Friday, September 9, 2016

How to Build a Valuable Business Team

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How to Build a Valuable Business Team
When you’re an entrepreneur with the goal of building a successful company, it’s incredibly important to put together a solid team. Without hardworking, educated, dependable employees and partners, your company will flounder and never achieve the success you’ve hoped for.
Let’s assume that you need a great team to support you and your business ideas. How do you actually build that team?
Tips for Putting Together Your Business Team
Team members are incredibly important for your business development. As time goes by and your company is growing, you will need more and more people to take over tasks like finance, content, and administration writing.
Here are a few tips I’ve learned over the years about developing and motivating a great team:
1. Hire highly-skilled professionals.
You’ll just cost yourself more time and money in the long run if you’re not careful during the hiring process. Training and motivating unqualified team members is a waste of your resources, so don’t just hire the first person that applies.
2. Connect with team members regularly.
Even the best employees and consultants need some feedback, and to touch base with their leaders from time to time. The best way to keep everyone on the same page is to meet regularly, whether virtually or in person.
3. Instigate a coaching and develop program.
In most companies regardless of the size and achievements, the success of every consultant depends on the cultivation of a great team. Since the income of a consultant is heavily dependent on the subsequent sales of his or her recruits, coaching is a very important part of the team ethos. Take the time to create an in-depth, easy-to-understand program that teaches your recruits everything they need to know about your business and your plans for the future.
4. Present webinars.
A webinar is a simple way to connect with your team members. Not only can webinars be recorded ahead of time and broadcasted later, but it can save a lot of time and money when it comes to getting team members together to discuss issues. Most companies host at least one webinar a month.
5. Create Facebook community groups.
Facebook groups are the ideal place for team members to meet casually and discuss anything from procedural issues to customer relationships. These discussions can happen slowly over the day or week, and everyone can benefit from seeing the conversion unfold.
At the end of the day, it’s up to each team member to be productive. Provide all the relevant tools and support, and the people who truly believe in you and your company will rise to the top.
Every Great Team Needs Direction
Staying connected with your team is the most important thing to remember. If you want to take your business to the next level by building a dedicated team, you have to offer a great deal of support to your staff and partners.
And most importantly, if you want to take your business to the next level by building a dedicated team, you have to offer a great deal of support to your staff and partners.

New Entrepreneurs: Don’t Make This Mistake!

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New Entrepreneurs: Don’t Make This Mistake!
“What is the number one mistake that new entrepreneurs make when starting a business?”
Because it gives me a chance to talk about something I see almost every new business owner doing wrong, I love this question. Now, let’s answer this question.

Productivity Versus Busywork

The answer is inaction.

The biggest mistake new entrepreneurs make is to confuse movement for action. I see too many people wasting their time on the latter.

A study conducted by the University of California, Irvine revealed that employees actually feel happiest while engaged in busywork, or what the researchers refer to as “rote work.”

You need to reconsider how to manage your time because you’re mistaking being busy for being productive if this sounds like you. Watching more training doesn’t move your business forward.

The leader of the study, Dr. Gloria Mark, explains: 
” With rote work, you get a feeling of accomplishment, but you haven’t exerted a lot of mental activity. It gives you a feeling of fulfilment, but there’s not a single frustration or stress.”

You Won’t Make Money until You Start Selling
Some entrepreneurs seem almost scared to start their businesses, as if the fear of failure has trapped them in their desk chairs and forced them to buy more and more educational products instead of setting up a website or putting together an email list.

Because they are action-oriented, I’ve seen people that are brand new to this industry go out and make a lot of money simply. If you want to be successful, that’s exactly what you need to do, too.

Do Something Productive Every Day
I’m talking about tasks you complete that can directly make you money when I talk about productive activities. Things like creating capture pages, sending sales emails, and posting ads.

Don’t just sit there learning; take the time to use that knowledge to start your business. Figure out how to brand yourself, how to reach your niche market, and then get it done. You won’t start making money until you do!

It’s so much more valuable to take action, even when you make mistakes! Those mistakes teach how to fine tune your business and make it a success. I know this from my own experience.

The biggest mistake new entrepreneurs make is to confuse movement for action. That discovery makes sense to me, because time and time again I see new consultants getting stuck in training mode– that’s when they watch educational video after video without actually putting any of that knowledge into practice. Those mistakes teach how to fine tune your business and make it a success. And I started making a lot of mistakes.

When I started in the internet marketing industry, my main problem was getting traffic. And I started making a lot of mistakes.

That discovery makes sense to me, because time and time again I see new consultants getting stuck in training mode– that’s when they watch educational video after video without actually putting any of that knowledge into practice. Why? It’s easy to sit back and be educated, while it’s much more stressful to take your business and your future into your own hands with productive actions.

