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The Prize Is Always Right

Giving away a prize as an incentive to sell a product or solicit a donation is a time-tested marketing ploy that never fails. The only problem is that the market has become oblivious to sweepstakes.

Promoters are giving away the same old prizes time and time again. Without adding anything exciting to the sweepstakes, you might as well offer $10 million or your efforts (or your product or charitable cause) are likely to be ignored.

In this age of mega-million lotteries, the type or value of prizes offered speak the language of the market. If your product is just as good as that of your competition, or if your charity is just as worthy as any other that seeks donations, then you’d better spike your campaign with a sweepstakes that is unique as can be.

THE PRIZE

A few years ago, a church in Daly City, a bedroom community west of San Francisco was planning a fund raising campaign that involved selling “raffle” tickets to the congregation.

The plan was to sell the tickets for around $5 each, and for which one lucky ticket holder could win the grand prize of a brand new Toyota Tercel.

To say the least, the idea was worn out and unimaginative. A friend coordinating the project decided the raffle could be improved, and consulted me on what the fund raising committee can do to make the sweepstakes more attractive.

My suggestion was to give a different prize. Why not give away a business - a store!!!

VIDEO STORE PRIZE

We went to a new strip mall that was being constructed and leased a storefront for $1,100 a month.

Next we ordered signs and shelves and an initial inventory of 1,200 used video tapes for which we spent a total of $15,000.

For under $20,000, we were able to put together the basic framework of an operational video store. We hanged a banner outside that says “You can win this store. Call for info”.

$200 A TICKET

Because the church wanted to raise $25,000, we decided to sell 250 tickets at $200 each - for a total of $50.000.

Out of this amount, $20,000 will pay for the grand prize, $25,000 goes to the church and $5,000 for my friend for organizing the project which lasted for 6 weeks.

To achieve the same results, and using instead an $8,000 car as a prize, it would require the church to 8,000 tickets at $5 each, a much more difficult fund-raiser by comparison.

Utility Auditing Business

Auditing is not a matter of magic. If you have the patience to sort through regulatory tariff and have a keen eye to spot billing inconsistencies, you can conduct an audit.

Minimum Start-Up: $500
Average Start-Up: 15,000
Revenue: $35,000 - $1 Mil+
Profits: $20,000 - $500,000
One Person Business: Yes

UTILITY BILLS

Auditing utility bills has become one of the most popular areas of concentration for auditors because of the inherent complexity of billing for utilities.

Utility rates are highly confusing because they differ depending on type of service, volume of usage, and promotional packages offered at the time of installation.

GETTING PAID

Utility Auditors earn commissions, usually around 50% of any overcharge they uncover. And this is where you may need to exercise more of your patience.

Although utility companies would gladly settle a verifiable overcharge (relatively quickly out of court), it may ask them up to six months to issue any refund. This is particularly true with larger utility firms.

COMMISSION WORKS

Most clients prefer to pay auditors on commission basis for two reasons: No upfront cash outlay, and no risk if the auditor comes back empty-handed.

For the auditor, working on commission offers distinct advantages: It makes it easier for them to land clients, and it usually enables them to earn more than if they would take a basic fee.

MAKING THE SALE

The biggest challenge facing auditors is to get a potential client to admit that “there is a high probability that they (the client) overpaid for their utilities without knowing it”.

This issue is usually not a problem if the client is a small business where the owner makes all the decisions.

However, the executive committee of a major corporation may feel threatened that they’ll be held accountable for irresponsibly overpaying for utility.

Your job is to convince your potential client that overcharging does happen and that it is the job of an outsider auditor, and not people from within the company, to “fix” the problem.

5 WAYS TO GENERATE QUICK CASH YOU NEED BY RUNNING A MINI-BUSINESS, PART 5 of 5

Continuing from part four, mini-businesses:

INCREASING YOUR INCOME FROM YOUR PRESENT BUSINESS

The easiest way to bring in more income quickly is to offer a special price or package of your current products or services. Your only upfront expense will be getting the word out about your special. Depending on the type of business you run, this expense could be minimal.

For example, one of the services I offer, in addition to my publishing efforts, is custom typesetting and layout work. I could offer a special price for a limited time, or a quantity discount off my normal per-page pricing. In this case, the most cost effective marketing method I could use would be to prepare a flyer for the special (no cost to myself but time spent creating the flyer and copying costs), and distribute it to my best customers and those prospects I would most like to have as long-term clients.

Besides the quick business I’d get from the special, I may entice a few newcomers into my fold that will bring long-term business my way. Used correctly, this technique can provide the quick income you need, while building your permanent customer base.

CONCLUSION

Every business has hard times at the start. That’s just a fact of life or the self-employed. It doesn’t have to be so bad, though, if you plan ahead and take whatever steps are necessary. Package your products and services for quantity sale. Run a small secondary business. These are the ways to reinforce your main business and keep it afloat in rough water.

