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Why should you do them? Well success is based on organisation, preparation and perspiration. So here’s a mix of them that will put you on the right lines to success

Image courtesy of Carlos Porto | www.freedigitalphotos.net

1. Order your email box

If it takes two hours, so be it. Delete the chaff and file away the rest in logical folders. Consider it a late spring-clean. An ordered email box, means an ordered mind, makes for a more solid platform to build your success.

2. Return those calls

We all have one or two call-backs we dread. Either because of the person we have to call, the length of time since they were expecting a call or because the topics to be discussed aren’t necessarily positive or awe inspiring. The thing is, the longer they get left, the worse the situation becomes. Clear a space on your desk, grab a drink and pick up the phone. They will be over before you know it and the outcome will probably be better than you expected.

3. Speak to your colleagues

The sun is out so make the most of it. Convene a meeting in the sunshine. It could be a walk in the park, a coffee in a nearby park, or just standing on a terrace outside the door. A change of surroundings can have a big positive impact on your thought process, especially creatively and sharing that with a colleague and sharing their thoughts will be a ‘nice’ thing to do but also have a positive impact on your business. Finding out what others think, feel or observe is an important barometer to working out how your business is running. Communication is key and that needs to begin internally first.

4. Listen to music

Just like changing your location boosts the mind so does changing the sound in your ears. Vary it up too. Uptempo may not be what you need. Soothing the soul can often boost adrenaline and energy as much as a thrash metal big sound. Tuning out of your surroundings and into ‘another place’ even for a mater of minutes will freshen your thinking and help re-focus when you may have hit a block. Don’t be afraid to move to the music either. Movement is another great mind-cleanser. So whether it is moshing Give it a try.

5. Review your work so far this year

If you are in a creative industry this may be easier. Have a look at what you have created, think about how you may have done it differently. Even a couple of weeks on we often look at things in a different frame of mind and consider a different approach.  Even if you are not creative, looking back even just over the books or sale orders will help you focus your mind and attention

6. Prioritise the rest of your week

Bank Holidays are great for BBQ equipment sellers, ice-cream vendors and pretty much most physical retail outlets and entertainment venues. They are not however great for the majority of businesses. Your workload won’t  have remembered you only have a four-day working week, which no doubt means a whole host of things to get through before the weekend. With the five must dos already above, today may also have been a bit off the usual planed path and so number is six is all about making sure you reach the weekend with some sanity and your business intact. List everything you need to get done – even if you know you won’t achieve it all. Then prioritise them all into urgent, very urgent, important etc. If you don’t get the all the important stuff done this week make sure they become the very urgent next week so they do eventually get addressed.

Common-sense? Probably, but if that’s the case why do we so often dread them, put them off or forget them. If you learn anything this week let it be that non of us are perfect and a little bit of help here and there, the odd re-focus etc is normal and healthy if you are achieve long-term success.

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Here at 123-reg we are always keen to expand our knowledge and that of our customers so we are constantly on the hunt for new guest bloggers willing to share their expertise and insight.

If you fancy writing a guest blog for us why not check out our 123-reg Blog Contributors Guide 

We look forward to hearing from you.

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The other day I received a call from a recorded message which began “Please don’t hang up”.  I hung up.

A few days later I received another – [long pause… recording begins] “This is an important call”.  It wasn’t, I hung up.

And yesterday I received two items of post; one plain manila brown envelope and another white one with brightly coloured emblems and writing all over it.  I opened the brown envelope first.

Why did I do the exact reverse of what I was being asked to do?  Is it that I’m naturally rebellious or perhaps I’m just bloody-minded?  Well, the truth is neither (unless you speak to my wife).

In fact, I have been programmed to respond this way – most of us have.  And do you know by whom?  By the very people who want us to listen and read their messages!  How ironic is that?

So what’s really going on here and what’s it got to do with helping you sell online?

Well, my examples illustrate that the more something unimportant screams for your attention the less likely you are to respond to it.  This psychology is particularly important when it comes to email marketing.

These days our inbox is crammed with emails all demanding our time and because we receive so many our brains make judgements as to which ones are really important and which are not.  This means we have each devised a filtering system (aka the delete key).

You will typically automatically delete emails from people you don’t know and emails that look like they’re selling something (and people you don’t know are usually selling something).  So, what do the people sending the sales emails do?  They make their emails brighter, more colourful with bigger text and lots of pictures.  In other words they scream the message louder.  (These are often known as HTML emails.)

However, all they are doing is shouting even louder that they are a sales message and so get their message deleted even faster than before.  Genius!

