Salary vs. Hourly Pay: Difference and Pros & Cons of Each

Visuals heavily influence customer impressions of your business in digital and physical environments; as such, visual merchandising is a powerful tool for improving customer experience inside your store and, increasingly, online. We will first define visual merchandising, and then run through some helpful ways you can use it in your business to drive sales and build your brand. Visual Merchandising Definition Many decades ago, companies realized they could influence customer perceptions by organizing products in their stores in a specific way. Instead of laying items out in the most convenient way, visual marketers focus on customer experience. Their goal was to find a product merchandising formula that would lead to higher sales. Online and retail visual merchandising has several objectives: Making customers feel welcome Retaining customers’ attention Prioritizing the most profitable products Using products as a branding tool For instance, a store might put a large figurine at the front entrance to create excitement, even if they never plan on selling it. In a similar vein, an online store might put its special offers or “most wanted” products on its home page, instead of hiding them away in a menu.  Although they may not be strictly visual, other merchandising techniques leverage: Scents that promote calmness (e.g., lavender), or excitement (e.g., orange blossom) Technology that allows customers to interact with merch via digital displays or their hands Space to encourage shoppers to move through the store Lighting for an ambiance that gets people in the mood for spending Colors that match your brand Scents that make customers feel nostalgic about the past Sounds that foster relaxation, such as running water, chimes, or soft music Sounds that incentivize action, such as rock or dance music The goal is to exploit the senses to complement the brand message you want to convey. In other words, you need to use digital arrangements, display tables for boutiques, and all other tools at your disposal to provide in-store experiences that incentivize customers to part with their cash. Types Of Visual Merchandising So, how do you create a compelling visual merchandising experience? Brand-Aware Design Brand-aware design in visual merchandising means choosing store upholstery, textiles, flooring, and cladding to represent your company’s signature aesthetic. In other words, your efforts should go beyond the signage above your front door. Especially if you don’t really have a front door: In the online space, retailers include brand-specific designs in product photos and accompanying content, going far beyond branded headers. Interior Fixtures As mentioned, the fixtures you use in your store influence the vibe customers get when they walk in. Depending on your choices, you can create a fun, laid-back, luxurious, serious, or affordable aesthetic. Bundling Stores use bundling – i.e., displaying several products in a single display to show how they work together -  to entice customers to make bigger purchases. For instance, you might bundle t-shirts, pants, and shoes together on a mannequin, or several matching kitchen appliances on a single countertop. Exterior Signage If you are a visual retailer, you often want to influence customers before they set foot inside your store. Exterior signs play a role in setting the tone for the kind of shopping experience customers can expect when they step inside. Window Displays A visual merchandising classic, window displays are meant to pique the interest of potential customers walking by your store.   Online operators can create digital versions of window displays on their websites, perhaps in the form of a banner on their homepage. Layout How you organize your store can also be a powerful tool for influencing brand perception. Stuffing shelves with products up to the ceiling tells shoppers that you run a budget-friendly store, while leaving plenty of open space and celebrating each product with an individual display creates a luxury vibe. Seasonal Displays Seasonal displays can entice shoppers to spend more on themed products. In the US, most shops have seasonal collections for: Halloween Easter Christmas Diwali All four seasons New Year 4th of July Valentine’s Day The most beneficial seasonal displays depend on your business. If you sell clothing, individual summer, spring, fall, and winter displays will be the most important, whereas food stores will have Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas as their top priorities. Checkout Displays Checkout displays, also called “point of purchase” displays, take advantage of the fact that customers often make impulse purchases, especially if they have to wait in line, with cheap products everywhere they look. You can adapt this concept for online stores, too. When customers get to the checkout page, you can offer discounts if they buy in bulk or recommend products that complement the items in their basket. Music Music contributes to visual merchandising in unique ways. For instance, research shows that certain melodies can enhance other sensory influences, such as taste or sight. Moreover, some music genres will be more in line with your brand message than others. For example, if