5 Useful Time-Tracking Apps for Time-Crunched Entrepreneurs

Whether you’re a solopreneur or head a staff of 50, keeping track of time is an ongoing headache for most small business owners. Without accurate time tracking, you can’t bill clients properly—or pay your employees correctly. Fortunately, time tracking has come a long way since old-fashioned punch time clocks.


Here are 5 cool time tracking apps to help small business owners manage time.

Toggl

Toggl offers the ultimate in simplicity, letting you track time with literally two clicks. Create an account and connect the Toggl timer to more than 100 web apps. Just click to start the timer when you begin a task and click again to stop it when you end or take a break. Advanced features in the paid version send employees automated reminders when they haven’t tracked time. Toggl also creates visual reports that show you how you and your employees are actually using your time and which projects are the most profitable.

Toggl integrates with popular project management apps such as Asana, Basecamp, and GitHub. It works with one-person businesses or teams, and is a good solution if you want simplicity and are primarily interested in time and project management.

Timesheets.com

Timesheets.com works for both hourly employees and salaried workers who need to track billable hours or time spent on projects. It can also track employee time, mileage, and expenses on the road via its mobile app. Timesheets.com works with popular payroll companies including QuickBooks, SurePayroll and ADP; you can also export the data into a wide variety of formats. There are even HR tools including standardized documents and the ability to store documents privately so only relevant managers can see them. This is a good solution if you have both hourly and salaried workers.

TSheets

TSheets is a time tracking and scheduling solution that focuses on mobility (although there’s also a desktop app). Employees can clock in on their smartphone via text, email, voice call or even Twitter. Crew features let you send an entire crew alerts at once, or clock them all in and out at the same time. The drag-and-drop schedule creator makes it easy to schedule employees for shifts, such as retail or restaurant work, or particular jobs, such as landscaping or construction. Employees can use the app to request time off or ask to trade shifts; managers can make or approve schedule changes on the fly and quickly alert employees.


TSheets is well suited for businesses with hourly workers, work crews, or mobile employees, such as field services or construction. It integrates with most popular accounting and payroll software.

Harvest

Planning for the future is a strong point of Harvest. This time tracking app creates visual reports that show you how much time your team is spending on each project. Employees can use the app’s timers to track their time or input it manually. With the mobile app, it’s easy to track time and billable hours anywhere. You can also track expenses by simply snapping pictures of receipts, and automatically pull data from Harvest into invoices.


A sister app, Forecast, lets you use data from Harvest to accurately schedule your employees’ time into the future. This is a useful app if your business works on a variety of projects for clients at one time or you have employees who travel for business.

Hubstaff

The Hubstaff time tracking app runs on computers or mobile apps, and builds in plenty of employee monitoring tools. The app tracks mouse movements and clicks, takes random screenshots to show you what employees are actually working on, monitors employee internet use so you can see what websites they’re visiting, and even tracks which apps employees use the most. The mobile app uses GPS to track employees’ time and location on the road; employees can also track time on their mobile devices.


The Hubstaff package also includes a scheduling tool and invoicing app. This is a good solution if you want to monitor employees, remote or otherwise, closely and keep tabs on productivity.

What Color Is Your Company? Harnessing the Power of Color in Branding and Advertising

First impressions are important. It takes just 90 seconds for a person to form their initial opinions when interacting with a new product. And up to 90% of that assessment is based on color alone.

So what role does color play in communicating key brand messages to consumers? And how can businesses use color effectively to influence purchasing decisions?

Can a color evoke a specific emotion?

The psychology behind color is a complicated subject, and there have been countless attempts to define the affects of color on consumer choices. It goes without saying that attitudes to color are subjective, based on an individual’s personal experiences, preferences, and upbringing.

Does red signify youthful energy . . . or danger? Or is it the color of passion? In the West, pink is primarily recognized as a feminine color, whilst in Japan pink has masculine associations, with pink cherry blossoms representing fallen warriors. So much depends upon the context and placement of the color, as well as an individual’s previous experiences of that color.

Whilst it’s not as easy as pigeon-holing specific colors into evoking specific emotions, there are some important messaging patterns to be learned from color perceptions.

Lesson 1: Color makes a brand recognisable

Some of the world’s most successful brands have used color to become instantly recognizable. You’d be forgiven for thinking that Coca-Cola had trademarked the color red. In fact, the company’s use of the color red in branding has been so successful its even rebranded one of the Western world’s most famous characters: Santa Claus only started wearing red once Coca-Cola got its hands on him!

Studies have shown that our brains prefer immediately recognizable brands, with strong branding eliciting strong activity within our brains. Color choice is one of the most important decisions in establishing a brand identity at its most basic level.

Whilst there is no “right” color choice for any particular type of brand identity, what is important is gauging consumer responses to color appropriateness. Do the colors used to depict a brand fit well with what is being sold? The perceived appropriateness of the use of color can bring inherent and immediate value to a brand.

There are many resources and theories to draw from when it comes to deciding which colors are appropriate for your brand, but when push comes to shove, you know your consumers best. Only you can decide which colors your consumers would perceive to be appropriate to your brand.

Lesson 2: Vibrancy and contrast dictate viewer response

The tone and vibrancy of colors can dictate the way in which a viewer engages with and responds to your brand. Bright, vibrant colors are more energetic and stimulating. They are more likely to evoke strong responses and reactions from viewers. McDonald’s famously uses strong primary shades of red and yellow to evoke bold energy, fun, and excitement.

On the other hand, softer, darker, and more neutral tones tend to relax the viewer. These less vibrant shades enable the viewer to process more information—ideal for products and websites that are heavy in information.

High contrast colors are more likely to grab consumer’s attention. That’s why “SALE” signage often adopts that instantly recognizable white font on a bright red background. High contrast color combinations and patterns can be very effective at encouraging consumer action. For example, using an accent color (like red) for calls to action has been proven to be more successful in boosting website conversions.

Lesson 3: Men and women favor different colors

Generally speaking, certain colors tend to be more popular with specific genders. If you’re targeting an all-male or all-female audience, it’s helpful to understand the different trends of color preference between men and women.

Blue is the most popular color amongst both genders, but particularly so for men. Women favour shades of purple, red, and green, whilst men favour black and green. The least popular colors amongst men are brown, yellow, and white, whilst the least popular colors amongst women are grey, white, yellow, and brown.

Lesson 4: There is power in recognizing established color trends

Whilst colors in their many shades and hues can communicate a myriad of messages, there are some established trends in the use of color among major brands. Knowledge of these trends can give your brand the power to either communicate a clear message by conforming to established color messages or to stand out and make a statement by bucking the trends.

Some examples of instantly recognizable color trends in Western branding include:

Blue: Blue is commonly associated with trust and loyalty. Think online banking or PayPal.

Black: Luxury brands like Hotel Chocolat, Burberry, and Rolls-Royce (to name a few) use black successfully to communicate sophistication and timeless class.

White: White lends clarity, space, and simplicity to a brand. Perhaps that’s why so many tech companies use white so heavily within their brand identity. Apple is the most famous example of this.

Green: For its obvious associations with nature, green is often used to communicate environmental concerns. As such, companies that want to highlight their environmental responsibility often incorporate green into their branding. UK’s OVO Energy does this to the extreme.

3 Ways to Turn Your Expertise Into a Profitable Online Business

Thanks to the power of the internet, practically anyone today can start an online business. However, with so many options on the table, what are the best types of online businesses to start?

One of the best ways to get started is to turn your expertise and passion into something of value. And starting an online business has become much easier to do, thanks to powerful course creation and management platforms, which allow you to create a website or blog, even if you don’t have advanced technical skills such as site design or programming.

