good morning, coming up. two company website one focused on golfers, one on flowers, grow their business by making everything here in the u.s.a. we're keeping it local. that and more coming up on "your business.

hi there, everyone. i'm j.j. ramberg, welcome to "your business." when your company provides a service, getting your clients to trust you goes a long way, and when you're dealing with people's pets, we all know how people feel about their pets. one online service that matches pet owners with pet sitters inspired confidence by taking a hyper local approach to marketing. he now has the community barking up storm about his company.

it is a beautiful saturday morning in santa monica. these cute pups and this their human counter parts are ready to get their party on. they're celebrating the fourth anniversary of dog vacay. in 2011 my wife and i visited our family on the east coast, and left our dogs in a kennel here. we had a $1400 kennel bill, and rocky was traumatized. >> he and his wife started offering dog sitting services out of their home. the response was huge. eight months after posting on yelp, they watched over 100 dogs and earned $35,000 in cash. they knew they had their paws on something great. aaron developed a website and started recruiting sitters to post on the platform. >> we had a few customers, they

told a few people, we launched, a few people wrote about us, and is snowballed. >> it now features dog sitters in 3,000 cities and counting across the u.s. and canada. it also offers offices like day care, dog walking, and grooming. >> i can ask my friends to watch my dog, but sometimes i feel guiltiy doing that, so it is a pretty guilty free way to ask natalie. >> one of the companies biggest thing social security knowing what you're up against. >> we're caring for your dog, for your family. it's a high bar to say leave your dog with us. >> so pet sitter and client relationship is not a one time

thing. when you find someone you trust you use them again and again into we had to say what can we do to add value not just on the first reservation, but every care reservation. >> frequent photo and text updates and 24 hour customer service. >> thank you for calling doing vacay, this is anthony, how can i trust you. >> you can do your best to convey trust, but at the end of the day when it comes to family, it's much better if someone tells you they use or trust the service. >> the site actively encourages a meet and greet. two people that host dogs say the face to face encounters help seal the deal. >> you see our face and our profile, but you can get to know the person, they get to know

you. i think the more you speak to them the more they understand what you're about and what we do. you feel their anxiety go down a little bit. >> frequent community events is another way they get the word out. they often partner with local rescues and organizations with common values and demographics in hope that's even if their efforts don't translate to sales right now, they may in the long run. >> it's an investment. people use the service when they travel. you can't sell it like a pair of shoes or belt. people need to hear about it more than once. so they see it, then a friend mentions it, and then an ad, and then they say maybe this thing is real. >> having local hosts attend the get togethers is a key. >> this is a real person that may live a few blocks from where they live, and they're enjoying it and passionate about it.

>> i have met new clients, and i gave them my card, and they're now steady clients. once they see a face and not a stranger. >> each new city meets a determine graph take has different needs, wants, and specifications. >> we learned a lot about what people want. how they might differently use it. here are things you can do in this area. here is where people look for referrals around dog sitting. if you're in manhattan, you don't want to travel more than a few blocks. los angeles is different, people are used to driving and spending 20 minutes in a car. >> talking about how great the service is means nothing if you're not taking the time to listen to your customers. >> we have learned to listen to the guests, the hosts, the dogs.

they don't write reviews, they can't give two paws up, and listen to our employees to try to find the balance. it is ongoing learning in business is based on trust. when it comes to local, there are a lot of ways to look at it. local markets and local operations in north carolina, we met the owner of a company that produces golf products dead set on making sure all of his manufacturing happened in his home state. >> dollars and cents wise, it is cheap tore make a product here than it is overseas. we can drive and in two hours we can be at every one of our suppliers. >> one business owner new he wanted to source all of his

prupru products locally. >> knowing that north carolina furniture industry had fallen on hard times, he recognized the potential, got in his car, and started driving until he found the materials he needed. >> i told my wife i was leaving in the morning and i'm not coming home until i figure it out. >> he went door to door looking for the right partners to help make his first product. >> we started out with leather covers, and it was something that we could manufacture here. >> stitch now has an established supply chain. >> we have suppliers in cary, high point, greenesboro, charlotte, conover. >> anthem leather is one of the

