America’s Best Companies (http://www.americasbestcompanies.com) is dedicated to helping small businesses stay in business, grow their business, and make more money in their business. ABC is built on the strong belief that small businesses are the most important companies in America. After all, the American Dream has always begun with the idea of starting a small business.
To carry out this mission, ABC provide small business with the tools, opportunities, and resources to compete with the existing mega-marts and giant online retailers. They strive to educate the point-and-click generation of today to recognize the unique products and personal services that local business owners provide every day.
For example, ABC provides advice on how to advertise your business through ABC's own Internet directory and several big-name local search sites like Yahoo, Yellowbook.com, and Yellowpages.com. Second, ABC publishes and hosts an easy-to-build website for your business where you can post in-store specials, coupons, photos, videos, and more. Third, the ABC website provides discounts on a variety of goods and services for all of your most common business needs.
A subscription to the America’s Best Companies magazine will provide you with the most current information and advice available to help you run your business as efficiently as possible. There is a whole lot of helpful information and resources that small business owners would be glad to capitalize on.
http://www.americasbestcompanies.com
Free Webcast - 5 Tips to Staying on Top in an Economic Downturn
Posted by Marcel Sim under Recommendations,
May 18, 2008
Our friends over at SBTV.com alerted us to this not-to-be-missed, free event:
Free Webcast: 5 Tips to Staying on Top in an Economic Downturn! Tune in to SBTV.com on Wednesday, May 21st at 12:00 p.m. EST, as Susan Wilson Solovic hosts this very special episode of "Power Lunch with Susan" for time tested tips on starting and growing a business during the tough times. Susan features online micro lender Count Me In and guests Make Mine a Million Dollar Business winner, Francine Glick and Latin Media Dynamo, Nely Galan. Click here for all the details.
We reviewed Wix a few days ago, and found it an easy-to-use online application for creating, publishing and promoting Web content in Flash. With Wix's drag & drop interface you can easily add audio, video, images, text, animation, decoration and more.
Wix.com has graciously agreed to give away free trial accounts for the first 100 users who sign up exclusively through GetEntrepreneurial.com. You can make use of this opportunity to try Wix out for yourself. Sign up here: http://www.wix.com/Welcome/GetEntrepreneurial
Wix is an online application for creating, publishing and promoting stunning Web content in Flash. With Wix you don't have to be a designer or programmer to create gorgeous Websites and embeddable Web objects. With Wix's drag & drop interface you can easily add audio, video, images, text, animation, decoration and more.
Wix content can be published anywhere on the Web — on social networks, blogs, as stand-alones, etc. and is automatically updated in all destinations whenever you edit and save it. Furthermore, you can add tags to your Wix creations to make them search-engine friendly. A free Wix account allows you to have complete control of your web presence from one place.
It's a pretty useful tool for content creation for entrepreneurs and small business owners who would like to take their business to the web. Try it at http://www.wix.com/small-business/
Update: First 100 users to sign up exclusively through GetEntrepreneurial.com will get to enjoy a free trial Wix.com account. Sign up here: http://www.wix.com/Welcome/GetEntrepreneurial
If you are a freelancer or consultant or somebody who bills your clients for work produced by the hour, you may find this software useful. Reader Phil alerted us to his timesheet tracking software which he has produced to record time worked on client projects.
Phil's ATT software tracks activity periods, clients, projects, billing time and the hourly rates you charge your clients. Using the built in TimeSheet Wizard you can instantly print or save PDF time sheets which accompany invoices you send out to your clients.
Other software features include on-screen 'Project Summary' panel displaying instant breakdown of charges and rates, and built in data backup and data restore feature allowing you save your data to another location such as a USB memory stick. ATT can be downloaded for free and the full version costs $49.
Small Business Insights from Northstar Thinktank
Posted by Marcel Sim under Recommendations,
February 2, 2008
Northstar Thinktank is an useful resource center for entrepreneurs to find highly targeted business building tools from a lot of great places on the World Wide Web. Everyday the Thinktank team scours the world marketplace for valuable information and emerging business trends. This information is summarized, distilled and then delivered in such a way that small enterprises can quickly put it to work, keeping them far ahead of the curve.
