2 Ways to eliminate your competition it s easy

Eliminating your competition is the easiest way to increase your chances of business success. And I don’t mean literally eliminate them, in the sense of doing something “bad” to them. When I say eliminate, I mean ... take them out of your prospect’s consideration set for your product or service category. Make it so your prospects ONLY think of your business, product or service when they are contemplating making a purchase. That way you get their business, instead of your competition making the sale. What this means is if you sell widgets, you want your prospects to only think of your widgets when they are thinking of buying widgets. This is pretty easy to do if your business is not in a competitive industry. But let’s suppose there are all kinds of businesses selling what you are selling, or filling the same consumer or business need you are filling. How can you make sure your prospects ONLY think of you — and therefore only BUY from you — and not all those other companies? Answer: By thoroughly understanding those competing businesses and then doing one of two things: (1) Finding a position in the category you can own. This will separate you from all the other businesses and will make you uniquely qualified in the eyes of your prospect to fill their need. This usually requires finding a specific market niche you can focus on, or finding a specific product or service attribute or benefit, that is of value to your prospects, that none of your competitors can claim or are currently promoting. This puts you in a class of your own and virtually eliminates the competition. No one does exactly what you do. Or in the quite the way you do it. (2) By turning your competitors into “co-opitors.” What the heck is a “co-opitor?” It is a competitor that you turn into a partner or a cooperator. Are there businesses or individuals with whom you could partner, with the idea of referring business to each other? For example, a wellness coach could partner with a weight watchers clinic or a health club or a massage therapist. All of these practitioners are selling improved health and well being, but they can also be positioned as complementary services. Or, let’s say you are a web site designer and you decide to focus primarily on working with small businesses (a market niche). You could create a partnership with another web site designer who has decided to focus on large corporations. If you both agree to only take on business that fits your identified niche, and to refer business outside your niche to the partner, you both win. You can partner with other businesses in your exact business in this manner, by identifying niches, by geographic area served, or by size or type of clients served. And you can partner with businesses in different categories that fill a similar customer need by agreeing to work together to help each other get customers. There is not a business out there that cannot effectively use one of these two strategies to significantly reduce their competition. So figure out which strategy fits your business best, and make it a priority to eliminate your competition this year. (c) Copyright 2005 Debbie LaChusa, 10stepmarketing

Entrepreneurs you might want to drop out of college

Young entrepreneurs and business owners are often times faced with the choice of which road to take. On one hand, there is the more conservative route of staying in college and getting a degree. On the other hand, many have thriving businesses that are making more money than their degree will ever get for them. Is college simply a hindrance? Or is it a valuable resource that should be continued at all costs. Many college business owners don't even realize they have the choice of dropping out. Knowing this option is there could be vital to the success of their future business. If you are in college and are an entrepreneur or business owner you must ask your self this question: should I drop out of college? The answer to this question often comes in many forms from many different people. I was recently at an entrepreneurial conference and had the opportunity to discuss this matter with many rich entrepreneurs. The answers I was getting from them were vastly different from those that my family had given me. On the one side I was being told that college is only useful if you are getting something out of it, and that if I was serious my businesses should take priority over schooling. From the family side I was being told to stay in school no matter what, put schooling at the forefront - there will always be time for business and it will be good to have a safe backup. Both of these answers have their merits, but which one is right?. It became clear to me that it was my decision - not the other wealthy entrepreneurs, and not your family. Why are you in college? This question is the fundamental element in the decision to drop out of college. Entrepreneurs must figure out the reality of why they are in college before making a decision to drop out. Some business owners are in college because their parents told them to go there, or because they didn't realize they had the choice. Other young entrepreneurs are in college because they find the information valuable and want to continue learning while they expand their business. Even more still had childhood dreams of one day being an engineer or architect and want to follow through with their early ideals. You must answer this question truthfully and honestly if you are going to make a choice about running your business full time or staying in college. Why Do You Want to Drop Out? It is very important to understand exactly why you want to drop out. Many business owners and entrepreneurs have vastly different reasons for dropping out of college and it is key that you understand yours. I have often fielded this question in conversation, and many times a young entrepreneur will want to drop out of college on pure speculation. This is never a good idea without a solid business plan. I recommend having a solid business plan and some backups in the least, as well as some plans for continued learning of business skills. Dropping out is a risky decision - entrepreneurs will understand and easily accept this fact. Understanding and accepting risk is part of being an entrepreneur and starting new businesses. I have also talked with many entrepreneurs who already have million dollar plus income, and are thinking about dropping out in order to focus more on their business. This instance presents an entirely new set of questions. Whatever your reasoning make sure that you understand and research your position. Here is the Secret to Making the Decision It all comes down to balancing the two sides of the argument. If you've figured out both your reasons for being in college and your reasons for dropping out and starting a business, then you can easily make a decision. The trick is to look at a list of both sides: your reasons for being in college and your reasons for going out and becoming an entrepreneur. If either side has reasons that aren't your own, or that have doubt in them, then you will most likely pick the other side. Here is an example situation, look at the two lists and decide what the student should do. Student A - Reasons to Stay in College: - My parents are paying for it, and they would flip if I left - Everyone I know is in college, it would be weird to leave. - A degree might give me some security later on. Student A - Reasons to Drop Out and Pursue Business - I have a solid business plan and have been working on it for months - My income is almost half of my parents already - Having more time to work on business would let me expand faster I think it is fairly clear in this setup that we have an entrepreneur at heart. There is doubt in the reasoning behind college, and he also doubts that he will even need the security of a degree. The second list is much more profound and certain. This student knows he will be successful as an entrepreneur and he only wants to build his business more. There is certainty and understanding in his tone. With this situation it seems very likely that the student would be far better off dropping out of college and pursuing his business goals. The case is almost never as cut and dry as the situation above, most young businessmen have far more complicated setups. Even with the complications, the end result is always the same. Follow the path that you are sure of in your heart. If you are an entrepreneur in the right position then you will know exactly why you want to drop out and that it will be better for you. Or, you will know that staying in college will teach you more about business and let you grow faster out of college. I will leave you with one last thing. Listen to your own thoughts, and pick the path that you know is better for you.

