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An interview with Mr. Martin Zwilling, CEO and Founder of Startup Professionals

Guna — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 14:35:33 +0000

Over the weekend I had the privilege to interview Martin Zwilling, CEO & Founder of Startup Professionals. He is also a Callaman Ventures Board Member and Executive in Residence; Advisory Board Member for multiple startups; Arizona Angels Selection Committee; Entrepreneur in Residence at ASU and Thunderbird School of Global Management.

I have known Martin since August of 2009. I have emphasized again and again on my previous postings how important it is to reach out to your peers within your niche. I’ve reached out to Martin and asked him to share my post, 21 Words All Entrepreneurs Must Eliminate To Be Successful, with his readers. Not only he got back to me right away, he also agreed to share my post with his followers on Twitter. Since then Martin and I kept in touch.

Martin has a lot of experience with startups. I thought it would be beneficial to all of you to hear from him. Below are few questions I’ve asked Martin. Martin also helps many entrepreneurs through is blog, Startup Professionals Musings. He blogs daily on various topics to help today’s entrepreneurs.

In your opinion, what does it take to be an entrepreneur in today’s world? (new technology, internet, etc).

The first challenge for any entrepreneur is to identify a real “need,” and then build a solution. Too many invent or fall in love with a “technology,” and assume everyone will want it. That’s a “solution looking for a problem,” and these usually fail. The second challenge is to make a business out of it – how do you make money?; who will buy it?, etc. The Internet social networking model, like Facebook, has convinced people that most things ought to be free, with businesses making money on the advertising. That model doesn’t work for small start-ups, and makes it tough for them to survive.

How difficult is it for an online entrepreneur to get initial funding through an angel investor (any investor)?

Getting initial funding from angels or any professional investor is very difficult. All now expect you to have something already, like a product built, a few customers to prove the business model, and significant “skin in the game.” That means initial funding usually comes from the entrepreneur, or FFF (friends, family, and fools). The myth that you can sketch out an idea on a paper napkin, and investors will throw money at you, is gone (unless you have a successful track record several times over, or a rich uncle who is an investor)!

What does it take to secure funding in today’s internet world?

In today’s internet world, you still need to start with a written business plan, and a strong team. Investors actually fund people first, a good plan second, and the idea last in priority. In all cases, networking to find investors is very important. Emailing your idea to hundreds of investors, or using Twitter and Facebook, is a waste of everyone’s time. Go to local business association meetings, talk to executives and potential investors, and ask their help to get an introduction to VCs, Angels, and potential business partners.

Who will they be competing against?

You compete against a thousand other peers, because the entry cost of providing a solution on the Internet keeps going down. Years ago, it cost a million dollars to develop a reasonable e-commerce site, now web design tools and platforms allow you to do it for a few thousand dollars. That’s both good news, and bad news, since almost anyone can jump into the game. Of course, you also compete against the “big gorillas” of the Internet, like Google, Yahoo, Travelocity, and many others. If they see you are getting traction with your new idea, they can jump in quickly with huge resources and kill you.

What is the one area that an entrepreneur MUST focus more on when writing a business plan?

I look first for a clear definition of the problem being addressed, and how your solution relieves the pain. Most business plans I see start right out talking about their solution, and how everyone will “want” one. “Nice to have” is not good enough – you can’t create real change until the pain level is high enough. The first page of your business plan better be your “elevator pitch” and it better have the “grabber” or investors won’t look for page 2.

In your view, how can an online start-ups get funding and where should they go to get it?

In my view, a lot of online start-ups don’t need funding, because the entry cost is so low. If they start by asking for $500K or $1M, they won’t get it, and they will lose all credibility, because it shouldn’t cost that much. In general, online start-ups should go to friends and family first, and then to local Angel groups if their needs are greater than $100K, but less than $1M. Angel groups are easily found online through www.angelsoft.net.

Do you get a lot of online start-ups for your help?

Yes, I talk to many of these. Often they just need pointers to resources, like how to incorporate, or how to build a business plan, or where to find Angels. These are the questions I try to answer with my blog articles, or via email, Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn. Sometimes they need real help writing a business plan, or making sure it’s adequate for funding discussions with investors. That’s what I do.

If you want to leave one message with entrepreneurs, what would that be?

I think the Internet is a huge opportunity for new entrepreneurs – it doesn’t cost so much to start, it’s changing rapidly so there is a great acceptance of new and better ways of doing things, and it scales instantly to worldwide, so the potential is unlimited.

Do you have any businesses online that generates revenue? What was your first effort online in business?

