Get ready for that question Somebody walked up to me after a recent speech and said, “In 15 words, why should I do business with you?”

You need a good response. After you have created an elevator pitch and are comfortable presenting it, condense it even further. You might come into contact with someone who may have heard hundreds of elevator pitches and wants something even more concise. They may want 15 words. You have to be ready.

The 15-word response I responded, “I can turn your problems into solutions. I’ve been doing this since 1992.” That was 13 words (five seconds). It met his criteria and helped establish a dialog. We ended up talking for another 10 minutes. When you have an answer, you look competent and invite new business. If you don’t have one, you may end up looking inexperienced to a prospect. I am sharing a few more similar responses for your review. They’re all 15 words or fewer:

I can turn your problems into solutions. I’ve been doing this since .
I can turn your problems into solutions. How can I help you today?
I’m a business owner too. This works for me and my business.
My customers are jumping for joy!
I was skeptical at first, but I gave it a shot. It works great!
My product is not the cheapest, but it is the best value.
You won’t have to think about anymore.
Pay me to think about . You’re running a business.
It works. It works right. You won’t have to think about it at midnight.

Embrace one of these or create one of your own. Create a worksheet to help you answer the “Why should I do business with you?” question. Write the date in the left column and your 15-word responses in the right column. Get ready for this question. You may need a 15-word response tomorrow.

Daphne’s Answer I have a friend, Daphne the Dancer. Daphne already has sufficient information for three elevator pitches. She tells me, “I don’t know what to do. I’m working at my 9-5 job, I’m still teaching at the health club, and I’m launching my business. Can I get 90 seconds to recite three elevator pitches in a row?”

“No. That would confuse everybody. Stick with what you are pursuing. That is how you want people to remember you. That is where you’re looking for help, vendors, customers, and referrals. It’s OK to say what you are pursuing as long as you’re not physically at the 9-5 job or the health club when you say that. Keep your separate occupations separate. It’s also OK to tell people you are launching your own dance studio and it won’t happen in a New York minute.”

“OK. I am going with: ‘My name is Daphne Prancer. I dance. I have danced professionally in 10 countries. I have taught dance locally since 2005 and am opening Daphne Dance Company soon. I am looking for dance students of all ages. It’s OK if they’re deaf-I know sign language.’”

“That sounds pretty good. Let’s move on to another item. What will you say when you don’t have enough time for the elevator pitch? You may have someone approach you and say, ‘Why should I do business with you?’ Daphne, you may be surprised by how many people cannot answer that question quickly.”

She replies, “I can see that happening. How about these:

‘I can help you become a great dancer. That is what I do.’
‘My students have had great results.’
‘I’m not the cheapest, but my students appreciate the quality.’

“How will I know how much time I will have? Somebody may give me enough time for an elevator pitch and the next person may ask me, ‘Why should I do business with you?’ How will I know?”

“Ah yes, that could be a toughie. Here’s something I’ve noticed. Folks who want the 15-word response will usually dart across the room to get to you and then they will get in your face. If you see someone make a beeline to get to you and then stare at you like a cat stares at a mouse, they may be too impatient for the elevator speech. Give them a 15-word response.”

Create your elevator pitch and your 15-word responses today. You may need them tomorrow.

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As the owner or executive of a business, you have business goals. You have your 5-year goals or your long-term goals, and then there are steps along the way to reach those goals: medium-term goals and short-term goals.

If you were a retailer you might have the following goals:

Short term: sell a certain amount each sunny day, a certain amount each rainy day, a certain amount each holiday, weekend and weekday.

Medium term: Identify your best suppliers. Establish relationships with the most efficient, timely, reliable and innovative suppliers. Attract a higher number of baby boomers than your competition.

Long term: Continue to create innovations in the marketplace that can set you apart from your competition, such as innovative loyalty programs or bleeding edge point-of-purchase technology.

In business planning and business performance management, key performance indicators (KPIs) are fundamental to knowing where you are in your path towards a certain goal.

