Category: New Business Development

The average day is broken down
into three 8 hour sections.

One section is for,
what writers call,
the evil day job.
This is the time you earn money to live on.

A second section is for sleep.
Many of us sleep less than 8 hours
but that is what is recommended.

The third eight hour section is ‘everything else.’
This ‘everything else’ is what
separates the women from the girls.
Women use it wisely.
Girls squander it.

Do you have to work, work, work
during every minute
of the ‘everything else’ section?

Nope.

Robert Pagliarini,
author of The Other 8 Hours,
states
“I’m not saying,
‘Be a robot
and use every minute of every day.’
If we just fill up part of that free time
with activities that bring us
closer to our goals,
we start to bridge those gaps.
For example,
if you write just one page a day,
at the end of the year you’ll have a book.
I’ve interviewed a lot of people
who changed just a sliver of their day,
and the payoffs have been huge.”

Use the other 8 hours wisely.

I was a lurker
on another blow up
between an author and an e-publisher.
The author was upset
because she felt the e-publisher was neglecting
the print side of the business.

This is an e-publisher!
The print side is… well… a distant second
to the e-book side.

If the author was so focused on print,
she should have approached a print publisher
also offering e-books,
instead of a e-publisher
also offering print books.

Know the strengths of your partners.

If you get it wrong
and pull a dumb ass move
like going to McDonald’s expecting steak,
don’t advertise your stupidity.
You may get a few laughs
but no one will have any sympathy.

You are responsible for the people and companies
you partner with.

When I was first approached
with the business gig
that ended yesterday,
my brain screamed ‘yes’
but my gut said ‘no.’

I listened to my brain,
ignored my gut,
and the result was a heavy dent
in my carefully nurtured reputation.
Yeah… ouch.

Suze Orman has a great post
on why listening to your gut
as an entrepreneur
is always the right thing to do.

“This is my most trusted business practice:
The minute I say yes to something
that is not honest and true for me
is the minute I stop being a good businesswoman.
I have never been led astray
by my commitment to listening to my gut.”

Listen to your gut.
It sees truths your brain will try to rationalize away.

Analyst John Morris
says that, in clothing,
the sweater is expected to outsell
the gift card for the first time in years.

“Consumers are saying
gift cards are falling in favor
a bit this year.
They’re shifting back to
more traditional gifts,
especially accessories, jewelry, and sweaters.”

The hot toys,
according to toy analyst Gerrick Johnson,
are
Squinkies,
Zoobles,
Monster High dolls,
Disney’s Chuggington train,
Bey Blades,
and Dance Star Mickey.

So if you are a retailer,
you can’t rely on the lucrative gift card market
as heavily this season.
Have some gifts
shoppers can touch and feel and wrap.

30 Rock’s Tracy Morgan is upfront
about his ‘secret’ to success.

“I got booed at the Apollo.
That’s what gave me my balls.”

“If you can survive getting booed
at the Apollo,
then everything else is a cinch.
That’s the attitude I had
when I went to Saturday Night Live.”

My equivalent experience
was losing the company I worked for
one million dollars
(in a contract screw up).

After that,
I was fearless.
I figured that if I could survive
that big mistake,
I could survive anything.

Mistakes often don’t make you fearful.
They make you fearless
and that is a very good thing.

There is a high end housewares company
in the midst of a very painful
management transition.

When the dad ran the company,
sales were high,
and product lines were profitable.
The brand is so powerful
that vendors will wait over a year for payment.

… And they have been.
Why?
Because when the dad retired,
he convinced his son to take over.
It was his legacy, he argued.

It may be the dad’s legacy.
It isn’t the son’s.

The son is a computer programmer.
He is very intelligent
but he has no interest in housewares
and no aptitude for business.
He is running the business
because he feels he has to
and is doing a piss poor job at it.
On the side…
yes, he writes computer programs.

Just because your kids love you
doesn’t mean
they love your business.
Don’t link the two.
Assume you’ll sell your business
to someone outside the family,
and give your children
the freedom to build their own legacy.

Darren Hardy has a wonderful post
on the difference between
insane risk and calculated risk.

I love Richard Branson’s thoughts on risk.
Outsiders perceive the Rebel Billionaire
as taking crazy risks
when in reality, he is a pro at calculated risks.

“First of all I never risk the main business
for the sake of a new venture.
That is why each Virgin brand
is a separate business.
No new business will ever put
any existing business in jeopardy
—that is my first discipline.
Then in each new risk
I build in an out.

When I started Virgin Airlines
I started by buying only one used 747 from Boeing.
Part of my contract was that after a year
if it didn’t work out,
they would agree to buy back
the plane from me.
That ensured if it didn’t work out
I wasn’t really risking anything,
just the time to see if I could make it work.”

Calculated risks are good
and necessary for success.
Learn how to manage risk properly.

I start a new business gig on Monday.
I didn’t take it because I needed the money
or was hankering for business
or was excited about the opp.

I took it for one reason
and one reason only.

I lost the faith.

Rejection in the writing world beat me down.
I need a breather.
I need a pat on the back.
The quickest way to get this
is to take a short business gig.

I’m putting the writing on life support
(writing a short a month
during the gig).
After the gig
(less than two months long),
I’ll focus fully on the writing once more.

You WILL lose the faith
while building your business.
Before you do something dumb
and quit completely,
figure out the quickest way
to regain that faith.

I’m participating in Nanowrimo
(National Novel Writing month)
which challenges writers
to write 50,000 words in 30 days.

Yesterday, I wrote zero words.

Why?

Because yesterday
I was in a blue sky mood.
My mood was over-the-top positive.
Creativity was off the charts.
Solid story ideas were flowing.
I spent the day
brainstorming plot lines
and recording them.
The day was wonderfully productive
and very inspiring.

Blue sky days are rare.
I don’t waste them
by doing grunt work
(and writing is often grunt work).

If you have a blue sky day,
you also may not wish to waste it
by going to meetings
or filling out expense reports.

Push the daily stuff off if you can until tomorrow
and spend as much as possible
of that blue sky day
in creative pursuits.

One of the common phrases
in the writing world
is
“If you can do anything else,
do it.”

Writing, like anything worth doing, is hard.
It takes the average writer
10 years of serious writing
before she is published.
The job is rejection after rejection.

So if you can do something else,
you will.
You’ll quit before you’re successful.

Seth Godin has a great post
about how this holds true
for business start ups.

“The people who successfully
start independent businesses
(franchises, I think are a different thing)
do it because
we have no real choice in the matter.
The voice in our heads won’t shut up
until we discover if we’re right,
if we can do it,
if we can make something happen.
This is an art, our art,
and to leave it bottled up is a crime.”

If you can do anything else,
do it.
If you can’t get that business start up
out of your brain,
you’re likely an entrepreneur.