Keys to successful online entrepreneurship

Many people think operating an online business is good idea to make some extra money or to provide them with a way to work anywhere they want. An online business can be a very lucrative way to make money. A online business can provide you with more income and more freedom with your time. The key to having a successful online business is to find one that you believe in and that suits your style. For instance, if you don't like selling things or contacting people face to face or by phone, then you probably need to choose a online business that does not require these things. If the online business is selling a product that you, yourself would not use, or don't believe in, then it makes it very difficult to make a believable presentation to others. A online business is not going to run by itself, either. Most successful online business entrepreneurs would tell you that their online business got to be successful by working at it, putting in the time and the energy to make it a success. There is no online business that does not require some work. There are, however, some that do not require a large financial investment by you. The best way to find the perfect online business for you is to do some research about the many different online businesses out there. This way, you can feel confident that you have chosen a online business that you will be good at and will generate the income you are hoping for.

The five minute guide to what is in the public domain

Just how exactly do you determine what is in the public domain? I have come across this useful acronym to describe whether a work is in the public domain If it in the FRIDGE – its in the public domain. F is Facts R is Recipes I is Ideas D is Dedicated Works G is Government Works (U. S) E is Expired Works FACTS: Any fact whether historical or present, scientific or biographical are Public Domain. News reports and news broadcasts are sometimes copyrighted but not the news itself so you can rewrite a news article in your own works and you are not breaking any copyrights as facts just cannot be copyrighted. Some Facts related Public Domain resources: News: cnn/ Biographies, Histotical facts, science and more: infoplease/world. html Selected historical transcripts, translations and facsimilies from Western Europe eudocs. lib. byu. edu/index. php/Main_Page RECIPES: Recipes actually come under facts. Same sort of thing though you will have to reorder the ingredients and rewrite the methods to avoid copyright complications. The annotations and pictures in a published cookbooks are copyrighted however the recipes themselves are not. Although not protected by copyright they can be protected to a certain degree by intellectual property laws so proceed with caution in you are unable to make recipe look like your own. Here are some sites for food for thought: Searches over 400,000 recipes by ingredient, recipe, dish, chef etc. foodieview/index. jsp – Recipes approved and provided by home cooks worldwide: allrecipes/ Another searchable database: recipeland/ IDEAS: Ideas by themselves can not be copyrighted. If you apply an idea and can show something physical from it can be patented as long as they are novel or useful. But ideas themselves cannot be copyrighted so keep an eye out for an idea you like add a unique selling point of your own and copy away! Some great idea sources are here: A fantastic idea database springwise/ Places to find ideas article (written with article writers in mind but applies to anything you want to get ideas about): writersweekly/this_weeks_article/003318_03082006.html DEDICATED Sometimes you will still statements on websites saying work are dedicated to the public domain. Also ebooks that are freely distributed are in public domain (they have conditions that you cannot change the wording but they are in public domain all the same). Look out for websites and ebooks that have words to this effect in “I grant this to the public domain”. “I grant this to the public domain” sites: onlinebooks. library. upenn. edu/book-criteria. html – lots to explore on this one some great finds to be discovered sxc. hu/ - copyright free photos en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Main_Page - "All of the information in Wikipedia is free for anyone to copy, modify for their own purposes, and redistribute or use as they see fit, as long as the new version grants the same freedoms to others and acknowledges the authors of the Wikipedia article used (a credit or backlink to the original article is sufficient for this)." GOVERNMENT In the U. S works published by officials of the government are public domain. However when private contractors write government publications, the copyright can be retained. The government website have a whole load of information and images. If you looking for images a good tip is to search your subject in Google Images and limit to. gov sites . This is likely to be the largest source for public domain government content. Google has indexed loads so you can find it. google/unclesam All about the FBI! fbi. gov/ Government resources made available to American public gpoaccess. gov/databases. html EXPIRED Works that have expired are ones that have reached and gone beyond the limit of their copyright protection. This is not always easy to determine. You can safely assume everything before 1923 is public domain unless someone has renewed it. To find out if it has been renewed you can go to The Library of Congress Copyright Office ( copyright. gov/). Or you can do a quick search on net to see what other people are doing with that particular work or search something along the lines of “Little Red Riding Hood + public domain”. One of those should get you your answer. Expired works can be found on these sites: Project Gutenberg – probaly one of the more famous sources for public domain material gutenberg. org/catalog/ Fantastic selection of links to a a variety of speciality public domain books onlinebooks. library. upenn. edu/archives. html#specialty Increbible collection of public domain materials covering almost all religions sacred-texts/index. htm By reading through the above and taking a look at the resources given, you will be well on track to understanding how to determine what is in the public domain and hopefully be able to find a public domain works that you can republish, package and sell.