This is what Wikipedia says about KPIs:

A performance indicator or key performance indicator (KPI) is a measure of performance. Such measures are commonly used to help an organization define and evaluate how successful it is, typically in terms of making progress towards its long-term organizational goals. KPIs can be specified by answering the question, “What is really important to different stakeholders?”

Wikipedia mentions long-term, but that misses out on important short-term and medium-term goals which I’ll explain shortly. The other key term here is “stakeholders.”

Each goal, whether short-term or long-term, has different stakeholders.

If you have daily retail sales goals, then a store manager has to have access to data that shows him or her in real time what’s going on in the store.

If you have quarterly or yearly goals vis-a-v?s your suppliers and different customer segments, then an operations person or sales director needs access to information that shows how you’re doing along these paths.

If you have long-term plans to create innovative solutions and become a market leader, then the CEO or owner needs access to key data to know how you’re doing against these plans.

Different time-frames, different stakeholders, different goals, different KPIs.

What tools are available to help you along the path?

David Abdo wrote a post entitled “Business Intelligence Software: Who Is It Really For?” where he argued for the democratization of business intelligence software across the enterprise.

The existence of a multi-tiered goal structure as illustrated above implies the requirement of a company to implement a business intelligence tool that’s accessible to all people within the company.

What are your thoughts on the matter?

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business card printing can be one of the most crucial things you can do to support who you are, where you come from and what your company has to offer the average consumer. Whenever you run into an old friend or create a casual conversation with a new one, custom business card printing can be your partner in crime. Because of the influx in technology in recent years, it’s easier – and cheaper – than ever to create your own order from home or on the go, wherever there is a computer and an internet connection. Here are a few things to get you started.

As far as the physical attributes of your cards, you’ll want to select the right options for your needs. Paper stocks come in many different types including 12 and 14-point card stock. These provide a sturdier, crisper version than, say, a 100# gloss flyer. That’s because business card printing needs to be able to withstand a fair amount of abuse when being transferred from place to place or housed in a wallet. For the most part, you’ll be able to choose if you’d like a matte finish or even a completely plastic and translucent card at specialty printers.

Coatings are of major importance to the finishing touches of your order. These can make your cards shine like the sun and protect them from any moisture, scratching and smudges. They are a mark of a true professional because they make the whole thing look clean and brilliant. Pick from an aqueous or high gloss UV coating, the standards at most online print companies. Sometimes they will even be able to apply a laminated coating if you’re looking for the ultimate in appeal.

Designing can be a huge issue too, especially if you’re unaware of how to exactly go about doing it. There are online design templates for the person who likes to be able to do it on their own. These are a great idea because once your design is set up, all the printer has to do is send it through the press. The form comes in a print-ready state. Otherwise you can always hire their graphic designers to conceive something unique for you. This can include logos, designs, body copy and layout ideas. Plus, it’s going to be a heck of a lot cheaper than hiring an external source to produce the same. You should always consider these kinds of options when you’re looking to order business card printing.

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Networking through the internet has given companies more opportunities than they’ve ever had before. Whether looking for clients or to form strategic alliances, it is now possible to interact with people that may not have had access to the company previously. However, even though dealings are taking place through the internet, networkers are still forced to deal with many of the concerns they would’ve contended with offline. Of these, the biggest issue is the question of how to make sure companies are able to reconnect with each other. Although previously this may have been matter of luck and e-mail more than anything else, businesspeople can now combine the results of offline networking with the convenience of the internet by using digital business cards. Here are four reasons to give them serious consideration.

1. Ramp Up Marketing Efforts

One of the biggest advantages of having a company business card is that it allows representatives to interact with more people. When using the internet, finding and having conversations with people is not hard to do. Digital business cards make it possible for companies to efficiently “finish things off” once that critical first connection has been formed.

2. Stay Professional

There are companies that make every effort to be professional offline while neglecting to do the same online. To a certain extent, this is likely because the internet is decidedly less formal than a face-to-face meeting. As a result is easy to find people walking a fine line between informality and being unprofessional on the internet. In offline dealings, cards have a way of lending credibility. Digital business cards have a similar effect online.

