Why A Picture Matters.
What happens when you look at a picture of your loved ones? Does your heart flutter? Do you become more responsive to what comes next?
Did you know that a picture can connect you to an experience. And that experience connects you to an emotion. And that emotion can connect you to an action. And in business action and emotion can help your business grow or it can prevent that growth
How the Picture triggers the mind
What do you think when you look at each of the people in the picture above?
Do you see an excited grandmother who now will need to buy a gift for the newest grandchild or do you see something else?
Do you see a wizard and think of a flim flam man trying to get you to believe his pitch?
Or do you see the successful young executive busy closing the deal?
Do you see a young woman showing you something or do you see something else?
Why do car dealers use bikini models to sell certain brands of cars? Is it because the models make men feel young? Have you noticed the new beefcake models used to sell cars to women?
Why do successful real estate people show their houses in ways that make them inviting to the people who might buy the house?
What YOU See either virtually or actually triggers most of the things you say, do and think
When you have a picture, real or virtual (in your mind) of the prospect you are talking to, you write better copy. You create best when you talk to a real person about what you want to say. Seeing a real person rather than a vague construct, the demographic of your ideal prospect, helps you focus on what you want to say.
Understanding this concept is difficult for many of us. We are afraid that if we talk only to one picture we will miss opportunities with others. But, the interesting thing is that what you see in your picture is different from how others see themselves.
My Business Start Up was specifically targeted to women over 50 who were finding it difficult to find employment and self employment was a viable option for their skills. Our best pieces were created when we talked to each other either in person or pictures each other.
But our following included men and people in their teens and twenties who saw value in the messages we were giving.
Roberta Budvietas
Researching Expectations for 2013
On going research is essential for any business to succeed. Today would you please answer 8 simple questions that will allow me to develop materials and blogs to help you more effectively. The survey is here http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/62YM3QN.
Your expectations in life and business often dictate how you respond to your environment and the events that happen. In life this can affect things like:
- Relationships
- Career
- Children
- Where you live
- How you live
In business your expectations can affect:
- your cashflow
- how you deal with clients
- your sustainability
- how you run your “business”
If you expect your clients will have problems with your price or service, they often do.
If you think of your business as a way to keep you busy then it does.
If you expect to grow each year and find new opportunities you will but if you buy into the dire economic woes that sell media, then you can struggle and feel challenged.
So what are your expectations. Please take a moment to fill in the survey and remember that if you want help to grow your business this year, a mentor can make the difference between same old same, old and expecting more.
Take you ideas to $$$$s in 2013 and have fun, earn funds and be fit.
Roberta
No Profit, Get a Job or……
Sometimes professional advisors really fail to understand the real world of small business.
A client of mine was advised by a financial person the other day that since their business had not earned any profit in 18 months (the length of time the business had existed) the main contractor should get a job.
Now this business has no debt. It had invoices out for more than its monthly payments and jobs in his area of specialty were scarce. So getting a job, if he could, would be a challenge. Meanwhile, if he takes his eye off current and future contracts to look for a job, the family would be in dire straights.
No Profit. So is a job the answer?
Profit and cashflow are 2 different things. Profit is a bookkeeping total whereas cashflow is the flow of money in and out or the business. Many businesses have good profit but poor cashflow. They have high debt that prohibits growth and yet they are profitable.
So if your financial advisors are telling you to get a job because you have no profit, look at these things before you make the move.
- Is your cashflow positive or negative?
- Does your debts and operating expenses allow you to pay yourself a wage?
- Do you have any work coming up that you are sure to get?
- Are there any job vacancies in your field or are people being made redundant and losing their jobs?
- Is there contract work out there, if only you could find it?
Having a job is lovely as it guarantees a steady income. But does it really guarantee your future?
EVERY employer can restructure and you can find yourself out of a job. EVERY employer can be sold, have the owner die or have some physical disaster happen that closes it down overnight.
If we taught every child to read, write, do arithmetic and be responsible for contracting their physical energy and mental acumen to others who need that service, the world would be in better shape.
