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Where am I going: Integrity & Marketing Management for the woman entrepreneur

Despite a still struggling economy, many women are leaving the security of their 9-to-5, making the decision to take a leap of faith and starting their own businesses. Most of my clients started in business with many big ideas but without a real sense of how businesses are run in a tight economy.

Finding the right location, hiring the right staff, and making the right marketing decisions are all valid issues but what I find  too often among my clients is the failure to properly plan and execute a business idea. You may want to get a Cosmo before reading any further; I’m here to tell you the truth, not please you with lies.
If you’ve been paying attention to my past articles, you know that you may have over spent when initially setting up your business.  I feel very comfortable making that assessment even if I haven’t met a woman business  owner for one simple reason; many of us don’t know where we’re going because we don’t know where we are in our businesses initially.  Do you know there’s a formula which will tell you the exact value of your business? The formula is important because it helps you make well-informed decisions about budgets and expenditures. Are you listening?

Your company’s personal formula for success

Seconds CEO, Nick Hughes believes all business owners must start with a clear and simple idea, but cover all bases to include target markets. Many women business owners start out not knowing who they’re targeting. Get focused! 

Next, know your risks. As romantic as the notion of managing your own business may be, there is a downside. Assess the risks, keeping in mind the five “P”s of business; proper planning prevents poor performance. In line with understanding risks, please retain and accountant and an attorney. I feel the need to be blunt here; the attorney and accountant you hire must have a specialty or extensive experience in your area of business. There’s no room for nepotism here; don’t hire your uncle.

Create your own niche. There are a million businesses out there but the ones we remember are those that have a niche or something that draws us in. For example, most of my clients are home health providers. There are literally thousands of  home health providers in the mid-Atlantic area. However, by creating a niche market and developing a campaign to match, we were able to increase visibility and revenue for providers in 2011.

“The enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend”

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Know your competition. While partnerships are great, business is business. If there’s to be only one success story, it should be yours. Perform a market analysis or ask your consultant about your service area. I know you have a consultant, right? A market analysis is fairly easy to obtain but any reputable consultant can tell you the condition of your market. When partnering with other business owners, ensure professional lines are clearly drawn in ink.

The Kindness and comfort of strangers

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Starting a business in a tough economy is hard. Starting a business with family and friends in a tough economy is suicide. Not to be too harsh, I too have made this mistake more than once but the reality is; strangers with common goals are generally more successful than commoners with strange goals. That is to say, don’t let relationships get in the way of your pursuit of happiness.

Measuring and cutting     

Lean Start-up entrepreneur, Eric Ries tells us; good management relies on mangers being able to measure the right things and draw the right conclusions from those measurements. In a down economy cutbacks are sometimes unavoidable. That doesn’t mean you should hesitate to make them. Cut back on things before people. Measure all parameters before making cuts.  Don’t apologize. 

Oops, I.M. managing!

The one thing you can’t gain from cutbacks is the one thing most women entrepreneurs covet, growth. Growth in business comes in many forms, experience, knowledge, relationships. But at the end of the business day, what we need is sustained profitability. To ensure profitability and growth, managers must have a skill set, founded in integrity and marketing goals. The following is the skill set I believe every business women should have to lay a foundation for efficacy-based management and growth:

1.      Basic Business Acumen- Develop a workable business plan, even if you’re not planning to seek funding.

2.      Salesmanship: At least one member of your leadership team should be good at sales and promotion. Businesses don’t sell themselves.

3.      Brand management: Social media and market savvy, enough said.

4.      M&M: Measurement & management; you have to be able to make tough decisions and reassess goals at east annually.

5.      Vision: keep focused and ensure mission compliance.

Now you’re managing. !

By the way, if you need that formula I referred to earlier, email me at Shereese@mayhac.com. I’ll send you the formula and an example.