Money Making Guides
How To Start Mobile Food Concession Business
Mobile Food Concession Business Components
Starting a mobile food concession business is a very risky but possibly very profitable business. It is not just a easy endeavor that can be taken lightly. There are several things that need to be researched and done in order to truly start a mobile food concession business in the right and legal way. There are licensing issues, decisions about food choice and location and equipment you are going to have to make. These are just a few of the many decisions and regulations you must make and be aware of to start a concession business like this one.
One of the first things you will need to research to run a mobile food concession business correctly and legally is to find out the regulations of your city, county, and state governments. These regulations include health standards, location standards, and other standards that you will need to be aware of if you do not want to receive a citation, fine, or even be shut down.
All of these things can happen if you do not research the local laws concerning your mobile food concession business. As is right with any type of business, research everything before you make an investment talk to other people in the same field that you want to be in. Try to learn everything you can in order to be fully informed about the decision you are about to make.
Some states have regulations on how many feet you must be away from the highway where you set up your mobile food concession. Many states have fees you must pay in order to be properly licensed. Most states have health inspections to make sure everything is up to code for service to the public. All of these requirements and more will be things you may encounter. Never assume it is simple.
Another thing you are going to encounter is deciding what type of food you are going to sell. Are you going to sell prepackaged food that you don’t have to cook or are you going to prepare everything by hand on a grill. Whichever of these you choose, it can also make a difference between what type of license you must acquire. Also, are you going to choose something unique or go with a standard that has already proven successful? Whatever you choose, this is something you must think about in-depth.
Equipment is another thing you must decide on. Are you going to purchase a hotdog cart in order to make a smaller investment, or are you going to choose to purchase a concession trailer, which is a considerably larger investment?
Determining these decisions all go together. Location and equipment are partly decided by what type of food you choose to prepare. Food and location are also decided partly by what equipment you can afford. Each and every decision you make affects another decision after it. Knowing what you are going to encounter is an important reason for researching.
Mobile Food Concession Business Aspects
The ability to be one’s own boss and make lots of money doing it is all part of the American Dream. An up and coming segment of the small business world is food concession vending. This is a form of food service that does not involve being stationary. Mobility is the key to the food concession industry.
The ability to pick up and move when you have an event or want to switch locations is paramount in this business; which brings attention to the fact that there are several things needed to start a mobile food concession business. One of the first important things is location. Another important aspect is choosing the type of food you will serve. One more important thing to consider is advertising.
Another thing to consider when you start a mobile food concession business is what type of food you will serve. You must first consider the part of the country you are in. Goulash may not appeal to New Yorkers. Another thing you must consider is financial history of the area you are serving. Some people may neither want or be able to afford sushi or caviar for lunch so be careful about offering food out of the economical means of those to whom you are planning to sell.
Another thing to consider about food is how easy or difficult it may be to prepare in a mobile style kitchen and how long it will take to prepare. You definitely don’t want the items you are selling to take a long time to prepare. If so, people will be more tempted to just go into a sit-down restaurant to eat. Quickness is definitely a way to go for the mobile food concession business.
One other thing you may want to weigh when setting up a mobile food vending business is advertisement. Roadside signs and billboards are a great way to go, albeit expensive. A great way to make sure you have great advertising is to have exceptional food and service. With these to attributes, your company will be advertised by one of the best and most powerful means of advertisement: word of mouth. Get people to enjoy your food and the friendly face you offer in the middle of a possibly hectic workday. Having a great relationship with your customers is definitely a must when dealing with the food service industry.
Other forms of advertisement include paper fliers, sale signs, and discount coupons. Bags, napkins, and containers with your company name and logo on them are also great ways to advertise. For the business with the larger budget, t-shirts, hats, and bumper stickers might be a way to go.
Whatever decisions you might make about your mobile food concession business, there are certain things you must consider to make having a successful company easier. In the mobile food service industry, important options include location of your vending equipment, type of food served and advertising your mobile food concession business in order to make it more successful. By considering these things, you will have a better chance of making a name for yourself in the food industry.
Mobile Concession Business Location
When running a mobile food concession business, there are several aspects to take into account. Many issues arise that need to be dealt with in order to make a food service business run smoothly. With a mobile food concession business, one of the most important things you must decide is the location where you plan to set up to sell. There are several different things to keep in mind when you are choosing a location for the running of your mobile food concession business. First you need to consider the population numbers of the area you plan to sell in. Another important thing to consider is whether you are willing to pay to set up. One last thing you need to consider is getting permission to set up.
