DESPITE seeing its pre-tax profits fall by more than half last year, electronics company Stadium Group plans to spend £1.5m on its Hartlepool site and is hiring 30 extra staff.

In its preliminary results issued yesterday, the firm said its pre-tax profit in the year to the end of 2012 was £1.77m compared to £3.96m in 2011.

The firm is a specialist supplier of electronics and manufacturing services and has bases across the UK and China.

Revenues were also down from £44.94m to £40.99m, despite a one-off sale of the business’s property in Hong Kong, which brought in a standalone profit of £2.4m.

The company put this down to ongoing difficulties in market conditions in the last half of 2012.

However, the decision to close it Rugby facility and keep its Hartlepool facility open means Stadium will spend more money on operations in the North East as a result.

Chief executive Steve Phipson said the Hartlepool-headquartered company had achieved the objectives it set out in 2011, with the acquisition of IGT Industries in September, last year, and the consolidation of its operations in Asia to mainland China.

He said: “The sector we’re in fell back 25% across the UK as lots of competitors squabbled for business. Our market only fell by 11% so we were pleased with our performance overall.

“We decided to close our Rugby facility because we only needed one site in the UK going forward and our Hartlepool base is far more cost-effective. There are a lot more resources and it’s a bigger facility. It’s also a lot easier to recruit good engineering personnel in the North East.

“Because many of the workers at our Rugby facility understandably don’t want to relocate, we will be growing our workforce by 30 in the North East and employing locally. So far, we’ve hired 10 workers.

“We’ve already invested in the North East as we plan to take on more work. We need to make the site ready for machines that will be coming up from Rugby. This whole programme has cost £1.5m as a result of closing Rugby and investing in Hartlepool.”

Looking ahead, Stadium said after a tough trading year it was well positioned to compete effectively in its traditional iEMS markets and pursue new growth opportunities within its technology-led businesses and other possible acquisition opportunities.

Chairman Nick Brayshaw said: “Trading in the first few months of the year has been challenging given a continuation of the difficult market conditions experienced in the latter part of 2012.

“Going forward, our self-help programmes will deliver leaner business structures and improve operational efficiency, which will offset the impact of weak or zero growth.

“The board remains committed to the growth strategy of investing in technology led businesses where we can leverage our manufacturing know how and exploit cross-selling opportunities, and will continue to explore suitable opportunities to drive this strategy forward. Consequently, the board remains confident in its strategy for the future and the group’s prospects for the current year.”

Author: Lucas Anthony

If you own a business then your need for marketing is definitely perennial. You cannot do without publicizing what you do because of the cut throat competition and local markets reducing your business opportunities. Marketing increases your prospects and build your future customer base which in turn strengthens your business and market base. If your business has an internal business team then they have to come up with ideas every day. Owing to the business revolution these days, you cannot live without marketing and without it your business is sure going to dry up soon.

Ad agencies can also help you achieve your goals easily. All you need to do is hire them and let them know the guidelines and the grounds where you would like them to perform. This will help the agency in coming up with a strategy and also help your business gain momentum. With the help of several marketing techniques your business can touch heights that you have never thought of. Of course, this is going to take months but once you have achieved it, you definitely will have issues handling the incoming business.

For multiple marketing strategies and layers of promotional events that you want to carry on for your website, you can also get help from a media buying agency. These firms help you devise a techniques that will make your business gain momentum and run for years to come. You will never have any issues with the incoming business and will always have clients to serve. Ad agencies have helped many businesses walk the ladder success and if you have troubles finding out the best firm for you then you can try online for different options. There are many websites that will help you find your niche in the market and also guide you with managing different aspects of marketing your business.

Media buying agency is the backbone of any business and do a lot when it comes to strengthening a new business in the market. As all have to start with building a customer base, these firms can help you get the impetus required to meet the ends. Without these agencies you can have a real hard time looking for customers and running your business. So make your choice and select a firm that can answer your marketing needs. All would be well once you have got marketing in place and have the right customers to serve.

Freelance Writing From Home Offers Many A Job Opportunity

Perhaps you’re a stay at home mom looking to make some extra money to help the family budget out or maybe you’re disabled and looking for something to do with your time. With either of these scenarios, becoming a freelance writer could be the answer to your boredom, money issues and an outlet for your creativity.

Becoming a freelance writer from home is a great way to make extra cash in this strained economy. There are few start-up costs for equipment, most of which you probably all ready have. You should have a computer with Internet access, a word editor software and time on your hands. There are many companies in the marketplace that hire new and experienced writers to write projects for their customers. These companies pay you either a set fee for an article or project or they pay you by the word. Either way, the more you write, the more you make. But, keep in mind, most companies will publish your work without giving you credit for it. When they buy your piece, they’re buying all the rights to it.

