Getting Your Business Started with UMPH!

Let’s say you are like most entrepreneurs. You have an idea. You think it’s brilliant. Your friends think it’s gonna make you a billionaire, and you are ready to do what you need to, to make this dream a reality. Before you quit your job and run headlong into this new adventure, stop. Get the following in order so you can give yourself a fighting chance.

• Put together a real business plan, wearing the CEO, COO and CFO hats. The plan should outline all the basics surrounding the cost of your operations, for at least one year. This includes, but is not limited to, purchasing office equipment (desk, filing cabinets, bookcases, phones, fax, printer, scanner, PC, cell phone and a laptop + the relevant operational and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software); rent, insurance, internet and phone services, marketing (we’ll cover this in more detail shortly), sales initiatives, gas, tolls, miscellaneous niche consultants, air and other travel expenses, entertaining, cost of producing your goods or delivering your service, admin help, IT person, lawyer, bookkeeper, accountant, and business filing fees, trade and other membership fees, printing and mailing charges.

• Assess the yearly & monthly costs of these. Add 25% - 50%.

• Create a separate marketing plan. Businesses that don’t take into account the cost and the time involved with getting the cash register ringing (read marketing, advertising and the process of selling) are planning to fail. A realistic marketing plan includes the cost of the following: figuring out your geographic footprint (local, regional, national, or global); best target markets - how and where you will engage them; developing a strong brand and the tools, a website and a suite of collateral materials that “speak” to your target market(s) – i.e. a business card, letterhead, brochure, website, oversized postcard(s), print ad, web ad, etc.; attending networking functions, sponsoring a local high school team, taking ads in industry or Chamber journals, sponsorships, internet marketing, direct mail campaigns, PR, attending trade shows and business expos, etc. The team you need to help you accomplish all these tasks should include: admin/sales help, marketing consultant, business consultant, graphic designer, webmaster, printer, and a marketing communications copywriter (SPECIAL NOTE about Copywriting: Getting an “A” in creative writing in college does not qualify you for this job! Being a staff reporter is not the right credential either. See “Making Sales with Authentic Copywriting” for more details).

• It’s a lot of hard work. Forget visions of lying on a beach somewhere in Hawaii. Newbie business owners who succeed live and breathe their business 24/7, and working incredibly long days for years! Fact is no matter how many people you know, creating trust (and generating sales) takes an organized, respectful process & time, lots of it.

• You don’t know everything. Smart entrepreneurs take the time to get educated as to all the hats (and their specific job functions) they have to manage, as well as the functions they need to outsource in the course of getting their business up and running quickly. I’ve interviewed scores of millionaires who admit that they would have made it to that “millionaire mark” sooner had they focused on what they did know how to do, versus leaving it up to chance, or worse, trying to juggle everything themselves long term. The ones that make it BIG all say the same thing — they hired or worked with an assortment of professionals who were specialists in a range of important areas — operations, systems, organization, marketing . . . and a marketing communications copywriter. Bottom line: most business owners who try to do everything over the long haul to “save money” usually end up treading water instead of sailing ahead.

(Special Note about Copywriting: Getting an “A” in creative writing in college does not qualify you for this job! Being a staff reporter is not the right credential either. Marketing copywriting is serious work, and a blend of art & science. See “Making Sales with Great Copywriting” for more details).

Marketing Success Mentoring

Our meaty Marketing Mentoring sessions will leave you inspired and ready to make better choices, to get the most bang from every marketing & sales initiative you take on. We cover branding, cold calling, web & print marketing, networking & lots more! And depending on what you need for your business, we offer three mentoring options:

Intro to Success: $595 for 4 weeks, one 40 minute session per week

On Track Success Mentoring: $1,495 for 12 weeks, one 40 minute session per week, plus up to ten e/mail communiqués per week

Advanced Success Mentoring: $500 per month, $3,000 total for 6 months, for one 35 minute phone session per week, with unlimited email access for all your questions*
*For questions received Mon-Fri. 8:30-4:00 pm, with maximum 24hr response time

Making Time in ‘08

(Revised from March 17, 2007 post)

Okay - so there are only 24 hours in a day, right? So how do you “make” more time? It’s not as hard as you think.

With just three simple steps, you can create the time you need to do stuff that keeps getting put on the back burner.

A) Take one week and track your time. No cheating - make a log that counts every second, from the moment you wake up to the moment your exhausted head hits the pillow ( I did not say this was going to be painless, did I?)

B) Take a hard look at all the time you wasted ( like the 30 minutes you blew surfing the net for travel deals when you should have been working on a project, returning phone calls, etc.). See how much of your time is dealing with e/mail … sorting, tossing, answering, etc. I bet right now you let yourself get involved with email at least 10 times a day, if not more … Effective time management can rescue you from this trap.

C) Take command of your life! Yup, Stage Three is the best, because you get to create the work-flow chart that meshes with your personality, your job and your responsibilties. And that very simply means you must allocate those precious seconds, minutes, quarter hours, mornings, etc. in a very deliberate, methodical manner. Keep in mind three things you must do each day - review tasks, sort by priority, allocate defined time to attend to each task. By embracing this self-produced time allocation system you will actually be able to take control, work more effectively and keep organized!

A well-organized schedule for at least 3 days a week should be something that includes:

1. Lunch time away from your desk, even if it’s a half an hour
2. Short breaks, one mid-morning and one in the late afternoon
3. Defined times to return and make phone calls
4. Prescheduled times to check, sort and toss emails
5. Calls or emails to follow-up on new networking leads

In between this new regimen, make sure you plan at least one full hour where you can work without interruptions. The last two days can be earmarked for catch up work, intensive sales calls, uninterrupted project time, special networking events or client meetings as needed.

