January
28, 2019

6 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Is your small business struggling to get reviews online? It’s hard to compete with the big guys who have hundreds, even thousands, of amazing online reviews about their products and/or services. And that fact is made all the more important because these days, almost nobody buys something without first checking out the online reviews.

Related: Online Reviews Are the New Social Proof

In fact, according to a survey conducted by Bright Local, 86 percent of consumers polled said they read reviews for local businesses.

So, if your potential customers are coming across your small business online and running away in the opposite direction once they see your lack of endorsements, what can you do to turn that around?

If your online business profile is still looking lonely, with only one or two reviews, check out these five tips to get more online reviews for your small business.

1. Create an email campaign.

One way to encourage more online reviews for your small business is to create an email campaign. If you already have an active email list, you’re off to a great start. Your email subscribers are your biggest fans, so chances are, if you send them an email asking them to leave your business an online review, they’ll do it.

If you haven’t built an email list yet, get started by signing up with an email marketing software and adding a popup on your website to encourage people to join your list. Plus, if visitors can place an order from your website, you should already have their email addresses to add to your email list.

Related: 5 Surefire Ways to Improve Your Site’s Online Reviews

To get the most responses, send a triggered email campaign. This means your online review email will send automatically any time a customer places an order, like what happens in the example below from Everyday Art.

Online review email example.

Image credit: Fresh Relevance com 

Sending an email right after consumers’ purchases, while the positive experience is still fresh in their mind, will get you the most online reviews.

2. “Ask” them in person.

Now, by in person, I don’t mean asking every single person who walks through your doors to leave a good review for your business online; that would be time-consuming and exhausting. Instead, gently encourage your customers to leave an online review in various places around your physical location. There are a number of ways to make the most of your space to generate more online reviews including:

Your regular customers who walk through your doors might not have checked you out online beforehand, but by advertising offline that you want more online reviews, you’ll be able to reach all of your customers — new and old.

3. Reply to every online review.

When asking people to review you online, you open yourself up to bad reviews, too — and that’s okay. Just remember to respond to every review, in a calm, helpful fashion and seek to turn any poor review into a positive experience. What’s important is that you shouldn’t respond just to negative reviews; you should respond to positive reviews, as well. Replying to your reviews will show other future customers that you’re active in your online communications.  

In fact, according to a study in the Harvard Business Review, replying to customer reviews results in better ratings overall. Through their studies, the researchers found that users exposed to management responses — for example,users who read your response to a negative comment from another user — left ratings 0.1 “stars” higher than those who had not.

This finding applied in the same way to responses to positive reviews. Additionally, customers who read management responses were also less likely to leave a trivial or unsubstantiated negative review.

4. Share glowing reviews.

Another way to get more online reviews is to share the glowing reviews you’ve already received. When others see that people are leaving you great reviews, they’ll be more inclined to do so themselves. In fact, according to Psychology Today, people look at what others are doing to learn what’s correct. That’s social proof in action.

So, share your best reviews on social media, as in this restaurant example:

Social media review example. 

Image credit: Instagram 

Not only does this tactic work to generate more online reviews for your business, it also helps to advertise your business and get more customers through your doors.

5. Go above and beyond in customer service.

You can use all the tips and tricks in the world, but if your business is giving poor customer service, you’ll never get online reviews — or else you’ll get a ton of scathing ones. The easiest way to get more online reviews for your small business is to go above and beyond for your customers. Most people don’t leave a review for a pleasant but mundane experience, but people will be more likely to leave a great review for your business if you’ve provided them with an amazing experience.

So, try to make your customers’ day by saying “please” and “thank you,” sending a personalized thank you note in their online order, giving a small discount to apologize for a customer service issue and so on. Customers will remember your kindness and return the favor by leaving you a five-star review.

Related: How Online Customer Reviews Help SEO and Drive Sales Growth

Over to you

With these tips for getting more online reviews, your small business will stand out from the crowd online. Patrons will be lining up at your business because they’ve heard nothing but good things about you. Customers will be happy. And you’ll have just one more task for immediate future: thanking your customers for their kind words and the extra sales their favorable reviews will prompt,

January
25, 2019

7 min read

This story originally appeared on PCMag

There was a time when many items littered my nightstand. There was a lamp, a stack of books and comics I had every intention of reading, a point-and-shoot camera in case my dog climbed into the covers and did something adorable, and even a landline phone for those late-night calls that wake one with dread. Also, a back scratcher.

