Author: Steve Header

To everyone everywhere

 

 

 

The essence of entrepreneurship is the desire to love our work. How, exactly, do we do that?

By Brian Hughes

How many of us are unhappy with our day jobs? We dream of leaving behind the 9-to-5 and following our dreams; of leading a life where we get paid for doing what we truly want to do. That’s the essence of entrepreneurship. The desire to love our work.

But how, exactly, do we do that? How do we take a hobby, like brewing craft beer, gardening or photography, and turn it into an income-producing business?

For most of us, the answer is not as simple as quitting our jobs and going for it. Instead, there are decisive steps we can follow to realize that dream . . . and still get to eat. On a regular basis.

1. Ask for honest feedback.
You’re not the best judge of your work, and neither are your family and friends. You need a mentor — an experienced professional –and honest feedback. Before you can make real money, your work has to be remarkable. Everybody has a camera, but not everybody understands lighting and framing. Even some professional photographers can’t seem to capture the drama of a moment.

Certainly, no one dreams of being mediocre. That’s not what dreams are about. You need to know your idea is good enough to succeed and your skills are up to the task. If possible, you need to find a community of experts willing to share knowledge and examine your work with a critical eye.

You should also consider a learning environment, where you can find an expert teacher, one-on-one feedback and fellow students to discuss the finer points of your craft. One option is Learning with Experts, an online school that helps hobbyists polish their skills under the tutelage of expert teachers in a group environment.

This option is kind of perfect: You get individual instruction and a critique of your work, plus a built-in, knowledgeable focus group.

A second option is Mogul, a worldwide platform that reaches 18 million women per week and provides personalized mentorship in the form of a 24/7 digital advice hotline.

Still another option is LinkedIn, a platform that is arguably the best place to search out expert mentors and peers, alike. LinkedIn has been touted as a place to help users create a network of trusted allies.

2. Get proof of concept.
“Proof of concept” is a business term used by entrepreneurs seeking funding. Even if you don’t need funds to get started, securing proof of concept is not a bad idea. It helps you find out whether people will buy your product or service.

A quick-and-dirty method of assessing your marketability is a crowd-funding campaign. Kickstarter, GoFundMe and Indiegogo are popular, but there are also specialized crowdfunding sites like Barnraiser for artisan foods, Slated for film projects and Fig for video games.

The key to selling your idea is the presentation. Thousands of projects launch on any given day. The challenge is to stand out from the crowd. And a crowd-fundging pitch is a fast, and sometimes brutal, way to find out if people will pay for your work. If it works, congratulations! You’ll have seed money to launch your business and an interested customer base.

3. Do a side hustle.
A side hustle is anything you do to make money when you’re not doing your bread-and-butter job. If you’re working full-time to pay the bills, you can work on your own business on the weekends. That might entail marketing, building community, working on your website or performing one task at a time until word gets out about what a great website developer or landscaper or wedding videographer you are.

Additionally, tapping into the gig economy can be a viable way for you to supplement your income or even set up a new, full-time gig. Tech companies such as Lyft, Doordash and Airbnb have paved the way for many to earn some extra cash, as well as passive income. Many have even reported earning more from the gig economy than from their bread-and-butter job.

When you fill your calendar a month or more in advance or take orders for enough product to replace a month’s salary, you can be sure that it’s a good time to think about making your side hustle full time.

4. Create a business plan.
If you were starting a business, you’d make a plan. Why wouldn’t you do the same to launch your hobby career? By this step, you’ve polished your skills to professional level, vetted your product or business idea and started to make some sales. Don’t overlook the business side, or you’ll quickly become overwhelmed. You’ll need a customer relationship management (CRM) system to keep in touch with your customers, a social media presence and a strong marketing plan.

Bottom line
You are unlikely to succeed unless your dream is realistic. Some hobbies are destined to remain hobbies. The negative odds of your going from air guitar to rock star are astronomical. But you do have a reasonable chance of being successful as a brewmaster, a photographer or a personal trainer. If your hobby is something in high demand, your chances of success are higher.

So, go find your mentor and get started.

 

 

By Shane Barker

Winston Churchill once said, “Success always demands a greater effort.”
While the courage to continue is something that many of us lack at times, if you look at the journey of any successful entrepreneur, you’ll see that they have this immense courage.

