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If you want to advance in your job and find meaning in your day-to-day work, consider these strategies. For further insights, read “What to Do When Success Leaves You Empty.”
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Archives for April 2018
How to Choose a Business Partner (Infographic)
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Finding the perfect business partner isn’t easy, but it can make or break your company.
2 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Finding the right business partner is a matter of chemistry. While it can be a tough, it’s extremely important to find someone compatible with you and whose skills complement yours.
Related: 5 Things to Consider Before Getting a Business Partner
So what can you do to have a good partnership? For starters, understand your business and leadership style so you know what you need from a partner. Ask yourself questions including: Do I prefer coming up with facts and figures or brainstorming ideas? Do I like to plan things or play them by ear? Do I look at the bigger picture or focus on details? Questions such as these can help you understand what you can bring to the table in order to figure out what you need from the other person.
Related: Everything You Need to Know About Business Partnerships
Once you figure out the type of partner you need, there are a few other rules to live by. Before jumping into a partnership, you should know that person for at least a year so you’ve seen their true colors and have a solid grasp of who they are. Next, make sure your core values and beliefs line up. It would be no fun to butt heads later on. Lastly, draft it all out: Write out your partner’s responsibilities, rights and exit strategy so everything is clear and transparent.
To learn more, check out Business Backer’s infographic below.
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Webinar Set for May Will Teach Small Businesses to Cope with Greatest Security Threats
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Security, whether it is in the physical or digital world, is a big issue for businesses of all sizes. With data breaches costing companies millions in the digital world, and inventory shrinkage and theft causing similar headaches for stores, an upcoming Brivo/Small Business Trends webinar seeks to educate on the subject.
The webinar happens May 16, 2018, at 2 p.m. ET with Anita Campbell, founder and CEO of Small Business Trends, Nicki Saffell, Senior Security Consultant at Brivo, and Sara Polon, owner of Soupergirl, a DC area small business.
These thought leaders will discuss data breaches, inventory shrinkage and theft along with ways to combat them.
You can get more details from the featured Events Section and sign up for the webinar while you are at it.
If you happen to have your own webinar or another event, contest, or award listing, you can post it by visiting the Small Business Events Calendar.
Featured Events, Contests and Awards
Entrepreneurs Cruise 2018
April 22, 2018, Florida, United States of America
Are you an Entrepreneur and need to get away and take a break? Ready to recharge, rejuvenate in new surroundings and be inspired by other like minds? Then, you can’t miss the 4th annual Entrepreneurs Cruise! Entrepreneurs Cruise 2018 takes place April 22nd to 29th, 2018 onboard the Royal Caribbean ‘Oasis of the Seas’ Cruise Ship departing Orlando (Port Canaveral), Florida, sailing to Philipsburg (St. Maarten), San Juan (Puerto Rico), Labadee (Haiti). Register today!
DigiMarCon East 2018 – Digital Marketing Conference
May 10, 2018, New York, New York
DigiMarCon East 2018 Digital Marketing Conference takes place May 10th to 11th, 2018 at the luxurious New York Marriott Marquis in Times Square, New York City.
It’s the one digital marketing event you can’t afford to miss! Whether your goal is to reinforce customer loyalty, improve lead generation, increase sales, or drive stronger consumer engagement, DigiMarCon East 2018’s agenda will help attendees enhance their marketing efforts. Sessions will focus on building traffic, expanding brand awareness, improving customer service and gaining insight into today’s latest digital tools. Register today!
WEBINAR: Small Business Doesn’t Mean Small Security: 3 Major Threats You Need to Combat
May 16, 2018, Online
Data breaches, inventory shrinkage, theft, oh my. On average, data breaches cost $3.62 million per breach and stolen customer data costs $141 per record. And inventory shrinkage in the United States is a $60 billion a year problem. Believe it or not, your business exists within both of those realities. Do you know who is accessing your most valuable assets and sensitive information? Do you know what your employees do when you are not physically onsite? On May 16, 2018, at 2PM ET join Nicki Saffell, Senior Security Consultant at Brivo, Sara Polon, Owner of Soupergirl, a DC area small business, and Anita Campbell, Founder and CEO of Small Business Trends, for a discussion on these challenges and discover modern ways to combat these threats – including electronic access control.