Today those items are gone, save for the lamp so I don’t stub my toe, and the back scratcher, because I still have a back. They’ve been replaced by my iPhone and its plethora of apps to keep me busy, including those that turn my smartphone into a kick-ass futuristic alarm clock.

Amid this collection for iOS and Android, whether phone or tablet-sized, features can vary wildly. But they all tell the time and get your butt out of bed in the morning. Or after a nap. Some do it gently, some do it harshly, some do it with new-age special effects, and some make you work to wake. Whatever you’re waking needs, you’ll find them here.

Rise Alarm Clock ($1.99, iOS)

Rise isn’t about making you feel jangled in the morning. The multi-lingual app bills itself as a “work of art that wakes you up.” The lovely, minimalist settings require swiping up and down and left and right, but it’s filled with soothing alarm sounds with names like Grandma’s Clock, Gentle Chimes, and Jungle Morning. You can also wake to any song stored in iTunes. Setting multiple alarms for all different (or repeating) days and times is a breeze — though that feature requires a $0.99 in-app purchase. You can set the colorful clock option to monochrome and dim it down with a swipe. Snooze it with a shake.

Alarm Clock Xtreme & Timer ($2.99, Android)

Image credit:

via PC Mag

Have you heard of those apps that won’t let you drunk-text someone until you do some math problems to prove you’re sober? That’s one option of Alarm Clock Xtreme, which aims to stop excessive use of the snooze option. It’ll even decrease the time between snoozes, so it’s not always that magic default 9 minutes. It can wake you gently with gradually growing volume. Hitting snooze can involve a shake, the side buttons, pushing the screen, or the previously mentioned math. It all comes with a sleep tracker, stopwatch, and timer option as well. If you don’t mind advertising in your clock, you can get a free version.

Alarm Clock for Me (Free, iOS or Android)

Alarm Clock for Me believes in customization, offering themes for the look of the digital digits, with names like Ultrasonic, Retro, Digital, Worky, Odometer, and C-Motion Clock. On start it’ll ask for Location services to be turned on, so it can also offer you weather updates. Inside the app is the full set of alarm options like using your own music and various snooze options, plus a sleep timer for cutting off music as you start to snooze, a timer, and a shake-to-turn-on-flashlight option. Unlike some other alarm clock apps, this one supports background alerts so you’ll get an alarm even if it isn’t running all night. The app comes with very annoying advertising, though — you’ll need to make a $3.99 purchase on iOS or $1.99 on Androidto be rid of them.

Timely (Free, Android)

Image credit:

via PC Mag

Google liked this Android alarm clock app so much that it acquired its Zurich-based developer, Bitspin. Where it’s different is in using a cloud sync (via your Google account, naturally) so all your devices have the same alarms. It’s a beautiful clock app suitable for tablets, using gestures to set alarms, color schemes for the clock to suit you, challenges to ensure you’re up, a flip-to-snooze, and the option to quiet an alarm when the handset is picked up.

Sleep Cycle (Free, iOS or Android)

Image credit:

via PC Mag

Sleep Cycle is all about rest. This sleep analyzer app uses the phone’s or tablet’s microphone and accelerometer to track your snoozing and finds the best time (during your lightest sleep period) and method to wake you up. It’ll show how your sleep quality compares to the rest of the users of the app. If you’re still asleep, pick up the phone or tap it to snooze, but each snooze gets shorter if you use the Intelligent Snooze feature. iPhone users can sync the data into the Apple Health app, and it will talk to Philips Hue smart bulbs to come on at wake time, in simulation of sunrise.

Loud Alarm Clock (Free, iOS)

Image credit:

via PC Mag

Is there much mystery around what makes this alarm clock stand out? As long as you leave the app on-screen all night, it will play — nay, blare — a sound at a preset time to wake even the soundest sleeper. While you can use your own music from iTunes, the app comes loaded with annoying noises like nails on a chalkboard and a fire alarm. The alarms can be randomized so you don’t get lulled into sleeping through a sound to which you’ve grown accustomed.

