Business // Current

Church Simulator 'Mass: We Pray' Revealed To Be 'Dante's Inferno' Publicity Stunt

Once again, Electronic Arts has exploited Christians to help promote its upcoming... more

remanns
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The Digital Coin and self-issued credit

A comprehensive & innovative proposal for a new system of sustainable economics.... more

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How Your Small Business Can Grab the Green Business Spotlight

This blog is written by a member of our expert blogging community and expresses that expert's views alone.

The green entrepreneurs I speak with every day have great stories to tell about their phenomenal work saving resources, cleaning our energy, and creating a better world. These stories do more than entertain; they get attention and bring in business. Telling your story is one thing, but making sure that it’s heard is another. Tools ranging from PR to Twitter can deliver your message, each with their pros and cons, and services like 3BL Media can amplify your story to reach more eyeballs and get noticed.

The first step is paring down your message to be crystal clear, making it as short and simple as possible. The value of clarity is often overlooked; clarity helps the message to stick, and also helps entrepreneurs to better understand their own business.

The next step is finding tools to deliver the message to the right eyes and ears. The tools to boost your business visibility include:

1. Blogging – Blogging doesn’t cost anything and can connect you to large numbers of people, but it does take time and it’s not for everyone. For blogging to attract an audience you need to post frequently, probably at least once a week. This may not sound like much, but the entrepreneurs I know are incredibly busy people.
2. Social networking –Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube are free and potentially powerful ways of making connections, but they are also full of noise. The great hope is that your post will go viral, taking on a life of its own, but your content will usually need a big push to stand out and get noticed.
3. Partnering with media distributors – If you already have content and want it to reach more people, services like 3BL Media amplify your message through high profile distribution to a big chunk of the CSR world.
4. Ads – Ads on the internet can be highly targeted based on demographics of websites. An ad campaign does cost money, and the time to keep an eye on what is working, and not working.
5. Public relations – PR can be immensely powerful; getting others in the media to talk about you can provide credibility. It usually takes connections and time to make this happen, and the efforts of a paid professional.

For entrepreneurs working on tight budgets, free tools like blogging, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook can be very attractive. Small businesses are often so focused on their business and so cash strapped these days that they have little money for marketing. Free social networking tools can accomplish a lot and should be used as much as possible, but they can’t always do the whole job on their own. Public relations efforts provide a big boost with the right investment of time and money, although some businesses find it’s more than they can invest today.

http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/glenn-croston/starting-and-growing-green-businesses/how-your-small-business-can-grab-green-busiThis blog is written by a member of our expert blogging community and expresses that... more

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Elizabeth Warren's new model for Wall St.: 'If you can't explain it, you can't sell it'

In Elizabeth Warren's world, credit card contracts would be so simple a teenager could... more

atomiclegion
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'WE MAY HAVE TO SACRIFICE JUST TWO MORE JOBS TO SAVE THE ECONOMY... Fire Geithner, Summers

Rep. Peter DeFazio called for the firing of President Barack Obama's top two economic... more

atomiclegion
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Biden On The Bailout: 'Socialism For The Rich And Capitalism For The Poor' (VIDEO)

In an interview with Jon Stewart on Comedy Central's The Daily Show Tuesday evening,... more

atomiclegion
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Students Win in Anti-Sweatshop Movement!

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/18/business/18labor.html?_r=1 Labor Fight Ends in... more

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The Secret Origins Of Subway's $5 Footlong Revealed

"Five dollar...five dollar footlooooonggg!" Who comes up with this stuff? So goes... more

atomiclegion
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Better World Business From Europe

America used to be the vanguard for change and innovation. Apple, Microsoft, Google,... more

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Adding Services for Increased Spa Traffic

Increasing revenue and traffic for spas and MedSpas can be done several ways. One, open new locations, increase marketing efforts, or adding new services or products.

For many spas, opening new stores or locations may be part of a long-range growth plan, yet may not be suitable while operating in a down economy when spa treatments are viewed as either a luxury or discretionary.

