Negative Media Exposure

Like the saying goes: "Nobody is perfect," it also goes to say that no company can be perfect...in the public eye. No matter if you are running a huge empire or a small business, people are watching and they are waiting for you to do something wrong, so the media can expose your "wrongdoings." Even if you think that negative publicity is a nightmare, it isn't always "horrible." I'm going to tell you a few things I do to take care of negative press coverage- if it were to ever happen to me or my companies.

#1- Know journalists. This is by far the MOST important thing you need to start doing with your PR work. I can't tell you how many powerful journalists I know and have created relationships with so if I were to ever get negative media attention I could do the following (or have issues with another company I work with):

• Save my company
  
• Expose companies I have issues with.
  
• And you would be surprised how many journalists will put friendship over attention.

#2- Maintain the relationship with journalists. Knowing journalists won't do you any good, if they really don't know you back on a personal level. You have to be nice to them, but also entertain them with gifts, etc. etc. Keeping them happy, will keep your company's image happy.

#3- Use the journalists. Say that a TV station criticized your business. Then there is all this negative publicity in the air. You call up your journalist friends and tell them you have something better to share, the truth. Lets be honest- a lot of stories are evolved from rumors; if your company is being wrongfully publicized, then you should stick up for it and tell your part.

#4- Talk to your customers. Issuing a statement like Domino's did with their recent issue in the store with the employees playing a "hoax" will definitely give consumers something to chew on. But it is important to keep this statement in a conversational way and not sound like you are reading from a teleprompter.

#5- Turn something bad into something great. I'm not going to sit here and tell you how hard it is to get good exposure for your business in the world, because you probably already know that. But if you get negative press attention, there are a BUNCH of ways to turn that into PROFIT.

• Show the customers you have changed and improved by 1000 times.
• Give the customers an incentive for the situation.
• Be transparent with the "issue."

While each situation varies, as long as nothing is too- out there- it usually can be saved from a meltdown. The press is usually just stating facts, which go off of people's experiences, which a company can change with a "can-do" attitude. But in the end, it all comes back to, giving all the customers with the best experience they can ever have with your company, so you don't have to worry about the customers that have the hookups with the media.

#1 also goes to show that when you have journalist connections, more companies will be willing to work with YOU because they don't want to be negatively exposed themselves.

The bottom line is...start making friends with journalists and make that connection last and evolve.

Filter The Noise

It doesn't matter what industry you are in, there is always competition. Rather than fearing competition, I encourage it in any industry that I am involved in, because it makes me become that much better at what I do. A lot of people think there is only so much they can grow their business because there is always a larger fish in the pond. But I think that any entrepreneur, better yet- every person- can dominate their industry, if they learn how to handle the following:

The BEST Consumer Experience: It doesn't matter whether you are offering a paid service or product, a free one (like a blog), or even if you are working for someone. There is a consumer for everything and you have to deliver 200% to that consumer. If you are a business owner, you have to deliver 200% of what the customer expects. If you are a blogger, deliver something that people can go "WOW" to. If you are an employee, stick out in the crowd and really take control of your career and the consumer for your skills (the employer) should really see you as an asset to their company.

Approach With A Different Touch: There are a handful of people that can do what you are doing, but are you the only one that can deliver something a certain way? We all have our favorite types of food (Italian, Mexican, Indian, etc.), but we all have one place we choose to go to, to eat those favorite types of food. Why do we have favorites for our favorites? Because they deliver like no other. If you learn how to deliver with your own style and a way that no one person or company can, you will be building a brand right there.

Explore New Horizons: Too many people want to keep exploring what has already been explored. So they can only achieve what has been achieved. If you start exploring what nobody has explored before, chances are you will be able to achieve what nobody has been able to achieve before. Essentially, maximum recognition for your skill or product.

Get People to Compare: You do what people do, but you do it 10x better or you offer a 10x better product. People then compare. If people are able to compare your greatness to someone else's "averageness" then you should be able to dominate your market, one customer at a time. People will spread the word for you, instead of you having to lead them into a box, where only your product is available.

Acknowledgment Is Confidence: Going back to the previous point, if you can acknowledge that there are other strong players in the industry and point that out to your consumers, it shows that you don't fear competition. When you are confident enough to acknowledge others for their skills (or lack thereof), and know you will be able to capture the audience regardless, people will automatically see that you are strong and confident in your abilities to provide. This may include acknowledging another company for a rock star product, but then consumers see that you have a bunch of rock star products. Or sticking out in a group of people a company is looking to promote, where everyone has excellent skills, but it is a no brainier to see that you have the most skills.

