Category Archive

We business owners typically operate day to day with no thought of what’s coming 5, 10 or even 20 years down the road.  We fail to strategize about our future due to the busyness of the “Now”.

This can be a big mistake.  For business owners, big changes are coming, and are currently happening, that can make or break your business.

I’m speaking of the relationship between the boomer generation (currently running the USA), the Gen X generation after them, and the Gen Y generation after them (also called millennials).  How these different generations manage people, are managed by other people and want to work can carry huge ramifications to what you do or don’t do right now.

Our firm is highly focused on the generation that will be taking over leadership from the Boomers.  They are in the Gen X demographic born approximately between 1963 and 1981.  I’m smack in the middle of that generation, and love to serve my clients and prospective clients in the way that I love to be served.  Our Thriveal Theory of operation in our firm summarizes the four main ways we see these clients behaving.  These four points are:

1                    Business owners and individuals with an eye to the future of business, noting trends and acting on those trends today

2                    Business owners and individuals who take on the responsibility of financial management, proper operations and right strategies to succeed

3                    Business owners and individuals who embrace excellent training and learning to succeed and accomplish their business and individual goals

4                    Business owners and individuals who are poised to accept change in a global marketplace and benefit from its lessons and blessings

We see our Gen X clients embracing these values, and we want to be there for them when they call.  We want to be strategic business consultants, helping our clients look forward, learn, accept change and prosper in their world of ownership.

If you are a client, then let us know how we may serve you in this way so that we can both grow together into the future… strategically.

Thanks, Jason M. Blumer

1.  Here is a good marketing reminder (from John Jantsch of the Duct Tape Marketing site) for small businesses during a “recession” - GoSee

2.   ”Companies today aren’t managing their knowledge workers’ careers. Rather, we must each be our own chief executive officer,” this from a Harvard Business Review article I saw on BNET.  The article speaks to the art of managing yourself - GoSee 

3.  I’ve been reading a lot about this study lately, and I know it to be personally true.  The study conducted by the University of Utah purports that the use of larger monitors or dual monitors at work can increase productivity.  My productivity definitely went up when I added the second - I won’t ever go back! - GoSee

Thanks, Jason M. Blumer  

Marketing is being discussed more and more these days.  My business clients, articles in the newspaper and the economy leads us to talk about how to market more effectively.

And future trends seem to be leading the way to niche marketing as a way to thrive (not survive).  Proper niche marketing allows for focused service, focused price-setting and a focused way of measuring your marketing results.

Check this quote out from Melanie Lindner in a recent Forbes writeup:  

Rather than trying to capture 1% to 2% of a giant global market, startups should aim to capture 25% to 40% of a niche market, advises John De Puy, chief executive of Oaktree Ventures, a San Diego-based venture capital firm. “Define and dominate,” he says. “That’s the secret sauce.”

It’s hard to win when ”everyone” is your client.  How can you reach them all?  Which person will give you your next sell?  How do you know when you are best spending your advertising dollars?  It’s hard to know when you lose sight of your niche.

Check this quote out from marketing expert John Jantsch in a recent post on his site:

If you can become known by a very narrow target market for doing something very specifically unique in a way that your customers adore, you will no longer compete on price and no longer live at the mercies of the ups and downs beyond your control.

Why the change to niche marketing?  Because the world of business is changing.  Due to technology and the means by which we all do business, our world has become bigger.  That is, your customer base has become bigger.  You can do work, or become an expert, or consult with someone from anywhere in the world now. 

That allows you to narrow your focus, in an extreme way.  That allows you to focus on your best work, and make offerings to a smaller group of customers… located all over the world.

Try it.  Narrow your focus.  Become excellent at what you do.  Now charge people for it.

Thanks, Jason M. Blumer

I just heard (on a podcast) the head of marketing at jumpup.com, a great site from Intuit, talk about the 65/25/10 rule.  This rule was to offer some type of guidance on how to bill for your time once you make the jump to becoming self-employed.  It was originally suggested by one of the members at jumpup.com.

Basically, the member was struggling with how to bill for her services after starting her own venture.  After some time, she figured it out, and offered this model: of your total hours to be worked in your new venture, 65% of your time should be spent on billable client work, 25% should be spent on business development, and 10% should be spent on the administration in your company.

