Man Falls In Love With A Salad AKA Ramblings Of A Juicing Convert!

I occasionally eat a salad, and I always enjoy it. Salad has always been there for me, bailing me out of feelings of gluttony after, say, binging on Ben and Jerry's Strawberry Cheesecake ice cream.

Boy, how that has changed!

I started on a 10 day juice diet that I learned about from watching "Fat, Sick, And Nearly Dead" on Netflix. Let's just say that I was inspired.

Anyway, I'm FOUR days into it, and let's just say that nature has not taken it's course.

                                       C'mon!

I have magazines to read that are designed (in my mind at least) for reading in that restful place housing the porcelain goddess.  Well, I'll fix that!

Time for some rough·age / ˈrəfij/ - fibrous indigestible material in vegetable foodstuffs that aids the passage of food and waste products through the gut.

Which brings me to my salad - look at this glorious thing!  I don't know if the 4 days of no solid food has driven me to madness, but man o' man, this salad is great! Check it out (actually,  this is a picture of my 3rd bowl)!

Anyway, all that I can say is that everyone should try a juice diet! I actually TASTE everything...The sweetness of onion and bell pepper...I think that my palate is waking up!

I'll never be the same...by the way, as a black man I can confidently and emphatically say that after 4 days,  I'd pull a 'Dani Alves' and eat food thrown at me too - banana, skittles,...whatever.

 You've seen these logos beside the names of prominent business people on the media ever since you started watching TV, reading the newspaper and
magazines, or surfing the web.

Now you can have these logos by your picture. Email Eric at eric@swaythemedia.com to find how inexpensive it is to become a small business celebrity!

We offer GUARANTEED media placement, with over 100 media sources, like FOX, Worth, and Miami Herald that syndicate our content. You can expect the media to be placed, and a report in your hand outlining where you are showing up, all within 24-48 hours of signing up with us!

4 (Less Than) Obvious Steps to Take Before Launching Your Business

Congratulations!

You've got your business plan, business license, and nothing else. Time to spend some real money turning your hobby into a business, right?

Wrong.

To put it plainly, "You are surrounded by simple, obvious solutions that can dramatically increase your income, power, influence and success. The problem is, you just don't see them.” - Jay Abraham

Here are 4 of the best, least expensive, and most powerful ways to either kick off your new business, or revitalize an established one:
1.            Sit down and clearly identify exactly WHO your key, or best clients should be, then join their associations. This is vital, because for the cost of an associate membership, you can have the ear of your marketplace. Remember, not everyone is the finest prospect for your business.

It's incredible that most people focus on their own industry associations, which are full of their competitors, while in many cases, you may be the ONLY business of your type in the associations of your dream clients.
Here's a sample script to use when calling to become a supplier/vendor member or associate member of an association:
"I'm calling about membership as a (supplier/vendor/consultant) to the industry. I want to do a better job of caring for the needs of my clients, and joining their association is the best way to do it."

Believe me, this script works, even when dealing with associations that don't normally allow outsiders to join. They seem to like the fact that someone is truly interested in using “insider” information to benefit their members.

Cost: Usually $50 to a few hundred dollars.
Bonus benefit: Once a member, you can offer to write articles and give other free content for use in the association newsletter, which if published can begin to set you up as a “go to” expert. What’s fantastic is that you’ll have the implied endorsement of the newsletter, which is dramatically more powerful than if you paid for a regular ad in the newsletter.

If you do use traditional advertising, try to spend to get in these publications. They are much more targeted than advertising in mass media publications.

2.            Write a press release.
Doing this step is important AFTER joining the association(s) that we just spoke of because you will not only send the press release to local and/or national media, but also to the association(s) that you just joined.
Call them and ask them where to fax (yes, I said FAX, not email) the press release. Fax volumes are way down compared to email, so you won’t be competing with as many if you fax. They may actually end up interviewing you and/or placing your press release in their industry publication! Faxing is also best to newspapers and other media.

Everyone thinks that it's easy to write a press release, and there are many free templates available online, but the best press releases are part of a package.

