When you start out in business, you find yourself competing in the marketplace with much more established companies and brands. As a result, the temptation is often to offer clients the lowest price possible in order to compete and win business. However, this is a big mistake. Pricing your services or products at a bargain rate can negatively affect your cash flow and the reputation of your business. Instead, you need to price for profit. This sends a clear message to potential clients that your company’s products and services have a perceived value. If you offer big discounts and lower your pricing in the marketplace, clients perceive they are not getting quality, and this is a problem. Ultimately, customers want to buy their products and services from a reputable company that is profitable, as that means it is a successful company and one to be trusted. It is all a matter of confidence building, and pricing for profit is part of that process.

This month, global media reported that Amazon CEO, Jeff Bezos, is now the richest person of all time with a net worth of $105.1 billion. The majority of that net worth comes from the 78.9 million shares of Amazon stock he owns. This year so far, Amazon shares are up 7%, rising by 56% last year. So, what is Amazon’s incredible secret to success? According to Bezos, it starts with its Leadership Principles. The first Leadership Principle is customer obsession. The company believes leaders start with the customer and work backwards. They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust. Although leaders pay attention to competitors, they obsess over customers first and foremost. There is a lot that entrepreneurs can learn from Amazon’s Leadership Principle approach, because ultimately it doesn’t matter how big or small the business is, it all starts and ends with the customer. So, the question is, are you customer obsessed?

Guy Kawasaki once said, “If you want to make a good first impression, smile at people. What does it cost to smile? Nothing! What does it cost not to smile? Everything, if not smiling prevents you from enchanting people.” In business, making that first impression count is important. After all, you may not get another chance to connect with that potential client. Here are some practical tips to help you make the right impression. Firstly, be present in the moment or meeting, put the phone away so there are no distractions, and focus on the people you are speaking to. Secondly, ensure your greeting is positive, your eye-contact is maintained, and your handshake is firm. Thirdly, do your research on the people you will be meeting, so you are well prepared. Fourthly, greet everyone personally and by name. Finally, be genuine and honest, don’t try to be someone you are not. That’s how to make a good impression!

Not everyone is a born salesperson and it can be tough for many entrepreneurs to sell their products and services. It can be especially hard when you lose a sale that you worked so hard to close. So how do you recover from what seems at first sight to be a rejection by your prospective client? Simple, you learn the art of the rebound, and you bounce back! It starts with firstly understanding why the sale didn’t close. There could be a number of reasons - perhaps the client didn’t see enough value in the product or service; or maybe the timing wasn’t right; or perhaps the pricing was too high; or it could simply be that the client was going through a change in priorities. Whatever the reason, move on, and remember that ‘No’ to a sale today, doesn’t mean ‘No’ to a sale tomorrow. Resilience and persistence are everything when it comes to sales - keep the client contact going, keep communications going, and wait for the right time to pitch again.

It’s always easier to hit a target when you can clearly see it, when it doesn’t move, and when there’s no ambiguity about it. The same can be said when it comes to hitting revenue goals for the year ahead. One of the challenges for many entrepreneurs in the early days in business, is setting clear revenue targets instead of just making enough money to cover the bills and pay a salary each month. Yet it’s always easier to hit a target when you know what it looks like. So, if you haven’t yet set your revenue goal for the year, start now. Figure out your various expenses that have to be covered, including business and personal expenses, taxes, savings and any investments you want to make this year and then calculate what you want to make once all those are covered. Then, ensure you look at that revenue goal target each morning to keep you focused on the task at hand.

Many of us grew up being taught that the best way to get something done right is to do it yourself! That’s okay advice if you are happy going alone in life and business. But if you want to grow, to expand, to push boundaries, then it’s essential to also learn the art of delegation. However, it does require a mind-shift - ultimately, it’s about learning to trust people around you, to empower them to run with your ideas, to give them more responsibility. It can be scary at first, but it just makes good business sense. As one of the most famous delegators in business, Richard Branson, once said: “If you really want to grow as an entrepreneur, you’ve got to learn to delegate. You’ll find that you have more time to focus on the big picture and achieve the things you need to do to make your product or service stand out."

It’s a human need - we all like to feel good about the work we do and the contribution we are making - to the world, to our businesses, to the lives of others. But when it comes to trying to attract the best young talent to your company and brand, Millennials genuinely like to feel their efforts are making a difference. They want to align themselves to a mission and vision they can feel good about, to a company that has shared values. They want to know that the company and brand they choose to work with has a purpose they can get behind. So how are you communicating your mission, your vision, and your company values, not only to your customers, but also to the new generation of people you would like to work for you? If your company has a mission and a purpose that appeals to talented people, they will feel good about getting things done and they will be ready to work hard for you.

