Strategic Planning | Dr. Ivan Misner®

20Feb2014

Jim Blasingame: ‘The Age of the Customer’string(53) "Jim Blasingame: ‘The Age of the Customer’"

I have been good friends with small business expert Jim Blasingame for over ten years and I can fully attest to the fact that his knowledge of what it takes to achieve success in small business is unparalleled (but don’t take my word for it, check out his bio below*). I am excited to announce that just a few weeks ago, he released a revolutionary new book that will change the way the we think about buying and selling.

This short video offers a quick overview of the premise of Jim’s newly released book, The Age of the Customer, which focuses on the momentous marketplace shift currently taking place that is affecting the way we all do business. Watch the video now to get a glimpse of what this significant marketplace shift means and to gain an awareness of the greatest danger it presents to business owners across the globe.

Knowledge is power and preparation is one of the greatest keys to success in business; The Age of the Customer arms you with the knowledge you need to prepare your business for lasting success. CLICK HERE FOR A FREE SAMPLE OF THE BOOK.

After watching the video, reading through the free book sample, or reading the entire book, I’d love to hear your thoughts on Jim’s ‘Age of the Customer’ concept–please leave your feedback in the comment forum below. Thanks!

* Jim Blasingame is one of the world’s foremost experts on small business and entrepreneurship, and was ranked as the #1 small business expert in the world by Google. President and founder of Small Business Network, Inc., Jim is the creator and award-winning host of The Small Business Advocate^® Show, nationally syndicated since 1997. As a high-energy keynote speaker, Jim talks to small business audiences about how to compete in the 21st century global marketplace, and he talks with large companies about how to speak small business as a second language. A syndicated columnist and the author of three books, including Small Business Is Like a Bunch of Bananas and Three Minutes to Success, which have sold almost 100,000 copies combined; his third book, The Age of the Customer^TM launched on January 27, 2014.

9Jan2014

Networking Strategy Advice from NetworkingNow.comstring(49) "Networking Strategy Advice from NetworkingNow.com"

January 9, 2014

Ivan Misner

4 Streams of Networking, networking strategy, NetworkingNow.com Educational Resources, Networking, Networking Prep, Networking Tactics, Strategic Planning, Strategy, System, Video Blog 1

Today I’d like to share a video that I recorded a while back that is timelessly useful when it comes to creating a solid and effective networking strategy. In the video, I outline the best way to find like-minded business professionals to network with and I explain the four different streams—or types of networks—which you should be sure to strategically build into your overall network.

This video comes from the educational video archive housed within NetworkingNow.com and it is just one example of the vast array of educational content offered on the NetworkingNow.com website—there are literally hundreds of business and networking downloads available in the site’s online library and you can access all of them for FREE for six months by entering the free subscription code given below.

The free subscription is a gift from BusinessNetworking.com and all you have to do is enter the code (“freesixmonths”) on NetworkingNow.com to gain access to the entire library of content! Please note that you will be required to enter a credit card number on the site but you will not be billed for the free six month membership. You will need to end your subscription if you don’t wish to be billed for the second six months.

Please leave a comment regarding your thoughts on this video and also letting me know what type of downloadable content you most like to access on sites like NetworkingNow.com:

Video?
Audio?
PDF Articles?
Digital Books?
Something Else? If so, what specifically?

6Jan2014

4 Questions to Start the New Year off Rightstring(43) "4 Questions to Start the New Year off Right"

January 6, 2014

Ivan Misner

business mission, core competencies, Direction, Environment, goals, new year, questions Business, Goals, Growth, Strategic Planning, Strategy, Success 4

With 2014 having just kicked off, it’s a whole new year and a perfect time to re-examine why you’re doing what you’re doing. You may think you know why you’re in business, but perhaps it’s been years since you gave it serious thought.

Ask yourself the following questions:

What is my business mission? — Beyond simply making a living, what are my long-range professional goals? Do I wish to become the standard by which my competitors are judged? Is it my dream to help make the world a better place?
Where is my organization going? — Am I achieving my mission? Am I making plans to accomplish it? How can I change policies, procedures or personnel to improve my chances of achieving my mission?
What environment is my organization operating in? — What are the social, economic and technological trends that affect the way I do business and my progress toward my goals?
What are my core competencies? — What do I like to do? What is it that I do better than my competitors? Is my business mission compatible with my values and aptitudes?

I’ve seen too many business professionals and companies make the mistake of trying to be all things to all people. Starting out with the fundamentally sound goal of finding a niche that will make them successful, they go astray by changing direction every time a customer or associate suggests a new product or service. The mission gets lost in a frantic scramble for business before the original idea ever gets a chance to pay off.

