Friday Income & Cash Flow Forum–EARN EXTRA MONEY SELLING FOR YOUR COMPANY

By Kevin M

This is a weekly open forum dedicated to increasing income, cash flow and customer base, for anybody who needs to increase business or supplement a paycheck. Salaried employees, homemakers, small business owners, commissioned sales people, entrepreneurs, retirees?this is FOR you, and we?d like to hear FROM you. What works in one household or business may not work in another, but then again it might. Or it might be modified and adapted to different situations.

Volunteer to be a part time sales rep for your company. Right now there?s a lot of anxiety out there over whether or not jobs will last; layoffs and the threat of layoffs are everywhere. It may be time to stop worrying, and volunteer for (paid) duty on the front lines.

Every company needs sales to stay in business; you may not view yourself as a ?sales type?, but you may still be able to help in different ways. I can think of three ways to accomplish this:

1. If you?re job has been eliminated or is likely to be, offer to shift over to the sales or marketing side of the business, even if it?s for lower pay. I have a friend who?s doing this very thing right now. It may be an entirely different job than what you?ve known, but if you lose your job, you?ll have a different one anyway.
2. Offer to work in sales or marketing in addition to your regular job. There may not be enough work to keep you on full time in your current position, but maybe a job split will provide some stability.
3. Volunteer to work on the sales and marketing side of the business on a part time basis, in addition to your regular job. Not only will this offer the opportunity to earn additional income, but it will also make you more valuable to your company (and to other companies if the time does come that you need another job!).

When I say ?sales? I?m not necessarily talking about banging on doors or making cold calls, though if you could perform those services it might be in everyone?s best interests.
But revenue generation requires more than just direct sales. It often involves follow up customer contact, problem resolution, customer support, database management and database marketing. Find a niche in any of those areas and you may be passed over when the pink slips go out, or better find yourself earning badly needed extra income at a higher rate of pay than you could earn on a part time job outside your company.

Business partnering/combining. This is about partnering or combining with parallel businesses, and it seems to be a trend in certain fields. It?s not unusual to see combinations such as Kentucky Fried Chicken/Taco Bell, Schlotsky?s Deli/Cinnabon, or Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robins. In each case, two organizations combine in a way of complimenting each other. One offers meals, the other dessert, or two combine to become a mini dessert superstore, or a single restaurant with wider selection.

The key here is that both entities share space and customer base, lowering operating costs and cross selling to the common customer base. Banks and other financial institutions do this all the time.

Are there any businesses you can combine operations with in such a way that you can either reduce expenses or increase/maintain sales or both?

Viral email marketing. A close friend of mine markets his business (nationally) by emailing monthly newsletters to thousands of potential clients. It would of course be very difficult and time consuming to develop a list of thousands (or even hundreds) of prospect emails unless you maintain customer databases, which you should. But assuming that isn?t the case and you?re going from a dead start there may be other ways.

What my friend did when he began was to join certain organizations within his field, which gave him access (for a fee) to contact databases in the industry. 3000 newsletters emailed monthly have kept the cash flow coming in, and surprisingly few recipients have opted out of the mailings. It?s a way of getting your name and product or service in front of likely customers with relatively little time and at close to zero cost.

Many industry and trade groups maintain similar databases that can be obtained by joining the organization and paying a relatively small fee for a large collection of contacts.

One caveat here though, I?ve purchased databases from commercial sources in the past and found them to be not much better than the phone book, so I would advise against spending the money for this purpose.

There are restrictions on email marketing that need to be observed in order to avoid fines. The Federal Trade Commission can provide guidance on this, but you may also need to consult with an attorney who has experience in this area. Like all regulations, the guidelines on this are thick and not always easily comprehended, but you?ll need to be in compliance.

If you?re a salaried worker, retiree or a homemaker, what are you doing to find new sources of income? If you?re a business owner, or in some capacity responsible for bringing business in the door, what is it you?re doing to attract customers and cash flow in this economy? What ideas have you heard about or know others to be doing? What?s working, what?s not?