Wow that’s a nice business card!

Everyone has seen and heard the ads for the cheap online printer offering 250 business cards free or 500 cards for $10. Truth is,  you can not buy quality printing for $10, whether or not you have ordered from the big box printer like Vista, who will even admit that their templates are generic and customization and quality are clearly lacking.

I have spent the last 7 years in the printing business and have seen over 100 businesses using the boring brown background with ivy design. If you have seen this template you know exactly which one I’m talking about. Can you recall one company that has used that template and remember what their business name or brand was? Did their card have rounded corners, custom glossy coating, or just the logo with a smooth matte finish on the rest of the card? Was the card flimsy or single sided? Now take your business card out and ask your self “Is this a unique business card?” If your immediate reaction is not yes, then your missing out on making a lasting first impression with a new potential customer. You only get one first impression and your business card is a representation of you, your brand, and the services you offer.

Internet printers are only able to offer such cheap pricing for one big reason. “Gang Run Printing.” this is a term commonly used in the changing printing industry. Gang Run Printing is when a printer creates a set of metal plates for each color in your design. The colors will not be matched up, and the colors can sometimes shift by up to 50%.

The craft of quality printing may no longer be with many internet printing companies, but that is not the case with Adrian Agency. Your printing job is guaranteed to be printed on the best quality paper with environmentally friendly inks and up to 70% recycled paper.

Bottom Line: If you are willing to compromise on the quality of your companies printing to save $25-$30 on a set of business cards, it will translate into the rest of your business and immediately say to your customer “cheaper is better.”

3 Wealth building secrets that will change your life

1. A part of all you earn is YOURS to keep!

Wealth, like a tree, grows from a tiny seed.  The first money you save and hide away is the money from which your tree of wealth will grow. The sooner you start saving, the sooner your tree will grow. Faithfully nourishing your tree.  Pay your self first, do not buy the newest smartphone or go to a fancy dinner before paying yourself a minimum of 10% of your income.  For example if you earn $50,000 per year for 10 years and contribute $5000 a year In savings, your $500,000 in total earnings over 10 years will give a whopping $50,000 in savings.  Seems simple enough right? Unfortunately many people never reach their goals of financial independence because they never planter their seed.  Decide what percentage is best for you, as a general rule 10% should be the minimum starting point when growing your tree of wealth. The amount you save should not compromise your financial responsibilities. If you can afford 15%, then by all means add 15% to your tree. When you wake up in the morning say to your self “a part of all I earn is mine to keep” say it at the end of your lunch and say it at night, say it every hour of the day if needed till the words are ingrained in your mind like the abc’s. Fill your self with this thought as often as possible, you will soon realize what a rich feeling it is to own a treasure upon wich you alone can claim, as your tree of wealth grows it will reward you with a new feeling of joy and accomplishment.

2. Only take advice from someone you would trade places with

Would you take Landscaping advice from your mechanic, or would you take financial advice from someone who is unemployed?  No, you must learn to only take advice from a competent that knows the topic of interest or focus better than yourself. So find an expert.  Taking bad advice from the wrong person can literally rip your tree of wealth out from the roots. Counsel with wise men, seek advice from those whose daily work is handling money.  Everyone makes bad choice but the key to success is learning from them so not to repeat them.  Dust your self off, and begin again. Failure is not an option, and your will power must be strong enough to perservere through your misfortunes or mistakes.  Will power is the unflinching puporse to carry out the tasks or goals you set for yourself personally or your business. This is the best way to build the confidence you need to accomplish the goals you set.

3. Make your Money work for you

Once you have built your tree of wealth  to provide you with shade,  it is time to invest with the greatest caution and critical thinking.  Make your money work for you by investing in safer and smaller returns.  A small but safer return is more important than the riskier and larger returns.  There are hundred of investment strategies out there, Mutual Funds, Roth IRAs, and 401ks are sound investments that will help you slowly but steadily grow your tree of wealth till you are content. Do not overstrain and try to save or invest too much.  Lending out money can also be a  good way to earn larger returns without collateral and contracts. Remember to never lend anything out that you are not willing or able to loose.

