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Sher-Lee’s kids were intrigued by the idea of receiving mail but, unfortunately, they almost never received any. Inspired by their interest, Sherri-Lee formulated a business that would deliver postcards to those kids who loved to receive mail.
Facebook Fan Pages are changing marketing for the better. Watch this video and find out how.
YODEL METER, 1925
An early version of American Idol?
VENETIAN BLIND SUNGLASSES, 1950
It was a bad idea then, it’s a bad idea now. Sorry, Kanye.
TV GLASSES, 1963
MUST see TV.
DOG RESTRAINER, 1940
Yes, it’s so much easier to use than a leash.
Photo by LIFE Magazine.
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Last month, the Center for Women’s Business Research released a study which found that 28 percent, or an estimated 8 million, of all U.S. businesses were women-owned, reports The New York Times.
The study also showed that those 8 million cross-industry businesses created or maintained 16 percent of the country’s jobs.
However, only 4.2 percent of the nation’s revenue is generated by women-owned businesses. The Center plans to approach the Obama administration, the Small Business Administration, and House and Senate small-business committees to request more resources and programs in support of the women business owners.
On how the sector of support for women business owners needs to expand, executive director of the national Women’s Business Council, Margaret Barton said, “Women really have to fall in love with running a business. They have to move into the state about being excited and motivated by running a business. We need help with that area.”
Photo by biewoef.
Although technology and the Internet have taken a beating in the past for potentially limiting people’s social interaction, a new study from the Pew Research Center has found that the opposite might be true, reports CNet News.
According to a Pew Internet Personal Networks and Community survey, which polled 2,512 adults, the dawn of new technology and the Internet has not caused people to withdraw from society.
In fact, the study found that “the extent of social isolation has hardly changed since 1985, contrary to concerns that the prevalence of severe isolation has tripled since then.” Pew said that 6 percent of the entire U.S. adult population currently has “no one with whom they can discuss important matters or who they consider to be ‘especially significant’ in their life.”
That said, Pew did find that Americans’ “discussion networks”–a measure of people’s “most important social ties”–have shrunk “by about a third since 1985″ from three people to two.
However, Pew found no evidence to suggest that it had anything to do with mobile phones or the Internet. In fact, the organization’s study found that mobile-phone use and active Web participation yields “larger and more diverse core discussion networks.”
Photo by alxsanchez.
In business, as in poker, sometimes you have to know when to fold ‘em. So says serial entrepreneur and blogger Eric Ries on GigaOM.
Ries takes the lessons he’s learned from watching the World Series of Poker and explains how entrepreneurs and poker players share many of the same qualities. Namely, “Both rely on acting strategically under conditions of extreme uncertainty.
And, in both, small changes in your odds of winning can have a big impact on the final outcome.” Ries goes on to point out that just as in poker where amateur players sometimes beat the pros, many successful businesses are run by generally poor entrepreneurs. A frustrating truth in both cards and business.
As Ries says, “Just because someone has had a success doesn’t necessarily mean they understand why they were successful at all.”
Photo by stelogic.
Tech entrepreneur Neil Patel shares some advice on his blog, QuickSprout, about the benefits of having a business partner, and how to find the right one.
Patel, who admits he’s been through his share of partnerships, warns that the union can be as tumultuous as a marriage and recommends setting expectations for each partner on day one.
To that end, he suggests “sealing the deal” by putting both names on the LLC — with clearly delineated percentages — to prevent issues with money or ownership.
Photo by spekulator .
Google’s ever-expanding product line just got even bigger thanks to its new Commerce Search, a search function tailored for retailers.
The service, which incorporates Google’s search capabilities into your online store, carries a price tag of $50,000 a year according to TechCrunch, but Google says it’s worth it.
Their claim is that faster search speed will help customers navigate to what they want quickly, making them more likely to buy.
Other perks include the ability to customize the search function to match the rest of your site and integration of other Google products like Google Analytics.
Photo by Google.
In the fall of 2004 a young mother in Sac City took the entrepreneurial plunge, turning her home bread and baking passion to a business, with a location just off U.S. Highway 20 and an ambitious marketing and sales schedule.
Amanda Lynch, 32, a Sac City native and president and founder of The Beer Bread Company, is one busy Iowan. In addition to churning out bread and dip mixes, Lynch and her husband, Chad, an employee of Evapco, are raising five daughters – all under age 9.