One of the first things to consider when you are trying to choose a location for your mobile food concession business to run is the population numbers of the area. In order for your business to run successfully, you need to make sure the location you choose is well trafficked and fairly densely populated. The more populated the location, the more potential customers you have. If you choose a location that only has a few houses and businesses, you might consider a location that has more houses and businesses. Businesses are great to be around because employees who need a quick-lunch break can be a great source of income. They can also be a great source of word-of-mouth advertisement, getting friends and even fellow employees to come sample your culinary delights.
Another important thing to remember when choosing a location to sell from is finances. You have to decide how much money, if any, you are willing to pay for a spot on someone’s property. For the most part, to park on the property of another business or a private person, you must expect to pay for the rental of the space. Prices for renting a spot are usually dependent upon the size and location of the space. Be on the lookout for the least expensive place you can find that will still give you the customer base that is necessary to be able to make money at your mobile food concession business.
This brings us to another thing that must be kept in mind when choosing location is that you must have permission to set up on private property. You are not allowed to just set up anywhere there is a space. You must first check with your city and county about the laws that concern concession food sales. Once you know these requirements, when you decide to settle in a spot, you must always ask the owner of the property you would like to set up on if that is ok. Many times, the offer of a nice chunk of monthly space rent will convince a person to allow you to be on their property. Either way, written permission must be obtained to make sure that no legal problems arise.
Wherever you decide to set up your mobile food concession business, several details must be seen to before that can happen. Choosing a location for your mobile food concession business must include consideration of population, cost of space rental, and gaining permission of the city, county, and private person who owns the space. This can be a very profitable business but, make sure to find a great location that can improve chances of making money, and transform your mobile food concession business into a success.
How To Make Money With Classifieds
Do you wish to make a lot of money with spending only a little time and just a few dollars? If you are prepared to fulfill your dreams and realize your goals, mail order classified ads are your ticket to success.
You have what it takes – right now. Classifieds are the best dollar-for-dollar return in advertising, and you can earn a high profit on your product investment.
Classified ads are the easiest to write, the easiest to place, and cost the least. They need only a simple follow-up, and bring in hundreds of dollars of sales.
People read classified ads for a purpose. They aren’t interrupted – as in most advertising – and are specifically looking for products, services and information that appeal to them. As well-placed classified ads will bring hundreds – thousand – of replies month after month, year after year.
You don’t have to have a special background to make money with mail order classifieds. Any beginner can realize a steady second income or develop a stable, full-time business through classified ads.
But you have to be persistent. You must WANT TO MAKE MONEY, and be willing to stick with it. If you do, you will find that being successful is easy – just follow the steps, one by one, climbing the ladder to the top.
WHAT SHOULD I SELL?
Take a look at the classified ads in the magazines and tabloids you read. They are filled with offers for services, products and information. And they sound good. The ads show enthusiasm about the materials being offered.
What gets you going? There are many things you find of special interest constantly. Could you offer those for sale? Do you have a special trade or service that can be conducted by mail? Maybe you have a product to distribute, such as stamps or coins, a time-saving gadget, or a do-it-yourself kit. Or perhaps you can tap into wholesale or surplus goods that you can sell at a good profit. Bargains are always in demand.
The most successful type of mail order product is INFORMATION. Specialized information in the form of ideas, money-savers of self-improvement can be easily produced on a low-budget and readily SOLD AT A HUGE PROFIT.
Information in the form of how to make or do something is a constant best-seller. People are always looking for simpler, or cheaper, or better ways to improve their crafts. What can you offer?
THE 2-STEP APPROACH
The proven method of selling mail order items of information is called the two-step approach. Basically, you place a short classified ad in the back of a magazine or tabloid. The ad does not mention price, but tells the reader to write for free details. Once you have an inquiry, you then send information on what you have to offer, and watch those orders pile in. Essentially, a mail order classified ad buys a name and potential business. It may just break even with the real orders placed. The real money comes from next sales.
Profit begins at the second sale and gets bigger and bigger as the sales continue.
WHY NOT CHARGE IN THE CLASSIFIED?
You’ll get far more responses from an ad for free information than you will for gods – at any price. And, since you want a POTENTIAL BUYER, you’ll have more inquiries for materials you want to sell later.
Charging a small fee to cover postage or the cost of the inquiry will never make you break even – people won’t be bothered. And a small fee doesn’t necessarily weed out non-buyers. If you find your classified is pulling people who aren’t interested in your offer, you can change the advertisement to be more specific about what you really have for sale.