It is this “never give up” attitude that is an essential quality of a successful entrepreneur. Come hell or high water, their passion always remains ignited. Even in the face of adversities or failure, they never quit.

In this article, we’ll take a look at 11 things every successful entrepreneur refuses to do. I hope these will help keep you motivated throughout your entrepreneurial journey too.

1. Give Up

Bouncing back from a failure or a setback may seem daunting to most of us. Repeated setbacks can completely discourage us from walking on that path again.
However, successful entrepreneurs aren’t scared of setbacks. In spite of repeated failures, they’re not afraid to keep going. Instead, they learn from their mistakes and use them to make improvements.

 

2. Be Arrogant

Truly successful entrepreneurs don’t let success get to their heads. Even when they are immensely successful and wealthy, they refuse to be arrogant.

Arrogance won’t help you gain the love and respect of others. Humility, on the other hand, is appreciated and truly respected. Successful entrepreneurs understand the importance and value of humility and refuse to be arrogant.

3. Make Excuses

Successful entrepreneurs are self-aware. They completely understand their strengths and shortcomings, and they’ve done a thorough assessment of themselves.

They remain true to themselves and the people around them. If they make a mistake, they take full responsibility and work towards rectifying it. They don’t make excuses or pass the blame onto others.

4. Buy Into ‘Perfection’

We all make plans. However, reality almost always turns out to be a little different than anticipated. Successful entrepreneurs don’t obsess over getting things done exactly as planned.

Instead, they understand real-world contingencies and are able to adapt accordingly. If you’re waiting to launch your product until it has reached that “perfect” state, the launch might never happen. Successful entrepreneurs refuse to wait for things to be perfect.

5. Please Everyone

Successful entrepreneurs realize that they cannot please everyone. There will always be people who are skeptical, critical or doubtful of your actions. However, there will be people who believe in you too.

Successful entrepreneurs don’t worry about pleasing everyone. They aren’t scared of making a decision that might be frowned upon if they know it’s the right one.

6. Focus On What Others Think

Successful entrepreneurs are self-driven and motivated. They don’t look for encouragement or validation from others.

They don’t waste their time trying to change people’s perceptions about them or their actions. Regardless of whether people applaud them or don’t, they remain focused on their goals.

7. Hold Grudges

Someone once said that holding a grudge against someone allows them to live rent-free in your head. Holding grudges simply drains you of useful energy that might otherwise be put to better use.

Successful entrepreneurs realize that their mind space is limited. Hence, they only fill it with what truly matters and refuse to hold grudges.

8. Compromise On Values

Successful entrepreneurs never compromise their values for the sake of an easy win. They don’t believe in bending the rules when it comes to ethics and moral values.

They believe in doing business the right way. Even if it takes longer to achieve success, they never give up on their values or do anything unethical.

9. Be Serious All The Time

Successful entrepreneurs don’t believe in being serious all the time. A little light-hearted playfulness can make the work environment less stressful and more enjoyable for everyone.

Successful entrepreneurs realize the importance of unwinding. They know that it can make people more energized and motivated. Hence, they refuse to be always serious.

10. Benchmark Their Progress

Constant evaluation or benchmarking of your efforts and progress can do more harm than good. Everyone grows at their own pace.

Of course, you need to be aware of your competition and know what needs to be done to grow. But it’s completely futile to constantly evaluate yourself against your peers or competitors and their growth rates.

Hence, successful entrepreneurs refuse to constantly benchmark their success. Instead, they look at the big picture and concentrate on their goals.

11. Burn The Candle At Both Ends

Successful entrepreneurs realize the importance of taking care of their health. Hence, they avoid working so insanely hard that it exhausts them both physically and mentally.

They believe in recharging their batteries at the end of a workday by investing time in something relaxing. They also devote adequate time to sleep so that they wake up energized to face the new day.

For some of us, these habits may not come naturally. However, if you wish to be successful as an entrepreneur, you must develop them sooner than later. Not only will they help to diminish any negative thoughts or feelings, but they will also boost positivity so you’re completely motivated.

 

 

Make sure your content investments deliver adequate returns for your business by following the right content marketing trends

By Susan Gunelius

We’ve reached a tipping point in content marketing where there is so much content published on a daily basis that no one can consume even a small percentage of it precisely when marketers would like them to. Content fatigue has set in, and it’s creating a very real problem for businesses that understand the importance of content marketing but can’t break through the clutter.