My current business, Startup Professionals, Inc., is an online mentoring and consulting business that is my revenue stream. This is my first online business, but I have had “brick and mortar” businesses, as well big-company executive experience with IBM, First Data Corp, Fujitsu, and others.

How much time do you spend on the internet daily?

I spend at least a couple of hours a day, sometimes much more, writing blog articles, answering questions on Twitter and Facebook, and trying to absorb the wealth of information that rolls out daily from all the other online sources.

How did you get started? And what was your first gig?

Many years ago, I was on the team that developed the IBM PC, so I’ve been on the Internet since it started. I really only started mentoring entrepreneurs and start-ups a few years ago as part of my “give back” to local universities and business groups. It was so much fun that I decided to start my own company Startup Professionals, to see if I could make it a business. I’m a strong believer that your business should be fun. My first gig was joining the Advisory Board of a local new job site for Baby Boomers.

What would your advice be for someone looking to make money on the internet?

My advice is that making money should be part of everyone’s motivation, but it should not be the primary motivation. Your primary motivation should be to solve some people’s problem, show people a better way, and get a sense of satisfaction. If your primary motivation is to get rich, you may be short-changed.

My Corporate Logo: a place to get your corporate identity

Guna — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 23:15:13 +0000

Today I was contacted by the founder of My Corporate Logo, a site dedicated to improving your corporate identity as you enter the business world. Vineet Kothari, the founder and CEO of My Corporate Logo, had he following to say about his startup.

Since 2005, My Corporate Logo has been offering logo design and corporate identity design services to startups, small and mid-sized organizations. Our creative team of over 25 designers and more than 100 years of combined experience can effectively deliver any message across a wide variety of media. Over the years, we’ve developed the right set of research, creative and design skills to further your existing brand or develop a new brand strategy that builds the strongest possible connections with your customers, employees, and partners.

My Corporate Logo has successfully designed thousands of logos catering to the needs of almost every industry imaginable. Besides, we have also designed hundreds of websites, brochures, letterheads, business cards, and envelopes for our clients. Our support team is always accessible via email and phone for any technical support or consultation.

My Corporate Logo is a business of Digital Avenues Limited – an integrated web solutions organization that helps advance web businesses by combining its expertise in Technology and Creativity.

While there are a number of other custom logo design companies and the market seems saturated, My Corporate Logo is both profitable, and has the potential to grow and touch thousands of businesses. We are able to tap into a pool of highly skilled designers and artists with years of experience behind them to service the needs to businesses looking to get a logo designed.

While My Corporate Logo is a paid service, start ups and small businesses can benefit significantly. Our logo design services are reasonably priced, we offer unlimited revisions, 100% money back guarantee and more importantly, the quality and creativity of our work ensures that our customers are happy. Satisfied customers can always come back to get all their web needs taken care of under a single umbrella.

The start up is an extension of an established web business and hence we are able to keep our costs low while at the same time leverage the parent companies infrastructure and pool of quality resources and processes. The focus of the business is also going to acquire as many logo customers with the ultimate objective of converting them into larger customers by offering a wide variety of services like web design, web application development, mobile applications, rich internet applications and other creative services.

As My Corporate Logo evolves, we intend to setup a local American office for pre-sales support, after sales account management and a support team to make quick enhancements based on our client’s feedback. This will enable us to provide 24-hour availability to our customers and ultimately assist in improving our clients’ experience in working with us.

Are you in need of a facelift for your startup? Drop by My Corporate Logo and find out what they can do for you.

Please don’t forget to leave your comments below.

NeedCube – Let Your Needs Find You

Guna — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:07:52 +0000

Have you ever had the desire to just tell someone what you need and when you need it and then expect them to fulfill all your needs rather than you do it each time? Well I believe NeedCube, a new website, has a solution to your desire.

NeedCube allows you to create a profile/identify for yourself in which you can define your needs, desires and wishes. NeedCube will then bring you what you need and when you need it. According to Gergely Nagy, the founder of this website, this website revolutionizes the way you seek information on the web.

It does sound like a buy and sell website that allows you to post for items that you are in need of and someone who has that item will contact you to sell it. However, according to Gergely, this is a different concept. It really acts as a reverse matching concept of the traditional searching for a product or a service.

We had a chance to interview Gergely earlier with a few basic questions. I believe his answers to these questions will provide you with a bit more information about the new venture.

What is your vision? (what are you offering to your visitors?)
NeedCube is a unified field for people’s needs. We offer free need submission and search among existing needs. The vision is to have a central place for all the need of people no matter what the category is. At NeedCube you don’t have to struggle with categories.

What is your business plan or model?

At the moment everything is free. Later on we can introduce premium services for premium needs.

Why did you start this website?

