Holidays are a little different for small businesses.
We aren't relieved that it is a break, we are fretting that we don't have as much income for a few days or a few weeks! Retail stores who are taking advantage of the buying season are not as strapped (not until January at least), while business to business companies often find things put on pause.
So what are some things that we can do during this time?
If you are experiencing a slowdown;
1. Plan for the new year. With the day-to-day rush of business, you probably don't have that much time to be strategic or reflect upon your business. Are you still going in the direction that you had originally set out? Are you still happy with what you business is doing?
2. Follow-up with customers and reinforce your relationships. Send out those emails, catch up on those emails that have been clogging your inbox, and call the people who are typically busy and unreachable. Just don't be too pushy. Although you will be able to reach some people that are typically busy, not all of the decision makers are going to be in the office. So it is still difficult to get things moving forward. So just aim to build the relationship, so that when they are busy again they will make time for you.
3. Rest. You don't get too many opportunities like this. You will be more prepared in the new year, if you take the time to refresh yourself now.
There is nothing that you can do about the slowdown during the holidays, so you may as well take advantage of it.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Should You Network With Other Small Businesses?
Time is money. As entrepreneurs, we know that.
Time is a huge factor when deciding which networking events to go to. Although many of them sound like fun (especially during the holidays), you should only go to the ones that help your company meet its objectives.
So should you consider going to small business networking events, even if small businesses aren't your customer base? Chances are there are still a ton of big advantages for you to attend these small business events. Here are a few:
1. Two heads are better than one.
If you have a small business challenge, there is a good chance that someone else at the event is going through the same thing or has in the past. Small businesses go through 90% of the same challenges at some point. Why not learn from someone else's experience and leapfrog these difficult moments?
2. Small business is willing to help.
If someone approaches an entrepreneur with a business idea, there is a much bigger chance that they are going to be willing to help make the idea work than the average person. Entrepreneurs are always looking for good ideas, so they are more open to them. Also, entrepreneurs have all experienced rough times and are more likely to help others in that stage.
3. They may not be your customers, but they may talk to your customers.
Even though a small business owner may not be your direct customer, if they have the same target market as you, they could very easily be an extension of your sales team. Why not partner and double your salesforce? Affiliations are a great way to extend your marketing reach, grow your salesforce, offer a wider range of services, and help you go head-to-head with the big guys.
4. Support could be more than just business support.
Being an entrepreneur can be lonely at times. A lot of responsibility is on you. Having people who are going through the same thing (dealing with cash flow, customer, economy, and time management concerns), can give you the emotional support that you are looking for.
So next time you are debating on which networking event to attend, take a second look at mingling with other small businesses. The opportunities could be limitless as Microsoft, IBM, and Wal-Mart were all small at some point.
Time is a huge factor when deciding which networking events to go to. Although many of them sound like fun (especially during the holidays), you should only go to the ones that help your company meet its objectives.
So should you consider going to small business networking events, even if small businesses aren't your customer base? Chances are there are still a ton of big advantages for you to attend these small business events. Here are a few:
1. Two heads are better than one.
If you have a small business challenge, there is a good chance that someone else at the event is going through the same thing or has in the past. Small businesses go through 90% of the same challenges at some point. Why not learn from someone else's experience and leapfrog these difficult moments?
2. Small business is willing to help.
If someone approaches an entrepreneur with a business idea, there is a much bigger chance that they are going to be willing to help make the idea work than the average person. Entrepreneurs are always looking for good ideas, so they are more open to them. Also, entrepreneurs have all experienced rough times and are more likely to help others in that stage.
3. They may not be your customers, but they may talk to your customers.
Even though a small business owner may not be your direct customer, if they have the same target market as you, they could very easily be an extension of your sales team. Why not partner and double your salesforce? Affiliations are a great way to extend your marketing reach, grow your salesforce, offer a wider range of services, and help you go head-to-head with the big guys.
4. Support could be more than just business support.
Being an entrepreneur can be lonely at times. A lot of responsibility is on you. Having people who are going through the same thing (dealing with cash flow, customer, economy, and time management concerns), can give you the emotional support that you are looking for.
So next time you are debating on which networking event to attend, take a second look at mingling with other small businesses. The opportunities could be limitless as Microsoft, IBM, and Wal-Mart were all small at some point.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Does social media make sense for your business?
Almost every single small business is talking about social media these days. It is one of those tools that small business can use to overcome many of the advantages that larger businesses have when it comes to marketing. Brains beat brawn.
