Regional Growth Rates Differ, Take Heed

The Bureau of Economic Analysis recently reported state and regional growth statistics for 2007. No surprise that the Great Lakes region showed the slowest growth overall at 0.5%. Illinois, with the most diverse economy in the region grew at 1.5%, while Michigan lagged at negative -1.2%. Nationally growth advanced by 2.0%.

Lessons for small companies, if you sell in or to particular regions or states, you must prepare forecasts and plans for the particular economic trends in the areas where you make most of your sales. Accountants can assist you planning efforts, but you and your financial staff must do the hard work of forecasting. Accurate planning assists your relationships with lenders and other investors. I can help you adjust spending, and if you can't make your revenues you must be prepared to cut elsewhere.

On the flip side, locate the areas that are growing more and target these markets. Long term trends don't lie, and they may save your business if you plan for them.

Getting Help Selling Online

Last week I wrote about full-scale online offerings for small businesses from Yahoo and Microsoft. These hosted services promise to launch you online and get you collaborating, selling and marketing as well. What if you don't need such a comprehensive solution and just want to sell your product into cyberspace? Then have a look at the options available from Flying Cart.

With Flying Cart you can be up and selling in two minutes (or so they claim). The Madison, WI company's free offering lets you launch up to 5 products, but prices range up to $30/month for unlimited products and transactions. The offering set includes:

• Web hosting
• PayPal integrator
• Email promotion
• and most importantly Store Networking

As described by Justin Petrocelli at Entrepreneur.com;

"Flying Cart helps retailers bring traffic to their sites by promoting their stores on search engines like Google and on local classified ad sites like Craigslist. The company's philosophy is unorthodox but refreshingly simple--time spent creating too many bells and whistles for an online store is time taken away from making sales. Flying Cart encourages its clients to get their businesses online quickly and make up the rest as they go. Shah (Flying Cart's founder) says the result is an online store that promotes itself."

In addition to Google and Craigslist promotion, cross-selling with similar stores online promises to be the big bang - the long held promise of the so called "network effect" where everyone links to raise the tide for everyone. A great try if it works.

Small business retailers would be wise to consider this option pronto.