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Top Challenges Faced by Family Business and Its Team Leaders

Like every business organization family business has a unique set of challenges and problems.

The Keyword is CHALLENGE

Family Business mixes pride and passion with pain and glory and a very hardworking pathway to success. Sometimes a family finds peace and prosperity without apparent effort, while others seem to lurch from one crisis to the next.

We can define Family Business success as achieving, A Happy Family within a Strong Business. Success is more of a challenge at a family owned business because we strive to produce both desirable outcomes, within set time frames. We have twice the responsibility that is the happy family and the strong business.

Obviously Family Businesses go through various stages of growth and development and it becomes more challenging for the second generation or the subsequent generation that enters the business.

A famous saying about family owned business in Mexico is “Father, founder of the company, son rich, and grandson poor”. The founder works and builds a business, the son takes it over and is poorly prepared to manage and make it grow but enjoys the wealth, and the grandson inherits a dead business and an empty bank account.

Family Business is Hardworking Pathway to Success

Below we have listed some of the paramount challenges faced by family owned business which determines the success, growth, and continuation of a FAMILY BUSINESS.

1. EMOTIONS – Family problems will affect the business. Divorce, separations, health or financial problems also create difficult political situations for the family members.

2. INFORMALITY – Absence of clear policies and business norms for family members.

3. RESTRICTED VISION – Lack of outside opinions and diversity on how to operate the business.

4. CARELESS DOCUMENTATION – No documented plan or long term planning.

5. FAMILY MEMBERS COMPENSATION – Dividends, salaries, benefits and compensation for non-participating family members are not clearly defined and justified.

6. CONFUSED ROLES – Roles and responsibilities must be clearly defined.

7. PRESSURE TO HIRE FAMILY MEMBER – Hiring family members who are not qualified or lack the skills and abilities for the organization. Incompetency should not be tolerated.

8. GREATER COMPENSATION TO NON FAMILY MEMBERS – It is a common myth that family members will receive more compensation in a family business and develop a attitude of incompetency towards management.

9. PLANNING FOR SUCCESSION – Great conflicts and division are the result of no proper plan for handing the power to the next generation.

10. ESTATE PLANNING AND RETIREMENT – Long term planning to cover the necessities and realities of older members when they leave the company.

11. PROBLEMS IN COMMUNICATION – Difference in level of seniority and emotions like envy, fear, anger invoke zero communication in members.

12. DISABILITY TO CONTROL – Difficulty in controlling the operations of the organization, other family members and lack of supervision in day to day activities leads to more problems.-

But as we all know that Families and Businesses come from different worlds. Like oil and water… they cannot be mixed. But, families have always built businesses together… and they always will.

One of the challenges in family business is working together in teams. It is a fact that team work offers huge rewards but some frustrations are likely. Working within teams needs improvement in the power of creativity. The team leader needs to encourage this creative power, harness it, and channelize the creative fuel.

Andrew Carnegie- “Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results.”

It is vitally important that the team leader unleash the power of team members with a collaborative leadership style to fuel the creative fire within the team.

Below are our top ten tips for channelizing the creative fire of Family Business Teams.

1. BE CLEAR ABOUT THE EXPECTATIONS – Only after the team members know what is expected of them can they deliver the perfect output. So understanding the difference between expected and derived results is necessary for both the team leader as well as the team members.

2. Faith in the Team Members – Being optimistic and challenging helps when you have total faith in the members of your team. As the leader, you need to expect the best from your team, keeping your expectations high and realistic. This is a challenging balancing act, but people need to be inspired to perform at their best. Instilled faith helps the group to perform better and come up with creative innovative ideas and solutions. Like Mike Litman says Improve at 1% each day and thus raise the bar for top performance one step at a time.

3. Encouragement accompanied with respect goes a long way in generating new thoughts. Fresh perspectives and courage too make up for new ideas easily. the leader needs to master the art of creative mindset.

4. Avoid making judgment while generating new ideas. If you are open to new solutions then the process of idea generation is not suppressed and sometimes best ideas are generated.

5. Brainstorming sessions are a great way to get numerous ideas. While brainstorming avoid judgment, look for quality, make notes to capture the idea and moreover combine two good ideas.

6. Communication is the keyword again, which helps to build strong relationships. Communication with open channels helps to trust the team members and know each other better.

7. Employees need to be given responsibility to bring out the best in them, give them the power to decide on a solution to a problem and watch the creativity grow by leaps and bounds.

8. Praise works like reward for the individuals and team alike. Acknowledgment in the form of encouragement is another word for praising the team members. Making sure that the team is cared for and recognized for its hard work is a reward in it self.

9. Be daring and build a brave team. Accept that mistakes are made at times and it is challenge to build on failures and see them as opportunities to learn and succeed further.

10. Unity in Diversity is the final mantra – build a strong team with diverse people, diverse backgrounds and combine the experience, culture, creativity and align them for the success of our family Business.-

Adding humor as a fuel to creativity is the last but not least step to see the team working happily together and productivity of business soaring to great levels.

The Top Ten Ways To Grow Your Business

Following startup, many small businesses are so concentrated on daily business operations that they do not, or cannot, take the time to actively focus on business growth. While others are focused on growth but do not have a strategic plan to achieve it. The Top Ten Ways to Grow Your Business is provided to help your small business enterprise attain growth beyond startup on a continuous basis, and is based on my experience working with small businesses from startups to expansion.

Know Your Market Opportunity – When I work with small business executives and entrepreneurs, one of my first questions, if not the first, is-“Do you really know your market opportunity”, or more succinctly, “Do you know your strategic market opportunity?” And then, “How well do you know your strategic market opportunity?” These are your common how, where and what questions that a small business owner or entrepreneur must ask. For instance, how do you see your market?, where is your market”, and what is your market? Business growth is extricably linked with and to market opportunity, and how well you capture it. In my experience business growth is a function of envisioning your strategic market opportunity, planning how to acquire it, executing your plan, and then working your plan to attain it.