WHERE TO PLACE CLASSIFIEDS
The best advice in placing classifieds is to follow the leader. Find where other goods in your category are being sold and do the same. The mail order business is not a place to be real different – especially as a beginner. Although your product must have an appeal different from the others. Stay with the pack and advertise in the same publications.
Look for repeat business. You can check back issues of publications at your library or buy some copies of the publications you might advertise in. If a certain ad has appeared time after time, you can bet it’s a winner.
Write for the details of some of the offers similar to the one you have. You might even purchase a sample product or two so you can get a good feeling for what is being offered, how the ads run, and what kind of prices are successful.
If you have a specific product or information that is appropriate to a specialized type of magazine, check out all the magazines of that topic. Which publication carries most of the ads? What is the circulation of the of the publication? A magazine with a higher circulation may cost more to place a classified, but bargain rate publication won’t be the best investment if they don’t bring the inquiries.
Consider your dollar-for-dollar inquiry. How many people may read your advertisement for the cost it takes to place the ad? Many products have special seasons, and classified ads are no different. December generally returns varied responses because of the holiday season, and is not a good month to include in your testing. The summer months are generally slower for classified responses and mail order packages. The best time to try your ads are the fall, winter and spring months.
WHAT IS TESTING?
The most important element in mail order advertising is to test. Not only do you need to find out if your product will sell, but you have to find out what the best price is.
You have to test the magazines. One may not draw as many responses as another. Or, after three months, it may not seem to pull at all. Then switch to another publication. You may try several publications at the same time with the same ad to be able to judge which has the best dollar-for-dollar response.
Don’t be too hasty in dropping a publication, however. Sometimes it takes the repeat insertions of three or four months to get the proper percentage of responses. People become more secure with a repeat ad, or they may pass it by the first or second time until they get around to writing for information.
Other things you will be testing are the type of inquiry and the response package that contains a sales letter and brochure. You’ll also need to test the frequency and number of times to continue mailings after you have a good customer list.
Testing is the name of the game – and this is where you need perseverance. Don’t get discouraged. GIVE IT A TRY. Because of the low-cost of placing classifieds, it’s worth it to keep it going. YOU CAN PROFIT.
TYPES OF ADS
There are three types of classified ads – qualified, partially qualified, and blind.
The qualified ad is specific. It includes several details to inform the reader about what you are selling. The people who respond to highly qualified ads usually are specifically interested, and produce the best quality prospects with the highest percentage of sales. Since the ad may be a few words longer, it is the most expensive to place.
The partially qualified ad offers a special benefit, such as money or self-improvement. The readers have some idea of what you are offering, but don’t know the specifics.
Blind ads offer only the few details, are inexpensive to run because they are short, and bring in the largest response. However, blind ads product the lowest percentage of actual orders because they are often answered just out of curiosity.
The best place to start is – you guessed – the middle. A partially qualified ad is a good test ad. It doesn’t need to be specific about your product, so it brings in inquiries that can be used over and over for related items. You can rewrite it with more details or trim it down later.
What’s the best guideline? PROFIT. If you compare the actual orders received from the number of inquiries for each of your ads, you have the rate of conversion. Aim for the ads which pull best for you.
KEYING THE ADDRESS
How do you determine what inquiry response cam e form which ad?
You code the company name or street address so you can determine what ad pulled the response. This is called keying the address, and it’s one of the most important tips in mail order classified advertising.
The simple key is a two-part letter and number code. The letter stands for the name of the publication, and the number represents the month the ad appeared. You can make up any code as long as you keep track of what publication it appeared in. You can add the key to the address by hyphenating the street address to include the code. Or you can key the company name by adding specific initials.
The surest way to key is to add the code to the address in the form of department, division, or suite number. Be careful it doesn’t conflict with any other addresses nearby.
WRITING CLASSIFIEDS
Writing your own copy for a classified ad is easy. There are so few words you need to use that you don’t have to worry about being a writer or a professional in advertising. You are your own expert in selling your product.
The selection of words is the most important aspect of classified ad copy. You need to choose precisely, by don’t skimp on words to save the cost in the ad.
The best way to prepare copy is to first write about your product or service at length. Go ahead – list all the benefits. Scrutinize the features and write them down. What sticks out? What is so great about your product? What can it do for the reader who will take the time to write for more information? How can your product help? Will it show how to earn money, does it offer self-improvement, can it help accomplish something appealing and significant?
Choose a heading that points out the most significant aspect or feature of your product. Follow up with a few words or details, and finish with a request to write for more information. The best word in a classified is “free,” but you must follow up with something free.