Marketing efforts can be categorized as advertising or direct sales. Advertising can come in many forms. Direct mail, email campaigns, joint marketin efforts with related products or services, TV or radio. Many spas I have seen are flying banners outside their locations (local laws permitting), putting up billboards, and putting advertisements or discount inserts in papers, local news, press releases, or handing out discount or “specials” to customers and guests coming through the spa.

Increasing marketing efforts or expanding services is your best ROI when the economy has slowed. Massage Therapy, Botox or anti-wrinkle procedures, facials, and vein therapy can be supplemented with several ideas.

Another opportunity is making available additional services or products inside the store.

Selling in-expensive consumable products can help boost sales, improve traffic, and get consumers coming back. Spider vein creams can be excellent ancillary products following sclerotherapy or laser therapy. For pregnant women or those who have had children, a preventive or repairing stretch mark cream can help aid recovery and prevent scarring. And while injections can help smooth wrinkles and puff lips, anti wrinkle creams and serums help neck wrinkles, crow’s feet, and puffiness or dark circles under the eyes.

These products are designed to supplement and enhance procedures and improve weekly or monthly revenue. Choosing products that are expensive with luxurious packaging and “rock star” name brands may work against you. While they may certainly enhance the image of your spa (and to many that is important), high-priced skin care products have been shown to be great initial purchases, but lack the consumable “punch” needed for return purchases.Increasing revenue and traffic for spas and MedSpas can be done several ways. One,... more

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Non-Recyclable Disposable Single Cup Coffee Packaging. The K-Cup.

I'm starting to see these little empty non-recyclable, non-biodegradable... more

ninthstate
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Orchard to Business Center in Orem, Utah

Many years ago, my parents moved our family from a tiny little farm town in Fairview,... more

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U.S. Companies Willfully Kill 16 Workers per Day

It's legal in the U.S. for companies to have known deadly safety violations that they... more

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Drug Makers Raise Prices in Face of Health Care Reform

Even as drug makers promise to support Washington’s health care overhaul by shaving $8 billion a year off the nation’s drug costs after the legislation takes effect, the industry has been raising its prices at the fastest rate in years.
In the last year, the industry has raised the wholesale prices of brand-name prescription drugs by about 9 percent, according to industry analysts. That will add more than $10 billion to the nation’s drug bill, which is on track to exceed $300 billion this year. By at least one analysis, it is the highest annual rate of inflation for drug prices since 1992.

The drug trend is distinctly at odds with the direction of the Consumer Price Index, which has fallen by 1.3 percent in the last year.

Drug makers say they have valid business reasons for the price increases. Critics say the industry is trying to establish a higher price base before Congress passes legislation that tries to curb drug spending in coming years.

“When we have major legislation anticipated, we see a run-up in price increases,” says Stephen W. Schondelmeyer, a professor of pharmaceutical economics at the University of Minnesota. He has analyzed drug pricing for AARP, the advocacy group for seniors that supports the House health care legislation that the drug industry opposes.

A Harvard health economist, Joseph P. Newhouse, said he found a similar pattern of unusual price increases after Congress added drug benefits to Medicare a few years ago, giving tens of millions of older Americans federally subsidized drug insurance. Just as the program was taking effect in 2006, the drug industry raised prices by the widest margin in a half-dozen years.

“They try to maximize their profits,” Mr. Newhouse said.

But drug companies say they are having to raise prices to maintain the profits necessary to invest in research and development of new drugs as the patents on many of their most popular drugs are set to expire over the next few years.

“Price adjustments for our products have no connection to health care reform,” said Ron Rogers, a spokesman for Merck, which raised its prices about 8.9 percent in the last year, according to a stock analyst’s report.

This year’s increases mean the average annual cost for a brand-name prescription drug that is taken daily would be more than $2,000 — $200 higher than last year, Professor Schondelmeyer said.Even as drug makers promise to support Washington’s health care overhaul by shaving... more