Posts Tagged ‘Business’
I have no idea what business to start
One of the most common questions entrepreneurs is, I start my own business, but I have no idea what business to start. The “great” idea is something that every business would pay millions, but great ideas are only possible if we take big decisions.
There are many people with wonderful ideas, with dreams that are left alone in that, in a dream and are never made by inaction.
Most businesses start because someone had found a need and not as satisfying. Big business grew out of simple ideas that “no one had occurred,” perhaps that’s not true, perhaps we had all thought but only the entrepreneur had the guts to develop the idea.
The greatest source of inspiration for ideas of business is life itself. You have to look around, see what could be done better, that could fill a need. In difficult times is when most ideas come because people have more needs and because these are more evident.
More than a century ago came the great “inventors”, the Edison, Bell, Westinghouse, Ford. Today is the time of the great “reinventor” people who find a new way to improve traditional inventions. We’re talking about cars with new fuel sources that likely will not look at all the Model T by Henry Ford, and smart cell phones we see very different from Graham Bell’s invention, and certainly the “reinvention” of companies and services will be the source of the business development of the second decade of the 21st century.
80 percent of the products and services we consume today did not exist years ago. The iPhone and smartphones for example did not know them 5 years ago and today are an integral part of our lives. 10 years ago we did not imagine that we would not need CDs to listen to our favorite music and today we can say that they are collectibles. I remember with pride my first Sony Walkman, a revolution in the 80s and a few months ago the Japanese company was given formal burial. Music stores and video rentals are disappearing, iTunes, Netflix, Redbox, are players that did not exist 6 years ago. The iPhone, the Kindle and other devices are changing the way people read and well in all aspects of life.
What would you think if I told you in 10 years, 80 percent of the products and services we use today will not exist or be different? So, change is constant, so that new businesses are subject to that change or disappear.
With everything I have told not already have a clearer idea that it’s time to start a business? Yes, this is the time I was waiting, the moment he found Henry Ford when he found a need that everyone was trying to solve transportation. Ford began his business in the garage of his home, tells the story is that when he went to get out of it the first Model T, the vehicle went through the door, so he had to knock down the driveway to get him out of it.
Is the garage and bedroom, the most common places for successful entrepreneurs. I started my business in the bedroom, until my wife took me out of it to see the light remained on until 2 o’clock in the morning.
The ideas are there, closer than you imagine, under his feet and may not have noticed.
In a future article I’ll tell you how to look.
“You will never reach what you want, only managed to reach those you’ll clearly see” Zig Ziglar.
Do you have entrepreneurial spirit?
In business, there are no guarantees, since there is no way to eliminate all the risks involved in starting a small business, but with good planning, preparation and insight, you can improve your chances for success. Start by evaluating your strengths and weaknesses to assume the role of owner and manager of a small business. Carefully consider each of the following questions:
Is it a self-starter? In their hands they will bear the responsibility to develop projects, organize your time, serve and track all the details involved.
How well you get along with different types of personalities? Employers need to establish working relationships with a wide variety of people including: customers, vendors, staff and banks, as well as professionals such as lawyers, accountants or consultants. If your company’s interests so require, have the ability to deal with: A (a) customer (a) demanding? A (a) seller (a) irresponsible? o (on) a cranky receptionist (a)?
How good is to make decisions? Small business owners are constantly forced to make decisions, often instant, unable to consult with anyone else and under pressure.
Does the physical and emotional energy needed to manage a company or business? Owning a business can be exciting, but also labor intensive. Can you face 12 hours of work per day for six or seven days, every week?
How well planned and organized? Research results indicate that the lack of planning is the main cause of the failure of most companies. Good organization of financials, inventory, schedules and production can help avoid many pitfalls.
Do you have enough thrust? Managing a business can wear you down emotionally. Some employers will wear very quickly to shoulder the entire responsibility for the success of your business. Have a strong motivation to help you cope with both slow periods such as exhaustion.