Know Your Customer – Your customer is the primary focus of your business enterprise. Identifying who your customer actually is, followed by knowing your customer needs, is essential in meeting growth objectives. Staying connected with your customers via email, web site, face-to-face conversations, and special customer appreciation programs, such as offering a monthly customer discount, strengthens your customer base and lets you know who your customer is. Think of it this way; a customer-centric organization gains a competitive advantage over competition, which typically results in a bigger share of the market.

Cultivate and Maximize Your Brand – Brand recognition has become critically vital to small business growth as much as knowing your market, customer development, product and service credibility, growth strategy, pricing, cash flow, and having the right executive team in place. Your brand is the ‘face’ of your small business enterprise and how well recognized it is well directly impact your business growth. Cultivating and maximizing brand recognition is crucial to your business success. The new marketing media approaches include social networking venues such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, YouTube, etc, which need to be exploited. Global companies have realized the enormous marketing opportunity these venues provide and have established social networking as a primary business function. The small business enterprise can likewise take advantage of this expanded, nearly free, marketing approach to reach customers and increase brand recognition. Cultivating and maximizing your brand distinguishes you from competition and allows your customers to link your business with your brand.

Develop Your Growth Strategy – Developing a growth strategy is a best-management process which involves determining long-term growth objectives and developing a specific action plan for attaining these objectives. The process involves an assessment of your market environment from the perspective of having the relevant market experience after startup; performing a SWOT analysis; selecting a set of alternative growth strategies based on changing market conditions, and then implementing your strategy. Note that this is in reference to the ‘envision, plan, execute and attain’ model I mentioned previously. The strategic growth plan is developed from the viewpoint of your small business corporate entity, where the focus is on the accomplishment of your strategic business objectives based on four critical questions: Who are we? What do we do? Where do we want to go? How do we get there? The answers to these questions will give you the information necessary to create your strategic objectives for your growth strategy.

Get The Right People On The Bus – This is one of my favorite discussion points, concerning leadership and relates to the strength, character and capability of your executive team. Here we use ‘bus’ to refer to the small business enterprise or organization and comes from Jim Collins’ book, ‘Good To Great”, where he quotes Ken Kesey’s reference to a bus as being the company, organization or firm. Collins found”…if we get the right people on the bus [in the company], the right people in the right seats [in the right executive roles], and the wrong people off the bus, then we’ll figure out how to take it somewhere great [to attain the founder’s vision]…” As a small business owner, it is incumbent upon you to ensure you have the right executive team in place that will take your vision of where you want your company to go, and achieve it. Business growth at all levels is largely achieved with the right people on the corporate ‘bus’, driving it to success.

Listen To The Experts-Hire a Business Advisor, Coach – According to The National Federation of Independent Business [NFIB] Education Foundation, over the lifetime of any small business, 30 percent will lose money, 30 percent will break even, and just fewer than 40 percent will be profitable. The Small Business Administration [SBA] reports that 50 percent of all small business fail after their first year, 33 percent fail after two years, and nearly 60 percent fail after four years. A Business Coach and Advisor will work with you to help avoid becoming an SBA or NFIB statistic, help you to maintain focus on driving your business forward, work with you to develop and refine your objectives, help you to develop critical business growth strategies; and provide an honest assessment of where your business is in its life cycle.

Follow Your SOLE – It has been my experience that the small business executive responsible for business growth almost always follows and prescribes to a framework that embodies the envision, plan, execute and plan strategy in achieving business growth. Often this resembles what I have developed for my clients as the SOLE Framework. The SOLE Framework provides the context for accomplishing business growth optimization where you: Solve a critical market problem or need; Optimize growth by meeting customer needs in solving a problem, Leverage your principle business core competency, and Establish a competitive baseline to achieve business growth.

Be A Hedge Hog – The Hedge Hog Concept was developed by Isaiah Berlin in his “The Hedge Hog and the Fox” Study which divided management, leadership and professional positions into two clusters: hedge hogs and foxes, based on Greek mythology, where the fox knows many things, however the hedge hog knows one big thing. The fox is a sleek, cunning, fleetly, crafty and beautiful animal. On the other hand, the hedge hog is a dowdier creature, more like a cross between a porcupine and a small armadillo who when faced with danger rolls up into a very prickly ball and spends his days looking for food. However, Berlin points out that this otherwise simple creature is certainly not stupid, or simpletons; they have a piercing insight that allows them to see through complexity and discern underlying patterns of behavior. The hedge hog sees what is essential, critical, and important, and ignores everything else. To be a Hedge Hog, the small business executive must see only what is essential and focus on it, exploiting the essential in a positive, productive manner and concentrate on three key dimensions: what you can be the best in the world at; what you are most passionate about; and what drives your economic engine.

Establish a Competitive Culture – A competitive culture concerns how your organization is structured for market competitiveness. In fact, corporate culture is a competitive advantage for a small business focused on growth by following a rather simplistic approach, based on organizational shared values, direction, mission and belief that the primary focus of a small business is to first meet customer needs, followed by employee empowerment to meet those needs, then community involvement, using common business sense approaches towards conservation, and then attention to investor interests. This hierarchical organization places the most important focus on meeting customer needs, followed by empowering employees to meet those needs creating a company structure that is positioned to be highly competitive.

Optimize Business Growth – What is Business Growth Optimization? I think a good way to initially answer this question, is to draw an analogy to a perfectly timed automobile engine running on all cylinders, smoothly, fully optimizing its capability to produce maximum power. Similarly, the small business growth company that is fully optimizing its core business competencies is structured to maximize competitive advantages and has a strategic business growth framework; running smoothly on all cylinders if it were, is attaining Business Growth Optimization. In my experience, attaining Business Growth Optimization is a three-tier process involving the SOLE Framework, achieved through the establishment of the Hedge Hog Model and implementation of the Cultural Competitiveness Organization structure.

Top 10 Startup Mistakes

The following review will provide a number of examples that every entrepreneur should try to avoid when starting a venture. Some of the holes referenced below go in parallel with going out of business. With this in mind, we highly encourage you to carefully follow these guidelines. Remember, It is better to be safe than sorry. Each one of you should take your own decisions based on your due diligence, and other critical factors.