In most cases, you don’t have to come up with the topic, they’re provided for you. The company you’re working for will provide you with a phrase or word that you’re supposed to build your article around. Think of it like a creative writing project where the teacher gives you a word and tells you to write about that one word using the specific word in question a minimum of 4 times. That’s what freelance writing from home is like.

Some of the benefits of writing from home include the ability to set your own schedule, write when you feel like it and work in your pajamas. Yes, you do have deadlines, so it’s important to prioritize your work to make sure all projects are turned in on time. If you choose to become a freelance writer, make sure you have a Paypal account and expect to get paid approximately twice a month. Have several companies in mind to work for after you get the hang of the job as projects can get slow at times.

In most cases there are no qualifications required to become a freelance writer. They typically do not ask you if you have a degree in English or have experience as a journalist. Instead, many may ask you to take a grammar test or submit a sample of your writing for their critique. Remember the old adage about Keep It Simple Stupid. You’re not out to wow and impress them with your vocabulary, but to simply show them that you can string together sentences intelligently and convey a thought in an organized manner.

If you think you have what it takes to write content for websites and don’t mind having other people get the credit for what you write, becoming a freelance writer might be the new job for you.

How to Start an Online Business-Simple steps You Must Take

The economy is in bad shape right now. Although certain states do manage to maintain a low unemployment rate, a great deal of the country cannot say the same. If you are unemployed or are concerned that you may lose your job at any time, you may wish to learn how to start an online business. When you open a business of this type, you can start small and expand over time or keep it small as a second income. There are certain steps that should be followed to give you a better chance of success with your new endeavor. Here is what you should do to launch the business of your dreams.

Find a niche that suits your personality. If you love to sew, look for something in that area. If golf is more your thing, build a business based on that sport. Competition is fierce on the Internet today and you have to compete with major discount retailers who may sell similar or identical products. When you choose something you love, this will be more fun than work. One way to compete is to focus on a particular aspect and make your company known for that. One thing you should do is focus on customer service as this is very important to consumers during tough economic times.

Offer a marketing technique not seen in your competitors. You may offer a discount for referrals or set up auto shipping for items that are needed on a regular basis. Stop and think about the things that would make your life easier. Now offer these things to your customers and they will keep coming back. If you are selling pet supplies, offer pet food on an auto ship plan or flea medications that should be used year round. The customer will no longer have to take time out of his or her busy day to handle this chore and will appreciate how you are making their life easier. Make sure your prices are competitive though. If you charge too much, consumers will look elsewhere no matter how easy their life is made by your company.

Make use of a program such as Google Adsense to increase your profits. With this type of program, you will earn cash from your site every time a customer clicks on an ad and makes a purchase from your site. This does not require much effort on your part, but can pay great dividends in the long run. Of course, this will depend in large part on how successful your site is so make it the best it can possibly be.

Affordable Phone System for Business

Business is a sort of interesting game just like life where we plan out several strategies. One such great strategy that is common to all business types would be the cost-cutting technique. Not only business almost all types of industries strive to make the desired level of reach by cutting their extra costs. In particular, when it comes to business, almost all business associates try to cut down their costs by implementing a special kind of strategy that will help them to survive in the industry. The cost-cutting strategy plays a vital role during the tough times of business.

Even businesses that are money-spinning can gain from cost-reduction strategies to craft a constant elevated turnover margin on its products or services. Big businesses have quite a few choices in dropping the costs of the business without giving up the quality of its service.

Communication is one such important factor in a business which ultimately narrows down to great expenses. The operating cost drawn out for this purpose will cost several dollars. In order to cut down the cost there are several affordable phone systems for business. Here, in this article you will be able to find in some great information that will help you to cut your communication bills. Irrespective of the business type these phone systems can cut down your cost conjointly they are easy on the pocket.

Flagged down as the most recent in phone system technologies, VOIP phone systems makes bring into play of the Local Area Network and the Internet lines of a company for steering phone calls, as an alternative of doing the same process through customary telephone lines. The best part about the VoIP phone system is that it can offer your business a lot of flexibility thereby cutting your costs. on the other hand, before you start looking for the phone system, you need to find out what type of system you need, how well it will merge into your existing communications and what forms of alterations will be needed so that it will work competently.

The most important advantage of Small Business VoIP is that it smooth’s the progress of small businesses to offer a capable corporate status to the callers at a small amount of the cost of standard phone systems. A promising gist in Small Business VoIP is the count of both office and mobile communication devices into one textbook system. On the other hand you can also find in virtual office phone responding system giving professional and well-established corporate reputation for even small businesses.

Business phone systems are of great use to the business associates who have administrative centers across the country can benefit from all locations working and at the same time functioning together as one. Sophisticated business phone systems can help your company function far more efficiently and contend with superior organizations. So make sure that you select the one that best suits your organization needs. Several business associates report that this low-cost long distance phone service is a great deal.

