News And Updates
I was just reading this yahoo article and it caught my eye. I have worked on many of the various models they talk about. I actually purchased the Acer one Aspire and love everything about it. The touchpad is the only downside because of its stiffness. I would put that one second on the list. There is no doubt however that Asus has won the battle of producing the best netbook on the market! Especially with its quality of parts, stylish looks, and performance ratings. Read the rest of the article below.
http://finance.yahoo.com/family-home/article/106954/Battle-of-the-Netbooks
Craigslist is the new replacement for the local Yellow Pages! Having experimented extensively with small and big ads in the Yellow Pages I have to say that it is certainly not worth the investment compared to free ad placement like http://www.craigslist.org.
It’s easy to setup your account, select your local area under computer services, and write some text in your ad so its searchable through google as well as within the Craigslist site. Then….
THE REAL SECRET IS GETTING A PROFESSIONAL LOOOKING JPEG IMAGE FLYER CREATED!
ALSO MAKE SURE TO CONTAIN LINKS ON THE IMAGE AND IN THE TEXT BACK TO YOUR OWN WEBSITE!
By utilizing some html script in your ad you can post a JPG flyer ad that will draw in customers. Check out mine that have been created for some examples. I had each one created for about 30 dollars each and I use them over and over again. Outside of referral marketing this has been the most successful form of advertising for brining in at least 10% of my business every month! AND ITS FREE!
You just got your new business cards. Now you want to start handing them out and getting people to call you for your services. Well, hold on for a minute, read the below information first!
- In most cases when you meet people at the Chambers your going to find that you will need to build relationships with those people before you can convert them to actual paying customers. I have found that I need to meet someone at least three different times for this too really happen. A lot of times you’ll run into people asking for too much free advice and never pay. Avoid these people and give higher priority to someone you think will actually pay you for what you are worth.
- You’ll also going to meet lots of people who are involved in Multi Level Marketing programs, or just other businesses that want to just sell and not buy. Your learn after personal experience how to develop a gut feeling in who is going to be worth perusing a working relationship with, and who is just trying to sell, sell, sell and not buy.
- On a final note, I would visit the various chambers around your area and maybe join the top two that you feel are valuable. Be aware of others in your industry and there relationships with the other people. If the customers your trying to talk with already have a strong relationship with the other computer guy, move on to someone who you can sell too, or find out if they are happy and see if you can deliver something the other computer service is not doing. Use this as one way to meet people but also get involved in other local activities so you meet other people again and again. Over time you’ll find you bump into the same people at different mixers, rotary groups, business fairs, dinners, and ribbon cuttings! Over time you’ll meet friends and lots of potential business customers if you give it enough time!
There is not set time limit for how long things should take or how many customers your actually going to get. The focus here is Referral Marketing and this is just one tool of that type of marketing.
Craig writes the following email letter: Read Below for my response:
Scott,
I recently watched your You-Tube Video and really learned some things. I am starting my own computer repair business and trying to come up with my companies name. The more I read the more I realize the importance of a good name. One that is catchy, not cliche, simple, has my companies theme linked to it etc… I am wanting the name to be the same as my website address. It seems like lots of the good names and one\’s I think of are taken. I am originally from Australia and am now living in Massachusetts. I was going to use pcmaestro, but the .com domain is already used. Some names I have thought of that are not taken are as follows:
pcozgeek.com, pchoudini.com, techiedr.com, pccureit.com,
Is it important to have PC in the name or should I go for something a little different. How does it work when people are doing a google search to come up with Computer Repair Companies in m area. Any feedback/suggestions would be great. Thanks.
——–My Response Below———-
Hey Craig,
If your just doing a local small business then pick a name that you like and go with it. I had a similar problem that you have with picking the name. I focused on a name that would allow me to think big and not just limit myself to doing just computer repair. I wanted it to focus on anything relating to technology. So I chose Bates Technology Group. The name is long for a website but I chose batestechgroup.com for short. All those names are great, I would chose one you like and then brand it locally by providing a good reliable service.
Its easy to get caught up in all the think big stuff right now. I would just keep it small and just focus on building your clients first. As things progress so will the complexities of the structure of your business. Word of mouth will probably make up 75% of your return business, the website will be just a small part so that is way the name should be something you like and is easy to remember. No one else will care about the name as much as how good the service is.
Hope this helps!
