Business means profit and loss of a project. But I always focus on profit of my business. If you start a new business, you will remember some important issue. Here is some tips for you to start a new business.
1. Do your homework. You may think your idea is fantastic and your friends and family have probably told you it is great too, but what do other people think? Test out your idea on your potential customers before you start.
2. Work out your costs. You must be able to have enough money coming into the business to cover what your product or service costs you to make. If you don’t, you’re in danger of not making any money out of your business.
3. Think of free ways to promote your business. Let’s face it you’ve got enough to spend your money on without spending it on marketing. Think about where your potential customers go (i.e. if your customers are mums, they’ll go to schools, post office, doctor’s surgeries etc) and go where they go.
4. Don’t spend a fortune on a website. Believe me you’ll want to change your website after a few months when you get to know what you’re doing. Spend the money on your website then and get it done cheaply at first.
5. Write a business plan. Too many businesses don’t write a plan and 90% of them will fail during the first 18 months. If you write a business plan, 90% of businesses are still going after the same period. What would you prefer?
6. Be passionate. Your business idea should be something you would happily get out bed in a morning for without being paid. Your passion will come across to customers and everyone you meet and will help you get started.
7. Don’t worry about getting a ‘niche’. Listen, all of us would like to find the perfect idea that no-one else has thought of, but then you’ll need to work hard at telling people what it is because they won’t have heard about it. Competition is good! Your ‘niche’ is all about you – it’s what you’re passionate about that makes you stand out.
8. Forget about other people. Countless new businesses are worried about telling people in case their idea is stolen. But remember 60% of people are sat in businesses right now wanting to start their own business – but, only 3% actually do it. So, even if people think it’s a great idea, chances are they won’t actually set up. Bite the bullet and tell people!
9. Go for it! We’re all a nation of “what ifs” and “it won’t work”. If you’ve done your homework and believe in your idea, go for it! Also, remember that everyone is an expert, even if they’ve never run a business before. Trust your instinct – not theirs.
10. Go on a start-up course (well I would say that wouldn’t I?). But, a start-up course is run by experts who will give you the real answers – not rumours that your friends and family have heard. Our next 3-day start-up course, costing just £99 will be held on the 18th, 19th and 20th February and then every 3rd Monday to Wednesday of each month in Cheltenham. Have a look in our profile to book on.
Showing posts with label business. Show all posts
Showing posts with label business. Show all posts
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Top ten tips for network business
Network business means multi level marketing. It is a another version of marketing. If anyone wants to earn more $$$ from network business, he must follow some rules of business.
The speed networking ones (my favourite type of networking) are usually held over a buffet lunch. You’ll be seated opposite another business person and each of you will have 1-2 minutes to tell each other what you do.
Once your time is up, you’ll move to the next business person and so on. Some speed networking events allow you to meet everyone in the room; others don’t, but all in all they’re great fun.
The evening ones I won’t go into that much detail about these ones, suffice to say they are very similar to the lunchtime networking events, apart from they’re held in the evening.
How to make the most of your networking experience o First, make sure you bring the following items to every networking event you go to:
1) Plenty of business cards (more than you think you’ll need) – the amount of times I’ve been to an event where people have run out of cards. Nothing is more unprofessional than writing your contact details on a slip of paper.
2) A diary – if you have a diary with you and the person you’ve met wants to meet up afterwards, you can arrange a date there and then. It’s far harder (trust me on this) to make the call after the event.
3) A pen – how else are you going to jot down what people do on the back of their cards.
Later on, as you get more experience of networking, it’s well worth getting hold of a plastic name badge holder for yourself. If they don’t provide name badges at the event, put your business card in one of these so that people can easily find out who you are.
1.Try to arrive early at the event and this is especially important if you’re nervous about going. Why? Well, when you arrive, chances are that they’ll be very few other people there. All of them will be hanging around on their own waiting for the event to start. It’s much easier to go up and talk to someone on their own rather than to go up to people in groups. Later on, I’ll give you a few more tips on finding people who are standing on their own too.
2. Make sure (at all costs) you grab a copy of the attendee list. It’s going to be very difficult to follow-up with people after the event if you don’t.
3. Wear your name badge on your right lapel and not your left. Why? Since most people are right handed, when they shake your hand to meet you, their eye will naturally travel to your right lapel, making it far easier to see who you are.
4. If there are two or more of you from the same company, split up at the event. I know it’s hard if you’re nervous and you haven’t been to many events before, but if you split up you can meet twice as many people. Similarly, if it’s a sit-down event, don’t sit at the same table.
5. When you’re talking to other people, you will be asked the question “So, what do you do?” Keep your answers as short as possible. Nothing is worse than hearing another person ramble on and believe me they’ll quickly be making an excuse to get away from you as quickly as possible. Try to get onto natural conversation as soon as possible and find out more about that person instead of talking about your business.
6. Also, when you’re explaining what you do, try to keep to one thing even if you do lots of different activities. If you start explaining that you’re a life coach, do a bit of PR, interviewing skills and are a training company in your spare time, people will not know what you do and will get confused. How can they refer people to you, if they are not sure what you do? You can always give them a different message next time they see you.
7. Act confident, even if you don’t feel it. The more you act confident, the more you’ll be confident. Go up to people on their own – you can find them around the edges of the room or by the buffet table – and have a chat. Or, interrupt groups of two. Stay away from groups of three or four because they’ll be enough people in the group, but nine times out of 10, the group of two will have had enough of chatting to each other anyway and be looking for an excuse to move on and they’ll welcome the relief.