SAVE MONEY PLACING ADS
Most classified ads are billed a certain charge per word, so you want to keep your words important and precise. Once you have written your ad, take a closer look at it. Can you drop extra words without changing the meaning?
You might be able to delete conjunction such as “and,” articles like “the,” “a,” and “an,” or prepositions like “for,” “with,” or “from.” Perhaps you can contract your company name into initials or use just one word.
Each part of your address counts as one word: the number; the street name; the street aspect (boulevard, avenue); the key (if separate); the city; and the state. Many publishers let you include the zip code free of charge.
Use figures rather than words for numbers, but don’t use contractions or abbreviate. You have to pay for each word in full, so spell them out completely. That way you’ll get no confusion when people place orders.
RESPONDING TO INQUIRIES
Once you start getting responses from the classified ads, you should send out your sales literature immediately, definitely within one week. The goal is to convert the inquiry into a sale and convert the sale into PURE PROFIT.
Your sales literature can be a one-page pitch for your product. It doesn’t have to be an expensive color catalog. As you get going, you may prepare a sales package and a series of follow-up offers.
You can’t tell from the type of inquiry whether the person is a buyer or not. Postcards or letters are potential profit makers for you. What’s important is to MAKE A SALE.
Type the person’s name and address on a label and make at least three carbon copies of these labels to use for subsequent mailings. Your second sales packet should be mailed a month after the inquiry was received, and another month after that.
Follow-up sales are where you are going to MAKE YOUR FORTUNE. Your classified draws the inquiries, the first order establishes a good customer, and the rest of the orders are pure gold. Testing is the only way to find which plan works best for you in getting orders. You’ll need to find out which sales packet works best, and how often to make mailings.
THE RESPONSE PACKAGE
A typical mail order package – called a conversion – consists of a personal letter, a brochure, an order form, and a return envelope. How elaborate you wan to make your conversion depends on how successful your product seems to be selling and how much money you want to invest.
Always start small. A simple one-page offer can work as well as a fancy catalog. After you’ve built up a few good selling product, you might print up a single page brochure or catalog. Even at that, you don’t have to go to color unless your product warrants it.
You don’t need an advertising agency to put together your sales packet, but you can use one if you want. Be sure to investigate the type of agency and what it can do for you. You should have an agency with a proven background in mail advertising, and you must take a good look at what has already been produced. Talk with clients and see if the agency pulled through for them.
Why don’t you need an ad agency? Because you can produce all the sales literature you need. You are the best sales person for your product because YOU KNOW IT. If you have done the proper research, you have already found out what the competition is, how much their products cost, and what sales appeals they are sending out.
As in placing and writing classified ads, do what the competition is doing. Although you shouldn’t – and can’t, legally – take directly from them, you certainly can copy the format and general ideas they project.
If somebody have been selling something successfully for years, do the same thing. Adapt your product to fit. Of course, you can’t convert a sales pitch for surplus goods to an appeal for a self-improvement book, but take notice of WHAT SELLS PRODUCTS.
HOW TO PREPARE SALES LITERATURE
The sales letter promotes you as well as your product. It is a personal appeal to a potential buyer. You want the person to feel special and have a reason not only to look through the rest of the literature, but TO BUY YOUR PRODUCT.
The appearance of the sales letter is the most important aspect. It should be on company letterhead, cleanly printed, and inviting to read. Although it can be any length, it doesn’t have to be more than one page. But it must be double-spaced and typewritten in clear, easy-to-read type.
The most effective sales letters are printed in two colors. The second color offers eye appeal and provides emphasis in selling the benefits of your products. The most inexpensive way to product two-color is to print black on two-color letterhead. You may use the second color in alternate paragraphs, or as special paragraphs, indented to catch the eye. Blue, red or green type is harder to read, so keep the second color areas short and important to the reader.
Other effective ways to use a second color are as handwritten remarks in the margins of the sales letter, as underlines, and in the signatures.
Write the sales letter as though you’re writing to a friend – keep it direct and personal. Present yourself and your product as worthwhile, honest and desirable.
The beginning of the letter should have a lead line similar to a classified ad. It emphasizes the benefits of the product and points out the strongest appeal.
Don’t be tempted to use two or three appeals in a row. Choose only one and save the next best ones to try on other sales letters as you test the results.
Follow through on the appeal, amplifying WHY the product is desirable. Emphasize its value to the reader. Build credibility. Will it make me a better, or richer, or more secure person? Can it prevent worry, poverty, illness? Why should anyone want to have it? You might admit what the product won’t do, then present several positive aspects, stating what it will do.