To help you figure out how to turn your expertise into a profitable business, we will look at three different ways for you to get started.

1. Create an online course or membership site

One of the most lucrative and best ways to put your expertise to work is to create an online course or membership site which offers your content and knowledge at a premium. This type of business has worked extremely well for bloggers, content creators, and any professional who is able to help individuals, brands, or businesses grow.

In the past, to start this type of business would have required you setting up a custom site to host all of your videos, as well as creating a complex membership area and a way to manage your members and accept payments. In addition to the complexities and time required here, it would also cost you a pretty penny to get started.

One solution that has made this whole process a whole lot easier is Kajabi. Through its online course creation and management platform, individuals and brands of all sizes are able to take their expertise, bring it online, and generate a whole lot of money in the process. This all goes back to the solution of requiring the end user to have no technical skills, while also being able to have full customization and control over their site through a simple drag-and-drop system.

2. Become an established expert within your niche

With more than a billion active websites on the internet today, it can be a struggle to start an online business and brand of your own while trying to compete and stand out from the crowd. However, the world of online marketing and content generation is always open to new experts who can provide value to an audience hungry for new information. Some perfect examples of this is content that’s created through the use of expert interviews, roundups, and even interview-based podcast episodes.

Always keep in mind to include a call to action within your expert content. It’s one thing to get your name and expertise out there, but you also have to make money with your online business in the process. A call to action can be as simple as redirecting audiences to your website, blog, social media, or other website that you might be selling online courses or products through.

3. Build a business around the expertise of others

When attempting to make money online or build a brand around your expertise, it would be silly to only rely on your expertise alone. A perfect example of this would be any news or media website that continually covers the expertise of other entrepreneurs and company founders. This is valuable information that millions of people are searching for and reading on a daily basis, yet it has nothing to do with the actual person who is writing it.

With this in mind, building a business around the expertise of others and simply sharing that value with an audience is a legitimate business model in itself. A good example of this would be any “famous quotes” website on the internet that’s generating thousands of impressions daily and making a decent amount of money in the process. The expertise is within the content, the value is there for the audience, and the business model is through the advertising that can be done on the site.

This doesn’t mean that you need to create a website devoted to quotes, but you can provide a lot of information and resources from content that is already out there. Just think about the many different keywords and search phrases people are searching for on a daily basis to get answers to their questions, improve their businesses, or find a new job. To get a better understanding of how this can be accomplished, be sure to perform the necessary SEO research to see what people are looking for, how you can provide a solution, and what they are willing to pay for it.

Put your expertise to work

As you can see through each of the examples, there are plenty of ways to make money online through your expertise or the expertise of others. Since there are so many people on the internet, there is always going to be an opportunity for new authorities and influencers.

Even with the internet being as crowded as it is, the best way to make money off your expertise is to simply get started and see where things end up. The sooner you get started, the faster you will have an established audience to not only trust in what you have to say, but a following that will also pay for your time and expertise in the process.

How to Improve Your Focus: 6 Tactics to Stay on Task

If you aren’t focused on what you’re doing, then you stand zero chance of being successful.

“Focus can only occur when we have said yes to one option and no to all other options,” says James Clear, a writer who focuses on self improvement. “In other words, elimination is a prerequisite for focus.”

Here are a few specific things that can be done to increase focus:

1. Block the ringing and dinging

Ring . . . ding . . . you’ve got mail. Between phone calls, text messages, mobile apps, and emails, constant exposure to different notifications can disrupt your flow and prevent you from truly concentrating on the tasks at hand.

There are certainly times when you need to be notified, but there are also plenty of times when it’s appropriate and necessary to silence everything and focus on a specific task. Whenever possible, try to silence your phone, log out of your email, and block notifications. Once you complete your task, you can follow up on anything you missed.

2. Take frequent breaks

Research shows that the more you focus on a singular task for an extended period of time, the less focused you become. Your brain actually becomes numb to the stimuli and no longer finds it as engaging. One way to counteract this is by taking frequent, short breaks. The time away will recharge your brain and allow it to be stimulated again upon reintroduction.

3. Outsource draining tasks

Certain tasks are more draining than others; ironically, these tasks aren’t always the most important or valuable. If you find that you’re spending a lot of manual effort and energy on time-consuming tasks that really don’t create much value, it may be a sign that you should outsource. By delegating these tasks, you can focus on the ones that actually matter.

4. Strategically allocate time

In order to optimize focus, you have to be strategic with your time. Depending on how you operate and the way you process information, this may look like allocating specific time blocks for each task you face throughout the day. (For other people, it may look a little more flexible.) The point is that you need to create a framework for yourself; otherwise, you’ll bounce around from one task to the next without getting anything done.

5. Stop multitasking

A lot of people think they’re at their best when they multitask, but this is rarely true. You may operate under the illusion that you’re getting more done, but more than likely you’re not.
“Multitasking forces your brain to switch your focus back and forth very quickly from one task to another,” Clear explains. “This wouldn’t be a big deal if the human brain could transition seamlessly from one job to the next, but it can’t.”
For best results, stop trying to multitask; it’s better to do one thing at a time. You might feel like you’re doing less, but you’ll end up accomplishing far more by the time it’s all said and done.

6. Don’t ignore your personal life

Work-life balance is always an issue for people. In an ideal world, the two would coexist without any friction. One of the unfortunate side effects is that issues in your personal life can spill over into your professional life.
In order to prevent your personal life from being a distraction at work, make sure you create a healthy balance. When you’re away from work, spend time with your family and work through any issues that need to be handled. This will allow you to focus on work when you’re at work.

10 Best Strategies to Convince Customers to Purchase From Your E-Commerce Website

Every e-commerce entrepreneur will ask themselves this question at one point or another: How do I get people to purchase from my website? How do I effectively compete online? How do I increase revenue?

While every entrepreneur’s situation is slightly different, based on their target market, product, and objectives, it turns out that high performance websites and online stores have a number of common features that cut across industries and customer segments.

Over the past five years we have studied highly-successful business websites and online stores, and these are the most important features they share:

1. They offer something unique

That does not mean that the product itself is necessarily unique, although that also can be very helpful. However, those entrepreneurs typically offer something that no one else does, whether it be great service, a type of discount, hours of work, a good return or exchange policy, or anything else that a particular customer segment finds valuable.

2. They attract relevant audiences effectively

Successful online sites understand exactly who their customers are and what they find valuable, and then they create products, services, offers, and content that will drive that traffic to their website. They key here is attracting the relevant audience at a cost-effective rate.

3. They are reliable

The first few seconds of interaction between users and a website are crucial to creating a positive impression of the website and brand. Unfortunately many business websites take far too long to load (anything longer than six seconds is excessive) or are sluggish and slow to react to clicks and scrolling. A slow, unreliable website is an immediate turnoff for visitors and results in a high bounce rate.

4. They maintain expectation consistency

The best performing websites we have studied were very good at maintaining the expectation of their visitors as they transition from outside the website (ad, social media post or other links) to the landing page where conversion was expected to happen. This gave visitors the psychological signal that they were in fact in the right place, that they didn’t get redirected to a malicious website, and what they were looking for was right there front and center of their screen above the fold whether it was a blog post, an ebook or a product they wanted to purchase.

5. They are mobile optimized

Mobile optimized is a very different concept from responsive design. While responsive design is very good at rearranging elements of a page so that they fit nicely within a user’s mobile screen, that may not be the best way to present information to a mobile user with a small screen size.
The best-performing websites are very good at rethinking content for mobile users, and completely eliminating clutter and distractions, ensuring that the relevant content of each page is well-presented to mobile users with small device screens.