So, even if you think you know your mission, it will serve you well to pause periodically, analyze your business and, if necessary, refocus on your mission and philosophy.

If you found the questions above helpful in identifying where you and your business currently stand and where you’d like to go within the next year, I’d love to hear what you discovered. Please share your thoughts in the comment forum below. Thanks!

11Nov2013

Education Plus Preparation Equals Optimum Resultsstring(49) "Education Plus Preparation Equals Optimum Results"

During a conversation some years ago with Leslie Fiorenzo, a colleague of mine in the networking organization I founded, she made an interesting point of comparison between appreciating opera and learning to use word-of-mouth marketing in your business. She said, “The best way to experience opera is to see it on the stage, and the best way to use word of mouth is to put a referral marketing plan in place. The novice, in either case, may not know where to begin.”

We started talking about a system to generate business by referral and, just like opera, if you have little or no experience with referral marketing, it would be a mistake to jump into action without preparing yourself–preparation is key to success. Central to the referral-marketing process is getting people to send you referrals. To do so, they must know exactly what you do–what product or service you provide or make; how, and under what conditions, you provide it; how well you do it; and in what ways you are better at what you do than your competitors. You absolutely must communicate this information to your sources. And to communicate effectively, you must know the same things. Before business owners map out their referral marketing campaign, they must stop and get a clear picture of where their business currently stands.

Leslie commented that when people begin to learn and study opera, they begin with basic works by composers such as Giuseppe Verdi and Giacomo Puccini before moving on to more complex works by composers such as Richard Wagner. In the same way, when marketing your business by word of mouth, there is a place to start before you meet with the people in your network. You begin by preparing answers to some basic questions about yourself and your business like:

1. Why are you in business?
2. What do you sell?
3. Who are your customers and
4. How well do you compete?

The ability to communicate this information to your sources and prospects will be invaluable as you begin to build your network and formulate your plan to gain more and more business the most effective way–through referrals.

Once you master some basic tools, you can move on to a deeper understanding of the process. For example, there are three laws of Notable Networking:

1. Have a positive and supportive attitude, and provide a positive and supportive environment for other business people.
2) Learn how to use networking tools efficiently, including business cards and an informative name badge, and have a business-card case to hold others’ cards.
3) Networking is an acquired skill that requires listening to CDs, reading books/articles, picking the brains of great networkers and practicing what you’ve learned.

One fantastic place to get information about all things related to networking is NetworkingNow.com. I highly recommend that you become familiar with the basic tools of word-of-mouth marketing and begin to implement them in your business so that you can begin to watch it grow. Because, just like appreciating opera, if you don’t begin with the basics, you won’t experience the optimum result.

If there is an educational resource which you’ve found to be specifically valuable and effective in learning to network, I urge you to share it in the comment forum below so others might utilize it and benefit from it as well. After you leave a comment, be sure to send a quick e-mail to larry@bni.com with the subject line “Blog Comment” so he can reply to you with a coupon code for a free six-month subscription to NetworkingNow.com.

29Aug2013

How to Invest Your Time & Money for the Highest Returnstring(59) "How to Invest Your Time & Money for the Highest Return"

August 29, 2013

Ivan Misner

Benjamin Franklin, Bob, education, Learning, money, return on investment Business, Educational Resources, Entrepreneurial Enterprise, ROI, Self Development, Strategic Planning, Strategy, Success, Video Blog 14

In this video, I talk about how to invest time and money into your business in the way that will ultimately pay the highest return–education.

Many businesses fail within their first three years of existence because they only pay lip service to education yet aren’t willing to invest the time, effort, and money into learning about how to continually grow and develop in order to achieve the business goals and the vision they outlined for themselves at the start.

The fact is, people who immerse and engage in a culture of learning are much, much more successful than those who don’t. Watch the video now to learn about an action you can take this week that will help you measure whether or not you’re investing enough of your time and money into what will truly help your business earn more and achieve more.

I’m quite interested in hearing your thoughts on this video, your comments about what you currently do in order to invest in educating yourself to build your business, and also your results from carrying out the action item I explain at the end of the video. Please leave your feedback regarding any or all of these things in the comment forum below, and for the first ten people who add to their comment where Bob makes his cameo appearance (and get the answer right) during the video, I’ll send them a surprise gift that will most definitely help them invest in their networking education! (Note: To ensure you receive your gift, please e-mail your name and complete mailing address to erin@bni.com with the subject line “Bob.”) I’m looking forward to hearing from you!

