LocalProud is a discount card program to help vitalize local economies. Businesses offer discounts that are honored when consumers show their LocalProud card. They get to determine the offers and are able to change them via a convenient website…

Have you ever wished you could carry around a card that would be honored at any business who offered coupons? Well, we have which is why we’ve created Local Proud – a Coupon program that eliminates the hassles of finding, printing and organizing coupons.

This is the way of future discount programs and we are now bringing it to life. Consumers want great deals. Businesses want to offer great value. Now, Local Proud is bringing the two together buy offering an easy to use discount card called the Local Proud Perks card.

We are pleased to annouce that we have partnered with our first television station as well – an innovative thinker located in Buffalo, NY. WKBW is where you’ll find great deals in western upstate New York. Currently we are offering many deals in the Buffalo and surrounding areas.

The great thing is you can use the card or, if you’re old school (sorry:-) you can also print coupons from the website. Sometimes it take a little while to inform the community as to what a new value proposition is so in the meantime, you can still print coupons via Local Proud. We are adding new offers daily so keep coming back – we’re about to overtake the Buffalo, NY area!

As you all know, we are fans of local search – we’ve written about it, we have even partnered with a local search directory called MyLocalLookup. Well, we now have something new to tell you about. It’s called Local Proud!

LocalProud is a brand new discount card program designed to help vitalize the local economy. Area merchants offer discounts that are honored when consumers show their free LocalProud card. The business get to determine their offers and they’re able to change them anytime via a convenient web interface. No special equipment is required for the business or your customers.

By becoming a part of the LocalProud program, the business will receive Local Proud cards to distribute to their customers as well as a window decal to display in your storefront. The program will be promoted through various local media, including television.

Pre-Launch Phase
During our pre-launch phase, they are offering free enrollment to the first 100 businesses. That means there is absolutely no-risk involved to get started. It’s time that local businesses come together and make a difference in our community. This Program allows that aspect to take hold.

Benefits To Consumers

• No Points to Collect
• No Coupons to Print
• No Waiting for Rewards
• Instant Offers
• Supports Local Businesses
• Keeps Money in Local Economy

Here is where to get started. Log onto Local Proud and hit the Advertise with us tab. It’s free and its a very cool concept! Or you can go to their pre-launch page to get sdtarted. If I were you, I wouldn’t wait another minute – I believe this will be a big hit with both consumers and businesses!

Besides the hard work, commitment, sacrifice and long long days of first starting your company, it takes planning, strategy and a whole of mistakes and failure to build a profitable business.

That’s right… I said it, mistakes and failure! However, one can always learn from anothers misfortune. In other words, you will make mistakes along the way however you can learn from other people and not make the “same” mistakes others have made. Which brings me to the point – Profits. I have had the idea of writing about this for weeks but never had gotten around to it. Today, one of my fellow Twitter friends by the name of Steve Pohlit.

The following was written by Steve and can be found on his blog: Thanks Steve for writing this!

It is important to understand that in order to build profits, a profit must first be earned. If your business is a start-up or has been losing money, the main focus of all your activity is to make a profit.. not just any profit, but a cash profit. Cash profit is where your cash balance is growing after you cover all your expenses whether they be paid daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly or annually.

If your business is not in a cash profit situation, you will not be able to stay in business indefinitely. There will be a point when you run out of cash and you have to close your door. In the Proof of Concept article I mentioned Twitter as an example of a company whose business model is exciting but whose excitement will eventually die if it does not turn profitable.

One of the best ways to begin making a cash profit and then make even higher cash profits, is to develop a financial performance picture twelve months in advance. This financial picture is how you want you business to look financially a year from now. I always advise clients when doing this work to look at what the business has been able to earn in the past and then increase it significantly.

Individuals use a technique know as vision boards to focus on things they want including lifestyle improvements. The financial model of what you want your business to look like is your business vision board. “If you can see it you can achieve it.”

There is more to it than creating a picture twelve months out but that is a key starting point. For purposes of building profits I do not advocate going beyond a twelve month horizon as there are two many variables. However, when doing strategic planning a more forward outlook is appropriate. For now we are focused on building profits near term.

The rest of this article comes to us from Mark Dolliver…

Here’s a bit of Internet Age heresy from small-business owners: 46 percent regard it as a “myth” that every company needs a Web site.

That’s one tidbit from a release this month of supplemental data from the ongoing Discover Small Business Watch polling. When small-business owners were asked in an August round of polling whether their company has a Web site, fewer than half (45 percent) said it does.