Alarmy (Sleep If U Can) (Free with ads, iOS or Android / $8.99 Pro edition on Android or $7.99 on iOS)

Is Alarmy the most annoying alarm ever? You’ll probably think so if you set it up for its best feature: you have to get out of bed and take a picture with your Android phone of a pre-set location in the house that matches a previously taken shot. Naturally, that place should be far from your bedroom. If that’s not enough, the alarm can also go into a shake-to-wake or calculations mode before you are allowed to turn it off.

I Can’t Wake Up! ($2.99, Android)

Image credit:

via PC Mag

If you absolutely can’t wake up, you need more tasks while the alarm is running. This is the alarm app with ALL the tasks. Memory puzzles, tile ordering, barcode scanning (put the barcode somewhere else in the house so you have to get up), rewriting text, shaking, math problems, and more. The app will play music during the snooze interval, which you may need to calm down after all that task completion. There is a free version with lots of ads.

AMdroid Alarm Clock (Free, Android)

Image credit:

via PC Mag

From one-time alarms to recurring to countdowns, each alarm in the AMdroid app has its own settings. That can include challenges for waking, setting alarms that only work in specific locations, even setting it up so alarms do NOT go off during major holidays so you can sleep in. The app integrates with Android Wear smartwatches, so you can use voice commands to the wrist to set new alarms.

Sleep as Android (Free, Android)

Sleep as Android has your back, from notifying you the night before about your optimal time to go to sleep to the next morning’s alarm. It offers up white noise like ocean waves, crackling fires, and chants. Put the phone in the bed with you and the accelerometer measures how fitful or restful you are, then attempts to wake you at the best moment. It works with smart bulbs to wake you naturally at day break. Then come the alarms, with task options like shakes, math problems, scanning QR codes, entering Captcha codes, even counting sheep (which seems counterproductive).

Uhp Alarm Clock Pro ($1.99, Android)

Image credit:

via PC Mag

Like many others, Uhp has features like showing you the weather, playing music from Apple Music to wake you, etc. And it has a requirement to get you out of bed by making you walk somewhere as the alarm goes off and confirm it. The difference is, Uhp will post to your Facebook or Twitter account to embarrass you if you don’t get going.

Walk Me Up Alarm Clock (Free, iOS or Android / $1.99 Pro version on Android)

Image credit:

via PC Mag

If all you need to do is walk a little to get the waking juices flowing, Walk Me Up uses your phone’s accelerometer to make sure you actually walk a certain number of steps so you can’t just cheat it with a few shakes. There’s also an “evil mode” for disabling the snooze, among all the usual stuff. The app has ads, but you can ditch them for $1.99.

January
24, 2019

11 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Mike Peters will never forget the day his mother-in-law came to visit his family in Florida. She wanted to bathe his young daughter, but the water wouldn’t turn on. Embarrassed, Peters pretended he didn’t know why. The reality was he didn’t have the money to pay the utility bill.

“How did I get here?” the 30-year-old wondered. As a teenager, he’d been a rising tech star. He developed and sold his first software at age 13. At 16, he turned down a job offer from Microsoft. By 23, he’d saved $1 million.

But his dot-com startup, a messaging platform, burned through that cash along with $6.5 million Peters had raised from investors. In three years, his company failed to make a single sale.

Fast forward to today and Peters has bounced back and made enough money to last a lifetime. He’s the founder of the Yomali Group, an international e-commerce solutions conglomerate with over $1 billion in revenue. “My body is covered with scar tissue from the mistakes I’ve made along the way,” says Peters as he reflects on the ups and downs. “I made almost every mistake in the book.”

In high demand during the dot-com days.

Peters grew up in a middle-class family in Hod HaSharon, a small city near Tel Aviv, Israel. His computer obsession started early, and at age 10 he got his first, an Atari 800XL. He taught himself to code and created an accounting spreadsheet tool before Excel existed. He sold it to a neighbor for $500 — a lot of money to a 13-year-old. 

Peters’ first home in Hod HaSharon, a small city near Tel Aviv, Israel.

