Great Businesses are Discovered, Not Planned. Heard at an outdoor café along University Avenue in Palo Alto: “The strategy was clear.
You can’t start as a platform. You start as an application and then, when the user base is large enough to get a network effect, you can pivot into a platform.” Knowing nods around the table; wisdom understood by the cognoscenti. I was hunkered down with a Super Tuscan at the last sidewalk table, eavesdropping on the ideas circulating among the start-up crowd. This one is a lesson from my elective course at Stanford. For more evidence, go back and look at the strategic plan from years ago at your favorite successful company.
So how do we deal with the fact that discovery trumps planning? One common reaction is to pretend that the success was planned. Another bad reaction is to wax cynical, surmising that success really just comes down to luck. But there is information in those unanticipated consequences for those who know to seek it out. 3 Apps to Help You Write a Business Plan. If you have a killer idea for a startup, but lack the time, resources and budget to develop a business plan, a business plan-generating app can help you get your plan on paper and, ideally, off the ground.
A number of apps simplify the often tedious, complicated process of crafting a thorough bank- and investor-ready business plan. You provide the information, they organize it into a plan, and hopefully soon you'll be in business. Here's a look at three apps that can help get your business plan rolling: 1. Enloop. Enloop's Free & Easy option includes a single custom business plan packaged in a clean, professionally formatted PDF file that you can download, print and share. 3 Apps to Help You Write a Marketing Plan. You might have a great product or an excellent service but your business won't grow unless people know you're out there.
That requires marketing -- online, mobile, on Google, Facebook, direct mail or even printed flyers on doorstep. Page 2 Need a Business Idea? Here are 55. This article has been excerpted from 55 Surefire Home Based Businesses You Can Start for Under $5,000 by Entrepreneur Press & Cheryl Kimball (2009), available from Entrepreneur Press.
Today, tens of thousands of people are considering starting a home based business, and for good reasons. On average, people can expect to have two and three careers during their work life. Those leaving one career often think about their second or third career move being to their own home. People who have been part of the traditional nine-to-five work force and are on the verge of retiring from that life are thinking of what to do next. The good news: Starting a homebased business is within the reach of almost anyone who wants to take a risk and work hard. $1,500 or less to start up 1. Create a flier outlining your services. In many parts of the country, this business tends to be seasonal, but you can find ways around that. 3. 4. 3 Steps to Creating Your Branding Message.
You only have one value proposition and you want it to stick in your customers' minds.
BMW is the "ultimate driving machine. " Apple customers "think different. " Nike's message -- "Just do it" -- is ubiquitous with the brand. In my column "The Secret to a Strong Branding Message? Focus," I discuss the need to be one thing in the minds of your customers. The answer is to triangulate. Look for the intersection of three perspectives to identify your promise: the customer perspective, internal perspective and marketplace perspective. Take, for example, the Oakland, Calif. How to Get Started on Pinterest: 8 Boards Worth Creating. Starting a Virtual Assistant Business. Interested in starting one of the fastest-growing homebased businesses around?
These existing business owners' advice can help you get started. When Wicked Wordcraft president Angela Allen-Parker started her online business in 1999, she admits her parents feared she'd made a horrible mistake. Pinterest Marketing Tips: What You Can Learn From 20 Big Brands. Having a specific strategy for using Pinterest is still an entirely new realm, and it can help to have some inspiration from others who have blazed the trail for the rest of us.
Pinterest-marketing experts such as Cynthia Sanchez of Oh So Pinteresting have helped show other marketers how Pinterest can be beneficial to their businesses. For some companies, Pinterest can be a huge online marketing opportunity. To know how to make the most use of the picture-sharing platform, sometimes it's best to look at how larger companies are using Pinterest and getting it right. The following 20 brands on Pinterest give us some insight into the type of content that makes users gain so many followers, as well as how your target audience's overall exposure to and perception of your brand makes an impact when building up a faithful online community. Related: How to Keep Your Pinterest Boards Fresh, Fun and Relevant Comedienne Ellen DeGeneres is her own brand, built around her daily talk show and books.
Op-Ed Columnist - The Do-It-Yourself Economy.