She used this model to create her new hourly billable rate.  Here is an example: Before making the move to self-employment, you made $65,000 in your last job (including salary and all benefits).  And now, you assume you will be working 50 weeks during the year for 40 hours per week, or 2,000 hours per year.  This will equate to 1,300 hours being spent on billable client work (2,000 hours x 65%).  Divide your last compensation package ($65k) by the hours to be billed (1,300), and you arrive at how much you can bill for your time - which comes to a whopping $50.00 per hour. 

At least it’s a model, but a few cautions:

-this calculation only gives you what you were paid last year.  But bill-for-time service industries typically have some type of mark up on the rate they are paying themselves in salary.  This is because their hourly billable rate now has to cover their wage AND their overhead costs to run the business.  Should the $50.00/hour be marked up 2.5 times to arrive at $125.00 per hour as a billable rate?  Maybe so, but it may depend on the industry…  

-the industry you are working in has a lot to do with how you calculate your hourly rate.  Some industries allow for a certain amount to be billed depending on the market.  For example, an attorney may bill out at $200/hour in a certain city, while a graphic designer may only be able to get $100/hour at the most in the same city.  It depends on the market rate in that industry.

-niche work can sometimes bring higher rates, if marketed properly.  An attorney billing out at $200/hour for general practice work may be able to charge $300/hour for high end health care work.  Likewise, the graphic designer in our example may be able to bump her rate up to $150/hour if specializing in 3D renderings for engineers and architectural firms.

-what if you work more hours than 2,000 hours per year (which you most certainly will if you are self-employed), and don’t get 65% of your time billed out (which is hard to do - administration is so freakin’ huge)?  Let’s say you work 60 hours per week for 51 weeks, or 3,060 hours per year.  And let’s say you only get 55% of your time billed out.  Now use the $65k you got paid from your last job and divide it by 1,683 billable hours during the year (3,060 x .55).  Now you get a whopping $38/hour.  You don’t want this calculation to lead you into charging $38/hour, when you should charge $75/hour. 

Just some things to think about when using “scientific” methods to calculate your rates - sometimes it’s more of an art!

Thanks, Jason M. Blumer  

Wow!  What a plethora of good material I had to read through during this January 8th Edition of The Carnival of Small Business Issues, maintained by the elusive CA.  I feel like I just got a freakin’ MBA (maybe I did - hey, where’s my diploma?).

Anyway, on to the good stuff.  Here is what I learned…

Operations

Are You Copying Genius? Or Creating Mediocrity? by Debra Moorhead was an awesome post on receiving good business advice.  She so eloquently encourages us to hang out with the exemplary (and ditch the mediocre).  Surround yourself with good people, copy genius, and so many other points I can’t recount here.  Don’t miss this inspiring and accurate article by Debra!

Are You Exploiting Your Strengths? by David B. Bohl offers an interesting view on working on your strengths.  That’s right.  David points out that we normally tend to work on our weaknesses, but exploiting our strengths makes a lot of sense after reading David’s well-thought out article.  It’s definitely worth a read.

Business Performance And Profit by Jim Sansi had a great post on actually calculating and measuring the implementation of business processes (instead of just wingin’ it).  Using a simple example (that you should expand on), Jim explained how to measure profitability in order to help you know what type of systems you can and should implement into your company.   Great stuff.

Five Things Racquetball Taught Me About Succeeding in Business by Change Your Tree was very informative (and made me want to get on the racquetball court again).  Business does mirror so many other aspects of life… this was a great comparison.  This game teaches us to be patient, know the competition, know the angles, etc.

An Independent Consultant’s New Year’s Resolution, and How to Keep It, in 7 Steps by Tim King makes some confessions and commitments to improve in the new year.  How?  With his seven ethereal steps, of course (including): visualizing yourself completing the steps,  list the mental challenges and see yourself doing it anyhow, etc.  A wonderful New Year’s article (and he got in a few days of his “write 500 words per day” resolution too!).

Starting the Year off Right by Robert D Flach offers good reminders for all you self-employed people - start NOW tracking your income and expenses for 2008.  Tax time (in 2009) is no time to get organized.  He reminds us of the possibility of IRS audits for the nano business owner, and that you want to be prepared should the IRS chose to show YOU a little extra love this year (i.e. auditing you, that is).  Great advice worth heeding.