3. Let Prospects Find You More Easily

Although it is certainly possible to use e-mail and other methods to exchange proper contact information, it takes time to do so. So much so that it can become a little bit cumbersome for those who are hoping to make more connections in less time. With digital business cards, it is now a simple matter of handing it over and waiting for that call, fax, or e-mail.

4. Save Resources

Whether considering the possibility of sending cards or simply printing them, there is time and money that goes into that. Having something ready online makes the whole exchange faster and not having to pay for and send printed copies allows for financial savings as well. If time is money then the benefits will become even more noticeable to a company.

Online networking has developed into a legitimate way for companies to acquire more customers and find like-minded businesspeople at the same time. It is an opportunity that cannot be neglected. As such it is essential that businesses do what they can to handle things as efficiently as possible. Digital business cards allow companies to get more from their marketing efforts, maintain a certain level of professionalism, and stay in touch while saving money and time. At this stage, there is no reason for a company to be networking through the internet without making use of them.

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Concession stands are good business ideas especially when there are sports events in your area. The establishment of a concession stand requires a lot of manpower so if you want to operate a concession stand you must make sure that the money from it will be sufficient to pay your workers and gain a considerable amount of money. Here are some food types that you can choose from when considering a career in the concession stand business.

Hot dogs are easy to cook, serve and eat making it a good concession stand idea. Aside from this, they come at a very affordable place which makes it a favorite. An ideal concession cart comes with a serving station. This serving station will be a place or a corner where your customers can add their preferred condiments. The condiments that you can offer to your customers are mustard and ketchup. You can also add a relish or sauerkraut or anything that is a big seller in your region.

Another favourite concession stand food item that is easy to serve and eat is pizza. However, one good thing about having pizza as a food product for your stand is that it does not require a lot of preparation. You can contact your local pizza shop to provide you with their finish product. If you choose to offer a pizza that is produced by a local pizza shop you need to know how much they sell a slice for so that you have an idea on the price that you have to impose to your patrons.

Sports events take time and customers have high demand for cold beverages. If you are able to make a deal with a popular soft drink company then you can sell their drinks in your concession stands. If you have a limited budget but would like to offer cold beverages in your stand, you can choose to sell homemade juices such as lemonade to your customers. In this type of stand, a fast cooling cooler is an important element for you to be able to serve cool drinks.

Most stands, aside from offering a food product also serve snacks such as peanuts, candies and chips, this is because these snacks do not require a lot of preparation time. The most common snacks offered are popcorn. You can serve your popcorn in different flavors.

During early morning events and events that are held in an environment that is cold, serving hot beverages is a must. Make sure that you have brewing coffee readily available to your older customers. Hot coffee is also a good concession stand idea.

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Having the desire to create a home business opportunity and being in the position to actually do that are two different things. There are a few questions you should ask yourself before you quit your job and start a home business of your own. Be real with yourself before you start setting things up and building your home business opportunities.

Take the time to ask yourself a few questions before you make a decision. The first thing to ask yourself is do you think you are ready to start a home based business? Confidence will play a big part in the success of your home based business. You have to believe that the home based business is worth starting in order for it to do well.

Would others say that you are a prime candidate for self-employment? Sometimes we can be a little overconfident about our own skills. However, when it comes to whether or not you will do well with self-employment, you need to be honest with yourself. Think about how you work at your current job? Are you someone who completes tasks no matter what? Do you work just as hard at work whether or not your supervisor is in the office or not? If so, you may have what it takes to get a home based business off of the ground.

There are other questions you should ask yourself. Have you ever taken courses or seminars about starting and managing a small business? If you have not, consider doing this before you start a home based business. You will learn valuable lessons about some of the underside of having a business that you manage on your own.

Are you ready to lower your standard of living while the business gets off of the ground? Home businesses opportunity are great ventures but the majority of small business owners start off working a ton and making only a little bit of profit. You should make sure that you have some type of back up income to keep you a float while you build your home based business.

