Business-Building Ideas From Terry L. Brock

We are seeing a quickened pace of doing business today. It is faster and, at times, more complex than ever before. It is easy for small business people like you and me to feel overwhelmed. However, if we focus on key areas that are rock-solid principles we’ll succeed no matter what.

Here are a few key factors which can directly help you in your business. I’d love to hear from you and what you think.

1. Get Help Wherever It Is Located. You can’t do it alone. Find the right talent to help you and be willing to pay for it. I’m not necessarily talking about hiring employees. Too many governments today penalize you for hiring people. In the US they have now passed a socialized medicine bill that we know is going to increase the costs of health care for businesses. Not only are we going to see the inevitable wait lines and rationing, but also the increased costs to businesses will be enormous. So, why hire additional people? In fact, you are better off laying off people you already have. Get the job done virtually wherever possible. When not possible to do it virtually think temporary. Get temporary workers to do a specific task and then disband. However, keep track of who did well at what and they can be temporarily hired for your next project. Think Mr. Phelps and Mission Impossible. Think Navy SEALS and Army Rangers. Think task force. This lightening fast team of experts to get the job done now is a great model of thinking for business.

2. Think Internationally. Just as you look for talent and skills internationally, look for new revenues in the same way. I’m amazed at what can be done with tools like Skype and PayPal to develop business internationally. Your business base can easily expand internationally in almost any business. Of course it works for consultants, speakers, coaches others. But what about someone whose business is more geographically focused like, say a dentist or a chiropractor? Well, it’s time to expand your view of what you offer. Think information. A dentist can provide really good educational material in the form of audio and video that can be sold as a product. Take a unique creative point of view that meets a market need and create downloadable videos, audios and/or articles. Remember Theodore Levitt’s classic work from the 60’s in the Harvard Business Review. The problem with the railroads was that they thought of themselves in the railroad business. Levitt’s very astute point was that they were in the transportation business. Expand your mind’s idea of exactly what business you’re in and think internationally.

3. Being There (In Person) Still Matters — A Lot! In all this talk about international business development, the Internet, Skype and more, we are still in the people business. You hear people talk about this concept of “Internet Marketing.” That would be like talking about “Fax Marketing” in the late 80’s and early 90’s when fax machines were really popular and emerging technology. Come on! It is about people, not technology. That means you connect with people and, yes, even in this age of wonderful instant communication, we want to see people face-to-face, in person whenever possible. We want to shake their hand. We want to share a few pints with our mates. We want to have that great meal where we break bread together. Use the technology but make plans to be at the important conferences, conventions, trade shows and just “I was in the area and wanted to see you” kind of meetings.

4. Learn To Learn Fast Have you noticed that things seem to change faster now then ever before? As new technology emerges in social media, new tools, new Net-accessible devices and more, successful people continually saturate their minds with new ideas. Become an “information vacuum cleaner” as Winston Marsh has taught us. Learn how to read rapidly to assimilate information quickly. Learn how to listen to audio faster. Hang around really smart people that stretch your brain and help it grow. Put yourself in environments where really, really smart people hang out and share ideas. Doing this will help you come up with more ideas that help your customers and ultimately increases your bottom line.

5. Remember Always – You’re In The “Pleasing People” Business, No Matter What Business You’re In Regardless of the business you’re in you get your money from people. You have to develop products and services that people like and which solve particular problems they face. It is easy to lose track of that with an emphasis on the latest shiny new object of technology, the Internet or something else. Yes, embrace technology but remember that you are there to listen to what your customers want and then find creative, fun and mutually beneficial ways to solve their problems.

If you embrace these ideas, you are going to succeed no matter what happens with the business environment. And on top of that — you’ll have a lot more fun in the process!

Copyright (c) 2010, Terry Brock and Achievement Systems, Inc. Terry Brock is an international marketing coach and professional speaker who helps businesses generate profitable results. He can be reached by e-mail at terry@terrybrock.com or through his website at www.terrybrock.com. Join the Twitter adventure with Terry through his Twitter address: TerryBrock. Join Terry’s Facebook Fan Page at: http://www.facebook.com/SpeakerTerryBrock

Business-Building Ideas From Terry L. Brock

“Permanent fortifications are monuments to man’s stupidity.” General George S. Patton,

United States Army

For you, as a mobile professional, salesperson, entrepreneur or over-achiever you have to be able to move quickly toda

y. General Patton would have considered it silly to depend on a big computer fortress for your data. That means having the right kind of technology to support you up and get the job done to serve clients. A big trend now is having your software loaded “in the cloud” vs. on the desktop or even a laptop.

Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google is credited for coming up with the concept of doing business “in the cloud” a few years ago. It is catching on fast and it means solid business opportunities for you out in the field and in your office.