1) Having one founder. Startups should have more than one founder. The reason for this is credibility. Having at least two founders helps to diversify the work. It’s also a good thing if the founders are from different backgrounds, so that each one of them has something different to add to the mix.

Moreover, investments can be difficult to pitch with only one founder. With this in mind, potential investors might feel as though your ideas are not good enough. From a psychological stand point, when you are involved in a startup there are going to be more bad days than good days (yes we know, it is unfortunate). Having another founder that will support you through such days, and vise versa, is key. One of the best things about the early stages of a startup are the brainstorming sessions. It is impossible to describe with words the great satisfaction of coming together as a team with the perfect solution to a problem. Avoid individualism – that kind of spirit does not get you far. Team players are key, try to stay together as one and create an environment where everyone has each other’s back.

2) Wrong Location. Location is key. If you are located in the middle of nowhere it will be very hard not only to attract talent, but also the investment that will help you to build and launch your company. If you have an amazing idea and plan on executing it the best way possible, try to move to a bigger city where there is more action happening. In the beginning it will be hard to get used to a new city and to all the new changes, but you can certainly believe that in the long run it will be worth the struggle.

Some of the best cities to start a company are Silicon Valley, Boston, Seattle, Austin, Denver, and New York.

3) Doing too many things at once. One of the biggest issues that startups have is trying to do too many things at once. This creates distractions and focuses less on the tasks that need to get done. Do not try to go big right away. Make something small and make it better than anyone else. Once you have built your initial idea, then is the time to start adding new features. The easier you make it for the public, the better; otherwise they will get overwhelmed and won’t understand what you are doing.

Remember. There is nothing wrong with changing the idea that you initially started with in spite of what the market is demanding from your product. Some of the greatest projects did not turn out to be the way they were planned.

4) Hiring C- employees. On average it can take around 2 to 3 months to hire a person depending on your location. We advise you to be on the look 24/7 and never stop interviewing people. Talent is hard to find, but not impossible.

In the event you are a startup involved with the tech industry, make sure that you are hiring the best programmers. Before hiring them review projects that they have been working on, see case studies and ask for a first hand account from previous customers. This will help you in making an informed decision.

Furthermore, we recommend that you stay away from recruiters at an early stage. They do not care about your company as much as you do and the only thing they are going after is their 25% commission based on the annual salary of the potential person that you are trying to hire. This is way too much money for a startup to throw out the window. It is a pain taking care of human resources, however, someone’s gotta do it. After all, this is your company!

5) Launching too soon or too late. If a startup launches their project too soon, there could be a possibility that the product is not complete, and will not satisfy consumers. The main problem here is that if the project is not finished, it will completely turn off its users and as a consequence, people will not come back. On the other hand, you may have the problem of launching too late. This issue not only gives a bad image to the company, but since you have not been able to accomplish your milestones, it also creates a hole in the company’s pockets because keeping the lights on is not cheap.

From our point of view, launch when you have something solid. Don’t plan to launch the absolute best while waiting until such process is complete, launch with what you need and keep moving forward.

6) Raising more or less then the capital needed. Startups make this type of mistake all of the time. Make sure you have developed a detailed business plan that you are constantly updating and following carefully. This business plan should be the company’s guidelines when entering a round of financing. Keep track of your finances, and know when you are running out of money. Be sure to plan accordingly so that you can raise a little over the money that you need (in case of surprises) to carry your company until the next round of financing.

7) Lack of budgets. When startups raise money they sometimes forget that money is very easy to burn. Even though you might feel like you have everything covered, that will most likely not be the case. There are always unexpected expenses that come along the way. With this in mind, we highly encourage you to keep all the expenses as low as possible. Try to negotiate every single invoice, and extend as much as you can for the sake of your company’s cash flow. Try to operate only with the necessary number of employees. Another example of spending money could be moving into an expensive office space before the company is making any revenue. There are plenty examples of startups that blow up their bank accounts by renting very nice offices.. The moral – avoid getting an office space. Have it all start from your house if possible and only move into an office space when it is the absolute last resort.

8) Investors with lack of knowledge and expertise. Raising money is a tough battle. Dead money is the kind of investment that comes from a person who does not give an added value to the company. A good example of this would be startups who only bring in any of their friends or family members at an early stage. These kind of investors will not contribute the drive needed to have a successful startup. This can also turn off angel investors and venture capital firms that might want to jump in at a later round of financing. Another piece of advice is to not have a large number of investors at the Seed Round (first round of financing). Otherwise it will get too crazy with the legal paperwork on the next financing round, and as a consequence the attractiveness of the startup towards VC’s and Private Equities will be extremely reduced.

9) Arguments between founders. There are many examples of founders fighting, which can potentially result in losing a team member. Try to avoid fights, establish guidelines so that it never gets to a situation that it is impossible to handle. Make sure your startup has a healthy working environment. Remember, startup life is very hard to begin with, do not add additional obstacles and always try to understand each other. As explained in our article “10 Must-Know Legal Tips For Startups”, having restricted stock will prevent founders from walking out of the company with all the stock. Starting a company is not a joke, and is a long road to follow full of obstacles and darkness. Make sure you have a trusting and special connection with that person that you decide to share this journey with.

10) Lack of marketing. Your startup may have a unique product or platform, however, if no one knows about your product it’s the same as it not existing. Make sure that you get the word out and reach as many people as possible. Figure out what are the best marketing channels in order to reach the right audience. Keep in mind that print media or advertisements are less affective than online resources nowadays. In any case, as a startup your company should NOT spend too much money on advertisement.

Top 10 Online Business Gurus (Some You May Not Have Heard Of)

As an experienced, but self taught, entrepreneur and online business person, after learning to type at school and not much else, I turned to books and mentors when I finally decided I had had enough of being poor and unsuccessful!

Having read hundreds of books and websites, and subscribing to even more newsletters, there are some people who, over the last 10-12 years, have consistently delivered value.

Sometimes it was just one word, phrase, question or comment, that made the difference, but what a difference that was. Each step forward was a real step forward, and we all know that the journey to success is a series of steps, each building on the last.