In the next section, mention price and immediately talk about the money-back guarantee. The reader will be more convinced the product will do all you claim if you are willing to stand by your product enough to offer a full refund.
Finally, restate the major benefits or feature of the product and push for the order. If you are offering a special premium for ordering immediately, state it here. Include a good reason for why the person should not wait, but ORDER NOW.
ORDER FORMS
If you have only a one-page sales pitch, you need to provide space for an order form. It should be well-defined by a line or dotted line around it, and should be large enough for someone to write in the information. If you plan to send out a complete packet with sales letter and brochure, print up separate order forms.
Mention the benefit, the product name, and the guarantee. You might want to use the first person in pushing for the order. For example, “Yes! Please rush me my…” Include the price on the card, perhaps in a manner such as, “I enclose my check for $ .”
Provide adequate space for the name and address with long lines to write on. You may also want to place a key if you are using more than one sales appeal.
PRINTING A BROCHURE
Preparing a brochure or sales catalog is not as difficult as it may seem. It doesn’t have to be a glossy, four-color fancy booklet. You can send out even a one-page description of the product and an appeal for ordering.
The brochure or sales catalog is the visual representation of your product. It emphasizes the features rather than the benefits, and goes into detail about the product. Think about what you’re selling. What are the best points of sale? If it’s printed information, what is the format-size, number of pages, hardcover or soft. Is the author a well-known authority? How is this a better deal than another of the same subject?
If you’re selling a product, maybe you’ll need to include the colors available, sizes, or the type of materials. Or emphasize the clear, easy-to-follow instructions that are included. When you get stuck, just look at all the other catalogs and compare. What information is included? Follow suit.
The important aspect of a brochure is the use of illustrations. Again, these don’t need to be series of four-color photographs. Although photos are very good ways to sell goods, don’t bother to use anything that is less than excellent in quality. Be careful if you want to use a model. Remember, you WANT TO SELL.
An excellent way to illustrate your product is with simple lithe drawings. Even if you can’t prepare the final artwork, you probably can think of what you want and how to place it on the page. Local yellow pages, newspaper ads, typesetters and printers are good places to find an artist to do the final work at a reasonable price.
Once you have a good idea about the size and scope of your brochure, you’re ready for the rough layout. And this is easy. Just pretend you’re an artist. That’s right – you don’t have to draw to do a rough layout. Pencil in the type for the heading. You can do a stick figure sketch of a line drawing or indicate the size of the photograph. Draw lines to indicate the body copy.
Write out all the words for the brochure in accurate, clean typewritten copy. Don’t forget anything that will be printed, and don’t misspell anything. Then take it to a typesetter or printer. Printers usually can work with you to help choose the type style, size and particulars about the layout. Or, they may know artists or designers who can help you for a small fee. They usually work closely with a few typesetters, but you work directly with a typesetter to have the type put into final form.
MAILING
You can get a bulk rate permit at the post office if you send out at least two hundred identical pieces at a time. They must be presorted for destination. The bulk rate cost is lower, but it takes much longer for the mail to be delivered.
The most important aspect to mailing your sales literature is the quality of the list of people you are sending it to. A brilliant sales piece won’t work it if is not sent to the right people. That’s why you must be clear when you place your original classified ad, and that’s why you need to test which heading to use and how many details to include.
Your own mailing list is the best one, because – since you keyed the responses – you know what these people responded to. You have already profiled the potential buyer, you have already written a sales piece aimed at that buyer, and YOU WILL MAKE MONEY from that buyer.
Although you can buy or rent lists of names and addresses form list broker, you can never by sure how well the list will respond to your sales package. If you need more names, just place more classified ads. Test different headings, test different magazines, and test different products.
KEEPING RECORDS
It is extremely important to keep accurate records in mail order. It is only through these record sheets that you can determine which ad pulls the best, which advertising lead is the most enticing, and how well your product is selling. Good records are the follow up of good testing.
Keep copies of all ads and conversion material in a three-ring binder or scrapbook. You may also include in that book – or a separate folder – a record of all the keys you have used. The separate sheets of records per key or publication will help you be able to compare which ads are bringing in the profits.
You can make your own record sheet with a pen and ruler. Then have a few photocopied. You’ll need a separate sheet for each ad you place. At the top of the sheet, place the name of the publication the ad appeared in; the issue number or date; the date the issue was placed on sale; the address key; the size and cost of the ad; which ad you used; the price of the product; and – to be calculated later – the profit.
