Do you remember the day you worked for a company — large or small, it doesn’t matter — and dreamed of owning your own business?

“I will be *the boss*”, you thought.

“I will come and go as I please and make my own hours”, you thought.

“I will take vacations whenever I want”, you thought.

“I will have plenty of money to do what I want”, you thought.

And then you started your own business.

My, my how things have changed.
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Posted in Food for Thought, Entrepreneurship, start up advice 4 Comments »

Coach Sandra Martini offers her advice on creating an easy to follow marketing game plan….

It’s Monday and you get an email indicating that writing an ezine is THE way to get new clients. You drop everything and start working on an email newsletter.

It’s Tuesday and your friend calls and says that he heard the best way to get publicity is pay-per-click. You drop everything and sign up for a Google Adwords account.

It’s Wednesday and you heard that someone made a million dollars selling info products. Everything else waits while you work on your first million dollar product.

I once had a client who would tell me he figured out how to “fix” his business and what he needed to do to succeed. Unfortunately, he did this DAILY. Each day he had a new marketing strategy that he would drop everything else to implement. It was exhausting as well as counterproductive.

Does this sound familiar? You have no real plan for your marketing strategy and so you jump from one idea to another based on what you hear or read is the best or quickest way to get more clients and increase sales.

It’s time to get off the merry-go-round.
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Posted in Food for Thought, marketing materials 1 Comment »

What sign would tell you equal opportunity for business women has been achieved?

Laura Yamanaka, incoming president of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO), when asked the above question in a recent Los Angeles Times article, said:

When people no longer have the need to say, “Oh, did you realize she is a woman-owned business?” When your accomplishments don’t stand on whether you are a male or a female. When we get to that point. When it’s no longer relevant. When it becomes so common it’s not an issue. That’s when I’ll know.

What do you think? Is she right? Do you think it is an even playing field and if not, when will you know that a business owner’s gender is truly irrelevant? Leave your comment below.

You might also want to See last month’s food for thought, Traits of an Entrepreneur

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Posted in Food for Thought, Women Networking 3 Comments »

Maki posted an interesting piece over on doshdosh discussing why bloggers should think like entrepreneurs.

One of the most important factors you need to have when making money online is the entrepreneurial perspective. The drive to create and turn ideas or concepts into profitable online entities requires a thirst for success and an innovative mind. ~ Maki.

His post got me thinking about what I consider to be the traits of an entrepreneur. Here are what I consider My Top 3 Traits of an Entrepreneur:

Entrepreneurs have the desire to innovate and get enormous self satisfaction through implementing their innovative ideas.

Entrepreneurs recognize that the main purpose of the business is not to make a profit. According to Peter Drucker, the legendary management consultant and writer, “The purpose of a business is to create and keep a customer.” An entrepreneur understands the importance of cultivating and keeping his or her customers and focuses not on profit but on creating value. The customers come and stay and the profit follows as long as there’s value.

Entrepreneurs have the ability to understand and the willingness to take risks, often studying situations carefully and weighing alternatives involved before moving forward.

What would you add to this list of entrepreneurial traits?

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Posted in Food for Thought, Entrepreneurship 15 Comments »