Some topics discussed over there include: writing a business plan, retaining customers, creating a customer-centric culture in your company, and more. You may get more relevant entrepreneurship insights at the Northstar Thinktank blog, such as this article by CEO Jeff Chavez about how to find a great business idea and putting it into action. Jeff's suggestion that we think about what problems people have that you could help them solve, or what goals we could help people achieve, really is something that we agree with. People will pay you dearly to help them solve their problems or reach their goals.
If you have any helpful websites or resources for fellow entrepreneurs and small business owners, why not contribute to this post by making a comment below. Share with us your favorite entrepreneurship websites. Thanks!
Here is GetEntrepreneurial.com's new year gift to all readers and subscribers!
This free 20-pages PDF ebook (worth $38), New Business Ideas Report 2007, is brought to you by the business ideas hunting team at our sister-site CoolBusinessIdeas.com. What is this report about? It is an analysis of innovative and never-seen-before business ideas we've seen worldwide this year. Clearly, entrepreneurs around the world are often inspired by common underlying consumer trends when they are working to bring their new business ideas to fruition. We hope that you'll be able to come up with the next big thing after getting to know some of these interesting consumer and business trends behind 2007's new business ideas.
Some of the case studies included in this free report:
Cell Phone 2.0
The cell phone has evolved from its humble beginnings as a communication tool into a super gadget that offers us many useful services and resources, thanks to enterprising entrepreneurs with brilliant business ideas.
Ultra Luxury
The rich are just getting richer. With millions of dollars to spend, some use their huge riches to support philanthropy efforts, such as Bill Gates who gave away some $29 billion to charities from 2000 onwards. Some just spend their money on whatever they fancy. Entrepreneurs are coming up with new business ideas to entice the luxury-craving uber-rich to throw their money on.
Attention-Grabbing Advertising
Thanks to media saturation, it is now harder to reach your targeted group of consumers through traditional means of advertising and marketing. It’s no longer enough to place ads in TV, radio, print, Internet, etc. You have to look for avenues and places which will surprise your target audience.
New Business Ideas Report 2007 is available for free download here at GetEntrepreneurial.com.
Click here to view your free copy of the "New Business Ideas Report 2007". To download onto your computer, Right-Click on this link and Save As a file on your computer. PDF file, 1.08MB. Get Adobe Reader here.
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by Lorraine Cohen.
"How Do I Choose?" eBook
A powerfull five-step blueprint for making rock-solid decisions
Would you rather get a root canal than make important decisions?
When faced with even the smallest decision, do you waffle and procrastinate?
Have you paid penalties or "lost out" because you simply couldn't make a decision?
This groundbreaking eBook outlines a powerfull (and user-friendly) five-step blueprint for making rock-solid decisions. Packed with worksheets, exercises, useful tips, and real-life examples, How Do I Choose? is a must-read practical business and life tool that will help you make major and minor decisions that feel right - in your heart and in your bones!
"9 Keys to Claim Your Personal Power" eBook
This eCourse style workbook is designed to walk you through a process of thinking about POWER in a new way. 9 Keys to Claim Your Personal POWER will challenge you to explore what power means to you, what it is and how you can begin to deliberately become the Creator of your life.
Take Charge of Your Life: Overcoming Overwhelm, Procrastination, and Fear!
Receive insights, loads of practical tools and exercises you can implement immediately to feel more productive and confident in building your business as well as feeling more in charge of your personal life. Click here to learn more about Lorraine's products.
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by Jim Donovan.
Life is just a breeze... or is it?
Have you ever wondered why some people seem to just breeze through life, accomplishing everything they set out to do, while the majority of the population leads what Henry David Thoreau called, "lives of quiet desperation"?
The difference, as some of us have learned, is first removing the obstacles to our success and then, following a proven process to achieve whatever we want in life.