The Old Way

Way back in the 20th Century (remember that?) you would buy software, load it on your computer, fiddle with it to make it work, protect it from viruses, pay big dollars for the new upgrade and then cry when your hard drive crashed because you lost it all. Raise your hand if you can relate to that.

Yes, I thought there were many of you in that situation.

That was where we lived before and it created an endless stream of aggravation for people just trying to do business.

The Way Today

Today we do it differently. By being “in the cloud” you have the bulk of your contact management, your word processing, your spreadsheets and most anything else you need on a server that is accessed over the Internet. As long as you have access to the Internet, you do business there and get the most updated software on a regular basis. When a new upgrade is released, you don’t have to load it yourself. It is done by the geniuses at the company that provides your service. This is why is it also called “software as a service” or SaaS for short.

Today we access that data through a variety of Net-accessible devices. This could be a SmartPhone, your iPad, your Netbook computer, your laptop or even that desktop back at the office (yes, we can still use those).

I am using several tools now to keep all my contacts on a website, and then use Google Docs for word processing, spreadsheets and a lot more. By keeping the data in the cloud, I know it is constantly backed up. I also know I can access it with a variety of computers, including an Internet café if I’m on the road and can’t use my own computer for whatever reason. This is really nice. I can focus on generating sales and helping clients and let the wonderful IT people take care of the details.

Security & Backup

About this time many start wondering about two important concepts. The first is, “How do we keep our data secure? “ This is quickly followed by “What about Backup?” These are both important.

For security, make sure you have good password protection on your data access. Also make sure you are dealing with a company that has a rock-solid reputation for security. If possible, password-protect the documents that you put online so they have a double protection – one from the document and a second from the site.

And a further protection is to make sure you don’t put any very sensitive documents online where there is little security. For instance, Google docs is good but the security part of ti is very shallow. I’d love to have password protection for individual documents on Google Docs. Don’t put sensitive documents on Google docs. Keep those elsewhere on your computer system or on a specialized website that uses Department of Defense level of security

Regarding backup, yes, you will want to have a copy of your database on your laptop or portable device. I have my main contact management in the cloud and have it regularly send the info to my iPad and my laptop. That way I’m able to access what I need even if I can’t get to the Net. The database in the cloud serves as a regular backup if I have a computer crash or theft.

Bottom Line

The bottom line on this is that cloud computing is changing the way we operate and live. Instead of looking for the next cool software program, look for a good company with rock-solid support, security and service in the cloud.

Somehow I think General George Patton would be smiling as we become more flexible, adaptable and less reliant on the “permanent fortification” of software loaded on our computers.

Copyright (c) 2010, Terry Brock and Achievement Systems, Inc. Terry Brock is an international marketing coach and professional speaker who helps businesses generate profitable results. He can be reached by e-mail at terry@terrybrock.com or through his website at www.terrybrock.com. Join the Twitter adventure with Terry through his Twitter address: TerryBrock. Join Terry’s Facebook Fan Page at: http://www.facebook.com/SpeakerTerryBrock

Ideas from Terry L. Brock

Here are a couple of products I’ve been using for a few weeks now and I wanted to pass this along to you.

If you’ve ever experiencing the strain and discomfort from using a mouse, you know how unnatural it is. Your wrist needs motion naturally. I finally discovered a marvelous little tool that can help you with that and perhaps save you a lot of medical grief and aggravation down the road. It is the new Ergomotion mouse from Smart Fish.

Ergomotion Mouse From Smartfish

I’m no medical expert. However, I know that there are problems of carpel tunnel syndrome (CTS) from using mice on computers. It comes with a pivot base that moves with the natural movements of your hand and wrist. I hear that the static position of the mouse is what can cause strain and irritation. I’ve experienced this myself. They recently gave me this mouse to play with and investigate.  Well, I found that this ergomotion mouse feels more natural with movement. I found it to be comfortable and seemed to help me with some slight pain I had from using other mice. If you’ve encountered the strain and resistence from traditional mice, this is one to check out for yourself. $49.95.
http://smartfishtechnologies.com/products-mouse.php

Both of these products have been helpful to me.

If you use an iPad, or are considering one (great idea!) you want to have something that protects it without causing a lot of hassle in using it.

iSkin Duo – Great Protection For Your iPad

Your iPad needs protection. The iSkin Duo fits snugly on it but is not difficult to put on or take off. It provides great protection for your iPad.