Build Employee Loyalty

We always talk about building a brand and building customer loyalty, but rarely, do we speak of building employee loyalty. It is a really important factor in running any kind of business because it can mean the difference between saving money and spending money. The post on Turnover talks about how you can keep employees happy, without spending a lot of money, but building their loyalty to your company is a whole different discussion.

I have found, if your employees are loyal to your company, then it is easier to influence your customers to be loyal to your company and products as well. For example, a company that doesn't have loyal employees, will probably see higher turnover, which means regular customers will deal with new people more often than not. This shows that the company cannot retain a regular employee base, so how can the customer put faith forward and believe that you have a regular customer base. This is only scratching the surface, the assumptions in customers minds are truly infinite. They start thinking into things much deeper and sometimes even go elsewhere due to speculation they have.

Employee's who are loyal to your company will also represent your company in a better manner, on and off the clock. When they are with their friends and family, everyone will probably end up talking about how much they hate their employer, but if your employee talks about how much they like working for you, that will be a positive form of marketing.

Building the loyalty of an employee takes a period of time, but it arises from various things. For example, I have not laid off anyone due to the economy, so all of my employees don't have to worry about losing their jobs on a daily basis. Instead they can focus on the upbringing of the business they are running and making it more profitable. The less worried employees are, the better off the employer is. But back to the point of not laying off any employee, this shows that their employer stood by them in tough times, where another employer might have let them go. So even indirectly, they will think about the next time they want to leave your company to pursue a career elsewhere, but the job security might not be there. Experiences count and the more positive ones you can put out for your employees, the more chances of them staying with you for a long time.

Now, just because I don't lay off people due to the economy, it doesn't mean that I won't fire anyone for their poor quality work. In essence, I am not giving people a free ride and do as you please, type of job. You have to keep a balance between being a nice employer and being too nice of an employer where it affects the work output leading to your company's failure in some cases.

Making employees proud of your brand and loyal to your company is the first and most basic step in company reputation, marketing, and branding. Your company can only be as good as the people who represent it!

Gaining Credibility As A Start-Up

After writing a post on how Credibility Houses ROI, a reader requested that I talk about gaining credibility as a start-up business. Sometimes it is tougher for some start-ups to gain credibility, but if the person behind the start-up is well known, it isn't too difficult, if they have a good reputation. However, known or unknown, an entrepreneur who starts a new business, always has to build individual credibility for each of their ventures because more often than not, no customer or user knows nor cares who owns a company.

1) Don't be foolish- As simple as it sounds, a lot of companies mess up during their early phases. Whether it is providing bad customer service or doing something that upsets users or customers in another way, you have to make sure that everyone is always satisfied with what your company is doing.

2) Stay trustworthy- What is a good company? A company that users or customers can rely on and trust. Building trust obviously comes over a period of time, but your start-up has to be trustworthy from the beginning. Any wrong actions can especially get a lot of media attention when your company starts to grow, which can cause people to question your company, even though it was an issue of the past. If you advertise that you have the lowest price in town, make sure you maintain the lowest price in town, otherwise people will view your new company as a bunch of lies.

3) Get consumers talking- If your company is providing lousy products or is a bad company in the consumers eyes, people will talk naturally. But if you are providing good products, try to get testimonials from people and get the consumers stating their thoughts so you can show your future customers how people view your company.

4) Try to hire a credible staff- For example, if you are starting a consulting firm, try to employ a staff that is known to the public and has some credibility of their own. If people know that your company employs trustworthy and credible people, they will view your company the same way.

5) Be transparent- Tell people what is up. Don't mislead people even if you're not lying. Short term gains can turn into long term pains. More people will instill their trust in your company if you tell them things straight up instead of taking them down a curvy path.

6) Stand behind your work- The one thing all consumers look for is a company that can stand behind their work. If you are providing a service or product and your company messes up, you should stand behind and fix your problems. You shouldn't drag the customers through a long battle and either reject or fix their issues, but by doing it quickly and making it simple, people will definitely look back at your company the next time they want to make a purchase.

7) Don't irritate people- Something every person hates is when a company is irritating them. Whether a company is wrongfully billing them, trying to sell them more than they need or whatever else it may be, you can't irritate people. It doesn't hurt to up-sell your products, but don't go to the point where people are annoyed.

8) Communicate- The key to helping people out is to communicate. If you run away from your customers questions or concerns, they will think that you have something to hide, which is why you are ignoring them. If you can face your customers and answer 100% of their questions and concerns, people will find your company more credible.

Everything comes down to the BEST CUSTOMER SERVICE you can provide. From the moment a customer steps in your front door or visits your website, you have to provide the BEST user experience ever. You have to maintain that experience at the same level forever. Keeping people happy from the start is the only way to create a bigger and better company.

