This is a guest post from an old friend of mine, Pete Ekizian, a very savvy small business owner who owns and runs a very successful ecommerce engraved gifts store that has been online for twelve years.
I’ve known Pete for most of those years and had no idea what he wanted to write when he asked if he could guest post here and am very happy to share these tips from him on how to manage a small business during economically challenging times.
I hope you REALLY listen to what Pete has to share in this post. Few are as successful at ecommerce as Pete is – I can count how many I know about personally on one hand.
You can read more about his store in my post
How to Evaluate an Ecommerce Store and Merchant’s Affiliate Program.
So the recession is killing all of us.
Ignore what you read from certain people
who claim you can actually do
better in this economy.
The only reason they are saying
this is that they have something to sell.
You know the pitch:
The economy is bad, yes,
but we have the secret to
getting richer than ever!
It comes in many different forms:
- Build links that Google loves, without leaving your couch!
- How to add tons of content to your site on autopilot!
- Comment on followed blogs in your industry without lifting a finger!
There are two common threads to just about all pitches like this (and I’m sure you’re getting more than ever because people are getting desperate):
- First, they promise to automate a service that we all know works: Building links, building content, adding real value to blog conversations, etc.
- Second, they state that these invaluable activities can be done effortlessly.
And, of course, they claim that for a small lump sum payment or monthly fee, they’ll show you step by step how to do this.
Please, please, please take my word on this for your own sake…
Do NOT fall for what SIMPLY DOES NOT WORK!
99.9% of pitches for ways to automate your business
are utter nonsense!
I don’t say 100% are nonsense because I’ve been around long enough to know never to say never! (Never and always will usually come back to bite you.)
Grow Your Business by Building a REAL Small Business:
How about doing this instead?
Build a real business
(yes – even if its a website based business)
with real customers / clients who will
come back to you again and again
because you provide value.
How about using this recession as an opportunity to refine your business? You’re not packing as many orders, overseeing as much AdSense activity, or consulting with as many clients, so take the time to fine tune your business processes and practices.
When the recession ends, which it will because they always do, you will be so much better off because of this. Here are some tips that you can get working on today:
Business Operating Expenses:
Take a long hard look at your expenses:
- Stress what’s working for you
- Eliminate what’s not.
This is probably the single most important activity you can do right now. When business is booming, you can often add a whole bunch of expenses that may or may not work. Who cares when you have so much money coming in that you don’t want to upset the apple cart by getting rid of anything.
That social bookmarker you hired for $200 a month, maybe he’s paying for himself in traffic and/or rankings. The blog commenter from the Philippines you employ for $100 a month, well you don’t have time to check your analytics to see if she’s actually driving traffic. You’re too busy!
Make sure money you are spending
Is actually working for you.
Well guess what, now you’re not too busy. You have the time now to go and check your analytics, to do backlink analysis, to get on the phone with your virtual employees and see what’s working and what’s not.
GLOBAL OUTSOURCING:
Stop outsourcing so much that you lose
control of the quality of your product.
Look, I love outsourcing. It’s one of the most important activities you can do. When you break it down, every great business in history has used outsourcing in one way or another.
When you think of outsourcing as just getting someone else
to do your work (tedious, or otherwise), there’s no debating
that you need to learn how to do this.
The problem arises when you lose control. When you don’t know what your article writer is writing, and whether its really content you feel proud putting “out there.” When your AdWords specialist is upping your spend without increasing conversions because they get paid as a percentage of spend.
Or when your “brand” is becoming known more
for the blog comment spam your blog commenter
is posting than for your actual products or services.
Right now, outsourcing is huge. Everyone is touting the virtues of outsourcing your life. This is fine but you need to monitor your outsourcers just as you would any other aspect of your business. If you don’t, they may run amok, and bring your business down with it!
Strive for a better product and happier customers.
This one seems fairly obvious in theory, but judging by many of the companies I’ve bought products from or employed to do a service, it needs to be stated.
Everyone wants more, more, more.
More clients, more sales, more money.How about building a real business with happy customers
that you care about and products you’re proud to sell.
Now, you can do this for purely altruistic reasons of course but, let’s face it, you’re a business person. The best reason of all to do this form purely a business perspective is that you’ll build customers for life.
Your customers will come to you,
even in the midst of a recession
with hardly any money to spend
Because they know they will get value from you!
They know that you stand behind your products
and that they’ll never feel like they got ripped off.