I wanted to share with you the Top 10 Digital Marketing “gurus” who have inspired me on my online business journey so far and I’ve tried to tell you about them in chronological order – how I found them (or in Guy Levine’s case, how they found me!)

1. Robert G Allen – I became aware of the potential for making money online around 1998 / 1999, about five years after I bought my first domain name. I had long been aware of the potential for marketing any real world business online, but was totally blissfully ignorant about selling information products, making money by affiliate marketing and building a mailing list to make offers to. I, like many dyed in the wool entrepreneurs before me, was so obsessed by building a real world business, that the potential just passed me by! Luckily I was to meet Guy Levine and Chris Barrow fairly soon and accidentally did a few things right… in the meantime, my sister’s husband gave her Robert Allen’s “Multiple Streams of Internet Income” for Christmas, which I stole, devoured and which led me to read other great Robert G Allen books like “No Money Down For The 90′s” now updated for the 2000′s, the brilliant and groundbreaking “One Minute Millionaire” and also other great internet books like…

2. Joe Vitale – perhaps best known for his excellent personal development books and being featured in The Secret film, Joe Vitale is also a very experienced internet marketer – he’s been around and making money online from the mid to late 90’s (which in the history of the internet is very experienced indeed). Email marketing is one of the easiest ways to get started making money online and is, in fact, still the way that I make most of my money, either marketing my own products or services to my mailing list, or by recommending carefully chosen items by friends and colleagues. Email marketing (simplified) involves driving traffic to a page where someone gives you their name and email in return for a gift of some kind, thus building your mailing list. You then need to keep in touch with people so they get used to hearing from you and you build a good relationship with your subscribers. Joe explains how to do this very well indeed in his book “The E-Code” over a couple of chapters and if you want to get started somewhere simple, I recommend you read it. Then check out Martin Avis of Kickstart Monthly, as he is a master of using a simple text newsletter to make money online!

3. Jaclyn Easton – Her “Striking It Rich.com” book which I read around the same time. I had been trying to get an internet business off the ground, based around matching up unsigned artists in the music industry (where my husband and I had worked) with managers looking for artist to read. Jaclyn’s book was all about 23 little known websites that make more than $1 million per year and essentially many of the business models were membership sites. This inspired me so much I ended up presenting my business plan at the VERY SECOND the dot com bubble exploded, at the fancy Atlantic Bar & Grill in London, to a bunch of Venture Capitalists, during a fire alarm. Which fire alarm bell started and stopped randomly, so I was alternatively shouting into the void, or totally inaudible!

4. Thomas Leonard – founder of the Coaching movement, and Coach U, which was my online college, and then Coachville. Thomas wrote the first coaching book “The Portable Coach”, which I highly recommend still and he used email, mailing lists, research & development groups, autoresponders and everything we use today pretty much. I’ve been using the ShoppingCart he recommended, since 1999, to host my double opt in email list, handle my product inventory, automatically follow up with prospects and customers, deliver digital information products, offer both timed and % off vouchers, split test headlines and pricing via AdTrackers… Thomas was very inspirational and ahead of his time, however, he died very unexpectedly and tragically, having overcome many of his personal demons, in 2003.

5. Guy Levine – going to my first ever coaching convention, in Las Vegas, to see Thomas in action live, led me to meet Chris Barrow (my new business coach) and Guy Levine, his friend and internet marketing advisor. Guy blew me away – he was only about 19 – but one of the brightest people I’ve met. He knew way more than me about internet marketing and shared his ideas and techniques very generously. Guy has gone on to build a successful SEO / AdWords / PR company based in Manchester, have two babies with wife Martine and buy two helicopters which he flies himself to speaking gigs in. He’s a great speaker too! If he wasn’t so much fun you would HAVE to hate him!

6. Brett McFall – after getting to know Guy, Steve Watson, Paul & Philly Fuggle and I were invited to go along and support him when he was speaking at the first World Internet Summit to happen in the UK, in Wembley. There the co-host was Alan Forrest Smith who, while not one of my Digital Marketing gurus on this list, has also been incredibly influential in my life. I resolved, while standing in the audience at that first event, to speak on the stage next year. And I did, thanks to Alan, in fact I went on to speak twice for them, the only British woman to be asked to do so. I became great friends with Brett McFall, one of the co-founders of WIS as it’s now universally known, and he’s a very inspirational guy. He’s a very kind and genuine man who has helped me a lot with my speaking and promoting my business from the stage particularly. He came to Brighton just before one of our Money Gym events that he co-hosted and while we were recording videos there, we captured a very funny video of him being rained on and also being a bit upstaged by a seagull which never fails to make me laugh and remember a great day out.

7. Frank Kern – I was listening to one of Brett’s audio interviews around this same time and was particularly taken with a couple of guys who had a simple but dynamite system called “The UnderAchiever Method”. Those guys turned out to be Frank Kern and Ed Dale and they had invented a neat little system involving driving traffic to a page where you asked one question “What One Thing Do You Want To Know About……X? where X is your chosen niche. The answers were collated and compiled so you could see what most people wanted to know about, and which were the most popular 1 word, 2 word and 3 word phrases people were using. Then you went and created the product (usually an ebook, perhaps written by a ghostwriter, covering the most popular questions) and then you sold it back to your new mailing list. Most people gave the initial product away as an incentive to answer the questions and this also brought testimonials, so it was all good. Then the new traffic was sold the product along with real testimonials and using the language of the niche. Very clever stuff. I believe they sold their mini-publishing empire of niche information product pages to a UK publisher for a very large sum of money, in the end.

That was the first time I really realised the value of a specialist, niche market, responsive mailing list of buyers. Both Frank and Ed have gone on to become incredibly successful in their separate businesses, in Franks case not without a few setbacks! He is heavily involved with many huge IM product launches. Frank’s online style is laconic, casual and very, very persuasive. Now Frank get’s some stick for perhaps being too persuasive but I just love his style and watching his live gig recordings is just hilarious – so rock ‘n’ roll – I really want to see him live one day. Ed Dale went on to found the highly successful “30 Day Challenge” which walks new internet marketers through a free program (Ed makes his money on the affiliate products he recommends in that free program).

