By Omar Barraza

The answer, in a few words, is executing campaigns. There are many tools and systems to facilitate and automate Internet marketing so it's tempting to choose one and follow its "best practices" to get started right away. This approach causes disparate activities and uncoordinated tasks which often result in disappointment. Instead, consider Internet marketing as a collection of related activities sequenced to deliver a desirable outcome. A process rather than an event. 

By Omar Barraza

You should expect to find that business-to-business (B2B) marketing primarily involves communicating how you're going to save money or make money for potential customers. A key reason for this is that many businesses require a   group decision before making significant changes or purchases.

While it's easy to cast doubt over a potential qualitative improvement, it's challenging to argue effectively against something that quantitatively reduces costs or increases revenue. In other words, everyone stands ready to shout "I told you this would be a waste of money," but no one wants to admit "It's my fault were spending too much or not  selling enough."

Once you can describe how you can help prospects save money or make money, the next step is determining how to best communicate this opportunity to the individuals that will most benefit.

By Omar Barraza

You're going to find that one large prize works best most of the time. This is particularly true when you're asking your audience for something non-trivial, such as completing a survey or providing their contact information. This might be expected when you consider that more people are motivated to gamble by a chance to win one huge jackpot than doing a bit better than break even.

By Omar Barraza
 
You're going to find that companies are interested in ideas that will directly save them money first, followed by ideas that might make them money. This means you need to think about strategy and find an answer to the question "Why would [specific company name] be interested in buying my idea?" If you're wondering why saving money is preferred, the reason is simple. Saving money is lower risk.

For example, an idea designed to make a company money by selling more products will require marketing, selling, and other expenses before it has a chance of success. An idea that could save money won't cost them anything if it works since the savings will recover its costs. In a worst-case scenario, the idea won't cost much if it doesn't work well since it probably will never be implemented.

So ask yourself, will your idea save the company money? If not, can the idea be transformed so that it will? It would be ideal if you can get to yes on these questions.

By Omar Barraza
 
It's my opinion that niches are created rather than found. If you agree, then the process of making a niche can be simple. Start by identifying a group of people that share several similar interests, and then exclude interests (and the people with those interests) until you've excluded 99 percent of the people. One in a hundred is a strong niche. The interest they share is special enough to build a community and rare enough to hold the community together.

By Omar Barraza
 
Strategy is the reason for what follows. In other words, it answers the 'why' question. Plans, tactics, and other items are tools that help deal with the how, when, where, etc.

By Omar Barraza
 
One of the ways you could choose to make money while helping others is to share potential solutions to their problems at no cost and offer to help them apply the solutions for a fee. I think this is beneficial for everyone involved since some people will not be able or willing to try the solution you have suggested on their own. 

For example, you could teach entrepreneurs how to accept credit cards without expensive upfront fees or terminal devices and then offer to set things up for them if they are too busy to do this for themselves.

By Omar Barraza
 
Writing a news release to match the preferred media outlets gets the story picked up more often and results in longer stories. Perhaps this happens because it saves time by delivering a first draft others use. Convenience is valuable to busy writers. So, if you want to get picked up in newspapers you might find yourself writing traditional releases in the Associate Press (AP) style, and reserve the use of a narrative style for releases you want picked-up online.

By Omar Barraza
 
The most common mistake I see people make as they plan, start, and grow their businesses is to focus more on the marketing than the business. That is, they invest all of their energies following someone's "system" before determining if their business is viable (or that the system works for anyone other than its publisher).

Also, no matter what type of business you have, you will need to ensure that your costs to acquire and support a customer are significantly less than the expenses.

Suppose you need to reach out to 1,000 strangers (aka prospects) in order for 100 to become acquaintances (aka opportunities) and 10 to become a friend (aka buyer). Then suppose selling one of your items (product or service) provides a gross profit (selling price minus item cost) of $100 total. This means you will need to spend 10 cents or less to reach each stranger/prospect just to appear to break even. In reality, you'll risk loose money on every sale at 10 cents because of other business expenses.

You need to get your business formula (model) figured out before you begin to pour money into your marketing to ensure your business can succeed.

By Omar Barraza
 
This is absolutely possible. Consider www.Weebly.com for a retail website. It's fairly simple and essentially free to create a small website with an online gallery, blog, store, and more. A few of the options do cost a little money, but even their "Pro" package of advanced options cost less than $100 per year. Just as importantly, Weebly is faster to learn and easier to use than popular alternatives like WordPress that are intended for professional developers.

By Omar Barraza
 
A common obstacle in marketing and selling products that pay for themselves over time is the payback period, or the amount of time required before the advantages of the product overcomes its investment. A business buying such a product would need to have the cash reserves to tie-up money for months or years in order to achieve future savings. 

A hybrid pricing model that balances the upfront capital cost (price) with ongoing operational expenses may provide a solution. In other words, you could price the product at near-cost and require periodic payments (maintenance agreements, annual licenses, etc.) to generate revenue. This is a well-proven and effective approach since the selling price covers your costs and the payments bring in cache flow and profits.

If this approach seems attractive and feasible for your business, consult an accountant to ensure your pricing and fees are precisely balanced and do not create cash flow or other financial challenges.