Because none exists at the moment. We wanted to build a unique place for people’s needs. NeedCube is centered around the demand side not the supply.
It is not a classifieds site, it is about needs. If you are a seller you can come to NeedCube and search with keywords for the stuff you have to offer and see if anyone needs it or not.

The main slogan is: find people who need your stuff or register your own!

According to Gergely, there are no other similar website. I haven’t come across any at the moment but if Gergely can really serve the need of the people, then the website will be successful.

Gergely has also created some youtube videos on the basic functions and how to effectively use them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuS3jSbYfF8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfIHbr2_cIk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AWIzlSw_0o

Visit NeedCube.com for more information.

Entrepreneurs: Your Network is Your Net Worth

Guna — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 15:48:01 +0000

How good are you with networking? Networking is becoming more and more crucial for success in today’s interconnected world. You might be a hard worker but if you are not good at networking and making a few good friends outside your comfort zone, you will not be successful unless you invent something extraordinary.

What do I mean by the “comfort zone”?

In networking, “comfort zone” is often referred to the circle of people that you are comfortable interacting with. This could be your friends, family, co-workers and to an extent the people you may have to interact daily at your work. These are people that you can actually start a conversation with and talk about any particular topics. However, when it comes to introducing yourself to a total stranger, you are not comfortable because it is outside your “comfort zone.” If you want to be successful at networking, first you must identify your “comfort zone” and avoid spending time with that group at a party or at a get together of some sort. I am not suggesting that you don’t talk to them; I am suggesting that you limit the amount of time you spend within your comfort zone. If you go to a professional reception or a conference and spend time talking to a member from within your “comfort zone”, you are just wasting your time. You might as well have been at home instead of this event. You need to reach outside your comfort zone and connect with people.

First Step of Networking:

Networking has two important elements that run in parallel to each other. Without one, the other won’t get too far. Hence you need to work on both at the same time to be successful. In order to be successful in networking, one must give as much as they expect from others. Giving and Receiving are the two pillars; the two tracks. So giving and receiving run in parallel to each other. You must add value and give others an opportunity to expand their network as much as you want someone else to offer you the assistance to expand your network.

I can’t say that I am an expert in networking in my personal life. Two days ago, I had a chance to run into Kiefer Sutherland at a film ceremony reception that I’ve attended as part of my work. I had an opportunity to say hi to Mr. Sutherland but I didn’t really have the guts to get more than about 5 words out of me when I shook his hand. My intension wasn’t really to network with Mr. Sutherland, although I would love to know him, but I am just raising this as an example to show you that not everyone is professional at networking. You just have to continue to work at it every time you have a chance. Each time you should try a different approach. Once you get used to your own technique of saying hello to new people that you meet on a daily basis, you will see your network grow faster and faster. As an entrepreneur and as a business owner, you must remember that you network is your net worth!

Also don’t forget to read my previous article on relationship: Make a Habit to Invest In Relationships.

How to Get to Know Your Visitors: Data Collection and Analysis

Guna — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 17:26:00 +0000

Everyday you receive hundreds of visitors from all over the world. You can’t shut down your website while you go to sleep and then reopen it like you would with a retail business. Who are these people and why are they coming to your website? If you don’t have answers to these questions, you are missing out on the opportunity to make more money. In other words, you are flushing money down the toilet and you don’t even know about it.

Few days ago, I’ve discussed why it is important to know your customer to be successful. In this article, I am going to discuss how you can get to know your customer/audience.

With features such as the comment system, feedback forms and or user registration on your website, you may already know about some of your visitors. This is a very small number compared to the number of visitors you don’t get to interact with. These are the folks that you are really missing out on. They are your true potentials that will allow you to make lots of money. They hold the key and you need to do everything you can to get to know them. In order to be an effective marketer, you need to be proactive and get to know your audience.

By getting to know your audience, you can improve your content, you can shift your sales pages, you can introduce new products and affiliate programs, you can improve your ratio of conversation, you can improve your marketing strategy and eventually you can make more money.

In order to understand your audience, you can take the approach to collect all possible data about them and then analyze the data to improve your game. Therefore, I will take you through data collection in three steps: one to collect useful data with existing tools, collect data using statistical analysis and finally go one step beyond to get data directly from the visitors. This article will only focus on collecting data. In the near future, I will elaborate on how you can use this information to more than double the amount of money you make today.

Collect Data with Existing Tools

Like I said above, you already have a few means to collect data on users that visit your site. Most of these data is collected in the backend system you may be using. For example, if you run a blog on wordpress, your wordpress system will collect information on those who leave comments, feedbacks and user registration. This data is very important because this tells you the kind of people that you have successfully converted to participate on your site.