6. They are easy to navigate

When people look for products and services online, they typically have three questions that a e-commerce website should be able to answer quickly and efficiently:

1. Does this website have the product I am looking for?
2. What is the price of product or service I am looking for?
3. Can I trust this business?

7. They are secure

Today’s consumers are very tech savvy and understand that threats exist in the digital world. Having strong security features on a e-commerce website is no longer a luxury, but a necessity of doing business online. At minimum every website should have an SSL certificate that encrypts transmission to and from the website so that it is not intercepted by hackers.

8. They have conversion opportunities

To convert a visitor to a lead and paying customer, it is important to ensure that there are opportunities and ways for that conversion to happen. Conversion opportunities are not just email subscription forms inserted at various parts in the website; for conversion to happen two things are needed:

1. A compelling offer to convert (a coupon, discount, e-book or some other offer)
2. An easy way to claim the offer (email, phone, contact form, subscription form, etc.)

Strategically-placed conversion opportunities are key to growing a business’s leads, customers, and revenue.

9. They have the tools to understand customer behavior

Successful online entrepreneurs understand who their customers are and how they will behave on the website. Customer insight tools can help provide this valuable information, as well as pages have the highest level of engagement, and which pages are turnoffs for users. Knowing this information allows entrepreneurs to identify gaps where traffic is not good at converting.

10. They are good at retargeting

It is very common for users to land on your website, and then exit because they are not psychologically ready to make a decision to purchase or convert. They may want to read more, check other vendors out, or the timing just may not be right. It is therefore important to be able to retarget those individuals and remind them of your brand and offers.

Facebook happens to be one of the best mediums for retargeting. This can be easily done by creating a Facebook pixel that’s installed throughout your website. A Facebook pixel allows Facebook to match your website visitors to people on Facebook, who can then be marketed to through a retargeting campaign.

To summarize, combining a unique product offering with a compelling digital presence creates the winning formula needed to effectively compete and excel in reaching and converting customers through digital means. Small businesses that master this ability can outsmart, outcompete, and win against much bigger and better funded brands.

7 Ways to Effectively Scale and Grow Your Online Business

A common trait that you’ll find among many online business owners is that they’re never quite satisfied with the status quo, no matter what level of success they’ve achieved. Whether it’s called ambition or the entrepreneurial spirit, these business owners are constantly looking for ways to take their businesses to the next level. But doing so is dependent on whether or not their business model can scale.

The good news is that scaling an online business is much easier than trying to grow a more traditional brick-and-mortar operation; you don’t need to scout additional storefronts or worry about finding more physical space. The business is mostly virtual, so there is, quite literally, an infinite level of potential. So what are ways to achieve this kind of growth?

1. Expand your global options

When many entrepreneurs first start out, they only focus their efforts on one geographic region for the sake of simplicity. Some may only sell their products in the country they are living so they don’t have to deal with accepting different currencies, or having to figure out how to handle shipping and taxes.

Selling to the global market is actually a lot easier than you might think when you leverage e-commerce platforms. Certain platforms allows your store to display in almost any language and accept payments in almost every currency.

Your online store can integrate with PayPal, Stripe, and other gateways, with no transaction fees. You can ship internationally through integrations with many providers around the world, and the built-in calculator helps you make sure your pricing structures take territory-specific taxes and shipping fees into account.

2. Automate your manual processes

You can scale your production and you can scale your campaigns, but the one thing that you cannot scale is your time. No matter how you slice it, there are only 24 hours in a day, and only seven days in a week. There’s no sense in wasting your time doing tasks that can be done automatically.
Utilize tools like Hootsuite and Buffer to automate much of your social media management. The RSS feed on your blog can be automatically syndicated to Facebook and Twitter with ease, and similar tools exist to invoice reminders to your customers, for example. Look at where you are wasting time, and then figure out how an automated tool can give you more time that you can devote to growing your business instead.

3. Grow your content team

When you first start a blog, chances are you’ll be the only one doing the writing. And that’s fine in the beginning when you’re working to establish your brand or to solidify your reputation as an expert in your niche or industry. But as time goes on, you may want to ramp up your content production, and won’t be able to because you simply don’t have the time.

This is when you should think about outsourcing. Marketplaces like Freelancer.com and Fiverr are accessible and convenient, but they may not provide you with the long-term solution that you really need. Take the time to seek out people who you are eager to see their writing on your site for years to come.

4. Upgrade your hosting plan

Good news! Your online business is growing at a rapid rate. Bad news! Your hosting plan can no longer handle the kind of bandwidth and control that you need to keep moving forward. As affordable and as easy shared hosting plans may be, they may not be adequate as your needs continue to grow and your business continues to scale.

If you don’t feel like you’re quite ready to invest in dedicated hosting, but you want to have a greater sense of control, then VPS (virtual private server) web hosting could be a great step up.

5. Pursue media exposure more actively

To scale your online business, you will need to explore new markets and reach out to new people who can potentially become new readers, subscribers, and customers. There are many ways you can do this, including writing guest posts and sending out press releases.

One service that you might also consider is Help a Reporter Out, also known in many circles simply as HARO. Over 50,000 journalists and bloggers are constantly looking for expert sources for their varied content. When you add yourself to the HARO database, you may have writers reaching out to you for your comment or opinion. This could land you invaluable media coverage that you wouldn’t have otherwise been able to get.

6. Identify your bottlenecks

How you plan to scale your online business will obviously depend on the current status of your business. Maybe you’ve already gotten yourself a strong team of professionals on your side: content creators, a marketing team, a production team, someone handling logistics, and so on.

A big problem that you may face is with so many moving parts it can be difficult to identify the inefficiencies in the system. The pace at which your business can operate will be dictated by the slowest “cog” in the machine.

Some solutions use what is known as a Kanban board. This workflow visualization technique aims to progress tasks from left to right, limiting the number of items that can exist in a column. When you see things start to pile up, you’ll know where things are moving at their slowest.

7. Recognize the Pareto principle

The Pareto principle states that 80% of output is generated by 20% of input. This is definitely true when it comes to business, and may mean that in order for your business to grow, you may have to make some cuts.

Let’s say you have 10 products that you sell through your online store. A couple of them may be real superstars, bringing in the majority of your revenue. But at some point, you’ll need to take a look at those remaining eight items and get rid of the underperformers. Doing this will free up resources so you can either focus more of your marketing efforts on the two superstar products, or develop potentially awesome replacements that will hopefully perform better.

And continue to focus on what is working and discard what isn’t—remember, this cycle never ends and it’s a mindset you’ll need to reapply over and over again.

Give Your Content a Visual Boost: 4 Tips to Designing More Visually Appealing Content

Using the right language and long-tail search terms in your content is critical for SEO purposes, but are you paying enough attention to the visual aspects? Your readers want to engage with content that’s not only informative, but also aesthetically pleasing.

Social media has changed content marketing in many ways. One of the more significant developments has been a demand for content that’s both functional and visually stimulating. Here are some tips to get your content on the right track so you not only generate clicks, but also boost conversions.

1. Think strategically about color selection

Color scheme matters more than you may know. Many marketers arbitrarily choose a color scheme that looks good to them, or default to company colors, but more attention should be given to the color facet.

For example, did you know that women tend to prefer blue, purple, and green, but dislike gray, orange, and brown? Men, on the other hand, prefer blue, green, and black, but show a disdain for purple, orange, and brown. Blue is often used to cultivate trust, while orange encourages impulse decisions.

If you aren’t giving color selection enough focus, you could miss one of these important details and do your content a disservice.

2. Balance between visuals and information

Balance is huge when you’re creating engaging content. You want the content to be informative and persuasive, but you also need it to be visually pleasing and easy to consume.

This is easier said than done. Sometimes content is rendered ineffective because it moves too far toward one extreme.