Are you ready for long hours that often will produce no immediate profit? Working long hours at a job where you are getting overtime or a steady salary is quite different form working long hours at your start up home based business. You will not necessarily see a profit from the long hours that you put in. Of course, there is a bitter sweet feeling for working long hours. At the end of the day, after the long hours, you will have a home based business that is yours.

Have you contacted a business coach or counselor about your business plan? There are so many different aspects of owning your own business. There are legal issues such as what type of business you want to have, the break even point for the home business opportunity, how a business loan impacts your credit and if you need a special license or permit for your business. Getting valuable advice about all of these things can help save you time and money.

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If we observe and study the most successful businesses and professionals, there are some factors which are common in them. One of the most striking among them is their ability to create successful business networks. Networking is vital for any business or professional to really succeed, whether it is online or offline.

Internet has become a new arena for people to get connected. Initially, it was just for fun or for other personal reasons. Now it has emerged to be a very powerful business tool. More and more innovations are coming up to increase the level of interaction between people around the world. It has now opened doors for global trading and communication. Online business directories and online local yellow pages is a major business networking tool.

Majority of them allow free business listing. For some, you need to pay a small monthly or yearly payment. When you consider the ROI, this investment will never be a waste. Most of these business directories allow geo-targeted listing. Online local business listings will greatly help local businesses and professionals to get targeted local traffic and prospects.

Some of these online business listings like the one offered by Google, let you post product and service details, pictures and other business related information. There is ample facility for customer and prospect interaction. Your customers can rate your product or service, post reviews and ask questions. You can also respond to their queries through the business directory interface. This networking will further enhance your future sales and build a trust factor among the visitors.

Networking through online business directories should be done as a disciplined, targeted and planned activity. This interaction actually portrays your business image and ethics. In the long run, it should not become a black spot for your business or career. People love businesses that really care for their clients and prospects. Getting emotionally connected with your clientele is a sure way to get repeat sales. And the positive feeling also triggers many ‘word of mouth’ reviews and appraisals.

Even local businesses who are just starting to use online media to promote their products or services can significantly increase their lead generation through these online business listings. These are also good for developing a brand image for your business. All major search engines gives importance to this brand feel while displaying their search results.

Great success has been achieved by many online and offline entrepreneurs using online business directories. Start building interactive business profile pages on all major online business directories and drive highly motivated, ready to buy web traffic to your business.

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For our business transactions we can also use our personal account instead of maintain a separate bank account. But we shall have to take care that the heads for the personal and business expenses are well managed and mentioned. This practice can only be followed in a situation where a person a running a small scale business and there are simple types of expenses and can easily be extracted. Here in this discussion I would like to bring some special facilities offered by different banks for business bank account, into your attention and consideration.

To promote the banking exposure to the business market and to facilitate their clients most of the banks are providing special offers to the businessmen. In this way they are attracting the businessmen for establishing the accounts for their business transactions.

Most of the banks are providing the facility of free online transferring of payments to their stakeholders. Some of the banks are also providing the facility of free cross bank online transactions to their business clients. This type of facility cuts down the expenses and very attractive for the businessmen. But this changes from state to state.

Another very attractive facility for bank account holders is free ATM card issuances. Some banks are also offering free funds transfer through ATM.

Banks are also offering the facility of OD (Overdraft) to their business clients.There is a specific limit of OD. This facility means that even if your bank account is running out of cash, you can still with draw money from your account up to a certain limit.

Some banks are also offering special credit offers at special rates to their business entities. This is for promoting the business environment as well as for the growth of the financial institutions. Lending is critically made easy for small scale entities to help them nourishing their business.

From the above discussion, we can see that there are a lot of different facilities offered to the business bank account holders. So we have a lot of reasons to highly recommend the business bank account for business transactions. All these facilities are very helpful to cut down the business expenses, nourishing you business and for giving your business a great professional appearance.

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IT infrastructure Library (ITIL) has been around since 1989. Since v2 was released at the beginning of the millennium, there has been a shift in the perspective with which IT is viewed. Adopting ITIL 2 has cut the total cost of ownership (TCO) for billion dollar corporations by up to 48% according to internet.com.

