People are worried about 2008 in United States. Why? Many think there is recession. Others think calamities are coming. There are lot of talks but I know what will happen. Your business will have a geometric growth this year. Why? Let me explain.

For the past 19 years, almost each and every client that has come to me has asked me for something simple. They have simply asked for people with common sense. The problem is that there is no SENSE and there is no COMMONALITY whatsoever.

People sometimes ask me, "Seth why is it so important to you that you and for that matter others have a good handle on their finances?" Isn't it true that money can't buy happiness?

 

What does it mean to be an entrepreneur?
We often hear that being an entrepreneur requires taking great risks. I would like to explore a different point of view.

I wish I knew that someone distinguished business for me when I was younger. It would have made my life much simpler. But, like with all things in life, the most valuable information arrives at exactly the right time we need it to. It is my intention that this story arrives for you at exactly the right time.

What’s the deal with passion and business?

I often hear people say, “To be in business requires passion”, “Entrepreneurs need passion to be successful”, or “You won't make it in business without passion.” The list goes on and on.

My intention in this article is to discover if passion is truly required for business (or life for that matter).

The most effective pathway to achieving wealth is by owning your own business. In the book "The Next Great Bubble Boom" by Harry S. Dent he tells us that,

“The best single way to build wealth is to own your own business, especially one that can be systematically expanded or sold.”

Prepare yourself for a lesson in etymology.

The French word entrepreneur is derived from the verb "entreprendre." It comes from a great family of words such as "comprendre" and "apprendre" where the former means "to grasp, to include, to cover, to be understood" while the latter means "to learn, to inform, to find out, to teach." How appropriate for the business person today.

We live in a society that has a remarkable commitment to individuality and independence.

We all want to be successful as leaders of our business and in the organizations we belong to.

But, what is a leader? Are you a leader? How can you know for sure?

The game of business is simple. It is certainly not easy - yet, it is simple. The purpose of this two-part series is to provide practical steps for how to play the game of business, set your goals and play full out!

In the first part of this 2 series article we provided you with practical steps on the game of business. Now we are going to empower you with goal setting principles so you can set your goals and play full out! We call this "The Art and Science of Setting Goals in Business."

As an entrepreneur or small business owner/operator do you feel like you just don't have the time to handle everything you need to? Do things continuously fall through the cracks? Is being focused a challenge?

As a small business owner:

1. Have you hired a marketing company to increase sales – and got limited or no sales results?
2. Have you tried to increase sales, without having clarity on your marketing process and how it relates to your sales efforts?
3. Do you account for your revenue, but do not account for how many people know that your business exists?

If you answered “yes” to any of these three questions read on.

Can sales be easy and simple?

In part 1 of 2 this mini-series on marketing and sales (click here to read) we covered the importance of discerning between marketing and sales operationally and what we found is that marketing is not designed to produce sales. Marketing's only job, as a business process, is to produce prospects - or said operationally, people that know your business exists.

Imagine the following scenario.

You are playing your favourite team sport (hockey, basketball, volleyball, take your pick). You have had an exceptional season, and reached the finals. The championship is on the line. While preparing for the game, one of the best players suddenly, out of nowhere, says, “Everyone, thank you for coming. I can take it from here, by myself.”

Have you spoken the words "hard-work" recently?

It's an innocent statement to make, right? I mean, lots of people say it. Entrepreneurs say it. Business people say it. Parents say it. Children say it.

Buy why?!

In almost 23 years of being in the coaching industry and working with over 880 business owners and entrepreneurs, we have noticed many changes in the field of coaching.

The purpose of this article is to:

1. Define coaching
2. Outline its evolution
3. Describe the levels of coaching available in the marketplace
4. The future of coaching
5. Help you select a coach that is appropriate for your situation.

Businesses are all around us, yet very few people, actually know what makes businesses work or how they work. In the story¹ below we will be taking a look at a young pupil’s perspective at the different levels of labour that exist inside of a business, from the front-lines that do the work, to the middle management that supervises the work, to the executives that figure out what work to do, and to the ownership that creates the environment for the work to happen in the first place. The lesson is simple, yet profound, because for a business to work it requires people at all levels operating together to make a business functional.

The Story
One morning, a young pupil curious about life, went for a walk to the park. She had the idea of being a builder but did not know what to build.

What does it take to be a trained executive?

We spend most of our lives being trained to be good workers. Our universities train people for front-line work and management, yet there is very little in the way of true executive education.

There are many habits that cause businesses to fail. This much is certain.

In this series of articles we will be exploring some of the destructive habits we have noticed in our practice of coaching businesses, that people have adopted to undermine their ability to produce exceptional results.

Often, small businesses and self-employed individuals are not sure how to effectively make more money or have their desired lifestyle. In many cases, this is partially due to not understanding exactly how and why their business produces the results that it does. This lack of clarity and understanding leaves people ineffective at producing the desired results because they are not sure what to change in the way they run their business that would make the difference in achieving their goals and outcomes. Fundamentally, a business is a system made up of multiple parts that work together to produce certain results and outcomes, like a machine. Understanding what your business system or machine is designed for and how it works are the first steps to being effective at making more money and producing the desired results.

Research suggests that 5 - 10% of prospects are ready to buy right now. Some businesses focus on those ready to buy now and ignore the other 90 - 95%. The rest are waiting for something. Maybe they are waiting for the right time or for more information so that they are certain that they are making the best choice for them or to find the right information from the vast sea of information out in the world. Either way, that 90 - 95% are not ready to buy right now. Many businesses ignore these people to focus on the 5 - 10%. To ignore them is short-sighted when you can design a process for them to either remember your business when they are ready to buy or to speed up the timeframe in which they make a buying choice.

Businesses and self-employed individuals often have some combination of customers (one time buyers) and clients (repeat buyers) that compose their revenue. The percentage of customers to clients varies depending on the business model and the way the business is designed to work. Businesses that mostly go after or attract one time buyers have the challenge of constantly having to find new people to buy from them. This is like hunting where you can only reap the rewards once per kill. It can be stressful if the there is not an adequate marketing and sales system to consistently find enough new people and bring them in. It is also more work to market to new people and build enough trust for them to buy. Having a business designed to attract or go after repeat buyers is less work and provides more stable revenue. Here is how to set up your business to have repeat buyers.