Bottom line: A penny saved is a penny earned, and the sooner you start the faster you will build wealth, pay off debt, and start making a routine of putting your money to work for you by making smart and safe investment choices.

Thank you for reading our 3 tips and check back soon for more ways to accumulate wealth, make it work for you, and keep it!

 Respectfully,

Adrian Boysel

Founder

Adrian Agency LLC.

“Designed to inspire”

7 Cures for being broke!

1. Start saving now!

A portion of your income is yours to keep.  For every dollar you make, pay your self a minimum of 10 Cents. That is 10% and yours to keep.  The sooner you start the more your wealth will grow, if you can afford more than 10%, great, but remember small wins everyday create large long term gains.

2. Control your spending

Do not confuse neccesary expenses with your temporary wants a desires.  Your expenditures should not exceed 90% of your income.  Create a hard copy budget of your expenses and cross out all but the absolute neccesities.  However much you have left, if less than 10%, should be stored away from temptation in a safe, or inaccessible bank account.

3. Multiply your money by investing

Investing into low risk programs is a great way to build additional wealth and put every dollar to work for you.  The sooner you invest, the faster the stream of money will become a reality. Put your dollars to work by making your money your slave. Lending to someone you know with collateral and who has the means or ability to give you a guaranteed return is a great way to make profit.

4. Protect your money from loss

The penalty of risk is probable loss.  Research heavily before parting with your hard earned dollars. Be careful not to spend to much time deciding. If you have not come to a confident decision within 24 hours, it is probably best to move on. Be careful that the person or company you are investing or lending to can guarantee their ability to pay you back. Would you trade places with the lender business you are investing with? Consulting an expert is also a great way to determine if you have a good investment in front of you. Be sure it’s an experienced person in the proper handling of money.

5. Buy your own home or property 

A great sense of confidence and happiness comes from owning your own home. Though you may have a mortgage, each payment will go towards that debt and will greatly reduce your overall cost and improve your quality of living.

6. Guarantee yourself a future income

Prepare for a suitable stream of income that will provide yourself and your family for many years. Real Estate, Land, and other investments are great ways to gain more income. It must be stable income that will provide even once you are gone.

7. Increase your ability to earn

Your preceding accomplishments must be desire or drive. Your desire must be strong and definite- general desires are weak longings. Your desire should be simple and attainable the more you take interest in your craft. Cultivate wisdom by studying, practicing, networking and learning about your industry. This will make you more experienced and confident, and the more confidence you have, the more you will earn!

 

If you put these 7 cures into action we know you will see your wealth grow and your financial situations will dramatically improve.

How to avoid losing your business to greedy investors!

Why did you start your small business? For passion, for money, or both?  Truth be told, most entrepreneurs have a dream to not just do what they love but want get paid handsomely to do it.

Are you currently, or have you in the past been faced with making a decision that may compromise the future and control your passions, dreams, and small business?  I have on multiple occasions, and my first time making this decision could have cost me my dreams of being an entrepreneur.  I hope the ideas and strategies from this article will shed some light and give you some qualified advice on how to make the right choice.  For some, these decisions will be easy to make, and for others, not so easy.  Is your business providing a roof over you or your families heads, do you have employees working for you that depend on your leadership to secure their career with your company?  These are just a few of the questions you may ask yourself when deciding to take on investors, sell your business, or bring on a partner.  Can you afford to risk losing your income, or eventually lose a business you’ve risked everything for to start?  If you are like me, then you have put in blood, sweat, and tears to see your business succeed.  Letting a wanna be big shot with a checkbook just waltz in and start telling you how you should run YOUR business, or tell you that it is flawed and not running right is not a place that you ever want to end up.  Here’s my story of how I was taken by a greedy investor myself:

In late 2007 I started a retail print, sign, and graphics store called Kalifornia Printing aka KalPrint.com located in Citrus Heights, CA.  By the end of 2010 I had moved my small operation from 650 Sq ft to over 3000 Sq Ft. in Midtown Sacramento just blocks from the capital.  We had over 3,000 happy customers, tens of thousands in equipment and we provided jobs for more than 10 people.  In April of 2011 I was approached by a former employer Randy who was also in the printing business but specialized in direct mail.  Randy talked about all the success he had and how he had all the resources he needed for his business under one roof.  He then offered to buy my entire company from me, while keeping it as my business and told me to put together a proposal for purchasing my Kalifornia Printing.  Randy said that he saw great potential in me and saw the vision I had for my brand that I had worked tirelessly to build. He went on to say he could see us taking KalPrint nationwide. He even went as far as putting stars on a map in his office of locations where he would want KalPrint facilities.  At this time my business, although profitable, was going through some real growing struggles.  My stress level was high, my liabilities were very minimal, but I was truthfully overwhelmed.  I thought at the time that this offer could be something really great. After all my hard work, I was more excited than I had ever been about the future of my company.  I wrote the proposal and emailed it over, within 3 days we met again and he had a contract written up with his counter offer and what he was willing to give me. Not one of my offers were met, in fact, I was offered a tenth of what I was asking for upfront, and half of my monthly salary that I wanted.  I felt at this point like I was stuck in a corner. I needed help. I could continue like I was with all the stress and wearing 12 hats, or take his offer.  So there I was, faced with a tough decision that would not only affect my life but the lives of everyone of my employees and customers.  Randy was offering to relieve me of all my liabilities, stress and give me the financial backing and resources I would ever need. It seemed like a no brainer at the time.  So I signed on the dotted line without taking some qualified legal advice first.  It was this decision that I would regret for a very long time!

After signing, Randy ordered (not asked) but ordered that we move our entire operation over in one weekend and begin to run out of his facility in West Sacramento.  Hesitantly I made the switch hoping that two moves in less than 9 months was not to big of a jump, we had been growing our facility month by month in downtown and things were really starting to pick up.  Randy then fired all but one of my current staff which was my cousin, and he exiled my company mascot “Gizmo the Pug” from the building, which was one of my biggest sources of traffic downtown.  Unwilling to even compromise, Randy told me that I was no longer allowed to design, or draw, the whole reason why I had started Kalifornia Printing in the first place!  My new job was sales, and sales only. I was no longer allowed to have my own office, and I would now have to take orders from one of his managers.  This was not at all what I had in mind for the future of my company, and the horrible feeling that I had made a huge mistake began to sink in.  It was not 3 weeks after our move when Randy, trying to prove a point began to threaten me, so harshly that his nose began to bleed.  He said to me that if I did not do things the way he wanted then he would “sue the shit out of me and take me for everything I had”.  The situation had quickly become a hostile working environment and keeping quiet was no longer an option.  I explained to Randy that one more threat of that nature and I would walk out immediately.  Clearly my promise to leave was not enough to get his attention, because less than than two weeks later on a Friday evening one of his employees directly went against his and my requests and let a customer take an order that was not supposed to leave the building.  This sparked an absolute furry and Randy began to belittle, and threaten me while screaming at the top of his lungs on the phone.  Luckily the last employee I had happened to be my cousin. He heard the entire conversation and told me “You don’t deserve to be treated this way.”  So I packed up my computer that Friday, wrote a letter of resignation over the weekend and delivered it via email Monday morning to Randy himself.  That was the end of my empire I had worked so hard to build, it was at that time the most devastating experience I had encountered since becoming an entrepreneur, it affected my personal life, my drive, and will to continue working for myself.