How do you create enough high quality content and ensure the right audiences see it to move the needle for your business? To stay ahead of the curve and be one of the businesses that can successfully leverage content marketing to increase brand awareness, sales and loyalty, you need to understand which content marketing trends you should be following.

Here are 12 content marketing trends that I believe are most important for you to follow in the coming year to ensure your content investments are delivering adequate returns for your business in the long-term.

1. Embrace machine learning
Machine learning is a subset of artificial intelligence. It involves the use of computer algorithms to gain knowledge from inputted data and information. As more data and information is collected, the machines learn and produce different outputs based on a variety of factors such as patterns and trends.

Over time, the machine collects more and more data, and as a result, its outputs become more accurate, relevant and personalized. One of the best examples of machine learning in action is a search engine algorithm such as Google. As more people conduct searches using Google, the search algorithm gets better and better at delivering the best results.

For content marketing, tools are being developed that help publishers create the most appropriate content for specific target audiences. When a business can publish perfect content and make it available to the right audience at the right time, conversions will naturally go up.

2. Leverage automation
We live in the age of automation where savvy business owners look for ways to automate every task imaginable, including tasks related to creating, publishing and promoting content. This trend won’t stop, so it’s best to get on board and start automating parts of your content marketing process as soon as possible.

Don’t feel overwhelmed by automation. Instead, start by making small changes to your content marketing workflows. For example, begin by automating aspects of your lead generation, email marketing and social media marketing initiatives.

3. Publish co-created content
Why rely on your own ability to create content and promote it when you can partner with someone else to do it? Publishing content in partnership with another person or business that can help expand your reach is a trend that any entrepreneur can benefit from.

Reach out to other companies that have the eyes and ears of your target audience and ask them if they’d like to partner with you to create and promote useful content. You’ll share the workload and double the benefits for both of you.

4. Follow the data, but target people and needs
Data is critical, but don’t let data distract you from your target audience’s wants and needs. Remember, the vast majority of purchase decisions are at least partially affected by emotions. Data can’t accurately track emotions, so it’s important that your content evokes emotions based on people’s wants and needs or you’re missing a big piece of the picture.

5. Be adaptive, not just calendar-focused
Flexibility is becoming increasingly important in content marketing. The marketplace winners will be able to quickly adapt their content to meet market changes and consumer demands. In fact, market leaders will leverage machine learning and automation to stay ahead of market changes and consumer demands. Yes, you should create a content calendar, but don’t make it so rigid that you can’t adapt and harness opportunities (or thwart threats) as they arise.

6. Invest in the long-term
Content marketing is a long-term strategy. You can support it with short-term tactics to drive immediate results, but its power in growing a brand and business comes from its ability to generate long-term, sustainable, organic growth for your company. That means you need to make a commitment to publishing quality content on a consistent basis. Don’t give up. Persistence wins when it comes to content marketing.

7. Pay to play
Successful content marketing often requires harnessing Facebook advertising as well as media and influencer outreach. Be prepared to pay to promote your best content, which means you’ll need to invest in advertising as well as in tools and manpower to reach key influencers and members of the media.

8. Create dynamic content
Dynamic content is content that you create once but it includes variable elements which change based on the audience who sees it. For example, you could run an email marketing promotion that shows a 10 percent discount offer to one segment of your audience and a 20 percent discount to another segment.

When you publish dynamic content, images, text and offers can change depending on the individual who consumes that content, but you save time and money because you only have to create the content one time. Dynamic content has become commonplace in most corporate marketing departments, and it’s easy enough and affordable enough that small businesses should be using it, too.

9. Update and refresh old content
You don’t always have to reinvent the wheel. Many companies and online publishers are having great success updating and refreshing old content. Not only does updating old content positively affect search engine rankings for that content, but it also ensures more people see it.

It takes you less time to update an old piece of content than it does to create a new piece, so review your old content and look for great pieces that you can revive with a simple refresh.

10. Align content to the buyer journey
It’s essential that you consider where your audience is in the buyer journey before you create content because people who are just starting to think they want to buy something need to see completely different content than people who are about to make a purchase. This is particularly true of products and services with long purchase decision processes such as high-ticket items.

