Any business that has a successful product in one market, should consider testing that success in new markets. For some business owners, that seems like a daunting task. New markets are scary and unknown. Here is an inspirational story for you. We can learn three marketing tips from Kraft Foods about entering new markets or increasing sales in those markets. This will be relevant for any business considering re-niching a product line or entering new countries to increase and grow their revenue. Whether you hire a marketing consultant, or try to implement the strategy yourself, always remember the marketing lessons from this article.

Specifically, Kraft Foods decided they needed to do better in developing markets. Kraft knew they could do a better sales job outside the USA. Even though some of their products had been selling overseas for 22 years, sales were stagnant. The developing markets was a laggard and they were looking to improve their position.

How did Kraft do it?

I feel that we can learn three things from Kraft foods strategy that resulted in a revenue increase from developing markets to 21% of overall revenue in two years. Sales of Tang in developing markets grew 30% in one year.

#1: Focus on a specific task, instead of trying to do everything.

Kraft found their ten best brands, also known as their power brands, which were under-marketed and had the best profit margins. Some of the brands identified were Oreo cookies, Philadelphia cream cheese, and Tang. These ten products would get committed resources in R&D and marketing, while the other brands were not part of the strategy.

#2 Do market research

The second principle we can learn from Kraft Foods is they did market research. I think this is critical. We sometimes just jump into it and we think a product or a service, or even an e-book works no matter what country or new areas. But if you understand your target market, you can understand their needs, and problems. Then, you can create a solution to that problem.

In the case of Kraft, they found through market surveys that in China, mothers believed their children needed about six glasses of water a day. Of course being hydrated is a good universal habit. Moms really wanted their children to drink plenty of water, but the children felt water was boring and bland. Problem identified. Kraft Foods smartly pitched to the parent and to the kids that if they used Tang, it would make water more exciting. It became an appealing way for moms to use Tang to get their kids to drink more water.

Secondly, Kraft looked to expand their flavors to match the culture of the new market. It is still Tang, but they experimented with new fruit flavors, such as mango, tamarind, and maracuja (passion fruit), aimed at local palates in Philippines, Mexico, and Brazil. This reminds me of the worn out cliché -”When in Rome, do as Romans do”.

Finally, Kraft tweaked the packaging. The research showed that the Chinese preferred to make up powder drinks by the glass rather than by the pitcher. Given this behavior, Kraft created single serving packets of Tang. Kraft designed new single serving packaging similar to the powdered sugar pixie sticks found in the US market.

#3 Big product launch – free samples

When Kraft was ready to introduce the new Tang flavors and packages, Kraft distributed 27 million free samples in 2009, which is a big commitment. Consider that Kraft gave away 300,000 samples in 2008, so 27 million samples allowed them to reach an audience over 81 times greater in 2009. This meant that more prospects had an opportunity to try Tang and develop a relationship with the brand and a customer relationship with Kraft. Kraft really delivered value to prospective customers in developing markets. New customers were found.

Bottom line: Tang sales shot up 42% in Latin America, and 25% in Asia Pacific.

Conclusion

Applying these marketing principles can help any business expand into new markets for top line growth. Don’t try to do everything, just focus on a few products that have the best potential and highest profit margins. Do your market research. Commit to a big product launch. With minimal product changes, and a focused localized marketing approach, products can be successfully introduced to new markets.

As a home business owner you know that effective advertising is an essential part of your success. Many will argue the fact that paying for your website exposure is the best way to go. I see the same advertisements from the same home based professionals on various websites often. Do these people get more traffic than the ones that don’t pay for advertising? Maybe so, maybe not.

However, I will tell you there are a plethora of absolutely free ways to go about advertising your home business or website. You don’t have to pay for it in order for it to be effective. There are several free techniques for both online and offline promotion. Start with sporting your favorite, creative thinking cap, and opening your mind to new and innovative advertising opportunities and ideas.

Promoting is the easy part. Getting your home business in the hands of your target market, creating an effective call to action, and producing sales is the difficult part. I have a few places and tips for you that may help.

