Tag Archives: small business advice

Why Business Owners Shouldn’t Cold Call

The Owner as Salesperson If your business employs salespeople, then you’ve probably had them bring an account challenge to you. “You need to talk to this customer, Boss. You can (fill in the blank) better than anyone else.” The fill-in-the-blank … Continue Reading

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Service Needs to be a Defensible Territory

The UN air strikes against Gaddafi’s forces raise an obvious question. Why Libya? Although we believe Qaddafi is a really bad guy, there are plenty of other players in North Africa and the Middle East that have to rank somewhere … Continue Reading

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Recessions, Recoveries Bring Out the Sharks

This article appeared in the San Antonio Business Journal on Friday, March 4th A number of our business owner clients have been calling lately to ask about an offer that seems too good to be true. The owner gets a … Continue Reading

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Does the Economy Affect Your Business?

I love this quote from Paul Krugman in a breakfast speech a few weeks ago. “The Financial Industry rolled along extending credit to everyone, until they had their Wiley Coyote moment. You know how that works. Wiley Coyote runs off … Continue Reading

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Employee Incentives that Work

After four blogs on the long term motivations for running a business, perhaps it is time to return to some more practical advice. One of the most persistent issues for a business owner is trying to motivate employees with incentives. You install … Continue Reading

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Lifestyle or Legacy – Part 3

Let’s turn to the Legacy Builders.They are the business owners who have achieved Lifestyle status (as defined in the last posting) but continue to work hard to build their businesses. Their objective is a company that does far more than … Continue Reading

Posted in Exit Options, Exit Planning, Leadership, Life After | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Lifestyle vs. Legacy – Part 2

Let’s define a lifestyle business. For our purposes, I’ll start with what it isn’t. It’s not the small retail store being run by someone who doesn’t need the money. A few years ago I was on a judging panel for a … Continue Reading

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Lifestyle vs. Legacy – Part 1

There are three types of business owners. The first, which encompasses the vast majority of small businesses, is the one who simply wants to make a living from running his or her business. They dream of the day that they … Continue Reading

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Entering 2011: a tale of two economies

In January of 2009 I blogged here titled “The Strategic Triple Threat” At that time, Congress had just passed the TARP act, saving the world from financial meltdown. The Federal Reserve was predicting a short recession followed by a resumption of historical … Continue Reading

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From the Small Business Advocate newsletter

This is from Jim Blasingames “Small Business Advocate” newsletter, and is based on a show we did last week. If you don’t get Jim’s newsletter, or want to hear the show, I strongly recommenfd that you go to http://www.smallbusinessadvocate.com/ Here is … Continue Reading

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Losing Your Mind

All of us who are business owners know how tough it is to run a business. Most of us have long ago gotten past the ego part of owning a company. Sometimes I’m really surprised at how that affects folks … Continue Reading

Posted in Business Perspectives, Leadership, Managing Employees | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

A New View of Who We Are

The economy has experienced 5 consecutive quarters of growth. We are officially more than a year past the end of the recession. I’m guessing that you, like me, responded to that fact with something like “HA!.” We all still feel … Continue Reading

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