The main body of the record sheet has two main categories: inquiries and sales. First, the number of days should be listed in a column at the left. These don’t necessarily coincide with the days of the month, rather start with the first days responses came in. The subheads under “inquiries” should be: date received, number received, running total. the subheads under “orders” should be number of orders received, running total, cash sales, and running total for cash sales.
These record sheets will help you to figure out the responses to classified ads, orders from sales literature, and how much money you are making.
To calculate the cost per inquiry, divide the cost of the ad into the number of inquiries received.
To fine the cost per order, add the total cost of mailing the sales packets to the cost of the ad and divide that by the number of orders received.
The ratio of conversion is the number of orders compared to the number of inquiries. For example, if you get twenty orders from one hundred inquiries, the conversion is twenty percent.
HOW TO CALCULATE PROFIT
Total the amount of cash sales. That is your gross profit. Subtract the cost of the product. Subtract the cost of the product. Subtract the cost of mailing. Subtract the cost of conversion and the cost of the ad. That is your net profit, the one that counts. Just stick with it, and you can WATCH THAT PROFIT GROW bigger and bigger each ad, each conversion, each sale.
EXPANDING AND GROWING RICHER
Over the years, good buyers purchase many times your initial investment in classified ad space. A first buyer indicates a second sale; after that, you have a regular customer who may purchase for years.
Promote the field of interest you’ve selected – don’t expand into separate areas. Cultivating your prime customer list takes patience and testing, but you’ll find it rewarding.
Perhaps you started with one product to offer and are ready to try another. You can run new, separate classified ads in the magazines that have tested successfully to your other offer. And, you can use your list to send out sales literature for the new offer. Regular mailings depend on the number of items you have, the size of your list, and your budget. But follow through is very important.
Maybe you are at the stage of printing a small, two page catalog/brochure that offers five to ten products. You can mail this out to the inquiries from classifieds, or you can use any combination of one-page offers you have used in the past. Always run with what sell. Drop anything that pulls no response as soon as you’ve given it a fair test.
EXTRA APPEALS
Once you get rolling with your mail order business, you can try any number of incentives to solicit orders. You can offer a free gift – or free anything – certificates, coupons, fabulous prizes.
You might offer a sample, a trial period, or a special guarantee. One way to push for an order is to show that the supply is limited or you won’t stock a certain item for long. Time limitations will elicit quicker responses. You may offer one price until a certain time and then show an increase after that.
A successful way to push for large orders is to offer a discount on the larger orders. That way, it is worthwhile to order two or more items – for you because it’s more business and more profit in mailing and handling, and for the customer because it is at a reduced price.
What do the other mail order businesses do? What kind of incentives do they use? As always, check with the competition. What has proven successful to them probably will work for you too. What kind of “special” offer you can make to push for larger, quicker or more frequent orders?
SATISFACTION GUARANTEED
Not only must you print a guarantee in all your ads and sales literature, but you must honor it. Never send inferior merchandise; never take a chance on faulty mailers or guess lower on postage. Deliver a complete product.
It is only through satisfied customers that you will get repeat business, and it is through repeat business that you MAKE MORE MONEY.
Don’t try to get away with anything less than you promote and stand by all claims you make. Honor requests for refunds promptly and politely. A customer satisfied with your honesty remains a good buyer and may purchase from your later offers.
MAKING MORE FROM A WINNER
You’ve got a successful product. The conversion for orders is high, refunds are low, and the draw form the classified ad is great. How can you make more money – even if you think you’ve saturated your market?
The easiest way to increase your inquiries is to run another ad in the same publication with a different heading. If the classified section is large, you might ask one to be placed at the beginning, the other towards the end. Although several clever readers will notice the same address, it still draws a significant number of inquiries in. This technique is also good for copy testing to see which heading will draw the most response. Be sure to key each ad separately and keep accurate records.
Maybe you have two or more products that you want to advertise separately. This is a good way to do it without going to other publications. Again, key addresses, and be extra careful to respond properly to the inquiries.
YOU AND THE LAW
You do not need a special federal or state permit to run a mail order business. The material you sell must be legitimate however, and you cannot be deceptive or misleading in claims or advertising.
If you offer something “free,” it must be free, and all claims concerning money must be honored.
If you use testimonials in advertising, they must be real and available to investigation. Frauds are discovered and are prosecuted.
The federal and state governments require you to report all income, but you certainly can take every legal deduction. Once you make a good deal of money, it’s often worth every penny to have an accountant fill in your forms. If your income warrants it, you will be expected to pay income tax quarterly.
