I have recently been writing internet related marketing and social media marketing related articles over on my i am Mike Smith blog and wanted to share with you all a deal I’m giving all of my readers (and since you are all my readers here, that includes you as well).

Online business school is something very, very important. It is also the holy grail (in my opinion) for anyone looking into making money online. For anyone who purchases this course (more information at the following link) I am offering 1 hour of free consulting via E-Mail or Instant Messenger to help formulate a plan of action for you to maximize your chances of making some good money online and building a business for yourself.

Check out the article here and if you have any questions for me, drop me a comment or contact me through the contact page.

For those who don’t know about Gino’s high quality Business Cards Printing services, please visit here and read more about it. You are able to choose from a wide variety of stocks, including the eco-friendly cover stock (13pt. Cover Uncoated – Recycled) or the the 14 pt. family in Matte, AQ, or UV at any custom size we offer such as square cards, odd sizes like 3×3, 2×2

A fair word of warning though. Commenting with “I want to win” or something this quick will guarantee you are NOT chosen as the winner of this contest. I know the bootstrappers out there love a good deal and I know when one is in front of us, we capitalize on it. So write up a comment on this post and let us know why YOU should be the bootstrapper we choose to win the 1,000 business cards.

* shipping is free for anyone in the US and Canada

So what are you waiting for? Get your comments in!

For many Veterans, coming home after serving in the war is hard emotionally as well as physically and most of all, financially. For many of our brave soldiers, they cannot afford to pay rent and wind up homeless. According to USA Today in November of 2007, Veterans made up 1 in 4 homeless people roaming the streets of America. This number makes me sick. How can our country expect these men and women to risk their lives for us and then come home and not support them when they need us?

So, I put together 10 great ways our bootstrapping skills can help War Veterans in our local cities as well as around the entire country. Let me know if you can think of any more or how you’ve involved your business in any of these ten great bootstrapping skills to help our Soldiers.

1. Gain some media attention – We’re no strangers to doing things to attract attention to our businesses right? So put it to good use. Try making a nice guerrilla marketing campaign that helps get the awareness levels up about the soldiers who are homeless in this country. For some guerrilla marketing inspiration, check out these posts: here, here and here.
2. Donate a % of your profits – During certain months of the year business donate part of their profits to charities about breast cancer and other causes so why not pick a month and donate a percentage of your profits to a homeless veterans charity? With my Tennessee Web Design company I am donating 10% of all profits in November to the National Coalition for Homeless Veternas and I urge you to do something similar.
3. Rent out a hotel for the evening – Find a hotel around your area that has 20-30 rooms and invite homeless veterans in your area to stop by and get a nice shower and a place to sleep for the evening. Yes, it may not be the biggest thing in the world to do, but I am sure they will appreciate it.
4. Spare a few dollars – Every time I went to the dollar store by my home for about 2 months straight, a homeless veteran would be sitting outside asking for spare change. I would always give him money.
5. Spare some of your time – With the same guy above, I would talk to him and have a conversation with him. This few minutes of my life helped this man get through his day (yes, he told me that he was happy I talked to him). I was the only person to take time and talk to him while others either walked grimly by or dropped change in but never looked at him.
6. Open up some jobs in your company – Does your company have a few openings? Why not fill these spots with the War Veterans who need jobs? If they don’t understand a certain aspect of the job, train them. They’re good listeners and follow instructions very well
7. Donate some of your items – Do you run a computer store? why not donate some computers to a local homeless shelter or to a hospital for Veterans? What about those of you who run a clothing line? Why not donate some clothing to a charity for War Veterans? You could even give the homeless Veterans in your area some clothing right out of your car. What can your business donate to help homeless War Veterans?

So as you can see, there are many ways your business and bootstrapping skills can benefit the homeless War Veterans in this country, so get out there and do your part. I know I am.

• 5 Stellar Sales Tips To Push You To the Top of Your Field
• There’s no Shame in Being a Guerrilla
• If You Hit Your Hand with a Hammer Every Day
• Why Should I Buy?
• How’d you hear about us?

