You’ve got a killer idea for your small business. You’ve created a great new product or service, set up operations, raised sufficient money to get out of the gate. But where are the customers? It’s time to pay attention to marketing. During Small Business Week, I’m devoted to helping you “Make this Your Year to …
Plan for Growth
“You can’t reach a goal you haven’t set.” During Small Business Week, I’m helping you “Make this Your Year to Grow.” If you want to grow, one of the most important steps is to develop a plan for growth – and then make planning an ongoing process of your company. Now, don’t get worried that …
Find Your Niche
All over America, this week people observe “Small Business Week.” They’ll toast the huge contributions small businesses and entrepreneurs make to the American economy. Small companies will rightly be in the spotlight. But when USAToday turned to me to create a special, five-day, series for Small Business Week – kicking off today – I wanted …
7 Things an Entrepreneur Should Never Say
“Whoops – did he really just say that?” When you’re just starting a small business or launching a startup, it’s easy to put your foot in your mouth. You’ll be meeting many people and telling them about your new entrepreneurial venture. You’ll pitch to investors or try to impress a banker. You’ll almost certainly be …
Small Business Lessons from Silicon Valley
When someone says “Silicon Valley” business, you probably envision companies like Google, Facebook, Apple or startups like the one lampooned on the hit HBO TV series. But I live here in Silicon Valley, and I know there are thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of small businesses that succeed the “Silicon Valley” way. What lessons have …
Sleep, A Secret of Small Business Success
“There’s not enough hours in the day.” Virtually every small business owner and entrepreneur laments that there’s not enough time to complete everything we have to do. So, we stay up late, get up early. We try to gain extra hours by cheating our sleep. But we may be cheating ourselves and our businesses. Because, …
Create a Killer Small Business Prototype
Do you have an idea for a new gizmo that will take the world by storm? Are you about to create a what-cha-ma-call-it that will finally enable you to launch your own small business? Hold on. Before you invest your life savings or launch a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter, you need to create a prototype. …
7 Steps to Finding Your Ideal Customer
Startup Sally. Venture Vic. Paul Pasta. Midlife Mary. These customers are vitally important to my small business. And none of them are real. They’re a few of the “personas” we’ve devised to help us in our product development process. Some of the most important “customers” for your small business may not be real people at …
6 Great Growth Tactics You’ve Forgotten
The other day I was eating a terrific sandwich in a café near my office, when I noticed staff members wearing T-shirts saying, “We do business catering.” I immediately texted my office manager and told her to order from this café for our next staff lunch. Wow. They got an order from a T-shirt! This …
