1. You look at your brand image and it seems ‘retro’, and not in a good way.

2. Your logo design no longer represents your business well. Businesses generally ‘evolve’ over time. Have your products/services and/or your brand ethos changed and the logo isn’t pulling it’s weight any more in terms of accurately reflecting the message you want it to?

3. You’re a tad embarrassed each time you hand out a business card and find yourself having to explain your business because what they see doesn’t accurately convey it.

4. Your 5 year old child etched out a logo for you and it actually looked more relevant and a bit more professional than the one you have.

5. Your logo features a font such as ‘Comic Sans’, ‘Papyrus’, ‘Bickley Script’, ‘Enviro’….you know, from ‘back in the day’ when they were acceptable fonts for a professional business.

At the end of the day, as much as you would like to avoid it, most brands will become tired and less relevant over time and need refreshing or even overhauling.

Some Things To Avoid When Rebranding
Obviously a re-brand will usually involve a re-design or re-vamp of your current logo design and even colour scheme, however of course a re-brand is first of all about re-assessing and re-defining the core values and behaviour of your company and after that ensuring your visual image correlates with these definitions if it doesn’t already.

A re-branding exercise may even involve changing your company behaviour if it’s not behaving the way you would like it to (I’m making it sound like a naughty child now!)

1. Stuck In The Past. Don’t cling onto the past, make sure your new brand is relevant to how the company operates today or how you plan for it to operate, and that your imagery backs this up.

2. Plan. Don’t leap straight into a re-design of your current brand imagery without first establishing what your new and improved brand is exactly. This will lead to confusion over the design brief, a brief that keeps changing, and likely dissatisfaction over the outcome.

3. History. Take care not to alienate your existing loyal client base with the new image and/or behaviour…if the change is going to be quite dramatic it might pay to think about making slow changes over time rather than change everything at once.

4. Cover all areas. Once you’ve established what your new brand is, and then recreated your logo design to mirror this, it’ll be far more effective if you include as many other areas of your operation as possible; ideally all areas should echo your new brand behaviour; that includes customer communications (telephone, email, face to face for example), your website image, your stationery, documentation and more.

5. Don’t re brand without good reason if your current image does actually match your brand behaviour. If your logo design and imagery just looks a bit dated and tired compared to your competitors…you don’t need to change the entire image, simply refresh it without alienating your customer base with a completely new brand image that doesn’t have the same brand equity the old one has. A few small tweaks can make all the difference.

Out of Interest
Even some of the big brands have struggled with re branding, much to the delight of the media, some examples include;

Post Office (attempted to change to ‘Consignia’)
British Airways (removed Union Jack from it’s tail fins and suffered brand attacks from Virgin)
Coca Cola (In 1985 tried to launch ‘New Coke’, it was a total failure and they had to change it to ‘Classic Coke’)

Limited Bandwith.

Back in the UK I had unlimited bandwith. I could download and upload to my hearts content. I’m sure this is a luxury most of you reading this will have too.

When you earn money online, you soon realise that your Internet connection is very important. And it’s something I definitely took for granted before moving to what is effectively a third world country.

Right now I have a daily limit of 2GB of download/upload from a satellite connection. This can quickly run out when you watch a few online videos and dowload software updates.

So, every time a new version of Wordpress is released I used to consume a considerable amount of bandwith downloading and then uploading the new files. Until now that is!!

Thankfully I’ve discovered a peachy little plugin called Automatic Upgrade. This plugin allows you to upgrade Wordpress by following a few simple on-screen instructions, without the need to download and upload (this is what sucks the time and bandwith) all the Wordpress files to your computer. The only items you download are zipped versions of your files and database as backups. But because the files are zipped their sizes are relatively small.

Not only does this plugin save you a large amount of bandwith, it also reduces the time it takes to upgrade Wordpress massively. Even if you have unlimited bandwith. What used to take well over an hour from start to finish (for me anyway), now takes just five minutes.

The only issue I found is that the plugin doesn’t re-activate your plugins as it should do. But that’s no biggy because you can just re-activate them manually.

All in all, this plugin comes highly recommended as a time and bandwith saver for anyone using Wordpress.

A friend had told her that her having a child would lessen her chances of finding the TEFL job she desired.

To be blunt, this kind of advice really pisses me off. It can be really damaging.

Okay, so it may be more of a challenge for her to find a TEFL job with a child than someone without a family. But by no stretch of the imagination is it impossible. And it certainly should not be a reason for this person to give up pursuing what she wants.

Why do friends have to be so discouraging sometimes?

The truth is, when people give you this kind of ‘advice’ they are actually voicing their own self-limiting beliefs. What it really says is that the person giving the so-called advice is putting limits on themselves, blaming external circumstances and then projecting this on to you.

The truth is the only person that can put limitations on yourself is you. No external person or circumstance possibly can, only you.

The woman with the 3 year old can do anything she puts her mind to. She can have the job of her dreams if she really wants it. They are no limitations outside of her own mind. And the same goes for you and me.

