Since the economy has fallen and so has your revenues, what do you do?

What you need to keep in mind is that although sales had fallen, your presence shouldn't. Because more than often once a business gives up, your customers will give up on you. Once this happens there not much you can do to recover from it. Though advertising may cost money there are various ways to avoid paying a premium for it. Here are some ideas I can pitch to you from experience.

• BUSINESS CARDS AND MAGNETS: Create business card magnets, this will last much longer than business cards and is normally applied to kitchen appliances which equals more presence.
• WEB SITE: Definitely create a web site. This will help you get the word out for little cost compared to a newspaper ad. Make sure its searchable so people can find (should be no cost to you). If you can only afford a single page, that is fine. As long as you post updated data on it, maybe some pictures.
• BROCHURES: Brochures works best to pass out to people that enter your shop or potential customers you encounter. This will give them a "quick guide" to your services. Much like your quick guides that comes with electronics, instead of reading the whole guide it help give you a jump start.
• SOCIAL NETWORKS: Get the word out on your business though social networks. This is free and will get you noticed. Depending on your business type you could really benefit from it. Sites like Yelp, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkIn is all very good. Once of my clients are benefiting from Yelp's posting.
• CRAIGSLIST: Huh Craigslist? Yep, this works when you have a service to advertise. The search engines loves this stuff.
• VOLUNTEER YOUR SERVICE: Yes, volunteer your service, as I mentioned before this is a good way to network with people. Why do you think celebrities do it?
• DISCOUNTS AND COUPONS: At this time people are looking for the bottom line so any discounts will be very attractive.

There are many ways to generate more business, you just need to be creative about it. Maybe your business needs to be more interesting or more exciting to jump start it? Maybe you could change the look and feel of your business with vibrant colors or a new logo.

What ever you do, don't throw in the towel, not just yet. Your customers need you!

Aloha