With the small sum of money I had received from Randy for my business I took some time off to assess the situation, reflect on the decision I made leading to this event, and how I was going to dust myself off, learn from my mistakes, and keep pushing forward.  This first thing that I learned was choosing money over my passion had been a huge mistake and was a bold statement that I was giving up to the trials and tribulations that came with starting a new business.  If I was ever going to prosper and repeat the success I had with KalPrint I needed to stay committed, be patient, and turn the stressful times into learning experiences and use them to make my business better.  Make sure that the ideas and visions you have for your business are in line with your investors goals and ideas and that the changes in your vision are red flags that you should take very seriously.  The second thing I learned was that just because the investor tells you it’s still your business, it all comes down to what is in writing. I signed the contract stating his corporation was purchasing KalPrint. It was my choice that led to the failure of my first company.  Failure, like crisis,  breeds the opportunity to learn and to grow as an entrepreneur.   If you are even considering the idea of selling, partnering, or buying a business NEVER make a final decision without consulting a legal professional who can asses the situation from a legal standpoint and guide you in the right direction.  The last thing I learned is to trust my instincts, my heart, or what some might call “My Gut”.  Every good decision I’ve ever made I had followed “my gut” and it had never let me down.  If you have to ask yourself if it’s the right decision more than once, chances are high that it’s the wrong decision.  Fortunately my negative experience was not enough to make me give up my dreams of entrepreneurship, and after a long vacation away to reflect,  my fuel for starting over and building Adrian Agency LLC began.

The bottom line is that good relationships are built on trust and take time to form.  Make sure the person that you are thinking of working with is not only qualified, but has the same life values as you. Never give away complete control of what you have created.  Trust your gut and don’t rush or make a rash decision just because you are being pressured by a potential investment.

I hope you enjoyed my story of my hard lesson I experienced, if this helps just one person it will be a great success, and I would love to hear from you.  Also if you have experienced something similar to this please get in touch with me,  I’d like to hear your story as well.

What is a Marketing Plan?

Every Business Needs A Pinpoint Marketing Plan

To develop an effective and exceptional business strategy, it takes careful planning as well as a comprehensive understanding of the market. Also, if you want to achieve success, make sure to get started with a marketing plan.

Marketing plays a vital function in every business. Business owners should be familiar with the customer base of the business and the weaknesses and strengths of their competitors. Such factors and others must be identified in the best and well-prepared marketing plan.

A great marketing plan will help you outline how your business can retain and attract customers and how this will help you beat your competitors. Your needed budget will be also included in this plan to get positive results. This must also include, business location, market research, competition, target customer group, service or product being sold, promotion, advertising, and budget.

Market Research

A successful marketing plan starts with conducting a market research. It will give you relevant information that will allow you to solve any possible marketing concerns. More often than not, the 3 most pragmatic ways in conducting market research are utilizing a telephone survey, direct mail survey or through conducting a focus team.

If you consider using a direct mail survey, ensure to keep your questions short with a length no more than 2 pages. The consumer probably will not voluntarily participate with your survey without providing any incentives. Therefore, you must include postage-paid envelopes so that your respondents won’t have to pay for the privilege of assisting you. If you have sufficient budget, sending a reminder about 2 weeks after initial mailing can be a good idea. Take note that direct mail can be expensive as you will need printing of direct mail, postage, envelopes, and other incentives used.

Phone surveys are also another option you may consider. This is the most cost-effective technique in which you can conduct a survey without the need of worrying about mailing or printing costs. The major costs in phone surveys are the fee of the interviewer, questionnaire preparation, and phone charges.

Focus Groups are also another good way of gathering specific information of your targeted audience. Your main costs could include the expenses in assembling and recruiting the groups, fee of the interviewer, research time, renting rooms if possible, incentives, and recording cost of the interviews.

Secondary data is imperative to develop a successful marketing plan. Studies and reports done by the government agencies, some businesses or trade associations within your industry can offer you essential statistics on the research area.