This is part four of a five part series. Click to read part one, two, three, or four.

5 WAYS TO GENERATE QUICK CASH YOU NEED BY RUNNING A MINI-BUSINESS, PART 2 of 5

Continuing from part one of a five part series:

MINI-BUSINESSES

There are countless businesses you could run as a quick cash producer. I’ll go into a few that I think are the best ideas for most people. Come of these may sound minor league, but that’s what they’re meant to be: easy-to-run, low time and expense businesses you can use to up your income.

CURB NUMBER PAINTING

Here is a great opportunity that can work for anyone in any sort of community. What you will be doing is painting address numbers on curbs for a fee. Why would anyone want this service? Answer this question in your marketing and you’ll find great success with this.

If your house number is painted on the curb in front of your house, it is easier for emergency vehicles (police, ambulance) to find the house, as well as friends and family who aren’t familiar with the area. I’m sure you’ve tried to find someone’s house at night before, but had trouble seeing the numbers on the house. I’ve seen some house numbers that I couldn’t see during the day, much less at night!

Anyway, you should be able to start this business for less than $50. Here are the supplies you’ll need for this service: reflective white highway spray paint (available from paint supply houses), black highway paint, 3″ tall number stencils, wide masking tape, a few old rags, and flyers. The flyers should read something like this:

(Your business name, address, and phone, centered at top of page)

If the police or an ambulance had to find your house at night, would they be able to see your house numbers? If friends or family were trying to find your house for the first time, would they get lost?

Not if you have curb numbers!

Curb numbers are 3″ tall address numbers painted with high-quality, long-lasting reflective white highway paint on a black background. They are highly visible both day and night. You can have professional quality curb numbers by (business name) for only (insert your price).

If you would like this valuable and helpful safety measure, please fill out the coupon at the bottom of this flyer and leave it, along with a check for (price), made out to (business name), in your mailbox. We will be painting numbers tomorrow, starting at (insert time). Thank you!

NOTE: Our service is 100% guaranteed! If you are not satisfied with the quality of our service, call us and we will repaint your numbers or refund your money, no questions asked! (Business name, address, phone)

——————————————-
Name: _____________________________________

Address: __________________________________

Phone (Optional): _________________________

Please leave this coupon, along with a check for (price), in an envelope in your mailbox before (insert time) tomorrow. THANK YOU!

Prepare a batch of these flyers on your computer, or produce an original and photocopy it. It is crucial that it look professional. Take your time, and don’t handwrite it! If you can’t produce a quality original yourself, paying someone else to do it right will pay off in increased business.

Be realistic when setting your price. This is a very low cost service for you to offer, so there will be a good profit margin built in. I would say the price range for this service would be between $3 and $10, with $5 being the most likely for success.

The best neighborhoods for this business are newer, middle to upper income developments, though almost any neighborhood will produce orders, if the price is right. Drive through the neighborhoods in your area and look for those with house numbers that are hard to see.

When you find a neighborhood that looks good, go door-to-door with your flyers. It’s not necessary to knock on doors and do a sales pitch. Rubber band the flyers to door handles, or put them in newspaper boxes. DO NOT put them in mailboxes, as this is illegal. It should only take two or three hours to blanket an average size neighborhood area. The best time to do your distribution is on a Saturday morning, so you can do your painting on Sunday afternoon. This leaves the week untouched for your main business.

The day after you distribute the flyers, return to the neighborhoods you hit. Go to each mailbox and, when you find one with an order, use your masking tape to outline a rectangular area on the curb that is big enough to contain the house numbers. Then, paint the black background. Paint all the backgrounds for the neighborhood before painting any numbers. This will give the black paint time to dry.

When painting the numbers, take your time, make sure your stencils are straight and securely taped in place with your masking tape, and spray your white paint evenly and generously. Wipe up any drips, and touch up as necessary to make your job look flawless.

If you get any calls from dissatisfied customers offer to repaint their numbers or refund their money. Don’t argue and don’t have hard feelings. You might get one or two people who take advantage of you, but that’s a worthwhile chance to take. You see, the guarantee will help to sway any people who are undecided about your service. Offering a no-questions-asked guarantee can greatly increase your business, so why not offer it? If you’ve done a good job, and offered true value for your customer’s money, you shouldn’t get many calls.

Get more orders easily by visiting the same neighborhood 2 to 3 weeks later. Leave flyers at the houses that didn’t get numbers last time. You should get new orders from those who saw your previous work.

A good idea for building order volume is to offer a neighborhood volume discount. For example, if you’ll distribute 200 flyers in a neighborhood, offer 10% off on everyone’s orders if 50 or more people participate. This can help entice people to do a little sales work on their neighbors for you! Note this offer boldly on your flyers.