Whenever someone tries to tell you that you can’t do something for whatever reason, just smile nicely and take their advice with a huge grain of salt. It’s their own self-limiting beliefs they’re expressing, not yours.

You really can achieve anything you want. It doesn’t mean it will be easy, but guaranteed you can find a way to make anything happen if you want it enough.

You just have to want it enough and believe it is yours.

It’s so cool that I just had to share it with you. For $19 you can get yourself a snazzy Web 2.0 logo that looks really, really slick. Yep, for just $19!! (£10!!)

Sounds great! But there must be a catch right?

Well, there is an teensy weensy one. You only have one shot at getting it right. I guess it’s a bit like Russian Roulette. You tell these guys exactly what you want, and they’ll come up with a design. But for $19 you can’t have any amendments.

I really like the idea. It makes the process seem more exciting somehow. And for $19 I’m prepared to take the risk! Especially when you see how shit hot these guys are at design.

Go check them out and get your own logo for $19. I’m going to give them a whirl for sure!

Photo by A.Crider

Building an online business (or any business for that matter) is a science, not an art. Or at least it should be.

Now before you start reaching for your bunsen burner (you do have one of those, right? ;-0), let me explain what I mean by this.

Scientific progress occurs as a result of trial, error and analysis. Theories are tested, and those that work go on to develop further towards an accepted truth, whilst those that are proven wrong just die.

What works is kept, what doesn’t is ditched.

This is how you need to think in your business life. If you want to progress that is.

Your ultimate aim for your online business should be to produce a well-oiled machine that brings you maximum reward (not always entirely financial) for the minimum use of your resources.

The only way you can truly achieve this is by taking a scientific approach, and removing yourself from the emotions that you have probably attached to your business.

Here’s the key:

• If a product isn’t working, change it.
• If a marketing technique isn’t working, change it.
• If your whole business isn’t working, change it!

Don’t dilly dally. Just do it.

It takes strength of character to admit when you’re wrong, or when something isn’t working. But it’s an important skill you need to develop.

It’ll save you a lot of money and time in the long run. It will also mean that your business, and your self, is constantly evolving. Evolution is our natural state after all.

Fear Of the F Word

We naturally fear failure. I say naturally, but in actual fact it’s something that our society has programmed into us.

If we failed at school we were given a big fat ‘F’ or a dirty red ‘X‘. For some reason we’re taught that it’s wrong to fail. We’re made to feel negative emotions.

Those negative attachments stay with us way beyond the school yard.

Fear of Failure is utter crap.

Unless you fail you cannot possibly improve or grow. You just end up in stagnation. A situation that a huge number of us find ourselves in at some stage in our lives, if not most of it!

We’d rather trudge along in mediocrity than risk trying something that stands a chance of failure.

The truth is that the most successful business people fail. All the time! Over and over again. Read any biography of a celebrity business person and you start to realise this.

So, how do they end up successful?

Because they have bounce-back-ability!

They don’t let their failures define them. They don’t give up. And they certainly don’t let failure hold them back.

For every failure, they go on to create an even greater success story.

In fact, they see all failures as opportunities. They understand that if they screwed up big time, then naturally there is a big time success waiting around the corner for them.

It’s like Yin and Yang. Light and dark. Good and bad. Negative and positive. Success and failure.

You can’t have one without the other.

Know this.

You WILL fail.

Sometimes your failures will be small, sometimes they’ll be big. But they will happen.

Here are my tips for dealing with failure when it happens:

1. Trust your intuition. As soon as you realise something isn’t working, DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! And that goes for life in general, as well as in business.
2. Don’t dwell on things that you could have, would have or should have done. It’s gone. It’s happened. And there is nothing you can do about it. Focus on the now, always.
3. Contemplate every failure you have, big or small. Turn that failure on it’s head and give it a positive spin. What have you gained from that failure? Every failure has a positive slant. It’s a natural law.

Make the first thing you do something that will leave you feeling energized and ready for a fulfilling day.

Spend at least half an hour engaging in some kind of activity that will get your blood flowing. Do some yoga, go for a run, have a swim or even just dance like a mad fool around your bedroom. Whatever you enjoy.

I guarantee you’ll increase your productivity no end. A fit body equals a fit mind.

Here’s what I do to start my day:

p.s. I’m not a turtle, I’m the one swimming in the background with my legs in the air!

You’ve no doubt come across this kind of strategy gazillions of times in the high street.

Think loyalty cards and rewards schemes. Think frequent shopper programs.

You can do exactly the same with your online store by offering your customers rewards whenever they buy from you, or refer other customers to your store.

Membership sites are a great way to turn occasional buyers into loyal customers, thereby increasing the predictability of your income stream and generating higher revenues.