Below are 21 free effective advertising techniques you may want to consider

Online

Participate in online message boards. Always follow all rules and guidelines, as you certainly don’t want to be banned.
Write articles relating to your business and submit them to directories, forums, and websites. (article marketing)
Create a free blog and start participating on other blogs. Make useful comments without spamming your web links around.
Exchange articles with other webmasters and bloggers. This will benefit both parties with fresh content and search engine friendly links.
Signature advertising. Include your signature when posting on forums and email marketing
Join free newsletters, ezines and submit your ads and articles. There are several online and new ones are being created daily. And most of them offer free ad and article submissions.
Join online niche directories and submit your website. This gets you some free backlinks and therefore, higher website rankings.
Participate on various social networking sites such as, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace. Always handle yourself in a professional demeanor, and without spamming links as opposed to offering invaluable information. Proper networking is key when representing your business.
Exchange links with other webmasters, preferably ones with high search engine rankings.
Host a contest on your business message board or on your blog. Offer real prizes such as a free sample or free advertising.
Email marketing. If you have a nice compounded list of past customers, members on your forum, or members on your networking website, email marketing could be in your favor. Of course an attention-grabbing headline is key with this advertising method.
Guest blogging is becoming more popular, as many webmasters have converted their websites over to blogs. And to sustain their traffic flow and also due to time issues, many are seeking guest bloggers to keep their blogs going strong.

Offline

Create business cards from your home computer and post them throughout local businesses in your area
Create flyers and post them throughout local businesses in your area
Donate freebies for fundraiser events with your business card attached
Network with others in your church community that also have a home business. Get in on the various events that are taking place within the church. For example, if the community has craft shows, maybe by being a member of the church, you can get a free booth.
Giving gifts. Whenever you give a gift, include them from your business inventory. Always have your logo and card attached to them.
6. Keep a stash of business cards and flyers in your car for whenever the chance of advertising presents itself. You never know when the opportunity will arise, this way you will always be prepared.
Vacation time is upon us, whenever you take some time off for a vacation, always leave your business card with the front desk and also the maids when you leave your tip.
Ask about leaving your business cards at salons, daycare centers, and laundry mats. These are high traffic areas where moms are always around.
Word of mouth. This is by far the best way to advertise offline. Whenever you are out and about, talk about what you offer and what you do from home.

There you have it, the best of both worlds, some free online and offline marketing ideas. I hope they are helpful. Whenever you think of advertising, you may think of high cost strategies. In today’s marketing world, there are a considerable amount of free ways to help promote yourself. Finding free ways to advertise as a quick way to make money is one of the best money making ideas for your business.

Advertising is a crucial part of any business, and is composed of several activities that help promote a product or service. Advertising makes use of oral or visual materials that address the public and try to influence them on their buying decisions.

More often than not, advertising generally involves an element of cost, although it is possible to do it for free if you know how to go about it. Free advertising is easier to get with an online business than a traditional offsite concern. Generally, however, advertisers will pay publishers or media and broadcasting companies to provide the advertising platform of a newspaper, radio or television.

What is Advertising

1. Advertising consists of written and oral messages that are directed to a target audience.

2. Advertising persuades the public to purchase a certain product or service.

3. Each advertisement is related to a certain advertiser who is selling the product or service involved.

4. Advertising requires the advertiser to pay the publisher in return for the advertisement.

In summary, advertising is any paid form or message that presents goods or services of a certain advertiser or sponsor, and should present the product in such a way as to persuade the reader or listener to purchase the product.

Objectives of Advertising

Its objective is to stimulate sales, create customer retention and increase cash flow. However it also be intended to brand a product, since branding can do more for sales than simply advertising it. When one thinks of specific items, they often think of a brand name rather than the product itself.

Hence, vacuum cleaners became so connected to the brand name Hoover, that it became synonymous for a vacuum cleaner. It even entered the English vocabulary in the sense of ‘hoovering up’ being given the meaning of clearing something away.