Most states now have sales tax, so you’ll have to find out the regulations concerning the collection and payment of these fees. An advantage to this, however, is that you can get a state resale number and may not have to pay state sales tax on some of the items you need for your business.
If you keep accurate records and report the proper information to the authorities, you’ll have no problems.
ACT NOW
Classified ads are the best way to make a high income return from limited sources. You can buy the extras you’ve wanted, send yourself on an exotic vacation – even create a profitable yearly income.
One of the best aspects of this type of enterprise is that the number of successes increase as the number of errors decrease. You learn as you go along and YOU MAKE MONEY CONSTANTLY.
Cultivate positive thought. As you can see, there is nothing difficult, costly or extremely risky in making good money from classified ads. What is the best way to get started?
Thousands of people have earned a comfortable income from classified ads – with great happiness and contentment in their own business. You can succeed too, if you make up your mind that you want to. Faith is simply a state of mind, but it has been proven that state of mind can CHANGE DESIRE INTO REAL MONEY. There’s no better time to get started.
If you think than mail order classifieds are too much for you to handle, you can first try to make money with online classifieds. There are a lot of sites on which you can publish your online classifieds. Publishing classified ads on high traffic site like Craigslist, would be the best choise if you want to aim for more geo-targeted customers. Making money with Craigslist is also very cost effective because, by selling in your city, you can save a lot of money on shipping costs alone.
No matter what way you decide that is the best for you, classifieds are the great way to make money, either mail order or online.
3 Steps To Generate Income Online
Every normal man or woman is now able to reap the benefits of generating income online. This post consists of facts for everybody who is intent on transforming their online income generating concepts into a real possibility.
Exactly how do you make it happen?
1. Determine what you wish to do. Establishing an internet business inside a focused market is exactly what I recommend. After that you can integrate affiliate programs in it.
What truly you’re interested in or have you got a pastime or anything you’re genuinely obsessed with? Maybe you like cooking, marketing and advertising, homemade projects, sports activities, horticulture, sport fishing etc. These online income generating concepts are prospective online businesses for starters.
Buying your very own domain address is one thing you will have to do. Debate forums or article directory sites are great destinations for you to visit and find out more on how to make this happen. I wish to suggest that you simply need to incorporate the concept of your business within the domain address.
Buy a .com, .net, or .org domain address which includes keyword phrases concerning the business you’re establishing. GoDaddy.com is an excellent place to buy domains for a fair price.
Web hosting service is what you must arrange now. Hosting your very own WordPress blog is definitely the best method to get started achieving this. Web hosting companies like HostGator ensure it is quite easy to build your blog with as easy as pie.
2. Discover ways to promote on the internet. To begin making profits this is exactly what you will expend almost all your efforts on.
Having created your website then you definitely want to concentrate on getting targeted traffic to it on a steady basis. It’s all about the numbers and the more traffic you’ve got going to your website the more income you will earn.
Getting targeted traffic to your web page just isn’t as simple as it may sound and based upon on how competing the market your internet business it may very well be even more challenging.
You really should start out with free advertising techniques like article marketing and with social media. An effective method for obtaining back-links to your web page as well as for traffic generation is including content articles to your website and social bookmarking all those content articles.
Attempt to grasp a minimum of one or two types of significant traffic generation. There is no need to turn into an expert in all techniques, nonetheless, the more targeted traffic you’ve got arriving the more income you will earn. The system is fairly straightforward.
3. Broaden and include new revenue sources. In case you have additional websites you’ll be more well off. Once you have a method in place for getting visitors to your website you’ll be able to duplicate that same method and release the strength of online income generating in as much new websites as you wish.
The above mentioned is a step-by-step tested method to transform your online income generating concepts into a reality.
How To Create Your Own Product
Creating your own product can be a time-consuming task. And, a lot of people who are new to this type of activity can become intimidated by the concept rather quickly. They begin to question if their product is ‘ready’ to be unleashed unto the online world. And so, they place it on the ‘back burner’ for another day. Then the day turns into a week, a month, six months, and so on, until they have completely forgotten or given up on the prospect of creating something of their own.
Let me tell you that creating your own product is NOT a hard thing to do! Not by any means. So long as you have the right tools on hand to do it. Let me further explain that everything you have done up until this point can help you sell your product and earn you more profits even AFTER you have sold your original product.
So, the first thing you are going to need is a tool to turn your words into an ‘official’ e-book. But, before we get to the free tool, let me take a moment to explain WHY we are focusing on the ‘e-book’ format.
First off, they can be produced rather cheaply. Second, they can be produced quickly. And third, they can be downloaded almost instantly by your customers.