Therefore, identify where your audience is in the buyer journey, and align those steps with their positions in the marketing funnel to create the most relevant and targeted content possible. Your results will improve when you take the time to ensure your content and the buyer journey are aligned.

11. Future-proof your content
Every company will publish some time-sensitive content, but most of your content should be evergreen, meaning it can stand the test of time. To do this, make sure your content is clear, comprehensive and factual. Ask yourself, “If someone views this content a year from now, will it still make sense? What about in five years?”
Don’t worry if you can’t future-proof a piece of content. That piece could be a perfect candidate for an update and refresh in the future (see above).

12. Go deeper
Content that provides basic information is everywhere today. If you want your content marketing to be successful and work for your business, you need to go deeper than everyone else. Think about what the next step is after someone learns or completes the basic steps. Be specific and give the audience more than they can find anywhere else.

Your next steps
By focusing your marketing plan on these 12 content marketing trends, you’ll be ahead of your competition in terms of delivering the best content to your target audience. Next, promote that content as much as possible, track your results and identify where you can make improvements. As you learned above, you need to be adaptive if you want your content marketing investments to truly work for your business.

videohive.net

By Amy Bax for Gaebler Ventures

This is a short guide in use of sex appeal in advertising and marketing campaigns. Is it really effective? How should a company use it? What are things to be aware of?

Using sex appeal in advertising is a time-tested technique that will probably be with us forever.

If you are marketing a product or service, you need to be aware of the power of sex appeal in advertising and understand the nuances of using sex to market your wares.

Why Sex Sells

The most obvious reason sex appeal works in advertising is that it grabs attention.

Both males and females are attracted to this type of advertising. It is a powerful instinctive attraction that will take our focus from anything else we may be doing. And advertisers know this. They play off of our curiosity. They know that it will be more likely to be recalled than most other forms of appeals because of the generated interest.

Also, many advertisers have found that overly controversial images, even if they are taken off of the air, will stir up discussions about the ad and the product associated with it. Even if someone does not agree with what is put on an ad, they are still talking about it. By those discussions being had, the name of your product stays in the minds of consumers longer.

What to Be Careful of When Using Sex Appeal in Marketing

Make sure that people are not so distracted by the sexual appeal of the ad that they do not remember what the ad was for in the first place.

It does not do any good to create a sensual or sexual message when all they can remember is the image and not the brand name. So, make sure the sexual/sensual image being used is connected in some way to the product or service being promoted. This will create a link between the two and make the viewer much more likely to remember the product or service being advertised.

Many advertisers appeal to males in this way- buy the product, get the girl. Especially beer advertisements- generally, a group of average looking guys will be in a bar and by purchasing or drinking a certain brand, they will attract interest from an attractive girl across the room.

What is considered acceptable varies from one location to another. In a large metropolitan area with a diverse, less conservative population, you might be more likely to produce more risqué advertising versus a rural and conservative or religious community.

Tailor the message to the people you are targeting, which includes understanding their feelings and beliefs on public sexuality. If you are setting up a business in a smaller community, make sure to note what other businesses do to advertise. Sex appeal may not be an acceptable form of appeal at all.

It is not as attention-grabbing as it once was.

There is still an element of surprise, but do not think that people will react or respond quite how they did when it was first being used. As we have become more and more surrounded by sexual images in movies and television, we have become almost desensitized to it, and an ad with half-dressed models does not nearly shock us as much as it would have twenty years ago.

So, instead of just having a group of sexy girls or guys in an ad, try to find more subtle and unexpected ways to use sexuality in your message.

Dove did this by using “real people” in their marketing campaigns that started a few years ago. They used the different kinds of beauty, body shape, and age to promote their products. This unexpected campaign, which premiered during the Super Bowl, was extremely successful because it was something different that they were remembered for doing.

Sex appeal can be used in many ways. In short, make sure that the way you are using it is appropriate for the product that you are selling and the people you are selling it to.

 

 

Even if your content is amazing, and your offers competitive, you still have to promote your brand. Here are eight ways how.

By Anna Johansson

It’s almost 2018, and all the years (so far) that we’ve enjoyed web-based technology have produced an abundance of website builders available to help any of us, from aspiring entrepreneurs to passionate bloggers.

Even if you yourself don’t know anything about web development, spending just a few minutes playing around with a WYSIWYG editor will usually help you figure out the basic functionality of building a website from scratch. The problem is that most website creators take you only as far as establishing that website. And, even if your content is amazing, and your offers competitive, you won’t have enough to be successful.