8. Rich Schefren – around 2006 a new internet marketing guru exploded on the scene, except he was a real life business guru who was moving into the internet marketing world, having sold his last business. Having coached many of the big names such as Jim Edwards, Mike Filsaime and many others, he then released his ground breaking report “The Internet Marketing Manifesto” swiftly followed by the “Missing Chapter” and “Final Chapter” reports. Rich blew my mind because he taught a load of solid business techniques that I had NEVER come across before, in an easy to understand and digest way, capturing the attention and admiration of the ADD troubled internet marketing community at the same time. I went on join both his “Business Growth System” and “Guided Profits System” mentoring programmes – which are fantastic by the way – and my company started to grow swiftly as a result. Do yourself a favour and download the reports – they are not just about IM but about entrepreneurship – you won’t regret it.

9. Gary Vaynerchuk – well, what do you say about Gary? I bloomin’ love him. I first heard him on an audio interview Rich Schefren did for his mentoring students and Gary was just starting to rise to World Wine Domination! Hey, that’s a great catch phrase! You can find Gary at WineLibrary.tv and all over YouTube and Ustream – he’s the MASTER of online video. Enthusiastic, passionate, straight talking, unconventional, Gary believes in HARD WORK, that you can simply “Crush It!” in the title of his first book, if you care about what you do, care about your readers, listeners, subscribers and customers and if you show you care at all times. According to Gary, smaller companies have NEVER had a better chance to dominate their competition.

10. Yaro Starak – I can’t remember where I first came across Yaro and his Entrepreneurs Journey blog but I knew instantly he was the real deal. I have subsequently gone back and read pretty much every one one of his blog posts from Day One because I was fascinated in how he grew from a kid selling students Dissertation Editing Services to becoming one of the most respected bloggers in the world. He’s got an interesting background and talks very openly about that, and his various challenges – both work and personal – and I love that about him. It’s not just how to get traffic, it’s how to be a better entrepreneur. Yaro’s got loads of great free reports – one called the Blog Profits Blueprint and he’s very strong on Membership Sites too, both of which reports you really ought to read if you want to learn more about blogging for your business. He also recommends great people, like Gideon Shalwick who has got the most gentle, enjoyable video presence I’ve come across for a while. I recommend both Yaro and Gideon very highly.

There they are – the Top 10 Business & Internet Marketing Gurus of the last 12 years or so. For me anyway. I hope you enjoyed the article and you check out some of the reports and books and then PUT THEM INTO ACTION!

Top 5 Benefits of Online Networking

Networking is becoming increasingly popular among entrepreneurs in this day and age. It is an amazing means of allowing professionals to build relationships, grow their businesses, tap into resources, develop business skills and brand themselves within their industry or profession. Entrepreneurs can network in their jobs, clubs, organizations, associations and now online. Internet networking proves to be just as effective as regular networking while adding several benefits for professional and social success.

Online networking is an excellent tool that entrepreneurs should consider investing in for developing their businesses. There are several advantages to online networking in comparison to the traditional networking. Listed below are five significant tips that will open your eyes to a host of endless opportunities:

#1 Online networking increases and diversifies your network.

Online networking gives entrepreneurs a chance to develop relationships with several contacts at one time. Professionals can meet several people and communicate in a broader way than face to face or at a networking event. Business people are able to meet a wider variety of people through online networking. Usually, networking events will attract certain groups of people, depending on who is sponsoring the event. But with online networking, many different industries are represented within the group.

#2 Online networking makes you more accessible to others.

Having a virtual business presence allows professionals an opportunity to be reached much quickly than by phone and mail. Your ability to be accessible and reached easily makes you conduct business is an efficient and productive manner. You are able to organize and execute projects and agendas in an efficient method which can greatly affect your bottom line and give you a clear advantage over your competitors. It will also improve your credibility and image for your company, brand or service.

#3 Online networking shatters time and geographical boundaries.

By networking online, entrepreneurs are able to reach the world from their computer. Using the internet and email allows professionals to send messages to business counterparts during any time of the day from any location to be received anywhere around the world. The flexibility and practical aspects of connecting and building relationships expands target audiences, clients, customers, colleagues, vendors, partners, investors and even employees.

#4 Online networking can be an excellent low-cost marketing tool.

One of the best advantages of online networking is the ability to showcase yourself, company, product, services or brand. As entrepreneurs, we are constantly looking for ways to create awareness and online networking offers that unique feature. Many websites allow members to post pictures, profiles, articles, books and various marketing materials for advertisements and announcements. Entrepreneurs can display these features from online networking to their clients, customers and business colleagues.

#5 Online networking allows entrepreneurs to develop professional skills.

Many online networking groups or companies offers incentives and benefits to their members which can be extremely valuable to business and personal development. Blogs, articles, book recommendations, online seminars, teleseminars, announcements of local and national business events and discounts on business publications or services, are just a few resources that entrepreneurs can use for success.

Entrepreneurs should consider investing in online networking for their professional and social endeavors. Online networking can create many resources for businesses and gives entrepreneurs flexibility in their business dealings. It is just one more effective tool that can used to accomplish business and social goals.

Strategic Action Plan – How to Put Yourself in the Top 5% of Marketers on the Internet

Let’s spend a few minutes focusing on perhaps the most important principle in creating a successful online business- your strategic marketing plan. A lot of people are intimidated by internet marketing because there is so much competition in many large niches such as network marketing, coaching, consulting, and information marketing. As an online marketing coach, I can’t tell you how many times I have heard statements like:

I just don’t feel like there’s any room for me.
Who would want to hear what I have to say?
I can think big, but I have no idea how to take appropriate action
I have a website, but only have 20 people on my list
I have a website; isn’t that enough?

What I am about to share with you will give you an incredible competitive advantage and will serve as the ultimate answer to every single one of these statements, so that you never feel lost in the online world again.

Yes, the internet is absolutely packed with business owners competing for valuable online real estate. Many industries are indeed saturated with websites and blogs trying to compete for their fair share of traffic, leads, and customers.

But here is the thing you really need to understand: Less than 5% of the entrepreneurs marketing online have a strategic marketing plan that they consistently take action on.