This page from RISE, an online lending platform, is a sterling example of how to do it right. Notice how there’s plenty of textual content and valuable tidbits packed inside, but the color, imagery, and charts provide enough visual relief to keep you engaged.

That’s exactly the sort of balance you should aim for.

3. Image selection matters

Images are often an afterthought for content marketers. They spend all their time coming up with content ideas, fleshing them out, and selecting headlines. When it comes time to publish, they realize they could use some images, so they run a quick search for stock photos and paste in a few convenient shots. Such images clearly fill space, but they don’t necessarily add any value.

You have to be more conscientious about the images you choose, down to the last detail. Two images with people, for example, can produce very different emotions in readers, even though they look very similar.

Ellen Desmarais, former VP and head of marketing at photo marketplace 500px, says, We did some research on this at 500px, and the data was surprising: 60 percent of our best-selling images with people had a single subject, while only 20 percent contained two or more subjects. Candid photos sold nearly twice as much as posed images. And 85 percent of the sold photos we analyzed featured a subject looking away from the camera.”

These are just a few examples of how vital image selection can be. Spend some time investigating and plan ahead. If you really want your content to be engaging, you need to select images as you develop the written content.

4. Make it skimmable

Effective content is easy to skim. Whether a reader accesses it via a desktop browser or mobile phone, the experience should be simple and seamless. This means using subheads, images, and other visual relief elements to keep the user reading as long as possible.

Give your content a visual boost

The mark of a good contemporary content marketer is one who is able to develop engaging visual content that complements the text. As you work on improving your content marketing strategy, make sure you’re addressing this critical element of the equation.

How to Successfully Break the Rules of Business

Sometimes traditions take root because they’re the most effective and efficient way of doing things. But how can you move ahead if you are stuck on a wheel of repeating the same old systems? In short: you can’t.

There’s a real benefit to becoming a rule-breaker, especially when it comes to breaking business rules. Here are a few ways you can grow your small business by stripping yourself of old habits in exchange for new systems and strategies.

Transform into an agent of change

Innovation has never happened by repeating past behaviors. Hitting rinse and repeat, and falling into the comfort zone of old habits isn’t a way forward; it’s a way to stay still.

Although it can feel awkward, there’s a way to continue your forward momentum (or start pushing ahead again after staying stagnant for too long). It requires you to transform yourself, your team, and your entire company culture into agents of change. It demands that you think outside of the box. It means that you push aside traditional ways of doing things in exchange for a fresh approach that could be more efficient and more productive.

It sounds overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. Look at something as commonplace as setting your team’s schedule every week. Are you still taking the same approach you’ve been taking for years? If you’re buried in paper piles and red pencil marks, try using an app to make updates instead. Small changes like this can propel your business forward and set the tone for creative thinking in other areas of your company.

Spark more conversation

 

What happens when you do things differently? People take notice and you suddenly have something unique to contribute to the conversation.

Too many businesses speak at their consumers; few businesses speak with them. By changing your approach and dropping traditional business rules, you suddenly have a compelling story to tell that will add value to the greater marketplace. This makes it easier and more exciting to talk about you.

Leave a lasting impression

 

Few people remember the “me too” brands. It’s easy to forget the companies that put on the same song and dance in every commercial, blending in with their competition.

If you want to be remembered, you have to break away from the ordinary and start using nontraditional approaches to reach your consumers. These are the companies that get remembered—not the ones that blend into the background, hiding behind the same-old approach to attracting business.

Recognise the importance of diversity

 

When you drop a few of the outdated rules from your small business, you end up welcoming a diverse way of thinking about how to build your company and whom to work with. If creating a more diverse workforce of people from all ages, backgrounds, and lifestyles is on your to-do list, it’s time to drop traditional in favor of a new approach.

Invest in your cause

 

Why are you in business? Sure, you want to make money and add value for your customers, but what’s the bigger purpose? Think big as you answer this question. For example, if you sell pencils, is it to create a way for children to learn and thereby make the world a better place in future decades? Or, if you sell BPA-free water bottles, is it to encourage hikers to leave less of a footprint as they make their way through national forests?

When you break traditional business rules, you’re better able to invest in the cause that got your organization going in the first place—and this is what being in business is all about.

What are you doing to break free from tradition?

 

Breaking free from traditional business rules isn’t always the appropriate approach to running a company. Start small and work your way up. Knock down old habits in favor of new ones. Some will fail; many will work. It’s about iterating, experimenting, and continuing to surge forward. This is the path to making your small business a success in your industry.

The 4 Keys to Boosting Your Customer Retention

We’ve all been in situations where we’ve felt like we were “taking two steps forward and one step back.” That’s exactly what’s happening when you work hard to optimize your advertising and marketing programs, but then realize your customer lifetime value isn’t what it should be.

Your hope is that your great product or service will create loyalty and devotion. While this is sometimes the case, the truth is that it’s not always an effective strategy. If you don’t focus on your customers and make them feel valued, they’ll eventually leave—and the cost is high.

According to research, attracting a new customer costs your business six to seven times more than retaining an existing one. You need to do what you can to continuously earn your customers’ loyalty—never underestimate the value of retention. Here are four keys to achieving the level of customer retention you need to boost your top line:

1. Know your customers better than they know themselves

People have a strong, natural desire to be known and understood. If they sense that you’re meeting this need, they will strongly prefer your business over one where they are merely another customer or client. We know that customer service ratings plummet when customers feel they are being ignored; the same is true when they feel rushed.

There’s a huge clue in that second item. A winning tactic may be as simple as investing a bit more time with each customer. This simple strategy should be included on any list of ways to boost your business. Exactly how this looks in your business is up to you, but take some time to create real relationships with your customers.

Do you remember the theme song from the long-running sitcom Cheers? Its title—and most memorable lyric—was “Where everybody knows your name.” That reflects the kind of relationship that keeps people coming back.

2. Implement feedback systems

We said that customers don’t want to be ignored or rushed. One thing they do want is to feel heard. Allowing customers to speak for themselves plays a critical role in creating a positive customer experience.

Systems like surveys or just asking your loyal customers for feedback will help you know how they feel about your business and its products and services. Your customers can offer great insights to what would keep them coming back and supporting your business. Put their suggestions into effect and revise them as needed.

Haven’t done business recently with a long-time client? Get on the phone and find out what’s up. Don’t make it a sales call. This can also be a powerful tool when you know that you’ve lost someone’s business. If necessary, incentivize follow-up calls to former customers with a (third-party) gift card or some other small token that proves you value their time and comments.

3. Go beyond nice and polite

Thank-yous are nice, but an unexpected surprise is even more effective. People don’t forget when pleasant, unexpected things come their way—a random act of kindness will leave a lasting impression.

For some businesses, these could be as big as providing backstage pass to a major concert, or tickets to a rugby match. However, they can also be as small as a birthday greeting that includes a special freebie.

4. Provide anticipatory service

If you understand that customer service is the most important thing you can do to help your business grow, you’re correct. There are customer service lessons every business should learn, and one is to practice anticipatory service. Anticipatory service is the style of customer service when your business anticipates problems that may occur and stops them before they can happen.

You can do something as simple as calling a customer to see if they have any questions before they call you to seek help. Being proactive and establishing dialogue will show awareness from your company and prove that you have respect for your customers’ time. No one wants to waste precious time having to repeatedly call a business for help.

One-time customers won’t fuel the growth of your business. In fact, they tend to be a net drain on your bottom line by costing more to acquire than is gained by a single sale. Retaining customers is vital for sustained business success. Learn how to actively engage your customers and put a strong customer retention plan in place with extensive systemization and training. Do not leave it to chance! It’s a necessary investment for generating the future revenue that will ensure your business thrives.

