3M's: Missed Marketing Mistakes

I don't know how many of you are familiar with the agricultural aspects of like, but this is one thing I did not notice until I was in my first AG class (in high school). The Chick Fla cow that promotes eating chicken should not worry about becoming a hamburger. Why you ask. Because this cow is a dairy cow. Our milk we buy from the store actually come from the chick fla cow; not our hamburger meat.

Certifications

When deciding your next business adventure do your research. Of course you have to make a marketing plan and that does a lot of research for you, but what if you already have a business and what to branch out in it. Lets say we have a lime hauling and spreading service. Everyone keeps asking you if spread fertilizer too. But you don't and are looking into starting to spread. The first step would be look and see if you need a permit and you do. so find out all the item you need before apply. Then you need to find out what equipment you need, when the best time to spray is, does it have a season, should you take a class on it? Hopefully you see where I am going with this. Just because you open a lime hauling and spreading business does not mean you can only haul and spread lime.

Should you hire friends to work for you?

The is a topic talked about frequently in the business world. From my experience I would say you can hire friends as long as you don't care to close them or if you are not real close. Things will get uncomfortable when situation arise and you may end up hating each other. We hired an employee that is friends with us and that was a topic we had before we hired him. So far we have not had any problem but he has only been with us for a few months.

Leasons learned

When you own your own business take careful consideration into your name. You may just have one dump truck right now but in the future do you plan to have more? Or do you plan on expanding into other fields as well. Once you pick your name. have it copy righted and insurance with you can not change it or add to it. I have learned this from experience. If your store name is Lily's Gifts, LLC you can not simple change the name on your cards and shirts to Lily's Gifts and Monograms, LLC with out following certain protocol.

Missed Business Opportunity- Online Dating

Online dating is the new way to date. Every time you turn on the TV you see a commercial advertising a dating web site. Smaller cities like Huntsville, AL are not quite large enough to get a large pool of single candidates. A wonderful idea would to be open up a business being a match maker. Rather than using an online site which can be full of lies and dangerous people. You can use the match maker and make sure the person is real and has a safe back ground. Of course this method of dating would be more expensive then a dating website, but it could be totally worth it in the end.

Partners/Employees

It is very important to find the best possible partner. When found CR Trucking and lime Services I had to make sure that the person I picked was accountable , trust worthy, and a hard work. It is hared to find good help in this day and age. As a company we have already we are on our third employee for lack of work ethic. It always good to call reference even for the smallest of jobs. Lessons are learned everyday when you own and operate your own business.

Business cards and Pamphlets

When designing your business cards and pamphlets make sure they send a clear image of your company or service. Do not have poor grammar or inappropriate context. If you have an agricultural business you should not have a pink glittery business card. Same goes with the pamphlet.