How Chase and LivingSocial are Making Dreams Come True for Small Businesses

www.missionsmallbusiness.com

I have a (pipe) dream and it's to help one million entrepreneurs get noticed by the end of 2014.

Chase and Living Social believe in the power of small business and have teamed up to launch Mission: Small Business, a nationwide grant program offering up to $3 million to small businesses like Studio 4 PR.  The program will award 12 individual grants of $250,000.

I really want this. But, I need 250 votes to qualify. And, the deadline is midnight tomorrow (June 30th). 

If you want to hear more about why I want the grant, keep reading. If you want to cut to the chase, please go to Mission: Small Business. After clicking support on the homepage, look for Studio 4 PR and vote for us. Thank you!

 

The Backstory 

Studio 4 PR provides comprehensive public relations services to creative, independent, and what I call "kitchen table" entrepreneurs. It's based on the premise that in order to get noticed, the entrepreneur has to Get R.E.A.LTM.

In other words, the entrepreneur has to develop a realistic, engaging, authentic, and long lasting mindset about building relationships with prospective customers who don't yet know that they want or need what the entrepreneur provides. The entrepreneur needs to do this by telling a story that's so compelling, the prospects not only become customers, they tell everyone they know about the entrepreneur. Thanks to social media, the traditional "over-the-back-fence type of "word of mouth" is now on steroids.

Now, here are the statistics that shocked me. According to the 2008 Census, 75% of all U.S. businesses have less than 500 employees. And, (wait for it) more than 50% are home based. This means that entrepreneurs make a critical contribution to the U.S. economy, yet they are the most underserved by public relations firms. 

 

PR Firms are Charging What?!?!  

Why is this? I'm sure there are a lot of reasons. Thanks to the Tiger Woods and Lindsey Lohans of the world, entrepreneurs don't think they fall into the same (cess)pool for one. But, I'd wager that it comes down to cost. In 2010, the average monthly billing for a PR firm was $8,358. That's actually down from $9,808 in 2009, but that's neither here nor there.

What I want to know is what entrepreneur, what solo or home-based vital contributor to the revival of the economy, is spending $8,000 in five years, let alone per month, to make headlines when there's no guarantee he'll ever reap his investment. None! (Or at least none that I could find.)

So, the entrepreneur isn't getting the recognition he deserves because he doesn't have the money, but he also doesn't have the time (hello, he has a business to run), and let's face it, he doesn't really know how to write a press release, make friends with the media, pitch a story idea, or make public relations an integrated part of doing business.

The media, on the other hand, has a whole different set of problems. Ad revenue is down so  journalists are either out of work, working for less, or now doing the work of two or three. Bloggers are gaining the credibility and notoriety that was once reserved for pulitzer prize winning reporting. The days of being able to search for great stories and spend the time to flesh out the details has been replaced by Twitter updates and Facebook posts.

It's Time to Get R.E.A.LTM

 

This disconnect is what got me to thinking.  If there were a way for the entrepreneur to tell his story so that it reached his target customer  (without having to mortgage his house and sell his kids to pay for it) and if there were a way for the media to find him, that would be a good thing. The entrepreneur would get noticed and the journalists could get excited about covering the news again.

Get R.E.A.L Biz Buzz aims to bridge that gap. A virtual press room for creative, independent, and "kitchen table" entrepreneurs, it will feature customizable media kits that can be emailed, shared on social media, printed as a .pdf, or left on our server.  In addition, it will also feature a searchable database of the reporters, writers, bloggers, editors, and producers who cover the lifestyle and small business scene and are looking for the holy grail of story ideas. Every media rep who opts in will have a one page profile with their contact info, links to past stories, best way to pitch them, etc. They can search the media kits for story ideas or post queries for sources and interviews needed and the entrepreneur can pitch directly to the media rep(s) most likely to be interested in telling his story.

Just How Big (and Long) is that Pipe Anyway? 

Right now, we're at that juncture every start-up faces. The how-the-heck-am-I-going-to-pay-for-this-great-idea phase.


Which is why grant programs like Mission: Small Business are so important to small business and to our economic future. They provide a jumpstart that might otherwise take a business years (if ever) to achieve.

Every great (pipe) dream became a reality because enough people believed in it.

If you think that Get R.E.A.L Biz Buzz could provide an affordable way for entrepreneurs to get noticed, please go to Mission: Small Business.  After clicking “Support” on the home page, look for our business and vote for us! Thank you!