Bootstrapping is all about jumping in and getting things going, so when you bootstrap your business and hit these road blocks, it would be nice to have a set plan of action in mind on how to dodge bullets or jump over burning bridges. So, what do you do when trouble hits? Do you hide and curl up into a ball, or do you fight back? If you’ve got an interesting story on a time you hit a road block and got through it, please share it. It will help inspire all of us who are in the same boat you were once in.

Editors note: I have a brand new series coming up on The 17 Principles of Success according to Napoleon Hill. It’s going to be a must read and will definitely answer a lot of questions on what is needed to be successful in business.

My name is Mike Smith and I am a small business owner. I have owned and operated a couple very small (I mean so small you’d never even know they existed unless I told you) businesses in the past. After struggling for many years (about 4 to be exact) I started reading some great material and really focusing in on running a successful small business. I started my blog design company, Blog Theme Machine back in October 2007 and am looking forward to hitting my 1 year mark with it very soon! It has been very successful and has allowed me to live with it as my only source of income which is great.

I started this blog about the same time to share my ideas and tips on what I’ve learned over the past few years, from reading books like “Bootstrapping Your Business” and “Guerrilla Marketing” to reading blogs like Freelance Switch and Zen Habits. All I hope for is that someone reading this blog finds the proper tools to grow their small business into something they are proud of without having to go through the heartache that I have.

I am very easy to get in contact with and love hearing from my readers. It lets me know that I’ve done something right and that means a lot to me. I also love seeing comments (so comment! – really, I love it and I comment back) If you need to get in touch with me, the contact form on the bootstrapping blog contact page sends mail directly to me and I will write you back as soon as possible. If you’d like to chat via AIM or another form of Instant Messenger, just let me know in the email and I’ll send you my details.

So, enough about me

Below are some links to some of the earliest articles written on this blog that I think you will really enjoy. Definitely something to look over when you have some spare time. If you see something you like or have a question about, leave a comment and I’ll comment back (See, I told you I love comments) You can also request further discussion in new articles that grow on an old article if you’d like. I’m always open to suggestions.

• What is Bootstrapping?
• Legalizing Your New Company
• Enlisting Friends and Family
• How NOT To Run A Business
• Bootstrapping And Your Gut Feeling
• Ten Steps To Making That First Sale
• 30 Local Resources You Can’t Live Without
• How To Lose A Potential Customer In One Easy Step
• Building An Optimistic Business
• Enlisting Your Friends And Family

Thank you for taking the time to read this post and getting to know me, what I do and why I do it a little bit better. I hope the above articles bring some light into your days as a small business owner. Remember, bootstrapping isn’t for everyone but it sure is for YOU! Drive, Dedication and Determination can get you anything so please don’t ever forget that!

If you’re enjoying the content I’m providing, why not subscribe so you can get email updates or feed reader updates? It’s free and every time I post on this website, you’ll be notified (I only post once every other day so don’t worry about being flooded with emails/feed notifications).

• TheFunded Founder Institute – New idea, possible opportunity

Running is the first key to life

In the video, Will explains that the reason for this is because when you run, you have this little voice in your head that tells you “I’m too tired, I have to stop running. If I only walk for a second I will regain my composure and can run again. I wish I could just sit down” (paraphrased in my own words). He says that if you can conquer this voice when running, you can conquer this voice in anything that you do in life.

I couldn’t agree more. Regardless of the way you want to give the analogy, that voice in your head, which is based on fear, doubt and insecurity, will run your life until the day you die if you do not learn to conquer it early on. Running is definitely a great way to overcome this voice and has many benefits.

The Benefits of Running

Will Smith touches on the fact that overcoming the voice telling you to stop when you are running is the reason why running is beneficial and I don’t disagree with him but there are many other benefits as well.

Health Benefits – I put this first because I figured since most people like to skip over this fact of life, I wanted to make it stand out more here. RUNNING or ANY FORM OF EXERCISE is a great health benefit. Not only will running help you keep the weight off but it is also great for stamina. At the risk of saying too much, I will just say that stamina is a great thing for any man out there and you should pay attention to it more. (Sorry ladies if you found that offensive – contact me and tell me you did).

Running will also help your lungs open up which improves your breathing and good breathing can be very beneficial to concentration and relaxation. Ask anyone who meditates or does breathing exercises and they will tell you the same thing. Try it and I bet you’ll see the great results.