Instead, the end goal for most amateur website developers is to build traffic numbers (and, ultimately, the revenue that comes from that traffic). And to do this, new entrepreneurs need to realize that this traffic isn’t going to come naturally; people won’t know you exist until they learn about you, or see you on a site or app they’re already using.

That’s why, once your website is created, it’s on you to nurture and promote it. So, what can you do to make that happen?

Paid advertising

Your first option is to pursue paid advertising, such as through Google AdWords, a pay-per-click (PPC) ad platform that charges you based on the actual click-throughs you get for your site. This is usually a good method to start with, as long as you have the budget for it, since you’ll guarantee that at least some traffic will get to your site.

The problem is, most new webmasters don’t have the money to spend on this method, and it doesn’t scale as well as some of the other tactics on this list.

Search engine optimization

You can also work on search engine optimization (SEO), a strategy designed to help your website rank higher in relevant searches on Google (and other search engines). Most free and inexpensive website builders offer templates that are structurally sound for SEO, with clean code and a crawlable infrastructure. But, beyond that, you’ll need to create interesting, original content on a regular basis, and attract more backlinks that point to your site (to boost your domain authority and eventually rank you higher for relevant queries).

Blogging

Blogging is another good strategy, and it ties into several other strategies on this list. For example, blogging regularly is a practical necessity for any SEO campaign, since it creates more crawlable pages on your site, adds to your authority and enables you to optimize for more specific keywords. Plus, if you can build an audience with your blog, you’ll be more likely to retain that audience’s members and introduce them to other sections of your site.

Social media

The biggest advantages of social media are its sheer ability to connect with hundreds of millions of people, and the fact that it’s free to use (which gives it a tremendous potential ROI). The idea is to use your content to make your site more discoverable, engage with individuals and groups who might like your site and content and eventually build up a following that stays with your brand and provides a steady stream of inbound traffic.

Personal brands

As a supplementary strategy, you can create personal brands to support your main website brand. For example, if you built a website for your startup, you could start a side blog about your experiences as an entrepreneur, and develop your personal social media profiles in addition to your corporate social profiles. If executed effectively, these personal brands can help you double your visibility, and gain more trust (since people trust other people more than they do brands).

Press releases

When you first launch your site, don’t forget to write and submit a press release announcing your presence. You can do the work, yourself (if you’re familiar with the proper formatting), and spend a few hundred dollars to distribute it through PR Newswire. You’ll instantly spread the information about your new site, and will probably pick up a few backlinks along the way.

Guest posts

Finally, you can use your personal brand to start guest-posting on other sites. Make a pitch to the editor of a given publication, and try to appeal to his or her target audience. If you earn a spot, you’ll have a chance to expose yourself to an entirely new audience, build up your reputation and possibly build a link that points back to your site.

Experimentation and measurement

No matter what strategy or collection of strategies you use to promote your site, it’s incredibly important to measure your results, experiment with new approaches and tweak your tactics until you have a better overall system.

Just because a tactic worked for someone else doesn’t mean it’s going to work for you, and just because it’s working for you doesn’t mean it’s the best strategy for you. Take your time, try many different approaches, and stick with the moves that seem to work best.

 

 

By Bridget Weston Pollack

It could be said that small business has remained the same over the years. Customers expect excellent service, clear value and an overall pleasant experience when they complete a purchase.

The tools and techniques to achieve that small business standard, though, have changed greatly over the years. What was once accomplished through newspaper advertisements is now conducted online; what once required travel and time can be now be accomplished with a few clicks.

As 2017 comes to a close, here are three major small business trends that could help you run your business.

1. Remote work and cloud computing

Beyond cloud storage and project management tools, technology is providing more and more ways to help us work together even while we’re apart. You may not be ready to bring a rolling video robot into your workplace, but it may be time to evaluate options for video conferencing and other telework tools.

SCORE’s recent Megaphone of Main Street Small Business Jobs Report surveyed small business owners which revealed that 18 percent of businesses replaced employees with contractors over the past six months. If you’re considering taking this route for additional business support — especially if those contractors will be remote — be sure to put communications plans in place that make the most of the tools available.