Entrepreneurs: Make Sure Your Professional Development Plan Focuses on Building These 3 Crucial Skills

Why is a professional development plan important for entrepreneurs? Because without one, it’s difficult to grow a business. No entrepreneur has a ready-built skill set that provides all the answers to continuously changing situations.

Most likely, you are more competent in certain business functions than others. However, to successfully expand a business that’s changing as new team members join requires embracing different leadership and management skills. Here are three skills that will help you be more successful:

1. Embrace a leadership mind-set

Leaders have certain attitudes toward success that are reflected in their behavior. Embracing a leadership mind-set will help when you add new staff to your organization as people will be looking to you for guidance.

Start by focusing on how your contributions, and those of your staff, connect to a larger sense of purpose. As an entrepreneur, you should have the big picture in mind. Sharing this vision will elevate your energy level and serve as a motivator to reach new business growth levels.

Having a leadership mind-set can be contagious to others in your company and will be the foundation in solidifying a can-do attitude within your company’s culture. A leadership mindset displays confidence in yourself and the people you work with.

2. Be willing to delegate

When you first started your business, you most likely assumed many roles. To move the company forward, you probably worked in multiple areas until you were able to hire a team. However, for entrepreneurs, what often becomes a barrier to achieve broad levels of success is themselves.

You need to let go. Maybe you are an expert in marketing, or sales, or program creation; however, at some point you will need to delegate some of your responsibilities if you truly want to scale your business. You will reach your capacity at some point, and if you want to expand your business, you will need to delegate.

By delegating responsibilities, you are modeling that you have trust in your team members and that you are willing to share the glory of success. Part of the delegating process is communicating desired results and what these results look like; the other part is getting out of the way of your subordinates and letting them accomplish their tasks. Realize that team members may not do things the same way that you do, and this is also part of the delegation learning curve.

Learning to delegate is an essential ingredient in building a business, and it takes practice to learn this skill—but it’s well worth it.

3. Learn outside your comfort zone

The only way to grow is to step outside your comfort zone. No entrepreneur is going to start a business and possess all the skills, knowledge, and abilities to single-handedly grow a new enterprise. Situations will arise that you’ll need to learn how to handle; there will be changes in technology that will impact the business. New competitors will enter the market. New marketing strategies will be introduced. You get the picture: Societal changes will constantly affect your business.

An important reminder: Your business is your most important client. Taking care of number one assures that you are being proactive with the business and attending to changes as they occur. As an entrepreneur, think about your own professional development strategy. Review what skills, knowledge, or abilities you could acquire that would best serve the growth of your business.

You may find as you add team members that you need to improve your leadership skills—including communication, delegation, and monitoring skills. You may also find that you need to learn more about financial forecasting and operational planning, and as your company becomes more well-known, you may find that you need to brush up on public speaking skills.

Our best advice is for you to create an annual plan for your own self-improvement—not simply to acquire more knowledge, but to acquire additional implementation skills. To transform your innovative ideas into lasting success takes purposeful and continuous professional development.

Branding for Small Businesses Made Simple

There’s a lot of content out there that is written to help small business owners do their own marketing, but it’s often written by marketers who are adept in things like analytics, content marketing, and technical jargon. It may be written using terms you don’t understand and business processes you’re not familiar with, and then you’re left with no clue how to start marketing your brand.

If you own a small business, or are responsible for marketing one, you need to know how to be effective in your market without the hoity-toity language of marketing. You need marketing for beginners.

Here, in a nutshell, are four simple things you can do right now to grow your brand:

1. Develop buyer personas

As a brand, you’re speaking to human beings who share your ideals, and who want or need your product or service. If you don’t know who you’re talking to, you’ll have trouble reaching your audience. Creating a buyer persona brings those individuals to life and helps you figure out how to market to them.


A buyer persona is simply a description of the person you’re trying to reach. You might have several. Give the persona a name. Write out the features of that person (“Sally has a master’s degree and likes buying organic food”) to illustrate her and get to know her. Then, when you do your marketing, keep that “person” in mind and address your messaging to her specifically.

2. Establish your tone of voice

How you communicate your marketing message is referred to as the tone of voice you use. It might be professional, casual, or even funny. The tone you use should resonate with your audience. For example, if you’re a B2B firm, you might do better using a more formal tone than a casual one peppered with teen-friendly acronyms. Just make sure to choose a tone that is consistent across all marketing channels.

If you’re outsourcing your content, your writers will need to use your brand’s voice as if it were second nature. Help them by creating a document with your brand guidelines, meeting with them, answering their questions, and giving them examples of the tone you are going for.

3. Know your brand’s values

Establishing what your brand stands for can help you immensely in your marketing because you can then communicate those values to your customers.

How can you do this? Jot down the things that are important to your company. For example, do you care about the environment? If you do, let people know about the choices you make that align with this value, like using green energy in your office, only buying recyclable or reusable office supplies, or volunteering to clean up your community.

4. Blog consistently

Write about things that matter to your customers: write about topics that they have questions about or that can enhance their lives in some way. And if you really don’t have time to blog, hire someone to do it for you.

Don’t know what to write about? Come up with a list of questions you’ve been asked by prospects and clients. Google other brands in your industry and see what they write about. Keep a spreadsheet of topics so you always have one to write about.

These four easy tips will help you attract more customers and build trust with them.

4 Flavors of Sales Lessons From the Ice Cream Truck

One of the rites of passage of childhood in many cities is the beloved ice cream truck! In many neighborhoods and city parks, kids come running when they hear an ice cream truck’s familiar tunes. The ice cream truck is an inevitable part of summer, but there’s also a careful sales strategy behind it—and other business owners can learn from it.

Go where your customers are

It sounds simple, but it works: Ice cream trucks find customers by going to their customers. Whether that’s driving through neighborhoods full of kids playing outside, or driving up to crowded city parks where people might want to enjoy a refreshing treat, ice cream trucks go to where the customers are.

In your business, selling directly isn’t always obvious. Selling ice cream to kids is simpler than selling complex B2B solutions to business buyers. But you need to make sure your sales strategy is working hand in hand with your marketing strategy to find and target the right customers in the right places.

Stand out from the crowd

Ice cream trucks are known for playing catchy jingles from their loud speakers to get people’s attention and to interrupt the usual routine. Even other food trucks that don’t sell ice cream have gotten more inventive about painting their trucks with bold colors and offering unique food creations. What can your business do differently to be memorable and cut through the clutter?

Be mobile savvy

Ice cream trucks are one of the original “food trucks,” and food trucks have become a big business in every major American city, selling everything from tacos to Belgian fries to seafood. Food trucks have become more sophisticated using mobile marketing, and this type of marketing is relevant to all businesses today. Food trucks in big cities are on Instagram and Twitter, sharing photos of their food, offering daily specials to social media followers, and otherwise looking for ways to sell products in a way that is enhanced by the mobile food truck experience.

In the same way, even B2B sales organizations need to get better at using mobile marketing. More of your B2B buyers are using mobile devices to do product research and price comparisons. Is your B2B marketing speaking to a mobile-savvy audience, or are you still stuck in the desktop era?

Create an emotional connection

Many people have fond childhood memories of enjoying frozen treats from an ice cream truck. There’s something about the experience of eating ice cream outside, delivered from a truck, that provides a one-of-a-kind feeling of comfort and convenience. It’s one of those “taste of summer” experiences that stays with you forever. What can your business do to create a similar powerful emotional experience for your buyers?

