Burden of Number one?

If only No. 1 would have mattered world would have been a dangerous place. Business is not being run by just one percentage of business community. It takes rest 39% to manage the show and another 60% to validate the show.  Being at no. one might be a good idea, but draining all the resources and getting frustrated on the way just to be no one is insane race, doesn’t lead you anywhere. Reaching no. one position is not a big deal but maintaining yourself as a business or individual at no. one position is a challenge. Chase for no. one only if you have made up your mind to stay at no. one.  Being no. one has its own burdens associated with it - the constant performance pressure, vigilant eyes of customers and critics, lack of leisure time, being surrounded by greedy people and associations waiting to grab a pie of success are some. You are not supposed to commit slightest mistake at the apex position, not because things might go grossly wrong, but because of perceived sanctity of the position. You choose. It might be a good idea to focus on the things you do best and try to improve, innovate it, rather that wasting your time money and energy to mindless rat race to no. one position. 

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“Help your customer choose what you want them to choose”.

Some strategies to govern customer’s choices in your favor-

Provide multiple product option in the same category – e.g. same or similar energy drink in different colors, flavors and packaging in single cost bracket. Give them more options to choose.

Broaden your product line – Offer something which is perceived totally different from the existing product without expanding by leveraging your existing production and design capacity. Divert their attention to some other product from your line of product.

Start early – Your product should start targeting your prospective customers in its early interest phase, when children start choosing their own chocolate, when teenage start choosing their own spectacles, when a young couple start searching for their first car, when early grey-haired citizens start looking for investments. Approach early, either through target marketing or through mass promotion. 

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Key to TV Commercial business

TV commercials are highly competitive in nature and since viewers are getting more and more aware every day about the products, while being exposed to tempting products and offers of so many rival companies through different social media streams, one has to be very cautious while getting into TV commercial business. Few tips and question to ask yourself to get into TV commercial business -

Create a portfolio with different brands and products,

Focus on developing theme and script of your commercial no matter even if you are selling imaginary brands.

Test the commercials online through YouTube and different media channel.

Learn from the viewer’s feedback, re-launch the next version

It’s not just about what brand you choose to promote it’s about how you take an ordinary product and create a brand out of it.

It’s about how well you convey the message across to the audience, in that short period of time,

How sticky is your commercial, is it good enough for word of mouth publicity?

Does it have potential to go viral online?

Does it have wow factor?

Learn 25 Rules of success for business and online startups in the following article

http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/03/25-rules-of-success-for-business-and.html

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25 Rules of success for business and online startups

Launch early - you can’t afford to wait till you have a 100% fail-safe plan

Learn from your mistakes

Don’t repeat the same mistakes again, ..http://bit.ly/ArDoG0

Understand the legality of your business, choose your business name and content which is unique and does not attract legal notice.

Leverage your business through common attributes..http://bit.ly/xbhCGZ

Create business synergy among many businesses or support service or product line

Improve your products, services and online experience based on customer’s feedback.. http://bit.ly/xaNRyo

Reduce number of clicks to sell your products online

Reduce turnaround time

Promote relevant products

Do not get spread too thin doing multiple task yourself

Hire people for those parts of business you don’t like doing yourself

Keep track of your accounts from the day one; you are going to need those details on way to success

Maintain professional attitude from the get go …http://bit.ly/wEn1rh

Maintain focus- it’s easy to get distracted.. http://bit.ly/zuyxst

Be careful while hiring or joining friends for business…http://bit.ly/wi5I0i

Hang out with people with positive vibes, avoid people with negative spirit

Listen to criticism passively and discard everything which demotivates you

Utilize technological possibilities and help at your disposal ..http://bit.ly/yuGSYU

Utilize social media potential or hire someone to help you optimize it for you

Create a product or service capable of triggering word of mouth publicity… http://bit.ly/yibMqn

Pause to have a reality check, review and restrategize if needed… http://bit.ly/wv6vUE

Pause to appreciate what you have been doing

Don’t judge your success by someone else eye, only you know what you are getting from your business apart from money, things like satisfaction, attention , authority, control on your time and life etc. ..http://bit.ly/xLfxjc

Pay to yourself and feel good about you and what you have created.

Learn how to materialise every Business Opportunity which comes your way -http://bit.ly/x5Dv24

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Reading bestsellers before it’s written

You can't really afford to wait till someone gets inspired or disappointed or elevated or frustrated from everyday life or everyday business and compiles vivid colorful stories and experiences to mesmerize you, writes it down, get it published and waits till it hits the chart of bestseller, and book goes viral. By the time you are reading the book on a business trip journey or on a lazy Sunday afternoon story is as old as the first inspiration of bestseller writer which might be as old as his or her childhood memory or a decade or a year or few months old. You know the lightning pace at which the world and technology is changing, strategies evolving, myths are made and broken, breakthrough happening and believes are shattered as well as strengthened. You can judge yourself the relevance of those consolidated ideas in form of literature at this moment. 

Why not to have a glimpse of what’s going on at present in the human psyche and interaction, their hopes and aspirations. Why to wait till some skilled author will compile all this for you. Why not to go and read the first hand experiences and aspirations and lessons of millions out there writing every bit of their mind, a collective real time literature of mankind on blogs and forums and websites. Just be wise enough to know which information to relevant and which to discard. 


