Five affordable ways to grow your business

Marketing does not have to cost an arm and leg!

1. Sponsor a local youth team.  i.e.  www.3and2Baseball.com
2. Donate your services or products to local charities and your local PTA/schools.
3. Print an ad in the local school directories or newspaper.
4. Vertical marketing with other small business owners
5. Send out regular newsworthy press releases.

Plus, post your questions, marketing ideas, company info on this blog.

John the Marketing Guy

SHIRTS FOR THE KIDS IN HAITI

I am the part-time retail manager at 3 & 2 Youth Baseball in Johnson County Kansas a non-profit little league organization.  My wife and I help sell the tournament t-shirts at each event during the summer to help support the organization.   At the end of each tournament there are often a number of t-shirts left shirts, as many as 75 to 100.  Frequently they are sold the following weeks for a discount.  However, my son came up with this idea of paying it forward rather than selling the shirts at or below cost.  He said, “why not give them to someone that could really benefit and appreciate a new t-shirt.  Why not give them to the kids in Haiti.”    So here is his idea.  We put up a donation jar asking people for a donation.  They put money in the jar and for every shirt they covered our cost we mailed the shirt to Haiti.  However, if we could find a local charity to give the shirts we could save the postage and give even more shirts.    CAN YOU HELP ME.  CONTACT ME.  ALARMGUY@JERICKSONCONSULTING.COM 

Locally owned business gives back to local schools.

Locally Owned Lenexa Business gives back to Lenexa Schools


Papa Murphy’s Take and Bake Pizza in Lenexa Store located at 87th and Lackman in the Hen House shopping center has created relationships with three of the elementary schools in the Shawnee Mission School District within the City of Lenexa. Each school has a one “school night” a month and can has raised no limit on the amount of money they can raise. Recently we have had schools receive as several hundred dollars in one school night.

Rising Star Elementary School Night is the 3rd Wednesday of every month.

Sunflower Elementary School Night is the 2nd Wednesday of every month.

Christa Mc Aullife School Night is the 2nd Monday of every month.

There are more schools coming on board in the near future.

When you order from Papa Murphy’s, TWENTY PERCENT of your order will be DONATED BACK TO YOUR SCHOOL.

Also the class with the most orders will have a Pizza Party!

Here's what you WANT to Do:

Order off of the value menu to maximize the amount donated back to your school. You may also order off our store menu as well. Coupons or other specials cannot be used at the time of a school night order. However, we will happily accept discount coupons at any other time you place an order.

Good things happen to good people that do good things.

When is the last time you have turned on the news and heard a good story that gave you hope, uplifted you and made you feel good? It seems that much of the “breaking news” is how the Stock Market is crashing, another Amber Alert, or the latest unemployment numbers. So, here is a story about good things happening to good people that are doing good things. This is about a locally owned cookie bakery operated by a husband and wife team that has earned a reputation of quality and exceptional service. In fact, their reputation reached a very popular radio personality that once he sampled their cookies he repeatedly commented on their cookies that helped their word-of-mouth business climbed.


The company is Best Regards Cookie Bakery, Robert and Cherrie Duensing the owners and the popular radio personality is Toby Tobin. Because of the relationship that Best Regard and Toby started they were able to significantly help Harvesters Food Bank as with a successful food drive. This is truly a story someone making a difference and paying it forward. Instead of wondering what they are going to get out of it personally. Each individual in this story continued to look forward and found a way to keep doing good things for someone else which makes them good people doing good things.

Wait it does not stop there. NBC and Mark Clegg also heard about what Toby and Best Regard were doing and they did a story. See for yourself.

http://www.nbcactionnews.com/news/local/story/Popular-Cookies-Raise-Donations-for-Harvesters/l3jHtCwpJkWZQ7HdjEhDug.cspx

buy kc

buy kc


I have always said tell me the rules, show me the game, and I will find a way to win. Well when I ask my friends that have a small business if they got their stimulus check they laugh and say they are still waiting. So, I thought I would try to do something to help. I created a blog and LinkedIn Group both to try to give business owner and hopefully consumers a forum to go to where they could discuss buying local and stimulating our own Kansas City community. If every 68.00 of 100.00 spent goes right back into the economy then we have a way of helping ourselves. As a friend of mine says, “vote, with your dollars.” I have opened both of these sites up to any discuss to allow a company to throw out a promotion, an idea, marketing, or to tell us about a company that is doing a good thing for our community. I hope you will take the time to go to the site and participate.

On my LinkedIn account I have started a group called BuyKc as well as again started a blog to help promote KC business, give consumers a site to go to brag about local business as well as give business owners a site to shamelessly plug their own business or a fellow business. www.buykc.blogspot.com please check it out. I am not profiting just trying to make our town stronger.

Post what are you favorite local service or stores and why on this blog.

I will start with one of my favorites;

www.makethemsmile.com Best Regards Cookie Bakery

Also, check out my other blog.
 
http://www.madmanmarketing.blogspot.com/

Would you be more inclined to buy from a local company that you knew its employees all had their flu shots?

When I was a Vice President of a local security installation company I use to recommend to the owner that we either offer the employees one of several options; One, that we pay their co-pay for them to get their flu shot. Two, that we give them time during the day to go get their flu-shot on the "clock."  Three, that we just pay the $25.00 for the flu shot at the local drug store for the employee to get their flu shot.  

  Each time I would bring this up and get shot down, no pun intended.   My agrument was that we had an obligation  not only our employees and their families but also to our client's and their families.    Not to mention that we would have less down time due to sick days and loss of production that cost us much more than any of the three options.    Besides since I was Vice President I had seen the financials and knew we could afford it.  It was just good business.  

 It also seemed to be a good marketing tool that we could state that not only were we protecting your property but now we were protecting your health.   I never got the owner to give the green light to get the program off the ground. 

So, here is the question as a consumer would you be more likely to buy from a company that had all it's employees vacinated with the flu vacine?  Also, if you had a choice of buying from a local company or a national company and the local company had employees that were vacinated and the national company did not which one would you buy from?

Why buy KC? Why buy Local?

I have always been someone that believes that you should just take what is given to you and turn it into a something productive.   My montra, "tell me the rules, show me the game, and I will find a way to win."   Forget polictics, forget the weather, even forget the economy if you want to succeed you just  find a way to WIN.    Often small business owners do just that!

Being a small business owner I have always tried to "vote" with my dollars and keep my hard earned money right in my own community. That gives my community the jobs, taxes, and income  and more.   Additionally it gives another local resident the opportunity to work, pay their mortgage and bills.   With no  surprise I have always found that locally owned companies offer a higher level of personal service and often a better value.   

I created this blog to give both consumers and small business owners a chance to share.

I want to share with you now several small business website of local companies that I know they are "finding a way to WIN."

www.sealwizekc.com

www.makethemsmile.com

www.MoonlightDecks.com?ref=je


Please share your comments and insights also.

Thanks,
John Erickson
John the Alarm Guy
http://www.jericksonconsulting.com/