So, easy to make, cheap to make, and no physical shipping necessary? That’s all you need to know right there! Sure, it’s gonna take a bit of work on your part, but after the first work of creating the product is done, distribution will be next to nothing. And, best of all, distribution won’t cost you anything!
Okay, now for the free tool. All you need to create your own PDF e-book is: Open Office Suite. It’s 100% free and you can use it to make PDF e-books in a snap. Why PDF e-books though? Well, because PDF e-books can be read by anyone no matter the operating system their computer is running on. And because there is not a threat of malicious viruses being attached to them like .EXE files. Better for you, better for your customers 
.
Once you have your Open Office Suite downloaded and installed on your computer, you will notice there are several tools ready for you to use. For e-book creation, all you will need is the ‘Writer’ tool. It operates almost exactly like Microsoft Word, but you can do more with it, including, and most importantly, saving your compilations as PDF e-books with the click of a button. That’s pretty impressive. Especially for a tool you paid nothing for.
Of course, if you do have MS Office Word 2007 or later, then you can use it in a same way.
After you have your product all finished up, it’s time to ‘take it to market’. Or, sell it 
.
While you can of course sell your product as it is, there are a few other things you can do to make it more of an attractive product to potential customers. And that is by offering some form of Resale Rights with it.
Again, I won’t go into the entire description of types of resale rights, because you can download a superb ebook that explains that here. But just know that by offering such a ‘bonus’ to your buyer’s purchase can boost your sales.
Another thing you can do to try and boost your sales, and this has been proven to work, is to create a virtual ebook cover. This can get pretty expensive if you hire someone to do the cover, but for few dollars you can buy eBook Cover Impact’s whole set of Photoshop scripts, actions that make it incredibly easy to turn any flat image into a realistic looking 3D cover image.
eBook Cover Impact is not just a bunch of action scripts. It is a complete ecover toolkit for Photoshop, featuring 16 action scripts, 20 pre-designed templates and complete video training, along with some shortcut bonuses to help you complete your design tasks faster.
How To Create Return Customers
Return clients are all important to the success of any business. In online commerce however, this simple principle is often overlooked. The focus has got new customers to the website, but little or no attention is given to getting customers to come back at a later time.
In an online environment, securing return customers is even as significant as getting users to your website that first time. When creating web pages, marketers fail to keep this is mind. Often, there is plenty of information first visitor, but little inducement to return to it site in the future.
If a client remembers a company’s website, for reasons good or bad, they have the power to share their experiences with thousands of other potential customers with the touch of a button. Positive, mouth to mouth, advertising can mean big boost in sales.
In an environment where customers may only see your page for a few seconds, it is imperative that your site stands out among the others. One of the best ways to carry out this is to give content for both new and old customers alike.
Adding that special touch
When users return to your internet site is a matter of connection between the person and your business. Customers can do this easily by walking into a store, but with web pages this “ambience” is difficult to create. To be successful, you need to make an environment in which the customer can feel welcome, and remember you by.
A straight forward way to do this is to give them information they want or need about your product, but also information that is useful beyond this scope. Customers show interest in information about your industry, but make them feel welcome by providing them with stories that are of interest to your clientage. Show them your company has more to offer them than a hard-nosed online store. This relaxes the customer, gives them a reason to remember the company, and differentiates your site from those of the competition.
Feature Stories, News and Posts
Take a look around on the Web and you will see how the big online marketers are applying these principles. Try to do the same on your internet site.
Newsletter information value
One of the easiest things you can do to make your page more interactive is run a simple newsletter on your website. Newsletters give a practical means to distribute product information, company news, or alert past visitors of new changes to the internet site. This is one of the easiest ideas to carry out, as they can be simply added to nearly any internet site at little or no cost to you.
Update your Website
Regular website updates keep the content fresh and encourage people to come back and see the changes. Make sure that front page will be replaced each month to give the website a new look and stimulate return visits.
Weekly Special Offers
Offer your Web customers special incentives to use your website. Have sales, contests, or specials designed for your Web clientele and change them weekly. This gives your clients a real cash value on returning to your website and provides one more reason for your customers to spread word of your website to their friends.
Where to go next
There are plenty of sites online that are using these principles, and those are some of the best places to get ideas on how to use them on your site. Amazon is shining example of the website successfully using the ideas suggested here.
The intense competition the Web provides makes it much more difficult to stand out among the competition. The nature of this medium proves difficult in providing a personal touch, as well as the importance of customer service. Boosting web traffic to your internet site is a necessity, but remember that return customers can bring in more new customers than any advertisement will.