Freeing Your Mind – I know a lot of people talk about how walking helps them to relax their mind and free their thoughts. The same goes for running. When you run, you can think about many things but for some reason, to me at least, it seems to help me not ‘think’ about much at all, in the sense that I am not stressed about the things I think about. I actually get a lot of great ideas when I am jogging/running and always carry a tablet of paper and a pen with me. The writing might be horrible but I can read it so thats all that matters.

Anyone who is in business for themselves can comment on this and say that their life is at times a bit more stressful then they’d like. Running is a great way to remove a bit of that stress and free your mind for greater things. Looking at a screen all day will make things start to look like tunnel vision, so running is a great way to release some of those things and see life in a better light.

Reading is the second key to life

Will Smith then goes on to explain that reading is the second key to life and again, I don’t doubt that for a second. Anyone who is successful in business will have at least ONE good book they’ve read that helped put them in the right mindset or on the right track to making their dreams come true. I read Bootstrapping Your Business and that influenced me to start Bootstrapping Blog and write about the art of bootstrapping.

Anything you can read from Thomas Edison, Bill Gates, Richard Branson, or Benjamin Franklin will give you so much knowledge for life and business that you’d be upset you hadn’t read it earlier. Reading not only solves problems you might be going through, as Will Smith talked about, but it gives you a few more benefits as well.

Knowledge is Power – OK, I know everyone has read or wrote this phrase more than once in their life but it’s the truth. When you know more, you can do more. When you understand laws after you read a law book or study in law school, or study a CSS design book, when you are done reading, you will by far know more then you did before you read the book. The same goes with great blogs like Zen Habits, Pro Blogger, Skelliewag and Freelance Switch.

You’ll have the power to do so many more things in business and in life after you read these blogs and authors.

A good real-life example of this is that before I read the zen habits tumblr page, I didn’t know anything about this video or that Will Smith even said these things, but now, I am writing this very post because of it Knowledge does indeed give you power.

Better Communication – When you read, you will learn proper grammar (if the person writing it displays it, that is) and will learn a vast amount of new words. These skills will help you out in every day conversations with family, friends or co-workers. Your friends will laugh, or stare at you funny if you use some larger words in a conversation and they are the type to use a lot of slang terms or are the “myspace crowd” so-to-speak. I get a kick out of putting a 5 syllable word into a sentence instead of a 4-5 letter word just to play with people, its fun.

If you are in business for yourself, you normally are the name and face of your business and if you come off to your clients as ignorant or less-educated, you will surely lose many potential jobs and sales. I’ve seen many sales pitches with grammar mistakes that shouldn’t have been made, by writers who were selling their freelance writing services. This is unacceptable and easily avoided by reading more and learning more.

Why Will Smith is a Genius

Normally, people will give you some B.S. approach to succeeding in life, wrapping a cheap e-book page around it and slapping a $100.00 price tag on it while you have legitimate success stories (yes, I consider Will Smith a success story in himself) who give out great knowledge like this for free every day. All you have to do is open your eyes and ears while closing your mouth. Pay attention, you’ll thank me for it later…

Am I the only one that listens to what Will Smith and other stars say and grab the useful information from it like this?

• CUT THE CRAP…. What is your Mantra for 2011?
• Late Payments Can Be a Good thing in a Slow Economy
• Books all Small Business Owners Should be Reading
• Building on strengths or fixing weaknesses?
• Should I incorporate my business?

Feel free to drop a comment if you liked a post on this site and it isn’t featured on the list. Please note these articles are not listed in any specific order.

• 101 new years business resolutions
• Essential tools for the online bootstrapper
• Why quitting your addictions will kill your business
• Selling methods to avoid
• Bootstrapping and your gut feeling
• 30 local resources you can’t live without
• 10 steps to making that first sale
• 24 guerrilla marketing tactics you should be using
• 5 tips to appear large on a small budget
• Legalizing your new company

See you in 2008

In this article, I want to cover a little bit about what Shawn Hessinger talks about in his article and also touch on some points I believe should be discussed. Feel free to drop me a comment at the end of this article and let me know your thoughts as well. I’d love to hear them.

