4 Things You Can Learn from the Best Business Blogs

Posted on May 18, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

Once,  you’ve made the decision to blog……you have something to say to your actual and target customers, Alex Honeywell, writing in The Daily Muse,  has come up with four things he thinks you can learn from the best business blogs.

1. Find your voice (and make it fun): this means not all blogs will be written alike. Some are more scholarly (not this one) and some less, but you’ve got to find your own voice, or a writing style that you feel most comfortable writing in. Making it fun means putting a little humor in your writing.

2. Package your content, especially with videos. Now, putting videos with your blog is well regarded by the search engines, but it’s time consuming. Will videos influence your customers to buy? We are reworking one of our school concepts to do video blogs, but it takes a lot of time.

3. Educate. We like to think that we’ve put stuff into this blog that is educational, and our audience generally agrees. Our comment button isn’t the easiest to find, but it’s there, and we hear about blogs that aren’t telling our audience something that they need.

4.  Go social. By this the author means link into Twitter and Facebook, but we caution on that, because you have to make sure your customers are on the social media you are using, otherwise you won’t get the response that makes the blog worthwhile.

Anyway, if you want to read more of Alex’ blog on this subject, it’s at http://bounceexchange.com/bounce/iframeCampaign?cv_id=72388152&visit_id=1283336

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Old School Business Practices Worth Bringing Back

Posted on May 14, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

We guess Harvard Business Review doesn’t think of themselves as ‘old school’.

And, if they keep coming up with good posts like this one, we agree.

HBR has recommended in this article bringing back some old school business practices, a novel idea. Don’t tell Silicon Valley.

Some of the practices considered for preservation are dressing well, making meetings distraction-free, lengthen lunch (now that’s really retro; what’s next? Two or three martinis?). Be punctual, take a real vacation.

It’s a post reading in its entirety: http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2013/04/old_school_business_practices_worth.html

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Chicken Empire

Posted on May 11, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

No, we’re not talking about one of the fast food chicken franchises.

This is a great story of third world country entrepreneurial activity, one that we’d like to see repeated countless times.

One of our Solutions Forum members is a small Phoenix-based not-forprofit  that does medical aid missions to various underdeveloped countries.

Somehow, in one of their medical aid missions to Nicaragua, they gave $60 US to a lady to buy a chicken and its food supplies, to support her and her family. The chicken was unusually productive laying enough eggs daily to that the lady started selling eggs in the local farmers market. She sold enough eggs to buy a second chicken, which led to buying a goat, and so on. From $60 comes a local farm empire.

But, the lady doesn’t stop there…..she now volunteers at a local school, no doubt telling the students that if she could do it, they could do it.

Frankly, we’d like to see more feel-good stories like this coming out of the third world. If you have one, send it in through the comment feature.

If we like the story, we’ll comp you some courses in the American School of Entrepreneurship.

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Go Further

Posted on May 8, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

Recently, Ford published to employees and retirees an interesting note on ‘Go Further’, which, apparently, has gone well beyond just a slogan for the cars.

Ford’s even making the slogan emblematic of what it expects of employees, too, which is why we find it interesting. We can’t recall a major company coming out and saying that it expects its employees to do more.

While the communication was intended for Ford dealers, the import is clear for the rest of Ford employees: we expect you to Go Further, too. Several years ago we participated in a Ford employee ranking program to find innovative people within the company (even going so far to evaluate everyone inside the company for innovation), and we suspect this new communication is cut from the same cloth.

Here’s Jim Farley (the worldwide head of marketing and sales), with whom we correspond regularly, commenting on how he views employee involvement: “We need to make it personal. We all have choices at work about what we can spend our time with, and where we can add value. Think about what really what really gets you motivated and excited to come to work each day, and make sure you are putting yourself in that zone more often”.

Well said, Jim.

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When It’s Time to Take the Back Seat

Posted on April 27, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

Or at least the right seat.