Image credit: Courtesy Mike Peters

At 14, Peters enrolled in the computer science program at the Open University of Israel. He convinced his parents to let him drop out of high school to complete his studies and work in the field. In 1991, he hosted one of Israel’s first bulletin board systems (BBS), an early iteration of today’s websites on which visitors played games and exchanged messages.

A Microsoft recruiter discovered the talented teen and offered him a job. The company wanted him to permanently relocate to the United States, but Peters was only 16, and he turned down the offer.

Instead, he accepted an Israeli-based gig developing software, which ironically brought him to the U.S. for six months. “I was 17, making bank doing what I loved in Laguna Beach, California. It was everything I’d dreamed of.”

Forced by the military to postpone his dream.

A week before his 18th birthday, Peters flew home to fulfill his duty as an Israeli citizen and join the military. “My friends didn’t understand how I could leave my comfortable lifestyle to lie in ditches and fire guns,” he says. “I had no choice. It was the right thing to do.”

In the artillery forces, Peters wouldn’t touch a computer for three years. “I had to put my life on hold for my country,” he says. “That’s when I learned life doesn’t always go your way.”

Peters joined the military a week before he turned 18.

Image credit: Courtesy Mike Peters

“I hated almost every minute of the army,” says Peters. “But in retrospect, those three years made me who I am today. I developed perspective and perseverance, and learned the importance of having the right mindset.”

Every four months Peters rotated between the border surrounded by enemies, Gaza, where he had a few close calls, and training. “The military teaches you to always be a student,” says Peters. “Most people think they’ve learned everything after university. They end up working for those who never stop learning. Formal education eventually ends, but self-education never stops. The more you learn, the more you earn.”

Finding love — and losing $6.5 million along the way.

Peters fulfilled his commitment to the military at 21, then spent the next two years at a cybersecurity company while selling software on the side. He’d been saving since he started working at 16, and reached $1 million by age 23. Peters decided to launch his own startup, a customer messaging platform.

That’s how he met his wife, Orit (pronounced Oh-reet) Tenenbaum. His company’s recruiter recommended her as a quality assurance manager, even though she was a 21-year-old fresh out of training. Peters gave her a shot, and she excelled. When they started dating, they kept their relationship secret, which wasn’t easy — especially when Peters moved to Silicon Valley for the company.

It was 1998, the peak of the dot-com era. Peters’ startup had raised $6.5 million from big-name investors. “At the time, the tech industry was all about eyeballs and downloads — and figuring out revenue later,” says Peters.

His company was no different. Three years later, the $6.5 million was gone. They’d spent it all building the business without making a single sale. Peters had also spent most of the $1 million he’d saved.

Peters married his wife, Orit, in Israel before returning to the U.S.

Image credit: Courtesy Mike Peters

After the startup shut down, Peters returned to Israel to marry Orit. The newlyweds decided to start over in the U.S. “My father-in-law was concerned about what would happen if I failed again. I told him I would just keep trying,” says Peters.

“I don’t know a single entrepreneur who failed 10 times in a row. That rarely happens. The problem is that most people quit after the second or third failure. I knew if I kept trying, eventually I’d succeed.”

From broke to really broke.

At 27, Peters moved to New York City with his new wife and their remaining savings: $5,000. They rented a tiny studio in Times Square for $2,000 per month. “That was a lot of our money, but I wanted to force myself to figure things out,” says Peters. “To be successful you have to burn your boats, leaving no option of going back.”

For the next few years Peters worked 15 hours a day, seven days a week. Despite his software development experience, he settled for website development projects because he didn’t want to go back to investors.

For the first few years in New York City, Peters worked 15 hours a day, seven days a week.

Image credit: Courtesy Mike Peters

After their son was born in 2003, the couple moved to Florida, where they had their second child, a daughter. They had no family, friends, or support there. “I could’ve made more at McDonald’s for the hours I was slaving away,” says Peters. “I had to look my wife in the eyes and tell her it was going to work out — even though I didn’t know how. Web development wasn’t my passion, but it was a way to keep the lights on until I found my passion.”

Except he couldn’t keep the lights on.

