Don’t be afraid to sell

“To be successful in business you don’t just need a great idea — you have to sell it. Don’t be afraid to sell. Don’t think of yourself as anything but a marketer.”

This is a quote from the post "Ten Quotes to Run Your Business By" in the 'news for entrepreneurs' section.

In the first 5 years of a business, 'sales' is the most important and most hated task to grow your business. That means it is not about you and your business, modern selling is all about fulfilling the needs of your customers.

When you plan your sales strategy, create your task list. You take care of your business, when you are in the actual sales conversation you take care of your customers needs. It is a paradox.

In an entertaining way 'Sales/ It's Jerry Time video' shows how important it is to adjust to your customer.

goals 2

A really great list of goal setting tips and tricks can be found in the article "25 gems I've learned about goal setting" in the 'news for entrepreneurs' section.

A new one for me was the following: "The best weekly goal tip I ever got was to divide my time into 5 sections: to do, to contact, to see, to read and to write. If I could cross everything and everyone off that list by the end of the week, I was successful."

Use it and play with it...

goals

One of the growing stages in developing your business is goal setting and creating projects. Here the fun starts. When you set a goal and create a project, ideas get real. Results are defined, a game is created. Maybe it is a group project, now players can join the game/ clients can join the business. Now you can see if it is really the right idea, if yes, energy comes in, anxiety, excitement. You feel the risk to loose, if the game is the right challenge. That creates this stimulating flow of energy.

A good example is the article "NaNoWriMoOhNo!" in the 'news for entrepreneurs' section. The author of this blog decided to write a novel in one month, supported by an online-community. You can sense the excitement of creating a challenging game.

entrepreneurship

Something outstanding just happened in the internet tech bubble world.

The founder of Odeo, a music and podcast sharing internet service, Evan Williams just bought his company back from his investors to gain control and develop his business.

While every day new web2.0 start up's get funding and get bought by big companies, he decides to do it different. Read the article in 'news for entrepreneurs' "Odeo bought back from investors", especially the quote of the founder and owner Evan Williams.

Evan illustrates how he want to build his business, independent from investors. Longterm instead of shortterm, that is exactly what is our philosophy at The Soul of Entrepreneurship. After inventing a sevice, finding the right business model, means how to make money with it. Then we know people want it, they pay for it...

leadership

... is the 6th stage above the launch line in the Sage Performance Charts for business. What is modern effective leadership in an entrepreneurial company? In The Soul of Entrepreneurship class we talk about the paradox of humility and forcefulness which makes an enterprise outstanding. In the article "The first 100 days" in the 'news for entrepreneurs' section you can listen to an interview with a CEO consultant who talks about leaders. The story about a new CEO at Kinko's illustrates these two qualities of leadership.

values

... is the first stage of the growth pattern a business goes through. When you know your own values, you can find out who shares your values. With those people you can easy gain trust, create friendship, do business. "Birds of a feather, flock together". A great example for this effect , lightly twisted you can read in the blog post "Why do people look like their dogs?" from Seth Godin. You find this in the "news for entrepreneurs" section on the top right side of the main page.