If we paid out only what we earned minus 10% then we would reduce stress, sickness and financial problems. In other words, we lived within our income.
Profit is a great measure of a successful business but only contribution and the ability to pay debts and manage growth, truly indicate a successful business that meets the needs of its clients, owners and the community.
Today commit to your financial management to managing cashflow rather than profit.
Has anyone ever told you to get a job? In the comments below share what you did? Oh and please share this blog with others. Thank you.
To your success.
Roberta Budvietas
What do you want to earn?
What you want to earn and what you earn are often very different for many people.
To earn anything means that you need to do something, say something, produce something or talk to someone. There is always a 
correlation:-
effort = income
There will be times when the income may seem disproportional to the effort you put in though.
There will be many times when you work very hard and seem to achieve nothing. Oh and before you tell me that winning a lottery or another game of chance, think – you have to buy the ticket or enter the contest.
So let’s look at what you want to earn in your business.
You need to do some research and you also need to do some personal mindset work.
- Look at what other similar businesses earn. Keep in mind that the revenue in must also cover the cost of the goods you sold, some of your expenses and the related taxes.
- Look at how comfortable you are at charging that rate. If you feel that the norm in industry is comfortable for you to charge than see what happens if you increase that by 10%. Unless you believe that the rates are too high for your target niche, try never to charge less.
- Look at what you were earning as an employee and how that income supported your lifestyle. In your own business will this be adequate for you or do you need to earn more? If you need to earn more, what more will you deliver to your clients?
- And finally, look at what your clients can afford to pay. If the people you want to deal with can afford what you want to earn, then charge them that price but unless you can find clients who are able to pay you what you want to earn then you will never earn it.
- And finally, figure out if there are enough hours in the day to deliver what you want to earn. If you are the sole deliverer of your service and your service delivery model requires you to produce the goods, then you are limited by the time you have available to deliver. For example – If you get paid $20.00 per hour and can only work 5 hours per day 4 days per week, you can only earn 20*5*4= 400 per week out of which you will have to pay costs and tax.
Take some time to figure out what you want to earn and then create a sales forecast and a cashflow forecast to see if you are VIABLE. It always surprises people when they do the numbers how hard it is to earn what they want.
In the comments let me know if you are earning what you want and what you are doing about changing the situation.
To your well-being
Roberta Budvietas
What about the numbers?
This morning I read a great message from Sandi Krakowski. The title was “It’s Just Numbers” and the line that really
stood out for me was
“Behind every call, behind every lead, behind every opt in and email that we have the privilege of serving is a life.”
In business it is about the numbers but those numbers always relate to something happening with people. Every transaction is based on one person giving another person something that they want. The exchange, whether in goods, service, money, an address, or a comment is based on the exchange.
The Numbers
You always need to watch the numbers in business but if you take care of people, the numbers should take care of themselves.
And yes, sometimes you can give more than you get in the short run.
It can be a challenge taking care of the numbers but without doing the accounting or keeping track of the expenses and the outcomes, you can lose control.
- You need to know the costs you must cover with your sales to stay in business. These are broken into 2 main categories:
Costs to have something to sell (production costs – goods and labour)
Costs to keep the operation going (rent, phone, internet, transportation, taxes, etc.)
- You need to track that the money owing and owed is collected and paid
- You need to track your time, especially the time you promised to deliver in.
- You need to plan the actual ability to deliver. Without extra manpower you have only so many hours in any day to work.
- You need to monitor the time you spend doing a job to the number of hours you spend finding the next job.
Most people dislike numbers because they would rather just get on with their job. They believe that numbers complicate their job but…
- A chef uses numbers to figure out quantity needed to put quantity of goods on a plate at a price to serve to a client
- A fashion designer needs to work with the number of meters of fabric, notions and other bits that goes into a creation that will sell for a price
- A trades person works out the parts and the hours to quote to fix something.
- A manufacturer works out the the quantity of raw materials and labour they will need to produce the items to sell
- A retailer figures out the number of items they will sell and looks at things like size and colour too.
Roberta Budvietas
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Guest Blogging with Jon Morrow