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• Top Woman Entrepreneurs to Follow on Twitter

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Forty Miles for a Cause

2007 Tour de Cure (Photo credit: blossominc)

This Sunday, June 10, my husband, Dave, and I are participating in the Tour de Cure Bike Ride to benefit the American Diabetes Association. This is significant for several reasons:

1. We have challenged ourselves to do a 40-mile ride on a day that's expected to be 85 degrees. Enough said. (Mom, there will be medics everywhere and I will not get hit by a car.)
   
2. My wonderful husband has struggled for the last several years to recover from a botched surgery that damaged the nerve function in his leg. It's impacted his quality of life (as a former runner), made walking difficult, caused him to gain weight, and most importantly, zapped his confidence and self esteem. I signed us up for the Tour de Cure in January as an incentive for us both to get in shape. To date, he's lost 20 pounds and I've lost 7, and this past week he rode more than 100 miles in preparation for Sunday! Way to go, Honey!
   
3. We are doing the ride in memory of Dave's mom, who endured the effects of diabetes for more than 20 years.

We hope you'll consider making a donation to help us stop this devastating disease.
Thank you!

 Robin and Dave Taney
 http://main.diabetes.org/goto/thetanks 

P.S. If you are a business owner, you can take advantage of my "Is Your Message for R.E.A.L?" deal, which includes a 30 minute PR consultation plus your choice of a press release, blog post, or PR plan for $35, all of which I'm donating to the Tour de Cure.

Related articles

• 2,000 cyclists join Tour de Cure to fight diabetes

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• 12-Year-Old Boy Will Bike 22 Miles In Tour De Cure Fundraiser For Diabetes

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The Business of Doing Business

Yesterday, blogger Hesham Zebida wrote a blog post about a contest that Vendio, a leading ecommerce software provider, is holding in an effort to find someone to write for its Vendable blog.

Since the blog is about one of my favorite topics--e-commerce (aka shopping!), I figured I would give it a shot.

According to Miriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, commerce is defined as "the exchange or buying and selling of commodities on a large scale involving transportation from place to place." From the trading posts that sold fur pelts in the 1800s to the grocery store that sells milk; from the computers that Michael Dell sold out of his college dorm room to the tchochkes that can be purchased for a quarter from any garage sale in America, it's all commerce. Put an "e" in front of it and it opens up a frontier so vast, so ripe for opportunity and scams, so infinite in its scope that it's almost hard to grasp.

According to researchers, e-commerce makes up only 4% of all retail sales, but it's a big 4%, topping $155 billion in 2009. Is there anything you can not find online? Name the most outlandish thing you can think of and I'll bet you can find someone somewhere who's selling one. In past last week alone, I've ordered cosmetics, books, and DVDs online. Today, I needed tongue depressors for a craft project and discovered that I could buy a box of 500 on Amazon for $8. Who knew?

The appeal is simple. It's convenient. Nothing beats being able to shop in your pj's at 3 a.m. It's ecologically friendly. Imagine if catalogues for everything you searched for online came to your house. (A scary thought in my house.) And, most importantly, it's relatively safe.

Some would argue that e-Commerce has eliminated personal customer service from the shopping experience, but I disagree. I think e-Commerce has enhanced it.

At the Internet Retailers Conference 2011, Dealernews.com reported that "e-Commerce is a behemoth to be reckoned with", but goes on to say that it in no way means the end of the brick and mortar store.

Far from it.

A study by BIA/Kelsey found that 97% of consumers do research online before making a purchase while Forrester Research found that 75% of those consumers prefer to buy local.

“So there’s a new type of commerce that we’re seeing,” says Ed Stevens, CEO of Shopatron, which calls itself  the No. 1 retail-integrated e-Commerce solution for branded manufacturers, distributors and multi-channel retailers. “It’s not online stealing from offline, but it’s an online-offline hybrid. We’re seeing more growth in that area. It’s growing faster than just pure online commerce.”

Take Amazon, for example. When you make a purchase, you have the convenience of 1-click ordering (so, let's say you're ordering books, inflatable party sheep, and 1500 live ladybugs--all real listings, you don't have to place the orders separately.), plus you can see what else the other customers who bought what you're buying bought and you can read reviews  of those purchases. You're also protected by Amazon's buyer protection plan, so you don't have to worry about whether you're doing business with a con artist.