2. Mobile access and ease

Customers aren’t just browsing on mobile devices — they’re purchasing, too. Mobile shopping gained particular speed over the recent Black Friday shopping holiday and is expected to continue to creep on desktop transactions in the coming months.
Google offers a search tool that tests whether your website is mobile-friendly and makes recommendations for improving it. Don’t forget to check your email marketing and social media presence as well, to make sure your messaging is easy to read and engages customers with enticing, clear visuals.

3. Personalized customer service

More people are shopping online, but they still appreciate good customer service. Modern customer service doesn’t always come in the form of a warm greeting or an easy returns process. Sometimes, it takes the form of personalization. Studies have shown that Generation Z (people born between 1996 and 2010) love connecting with brands on a personal level via social and email content. These young adults have an enormous amount of buying power and often serve as unofficial ambassadors for brands to which they feel connected.

To make sure you’re reaching your target markets with a personalized approach, pay close attention to social media analytics along with one-on-one feedback from customers. Segmenting your emails by customer type is just one way you can form a more personal connection with your clientele.

Meet with a SCORE mentor to discuss each of these trends and how your small business can adapt to new technology, trends and markets.

About the Author
Bridget Weston Pollack is the Vice President of Marketing & Communications at the SCORE Association. 

 

By Jane Burnett

Excelling at a fast-paced job can be challenging — especially when you feel like you’re not being respected enough for your ideas and contributions.
But how do you earn the respect of those you work with? And how do you deal with public displays of disrespect?

Remember that respect is a two-way street

If you want to know why you might not be getting the respect you want, stop and think: are you doing anything to disrespect others?
Some of the top offenders include interrupting others while they’re speaking, refusing to admit your mistakes and criticizing others publicly.

“Interrupting others while they’re speaking … is the ultimate sign of disrespect. So stop doing it. Immediately. Bite your tongue and spend your time listening to understand, not to reply,” business consultant Lisa Quast writes in Forbes,
While you can add your two cents after hearing the other person out, it’s better to give them the floor and actively try to understand their perspective instead of talking over them.

Another red flag? Refusing to admit your mistakes — or worse, blaming them on others — is a surefire way to make people lose respect for you.

“If you pretend that you’ve never done anything wrong and then find ways to excuse your failures or blame them on others, you’ll lose the respect of everyone,” professional development expert Jeff Havens, author of the book “Unleash Your Inner Tyrant!” writes in Fast Company. “Failure is only failure when you don’t learn anything from it, and you can’t learn anything when you pretend that you never actually failed.”

Other big offenders: treating people poorly because their titles are lower than yours, only looking out for your own self-interest, refusing to listen to suggestions from others and creating a toxic work environment.

In Dale Carnegie’s seminal book, “How to Make Friends and Influence People,” he writes of a tyrant boss who eventually became willing to learn how to change his ways.

“For years he had driven and criticized and condemned his employees without stint or discretion. Kindness, words of appreciation and encouragement were alien to his lips,” Carnegie explains in the book, “After studying the principles discussed in this book, this employer sharply altered his philosophy of life. His organization is now inspired by a new loyalty, a new enthusiasm, a new spirit of teamwork.”

After all, no one wants to deal with a bully at work.

Be humble, but not insecure

There’s a difference between being grounded and groveling.
If you are constantly putting yourself down in an effort to appear humble, you might run the risk of losing the respect of others, who could mistake your self-effacement for insecurity.

“Be willing to admit your flaws, but do not focus on them. You should have some self-depreciation, but it should be paired with self-confidence,” Entrepreneur and author Peter Daisyme, co-founder of free web platform Hostt, writes in Entrepreneur.”People generally will not respect a leader who appears insecure and continuously mentions their shortcomings. Show your human side but maintain a sense of bravado and self-assurance.”

So, if you’re constantly talking about what you don’t understand or what you’re not good at, people might start to believe you.

Displaying confidence can go a long way.

Let your work speak for itself, and take pride in your accomplishments. Others will see your enthusiasm and respond positively.

Avoid sending mixed messages

Empty promises are a respect-killer in the workplace. If your coworkers can’t count on you to follow through, they’re going to eventually stop listening.
“What you actually do matters much more than what you say you’re going to do. Anyone can talk a big game or over-promise, but the actual follow-through is what creates lasting success,” writes web designer and bestselling author Paul Jarvis.
Entrepreneur and author Kevin Daum writes that leaders should “be consistent” to get respect.