you run a clothing store for teenagers, playing music currently charting well with that demographic can help ingratiate you with them. Similarly, if you run a department store where most shoppers are over the age of fifty, you might want to focus more on golden oldies or subtle music that won’t overpower your products. Mannequins Mannequins are visual merchandising staples. Brands usually avoid making their models look overly human to avoid unsettling people; they are generally made to represent “ideal” body types and transfer that aspirational quality to the clothes they’re showing off. As mentioned, mannequins show shoppers what clothes and accessories can look like when worn in conjunction, encouraging them to purchase entire outfits instead of individual garments. Lighting How you light your premises can also have a tremendous impact on your store’s atmosphere and product appearance. For instance, stores like Hollister keep shop floors quite dark and often diffuse essential oils into the air to create a unique experience for customers. By contrast, Walmart uses intense lighting that equally illuminates all parts of the shop floor and its products. Customers respond very differently to the lighting choices you make. Some view fluorescent lighting as cheap or are put off by harsh lighting, particularly when trying on clothes. Others may want bright lights to see what they are doing. Softer lights can calm people down and create a luxurious feel, while ramping up the lumens creates a more intense atmosphere. And even though most people still prefer in-store shopping, that doesn’t mean all your lighting efforts should be concentrated on your physical venue. Designing your website in shades that reflect your values and the brand “vibe” you’re trying to convey is essential. Cross-Merchandising Cross-merchandising is a strategy akin to bundling. The idea is to deliberately place complementary items alongside each other, even if they are not in the same category. Grocery stores often adopt this technique around Christmas time. Instead of storing turkeys, stuffing, and gravy pouches separately, they bundle them together in the same display refrigerator. Electronics stores do something similar. They will often display devices, like smartphones, alongside their accessories. Naturally, you can adopt a similar strategy online. Linking complementary products to the one your customers are currently looking at encourages them to spend more. What Can You Do To Improve Your Visual Merchandising? Reading through visual merchandising examples can be helpful, but if you want to significantly improve your storefront, here’s what to do: Research Your Audience First, learn as much about your customers as possible. Go beyond conventional demographics, such as income, age, and location, and explore more in-depth factors, such as your average shopper's hobbies, lifestyle, and interests. Conduct market research to uncover the primary preferences and characteristics of your best customers. You can then build customer personas (the most common sets of traits your customers have put together) and adjust the imagery in your shop to cater to them. Learn New Trends Next, find out as much as you can about how your rivals go about visual merchandising. Visit their stores, take note of what seems to be working for them, and how you could leverage it. For instance, if providing plenty of space between displays is en vogue right now, follow the industry leader. Similarly, if monochromatic designs are all the rage, try them for a season and see if they improve your sales. Make Displays Interactive Static merchandising works well, but interactive displays can boost engagement even further. For instance, you might link your physical displays to your online store, boosting website traffic. You could also offer customers the opportunity to try products before buying them. Hire A Consultant If you can afford it, you might want to hire a professional merchandising consultant. These experts are familiar with the best practices in the field, and can implement them much more quickly than you can. What’s more, having an expert on your payroll means fewer expensive mistakes. Still, bear in mind that the average visual merchandiser salary is $43,006 per year; if you want to have one in-house, you’ll need to make plenty of room in your budget for it. Otherwise, you can hire them on a case-by-case basis, if you don’t predict needing their services too often. Avoid Hazards Safety is a concern in any visual merchandising effort: Temporary arrangements can fall over and injure people.  