Marketing

Re-Evaluate and Measure Your Marketing Strategy in 10 Steps by Jay M helps us with the “science” of marketing.  With 10 ways to expand your marketing campaign, Jay spells out in clear and easy language how to review what you have done, what you should be doing in the future and analyzing how you did financially.  Wonderful material.

Marketing Tip - Train Your Team on Promotions by Ingrid Cliff makes such an important, often over-looked point to train your team on the new promotions offered to your customers/clients.  We all get so excited about our new stuff that we fail to brief the team on how to best sell it to the public.  Great reminder from Ingrid!

A Subtle Conversion Rate & Response Booster From 3 Masters by James Alenteal gives some straight forward advice on conversion at your site or blog (i.e. turning visitors into readers and/or buyers).  He gives examples (here, here and here) of three different people (actually four - see here) who have implemented some interesting conversion pyschology on their visitors.  It’s great stuff and takes just a minute to read (watch out - prepare to be converted!).

Bring the Love Back by Edith Yeung offers some quick advice on what your customers need (and the reminder that you might not be providing it).  With a funny video reminder, Edith tells us it’s time to give some love back to those customers… after all, they may not feel like you love them anymore.

The Power of Multivariant Testing by Jim Logan speaks to the need for testing of any marketing campaign launch.  But testing the success of a campaign can be daunting (how do you test direct mailers, their use and impact in an inexpensive way?  You have to change things and send them again).  Enter the world of multivariant testing online.  This is seemingly a powerful tool that lets you test multiple variables online all at the same time.  Jim knows what he’s talking about in this well-written article.

Blogging and PR: Six Principles to Live By by Laura Spencer offers six basic ways to get your business blog rolling.  They are straight and to the point, and come from experienced bloggers.  This is an article for all of us…

Mortgage Issues

When Should You Refinance? by Ryan from CareOne Credit Counseling offers some very practical advice on the decision to refinance your home, and for what reasons.  Use some of CareOne Credit’s handy dandy calculators or budget planner to help you make the right decisions.  There’s a lot of useful info on their site for those interested in repairing or enhancing their credit standing.

The Mortgage Loan Process by Ryan from CareOne Credit Counseling urges us to know the mortgage loan process before the surprises arise.  Walking you through the three basic steps of acquiring a mortgage (1 Applying for a loan, 2 the processing of your loan, and 3 the loan closing), this article provides very practical advice for the new homeowner, as well as those buying again for the second or third time.

The Power of Pre-Approval by Ryan from CareOne Credit Counseling provides yet another awesome and well-written article concerning a different aspect of the mortgage process: pre-approval.  The power of pre-approval during the loan process offers some very basic benefits to the future homeowner, that being ultimate speed of the loan approval, gaining bargaining power while house-hunting and offering comfort to the seller during the process.

Taking Advantage Of The Equity In Your Home by Ryan from CareOne Credit Counseling offers a great example of how much equity you can pull out of your home.  Explaining the difference between a line and a loan, Ryan details various terms, rates and costs to the homeowner during the equity-pull-out process.  Again, well-written content from this involved and detailed website.

General Business

Evaluating A Business Opportunity by John Crickett offers so many great tips on evaluating your move into business ownership.  There are tips on avoiding scams, making sure you’re the right fit for the business opportunity and making sure the move is profitable.  John’s blog is chocked full of so much more too.  It’s worth a visit (again, again, again and again).

Does Bad Personal Credit = Bad Business Money Management by Scott Allen explores whether the method by which you manage your personal finances spills over into how you manage your business finances (for better or worse).  No concrete answers here (except that Scott feels he is better at managing his business finances over his own personal finances), just good exploration into the possibilities.  Well written and insightful.

Top Ten Opportunities in 2008 for Personal Businesses  (article provided by Dawn as a guest blogger on Small Business Trends) by Dawn Rivers Baker gives a rundown of some upcoming opportunities (along with some convincing statistics on SMBs) for nano-businesses.  And Dawn has the experience to backup her predictions.  Ready to start your new business in 2008?  Why not start with Dawn’s suggestions.

Is the Sky Falling? by Mike Buckleygives us a candid rebuttle to the latest US recession scares in the news.  He reminds us that even in a recession, there are still many opportunities for the small business.  You may have to work a little harder, but you can do it.