As internet and network marketing guru David Wood says, ‘The internet is full of people with huge dreams and little work ethic.’

Because this is true, you really have very little competition, besides the one taking place within yourself. Your only true competition is the excuse you may be making to yourself as to why you can’t/won’t consistently take action to generate massive online exposure. That, my friend, is what you want to expose first. Don’t worry about your external competition in the online marketplace. The only real issue is how willing you truly are to keep taking action until you get the results you desire.

This is why your mindset is such a critical factor that underlies your marketing plan. Sure, you can map out a marketing strategy that looks good in theory. But the flat out truth is very few entrepreneurs stick with their action plan. Why is this so, especially when marketing is by far the #1 activity that leads to more money in their pockets? Here are the big 3 that I have seen:

lack of immediate results– I can relate to this one, as many online marketers can. We all want to see immediate payoff for our efforts. In my experience, one of the highest virtues of successful entrepreneurship is the ability to keep putting in the effort without seeing the immediate return on our time and energy investment. Call this faith, emotional maturity, or discipline-the point is that many of us weren’t taught this virtue and instead, we seek immediate gratification. This is a killer when it comes to online marketing, as it typically does take time to see tangible results.
impulsive and reactive tendencies– This is often a result of not seeing immediate results. One of the hardest things in internet marketing is that you have a lot of incredibly savvy marketers out there basically preying on your hunger for results. They lure you to their offers and solutions, which keeps you constantly grasping for the latest and greatest product or program that will quell your frustration and feed your hope. What ultimately results is a lack of any real consistency or rhythm, making it impossible to build any momentum in your marketing efforts. You keep jumping from marketing strategy to new program to new idea to new guru. This becomes a sort of addiction for many people trying to make money online-and there are many smart marketers absolutely capitalizing on this weakness.
lack of inspiration/laziness/disconnection from real purpose in life-– This one can take a lot of different forms, but the essence is that you lack the real drive and desire to take effective action because you aren’t clear on what you really want out of your marketing, your business, and often your life in general. Many people turn to the internet because (I hate to say it) they have no idea what else to do with their lives.

Before you create a strategic marketing plan, you want to honestly assess if you have a tendency to be vulnerable to any of these 3 obstacles (99% of us do). Seeing your obstacles clearly is always the first step to becoming an empowered and successful entrepreneur. When you see your blocks as they are without judging them, a door is opened where you see that you have a choice to change anything that is holding you back.

Once you have done some of this inner work, then you will likely be able to create an external action plan that is accessible, effective, and even fun to implement.

When it comes to online marketing, what you want to do is create a marketing process that you can literally commit to just about every single day, especially in the initial phases (the first few months) of launching your product, service, or company.

Your marketing plan is determined by 3 factors:

Your budget
Your knowledge and skill set
Your motivation

If you have a good marketing budget, then you’ll want to spend some money on online advertising, as this is the fastest way to start generating leads for your business. Google AdWords is really the best way to start. Depending on your business, you can also invest in classified and ezine ads, or in banner ads on other websites. Google AdWords is a big learning process, so be sure to get the right training before you go and spend thousands of dollars (this will often turn out to be a generous donation to Google). I recommend getting Perry Marshall’s Definitive Guide to Google AdWords as a starting point.

If you’re on a tight budget or you don’t want to learn AdWords, you’ll want to do some free marketing strategies. Let me share with you my daily marketing process. This should really help you see how this is done. Keep in mind that I am very strong in factors 2 and 3 above-I have a lot of knowledge in online marketing because I have been doing it for a few years and I have a high level of motivation. If your knowledge and/or motivation isn’t quite that high, you’ll want to just take a fraction of what my process and implement it consistently. Bite off only as much as you can chew and be honest with yourself.

Here is my daily marketing strategy:

1. Write a blog post (you’re reading today’s efforts)

2. Make a video of that blog post and distribute it through a video distribution software that sends it to all of the video sharing and podcasting sites – this is an incredible online marketing tool that any serious online marketers should be using.

3. Distribute the post to 27 social bookmarking sites.

4. Distribute the post to 250 article directories using an article submission software.

5. Post my blog content on ping.fm so it goes to Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, etc.

6. If I’m really wanting to compete for a specific keyword (like for instance if I really want to get ranked for the keyword I am targeting in this post, strategic marketing plan), I will create a squidoo lens and/or a hub page.

7. If I am so inclined, I will send an email blast to my list to let them know about the post.

I do this as often as possible because it is seriously an incredibly effective FREE way to get my content all over the internet. Of course, this strategy is premised upon offering real value to the online community, not crap or spam. I only send out content like I’m sharing with you here. You only want to distribute your best stuff; don’t be like so many lame marketers and just promote your business and spam people. Give people stuff that really makes an impact and you’ll see a big difference in your online marketing results.

The essence of a strategic marketing plan is that it is implemented consistently over the long-term. Your goal should be to be just as methodical, inspired, passionate, and consistent about your marketing one year from now as you are in the start-up phase where it’s easy to get fired up. It’s just like trying to lose weight and get in shape. The first week you’re hitting the gym every day and you’re totally on fire about your commitment. Then, for whatever reason, your enthusiasm starts to wane and other priorities take over. Eventually, you forget all about that commitment and your mind has taken you to a new focus entirely.

In order to succeed in online marketing, you have to have that vision for what you want firmly in mind all the time and never let go. Do you really want freedom, passive income, a huge downline, or thousands of people on your list? Then you need to tap into the virtue of entrepreneurial tenacity. You keep your eyes on that prize and you let nothing distract you, especially your own mind (this is the biggest danger-that you’ll convince yourself that it’s not possible or that you value something else even more).

When you implement your marketing plan consistently over the long-term, there is no competition because very few business owners actually do this. I know it doesn’t sound all romantic and hype-based like so many of the promises you hear online, but I will tell you this: If you just stay consistent… if you remain tenacious… if you keep a clear focus on what you really want… and you take action on that every day at least a little bit… you can have it.