The functions of Advertising for a company can be classified into two groups. These are known as the primary and the secondary functions.

Primary Objectives

1. Advertising helps increase sales of the service or product because it helps promote it to a bigger market. People who don’t previously know about that product or service become aware of it because of the advertisement about it.

2. Sales persuasion is frequently used to help buyers decide on their next purchase.

3. Advertising also helps dealers or franchisees to sell the product or service being featured.

4. Advertisement makes it easy for a company to adjust to a new product or service. People are most likely to welcome a new item or service if they have already seen it in an advertisement. Many companies commence the branding of a product before it has hit the shelves.

5. Buyers tend have a better view of a well advertised product or service as compared to those that don’t have any advertisements or are poorly advertised. People tend to purchase products they are familiar with, and a well thought out advertising campaign can achieve that.

6. Advertising leads to branding and promotes brand loyalty as well. Once a user has become satisfied with a specific brand, they tend to stay with it.

7. Products and services that are advertised are deemed as better and higher quality products or services by the public. Many take the erroneous view that if it is well advertised then it must be good.

Secondary Functions

1. To encourage salesmen and provide that feeling of support especially when they are dealing with hard to get customers. Sales staff find their job easier with a good advertising campaign behind them.

2. When a company makes use of advertising, it helps employees feel more secure in their jobs. If a company can pay a substantial amount just for advertising purposes, then the workers will feel that it’s a good company to work for and remain loyal with.

3. Advertising helps the company to attract better or more qualified employees.

So, advertising has many facets and objectives, and its functions are more than just letting the world know of the existence of a specific product.

There’s more and more ways to advertise your business for free every day, plus being a small business keeping the costs down is very important. Having a small business myself finding all the possible ways to advertise for free is vital. I have used many methods and still look for new ways. I thought I can’t be the only one doing this, so I put together what I have used and some which I have not used. I feel this will be just the beginning of me sharing ideas, tips and more about free advertising, so this piece shares the beginnings of free advertising. Let me point one thing out before I begin, the ways by which you advertise your business for free can be maintained, with the assistance of some imagination and creative thinking. However don’t forget to monitor your results, it’s all good and well advertising for free but if it is not benefiting your business then it’s just a waste of your time.

A business wanting to promote their product or services, can write articles associated their area of expertise. These can then be submitted to media and publications which focus on that particular area. The article could feature information about the business and the benefits your products or service offers or some general information about the area you are working in, then implement bits of your own business with the piece. Due to the fast increase in Internet users and websites, many websites also offer free services when it comes to promoting your businesses. Your articles can be submitted to these websites and they then broadcasted them for free on your behalf, which will be viewed by hundreds of people everyday. However remember to place your contact information at the bottom of the article, this way the reader will know how to take up your offers or enquire. This should include your name, a contact number or your website address.

Free classified ads are also a great way of promoting your product or service online. By doing a search for classified ad sites you will that there are loads of pages all dedicated to these websites. I would recommend using them all, for it can become time consuming. So choose between 10 – 15 or more if you can handle it. You will have to plan what you are going to write about your business. This is very different to an article where you are free to write as much or little as you like. Most classified ads have a word count between 25 – 30. Read the terms and condition before you start writing. With such a few number of words you have to get across your business product or service benefits clearly and straight away. If you have a promotion you could centre the ad on that. Most of these websites offer the option of uploading an image, this is good for quickly capturing the user’s interests. However remember that when you first submit you add it will probably be on page one at the top, to keep this position you will have to keep resubmitting new ads or resubmit the one you used in the first place. Again most of these websites will email you and let you know when you need to resubmit your ad. It may become dull after a while but simply remember that it is not costing you anything only your time. Classifieds ads offline adhere to the same guidelines when it comes to the word count, except you are dealing with newspapers. The process of adding your ad is quite simple you can do this either online via their website or by ringing the contact number provided by the newspaper. However find out if placing an ad is free first before submitting yours because each newspaper has its own rules.