Vendio is one of the companies making e-Commerce a no brainer by enabling online merchants to sell on Amazon, eBay and a variety of other sales channels from one place thus reaching buyers wherever they are shopping.


The takeaway here is that the business of doing business has changed. If you don't have an online presence, you probably won't be around for very long, but the importance of personal customer service has not changed. If anything, it's just gotten bigger. Now, whether you love something, or hate it, you can let a few million others know via  social media.

What's Your Why? Six Steps to Getting R.E.A.L About What You Want

A good friend has asked me to take her on as a PR client. She worked for many years, very successfully, for a large, very well known company where her work was regularly recognized and appreciated by the top management. When she left, she thought she was moving on to "the next big thing".

Unfortunately, her next employer didn't appreciate the value she brought to the company. Not only didn't appreciate it, but came right out and told her how much they didn't
appreciate it. It wasn't long before she left because it was
starting to affect her health.

The tanking economy made jobs hard to come by, so after being unemployed for awhile, she found a job writing policies and procedures for a non profit. It's a pretty important gig since this agency has to comply with HIPPA privacy laws and Medicaid  not to mention a million other compliance issues. But, the agency's senior management is mean-spirited and the job itself is about as much fun as watching paint dry.

So, she called me, almost in desperation, to help chart a path to her true destiny. I'm a PR specialist, not a career coach, I reminded her. I'm used to working with clients who already know what they're passion is and then letting the rest of the world in on the secret. I couldn't start doing PR for her until I knew what the heck we were promoting her to do.

I had her do a couple of exercises that, I think, can benefit any creative entrepreneur.  The first is based on one I learned from PJ McClure of The Mindset Maven. 

I call it "What's Your Why?"and it embodies my Get R.E.A.LTM principles that every entrepreneur should have: Realistic, Engaging, Authentic, Longlasting.   In six steps, this exercise will help you Get R.E.A.L about what you want to do.

Here's how to do the exercise:

1. Write down your goal. It should be clearly defined in 1-2 sentences. So, if your goal is to quit your job, win the lottery, and travel the world, you need to rewrite these as three separate goals.
    
2. Look at your goal and ask yourself "why is this important to me?"  Write down your answer.
   
3. Look at your answer and ask yourself "why is that important to me?" Write down your answer.
   
4. Look at that answer and ask yourself "why is that important to me?" Write down your answer.
   
5. Look at that answer and ask yourself "why is that important to me?" Write down your answer.
   
6. Look at that answer and ask yourself "why is that important to me?" Write down your answer.
   

The final answer is like a tiny kernel, but it's also the most important. Even though, it may seem to be world's apart from your goal, don't dismiss it. This is what your heart wants and your head is afraid to admit.

I'd love to hear what you discovered when you got R.E.A.L. Please feel free to post in the comments section and share this post if you found it useful. 

Thank you for being in this space.

Robin

P.S. If you're ready to Get R.E.A.L and want to help support a great cause, click here to learn more.

We Have a Facebook Page...and Fourteen Fans!!

Image via CrunchBaseWoo hoo! Alert the media. Studio 4 PR has launched its Facebook fan page. We are ready to engage, share, and exchange information and ideas with creative types, kitchen table entrepreneurs, and anyone else interested in unleashing their passion with PRsonality.

Now, we just need fans. Well, actually we have fourteen (thirteen, if you don't count me). When we get to 25, we can get a custom URL. (and lose the forgettable one with a string of numbers that looks like a prisoner ID badge.)

My goal is that in 25 days, we'll have 25 fans. Will you help me?

It's easy. Go to our Facebook page and "like" us. I promise that once you get to know us, you'll love us. As a thank you, I'll send you a copy of my "Top 11 PR Mistakes that Businesses Make." 

Then, come to the page--often--and tell us what you think. What are your biggest PR challenges as a creative entrepreneur? If you could wave a magic wand, what is one thing that PR for your business could fix?

Let's create a community of creative types and "kitchen table" entrepreneurs that ROCKS this world.

I look forward to sharing this space with you!

Best,

Robin

3 Key Things to Remember About Social Media

Image via CrunchBase

Ah, it's a "problem" we all should be so lucky to have -- having too many friends. Or, as in this case, too many "friends", which are classified as people who found you through some form of social media and because of your expertise, reputation, products or services, have decided to follow you. Think of it as the high tech version of the Pied Piper.