11Apr2013

The 2 Key Factors of Successstring(28) "The 2 Key Factors of Success"

April 11, 2013

Ivan Misner

goals, Good Choices, hard work Self Development, Strategic Planning, Strategy, Success, Video Blog 1

In this video, I talk about the two factors that I firmly believe are what make people successful in any situation–hard work and good choices. The truth is, you can’t achieve success without both of these things.

People talk all the time about the necessity of hard work when it comes to success and though they’re one hundred percent correct about the importance of hard work, I’ve seen people work hard for decades and still not achieve the results they want because they consistently undermine themselves by making bad choices.

Think about one of your more important goals–are the choices you’ve been making surrounding that goal consistently contributing toward achievement of that goal? There’s no better time than now to make a list of the choices you’ve been making in relation to your goals, examine the list, and decide how you can make better choices toward your goals moving forward.

Are there additional factors which you believe have helped you or someone you know to achieve success in aspects of life and business? I’m always eager to hear new ideas and learn from others’ experiences and I know many of the people who read this blog share this desire to learn so please offer your thoughts in the comment forum below. Thanks!

25Feb2013

Who’s In Your Room? – A Personal Storystring(50) "Who’s In Your Room? – A Personal Story"

A few years ago my company was in the midst of one of the largest projects in the history of our organization. The project involved many people—it was very complex and financially challenging. It was also in trouble. I needed to select a key player for the project team. The man I chose had incredibly strong technical skills. He was very qualified for the project and was the perfect person to help turn this around . . . or so I thought. I knew he came with a lot of baggage. He didn’t always play well with others, he would fly off the handle emotionally when talking to people and, worst of all, he brought an immense amount of drama to the workplace. On the other hand he was highly qualified for the work. Based on those qualifications, I hired him as manager. I suspected there would be problems with the drama and the outbursts – however, I felt I could coach him and guide him through this.

It turns out I was wrong. Monumentally wrong.

Despite his incredible technical skills, his behavior more than offset his technical strengths. The project went from problematic to horrific within a year. It was way over budget, well behind schedule, and not nearly the quality that I expected. Around this time, one of the project team members told me that the best thing the project manager could do for a meeting was to call in sick! The team member said when the manager was not there they got a lot more done.

Right about that time, I attended a presentation that Stewart Emery did where he talked about the concept of “Who’s in Your Room?”. I walked out of that presentation and decided right then and there that this project leader should have never been in my room. I also realized that getting him out of the room was going to be very difficult. Why? Because he kept everything close to the vest. Most of the people in the project didn’t understand or know many of the aspects of the work, because this project leader didn’t collaborate or share information freely. I understood that removing him from the room was going to be difficult and painful. But I was clear on the reality that it had to be done.

It ended up taking months to lay the ground work with everyone on the team by me personally engaging them in pieces of the project they needed to know but weren’t privy to with this manager. I had to drop many of my normal responsibilities and devote an immense amount of time to this process. I promoted some people and moved others around. When all was ready, I made the move and let go of the project leader. There was an immediate and palpable change in the project. Today it has made incredible strides, and it is becoming exactly the product that I was hoping for and it is something I am proud of as an entrepreneur.

The lesson I learned in this very expensive and very stressful process was this: be very selective about who you let in your room. Don’t allow people in just because of their technical skills. I want a work environment that is a “drama-free” zone and I pick people for my organization who I want in my room. I now try to select qualified people who fit the organizational culture of collaboration, people who share information and knowledge and people who don’t bring to the process an Emmy Award winning soap opera of behaviors.

Have you experienced this phenomenon? If so, please tell us about it in the comment forum below and, also, please share any thoughts you have on Stewart’s Who’s in Your Room concept. Thanks!

31Dec2012

With All Due Respect for the Mayans . . .string(41) "With All Due Respect for the Mayans . . ."

December 31, 2012

Ivan Misner

Strategic Planning Business, Management, Recommendation, Self Development, Strategic Planning 4

With all due respect to the Mayans, 🙂 it appears that we need to give some thought to our plans for 2013.

Each year, a few days before New Year’s Eve, I head off to my mountain retreat in Big Bear Lake, California, to recharge my batteries. Getting away to the mountains is something I’ve done for almost two decades. It’s a great opportunity to spend time with the family and prepare for the onslaught of the coming year.

It’s also a good time to give some thought to the vision I have have for my business and life over the next year.

It’s hard to hit a target you’re not aiming at. The end of the year is a great time to think about some of your plans and goals for the next 12 months (and beyond). Even if all you have is a couple days, take the time at the end of every year to slow down and do some “vision making” for your business. Remember that a successful businessperson needs to work “on” the business as well as “in” the business. Work “on” your business this month by creating your vision for next year.

It’s also good to include some personal goals in your planning. Some of the business and personal goals I set for next year include: