Payton Prather

Marketing is the sign of our times

Marketing is an essential part of running a business in today’s world. As a business owner, you need to ensure your company has a solid presence in and around Augusta. “The sign says,” outdoor marketing is one of the most effective ways to raise awareness of your business and increase brand visibility. It is important to create a consistent brand identity that is eye-catching and visually appealing.

Here are a few outdoor marketing tips to boost business and brand visibility in the CSRA:

  1. Use window graphics and displays to boost walk-in traffic. A customer is more likely going to pass by a blank window, and it also makes your business harder to find. Having a graphic or display will help attract those walk-in customers.
  1. Park A-frame signs outside your doors. A-frame signs are a great way to promote specials for your business. Giving customers a visual of what you can offer, can help increase their chances of visiting your business.
  2. Stand out at community events with banners, booth displays, and table throws. Local community events such as Golf Tournaments, Chamber events, and Conferences, are a perfect way to meet potential clients who may have never heard about your business. Making sure you stand out with your tabling displays strengthens your brand. Just like your brick-and-mortar, is important to maximize the space you are given and give people a reason to stop and see what you have to offer.
  3. Give them something to remember you by. You always want to make a lasting impression, whether a customer is visiting your store or interacting with you at a local event. High-quality business cards and promotional items are two ways to help keep your business and brand top of your mind.
  1. Leveraging local billboards to keep your brand top of mind. In an era of “cutting the cord,” streaming content, and having the power to skip ads, billboards are something consumers can’t “skip”. Keeping your brand in front of your community is imperative so that when it is time for consumers to make a purchase decision, you are the brand that they think of first, not your competitor.

Outdoor marketing plays a pivotal role in boosting your brand. The more you do, the more likely a customer will see you, remember you, and not pass you by the next time they are passing your business.

At Richardson Professional Solutions (RPS), we help you make more time in your business by providing back-office solutions such as bookkeeping, marketing, or project management. This, in turn, provides small business owners the flexibility to do the things that matter most to you like building your business, continuing their education, traveling, or spending time with family.  

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Offering a helping hand in making estate plans

Today, I want to tell you why estate planning is important. But why would someone need help with their estate?

An estate plan is a vital component of any financial plan, regardless of the ages of your family members or your net worth. Whether you are single, married, or partnered, there are essential components of an estate plan that can help ensure your family’s financial security.

According to The Balance magazine, there are three key reasons why estate planning is essential for any family.

• Estate Planning Protects Beneficiaries. There are a number of estate planning tools and resources you can use depending on your financial situation. A life insurance policy is among one of them. This quickly provides your beneficiary with a death benefit after you pass away (and they file a claim). The proceeds of a policy can help cover things like final expenses, mortgage payments, and future college tuition for kids or grandkids.

• Estate Planning Protects Your Assets. Without a will and other estate planning resources in place, your assets will be distributed based on the law of the state where you live. Each state has its own set of laws. Even though the recipients of your assets are your spouse and your bloodline, things can quickly become complicated.

• Estate Plans Simplify Things for Your Family. Without a will and other directives in place when you die, you may inadvertently stir up hard conversations between family members. And it’s not always about money. This is especially important with blended families, which may include ex-spouses, new spouses, biological children, and stepchildren. Since each state has its own process for determining heirs, not having a will may cause you to unwittingly exclude someone you care about who isn’t a blood relative or include relatives you don’t want to inherit anything.

At Richardson Professional Solutions, we are a small business that helps other small businesses, non-profits and family estates across the country make time for what matters most by handling their back-office tasks.

Although we clearly have a passion for small businesses, one of our favorite and most rewarding services we provide is estate assistance. What this means is that a family member brings us in to help with tasks for the family like picking up, sorting, and scanning the mail for the estate; paying bills for the estate; being a professional liaison on behalf of the estate with an accountant or lawyer; handling the bookkeeping and document maintenance for the Estate’s accounts; providing fraud monitoring; and so much more.