Free notice boards located in the neighbourhood, like in libraries and community centres are another effective idea. Using flyers or leaflets are best when it comes to bulk distribution because they can be handed out at shopping centres, bus stops, especially during weekends when there is a big rush. But before you do this contact your local council to see if it’s ok, some may require a fee and if that’s the case leave it until you have some share funds to use. Plus don’t for get student unions and common rooms. If your product or service is targeted to this audience add an incentive for students to latch onto, like a student discount or refer x amount of fellow students and get your product or service for half price.

Advertise your on all the printed material your business uses envelopes, boxes, business cards. Plus invent a few like postcards, greeting cards, bookmarkers if you cab print them off yourself then you are saving a lot of money. Send them to your existing customers, which will in turn keep you at the fore front of their mind.

Another free way is offering other small businesses free advertising via your business, while they advertise yours. Both parties come out winners and this is called joint venturing which can work on many levels.

The basic ingredient for advertising for free is imagination and research.

Happy Advertising.

Cleaning foreclosures is an extremely lucrative business opportunity — especially in today’s economic climate. And, it is likely to be for some time to come. This in part explains why so many are jumping into it. But, like any business, you have to market — consistently — for it to pay off.

Many are jumping into business cleaning foreclosures right now thinking that jobs will somehow magically appear. They won’t. If you have no money for marketing, how can you capitalize on this business opportunity? Following is a free marketing idea that works.

Foreclosure Cleaning Company for Hire: No Job Too Big or Small!

How’s that for the headline of your flyer. Yep, a simple flyer is one of the most effective marketing tools you can use to get the word out about your foreclosure cleaning company. Following is a step-by-step plan for marketing your foreclosure cleanup company using flyers.

How to Design an Effective Flyer for Your Foreclosure Cleanup Business

Headline: As listed above, your headline should state exactly what you do. It should be in big, bold letters. If possible, use a color printer so that you can choose bright colors that stand out. If that’s not possible, choose brightly colored paper. That way, even if your print is in black, the flyer will still get noticed.

Body Copy: In the main body of the flyer, list the major services you offer. Don’t try to cram every service you offer in there because it can make the flyer look crowded. The idea is to get the person interested in your foreclosure cleaning services. You can put your website address on the flyer so that they can visit that to get your full list of services.

Leave lots of space between paragraphs on your foreclosure cleaning flyer — again, you want to grab a prospect’s initial attention. flyers that are too crowded with copy repel prospects — they don’t attract them.

Cleaning Foreclosures Marketing Tip: State Benefits, Not Features

If you don’t remember anything else about marketing your business cleaning foreclosures, remember this — customers don’t buy features; they buy benefits. What’s the difference? A feature describes some aspect of your foreclosure cleaning business. It may say something like, “We offer excellent customer service.”

A benefit, on the other hand, tells the customer what’s in it for them. In advertising, it’s known as the WIIFM principle (What’s In It For Me). A benefits statement reads like, “We Can Help You Sell More Houses with Our Foreclosure Trashout Service” or, “Get Your Foreclosed Properties Cleaned, Repaired and Painted In 24- 48 Hours.” See the difference?

Once you’ve designed the perfect flyer describing your business cleaning foreclosures, drop them off at local realtor offices (in person); post them on community bulletin boards (eg, in your grocery store and restaurants); and follow up. Your phone will soon be ringing with foreclosure cleaning jobs. Rinse and repeat — and you’re on your way.

Starting a small business in this economy could be considered a wild and crazy chance or it can be considered a smart move. On one hand you have the lack of free and loose money and on the other you have people unemployed and looking for any kind of reasonable work.

Starting a new business takes a bunch of work, a lot of hours and access to cash. You don’t need to have the cash… just access to it. We will elaborate a bit on the cash in just a few minutes.

Before you do anything you have to take a look at some low cost, high profit business ideas. Almost all of them are going to require that you use some elbow grease to get going and all of them are going to require a lot of time and energy.

For instance, you can start a janitorial cleaning company with items and products that are in your home right now with just a couple of exceptions. You will need business cards and flyers but you can make your own flyers on your own computer and print them at home so that shouldn’t cost you any outlay of cash.