Regardless of what kind of market research you do, you should concentrate on gathering enough information when determining who your potential customers are and other things that would help youmake your business grow in no time.

The Marketing Plan Components

Once you are done with your market research, the next thing that you should do is to start developing your marketing plan, which has some basic components and these are:

  • Executive Summary

At the start of your marketing plan, you should always include a brief summary that would summarize its contents.

  • Business

In this part, you will need to define vital characteristics regarding your business.

  • Goals

Discussing your marketing objectives will help you create a good marketing plan. These must be clear, attainable within a particular period of time, and realistic. If you many goals, see to it that they complement each other and ensure that your plan’s components support all your marketing goals.

  • Customers

Evaluate your customers based on their gender, profession, age, educational level, neighborhood, and income. Know where some of your customers shop and what qualities of your products or service that your customers value.

  • Service or Product

Describing in detail your service or product and emphasizing its exceptional selling points, features, and many more is also an important component of a marketing plan.

  • Competitors

Knowing your competitors can also play a huge role in achieving results with your marketing plan. So, know your competitors first and find out how you can beat them.

  • Location

Include the location of your business and the pros and cons of your location.

  • Budget

Including your budget will allow you to know the cost that will be allocated for promotions and advertising including material distribution and printing.

  •  Pricing Strategy

List the best pricing methods and provide a brief description of every technique. With this component of marketing plan, you will know how to price your service or product properly.

A comprehensive and well-written marketing plan is important in every business venture as it describes how you plan to retain and attract customers, what resources you will have, and how you will stay ahead of the competition to achieve all your business goals.

The Perks of Marketing Plan for Your Business

There are numerous benefits you would get if you will make a marketing plan for your business. Some of them are:

  • Marketing Plan Allows Clear Decision Making

Knowing which factors could affect your business and auditing which resources you have within your business to deal with, you can guarantee that you will make great decisions that will lead you to success.

  • Marketing Plan Can Help You Prevent Panic Decisions

Marketing plan will provide you a clear view of what’s going on in today’s market and will provide you a framework that would help you make decisions no matter how tough the situation is.

  • Marketing Plan Also Offers Direction

Marketing plan also provides you a direction. Since it includes all of the things you need to know for your business, you will be able to stay on the right path, regardless of what issues may arise in the long run.

There are other benefits that you could get from developing a marketing plan. So, if you are planning to establish a business, ensure that you start with a marketing plan first because this can make a huge difference and can help you reach all you goals in a hassle-free manner. The Adrian Agency team can help you craft a marketing plan for your business today and discover how our Market Optics Program can turn your business into a success.

For more information about developing a marketing plan feel free to call us directly at 916-905-0551

3 Tips to Improve your Business in 2015

Strategic Business Marketing and Planning

If you’re anything like us, getting a jump on the new year is a critical way have the competitive edge on your competitors.

Check out these tips to increase productivity, branding, and inbound leads.

 

    1. Automate your email marketing with Get Response software, it’s a robust platform allowing you to create inbound lead capture pages, build an automated email marketing system and unlimited follow-up auto responders. Video Email Marketing Give a face and a voice to your messages and triple your click-through rates! GetResponse Multimedia Studio lets you record and store up to 100MB of video email marketing files, right from your account. Deliver high-impact customer testimonials, product demos, and event videos − no added software or expense required! Twitter Integration Millions of potential customers are getting their product “buzz” from social networks − and you need to be there! GetResponse puts you in the middle of this non-stop conversation with point-and-click integration. Let Twitter deliver instant links to your latest campaigns, coupons and blogs today! Online Surveys With GetResponse Surveys, research won’t cost you a dime extra! Ask as many questions as often as you want and get the data you need to improve products, target campaigns and stay ahead of the competition! It’s a snap to use – just point and click to design, then publish and watch the results roll in. 300+ Industry Templates Looks matter! strategic-marketing-agencyChoose from over 300 Industry HTML Templates to create eye-popping campaigns for every audience and industry. Use our intuitive editor to customize your email communications with cool graphics, fonts and formatting, then brand with your company logo and colors to sign your masterpiece! Split Testing To ensure you get the best results from your email campaign, test it first! Create up to 5 messages, with different personalization techniques, subjects, and styles. GetResponse will test each version for you, then automatically select and send the best! It takes only minutes and can save you cash − and lost customers! GetResponse for iPhone Keep your finger on the pulse of your campaigns! GetResponse for iPhone gives you instant access to your dashboard and key stats, so you can react, anywhere, anytime. Add subscribers manually or import from your Address Book and you’ll never miss an opportunity to grow your list and your business! Email Analytics Make sure every campaign is better than the last! Let GetResponse track every open, click, unsubscribe, and purchase. Review your stats by product, date, domain, and more! See the Big Picture with visual graphs, and get customized reports in your inbox daily.

