Marketing Your Business
Marketing Your Business
The literal jump from the corporate arena into the world of business ownership often times has the skill chilling awakening that comes from a dive into Lake Superior in mid February. One of the advantages to being employed under someone else’s corporate logo is the infrequent, but essential mental relief that comes from being able to leave the job and go home. The physical and mental separation provides the psychological comfort of distance and the charm of being able to unravel the corporate threads, if only for a short amount of time. The role of business employee is, at minimum, to do no harm to the organization, sustain its existence and contribute to its growth and success. The same holds true for the new business owner engaged in building their business while trying to define its distinctive competitive edge. However, there is one important difference that is rarely known to new business owners until they attempt to find the psychological distance between their business life and their personal life.
“I have yet to find that distance,” laments Akilah Rashidi owner of Digital Marketing. “Most of my waking time is spent actively managing, promoting, marketing and selling my business service. Sometimes I don’t bother to ask what day it is because everyday is devoted to getting my business off the ground.”
As many of her contemporaries have discovered, the path to business ownership is a 24/7@365 energy consuming activity that makes little distinction between mid day and mid night. The comfort and security of a highly structured work life is replaced by a seemingly random series of unrelated activities dedicated to amplifying your voice in a chorus of good singers. The real challenge lies in identifying as many viable business and social networks as possible for marketing your business and establishing contacts.
“It’s not something that a painfully shy or moderate social recluse should take up as a career move,” says Akilah “There is rarely a moment when the business owner is not on center stage trying to engage as much of the audience as possible. Bill Gates still attends tekkie conferences even though he could probably buy up most of them. He understands that you can never stop selling the business and the business has to be about what you can do for others.”
The toolkit.com website provides a downloadable Strengths and Weaknesses Checklist for small business owners as a way of assessing interest and skill level. 5 of the 8 skill categories specifically address the outward social networking aspect of business ownership. The willingness to take on the responsibility of running a business is the hallmark of most of the entrepreneurs abandoning the corporate ranks. The ability to engage in an unparalleled form of marketing savvy is one of the primary reasons why so many fail to get past the first year of operation. The checklist provides a quick assessment for determining the degree of help you may need in the social interaction area.
Akilah has spent a large amount of time making sure her business is known directly by people she’s met and by others who’ve heard of the business. “Sometimes I feel like Uncle Martin from that 60’s television show ‘My Favorite Martian’. He would raise his antennas every time he was ready to disappear. My antenna is raised higher and tuned into a broader frequency in order to pick up on networking opportunities.”
Websites:
http://www.toolkit.cch.com/
http://www.whatifind.com/business/small-business.php
http://www.myownbusiness.org/course_sba.html
http://www.inc.com/guides/write_biz_plan/20660.html
Marketing Your Business - To learn more about this author, visit Lee Meadows's Website.
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Marketing Your Business
The literal jump from the corporate arena into the world of business ownership often times has the skill chilling awakening that comes from a dive into Lake Superior in mid February. One of the advantages to being employed under someone else’s corporate logo is the infrequent, but essential mental relief that comes from being able to leave the job and go home. The physical and mental separation provides the psychological comfort of distance and the charm of being able to unravel the corporate threads, if only for a short amount of time. The role of business employee is, at minimum, to do no harm to the organization, sustain its existence and contribute to its growth and success. The same holds true for the new business owner engaged in building their business while trying to define its distinctive competitive edge. However, there is one important difference that is rarely known to new business owners until they attempt to find the psychological distance between their business life and their personal life.
“I have yet to find that distance,” laments Akilah Rashidi owner of Digital Marketing. “Most of my waking time is spent actively managing, promoting, marketing and selling my business service. Sometimes I don’t bother to ask what day it is because everyday is devoted to getting my business off the ground.”
As many of her contemporaries have discovered, the path to business ownership is a 24/7@365 energy consuming activity that makes little distinction between mid day and mid night. The comfort and security of a highly structured work life is replaced by a seemingly random series of unrelated activities dedicated to amplifying your voice in a chorus of good singers. The real challenge lies in identifying as many viable business and social networks as possible for marketing your business and establishing contacts.
