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Michelle Hite

Launch Your Business Online: Free Workshop on Website Essentials

When:
Tuesday September 27, 2011 from 9:30 AM to 12:30 PM EDT

Where:
SBA Georgia District Office
233 Peachtree Street, NE
Harris Tower, Suite 1900
Atlanta, GA 30303

What:

SCORE  mentors and  representatives from the local business community  conduct a  variety of  regularly scheduled, low cost educational  workshops that  provide  valuable information and techniques necessary  for establishing  and  managing a successful business. 
    
Having  a  website has become almost a requirement for small businesses.   However,  when it comes to setting up a website, there are so many   options,  choosing what to do is often confusing for a non-technical  small  or  independent business owner.
In this  introductory  workshop, the instructor will introduce you to the basics  of great  website design and the available options to chose a domain  name. You'll touch on web hosting, providers, and the different forms  of  websites your company might select.  The instructor will acquaint you   with WordPress™ and it's capabilities as a design tool and content   management system

Register today and begin your road to successful entrepreneurship.

SCORE Atlanta
scoreatlanta@joimail.com
404 331 0121

Get Free E-book: How to Use Twitter for Business

Happy Thursday GloryWorks! Family,

 

Sometimes tidbits of wonderful information cross my desk. I subscribe to a e-mail newsletter that social media expert Debbie Weil sends out, and it's always chockfull of great information.

The following comes directly from her newsletter, and tells you how you can get your own copy of HubSpot's free e-book on how to get use Twitter for Business:

 

Weil says:
HubSpot's free e-book is, hands down, the most practical resource I've run across for how to get the most out of Twitter for business.

I love the tips on:

• How to set up your Twitter profile (hint: use a smiling photo and make your mini bio an elevator pitch)
   
• What to tweet about (hint: don't be corporate; offer useful links to other resources; live tweet a conference)
   
• How to create a customized background (hint: if you don't have access to a designer, use a service like Themeleon to customize color palettes and patterns) 

Download the Free eBook now

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Part 2, there is more strategic information on how to use Twitter for marketing, PR, customer service and lead generation. As I've said before, I love HubSpot's free e-books and Webinars. They are the best example out there of "marketing with great content."

 

I'll be in touch again soon.

 

best regards,

 

Debbie Weil
202.255.1467
www.debbieweil.com/blog

Serial Entrepreneur Finds Success Using Social Media

GloryWorks! Family,

How are your business related social media efforts going? Swimmingly, I hope. If you need a little inspiration, I have plenty of examples of individuals who are using social media to boost their businesses and rake in some serious dough.

This week's inspiration: Mari Luangrath, founder, Foiled Cupcakes
taken from Crain's Small Business Forum Newsletter

Luangrath is currently working on her third entrepreneurial venture, Foiled Cupcakes, Chicago's only online-order and personal-delivery cupcake company. Starting the gourmet business with her own capital and using social media as her only form of advertising, Luangrath has proven her expertise in relationship building using online networks and word-of-mouth marketing: Foiled Cupcakes surpassed first-year revenue goals by more than 600%, entirely attributed to Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and blogging.

Luangrath's authenticity and passion for business strategy and networking has resulted in a client list that includes Bank of America, the Chicago Cubs, the Food Channel, Harpo Communications, Northwestern University, Wm. J. Wrigley Co. and more than 100 Fortune 500 companies.

Good News for GloryWorks! Biz Owners: Alpharetta Accelerator Launches August 9

With Georgia leading the nation in new business startups, a new kind of small business incubator will launch with ribbon-cutting ceremonies 4pm-6pm on Tuesday, August 9, 2011 to serve the need for more and better small-business growth and job creation throughout the state.

 

The Alpharetta Accelerator has been designed by its principals to offer multiple new services to its clients, unlike other small business incubators. The services include a 75-member Board of Advisors; access to the soon-to-be-established $10 million Alpharetta Seed Capital Fund; and preferred access to the Atlanta Gathering of Angels, a group of accredited investors that meets twice monthly. The Gathering of Angels group has found capital for more than 375 young companies since it was founded in 1996 by Tarby Bryant, one of the managing partners of the Accelerator.

The Accelerator will be located at 221 Roswell Street in downtown Alpharetta, Georgia, in what the principals call full service, state-of-the-art and best of breed facilities complete with unlimited free parking and neighborhood amenities. It will comprise the entire first floor of the building which is the headquarters of Staffing Technologies Worldwide, a privately-held $60 million international technological staffing company owned by Jim McNabb, another managing partner of the Alpharetta Accelerator.