Creativity will shine in the bootstrapper

When dealing with a multi-national, well funded company that has 1,000 employees and 10 bank loans, the odds of anyone in their business straying from the old path their owner told them to use is slim-to-none. For the bootstrapper, we strive on the wooded, unchartered land that we walk through on a daily basis to make it to the other side. Our creativity is something that no one can take from us and a great gift that we have.

Regardless if you’re creating a guerrilla marketing campaign or trying to figure out what not to do when talking to a client, you’re using your creativity and thinking outside the box and the results with show that doing this boost sales to a higher percentage; much higher then a traditional sales and marketing approach. Plus, we have fun when we’re being creative, so work doesn’t seem like work to us.

Less room for error brings better results

Lets face it, if you have 2 months to complete a project, the odds of you finishing in the first week are very slim. At the same time, if you’ve got a 2 day deadline, I bet that the same project could be completed. Why? When bootstrappers know that there’s something to be done and it has to be done quick, we’re right on it and putting in the work needed to complete it quickly. We don’t have the luxury that big corporations have when dealing with product deadlines and promoting our company.

I know from experience that I can design websites in a matter of 2 days and make around $1,000 dollars. Yes, there’s more work time involved in a short period, and a bit more stress, but there are a lot of times that those same jobs can linger on for a week. When faced with a deadline, or the thought of knowing you’re the only person that can get the job done, bootstrapping becomes a driving force behind some super-charged work and really benefits the bootstrapper.

While we’re in our offices (spare bedrooms, garage, basement or other make-shift office) putting in 10-14 hour days on sales, customer service, product building and promoting, the big exec. in his high-end office is relaxing far too much and letting his/her employees get away with far too much slacking off on the job. As bootstrappers, we don’t have a second chance when creating our product. We don’t have 20,000 dollars to toss away on T.V. promotion campaigns that don’t work. So, with the added pressure, comes better, and faster results.

Bootstrapping a business gives a greater amount of flexibility

When you accept a big loan from an external source, you become a slave to their thoughts, ideas and plans. You no longer have your own way of doing things because you have to run every decision by them first. Bootstrapping is about unconventional thinking, split second decision making and doing things against the grain of normal businesses, so adding an external funding source to the mix only complicates the true essence of the bootstrapper.

Doing things your own way, on your own time and at your own pace is one of the main reasons people leave their 9-5 jobs and start their own business. The majority of the time, these same people will end up taking bank loans to fund their start-ups and wind up in the same mindless cycle they were leaving to begin with. Why put yourself through that?

For instance, I am up at 2am right now writing this article. Do you think that I could do that if I were writing for a company who had strict deadlines and time-frames they wanted me to work in? I also design late at night like this, partially because a lot of my work comes from overseas so I catch a lot of clients this way, but also because during the day, I find myself less focused and creative compared to during the night like this. If I wasn’t bootstrapping and doing things my way, I wouldn’t have the freedom to do these things.

Bootstrapping is supposed to be fun!

No matter what, always remember to have some fun when you’re bootstrapping your business. If not, you’ll end up hating your job and crawling back to your former employers, begging for your jobs back. None of us want that, and I don’t want to see anyone have to do that, so please, enjoy yourself. If you’re doing some crazy promotional work that is so out of the box, no one would believe it would work; smile while doing it. If you’re on the phone with a client, explaining how the new service you offer would benefit their family members; smile and laugh while doing it. Having fun will make life go by at a much smoother pace, regardless of the things happening around you.

A resolution is, by definition:

1: the act or process of resolving: as a: the act of analyzing a complex notion into simpler ones b: the act of answering : solving c: the act of determining d: the passing of a voice part from a dissonant to a consonant tone or the progression of a chord from dissonance to consonance

Below are 101 New Years Business Resolutions you can adopt for your business to ensure that you make the most out of your business in 2008. Why are they resolutions and not goals? All 101 resolutions in this list will solve a problem in your business (lack of money, lack of time, lack of promotion, ect).

1. Increase revenue by 10% each month
2. Create 1 guerrilla marketing campaign each month
3. Follow up with clients once per month
4. Network with other companies in my niche
5. Network with companies that compliment my niche (ie: web design / web hosting)
6. Give 5 free consultations
7. Create 1 viral marketing campaign each month
8. Build testimonials list for future clients to read
9. Create out-of-the-box ideas/designs for business cards
10. Appear larger on a smaller budget
11. Start saving pennies for a full year and spend the money on your business
12. Decrease hours worked each day while increasing profits
13. Attend at least 5 seminars or expo’s related to your niche
14. Adjust pricing for your products
15. Build a new product to add in to your current package
16. Add a new service to your current list of services you offer clients
17. Create 6 new contests as a marketing strategy
18. Register your company name
19. Write a book or guide for people in your niche
20. Donate at least 10% of your profits each month to charity
21. Get your company featured in local newspapers
22. Get your company featured on the local news television shows
23. Start a fusion marketing group (more on fusion marketing in a future article)
24. Create a subscriber/mailing list of 10,000 people by December 2008
25. Bloggers: Get 1,000 new RSS Subscribers each month
26. Add a sales team to sell for you
27. Hold 1-2 demonstrations for your service/product
28. Generate more word-of-mouth advertising
29. Bloggers: Guest Post on 2 blogs each month
30. Get your website to the top 5 results for a new keyword each month
31. Create a form of passive income
32. Double your client list
33. Find one extra client each month (ie: Jan – 6 clients, Feb – 7 clients, March – 8 clients)
34. Invest 10% of profits to growing your business
35. Invest 10% of profits for new equipment
36. Cut advertising costs by 25%
37. Go Green!
38. Bloggers: Become one of the top 100 make money online blogs
39. Bloggers: Get your blog featured on 5 of the top 100 make money online blogs
40. Be more friendly to the “not-so-nice” clients; even when it hurts your pride.
41. Become more reliable
42. Take as many risks as possible without letting yourself say no; even if you think its a crazy idea!
43. Think outside the box with advertising
44. Study your competition and find their weaknesses; capitalize on them
45. Have each of your friends generate 1 sale for you
46. Promote your product in 5 different states
47. Open a store for your product/service 1 other state
48. Benefit from local resources
49. Bloggers: Update your blog design at least once this year
50. Read 1 business related book each month
51. Participate in at least 2-3 discussions on message boards each month
52. Check emails less and close IM’s when working online
53. Reorganize your office space
54. Increase the response rate in your customer service team (or yourself)
55. Track the time you work better. (we recommend: slim timer)
56. Trust your gut feeling more
57. Bloggers: Mind map blog ideas for every day in 2008 (365 ideas won’t be hard with this method)
58. Sponsor an event in your community to clean up parks or recreation centers
59. Enter local business awards
60. Enter blogging awards
61. Enter web design awards or submit to CSS Galleries
62. Take a vacation (even if you sit at home for a week not working, it’s still good for business because if you don’t, you’ll burn out).
63. Hire 5 college students for various jobs (sales, customer service, cleaning, ect)
64. Invest money in each month to a new business you see becoming highly successful
65. Create all new promotional material (business cards, flyers, posters, bumper stickers, ect)
66. Spend more time with family and less time working on the weekends
67. Bloggers: Start 1 new blog every three months to build your network
68. Bloggers: Add different forms of revenue to your blogs
69. Allow affiliates to promote your products and services
70. Bloggers: Add 1 article daily, Monday-Friday and have auto posts setup for Saturday-Sunday.
71. Buy larger office space due to your company growing too big for the current office
72. Set up your own business expo for local businesses
73. Build website dedicated to your local business entrepreneurs (ie: yourstateentrepreneurs.com)
74. Be more consistent with daily work habits
75. Convert at least 10% of all cold-calls into sales each month
76. Increase website traffic by 10% each month
77. Increase pageviews for your website by 2 pages (1 page view per person – 3 page views per person)
78. Increase the time users spend on your website by 2 minutes
79. Find 10 unique ways to sell your product or affiliate sale in less then 2 minutes on your website
80. Double your search engine traffic every 3 months
81. If you haven’t already; submit a press release
82. Build or outsource 1 link bait survey/article each month
83. Get your entire staff (even if it is only yourself) healthier because healthier workers are happier and easier to be around
84. Earn enough money in 2008 that you can take an entire year off and travel
85. Build your passive income enough so in 2009 you can travel and still make money
86. Diversify your income streams on and offline
87. Bloggers: Aim at making $500.00 per month from Private Ad sales
88. Study the power of social media marketing and create 4 campaigns to run in 2008 on social media sites
89. Subscribe to 5 magazines that relate to your niche and study successful businesses inside them
90. Dare to be different; find what your niche is missing and fill in the gap
91. Find 5 ways to brand your company (or yourself if you freelance or bootstrap your own business)
92. Offer holiday sales for the major three holidays (Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Years)
93. Hire a PR team to give you an added boost of exposure
94. Bloggers: Hire front-page digg pushers to get your articles to the front page of digg.
95. Create a trend. John Chow and Shoemoney had their blogs redesigned and now EVERYONE wants the three box look.
96. Give 10% earnings for one month to a children’s college fund. Someone in your family, or a random child at a local school
97. De-clutter your entire business inside and out
98. Downsize your staff if profits aren’t as great as they should be
99. If downsizing your staff isn’t an option, then find 10 ways to downsize your expenses
100. Re-negotiate with all affiliate companies you promote for better rates
101. RETIRE! Hey, if it’s that time in your life, sell the business off and spend the rest of your life doing nothing