Online marketing can take you to that place of incredible freedom and success. Just be willing to do what so few others are: Let go of the hype, let go of the need for immediate gratification, and treat this as if it’s your child- daily nourishment and care. Keep feeding your business through strategic marketing and you will-sooner or later-realize your financial goals and have a lifestyle that most can only dream of.

A Guide to Auditing Top Management and the Internal Audit Checklist

Organizations must audit the processes associated with top management as part of an effective internal audit program. These processes include those relating to strategic planning, the establishment of policies and objectives, ensuring effective communication and ensuring the availability of resources.

Auditing management or directors is often seen as a sensitive issue but by considering each management activity as a normal organizational process, it becomes much easier to focus on determining whether the outputs of their activities are effective.

How to Audit Top Management

By using a formal risk-based approach to internal audit planning, as required by ISO 9001, auditors have a great opportunity to engage top management in the audit process. By making management part of the planning process and by giving them ownership of the areas to be audited, the internal audit becomes a valuable mechanism for development.

A good starting point is to copy, into the audit checklist, all requirements from the standard that say ‘top management shall’, almost every clause of section 5 starts with ‘top management shall’ and it’s the auditors job to find if management ‘did’. The audit checklist must cover the requirements from the following sections:

5.1 Management Commitment

5.2 Customer Focus

5.3 Quality Policy

5.4.1 Quality Objectives

5.4.2 Quality Management System Planning

5.5.1 Responsibility and Authority

5.5.2 Management Representative

5.5.3 Internal Communication

5.6 Management Review

5.6.1 General

During the Internal Audit

When undertaking the internal audit of top management, the auditor should collect and corroborate evidence of top management’s commitment from within the quality management system itself. The auditor should ask how the quality manual addresses management commitment issues and ask how they are accomplished; then, the auditor must find objective evidence that proves it’s actually being done. This method applies to management as well as the production machinist, and everyone else in the organization for that matter!

If the standard, documented procedures, policies and objectives are audit inputs, then the evidence sampled and the interview statements made by top management auditees are the audit outputs. If the input does not align with the expected output, the auditor simply states this misalignment as a non-conformance whilst providing an audit trail to the supporting evidence.

Final Reporting

Auditors should prepare the internal audit report in a manner appropriate for presentation. It might be necessary to present the executive summary of the audit report directly to the top management and other interested parties within the organization. The executive summary must highlight both positive and negative findings and suggest opportunities for improvement.

Shamus Brown’s Top 5 Sales Presentation Tips

When its time to give your next sales presentation, here are my favorite tips for delivering powerful, charismatic, and engaging sales presentations.

#1 – PLANT YOUR FEET SQUARELY ON THE FLOOR

How you hold your physical body during your sales pitch communicates a tremendous amount of information about you to your audience. Studies have shown a person will unconsciously interpret approximately 55% of the meaning of your message from physiological cues in your body position, stance, and facial expressions.

Deliver your presentation from a position of confidence. Stand with your feet squarely between your shoulders. Distribute your weight evenly between your legs, and plant your feet firmly on the ground. Keep your arms relaxed at your sides, until your are ready to make a gesture.

Shifting your weight from one leg to another communicates to the audience a lack of confidence. This comes across unconsciously in that if you were to ask someone, a typical response might be “he didn’t seem like believed in his company” or “I not sure that I can trust her”.

Try both the balanced and the unbalanced speaking postures right now, and see which one makes you feel more confident and ready for your next sales presentation.

#2 – GET PUMPED UP

It is your job to lead the audience. The reason they are there to get something from you. So you must lead them where you want them to go. If you want people to get excited about your product or to feel a sense of trust towards you and your company, you must first create this emotion within yourself.

How do you do this? Simple. Do whatever it takes to get yourself excited. Jump up and down. Clap your hands. Play your favorite music loud. High five your sales partner. You can do this where you won’t be seen by the prospect (in your car, in the customer’s stairwell, bathroom or outside the building). What do you think a rock star or an actor does to warm-up before going on stage?

The idea is to begin your presentation in an absolutely great state. Do this right and the audience will follow your where you want them to go.

Special tip: Use this technique before making important phone calls so that you are “on” when you make the call.

#3 – WARM-UP THE AUDIENCE

Another thing big rock stars do before coming out on stage is they have warm-up acts. The job of a warm-up act is to get the audience in a mood will be receptive of the main act’s energy.

You can accomplish this same effect by simply playing music before you start your presentation. Many laptops have CD players these days, or you can use a boom-box. The type of music you play will depend on your audience, and the emotional state that you want to warm your audience up to. Just think about how this will set you apart from your competition’s stale PowerPoint slide show.

#4 – BEGIN WITH AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION

The more rapport you have with an individual or a group, the more receptive they will be to your message. One way to build rapport with your audience is by asking questions of your audience during your first few minutes on stage.

Ask a question or two that most people can easily answer (but don’t put anyone on the spot too much). Questions such as “How far did you come to get here?” and “How long have you been working in this field?” easily get conversation going and begin creating a relationship between you and your audience.

#5 – SUSTAIN EYE CONTACT WITH INDIVIDUALS

You probably know you should do this. Now here’s why and how.

The more frequently you change the location of your focus, the more new information your brain is taking in. Your eyes are the visual sensory input system for your brain. Change focus fast enough and frequently enough, and you overload your brain to the point where you forget where you are at in the presentation. Aaaaggh!

Maintain your concentration on what you want to say next by fixing your visual focus for short periods of time. Do this by completing a thought or a sentence (whichever you find easier) while sustaining eye contact with one person. Move eye contact to a new person with each new thought or sentence.

Top 10 Mistakes Entrepreneurs Make When Choosing a Business Name

In this rapidly growing economy, it is commonplace to see businesses in every nooks and crannies of the world. Sole proprietorship is having the highest number of registration. From the home-based entrepreneur to the shop owner, and then the small office consultant, people are taking advantage of the freedom enjoyed in becoming their own boss.

Billions of corporate monies are invested yearly in starting new businesses. A visit to the Lagos office of the nation’s registrar of business names buttresses this fact.

While it is true that anybody can start up a business of their own, many entrepreneurs have fallen short of the leveraging that accrues from this experience. This, to a large extent, has to do with the disadvantaged names worn by these businesses.

