A wise man told me if you want to be a successful Startup Company you need three things:
1. An incredible product
2. Great people
3. And enough Money

The theory is, if you have any two of these three the third is easy to attain. Read the rest of this entry

I was pondering the different ways you can manage the promotion of your product, service and website. (in bold below). I’m a guerrilla marketer so pardon me if most of them are free if you have some skill at all in CRM and have someone help you install a template at least for your blog.

Start off with a marketing plan, a guide to your focus and direction needs to be in place. When you develop your marketing plan you will have identified a couple of things necessary to have a successful operation. The obvious, a dynamic business name, a business card, snappy logo and a market niche can all be drawn into a compelling identity with a focused brand.

So how does a guerrilla develop a marketing plan? Read the rest of this entry

It is daunting to setup a new business from scratch. I thought I’d fire off a few items that I give my clients to account for in the strategic planning of their new start-up. Some may seem logical but many are often overlooked.

First Steps

• Choose a really, really good name for your business
• Do a name search of your new sole proprietorship or corporation (in BC its around $40)
• Once you’ve searched your business name, Register it (around $40)
• If you have a partnership, incorporate and setup shares for each partner Read the rest of this entry

• Set Goals for your Social Media marketing
• Know who you want to target and understand them
• Actively engage people every day in a two way conversation on Twitter for 10 minutes
• Join a social media site once a week and develop it completely
• Follow stats programs to know where you are, Klout, Dashboard on Blog, etc
• Monitor what is being said about you and your business on Google Alerts
• Check email several times a day on SmartPhone
• Answer Email ASAP
• Pay for one professional photo for all of your Social media and keep it current Read the rest of this entry

I’ve been working with many entrepreneurs over the past few years trying to work out some inherent but typical problems that have brought them to me. Funny but most of them suffer from the “I think I know it all’ syndrome.  Most, though, don’t even know what they are missing or what questions to ask if they did. A lot of their problems can be easily addressed and most are systemic.

I’ve tried to provide service to a few of them with mentoring services by the month. Many people have taken my advice and a few have sought to have me acknowledge their issues and agree with them. I figured these client were determined to have me enable them and agree with their methods and agenda.  If you just want someone to agree with you don’t waste your money on me!

I was wondering if there was a better way. Read the rest of this entry