There comes a time when a company is launched, and it’s time to the founder to bring in some additional talent.

There’s an interesting post in Inc, at www.inc.com/karl-and-bill/when-its-time-take-the-back-seat.html about this topic, but it’s a little too narrowly focused.

For example, we have a member of Solutions Forum that has gotten his company to sustainability, but I’m not sure understands that, in return for v.c. funding, he might have to give up control. Intellectually, he gets it, but I’m not sure he’s there emotionally. And he’s sitting on a nice little niche company that could probably be twice the size it is. But he’s got to look at other alternatives, like co-manufacuring with another Solutions Forum member.

And, at any point, the founder has to make a decision when it’s time to step back. Does he/she have other things in mind? Is the person to whom I’m handing off really capable? Even Apple might have been handed off to the wrong person. Not that he’s a bad person, just maybe not right to lead a company of crazed innovators.

And then there are family members…..

These things keep us in business. Take a look at course S06 on Family Business.

And don’t get us started on back seat drivers…..

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Learning How to Set the Right Price

Posted on April 13, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

The Wall Street Journal had a very useful article buried in the paper this week, which bears further publicity.

Price setting in this day and age is perilous….competition is mercillous, and if you don’t get it right the first time, there might not be a do-over.

What’s good about the article is that there are two approaches that aren’t generally used…quality based and customer return on investment when purchasing. A miss of sorts is that there wasn’t an explicit acknowlegement of perceptual pricing, although the quality/price segment hinted at it.

I would hope that the Journal makes the article available online, and if it does, it’s most likely available at www.wsj.com/startup.

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Sometimes, Just Throw a Chair

Posted on April 6, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

The title comes from a Wall Street Journal article reviewing a new book on negative leadership styles by Bob Knight, the former Indiana basketball coach (the fired Rutgers coach, Mike Rice, must have used the Knight theories taken to the extreme). Knight was effective as a leader, and even admired by most of his players.

And, here comes the New York Times blogging about the leadership style of Christine Quinn, who’s apparently famous for her effective rants at other legislators, staff, etc. Ms. Quinn is similarly admired for getting things done.

What’s going on here? It seems to us that leaders of companies need to practice situational leadership, which means that sometimes, you just have to throw a chair to get your point across. Now, Knight and Quinn may go too far at times, but they get their points across to those within earshot.

If you don’t know what situational leadership is, it’s basically letting the situation dictate what leadership style you’re using. Sometimes, you might be coaching. Sometimes, you might be authoritarian, when the troops don’t seem to be getting the message. And, if they’re REALLY not getting it, you rant like Knight and Quinn.

Many leadership theorists will say that you have to have one leadership style, but we’re not sure that’s the case. We’ve probably seen situational leadership work best, but just for the record, I’d like to find out, for example, if Alan Mullaly of Ford ever looses his temper. He’s always so even tempered and reasonable, it’s a lesson for the rest of us.

If you want to read more on leadership and developing your own style, also add to your readings list some of the work by Daniel Goleman, who first popularized the ‘emotional intelligence’ of leadership, or using one’s emotional makeup to become a better leader.

We don’t have a course on leadership, because it’s just too long and complex a subject. Entire MBA courses are devoted to the subject, as are many books.

Our best advice is keep leading and evolving.

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Best Practices for Crowdfunding

Posted on March 30, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

Crowdfunding is a financing form that’s come to the fore in the last two of three years, largely because of one company, Kickstarter.

Simply put, rather that relying on banks or venture capital for funds to start or expand, firms take to the internet, through Kickstarter and a bunch of similar sites. Crowdfunding has also grown beyound its original roots in the artistic community, and now will include funding for about anything.

Long preamble, but Catherine Clifford, writing in entrepreneur.com, has actually come up with a list of best practices for crowdfunding, most of which go back to planning ahead, being pretty specific about your project, who gets how much for what money, and the use of the proceeds. The link is at http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/226182.

