The Bulls Roar » Small business

What’s Your UBD?

AnnieInfinite — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 01:40:03 +0000

First of all I hear you ask, “What’s a UBD?”

Your UBD is your Unique Business Differentiator and it is the most important thing you can know about your business before marketing it. It is what makes your brand, your business stand out in the crowd.

This is what you will use to establish your brand amongst your competition, it is what will draw your clients and customers to you in preference to other brands, it is how you brand yourself, it belongs in all of your marketing and will be used daily by you, your marketing, and your employees.

So how does a business find, create and establish their UBD?

It all begins with your Vision and Mission statements which are a list of values, goals and outcomes you create for your business. Your vision and mission statements help to keep motivation high, give your business purpose and move you and your business from A to B, effecting growth on a regular basis according to your goals and outcomes.

From these statements you will gain and insight into who your business is, who your target market is, and how to market your business. The next step is to sit down and list your businesses main benefits to your customers and what is different or unique about it.

Questions to ask yourself at this stage:

Who is my main target market?
What is different about my business?
What am I proud of offering?
What am I passionate about?
What core values are most important to me in relation to my business?
What do my current customers/clients say about my business?
What benefits of my business are already important to my prospective and current clients/customers? (This might mean some research on your part)
What are people saying about the biggest or most well-known brands in the same business? (researching what other brands are saying around their own businesses can give you an insight into current trends)
What are the most universal needs of people searching for your niche?

Now create a new list, of words I want associated with my business.

The next step is refinement, take your lists and begin a list of words, values and answers you gave to the questions and prioritise them. Which ones are the most important to you, which ones are already associated with your business by your customers/clients.

Continue to refine this list until you have between 3 and 5 of the most important to you and your customers/clients remembering that your customers and prospects are even more important than you when it comes to your marketing, these are your business’s UBD’s. Once you have this list try coming up with a few different slogans or phrases that encapsulate these UBD’s and these can be your very first branding messages.

Great Job! Now you’re thinking like a marketer!

The Zen Bull

More articles to help you establish your UBD:

http://www.asparker.com/ppts1004.html

http://www.flyingsolo.com.au/p236158609_Finding-out-what-makes-your-business-unique.html

© AnnieInfinite for The Bulls Roar, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Brand, Business, Marketing and Advertising, Small business, Target market

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21 Questions to ask Yourself BEFORE Getting a Website

AnnieInfinite — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 02:19:29 +0000

: Image of The Zen Bull

I talk to people every day about getting a website for their business and one of the things I find most is that businesses of all sizes have the same problem: They don’t really know what a website is for!

Do you know? Or like many of my clients do you just have some unformed idea that it is a good idea, lots of other businesses are dong it, and it seems to be the thing to do?

My advice is this: You MUST know what your outcomes for having a website are long before hiring the designer or finding the right software and hosting.

If you do not know your outcomes you will end up, like many business both large and small with a site that has to be fixed, changed to suit your purpose, the wrong hosting package, the wrong kind of software package…..

Here are some questions we ask all our clients well before designing anything for them, please if you are thinking about having a website for your business, sit down and write out the answers to these questions as best as you can:

1. Why do you want a website for your business?
2. What outcomes do you want your website to fill?
3. Do you want a brochure site, an online shop or a site that becomes the main ‘go to’ site for everything in your niche?
4. Do you want to send newsletters?
5. Do you want a blog?
6. Will you want to have a membership area?
7. Will you want to use video?
8. Will you want some social areas e.g. where members can interact with each other on your site, like a forum or chat area?
9. Do you want to be able to have affiliates, to help market your product or service?
10. Will you need autoresponders?
11. What do you plan to do with your site over time? What expansions do you think you will need later?
12. What are the main objectives starting out?
13. What are the main objectives long term?]
14. What type of visitors do you want to attract?
15. What is the most important action for your visitors to complete on their first visit?
16. What outcome is the most important one for your site to fill for you?
17. What is your budget?
18. How do you want to brand yourself?
19. Where will the content come from?
20. Which sites have you seen that appeal to you? and why?
21. Which sites have features you would like to include on yours site and why?