What is the effect it will have your company on your family? The first years at the start of a business can be very difficult for his family life. It is important that family members know what to expect from this situation and that you trust who supported them during these stages. Also, could suffer financial difficulties until the business becomes profitable, which could take months or even years to achieve. Even more may have to adjust to a lower standard of living, or even jeopardize your family’s resources for a short time.
Do you have the guts to start a business?
Entrepreneurship comes with success and failure, are you prepared to deal with them?
There is nothing more satisfying than starting a business, perhaps can be compared with giving life to a human being. Proportionately to see a company born as exciting as having a son or daughter. If you generate a product of love life is great in the realization of a human being, creating a business is the realization in the life of an entrepreneur.
And businesses like the children, fill one with pride, satisfaction, tantrums and sadness, but for the employer, for one who has that entrepreneurial spirit, that’s part of life and growth of that created by him.
There are always risks, trips and falls, we can not eliminate them, we can only be prepared to deal with them and avoid them. And the preparation is only achieved by educating, informing and working.
Reinventing the buzzword
One of my favorite words is reinventing itself. Tomorrow I am invited to a panel at the University of South Florida to discuss “The Power of Vision” and specifically to reinvent itself.
11 years ago I came to this country, not with the idea of ??staying only being a year and my children learn a language and of fate, I was and I had to reinvent.
I decided to start a business, something he had never done in my life, but I liked it, was akin to what he could do and had found that there was a need.
Together with my wife, decided to start a magazine. We analyze the Hispanic market in the area where we lived, we saw the competition and we knew we had a chance.
Without capital, knowledge and my normal training of the library listening to audiobooks, reading magazines, I learned the business and management of a company.
We started our business and the magazine was quickly becoming the number one publication in the area, shortly after we had our first employee, then the second and so we had to make the business of my room and our house.
Within two years this small venture began its second product, a newspaper. The turnover had barely begun to cover the costs, ended the first year with just over $ 32,000 in less than three years had reached one million.
During these 10 years we have won business awards for the year in different cities, have been named Entrepreneur of the Year and one of the visionary U.S. 5. And our publications has been recognized many times for its editorial quality.
What did I do differently than those who had started a magazine here and they started later? I think the big difference is that I analyzed the market, talked to people to create a product that was for them and not me. I identified with my readers, think big and put my business purpose as a simple sentence, if my client is doing well, my suits me best.
The key to success was to learn, study on entrepreneurship, focus, take action and persevere.
I know many people who read me should be in the same situation 11 years ago I was 40, I was scared to start a business and fail. Needed to bring up my family and this country had no one to help. So I did what I had to do, start, because failure was not an option, so I deleted my dictionary and had only one goal, to succeed and make the best publication in the area and the country.
If you have the illusion of having your own business, do not hesitate, get ready, follow the steps and do it. If I can do, you can also. I am not a special being, I’m smarter than you, I’m better than you. I just did something you did not actually start.
Someone taught me that life is like a large buffet full of delicious food that everyone wants to achieve. For lunch you only need two things, one, get in line and the second is not out of line.
How will you know if your business can be successful if it does not start? And if you do and it closes soon neither will be discovered.
Perseverance and action go hand in hand. And vision and reinvention are the final one word, one that translates to success.
Tomorrow I will go to the panel to tell the audience here as well as plasma, the same message, start your business, there’s no better time than now to do so and find someone who has walked the road to guide you.
How to start a successful online business
Of the hundreds of businesses that start each year, only 20 percent of them survive 5 years. On the Internet the percentage of businesses that fail is higher, only 2 percent make it to the first half.
The question is, what makes the Internet businesses fail than traditional businesses?
The big problem that exists is that people think that starting a business online is different from a traditional and essentially that’s not true.
Thus, the platform offers the technology is different, a business is a business and you have to learn to manage and program it for success.
At lower investment cost people does not plan to start an Internet business. It does not make a business plan, no worries about creating a brand are not implemented performance measurement systems and just open a blog or create a page with the hope of turning it into a profitable business.
Start an Internet business is just to do it with a traditional one, start with an idea, a dream. Must now determine whether that dream fits our interests, if a viable business which we can love.