They know they will be treated well –
and that is even more important to them when they’re
parting with the few extra dollars they have.
These are some things that have helped me survive this economic downturn. Obviously, things are not booming like they were three years ago, but when they do come back, my company will be a leaner, nicer, more customer-friendly operation.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on the things you’re doing to survive the recession.
My name is Pete Ekizian, I own an e-commerce website named Executive Gift Shoppe. We specialize in gifts for men like Flasks, Wallets, Pub Signs, Accessories and Money Clips.
[NOTE: Pete often shares business tips in the Executive Gift Shoppe blog including this interesting piece on Keeping Your Employees Happy When Money is Tight.
NOTE from GrowMap:
I hope you REALLY listened to what Pete had to share in this post.
Few are as successful at ecommerce as Pete is – I can count how many I know about personally on one hand.
Small businesses like Pete’s that Google’s favored big brands see as
competition were severely impacted by the Google MayDay update,
then the Google Panda update, and will continue to lose traffic from
organic search and from AdWords pay per click ads (unless they
keep adding more and more keywords or spending much more).
One other thing Pete does is that he offers the very best money back guarantee I have ever seen – so good that I highlighted it in this post I wrote about my favorite category of all the products he offers: business card holders.
You can see Pete’s guarantee
and some of my favorites in my post
How to Use Business Card Holders to Attract More Business.
Pete has a larger selection of practical and unusual gifts that can be personalized with engraving than any site I’ve seen online or any store I’ve ever seen – and because I once managed Pete’s AdWords account and worked with him on blogging and social media I’ve done a LOT of research in his niche and seen all of his competitor’s sites.
As the holiday season approaches, I encourage you to
support small businesses – both local and online.
Every dime you spend with them benefits our economy and working people everywhere because real people like us spend the money we receive so that it stays in circulation and benefits more people!
Make notes about your favorite small businesses
that include their Web site URL because during the
holiday shopping season they will become harder to locate online.
Whenever you need personalized gifts, groomsmen gifts, or unique holiday gifts I can highly recommend Pete’s store.
DISCLOSURE: Pete Ekizian / Executive Gift Shoppe is a former client of mine. We are not currently working together. He did not offer and I would not accept any compensation for the privilege of my readers and I benefiting from him sharing his wisdom.
I put more links in this post because limiting links is another way that search engines make it difficult for us to find small businesses. I wrote the intro and closing. At the time of publication, he has not even seen what I wrote about him.
I add this because so many (not my regular readers who understand – others who may see this) are so quick to jump to unwarranted conclusions and so far have still not seen what is so obvious to me:
When we actively promote small businesses
we use and trust EVERYONE benefits;
- The small business benefits because they MAY receive more sales.
- Anyone who reads or hears your recommendation benefits because you have assisted them in finding a business they can trust offering products or services that they need or want.
- Our economy benefits because money you spend in a small business stays in circulation, pays sales and often property taxes, and creates jobs!
- Your favorite small businesses will STAY in business and you still have freedom of choice!
- The relationships you form with small business owners can change your life and theirs for the better.
We have been conditioned to object
when small businesses use
word of mouth small business marketing
to help us find what we want and need.WHY greatly favor ONLY the multi-national corporations
who can afford to advertise nationally or internationally?Small business marketing BENEFITS US!
Big brands and bankers have taken too much from us already:
our jobs, our pensions, our benefits, our standard of living –
and now they want our food and our freedom, too.If we are ever going to stop this we must understand
what caused the great depression that is happening again now
and what causes economic decline.WE MUST ACT NOW!
to stop it from going any further
While we still can.
By understanding how our economy benefits we can raise our standard of living – and the first step is to CHANGE where we spend our time and money!
Have you heard about BANK TRANSFER DAY? MOVE your money!
peteekizian
Latest posts by peteekizian (see all)
- Small Business Economy: How to Beat the Recession - October 18, 2011
I completely agree with you, you have shared some of the best tips to beat recession here. Thanks a bunch for this.
You would not get a perfect solution fro this – just wait a bit, how the market will be developping after the crisis
Never make the mistake of assuming the critters will beat a path to your door. (John P. Mascotte)
Our economy benefits because money you spend in a small business stays in circulation, pays sales and often property taxes, and creates jobs your favorite small businesses will STAY in business and you still have freedom of choice.