Learn the Proven Money Making Keys to Success E-commerce by Dan-O gives some enlightening information of doing e-commerce well.  With a very interesting and brief history of e-commerce, Dan-O explains how personalization and online communities (among other ideas) make e-commerce sites enjoyable.  And enjoyable experiences online tend to bring customers back again and again.  Good reading from an experienced author. 

Social Security by Marc Blumer (is the name familiar… he’s my dad) offers some guidance on whether to take social security earlier or later, depending on your situation.  Interesting stuff for those in retirement mode… 

Miscellaneous

Finding Your Special Talent by Christine (all the way from France) shows us quite poignantly how trials can be avenues into embracing needed change.  And maybe this needed change can be a door to a new money-making venture, a new job, new fields of opportunity, a new life…  you never know what’s around the next corner.  Go ahead… go look and see what you find.

5 Questions You Need to Ask Yourself Before It’s Too Late by Liz Fuller offers her regular straight forward advice on reviewing what went right this past holiday season, and how to perpetuate that behavior.  How?  Write it down!  With 5 simple questions, Liz encourages you to make a note of the past, and apply it to the future.  Good stuff.

Can You Really Achieve Total Success? by Dr. Joe Capista highlights the often-forgotten parts of what Total Success truly is.  It’s not only defined by dollars.  Where do you stand on his primary four areas of Total Success?  They are Family (Relationships), Physical (External), Spiritual, (Internal) and Work (Business).  Many decades of wisdom on his blog, and in his books.

Total Success is Determined by Your Thoughts, Beliefs and Actions by Dr. Joe Capista talks about the ingredients to Total Success.  They are found in setting goals and being determined to seeing those goals through to the desired outcome.  Truly a well-rounded definition to success.

Be A Balanced Mom by Iamawahm gives Moms who work at home 8 helpful tips to make work happen… and stay balanced.  From knowing when to ask for help to fighting the guilt that often plagues the work-at-home Mom, this Mother of three speaks from heavy experience.

A Few of My Own Posts

Creating Customer Trust and Loyalty… with Consistency

Selling Yourself… to Your Employees

Excellent Networking… by Playing to Your Weaknesses

Change Your Mind

Whew!  I’m worn out (plum tuckered out, as they say it down here in SC).  This material was very enlightening.  I hope you enjoy the recaps as much as I enjoyed the reading (I got the best end of the stick).  If you are interested in hosting the Carnival of Small Business Issues, feel free to visit here to sign up. 

Here’s to another great edition!  Take care now, ya hear!

Thanks, Jason M. Blumer

  Wanna make your customers and clients trust you, and remain loyal?  Be consistent!

Perceived Consistency (PC) produces great trust and loyalty among your customers.  Do you have a friend, client, family member who is always living in chaos?  They never show when they say they will, they bring information to you that is in disarray, their information is inaccurate, their information is late, etc.  You tend to perceive them as untrustworthy.  And if they are untrustworthy, then you become uncommitted to them, or disloyal.

As the PC factor goes up, then trust and loyalty goes up.  And it works the other way too (doesn’t it always?).

What consistency am I talking about?  Let me give some examples from my firm.  I ALWAYS send out a semi-annual update to my clients, some time in May and then some time in December.  ALWAYS.  My clients come to expect it.  They feel a level of comfort when they receive it.  The tax packages we prepare for our clients must ALWAYS look the same when the client comes to pick up their information.  We are going to implement a new process in our firm at the beginning of the new year.   It’s an area where I have some marketing cushion, and I need to take advantage of it.  We will begin sending out new client information packets to all new clients.  I usually talk with the new clients about their respective needs, but the new information packet will be an opportunity to talk about all that we do, who we are, what our theories behind business are, etc.  We will ALWAYS do this from now on.  We will work the PC factor in this area and build trust and loyalty in our clients.  You see, my firm gives off good vibes when I confirm my customers trust again and again and again… we are consistent and that makes my clients trust us.  And if they trust us, they tend to remain loyal too.

Running your business in a chaotic way hurts you more than you think.  It might be hurting you and you don’t even know it.  Your PC factor is going down… maybe slowly, but it is probably declining.  Consistency in the way you do things, the way you present things, the way you return your client’s calls, the way you talk to your employees, the way you pay your bills, the way you bill your clients all build solid trust and loyalty… or not.

Consistency matters.  Work on the PC factor in your company.