GetEntrepreneurial.com Network Expert, Jim Donovan, a highly respected author who has written several successful books, now published in 22 countries, has just released what many of us consider his best work.
Based on his runaway hit, "This is Your Life, Not a Dress Rehearsal," his new self-paced, home study audio program and companion workbook of exercises and action steps, is guaranteed to change your life.
I can say this with confidence because Jim has been teaching these same principles in his live seminars for over a decade and has used them with his private clients who gladly pay him more than ten times the cost of this program for an hour of his wisdom.
Here is more info on his "This is Your Life, Not a Dress Rehearsal" course:
- Learn how total acceptance and surrender is the key to reclaiming your personal power.
- How to change the conditions in your life immediately with one simple activity.
- Identify what needs to happen in each key area of your life in order to live your dream life.
- Uncover the beliefs that are blocking you from your success.
- Learn a simple method to eliminate what's stopping you from becoming all you are capable of becoming.
- Develop the new, empowering beliefs that will support the lifestyle you desire.
Find out more about Jim's "This is Your Life, Not a Dress Rehearsal" audio workshop by visiting the homepage at http://www.jimdonovan.com/your-life-cb.html
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
Accepting Credit Card and Check Payments Online Easily
Posted by Marcel Sim under Recommendations,
December 26, 2007
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by AndyLax.
If you're looking for a merchant accounts provider offering affordable services for credit card processing, IntelliCollect - United Bank Card may just be for you. Designed for businesses on a budget, the merchant account offered by IntelliCollect - United Bank Card will lower your credit card processing expenses and increase your cash flow.
IntelliCollect - United Bank Card is one of the few merchant account companies in America that waives any startup fee and any termination or cancellation fee. Their merchant account contract is month to month, and they work with the nation's most aggressive wholesale payment processor to offer you an affordable merchant account at the lowest possible cost.
All credit card transactions are processed with the maximum secure encryption and funds are quickly deposited into the checking account of your choice. If you're looking to expand your business in the online world, IntelliCollect is a good choice.
Check out this free ebook, The Fool-Proof Guide to Accepting Credit Card & Check Payments Online & Offline, specially for GetEntrepreneurial.com readers.
IntelliCollect has a reputation for quick response times, exemplary customer service and an outstanding array of affordable services. You may want to have a look at a review of IntelliCollect's services on this page.
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
The FAQ Book - Public Speaking for Entrepreneurs
Posted by Steven Teo under Recommendations,
December 25, 2007
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by Eric Feng.
Eric Feng is the go-to guy if you want to learn how to impress your investors and customers through public speaking. For more tips and tactics that you can use immediately in your next presentation, visit The Public Speaking Blog.
Recently, Eric has just released a well-written book: "The FAQ Book- Public Speaking"
Here's what you get...
* The 3 most important attributes the audience looks out for in a speaker
* How to maximise speaking effectiveness and accelerate your growth exponentially as a speaker.
* How to find and cultivate your very own style of speaking that no one can duplicate
* Discover every single trick, tactic, shortcut, formula, jealously-guarded secret and psychological hot-button used by truly successful public speakers
* The little known secrets to capture the attention of the audience
* Why pauses are necessary in your speech and how you can totally eliminate pause fillers and don't let them haunt you again
And much more! Certainly a recommendable, humorous and effective public speaking book for all out there. Click here to receive a complimentary chapter of The FAQ Book on Public Speaking.
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
Networking for Entrepreneurs By Andy Lopata
Posted by Steven Teo under Recommendations,
December 24, 2007
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by Andy Lopata.
Here's a great Networking and Public Speaking Book written by Andy Lopata and Peter Roper: "...and Death came third!"
In '...and Death Came Third!', Andy Lopata and Peter Roper share their wealth of experience and insider secrets on networking and public speaking, giving you the tips, tools and techniques you need to overcome your fears and make the most of all the opportunities that come your way.