Similar is the process to understand your business from customer’s point of view. Now learn how to build and sell brand image of your business in following article- http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/6-ways-to-improve-your-products-and.html

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How to deal with business competition

If you think you can beat the competitor with rock bottom pricing, it can only be a short term strategy, its not sustainable. Bringing prices down to attract the customers will only reduce your profit margin, and you are only likely to compromise with quality of product or services.

To survive the competition or to win it, all you need to do is to provide uniqueness in your product or service or both to the end users. When number of people is selling the same product or service you need to differentiate yourself from the masses through innovation in product and services. 


Another advantage of having uniqueness in product and service is that you can dictate and control the prices and slowly a unique category of loyal customers emerges to buy your product and services, which also help promote your business through word of mouth publicity. You will need to create your own niche market by providing uniqueness to cope with Competition. Know top advantages of Niche Marketing, here - http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/top-10-advantages-of-niche-marketing.html

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Tricks of public relation - Workshop & Seminars

Attend every seminar and workshop in the city for first few years

Find out frequent faces of your industry attending seminars & workshop

Find out more about those influential personalities

Go ahead and introduce yourself - no matter how brief is the conversation

Do not forget to exchange business cards

Do write a customised mail to each of them within a week

Appreciate what they said or delivered in the presentation, or just thank them for their time

Do not let them forget you - keep posting mails appreciating their latest venture - also join them on Linkedin

Keep in touch

Your target is to be a recognized face in the crowd of thousands standing with the people you appreciated in your business startup days.

View top 10 suggestions for new startups and entrepreneurs, in the following post - http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/10-suggestions-for-new-start-ups-and.html

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Expand your business through Top 10 QR Code promotion approaches

QR Code holds immense marketing potential through both virtual online as well as physical world. Most of us know the tricks on online marketing and promotion. Promotion through QR codes are relatively new compared to online community and holds innumerable and ever new possibilities based on creativity on individuals and companies, some of these less explored or unexplored vistas of QR code promotion and marketing can be as follows.

QR code on product itself - helps educate customers about the product and company

Compulsory QR coding on Company brochures & pamphlets - promotion through workshop seminar pamphlets distribution

Integrating QR Code in company Business card of all the employees - minimalistic power packed business card

Cross company promotion through QR code- leveraging advantage of extended companies

QR codes on company owned vehicles/ fleets- promoting business wherever it goes

QR codes on Corporate gift items - Festive QR coding

QR billboards - for product promotion and company brand image 

QR Countdown timer at strategic locations - for public events, sports events, new year etc.

QR Sculpture and furniture for your office

QR coding art - creating eye catching QR codes with variation (which is possible without losing the code quality)  

Learn how to promote your business through Public Relation (PR) in the next article - http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/tricks-of-public-relation-workshop.html

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One page Business Philosophy

You should be able to summaries each component of your business for clarity, simplicity and understanding, though you can keep the details of business components for further reference.

One page Vision and Goal to guide the company

One page Target to drive the company

One page ever ready Business Plan to expand the client base

One page of Company Policy to guide the employee

One page Company Culture for uniformity

Know “why your Business needs to have a Vision” in the following post - http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/why-you-need-to-have-vision-for-your.html

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How to keep business proposal and project schedule realistic

It's easy to get swayed away by sheer numbers - do regular reality check

Don't get overenthusiastic with numbers - get your numbers validated by partners / trusted others

Overall business plan should make sense to your over-skeptical clients

Keep all the odd possibilities in mind while preparing project time schedule 

Business strategies should reflect in numbers and should complement each other

Try to foresee all the future obstacles and keep the time schedule flexible enough to accommodate the time lost due to this obstacle

Learn how and why to use Mindmapping tools which helps you streamline your business and makes your business plans realistic- http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/why-entrepreneur-should-start.html

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How to leverage your business in 7 easy ways

Find out other similar area of business expansion

Create and maintain a synergy between these businesses

Cross-promote your products using products complimenting to each other through your different business

Faster service and turn-around time using business process re-engineering

Automate as many services and process as possible - Auto reply, FAQ etc.

Utilize Social media potential

Outsource time consuming complicated processes with predefined operating procedure"

You should learn how much value you have created for yourself through your expanding business and tricks to know your market position in the next article - http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/top-10-indicators-to-assess-your.html

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6 ways to improve your products and company image

Customer feedback and Input

Quick Online Survey - Hire a online survey firm, integrating quick poll form in your website etc.

Studying available online comments on forums, blogs etc.

Periodic company brand image makeover to keep pace with the marketShift in strategies, if needed

You need to hire best designers in industries - Bootstrapping other requirements if needed 

You will learn about what is the common success factor between all the business owners in the following article- http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/what-is-common-between-successful.html

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Top 10 advantages of Niche Marketing

Higher perceived value due to unique content

Less Competition

You can quote higher prices

Higher profit margins

Early bird advantage

You can create your own niche market

Easy to establishment and operation - requiring minimal resources 

It's easier to provide targeted Solution in your area of expertise

Niche segment is loyal to your product or service once they like it

Easier to study the need of small niche market compared to general market

Suggestion

Find out the niche segment in wider publicized market itself like money, wellness etc.

Smaller the niche higher the profit margin - find out the minimum sustainable customer base

Keep upgrading industry knowledge as you grow

Here are the top 10 suggestions for new start-ups and entrepreneurs - http://fromthediaryofmentor.blogspot.in/2012/02/10-suggestions-for-new-start-ups-and.html

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