Orthodox Biz Blog

One of the new and exciting advantages to the computer age is the ability for people to join, meet and share common interest online. This has lead to the phenomenal growth in online forums.  
An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site. From a technological standpoint, forums or boards are web applications managing user-generated content.
People participating in an Internet forum may cultivate social bonds and interest groups.
Forums are relatively inexpensive to build and no cost to maintain because members take the responsibility for monitoring the content. A good example of a forum is action can be found at http://www.corshops.com/Support.html
Forums have proven successful for e-retailers that sell products to people with a passion. Pet owner are a fine example of people with a passion.
Before the Internet, people looking for others with similar interest had limited options. The Internet made possible discussion boards, forums and social networks that attract like-minded people from around the world. This ability to bring people together is at the heart of the online forums.
To build a forum for your website is inexpensive because the structure of an online forum is inherently uncomplicated. “The price range for a forum to be added to you site is between $100 and $1500 depending on the platform you are using.” says Olan Chancy, president and co-founder of Corfun   “As a e-retailer, when you are helping people find what they want and understand what they need to know also creating an opportunity to interact with other of common interest, you have created goodwill that you can not measure.”  Corfun specializes in dynamic Websites that are easy to mange and update.
When you are ready to launch your forum’ there are ways to “prime the pump” to elicit participation. First promote the forum on you website. Second would be to do an email blast to all friends, family and past customers. Third post it to and social networks you may be a member of. Forth you or your in-house staff “seed” the forum with questions, content and comments. Fifth reach out to industry pros and experts asking them to be an active member and post a topic. This will only help them because it gives them more of an audience to show there expertise.
Now that your forum is up and running the only thing left to do is monitor it so you can answer questions, delete inappropriate content and harvest insight into what your customers like and dislike.
As the owner of the forum you have the power to delete post and ban users. Most forums require members to provide a valid email address linked to the users name to become a member.

To have a successful business, it is very important that you have quality business relationships. You may have a great marketing plan, but one of the most important things you can do is to work on building up relationships with people you meet.

It can take some time for you to begin to see results when you use these techniques, but the results for building business relationships are excellent. So, here are a few tips that will help you build better business relationships.

 1: Work One Relationship At a Time. You don't have to work on meeting hundreds of people each week. However, you should work on meeting at lease one person each day.

Before you know it you'll have more than 100 people who you have built relationships with. The number of relationships are not important, but you do want quality relationships. Take the time to work on building quality relationships on a consistent basis for the best results.
Remember it’s not what you know but whom you know.

 2: Join Organizations. Joining organizations in your area is a wonderful idea and it can help you  work to build up business relationships. When you join clubs or groups in your area that have similar interests, you'll find that this is a wonderful way that you can build up relationships. Take the time to get active in the community around you, start a club or group, or volunteer in order to meet new contacts.
To quote the bible “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another”. ... Proverbs 27:17 and so it will be with business relationships.

3: Stay In Touch. Once you make a contact it is important to stay in touch with them. Just meeting them one time may not bring results, but if you stay in touch with them every couple weeks, you can build up a solid relationship.

4: Make Sure Your Personable on the Web. If you are trying to build up business relationships online in forums, social networking sites, or blog directories, then you need to be very personable. Leaving comments and personalized messages is important. The last thing you want to do is just send out a bunch of cookie cutter messages to everyone. So, make sure you act in a personable manner.

 5: Show Pride in Your Business. Showing pride in your business is imperative if you are going to build business relationships. Make sure that all the people you meet know about your business. Make sure you add your business website to your business cards, add a signature line to all emails, and talk about your business with pride. This is an excellent way to build up top quality relationships.

When you a stranger, you are planting tiny seeds of possible business relationship with each person you meet. There's no guarantee that you'll doing business right away but over time you'll harvest a large crop!

I've noticed a few common mistakes that most people make when meeting others. I made them too until I realized how to properly grow in a relationship.

This past election we the people voted for change or a fresh start. What can they do different with this administration and economic condition. I have a few ideas that might help you get a little more out of your web site in the next year ahead of us.