LEARN MORE: Alpharetta Accelerator Launches August 9 | Atlanta Daybook

Entrepreneur Bets on Happiness With Grilled Cheese

Serial Entrepreneur Jonathan Kaplan discusses his new idea: The Melt. Jonathan is known for making the flip camera phone that was purchased by Cisco for $500 million. He's been an entrepreneur since the age of 11.

Need inspiration for your business - read his story!http://www.npr.org/2011/07/29/138590240/entrepreneur-bets-on-happiness-with-grilled-cheese

Resurrection House's Art Hall Gets Social for Waffle House

Everyone who knows Art Hall knows that he "GETS Social Media!"   So much so, that Waffle House opted to use him in their Waffle House Regulars ad promoting their new iPhone Location App.

Check out Art Hall as he attempts to locate the nearest Waffle House using the iPhone app, but don't forget to get your FREE Sausage Biscuit too! Ah, the joys of social media -- Free Stuff All Day Long!

Catherine Cook & myYearbook.com on Donny Deutsch

Millenials Making Millions

Entrepreneur Catherine Cook founded myYearbook (http://www.myyearbook.com/) in 2005 when she was only 15 years old. The company has since been sold, and she made $100 million! Check out the story below.

http://finance.yahoo.com/career-work/article/113170/millennials-make-millions-wsj

Create social media fans on Facebook & Twitter | Jeff Wiegand | USA Today

Here's a question that I get asked all the time: How exactly do you create or get fans on social media newtworks?

There are probably a thousand ways to answer that question, but I can show you better thn I can tell you. This webcast gets right to the point about how to Create social media fans on Facebook & Twitter Jeff Wiegand USA Today, so please check it out today

Use This New Social Tool to Create Your Own "Radio Station"

So you think you have something special to share with the world? Well now you can in a cinch ...Cinchcast that is. Cinchcast can help you share audio messages and podcasts with your customers. In fact, you can pretend you have your own radio station and broadcast live from the comfort of your home!

If you want to report from the groundfloor conference, hold a global conversation, or share testimonies about your business? Cinchcast will help you do it because it transforms your smartphone or PC into an audio recorder.

Learn more about how some companies are using Cinchcast to move their businesses forward.

Ask GloryWorks!: Here's Your Chance to Get Your Questions Answered

The other day, I received an email from Green TV Marketing (anyone who knows me, knows that I am a little zealous about the whole going green movement!). The CEO of the company posed the following questions of her viewers/followers, and I thought the questions were worthy of repeating and tackling amongst ourselves.

Afterall, this blog was never intended to be one-sided; so here's your chance to ask any social media question you want. In fact, just in case you're a little shy about asking what's on your heart, here are a few items to get your juices flowing:

How can we best support you?
What are your goals are and what you want to know?

Try to be specific. Great questions to ask (I pulled these from Green Marketing TV) are:

• How can I use Twitter more effectively to reach my target audience?
• I am launching a business and need to get a beautiful website up fast, and cheap. What's the best way to do this?
• How can I network with people online so I can find influencers to mentor me in my particular industry?
• How can I attract more clients for my business with social media?

Don't limit yourself to these questions though. Go for it! Ask away.
If we don't know the answer, we trust God to show us where to find what you need.

I look forward to your questions, and I trust our community of Glorypreneurs will rise to the challenge and provide valuable feedback.

To your success,

Angela
P.S. Don't forget to follow RHFAN on Twitter: www.twitter.com/rhfantoday

GREAT WEBINAR on Wednesday, July 20: How to Create Content That Ignites Your Business

So how's your business coming, Glorypreneur?

I had the pleasure of attending a presentation by Ann Handley, Chief Content Officer at MarketingProfs, and I learned a great deal. I even have a copy of "Content Rules," a book she co-authored with C.C. Chapman, founder of Digital Dads, that is full of insightful information.

Learn more about how you can create content that really engages your customes during a free webinar on Wednesday, July 20 at 1 p.m. EST.

Blogs, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other online platforms are giving organizations like yours an enormous opportunity to engage directly with your customers. What's more, you can entice your customers to share those stories with each other, all across the web.

  
How to Create Content that Ignites Your Business 

Produce great stuff, and your customers will come to you. Produce great stuff, and your customers will share your story for you. More than ever before: Content is king! Content rules!

Join Ann Handley and C.C. Chapman, authors of Content Rules, as they discuss how content may rule, but your online content must be the right sort of content: customer-focused, authentic, compelling, remarkable, interesting (even gripping), valuable.

Attend this interactive webinar to learn how to:

• Create bold stories, webinars and blog posts
• Streamline the process of content creation
• Empower your brand with strategies, tactics and "rules"
• And more...