TECHSPO Houston 2018
June 06, 2018, Houston, Texas
TECHSPO Houston 2018 is a 2-day technology expo which takes place JUNE 6 – 7, 2018 at the luxurious Houston Marriott Eaton Centre Hotel in Houston, Ontario. TECHSPO Houston brings together developers, brands, marketers, technology providers, designers, innovators and evangelists looking to set the pace in our advanced world of technology. TECHSPO Houston 2018 promises to be better than ever and we’re excited to see all the amazing tech companies and talent that will join us. Register today!
Growth & Success Con
September 17, 2018, Online
This small business virtual conference is dedicated to supporting entrepreneurs at all stages who are stuck in the daily grind of building their businesses and struggle to get solid advice and guidance. An amazing panel of experts in various disciplines and business coaches will share tips & tricks on topics including Growth, Marketing, Management & Business Building for Success. Register today!
More Events
- Leadership and Team Management Skills
April 17, 2018, Ashford, United Kingdom - SILICON VALLEY BLOCKCHAIN CONFERENCE 2018
April 17, 2018, San Francisco, United States - Time Management and Self-Awareness
April 18, 2018, Ashford, United Kingdom - Funding a Business Application Deadline
April 20, 2018, Oakland, CA - Small Business Expo 2018 – WASHINGTON D.C.
April 20, 2018, Washington, United States - Sales Cruise 2018
April 22, 2018, Cape Canaveral, Florida - DigiMarCon Orlando 2018 – Digital Marketing Conference At Sea
April 22, 2018, Cape Canaveral, Florida - Tech Cruise 2018
April 22, 2018, Orlando, Florida - DigiMarCon Cruise 2018 – Digital Marketing Conference At Sea
April 22, 2018, Cape Canaveral, FLORIDA - AACSB International Conference and Annual Meeting
April 22, 2018, Honolulu, Hawaii - Social Media Week NYC
April 23, 2018, New York, NY - PATCA Consultants Networking Lunch-South Bay
April 24, 2018, Sunnyvale, CA - Create a Powerful Brand and Connect with Customers
April 24, 2018, Online - Business Networking for Professional Success
April 25, 2018, New York, NY - VR Franchise Seminar – Experience the only VR platform for Franchising 2018
April 25, 2018, San Francisco, CA - SearchCon 2018 Digital Marketing & SEO Conference
April 25, 2018, Breckenridge, CO - The Sixth International Conference on Digital Information, Networking, and Wireless Communications (DINWC2018)
April 25, 2018, Beirut, Lebanon - CHICAGO BLOCKCHAIN CONFERENCE 2018
April 27, 2018, Online - Free East Cooper Networking Event powered by Rockstar Connect
May 01, 2018, Mount Pleasant, SC - Free Roseville Networking Event powered by Rockstar Connect
May 01, 2018, Roseville, CA
More Contests
- Public Vote to Crown America’s Most Unique Small Business Underway
November 08, 2018, http://www.paychex.com/vote?utm_source=contest&utm_medium=press%20release&utm_term=americas-most-unique
This weekly listing of small business events, contests and awards is provided as a community service by Small Business Trends and SmallBizTechnology.
Photo via Shutterstock
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How 10 Billionaires Faced Failure (Infographic)
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Success doesn’t come easy.
2 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
When you’re starting a business, you can expect mistakes and sometimes even failures to come along with it. For most successful people, failure is always a part of their journey. It’s learning how to handle and grow from these experiences that make us stronger and better position us for future successes.
Related: 10 Blessings That Come Hidden in Rejection, Losing and Failure
Just take a look at Bill Gates, Richard Branson and Walt Disney. Before dropping out of Harvard and creating Microsoft, Gates co-founded a traffic monitoring website called Traf-O-Data, which failed.
For all Branson’s life, he’s struggled with dyslexia. He dropped out of school when he was 16-years-old, but then went on to create Virgin. Even at Virgin, Branson has faced many troubles, attempting to start a soda company, a bridal company and a digital download agency, all of which failed.
Related: 10 Strategies for Entrepreneurs Dealing With Failure
Walt Disney was also prone to failure: the high school dropout was fired from a magazine job at 22-years-old because the editor felt he “lacked imagination.” After that, he created Laugh-O-Gram Studio, which went bankrupt after two years.