Comments

You have to be engaged with your users to successfully build a profitable website. You need to follow the comments that are left behind by visitors. You should respond to comments and sometimes you should take their comment and generate content from it. You should then give the credit to the user for providing you with an idea to generate that content. This will allow you to learn more about existing users but it will also encourage new users to participate.

User Registration

If your site allows user registration, it will allow you to collect as much data as you want about that user. Many websites tend to keep the user registration forms short so they can encourage users to register. However, once they register, most websites allow users to update their profile, etc. This is where you can get more detail about users. This information will help you to target your marketing efforts.

Feedback

Many sites have feedback forms on their website. I am not sure how many of them take advantage of the feedback they receive from users. If you don’t have a feedback form or a contact us form, make sure you create one. Not a lot of people will send feedback but those who choose to send feedback, you will definitely get lots of useful information that you can take advantage of.

Statistical Analysis

If you are not using a traffic analytical tool such at the Google Analytics, you should get one right away. Most of these tools are free to begin with; hence you should take advantage of it. This sort of tool provides you with a lot more information about visitor patterns. They provide you with information far beyond what you may need to improve your marketing strategy. I am going to focus on a few key features of these tools so you get a sense of what to look for.

Source: Robert Robles

Traffic Source

Knowing where your visitors are coming from is important so you can focus more and more on improving the strategy to drive even more people from the same source. This is where you find out if your marketing strategy is successful in driving visitors to your site. If you spend time promoting your website on Twitter, you will see the amount of traffic coming from Twitter with these analytical tools. This information tells you the interests of your audience.

Keyword/Search Term

This is the best tool to find out the interests of your visitors. If people are coming from search engines, you should be able to track down the keywords they searched for before they reached your site. This piece of information is “key” because you can continue to focus on improving your content so you can drive more people to your website. This tells you which keywords are working for you and which aren’t. Knowing this information, allows you to focus on improving the ones that are not working for you.

Time on site/Bounce Rate/Loyalty

Finally this information tells you how much they love your site! So all of the above tools provide you with information as to who they are and where they come from. This information tells you if your website is sticky or not. If you find that the numbers low for these three key elements, you need to make adjustments to your website and the way you present your content. Lots of people may be visiting your site, but if they don’t stick around to read what you have to say, then you are wasting your time.

Content/Page Views

In order for you to distinguish between what is working and what is not working on your site, you need to dig into users interest a little bit further. This tool will tell you where the users are spending more time within your website. This tool will provide you with information that you can take advantage of to improve the content on your site. If you see users spending more time on one particular page within your site, you may want to consider changing the design and look of other pages OR work on improving contents on other pages. In other words, you can at least find out what sort of information on your site is drawing the most attention.

The above are just a few key features of analytical tools. You can use other features if you wish but the above features should be sufficient to let you know what is working on your site and what is not working. It will also tell you why people are coming to your site.

Get Data Directly From Your Audience using Polls, Surveys and Other Features

As your business grows, you may have the need to get to know your visitors even more. In order to get more details, you can implement the following tools.

Source: 6Smarketing

Polls

Polls are quick and are painless for people to complete. It usually takes a few minutes for someone to complete a polling question. Therefore this approach is easy to implement and probably will have more participants. You can choose how often you want to run a poll on your site to better understand your audience. You can plan out a polling strategy that spans our over a number of months. Then hit the users with a series of questions every week (or however you prefer) that will better inform you of who they are and what they are looking for once you’ve completed the full questionnaire.

Surveys

Surveys are sometimes difficult to pull through. In my experience, it is very difficult to get people to participate on a survey because it takes more time for them to complete a survey than a poll. However, a survey can be targeted and it will provide you with the best information once completed. You should plan out your survey so it will convince the user to complete it. You should try to keep it short in order to increase participation. You should also think about giving away a free product in return for them to complete a survey. This will motivate the visitors to participate.

On Site Features

With Web 2.0, it is very simple for you to create features that are embedded within your site that will allow user interaction. By following the user interaction, coupled with statistical analysis of content served, you can collect a lot of information about users. You can build features that will fulfill your need to improve the game. For example, if you want to know what sort of products and services will better serve your audience, you may want to build an interactive tool that asks for people to click on products they like. By collecting that data, you will know which product ranks to the top. Once you have that information, you can either create a product that you can sell on your site or signup for an affiliate program and offer that product on your site.

The intension of this article is to provide you with a quick glimpse of available tools to get to know your audience. The features and tools explained in this article are just to get you started. You can be creative and come up with many other features that will help you improve your marketing strategy and eventually allow you to make lots of money with your website.