The Beer Bread Company finds itself at something of a crossroads. After smashing success at food and craft shows around the Midwest, Lynch is now moving her product into more stores (including The Apothecary in Carroll). Lynch is employing 10 people part-time and producing 3,000 to 5,000 packages of beer bread mix.
“I know I’ve got a good thing here,” Lynch said. “It’s convenience, and people want convenience.”
Logo from The Beer Bread Company
When that idea hits for the perfect invention some people might ignore it. However, an inventor will do something about it. To go from idea to final product takes a lot of work and a solid design.
Bret Schaller, the founder of Schaller Industries, Inc and co-founder of Willow Creek Animal Hospital, understands the process all too well. Not only is he an entrepreneur, he has experience in CAD (Computer Aided Design) and he’s designed his own projects (like the easel shown above). Through his business Bret is able to help inventors take their idea and turn it into something physical.
First, tell us a little about Schaller Industries, Inc.
Schaller Industries, Inc is both a consulting and a virtual manufacturing business. As SI finishes its 2nd year of operation we have a small client list and one product. The product was designed and prototyped in house. Production manufacturing, including packaging is outsourced to a local business.
When was it launched and what inspired you to start your business?
SI incorporated 1/1/2008 and immediately started work redesigning a bank building into an animal hospital. Inspiration to leave a 6 figure salary with excellent benefits came from several different areas. First I have a passion for product development. Working through new concepts, prototypes, testing, tooling, assembly, all the phases creates many opportunities for setbacks and problems to occur. Every time I resolve one of these setbacks, come up with the key solution that gets the project back on track, I get the feeling like kicking the winning goal, or running in the touchdown.
Second my wife’s dream to start her own animal hospital was a huge financial challenge. Acquiring the necessary funding meant putting our house on the line. Failure was not an option. The biggest fear was signing on with a general contractor that didn’t finish on time. We did not have enough money to miss the launch date. Crazy or not, I ran the project. Applying my analytical approach and problem solving skills, I knocked down every wall, jumped every hurdle, and came out on time and on budget. (Well maybe not entirely on budget, I never actually got paid for that first project.)
What are some of the steps that you and your client take that helps turn their idea into a salable product?
The process starts with an informal design review. I spend about an hour over the phone going over their concept and discussing all the potential concerns. Are there new, unproven concepts or aspects to their idea? What level of proof of concept testing is merited before investing in design time or tooling? Do they plan to bootstrap their launch with low cost tooling and small initial volumes? Do they have funding and the confidence to go big with high volume tooling and a manufacturing base capable of ramping up very quickly?
After these questions the marketing specifications are identified. Next I convert the marketing specs into engineering specs. This is something like ‘I want 3 speed settings’ becomes 10, 25, and 50 cycles per minute.
Conceptual models of their product are created in Solidworks and shared with the clients via eDrawings. The viewer is like a pdf viewer for 3 dimensional models. It’s a free download that lets the user rotate the assemblies, explode them, take cross sections, and even hide/show different components. It gives the clients total freedom to see all aspects of their product in a virtual space without the expensive of rapid prototypes.
As needed, multiple iterations of their concepts are carried out until the product is ready for prototyping and testing. Testing is tailored to the specific product. The level of complexity, intended usage, and duty cycle are all factors that determine what type and how much testing is necessary.
Following the testing phase is tooling fabrication, trials, packaging, literature, and finally launch.
Not every phase is required. For an idea intended to be licensed, the process could be complete with the conceptual models and a video animation. This may be sufficient to make the sale to a corporate team.
On average, how long does it take to reach that final product?
There’s not really an average time. The products I have worked on have all been very different. The children’s easels were designed, prototyped and tooled up for production in about 3 months. For a product made from injection molded plastic, requiring multiple tools the complete timeline can be anywhere from 3 months to over a year.
What separates your business from the competition?
My experience with Buell Motorcycle Company separates me from most of the competition. If you consider all the parts that go into a complete motorcycle, every manufacturing process available is represented. Over 9 years I worked in depth with injection molding, thermoforming, machining, casting, forging, tube bending, sheet metal, weldments, and many many prototyping processes. There are many design engineers with experience in a few of these areas. Finding someone that has worked in all of them is rare. I am confident that I can match my client’s products to the best manufacturing process for their budget and marketing plan.