p suppliers. >> the company sells stitch the leather he needs based on demand. the products are also delivered back. at the start, they walked around the warehouse trying to figure out which liner would be best for the golf club covers. >> it is very important to us, to keep it as much local as we can. >> as a business own who are was used to the furniture industry, having him knock on his door was a welcome chance. >> you don't usually have people knock on the door and want to do business with you. >> back in cary, he needed someone to embroider his

products. that's where their embroideries come from. >> we are very particular we don't just want them from anywhere. >> if we have a problem, or we need more from them, they're right down the street. >> and royal embroidery has expanded and part of the operati operation is exclusively for stitch's needs. >> when you build a product, you don't know what it looks like until you go over there and see what it looks leike. >> that close proximity allows stitch to react fast to their

growing clientele. >> i launch a new product pretty quickly. >> while charlie says sourcing locally for his company, he admits nothing is perfect. >> we would have more product to sell if we brought in large lots. >> stitch's own production manager, who previously worked with major brands, even said that manufacturing stateside can be even trickier than manufacturing overseas. >> sometimes she says it was easier to coordinate 100 factories and suppliers all over the world. >> he said his products are made in the usa and that is the way it will stay. if which he do it he believes others will do the same. >> think about it, find out where it is manufacturing. what are the industries in your area? wanting to keep things in.

usa played a role in the success of one floral company. the owners from a midwest farm fuelled their design to support local farmers. >> when a bouquet of flowers shows up at your door, they usually wonder who they're from. but kristine wonders where they're from. >> i was at farm to table restaurants, they would tell me like the name of the chicken i was eating, but there was imported carnations an the table. >> i was a dork that everyone weekend was at home writing business plans. >> she has no formal training and no business degree. >> i just started researching and i found a industry that was huge, but had very little innovation in it in recent

years. >> most flower companies have imports stems. >> the same way we should should not can expect a ripe peach in december, we should not expect a peony in december. >> there used to be 150 roese growers, and now it's five. >> she tried to get investors to backed her. but ended up with a string of rejections. >> a couple investors said i should take my husband in with me, being a solo founder is difficult. >> but she boot strapped it herself. >> i got up at 3:30 in the

morning, and i would load up my car and go back and forth. >> it is now a business that is across the u.s. >> the team starts their day here at the flower market, office while it's still dark outside. they're sorted, tipped, arranged, and wrapped. they're known for that signature farm girl finish. burlap sacks cut up donated from local coffee roasters. >> i can't even breathe, they're so beautiful. >> i used to wear flowers in my

hair allot, and i would get made fun of for it. >> who is laughing now? >> exactly. >> it is the beginning of spring, and flowers are not the only things that are blooming, small business trends dotcom give us five ways to breathe life into your marketing. >> you bright colors. two run facebook contests around holidays. events like mother's day are perfect for marketing. three, sponsor a local team. many sports restart their season in the spring, so consider supporting a group or event that will bring you exposure with your target demographic. four, clean up your web presence. remove things that are not helping you and make sure you

don't have any misspellings or grammar mistakes. bring people together, get to know your customers in person. >> i wonder how many of you know your neighbor at work. or how many of you know other people in your industry across the country. both likely have a lot to offer you. eric rose is a free social network for small business owners. so good to see you, eric. >> thank you for having me. >> and you found constant contact, which grew so tremendously, and you found that businesses were not talking to each other.

>> yeah, we had a great run, but small business owners faced the challenge of getting access to customers that would help move their businesses forward. so we allow them to make connections in their community, across the country, to get access to the information and the customers that would drive their business forward. >> let's talk about some of these connections, and some of them we know are there, but we don't take the time to do it. you are a hair salon, and a wine shop is next door. >> yes, 80% of customers come from inside a five-mile radius. and they're willing to recommend your business to other customers, and you never know where you will meet them. we have a business owner here

who was going through the directory, and noticed another woman there that she has been working out with in the jim for months. turns out she was a big owner as well and she made that connection through the platform. >> so you can get recommendations, you talk about connecting with friends near by? >> yeah, out of the gate it is not always someone that will recommend new customers. you need to get your face and name out in the community. so set yourself a goal of connecting with two new businesses each month. and reach out, connect, and then take it offline. get to know them and understand they're business. as you get to know each other, you will be more likely to recommend each other's business. the other thing is leverage your knowledge in the community to share some insight that helps