Shortly after their water was cut off, their car was repossessed and their house foreclosed on. “I couldn’t support my family, and my marriage was on the brink of collapse. Orit took the kids back to Israel, while I stayed in Florida to figure things out.”

His wife and children wouldn’t return for a year. “I questioned myself so much during that time,” he reflects. “I experienced imposter complex, and started thinking it was just luck that made me successful when I was younger. I spent long nights feeling like a loser who couldn’t support his family.

“Nobody talks about the hard times,” says Peters. “But every entrepreneur experiences them. Not just bad sales — I’m talking about broken marriages, losing everything. It takes the right mindset, perseverance, and passion to overcome the challenges. But with that, you’ll be unstoppable.”

“I owe everything to my supportive parents and the army, which taught me to get back up every time I fell down.”

Scaling a business with clients’ money.

When Peters began hiring freelancers to help with coding, things slowly started to improve. Four years later, hundreds worked for him. He began building different software, using clients’ money as financing to develop a new business model. His employees wrote all their code in a generic way so they could reuse it to create their own versions of the platforms they built for clients.

Peters transitioned to selling that software as a service. “Selling your time has a low ceiling. To double revenues, I had to double the workforce. So instead, we started selling subscriptions.” The bottom line increased significantly.

He later pivoted again, this time as an online retailer. “Our clients sold products online, and many of them outsourced the majority of the work to us,” says Peters. “We were making five figures while they made six.” The bottom line exploded again.

At this point, Peters had many services under one business. “Every business needs focus. You can’t be everything to everyone. We hit a ceiling trying to do everything under one name.” Peters spun out into eight stand-alone businesses under one umbrella, the Yomali Group.

Today, his businesses include an affiliate network, CRM platform, payment processor, business process outsourcing and call center, physical fulfillment automation, big data analytics, software development, and shopping websites — all helping businesses sell more online.

The three steps to business success.

“I’ve over-promised and failed to deliver, made bad hires, and failed to see the big picture,” says Peters. “A partner stole $1 million from me and an employee created a competing company using our code. It’s my mission to share what I learned from those experiences — so others don’t have to learn the hard way.”

Peters says there are three levels to business success. “The first is hard work and putting in the hours. You need to love what you do to sustain it.” He says you can build a $1 million business if you pour 10,000 hours into it. “If you spend seven hours a day mastering your craft, that will take you four years. But if you dedicate 14 hours a day, you’ll get there in half the time.”

Second, Peters says mindset differentiates a $1 million business from a $10 million one. “You need grit, to believe that nothing is impossible. Do whatever it takes and don’t take no for an answer.”

To exceed $100 million takes leverage, such as using distribution partners and affiliates, monopolizing a small niche, and using others’ time and money like Peters did.

Peters has made it his mission to share what he’s learned and help others avoid his mistakes.

Image credit: Courtesy Mike Peters

Legacy over currency.

Their third child was born in 2011. Now that he’s made all the money he’ll ever need, Peters divides his time between family, business, and helping others.

“No amount of money beats knowing you impacted others,” he says. In January 2019, Peters was invited to join the board of the XPRIZE Foundation, which is dedicated to solving big world problems. The elite group includes filmmaking legend James Cameron, publishing icon Arianna Huffington, and Google co-founder Larry Page. 

Peters with his wife, Orit, and their three children.

Image credit: Courtesy Mike Peters

Despite all of his successes, Peters has found the most happiness helping others. “My legacy is my driving force. I want to leave this planet better than when I came into it,” he says. “Empowering entrepreneurs to do great things creates a chain reaction that benefits many. That’s why I devote my time to building tools and services for them — it makes all the scar tissue worth it.”

Connect with Mike Peters on LinkedIn or learn more about his company here.

January
23, 2019

6 min read

In this series, Instagram Icon, Entrepreneur speaks with the individuals behind popular Instagram accounts to find out the secrets of their success.

In 2010, Chriselle Lim was a wardrobe stylist, spending her days at editorial shoots for magazines. In the early days of YouTube, at the suggestion of her friend Michelle Phan, she started posting style tutorials on the site and began to grow a following. In 2011, she launched her blog, the Chriselle Factor, to share her thoughts about fashion and style and to inspire other women who shared her passions.