People Talk

People always talk. Whether it is good or bad people will talk, about your business, about your product or service, or even talk about you as an entrepreneur. It is good to take in all feedback, but you should really shine light back on good feedback...in other words you should show testimonials that people give in regards to your business to your future clients. As an entrepreneur, word of mouth or what people say about you will always reflect how people think about you before they actually meet you. The "word on the street" matters.

How Can The Word On The Street Help You?

If customers are happy with your service, they will say so, but you shouldn't take that comment and leave it there. If there is something positive floating around about your business, you should put some extra weight on it. Take those comments and show those testimonials to your future customers. It will give new customers confidence in what you have to offer.

At some of my retail locations, I have a wall that features what people say about my products or service. In a few online ventures, we show testimonials in a section of our website. It should be visible to new customers as soon as they connect with your business.

Gaining the confidence of customers will help you increase boarder line sales. If people are not convinced that you have a great product or service, those good testimonials will help the customers make their decisions.

How Can Having Good "Street Talk" Be Beneficial As An Entrepreneur?

I have ran into a lot of situations where my name has helped me make stronger connections with people that have just met me. There is no doubt, people talk about business dealings that they have or have had with other entrepreneurs and the positive talk from that can make people WANT to work with you.

For example, once I was working on a new project, when I started to work with a local law firm who knew me from my name. It was pretty impressive, not only that they knew my name, but knew numerous people that I work with. It made me feel more comfortable working with them and in return it helped the firm make sure the work they did for me was to my satisfaction.

On the other hand, if you have a bad street reputation, it can hurt you negatively as well. When you seek out new people to work with for new ventures, if they have heard negative things about you previously, they might not take you seriously or even may choose not to work with you.

Overall, street talk or reputation is good if what people are saying is positive. You can also leverage the talk to your benefit and essentially make more money for you or help create stronger connections. It is up to you how to maintain the positive street talk though.

Running A Transparent Business

Being transparent as an entrepreneur or running a transparent business gives you an upper hand in whatever you are dealing with. If you have been transparent with your business year after year and continue to be, you will more likely deliver higher customer service, at the same time run into less troubles. Being transparent will also help you deliver more quality within your business.

If you have not been running a completely transparent business or haven't started a business yet, you will notice that when you do start being transparent, there will be a stronger relationship between you and your employees and also you and your customers. The strong link will probably get more customers to come back to you, essentially giving you repeat sales and at the same time get your customers talking about your business among their friends or family.

Why would customers be happier if I told them something the way it is?

People look for what is really up these days. Nobody has time to listen to manipulated things or even that same sales pitch they have heard a thousand times. If you become honest with your customers, they will probably see through the sales tag and find that it is more beneficial to THEM to buy from you instead of the competition.

Admit your mistakes...

Making mistakes with a business or as an entrepreneur is only natural. It happens to everyone. But what everyone doesn't do is admit their mistakes and say they were wrong, instead they try to cover up their questionable judgment. For example, if you are working with a team to launch a new product, but a decision you make is incorrect, and you try to draw attention to another problem or incorrect decision someone made along the way of the product launch, instead of your own, people will notice that and they might become distasteful with you. On the other hand, if you took action and faced your incorrect decision, people will probably be more willing to work with you to fix it quicker, so less "chain-reactions" arise.

Same thing goes with a business. A matter that comes to thought instantly, is when Facebook launched their Beacon project a couple years back. It was a service that displayed what everyone's friends were buying online and notified people in their mini-feed. People's thoughts for "privacy" suddenly jumped out of the roof and Facebook acted on the feedback. Mark Zuckerberg, addressed the issue on a company blog post, and apologized for the lack of privacy with the project.

What about my staff?

While you cannot think for someone else, you can influence how they act if you create a surrounding that is persuasive. If you try to scope out people that are transparent and hire them, it is more likely that the people that are not transparent, will become more inclined to be transparent. After all, do you really want a employee that isn't transparent, working for you? You are the first step to having them become transparent.

What it all comes down to...

The bottom line shows, being transparent with your business or being a transparent entrepreneur will give you a better reputation in the end. If you remain transparent through the years, consumers will put their trust into you and that is the true key to crossing the finish line successfully.

Maybe the first step to becoming transparent, is to get a transparent business card. :)

Push Your Ego Away

There is no doubt in my mind that just about everyone develops an ego, the bigger they get. Most people think that they are the best and have a huge ego after they start cranking in the big bills. In fact, I have personally had experience with people who start showing their ego, once they start making a buck or two. Keep in mind that these same people, were extremely down to earth once upon a time, but after they grew, they started to act full of themselves. Their ego was the cause of anchoring further growth.

