photo credit: chegs

In my last post I shared 3 modes of thought that help you succeed as an entrepreneur. In this short post I share 1 more important mode of thought for entrepreneurs.

Think Like a Customer- So many entrepreneurs have great product and service ideas for their customers but they don’t really know their customers. They don’t spend time really interacting with their customers so they don’t know how their customers think. This is tragic. This is why many of the product and service ideas they have for their customers fail to deliver real value to the client and real profit for the entrepreneur. 

Successful entrepreneurs know how their customers think and so they know how their customers will react to new products and services. Indeed they can think like their customers. How did they develop this skill? They developed this skill by spending lots of time interacting with their customers. Asking not only what their customers want and need but finding out why their customers have this need. Then they spend time thinking deeply about the implications of what they have heard from their clients. 

Which clients should you focus on? This is a good place to think about the 80/20 rule. Since 20% of your customers create 80% of your profits, thinking like these customers will give you your greatest return on investment.

Take time today to spend time with your customers. Learn from them and learn to think like them.

As always, I solicit your feedback and your thoughts. This site is for you and I want to know what you think. Thank you.

photo credit: milena mihaylova

How we think affects every aspect of our lives. This is no truer than it is in our businesses.  As entrepreneurs our habitual modes of thought shape what we accomplish in our business. If we learn how to think right we can accomplish great things.

In this post and the subsequent post, I will share with you 7 modes of thought that will lead you to entrepreneurial success. Here are the first 3:

Think Big – I am sure you have heard this before but it bears repeating. It is important to think big in terms of your entrepreneurial vision and the number of people you can serve. For example, you may be thinking about creating one location for your business. How about thinking about 10 locations or 100 locations? Remember you don’t have to do it by yourself nor do you have to do it all at once. People often overestimate what they can do in one year but grossly underestimate what they can do in 10 years. Thinking big serves you well because it will propel you past pettiness and small obstacles. I encourage you to look at your current business reach and multiply it by at least 100.

Think Small -This is not a contradiction to our other mode of thought. Thinking small is thinking about distinctions. What makes your business different from your competitors. What distinctions can you make in your business that would be hard to copy? Remember several small distinctions can make a huge difference.  Look at your business and your competition, what are 5 small distinctions that you can make to better serve your client base.

Think without Fear – Ask yourself this question- what would I do as an entrepreneur if I knew it was impossible for me to fail? This powerful question helps you think in terms of possibilities. Many entrepreneurs limit themselves with fear-based thinking. They focus on what they can’t do instead of what they can do. In your current business or in the one you are planning to start, answering the question presented above will take your business to a new dimension.

Please stay tuned for Part 2 of this series.

As always, I welcome your comments and suggestions.

As an entrepreneur, I have always been inspired and informed by quotes from entrepreneurs past and present. I share these with you in the hope that you will be inspired and informed. Enjoy.

Think Right

1.”Capital isn’t scarce; vision is.” -Sam Walton

2. “If you think you can do a thing or think you can’t do a thing, you’re right.” -Henry Ford

3.”Singleness of purpose is one of the chief essentials for success in life, no matter what may be one’s aim.” -John D. Rockefeller

4. “What separates the winners from the losers is how a person reacts to each new twist of fate.” -Donald Trump

5. “If you think you are too small to have an impact, try going to bed with a mosquito” -Anita Roddick

6. “God didn’t have time to make a nobody, only a somebody. I believe that each of us has God-given talents within us waiting to be brought to fruition.” -Mary Kay Ash

Believe in Yourself and in Opportunity

7. “There are always opportunities through which businessmen can profit handsomely if they will only recognize and seize them.” -J. Paul Getty

8. “Business opportunities are like buses, there’s always another one coming.”
- Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Enterprises

9. “I had to make my own living and my own opportunity! But I made it! Don’t sit down and wait for the opportunities to come. Get up and make them!”

