Donald Todrin Entrepreneur
The darkest days of the Great Recession are over, so we are told, but I’m finding that sales have increased only slightly for some small-business owners, while revenue remains deeply depressed for many. While some customers are loosening up their wallets a little, it is clear purchasing habits have changed.
Deep economic changes have occurred, and business will never be the same.
Entrepreneurs — whether they’re an unemployed person striking out on their own or a seasoned veteran trying to get the mojo back again — must do things differently in order to survive. Everyone must change, especially small-business owners.
Luckily, what have not changed are the business fundamentals, those management traits that successful entrepreneurs almost all possess: tenacity, commitment and vision, and basic business skills.
New strategies are required, however, strategies designed to work in a changing business climate. Here are 7 ways to help ensure your business succeeds:
Laura Spencer freelancefolder.com
Upselling is a great way to increase your profits as a freelancer–if it’s done right. Upselling means selling additional products and services to your existing clients or convincing them to upgrade their current purchase to a more expensive purchase.
If a fast food clerk has ever asked you if you “want fries with that,” then you’ve experienced an upsell. Upselling is common for both service-based and retail businesses and it can help freelancers too.
Smart freelancers use upselling to increase their income without annoying their clients. In fact, if it’s done right, upselling can actually strengthen your relationship with your client.
In this post, we’ll list eight bad upselling practices to avoid and then we’ll explain how to do it right.
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Douglas E Rice unknowninkdesign.com
When you receive the spark of a great idea, you start to get the itch. You can’t contain it. You can’t keep it to yourself. You want to do something with it. You’ve got to turn it into a viable business.
In Poke the Box, Seth Godin says, “All around you are platforms, opportunities, and entire organizations that will come to life once you are driven enough and brave enough to contribute the initiative they are missing.”
Great ideas don’t make great businesses; great execution does. When you have developed something marketable, you are on the right track by thinking about shipping before you’ve even produced anything. That means you are a doer. That means you have the capacity (rather than simply the desire) of starting a new business. You have the initiative. The only thing left to do now is to ship.
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US Small Business Administration sba.gov
For those of you who have already successfully started a business and are ready to take the next step, you may be wondering what you can do to help growing your business. There are many ways to do this, 10 of which are outlined below. Choosing the proper one (or ones) for your business will depend on the type of business you own, your available resources, and how much money, time and resources you’re willing to invest all over again. If you’re ready to grow, take a look at these tips.
- Open another location. This is often the first way business owners approach growth. If you feel confident that your current business location is under control, consider expanding by opening a new location.
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Rob Petersen barnraisersllc.com
“If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it,” said Peter Drucker.
Social media measurement tools are one of the fastest growing areas of analytics and venture funding. But, among businesses that purchase them, only 34% are “happy;” 60% say they are merely “okay” and 6% are so frustrated they are ready to switch (source: KISSmetrics).
Do we need to know lots of measurements, or just manage the ones that matter.
Here are 10 social media measurements every marketer should know.
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Vivan Giang businessinsider.com
When you’re starting a new company, you’re hoping it’ll experience breakthrough growth, which means that every step is crucial because so many changes are taking place in the first few years.
To help move your company forward, you need to find and retain the right employees.
In the book ‘The Reinventors: How Extraordinary Companies Pursue Radical Continuous Change’, author Jason Jennings identifies five qualities that are crucial for new and growing businesses.
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Gianfranco Zaccai Fast Company
THE AERON CHAIR, THE SWIFFER, AND THE REEBOK PUMP–NONE OF THESE BREAKTHROUGH PRODUCTS WOULD HAVE GOTTEN HIGH MARKS FROM A FOCUS GROUP. HERE, CONTINUUM’S GIANFRANCO ZACCAI LISTS FOUR STEPS TO TAKE BEFORE INTRODUCING A DESIGN TO THE MASSES.
Think about it: How many great ideas have you had sitting around a table? If you are like most people I know, not many. Yet, time after time, companies looking for a winning idea gather a group of people around a table to ask them what they would like. Other times, companies may actually develop innovative ideas–but then their impulse is to convene a focus group to critique them and, more often than not, undermine them.
In my 40 years working in design and innovation, alongside some of the most brilliant minds in the business, I have never seen innovation come out of a focus group. Let me put it more strongly: Focus groups kill innovation. That’s both because of what they do and what they don’t do.
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Cynthia Cavoto firebrandsocialmedia.com
Part 2 continued from Part 1
Typical Social Media Errors Your Start-up Ought to Avoid
Stopping too soon
Developing an Internet presence takes a good amount of time. But, the largest error entrepreneurs usually make is to quit their consistent updates as they have an adequate following. Keep in mind, sustaining your Internet presence will be as demanding as developing it.
Giving Jobs Away to Others
At least within the first stage, you, the entrepreneur must be engaged in developing a social media presence. Employing somebody else to perform it might benefit you as far as strategy, yet the passion which you may exude in your effort will be bound to be lacking amongst the ones who work for you.
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Lee Polevoi Intuit
Going after big clients may seem like a daunting task. However, whatever their size, all businesses have similar needs and challenges for which they seek quality solutions. If you can demonstrate that you offer those solutions, you could prove to be an ideal partner or provider.
To that end, here are five tips for attracting big clients:
1. Do your research. Never approach a prospective client without thoroughly researching its people and products ahead of time. Plenty of basic information is available on a company’s website and through its social media presence. Check out the owner’s LinkedIn profile and the company’s Facebook page. Of course, you should already be knowledgeable about the industry the client serves. Positioning yourself as a well-informed resource helps to establish your credibility and demonstrates your value to the potential client.
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Stuart MacDonald Entrepreneur
Most startups are looking to grow. But once success hits, how can you scale your company without shedding the shared values and culture that helped make you successful in the first place?
FreshBooks, a cloud accounting company based in Toronto, started in 2003 as a handful of people in a small office. Today, more than 5 million people have used FreshBooks to manage their books and we now have more than 90 employees.
As we’ve moved beyond our initial startup stages, here are four ways that we strive to keep our small business values as we continue to grow:
1. Keep a small-business owner’s perspective. When we were a really small business, it was easy to empathize with the pains felt by our small business customers — be it paperwork keeping them from the work they love, to struggling to grow their own businesses. As we grow, it’s critical that we continue to see things from the small business owner’s perspective.
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Ashley Lutz Open Forum
The success of giant e-commerce businesses are forcing other retail websites to pick up the pace.
Retailers, such as Macy’s, Saks, Ralph Lauren and Tiffany & Co., have huge resources to build up their online presence, but no other online retailer can compare with Amazon in terms of innovation in recent years, according to Aram Rubinson, an analyst at Nomura Equity Research.
“Amazon is just revolutionizing retail. I don’t think any other adjective or any other verb would suffice. They are changing the way every retailer on the planet is thinking about retailing, and if they aren’t, they should be thinking about it differently because of Amazon,” Rubinson says.
It’s important to keep in mind that the online consumer is wealthier than average. According to a report by Forrester Research, online buyers with household incomes of $75,000 or more represent the largest group of the online consumer population. In fact, they make up more than 40 percent of all online buyers—almost twice the number of those with household incomes of $50,000 to $75,000. These consumers have considerable spending power, making it important for businesses to invest in the e-commerce space.