By Omar Barraza
 
I think pictures and graphics make eBooks more pleasant to read, whether they are printed or not. However, you will need to adapt your layout and file for each distribution vehicle -- PDF, iBook, Kindle, etc. -- as each supports different text, graphics, and layout options. The easiest choice is to start with a PDF version and release the eBook in other formats later.

By Omar Barraza
 
In my experience, small business owners can benefit from understanding that tools should not be allowed to define outcomes. Some do not fully appreciate why this matters, perhaps because they spend so much time running their businesses.

I recommend small businesses determine "why" (strategy) before they consider "how" (tactics). Only then should they review available resources (tools) and choose those that will best ensure their desired outcome. Many owners reverse this process, choosing the "best" tool they  and the success of their businesses is compromised as a result.

By Omar Barraza
 
I've worked with several startups and young companies and assisted others that have found themselves in similar circumstances. I think it's wise to simplify the decision. In other words:

Do you want to be the majority owner of a stable and profitable small business...

...or one of many minority owners of a rapidly growing business that will be acquired or sold in the future?

If you choose the later, you'll be working for a reasonable paycheck until the company is acquired or sold. If you want to make bigger paychecks sooner rather wait for a big payoff all at once, get stable and profitable ASAP and accrue your big bucks along the way.

By Omar Barraza
 
Check out www.99designs.com. For a few hundred dollars, you will be presented with several to many good designs providing you with lots of logo ideas to get you started. Some of these designs may good enough to use without hiring a designer or pursuing other more expensive alternatives.

By Omar Barraza
 
You should expect to find that Wal-Mart would show little interest in an idea. Their business model involves offering discounted products they can purchase that have a demonstrated demand from consumers rather than taking ideas and making them products.

You should try to create a small batch of products from your idea and market them directly to potential buyers. You will find that about one person per hundred is willing to take a chance on an unknown product or company. These people are often referred to early adopters and this community can often be found (or will find you) on the Internet.

Once you have some customers you can approach small resellers and work your way to larger ones, eventually convincing Wal-Mart to carry your product.

By Omar Barraza
 
You will find it's possible to have some of the resources you need at essentially no-cost including credit card merchant services, website, etc. Still, you should expect to need a little money for obtaining the materials you may need to deliver products or services. Perhaps this could be assisted using a personal credit card.

For example, you can sign up for a PayPal account at no cost and begin to accept credit card payments. You'll pay a small percentage (about 3%) of the amount and some small fees (usually less than $1) each time you bill a credit card, so include this in your prices to cover these expenses. There are other solutions such as Weebly.com for setting up a free website with an online store.

By Omar Barraza
 
You will need to meet the expectations of medium sized businesses to become a viable provider. For example, you will need to provide the types of services they expect at the quality levels and price points they are accustomed to experiencing.

Yes, this probably means you'll need to raise your prices or provide more comprehensive 'solutions' for them. You'll also need to brand and act like a medium business provider. Perhaps by using terminology like solutions. All of this helps to remove any apparent risk in trying your organization.

By Omar Barraza
 
I suggest you consider a business plan to be a road map and score-keeping guide for your business. Include whatever information might be needed to allow someone else to know if your business is heading towards success or not. For example, could you show the business plan to a stranger (perhaps an investor) and would they have the guidance to keep the business moving forward towards success and away from failure?

It would be very useful to understand the things that could go wrong and how you would react to them -- new competition, bad debt, etc. Knowing what could hurt or kill your business in advance would allow preparation of rapid responses for each risk.

In any event, the business plan should be considered a continuous draft and be reviewed and updated as often as needed to incorporate lessons learned during the start and operation of the business.

By Omar Barraza
 
If you're thinking of providing a service, start by determining where your potential customers interact with one another and begin to establish a presence where they gather. This might be a virtual location such as a website, or a physical location such as an organization. Share what you know and help them to achieve their goals, and then offer to do more for a fee.

Avoid trying marketing tips, tricks, or tools that have worked for others unless those businesses are very similar to yours and you have the resources (time and money) to experiment.

By Omar Barraza
 
Paid services can help you spread the news release to more news outlets. Still, the outcome will largely depend on the content of the release.

For example, I helped the folks at www.BeerPager.com write and distribute two news releases using the paid distribution service PRweb. The result? Lots of links and blog pickups, some stories from TV and newspapers, a celebrity partnership, and several new reseller customers.

For comparison sake, I helped www.NewtData.com write and distribute several news releases using a free distribution service called PRmac. They also experienced great results with pickups in Google News, Yahoo News, and many other online news sites and blogs. Still, there was little interest from traditional media.

By Omar Barraza
 
WordPress, Joomla, and other professional content management systems (CMS) are very complex to setup and utilize effectively. Still, they become a solution to the problem of having many people updating a website at once or running websites with hundreds or more pages. In this scenario, the complexity of the CMS is preferable to the monumental challenge of maintaining the website.

By Omar Barraza
 
Well, there are numerous ways to create publicity for essentially no cost. You could perform a survey on a topic of high interest and report the results. Some free publicity would come from articles, blogs, and other mentions of the facts and figures you report. Another common method is to host a contest and offer awards. The winners are likely to promote their wins, particularly if you provide ready-to-use templates for news releases, logos for the awards, and photos of the trophy.

By Omar Barraza
 
I find Seth Godin's blog very worthwhile to read. Check it out when you get a chance.