Friday, October 1  

Doing business

Being in business is about doing business

At the risk of sounding like an absolute tosser - or more like one than usual ;-) - I'd like to share this bit of Brendon philosophy about business.

I did a fair bit of work for my brother when I first landed in this city about 7 years ago. And he often says the main thing I taught him was that he has to be "doing business" all the time.

That sounds like a fairly vague term or some Life Coach Psycho Babble, but it's not.

Here's 2 examples of what I mean

# 1: Made a pitch to an existing client this week for a new and improved web site. We originally did the site for the client about 6 months ago and it has exceeded all expectations. It's gone brilliantly and he is already making a full time income from the site.

We discussed at length how we could move the site onto the next level in terms of quality, professionalism, automation, etc with a full estimate of the benefits to him.

The client believed everything we told him about the sort of income he could expect, because our previous forecasts were very low compared to the $ he is doing through the site now.

But the client said no to our proposal. He doesn't have the capital to invest.

# 2: We own and manage a web site with a very specific niche. There is about to be a lot of publicity (starting tonight) for a product that is targeted to our niche. I don't know what the product, how much it is or if it will actually help our market.

Now this is what doing business is about

With # 2: I'll be finding out all about the product as soon as possible. If it meets the need for my market (and I can buy it) I'll be offering the product to our database of customers and subscribers within an hour(approximately 35,000).

With # 1: Under capitalisation is the big problem for many businesses. But if you identify something that will make you good $ then there is always a way.

This client could have come back to me with a payment plan, a profit share deal, a deal for bartering services....any number of things.

That's 2 examples of doing things. You have to make things happen.
If you are in business you have to be out there doing business.

Have a good weekend.

Cheers

Brendon