Business Building Basics Most people when they think of business building they think of creating a product, selling the product, and hope to make enough capital to finance their next product idea. This kind of thinking is short-term, and doesn’t lend itself well to a long-term business venture. When you stop and think about a [...]
Read More Entrepreneurship, Small_Business, Startup, strategyWhen someone asks: How’s business? Do you really know what to say? If you’re like many business owners, you may roll along with the dim feeling that your business is holding its own. But in the back of your mind is the nagging feeling that honestly, you don’t know for sure if you’re falling behind [...]
Read More Entrepreneurship, organization, Small_BusinessI was conducting a small business marketing presentation today. During the presentation I indicated that the practitioners should be building their businesses using some form of video. I received “heavy sighs” and “rolled eyes”. One of the participants indicated that “everyone is saying we should be using video in our marketing but [...]
Read More Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Small_Business, Startup, TechnologyEarlier this week we talked about the 5 Lies of Social Media. This is a rebuttal to that post by Greg Lieber. My responses to Greg are in italic. Earlier this week, Mikal Belicove published a well-written but misguided article entitled “Five Lies About Social Media Marketing.” While several of his suggestions may be useful for [...]
Read More branding, Marketing, small business, Small_Business, social media, social networking, strategyOK. It’s the end of the week. I’d like you to take a look at your schedule this week, business owners. How much of your time is taken up with activities that don’t create new products or services, drive more sales or find new customers? If the answer is a lot, it’s probably time to [...]
Read More organization, Small_Business, staffing, strategySome people study the market, find an opportunity, and start a business. Others find a product they like, buy a gross of it, and declare themselves in business. But really, they’re not. An entrepreneur who simply follows their muse and sells whatever they find fascinating doesn’t have a business, in my view. What they have is a [...]
Read More Entrepreneurship, organization, Small_Business, StartupDerek Halpern of the blog DIYThemes recently had an interesting customer-service experience with Brita water. He bought a filter, but when he got it home, it didn’t fit his faucet. When he called Brita, its customer-service rep immediately said it would mail him off some additional parts that would make it fit — for free, no [...]
Read More customer service, Small_Business, social mediaName: Lucas Sommer, 25 Founded: Audimated Corp., 2010 Business: A web service providing independent musicians and their fans the tools to make money with music. Location: Miami, Fla. Lucas Sommer of Audimated Corp. Until this summer, longtime guitarist and songwriter Lucas Sommer had been operating a music studio in Miami assisting fellow independent musicians with [...]
Read More Entrepreneurship, organization, Small_Business, StartupRob Croak, founder and CEO of BCP Imports. Photo Courtesy of BCP Imports If you haven’t spent time in playgrounds recently, you might not know about Silly Bandz, the colorful silicone rubber bands that come in hundreds of styles. Shaped like animals, numbers, letters and a range of objects, Silly Bandz have become a schoolyard [...]
Read More branding, Marketing, Small_Business, strategyDuring the earliest stages of starting a business, the last thing you should concern yourself with is writing lengthy plans or long-winded executive summaries. It’s time to kill the traditional business plan in favor of a realistic, practical tool: a one-paragraph startup plan. You might think there’s no way to write everything there is to [...]
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