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.

7 Must-Ask Questions for Your Inbound Sales Leads

Lots of business owners think that the sales process begins with making a sales pitch or dialing a cold call.

But what about the sales leads that contact your company? When a new business prospect calls your business or emails your business for the first time, what happens next? Do you just handle these new business leads on a haphazard basis, or do you have a consistent process in place to figure out which sales leads are really ready to buy?

Here’s the thing about sales: Not all new sales leads are equal. Some new business prospects are going to be the right fit for your business, some are not, and some new prospects MIGHT buy from you in the long run—but they need more time to do research and ask questions and figure out their internal dynamics.

But how can you find out which sales leads are which? You need to qualify your sales leads by asking lead-qualifying questions. This way you can learn more about your new prospects and figure out which ones are ready to buy, and which ones will need more time. This will help you avoid the problem of good sales leads falling through the cracks, while also avoiding the problem of wasting time on “bad” leads.

Here are a few lead-qualifying questions that you need to ask every new inbound sales lead, and why:

Why did you decide to contact our company?

This question helps you learn more about how the prospect found out about your business. Did they get a referral? Did they find your website? Did they see one of your ads? Did they hear about you from a news story or social media post? Whatever it is, it’s worth asking to find out what they know about your business and how they decided to connect with you.

Why are you looking for a new solution?

Here you can identify what issues or problems the prospect is having with their business that motivated them to contact you. Learn more about their overall business operations and future business goals.

How are your current issues impacting your business?

This question helps you go more deeply into the prospect’s business and figure out how much “pain” they are experiencing. This can help you make an estimate of how motivated they are to buy.

What other competitors are you looking at so far?

Get a sense for how much the prospect knows about you industry and the competitive landscape. Find out if your business is the only one they’re considering so far, or if you’re one of several vendors who might be invited to put in a bid.

How long have you been researching for a new solution?

Find out if this is a long-term process that’s been in the works for a long time, or if the prospect is just getting started doing their research. This can also help you evaluate how quickly the prospect might be ready to buy.

How soon do you think you might want to make a purchase decision?

Again, this question is more direct but it can give you insights into the prospect’s decision time frame.

Who else is involved in your decision-making process?

Ask to identify key stakeholders in the purchase decision. Figure out more about the shape of the prospect’s organization and which parts of the organization need to be involved in your sales discussions.

After you’ve asked these qualifying questions, you can start to sort your sales leads into categories based on which ones are most ready to buy. Ideally, these qualifying questions will help you get an estimate of which sales leads are higher priority or lower priority, and you can direct your sales efforts accordingly.

On Crappy Napkins, or Why Cutting Corners Never Benefits Your Business

Think about the last time you visited a restaurant and there were those sheer, brittle napkins in an old school metal napkin holder on the table. You desperately pulled clumps of them out in an attempt to create the thickness of a single napkin with which to wipe your sticky hands.

Now think about another restaurant where you had a soft but strong napkin with plenty of absorption power. It didn’t fall apart when you used it to wipe barbecue sauce off of your face.

Which memory has the better position in your brain?

Are you really saving money?

The above illustrations are from the customer’s perspective, but as the business owner of this mythical restaurant, you’re probably on the side of the cheaper napkins. After all, if you can save a penny per napkin, that’s a ton of savings each year. Or is it?

While you may spend less on napkins, you may end up losing customers in your attempt to cut a few corners. Think I’m exaggerating to say that the quality of napkins is enough to send customers running out your door? Think again.

There are a million indeterminate factors that make someone decide to choose your business over another. Customers could walk out after being frustrated with your crappy napkins, or upset because the air conditioning wasn’t turned on, or annoyed at how long it took to get their meal. You can’t pin a person’s reason for not returning to your restaurant to any one of these factors, but you can bet they all contributed.

So the next time you have to choose between cheaper (and inferior quality) or more costly (but ultimately providing a better experience), ask yourself, Which would you prefer as a customer?

Consider the experience you’re creating

Every business offers an experience, a chance for customers to interact with its brand, whether you run a restaurant or a marketing company. Service companies like my own may not have to worry about the whole napkin debate, but there are definitely ways to enhance that experience
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For my company, I have high-quality, skinny business cards that always get commented on, rather than the freebies that come from Vistaprint. I send clients gifts on my company’s birthday. I send handwritten holiday cards. All of this goes into the experience clients have with my brand. I will never cut corners on what I want them to remember about me and my brand. And you shouldn’t either.

For the brick-and-mortar store, experience includes everything from the music you play (go for middle-of-the-road, not hard rock) to whether or not there’s cacophony coming from the kitchen into the dining room. If clothes racks are crowded together too much, it takes away from a positive shopping experience. If cashiers are rude, people won’t return. Every facet of your business gets judged. Isn’t it in your best interest to ensure everything is top notch?

To succeed in business, your focus can’t always be on the bottom line. Sometimes investing in your business’s growth and secure future is as simple as buying the better napkins.