For business cards, expect to have to spend 50 dollars or so… do not go cheap on your cards as most people will only know you by your business card. Everything else is in your home and you can operate out of your car and use your cell for a business line. If you need a website, there are plenty of places to get a free website that are easy to set up and design.

With a business such as this, you offer only the services for which you have equipment and products… if you have just the basic cleaning materials, offer basic services and when you generate revenue and have “extra” cash, you can purchase more commercial equipment and upgrade what you are offering to your current clients and get new ones based upon your more complete services.

It will take a lot of energy, you will have to go out and introduce yourself to businesses that may require your services, you will have to wear the sales hat, the service hat, the accounting hat… you will have to do everything your self at first.

Once you get past the initial hurdles though, you can outsource or hire people and live a more reasonable life.

Now you have a basic idea of what you will need to do to start a low cost high profit business, you want to know where that fifty dollars is coming from if you do not have any cash, right?

A few sources you should have available to you.

Your credit card is the first place I would look. No credit card you say…

Hold a garage sale and sell of some things that you do not use. You live in an apartment you say…

Place the items you want to sell on Craigslist or other free classified site. Don’t want people coming to your home you say…

Meet the people in a public place like a McDonalds. Don’t want to deal with the general public you say…

Take a ride down to your local Pawn shop. Don’t have anything of value at all you say…

Sell your blood plasma… I know you have that. That may sound like a desperate measure but desperate times call for desperate measures and it really is not all that desperate. People give blood all the time, I personally do it once a month and if you need the cash, why not get paid for it and get your low cost high profit business rolling!

Here’s an economical way to advertise to the best neighborhoods in your city. The system outlined here works great for any carpet cleaning, window cleaning, maid service, or pressure washing business.

I get many emails from guys who want to know if passing out flyers will work. They read that I’ve had success with it and wonder how. Almost everyone has tried passing out flyers at one point. I always hear, “It used to work 10 years ago, but now it just doesn’t work any more.”

Yes, it may have gotten more difficult. Consumers are getting wiser. A flyer without selling power won’t bring you any new clients. Homeowners want to know more than how cheap you are. They are skeptical about bait-and-switch advertising that is prevalent in the cleaning industry. It’s up to you to change their mind when you put a flyer on their doorknob.

First, keep in mind flyers are a cheap way to advertise. This isn’t necessarily a good thing. In fact, I usually recommend steering away from cheap ways to advertise because your prospect can view you as cheap. They WILL view you as cheap if all you do is put a piece of paper on their mailbox or a run-of-the-mill door hanger on their door.

You have to do something different. If you’re going to use flyers, they have to be something extraordinary. One of the most profitable flyers we’ve used appears like a folder that sits on a doorknob. Many clients have told me, “I got your nice little information folder.” They didn’t look at it like some cheap flyer.

Other times, we’ve put a salesletter, brochure, magnet, and business card in a plastic door hanger bag. In this case, the prospect views it as a package left on the doorknob. If you’re going to bother to go out and walk door to door, put something nice on the door. Use full color printing with attention getting pictures. Or, if you use black and white print, make sure it’s on a heavy piece of colored paper. You want something that will look good as well as feel good in their hands.

Try using an exclusive offer just for homeowners in a particular neighborhood. Or, use a limited time offer due to a slow week, holiday offer, FREE trial offer, or an offer based around something going on in your city in your flyer. Create a great offer, but also tell how you’re unique. Write your flyer with a particular target client in mind.

This is important: When you pass out the flyers, wear your company shirt that identifies who you are. Sometimes people will want to speak with you. NEVER, EVER place a flyer on a mailbox. Stress this to anyone who passes flyers out for you. Then, spot-check the neighborhood to make sure they did it how you asked. It’s actually a federal offense to place anything inside or on a mailbox. Plus, it looks unprofessional.

Use flyer advertising as a way to keep your employees busy on a slow afternoon. It can reap a harvest of many clients to come.