To learn more, check out Quick Base’s infographic to see how 10 billionaires faced failures.
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What’s Best For Your Business?
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3 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
When you own a digital marketing agency, clients want to know where to invest their marketing dollars. A question we frequently receive is, “Should I invest in PPC or SEO?”
Related: SEO vs. PPC: Knowing Which Is Right for Your Website
According to WordStream, PPC stands for pay-per-click, “a model of internet marketing in which advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads is clicked.” Essentially, it’s a way of buying visits to your site, rather than attempting to “earn” those visits organically.
Earned placement via Google organic (or SEO) means you don’t have to pay for each click.
An example
Below is an example of PPC result versus SEO via Google Search. The search term I used was “car insurance.” Using Google’s Keyword Planner, I was able to determine that the average cost per click for this car insurance keyword was nearly $60. This is one of the more expensive terms, folks!
You’ll notice there is a little box that says “Ad” to the right of the PPC advertisements. For organic results, this box does not display. Even though organic placements are below the ads, search engine users overwhelmingly click on organic results on Google and Bing by a margin of 94 percent to six percent, according to Search Engine Watch.
Related: 5 Pay-Per-Click Mistakes That Can Cost You Money
There is enough search volume where Geico, Progressive and Farmers could each get thousands of clicks per day via PPC advertisements. For this example, let’s say Geico generates 100 clicks daily to its site via PPC. This would mean it would pay $6,000 on paid advertisements daily (100 clicks x $60 cost per click = $6,000).
Allstate, on the other hand, ranks No. 1 organically. This means any time someone clicks on its organic placement, that is not costing it a penny. From an ROI perspective, this is obviously much more lucrative than paying $6,000 per day to acquire customers.
Diversification plus patience
The mistake we see most brands make is that they want to get results tomorrow. They don’t have the patience to invest in SEO for three months or possibly three years from today. This makes them quick to jump into PPC and forget about SEO. PPC can drive results tomorrow. SEO is a longer-term process.
On the other hand, we see businesses that don’t want to pay each time someone clicks on their advertisement. They want to have the No. 1 position, similar to Allstate. The issue is that their SEO metrics are far behind their competitors. Their on-site SEO needs work. They need assistance with local directory submissions. They don’t have a backlink and digital PR strategy.
Related: 9 Key Questions to Ask an SEO Company Before Hiring It — or Firing It
My recommendation
If you can rank in the top three positions on Google for every prominent keyword within your industry, you are fortunate and don’t have to invest much in PPC. For the majority of businesses, that isn’t the case, so PPC is necessary to drive traffic and generate sales.
If you are profitable with your PPC, why not invest in this channel as well along with organic? It is just another way to increase your customer base. Don’t think you can only invest in one of the two options between SEO and PPC. You should have a diversified game plan for both.
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Mark Zuckerberg in the Hot Seat and 'Grand Theft Auto' Beats 'Star Wars'! 3 Things to Know Today.
MailTag Chrome Extension Introduces Free Tracking and Auto Follow-up for Business Email – Small Business Trends
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When you send an email for business, knowing the actions your recipient has taken provides valuable information about how you should follow up. The MailTag Chrome extension for Gmail and G Suite gives you unlimited email tracking, scheduling and auto follow-up, for free.
The MailTag Chrome extension lets you take three very important actions regarding the email you are about to send out or have already sent out. The extension does more, but by properly using these three functions you will get more from your email than just blindly sending them out and hoping for the best.
As a free tool, MailTag gives small businesses some of the many benefits of email tracking solutions. If your company needs more services, the Pro version provides more options. The cost is $3.15 per per month when you pay for the year. The free version has MailTag ads and signature watermark.
Features of the MailTag Chrome Extension
When you add the MailTtag Chrome extension to Gmail or G Suite, you will be able to track unlimited emails in real-time. You will know the exact time your recipient opens your emails because you will get alerts. Once they open the email and then click on any link, you will also be notified. And all of these actions can be analyzed.
You can track the performance of your email and figure out what is working with your audience. You can then make the necessary changes to correct what’s not working.
With the Ping feature, you can automate the follow-up process of your email. You can customize the automated follow-ups by sending emails every other day, week or whenever you think is right to improve reply rates and bring your email to the top of the recipient’s inbox.
