Business and Finance Articles
posted on 21 August 2010
My family has learned the hard way that in New Hampshire it is buyer beware on used cars. Once you sign that paper the car is yours. We bought a used car from Empire Auto Group for our daughter. Emily and I test drove the car. She needed to get a car and head up to school all in one day. The little red car looked good. They needed to put new tires on it and clean it. So Emily and I went home to get the insurance information all straightened out. We went back and they pulled the car up. I noticed another red car on truck with other cars going somewhere. The car they pulled around did not have new tires. The salesman told us oh we made a mistake can you come back in an hour. I dropped Emily off and she drove the car home. It was not the car we had tested. This car was the same make but not the car we wanted. She needed to go so I gave her my car to go north with. I called Empire Auto and told them we didn't want the car. They had rushed the paperwork on us. This was a complete used car scam. In New Hampshire there are no consumer rights buying a used car. We tried to bring the car back but they told it we drove it off the lot it is ours. |
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posted on 16 August 2010
As a professional marketer, it’s my job to help clients position themselves in order to effectively market their products or services – and along the way, I realized that I too needed to step up my game in marketing my own product and services. It’s always a challenge for a professional to do for themselves, what they get paid to do for others – and I was no exception.
There are many ways to drive traffic to your site: SEO, email marketing e.g. bulk business email lists, and through word of mouth marketing.
In promoting my “new” and “improved” website, I needed a strategy that would (hopefully) create a reason for people to visit my site, preview my services, and generate enough interest for them to pick up the phone or send me an email. For my most recent promotional strategy, I re-designed my website in a “weekly magazine” format, which includes news, profiles and events – and also ensuring that the content was industry for my targeted audience.
Since my client base and target market are interior designers, I update my site weekly with insightful and useful information geared towards the interior design and new home construction industries – with weekly updates that include the latest design trends for kitchen or baths, regional designer and builder profiles, industry pricing updates, and more.
As a result, I have seen a 32% increase in web traffic, 22% increase in new business and 15% increase in ad revenue. While this did not happen overnight, it did happen - at a gradual growth pace which did not disappoint nor overwhelm. To get the word out about my new site, I sent out creative, eye-catching designed announcements on quality stationery to existing clients, potential clients and the media (which garnered me two newspaper mentions and a magazine interview -all adding up to “free” advertising). In the world of advertising and promotion, no matter what marketing tool you decide to use, make sure you it is targeted, industry specific and is capable of opening the door to new business and revenue opportunities. |
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