Entrepreneur: Know Your Customer Better to be Successful

Guna — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 15:15:19 +0000

If you don’t know your customer, then you don’t have your priorities set for your business. In other words, you don’t know your business. Knowing your customer better must be ranked to the top of your priority list if you want to be successful in your business.

It is not just you. Many business owners, including online businesses, tend to believe that they know their customers. They don’t do any analytical work to actually make the conclusion. They just guess. To be successful in business, you must avoid making decisions with you gut instincts. Yes gut instincts may work but if you couple that with pragmatic analysis of your customers, then you will make the best decision.

Why should you know your customer better?

Respond to their needs

How could you respond to your customer’s need if you don’t know what they want? If you don’t respond to their need then they are going to move on to someone else that can provide them with what they are looking for. Especially for an online business, this is very important because a typical customer will have multiple options with a click of a mouse. Therefore, it is very easy for them to move on from you to someone else.

Respond to your sales pattern

You may have products or affiliate programs that aren’t selling as much as they should. If you don’t do your homework to find out who is buying and what sort of products or services they are buying from you, how could you really decide on adding new products and services? There may be one product that is making you good income for you but if you don’t know who is buying that product, you can’t really make an effort to target the same group of audience to further enhance the sales.

Stop Chasing for New Ones

Many people spend time chasing new customers because they don’t know how to retain the ones they get everyday. This is a huge problem. Why would you spend money and time chasing new customers when you can simply make small changes within your existing website or business to grow your dedicated customer base? It is very simple to make adjustments to the customer’s needs and retain a visitor when they come to your site than to chase for new ones.

So the above points provide a quick summary of why you should get to know your customers but how do you get to know your customers? Well there are many ways to get to know your customers. You can do this by asking your customers to complete a survey, an interview or a feedback form. You can also use traffic analytical tools or hire an outside market research firm to do the work for you. There are many options available for you, especially if you are an online business. Online businesses can take advantage of existing automated tools to track the visitors and their activities.

Once you get to know your customers, you can make necessary adjustments by testing few different scenarios to retain your customers. You may have read my post, testing is crucial to maximize the profits, which explained why you may be missing out on opportunities to make more money with existing customers. Test it again and again to make sure you are hitting the right target and that you are making the most of your business.

The goal here is to understand your customer better so you can fulfill their needs and make them loyal to your business. This way you can avoid chasing for new customers all the time to make your business profitable. Your loyal customers will refer many other loyal customers to you. Therefore, by satisfying your customers, your business will grow on its own.

Entrepreneur: Keep Your Heads Up and Think Outside the Box

Guna — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 15:34:13 +0000

I think it is time for you to wake up and smell the roses. Really, is it just me or are you all feeling the same today? It is 2009, almost 10 years from the peak of the dot com bubble, a lot has changed but have you? In this article, I am going to try and touch on a few points as to why you will fail today if you follow the “status quo.”

I don’t mean to make you panic but I want you to understand the urgency to think outside the box.

Since the economy has tanked over the past year, thousands of people are left without a job, consumers are reluctant to spend money and overall a lot of uncertainty on the market. I am sure I don’t have to elaborate on this point but have you ever asked yourself what this means for you and your startups? Well if you haven’t, then you should once you finish reading this posting. “Diligence” must be taken in the wake of the current economic crisis.

There is a lot of uncertainty associated with the recession but one thing we know for sure about recessions is that all countries, including all of ours, will bounce back in time. They have all bounced back out of a recession in the past and this time too, we will bounce back. So while we are down in the trenches at the moment, are you working on your building blocks so you can excel when the economy bounces back?

In order to succeed in today’s market; you need to think outside the box. Move away from status quo. Status quo kind if mentality is not going to get you in front of your competitors; it will only keep you afloat. Afloat only if you are lucky! Thinking and doing the same as your competitors is not going to make you successful.

Source WikiPedia

Learn to think differently than others. Learn to stand out among others. Do something different so you can show your visitors that you have something unique that is not found anywhere else. Think about Richard Branson and his well known controversial marketing tactics. He created his first business when he was 16! Think about the amount of free exposure he generates just by thinking outside the box. I am not suggesting that you work on setting world records to make your startup fly but what I am getting at is that you need to think a little different than the million others who are trying to do the same thing as you are. Then only you can stand out among other entrepreneurs. Everyone has different traits, show your talent by coming up with something unique.

Here are few things you can work on that will help you with your startups.