Ever seen flyers advertising home business opportunities? Yes, in many places

you see flyers of all kinds selling different things from services to valuable products.

Have you ever given it a thought whether flyers actually work? Well if it

doesn’t work, how come everyday we continue to see them in many places? What does that tell you? That means it is working for some people.

But there can be a downside to it, if you just print flyers advertising your

home business opportunity, chances are that you wont get much responses.

However, to make the use of flyers more interesting and effective, you need

to print them in thousands. Say 1,000 – 5,000 copies. You can pay a high

school student to stuff them in peoples windshield and doors as well as give

it away to as many people as possible.

But if you want to get as much as 5% – 10% of all the prospects who saw the

flyers to your home business, this is what you will do. Just make the

headline of your flyers scream “Free gift” in bold for everyone who reads

this flyer.

In the flyer, tell them to visit your website to claim their gifts. Once they

are on your website, they will have to give you their email address, phone

numbers, and names before they can instantly download the free gift. The free

gift this time around should be a free sample of your products, or a free pdf

report on the opportunity or some of the useful products that can help your

prospects.

However, you should know that those people who take the trouble to visit the

internet in order to get your free gifts are more interested in you and will

get more responsive as you follow up on them.

Therefore, if you want to use flyers, learn how to utilize the internet to

your advantage to sell your products and build your downline in the fastest

way possible.

I am asked from time to time what an attorney should do about their law firm business cards since they are about to get some new cards. Actually I would recommend you not wait until you run out of cards currently to think through your business card strategy. You may or may not have to throw out your current cards. That is not important. What is important is what results can you expect from your business cards. Let me list for you some guidelines for your business card strategy that will improve your results. Business cards need to be created to get you business are they not?

1. You probably need more than one type of law firm business card. One card that is conservative and is used in situations or with people you think will respond best to a more conservative card like other attorneys, court personnel, bankers, and the like. You need a more “sales oriented” card for other environments to be used in situations where you are dealing with some referral sources or with your prospective client. Particularly if your practice areas are family law, criminal law, personal injury, elder law, immigration law, residential real estate, etc. In fact if you market to an ethnic market like Hispanics then you need a third card that works for them and preferably has been done by a vendor who specializes in Hispanic work.

2. Please don’t use the templates available at your local printer or print them off your computer. Go to http://www.guru.com and hire a graphic artist to design your law firm business card. Do be sure it is readable for your market (older people need larger and easy reading fonts). Have them design a logo if you don’t have one as well. It will be inexpensive ($8 per hour and up) to hire a graphic artist type since this website is a worldwide marketplace. You can hire vendors from places like India, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Canada or the USA and be safe since they do understand our market. The United Kingdom is expensive with respect to the US dollar currently and they tend to be overly conservative for our market. Some USA vendors are young, eager and/or want to create a portfolio so their fees are low but their skills are fine for this purpose.

3. It is probably better if your law firm business card is at least a two-color card (maybe even a four color card for some practice areas like criminal law or personal injury for instance). What I mean here is either different color inks or a difference between the color of the card and the ink. You need something to make the card more visually interesting. Always use a quality paper for the card.

4. Be sure your website address is on the card and it is a domain name you own that reflects your practice area if possible. Naturally name, address and phone number as well on the card.

5. Consider putting your email address on your law firm business card or maybe instead of putting the website address. One caution here is be sure you have an email address on your card that is your own domain name and not AOL, Hotmail, Yahoo, or a vendor at your home like Comcast, Road Runner, Bell South or the like. Why? You don’t look like someone who is a solid business unless your domain name is one you own and is business/keyword related.

6. Consider putting your “slogan” on your law firm business card. One of mine is “Guiding your practice to increased revenues while reducing your work hours as you serve your clients better than ever.” Now, clearly a bit long for a business card and you get the idea. If you don’t put a slogan at least put something that indicates your major practice area focus on the card. Also you may need different cards for different practice areas thus more than 3 different cards (conservative, sales oriented, ethnic type for each major practice area) for some.