A quick example is a family who has allowed us to assist them in lifting the burden of the financials off of the family members so they can spend more time with the aging family member in declining health. Not only do we handle the bookkeeping and bill pay, but we have also been a liaison with the repair man, landscaper, and accountant on their behalf, removing that stress.

We also assisted the family with moving the client into an assisted living facility by preparing paperwork for the facility, establishing a post office box, handling mail forwarding and address changes – things that must be done, but are not where the family needs to be focused on spending their time in this stage of life.

We can help with as little or much as your family needs to make time for the important things in your life. No two people or families are the same, and neither are the ways that we support families.

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Keeping Your Online Office Safe

At Richardson Professional Solutions (RPS), we utilize a variety of software and applications to complete our work. Since most positions are remote, learning how to use these is critical to our job.

Some of the programs we use include email and cloud storage tools; bookkeeping and bill pay software; time tracking, project management, and task tracking applications; digital marketing and graphic design tools; and password and critical data storage applications.

Utilization of a password and critical data storage application, such as LastPass, is critical in RPS since we deal with a lot of confidential client information. LastPass is a password and data manager that stores your passwords and helps to create strong, complex passwords when creating new accounts for different programs. Safely sharing business passwords is crucial in keeping your online office safe.

Amber Steel from LastPass explains it best why keeping everyone in sync is crucial when your team is working on a project: “Passwords are a fact of work life. We use passwords to access company email, the corporate network, cloud apps, databases, subscriptions, client portals, and dozens more accounts in the workplace. As team members collaborate on projects or manage shared tasks, password sharing is often required. The challenge is to share those passwords securely, especially when team members are in different locations.

“In the past, team members have relied on sticky notes, shared spreadsheets, emails, or text messages to share passwords. Unfortunately, in addition to being insecure, all those methods are tedious timewasters. Searching out a password every time you need it, bothering team members for the correct password, interrupting your workflow to remember where you can find that password – this style of password sharing is inefficient and disruptive. The lack of encryption or verification also means that data is open to cyberattacks and theft. With 80% of data breaches traced back to poor password management, using a password manager to securely share passwords can reduce your organization’s risk of a data breach.”

At RPS we help you make more time in your business by providing back-office solutions such as bookkeeping, marketing, or project management. This, in turn, provides small business owners the flexibility to do the things that matter most to them – like building their business, continuing their education, traveling, or spending time with family.

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Amy Richardson’s Got Your Back for Business

BY MITZI OXFORD, PHOTOS BY MELISSA GORDON

Are you the owner of one of the thousands of businesses in the CSRA? Do you have time for bookkeeping, IT, marketing, recruitment, project, or event management?

If not, maybe it’s time to call for backup. Amy Richardson created Richardson Professional Solutions to help solve the issues most business owners may not have time to address when their time can be better spent building a successful company. In other words, she has created a one-stop shop for all those backend jobs.

Her company provides a balance for business owners. Initially, she started it to create her own balance.

When her son was born in November 2019, she launched her company two months later.

“It started as a side hustle with a baby on my hip,” Richardson explained. “When COVID hit, we were bombarded. The company I started allowed me to work from home, focus on building the business and be a mom.”

The business has changed dramatically post-COVID. While some companies used to offer the ability to work from home as a perk, it has now become the norm for many businesses. By 2025, an estimated 70 percent of the workforce will be working remotely at least five days a month, according to Forbes.

Richardson has a head start in the remote workforce world. She and her team of seven, deliver a support system for more than 25 clients. Their services include everything from website design and management to employee scheduling and paying bills.

“Still, there is a stigma about working remotely but we are a legitimate business offering our team members health insurance, maternity leave, and a 401k,” Richardson said.

Richardson has a great support system in her professional and personal life. Her husband, Ben, who works remotely for a bank in Ohio, does double duty by providing IT support for Richardson Professional Solution clients and, of course, as husband and dad.

“Since I work from home, my lunch hour is spent with my toddler and if I see my work calendar is getting too fat, I put on the brakes,” she said.

The challenge of owning and running a business is real, especially for a woman.

“Women are the default caregivers,” Richardson said. “We automatically have to make sure everyone is covered.”