You know the quote, “If your dream doesn’t scare you, it isn’t big enough,” by author Kristine Stevens in her book of the same name about her solo journey around the world? It’s an inspirational story with a powerful message. As entrepreneurs, we need to keep pushing ourselves to think bigger, to think outside the box, to push the envelope each time we embark on a new project or venture. Doing something each day that pushes us, and sometimes even scares us in business terms, is a great habit, not just a great quote. It helps us to lose the sense of fear that comes with doing something new, something untried and untested. It builds confidence and makes us braver when the need is there to launch something new, or to break into new markets or sectors. It’s all about stepping out of the familiar and exposing ourselves to new possibilities in business and life.

We all know that feeling - it’s the start of a New Year and already our email inboxes are full of invitations to attend events, give talks, write articles, etc - and that’s great. But, if we are to fulfill our goals this year, it’s essential that most things we get involved with fit into our bigger business and personal strategies for 2018. So the way to avoid getting distracted from our purpose, and to ensure we build momentum on our priorities from the beginning of the year, is to ask ourselves some key questions before saying yes or no to these requests. Firstly, will the commitment contribute to achieving key goals? Secondly, will there be clear outcomes that will add value? Thirdly, will there be tangible benefits in terms of brand or personal profile building? Fourthly, will it be rewarding from a personal development perspective? If the answer is yes to most of these questions, then it could be worth getting involved. Otherwise, focus on those things that get you closer to your goals for the year ahead.

There is nothing quite as satisfying as receiving great feedback from your customers, it makes all your hard work feel worthwhile. But feedback goes both ways. So the trick to keeping your happy customers positive is to keep them engaged and feeling valued. Here are four ways to turn your happy customers into ‘super fans’. Firstly, if you receive feedback, acknowledge it immediately and respond directly. Secondly, take the time to properly reply to any positive review. Thirdly, ensure there is a personalized sign off to any response. Finally, provide inside knowledge on any news, developments, giveaways, special offers, etc to engage the reviewer further and to make them feel part of the community. After all, happy customers who can be turned into ‘super fans’ become your best ambassadors.

Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy author, Douglas Adams, once said, "I love deadlines. I love the whooshing sound they make as they go by.” That is one quote that will resonate with any entrepreneur who has a tendency towards procrastination and who is regularly time challenged when it comes to hitting key project or business deadlines. Yet deadlines can be our best friends in the business-world as long as they are strategic in nature. Strategic deadlines really do hold us accountable and help us at a practical level to move closer to our goals every day. They provide us with a timeline for action, and a framework for experiencing small wins along the way, instead of one big delivery target, if managed properly. So instead of bemoaning deadlines and seeing them as a huge pressure point, learn to love the power of the deadline to keep us focused on the end goal.

The late French sociologist and expert on social capital theory, Pierre Bourdieu, coined the term Social Currency, which describes the resources and abilities created and accessible through presence in offline or online networks and communities. He believed that great value can be derived from social participation through such networks and that personal Social Currency can be used to measure an individual’s online influence and access to influencers, derived from their presence on social media sites. Today, it has become more popular because tracking tools, analytics and other technologies make it easier to track and compare Social Currency. From a personal and brand positioning perspective, where getting the competitive edge can be crucial to successfully tapping into new business opportunities, your Social Currency could provide that extra USP you are looking for.

Curiosity refers to the thirst for knowing and the desire to explore and learn. It is perhaps not the most obvious trait that comes to mind when you think about what it takes to be successful in business, but today it’s essential. For any entrepreneur looking to effectively compete and succeed in an ever changing and technologically advancing business environment, curiosity is a key attribute to have. People who adopt a curious attitude in life and in business have the ability to think out of the box, to try new things, to explore unconventional ideas and concepts, and then transform traditional ways of doing business. Companies that nurture curiosity will see creativity increase, and as creativity grows, so does a company's ability to innovate and stay ahead of the competition. As the legendary Walt Disney once said, “We keep moving forward, opening new doors and doing things because we’re curious, and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.” 