7. A bit more daring yet effective is putting an offer for a “free report” or “white paper” offer on your law firm business card. The article title needs to be very appealing to your market. Usually the article needs to be a “how to” or “7 ways to” or “secrets of” type of title. Maybe saying on the card “call or email me for the my complimentary report on XXX” on the card or even “download at xxx.com” which also doubles as putting your website address on the card.

8. Up to this point you probably have been thinking only about the front of your law firm business card. Let’s get a bit outside the box and think about the back of the card. How about that long slogan, the quote or the complimentary report offer on the back?

9. OK, lets get even more outside the box and say put your picture on the front of the card. Research on business cards shows those cards with a picture on the fronts are noticed, kept and remembered better than other cards without a photo.

10. Having said all of the above do be careful not to have the card cluttered so you don’t have to put everything I wrote about on your card.

Now you have it. Some ideas to consider with law firm business cards. I am sure some would say this is too much and maybe so. There is much to consider in law firm business cards that really makes a difference in getting you new clients or not.

Food items are a great item to base a business around due to their popularity and buying frequency. I recently came across an article about using E.D. Foods for fundraising and got to thinking about the different ways an individual could sell their soups if they wanted to start a soup business. Here are the 8 different methods I came up with:

1) Resell the buckets or packets to others looking to start a home based business

You’d be like a playing the role of product provider/wholesaler to other aspiring home business owners. Give them the soup and the preparation instructions and ingredient list so they can make their own labels (if they want). And keep in contact with them so they’ll continue to buy soups from you to replenish their stock.

2) Put soups in your own packaging and sell the packages individually

You can sell them online, put them on the shelf or on display in a local grocery store (with the owner/manager’s permission), sell them out of your home via catalogues/business cards/flyers or local publicity or classified advertising.

3) Put repackaged soups into a “Get Well Soon” gift basket for the sick

Since soup is such a popular food to eat while sick, here’s the perfect opportunity to make some money. You can also include get well cards, some crossword puzzles or other items they can easily do while they’re just lying around recovering, and maybe even a sweet treat or two.

4) Resell the soup buckets to local restaurants

Once again, you’d be acting as product provider/wholesaler. Prepare a serving of soup and offer the person in charge a sample to taste. If they agree to offer it to their customers, then you can work out the transaction details and give them the preparation instructions. You may even be able to make an arrangement to sell the soup as individual servings in the restaurant for a split of the profits, if you don’t want to sell whole buckets.

5) Put repackaged soups into a “care package” for parents to give to their college kids

When I was at Mercer University, we had care packages that our parents could buy for mid-term and final exam time. They’d be filled with treats like candy and hot chocolate for us to consume while we crammed like crazy. You could do something similar for your soups.

This could work even during the non-stressful times for students, because a lot of them like to have simple foods like Ramen noodles in their dorm room anyway when they don’t feel like going to the cafeteria to eat. You can give them a more diverse alternative with a soup basket for college students.

6) Resell or repackage and sell soups at a flea market

Set up a booth and display your soup packages. Definitely try to prepare some soup for people to taste, if you can. You can put a couple of tablespoonfuls inside cups when they request to try it.

7) Prepare these soups yourself and start a soup catering service

Offer your soup services for parties and other get-togethers. You can advertise your business locally through free publicity and classifieds in cooking and home/garden publications. You’ll especially want to get the word out during holidays.

Sell the soup (in buckets or packets) along with information on starting a soup business

Basically, write a booklet with information on how you do your own packaging, ways you can advertise, the different ways you can sell the soup (like this article), and even the legalities like getting a business name and license and keeping track of your profits and expenses for tax (and tax-cutting) purposes. All of this information you can research and put together, or actually go through the process of starting your own soup business and then sell the information based on your experience.

If you have a passion for cooking and would like to try selling soup, then using E.D. Foods as your soup source and combining it with your business desire and creative imagination is one of the best opportunities awaiting you. Use any of the above ideas or come up with your own for a soup selling business model that’s right for you.