Even when she’s away from her home office engaging with the community, Richardson seems to be making the delicate balance of being a business owner, wife, and mom work.

Her clients describe her as smart, honest, energetic, thorough, and creative. Richardson attributes that to her core values, including integrity, being accountable, thinking outside the box, and being a lifelong learner.

At the heart of it all is compassion for her clients and her family.

“I was laying here after putting my toddler back to sleep, staring at his sweet, peaceful face, and I am reminded of a quote I heard some time ago about raising children: ‘The days are long, but the years are short,’” Richardson said. “I think of it often and it grounds me to realize how fast time is passing and that I won’t get these years back. I want to spend as much time as possible with him, and the rest of my family, while still being able to provide us with a beautiful life. My business gives me that freedom.”

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Increasing Engagement + Social Media

One of the perks of digital marketing is its ease of being shared. Video is a powerful tool to see its shared content. I want to tell you the benefits of having Video in your Digital Marketing Strategy and what metrics brands are tracking.

According to Hubspot, video boosts conversion rates. Including on a landing page, video can increase conversion by 80%. Search engines love video. They are searching for content that engages viewers. Nothing lures longer page views quite like a video. Video can help build trust among your customers. Sight plus sound plus motion equals an emotion. Videos make people feel connected with the brand. People love to share videos more than other content. Think back on the things you enjoy sharing on Facebook, what percent of the shared content is the video? Studies show that videos are shared 1200% more times than links and text combined. Video can also gain access to the C-Suite. It is a fantastic medium that will get your content in front of the eyes of real decision-makers. 75 percent of business executives watch work-related videos weekly. 59 percent of senior executives prefer to watch a video over reading text. And 54 percent of senior executives regularly share work-related video content with coworkers.

Earlier this year Hubspot also surveyed over 500 global video marketers to find out what metrics they think are the more important for measuring the success of a video. Engagement, conversion rate, and view count were the top three metrics tracked in a video marketing campaign.

Engagement with your content can increase customer loyalty, build deeper relationships, drive sales, and improve brand awareness. Engagement rates track how actively involved your audience is with your content through likes, comments, and sharing. Conversion rates are the percentage of viewers who clicked a post that led to your website to make a purchase, subscribe to your newsletter, or reach out via your contact page. Each conversion will vary depending on the goals of your company. View count is also known as impressions, which means the number of times a viewer has watched or engaged with your content. View counts can differ between each social platform, so make sure to be aware of the differences when collecting your metric data each month.

As you can tell video is a visually rich communication tool that can be tailored to suit any audience and share any message, no matter your end goal. Our team would be happy to connect, talk through things, and help you to decide if incorporating video into your digital marketing strategy is the best fit. Do you think we can help? If so, we would love to become an extension of your team and take that to-do off of your plate.

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Keeping You Safe

Social media has changed the way we view the world, especially businesses. It can also help us unwind after a long day, but social media isn’t always a safe place.  Cyber scammers and identity thieves are on social media. It’s extremely important to take precautions before stepping into the digital world. A big part of what we do in Social Media Marketing is to help keep you safe. Here are some 3 ways to steer clear of scammers and keep your company safe on social media.

  • Privacy Settings

You lock the doors to your house to keep out intruders, why not do the same for your social media. Check your business account settings to make sure your telephone number and email address are hidden from the public sight. Default settings aren’t always safe as they give strangers more knowledge about you and your business than you’d like. It might be time to dig a little deeper into each platform’s settings. New privacy settings are updated from time to time. If you’re not frequently checking, you may be missing the chance to lock down your digital security.

  • Knowledge is Power

With all the new technology, social media allows you to share your life with the people you care about… along with everyone else. Be sure to not post about travel plans when you are away from your business. It is easy to share information about where you live without typing anything. Your images and posts can be tagged with your location if you haven’t changed your privacy setting. Try to share as little as possible with the digital world. They don’t need to know personal addresses, phone numbers, or even your goldfish’s name.