8. What to do with your business cards? Wear a jacket with pockets. Most networking events are a business dress code anyway and ladies if you don’t think you have any pockets in your jacket think again. Most of the time, they’ve been sewn up by the manufacturer and if you look in the pocket, you’ll find a small hole where you can unpick the stitching. Put your business cards in your left hand pocket and any business cards you collect in your right hand pocket. That way, they’ll be easy to find and you won’t get them mixed up.
9. Oh and my excuses for getting away from people when you’ve had enough of talking to them – try “Oh I was just going to grab a drink”; “Do you know where the loos are around here?” or “Oh I must just speak to…”. Don’t be offended if people make these excuses to you. The whole point of networking is that you should be looking to get around as many people as possible.
10. Remember to follow-up afterwards. It’s been said time and time again that very little business happens at the actual event; it’s what you do afterwards that counts, but how many people actually follow-up? Make sure you do and you’re chances of getting business will increase significantly.
All in all though, remember that networking is not about having fun. It’s about getting you known out there and getting business. And if you’re not achieving that objective from networking events, you should be looking at doing different activities to increase your marketing. Set targets at the events for how many people you’d like to meet and how many potential contacts you’d like to get out of the event and try to achieve that at each event you go to. That is the way to make sure networking works for you.
The speed networking ones (my favourite type of networking) are usually held over a buffet lunch. You’ll be seated opposite another business person and each of you will have 1-2 minutes to tell each other what you do.
Once your time is up, you’ll move to the next business person and so on. Some speed networking events allow you to meet everyone in the room; others don’t, but all in all they’re great fun.
The evening ones I won’t go into that much detail about these ones, suffice to say they are very similar to the lunchtime networking events, apart from they’re held in the evening.
How to make the most of your networking experience o First, make sure you bring the following items to every networking event you go to:
1) Plenty of business cards (more than you think you’ll need) – the amount of times I’ve been to an event where people have run out of cards. Nothing is more unprofessional than writing your contact details on a slip of paper.
2) A diary – if you have a diary with you and the person you’ve met wants to meet up afterwards, you can arrange a date there and then. It’s far harder (trust me on this) to make the call after the event.
3) A pen – how else are you going to jot down what people do on the back of their cards.
Later on, as you get more experience of networking, it’s well worth getting hold of a plastic name badge holder for yourself. If they don’t provide name badges at the event, put your business card in one of these so that people can easily find out who you are.
1.Try to arrive early at the event and this is especially important if you’re nervous about going. Why? Well, when you arrive, chances are that they’ll be very few other people there. All of them will be hanging around on their own waiting for the event to start. It’s much easier to go up and talk to someone on their own rather than to go up to people in groups. Later on, I’ll give you a few more tips on finding people who are standing on their own too.
2. Make sure (at all costs) you grab a copy of the attendee list. It’s going to be very difficult to follow-up with people after the event if you don’t.
3. Wear your name badge on your right lapel and not your left. Why? Since most people are right handed, when they shake your hand to meet you, their eye will naturally travel to your right lapel, making it far easier to see who you are.
4. If there are two or more of you from the same company, split up at the event. I know it’s hard if you’re nervous and you haven’t been to many events before, but if you split up you can meet twice as many people. Similarly, if it’s a sit-down event, don’t sit at the same table.
5. When you’re talking to other people, you will be asked the question “So, what do you do?” Keep your answers as short as possible. Nothing is worse than hearing another person ramble on and believe me they’ll quickly be making an excuse to get away from you as quickly as possible. Try to get onto natural conversation as soon as possible and find out more about that person instead of talking about your business.
6. Also, when you’re explaining what you do, try to keep to one thing even if you do lots of different activities. If you start explaining that you’re a life coach, do a bit of PR, interviewing skills and are a training company in your spare time, people will not know what you do and will get confused. How can they refer people to you, if they are not sure what you do? You can always give them a different message next time they see you.
7. Act confident, even if you don’t feel it. The more you act confident, the more you’ll be confident. Go up to people on their own – you can find them around the edges of the room or by the buffet table – and have a chat. Or, interrupt groups of two. Stay away from groups of three or four because they’ll be enough people in the group, but nine times out of 10, the group of two will have had enough of chatting to each other anyway and be looking for an excuse to move on and they’ll welcome the relief.
8. What to do with your business cards? Wear a jacket with pockets. Most networking events are a business dress code anyway and ladies if you don’t think you have any pockets in your jacket think again. Most of the time, they’ve been sewn up by the manufacturer and if you look in the pocket, you’ll find a small hole where you can unpick the stitching. Put your business cards in your left hand pocket and any business cards you collect in your right hand pocket. That way, they’ll be easy to find and you won’t get them mixed up.
9. Oh and my excuses for getting away from people when you’ve had enough of talking to them – try “Oh I was just going to grab a drink”; “Do you know where the loos are around here?” or “Oh I must just speak to…”. Don’t be offended if people make these excuses to you. The whole point of networking is that you should be looking to get around as many people as possible.
10. Remember to follow-up afterwards. It’s been said time and time again that very little business happens at the actual event; it’s what you do afterwards that counts, but how many people actually follow-up? Make sure you do and you’re chances of getting business will increase significantly.
All in all though, remember that networking is not about having fun. It’s about getting you known out there and getting business. And if you’re not achieving that objective from networking events, you should be looking at doing different activities to increase your marketing. Set targets at the events for how many people you’d like to meet and how many potential contacts you’d like to get out of the event and try to achieve that at each event you go to. That is the way to make sure networking works for you.
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