Read this book and discover how to:
WALK into a networking event and approach people with CONFIDENCE
STRUCTURE a talk so that you can get your key message across POWERFULLY
ENGAGE people in conversation and get them interested in YOU
FOCUS on the results you want from networking and achieve them EASILY
STAND and speak with CONVICTION and AUTHORITY
and much, much more...
Or look at the Word of Mouse - the social network that means business
For your business to grow people need to know about you. Networking has been proven to be effective in developing advocates who will recommend your business to others – but not everyone finds regular networking meetings easy to attend.
Sometimes, you have to be with a client at the time of the meeting, some of you just don’t find it easy to get to breakfast meetings, and lunchtime get-togethers can interrupt the working day.
If there was a way to network locally where you were in control when and where you met the other group members, wouldn’t that solve all those networking challenges?
If this sounds too good to be true – it isn’t. Joining the Word of Mouse network will put you into a strong team, all committed to helping each other’s businesses to prosper and grow.
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
Effective Time Managment For The 21st Century
Posted by Marcel Sim under Recommendations,
December 23, 2007
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by Klaus Wiedemann.
DAISHO is a group collaboration software designed for the working environment of the 21st century. It offers Goal and Time Management with Time Budgeting, Contact Management, P2P Groupware Functionality and more features. DAISHO integrates seamlessly with Outlook and supports calendar synchronization and contacts import.
You can request a trial version of this useful software, free, by visiting:
http://www.daisho-blacksmith.de/en/
With DAISHO, you can do long term planning and track the degree of your goal achievement. Combine your long-term planning with more strategic mid-term planning, and you can set deadlines to prioritize your goals. Moreover, you can integrate your diverse Outlook calendars and reduce unplanned activities with timeslots. You can even analyze your network contacts with DAISHO.
It's worth giving DAISHO a try. A free trial version is available at http://www.daisho-blacksmith.de/en/
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
Helping Entrepreneurs Get Their Videos Online
Posted by Steven Teo under Recommendations,
December 22, 2007
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by Lou Bortone.
Veteran television producer Lou Bortone, The Online Video Guy, has released several new products and services to help entrepreneurs produce online video for their websites or blogs.
The Online Video Guy’s signature products include a step-by-step e-course entitled “Maximizing Opportunities with Online Video,” as well as a new, low-cost e-book, the “Webcam Buying Guide and Videotaping Tips.” Both products are available online as PDF downloads at:
http://www.theonlinevideoguy.com/home/
In addition to Online Video “how-to” e-books and self-study e-courses, The Online Video Guy also offers video production and editing services, as well as design and production of full-motion video graphics. Samples are available at the homepage.
For entrepreneurs who prefer one-on-one coaching and assistance in getting videos online, Lou offers monthly e-coaching programs. Visit the website or e-mail lou.bortone@gmail.com for more information.
Exclusive for GetEntrepreneurial.com readers:
TV writer/producer Lou Bortone is "The Online Video Guy," who gives small businesses and entrepreneurs the tools and rules for creating their own online video content. Lou helps individuals, businesses and non-profits produce compelling video blogs, podcasts and TV programs for the Internet. Be sure to visit www.theonlinevideoguy.com and pick up your free Special Report "7 Secrets to Boosting Your Business Using Online Video!" - specially for GetEntrepreneurial.com readers.
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
25 Surefire Ways to Capture More Clients!
Posted by Steven Teo under Recommendations,
December 21, 2007
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by Terri Zwierzynski.
Free E-book By Solo-E specially for GetEntrepreneurial.com readers: 25 Surefire Ways to Capture More Clients, Get More Done in Less Time, and Make More Money -- in 90 Days or Less
The Dream
You're finally making a living as a solo business owner, and love telling your "employed" friends how great it is to be self-employed. And it's true -- you're working from home (or the beach, or a hotel room!), there's no stressful commute, and forget the confines of a 9-5 workday.
The Reality
But there may be more you aren't telling your friends: It's a little scary sometimes! Your salary is a roller coaster, as customers come and go, making it hard to plan for -- much less save for -- the future. You know you are working too hard, but you just have too much work to do -- plus mountains of email. There's no time to take a break, and frankly, you're exhausted!