Tell us a little about the Willow Creek Animal Hospital.
Willow Creek Animal Hospital has been open for a year and a half now. We specialize in small animals and offer services in medicine, surgery, dentistry, grooming, and boarding. Currently we have a staff of 11 people. My wife focuses on medicine and I manage the rest. One thing a little different about our hospital having an engineer on staff is in the level of technology we use. We have paperless records which many hospitals have switched to. We also have a 36” flatscreen monitor in our treatment area that functions as a live whiteboard. It lists every patient in the building and their needs, it also has a timer for people waiting up front. Everyone in the back can see who’s been waiting the longest and exactly how many minutes they have been in the building. With remote access, our doctor can bring up any records offsite to assist with emergency phone calls or just to complete writing records from home at night. Inventory is also tracked in the same system. I setup the security cameras so that I can see live video from my cellphone. When an alarm is tripped, my system calls my phone. In less than a minute I can see inside the building on my phone to determine if a dog is walking around or a person. With a high resolution, wireless camera, the doctor can also see inside a cage for a visual check on a patient or to see the equipment screens on the IV pump, or vital stats monitor.
How did you get started with the idea to turn an old bank into an animal hospital? What was the process like?
We liked the idea of utilizing an existing building in our town. It improves the appearance and costs less than building new. Location and size were the major points. We found both. I spent 4 weeks designing the layout. I had to work around the vault (12” steel reinforced concrete walls and ceiling) and the plumbing constraints. We needed sinks in the exam rooms so new drains were needed in the foundation. It came down to the depth of the building’s main drain as to how far across the building I could place a sink and still meet the slope requirements for the plumbing code. The vault functions perfectly as our radiology suite. The post installation inspection was unable to register any radiation on their meter coming through the walls.
In all, I spent 4 months renovating the building with the help of some local workers I hired and professional subcontractors for plumbing and wiring. The low point – sitting on the front step with the street blocked off out front, the Burger King next door evacuated, and 3 firetrucks, 2 city trucks, a back hoe, several police cars, and a small crowd of people watching the hazard suited people fixing the natural gas line we severed putting in a fence post. Yes, I did call before we dug the holes and the gas company admitted it was their fault. The open house was the definitely the highest point. We had literally a couple of hundred people come through and commenting on the 12’ ceilings, the ceramic tile floors, the dark wood cabinetry in the exam rooms, the custom built cat condos, it was great. I hadn’t been to sleep in over 24 hours because of all the last minute work I had to do, but I still enjoyed it immensely.
I can only imagine the work that goes into running two businesses so successfully. What goals do you still hope to accomplish with each business?
I named my consulting business Schaller Industries because I have 4 sons. I hope one or maybe all of them will want to work with me someday. While both businesses are currently profitable, my wife and I both believe in continuous improvement. We would like to see the animal hospital reach a point where a second doctor can operate the practice while we take some much needed family vacation time. For Schaller Industries I would like to launch one of my own products that produces sustainable income sufficient to allow for more family time.
Are there any new business ideas in the works?
My Core Revolution training product is ready for production. I just need to sell the children’s easels to pay for the tooling.
What are some of the lessons you have learned from each business?
From the animal hospital:
Get 3 bids on your SBA loan or any banking product. They are not all the same, and the people selling them, while they may work at a bank, are not necessarily expert financial planners. Do not tie up all of your available credit – ever. Not at the start, not during the initial phases, not during the first year, not ever. Solving problems is much easier when there’s some cash available.
From Schaller Industries:
Educate your clients. If they understand the work your doing, whey you’re doing it, and how it helps launch their product they will most likely tell their friends and generate referrals.
Founder Maxine Clark tells Fortune Small Business how she built Build-a-Bear Workshop into a $468 million business.
Early in my career, Stanley Goodman, who was then CEO of May, said something that has stuck with me: “Retailing is entertainment, and when customers have fun, they spend more money.” I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, but I knew it would involve children, because kids know how to enjoy themselves.
I may not have invented the idea of making a stuffed animal, but I did provide a venue for it. When I started Build-a-Bear Workshop, most malls had little to offer children. The stuffed-animal business was mostly seasonal, but I didn’t let the way others made or sold stuffed animals deter me. Our concept was based on customization and guest entertainment.
