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Article of the Month |
Being a Professional
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Tom Shay
This month's article is discussing ways your business can distinguish itself from the competition. Using examples from the marine industry, boaters reading this article will likely compare the marina they do business with currently with the ideas suggested in this article.
The principles apply to any kind of business.
Click on Article of the Month to read this article.
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Book of the Month |
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Romancing your customers
by
Sam Allman
For those of you in the floor covering industry, yes, this is the same Sam Allman that you have know for years.
For the rest of the small business world, Sam is a much admired instructor, speaker and writer whom I have known for many years as a good friend. This book came out about 18 months ago and just like the article above, helps you to gain a competitive advantage in giving value to your customers.
We have more books to suggest for your reading. Click on Book Referral to visit this page on our site.
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Contact Us |
Profits Plus
P.O. Box 128
Dardanelle, AR
72834 USA
(727) 823-7205 Voice
(727) 898-3179 Fax
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National Independent Retailer's Week
July 20-26 are the dates for this year's event. Some of the best merchants use this event to engage the local media in telling the story about the advantage of shopping with a local business.
When you spend money with a local business, there is a high percentage of each dollar staying within the community. With the chain store, the opposite is true. The majority of the dollars are leaving the community.
This week long event invites you to tell the story to your community that shopping with a locally owned business is good for them and good for the community.
Got check?
The checks are starting to arrive from the IRS. You may have gotten yours, but more importantly has your customer gotten theirs? Some of the mass merchants are being very aggressive in their courting of customers for these dollars. As an example, one of the mass merchants is asking customers to bring in the check and the customer gets a 10% bonus for each dollar they spend in that store. The mass merchant can even put the total amount on an in-house debit card so that all of the dollars are captured by their store.
Granted this would be a bit big for a project of an independent; but what are you doing to capture your share of these dollars?
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Internet Tip of The Month |
Return on Investment Calculator
Think about owning a business on the most basic level. You started by taking your own money and making a deposit to your new business checking account. Over the years, you may have made additional deposits as your business grew or needed an infusion of cash through a rough period of time.
Then as you have progressed through the years and made money, the profit that you have not taken out of the business has also been added to that initial investment.
The Return on Investment Calculator has been created to help you determine what the rate of return is that your investment is earning. If you were going to take that money and investment in a money market fund, you would want to know what your rate of return is. Shouldn't you know the rate of return is for the money you have invested in your business?
Return on Investment Calculator
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The Power Promoting Idea of the Month |
What is one of your biggest competitive advantages? It is likely that you would say it is your employees. So, why not make a point to remind your customers? In your print advertising you could include a picture of an individual with each ad. The copy in the advertisement could have an employee telling why they like a particular product.
Your television advertisements could utilize employees as models or the voice of the commercial. Your employees could be the voice of your radio commercials.
In the store you can put photos of the employees so that your customers can get to know them on a first name basis.
If your employees are going to be one of your biggest competitive advantages, then you should play that advantage as strong as possible.
| Looking for a few good readers
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I am ready to take a bold step. As you have heard me speak about establishing goals and deadlines, I have one that has repeatedly been moved out for the last few years. While business has been good, and forced me to do so, I so want to get this new book finished and published.
The idea is that I think the best people to review the book as I write it would be those that the book is written for and about. I am looking for a few people that love to read the types of business books I have suggested over the years. What I would like to do is send you a chapter and ask you to read and review it for me. You will definitely help me to make the book better.
I will be establishing the deadlines for each of the chapters, and I will want you to hold me to that. If you are willing to do that, you will be the first to get to read it, and I will send you a free copy of the book when it is published.
Send me a note; tell me about the books that you read; and give me your commitment to see this through to completion with me. You are sure to pick up some great business ideas and I will get this long awaited book completed. |