Wouldn't it be lovely to work less and relax more? Can you imagine having so many clients that you have a waiting list? And being financially successul enough to save for retirement, afford your dream vacation -- and have the time to actually take that vacation?
Proven Solo Success Strategies
We've mined the collective experience of 15 successful Solo Entrepreneur Experts who share their best advice on how to start achieving those goals -- 25 proven strategies that will net you measurable results in less than three months.
Download your personal copy of the latest version of this ebook: http://www.solo-e.com/
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
Using CRM Technology and Sales Techniques to Help You Sell
Posted by Steven Teo under Recommendations,
December 20, 2007
This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Check out the rest of the series here. Today, we review a recommendation by Russ Lombardo.
Sales consultant Russ Lombardo who has over three decades in the high-tech industry, has released a couple of books to help entrepreneurs and sales people to increase revenue and success, namely "CyberSelling" and "CRM For The Common Man".
CyberSelling will improve your sales career, and your sales team, by teaching what you need to know in order to succeed in today's tough and challenging economy. Whether for a sales team or an individual sales professional, you will learn various selling skills -- from Cold Calling to Closing, and even Customer Retention after the sale.
You’ll see how to use an actual CRM product, GoldMine®, to assist in each of the stages of the sales process as well as how to use this technology to support your selling activities. The PEAK Sales Process is highlighted as the sales process used to guide you through your selling activities in the most effective order.
CyberSelling combines the 3 key ingredients for making your sales career more successful – Sales Processes, Selling Skills and CRM Technology.
Click on the image below to watch a free NetSeminar:
CRM For The Common Man provides you with:
-Plan your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) strategy
-Identify what needs to be done internally before considering a CRM solution
-Develop your company’s processes to improve your customer relationship management
-Use your existing systems to maximize your CRM potential
-Engage your entire company and get them behind your CRM strategy to guarantee success
-Communicate your CRM plans and strategies to your sales reps, and other stake holders, to ensure total buy-in
-Determine the costs associated with a CRM solution for your business, and calculate your ROI
-Develop a business planning roadmap to assure a successful CRM implementation
Click Here to Listen to Russ's CRM Radio Interview:
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This product review is part of a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
It's the time of the year again, when people all around the world take time off to savor the joys of Christmas. To mark the joyous season, we at GetEntrepreneurial.com are working on a special daily series, GE Network Recommendations. Everyday, one of our resident GE Network Experts will recommend to us small business products or services which they feel are highly beneficial and relevant to aspiring entrepreneurs.
We'll do a review of our experts' recommendations in the hope that you'll find them useful and informative. As the year 2007 comes to an end, and the new exciting year beckons, we hope that among the reviews in the special daily series, you'll find one or two hidden gems which would turn out to be really effective in starting your own successful business or bringing your current business to the next level in 2008.
We thank our Network Experts for their contribution, and we also want to thank you, our readers, for your participation in this small community. Happy Holidays!
About.com: One of the many questions about business planning I receive is how long is a typical plan? The length of a typical business plan can greatly vary from 10 pages to a 100-page document. It depends on the intended use of the plan and its audience. An internal business plan for your company will exclude areas such as management team experience and be heavier on the implementation side. A basic plan for the banks will usually run 20or more pages. The executive summary shouldn't exceed 3 pages.
Business Plan Length? [About.com]
In a sales economy where up to 62% of sales people don't go for the close, how is a sales person supposed to succeed? First, they need to use a sales process that helps them manage the steps in a sales cycle in the right order. Second, they need to learn, or re-learn, basic selling skills. These skills include how to cold call, qualify prospects, ask the right questions, listen, handle objections, negotiate, close and retain customers.
The problem lies with finding the time to learn these skills, or at least get a refresher course in skills that were learned long ago and since forgotten. PEAK Sales Consulting now offers inexpensive, on-line sales training that helps new and experienced sales professionals learn basic skills such as cold calling, listening skills, qualifying, value-added selling, handling objections, negotiating, closing, and more.