Ultimately, people usually don’t make buying decisions based on rational, logical, numbers-driven reasons—they buy for emotional reasons. What can your business do to make people feel better? Even if you’re a B2B seller of “technical” solutions, focus on the emotional connection. Can your solution help relieve your buyers’ stress, boost their optimism for future growth, or eliminate daily organizational clutter and tension? Don’t be afraid to sell the emotional side of your product or service; it might be what people respond to best of all.

Summer is often a time of nostalgia, fun, and relaxation. The beloved ice cream truck is one symbol of this softer, easier time of year, don’t assume that it’s just an innocent bit of fun—it actually shows some great examples of how to be more successful in sales.

Business Owners: Don’t Sacrifice Long-Term Success by Making Short-Sighted Decisions

A common situation for many small businesses and SMEs is having an immediate need for cash today, and taking action without considering the consequences for tomorrow. Although cash is certainly an important element for operating a small business, many entrepreneurs don’t understand that certain actions they take to obtain cash can lead to harmful consequences in the future.

A need for cash should never override prudent business decisions that can affect customer relationships. When business owners or managers consider cash to be the most important factor in their businesses, overriding product or service offerings and customer relationships, negative outcomes are certain to occur. Small business owners should not have the attitude of “make what we can today and worry about tomorrow when tomorrow comes.” With this philosophy, tomorrow will come along with lost customers, a negative reputation, and decreased profits.

You need long-term, favorable relationships with your customers in order to build a successful business. Securing future sales is as important as current sales. Thinking today about satisfying tomorrow’s customer sometimes means letting a sale “go” if all the factors are not right. When customers have satisfying buying experiences, they are more likely to become repeat customers. A combination of returning customers and new customers will build your customer base, leading to business growth and sustainability.

The flip side of a satisfied and returning customer is a dissatisfied customer. Once customers fall into this category, it is highly unlikely they will ever return—once lost, lost forever! But, this situation does not tell the entire story. The residual effect of dissatisfied customers sharing their bad experiences with others can damage your company’s reputation and be detrimental to your profits.

Negative Actions = Negative Results

Here are a few sales actions that can produce immediate cash, but may also cause lost business in the future:

Promising too much. When a business promises its customers more than it can deliver simply to secure a sale (i.e., over-promising and under-delivering), disaster may loom in the future. It is far better to take the opposite approach—under-promise and over-deliver.

Lack of customer service. So often a positive sales presentation turns into lackluster customer service once a sale is completed. During the sales phase, everything the customer asks for can be accomplished; however, once the deal is consummated, there is a quick change of attitude. Customers remember promises and are not too quick to forget.

Short on details. No one likes the hassle of reading the fine print of a sales or service agreement, but it’s necessary, depending on the product or service sold. While it might be easier for a small business to avoid all the legalese, problems can arise if customers think they agreed on one thing, and the business thinks they agreed on something entirely different. Take time on the front end to agree on all the fine points of a sale to reduce customer disappointment in the future. It is far better to rely on written details than your customers’ memory.

Positive Actions = Positive Results

Returning customers are like a cash annuity for your business. As sales increase and satisfied customers give excellent recommendations and reviews, this can create a compound effect on revenues and profits. Long-term business success relies on this type of steady growth: customer retention enhanced with new customers. In contrast, a business that’s constantly obtaining customers, losing customers, and gaining new customers is wasting its efforts and profits.

Take the following actions to produce positive results:

Deliver what is promised. Customers seek benefits, solutions to problems, value, and service. It’s quite simple: Just deliver as promised and watch customer loyalty develop.

Make customer satisfaction a priority. Customer service does not begin and end with a sale. It begins during the sales process and continues past the point of sale. Forgotten customers become lost customers.

Follow up where it counts. You can never go wrong by following up with customers after a sale to ensure they are satisfied. When the competition forgets about the fine details of a sale, having a strict attention to detail and following up can be a springboard to leap past a rival.

Your business’s success is not only impacted by the actions you take today; you also need to be aware of how your actions will impact your business tomorrow. Realize that any sale you make today is an installment for future sales.

Take care of your customers today, and those same customers will take care of your business tomorrow!

4 Ways to Be More Productive at Work

Do you wish you could be more productive? You’re not the only one. Small business owners are working long hours—but with little to show for it, a new survey from The Alternative Board reveals. A whopping 84% of entrepreneurs in the poll work over 40 hours a week. What’s more, only one in 10 feel “continuously overwhelmed” by their workload.

I’m actually impressed that 90% of business owners don’t feel continuously overwhelmed, especially considering that the average business owner in the survey reports having only 1.5 hours of uninterrupted, highly productive time per day. (Sounds about right!)

What’s eating up your productivity?

Parkinson’s Law (“Work expands to fill the time available”) isn’t the only thing keeping business owners from peak productivity. Here’s what survey respondents say are the biggest culprits:

• Poor time management—35%. No matter how much time you have available to get things done, if you don’t use it wisely, you won’t accomplish your goals.
• Poor communication—25%. Do you spend a lot of time waiting for answers to questions from clients, prospects, vendors, or your staff? Thinking things through and communicating clearly enhances productivity. For example, before assigning a new project to an employee, make sure they have all the information they need to get started. Before starting to invoice a vendor, gather the relevant details.
• Personal problems—18%. We all face personal issues from time to time. Unfortunately, if your time management skills are weak at the best of times, personal challenges can really put you behind the eight ball. Aim to build some open time into your schedule each day; that way, you’ll be able to handle last-minute business and personal emergencies without falling hopelessly behind.
• Technology distractions—16%. Smartphones, tablets, texting, and communication apps are a double-edged sword. They make it possible for us to work from anywhere and communicate instantly. However, they also put the entire internet in our pockets, tempting us with endless distractions. (How many times have you gone on Twitter or Facebook to update your business account and gotten sucked in?) In addition, responding to multiple notifications, alerts, and emails on umpteen different devices all day long can eat up time and drain your brainpower.

What’s the biggest time suck for small business owners in the survey? It probably won’t surprise you, but the majority says email eats up most of their time—although only a measly 9% say email is the most important use of their time. Also on the list of top time wasters: in-person meetings and conference calls/video conferences. Just 4% of business owners say those meetings are always productive.

How to be more productive

Increasing your productivity may be easier said than done—but it is doable. Here are four ideas to help you be more productive:

1. Limit checking your email to certain times of day. One-third of business owners in the survey believe this would be the best way they could maximize productivity. While it may not work for every business owner, setting aside 20 minutes in the morning, early afternoon, and before you leave for the day (or whatever cadence makes sense for you) to check emails can minimize multitasking and leave you feeling less frazzled.

2. Get a head start. More than eight in 10 business owners in the survey say the morning is their most productive time of day. Don’t waste this valuable time updating social media, sorting travel expense receipts, or holding meetings—set aside the first hour or two of your day for important tasks that require lots of focus. Getting up extra early and working at home for an hour or so before you head to the office can help ensure you aren’t interrupted during this focused time.

3. Find your most productive place. We all work differently, and while most business owners say they’re most productive at the office, almost one-third say they are more productive when working at home. It really depends on what your needs are, what you have to get done, and how you prefer to work. A business owner who’s the parent of three young children may welcome the relative calm and silence of the office, while those with hectic offices and nonstop interruptions may need to hole up at home to get things accomplished.

4. Model the behavior you want to see. As the leader of your business, you need to set the tone for your employees in terms of maximizing productivity. Try brainstorming with your team to think of ways to eliminate time-wasting habits or processes in your workplace. Share strategies that have helped make you more productive. It’s hard to break habits that eat into our productivity (such as instantly responding to the ding of an incoming email), but working to be productive as a team can make it a little easier.

Richard Branson to Young Entrepreneurs: 'Just Do It'

Through the decades, entrepreneur Richard Branson has not lost that certain wunderkind vibe about him and the way he runs his brand. This aura makes him especially inspiring to entrepreneurs who are looking to start young.