That’s the heart of the problem with junk mail, junk telephone calls and junk emails: once your brain knows their marketing tactic it filters out their message.

But what if you want your sales emails read because you know that you can help the recipient?

The answer is easy, think about the messages that you do read.  The common factor is that they are all text – no graphics, flashy fonts or buttons, just plain old text.  These are the messages that your friends, colleagues, suppliers and customers send you.  Your email will stand a better chance of being read if it’s in that format than if it’s putting on a visual song and dance!

So, forget the flashy HTML emails and simply write your sales emails in text.  Just remember to offer your recipient lots of help and great information so they can feel the value of your business.  That way they will open, read and (most importantly) act on your email.

Jed Wylie is the author of Make Your Website Sell and works for Morgan Wylie a web design and digital marketing agency in the Midlands.

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If you were to select one key element of a successful business it would more often than not be an up-to-date well written business plan. Too many people ignore its status as the guiding light of your business and the one document that encapsulates what your business is about and where you want it to head. A would be investor or even just a new employee should be able to pick up your business plan, read it once and understand exactly what your business does and how it does it differently from anybody else.

There are countless templates on the internet – many free – which are all very helpful but it is the content  you include that determines whether your business plan is great and fit for purpose, or just paying lip-service to another form. However you draft your business plan, there are certain essentials you must include and must keep in mind as you are compiling it. Here are just six such tips to help you on your way:

1 Define your business as an answer to a problem

Too many people begin their business plan with a description of the company and the products or services they intend to offer. That’s no good if there is no call for those services or products because then there is no need for the business. Even if you are moving into a crowded market, identify the problem you can solve, and then go on to say how you will solve it.

2 Keep jargon out and keep it succinct

Although potential investors or lenders will be interested in seeing your business plan, the most important person your business plan should be written for is yourself. Your business plan is your constant reference tool, the item you will need to refer back to in good and bad times to check your business focus. So you need it to be slick and easy to read. You should look to impress with the content not the language, and make it accessible by anyone so they can read it and know exactly what your business is all about.

3 Show understanding of the market

Nobody wants a chronicle of the commercial world, but a bit of background of the sector you will be operating in, a brief analysis of the demography and acknowledgement of any rivals and how you will fit into all of that, all goes a long way towards proving you may have the where-with-all to make it happen.

4 Make your business model clear

Any investors or lenders will be looking at your business plan to tell them clearly how your business will make money. So the key information to get across in your plan is the business model you will be using and how that will drive you revenues. Your plan will need to be realistic and provable, so take time and fully consider the best model for your business both long term and short term.

5 Include details about your key people

While what your business does and how it does it is key to whether or not it will succeed, human nature means people invest in people – whether knowingly or not. In people, investors will trust, more than even the most innovative of ideas.

6 Forecast your financials

Financial forecasts can often, at a glance, show how serious you are, how much you really understand business and how realistic your goals actually are. You need to clearly show where and when your break-even point is and how you you foresee the cash-flow coming in to keep things ticking along. Make clear what if any assumptions you have made such as on growth (also say why). Project you financials both short, medium and long-term to cover the next five years.

Aim to educate via your business plan, not entertain. Once a potential investor has read through it they should have no fears about investing and back you. If not you haven’t quite done it right.

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Ten years ago yesterday, the way we listen, collate and even just consider music, changed. On 28 April 2003 Apple launched the iTunes Music Store *. A decade later and it’s just days since social network Twitter launched music.twitter.com – an iPhone and web app designed to help people sample and share their current favourite music -  and it’s partner to purchase the previewed track from? iTunes. It really has become the dominant force.

Pre-iTunes, digital music was at a cross-roads. Illegal downloads were threatening to get out of control and because of that many record labels, producers and artists were reluctant to move into digital formats. iTunes made  the world change the way it did music. In effect iTunes was the biggest influence in ensuring people continued to pay for their music.

Many would argue, iTunes’ parent, Apple, did so only to boost it’s own profits and indeed the insular format of iTunes certainly forced up sales of Apple hardware. Many, argue it is wrong to combine audio library management tools with a music download service and others complain about the restrictive digital rights management (DRM) that comes with iTunes downloads, but you can’t argue about its influence or success as 10 years on it is still head and shoulders above competitors in terms of popularity.

Love it or loathe it iTunes continues to grow, evolve and lies at the heart of Apple’s resurgence as a genuine competitor to PC based computing. The iTunes Music Store led to third-generation iPods and many regenerations since. It also led to the success of the iPhone and of the iPad too, not forgetting MacBooks, Apple TV et al, all part of Steve Jobs’ “digital hub” strategy.