If you implement any new interior or exterior signs, affix them safely to the walls so they can’t tumble down. Always follow instructions and maintenance advice for additional shelving, tables, or electrical circuitry you install. Also, check if your business insurer would be willing to cover your liability before undertaking any merchandising projects. Turn Merchandising Into Marketing To execute your marketing vision, use graphics that will inspire customers to share their experiences of your store with their friends. The more infectious you can make it, the more effective it will be. Use Themes Lastly, you’ll want to create themes in your visual merchandising: Perhaps they’ll be about seasonal items, new products, or celebrating fifty years in business. Whatever it is, having a theme with an attached storyline can draw people in. Test Regularly Try changing individual aspects of your merchandising strategy, such as the products on display, decor, color, themes, or number of mannequins at a time, and keep track of any concurrent changes in demand or revenue. The Bottom Line Visual merchandising is a method for drawing in customers and  increasing revenue by setting the tone for your brand. The most obvious examples of visual merchandising are seasonal displays in brick-and-mortar stores. However, that is far from the only way you can use this strategy; coordinating the sensory impression your physical or virtual storefront gives out can be a deciding factor in your success - you would do well to invest in it. Further Reading 7 Best Business Credit Cards The Best Direct Mail Companies for A Successful Offline Marketing Campaign Top SMS Marketing Tools on the Market

Many people assume that you need a lot of money in the bank to start a company. But, as you’ll discover in this post, that’s not always the case. While capital helps for certain types of enterprises, it’s not always necessary. In today’s world, you can start something from scratch with no cash outlay at all and, in some cases, even build an income that far outstrips your regular salary. In this post, we'll take a look at how to start a business without money and then provide some business idea examples that are affordable and easy to pursue. How To Start a Small Business Without Money Fifty years ago, start-ups had to do virtually everything themselves. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak built Apple computers in a shed, and Bill Gates didn’t exactly have a ton of investors lined up to support Windows when he started out.  Things have changed in recent years, though, and starting a business with no money is considerably easier than it was in the past. These days, it’s more about leveraging the tools that are already out there in new and interesting ways. Good business ideas often still need some money, but there are ways around that, too. Here’s how to start a business from scratch with no money saved up:  Find a Problem To Solve That Uses Your Skill Set The best business ideas are those that sit at the confluence of your skillset and a problem that needs solving. Pursuing a passion of yours at any cost is not necessarily advisable. While you might love the work, it may not align with a problem in the marketplace. Instead, look for a small subdivision in the market where consumers’ needs aren’t being solved and then look to fill the gap. For instance, you could: Chop a larger product into smaller, more manageable chunks (such as chocolate buttons or apple slices). Improve how often or in which ways you interact with customers (for example, eBay reviews). Change how quickly you deliver products (such as next-day or same-day delivery). Combine two existing ideas (such as providing a play creche in a coffee shop). Take something out of a product that people don’t like. Exaggerate your love of ugliness (such as misshapen fruit and vegetables to reduce waste) Automate an activity that used to require human labor (such as picking products in a warehouse) Of course, your imagination will be much better than ours. But the principle remains the same: your idea needs to provide a meaningful improvement in your customers’ lives in a way that others on the market aren’t offering at the moment. Create a Minimum Viable Product After you find a novel problem that requires your skill set to solve, you need to create a minimum viable product (MVP). Your MVP should offer at least a minimum feature set that people will pay you for - it’s basically a demo meant to attract buyers. When starting a business with no money, MVPs are essential. You need to generate revenue as quickly as possible to keep your head above water. You should not wait until you’ve built out your entire feature set before you start selling the product or idea.  Set Up a Payment Mechanism Once you have your MVP in place, the next step is to set up a payment system. If you want to open a retail store with no money, you can work with a merchant account service. These provide you with the POS tools and accounts you need to take credit and debit card payments at your premises.  If you are setting up an online shop, eCommerce websites will provide you with various ways to take payments. Similarly, if you want to sell courses or training, you can use an online platform, such as Mastermind or Kajabi.  If you’re selling something else, look for existing payment platforms in your niche. Usually, you’ll find a company that provides you with all the tools you need to make payments so you can avoid relying on old-fashioned paper invoicing, bank transfers, and cash.  Go Public The next step is to go public with your plans. Even if you are an entrepreneur without money, there are still plenty of ways to do this.  Start by setting up a website on a free platform, such as Squarespace, Wix, or WordPress. Then acquire a domain name from a reputable provider.  You will need to pay a small fee for this, depending on the name you choose. However, prices are low for more obscure domain suffixes (such as .co or .us), meaning that you can get a URL for just a few dollars a year.  