Mistakes that will kill your business

It is important to be aware of issues that will kill off your business. It could be factors such as when you’re taking things to seriously when you just want it as a hobby, or when you’re simply tired of it, or even when you are terrified of success or failure. There are also plain errors which luckily can be fixed. Watch out for, and repair, these warning signs to build a healthy business.

1. A bad attitude
If you have a bad attitude about your business, everyone else will too, and vice-versa. Every contact you have whether they are a visitor to your website, in person, or on Twitter and Facebook will know how you view your company. How do you know if you have a bad attitude?
• If there are long lapses between your posting.
• If you haven’t released a new product or service in the last six months.
• If you blame poor business on difficult customers.
• If you complain about how complicated business is and how all the successful people must’ve had contacts in the correct places.
• If you’re astonished that after six months you are not both rich and famous because you anticipated being an overnight success.

2. Marketing not to a niche, but to a demographic.
A fantastic definition of a niche is “a group of people with a common problem who assemble together”. So what is not a niche? Small business owners, copywriters, freelancers, work at home parents, women over 40, or men after retirement are not niches but demographics that people commonly market to. If they share a common problem, then they are considered a niche. The solution is to examine the problem in you niche so that you can solve it and figure out where your niche assembles so that you can market specifically to them. It is ironic to learn that your marketing will be more successful the narrower your niche is. Scrutinize your current marketing plan, figure out if you’re are in fact targeting a niche or a demographic and then narrow down your message to a common interior problem that you can solve exclusively.

3. Appearing to be a tightwad.
It is simple to set up business online these days. Start off with a Wordpress.com or Blogger site, pick up some clip art graphics, outsource a logo and website header to the lowest bidder, get free business cards from site like Vistaprint, and compose a quick newsletter list from your Outlook. This may sound like a good idea, but instead you just come off looking shameful. The impression you are then giving to visitors and potential clients is that you have no money, are unprofessional, and cheap. If you must pinch pennies, there are some things that you can do for free or low-cost that will not grab notice, but you’re website is not one of them. Of course you do not need to bankrupt yourself creating a website, just be sure that it has an organized, professional look, is simply to navigate and creates a web presence that makes you appear worth your cost.



4. Neglecting to secure visitor details.
You have a customer visit your site, who then looks around, reads a few articles, then leaves. They like the site and would definitely come back, but never do because they lose the url or simply get too busy. Then they’re lost forever. By not securing visitor details, such as a name and email address, they’re losing customers. Set up a way for them to keep in touch, offering an incentive, such as an ebook or valuable free report, in exchange for details. MailChimp is free up to 500 subscribers if money is tight in the beginning and you can build your newsletter up from there. By losing one visitor you aren’t losing just one potential customer, you are also losing all the referrals that they could have given to you, and once they leave, they’re gone forever.

5. Neglecting to plan long term.
It’s easy to think that business plans are for large business, and for when your need to visit the bank for capital, but this is incorrect. By not planning you’ll impulsively buy the next great marketing technique and jump from one idea to the next and then question why nothing works out for you. How will you know when you’re reached what you’ve been aiming for without a solid plan? It is not necessary to have pages upon pages of incomprehensible financial projections, budgets and legal jargon, but at the very least you need to know what the goals for your business are, who you are marketing to, and what makes you unique from every other business out there. If you do not have a plan, you will not have a business.

6. All learning, no action.
Information is great; ebooks, courses, videos and many other teaching methods can help you get started, but only if you make use of what you have learned. Don’t procrastinate, saying that you’ll take action once you’ve finished this online marketing course, or finished the 128 books that you bought, or listened to the 76 teleseminars. You’ll learn more in your first year of business from just doing, putting yourself out there and running your business is the best teacher. Information is wonderful, but it is nothing without action.