other businesses succeed. we had an insurance agent introduce himself to the community in kansas, and he came out with tips for business openers looking to understand their policy when they are employees having their personal vehicle drive a customer to a product. it set that person up as the go-to expert on insurance in that community. >> and the next two together, your neighborhood and others in your industry. and the point about making connections here is that you don't have to reinvent the wheel, right? if you a question about parking on your street, perhaps your next door neighbor has dealt with it. if you're a cup cake store, and you want to know what machine to buy. >> absolutely, sometimes the answer is ten feet away through dry wall. the opportunity to open up the

dialogue from a community or industry, and ask those questions and get answers that are trusted answers is a great source of information and knowledge. and it really, you all the cupcake stores across the country aren't competing with each other. they actually like to share knowledge and help each other succeed. >> and that gets to your last point, too. make connections with people who are sharing similar challenges. and again, that could be your neighbor, someone in a similar industry who's across the country, or perhaps someone in an entirely different industry. but who's just dealing with the same stuff you are. insurance, what have you. >> yes. absolutely. i mean when you think about the challenges you face, whether it's i'm trying to figure out how to get my yelp reviews to work, or to find access to lenders, there are literally hundreds of thousands of businesses across this country that have already solved that challenge and are more than willing to share their insights. all you have to do is build a network and work within that

network to find answers, and set your business going forward. >> you know, eric, thanks so much for coming and talking about this. we've been actually talking about it a lot recently which is get out of your space, every once in awhile. even though your to-do list is so long and go talk to other people because there are shortcuts, whether it's referrals for new customers or answers to some issues, there are shortcuts out there if you just go talk to people. >> absolutely. you know, your number one source of new customers is word of mouth referrals. and that means you need to have a network. >> all right. great to see you, eric. >> you as well, j.j., thanks so much. >> still to come, how to grow your business and get your product into more retail outlets. and why giving away something for free can lead to higher profits. our cosmetics line was a hit. the orders were rushing in.

i could feel our deadlines racing towards us. we didn't need a loan. we needed short-term funding fast. building 18 homes in 4 ½ months? that was a leap. but i knew i could rely on american express to help me buy those building materials. amex helped me buy the inventory i needed. our amex helped us fill the orders. just like that. another step on the journey. will you be ready when growth presents itself? realize your buying power at open.com we are in the search for new customers constantly. and so my question is really to find the right customers what's the best way to go about finding new boutiques that would want our products and services. >> what i would suggest is that you find a sails rep. find an independent sales rep who can go out and look for new clients, new boutiques, new customers. how do you find that person? what i would suggest is you

start with, you know, think about what you want from this person, and how you're going to pay them. you could pay them by the hour. or, what about hiring someone on commission. a sales rep typically on commission will make between five and 25% of a sale. that's nothing out of your pocket. that might be a very attractive thing. then you want to go and cast a wide net. linkedin is very, very good for this. you may know sales reps but you may not. you can start with your own network. your linkedin network will probably find you some very, very qualified people who do this for a living, can go out, find some people, and then you're going to interview and hire and one thing i would finally suggest is that as you hire someone, hire them on a test basis. you want to make sure that you have the ability to work together well. and that's not always true. so hire someone on a test basis, see how it works, see if they can get you some new business. if they do, bring them on full-time and voila you've grown your business and it's maybe no money out of your pocket, or is

but it's okay because you're making more money. the top two tips you need to know to help your small business grow. let's introduce our panel. investor phil town is the founder of rule one investing and barry moltz is a small business consultant. you can find them online at barrymoltz.com. good to see you both. >> okay, barry, let's start with you. >> my number one tip, it says the only rule you ever knew is it's a very, very simple formula. it's people times process is the most important part of the business. ideas are meaningless. it's all about execution. you've got to follow your mission. you multiply that times a process. you have to have systematic process on a way to do everything in your business. not just production. not just finance but marketing, sales and development and finally that will equal the maximum profit. so many small business owners, they get paid far too little for what they do. they've got to figure out where is the leverage in their business j.j. all i know is you can make a lot