Honestly, we didn’t see any real  weaknesses in Catherine’s article, other than a lack of specificity about whether most of the action has come to startups or those companies who are already going and need an injection of cash in return for a minority share, in order to grow.

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Questions Abound in Learning How to Adjust to Obamacare

Posted on March 28, 2013 by asechmentor@gmail.com

We had been pondering a blogpost on Obamacare when the good ol’ biased New York Times rode to the rescue with an article on how companies over 50 employees are adjusting to Obamacare, having missed a major option for such companies.

1. We agree that they’re going to have to provide insurance, but what the NYT missed was the fact that the business in question can ask the employees if they want the insurance. They may not, because they’ll have to pay something, or they’re on their parents’ insurance, etc. Big difference here.

2. If the employees opt out of being covered, as many have in the fast food industry, per a recent Wall Street Journal article on compliance with Obamacare in the land of fries and burgers and pizza, the employer can actually pay the $95 fee the individual would have incurred, through payroll deduction at the end of the year. We’re sure there are rules about explaining this to employees, too.

3. There’s also the more cynical view that the whole Obamacare structure may collapse into itself, due to funding problems, the government not having its act together on insurance exchanges and God knows what else we may find before the end of 2013.

4. Companies must be careful in reclassifying employees as contractors to not run afoul of IRS regulations on what constitutes an employee. Regular routes, regular hours and employer provided equipment, such as a delivery van, make an employee, not a contractor.

5. The NYT article assumed the company had no  insurance coverage at this point. If it does, or did, there’s just a burden of proof on the company that its insurance coverage is as good as Obamacare minimum coverage. We think most employers can ropeadope this requirement into mid 2014 or beyond, because the value of healthcare has to be added back on corporate tax returns even now, so it’l take the IRS a year or two to figure out a comparo between your plan and min coverage.

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Sales Hasn’t Changed

Posted on March 28, 2013 by don.gray@salesengineeringgroup.com

I hear much discussion about how sales has changed.  There is a new paradigm out there.  Buyers are different.  They have more knowledge.  They are smarter.  They enter the buying process farther down the selling process.  I hear that sales has to be prepared to discuss the prospect’s business.  They need to have a good value proposition that differentiates them from their competition.  They must say something insightful to catch the attention of the prospect.   It’s really different today.  So, tell me, what is different from ten, twenty years ago?

I contend that sales hasn’t changed.  What has changed is the tremendous availability of data and information.  Both sides, buyers and sellers, have a vast increase in the available information with which to operate.

Buyers are using this new information access to get better educated.  They are using it to better identify and clarify their problems, challenges, and needs.  They are leveraging it to improve their preliminary evaluation of approaches and alternatives to making improvements in their business.  Sales representatives have better access to company and contact information. They also have better access to industry trends and their competition.  Both sides can use this increased data pool to be better prepared to dialog with the other side.

What hasn’t changed is the need for the sales representatives to first clearly understand the value of their own products, solutions, or services.  How does what they do actually impact the prospect’s business?  Second is the need to professionally communicate with the prospect to gain an understanding of their business and requirements.  Third, they need to be able to position the specific results they can deliver for that prospect through their products, solutions, or services.

My contention is that this is what we have been doing over the past 20 to 30 years way back when it got the name Consultative Selling.  It has evolved to Solution Selling, or any number of other tags that represent gaining an understanding of your customer’s needs (some people still call it the customer’s pain) and we describe the results (value) we can produce for them.  In this information and data rich environment in which we live, both sides are better equipped to meet the challenges of the other.  But we still have to execute.  We have to be willing to learn about our prospects.  We have to be able to listen.  We still have to be able to carry on a constructive, consultative business conversation.  To do that, we must train our sales representatives on the value of our solutions and how to listen and learn about our prospects so that we can relate specifically what we can do for them.  This hasn’t changed and never will.

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