Promotion - how to get things started

You have a fresh new idea to start with your business or you just want to sell new products? If so, you have to bare with some very frustrating yet interesting things for promoting your new business venture. If you are not a pro in business marketing, consider some of the following points prior going 'alive' with your new business or product/service.

• Investigate your competition - your competition is the most not to say the only reliable source for information and will provide you with information on their core strength but you should be most interested for their weaknesses 
• Determine your customers - you should have a target group, think and write down in general opinions about the product/service. If the product is for young people, you should consider different approach to market than if it would be a offered to different age group. Also, it would be helpful if you divide your potential customers not only by age group, but as well location, amount of money they will be spending according to your location social atmosphere etc.
• Investigate about interest for your business venture - in order to reach high sales as you probably wish you need to ask people's opinion on what do they think about your service/product which will be offered will they be interested to pay to get it and what they think would be the best variant to offer. When doing this research however have in mind that you shouldn't reveal the whole idea just make an overview and see what other think. If you don't know who should you ask you can use some social networking sites as well forum boards where you can ask for peoples' opinin just about anything. A good start for this kind of research could be done here 
  
• Define budget and costs - sadly everything is connected to money, you have to have even small amount money which you would spent on your business development needs, there are always some fixed costs which will need to be covered, so you need to start that old Excel again and do the calculation. The calculation should be as detailed as possible so you will have a detailed overview latter on. Don't think that you are forgeting something, some point is missing, as most probably you will miss a point or two, but this is a normal situation in every business as for instance when you calculate your costs you calculate them knowing prices at the moment but you can not predict the future!
  
• Define sales channels - are you going to offer your product/service with conventional sales channels as direct sales, or are you going to use more tech approach. What will suit your customers group? Maybe telemarketing will work, or you need to find agents in different locations?
  
• Define your goals - in order you business to be profitable you need to set your target goals for the first, second year. What do you expect from your business, how much will your business cost you? What are your fixed costs?
  
• Define your marketing channels - are you going to use the conventional marketing, newspapeprs, magazines etc or are you going to use telemarketing, e-mail newsletters, e-zines, blogs. What will be the most effective on your customers?
• Define prices - The most important thing, prices! I know you want to get those nice high prices which you saw on your competitors list but most probably you're not going to drive a sale if you compare with a business which is established some years ago. Since you already done the calculation for your costs and determined most of them calculate how much really you want to earn during one month of your business operation. But, be aware that most probably in the first year you would be lucky if you can cover your costs only, and this is the good story we're talking about as most of new established business can not cover their expenses in their first year of operation!
  
• Define your business name/product name - now that you have everything covered up, you have your expenses done, you did your research you are ready to go with your product and have your prices and all well tide up, you need a professional name for your product. if you can not think of an idea name for your business you can always try to search online. But most important, your business name is also a key to your success, you should be carefull with your choice.
  
• Hire a professional - in order to start with your new business you need professionals to cover some of theareas you are not proficient with. If you want to look professional with your business venture, you need to hire first a professional to work on your visual style (professional logo, stationery, business cards, website) and also an accountant and maybe a assistant. If you can not afford to pay 'big money' for these services you can try here 

Finally

• Go alive!

and

• Good luck