The package must consist of a press release, q and a, and a bio sheet.

Cost of sending out press releases: Free to a few hundred dollars for distribution, and free to create (for yourself) or about $250 - $500 for a full professional package.
By the way, don’t think that a press release isn’t for you. Any business can greatly benefit from using them. People are hungry for information, and you must become a trusted source to them.

3.            Speak to your suppliers/vendors about partnering with you to launch your business.

This is an almost never used, but incredible step. It works best in businesses where there is a high profit margin (100% or more), but you can put on your thinking cap to make it work in most businesses.

You should sometimes be willing to actually pay MORE for your upfront products/services from your supplier/vendor IF they will invest in your launch. Obviously, you must have the ability to afford this, possibly due to the back-end or continued business that you'll receive from your clients after their initial purchase.

Suppliers/vendors can add value by:

• Using their contacts to get you appointments with your best prospects, maybe even going with you to the appointment to create a warm relationship right off the bat;

• Assisting in the creation of and placement of advertising to assist you in your launch. They know who is successful, and may even know about the campaigns and agencies used in those successes. Plus their ad buying costs are probably lower than yours due to their volume of advertising.
• Working with you on trade shows – Depending on the type of industry that you are in, asking to share space in a booth with your supplier can be an incredible boost to your brand! They’re paying for the space anyway – simply try to negotiate a corner of their table to showcase your offer, and leverage your use of their products and/or services!

Talk to them about these ideas - they may have other good ideas you haven't thought of!

 *Come to think of it, try to share with a big non-competitor at your own trade shows as well. Why pay all of that money for a spot, when you can just leverage off of the traffic coming to one of the larger booths by paying for a corner of their presentation table?

4.            Make a YouTube video of a compelling offer, even prior to creating a website.

Make sure to view the descriptions of successful YouTube videos. Many times, they give an exhaustive explanation of the content, and Google seems to reward that. Don’t be brief, just use as much of the allowed space as you can!

Believe it or not, leveraging the power of Google’s ownership of YouTube almost guarantees that, if done correctly, your video will receive a lot more traffic then a static website will. As a matter of fact, there are many businesses that make incredible money (and margins!) without a website.

Example: This business sells a $1,500 + product, and receives many free leads per day. It was averaging 2 sales per day without a website!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2U-nyTpHDY

Yes, they now have a website, but…they paid for it out of profits later on, NOT before launching!

Here are some highly rated Fiverr.com resources to have the videos created AND distributed for you for $5 or more:
To create a video, look at the different types of services offered here:
http://fiverr.com/gigs/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&search_in=everywhere&query=video+creation&x=0&y=0&filter=rating&jls_se99912_1_rating=1&jls_se99912_2_rating=1

To distribute your video after creation: http://fiverr.com/mikewitkowski/upload-your-video-to-all-video-social-and-status-sites-in-traffic-geyser-platinum-3-times-so-you-will-get-ca-540-natural-backlinks
Bonus Idea: Have a “clickable” Craigslist ad created for your business YouTube video by these folks, and give them the URL to your YouTube video to send people to:
http://fiverr.com/gigs/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&search_in=everywhere&query=video+creation&x=0&y=0&filter=rating&jls_se99912_1_rating=1&jls_se99912_2_rating=1

This will really help give “juice” to your YouTube video, because Craigslist is such a strong online presence in Google’s eyes. Plus, you may see your offer rank multiple times on Google’s first page for your business keywords using these tactics!       

Lastly, use Fiverr.com for backlinks to your YouTube and/or Craigslist offers, as well as http://onehourbacklinks.co to “bump” your ranking.

So, there you have them.
The 4 (less than) obvious ways to come roarin’ out of the gate in your business, even if you don’t have the biggest startup budget.

To learn more…
Eric Briggs is a B2B/B2C marketing expert who specializes in using press releases, associations, and video to increase his clients' business. He can be contacted at eric@swaythemedia.com. His LinkedIn profile – http://www.linkedin/in/ericabriggs123/. Give him 24 hours to get back to you!