Apple does love iTunes and with stats like this who can blame them

• 40 billion apps downloaded
• 25 billion songs sold – that’s over 15,000 songs downloaded every minute
• 1 billion courses downloaded on iTunes U
• More than 100 million books on iBookstore

Apple are celebrating that decade with a very interesting interactive timeline ‘A Decade of iTunes’ (you need iTunes loaded on your machine in true Apple style). Well worth a look as it is thought-provoking to see how digital music really has changed over that time.

The question arising is where does it go now. Spotify has certainly begun to become a force to rival iTunes as more and more people live their lives permanently online. Integration into mobile is well established, but could the next step be integration of these services into more traditional technology such as in car entertainment systems and home music systems? Will the next decade even see a new model or new way of delivering music that we haven’t even contemplated? We wait to see…

* The iTunes Store UK wasn’t launched until 15 June of that year.

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Want to hear my geeky news this month? I am downgrading my phone and I actually bought a Nokia 3410 to replace my iPhone 5. It’s brilliant. It doesn’t even have Bluetooth, but it does come with the Snake app preloaded.

Why am I taking this stand against technology? Well, I think I may be an internet addict and the only way to overcome this terrible illness is to not walk around with the entire WWW stored in my pocket. It’s hard work, but I’m comforted by knowing I am not the only one. Internet addiction and the terrible downer that comes with going cold turkey is now a recognised condition. Don’t believe me? Have a butchers at this –

‪http://thedrum.com/cGW 

Now, if that hasn’t scared you off, let’s get on with this shall we? Why the hell is the internet full of cats? Are they trying to tell us something? I have always thought they were of a far superior intellect than dogs, but it can’t be our feline friends filling the web with cute pictures, can it? To be honest, even if cats were running the old http, I don’t think they could have been insane enough to come up with Sports Balls Replaced By Cats. This has to be the work of their evil nemeses, dogs…

sportballsreplacedwithcats.tumblr.com/

Ooh, speaking of cruelty (although, before the Daily Mail jumps on me again, none of the sites I write about are actually cruel, what do you take me for? No, the cruel ones are just stored under my favourites in my web browser) here is a brilliant tumblr page for those of you with kids. Only a parent would get the sheer beauty of Reasons My Son Is Crying.

www.reasonsmysoniscrying.tumblr.com/

How can I explain One Tiny Hand? Er, it’s pictures of famous people, Spiderman, the cast of Mad Men etc., with, well, one tiny hand.

www.onetinyhand.com/

My dad passed away recently and I miss him every day. I really do. I have so much I want to say. If only there was a way to get messages to our deceased relatives, wouldn’t that be wonderful and completely non-exploitative. Sorry? There is? A company are delivering telegrams to the dead? Well that is fantastic. How much does it cost? $5 a word…hmm…a bit pricey, but if it works, why not? Check out afterlifetelegrams.com but perhaps start with the slightly wishy washy FAQ’s.

www.afterlifetelegrams.com/AFTERLIFE/

Described as ‘flotsam and jetsam from around the world’ The Urbanaut is just that – a collection of nonsense, rubbish and stupidity from the 4 corners of the globe. And all of it is very, very funny.

www.theurbanaut.net

I had literally hundreds of emails this month* from people complaining that I don’t represent the cloud lovers of the world on this page. I am sorry, and I promise to rectify that in the next link of this article.

www.cloudappreciationsociety.org

If you are under the age of 35, well then you disgust me. No, hang on. Not disgust. Arouse me, that’s it. Anyway, you probably don’t know what a ZX81 is. Shame on you. Forget all of you kids pretending you don’t like Margaret Thatcher when you can’t name one thing she did (she invented Mr.Whippy style ice cream – FACT…. ish) you should be reading up on your computer history. The ZX81 was one of the first ever home computers, and even in its day (1981) it was considered pretty pony. Have a look why.

www.zx81museum.net

I may know a lot, but I know very little about glue. Gluing fabric to glass? Is that even possible? Why would anyone want to do it? If they HAD to do it for some deviant reason, how would they know which glue to use? They would go here, of course –

www.thistothat.com

Finally this month I have a rare treat for you – Tom Selleck, waterfalls and of course, sandwiches. Enjoy!

www.selleckwaterfallsandwich.tumblr.com

*I had literally no emails regarding my under representation of clouds.