Nuking Your Neighborhood

Fellow Business-Builder, one of my favorite types of businesses to work with are the local brick-and-mortar ones you see on every corner. Why? Because it’s real simple to take the type of marketing techniques we talk about here … and make them work in a local market.

There are a number of ways you can find local buyers below. The key is to find just one to start with right away.

I realize that you may not have a business that can market locally. You may sell to a very specific type of business which isn’t found in your city, or you may target a very particular type of buyer.

But I guarantee you that hidden below are a few ideas that will grow your business. Make them fit.

The first place you should start? Your local Chamber of Commerce.

Many cities have a fantastic chamber that understands the needs of small businesses, others aren’t so fortunate. The city I am in isn’t all that tailored to entrepreneurial-run ventures – but there is a new initiative in 2012 that I am heading up with them that will change that forever. The chamber is a great place to meet like-minded members, and network your way to success.

Some things you need to do:

Become a member and attend the functions. Often they will bring in exceptional success stories from the local area that you can learn from. Other times you will meet that new best client. You won’t know though until you are out there in the midst of other members.

Give talks on your area of expertise. Often, the chamber will be looking for people to teach classes during lunch-and-learns, or breakfast sessions, sometimes networking nights. If you can get in, it is a fantastic way to spread your story.

Advertise in their newsletter. The Chamber in Calgary has a print component, a digital e-zine and a website, all of them being read by thousands of other entrepreneurs in the community. A fantastic place to be seen and heard.

Ask them for help. That’s what they are there for! The chamber’s mandate is to help support the needs of local businesses. So tell them what you need and see who they can introduce you to. That’s what your member fees are for.

Flyers Distributed Throughout Your Neighborhood or Community.

This is a very underutilized marketing tool for small businesses. In most cities, there are professional companies who will distribute flyers for you to businesses and to homes.

In Canada, you can hire private firms or use Canada Post. The price ranges from 4 cents to 11 cents per flyer.

If you have never tested this … you ARE missing out.

One guy teaches piano lessons: any time he needs new business he drops off 5,000 flyers and is booked up for three-six months. Another local pizza shop delivers handwritten letters with bags of flour attached … and they are thriving with their premium-priced pizzas in a down economy.

Some thoughts on how you can use flyers:

Target specific areas within your community that have a higher than average number of your perfect clients as residents. Depending on the service available in your city, you may be able to target high income areas, even going as deep as demographic information for only 11 cents per household or business.

Consider using your flyers as inserts in your local papers … both the major papers and the weeklies or freebies.

Does your local community have its own newsletter or paper? Usually they are hungry for advertising dollars and offer half and full page spreads for a couple hundred dollars. Each residential community in Calgary has its own mini-newspaper that you can advertise in for dirt cheap. Not only that … NONE of the ads in these circulars are written properly … so it doesn’t take much for you to stand out and get a response.

Direct Mail

Obvious but highly neglected. I watch very carefully how much and what type of mail comes across my physical mailbox … and it has been rapidly decreasing in quality and quantity for the past year.

People are not investing in direct mail like they used to, so the opportunity for you to stand out and be noticed is great.

Community lists are often available. Sometimes you can get lists of new businesses, new homeowners, new parents, etc. Depending on who you find as your perfect client, there is almost always a way to find a list of them in your community.

Existing names in your database. Basic, I know … but are you using it? Every week I talk to a local entrepreneur who is totally missing the boat on this. They have hundreds, maybe thousands of past buyers in their database, but have never ONCE mailed them anything. Start there!

Compile your own lists. One client of mine joined an association whose members were his perfect client. One of the benefits of membership was access to a database of other members. Names, addresses, and titles for all of his targeted buyers. We had great success mailing to this list. Find out which associations contain your best buyers and become a member yourself.

Make it fun and make it dimensional. Remember: The types of mailings you know all about … are foreign to those in your community. Dimensional mailings may be a common word in your world, but when a potential buyer receives a mini trash can with a letter inside, he WILL take notice and read your letter.

Joint Ventures

In the Internet marketing community, this is “Marketing 101.” In your local business community, it will be a foreign concept that they have never heard of, let alone tried before.

Partner with other businesses in town that sell to the same clients you do. Do reciprocal endorsements of each other to your lists. It may take some education to get them to understand what a joint venture is and why it is beneficial to their business. But the payoff is immense so get busy educating them.

Swap advertising space with others who do newsletter marketing.

Rent/trade/barter window-space advertising with other local merchants.

Look for local JV brokers. Thanks to Internet marketing, there are now a lot more brokers out there who understand the power of a solid joint venture. There may even be a broker in your city that gets it. If they do, they will do all the work for you, for a percentage of the profit. You can’t lose.

Post flyers and coupons in other establishments with a tracking code on them.