Adults told me my idea wouldn’t work. “Who wants to make their own stuffed animals?” they argued. But every kid said, “Where is it? When can I do it?”
Continue Reading: “How Build-a-Bear Invented A Bear Market”
Photo by Build-a-Bear.
It’s now easy to offer printable coupons on your Web site, thanks to OneMinuteCoupon reports Small Business Computing.
It’s a simple service, and here’s how it works.
First of all create a free account on the site, then create your coupon using the online editor — you can even include your own images in there — and then copy-and-paste the provided html code into your own Web site; simple as that.
Photo by OneMinuteCoupon.
photo credit: Domain Barnyard
In sales we all know that quality leads are the key to our success, and we all are on the hunt for new ways to generate these quality leads in order to boost our sales numbers. I came across an interesting article located on Duct Tape Marketing that suggests speaking for free at conventions in order to create these quality leads.
Instead of charging a couple thousand dollar fee for speaking at a conference and maybe selling one product at the end, why not speak for free and walk away at the end with 20 or more quality leads that could end up turning into 10 or more sales? When you do the math, that is a lot more money in your pocket when you speak for free and walk away with more leads to follow up on.
Set up some sort of deal with the sponsor of the event, let them know you are willing to waive your usual fee for speaking in return for them allowing you to request the audiences information in order to make sales at a later date. Also offer the customers some free items in exchange for allowing you to take their information with you.
At the end answer questions, make free offers, and, almost as an afterthought, agree to let them also bring a friend to the event you mentioned at the same price if they sign-up today. (You’ve just made the event half price in their mind, turned them into a recruiter, and given your potential attendee a valuable tool to offer to a friend or colleague) So, all of a sudden, anyone considering the offer is now highly motivated by this compelling change of events.
To members of its Amazon Associates program, Amazon.com is promoting Twitter integration for affiliate links writes Downloadsquad.com.
People have been posting Amazon links to Twitter for just about as long as Twitter’s been around, but now it’s an insanely easy two-click process, using the toolbar on any product page.
This is good news for Associates, making Twitter a viable place to pick up some extra clicks and sales.
The messages don’t auto-post to your account, they just redirect you to Twitter.com with a pre-filled tweet.
The text before the product names seem to rotate, and it includea stuff like “Great deal on,” “Check out,” and “Just saw on Amazon.”
I guess that’ll make people who post frequent product links look a little bit less like spammers.
Photo by downloadsquad.
To reduce the number of plastic water bottles that end up in landfills, consumers are encouraged to buy reusable bottles reports trendspotter Springwise.
Since those can be bulky to carry along, a company in Thousand Oaks, California designed an alternative.
Vapur is a reusable water bottle that flattens when empty. Like a regular bottle, it stands upright when full. But when it’s empty, users can fold or roll it up to stick it in a pocket or a purse.
Made of ultra-durable three-ply, BPA-free polymer, Vapur bottles can be cleaned in a dishwasher’s top rack and can be frozen to keep water cool.
Vapur’s eco-creds aren’t limited to their day-to-day use: since the bottles can be shipped flat, they’re also greener to ship from manufacturer to distributors and consumers. All in all, it’s an innovative way to make it more convenient for consumers to drink and carry tap water.
Photo by name.
Small Business Computing has a great review of a free biz tool.
If you currently use Google alerts as a research tool or to be notified whenever your business is mentioned online, then you’ll love FiltrBox.com. It’s kind of like Google Alerts on steroids.
Now the downside to Google Alerts is that it only gives you results from the Web. FiltrBox on the other hand, searches offline publications including major newspapers and magazines, as well as blogs and even Twitter.
FiltrBox is very easy to set up, they’ll send you a daily briefing e-mail, which is very nicely laid out and easy to read.
Now what’s interesting is that this kind of clipping service used to cost many thousands of dollars a month, but it’s now completely free. There’s also a premium paid version of the system available that gives you unlimited search terms and other benefits.
Photo by FiltrBox.
If Twitter can be used to track packages, publish school menus and crowdfund startups, why not help tackle the US healthcare crisis too, asks trendspotter Springwise.
