You’ve just found your calling.  Whether it’s your first entrepreneurial endeavor or you’ve lost count, you’re just barely getting started and are debating which business structure would suit your new company best.  And if you haven’t already, you should probably start thinking now about selling your business.  Seems counter-intuitive, but a Small Business Trends article explains why you should “think about selling your business – from the moment you open your doors.”

The point that author Peter Renton makes is that many small businesses aren’t as valuable on the market as they could be because they are too reliant on their owners (and of course, the owners are setting themselves up in the bad position here).  Renton articulates that branding your company with your face and name attached to it could put you on thin ice.  ”Your customers may be more attached to you than your product or service. Any savvy business buyer will be wary of that.”
Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve watched several clips and have read plenty of reviews on Apple’s new iPad, which hits the streets on April 3rd. TechCrunch shared an image comparing the iPad to a rock, and engadget posted a review of disappointment with a video of an uncooperative iPad and its lack of features.  Naturally, my initial take on an Entrepreneur article titled “How the iPad Will Change the Way You Do Business” was a wary one.  My foremost thought when checking out reviews of the iPad was that business owners are not going to waste their precious time and money on something that seems downright incomplete.  But Allen Moon, the author of the Entrepreneur article actually makes a solid argument – one that I’m even willing to share.

If you’re already familiar with the iPad, you’d might as well skip the first section of the article; Moon briefly describes the iPad’s resemblance to the iPhone and its pitfalls.  He then explains that those who are middle-aged and older will find the iPad easier to work with than a ‘traditional’ laptop, that those who travel or want to shut their kids up will find its portability useful, and that students will start getting more and more of their textbooks as iPad e-books.
Read the rest of this entry »

One issue that comes up with nearly every business startup is that of having a big-name competitor.  Chances are very likely that the product or service you’re providing is already being provided by another company – worse yet, a Fortune 500 company.  The way I see it, there are three things to remember here:

1. The only way you can avoid competition is to not go into business at all.  If the realization that you have competition has crossed your mind, then you’ve clearly already made the decision to start a business – why run away now?  Just remember that competition is a given, and there are plenty of ways to work around it.  The first – and possibly the easiest – step is to find a niche.  People will often pay more if they’ve found something that perfectly suits them.  Another way of dealing with competition is to create a better product or service.  Often enough, this simply means giving “that little extra” with solely the customer in mind.

Read the rest of this entry »

Numbers really have a way of capturing our attention. I recently read an article from NASA that briefly explained – among other things – that the length of Earth’s days change quite regularly:

Recent news reports have focused on Earth’s length of day, noting that the Chilean earthquake might have shortened days by as much as 1.26 microseconds out of 24 hours. That’s true. But it’s also negligible compared to the normal effect of wind and tides, which can lengthen or shorten days a thousand times more than earthquakes can.

~ Science@NASA

I don’t really know how quickly 1.26 microseconds pass, but based on basic concepts I learned in college Chemistry, I can safely assume that writing this sentence alone took tens of millions of microseconds.  To many people, numbers are simply fascinating.  Given that, the title of a recent article from Entrepreneur.com titled “10 Common–and Effective–Emotional Triggers” caught my attention.
Read the rest of this entry »

The author of Blink, Malcolm Gladwell, and the president of a Cleveland advertising firm, Steve McKee, are both going against the grain – and have a very good point to make, collectively. Reading an article by McKee about why market research can lead a company down the wrong path reminded me of a presentation I heard about, given by Gladwell.  While the former is about minivans and Apple, the latter is about spaghetti sauce and Grey Poupon (and will probably leave you feeling quite hungry).  The former is to-the-point and interesting, the latter more humorous, though long, as it will cut through about 17 minutes of your day.

Personally, I found that points 3 – 5 made by McKee in this article are the most impactive and most relevant.  That Absolut Vodka would flop because it’s Swedish and people were only drawn to Russian Vodka.  That the minivan wouldn’t be a big seller because no one had ever asked for a minivan before it existed.  That New Coke would be a gold mine, discounting the possibility that people wouldn’t take well to the change in its formula.  It has been proven time and again that people simply do not know what they want, and they especially can’t tell you what they want to have or see until they’ve gotten a taste of it.  As is clearly pointed out in McKee’s intriguing article, no amount of market research can be so blindly followed; likewise, he says that “[the] best research is the real world,” which honestly means you’ll watch at least one of your ideas flop.  The good thing is that it happens to all companies, and the giants aren’t exempt from this one.
Read the rest of this entry »

It’s been more than a week since I last posted (oops), but I just finished an article from a few days ago about “getting the startup equation right.” This one actually came off seeming hollow – downright boring – because it feels like the topic should be obvious: The idea behind your business is important but equal emphasis should be placed on who is with you for the endeavor. The more I thought about it, though, I began to think of all the companies I’ve heard of (usually when it’s “too late” and they’ve already gone under because a bigger, better company took over their market) and have even seen that simply did not have the right people in place to really carry a company to its full potential.

I also realized that the companies mentioned in the article, for which the author has held leading positions, are big names. They’re well-known companies that have been the ones to shut out other companies by having the right idea and the right people. It’s worth reading, but you may get more out of it if you read between the lines a little while keeping the overall message in mind.