How To Guarantee Your Small Business Growth!
            by Jim Daniels

As a small business owner, your concerns and interests are invariably spread between many different areas - especially online, where things move fast and furious.

Day-to-day activities such as answering email and website creation/maintenance can eat up large chunks of your time. I know this all too well.

Today I ask you to step back for a minute or two and focus on the big picture. I make it a point to do this every few months. Not only does this give you perspective, it helps you to steer your company in the direction you want it to go. That is, forward.

Driving a small business forward means many different things to many different business owners. More than likely however, your business growth can be measured from one statistic. You probably have a good idea of the number in your head. It is called profit. If your profits show a steady increase from year to year, your business is growing. You must be doing something right.

Although this theory looks simple enough on paper, actually "achieving" good growth is difficult for many businesses online. Keeping up with technology and the competition all at once can be challenging.

As a business owner who has been doing 100% of my business online since the start of 1996, I've managed to learn a thing or two about online growth. Actually, I've learned a few ways to virtually "guarantee" a continually growing business in this arena. Today I'll share them with you, my faithful business gazette reader.

It all comes down to committing to certain regularly scheduled "cyber-growth essentials". My own proven "guaranteed growth builders" are listed below...

1. New stuff.
Although the expansion of the internet itself can actually drive increases in your profits, don't let this fool you into thinking YOUR business is growing.

In order to see real growth from year to year, you MUST offer new products or services every six months or so. If you are unable to create something of your own, locate solid products and services related to your own and resell them.

Consider offering web hosting, software, information or anything else related to your area of expertise. Every new product or service you introduce will plant a seed for future income growth. If you need ideas, come see the results of some of my add-ons over the past year:

2. Regular Promotion.
Pick at least two of the following three "tasks", schedule them monthly AND have the discipline to stick to them.

• a. Send monthly articles or press releases to at least 50 online publications related to what you are marketing. If you can't find 50, then you had better start your own!
• b. Re-invest some of your profits by purchasing low-cost advertising that reaches your target audience. See http://www.bizweb2000.com/competit.htm for some of the best bargains in targeted advertising. If you do not have profits to re-invest, you can always trade services with these companies. Use your imagination!
• c. Get involved in a discussion group or forum related to your area of expertise. Post intelligent, legible, objective feedback - NOT blatant self-serving "ads" or "come to my site" messages. For a good idea on what your posts should look like, check out some of the posts at: http://bizweb2000.com/wwwboard - The posts with lots of replies are hot topics. Get involved!

3. Regular contact with your customers and prospects.
I know, I probably mention this in every other issue of the gazette. The fact is, you will not find a better way to insure constant growth than using your own "house list". Although there are many ways to accomplish regular contact, the simplest and most cost effective way is publishing your own email newsletter.

If you would like to learn more about the best methods and tools for keeping in touch with your prospects and customers by email, read my recent article called "Keep In Touch" at: http://www.bizweb2000.com/contact.htm

That's it. Now you know how to grow your business online. Why not enter your "business growth" strategies into your monthly schedule right now. Schedule a full day each month to complete the tasks in item two above. This is the stuff that will virtually insure the growth of your business!

Do you have a favorite growth strategy? Why not come share it with your cybermarketing peers at the CyberMarketing Infoboard: http://bizweb2000.com/wwwboard/

JIM DANIELS of JDD Publishing Company . Have you been to Jim's http://bizweb2000.com lately?

You'll find some exciting new tools to help your small business cash in on the internet, including their hot- selling books, software and web hosting services!

Visit today! Your business CAN be making a lot more! We'll teach you how...
       http://www.bizweb2000.com

The Ultimate eBusiness CD The Biggest, Most Valuable Information Products Package just got even better. Now with resale rights and free CD duplication rights The Ultimate eBusiness CD comes with over 150 Information products, packages, and software programs you can use to manage your on-line business or resell. This HUGE CD now comes with a complete Sales Web Site. For Windows 95,98, NT, 2000, XP Resale Rights & Huge Web-Site Included