If you want to start an eCommerce business with no money, there are plenty of platforms to choose from, including WooCommerce, BigCommerce, Shopify, and Magento.  Next, maintain a constant social media presence. Make sure that you:  Regularly respond to users’ questions and queries. Ask other people in your network to promote your posts. Post one to three interesting items about your brand per day. Regularly check in with your audience to make sure they’re happy and address their concerns. Get Some Help Great business leaders don’t try to go at it alone. They always ask for help and try to find ways to make the universe conspire in their favor by: Getting friends and family to pitch in and provide extra funding or ideas. Asking for mentors to listen to sales pitches and offer advice on how to improve them. Going to reputable lenders for small business loans when extra cash is needed. Looking for local grants and small business funding opportunities. Finding potential angel business investors who might be willing to take a punt on their business idea. Looking for additional sources of funding, such as peer-to-peer lending and crowdsourcing. Learning more about how to start a business without money. Grow Your Business The final step is to grow your business so that it becomes profitable. If you don’t push forward hard, you may not build enough momentum to make a good return on your investment.  Here are some inexpensive or free ways to market your business and ensure that it thrives:  Invest in SEO You can pay an agency to do this for you, or if you’re really short of money, you can do it yourself for free. Ensure that you include relevant keywords on your website, write content relevant to your audience, and get links from partner sites to your pages.  Market on social media You can pay for this with ads or do it for free by creating content for your pages and accounts. If you are struggling to gain traction, try working with influencers. Do content marketing By writing useful articles and creating helpful videos, you can provide prospective customers with the value they can’t get from your competitors. Cold outreach Lastly, you might want to try cold outreach. While challenging, it is a great way to get your foot in the door and build more sustainable clients long-term.  Examples of Businesses You Can Start With No Money Wondering how to start a business with no money or credit? There are plenty of examples already out there and they provenly work. Let’s take a look at a few: Life Coaching A life coach is simply someone who offers guidance to other people on how to live better. Many coaches focus on a particular dimension of life, such as relationships, finances, spirituality or career. To stand out in this industry, you’ll need to have the ability to truly change someone’s outlook on a particular area of life.  Pet Sitting Becoming a pet sitter can be a fun line of work. You walk or groom dogs and, in return, their owners pay you a fee. Pet sitting is popular in cities where professionals don’t always have the time needed to look after their pets properly. Handyman Services If you are good at fixing things around the house, then you might consider handyman services. These professionals charge callout and service fees for fixing broken windows, putting up curtain rods, and removing mold from tile grouting. You might need some initial investment to buy the necessary tools if you don’t already have them, though. Selling Printed T-Shirts On-demand, customizable printed t-shirts are a viable, low-cost business option. Here, you simply set up an online store and then work with a t-shirt printing partner to distribute apparel to your customers. This is not exactly a free option and is something you’ll need to invest at least some funds in, but the overall returns make those modest initial investments worth it.  Selling Books You might think of writing as a different category from business, but it’s not. After all, a book is just another product that gets bought and sold.  There are many types of books you could create. These include: How-to manuals. Professional books for a particular industry niche. Novels and fictional literature. Scientific books and journals (not really a money-maker, though). Self-help or philosophical books. Photo books. Comics. Customizable books for children and adults. Again, this is one of the best businesses to start with little money because you don’t need to set up the printing shop yourself. You just work with an existing publishing house that provides the features you want to offer your customers. With that in mind, you’ll still need to scrounge up some starting capital. Selling an Online Course If you are thinking about how to start a business online without money and are serious about not having even a tiny bit of seed capital, there are still options to consider. One is to simply sell your skills – something that you already know how to do well, but other people will find valuable learning.   Selling a course online is much easier than you might think. Today, there are many platforms that host your course and help it reach your target audience. What’s more, it’s the type of work you can do without having to quit your day job, and, on many platforms, you won’t have any upfront costs, either.  