The two concerns for small business is always time and money. Social media doesn't impact your money, so that biggest difficulty for small businesses and social media is the time it takes.
How do you overcome this? From the very beginning figure out if social media makes sense for your business.
Answer yes if you are using social media can be used to get more customers, more suppliers, more marketing opportunities in terms of interviews and webpage hits, or meet any other goal that your company has through doing social media, and this has worked for you in the past.
Answer no if your customers, suppliers, and traditional marketing connections don't have a facebook account. You can't achieve goals for your business if the contacts that will help you get there aren't using social media themselves.
Answer yes if you are trying to connect with peoplw who are also using it. This is great to reach people who are using social media for business themselves, people who have access to social media at work or home, or people who are online social media butterflys.
Answer no if you are trying to reach people uncomfortable with using technology, people without computers, and people too busy to use social media frequently.
The heart of this message is, don't spend the time necessary for social media if it doesn't add value to your business.
The two concerns for small business is always time and money. Social media doesn't impact your money, so that biggest difficulty for small businesses and social media is the time it takes.
How do you overcome this? From the very beginning figure out if social media makes sense for your business.
Answer yes if you are using social media can be used to get more customers, more suppliers, more marketing opportunities in terms of interviews and webpage hits, or meet any other goal that your company has through doing social media, and this has worked for you in the past.
Answer no if your customers, suppliers, and traditional marketing connections don't have a facebook account. You can't achieve goals for your business if the contacts that will help you get there aren't using social media themselves.
Answer yes if you are trying to connect with peoplw who are also using it. This is great to reach people who are using social media for business themselves, people who have access to social media at work or home, or people who are online social media butterflys.
Answer no if you are trying to reach people uncomfortable with using technology, people without computers, and people too busy to use social media frequently.
The heart of this message is, don't spend the time necessary for social media if it doesn't add value to your business.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Small Business Resources
Too little time...too much to get done. This is the life of an entrepreneur.
Not only does a small business owner clean the bathroom, but they are the CEO. They may not be naturally good at all of these roles and have a steep learning curve. For instance, someone who is cleaning residential facilities or making homemade peanut butter, may not know a lot about marketing and it will take them a while to figure out what works best for their company.
If you are already busy looking after your accounting, getting new clients, and actually doing the work that you said you would get done, when do you have time to be strategic? And even worse, when do you have the time to gather the necessary information in order to ensure that your strategies are going to make sense?
This blog's focus is going to be to provide a central place for small business owners to find out what is happening out there. Topics in the upcoming weeks will include:
1. Technology (The current question is how new iPhone applications can help business and how social media can best be used)
2. Taxation (The current question is how HST will affect small business?)
3. Government grants and program updates (The current question is how and is the OSEB program changing?)
4. Economy (The current question is whether the recovery is real or not? And what new business to get into based on the current economy?)
5. Trends (The current question is what is the next big thing? And how small businesses can take advantage of this?)
Also, the blogroll will be an added source of information.
The mission is to make this one place to keep track of what is going on out there. Saving you time to focus on what is important...your business.
Not only does a small business owner clean the bathroom, but they are the CEO. They may not be naturally good at all of these roles and have a steep learning curve. For instance, someone who is cleaning residential facilities or making homemade peanut butter, may not know a lot about marketing and it will take them a while to figure out what works best for their company.
If you are already busy looking after your accounting, getting new clients, and actually doing the work that you said you would get done, when do you have time to be strategic? And even worse, when do you have the time to gather the necessary information in order to ensure that your strategies are going to make sense?
This blog's focus is going to be to provide a central place for small business owners to find out what is happening out there. Topics in the upcoming weeks will include:
1. Technology (The current question is how new iPhone applications can help business and how social media can best be used)
2. Taxation (The current question is how HST will affect small business?)
3. Government grants and program updates (The current question is how and is the OSEB program changing?)
4. Economy (The current question is whether the recovery is real or not? And what new business to get into based on the current economy?)
5. Trends (The current question is what is the next big thing? And how small businesses can take advantage of this?)
Also, the blogroll will be an added source of information.
The mission is to make this one place to keep track of what is going on out there. Saving you time to focus on what is important...your business.
Monday, September 7, 2009
Business Isn't Rocket Science - Unless You are Making Rockets
Business can't be rocket science!
Who are some of the most successful entrepreneurs? Many of them dropped out of school or have been laid off from work in the past. Bill Gates never finished university, and children everywhere continue to quote example as evidence of why they shouldn't finish their homework. It is similar stories to this that have created the urban legion that "C" students own small business, "B" students work for the large corporations and government, and "A" students work for the "C" students.