I am hopelessly addicted to sweets, soda, sugar and junk food. I am not an overweight guy, but I love to eat sweets and drink soda. On average, I drink 7 two-liter Mountain Dew’s a week, eat a box of Oreo cookies, bake sugar cookies or chocolate chip cookies (well, my girlfriend does that for me), and go through a few bags of flaming hot cheetos. Sounds bad don’t it? Yeah, technically, it might be bad for my health in the long run if I don’t take care of myself in other ways, but not having these things in my daily diet would wreck everything for me.

Recently, I stopped eating sweets and junk food; cold turkey. I had no soda, no caffeine; nothing. A few things happened to me when I did this, and none of them were for the better like everyone kept telling me. I want to break these things down for you, explain why they are bad for business, and give you some possible solutions to keep the habit, but even it out with the rest of your life.

Lower energy equals lower motivation

When you’re addicted to something, regardless of what it is (sweets, coffee, energy drinks, pizza, ect), if you stop having that as a part of your life, your energy levels will drop drastically. I know that the first couple days that I stopped eating sweets and drinking pop, I slept about 10-12 hours those days instead of my normal 3-5!

When you lack the energy, you lack the motivation to do anything. Small amounts of motivation might occur, and you might sit down to write up your next business plan, cold-call potential clients or design your next website, but that same motivation will leave you quickly, and you’ll be left in front of your desk either angry or depressed and ready to stop.

Lower motivation equals lower quality work

If you’re not motivated to do something, you’ll immediately give yourself reasons to put it off until later. If you’re business runs by you interacting with clients, shipping out orders, or giving services to people, you cannot begin to imagine how much this will effect your work. Lower quality work oftentimes will be seen by new prospects of your business as laziness and they will perceive your company as lackluster and unworthy of their time. This is not the immediate reaction you want from potential clients.

Lower quality work equals lower profits

Besides the fact that you’ll be undoubtedly doing less work and at a lower quality, the fact that referrals to your business will be less is another way your profits will decrease. If you’re working with a client and you end up taking 2-3 times longer to finish their work, or their product isn’t delivered when it was supposed to, they will NEVER respond with referrals to their friends and family members. This will cause a huge decrease in money, especially if you do not have a sales team working for you constantly.

Why quitting your addiction sucks

Besides all of the things I listed above, I noticed that the day I begin drinking soda and eating candy again, I was immediately in front of the computer and pulled a 19 hour shift through the night and part of the next day. I then pulled another 10 hour night right afterwards and felt great the whole time. I couldn’t understand why it happened like that at first, but then it hit me: I was happy!

When you’re happy, you tend to want to do more things with your day. For example, look at someone who’s suffering with depression; the odds of them really pulling them most out of their day is very low. Now, look at someone who works as a comedian and spends their days happy and cracking jokes; they are out in the open, doing what they love and feeling great about it. I know when I’m happy, I want to work or do something worthwhile, and when I feel like crap, I tend to sit and watch television or sleep more.

So, the next time someone tells you that you should quit your “nasty habits” because it’s affecting your life, take a look at what you’re doing and if it isn’t killing you at an alarming rate, I’d suggest second-guessing the idea of quitting. You’re business might regret it.