- Madam C.J. Walker, creator of a popular line of African-American hair care products and America’s first black female millionaire

Move Forward

10. “Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal.” -Henry Ford

11. “Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.” -John D. Rockefeller

Have the Right Attitude about Money

12. “What material success does is provide you with the ability to concentrate on other things that really matter. And that is being able to make a difference, not only in your own life, but in other people’s lives.” -Oprah Winfrey

13. “Sometimes your best investments are the ones you don’t make.” -Donald Trump

14. “Money is like manure. You have to spread it around or it smells.” -J. Paul Getty

Leader Others

15. “As I grow older, I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do.” -Andrew Carnegie

16. “No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself or get all the credit for doing it.” -Andrew Carnegie

17. “You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don’t do too many things wrong.” Warren Buffet

I hope these quotes inspired you. I invite you to share your favorite quotes for entrepreneurs. Thanks.

photo credit: waffler

Is anyone else tired of hearing about how bad the economy is faring? I mean I know we as a country are having serious problems economically. I get it. The news media has made it abundantly clear that things are going really badly. I personally think the amount of negative rhetoric is helping to perpetuate this situation. It is like someone being sick and a crowd of people gathering around that person reminding him or her how sick they are and how bad they look. The crowd constantly reminds the person that no one knows whether they can ever recover from this sickness. It is no wonder that the economy is getting worse. It is almost as if the news media is deriving a morbid sense of pleasure from reporting this bad news.
Anyway, I believe that while the economy may be bad, you don’t have to do bad financially with it. Below are 3 things you can do to help you thrive in these economic bad times.

1. Look for opportunities within problems

“Too many people are thinking of security instead of opportunity. They seem more afraid of life than death.” – James Francis Byrnes

Instead of being problem-focused be opportunity focused.  There are opportunities to prosper all around you.  Many times these opportunities are found in the problems others are having. There are answers that you have that no one else has.  Solve a problem and you will increase your value. Get in the opportunity mindset. Look for opportunities that only present themselves in a weak economy. Believe me, the opportunities are there if you look for them. Once you find the opportunity, go for it. Don’t let fear or doubt stop you. You can do it.

2. Get rid of unnecessary things in your life.

A lot of times people look at the negative side of what they feel they can’t do. I always look on the positive side of what I can do.
Chuck Norris

When times are tough it can be a great time to get rid of excess baggage. It is a great time to change. Here are some things you can do:

Review your mental attitude.

Get rid of attitudes and modes of thought that are negative and wasteful. This is also a time to get rid of your negative beliefs about yourself and your potential for success. You are successful. It is in you now.  Have confidence in yourself and your abilities. You were designed to be great.

Review the people with whom you associate

Separate yourself from negative people. Get rid of people that suck energy out of you. These people are more expensive than you know. Let them go and get stronger. Stop hanging around the nay Sayers. Hang around people that believe they can succeed even in this economy.

Review your budget

 Are there things that you no longer need that you are paying for? Get rid of these things. Go line by line and eliminate wasteful spending in your budget.

Refuse to participate in the recession.

When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. I have several stands around here.
James Brady

This has to do with attitude. We know the facts and the numbers about the economy. Let’s decide that our right attitude, faith, skills, ingenuity, determination and the great people around us will not only cause us to survive but to thrive in these times.  Let’s refuse to focus on all the negative things going on. We are aware of them but we know we have what it takes to make it. Don’t spend a lot of time talking about how bad things are. Expect to prosper.

Please share other things that we can do to thrive in this economy. I want to hear your thoughts.

Great opportunities are abundant and surround us everyday.  Opportunities in all areas of our lives. Opportunities to draw closer to the ones we love, opportunites to help more people, opportunities to start a great business, oppotunities to start a new career. Opportunities, Opportunities, Opportunities…

These opportunites come near us but we miss them all the time.  There are many ways to miss great oppotunities but I believe there are four major ways that stand out from the rest. If we change our behaviour in reference to these ways, we will be able to seize more oppotunities and we will be on our way to living higher and more fulfilling lives.