If these successful entrepreneurs were so-called failures by society's standards at one point in time - wouldn't business have to be easy for them to be so good at it?
Business is easy. A business owner just has to do things that make sense in order to be successful.
So why doesn't everyone do this? The challenge is that business has achieved its own stereotype of being complicated. When an individual approaches a business problem, instead of pursuing the route that makes sense, they often think it should be more complicated. They follow what others have done for different businesses that have worked, as opposed to just sitting down and thinking about if it makes sense for them.
One example I've seen time and time again is a small business instantly using SEO (search engine optimization). Let's pretend that the company is a local barber who thinks that to promote their business they simply need to be ranked highly on Google's search engine. But if you are trying to target local clientele, your time and money is better spent putting up flyers at the local coffee shop or community centre. A barber shop trying to market their service through SEO has gotten wrapped up in what other companies where doing and talking about. SEO really didn't make sense for their business. This is just one example.
How do you ensure that you are doing things that make business sense?
First, do a quick numbers check for every business decision. If you aren't making money on something, you shouldn't do it. Let's use the SEO example from above. In order to be ranked highly in SEO, you need lots of partners and other websites to link to you. This takes a lot of time to develop the partnerships, and it also can take money in order to put advertising links on directory pages. In addition, most people don't find a barbershop online. Alternatively, the flyers are 10 cents a black and white copy, and are in the same location as the target market. When doing the numbers using both time and money, the flyers comes out as the better decision.
Second, re-consider your basic assumptions. Again with the SEO and the barbershop, the barber had assumed that all companies need a webpage, all webpages are designed to need SEO to be found on search engines, and that people search for a barber online. If we look at these three assumptions, we can see that they may not be logical. Most people find their barber since they are in the neighbourhood, the webpage could be used for people to book appointments or to have store hours, or maybe the barber doesn't even need a webpage.
By doing the numbers and testing basic assumptions, the barber would make better business decisions.
Remember, business is easy. And this really isn't rocket science - unless you are making rockets.
Who are some of the most successful entrepreneurs? Many of them dropped out of school or have been laid off from work in the past. Bill Gates never finished university, and children everywhere continue to quote example as evidence of why they shouldn't finish their homework. It is similar stories to this that have created the urban legion that "C" students own small business, "B" students work for the large corporations and government, and "A" students work for the "C" students.
If these successful entrepreneurs were so-called failures by society's standards at one point in time - wouldn't business have to be easy for them to be so good at it?
Business is easy. A business owner just has to do things that make sense in order to be successful.
So why doesn't everyone do this? The challenge is that business has achieved its own stereotype of being complicated. When an individual approaches a business problem, instead of pursuing the route that makes sense, they often think it should be more complicated. They follow what others have done for different businesses that have worked, as opposed to just sitting down and thinking about if it makes sense for them.
One example I've seen time and time again is a small business instantly using SEO (search engine optimization). Let's pretend that the company is a local barber who thinks that to promote their business they simply need to be ranked highly on Google's search engine. But if you are trying to target local clientele, your time and money is better spent putting up flyers at the local coffee shop or community centre. A barber shop trying to market their service through SEO has gotten wrapped up in what other companies where doing and talking about. SEO really didn't make sense for their business. This is just one example.
How do you ensure that you are doing things that make business sense?
First, do a quick numbers check for every business decision. If you aren't making money on something, you shouldn't do it. Let's use the SEO example from above. In order to be ranked highly in SEO, you need lots of partners and other websites to link to you. This takes a lot of time to develop the partnerships, and it also can take money in order to put advertising links on directory pages. In addition, most people don't find a barbershop online. Alternatively, the flyers are 10 cents a black and white copy, and are in the same location as the target market. When doing the numbers using both time and money, the flyers comes out as the better decision.
Second, re-consider your basic assumptions. Again with the SEO and the barbershop, the barber had assumed that all companies need a webpage, all webpages are designed to need SEO to be found on search engines, and that people search for a barber online. If we look at these three assumptions, we can see that they may not be logical. Most people find their barber since they are in the neighbourhood, the webpage could be used for people to book appointments or to have store hours, or maybe the barber doesn't even need a webpage.
By doing the numbers and testing basic assumptions, the barber would make better business decisions.
Remember, business is easy. And this really isn't rocket science - unless you are making rockets.
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