  • Always Think Twice

Scammers love to impersonate, especially your closest friends. Be sure to avoid those duplicate friend requests. If it’s a friend you know, reach out to them, make them aware their social identity is being used, and then report the imposter. Be careful when adding new friends as well. Take some time to review their friend list to see if this is someone you might know. If someone sends you a message be hesitant to respond back. Take caution with each message and post, especially if it has links and doesn’t sound like something your friend would post.

By taking these steps to stay alert and adopting a few of these smart practices, you’ll be able to share your story with the world with a little more ease. One of the many services we provide is Social Media Marketing, which includes helping keep you safe from potential scammers.

At Richardson Professional Solutions (RPS), we help you make more time in your business by providing back-office solutions such as bookkeeping, marketing, or project management. This, in turn, provides small business owners the flexibility to do the things that matter most to them like building their business, continuing their education, traveling, or spending time with family.

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Corporate Event Planning and How We Can Help

At Richardson Professional Solutions, we help you make more time in your business by providing back-office solutions. One of the many services we provide is Event Management. Here at RPS, we can help with brainstorming, budget/invoicing, venue management, vendor management, risk management, and day-of coordination. We can help with as little or much as you need to help you be successful. No two clients are the same, and neither are your events.

You might be wondering if outsourcing some of your events is for you? Here are five advantages to outsourcing your next event.

At RPS we have certified Project Managers. We are prepared for every eventuality. We know what questions to ask, what is needed when and how long it might take to get things done. We are also extremely organized, meet deadlines and know how to manage a budget. Using us to plan and organize your next event will help you focus on what matters most in your company.

We can also help you save time and money with direct connections to venues and suppliers. We can also help negotiate the best prices based on our relationships and our experience. We will also be able to list out suitable options for locations and support services you might need for any event.

We are creative. We can help you get the wow factor you are looking for whether it be a teambuilding event, conference, or small training workshops. We are up to date on the latest trends in event technology and attendee interactions and the ability to connect you to the right people to help your event run smoother, making things easier for you.

Still unsure? Our team would be happy to connect, talk through things, and help you to decide if hiring RPS to help with your business’ events is the best fit. If so, we would love to become an extension of your team and take that to-do off your plate.

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Email Marketing and How RPS Can Help

At Richardson Professional Solutions (RPS), we help you make more time in your business by providing back-office solutions such as bookkeeping, marketing, or project management. This, in turn, provides small business owners the flexibility to do the things that matter most to you like building your business, continuing their education, traveling, or spending time with family. One of the many services we provide is Marketing Management. At RPS we can handle your social media marketing, content creation, content management, brand management, and/or email marketing.

I know what you might be thinking… Why do I need email marketing? Is it really going to affect my business? I am here to tell you, YES! Email marketing can make or break the growth of your business development. According to Digital Agency Network, “There are four billion daily email users and 99% of those users check their inbox every morning.” That is potentially a large untapped audience for your business to gain additional visibility.

The purpose of your newsletter is to inform your subscribers. This isn’t a sales pitch opportunity, although your newsletter could lead to new customers. You want to use this platform of marketing to keep your customers up to date with the latest news, tips & tricks in your industry, and updates on your products or services.

When you create interest in your readers and add value to their lives, your business starts to gain value. An article from Campaign Monitor lists these stats to give a sense of how popular and effective email marketing and newsletters have become:

  • For every dollar you spend on email marketing, you’ll get a $36 return on average – more than any other channel. (Litmus) That is a 3500% ROI!
  • 31% of business-to-business (B2B) marketers say that sending email newsletters is the best way to nurture leads. (Content Marketing Institute)
  • 49% of consumers are happy to receive promotional emails from the brands they love on a weekly basis. (Statista) People do business with others they like, know, and trust!

Understanding how effective email marketing is to your business will indeed help your business grow. But what if you don’t have the time or money to hire a full-time marketing guru? That is where RPS can help! We have three different types of pricing: we have retainer pricing, which is best for clients who have consistent work on a regular basis; project pricing, a flat price option based on time and materials needed to complete the project; or an hourly rate, which is a better option for clients that only need occasional help or have a small project. Not sure which one to choose? Let’s talk about your needs and decide what may fit!

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