1. Not being on the look out for opportunities

One sure way to miss opportunity is not to look for it. An opportunity can be right in front of you but you can miss it if you are not looking for opportunities.  Let me share a great example with you.

Let’s say you are in a bustling warm weather city with lots of traffic. Let’s further say you spend an hour a day eating lunch outside where you can see the cars traveling on the street. After lunch, if I were to ask you how many red cars passed by, you probably couldn’t tell me. If, however, I asked you on the next day to count the number of red cars that pass by during your lunch break,  I suspect you would get that done quick easily. As a matter of fact, you would probably see more red cars than you have ever seen. You would see red cars because you made the decision to look for them.

It is similar with opportunities. In order to see them you have to make a decision to look for them. 

2. Not knowing exactly what to look for

Another way we miss opportunities is not knowing what they look like. Unlike red cars, opportunities are not always so obvious. In fact, opportunities are usually disguised in a way we wouldn’t expect.  This is a reason that even when people are earnestly looking for opportunities, sometimes they don’t see them. Here are two diguises opportunities don:

Problems are opportunities waiting to be harvested

Many times the greatest opportunities are found in problems around us. Things we face everyday.  No matter the size of the problem, in its solution is a potential opportunity. Every successful invention has been the result of  solving a problem. In fact, you were created to be a solution to a problem (We can discuss this further in another article).  Think about problems you face all the time. Things that may frustrate you in your work, in your relationships and the mechnical, technical, economic and political systems around you. Even the way things are done. You may be the person who has the idea to solve the problem, provide the missing link, or devise a better way of doing something. If you want to miss great opportunities then simply complain about the problems you face. If you want to identify great opporutnities then look at problems as a source of opportunity and start thinking of solutions. Who knows, you may suprise yourself.

Conversations contain opportunities not yet realized

Although it may not seem like it at times, all the problems in the world are not finding their way directly to you. Other people are experiencing problems all the time. Sometimes the problems they are experiencing are quite different from the problems you are facing. Indeed, the problems that they are facing may not even seem like problems to you. You know the solution or you have an inkling how to figure out the solution.

Oftentimes, we miss these opportunities because we don’t really listen to people. I am very guilty of this myself. We need to practice active listening.  Listen on purpose and talk less.  You will be surprised at what you learn and how many opportunities you will hear. If you want to miss an opportunity, just keep talking and half-listening to those around you. If you want to discover great opportunities, listen, really listen to those with whom you converse.

3. Reacting in fear

This is a big one and a common one. A lot of times we see the opportunites and we know they are opportunities, but we fail to act on them because of fear.  We may fear we are not smart enough, fast enough or worthy enough to seize this opportunity. Or we may think that we may fall flat on our faces. Or we may be afraid of success. How will this opportunity change us? There are so many variations on this theme of fear. The best advice I have heard to defeat this type of fear is to prepare the best you can and then act anyway, despite the fear.  You may feel fearful but go forward anyway.  Also, if possible, start small and build on your successes. Don’t let fear stop you from seizing great opportunities.

4. Dismissing opportunities

Finally, a common way we miss opportunities by simply dismissing them. We decide, for whatever reason, that this is not something we can do. It is too big for us , too complicated for us or too small for us. It may be because of fear or because we are just overwhelmed with other things. Whatever the reason, deep down, we believe that we can’t get the opportunity done. We talk ourselves out of pursuing it. Let me suggest that if you have an opportunity don’t just dismiss it, even if you can’t do it by yourself, consider teaming up with someone to do  something with it. Even if it doesn’t go anywhere it doesn’t mean it was a waste of time. If nothing else, you have learned something valuable that can help you seize the next opportunity. If an opportunity comes your way and you recognize it, it is important for you to do something with it. I would go as far as saying it is your duty act on it in some way.  It presented itself to you for a reason. This may be the opportunity that changes your life and the lives of many others for good.

Opportunities are all around us, they are very valuable and help us live better more fulfilling lives. Let’s make up our minds to seize more of the opportunities around us starting today.