“It’s not something that a painfully shy or moderate social recluse should take up as a career move,” says Akilah “There is rarely a moment when the business owner is not on center stage trying to engage as much of the audience as possible. Bill Gates still attends tekkie conferences even though he could probably buy up most of them. He understands that you can never stop selling the business and the business has to be about what you can do for others.”
The toolkit.com website provides a downloadable Strengths and Weaknesses Checklist for small business owners as a way of assessing interest and skill level. 5 of the 8 skill categories specifically address the outward social networking aspect of business ownership. The willingness to take on the responsibility of running a business is the hallmark of most of the entrepreneurs abandoning the corporate ranks. The ability to engage in an unparalleled form of marketing savvy is one of the primary reasons why so many fail to get past the first year of operation. The checklist provides a quick assessment for determining the degree of help you may need in the social interaction area.
Akilah has spent a large amount of time making sure her business is known directly by people she’s met and by others who’ve heard of the business. “Sometimes I feel like Uncle Martin from that 60’s television show ‘My Favorite Martian’. He would raise his antennas every time he was ready to disappear. My antenna is raised higher and tuned into a broader frequency in order to pick up on networking opportunities.”
Websites:
http://www.toolkit.cch.com/
http://www.whatifind.com/business/small-business.php
http://www.myownbusiness.org/course_sba.html
http://www.inc.com/guides/write_biz_plan/20660.html
Marketing Your Business - To learn more about this author, visit Lee Meadows's Website.
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Jeff FosterWebBizIdeas.com is a Minneapolis website design company founded to help people start an internet business by providing them with website, business, and internet resources that help foster the growth of successful online businesses and develop innovative Internet business ideas. We specialize in internet consulting & internet marketing. - Visit Jeff Foster's Website |
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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Stephanie RobeyStephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals. She is a successful entrepreneur having started and sold 2 companies and remains on the board of directors of the third, PhotoSpin.com Stephanie began her career in the direct marketing realm creating and producing direct mail for many of the major cable television companies and directly attributes her understanding of Internet marketing to those early offline experiences. Stephanie is a graduate of San Diego State University with a BFA in Graphic Arts and also holds an Executive MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University. Read Steph's Blog Meet Steph and Dave Sign up for our Free 7-Day BootCamp: Self Employed & Rich - Visit Stephanie Robey's Website |
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Anne BarrAnne Barr has over 26 years experience in sales and marketing, six years as a franchisee. She has assisted over 367 business owners and purchasers to achieve their goals in career change, transition and exit strategy. She holds the designation of Certified Franchise Executive from the International Franchise Association, Certified Business Intermediary from the International Business Brokers Association and Board Certified Broker from the Texas Association of Business Brokers. Anne is active in professional organizations, networking groups and volunteers for non-profit entities. As owner/operator of four successful businesses, Anne has proven people skills and enjoys helping clients find the right "fit" in business ownership. Visit www.FranchiseOpportunitySpecialist.com for more information about me and my company. - Visit Anne Barr's Website |
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Joe DagerJoe Dager is President of Business901, a progressive coaching company providing no-nonsense direction in areas such as Lean Six Sigma Marketing and organized referral marketing. What others say: In the past 20 years, Joe and I have collaborated on many difficult issues. Joe’s ability to combine his expertise with “out of the box” thinking is unsurpassed. He has always delivered quickly, cost effectively and with ingenuity. A brilliant mind that is always a pleasure to work with.” - James R. If you want to learn more about Business901, start a conversation with us. We can be found @ Web/Blog: Business901.com Web/Blog: FundingYourNonprofit.com LinkedIn Profile Follow me on Twitter - Visit Joe Dager's Website |
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John AlexanderJohn has taught keyword research and SEO skills to small groups of business owners and Webmasters from over 80 different countries world wide since 2002. John is also the Director of Search Engine Academy ; Co-director of Training at Search Engine Workshops offering live, SEO Workshops with his partner SEO educator Robin Nobles, author of the very first comprehensive online search engine marketing courses at SEO Training Online and the SEO Workshop Resource Center. I look forward to hearing from you! - Visit John Alexander's Website |
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