Speaking of sending emails, you can schedule your emails so they get to their intended destination at the right time. Different time zones, reminders, and well wishing for birthdays, holidays and special occasions can all be scheduled.
Email Stats
An analysis of the hundreds of millions of emails sent by MailChimp’s millions of users has revealed the average unique open rates, average unique click rates, average unique soft bounces, average unique hard bounces and average unique abuse complaint rate by industry.
MailChimp looked at industries from agriculture to vitamin supplements with companies ranging in size from 1 to 50 plus employees. The analysis reveals open rate averages of 15.22 to 28.46 percent, with click rates going as high as 5.13 percent.
The MailChimp stats highlight the importance of knowing if your recipients are opening their email, and what they are doing once they do open.
Even though today’s digital technology provides more ways to reach your potential customers than ever before, email is still a powerful tool. With the right applications, email can be optimized to engage with your audience and gather important data which can be analyzed to gain insights into their behavior.
Image: MailTag
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In This Job, You Get a Sinking Feeling Every Day
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‘Deadliest Catch’ captains Jake Anderson and Josh Harris stopped by Entrepreneur to discuss the new season.
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37 Windows Keyboard Shortcuts to Improve Productivity
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If you are on your computer keyboard all day long for your business, and a couple of more hours when you get home, you should look into using keyboard shortcuts. A new infographic by Parken lists 37 Windows keyboard shortcuts to improve your productivity and save you more time than you might’ve thought of.
Although the computer mouse is a very useful and practical tool, the seconds it tags on to each task can quickly add up. If, on the other hand, you use keyboard shortcuts, you can devote this time to more productive undertakings.
For small businesses with a limited workforce, each new process implemented to make the organization more efficient and productive delivers overall improvements. Using Windows keyboard shortcuts will add to the improvement.
So by now, you are probably asking yourself how much time can I really save?
Brainscape has created a formula to figure out just how much time people lose while working on the computer without shortcuts. And it comes out to a shocking 64 hours or 8 days per year. This works out to 3.3 percent of your total productivity. Even if you learn just a single shortcut, you can save several cumulative hours each year.
Here’s the example Brainscape provides. When you use a mouse to open a new tab in a browser, you move your hand from the keyboard to the mouse, move the cursor to the + button on the open tabs, click the button, and switch your hand back to the keyboard. With the keyboard shortcut, you just press the CTRL and t keys on your Windows PC and CMD and t keys for a Mac, and you are done.
Brainscape came up with the total using this equation — 2 wasted seconds / min multiplied by 480 min / workday multiplied by 240 workdays / year equals the 8 lost days. View the video below for a quick explanation:
What are the Windows Keyboard Shortcuts?
Parken has broken down the 37 Windows keyboard shortcuts in the infographic into five keys. The Function, CTRL, ALT, Shift and Windows Logo keys.
If you need help, the F1 key will display help. And if you are searching for a file or folder in File Explorer, you can press F3.
The CTRL key is used along with other letter keys to perform different functions. The CTRL + c will copy a selected item, and you can close the active Window when you add the W key.
The ALT key also works in combination with other keys. Add the Tab key and you can quickly switch between open apps. If you want to cycle through items in the order they were opened, just add the ESC key with ALT.
You can take a look at the rest of the Windows keyboard shortcuts in the infographic below.
Image: Parken
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A Small-Business Guide to Facebook Insights (Infographic)
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Facebook Insights is an incredibly helpful tool — if you know how to use it correctly.
1 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Facebook is more than just status updates and photo albums — it’s a major marketing tool for businesses. However, if you don’t know how to use it properly and take advantage of all it has to offer, you might as well not use it at all.
Related: 3 Ways Facebook Spaces Could Revolutionize the Business World
From engaging customers to entertaining them, Facebook Insights provides some of the best tips and tools for boosting your business. To start, Facebook Insights will tell you information about your customer base, such as the type of people who follow you, where they are located, how old they are and more. Another important area that Facebook Insights covers is your competition. Using the tool, you can track their posts and engagement in order to get ideas for your own business.
Related: How Your Business Can Capitalize on Facebook Live
With all of this information, you can come up with a bulletproof plan for growing your business. To learn more, check out Business Backer’s infographic below.
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