Scott
Every legitimate business seems to have one thing in common. There is a phone number to call for vendors and customers who need your service. When you are trying to get small business clients as customers you will need to have a professional way to greet callers when they call your phone number. There are a lot of ways this can be done with expensive phone PBX systems, receptionists, answering services, etc. My personal choice is to use a virtual PBX like http://www.ringcentral.com
This type of service will allow you to have all the power of a big company phone system with no expensive hardware and nothing to maintain. You can choose a local and toll free number for your business! The biggest feature that comes in handy is a call forwarding feature that you can assign a certain extension. For example when I have people call my business they can press 1 for Tech Support, 2 for Sales, 3 for Client Relations, and 4 for the Front Desk. Each extension can be programmed to forward the call to a cell phone, home phone, or another ring central internet phone. I have my setup going for about 30 bucks a month!
Also, it helps to have a person with a good voice make your greeting, there are services who can do this for you and most will do a one minute recording for under a couple hundred bucks!
This is just one more idea I thought I would share for someone wondering how to get the phones setup in your new business. With the flexibility of a cell phone and call forwarding through a virtual PBX, you really don’t need to pay an answering service or receptionist unless you want too!
5 important business tips to get you on the right track if your even thinking about starting a computer repair or other services type business!
1) You need some type of supplemental income starting out, either from your wife / husband, a part time job, a huge savings account, or a trust fund.
2) Don’t borrow more on credit than about 10% of your gross income. If your gross income is still negative, then you don’t use credit cards.
3) One man shows are very difficult to run, I recommend you have at least one business partner you can trust. I know this is hard but it is an absolute nowadays where it seems like every great idea always involves two minds instead of one.
4) Don’t get caught up all the legal structuring like CORPS and LLC’s, and hiring CPA’s etc.. this is all unnecessary until you start making the big bucks. I had a 1 million dollar liability insurance policy that only costs 250 dollars per year! That’s a lot cheaper than the minimum tax of a LLC or Corp.
5) 90% of the people you talk with will have bad advice and don’t really know much more than you. You have to become your own expert through trial and error. Doing trial and error with no supplemental income will put you out of business quick!
There are many other things to consider but I felt these topics are very important to keep in the back of your mind at all times!
A lot of people starting up there business for the first time are going to have questions about what makes a good business card. Your also going to be curious about the cheapest method to get the best looking, feeling, and quality printed card. After going through this process once before I thought I would summarize what I think to be the best way to get this done in the following order:
- Every good business card needs to have a logo that represents your company. A great logo is a sure sign of the kind of quality your business is going to deliver to the customer. You’ll also need to have this same logo to start your website, I’ll discuss the process of doing the website in another article. The bottom line is a great logo for a low price by finding a competent graphics designer. You can search for one on cragislist.org or get a referral by someone you know. My logo was made by http://www.ginawassdesigns.com and it came out perfect!
- The same person who creates your logo can also create a whole bunch of other marketing materials like letter heads, brochures, packaging, and other business promotion materials.
- Take the pdf file that you recieve and you can upload it to a site like http://www.overnightprints.com. Once things are lined up you can place your order and have a pretty decent business card with in a few business days. I use overnight prints because of the prices and the quality of the card. The card has a pretty good thickness to it so it does not feel like cheap thin paper. Again, going back to the quality concept, don’t be cheap!
Business cards are not suppose to be complicated or expensive. But it is probably the most important thing you have when your doing network marketing and sales for your business!
Here is an example of my business card, its a front and back design. It delivers a clear image of what services I provide, how to get a hold of me, and that I am not some overnight operation with a cheap business card!
A new virus worm has made its way through people’s USB drive sticks! This is one reason I always inform people of the importance of a good anti-virus software and keeping your windows operating up to date with the latest patches from Microsoft.
When you plug in your drive it will trick your auto-run to execute and fools you into clicking on “Open folder to view files”. Once installed, the virus spreads like crazy via a separate flaw in Windows networking system (now patched, so be sure to run Windows Update if you haven’t lately) and can quickly infect a whole office.
Yahoo News has produced an excellent article about this: Read it at this link below:
You can download AVG Free 8 which is an excellent anti-virus software this link below:
Thanks and please leave your feedback!
I was just reading an interesting story this morning about Steve Jobs and Apple Computer. People may think about selling off all of there apple stock but between a robust management team, good supply chain, and good distribution it just makes sense to hold on!
I have always valued what Apple has done with the iTunes, Ipod, Iphone, and there excellent power book computers, I will always be a Windows power user but hey Apple’s have there place too!
What do you guys think? Read this interesting story on Apple at think link:
I have been looking forward to this for a while now. In a future article I will be discussing more details of what you can expect from Windows version 7. For now, let’s just say it looks a lot like Vista but will have far less problems with bugs etc.. I am hoping it will work well with new hardware and give Microsoft a new OS that will be as successful as Windows XP in the home and business worlds!
You can read a detailed article about Windows 7 here:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/01/11/windows_7_public_beta_live/
You can download the beta at this link:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/dd353205.aspx
What do you think? Leave a response below!