Selling Print-on-Demand Cards, Posters, and Prints Print-on-demand services are becoming more popular as consumers look to personalize gifts or items in their homes. Therefore, selling these products could be a great way to scale a business fast. Again, you don’t need to pay for the printing facilities or worry about shipping yourself: you can partner with a dropshipping service and a publishing house and get them to do it for you.  Child Care Have you ever said to a friend, “I want to start a business but have no ideas on where to start”? Child care is a very popular profession in this age of overworked people who cannot dedicate the time they’d like to their children but still want them to be in good hands. Parents want to leave their kids with people who will look after them properly and provide educational support.  If you get a license, you can start using your home, which will allow you to look after multiple children simultaneously to earn more money from this venture.  Test Prep Services Parents want their children to perform well at exams. Hence, test prep services are just as popular as private tuition, if not more so these days. All you need is some experience in academia or a background in education.  Car Detailing If you love cars, you might want to offer a car detailing service. Proud owners are often willing to pay a premium for specialists who can make their vehicles look great, and the start-up costs to set up such an operation won’t cripple your budget.  Food Trucks Food truck businesses aren’t free, but they are much more affordable than setting up a restaurant or getting a retail unit in the middle of town.  These days, you can rent food trucks to test your business model – you don’t have to buy them outright. To be successful, you’ll want to offer people niche food that they love.  Electronics Repair Services If you know a lot about electronics, such as smartphones and notebooks, you might want to offer an electronics repair service. Here, people bring you their broken items, and you’ll attempt to fix them. Again, you’ll need both knowledge and a set of tools, but if you’re keen on electronics and have been fixing your own hardware for years, chances are you’ll already have everything you need. Refurbished Electronics A similar idea to the one above is opening a refurbished electronics business. Here, you take old devices, factory reset them, clean them up, repair any obvious damage, and then sell them on while making a profit. Landscaping The landscaping business can be a very lucrative option. If you are careful with the type of projects you take on, this can be a great way to make money. Start with small items that you can complete with simple hand tools, and then use the cash you earn to buy more equipment that will let you take on larger projects.  Vending Machines Believe it or not, there is actually quite substantial money to be made from getting into the vending machine business. It’s not an entirely passive income stream after the initial investment, though - at least not if you want to keep making money. The ongoing work involves restocking machines and fixing them if they go wrong. To make truly good money, you’ll eventually want numerous vending machines and a team of staff to help with restocking and repair work. Airbnb Business It’s easy to start an Airbnb business without money, but you will need a place for people to stay. Your home is more likely to be in high demand if you are close to a tourist hotspot or a business district. Selling Subscription Boxes Selling subscription boxes is a great way to start a business without experience. The way it works is simple: instead of building your own products and packaging them, you curate those of other brands and then pass them on to consumers in boxes. The value is in the selection process itself: you’re telling consumers what’s good instead of relying on them to figure it out for themselves.  Selling Phone Accessories Today, there’s a huge market for smartphone accessories, due to the sheer volume of people who now own these devices. They need Bluetooth headphones, tripods, cases, dashboard holders, portable and wireless chargers, and so on. What’s more, they are often willing to buy on impulse, either online or in-store, so you’ll likely have a high demand for your products. Just bear in mind that this is another job that will require some reasonable starting capital.  Online Consulting If you have had a long career and are starting a business from nothing, you might have success with online consulting. Here, you provide firms with guidance and advice on topics they might not understand. They may then ask you to directly intervene and perform tasks for them, paying you fees for the privilege. It’s another great job to put your skills to good use without having to spend any money upfront. Conclusion Starting a business without money is surprisingly easy in the modern world. Thanks to the internet and other communication technologies, it’s now something that’s accessible to most people. That said, some of the ideas we presented here still might require some sort of seed capital, but you won't need a large amount of funding to get your idea off the ground. 