Have you ever noticed that your boss, a coworker, or just someone you know has an ego that stops them from growing even larger and making new connections? What do you think of this person? Many people who show their ego after certain accomplishments, don't understand that there are still people smarter and more successful than they are. A problem that people run into is thinking that they are the best, which causes others not to want to be associated with them or even worse, stop talking to them altogether.

When a business is growing, you also shouldn't show an ego. Many people involved with the growth of a business such as founders and highly ranked management get their judgment clouded by the fact that the business is doing super well, which causes them to make wrong decisions, which can end up hurting the business in the long run.

Egos can also destroy businesses that are up and running. For example, it can take down a family business or a partnership. Simple disagreements or views on certain things can escalate and be the start of taking down a profitable business. Keeping an ego in check must be done when negativity of an ego is taking over.

While it is good to be competitive in the business world, you shouldn't act like you are the boss or that you are the greatest. The day you start acting like that, is the day you stop welcoming new people into your network and the day your growth starts to slow down or even turn negative and start destroying everything that you have worked hard to bring up. Your reputation can be slaughtered extremely fast after you start being arrogant and full of yourself. New opportunities can stop proposing themselves to you and you might also find that you will start being criticized by people.

Failure, An Achievement

The last thing people would probably think of when someone says "failure," is probably achievement, but it is true that failing at something early on in business can be an achievement. Every entrepreneur I know has failed at something or another relating to one of their ventures and each and every one says that it is a good thing that it happened. There are many reasons why failing early on can be better than failing later on in your life, but at any time when it happens you can always learn from it and become wiser.

How can you possibly learn from something you failed at?

Learning from what exactly you did wrong which caused you to fail, can teach you what to watch out for next time. You can also identify what you will need to spend more time with or research more, in order to get things correct the next time you are involved with something similar. Failing and correction goes with learning by doing.

Why is failing early on in life- a good thing?

If you fail right off the bat, you will notice that there is a lot of room to improve at something. However, it is beneficial that you fail earlier in your entrepreneurial days, than later because it will hurt you less. What I mean by "hurt" is in terms of finance and reputation. If you fail at an early stage, chances are you have not invested a lot of money into a venture which means you won't be losing a lot of money. If you failed when you were a bit larger, you will end up losing a lot more money than you would have before.

Reputation also goes with failing. People notice when a business fails and they look at the person who used to own the business as "weak" or not so much of a business person, but that is not 100% true. When a business fails, it can be caused by many things, not just the person who was running it. If you fail early on, chances are it will be less of a big deal in public since you probably aren't that well known yet.

When you fail early on as an entrepreneur, you are probably failing at a small venture that really won't set you back in life. If you fail when you are launching something really revolutionary, chances are that your idea might be stolen after you fail. For example, if YouTube failed in its early days for lack of funding, it is probably true that a copy cat site would have been hyped to the top. Once an idea is launched and it fails, if there truly is potential in a concept, it will be reproduced and taken to the top, so failing early on as an entrepreneur will lower the chances of you failing after coming up with a great business.

Nonetheless, failure is a part of doing business. You should not be ashamed of failing as it is only one of the many risks involved with being in the business field. Even more so than just business- people can fail at a lot of different areas as an entrepreneur and that shouldn't drag one person down from getting back on their feet and starting over. After all, if you want to become super rich, you only need one amazing and profitable business that goes to the top and if you fail at all your other businesses, it might not matter.

Philanthropy

Philanthropy is not only a kind act, but it is a act of showing that you care about your community & even the world. It is not always about how much money you make, but sometimes it is about how much you donate. Not only money, but time and other donations can be valid forms of giving as well. I often get asked about how much money I make or what kind of cool gadgets and gizmos I buy, but I rarely get asked where I donate or how I donate, so I am going to share that and how donating makes me feel like a better person.

I donate money to different organizations which I believe makes the world a better place. Although I won't share the organizations I donate to, I will say this: Pick something that relates to you or that you want to help improve and focus on donating to make that issue less trouble sum in the world. I chose very wisely where I send my donations to and there is a little story that I can tell behind each donation. I also don't only donate money, but I donate a lot of time to certain causes.

My most involved donations are towards educating people who wish to get an education, but are not fortunate enough to pay for tuition.

I have personally visited India a few times and went to areas where I see children living in poverty and it really shows how fortunate we are to have a shelter over us and have the luxuries of cell phones, the internet, cable TV, and so on. In India, there are a lot of children who are brilliant, but whose families struggle to survive. Even more-so communities who don't have very much money at all and struggle providing a basic education towards youths in village schools.