Cell phones are already changing the way healthcare is delivered in the developing world, after all, and now Twitter promises to transform the delivery of healthcare information for stateside consumers.
ASKch is a new service from Nashville-based healthcare information provider Change:Healthcare that allows users to send quick healthcare questions via Twitter and have them answered within 60 seconds.
Consumers can simply tweet a question such as, “what is diabetes” to @askch, which is now in beta; in return, they get a short description of the disease and a link to more information.
Where else could Twitter be used to answer consumers’ standard questions quickly and in real time…a business opportunity?
Photo by ASKch.
An old family recipe launched a successful home-based business for Donna Gabrilson a few years ago.
Now Gabrilson and her daughter and business partner, Stacey Barnes, have embraced a new brand to grow their Scottsdale-based GoodyTwos Toffee Company.
In 2004, the newly divorced Gabrilson wanted to make some extra money, so she began selling toffee made from her great-grandmother’s recipe at area farmer’s markets. “It was always a big Christmas treat that I would make for friends and family,” she said.
Two years ago, Barnes joined her mother in the business and they opened the retail shop in 2008. The two feared they might have a dismal holiday season, typically their peak selling time. But the corporate orders started arriving in December and they worked around the clock making batch after batch of toffee. Barnes specializes in adorable, colorful packaging. They sold 8,000 pounds – better than they expected.
After Christmas, mother and daughter rethought their business. They had never nationally trademarked the Market Street name, and there was a similar business in North Carolina. After consulting with lawyers, they decided to rebrand.
They worked with Cindy Gombert, owner of Scottsdale-based Lunabrand Design Group. “The really great thing we found about them was a great relationship between mother and daughter,” Gombert said. “The mother is based on tradition and the daughter was really contemporary and wanted to push the limits. There’s your brand.”
They changed the name to GoodyTwos Toffee Company and the new logo is a silhouette of them both. They added a shot of bright apple green to their crisp brown and white color palette.
Rebranding meant adding contemporary flavors. They spent the summer tasting a lot of toffee, adding several flavors, including Sweet and Salty, made with dark chocolate with a sea salt crunch, and Double Trouble, made with peanuts and milk chocolate and topped with miniature peanut butter cups. There’s a seasonal Peppermint Bark as well. Unlike traditional pull-your-fillings-out toffee, GoodyTwos has a delicate crunch and rich chocolate finish.
Image from GoodyTwos Toffee Company
Fortune Small Business reports that Saul Griffith gets up to 30 e-mails a day from qualified scientists eager to work for him. He can’t afford to hire them, so he wants to inspire them to be entrepreneurs instead.
Pithy articles about genius boys be damned,” says the 35-year-old Australian, thumping the table at a San Francisco coffeehouse. “There are more important things to cover a page with. I’ll give you one graphic with 600 new business models in it. Done.”
Griffith is talking about WattzOn.com, a Web site that calculates your precise impact on the environment — not just the energy it takes to heat your house or run your car, but the energy needed to manufacture all your possessions, as well as the energy the government hogs with your taxes. With all that data, WattzOn produces a detailed pie chart of your life. It’s a shocking sight, and it’s also where the new business models come in.
“Pick any one slice of that pie, figure out how to do that slice with 10 times less energy, and you have a billion-dollar company,” says Griffith, who launched WattzOn last year as a side project. “It’s that easy.” So much so, he says, that he’s using WattzOn to come up with ideas for his next 10 companies.
Photo by WattzOn.
For all the continual media frenzy over Facebook and Twitter, the most remarkable social networking story of all may well be LinkedIn, the global social network for business professionals founded by serial Silicon Valley entrepreneur Reid Hoffman in December 2002 reports The Telegraph.
While the LinkedIn 50 million may pale in comparison with the Facebook 300 million army, its achievement is quite remarkable when one considers that there are only around 360 million white collar professional people in the entire world (at least according to the latest International Department of Labor numbers).
So over 10% of the world’s professionals are already on LinkedIn. And with the social network now signing up a new member every second of every hour of every day, it shouldn’t be too long before the other 90% of the world’s business professionals eventually wind up in the LinkedIn universe.
According to Kevin Eyres, the London based Managing Director of LinkedIn’s European operation, it’s all about professionals now “taking more responsibility for their own careers.”