Called "Sales Snippets", which range from 10 to 20 minutes each, these on-line training modules are Internet-based sessions that allow a sales person to get quick, concise training sessions on various selling skills. All ten Sales Snippets cost only $29.95.
"Our Sales Snippets are derived and summarized from our full sales training courses. They are brief training sessions for both new sales people for getting up to speed on basic selling skills as well as veteran sales reps to review sales techniques that have long been forgotten and to learn new skills required in today’s economy," said Russ Lombardo, President/Founder of PEAK Sales Consulting, LLC and instructor on the Sales Snippets programs.
Small Business Trends: The HitTail widget shows the keywords that searchers are using to arrive at this site, updated in real time. It demonstrates part of what the HitTail service does.
Using the HitTail service, you can (1) track the keywords that people are using to come to your site or blog, (2) extract the keywords that matter most into a handy list, and (3) use those keywords in future articles or blog posts that you write.
The idea behind HitTail is to increase the organic (non-paid) search traffic to your site, by revealing the keywords that visitors are using to find your site so that you can build on those to attract even more traffic.
HitTail Helps You Build Web Traffic Without Advertising [Small Business Trends]
Inc.com: If only you had a crystal ball for business.
Gilbert Systems seeks to provide just that -- with a new product that helps business owners anticipate their customers' spending habits in order to maximize sales.
Proclivity is a consumer predictive engine technology that is able to analyze a customer's online activity and identify their interest in certain types of merchandise. The program aggregates the data collected and then generates probabilities for the number of customers likely to buy a certain product, during what time period, and at what price point.
Online businesses can then use the results from Proclivity to design their marketing campaigns around specific consumer interests. For example, if an online clothing retailer wants to launch a campaign around jeans, Proclivity will quickly generate a list of customers based on the analyzed data that predicts how many customers would buy jeans and how much money the company would make in a given amount of time. The company can then decide how much to invest in certain campaigns.
Ever Wish You Could Read Your Customers' Minds? [Inc.com]
There are many business blogs dedicated to small business and entrepreneurship on the Internet today. The bloggers put in a lot of effort on their blogs, sharing helpful small business content and resources for the many aspiring entrepreneurs out there. The road to your own start-up is full of uncertainties and unknowns, and as such it's always great to learn from the entrepreneurs who share their guidance with their useful advice and comments on their business blogs. Likewise, here at GetEntrepreneurial.com we're always learning from and aspiring to reach the same levels as entrepreneurs like Anita Campbell, Yaro Starak, Adnan, and many others.
Evan Carmichael is no exception. His YoungEntrepreneur.com blog is another fantastic resource for all of us young, aspiring entrepreneurs around the world. Filled with entrepreneurial advice, business growth strategies, startup experience and marketing tips, YoungEntrepreneur.com is an useful resource which we watch very carefully on our blogroll. We particularly like the entrepreneurial advice which he shares based on his own experience, such as delegating tasks in your startup:
If you want to build a company of any substantial size you need to learn how to delegate. It can be a difficult process for many entrepreneurs because it means they are giving up some degree of control but you can only do all the jobs in the business for so long. Here is my advice on how you can successfully delegate some of your work.
There are many other interesting insights and useful articles on the YoungEntrepreneur.com blog, and it'll continue to be a great resource for us to depend on.
Inc.com: Everyone likes presents on their birthday -- including your customers. Creating a "birthday club" could ensure that you have many happy returning customers.
Birthday Connections, a new service launched by Moving Targets, a Perkasie, Pa.-based direct-mail marketing company, allows small-business owners to create and send birthday offers based on specific demographics and geographic areas.
Such birthday programs are ideal for restaurants, nail salons, and other types of retail businesses that have limited ad budgets and not enough time or expertise for new marketing campaigns. Birthday Connections works with business owners to define a range of people they want to reach. Using Moving Target's database technology, Birthday Connections can compile a mailing list for customers in a certain ZIP code, age range, gender, or even income bracket.