I have chose to sponsor a few children and give them the education they could only dream of. I could have chose to just donate to help the family survive by paying for their groceries, but that wouldn't change the fact that children remain uneducated. Instead, I chose to donate more towards educating a few children, that I have met, so they can have the knowledge and skills to get a better job and keep the family out of poverty.

To help share the wealth and prosperity, even if only $5/year or any other small donation, I encourage people to donate because even a small donation, is a HUGE donation. In the end, it is up to you whether or not to donate. By donating, you are sharing your happiness with others who are not as fortunate.

Look At Your Own Success & Future

If you open the Wall Street Journal, you might not find yourself featured on the front page, but you will probably find someone like Warren Buffett and news about his latest investments. While it is good to know what the industry leaders are doing, you shouldn't be too caught up in their lives. Instead, you should be focusing on your own success and future goals you have. Too often I see many people talking about who did what and how much money someone made from their latest ventures, but they are missing the main point. Knowing what other successful people are doing and how much money they are making can be motivation for others, but you shouldn't try to compare your earnings to theirs.

If you focus on how to make yourself more successful and earn more money, chances are you will probably accomplish something more valuable than knowing what the richest guy in your town is up to or what car he bought last week. I view, time spent after finding out about where Michael Dell spends his weekends, as time wasted. Instead if time was focused on how one can try to become more financially capable like someone who has a 20% higher net worth than themselves, one might be able to achieve that goal.

The reason why I shouldn't compare myself with some billionaire is because it takes time to build up that kind of net worth. There is no reason why I cannot achieve it, but I have to get to $750 million before I can get to $1.5 billion, so studying the top ten richest people from A-Z really won't do me much good except for knowing what kind of ice cream they may like.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't take the good parts from any successful person, but never be obsessed with it. It is always good to learn from financial gurus, but you should always keep in mind that time spent learning about their non-business related involvements is probably time wasted and not spent after your personal involvements.

If you focus on what YOU want to achieve and set personal goals that are achievable, you might just find people looking after your success instead of having it the other way around.

The Personal Brand Leverage

It is a well known fact that personal branding can be really helpful as an entrepreneur because it establishes not only your reputation, but links you to your ventures. Sometimes people lack to build a personal brand when they are employed by another company; one that they do not own or have not founded. Some say that it is not needed to create a personal brand when you work for a company which you have no personal ownership in or do not have any private ventures of your own. I strongly disagree with people who think that creating a personal brand is unnecessary for many reasons. The main point of creating a personal brand is to get people to know you for your expertise and can give you an edge over other people in the workforce.

Be the one- Companies face numerous applications when they are interviewing for certain jobs, especially when the position is really high up in the hierarchy. Having a strong & established personal brand can give you better chances to be selected for a certain position.

Don’t be the one- On the other hand of being “the one,” there is the fact that companies face when letting people go. When you have a strong brand that represents the company you work for, chances are they will not let you go among your co-workers because you have more influence in the outside world, than the other employees. Say you are a business consultant and there are four more in your department. Your department head is letting two people go, but chooses to hold on to you because you are known for your expertise in consulting and the companies clientele are likely to give their business to the company you work for. Because of your personal brand, you are recognized as an asset to your company.

Get a Higher Pay- Most of us don’t mind making more money. Along with a strong personal brand, chances are pay will have a strong positive correlation with the strong identity you have created. Companies will WANT to hire YOU over other applicants, even if it means paying an extra $50k or $100k.

Ability to Create Your Own Business- The workplace is a great learning experience, but what if you want to experiment and start your own business, which is similar to the one you are employed with. Having a strong personal brand can boost that start to your business. The clientele that will come to your new business might have heard from people that you have worked with in the past through your employer. Due to your brand, you have created a strong and positive reputation, giving you an edge over others in the industry.

Many Networking Possibilities- Bill Gates is respected among the tech world. It is probably true that any technology conference around the world would be pleased to have him speak or appear at their conference. He has created a very strong personal brand aside from Microsoft, which gives him the ability to network with new people, who would be honored to be in his presence.

It is not needed that you be working for a Fortune 500 company or own a very well known business to start building your personal brand. Anyone can create a positive personal brand or a negative personal brand, but it is the personal brand that will set you apart from others. If you create a well respected and knowledgeable personal brand, chances are you might open the door for numerous new possibilities, for any industry.

Starting A New Concept

That's unheard of! When starting a new business, if you really want to make it big, it has to be more than just starting a new business. You have to start a new concept, trend, or niche. Look at any franchise, the founders are usually the wealthiest in the "food chain," then come the franchisees and so on. Take a look at Google, it dominated search, then there were multiple search engines that came along after Google was named king, but Google was and is still the master of search.