Once the list of possibilities we analyze the market, look for whether our idea is consistent with a hungry market to which we can meet. Seek a niche in that market segment or refining the search and study well the needs of this prospectus. Define the profile of our client, we will in their shoes, talk like him and find out how to make your questions to determine which product or service are you looking to meet their needs and then, only then create a product or develop a service to meet those needs.
Detail the potential market, the square and the competition and determine the cost of the product or service.
So far both online and offline business are handled well.
Then we will create our vision and mission of our business, develop a unique selling proposition and we will make a “business plan”, a road map, a map will include our expectations to 5 years. We will cash flow and determine the capital we need for the business and sales projections to see the return on investment. All the same for the two businesses and this is the part that Internet entrepreneurs fail.
After having done all this work the brand, the corporate image, packaging of our business, which includes the logo, colors, slogans, messages and all that constitutes our identity. And there begins the difference, only apply this brand to our website or our physical business or both. The difference is just the platform, whether physical or virtual or in combination, that’s all.
Own business, the worst job
Usually the decision to start a business situation emerges from a long meditations. Put in other words, you take months if not years thinking about the possibility of independence, starting a business, each day that passes more bored by your current job, your boss begins to transform into a kind of tyrant, one of those ogres in fairy tales. Going to work has become heavy, your salary each time shrinks until one day not take any more and resigned. Does it seem familiar situation? Or how about this. One morning, leaving their children go to school and remember that day with the presentation of Christmas and you can not attend that day because that day has to report to his boss and has exhausted their permits, so that day together with the report also presents his letter of resignation. And how about this one. It has awakened early, there is something in the environment that makes you feel different, lighter feel, something free, rises strongly and the same impulse says, I’ll start my own business! It seems to have contracted the virus entrepreneur, the one that occasionally comes as allergy season arrives and infects and gives the courage to make a decision.
Whatever you decided, took the step to leave your current job and into the path of entrepreneurship. The problem is that you are not an entrepreneur does not know business, you may know a trade by which he was paid and now wants to devote to work for you instead of working for someone else and that’s the main problem.
Working for you is not the solution. You worked for a company, had a leader, good or bad but the boss assumed many responsibilities, he had a secure income, their concerns were on his desk and did not have to suffer if the company had cash, if the competition took away participation, if the industry had problems, if any taxes, insurance, the, etc. You had nothing to leave his job and think about the payday. Now you are working for you is that you are the boss, the responsibilities, which turns the check on payday, which pays taxes, insurance, the, etc.
But there is something else you could do something independent because he now wants to do on your own. You were the star mechanic now wants to have his own shop, the brilliant chef who wants to open his own restaurant, the veterinarian who wants to have his own practice, but only known animals, or mechanical or kitchen, not aware of administration, accounting, marketing, sales, etc. Now you’re all, is the CEO of the company, in English, the Chief Everything Officer rather what good Christians call a “handyman” who serves coffee, make payments, shared kitchen, and what have to do. And people start looking because you are the best mechanic or the best chef or the best veterinarian. People go to their business because they want their animals treats you that you can fix your car, your food you prepare yourself. And so you begin to dream of success, to see how their customers are multiplied by the effect of mouth and as the time decreases in proportion and his life begins to turn and become miserable.
That day can not go to birthday of your children, you can no longer think of vacation, sick, stay home because there is an emergency. That day you have to open the business because there is someone waiting for you and nobody else. That day will be working for you, you are fulfilling the promise of not working for anyone else, but will not be thinking that your business idea was to work for you as it should be from the first day.
If you do not organize your business, your business will consume will be your worst tyrant, worse than his former boss, and the idea of ??”independence” will be the most terrible slavery.
Do not turn your own business in his worst job, plan your venture, prepare and structure your business as a company a million dollars, and billing only reaches a few thousand. Doing so will one day truly a business that works for you, an asset that will not steal money and your time and why not a million dollar business.
Other 5 tips for starting a business
In business, there are five keys that impact profits. If you can master them and keep costs under control, you can have a successful business.
The five keys are simple. Get more leads, convert prospects into customers, increase the number of times that customers will buy, raise the level of the average sales price of each customer and increase your profit margins.