Business owners then create the terms of their offer -- whether it be a free dessert or a 25 percent discount during the month of the customer's birthday -- and then choose the format for delivery, either a birthday card or a letter. Companies can also choose to use a pre-designed card or have Birthday Connections create a custom one for them with their company logo.
Birthday Connections then mails the offers around the month of each resident's birthday. Based on market testing results, Birthday Connections will help business owners create the best offer for their company.
Looking for a New Way to Woo Customers? Try Birthday Presents [Inc.com]
Business Opportunities Blog: Despite many work places banning the use of sites such as Facebook and MySpace, online networking sites offer opportunities to interact with other businesses and customers without the constraints of cost or location.
Sites such as www.linkedin.com and www.konnects.com offer online networking specifically for the professional and commercial sectors* and can sometimes be more effective than traditional methods of networking such as trade shows, business clubs and breakfast meetings.
Social networking allows users to talk directly to new contacts and send people straight to their website. On some sites it is even possible for businesses to make money through selling subscriptions to their networks.
Social Networking Sites Good for Small Business [Business Opportunities Blog]
Businesspundit: It is tough to find good business partners. Starting a company takes a special type of person, and there aren't many people out there that want to work on something outside of the normal 9-5 workday, let alone do it for free for awhile. On top of all that, you still have to find people that have similar values, interests, and work styles in order for your startup to succeed. I've been through quite a few partners over the years - not because they were bad, just because we were a bad fit. A few months ago a company launched that aimed to ease that process - Partnerup.com.
Partnerup is a fast and effective way to find people like you, looking for the same things. For finding business partners, it is much more efficient than offline networking. So if you are looking for someone to join you as you change the world, check out the site. It could save you a lot of time and trouble.
The Fastest Way to Find Good Business Partners [Businesspundit]
Small Business Trends Radio: Sometimes it can be hard to determine which of the many small business podcasts will provide what you need. So much audio, so little time.
So we have taken the guesswork out of it for you. We narrowed it down to 100 informative podcasts for small business owners and entrepreneurs.
Most of the following podcasts specifically target a small business audience. Others have a broader business focus. All, however, are relevant to business owners and entrepreneurs. Explore and listen, and see what you think of this list.
100 Small Business Audio Podcasts [Small Business Trends Radio]
Lyro: Lyro is a service that helps people expand their individual-level professional identity on the Internet. In today’s global economy, it is more important than ever that each of us is discoverable online. Using technology, innovation, and user-driven features, it is the mission of Lyro to empower our customers through the formation and marketing of their personal-level professional brand, resulting in improved visibility and broader opportunities.
We provides an open, fully searchable, and user-driven tool for professional branding on the web. Some time back we had a thought - more of a question really. Why isn't basic business contact information internet searchable and controllable at the individual level? As we looked at the marketplace, nowhere could we find a truly "open" product that made this information accessible online and also put control of the information in the hands of the individual. As we played around with new ways of displaying people's basic contact information, the simple concept of an online business card emerged. After a little research, we realized that no one else was providing open, easily accessible online business cards. Although a web-based business card concept was novel, we questioned whether an online business by itself would be compelling enough to grow in popularity with millions of users. That more we talked with our customer base, the more we realized that they desired a product whose features were entirely driven by fellow users.
The ARCA Launch for the Google Lunar X Prize » The Aeronautics and Cosmonautics Romanian Association (ARCA) has announced that it will be ready to launch it’s 92-pound rover called the European...
Nuebbo Business Contacts » Nuebbo is a new digital and virtual business card holder for the Internet. The free service provides you with all of the...
Ikea Guerilla Marketing Stunt » Ikea have done an amazing job of creating a brand that everybody considers when needing good quality cheap and cheerful furniture. We...
TerraCycle » The Wall Street Journal: TerraCycle has formed deals with large food and beverage makers to collect discarded wrappers and juice pouches and...
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