Now, it isn't true that you have to come up with a new concept in order to succeed because surely, Yahoo was around before the Google days, but Google still dominated the search industry. This shows that just because you started a concept, you might not dominate it. Yahoo still gets more page views with the number one Alexa web rank and dominates the web news industry. Google has entered the markets for news, but people still resort to Yahoo for that more than Google from what I see. Another example would be Friendster and MySpace. Friendster was around since 2002, in which it had been the successful in breaking the ground to social networking, but it had not done much after that. MySpace came along and took over the original concept, but allowed users to tweak their profile in newer and better ways. If innovation is not kept going, a company can soon face being taken over or even worse- surpassed and left in the dust.

It should be kept in mind that when trying to innovate new ideas into an existing business, the quality should be consistent, if not improving. The web browser business is a great example of this. Internet Explorer was always what people were using in the beginning of the internet era, soon after there were competitors, but none significant until Mozilla Firefox came along. The reason why Firefox was able to "steal" Internet Explorer users, is simply because they had a more secure and faster browser. Although Internet Explorer still has the largest user base, there are competitors slowly creeping up due to lack of quality.

After your business becomes an authority, you don't have to stick to the original concept of the business you are involved in because surely you will want to enter other industries. With that authoritative image, more respect will be given to your brand and it will be easier to acquire and dominate other markets. Since Google's authority in search, they have captured other web markets such as RSS feeds with Feedburner, the email industry with Gmail, the blogging industry with Blogger, the video industry with YouTube, and much more.

Age Is Just A Number

You hear it a lot, "There's no way I can be successful, I'm too young." Well, you may not hear it often, but I sure do. A lot of people think that their age anchors them from being successful, but this is untrue. I could give an example of myself, young and fortunately successful, but there are younger people than myself that are successful, so that would not really mean anything, right?

Instead, for those who want solid proof, that age is only a number, look at Alex Greven's success story. Let me just state that he is currently a fourth grader who is only 9. By story, I really meant "story" as in a book. He has written a book, which teaches people of all ages, how to talk to girls. Most people would be amazed that a nine year old was able to put together a book that can help people of all ages, but that isn't even the amazing part. The really interesting thing is that Fox has bought the rights to Alex's book for SIX FIGURES.

By no means is six figures an amount for someone to retire on, but I would have to say that is a pretty great achievement for someone to land a movie rights deal at the age of 9. If a 9 year old can prove to be successful, what more motivation can you possibly need?

This just shows, age is only a number, and while you may not be selling rights to some movie with your next venture, if you are dedicated, you just may be looking at an opportunity to shine. Anyone at any age, has no reason to say "I'm too young" or "I'm a nobody" because everyone is a somebody. Nobody can be rich and famous from day one, unless you are a celebrity's child, but even then, who's to say that person will be set for life. Most entrepreneurs start from scratch and while they may not be running a fortune 500 company, the determination can only show where they might go. Some may argue that young people have a tough time getting promotions at work over seniors, who have been with the company for years, but that is an excuse from what I see. If you show that you are capable and demonstrate that you are an asset to a company, there is no reason why you wouldn't have a fair chance for that promotion. Setting your mind to being an entrepreneur, can be done at any age and means setting your mind to hard work and dedication.

Ego Satisfaction? Not So Much

A few days ago I posted a video on the Customer Experience aspect business, where you can develop a brand and have your customers potentially market it for you. In relation to having a rockstar business or brand reputation out in the open, you should also be caring enough to see who is saying what about your brand. Good or bad, you should find out what the word on the street is about your brand. Gary Vaynerchuk made a video on how you should be searching and caring for your customers, some may thing it is ego satisfaction, but it is far from it.

The Customer Experience

In the business world, it is very important to always deliver great customer service, but as we all know, it doesn't always take place. If you went somewhere and had a bad experience, what actually goes on in your mind? The same thoughts flow in the minds of customers that can come to your business and are unsatisfied. On the other had, if there was a good experience taken place with a customer, it can be extremely advantageous to a business.

Watch the video for more of what I think on the whole "Customer Experience" issue...

Branding Myself And Branding My Venture

Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook or Facebook founded by Mark Zuckerberg? It is a question of branding one’s self or their empire. Personally, I’ve had this experience before. I have been a part of ventures, but when I sell them, I am no longer associated with them and there is no brand for myself, just the business. In the business world, companies are well known, but the people behind them are not as well known. So why do you need to brand yourself and how do you do it?

Originally when Facebook launched, Mark Zuckerberg used to have a tag on the bottom of each page that went something like “A Mark Zuckerberg Production.” This definitely spiked the curiosity of who Mark Zuckerberg was as Facebook grew. Facebook being his first large venture, many who know Mark today, did not know him in the pre-Facebook era. Today he has a brand not only connected to Facebook, but he has a self-branded image out in the world as well.