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That’s it for now. Do please keep sending me your websites. I don’t have a proper job so I need something to keep me off the streets. Pop along to www.facebook.com/iainleeofficial

You can read Iain Lee’s very own take on the internet here on the 123-reg blog every last Friday of the month.

A familiar face on television since he got his first break landing the job hosting Channel 4’s thrice weekly topical comedy show the 11 O’Clock Show at the age of 25, Iain is also an award winning radio presenter, top podcast creator and a genuinely funny guy with an eye for the bizarre.

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How many emails do you get a day? According to Radicati’s recent report the average is about 78 and typically costs workers 2.5 hours a day just managing them all!

So it’s safe to say that there’s quite a lot of pressure on the inbox which means from the marketing perspective it’s getting harder to differentiate yourself. Just use your own circumstances as an example. Count how many sales and marketing emails you get a day. Now count how many you actually read. If you’re anything like me you spend more time hunting for the “Unsubscribe” than reading their message.

And, of course, the situation is getting worse as more businesses use email because it is practically free and instant. This means that our brains are being programmed to filter out ‘junk email’ more aggressively and that means any marketing email either has to carry an extraordinarily powerful message or be from someone we already know and trust. (I think the latter is more easily obtained than the former, but how?)

Well, trust (and, therefore, interest in what your email has to say) is gained by your recipient requesting to receive your email rather than just getting it out of the blue because you bought a database with their email address on. (This is called ‘permission marketing’ and you can read all about in Seth Godin’s game-changing book of the same name.)

But how do you get someone to give you their email address in the first place?

The answer is to give them something of value on your website. So, let’s imagine that you sell TVs. People are coming to your website wanting information about TVs not just to see what you sell. However, some of them won’t know a lot about the products you offer and will need help. This is your perfect opportunity to give them some useful information in the form of a ‘buyer’s guide’ PDF document which explains all about modern TVs and how to choose the right one. And, you’ve guessed it, in order to get the download they have to give you their email address.

So the simple way to get prospects to leave their email address is to give them some information of value for free. Once they do that the email gets automatically sent by your website and they will open it above all the other marketing guff they’ve received that day because they asked to receive it.

Now the trick is not to stop at that one email (because they will have forgotten all about you by tomorrow!) but to send another email a few days or a week later. Again the email you send gives them some great information which makes their life a little easier – by making life easier you also make it easier for them to buy from you as you’re being helpful and not just ramming your latest offer into their inbox. (You’re also differentiating yourself as an expert in your field which marks you out from the competition.)

Now you are sending out several emails all helping your prospect by giving them useful and valuable information which gains their trust – and once you have their trust sending out a more sales oriented email will have a far greater effect.

This is a winning technique and yet few businesses do it (and of those that do few do it well). If you follow this strategy you will find your emails read, absorbed and acted on and not just received and deleted!

Getting this right on your website can be the difference between having life-long relationships with commercially productive customers or having anonymous visitors bouncing off your website never leaving their details. So this is a critically important technique to be testing in your marketing.

If you’ve got a question on this subject the post it in the Comments below and I’ll reply as soon as I can (only for the next 7 days).

Jed Wylie is the author of Make Your Website Sell and works for Morgan Wylie a web design and digital marketing agency in the Midlands.

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This summer we’re on the road, or at least our advertising is. We’ve teamed up with a set of taxi cab drivers in Leeds and in London to spread the word about 123-reg and in particular the great value of .co.uk domain names.

It’s not all about advertising though, we are trying to make it fun and get our fantastic customers involved too. Over on our other social channels, especially Facebook we are running a series of taxi-related competitions with lots of giveaways too. For example, if you spot one of our liveried cabs, take a photo and send it to us to be in with a chance to win.

We’ve also got our taxi quiz up and running so test yourself and see if you have the knowledge.

There’s plenty more to come, so make sure you keep an eye out for the 123-reg cabs in London and Leeds and also keep an eye out for chances to win and opportunties to get involved too.

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In the current economic world, running a small business has a whole host of potential barriers, none more so than money. Money makes the world go round we are told, and with increasingly limited lending sources, tighter borrowing criteria and a general waryness about taking on credit, how businesses approach finance and cashflow is often a make or break for their success. It’s not all doom and gloom however. You can make it, and many do, you just need some thought, some preparation and some knowledge. So here’s our six top tips on making your business funds go further and how not to overspend your budgets.