Nine years later, Lim turned her love of fashion into a full-time career. She employs a staff of 13 people at her downtown L.A. office to create content for her blog and across YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest and Facebook for her 3.2 million followers.

The married mom of two has worked with some of the biggest names in fashion, including Dior, Gucci, Fendi, LV, Valentino, Cartier, Elie Saab, MiuMiu, Masion Margelia, Stella McCartney, SK-II, Armani, Chloe and Versace. Last year, she launched the Chriselle Lim Collection with Nordstrom. A second collection will arrive this March. She also started a branded content firm called Cinc Studios.

Entrepreneur spoke with Lim to get her social media insights.

How did you get your start with YouTube and Instagram?

I started on YouTube in 2010. Soon enough I realized that I wasn’t able to make as many videos as I wanted. So I decide to start the Chriselle Factor. Photos were so much easier to take and post. [I could share things] in between the video content. They both grew together simultaneously.

A year and a half into it is when I started to realize that I could possibly make this into a business because of the amount of viewership I was getting. I came from the fashion editorial world where I understood the business of ads and how magazines were making money. So I just viewed it the same way. I was getting close to millions of views per video. [So I believed] there was a possibility that I could actually make it into a business and someone can pay me to create a video. It took about two years for me to finally make my first real paycheck.

What’s your content strategy? How do you decide what and when to post?

We deliberately work on creating the best content for our followers on all platforms but especially with Instagram, because that is where a lot of the engagement and action happens. We have a strategy meeting every day just for Instagram. We’re always testing out things to see if the followers respond to it. What do they like most? What is the most engaging? We’re always trying to create content in the moment because they feel like they are there with you. But also we plan a lot of content as well, especially video content on Instagram. Those can take hours or days to create.

Related: Food Network’s Molly Yeh Shares How She Built Her Blog Into a Growing Farm-to-Table Empire

How do you leverage your account, and to what extent do you monetize it?

On Instagram we will see more and more brands that want to partner with influencers and celebrities on that platform because it’s an engaging platform and it’s immediate and you can interact and engage. Monetization on Instagram has just grown so much. I foresee it to continue to grow just because more brands are understanding the power of Instagram influencers. It’s the same across the board with YouTube and the blog.

We started off as more of a highly produced account. We shifted our branding on Instagram and that started after I became a mom. I have a 4-year-old and a 3-month-old. Because my followers been following me since I was in college, they’ve seen me get married and have kids and start this company and then have my second baby. They’re growing with me and they’re getting older with me so they’re just really craving authenticity versus this perfect imagery. But we do balance the two out because I have a passion for creating elevated curated content because I come from that world of editorials and fashion.

What advice do you have for other people who want to build brands on the platform?

To find a strong, unique voice. It is a crowded space especially in beauty and fashion. There’s a lot of content that feels very similar. I feel and I have noticed that once I became open about my life and who I am as a person being more raw and real and authentic to my followers, the voice became more obvious. That’s when my followers became a lot more engaged with me and just feel connected with me and knowing that I was a real person.

Second, hiring people that are better than you. I pride myself on being able to be creative but especially on YouTube with editing and the more technical elements, that was never my forte. I want to grow a brand, so whatever money I earn, I immediately invest it into hiring well-qualified people. That’s how I’ve been able to not only grow my numbers and my following but my company as well.

What’s a misconception people have about Instagram?

It’s important that brands understand who they are first before they go on Instagram. If they’re expecting to go on Instagram and get sales and more followers, then there is a misconception that Instagram is going to make them successful or wealthy or whatnot. It comes down to what the product is and what the brand stands for. That is most important.

“My pregnancy announcement was one of my favorites as I was keeping this a secret for so long and I was in the dreamiest Valentino dress.”

Image credit: chrisellelim | Instagram

“Our very first photo as a family of four.”

Image credit: chrisellelim | Instagram

“A very real and raw moment captured by my husband.”

Image credit: chrisellelim | Instagram

“A princess moment attending the Dior fashion Show in Paris.”

Image credit: chrisellelim | Instagram

“Launching my very first collection at Nordstrom.”

Image credit: chrisellelim | Instagram