Thanks, Jason M. Blumer

  Everyone is interested in branding themselves to their clients (i.e. “touching your client”).  Here are five simple ways to do that:

[I refer to my client-oriented marketing as "touching."  I helps us, as a firm, to remember HOW we are to market to our clients... gently and consistently] 

1. I try to “touch” my clients twice a year.  I always send out a post-tax season letter talking about the firm, how we are growing, and thanking everyone for their business.  It’s kind of like a newsletter, but I don’t spend as much time writing formal articles (I’ll do that on the blog!).  Then, I usually send out another letter toward the end of each year, reminding everyone of our procedures for tax season, and throw in some updated tax information for that year.  This latter touch letter is usually where I talk about the new people we are hiring, and how our firm is growing.  We always receive good responses from this “growth” touch letter.  People seem to be proud to call us “their firm”.  I always want to get in front of the client - consistently!

2. Take every opportunity you have to show your clients your logo, tag lines, promotional products, signage, print collateral, etc.  You can’t do this enough.  These collateral items say “we’re a big firm” or “we are in business for the long haul” or “we’re big enough to spend money on nice looking things like this bottle opener”.  Needless to say, I send my letters from point #1 on letterhead with cards.  Touch your clients with your logo - you spent money on it so you might as well use it in the “touching” process.

3. “Guard the door.”  No one will ever guard what leaves my firm but me.  That will always be a rule in our organization.  I guard the door (a.k.a. what the client sees) because perception is everything.  Perception, unfortunately NOT reality, normally determines what your clients think of you as a company.  That being said, what clients see must be pristine, clean, nice-looking, tactful, delivered with a smile, in order, accurate and precise, etc.  If my employees know they are doing something that clients will see (and then make a quick judgement about our company), then they know I want to look at it first.  Guarding the door ensures that your client “touch” will be received with happy feelings!

4. Develop a nice looking website.  Smaller CPA firms are notorious for signing up for templates made especially for CPAs.  And guess what they look like?  THE FREAKIN’ SAME.  As a firm, we don’t want to be the same, and neither does your company (let me know what you think about our firm’s web site).  You can touch your clients and customers (and other potential clients) best when you can send them to your web site and they can tell that you spent some time developing and creating your site.  This probably means you have to use professionals (like AMG, the company I own with other partners). 

5. As the head leader and marketer in the company, I spend a lot of time actually really touching my clients and potential clients (in a healthy way, of course).  I shake their hand, take them to lunch, give them gifts, send them thank you cards, hand-deliver a lot of our work, talk about personal things, pray for their kids, etc.  This is simply called customer service.  And if you do it right, then you will probably have to do it off the clock a lot of time (that is, not charge them for it).  This can be costly NOW, but the rewards will be felt later when the referrals come flooding in.  Of course, you have to weigh these types of touches with those who never seem to shut up.  Be careful, but don’t let any bad past experiences keep you from really touching your clients - they need tender loving care!

Thanks, Jason

It’s a shame that advertising is often spent “on a whim.”  If you’ve spent money lately on a new logo, new print designs, hot-looking collateral, new web site designs, or new banners for you store front, you can see why spending money in this area is so tempting.  It just looks… cool.

In fact, my CPA firm has a new logo (seen here), in celebration of 10 years of consutling.  Though this was created by my business partner at Atkins Media Group, Inc., I have to be careful how much money I initially put into print, letterhead and business card redesign.  It gets pretty freakin’ expensive.  But it’s so… cool.

But consider these four insights before spending your hard-earned dough on “cool” advertising:
1 What additional revenue will be DIRECTLY generated from the new advertising expenditure? (can’t track that with a yellow page ad, can you?)
2 Always spend toward your NICHE, not the general public (do you even know you niche?)
3 You have to be able to TRACK what the advertising dollars did for you (did the audience you just spent money on actual return and generate revenue?)
4 You have to RECOVER your advertising expenditure before you can even consider it successful (after all, you aren’t making any new money until you pay for the advertising first).

These all point toward KNOWING YOUR CUSTOMER! If you are spending money on advertising blindly, then you don’t really know your customer. And your customer is not necessarily who you customer is now - it may need to be who you WANT your customer to be in the near future (are you spending money on yearbook advertising at a local high school, but consider rich women over the age of 50 your best customer? - huh?).

And if you don’t know your customer, please do some research, analyze that area and figure out that important part of your business. You will be making long-term investments in your business.

Thanks, Jason