Social Media Marketing:

Yesterday I’ve discussed about the “Importance of Understanding the Social Media Marketing.” I think it is worth mentioning that again today. The fundamental aspect of marketing is to fulfill certain objectives of yours by gaining the attention of an audience (the visitor). Such objectives could be as simple as to build your reputation, make a sale, redirect to an affiliate program, get a few clicks on your ads or to capture the lead (users, subscribers, etc).

Social Media Platforms offers a wide range of opportunities for you to take advantage of millions of people who wants to participate and collaborate with you. Some entrepreneurs focus on building profiles that are self serving with user generated content only to get traffic back to their websites. Some focus on building a community by participating and contributing to a network of people and eventually building his/her authority in that particular topic or niche. Then there are those that fully take advantage of the social media market and really push it to reap the full potential of social media marketing.

Just think about Twitter. It has millions of users from all around the world with thousands of different interests. It is like you don’t even have to be specific to one niche or to a target audience when you launch something viral on the social media. It is time to leverage the size and the reach of large user base of these Social Media Platforms.

Many large companies such as Dell are taking advantage of sites like Twitter. They are posting “exclusive sales only for Twitter users.” I am sure you would have heard of the Dell earning $1 million in revenue by posting offers on Twitter. These are different tactics used by leading companies to take advantage of Social Media Marketing. Dell probably don’t care who is looking at their tweets. In other words, with such a large user base of Twitter, Dell doesn’t care who or when a user reads their tweet. Dell today has over one million followers on Twitter. Where else would you get this sort of attention when you hit the “send” button with your message or your sales pitch? People just waiting to read what you have to say! This is very powerful if you know how to master it.

Just think about it. Are you taking advantage of social media marketing? Are you leveraging the large user base of such platforms? If you aren’t, why are you not thinking about it?

In order for you to succeed with your social media marketing strategies, you need to understand why the people are there in the first place. You need to understand why some spend time on Twitter while others spend time on Facebook or other social media platforms such as Digg. Some spend time on all of them. People tend to cluster in places they feel comfortable with – the tools that provide them with the ability to interact with other users. Therefore, your marketing tactics should differ for each platform. Once you understand what makes each platform unique, you need to launch your campaigns accordingly to satisfy the need of those people.

Once you learn to gain the attention of these users, you will have no problem monetizing your efforts. Some of the key things for you to keep in mind about social media marketing is that when you work on your own profile, make sure you are being honest with people in your network and also try to build relationship with key influencers. These key influencers can make your story/product go viral in no time. They have a huge fan base and they can get the words out. Therefore, associating with key influencers is a must in social media marketing strategy.

Give Before You Ask:

I am sure you’ve heard these terms many times in your life. Are you really taking advantage of this strategy? How are you adding value to your audience? So you work so hard with your social media marketing strategies and drive traffic to your site but if you are not adding value to your audience, then what is the point of driving them to your site in the first place?

Many people have used this strategy and it still works. Yesterday I logged into my Google Adsense account and I saw some unusual activity. I’ve made 3 times more money than any other days. I was happy but in the mean time I wanted to know what was happening. So I went over to my site and watch what sort of ads are being displaced. With no surprise, I found an ad that was giving away a “FREE” product on internet marketing. My visitors found it interesting enough and click through to get their free product. The point of this story is that you should make an effort to add value to your audience before you ask something of them. People will almost all the time will go for it. They will click through or they will subscribe just to get the free product.

If you are a blogger, write good content so you can keep your visitors and gain their trust before you ask them to buy a product or something. If you have a website, give them a free e-book of all of your knowledge. People love the free stuff and they will sign up or even subscribe to get the products.

However, when you offer them a free product, you have to do it in a way that you don’t come across as a spammer. Therefore, you need to make them feel comfortable on your site then you offer them something they want. Do whatever you can to add value to your audience before you ask for something.

Build Strong Relationships within Your Niche:

Don’t take every competitor as an enemy and that you need to take over their business. Everyone during this recession is hurting, so why not think about working together to achieve your goals together? I am not suggesting that you should share your secrets or your products but I am suggesting that there are ways to take advantage of each others traffic, knowledge, etc.

Governments across the world are working together to tackle the economy. They know it is best to work together at this time than to compete. The same strategy should be used by entrepreneurs who are looking to build a foundation for future success. The internet is huge; there is traffic for everyone. Sharing and sending traffic back and forth between sites will allow the audience to feel fulfilled. They will feel that they have gained more by visiting your site or your competitor’s site. Refer to each others products and services. Once a visitor see you working together with your competitor, they also feel comfortable enough to trust you as well.

I talked earlier about the recession and how we need to work on our building blocks for future success. Well if you know your customers are not spending the big bucks today because they are out of a job or something, why not just work on gaining their trust over the next few month so when they have the money, they will spend it on your products? This is what I meant earlier about working on your building blocks and assembling them in a way that you are standing on a stronger foundation when this recession is over.