more money having the 80% gross marken than a 30% one. >> how often do you see small business or owners who know they don't have a-plus people and keep them around and make excuses why they need to keep them around. >> all the time. a lot of small business owners hire people that aren't as good as they are. they stay at the center, everything go through them and they don't hire good, independent people that actually operate the business on its own. >> one of our companies does a great job with, as a service company, education company, they do a great job of bringing people in and giving away their best stuff for free. i'm going to really encourage, all of our viewers to see if they can find some aspect of their company that they can give the people to build their credibility without any strings attached. so this company brings people in, they spend three days training them and at the end of the three days of training what they've done is establish the credibility of the brand, they've established that the

people need the product and then they send them home without selling them anything. and it's an incredible -- it has tripled their revenues over the old model. >> because then they sell them something after. >> then they sell them something after because the client or the customer is demanding it at that point. >> can i ask you a question? >> sure. >> i get that, right? it is a bigger scale of getting something in the app store for zero and then selling them after you're addicted to the game, then you sell them something more >> sure. >> what about for something like this, education, and something that's big and takes three days and you have to fly there and spend three days of your time, is there the problem that people think, oh, it's free? it's not going to be as good as something i pay for? >> well, we thought that that might be a problem. and it turns out that, you know, around -- you hear people saying that if you're free, people don't buy or you're going to waste your time. turns out they buy better than people who pay for the same experience. we've run the test on it. >> got it. >> they pay better and they buy

better and i think the reason is, is because you start to remove that sense of the company trying to sell me something, trying to pull me in. >> uh-huh. >> you ne. it's gone. people people are waiting for the other shoe to drop -- >> presumably a lot of them drop out at some point, too. so you've really qualified the customer. and you're willing to pay more. >> the dropoutate is more about just where you're going to price your product. >> mm-hmm. >> i mean if you were pricing products from $100 up, you probably wouldn't have any dropout rate at all. this company is pricing products at 5,000 and up i think. >> right. >> and so there is a dropout rate. nonetheless, about 40% of the people who go through this process end up buying something. >> interesting. all right well thank you. good to see you both. >> good to see you. >> this week's your biz selfie comes from marist and her staff at karin's florist. they've been in business for more than 60 years and say they love our show which we really appreciate. now, why don't you pick up your

cell phone and take a picture of you and your business and send it to us at yourbusiness@msnbc.com or you can tweet it to @msnbcyourbiz and please don't forget to us #yourbizselfie. thanks so much for joining us today. here's what i learned on today's show. we talk a lot about digital marketing but we should never forget especially in the beginning when you're launching your company about face-to-face contact with your customers. because if you're getting them to trust you, if they know who you are, they may be willing to forgive some mistakes early on or they may feel more confident working with you because they know there is an actual person behind that company. now, we've loved to hear from you. so if you have any questions or communities about today's show, e-mail us at yourbusiness@msnbc.com. you can also click on our website openforum.com/yourbusiness. we've posted all of the segments from today's show, plus a lot more. and please don't forget to connect with us on all of our digital and social media

platforms, as well. next week, many of us have heard the phrase the customer is always right. but we introduce you to one entrepreneur who says not so fast. >> be responsive, be attentive, make the customer your priority but at the end of the day know that the customer is not always right. >> we'll tell you why the owner of this texas garbage company doesn't believe that every complaint is his company's fault. till then, i'm j.j. ramberg. and remember, we make your base, our business. our cosmetics line was a hit. the orders were rushing in. i could feel our deadlines racing towards us. we didn't need a loan. we needed short-term funding fast. building 18 homes in 4 ½ months? that was a leap. but i knew i could rely on american express

to help me buy those building materials. amex helped me buy the inventory i needed. our amex helped us fill the orders. just like that. another step on the journey. will you be ready when growth presents itself? realize your buying power at open.com i'm todd piro with the hour's top stories. bernie sanders continuing his winning streak claiming victory in last night's wyoming caucus. nbc news projecting he beat hillary clinton by double digits. today both candidates are in new york campaigning ahead of the april 19th primary. on the republican side ted cruz swept the colorado conventions. he has won 34 out of colorado's 37 delegates so far. politics nation with al sharpton starts now. new york, new york. >> it's great to be home. this is home. >> it is so great to be in new york. >> it's fantastic. >> i love new york. >> the