Marry would love you to read ..Featured Stores at CouponRefund.com
wow! these are some really good advices! i hope that i’ll be able to stick to them! thanks for sharing this with us
I love the idea of outsourcing. Hopefully I can get over my control factor and get some benefits from it. This is helpful also from the standpoint of how expensive internal labor costs are. Thanks for info
Cut expenses and 2 jobs helps to beat the recession.
Chris
Owner
Cel Financial Services
Please visit my website at Fillmore Income Tax for your tax needs.
This is true , but their is alot of factors as to why we are in a recession. Having something to sell is the only way i am making it. I work part time and do full time work. I can show anyone that wants to make some extra money free of charge .
Ahmad Ave would love you to read ..Apple Care
It is not so that all social bookmarkers don’t work for you to send traffic to your business site. They are very honest in their work, and if you judge them, you may find that your investment are at very right hand.
“Stop outsourcing so much that you lose control of the quality of your product.” – I’ve seen lots of online entrepreneurs who outsource almost all tasks but remained clueless on which items are done already. Just for example, they used to order articles that sometimes they totally forget if they already used it.
I agree with you that people stop buying things as they buy in non recession days and i agree with you that starting a real small business will make our contribution to close that recession chapter. according to what i noticed is that outsourcing is the main issue that is why we are facing such high unemployment.
Hi Reeha,
The basic problem is NOT outsourcing because outsourcing can be an effective way for businesses to grow so that they can then afford to hire more regular employees.
The problem is greed – not outsourcing. Some companies become so obsessed with maximizing income that they ignore quality for quantity. As in most things in life, balance is needed between expenses and income and actions taken.
Many businesses will not realize when their poor decisions are affecting their bottom line because unhappy buyers usually don’t say anything – they just quietly leave until over time it becomes obvious that something is wrong.
At that point, few businesses will look at what THEY have done to cause that problem and it can be difficult to tell whether drops in sales over time are due to bad customer service, an economy that leaves people with less money, or search engines intentionally taking away your traffic.
Businesses should especially check to see how traffic on their highest converting phrases is holding up. Search engines can hurt you badly by delivering searches on your top keyword phrases to their favored big brands instead of you.
I warned this would eventually happen when they first started giving away conversion and analytics data.
growmap would love you to read ..Food Safety Law – Already Passed – Imposes Up to $1 MILLION Fines for Growing or Sharing Food
I believe outsourcing is one of the key causes of the sheer amount unemployment in the western world. No wonder there are so many people collecting state benefits and what not. The government needs to add more incentives to businesses keeping their departments state side rather than india and asia.
Hi Harry,
That is partially true; however, I believe every person regardless of where they live should earn a living wage – and they would if the greedy few weren’t manipulating economies around the world. It is time to take power away from them.
We must stop looking to governments that are corrupted by the money of the wealthy elite and fix this ourselves by supporting small online and local businesses.
People have been falling for their “get rich quick” illusions for far too long and it is about time they realized the truth. There IS NO Get Rich Quick scheme that works and taking their money gives them control. Slow growth and modest goals are the keys to freedom.
growmap would love you to read ..Why Small Business and Bloggers Can NOT Ignore Economic Decline and Occupy Wall Street
outsourcing isn’t the problem. We all outsource all sorts of things, we outsource our food production, we outsource our fuel production etc etc. Outsourcing is just getting someone else to do jobs you don’t want to do. Offshore outsourcing, in the case of USA to India etc. sends money offshore for tasks that can be done cheaper offshore. In a global market we are free to shop around the whole world to get the best deals. Theres a great post by Seth Godin about the race to the bottom, in a race to be the cheapest US, UK etc are not going to win, cost of living is already too high. However money also flows in, lots of tasks are outsourced to the US from outside, we need to focus on generating new business, evolve and look to the things that we can do, eduction, technology, finance etc. things where quality of product and service are the driving factors. We need to be focusing on the race to the top.
Hi Tom,
If someone is focusing on nothing but cheap, they ARE in the race to the bottom. Only when people STOP worshipping money and focusing on getting more than they need for themselves even if that means others will suffer, starve or die will this ever change.
You say “lots of tasks are outsourced to the U.S. from outside”. Oh really? Like what? The only things I can think of are weapons and appallingly: land mines.
America’s hottest export is weapons so that makes US the largest evil in the world.
Instead of people taking jobs in the war machine because they pay better than anything else, they could refuse to take part in making more weapons and killing others and create a totally different world where everyone can live sustainably.
Payday loans prey upon the poor and desperate and charge obscene interest rates and fees. Do you feel any guilt about promoting that financial trap?