A business does not actually begin by formulating a business plan or opening a bank account. It starts from choosing a name. There’s more to business names than just identity. The right name is an advertising tool. If the name doesn’t describe the nature of your business, potential clients may not realize that you offer something they need.

Let’s take a look at the top 10 mistakes to avoid when choosing a business name:

1. NOT KNOWING WHAT KIND OF BUSINESS YOU ARE IN. It is surprising that some entrepreneurs choose a name with little or no indication of what type of work the organization actually does. Including a descriptive word in your business name can be useful when marketing your products or company. This may be made possible if you have identified what differentiates you from competitors. Take the following examples:

Adenix and Sons

One Love Enterprises

Just You Shop

Can you tell me what any of these companies do? No! They’re relying on customers already knowing who they are (a tricky proposition for new businesses).

2. USING A NAME THAT IS TOO LONG, DIFFICULT TO REMEMBER, SPELL OR PRONOUNCE. A good name is something that can be mentioned on radio or over the phone without explanation. People will make a quick decision based on their first impression of your business name. Put the name through a spelling test and ask others to spell it. So, choosing a name such as “Lolitoesy” is not a good one.

3. NOT SPENDING QUALITY TIME BRAINSTORMING. Business names are not “spur of the moment” creations. It is the result of possibly long days and nights of brainstorming, digging the Thesaurus for synonyms and antonyms, interrelated words and words that have some kind of relationship with the proposed business activity. The big companies even hire expensive consultants to help them choose the right name for their businesses or products.

4. PROMOTING A NAME WITHOUT TESTING AND CHECKING ITS AVAILABILITY. Once you have chosen a few names, test them out on friends and family, potential clients and everyone you know. Ask them what kind of service they feel you provide and feeling they get about the name. You’ll be surprised at how honestly they give you suggestions. Then you can proceed to check availability at the name registry nearest to you after being convinced it’s best. Don’t waste money on letter heads and complimentary cards trying out a business name already chosen by someone else.

5. CHOOSING WORDS WITH NEGATIVE OR NEUTRAL CONNOTATION. A word’s connotation can be positive, negative or neutral, depending on the emotional associations that people generally make. If you are starting a transport business for instance, you don’t want it to have a weak sounding or negative name, such as “Willow Twig Trucking” or “Kitten Transport”. You want a business name that conveys strength and reliability. A choice such as “Stone Creek Transport” would be much better. Remember: Words are powerful.

6. NAMING A BUSINESS AFTER THE FOUNDER OR ANY OTHER PERSON. It is a common tendency for a business to be named after the original founder. This approach can make customers expect the personal attention and care of the owner. Using your name, followed by the type of service works well if you have an already established reputation in your specialty. But, if you are planning to one day sell your company, a company-owner named business is less attractive.

7. NOT CONSIDERING THE FUTURE. Robert Dilenschneider wrote about a public relations person who broadened her services from just writing to media relations and had to change the name of her business from Miller’s Writing Services to Miller’s Communications. Aside brainstorming for ideas, you need foresight in choosing a name. Even if you are operating a highly-niched product, select names that would represent a broader category of your product line.

8. FAILURE TO GET THE RIGHT DOMAIN NAME FOR YOUR BUSINESS. If your business activity is almost 100% online or will do better having an online presence, you may need to consider starting your search by getting a suitable domain name for your website first. In the modern world of the internet, where people automatically turn to the web for information, it pays to have a domain name that reflects your site or business.

9. NOT AVOIDING LAWSUIT. Be unique. The best you can be trying to be someone else is second best. Avoid being a copycat. Using a name similar or identical to that of another business can get you into problems including legal issues. If you call your line of equestrian apparel “Polo Sporting Designs”, the holder of the trademark “Polo” – the giant Ralph Lauren – may slap you with a lawsuit.

10. NOT CONSULTING A BUSINESS NAMING EXPERT. While the services of lawyers, chartered accountants and chartered secretaries can be invaluable in the registration of a business name and company, these categories of professionals might not understand the selling and marketing principles that copywriters can use to your advantage. A good copywriter is always looking for ways to help you communicate more effectively to more people.

Top Online Business Ideas – Do They Really Exist?

There are hundreds and even thousands of business ideas that float around online. There are individuals who have made a lot of money through selling products or services on the internet. Not everyone has such a level of success and this is due to a number of factors but it leaves people wondering if there are really and truly any top online business ideas.

Factors Affecting Success

While many individuals dream of succeeding at business, not everyone is cut out for it. A person needs to have a great amount of work ethic and determination to start with. They also need to choose the right product or service, the right business strategy, and implement the correct amount of marketing in the right direction. The vast majority of individuals who start an online business fail and it is because they have lacked in one of these areas or others.

The Good News

There are some great business ideas for online entrepreneurs that they can succeed with as long as they are willing to put in the required time and effort. They need to work at the business, create a good business plan as well as a marketing strategy. This takes research but it is worth it because it creates a larger level of success.

Choosing Top Online Business Ideas

There is no best business idea for any one particular person. The truth is that everyone is different. There are certain aspects to consider however, that a person can use to decide on the best business for themselves.

1. Product: Choose something that is enjoyable and is of personal taste.

2. Profitability: Choose something that will make enough profit to be worth the time and effort.

3. Perfection: Choose a product that is as close to perfection as possible that is credible.

If a person keeps these three points in mind while thinking about how they can sell the product, they are much more likely to succeed. A person can only truly be successful with a product that they believe in and that they like to share with others. This will not only bring a more genuine approach to sales but they will also have more motivation to sell it.

Keeping Mainstream

To be successful doesn’t mean staying mainstream. There are plenty of niche products available that are selling in high quantities because they are marketed effectively reaching the target market. That is the same with any business.

Anyone who decides to sell products not only needs to consider the previously mentioned aspects but also marketing factors. They need to know how to market and sell each product. They can really succeed in online sales if they research these methods and work at them. Nothing is completely successful right at the start but with time and the right strategies, online business ideas can turn into huge success stories that become the top business ideas.