In the current recession, he explained to me when we spoke on the telephone yesterday, everyone is “thinking like an entrepreneur.” Getting onto LinkedIn allows us to be “proactive” in building our own networks, finding new staff, rebuilding one’s career, “showcasing” skills and, above all perhaps, organizing one’s “reputation”.
Photo by LinkedIn.
Weddings are expensive. So are engagement rings and honeymoons and everything else peripherally associated with your nuptials so Valentine’s Jewelry, is trying to help you keep costs down writes WalletPop.
The jeweler has teamed up with Royal Caribbean and Norwegian Cruise Lines to put together a really awesome offer. Customers who purchase engagement rings from Valentine’s will be given a certificate for a free, 8-day, 7-night Caribbean cruise for two with either of the two cruise lines, to be redeemed within one year.
The store is located in Virginia, but online purchases count toward the promotion as well.
Pretty sweet deal, huh? It’s not just for newlyweds — buy any diamond ring that meets the above specifications and you’ll get the cruise, too. Maybe you aren’t even in the market for a diamond ring, but you were about to buy a cruise. You could think of this as a free diamond ring with the purchase of a cruise!
Photo by andreyutzu.
For people who have either been forced out of their jobs or have always wished they could work for themselves, the idea of owning a small business, at first glance, may seem like a wish come true, an article in The Portland Business Journal explains.
This is the point, however, when a beginning entrepreneur needs to become familiar with the “E Myth,” which outlines what every business owner needs to know to be successful. There are a variety of E Myth books and seminars, but the one volume that explains “what every successful entrepreneur does” is Michael Gerber’s E Myth Mastery: The Seven Essential Disciplines for Building a World Class Company.
Gerber addresses the problems faced by people who are skilled in one particular area — say, baking, painting, web design — and then decide to make the leap from being an excellent technician to being an entrepreneur.
Gerber’s experience with thousands of fledgling entrepreneurs reflects his belief that anyone in any business can run a “world class company.” In order to do so, however, a neophyte businessperson needs to focus on running a company rather than letting the company run him or her.
In Gerber’s words “The truth is that knowing how to do the work of a business has nothing to do with building a business that works. The technician builds a business that depends upon him, around his skills, his talent, his interests, and his predispositions.
In the end, however, there is little equity to show for the investment of his time. The entrepreneur, on the other hand, builds an enterprise that liberates her, creates endless amounts of energy, and increases her financial, emotional, and mental capital exponentially.”
Photo by HarperCollins.
U.S. companies hurt by the global credit crisis are continuing to hold more cash, even as the economy begins to show signs of improvement, The Wall Street Journal said, citing its analysis of company filings.
In the second quarter, the 500 largest non-financial U.S. companies by total assets held about $994 billion in cash and short-term investments, or 9.8 percent of their assets, according to the paper’s analysis of corporate filings.
The trend seems to have continued in the third quarter, despite an improving economy, the paper said.
The 248 companies that have reported third-quarter results so far saw their cash holdings go up by a percentage point sequentially to 11.1 percent of assets, the paper said.
Photo by adamci.
Eve Tahmincioglu at MSN Business has an interesting article about start-up business scammers.
Just ask V.M. from the Austin, Texas, area. A longtime entrepreneur in the home-building industry, he had visions of launching his own online travel and health-care insurance business but ended up out nearly $5,000. He didn’t want his name used because he’s still fighting for a refund from the company that scammed him, but his experience is a cautionary tale for anyone desperate to start a business and tempted by Web-riches hyperbole.
V.M. was initially contacted via telephone by a representative of an Internet-based company that claimed it could set up Web sites for him and that he’d be able to make more than $3,000 a month from people going to the sites. He immediately checked out the company online, coming to the conclusion that “the site looked pretty decent.”
Even though he had been a successful entrepreneur and retired several years earlier, the stock market decimated his savings and he decided to start yet another business. An Internet company seemed ideal because he wanted to work from home — and the concept seemed simple enough.
V.M. has never seen a penny, even though he said customers did use the site. He contacted the Better Business Bureau and found out the firm had a long list of complaints against it. And when he complained to the company and threatened to sue if he didn’t get a refund, he said a company representative told him, “You can sue us but no one has ever gotten money back.”
Photo by dreamjay.