I’ve used this skin for a couple of weeks since they gave it to me and have been very pleased with it. The Duo protects my iPad from damage and also serves as a reasonable stand to prop the iPad up for reading and viewing videos in landscape mode. The iSkin Duo comes in 7 colors so you’re bound to find a color that works for you. A nice feature is that you can still comfortably plug into the iPad accessories like the docking keyboard and plug in earphones (mine worked very well). The iSkin Duo helps to keep your iPad investment safe while retaining functionality. The engineers who created this did a good job of allowing for optimum functionality for the iPad while keeping it attractive and comfortable. It is a good example of function and form aligned together. $49.99, http://smartfishtechnologies.com/products-mouse.php

Enjoy!

Terry

Terry Brock, MBA, CSP, CPAE
www.TerryBrock.com, Terry@TerryBrock.com

Recently I had the opportunity to be on Blog Talk Radio with my dear friend Carole Copeland Thomas.  We talked about how to make your lifestyle work wherever you are.  We talked about marketing, technology, cell phone cancer threat (what you need to know and do!) and more.

Now, you can listen to the entire broadcast here.   You might want to download it and listen on your portable MP3 player or listen to it in double time on your computer (Windows Media Player or Apple’s QuickTime).  Either way, you are gonna’ love this one as Carole and I talk about a variety of topics that can help you in your business.

Let me know what you think by leaving your comments below.  I look forward to hearing from you.

 Standard Podcast [60:09m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (114)

Mid-Year Review, Evaluations

Business-Building Ideas From Terry Brock

[Note: Treat yourself to the (enhanced!) audio version of this message.  Click on the "Play" button, below, make sure your speakers are on and enjoy the sound.  You can also download the audio as an MP3 to listen on your computer or favorite MP3 player.  You're welcome. - Terry]

So, how’s that 2010 thing working out for you now? I love this time of year when we are exactly ½ the way through the year. Conveniently the rebellious signers of the Declaration of Independence in the United States had the good foresight to make July 4th the day for the celebration. It makes for a good time to step back, think and contemplate how things have gone thus far and where we’re going in the half-done year.

I’m a big believer in New Year’s resolutions. This gives us a chance to look back over what has happened and look forward to what the New Year is to bring. That is good for you individually as well as in your business.

Yet, too many people merely make vague, nice-sounding resolutions at the end of a year and don’t check along the way monitoring progress. A Mid-Year Review is an excellent way to pause, reflect on what has happned thus far (good and bad) and to make new resolutions, where appropriate for July –December.

So how is that 2010 thing working out for you? Are you making progress on the goals that are important for you? What has worked well for you thus far? What needs to be improved for the remaining six months?

Wherever you are, I encourage you to take this coming weekend and find some time for quiet reflection and candid review. I know I’m going to do it. Already have done some (end of day, 30 June, regular tradition now). Planning to do more.

In an economy like this one, it is very important to check what really works. Theory is nice but it only matters as it applies to practical, real-world applications. Use this weekend and this time of year to apply the theories you have to some real-world challenges. Then see what stands.

 Mid-Year Review for 2010 [3:06m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (103)

Life is about balance, the yin and the yang as the Tao Ti Ching has told us. I’m in Maui and wanted to share that with you today thinking about what you’re going through with the good and the bad. This is the ebb and flow of life. In this video I share with you some principles that can help you as you encounter challenges and more.

Enjoy the video as I enjoy some time here in Hawaii for a big presentation I’m about to give. I look forward to your comments here on the Blog so you can share with others and let them know what you think.

Aloha and Mahalo from Hawaii!

Terry
www.TerryBrock.com, Terry@TerryBrock.com

Here’s a quick video you’ll enjoy about how you can attract customers. Shot on location in Santa Monica, California, this video will help you discover the keys to acquiring more customers. Hey, these principles work for helping you to attract attention and get favorable attitudes from others.

I look forward to your comments. You can post them below in the Comments section. Thank you for your participation.

We can learn a lot about running our businesses from the dedicated professionals in sports. To find out more about that I interviewed Dan Moriarty, Fox Sports commentator. Dan shared some great principles that you can use and implement in your own business. Listen as he talks about Kobe Bryant and the secret he uses to be the #1 basketball player today.

This is one you’ve got to see — even if you’re not a big sports fan. You are going to enjoy Dan Moriarty and what he has to say.

Here is a video shot on location in Seattle, Washington. I think of great companies in that area and what makes them great. Watch this video and discover some of the characteristics that your company needs to sparkle and excel in this or any environment.

Seattle is a fun, energy-packed city. I always enjoy visiting there and hope you enjoy this short (2;48) video packed with a lot of good ideas you can implement immediately.

Watch this video about privacy and specifically about what Sheryl Kara Sandberg, the COO of Facebook had to say. This puts a new light on what is happening.

Our world is different today. If you’re an entrepreneur and want people to know about you, you’ll have to embrace some transparency. This video will help you think about what is going on and what you should consider. I look forward to your comments since this is such a hot topic. Let the discussion begin!