Register for the Webinar



EurekaThe Perfect Video Training Series to Help You Become a Blogger

I am super, duper excited! I just stumbled upon perhaps one of the most useful video tutorial sites around: Become A Blogger.com

Remember Erish's question at our last GloryWorks meeting: "Should I use Blogger or Wordpress for my company blog?" Either platform is great depending on your needs, but the authors of these really helpful how-to videos have created an entire series about how to use Wordpress (the platform my friend Lorraine Sanabria Robertson uses to power the popular blog RunWifeyRun) that is sure to answer many questions you might have about blogging.

One of the guys blogs professionally for a living and makes about $100,000 a year from his blogging business. I know this is a mere drop in the bucket for you glorious entrepreneurs, but

I know it's Friday and you probably have a million things to do; however, making an investment in your business is an activity that you can do today that will give lasting rewards and a great return on your investment.

Check Video #1 in the Series: Why You Should: http://www.becomeablogger.com/video-1.html

Now That I Set Up My Blog, What Do I Write About?

It's me again, Glorypreneurs!

I trust that you have taken a sneak peak at the How to Set Up a Free Blog video I posted yesterday, but now you may be sitting in front of your computer screen like a deer in headlights wondering, "What in the world am I going to write about now that Angela twisted my arm to start this sandblasted blog?"

Well have no fear. I've been where you are, and I have, and I still do, ask myself the same question.


The tips I posted on the blog earlier are sure to help you, but these little exercises I found online are also really, really helpful. Jeff Goins has created, "A Helpful Writing Exercise to Focus Your Blog Content."

The Exercise

Before you begin writing, consider your subject (what you want to write about), then boil it down to a theme (your specific angle and area of focus), then an objective (what you want to accomplish).

Subject

The subject is the broadest area of your writing.
It can be stated in a word or two, probably. In order to find it, ask yourself:

• What am I passionate about?
• In what topic do I have expertise or a desire to learn?
• What could I write about for a year without running out of ideas or energy?

Exercise: Spend 10 minutes brainstorming one-word answers to the above questions. Don’t take too long. Let intuition guide you. Then, pick one (and only one).


Find more helpful exercises on Jeff's Blog

GloryWorks Is Going Social

Good Morning Glorypreneurs!

I had a great time talking to you about social media last night at RHFAN's GloryWorks! meeting. I hope you learned a lot and will commit to doing a least something "social" that will take your business to higher ground!

I will be posting several how-to videos to help you along the way, but let's be like Nike, and Just Do IT! I believe with all my heart that you are going to love the experience.

To your success, Angela
Follow Me on Twitter for More Info You Can Use to Help You Go Social
http://www.twitter.com/gowonderfish

How Do I Set Up A Free Blog on Blogger: Here's How
I Can't Wait to Hear Who Successfully Set Up Their Blogs

Worth Looking Into

Fashion of Goodwill Blog
http://www.fashionofgoodwill.org/blog/
Serious Start Ups Always Has Great Things on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Serious-Startups/129524867111064

Ask Wifey is Serious About Blogging
http://www.runwifeyrun.com/

Gary Vaynerchuk
http://garyvaynerchuk.com/

The Pizza Guy Everyone Wants to Know
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWKbrCz0J60