“If you find you lack credibility, it’s probably because you are saying one thing and doing another. People do pay attention to what you say until you give them reason not to by doing the opposite. You don’t have to be predictable, just don’t be a hypocrite,” Daum writes in Inc.

Don’t micromanage

Hovering — literally or metaphorically— is not effective.
“Effective delegation is an important part of becoming a good leader,” Cheri Swales writes on Monster.com. “Understand that employees are looking to develop their skills, so when you delegate, give them an important task to accomplish. Then stand back and let them figure out how to do it. When you tell employees how to do the task, they feel mistrusted and perhaps worthless. It is difficult to trust a leader who can’t let go,” Swales writes.

Jane Burnett is a reporter for Ladders. She is based in New York City and can be reached at jburnett@theladders.com.

As appeared in theladders.com

 

 

 

By Anna Powers

In my previous article, I drew a parallel between the CEOs of Fortune 50 companies and their educational background in science. Being an entrepreneur means being a CEO and a leader more than anything else, and embodying those two qualities is both a science and an art.

I believe that harnessing your mathematical skill set will make you an outstandingly better CEO and a leader. The reason for that is because being a CEO involves a vision that can be achieved practically and soundly.

In our data-driven world, it involves understanding the relationships between numbers and trends, in order to outsmart your competition and this is where having a mathematical mind gives you an advantage. Here are three ways embodying a mathematical mindset will set you apart.

Faster Decisions — Seeing The Connectivity of Relationships

Mathematics, more than anything, is a study of relationships and connections. When one studies math, what is really being studied are the connections between various formulae and ways they interweave.

Of course, this is natural, because those formulae describe the physical world around us, which is connected. Thus by studying mathematics, our brain is trained to see the world in terms of connections and relationships. Recognizing patterns and seeing loopholes between things, ideas, numbers, and trends is the mindset that mathematicians work in.

In entrepreneurship, this is important because if your mind is trained in recognizing connections then you can make faster and better decisions than your competitions and be the first to gain market share. It also gives you leverage to adapt faster if certain problems arise. Speed is important because we all know timing is crucial.

Better Insights — Leveraging The Power of Data-Driven Trends

As the mathematician, we are trained to look at data and draw conclusions from it. In our data-driven world, a person leaves a digital imprint that can have more than a million unique parameters that store rich information about spending habits, likes, and dislikes, as well as behavioral patterns.

As an entrepreneur, in order to make key decisions in this digitalized landscape, you must be very comfortable with using data. And the more comfortable you are with it, the easier it becomes to spot certain trends or problem areas, which leads to a more efficient decision making and insights. Thus, leveraging the mathematical mindset allows you to draw better insights which translate to a better bottom line.

A More Perfected Execution — Choosing The Best Approach

Decisions predeterminate outcomes. When we make decisions in business, they can have an enormous effect on our bottom line, hopefully in the positive direction. Of course, the definition of a decision implies that there is more than one way of action. Thus the most crucial component of the decision-making process is picking the best outcome. Having a mathematical mindset, one is able to better understand outcomes and their probabilities and picking the outcome that will hedge the best case scenario.
Dr. Anna Powers is an entrepreneur, advisor and an award winning scientist. Her passion is sharing the beauty of science and encouraging women to enter STEM fields.

As appeared in Forbes.com

By Jia Wertz

Remember the hoverboard fad? eBay was selling the number one gift every 12 seconds thanks to celebrities like Missy Elliot, Jamie Foxx, Wiz Khalifa and Justin Bieber. In 2015 alone, 2.6 million hoverboards were sold. And then, due to a series of unfortunate events, the entire hoverboard market was declared dead.

You would think, Shane Chen, the inventor of the original hoverboard and patent holder (he eventually licensed HoverTrax to Razor), would be a billionaire by now sipping the most expensive tea in the world with Elon Musk. Chen isn’t doing that. He lives in Camus, WA and drives a Volt, not a Model X.

Chen’s the first to admit that he didn’t play his cards right. Lesser quality and lower cost knockoffs quickly saturated the global hoverboard market, eating into his potential windfall. But he didn’t throw in the towel; that’s not what true believers do. Now known as the Thomas Edison of rideables, he has a clear vision for his future, and has learned a lot from his past mistakes.