Shirley Broback, 34, was awarded the SavvyMom Mom Entrepreneur of the Year Award for her work as producer of the Vancouver Island Baby Fair and says her win proves that self-described regular women like her can make a big difference with big dreams and big effort.
“It shows you don’t have to be a big shot, just a regular person with some big plans and the confidence to put your plans into action,” Broback said.
Broback beat out 316 other nominees across the country to win the distinction of being named Canada’s top mom-entrepreneur along with $15,500 in cash and business services. She’s overjoyed to win but credits her clients and friends for helping to make her nomination possible.
“It’s such an honour to win the award. I had so many friends and family and exhibitors rallying for me. The prizes are incredible and the exposure is just phenomenal. I think it can be inspiring to other mom entrepreneurs,” Broback said.
Screenshot from the Vancouver Island Baby Fair
The following is a guest post by David Gash.
When starting a new business, entrepreneurs invariably face the brutal moment when they realize something needs to be done and they just don’t know how to do it. We let dentists fix our teeth and mechanics fix our cars; so why do we expect that when running a small business we can do everything ourselves?
The key to a successful business, especially in start-up mode, is the ability of the owner to look at the wall and say, “Mirror Mirror, on the wall…what should I hire someone else to do?” Ok, it doesn’t rhyme but it also isn’t a fairy tale. By carefully selecting professionals to support core functions of your business, you will ensure things get done right the first time and allow you the freedom to do what you do best.
When we discuss things like taxes, business leases and legal documents, it seems a no-brainer to hire someone educated and even licensed to handle these things for us. When you start thinking about things like marketing and advertising, the lines begin to blur and you begin to wonder if you should try to save some money and wing it. As a new business, you will get calls from everyone from the yellow page sales rep to the local newspaper.
How do you know which is right for your business? How do you know what you will ultimately need? One of the best places to start is to look at your competitors. If you offer a service like landscaping, chances are you’ll need to be found in the yellow pages or local phone directory. If you offer personal care products that are available online, chances are that you will do just as well skipping the ad in the phone book.
Now, when it comes to things like business cards, brochures, color ads, and flyers, being cheap shows and this definitely isn’t the place to cut corners. Consider the money you will spend hiring a professional more like an investment in new business. Your business needs to look confident and the best way to do that is to hire a professional graphic designer to put together a comprehensive branding package. Before you invest, spend some time deciding what things you really need. Just about everyone needs business cards but very few businesses need, or use, printed envelopes. Decide what you need before you begin talking to a designer.
If you’ve never hired a professional designer before, don’t worry. Graphic designers aren’t expecting you to have all the answers. They should listen to your point of view, get a feel for your business and its style, understand what colors or themes you have in mind and then be able to put together a professional logo and assorted materials for you to use throughout your business. Companies like Prova Advertising take it a bit further and add in the element of fun. Imagine running a contest that lets professional, freelance graphic designers compete for your business. You get to set the budget and reap the rewards. An approach like that can definitely take the drudgery out of getting your marketing materials in top shape.
Whatever decision you are facing as a business owner, consider the impression that you will give to the outside world and hire a professional when that decision will make a difference between you gaining the confidence of a new customer or making them wonder if you’re really serious about your business.
Your job as a business owner is to decide what you do best and do it. Any time you spend outside of those tasks ultimately will lose your business money. You need to focus on your core strengths and hire employees or consultants to handle what they specialize in. When you have everyone focused on their core responsibilities and not distracted with other tasks, your business will take off and allow you the freedom to enjoy being an entrepreneur.
David Gash is the founder of Prova Advertising, a company that is revolutionizing the way that businesses meet their advertisement needs. Prova promotes crowdsourcing with an ingenious approach that allows small to medium sized businesses to launch Ad Design Contests in order to find the best design talent at YOUR price.
photo credit: midiman
Making money takes practice, just like playing the piano takes practice. No one expects anyone to be any good at the piano unless they’ve put in lots practice. Same with making money. The more you practice the better you get. Eventually making money is as easy for you as piano is for someone who’s been playing for 10 years.This is one of the reasons I encourage entrepreneurs to bootstrap instead of taking outside money. On day one, a bootstrapped company sets out to make money. They have no choice, really. On day one a funded company sets out to spend money. They hire, they buy, they invest, they spend. Making money isn’t important yet. They practice spending, not making.
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