The benefits for your online business are huge:

• Increased visibility
• Increased profits
• Increased credibility
• Increased SEO
• More opportunities to communicate with your customers
• More opportunities to sell to your customers
• More exposure and networking opportunities

Give people the reason they need to buy your products from you, and only you. Rewards them for their custom.

Joint Venture Partnerships

JV partnerships happen when two or more businesses get together to make money.

Joint ventures are the perfect way to leverage the contacts of other online store owners in your network. Particularly if the joint venture partner has built an opt-in list to whom they send regular newsletters or announcements.

Find another online business owner in your network and see if they want to get together for cross promotion.

There are a couple of ways you could work it, and there’s no reason why you can’t do them both:

1. You could hook up a business that has complimentary products or services to yours. E.g. If you sell boys clothes exclusively, you might want to JV with another online business that sells girls clothes exclusively.
2. You could hook up with someone that sells similar products but has a different range. Your first reaction to this idea is probably that you don’t want to risk giving away business to the ‘competition’. However, I’d recommend you come from a mindset of abundance and realise that two heads are always better than one. And chances are that many customers will buy products from both of you.

To take it a step further you and your JV partners could set up affiliate programs so that each of you gets paid for sales you refer to the other.

If you use your imagination there really are plenty of JV ideas you can come up with. The sky’s the limit!

Where To Look For A Good JV Partner?

• With people you already do business with
• Your online network, forums, chat rooms
• Seminars and workshops you attend
• Post an ad in a relevant forum.

Membership marketing and joint venture opportunities are both excellent tools to grow your online business. Start slow, create a plan for either or both, and enjoy the fruits of your labour.

Your business will benefit, your customers will benefit, and your profits will grow.

Good luck!

Photo by Grahambones

If you sell your products and services to a geographically specific audience it matters where your website is hosted.

For example, I sell products primarily to a UK audience. Therefore I host my website in the UK, with a UK based hosting company.

Now this is not because I’m patriotic (;-) ), it’s because experience has shown me that if I host my website in the UK it will show up higher in google.co.uk than if I host in the US (for example).

I guess Google looks at where you are hosted to ascertain where your search results are best served.

In my case, if I hosted my site in the US I would get lost in a sea of US competitors on google.com and have lower rankings in google.co.uk.

For me this means A LOT of lost revenue! How would if affect your bottom line?

You may think that most people use google.com anyway, but if you’re not in the US have you noticed that most browsers will redirect you to the search engine specific to the country you are in?

e.g. Whenever I enter google.com I automatically get redirected to google.co.uk. And so do most of my customers!

To summarise:

If you want to rank well in your location specific search engine, be it google, msn or yahoo make sure you host your website in that location.

First published on Qassia

Photo by HiggySTFC

Why did you start your online business? (Or why do you want to start an online business?)

Was it to

• spend more time with your family?
• spend less time working?
• be able to travel while you work?
• have more time to develop your hobbies?

Whatever your reasons, I think there is one fundamental desire that underpins why everyone starts an online business - We want FREEDOM!

We all want to be able to work when, how and where we choose.

In my opinion, an online business is the best way to achieve this freedom, but it’s not going to happen straight away.

Building an online business takes an enormous amount of time and energy. It’s not easy, and it’s by no means a quick fix.

You may be able to get a website up and running fairly quickly, but getting your online business to the point where you are earning a decent income with very little daily input takes an investment of time.

It took me five years to reach the point where my business could run without me.

Not that I’m saying you should expect it to take that long. I kind of did it the hard way and learned everything through trial and error in the early days. Which is okay, I learned a lot. But I probably could have achieved the freedom I was craving much sooner if only I’d realised that I didn’t need to reinvent the wheel!

If I’d made use of other people’s expertise early on, maybe I could have shortened that timescale to two years.

Anyways, the point I’m making is that if you want to grow your online business fast make use of the knowledge that is already out there. It’s the smart thing to do.

Remember that your ultimate goal is freedom. Everything you do should be working towards that goal.

To get your online business to the point where you have freedom:

1. Learn all you can about promoting your online business and keep your knowledge fresh. The Internet is constantly evolving and you need to evolve with it.
2. Outsource the tasks that don’t directly add to your bottom line as soon as possible.
3. Leverage other people’s contacts. If you sell products start an affiliate program. If you sell services, join forces with others for joint promotion.
4. Create systems and processes to streamline your work from the very beginning. This also makes it easy to hand over tasks to a VA when you start outsourcing. Which is going to be asap, right?
5. Always focus your time and energy on the things that will impact your bottom line and free up more of your time.

So, how do you know when you’ve ‘made it’ a success?

I think you’ve ‘made it’ with an online business when you reach the point that if you do absolutely nothing for a month or two, the money still keeps coming.

It’s also when you reach the point of earning enough income to live the lifestyle you want. This might be $1,000 per month, or it might be $10,000. It’s whatever gives you the level of freedom you desire.

If you started an online business because you want freedom, focus on turning your business into a well oiled machine.

Then, and only then, is it time to start sipping margaritas on the beach ☺