With this article, I didn’t mean to scare anyone about the recession or anything but just suggesting that everyone should open up their eyes, keep their heads up and start thinking outside the box.

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Entrepreneur: How to Go From Failure to Success

Guna — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 13:54:50 +0000

Knowing how to get through a failed attempt and having the attitude to move on with another startup is what makes up a true entrepreneur. How do you cope with failure? Are you better at handling failures? How do you do it?

Entrepreneurs are risk takers which mean you will face multiple failures in life. Although Entrepreneurs are confident and are better than many people in coping with such event, many still find it difficult to get through this period. This is why learning to accept and moving on is crucial for future success.

You need to look at the positive aspect of failing and take advantage of it. This is how you become a successful entrepreneur. As I mentioned on my previous posts, 21 Words All Entrepreneurs Eliminate to Become Successful, you can learn a lot from your failures.

Here are few things you should do if you fail so you can be successful next time around:

Accept & Pull Yourself Together

Accept that your business has failed. Although this may be difficult, it is the first thing you need to do. Many people can’t get out of the “denial” cycle hence stuck in one startup that has failed on them. They don’t go on to succeed with new startups. In order to move on and to succeed, you must accept the failure. Embrace the knowledge learned from this venture for future attempts.

Identify Mistakes

You need to do your homework. You need to make some time to decipher what just happened with your startup. This will help you identify your weaknesses. By identifying the mistakes you’ve made, you are on track to be stronger next time around because you will be on alert and will not repeat the same mistake twice.

Identify What Worked For You

Make sure you also note the things you’ve done right as well. The experience you have just gained is priceless. Hence making note of things that worked for you during the process. It is essential that you save this knowledge for your next startup so you can be successful.

Adjust Your Viewpoint

Were you trying to moving up to the top quickly? There is no such thing as becoming a millionaire overnight. You need to work on the building blocks step by step. You should reconsider your perspective and see if you can make small adjustments for incremental successes.

Find Something New and Try Again

Like I said above, you can learn a lot from your failure. Embrace the knowledge and find something different to try again. You will be surprised with the results when you apply your past knowledge. You must stay alert on your weak spots so you don’t repeat the same mistake again.

No one can teach you lessons similar to what you’ve just gained from failing. You have to learn to accept the failure and move on to something new. Success does not come with one try. Consider this as a building block to success.

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Startups: To Outsource or Not To Outsource Explained in 5 Steps

Guna — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 19:02:27 +0000

There are many that would argue that outsourcing during the early part of your startup is probably better. On the other hand, many would also argue that keeping it in-house and doing it all by yourself is better for you. Which one is it? Which one is better for you?

In this critical time, with tight budget and a tough financial market to raise money, this question to whether to outsource or do it in house has become more crucial than ever before. Startups with no internal staff on various core functions are struggling with this question on a daily basis to get their business off the ground.

From my experience, the answer varies from startup to startup. It varies because you need to ask yourself the question, “What are you good at doing and how much time you have for your startup?” If you answer this question honestly, you will have the answer to whether you should outsource some non-core functions or if you should manage it all within by wearing multiple hats.

You should follow this simple 5 step guide to help you answer the question. I have seen this work in the past. Throughout all of this, especially if you are going at this alone, find a mentor to guide you.

Your Numbers and Time:

Figure out how much time you have and how much money you can actually bring to the table for this startup. You need to be honest with yourself in making this assessment. This step determines the available startup capital for your startup. If you get this wrong, you will probably make the wrong decisions in the steps to follow.

Problem You Are Trying to Solve:

What is it that you are actually trying to solve with your startup? Figure out what sort of skill sets are required to complete the development work and what is required to market this product or service. Make a chart and figure out how much of this you are realistically capable of doing on your own and how much of this you will need some sort of help with – either in-house or external. You can wear multiple hats but you only have 24 hours in a day and 7 days in a week, just like everyone else. Hence, when your startup heats up, you won’t have the time to manage all functions by yourself.

Financial Analysis:

This is the most crucial step. You should always spend more time here and try to run through every component of your project and compare the cost between in-house and outsource. In order to do this, take your project and divide it into individual tasks and resources required to complete each task. Then examine the time required to complete each task. Do some research using employment websites and see what you will pay for in-house staff. You will also have to add the cost of providing office space for the employees. In order to find out the cost of outsourcing, call up a few outsourcing firms and get an idea of the kind of cost and time it would require to complete your project.

Numbers speak for themselves and many times, you should be able to decide by this step whether outsourcing is for you or not.

