I have reached my one-year anniversary working for 2Checkout. Last year, I was given an outline and a set of general goals that defined the job of Customer Advocate. Most importantly, I was given the room and options to take this position in a number of directions and to build on a sound base of providing vendor-centered assistance.

My most obvious contribution has been providing useful content for this blog space, but there is much more to Customer Advocacy. Often, unsatisfied people will not contact a company to express their dissatisfaction. Instead, they communicate this to their peers and this communication is happening more and more on the Internet. These are the folks I try to assist. My only priority in this is to make sure that the customers and vendors are provided with a satisfactory resolution or a clear explanation as to why their desired resolution could not be provided. Rather than waiting for someone to make contact, I am actively looking for people to assist.

What’s coming in the next year? I will continue looking for and assisting vendors resolve issues, noting trends in vendor’s needs and advocating that we meet those needs. I also will continue to provide content for our blog as well as seeking knowledgeable guest bloggers to help provide you with the information you need to run your business.

More importantly, I will be a more active participant on various online forums. This will allow me to clarify some common misconceptions about 2CO, and e-commerce. I am a voice for our vendor-base, and will use my position to bring up issues and recommendations that come from you, our vendors.

-Bion is 2CO’s Customer Advocate.

With over 85% of small businesses failing in the first three years of operation, one has to wonder why this number is so high.  So I did a little research and this is what I found.  It turns out that banks, business schools and different organizations that support small business were asking themselves the same thing.  With a passion (not unlike mine) to see small businesses succeed, they decided to find an answer.  They decided to survey small businesses and find out what the heck was going on.  Funny thing, all of them found the same revealing yet simple answer to the question.  Why are so many small businesses failing – simply put, “it is a lack of marketing”.

Even after discovering this, I was still perplexed as to why someone would put so much “blood, sweat, and tears” into creating something that they love just to see it disappear before their eyes.  But then I realized that we all start businesses (and I’m no exception) because we want to work for ourselves doing something that we love.  So we start our own (marketing, retail, literacy, training) business with all the right intentions to make it successful.  But then we get so involved in working in the business that we forget or don’t know how to work on the business.

So how do you break the cycle of working in your business instead of on it?  Simple, you have a plan:

1. Schedule time with yourself each day or each week to work on your marketing (do not break these appointments; they are as important as any appointment you would make with a client)
2. Decide in advance what you want to accomplish this year with your marketing (this will eliminate the “promotional panic” where you spend money on last minute ideas and get no results)
3. Commit to a budget to support your efforts (decide on a number that you can spend monthly; you can’t grow on zero dollars)
4. Identify your ideal client (it’s easier, cheaper and more effective to market to a specific group of people that wants your service than to market to the masses)
5. Define your differentiation and communicate it (you have to stand out from the crowd/competition if you don’t want to be shopped solely on price)
6. Create a communication system that allows you frequent and regular contact with your prospects and clients (it takes 7 – 10 touches for someone to know, like and trust you and then buy from you)
7. Stop talking about you in your marketing materials and start talking to your ideal client (people want to know what’s in it for them; tell them about the benefits; not the features)

John Jantsch said it best in his Duct Tape Marketing book, “If you’re in business, you’re in the business of marketing”. Continue reading…

Word of Mouth Marketing, the oldest form of marketing is gaining ground again. How can business owners beat the current recession with Word of Mouth Marketing?

Educate and Nurture Your Current Customers

Don’t put all emphasis on new customer acquisition, but affirm your current customers,
find ways to develop loyalty programs that increase the lifetime value of your customers. Reward
clients with your time, attention and little extras – they will become enthusiastic promoters for your products and services.

Get Known as an Expert in a Niche Community

Are you creating compelling stories (ideas, articles, informative presentations or videos) that are picked up and shared person-to-person via social networking sites or within niche communities? If not, observe successful entrepreneurs in your niche and find out how they have become experts and what has contributed to their success. Participate in discussions, create conversations and relationships that help you become an expert and share your ideas.

Continue reading…

Columbus, Ohio, September 28, 2009: 2Checkout.com, Inc., a leading provider of e-commerce and payments processing solutions for merchants, announced today the appointment of Tom E. Dailey as president of the company. Dailey is a 25+ year credit card and payments industry veteran who has held a number of executive and corporate board roles, most recently as head of Discover Card’s global merchant business.

Alan Homewood, founder of 2Checkout.com, stated, “we are happy to have Tom onboard as part of the 2CO family. Tom’s experience and leadership will be key as we take an already successful company to a new level.”

Established in 2000, and headquartered in Columbus, Ohio, 2Checkout.com (2CO) is a full service e-commerce solution servicing thousands of web-based businesses throughout the world. 2CO provides online businesses a merchant account alternative and a fully automated suite of backend services. In addition to a fast and secure checkout system accepting a wide variety of payment methods, 2CO offers built-in fraud protection, 24-hour customer care, PCI data storage compliance, an automated shopping cart and easy to use plug-n-play code.

There is only one more week left for South Africans to take advantage of 2Checkout’s no-risk free sign up offer.

The offer, which was recently extended through September, will expire Thursday, October 1, 2009 at 12:00 a.m. EST. South African businesses anxious to integrate a new e-commerce solution and try our system on for size, are encouraged to signup as soon as possible and enjoy the $49 USD savings.

Detailed information highlighting 2Checkout’s international advantages, as well as a link to the free signup offer for South African-based businesses is still available.

In related news, 2CO will soon be announcing the integration of five additional international currencies to its purchase routine, including the South African Rand. Stay tuned for more details.