Do you feel like you have a great business idea or new business, but are struggling to get people to take notice of you. This is a very common problem and can become very disheartening for any entrepreneur. It's the vicious circle of not being known leading to few sales and no one willing to take a chance, but without selling your product or service your business won't gain a name for itself.

So, if you are strapped for cash but want to give your idea a chance have a think about some free marketing ideas.

Of course there's social networking. Get your business onto sites like Facebook and Twitter and start talking about it, offering deals, giving advice, posting images and testimonials. Don't expect a fast take off, but bit by bit you'll see your numbers grow. A lot of it will be by word of mouth as customers pass on recommendations.

As the latest series of the popular TV show The Apprentice hits our screens this week, it raises the question about the impact these programmes have on today's entreprepreneurs. Do they give the impression that starting a business is easy, do they trivialise what is a very serious subject and are the people we see on the likes of Dragons' Den and The Apprentice a true representation of today's entrepreneurs?

Clearly some of the people we see on these shows haven't got the first clue about business, despite what they might think, plus there's the inevitable fame wannabes just looking for some TV exposure and hoping for the phonecall that will lead them into the entertainment industry rather than business. But then, if they are successful as, say, TV presenters, you could say they are simply marketing themselves into a successful business.

In a recent blog we discussed how age is no barrier to starting a business with entrepreneurs in their teens up to the nineties starting businesses. The government has obviously been listening, well in part, as the prime minister, David Cameron, is believed to be looking at funding young people looking to set up in business using a student loan style scheme. The idea was first proposed by Sir Richard Branson as part of the Virgin Media Pioneers Control Shift campaign.

When asked about helping young entrepreneurs at a recent 'PM Direct' event David Cameron said, "There's a very good idea in there that Richard Branson has come up with and others have been looking at, which is that, okay, we are providing loans for students to go to university - why not look at something similar for people who have got a great business idea and want to get on and start that business? I think this is a brilliant idea and we are looking very closely at it. We might be announcing something like this later on."