Selling your business requires going through a sequence of well-defined steps. You need to proceed methodically so that you don’t miss out on key processes or make mistakes.  In the following selling a business checklist, you’ll learn more about determining the value of your business, preparing a statement that outlines why you want to sell it, and the various documentation you need to support its value. When selling a business, a checklist can be a lifesaver, so let’s look at what one should entail. Preliminary Business Sale Preparations When selling a business, it’s critical to get the price right. If you pitch too high, you won’t get any interest, and your company will remain on the market for too long. Before you sell your LLC, you’ll want to make sure that it’s ready for viewing. This could include fixing up any interior or exterior issues with the property.  You’ll also want to make sure that:  You have all the business documents you need for the sale. You understand the actual value of your business to prospective buyers. You know when you want to sell (timing the market can influence how much you get paid.) You’ve had a professional business valuation. Sale Of Business Assets Checklist Here is a business sale closing checklist:  1. Hire Advisors To Help Start the Business Sale Process You’ll need to organize the following professionals and tell them about your intention to sell your business:  Accountant – for filing all your business’s financial information in a professional manner. Business broker – an individual who acts a bit like a real-estate agent, finding the best price for your business and then taking a commission (usually around 10 percent on a $1 million enterprise). Valuation expert – a professional who understands what your business is really worth. Attorney – for making sure that you follow legal procedures for commercial sales. 2. Write Down Your Reasons for Selling You’ll want to provide potential buyers with compelling reasons for the sale. These could include:  The need to move to a different part of the country. Retirement. Illness. Moving onto a different project. 3. Organize All Your Contracts and License Agreements You’ll want to collate the following when selling your company:  Operating license agreements (for software, for example.) Company bylaws that relate to the sale. Dissolution of corporation status. Multiple owner sign-off. 4. Ensure You Have All Relevant Documents You’ll need both business and tax documents when selling. Business documents include things like your marketing plan, supplier and customer contracts, product pricing lists, and a written business plan. Tax documents include all your federal and state returns for the last three years, along with profit and loss statements. These are the most important documents needed to sell a business.  You may also require:  Intellectual property documents Financial statements with creditors and accounts receivable Legal documents, such as stocks and shares held by the company, employment contracts, pending lawsuits, and so on Business assets and associated paperwork Insurance coverage and policies.  5. Write a Company Inventory A company inventory lets both you and the buyer know in detail what comes with the business. Examples of items on this list might include buildings, equipment, vehicles, and staff roles.  6. Discuss Supplier Contracts Buyers will want to know who your suppliers are. Small businesses for sale, therefore, should have a list ready. For instance, make a list of all the services you regularly use that are not a part of your business, such as cleaners or SEO agencies.  7. Prepare for an Environmental Audit Any due diligence checklist for selling a business should include provision for an environmental audit of your firm. Only licensed environmental auditors can perform these. They will explore: Your business permits and whether they are up to date. Whether your company meets environmental standards. What measures you will need to take to bring your firm up to scratch if it is not already. 8. Provide Buyers With a List of All the Licenses and Permits Required To Run the Firm For someone buying a business, the checklist of needed permits and licenses could include:  Land use permits. Tax registration. Business sector licenses. Environmental permits. Liquor licenses. Business handover permits. These licenses may not automatically pass over to them when they purchase the business, so you need to be prepared for extra legwork.  9. Tell Your Employees Once you’ve put the groundwork in place, you’ll need to tell your employees what’s happening. Inform them whether they will keep their jobs, what corporate policies might change, and who the new owners are.  Always treat employees well and engage with them in concert with the buyer. They are a valuable asset to the firm, and you don’t want extra trouble in the form of lawsuits from disgruntled workers. 10. Identify Outstanding or Unfinished Work Tell the buyer which projects or contracts are ongoing and yet to be fulfilled. Check domain renewal dates for your business website.  11. Prepare Succession and Confidentiality Agreements Use your attorney to draft a succession agreement that will formally transfer your business to the new owner.  Also, get them to prepare a confidentiality agreement. This protects you from buyers who might misuse financial information regarding your company. It also prevents any sensitive information from becoming public.  12. Prepare and Sign the Sale Documents The final part of the process is to prepare and sign the sale documents. You’ll need:  An indication of interest, which is a document signed by both parties before buyers learn more about business assets or get copies of other documents, such as tax returns. A letter of intent, which is a sign of a pending purchase. A purchase agreement, to be signed by both you and the new owner once you finish the negotiations. Once you’ve signed all these documents and followed the proper legal process, the business sale is complete.  Further Reading Our Top Picks for Inventory Management Software Small Business Banking: Top Banks Conclusion In this article we ran through all the things you need to do to sell a business successfully. Usually, the buyer will pay the closing costs, so you don’t need to worry about these. Just remember to go through each of the factors we’ve mentioned carefully as forgetting any of them could compromise the sale of your business.