “Internet marketing
niche” where many people launching products were seeking
joint venture with the SAME pool of super affiliates.This triggered an interesting phenomena where super
affiliates were shown a plethora of absolutely incredible
products… many of which the same “100 super affiliate” all
chose to promote at the same time.This triggered wave after wave of many of the super affiliates
promoting the same product packages during well orchestrated
launches. As soon as one of these well-orchestrated launches
was over with, the next one kicked off.The thing is, there really were a lot of great product
being released. There were more great products being offered
to the same core group of customers than they could possibly
purchase AND digest… because it was coming at them so fast.As the competition really heated up, and the market began
to tune all of the emails, something interesting happened.Since many of these products really did solve a painful
problem in the marketplace, and since many people were on
multiple lists, and got pitched on the same product by dozens
of marketers… all on the same day, the distinguishing factors
soon became the bonuses that the affiliates were offering.When any product launch has so many super affiliates promoting
the same product launch to the same customers, the product
becomes such a “commodity” that the bonuses become what
determines which marketer get the sale.Soon, we had the “product launch bonus wars.” Each launch soon
became a contest to see who could get the most creative, and
who could offer the most enticing bonus.. the bonus with the
highest perceived value.It was at this point that many super affiliates began to do
their customers a big DISSERVICE. They began offering product
launch bonuses that made no sense. They began offering product
launch bonuses that distracted the customers too much, and kept
the customer from even having time to use the primary product.Some offered such huge bundles of “fluff” that their customers
would read a mile long page describing their bonuses, be
convinced that something in that long list was something that
they needed, and grab the package just for that bonus. Often,
those customers soon discovered that they’d never use the
bonuses, and then they were STUCK with a bunch of useless
clutter!The criteria that conscientious affiliate marketers should use
is to offer bonuses that help a customer to get the most use
out of a product. The bonus shouldn’t distract them so much
that they never even find the time to take the primary product
out of its shrink wrap.In my opinion, selling someone something and then overwhelming
them with bonuses that keep them from using the primary
product is totally WRONG!I believe this so much that when I noticed Jeff Walker
preparing for a launch of version 2 of his Product Launch
Formula, after confirming that it really is one of the most
useful products that many of my clients needed, I had to ask
myself, “If I recommend this to my clients, how do I help them
to actually USE the product?”I think that is a very logical approach to deciding what bonuses
to offer with any product.Don’t you?For example, I acknowledged that anyone getting Jeff Walker’s
Product Launch Formula 2.0 would likely be planning on doing
a product launch. If they are marketing online, they likely need
help in planning that launch, getting joint venture partners,
and publicizing their launch.So, my “ideal” bonus for Product Launch Formula 2.0 evolved to:1) A “solo” email, promoting only their product, sent to a list
of 120,000 subscribers.2) A live 2-day seminar where they are taught many of the things
that they need to know to both launch their product and to
continue building and running a successful online business.3) At least 2 hours one one-on-one consulting.So, that’s what I bundled as my bonus for Jeff Walker’s Product
Launch Formula 2.0. My thinking was also that the live seminar
would put… as many as… several hundred ideal JV partners in
the same room.My challenge issued to all affiliates promoting product launches
is to offer bonuses that actually help the customer use the
primary product and benefit from that purchase. My challenge
issued to potential customers contemplating buying ANY big
ticket item in particular is to look for bonuses that actually
help you to use the product.Buying a product just for a bunch of bonuses that you’ll never
use is generally illogical. Buying a product that comes with a
bunch of product launch bonuses that distract and detract from
the primary product is counter-productive. Offering your
customers bonuses during product launches that are inconsistent
with getting the most use out of that product is
unconscionable.So there you have my opinion on “product launch madness and
bonuses that make sense.” If you’re serious about your business
growth, I encourage you to give what I’ve just shared with you
some deep though.Soul searching and intuition are good things