Among respondents whose business doesn’t have a Web site, the foremost reason (cited by 41 percent) was that “my business doesn’t need one.” Other reasons included “cost” (cited by 19 percent), “not enough time to monitor and manage” (16 percent) and “complexity” (9 percent).

Do consumers penalize small businesses that choose not to have an online presence? Not as much as you might expect. Polling in September among consumers asked, “Are you more likely or less likely to use a small business that has a Web site?” While a plurality (47 percent) said they’d be more likely to do so, half said either that they’d be less likely (17 percent) or that “it would have no impact” (34 percent).

Nor is there a consensus among consumers that it’s odd if a company doesn’t have a Web site. Asked whether they “expect every business, large or small, to eventually have a Web site,” those saying “yes” (46 percent) were outnumbered by the sum of those saying “no” (37 percent) or “not sure” (17 percent).

The same poll also asked consumers whether they would “consider using a service or small business that you heard about on a social or business networking site.” Forty-three percent said they would consider it, but 32 percent said they wouldn’t and 26 percent weren’t sure.

If you have been keeping up with the news recently you will be aware that social media tools like Facebook and Twitter are the talk of the town. Not only are they great for connecting on a personal level but they can be extremely valuable for your multimedia and storytelling projects. By utilising your social network effectively you can direct significant traffic towards your projects. You can, if you know how, make your projects viral and ones which are talked about all over the Internet. But with so many different social media websites around it can be difficult to know how best to approach social media.

There are many resources online which can help you learn the best methods for using social media, and many tools to make your life easier. I have put together a very brief list of four sites which I think will really help you become a social media pro.

1. Twitip
Darren Rowse runs this great site (www.twitip.com) which focuses on teaching you how to make the most of Twitter. There is a lot of really helpful and useful information on this site and it is a must read for anyone looking seriously at using Twitter to drive traffic to their website. No matter what you want to find out about, there is probably an article on Twitip for you.

2. Hootsuite
This is one of my favorite applications. Hootsuite (www.hootsuite.com) lets you manage several different social networks, Twitter, Facebook, etc.. all at once. There is also a great iPhone application and a bookmark button which allows you to post links directly one or all of your social networks. You also get fantastic statistics on who clicks on the links you share which can help you decide what suite your audience better.

3. Chris Brogan
Chris Brogan is one of the leading social networking experts. His website, www.chrisbrogan.com, is a wealth of great information that will help you not only build a large social networking presence but will help you grow a community of interested people. Not only does he have the website but Brogan also co-wrote a book, Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation, and Earn Trust, which has received many good reviews. I guarantee that you will get some great information from him.

4. TweetDeck
TweetDeck is another great social networking tool which allows you to manage and connect to multiple social networking websites. Unlike Hootsuite which runs in your Internet browser, TweetDeck is a desktop application which runs on Adobe Air. Many of the top social networkers have often commented about using TweetDeck as their main social networking client. If you would like to do all your networking from one easy desktop tool then head to www.tweetdeck.com.

No matter what resource or application you find best for you, the important thing to remember with social media is to stick with it. Eventually the hard work will pay off and you will have a great list of followers who are interested in you and your projects. You will then be able to leverage this audience to make your projects more successful.

Stay tuned for our next article, when we discuss how many small firms don’t have a website today.

Some say we are on the road to Recovery. Some say otherwise so it depends on which side you believe. I will say this…

Productivity grew by an annual rate of 8.1% in third quarter of 2009, the biggest increase since 2003, according to the Commerce Department. This followed a 6.9% rise in productivity in the second quarter of 2009. As productivity increased, labor costs fell at a 2.5% annual rate, indicating that inflation remains under control. But, this also signals that workers’ wages are decreasing, experts say, raising a cause for concern on the durability of the nation’s economic recovery.

What does this all mean? It means that we still have some tough time ahead of us. But I like to pose the question… is your glass half full or half empty? Me personally, mine is always half full, no matter what. I will say that the month of December has been my best billing month in 10 months… I feel it getting better!

As people of the Greatest Nation on earth, we need to always be “Half Full”!

I recently asked the question to a few small businesses and clients that I’m close with around the country… How effective has Local Search been for your business.  The answers that I’ve been given have been all across the board, some good, some bad but more over what most people say to me is “we don’t use it at all” 

For the businesses that use local search as part of their Internet strategies, you get it… but for the latter, I find this to be fascinating. Let’s look at a few facts about local search and how consumers are online today.