You won’t start making money until you do!

Successful Online Marketers Eat Frogs

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Successful Online Marketers Eat Frogs

Why do we generally decline to eat the frog first thing in the morning, or at any time during the day? It’s because these major tasks usually involve things that are totally foreign to us so we feel there won’t be much satisfaction in the short term.
Frogs Top to Bottom.
People at all levels of businesses– newbies to veterans– have their frogs and we all find ways to avoid them.
What is the one thing you could do right now, today, that would move your business along? What could get you closer to being in business, get you that next client, create future income?
I first heard the saying from Brian Tracy, the personal development expert and sales trainer; in his book Eat That Frog! He uses it as a colorful way to say, “Stop procrastinating.”.
Are You Really Hungry?
” Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.”.
He mingled among France’s upper classes, Chamfort supported the French Revolution. His use of the “frog” statement was aimed at his disgust with French high society.
More specifically, “eating the frog,” means tackling the biggest or most important task( s) that will move your business forward.
If you really want to be in business– if you’re really hungry– you’ve got to eat the frogs.
This humorous saying has been credited to 17th century American author Mark Twain (though someone on my staff has pointed out to me that there is no evidence that Twain ever said or wrote it; it’s a translation of a statement documented as having been written by a 17th century French humorist named Nicholas Chamfort, who was quoting an associate known as “Mr. de Lassay”).
How do I stop wasting time and just get on with it?
If you can motivate yourself to take on and complete the things you’ve been putting off– usually, they are big, meaningful things that would move your business forward– you will find yourself actually in business.
For people who are further along and do have an audience, the method is to announce your “frog” in an email, on social media, or both. It’s a good idea to put some cash up as well, to ensure you really do deliver. Declare that the penalty for failing to deliver is some amount of cash that you really can’t afford to lose. Either deliver and reclaim your cash or fail to deliver on time and lose it.
For someone just starting out, who does not yet have a list of customers and leads, you would make yourself accountable to a friend or family member.
Final Thought.
Use self-imposed accountability if motivation is hard to summon. The frog will seem palatable in comparison if you make the deadline short enough and the penalty stiff enough.

Thursday, September 8, 2016

You Need a Support Team to Grow Your Business

You Need a Support Team to Grow Your Business
Yesterday I had the pleasure of meeting two very special people in my life and business. For the last 10 years I’ve worn many hats in my business. From trainer to marketer- product developer- copy writer- editor-customer service and everything in between. I outsourced a little bit but mostly handled everything myself.
You see, I thought If I didn’t do it all myself, I wouldn’t be a good business owner or example to my clients or students.

Being a Good Business Owner Doesn’t Mean Doing it All Yourself

Boy was I wrong about the way I was handling my business. The whole reason behind leaving my job and starting my business was to travel and be with my daughter. As I got busier, that freedom started to drift.
The time I wanted to get back from my corporate job was slowly replaced with more “stuff” working in my business, not on it. What good was doing myself, Brian, or Hanalei to allow “stuff” to take all of my attention. That is not the Freedom-preneur life- it’s the corporate life- the one I left behind.

Outsourcing is The Answer to Growing Your Business

As much as I loved the 4 Hour Work Week idea of outsourcing, I still couldn’t give away the control or trust that someone else could do as good of a job as me. That is a misguided thought for sure. No one will do the job the same way I will do it, but that doesn’t mean they won’t do an incredible job.

The Outsourcing Company I Trust

Earlier this year, I was introduced to Jenny Jordan whose company, Need a VAspecializes in creating space for busy entrepreneurs. They offer outsourcing solutions and build teams for organizations to become more efficient.

My world shifted almost immediately.

I now work on my business not IN my business. I now spend my time with my family and my clients and not spend my time on organizing my day but building and growing my business.
I had the pleasure of meeting my assistant Larcie Martinez Tulao for the first time in person, and our “Sexy Blog Artist” Mark Ryan Holanda. These two are the heart and soul of my organization, they keep me organized through the day and take care of our clients needs. There is a huge amazing team behind them that is a full support system that I now cannot live without.

What I’ve Learned From Outsourcing

There are several things that I have learned from outsourcing and the biggest thing is that developing a team has helped me grow in ways I couldn’t have imagined. Now that I allow people that are specialists in their areas handle different aspects of running the Unstoppable Family, I’m able to hone in more on my own specialty.
With the time I’ve regained, I can help more people. I’m even better now at what I do than I have ever been before.
The moment I brought on a team of others to help was the moment I was able to meet the needs of my clients. That is what it is all about- helping others reach their business goals.