 

    1. Increase your search engine directory visibility with Yext Powerlistings. As a certified partner of Yext Adrian Agency know the value of being in the Yext network of over 220+ Million monthly users. Many people have misconception that google is the only they should be dominating and in today’s market that’s just not true. The truth is in the numbers, with over 54 directories including mobile directories. Yext allows you to sync all your important company information such as a logo, videos, photos, employee bio’s, service and product menus and more all in one single dashboards. Yext Powerlisting’s also allow you to upload more categories than the standard 3 included in free listings, with yext you can select up to 10 categories giving you a wider range of potential buyers or customers increasing your reach dramatically.

 

  1. Boysell.com is a a discount online services provider offering some of the most competitive pricing and special on the internet. Purchasing a deluxe hosting package for 1 year qualifies you for a free .com domain name. Boysell also offers discounted cloud backup services for only $2.43 a month that can save you over $500 a year over Dropbox $9.99 monthly cloud hosting. It is easy to use and simple to get started. Boysell also offers very affordable email hosting for your business for less than $1.99 a month. If saving money is not enough to get you to make the switch then the award winning customer service and support should change your mind. If you want the best services for less money and  want to feel like a hero to your boss or business partner, you will not find a better place to do that then Boysell.com.

 

We hope you enjoy these great tips, and check back soon for more great resources to help your business grow and flourish in 2014!

Brand Identity Designer in Sacramento, CA

I have been in Sacramento, CA my entire life. Although I’ve traveled all over the United States Sacramento is my home. Lucky for me it also happens to be the Capitol of the Golden State. Much government agencies and large corporations call Sacramento home as well.

Being from Sacramento I understand the geography, people, and culture of the city and know how to reach the public. It starts with an in depth analysis of your business and services, we will review your business and marketing plan and give you recommendations based on strategic research from various study groups of local Sacramento Residents. Buyers in Sacramento are very critical of who they trust so it is important that you build your brand by not only the best quality products and services but exceptional customer service as well.

The city of Sacramento it self is a very diverse and fairly small town with outlying cities that make the valley’s population quite large and the potential quite large. If you have been burned by other web site designers and developers, graphic designers, and marketing gurus, then now is your time to work with a company who can not only do everything you need under one but do it with excellence and on time.  We back our services with a 100% Money Back Guarantee.  If for some reason you are unhappy with our results in the first 30 days of our agreement or project we will refund you all of your money.

We specialize in custom graphic design, logo design, brand identity design, digital & offset printing, signs, banners, canvas, stickers, decals, promotional items printing, business card printing, internet marketing and advertising, and even website design and development. For larger businesses we also offer 1 on 1 consulting with our monthly marketing packages.

For more questions or for a free quote please contact us and we will get back to you right away!

Thank you for taking the time to read this, we value your business and would love the opportunity to show you why Adrian Agency is the best Marketing Company in Sacramento, CA

Respectfully,

Adrian Boysel

Founder

Adrian Agency LLC.