Is this the year to take more risks in life and business? I asked myself this question when I was doing some research for an article I was writing and I came across a quote by Mark Zuckerberg  who once said, “The biggest risk is not to take any risk.” There has been a long regarded view that women entrepreneurs are largely more risk averse than their male counterparts. But an interesting study last year by BMO Wealth Management shattered that notion by finding that women entrepreneurs are ‘risk rational’, taking more calculated risks in their business decision-making processes. In fact, sixty-one percent of women entrepreneurs interviewed for the report felt a business risk should be calculated, assessed and then managed well, indicating a confident approach to risk taking. Perhaps it’s like Mark Zuckerberg suggests, until we are willing to put ourselves out there, step out of our comfort zones and take a calculated risk, we will never able to achieve our full potential.

We all know the phrase, “if you can visualize it, you can make it happen”, but how often do we apply that to our business building approach? Many successful entrepreneurs use vision boards to help them to maintain their focus, keep them motivated, and ensure their eyes remain firmly fixed on their ultimate goals. By creating a vision board which clearly articulates what you are trying to achieve, in a highly pictorial and inspirational way, it brings your vision and your goals so much closer, and helps you to make them real. Ultimately, visualization is a powerful confidence building tool to keep you motivated and ensure you take the necessary steps and actions each day to turn the dream into reality. As Oprah Winfrey says: “Create the highest, grandest vision possible for your life, because you become what you believe.” 

As an entrepreneur, chances are that before the holidays you did your annual end of year review. You evaluated what worked and what didn’t, what could have been done differently, whether you met your objectives set at the beginning of the year, etc. But what matters now, at the start of an exciting year ahead, is how you take those learnings and apply them to your new business strategy. The big question is do you know where you are headed, what you are trying to achieve, what goals you are setting for yourself and the business? Set that compass for a successful year ahead, have a clear idea of the direction you are headed in, and have your objectives clearly set out with targets in place to be reached. That compass will keep you on the right track, no matter what happens along the way.

Much has been written about the 80-20 Principle - the idea that with the right focus, 80 percent of the results come from 20 percent of the effort. In business, if you can successfully apply this approach to your sales generation activity, this means that 80 percent of the sales should come from 20 percent of the customers. The trick is to hone your efforts and concentrate your time on what will bring the biggest results, and this doesn’t necessarily mean working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Instead, it’s about focusing on what is working, identifying those tasks and activities that are producing the results, and scaling those activities. Remember some of the principles outlined in Tim Ferris’ book 4 Hour Work Week? The book talks about the secret to business success coming from expending quality time on highly focused activity, rather than quantity time on multiple tasks that dilute the outcome. Just identify what efforts are producing the biggest results and then formulate your sales plan to maximize the approach. 

A new report on the changing global manufacturing landscape has just been released, and it makes for interesting reading. “IDC Futurescape: Worldwide Manufacturing Predictions 2018” predicts that by 2020, 60% of manufacturers will rely on digital platforms, which will support as much as 30% of their overall revenue. Most of the group’s predictions refer to a continuum of change and digital transformation within the wider ecosystem of the manufacturing industry and global economy. Manufacturers are expected to adapt rapidly as new digital technologies, new competitors and new ecosystems, create new ways of doing business. The report also predicts that those manufacturers that can speed their adoption of digital capabilities in order to create business value will ultimately be the leaders of their industry sectors. It’s something for Africa’s women manufacturing entrepreneurs to think about!

There is a concept often used in meteorology known as the Butterfly Effect. It looks at how often small and insignificant changes made in one place could result in large differences somewhere else or at a later state. What seem like small, very insignificant decisions might or might not have a larger impact on your life than you originally might have thought. For example, getting up 30 minutes earlier in a morning could provide you with much needed, quiet strategic thinking time that is essential to help the business grow. Or making a conscious decision to procrastinate less, could lead to better, faster decision-making, essential for capitalizing on new business opportunities that can transform the business. Simple, seemingly small changes made or new small habits formed can have the butterfly effect that can enhance your business journey.

If you are one of those people who each year make a New Year’s resolution, only to break it within the first few days, then you are not alone. So, how about this year doing things differently? What if your resolution this year was to think positively in all you do, to choose to see the world as a glass half full, rather than a glass half empty. In life and particularly in business, people are drawn to those who are positive in their outlook, positive in their approach to challenges, and positive in the way they relate to others. Sometimes, all it takes is a change of mindset. As Oprah Winfrey says: “The greatest discovery of all time is that a person can change their future by merely changing their attitude.” So will embracing the power of positivity be your New Year’s Resolution this year?