1. Set a budget

It may sound ridiculous but the majority of businesses fail because they have no idea about how much money they spend or perhaps need to spend. In business every thing you do, from boiling the kettle (increased electricity) to making that phone call (do you choose mobile or landline?) has a cost. Even planning, sitting down working out what you do tomorrow, has a cost. You should value your time in every sense. You should also value everything you spend. So know what your limits are and you won’t find a few weeks down the line that you just did that last job for nothing.

2. Calculate your costs and add a little more, then some more.

When a ‘job’ comes in make sure you fully cost it. Include a bit more for a contingency too. Even the best of us will forget to include something in an initial estimate and inevitably there will be hidden costs, such as emergency delivery for essential items or the need to draw in extra help due to delays, sickness or just sheer weight of work. Yet, that only covers your costs, unless you are some super-rich philanthropist you will probably be expecting to make some money too, so make sure you then also add on a profit margin. Remember, this needs to cover all your overheads too such as rent, tax, etc so it will soon get eaten up, so be realistic to yourself about how much this needs to be.

3. Keep your books up to date

Hopefully, you understand we are not referring here to avoiding overdue library books, this is your accounting books which are the dashboard of your business. From day one of your business make sure that you note down everything you spend and everything you earn. Legally you need to do this anyway, but it pays to get into a good habit to do this regularly and not just when tax deadlines loom. A glance at your books will help you analyse the state of your business in a matter of minutes. Only with these being accurate can you begin to look at unnecessary expenditure that may be cut. Staying organised with your books goes beyond just cashflow, it shows an organised mind and a commitment to the nastier side of business. Very few people like doing their books, but business is not all about meeting clients and creating products.

4. Use technology to break the leg work

It is clearly proven that the use of technology within your business practices will help improve productivity. Check out the online tools we have suggested here. Many ‘super-tools’ do come with ‘super’ price tags too and remember the aim is to help your cashflow not hinder it, so check out free-trials of any products you are interested in. If they don’t clearly offer a free trial, call them up and ask. If you don’t ask you won’t get and in the modern world, many businesses will see this as an opportunity to recruit you in the future as a customer.

5. Spread the costs

If you do purchase new equipment, new tools, new software, then try to spread the cost. Many companies will offer monthly payment plans. Some will charge a credit premium but even these may be worth looking at. Having the knowledge that every month, this, this and this will come out of your bank account is far easier to manage and plan than big lump sums here and there. This is particularly true where there is an annual renewal fee. While this year you may be well placed to pay a lump-sum up front, next year you may not be as flush that month. If you pay monthly you should already have that covered.

6. Review any contracts annually

Inflation, interest rates, economic dips. Even the experts can’t seem to predict how these will change over the next few years, so what makes you think you can? Multi-year deals sound great initially for a small business but too often they are the undoing of them. Your agreements with clients should always be representative of your current costs and the current state of the market, so make sure your contract with them does too. All your contracts with vendors and suppliers should at best be limited to a year, or at least allow review after a year. Annual negotiation will not only ensure both parties are getting a fairer deal but also ensure you are more focused on costs, making the contract work etc. While it will mean more admin, in the long run it will save you money and cut your costs much more than a multi-year deal.

That’s just 6 tips, but there are countless more – many of which we will refer to in future blogs. The key to staying on budget and in business is taking a step back every now and then and reviewing what your strategy is and how it is going. Controlling your business is about more than doing everything right, it is also about not doing too many things wrong and being too consumed in the day to day grind of your business can mean you miss very simple costs that are spiralling out of control.

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As our sister site highlighted at the start of the year, cloud technology is changing the way we lead our everyday lives but many aren’t even aware the are using it. Now with the launch of 123-reg Cloud Servers we are changing the way you do business too.

Imagine the flexibility of VPS coupled with the performance and power of a dedicated server. That is what 123-reg Cloud Servers offer and much more too. Taking advantage of a state-of-the-art virtualisation platform, Cloud Servers benefit from dedicated CPUs, RAM and and hard disk drives. All meaning increased performance, less bottle-necking and flexibility to upgraade without complicated and time-consuming manual migrations.

123-reg Cloud Servers provide dedicated resources but at an affordable price with unmetered data transfer. Allowing you to host multiple websites, install your chosen OS and handle virtually everything you throw at it.

Our Cloud Server range has been designed to be accessible for all to afford but just to help you even more, we’re launching with a special introductory offer – Order NOW with voucher code cloud2013 and we’ll even waive the usual set-up fee. Offer ends 30th June 2013.

So if you looking for a cost effective hosting solution with near dedicated server performance our Cloud Servers range are here to change the way you do cloud and change the way you do business.

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