My final word of advice is to practice before you do any actual painting. Pick up an inexpensive patio block and practice on it. Only an hour or two of practice should be necessary.

A side benefit of this business, besides the income it will generate, is that it will get you out of your office for a few hours each week. Enjoy the fresh air! Plus, the exercise can’t hurt anyone. Good luck!

NOTE: There is a kit for curb numbering that includes interlocking brass number stencils, 2 cans of black paint, 2 cans of white paint and instructions for $39.95 plus $4.95 for shipping. Order from Magic Systems, Inc., Order Dept., P.O. Box 23888, Tampa, FL 33623-3888, or call (800)237-9106 with your credit card.

This is part two of a five part series.  Click to read part one, three, four, or five.

5 WAYS TO GENERATE QUICK CASH YOU NEED BY RUNNING A MINI-BUSINESS, PART 1

It happens to all of us. You’ve left your full-time job for the freedom of self-employment. Things are going well, but then that big bill comes due. Where will you get the extra cash? If you plan ahead, this won’t be a problem. One of the best things a newly independent businessperson can do is to run a mini-business in addition to the regular business. The mini-business acts as a fast cash generator to help you along in those tight times.

The ideal mini-business can be operated in a total of one or two days per week, with a minimum of upfront time and expense. This leaves enough time and resources for your major business. Depending on the type of full-time business you’re running, your mini-business could be an offshoot of your main business, or something completely different. In most cases, service businesses will be the most adaptable to your needs.

Before I go into some examples of mini-businesses, I’d like to cover an essential skill for every businessperson, especially if they’ll be running a secondary business. This subject is TIME-MANAGEMENT.

TIME MANAGEMENT

I remember when I first started my business. I held a full-time job at the same time and worked at least three to four hours every night, and most of Saturday and Sunday, in my own business, just to keep up. I thought there weren’t enough hours in the day. I know I drove my family crazy! Anyway, it all added up to major stress. Do you feel this way?

If you do, you need to do what I did: learn to manage you time. It wasn’t until I took a time management course that I realized how much time I was wasting on unimportant or disorganized tasks. You need to learn to say NO to the time-wasters and to organize and prioritize the important things. Once I started managing my time, I found I had enough time to get everything for my newsletter done, PLUS enough time to write full-length books and market them successfully! You can, too.

The first thing you should do is purchase a daily planning system. If you go to an office supply discounter, you should find a selection of sizes, styles, and prices. You don’t need a big, expensive one, but find one that will be big enough for your own needs. I use a Franklin planner, but any of the others will work just as well. They all work with the same principles of organizing and prioritizing.

If you don't want to purchase a daily planner, you can accomplish many of the same things with a modified "To-Do" list. Now, almost all of us make To-Do lists. They usually consist of a list of tasks that get crossed off when they're done. This is good, but not good enough. Here's what your To-Do list should look like. You can use this as an example to create you own with you computer.

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/ X / PRIORITY / TASK
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/   /          /
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/   /          /
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/   /          /
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/   /          /
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/   /          /
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/   /          /  
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When using this list, first fill-in the tasks you want to accomplish in the “TASKS” column. Write down EVERYTHING you want to do. When you have all your tasks written down, assign priorities. Give all the important “must do” tasks an “A” priority. Tasks that are somewhat important, that can be done if there’s time, get a “B”. Totally unimportant tasks get a “C”. Once you’ve assigned letter priorities, organize your list further by assigning number priorities within each letter group. Look through your “A” list and pick the most important task that MUST be done first. Write a “1″ next to the “A”. Continue through your “A” list, and then start over with the “B” and “C” lists.

You now have a road map for your day. Do the “A1″ task first. When it’s done, DON’T cross the task out, like you might have done on your old-fashioned To-Do list. Instead, put a check mark in the box to the left of the task’s priority.

At the end of the day, you’ll be able to see exactly what you were able to accomplish. Any “A” or “B” tasks still unaccomplished can be transferred to tomorrow’s list. Cross out any “C” tasks that remain. You’ve just eliminated a group of time-wasters!

While you’re transferring “A” and “B” tasks to tomorrow’s list, think about how you could have freed up time during the day to have done them. Were you distracted by the TV for a while? Did you stroll into the backyard to talk to your neighbor? Stick to the list religiously and you’ll get more done.

This might sound corny, but making a written, prioritized list will really help you be more productive. You’ll see exactly what’s important to do, and what you can say NO to (an important skill to have!). You can’t argue with something that’s written down. Just be sure to be realistic when assigning priorities, then single-mindedly finish your tasks according to their priorities.

Give this time management system a try. It only takes five minutes a day, at most, and you’ll be amazed at how much more you can accomplish (including a secondary business)!

This is part one of a five part series.  Click to read part two, three, four, or five.