Gail Gardner would love you to read ..Why Success Should Not be Measured in Money
Great article! People buy what they want even in this economy.
Jan would love you to read ..How to tackle water damaged drywall
Hi Jan,
Some still are but that isn’t going to last much longer.
growmap would love you to read ..Food Safety Law – Already Passed – Imposes Up to $1 MILLION Fines for Growing or Sharing Food
Hi Pete,
“Building a real business” is such a novel idea! 🙂 Jokes aside, so many people are grasping at straws looking for a way out, they forget to seek and follow the tried and true.
Thanks for solid, down-to-earth advice (reminders). I also appreciate Gail’s addendum which reiterates to buy local, buy from those you have developed relationships with, and those you trust.
Vernessa Taylor would love you to read ..Virtual Assistant Comment Spam
Hi Vernessa,
Thank you for taking the time to comment. Pete has built a strong business and done an awful lot of things right, so other businesses really need to be listening to his advice.
growmap would love you to read ..Why Small Business and Bloggers Can NOT Ignore Economic Decline and Occupy Wall Street
Unfortunately, in a bad economy the spammers and shysters make lots of money. People are desperate and will try anything to get more money. We must remember that there is no easy way to be rich. It requires hard work and time just to make a decent amount of money. Great post for those who are thinking of getting into making money online.
To tell the truth i’m not sure that spammers earn lots of money, but their activity at least is very annoying… But it won’t stop till Google takes into account the number of backlinks to your site while ranking the site. Just today i saw a video by goggle about its attitude to seo, it is positive, but mainly to onpage on. So, I hope that in future only content will decide who is the best.
Hi Lionel,
Isn’t that the truth! They really come out of the woodwork when times are tough. I believe the problem goes beyond the fact that there IS NO GET RICH QUICK SCHEME THAT WORKS unless it takes advantage of others to the underlying truth that having a goal to get rich is simply the wrong goal.
Anyone who thinks that is what they want should really think about what they believe achieving that goal will give them. I am appalled when young teenagers want to buy mansions and drive a Rolls Royce. That’s nuts? What would a teenage need with either of those? The ONLY reason they would have goals like that is conditioning because they don’t know anyone personally who has either one.
What people really need to do is have realistic goals and stop worshipping things and money.
growmap would love you to read ..Why Success Should Not be Measured in Money
I agree with keeping your company lean, and of course no better time than now to trim your expenses so when we come out of this economy you will just be that much better off, and make more bottom line profits which over time might compensate for those not so good years! I am glad you explained the link juice bonanza going on in the blog post, transparency is key, and since you mentioned why you did it, it adds that much more credibility to the post. Cheers!
People try to cut back a lot these days and small business owners are among the most fortunate because they do have the option of cutting back on their expenses. That doesn’t apply everywhere though
Building loyalty with customers through service and social outreach is definitely one way to do it.
Very good post. It’s true that there’re tons of ad promising easy money but in reality it’s far from being true. Doing your business with small but regular clientelle will bring you profit. That’s for sure.
Nice work, Pete.
I couldn’t agree with you more. There are no shortcuts when it comes to business, everyone has to work hard for their money and success. And those easy-way-out automated software that are supposedly doing the jobs for us, will never work especially now. In fact, they will be our downfall if we ever decide to use it.
When income decreases, people start watching out for every dime they spend. Naturally, they want to spend it well and they want to feel good about doing so.
Also in the times of crisis, only the best survive, and the best means – the ones with the highest quality.
Therefore, even if you do outsource, do it with the best!
Managing expenses by reducing costs can be a huge help. This plus having strong marketing strategy can get small business going.
Hey Pete,
Yes, building links and content on autopilot seems to be the common pitch these days. It seems that a lot of people like selling dreams in these difficult economic times. The best advice you gave here to me was to stop outsourcing so much.
I have experienced outsourcing so much that I lost complete control over my campaign. In the end I was wasting money on outsourcing and not getting the quality of work I wanted. Thanks for all the great advice in this post Pete, much appreciated.
Quality always important therefore we should keep an eye on outsourcing.Thanks for taking time to write this post for us.
Pete Goumas would love you to read ..StarStruck Coupon & Review
I’m with you on outsourcing. The entrepreneur should COMPLETELY understand the in’s and out’s of each and every single process – no matter how small or tedious. While producing content for blog and products too – it’s important that genuine insights come from direct experience of the entrepreneur.