Make or Break a Project – Find the Right Talent:

Many startups are not the experts in managing staff or directly dealing with another outsourcing firm. Hence when the pressure mounts to get additional help, they tend to make the wrong decisions. Even if they make the right decision to outsource or to hire staff, they end up hiring the wrong employee or outsource the work to a firm that does not deliver. You can make or break a project with your choice. Timing is crucial for any startups so make sure you do your homework to either hire the right employee for your office or find the right firm to outsource. Don’t cheap out on either one. You need to go back to the above points and see how much you can afford, then find a decent firm that can deliver for you on time or hire a professional that can help you with your startup.

Decide if Mixing Outsourcing with In-House will Work for You:

Many will find this model work for them because there are core functions that you may not want to outsource. Such core functions could be financial related or security related. Once you follow the above steps, you will be able to identify the core functions and you will also be able to identify how much money you got to play with. These two pieces of information will help you figure out what you should keep for in-house and what you should outsource.

From my experience, mixing both works well most of the time. As a founder of a new business, you tend to wear multiple hats. Hence you able to do many functions but at the same time, you will need help with tasks that are beyond your skill sets. For those tasks, I usually look for a firm that I can outsource the work to. Once you start dealing with a firm or a few, you will begin to create a relationship with some of them. You should work on this relationship because if you find the right firm, you can use them over and over again because you know they will deliver on time and on budget.

I hope this simple step by step guide to decide whether to outsource or to do it yourself works for you. If you’ve experienced this in the past, share it with our readers by leaving a comment.

Entrepreneurs: Make a Habit to Invest in Relationships

Guna — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 20:49:39 +0000

How do you know if you are truly making the most of the people around you, the people you come in touch with on a regular basis and all other people you meet through social networking sites, etc?

Today I had a chance to read Martin Zwilling’s blog post “Can You Find My Contact Info in a Second?” In this particular post, Martin explains why it is so difficult to find up to date information on the people you’ve met and why the rolodex with 100 business cards doesn’t work anymore. I totally agree with him. It is very difficult to find someone’s current contact information these days. Many people are moving around from job to job and hence their contact information is changing on a regular basis. His posting made me wonder throughout the day and it made me think about my own relationships. So I wanted to share my perspective on why it is so important for you to maintain your relationships on a regular basis to not only succeed in business but also in life.

How many true friends do you have? Are you in touch with them on a daily basis? I believe many entrepreneurs don’t take this particular subject seriously before they go about starting their own new business. If you maintain your relationships, it will be one of the best tools you can tap into when you launch your new startup. In most cases, this will not cost you a penny. These are the people you can count on to provide you with some feedback for your new website, new service or a product. They are the people that can spread the words about your products and services. They are your free marketers when you are ready to launch your next startup.

However, maintaining the relationship comes with responsibility. It is not an easy task. It requires daily commitment from you to make a phone call or to send an email just to say hi. I think many of us take relationships for granted and we don’t give the attention it requires. We believe it will be there when we need it the most but forget to understand that just like us, everyone is busy as well and that old relationship does not wait around for you.

In order to maintain the relationship you need to invest in people. You need to first learn to value who they are, respect their work, respect their view and finally understand them. Understanding one another is not an easy task as well but at least if you want to build relationships to help you with your business analyze the following areas and help them along.

find out what their goal in life is
find out what they like doing the most
do they have any interests or hobbies
find out what they need help with
find out what they are working on

Many successful people find a way to keep in touch with hundreds people all the time. They don’t know much about the individuals but they have a way to keep a tiny bit of crucial information that they know will spark an interest or a conversation with their contacts. This sort of delicacy will help you go a long way in terms of building relationships. You will need to find a way to keep this information along with your contacts. Martin’s post suggests a few tools for you to try out.

In order to find this delicacy, first you need to understand the truth about people. You need to understand that at the end of the day, they are all human beings as well. They have feelings too and they want to feel important and special. You need to learn to give them what they want or lack. For example, if they want to associate with success then you should help them achieve that. If they are insecure then you give them confidence. If they don’t feel special, make them feel special by truthfully complementing about their work etc. If they are starting up a business, be the first one to lend a hand.

This is how you build a network of true online friends. This is how you build relationships in your life. If you do it right and help them along, they will be there when you need to count on them. In your niche market, you will meet a lot of people on a regular basis. Help them along and keep in touch. You will need them one day.

I hope my thoughts help your relationships. Please leave comments for others to read on how you manage your relationships and how it has helped you with your startups.

StartupBooster.com » startups

An interview with Mr. Martin Zwilling, CEO and Founder of Startup Professionals

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