It is really important to do your research and ask these questions, if you do not know what some of the terms mean, then your website provider should be able to explain and discuss them with you and give you a reason why you need or do not need that particular addon.

The Zen Bull

© AnnieInfinite for The Bulls Roar, 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Ask an Expert, Brand, Business, Online shopping, Research, Small business, Website

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Opportunity Knocks Everyday for Everyone

AnnieInfinite — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 02:05:15 +0000

: Image by Stuart`Dootson via Flickr

Knock! Knock! Hello ~ this is opportunity knocking can you hear me?

Yes, I’m knocking on your door – hello.. can you hear me?

Ok, sorry you missed me catch you later…

Did you know that another person becomes a millionaire every 8 minutes, just average everyday people like you and me? Opportunity is knocking on our door every day often more than once a day and yet most of us do not seem to ‘hear’ the knock. Why is that?

Stop right now and just tune into your thoughts… listen to how busy your mind is, “I have so much to do (list). Oh! and I mustn’t forget to do that.. oh I wish ?? and nothing that great will ever happen to me… I really need ??.. I just not good enough… other people just seem to get all the luck… now why didn’t they mention me, didn’t I do a good job too?.. oh I really hate that.. overlooked again… what will they think of me if I speak up?.. oh well no point… they weren’t talking to me anyway…I really wish I had some money to do what I want to do… I need a new home this one is so crampled… I’d love to do that but it’s too much for me to handle, no point putting up my hand for it.. no I am already busy enough doing all these things I really don’t want to do……”

Your mind is just so busy keeping lists, being hard on you and avoiding being seen that when opportunity does knock you can’t possibly hear it. Isn’t it about time you gave yourself a break? If you really want a different life you are going to have to be able to hear the knocking on your door and to do that you really need to get a hold of your runaway mind.

These are what I like to call ‘patterns of thought’ and there is another pattern that goes along with this and that is ‘patterns of belief.’ These patterns will often prevent us from seeing, hearing or even being open to the very opportunities we yearn for. The ones that will take us from existing and surviving in a life we know we were not created to live to one of boundless success, excitement and joy.

So what are you waiting for?

Oh you don’t know how to change those patterns of thought and belief?

Easy, choose differently. That’s right no need for months of psycho-babble: When you are presented with an opportunity that you really want and hear yourself say, “I can’t” immediately say “I can” out loud, I guarantee you will put yourself on a new pathway. Just say ‘Yes” to life, to doing the things you have always wanted to do.

© AnnieInfinite for The Bulls Roar, 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Money, opportunity, Small business

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Generating BUZZ with Video

AnnieInfinite — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 04:17:43 +0000

As everyone who has ever read anything about the future of the internet knows, video is now an essential component of any website. Whether you are a Home Tinting specialist in a local area or a site offering online coaching and live TV podcasts. What I would like to ask you today is: Have you thought about the impact or impression you would like your video to make?

It’s easy enough to create a video yourself and pop it into the home page of your site, just a nice little ‘Hello World’ a welcome to my site and this is who we are. However one of the easiest ways to get traffic is by putting your vids onto YouTube and here is the big question is your little ‘Hello World’ likely to bring visitors to your site from there?

I think it’s time even small business took a leaf out of the big business handbook, just take a look at the Ads created for the Super Bowl, they make the news each year they are so creative. The moment they are put onto YouTube and other video hosting sites they go viral and get literally millions of views, now what would you pay for that kind of buzz created around your business?

Watch this ad and then read the number of views it has recieved in just a couple of months Imagine what this kind of imagination and exposure could to for your business:

This particular video recieved 584,159 views so far and this is not the only person who has this ad on their channel so page views of this one ad reach into the millions! Just a little imagination, a little thinking outside the square, so if you are thinking video for your site, imagine the possibilities that could open up for you and your business with just a little creative licence.

Let us help you create a video that is worthy of going viral on YouTube…

The Zen Bull – Bringing the World to YOUR Door.

© AnnieInfinite for The Bulls Roar, 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Business, Small business, Super Bowl, Television, Website, YouTube, Zen Bull

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