“Most young people with good ideas … will find that 99 percent of people will give them every reason why their idea’s been done before or why it’s not a good idea or why they’re going to fall flat on their face,” Branson recently told Inc.’s president and editor in chief Eric Schurenberg during an exclusive sit-down interview. “In the end, you have to say, ‘Screw it. Just do it.’”

At the age of 15, Branson dropped out of high school to start his first business, a magazine for young activists titled Student.

Four years later, in 1970, Branson began selling records by mail. In 1971, he opened his first record store. In 1972, he opened a recording studio. In 1973, he started his own record label. The Virgin business empire had begun, and Branson had not yet turned 24.

Today, the Virgin Group is a well-regarded global conglomerate of about 350 companies, branching into the entertainment, travel, and mobile industries.

Not all of Branson’s big ideas have been successful. Virgin Airlines and Virgin Mobile are now flagship brands for Branson, but remember Virgin Cola? With big risks come big, public failures. Branson has a follow-up secret to success: determination even when failure seems inevitable.

“If you have enough determination.... It’s more likely that you will succeed because of what you learned from the occasions when you didn’t succeed," Branson said. “The most important thing is to not be put off by failure.”

Mentally Strong People: The 13 Things They Avoid

For all the time executives spend concerned about physical strength and health, when it comes down to it, mental strength can mean even more.

Here's a list compiled by Amy Morin, a psychotherapist and licensed clinical social worker.


1.    Waste Time Feeling Sorry for Themselves. You don’t see mentally strong people feeling sorry for their circumstances or dwelling on the way they’ve been mistreated. They have learned to take responsibility for their actions and outcomes, and they have an inherent understanding of the fact that frequently life is not fair. They are able to emerge from trying circumstances with self-awareness and gratitude for the lessons learned. When a situation turns out badly, they respond with phrases such as “Oh, well.” Or perhaps simply, “Next!”

2. Give Away Their Power. Mentally strong people avoid giving others the power to make them feel inferior or bad. They understand they are in control of their actions and emotions. They know their strength is in their ability to manage the way they respond.

3.    Shy Away from Change. Mentally strong people embrace change and they welcome challenge. Their biggest “fear," if they have one, is not of the unknown, but of becoming complacent and stagnant. An environment of change and even uncertainty can energize a mentally strong person and bring out their best.

4. Waste Energy on Things They Can’t Control. Mentally strong people don’t complain (much) about bad traffic, lost luggage, or especially about other people, as they recognize that all of these factors are generally beyond their control. In a bad situation, they recognize that the one thing they can always control is their own response and attitude, and they use these attributes well.

5. Worry About Pleasing Others. Know any people pleasers? Or, conversely, people who go out of their way to dis-please others as a way of reinforcing an image of strength? Neither position is a good one. A mentally strong person strives to be kind and fair and to please others where appropriate, but is unafraid to speak up. They are able to withstand the possibility that someone will get upset and will navigate the situation, wherever possible, with grace.

6. Fear Taking Calculated Risks. A mentally strong person is willing to take calculated risks. This is a different thing entirely than jumping headlong into foolish risks. But with mental strength, an individual can weigh the risks and benefits thoroughly, and will fully assess the potential downsides and even the worst-case scenarios before they take action.

7. Dwell on the Past. There is strength in acknowledging the past and especially in acknowledging the things learned from past experiences—but a mentally strong person is able to avoid miring their mental energy in past disappointments or in fantasies of the “glory days” gone by. They invest the majority of their energy in creating an optimal present and future.

8. Make the Same Mistakes Over and Over. We all know the definition of insanity, right? It’s when we take the same actions again and again while hoping for a different and better outcome than we’ve gotten before. A mentally strong person accepts full responsibility for past behavior and is willing to learn from mistakes. Research shows that the ability to be self-reflective in an accurate and productive way is one of the greatest strengths of spectacularly successful executives and entrepreneurs.

9. Resent Other People’s Success. It takes strength of character to feel genuine joy and excitement for other people’s success. Mentally strong people have this ability. They don’t become jealous or resentful when others succeed (although they may take close notes on what the individual did well). They are willing to work hard for their own chances at success, without relying on shortcuts.

10. Give Up After Failure. Every failure is a chance to improve. Even the greatest entrepreneurs are willing to admit that their early efforts invariably brought many failures. Mentally strong people are willing to fail again and again, if necessary, as long as the learning experience from every “failure” can bring them closer to their ultimate goals.

11. Fear Alone Time. Mentally strong people enjoy and even treasure the time they spend alone. They use their downtime to reflect, to plan, and to be productive. Most importantly, they don’t depend on others to shore up their happiness and moods. They can be happy with others, and they can also be happy alone.

12. Feel the World Owes Them Anything. Particularly in the current economy, executives and employees at every level are gaining the realization that the world does not owe them a salary, a benefits package and a comfortable life, regardless of their preparation and schooling. Mentally strong people enter the world prepared to work and succeed on their merits, at every stage of the game.

13. Expect Immediate Results. Whether it’s a workout plan, a nutritional regimen, or starting a business, mentally strong people are “in it for the long haul”. They know better than to expect immediate results. They apply their energy and time in measured doses and they celebrate each milestone and increment of success on the way. They have “staying power.” And they understand that genuine changes take time. Do you have mental strength? Are there elements on this list you need more of? With thanks to Amy Morin, I would like to reinforce my own abilities further in each of these areas today. How about you?

7 Startup Lessons From Successful Small Business Owners

If you had the chance to live your life over again, what would you do differently? Most small business owners wouldn’t change a thing—at least, not when it comes to their businesses.

Some 82% of small business owners in the most recent SurePayroll Scorecard have no regrets about when they started their businesses; in fact, 10% wish they had started their businesses earlier. Only 3% wish they had waited for the economy to improve before starting their businesses.

The small business owners who participated in the nationwide survey are happy with their businesses today, and 80% are optimistic about the future of the economy in general. However, these entrepreneurs also admit there were some things they didn’t expect when they started out.

• Almost three in 10 respondents (28%) say the economy has had a much bigger impact on their business than they ever expected.
• 24% say they didn’t realise the toll business ownership would take on their personal lives and health.
• 21% say changing government regulations had an unexpectedly large effect on their businesses.
• 10% say their business location had a bigger effect on their business than they expected.
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What do small business owners wish they had understood better when they started their businesses? The top answers are:

• Administrative and regulatory requirements (34%)
• How to hire the right people (26%)
• How to better manage their time (19%)
• The need for capital and how to raise it (14%)

It’s also important to thoroughly understand what you’re up against when starting a business. More than one-quarter (26%) of respondents say a better understanding of customer behavior would have been helpful when they launched their companies. Sixteen percent wish they had known more about customer demand for their service or product; many also wished they had a better understanding of the competitive landscape earlier.

If you haven’t yet started your business or are still in the planning stages, take a lesson from the entrepreneurs in the survey:

1. Do your homework

You think you’ve got a great idea, but will your customers think so, too? Conduct market research to see who your competitors are, what your target customers are like and whether they will actually buy your product or service.

2. Know the administrative and regulatory requirements you need to meet

These can range from licenses and permits to local zoning regulations and record-keeping requirements. Once you’re up and running, keep on top of changes to local, state and federal government regulations that affect your business.

3. Have adequate capital

Insufficient capital is a key reason for business failure. Create a budget and financial projections for your new business, and figure out where you can save money and where you need to spend. Don’t forget to take your own income into account: You may have to go without a salary for a year or longer until your business starts making a profit.