If you make any of these keys while keeping costs low, you will see more profits. If doing all you can watch your business really take off.
7. Test and measure.
You can not change what is not measured and can not tell whether a program or strategy is working if it is faithfully testing, measuring and following up the results.
Another way to think about it is in medical terms. It is best to obtain statistics concerning heart rate, blood pressure and breathing before delving into the identification of symptoms and recommend treatment.
The same is true in your business. Why continue throwing money into a campaign that literally cost thousands of dollars, but does not bring anyone to your business?
8. Recognize that learning is like winning more.
If you have never driven a million dollar business, you do not know how to handle one – as simple as that.
But you can learn to do, even if it is a million dollar business that is building from scratch.
However, you need to understand that learning always comes before profits. You will have to commit to learn as much as you can about sales, marketing and management if you want a truly successful business.
Once done, the sky is the limit. Know and apply the basics in a simple manner with a high degree of leverage is one of many reasons why senior executives and entrepreneurs make much money.
Identify issues and then decide to learn it yourself or hire an expert and learn as much as possible from that person – you never know how much you can learn another way of thinking or a different strategy that can really take your business a new level of success.
9. No discount, add value.
Each time you give a discount, is taking money directly from your pocket and directly from their bottom line. So do not do. Instead, create added value propositions across its product or service lines.
Whatever the industry, seeks to maintain its prices and increase margins with the “bonus” extra low cost or no cost and with all sorts of offers freemium.
In the end, those little things do not cost much, but increase your reputation and word of mouth to new customers and its customer base.
10. Be a coach.
Even if you do not receive training on business at first to help and guide its planning and operation, can get someone who is objective and is out of business later. It must be a person that you trust their advice to help business and to be accountable and get results.
Too often we think we have all the answers and we are the only people who can actually do things. The reality is that another pair of eyes can do wonders to see how you operate both inside and outside your business.
A stranger can also make sure you are getting the numbers you need to see the results you need to survive.
I hope that this initial list is valuable tips to help you clarify your ideas and help prioritize some activities in their planning and implementation of new business.
In life as in business there are no secrets, only information we do not know yet.
So get ready as best you can, knowing right away that will have to make changes and corrections in your life. But armed with the right strategies from the beginning, you can shorten the time it takes to successfully reach their final destination whatever it is.
10 Tips for starting a business
In most cases, the implementation, the success or failure has to do with knowing both how and why such action and always be clear what steps to take next.
To help this process, there are 10 essential things you need to know about starting a successful business. Use it as a checklist to ensure that their thinking and business plan are on track or need more information about your market, your product or service.
1. Provide what people want to buy, not just what you want to sell.
Too often, people start a business around a product or service that you expect to succeed, rather than one that is already shown to have a market.
What do I mean?
Instead of creating and selling a new footwear with the latest in fashion design and materials would be much better from a business perspective, focusing on the category of footwear in general (a category that demonstrated by the people buy shoes every days) and then focus more specifically on the niche of high-performance sports shoes (which can even be sold in a shoe department retail). Better to have a small part of a broad category that much no market at all.
2. Have cash flow as soon as possible.
Cash flow is the lifeblood of business, and is absolutely essential to fuel profits. So you need to find a way to immediately start taking cash flow.
How is that done?
In a professional services firm, you may request advances balances due on delivery.
You can do the same in retail, especially in high-priced items or specialized payment and position as a value and a way to ensure delivery on a certain date.
You can also add value to generic items by creating their own brands and develop ongoing programs, where customers pay a monthly fee in advance to ensure delivery or availability of items to be purchased on a recurring basis. Of course, the key is to ensure that there is little or no difference between the time you pay for the job, the stock-and when you actually get paid. The ideal is to find ways to get money up front, and the difference in cash will not be a problem.
3. Always find new ways to keep costs down.
All cash flow in the world is worthless if it is not cash flow positive, which means you have to bring more money you pay.
This requires you to keep your costs and expenses down. The main idea is to never never pay retail and look for items used or gently used to furnish your office or commercial space.