Social media is a great thing. You can keep in touch with Aunt Millie in Minnesota, reconnect with your college roommate, and forge new frontiers in business by leveraging new markets, creating partnerships, developing relationships with vendors, and finding customers. And, you can do it a lot faster than you did when you were passing out business cards at a trade show or networking event.

That said, like everything in business, and in life, you have to frequently reevaluate and reassess whether your "friends" are continuing to provide you and your business with the value that makes it worth keeping them  in your rolodex.

Apparently, this is an issue that internet marketing guru Joel Comm has been pondering as well. According to the bio on his web site, Comm is an "entrepreneur, bestselling author, public speaker, social media evangelist, and mobile marketing innovator."  I don't even remember how I ended up following him, but I liked the fact that he wasn't afraid to address the sticky issues, even those that involved his colleauges, like this post he wrote on ethics (or lack of) in internet marketing. I've never ordered his products or read his books, but I've continued to subscribe to his blog and followed him on Twitter because I liked what he stood for.

Until I read his post this morning. Titled Unfriending for Fun and Sanity, he let his Facebook followers who he'd "friended" on his personal page know (along with the rest of the free world) that he was "unfriending" everyone he didn't have a personal connection with and suggested that they instead follow him on his fan page.

Although I have no problem with what he said, there are a number of things about the way he said it that I think were unnecessary (and I said as much in my comment.)  They are things that I think can be a lesson to all of us:

1. Pack Your Message in Your Headline

This is the first rule that every journalism student learns. Your headline should convey the essence of your story because that will determine whether anyone even bothers to read it. "Unfriending for Fun and Sanity" sounds just plain mean.

2. Keep Your Business and Personal Pages Separate

If you are using social media to market your business, create a strategy that does just that. Joel calls himself a "social media evangelist and mobile marketing innovator", so I'm not sure why he'd invite total strangers to "friend" him on his personal page. That's kind of  like inviting a whole city to sleep over at your house, and then realizing you have to always be on your best behavior, you can never leave the towels on the bathroom floor and you always have to watch what you say in mixed company.

3. They're People, People!

I'm not sure what happened, but for some reason, the advent of social media has caused us to forget our manners. Now, things we never would have dreamed of doing pre-Facebook, we can do anonymously (like cyber bullying, or destroying a person's or business' reputation,) and then not give a second thought to the lives we wrecked or the feelings we hurt.

If you find yourself overloaded with a few too many "friends" who are taking up prime real estate with their silly Farmville games or nonsensical chatter, or as in Joel's case, if you had a "what-was-I-thinking-by-inviting everyone-and-their-brother-to-friend-me-on-my-personal-page?" epiphany, invite them to follow you on your fan page. Then, instead of making them feel like gum on the bottom of your shoe, you can have your blog post be about how you're streamlining your marketing efforts and that you look forward to providing them with more dynamic and meaningful content.

Lest I sound like a 95 pound weakling who's used to getting sand kicked in her face, the concept of kindness in business is big business. A quick search on Amazon for books about "kindness" and "business" yielded nearly 50 titles, and I'm sure there are many more.

Bottom line is this: being nice pays.

Related articles

• Blog: Social Media engagement doesn't always have to be strategic (musingsfromsussex.com)
• Should You Unfriend A Dead Friend On Facebook? (allfacebook.com)
• 9 Surprising New Facts About Social Media in America (e1evation.com)
• Low productivity: Social networks or irresponsible employees? (zdnet.com)
• Can I just make them go away? (debsanswers.wordpress.com
• Unfriending for Fun and Sanity (joelcomm.com)

Sometimes My Life Feels Like a "Saturday Night Live" Skit

                                  Image via Wikipedia

Picture the scene. You're in the bathroom and your four year old opens the door (without knocking, of course). He's wearing nothing but camoflauge bikini briefs (his), white socks, and very high heels (yours).

Then, in a style reminiscent of Mondo Mango from "Saturday Night Live", he sashays in and picks up the plunger.

He says with the eerie calm of an evil dictator, "the next time you and Daddy are bad (holds plunger high), I'm going to use this (demonstrates best plunging move)."

"That's the RUE-ELLS! (rules)." Then, he turns and walks out.