November | 2019

Why Understanding Finances Is The Secret Ingredient

Nov 26 2019

I’m going to talk about finances.

Stop!

Don’t delete the email or close the window! You really need to hear this, and I promise it won’t be boring!

OK, jokes aside, unless you are a finance specialist like an accountant or a bit of a numbers nerd, finances usually make a small business owners’ eyes go blank.

That’s understandable because if you are like most small business owners, you started your business as a subject-matter expert. You knew your stuff, that’s why you had the confidence to start your own business. You knew that at worst, you could back yourself on selling what you know. But you’re an intelligent person, so you realised that running your own business wasn’t like working for the man, where all you had to do was show up and do your stuff. That’s why, to your great credit, you end up reading websites or newsletter like this.

You knew you had to find out about business planning, you had to know about marketing, you had to find the sales prospects and work out the best and most efficient way to supply what you supply. You had to hire staff and then manage them.

And, you had to manage the finances.

Like most people who are not finance trained you probably bought software that was hopefully easy to use, and you copied the data at the end of the year and gave it to your accountant. As soon as you could afford it, you hired a bookkeeper and handed the operation of the accounting software to her.

I don’t like to tear you down, but that’s not good enough.

Here’s why. Read More

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How Properly Focused Marketing Can Change Your Business

Nov 19 2019

I don’t know any small business owner who truly says that they have too much work.

Even if they are at the upward gradient of their growth phase, more is always better, and especially when they start to peak or plateau, more is definitely better.

Yet, not many small business owners think about their marketing in any serious, consistent manner. Often, their growth is through a number of factors such as excellent service resulting in referrals, unique products or services filling a vacuum, a market devoid of good competition, even luck.

From time to time, they may find themselves in a quiet period so they “do some marketing” by calling clients they haven’t heard from in a while, putting an advertisement in the newspaper or a trade journal, advertise a “sale”, or send out leaflets. Then, for whatever reason (other than by accident such disparate and inconsistent marketing is working) the business picks up again, and the need for marketing is forgotten.

The problem with this inconsistency is that you are not in control, and in business, you should always try to be in control of your own destiny, especially at the front end of being able to control your income.

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7 Things You Need To Know About Starting A Business

Nov 12 2019

If you are thinking of, or about to start a new business, you must be excited!

I know I was when I left the international consulting firm I was working for in 1991 to start my own financial and management consulting company. I was excited and a little terrified!

But at least, I had an advantage over most subject-matter experts who decide to leave employment and start their own business – I was a qualified and experienced Chartered Accountant who knew about starting and building businesses, about tax and registrations and the law and agreements. For some years before I had led a team of 20 people in worldwide consulting assignments. While a little fearful about how I would be my own boss without an internationally established set of systems around me, at least I did not experience the overwhelm of many people where they don’t even know where to start!

That is the most common experience of my clients over the years who have started their own businesses. Whether they were highly qualified doctors or engineers, or very experienced plumbers and electricians, they all expressed to me the sense of overwhelm about what they had to know, almost overnight! They were aware that despite their strong subject-matter knowledge that they lacked knowledge about running a business, they were concerned about if they had enough finance, and they were wondering how to bring those first sales in through the door. They were overwhelmed.

At least they had me to guide them through the steps they needed to take, but what about you?

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7 Things About Marketing Plans Your Competitors Don’t Want You To Know

Nov 05 2019

If there’s one thing about marketing plans, they’re not very obvious.

Tell me if you know for sure that your competitors have marketing plans?

You don’t see them, but sometimes what you see is a marketing strategy that you admire – why didn’t I think of that?

Your true competitors have marketing plans – trust me. By “true” competitor, I mean the ones who are not going broke, who are not struggling day-to-day and just getting by. I mean those who are doing well, and dare I say it, doing better than you – what have they got that I haven’t got?

Instead of asking these, what I call, “catch-up” questions, ask what they know that you don’t know; what are they implementing that you are not.

Yes, your successful competitors do have marketing plans and this is what they don’t want you to know.

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Increase your sales through a highly focused marketing plan!

SMART Marketing: In this book, the owners of a small business are led through the SMART Marketing 7 Step Process to produce a marketing plan targeted at their most desirable customers. Any business can use these principles and in 4 to 6 weeks implement a plan to get them through the door! Find out how...

The SMART Marketing Workbook: Companion to “SMART Marketing”, this workbook sets out the SMART Marketing process in 7 workshops for you and your staff to complete questionnaires and templates that at the end, form the marketing plan you need to sell your REAL product to your REAL customer! View now...

Archive - November 2019

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Why Understanding Finances Is The Secret Ingredient

How Properly Focused Marketing Can Change Your Business

7 Things You Need To Know About Starting A Business

7 Things About Marketing Plans Your Competitors Don’t Want You To Know