Networking clubs

I have mixed feelings about these. When I first started my business eight years ago, I was a member of a local club and attended every week. It was definitely good to get out and mingle with others. The problem was that many networking clubs are run very poorly. Be very careful in your choice.

Some of them tell you that you can’t join another club if you join theirs. Which is bull-crap.

Look for real entrepreneurs who get it. And look for clubs that aren’t full of network marketers. Nothing against network marketing, but my experience in clubs with an over abundance of them is that there is no real business happening. They are all trying to recruit each other and it is a ridiculous environment I wouldn’t wish on anyone.

Do not stick with lead swap clubs that consider it mandatory you bring X number of leads per meeting. The leads will be of poor quality and rarely are they warm leads.

Despite my negative experiences with them, I do know many business owners who have done very, very well by attending one or two clubs every week. It is a great chance to network, to find new buyers, and to learn from others who are going through similar challenges as you.

Test out a few before you commit. You won’t know the real deal until you have been to a couple meetings. If they don’t allow you to try them out … run away … quickly.

Local Search Engine Optimization and Marketing

This is a powerful way to get ranked high in the search engines when someone searches for a local product or service.

One good ranking can bring you in a substantial amount of leads every week.

Optimized for local search terms. If someone is looking for a hairdresser, they go to Google and search for “Hairdresser ” and if you are optimized well, you will be near the top. This is something you need to learn about because people are looking on Google for every type of product and service they can buy locally.

Get listed on Google Maps (http://maps.google.com/).

Your Google profile set up (http://www.google.com/profiles).

Listed on dmoz.org for your local city (www.dmoz.org).

Listed on every single local business listing or directory you can find.

Local coupon sites can be a fantastic way to drum up new business.

Social Networking Sites

As you may know, I am not a major fan of this for my own reasons. Not that I don’t use the tools, just that I don’t believe in spending more than half your day on this which is what many people are doing.

That said, I have had success with Social Networking and do recommend you get a presence out there. An hour or two a week adding articles and blog posts will keep people coming back to learn more.

Test advertising on Facebook (I did a small test for an event I was hosting and sold two tickets at $895. Total advertising cost was less than $10. You can specifically target Facebook users that live in your city.

Offer Facebook-only, or Twitter-only special deals.

Invest some time and learn about the different areas of Social networking that will help. Better yet, ask others who you see on the networking sites how they are doing. Most importantly … ask them about what is working best for them and giving the greatest return.

Golf Courses are an untapped resource

Being a member of a golf club here, I can speak from experience on the quality of people you can reach through a club.

My golf game sucks … but the people I meet there are golden.

They are typically professionals, white-collar, educated and more affluent than the general public. They are very good buyers for the right type of business.

Golf course newsletters often accept advertising.

You may want to consider getting a membership. The fees can be large, but the payoff can be much larger. Worth looking into.

Advertising

There are some GREAT deals on advertising now. Get aggressive with them and negotiate the prices … they NEED the ad revenues.

Offline newspapers and magazines that are distributed in your community.

Online yellow pages. Almost everyone I know of is bailing from the print versions and sticking to online yellow page ads. Do what works for you … not what everyone else is doing.

AdWords. There are numerous exceptional courses on how to use AdWords to grow your business. For local marketing, this will bring you ample quality leads if done right.

The Google Content Network. A course in itself is needed here. But, this gives you a means to advertise on specific sites within your community for a very low per-click price.

Craig’s list and Kijiji offer free listings – make sure you know the terms and stick with their policies for advertising on their sites.

Trade shows

I used to be a trade show guy … and have sold many different types of products at shows. If I knew then what I know about proper follow-up and direct mail … Yeesh! Have you ever actually looked at all the trade shows that happen in your community over the average year? You will be amazed.

Perfect for both finding potential JV partners and for displaying your wares.

Don’t do what every other trade show vendor does … actually follow up with the leads you collect! Sounds simple … but from my experience it is rarely done. Most of those names that go in the draw boxes and information boxes get thrown out without even a single thought to who could be in those leads.

Make sure you market your booth right to your existing database. Tell them you will be there. Tell them you have a gift for them if they show up at your booth. Make your booth exciting and inviting. Have skilled people on the floor that actually give a crap about being there (incent them on sales made or warm leads captured).

Association marketing

Have you ever opened up or searched your local Yellow Pages for associations? There is an association for nearly everything and could be a gold mine of great contacts for you.

Have a look at who they are, what they offer you, and how you can market your business through them.

You know as well as I do that this list is impossible to tackle in one month, even one year.

The key is to look through it again and find the ones that just seem right to you now. Get one going and giving you a measurable return, then choose the next while that one runs on autopilot.

A new year is just a few weeks away … and is the perfect time for you to try out some new marketing initiatives.

Set one of your resolutions to implement one or more of the above neighborhood marketing techniques into your business every single month.