Blog and Be Regular

Here are the top 10 business blogging tips:
1) Be regular: This applies to all kinds of blogs. But many think that business blogs have the liberty to be lax on posting frequency. Don’t do so!  Make sure that fresh articles come up on your blog regularly.  Blogs that are rarely  updated never gain momentum.
2) Don’t Oversell: Yes, it is true that the business blog is supposed to help your business. But don’t oversell through your articles. You need to strike a perfect balance between information posts and the posts that you use to promote your product/services. If you try to sell on every post you write, it is very hard to gain a customer base.
3) Get Authorities: You do not have to do it all yourself.  Invite experts, clients, authors others related to your business to write on your blog.  This is a great way of gaining authority and trust from your readers – which is a must for a successful internet business.
4) Clear contact information: Your readers should be able to reach you easily. Accessibility to the author is an issue that most business blogs face. make it easy for people to get in touch with you: Phone numbers, email addresses, social media and IM names, whatever. Throw the kitchen sink at that contact page, because you don’t know what other people’s preferred communication style is.
5) Connect Your Blog and Website Clearly: Business blogs can be a great source to create a lot of traffic to your company website. For this reason make sure that your company website and the business blog is connected clearly where visitors can see them. You can use  a subdomain (blog.yourdomain.com) or  (yourdomain.com/blog) for your business blog. Whereas, the main domain (www.yourdomain.com) can be your company website.
6) Leverage Social Media: Have a Facebook Like box, Twitter Follow Me badge on the sidebar. This will help you connect with social media platforms to your readers.
7) Not just articles: Don’t stick to words only. Create an interactive business blog using multimedia such as infographics, videos, pictures and slide shows. Provide links to other related articles on your blog as well as to other useful content on the internet. Use polls and surveys to increase interactivity.
Don’t Consider Ads: The primary aim of a business blog is to generate business for your company so it is not such a great idea for you to place third-party ads. Since, it looks unprofessional. However, you can add ads for your own company or service as well as partner websites.
9) Learn By Asking: The ultimate secret of business blogging is asking your customers what exactly they want. This cannot be achieved by talking all the time. Stop talking and observe what is it that your readers are hinting at. And of course, asking them directly is also an effective way to know what they have in their mind. You need not be the be-all and end-all to gain a million customers.
10) Set Goal and Measure Progress: If you are ever wanting to reach somewhere then you business blog needs to have a specific goal. This goal-setting needs to be done by you. More so, you should also be able to track its progress.
For this you can use services such as Google Analytics. But since this is business blogging it would also be useful for you if you know what people are saying about you. You can use services like socialmention.com, trackur.com for that
.

10 Business Blog Tips That Make A Big Difference

In business blogging the “little things” add up to a cumulative effect. What little things have you overlooked on your blog? Here are ten little things that add up to a better impression on your readers—if you’ve paid attention to them. If you’ve missed these, well, you may not be making as good of an impression as you’d like. These tips are specific to WordPress, by the way.

1. A tag line that instantly communicates your business benefit to the visitor. If you’re stuck on just how to do that (and it’s not easy) see this post on taglines at Copyblogger.
2. Somebody other than “admin” is writing your posts. I see this happening way too often. Hey there, “admin,” why don’t you go into your user profile settings and change them!
3. Clear contact information (or better yet, a contact form). I use Contact 7, but also check out Cforms. If you want the business, for goodness’ sake make it easy for people to get in touch with you: Phone numbers, email addresses, social media and IM names, whatever. Throw the kitchen sink at that contact page, because you don’t know what other people’s preferred communication style is.
4. Make what you’re selling obvious to find and easy to buy. Whether you’re a consultant, coach, freelancer, or selling products, don’t bury that fact in your About page. This information should be front & center on your home page and on dedicated page(s). Notice that big fat blog consulting link in my navigation bar and now the contents of my home page are unmistakably all about business. There are nice big buy buttons on the consulting services page: there is no mysterious process, here. No hoops to go through. Easy-peasy.
5. If you actually want people to subscribe, make it obvious and easy to do. See my post on the FeedBurner basics nobody told you about for how to add an awesome email subscribe thingy to your blog sidebar.
6. Simplify your permalinks with %category%/%postname% or just %postname%. Easy enough to do if your blog is new, but what if it’s not? Then you need Dean’s Permalink Migration plugin, which will automagically (I love that word) redirect all your old permalinks to their new ones. This way, any links to your blog (your internal ones and links from other blogs) will never be broken.
7. Clean up your slugs before you hit “publish.” Slugs, what? Yes, the post permalink file name is called a “slug.” You can edit them just below the headline in the blog post writing page in WordPress. Shorten them up for better SEO and human readability.
8. Put some thought into your business blog’s categories. Actually, put a LOT of thought into them. When you think categories, think keywords. For ideas, look at how your niche is categorized at large sites like About.com. This is especially important if you use %category%/%postname% permalinks.
9. Pictures of you and the other authors (if yours is a multi-author blog) so we know you’re real people. Happy, smiling faces induce trust. If your target market is people like you, let them see that you’re like them. The more you are your own brand, the more important this is. Make sure they’re decent pictures, too, taken with a good camera with good lighting.
10. Only put what matters in your sidebar. Get the rest of that stupid junk out of there. Unless you spend a lot of time on sites like MyBlogLog, you don’t need those widgets cluttering up your sidebar and slowing down your page load times. Everything on your blog serves the ultimate goal of subscribing or selling, and that goes for the sidebar, too. Don’t let it become the “junk drawer” of your blog.
11. Overdeliver. Go the extra mile. That’s where the real difference is made between you and your competition. When you feel like you’ve done enough, keep going. Add even more value than what is required of you. Do this consistently, and you will have a better shot at dominating your niche over time.

Social Media for Small Business: Will Going Social Boost Your Sales?