Chen shares his top five lessons learned through his entrepreneurial journey while inventing the hoverbaord.

Never Compromise Your Core Values

For Chen, his core value is quality; and he wants his rideables to provide a magical experience for his customers. “You can’t have these kinds of experiences with cheap parts and labor,” says Chen. “You’ve got to oversee the entire process from conception to packaging.”

No matter what stage of growth your company is in, it’s never too late to establish your own core set of values, as Chen did. The hardest part is embedding these ideals through every part of your company, from operations to budgeting.

That’s why it’s important to identify your company values, get them on paper and get your team excited about them. They will not only define your corporate culture and set the tone for how you conduct business, but will also serve as a check and balance to attract like-minded employees to your company.

Be Strategic With Your Partners

To compete, Chen needed to move faster while keeping his quality standards high. For rideables, a typical 3D-printed prototype was not feasible. Chen required a manufacturer who could produce the actual working rideable, and get it back to him quickly for testing and further iteration. This would require a more nimble manufacturer with a great deal of capability, capacity and high standards.

When looking for a great business partner that you’re aligned with and can trust, it’s critical not to rush into an arrangement you may regret.

When you’re ready to find the right partner, make sure to have crucial conversations before signing on the dotted line. Share your processes in advance and be transparent.

Ask potential partners about what values drive their business decisions and seek examples. You may even need to give your partner some skin in the game in the form of equity or profit sharing.

Today Chen has a strategic agreement with a single production partner where he oversees every aspect of design, production and packaging of his latest invention, the Solowheel, an electric one-wheeled self-balancing rideable. With a 31-mile range, the unicycle is the smallest, greenest, most convenient “people mover” ever invented.

Know That Failure Leads To Success

If you’re not failing, you’re not going to succeed. Failure is simply part of the process on the path to success.

Chen says he has had too many failed inventions to count, but for every ten that flops, one is total magic. “With every failure, I fail less,” he says. “As long as I’m learning and adapting throughout the process, nothing is ever a true failure.”

Leadership consultant and coach Susan Tardonico recommends these five strategies for dealing with failure:

Don’t make it personal

Take stock, learn and adapt

Stop dwelling on it

Release the need for approval of others

Try a new point of view

Create A Great Team

Chen used to handle every aspect of his business himself. Today he surrounds himself with seasoned business people whose strengths he can learn from, and vice versa. He humbly admits that he’s an inventor, not a business person.

“There’s a misperception that technical founders can run companies and grow businesses,” he says. “Running multi-million-dollar business deals takes a great deal of knowledge and experience. You may be able to invent a flying car, but that doesn’t mean you know how to market one.”

Marketing Matters

A recent WIPO study showed that nearly a third of the value of products come from intangible capital such as branding and design.

Chen learned the hard way that he had to do more than just create a breakthrough product to succeed. If he had a strong marketing plan for his hoverboard, he may have been able to drive brand awareness. Chen said he’s not going to make the same mistake with Solowheel.

If you don’t focus on marketing and branding, your customer won’t connect with you on a deeper, emotional level. You’ll have to compete on price alone, which is becoming more and more challenging. To build a premium brand, you’ll want to make sure you identify the core audience of your product, the product differentiators, and drive thought leadership and awareness.

Don’t let your competition walk circles around you because you have a great product but no winning marketing strategy. A successful marketing plan has these important components:

Describe your company’s unique selling proposition (USP). It’s a descriptive sentence that articulates what your business does. As an example, Domino’s Pizza’s USP is “You get fresh, hot pizza delivered to your door in 30 minutes or less or it’s free.”

Define your demographic. Who are your customers? What’s their age, gender, education, employment status, what kind of car do they drive, do they own a home, are they married, etc.

Describe your product’s benefits.

How are you going to position your product for your audience and what are the channels you’re going to use to get that message out?

Get the word out. While digital marketing may work magic for certain customers, it may not work for everyone. It’s a good idea to use a mix of digital marketing, advertising, public relations and direct marketing.

Chen is following his own advice and has built a great team, and has a marketing push for Solowheel that’s as swift as his 18.8 MPH electric unicycle.

Jia is the CEO and Founder of Studio 15, a socially responsible fashion brand. Follow her on Twitter @JiaWertz and LinkedIn.

Posted in Forbes.com