4. Watch economic indicators

Keeping tabs on the local, regional and national economy, as well as the world economy, will help you plan for the future of your business. It will also help you make smarter decisions about everything from the suppliers you choose to the types of employees you hire.

5. Don’t underestimate the power of location

I’ve seen some great businesses fail solely because they chose a location that didn’t have enough foot traffic or lacked adequate parking. If the rent on a location seems too good to be true, there’s probably a reason for that.

6. Make time for yourself

Entrepreneurship is all-encompassing and can eat up 24 hours of your day if you let it. But in order for your business to thrive and grow, you’ve got to be mentally and physically fit. Manage your time wisely, being sure to set aside enough hours in the day for rest, exercise, a healthy diet and time with the people you care about.

7. Last, but not least, get help

One-quarter (25%) of respondents regretted not experiencing the benefits of having a great mentor. A good mentor can make your life so much easier — he or she can help you cut through red tape, get the capital you need, find the perfect location and more.

5 Tips for Starting a Successful Business

When you start your own business, you're certain to hear a lot of different advice. Most of it will come from people who don’t know the first thing about running a successful company. Turn to the internet, and you'll be overwhelmed by a multitude of articles and lengthy lists on the subject. Don’t make the mistake of overthinking and over analyzing it all. A few simple steps now can start your business down the path toward success. Here, we outline the five basic tips we've followed to help us run our company.

1. Begin with a detailed plan.

This one is a must: Develop an in-depth plan that fully details how you'll attack the challenge ahead. Your plan should define any opportunities you've identified, clearly state your mission, describe your target, establish measurable goals, and set deadlines for each milestone along the way. Remember that while it's important to have a plan, it's equally vital to be flexible enough to pivot when needed.

2. Get out there and network.

Our business would not be where it is today without all the professional networking we did when we first started. We continue to emphasize networking today. Until you've established your business, you'll need to create your own word-of-mouth. Be your own brand ambassador, touting the benefits of working with your business and showing why people should give you a chance.

Start your own momentum. A wealth of events, trade shows, and networking groups exist to connect you with other professionals. These initial connections can lead to future business prospects, mentors, and strategic partners with the capacity to help grow your business.

3. Surround yourself with the right people.

The right mentors and strategic partners aren’t the only people with whom you'll need to align. Surrounding yourself with a great team is equally important. Build your staff with smart, talented, and driven employees who share your vision. They can not only transform your business but also accelerate its growth. Hiring positive, can-do employees helps create a culture that encourages teamwork. Foster an environment in which everyone participates, so you can collectively celebrate your company's successes.

4. Stay ahead of the curve.

You can't afford to be rooted in the present and solely focused on the day-to-day. It's crucial to keep one eye focused on the future, including upcoming movement in your industry. If you aren’t anticipating the next big thing, you're destined to fall behind. Successful business owners study trends and anticipate what's coming around the bend. This allows them to nimbly adapt and evolve.
Stay current on emerging issues in your field by faithfully reading trade magazines and websites. Keeping pace as your industry changes assures you'll have your finger on the pulse to predict what customers will want -- and which direction your competition might move.

5. Find a healthy work-life balance.

Running a successful business requires an inordinate amount of time and energy. It's paramount to find a healthy work-life balance, even though it can be a challenge to do so. It's easy to let work dominate your life. Don't. It could result in your losing touch with those whom you consider most important. It's also crucial to take care of your own health and well-being. Your business can’t run without you. You might believe you need that perpetual hustle to stay sharp and succeed. But that pace can and will burn you out, ultimately limiting how much you can achieve if you don't take time for yourself.

Find ways to maintain perspective and preserve healthy relationships outside of work. Set aside time to get your body active in ways that energize and invigorate you, and schedule catch-up time with friends and family. They'll help recharge your batteries and inspire you to persevere as you dream even bigger.

10 Key Differences Between a Boss and a Leader: Which Are You?

“There is a difference between being a boss and a leader,” writes Mark Miller, CEO of Volaris Group. “One manages their employees, while the other inspires them to innovate, think creatively, and strive for perfection. Every team has a boss, but what people need is a leader.” In her post on the Elite Daily blog, Leyla Abdullayeva adds that “although leaders and bosses have nearly identical definitions, in effect, they are different in today’s competitive world.”

While the differences between the definitions of leader and boss may seem small on paper, the two terms connote something very different to your employees. Managers need to understand those difference and aspire to become a leader.

Here are the 10 key differences between bosses and leaders:

1. A boss gives answers. A leader seeks solutions.

Part of being a leader means coaching employees. A leader will help an employee grow by guiding them through challenges. This is how employees can develop problem-solving abilities and other skills that add value to a company.

2. A boss manages work. A leader leads people.

“Management consists of controlling a group or a set of entities to accomplish a goal,” writes Vineet Nayar in Harvard Business Review. “Leadership refers to an individual’s ability to influence, motivate, and enable others to contribute toward organizational success. Influence and inspiration separate leaders from managers, not power and control.”

3. A boss expects big results. A leader is generous with praise.

A leader offers “immediate praise, thanks, and constructive criticism (when appropriate) as it happens,” according to business author and speaker Barry Moltz. Workers are motivated by more than money. Praise and signs of appreciation can help with morale and engagement, while a boss who simply expects good work can miss out on these opportunities.

4. A boss counts value. A leader creates value.

A leader focuses on creating value through leading by example, according to Nayar. A boss focuses on counting value and can even reduce value. “If a diamond cutter is asked to report every 15 minutes how many stones he has cut, by distracting him, his boss is subtracting value,” says Nayar.

5. A boss controls. A leader trusts.

Similar to the way a boss manages work while a leader leads people, a boss has the tendency to control workers and what they do. This behavior and frame of mind undermine productivity and growth. A leader is not caught up in micromanaging workers and work; instead, that person relies on trust and inspires workers to trust others.

6. A boss commands. A leader listens and speaks.

“Bosses tend to give orders; they need their employees to listen and to obey,” writes Abdullayeva. “However, leaders always listen to the opinions of their colleagues and regard them as important.” Miller adds that bosses talk more than they listen, while leaders listen more than they talk.

7. A boss creates circles of power. A leader creates circles of influence.

Nayar advises managers to look at how many people outside of their reporting hierarchy come to them for advice. The more people that do, the more likely it is that the manager is perceived as a leader.

8. A boss criticizes. A leader encourages.

“Constructive criticism is needed every now and then to help someone improve,” says Miller. “But constantly being told what they are doing wrong not only discourages a person … [it] causes them to disengage.”

9. A boss chooses favorites. A leader establishes equal relationships.

Equal relationships help ensure that personal preferences don’t enter the team dynamic, notes Abdullayeva. A boss who chooses favorites causes stress and tension, but a leader tries to treat everyone equally.

10. A leader creates more leaders.

A primary goal for leaders is to create more leaders. By inspiring and motivating their employees, leaders set the framework for workers to grow, improve their skills, and assume leadership roles themselves.

A role for the new economy

“Perhaps there was a time when the calling of the manager and that of the leader could be separated,” writes Alan Murray in The Wall Street Journal. “But in the new economy, where value comes increasingly from the knowledge of people, and where workers are no longer undifferentiated cogs in an industrial machine, management and leadership are not easily separated. People look to their managers, not just to assign them a task, but to define for them a purpose. And managers must organize workers, not just to maximize efficiency, but to nurture skills, develop talent, and inspire results.”

Leaders, not bosses, are needed in the new economy to manage “knowledge workers,” or those who have high degrees of expertise, education, or experience. A primary part of their jobs is the creation, distribution, or application of knowledge. No longer can managers act as merely bosses and expect employees to thrive; they must coach their workers and give them the freedom and support they need to do their work.