It is important to brand yourself not only as whom you are, but what ventures you are a part of. I was previously involved with some online ventures, that I played a small role in, but did not brand myself as a part of them. The connections made through a venture can be connections that you can use in the future with other ventures that you may be involved in. Once you create your own brand, people will look for where you are involved in other ventures, not the other way around.

Creating a LinkedIn profile is wonderful to help you create your own identity online, while networking with others at the same time. Unlike Facebook or MySpace, it’s more of a professional social network. There are straight forward connections to each person’s industry, showing who they work for, kind of like an online resume. LinkedIn is the best professional social network out there, which is why it has the most users out of any other professional social network. If I had to recommend one social network to anyone for networking, it would be LinkedIn.

Making your own website is also a phenomenal way to brand yourself. People have access to (YourName).com over the web, which you can turn into a blog about yourself or a website that explains what you are involved in. Some people even redirect their name to their about section of another one of their websites. Sometimes, your name might not be available, in which case you might want to try hyphening your name and see if that works. Creating a website can be awesome, but you should always remember to keep it professional and try to go for a different look or concept that what others do. For example, Neil Patel has a unique website NeilPatel.com which has a different concept, than any site I have seen, of walking visitors through who “Neil Patel” is.

Creating your own name- as your brand is always great, but you should try to stay away from naming products after your name. Sometimes people create a blog off of their name and brand off of that. I don’t like to personally take this approach because I feel it is less creative. Both of my blogs have unique names, instead of having RomilPatel.com as a blog URL. Blab Web is known as its own brand as well as Venture Level known as its own brand. RomilPatel.com is known as my brand, but I am known as the founder of all the brands. I think an independent URL expresses a sense of a unique brand image for that particular blog. Having a "FirstNameLastName" blog, can give yourself an name in the world, but I feel that it is best to come up with unique names for blogs because it gives a sense of bold style.
(I don't know what I want to currently do with RomilPatel.com, but I'm thinking about making it into a personal type of blog.)

How Large Enterprises Are Perceived

In many businesses there are large transactions that go on as a common thing, but for many small businesses or startups, big business deals are hard to come by. Clients always want to make sure who they are purchasing a service or product from, is one of the best at what they do. Nobody wants to buy from a small, unknown business. In advertising, no company wants to advertise with the third best advertising agency. If you were managing a Fortune 500 company, would what would you expect to see in company that you managed? There are many valid facts that are foreseen to show that a business has the strength and power to be an anchor in the industry they are classified in.

What is noticed in being #1, as a company and brand image?
1) Making sure quality service and reputation is upheld by loyal customers.
2) Having dealings with large companies (well reputated) publicly noticed.
3) A company that shows the capacity and knowledge base of an anchor.
4) Well note the good things a company does.

Having a strong loyal customer base is always a big plus point in any company. The more satisfied customers a company has, the more chances of referral business they get. Only customers that are truly satisfied will hold up a positive image for a company. It is very well known that- bad news travels fast, so it is very hurtful for a company to provide bad service instead of no service.

Any company that links themselves as a supplier with a well known corporation is always noticed as a valuable source. Showing that your business has big clients, can be advantageous to your future client flow and help your company show it has a strong reputation since it deals with giants. The more people that know about the dealings with good corporations, the more the public could perceive your company as a strong and knowledgeable, enterprise.

Showing that the company your running, knows what it does and is “better” among the others in the industry is always viewed as a strong company by clients. The ability to handle big jobs, involving more capital or other funding in the long run, shows the ability and capacity to fulfill the necessary requirements of capturing larger sales.

The community that buys from a certain corporation always likes to see that the company is “giving-back” to the community. For example, Google had its 10th anniversary recently, when they announced “Google Gives Back.” In this they are planning to help the world by giving a certain amount of funding for a new project that people will benefit from. Google is perceived as a company that is not only useful and reliable, but likes to help the world in return for their success.

These are just some things to note how big deals are brought upon large corporations and shows if the proper steps are followed, any size company can land bigger deals if they “play their cards right”-so to speak.

Overnight Growth, Not So Great

Many of us have bought it thinking we might hit it big overnight, and while some of the people who have bought lottery tickets have won the big check, most do not win anything. I’m over my lottery ticket buying days. Most people consider a lottery ticket the key to overnight growth and success. While I believe that overnight growth can be very-well possible, in most cases, it is not probable. I am going to give a couple examples of how overnight growth can be a short-term gain, but a long-term damage.