Anish would love you to read ..HRT Music Streamer II Review – Best Music Streamer?
There are certain functions that can be automated, such as through autresponders and form filling. But most things cannot be automated. If it could, then everybody would be doing it. If everybody was doing it, people would be buying from them. You have to be smarter, work harder and be more committed than “everybody”. And no automated system will do that for you.
David would love you to read ..SocialFloat – social sharing widget
Interesting post, yes advantage of outsource usually vary with the type of business or services you run that when the quality of you provide. Post quality content and build related links, thanks for the post.
Thanks for the post. Starting with small is always good for good experience and outsourcing is best way to do things faster.
Welche Recession, wovon sprichst Du 😉
I’m Sylvia – this really good blog content.
Welcome go GrowMap, Sylvia,
While I often include more details about what is going on in America because that is what I am most familiar with, I do try to raise awareness for other countries as well.
The recession this post discusses is really more of a depression and affects people in most countries around the world. See my post about What Caused The Great Depression for more details.
While most Americans probably think of what we refer to as “The Great Depression” as affecting only the United States, it actually impacted North America, Europe, and other industrialized areas of the world from about 1929 when the famous Wall Street Stock Market Crash occurred until at least 1939.
The current “recession” is going to be far worse than The Great Depression unless major changes are made and more people wake up. See Why Small Business and Bloggers Can NOT Ignore Economic Decline and Occupy Wall Street.
.
growmap would love you to read ..Why Success Should Not be Measured in Money
Thanks for the tips as I feel that the person is very experienced and it is great pleasure to read about what the person really has overcome and he wants to share it. Your tips are logical and in fact easy to perform actually.
hey im from denmark, but have read from the sideline.
thanks for a very good post.
You’re welcome, Klaus,
I know that I have many readers who read but do not comment. Some are just shy or don’t care to while others whose native language is not English are hesitant because they fear their English is not good enough. (Many times their English is better than most Americans!)
As long as I can figure out what they’re trying to say or the gist of it is understandable I publish and answer comments from those whose writing can be difficult to understand.
I can usually identify the language and use an online translator and use freetranslation.com which has an auto-detect that figures out what language something is written in for when I am not familiar with it and can’t guess.
Gail Gardner would love you to read ..Why Small Business and Bloggers Can NOT Ignore Economic Decline and Occupy Wall Street
Sometimes it is better to build a valuable and profitable SMALL business, than a big one which can or maybe cannot bring results to you. It’s always better to start something with not so huge goals, and then move further to achieve more results.
Jeanie would love you to read ..Free TV Channel Video Facebook Template
Hi Jeanie,
It is ALWAYS wiser to build a small business without debt and without giving up control to others and grow it over time. The desire to “keep up with the Joneses”, “get rich quick” and “have it all right away” are the traps that most people have fallen into that has led to what is happening now.
growmap would love you to read ..Small Business Internet Marketing: Where to Start
Great article Pete 🙂
All the points are rightly justified and this is really a different style of writing rather than keeping it the same paragraph way.
Building real business which really helps the customers is the key thing to achieve. It builds the brand name and those customers really do promote if they like our product/service.
Nicely articulated 🙂
Phanindra would love you to read ..Free Giveaway – Wondershare Time Freeze Software worth $39USD
This is such an awesome post and a must read one for all business when every one is facing a recession. In small business money that can be spent is limited and should make use of it in a effective way to get more out of the business…
I like outsourcing as much as the next guy, but what you said about enforcing quality control is absolutely spot-on. You need to stay on top of all your outsourced content to make sure quality doesn’t dip, as it often does on long-term contracts.
I have yet to see an example of a successful online business running on autopilot. There’s no such thing as a free lunch, even on the Internet. You get out what you put in.
wow this really good blog content
Simply hanging a sign over your door doesn’t get the customers like it used to. In these times we have adopted a “grow our own customers” philosophy. Basing your business on the continued success of your client ensures referrals, which if done well you can rely on as a steady source of new business.
I reviewed my outsourced income last month because the profits have dropped and I realized that a lot of services I was paying for weren’t even doing anything anymore. It took me a whole day to go through everything, but I felt a lot more clutter free after I “released” the services I no longer required.
Very true on many points. As you said, you might be surprised at how much certain services are adding up to, and not producing real results. Make sure to review your PayPal subscriptions and cut back on anything other than real result-building efforts. All a recession really means is you have to tighten your belt and ride out the storm 🙂