It will take 21 work days to get this whole new approach integrated into your daily routine, so that you are comfortable with it. Studies have proven that this is the minimum amount of time it takes to firmly establish a new regimen. It may seem nonsensical, even annoying, but you will be fighting yourself as you move through this adjustment period. Do not turn back! This new system will work better than the daily frantic pace you have most probably gotten used to.

Know that each day will throw you an assortment of curve balls. But if you actively start to manage your time, you can create a customized system that allows for more effective & more productive workdays, which is never a bad thing!

Kickin’ the New Year off Right!

Okay - so I, like most people, made some resolutions that haven’t quite kicked in yet! Here’s a sneak preview of my Top Ten goals for ‘06, in no particular order:

1. Get organized! (those paperwork piles are history!!)

2. Produce more TeleSeminars with a variety of experts

3. Get on radio and TV - a lot.

4. Write every day

5. Get my first book published

6. Reach out to other experts and develop unique, joint programming for corporate, non-profit and entrepreneurial sectors

7. Get my Business Success articles in more online venues

8. Produce at least 2 Entrepreneurial events at 2 colleges in the Northeast, with more national sponsors

9. Expand my feature writing from regional to national publications

10. Excercise more, and lose 20 pounds

Okay , so let’s face the facts. It’s the 11th and I’ve yet to get up earlier to exercise. My piles are multiplying as I write this, and I have NOT managed to write everyday. I am not abandoning my quest though, so want to share some great strategies that others have shared with me, as well as tips I give to my clients, that I need to implement myself!

First - Since life is so busy and it’s easy to get waylaid, I am gonna print out my Top Ten list and post it right near my computer screen. No way to wriggle out of it, if it’s in my face, right??

Next, I’m going to schedule my time to accommodate the various objectives I’ve set for myself. Now just looking over my list is enough to make anyone want to hyperventilate, but the secret here, according to Ellen Parlapiano, co- author of ” Mompreneurs(R): A Mother’s Step-by-Step Guide to Work-at-Home Success,” is thinking small. At first, I thought that was crazy! I have BIG goals, so that must mean I have to do it all, RIGHT NOW ( can you tell I’m a Type “A”??)

Anyway, it did not take me too long to discover how wise Ellen’s advice was. When you think small, things are not so overwhelming. As a group, these are YEAR LONG goals, and I will be able to accomplish them all ( and keep my sanity), by chipping away at them a little at a time.

I also thought about some feedback I got from a couple of my professional organizer contacts. Their advice will work for you too! All it takes is careful, coordinated planning. As Gayle M. Gruenberg, from Let’s Get Organized says, “live by your calendar, in pencil!” That means blocking out a bit of time here and there, in between my mentoring calls, my meetings, speaking engagements, and other work. The “in pencil” part makes it easier to be flexible, so there’s no excuse for not fitting in what I need to, to suit my own unique plan and ever-evolving schedule.

This is the key for me, cause otherwise the hours fly by and at the end of the day, well, I’m always wonderng what happened!?!?

Would love to hear feedback on how you deal with your time challenges, or any other entrepreneurial issues, as I hope this blog can become a forum that provides easy tips and solutions we can all benefit from!

Wishing you Success,
Pattie
President, Write-Communications
Founder, WomenCentric(TM) LLC

Ringing In the New Year with Gusto!

Greetings Fellow Success Enthusiasts!

From all that I’ve heard and seen at various networking functions, client meetings, training sessions and net spots, it’s been one heck of a year! Despite the wizardry of an increasing amount of “time-saving” techno-gadgets, almost everyone is still breathless at the end of the day…

Kinda ironic, don’t you think?

While I like most of the the “new-fangled” stuff, and begrudglingly admit that many of these widgets serve a purpose - it’s becoming a full-time job to keep up with it all! The lingo, the “Terms of Agreement,” the instruction manuals. . .

My suggestion to all - take a deep breath in 2006.

Get down to the nitty-gritty of what makes your business hum. It’s the people, the relationships, the shared glances of comraderie between peers when some goofball at a gathering acts out of place, the shoulder you offer when a client vents his or her frustration in a phone meeting … these moments are what are important. Your attention to these details are what make you stand apart from the competition.

Not the gadgets.
Not the gizmos.

They can actually hinder you (but that’s fodder for another post!) So - make it a Top Priority for 2006 to sweep away all the clutter, and boil your business down to the essense - start with turning your attention to three things:

-Determine what makes you valuable to your clients
-Haul away the garbage and do what you need to, to improve your performance and hence, your VALUE to your clients and prospects
-Take measured steps to insure that your employees help you achieve your goals

Set some simple, ACHIEVABLE goals within a sensible timeline; like “I’ll read more about what other industries are doing,once a week” or “I’ll get to one new networking thing a month,” or most importantly, “I’ll make the time to refresh, and encourage my employees to do the same.” You’ve heard it all before, but it’s worth repeating: some of my best ideas come to me when I’m NOT at my desk!

Like many, I’ve taken a lot on this past year, and will be doing what I can to trim and refine my initiatives, while balancing more “stuff to do” - like posting to this Blog, interacting with and producing new educational tools with more of my peers, publishing my first book, doing more radio & TV “Success Segments”. YIKES! It DOES sound like a lot, and I will post my progress (and setbacks) in smaller chunks in the New Year.

I’m wishing you all great success in the New Year, with more balance (I will NEVER give up my quest for that!!) and of course, personal and professional growth that helps you drive more business to your door!

Here’s to a Joyous Holiday Season,
Pattie