- The first example is about the fast food restaurant industry. – Say you are the owner of a sub shop that just had its grand opening and everything is going smooth for the next 6 months. After the six months have passed, you have probably got a grip on inventory control, staffing the proper amount of employees throughout the day and so on. All of a sudden, out of the blue, your sub shop is mentioned, on a TV interview, to be a celebrity’s favorite place to eat lunch. The next day you see the day opens up like normal, but when lunch rolls around, chaos occurs, and you find yourself understaffed, running out of products, and busier than the highways during rush hour. Now, most may say, that this is only a problem for the duration of the hype that the celebrity has created, but if you look into further detail, you will notice that while you might have made more profit than you made in the whole week, during that time where everyone flooded your sub shop for lunch, I see the long term damage. Your staff rushed through service, so some people might have gotten the impression that your shop lacks the phenomenal service it always has in reality, causing those people not to come back in the future, leading you to lose out on long-term sales. Running out of product very-well might be another issue, because this will lead you to display that your restaurant is not properly stocked for the amount of traffic it drives and since you had to turn people back, they have lost out on their lunch hour’s precious time, so they will more than likely not give your shop another shot for lunch.

- An example in the online world, of overnight-growth causing more long-run damage, would be when your website receives a tremendous amount of traffic in one day, than it has ever received in a lifetime! While it is a great thing to have 1,000,000 visits in a day, it is not so great when you were unprepared for it. In most cases, if your site is hosted by a third party host, your site may have been taken offline or the traffic would have been allowed and you would be facing overage charges in bandwidth. Both cases would hurt your site’s image because if it went offline, people would be more likely not to visit it again and if you got overage charges, you might have a tough time paying the bill. If your traffic grew gradually, over time, from say 20,000 visits a day to 60,000 to 150,000 and so on you would have been more likely to be prepared for it.

To conclude, I would like to mention, that in addition to be prepared for extremes, you should consider the long-term path to success, because you are probably more likely to benefit more from it. There are always exceptions to the examples above, such as having a sub shop being mentioned in the 10 best places to eat, which just might bring lost customers back. Or with a website, you might get traffic and attention from others among the web for having such growth overnight and make up for the time when it went down or the overage in hosting fees. Just remember, in business, you should think of the ripple effect and your company’s overall image.

Why is it That the "Rich Get Richer?"

Say you are a successful entrepreneur and founder of a company that has a cash flow of $1,000,000/year, of that the profit is $600,000. Since you have presented that you are making an amazing return on your investment, many people will listen to what you have to say. People value opinions from successful people because they have “proof” of their success.

I think it really comes down to the fact that when people are established and have had well known success, other opportunities are presented to the successful entrepreneurs. Think about it, if you were starting a company from scratch and had a chance to present your ideas to 5 people in the business world, who would they be? Would you present them to any business person or if you could, would you present it to someone who created a great enterprise? It is exactly how it works in the business world. Entrepreneurs involved in new business ventures always present their ideas to other successful entrepreneurs because they want not only their capital, but knowledge as well, invested in the venture. I believe since established entrepreneurs have numerous opportunities presented to them involuntarily, and over time become involved in various ventures, it is why “The rich keep getting richer.”

If you also ask any successful business person, “What do you do for a living?” They will probably reply with numerous ventures they are involved in. Take a look at Warren Buffett for example. He is involved in numerous ventures and is known as the “Greatest Investor” because he has investments in anything from Candy stores to some of the most influential companies around. Leading to the first idea, people listen to him because of his great knowledge and success. Warren Buffett is also a great example of how DIVERSIFIED income is a must. Many of his investments probably go bad, but most of them make a well above average return. Since his income is more spread out as an investor, he makes money from different sources, so not all of his “eggs are in one basket”.

Big Business

If you want to grow your business to the big league, there is a simple thing you have to keep in mind. Think like a big business. If you think big chances are you will market yourself like the big people do. Although you cannot become big overnight, clients gain confidence in your business and products that you are selling if you present your business like a well established one.

Products should be backed by strong confidence. Large corporations have confidence in their products, which leads to bigger bottom lines in sales. When their products are marketed, products are promoted as the one and only. You should do the same. Back up your brand with support, quality, and the confidence the customer wants to see.

Marketing your company like it's big is also key. No one wants to buy from small companies if the same items or services are available with a big giant, unless you have something more to give. Matching up to big companies' level would give your business a chance to gain leverage in the market. Try to give a little more support or service. People always want to see guarantees with things they buy. Throw in a little something extra. That is a great way to get leverage over a giant. Tell customers about other satisfied customers. Big giants always talk about how many customers love their products.

Remember, even if you are a small business, you are a BIG deal.