Pay suppliers in advance also gives you leverage to negotiate better prices. Especially in this economic environment where credit is scarce, suppliers are more willing than ever to find creative ways to fund operations, and this is a trend likely to continue for some time.
4. Planning, always overestimate expenses and underestimate revenues.
I’ve never seen starting a business where the costs were at least 30 percent more than originally planned or expected, and revenues are at least much less.
Be conservative in your numbers, does not mean they are willing to accept those numbers, it just means you are arming themselves with information that you can work and work harder. This means that you can measure the kind of effort and activities needed to invest in sales and marketing.
5. Focus on sales and marketing.
In business, nothing happens until a sale is made. From the beginning, you have to find a good way to get leads, convert leads into sales, and be sure to keep getting sales.
The way to do this is to find or create a funnel of sales and marketing system that can work, test, measure, one that anyone in your company can use.
Many entrepreneurs are focused on building the brand before starting to generate leads. That is exactly the wrong business. The prospects are always more important than your brand, so do not waste money building their brand at the expense of spending that same money to find new customers.
Soon discover that you can build your brand from below, instead of spending years and hundreds of thousands of dollars to build from the top. Do not assume that it will survive that long, because without prospects, will not!
How to implement this business opportunity
To implement this business opportunity, you need to know the type of people who go to the plaza. For example, it may be a very friendly atmosphere, where they are couples with young children. In this case, the opportunity would be to lure them with children’s products, like candy or games. I recommend you check the MERCA2 course, where we see how to make a perfect market research for a shopping center and observation.
Worldwide, the baby boomers or the generation born after the 2nd. World War, has become older adults who have money and need more specialized services.
This business opportunity low investment has to do with their care, through services that make life easier for these people. Read the rest of this entry »
Success in business and in life requires an open mind
Success in business and in life requires an open mind. To succeed, you must be willing to learn and that means becoming a student.
“Formal education will give you a life, free education will give you a fortune,” says Johnna Parr, author of “When the Dream is Big Enough.” Entrepreneur who runs with her husband Matt a network marketing business, Parr never thought being a good student. But when she was trying to start his own business, he realized that I had to learn the lessons of those who were already successful.
“I hear and I absorbed all the knowledge of business leaders,” said Parr. “I took notes, review and implement what they learned.” Parr today is that student teacher, she helps other entrepreneurs to realize their ambitions. One of the first things she tells her prospective entrepreneurs is that they have to be educators.
Parr said that all businesses go through different stages of learning
Stage 1: “I know nothing”
When people start a new career, students tend to be enthusiastic, listen to educational tapes, conference calls, reading books and formulas are set by industry leaders. His business began to grow. But no one stays in this stage forever.
Stage 2: “I know everything”
Sooner or later, everyone goes through this stage, often destroying their business in the process. “Some people mistakenly believe that if they achieve a goal, or have any success, no longer need to learn and grow,” said Parr. But this thought leads to a business stalled stalled.
Stage 3: “I do not know everything”
Entrepreneurs in the third stage they know they can bring good ideas to the table, but also realize the importance of the contributions of others. They are a creative and never stop trying to grow and improve as leaders. Because they are good students, they also become good teachers. The belief in themselves and their goals allowed to agree to disagree on important issues.
Few people naturally possess the skills to succeed in your business. Success is a journey that requires the ability to teach and learn. Without these qualities, to realize the dream may be impossible.
Three key Businesses on line
Consumer Management
Looking ahead, consumers aware about the management is very important for anyone who runs an Internet business. With good customer management, business can be much more understanding how the needs of each customer so that it can provide the best service as expected by each customer.
For internet businesses, the need for good customer database, at this early stage is very important. And then followed with a good customer database management.
Data Analysis
Each data obtained from the website you then need to be translated to be useful for business purposes. This is where the role of analysis is very important. Any data obtained from the use of various tools, need to be analyzed so that it can be used as a starting point in the next ACTION.
Conversion
The big problem that many business people descend on the internet is a conversion. The trend increase in demand for conversion will be increasingly large in the coming years. Here something to do with the trend analysis of the data above, how do you translate each data held for ACTION that is done can result in increased conversions.