92% of all people are online today and let’s face it, the Internet has become our lifes, both personally and professionally.

97% of people with online access will research products and services online before they buy – we still like to buy from the bricks and motars. 
Interesting enough, 35% of all searches are done with an intent to buy.
and 55% of all local searches are done with an intent to buy.
Of all local searches, 8 out of 10 call or visit a store and 60% of those result in a purchase of some kind.
Times are rapidly changing and traditional advertising mediums are losing their effectiveness.

The internet has changed the way the world communicates, gathers, stores and sends information. However, this global connection has created a problem for the local business in their local markets. Why? Traditional print advertising has become less effective.  Most people have thrown their Yellow Pages away and search online instead and Newspaper’s readership is down over 50% and many papers are declaring bankruptcy.

On the other side of local business and local search is big business. It’s true that search results in general are dominated by large companies. That is proven to be true with Local search as well. The big guys understand that us consumers are smart and we’re looking everywhere for the best deals, including using local search engines.

Business owners reading this post, I hope by now you are reading all there is to read about search, search engine marketing, blogging and anything else related to getting you better exposure with your online presence. We’re doping everyday and we’re a small business just like you!

I want to give a shout out to Ivana Taylor (DIY Marketers) for writing this article. She has some great insight into effective marketing and I want to share her article. You can find the original article here.

Marketing your small business doesn’t have to be expensive. In fact, it’s really easy to build your image or your customer base on little or no money. The most you’ll have to invest on this list is about 30 minutes but it will be the best 30 minutes you could spend….

1. Focus on customers critical to your success. We’re often so busy serving the customers we have and selling to new ones, that we often don’t take the time to put our customer list into perspective. As you go down the list write down those customers that could be critical to the growth of your business in the next year. If you haven’t seen them in more than 90 days, if they haven’t heard about any new changes, products or services, if you don’t know what the most important projects for them are – put them on the list and start making appointments to see them.

Creating the list will excite you about the new opportunities, calling these customers to set an appointment will be an additional personal touch in your sales and marketing program. Having the meeting is touch two, following up after the visit with a thank you is touch three, actually doing something with what they’ve said is touch four and more. Simply focusing on those customers that can make all the difference is an easy, natural and inexpensive way to grow your business.

2. Set a marketing theme and follow-it with every customer interaction. A really fun way to build your brand is to create a fun and versatile theme and then apply it to all your customer communication. For example, if your product is easy to use, then focus on that attribute. You might decide to create an article entitled “101 Reasons [Your Product] is Easy to Use” you could have serious reasons such as ”24/7 live online support”, or funny reasons like “You can use one hand to use the product and the other to eat an ice cream cone.” Either way, take a simple competitive advantage and keep repeating it in as many communications as you can. You will save money and your customers will remember you and what sets you apart.

3. Celebrate unusual holidays. There are a variety of fun, creative holidays that you can celebrate and adapt to feature a product or a service. No one takes the time to do this – and your customer will get a kick out of it. Send a Thanksgiving card or gift with a special offer if they display it at their office. Some creative days of the year include Elvis’ Birthday on Jan 8, National Hat Day on January 15, April 22 on Earth Day, and of course there are the standard Independence Day, and St. Patrick’s Day. The point is to actually MARK these holidays and use them to promote your small business.

4. Build a customer community. After you’ve developed your list of targeted customers, keep the communication lines open by giving them a space to connect with you. If you haven’t already, start a blog. Wordpress.com is free and you can set up a blog in as little as 5 minutes. Give the blog address to your customers and spend the first 30 minutes of your day writing something to them. In the beginning, you’ll have to remind them to visit and see what’s there. But if your content is good enough, you’ll soon have a loyal following AND get inexpensive and valuable feedback to your ideas. Think of a blog as a publication. It’s like creating your free advertising that goes direct to your customer’s mail box! Move your online community into the real world and schedule customer events. If your customers are scattered across the country, make a point to visit each region and schedule a customer event focused on helping them do their jobs better.

Marketing doesn’t have to be expensive. In fact, the best and most effective marketing programs come straight from the heart. A couple words of advice; have fun! People make decisions, not buildings, industries or titles. So try these low-cost, high impact marketing strategies for your small business and you will find yourself having fun getting and keeping customers.

You can learn more about Ivana Taylor and DIY Marketers by clicking here.