While ITIL 2 has helped organizations who have implemented it apply the principles of process change management to their IT operations, it still stops short in providing guidance on how to integrate IT functions into the business. This has made it easy for management to overlook the very real benefits contributed to the business by IT.

ITIL 3 helps resolves this issue. Rather than focusing on process, ITIL 3 focuses on service. It’s designed to incorporate the best practices of change management. A side benefit is that ITIL problem management process flow also becomes much more business centered in its scope.

The challenge many businesses face as they seek to implement ITIL 3 is how to approach IT problem management. What tools provide the 360 situational awareness necessary to implement this important process in ITIL 3? What products in the market deliver on the promise to facilitate the move towards ITIL and service oriented IT management strategies?

Business Transaction Monitoring

Gartner in the 2010 APM Magic Quadrant report and Forrester Research in its Competitive Analysis: Application Performance Management and Business Transaction Monitoring report have both identified these two technologies as key components of developing a service focused technology approach to business needs as contrasted to a function-based approach.

To borrow a term from design-form has roughly followed function. The form has struggled to provide dependable service. For too many years, form has preceded function. Multiple functional pieces (applications) have been developed in separate silos each dealing with its own business process. Each of these applications are supposed to be serving the business yet the design of the system, if form, makes consistent service impossible without outside help.

Problem management in a world of silos is very ineffective. This why business transaction monitoring is an important component for implementing either ITIL 2 or ITIL 3. It helps in the successful implementation of ITIL Problem Management as it enables the reconfiguring of IT operation structure from one where individual silos operate independently of each other, to one where many disparate processes and tools work interdependently.

Before the advent of business transaction monitoring (BTM), IT departments were so busy trying to discover where problems were occurring and then patching the problems up that providing dependable service was a nightmare. Business transaction monitoring changes this. BTM makes it possible to track a business transaction through its path of execution-which may include many Java,.NET, messaging middleware, CICS and database applications. Each IT transaction that comprises the business transaction must execute correctly and complete within the time allocated by the service level agreement (SLA).

BTM provides deep visibility into the application stack, enabling IT operations to readily see how a small IT issue can cause a large business impact. Testing application performance in QA can assess service impacts before new releases are deployed into production. It also provides the essential visibility to detect potential problems in transaction flow long before they have a chance to cascade into problems that impact customers.

Application Performance Management

Application performance management (APM) incorporates BTM but can do more. The right APM solution should employ an embrace-until-you-can-replace design. This means that an APM with a library of technology solutions designed to work with the leading IT technology lines: IBM WebSphere MQ, IBM WebSphere ESB, IBM WAS, IBM WBI, J2EE, TIBCO EMS, TIBCO RV, BEA WebLogic, Oracle Database, SQL Server, JMX, JBoss, and WMQ SPI for HP Operations Center, etc. will enable the implementation of ITIL all that easier.

Complex Event Processing

An application performance management solution must also have the ability to handle huge volumes of diverse data. In order to do this effectively, a complex event processing (CEP) engine needs to filter, correlate, contextualize, and analyze data captured from disparate live data sources (RSS feeds, internal IT technology, cloud-based technology, etc.). Then the CEP needs to respond to the information automatically with warning alerts and possibly automated repairs.

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The economy may be turning around, but there are still companies out there that are struggling, still looking for ways to cut costs without negatively impacting their day-to-day operations. Employers are beginning to breathe easier, but layoffs, pay cuts, and benefit reductions are still very real options, and cutting costs has never been a higher priority.

As an employer, what can you do to cut costs other than laying off your workers? Sometimes, the little things can make the difference between keeping a good worker and decreasing your staff. Small cutbacks can combine into real savings, which can help your company — all of you, together — weather the tough times.

Here are just a few ways to cut costs — they may seem small, but every little bit helps!

Save electricity

Employees, who typically are not privy to your company’s electric bills, may not realize just how much small businesses pay to keep their place of business physically open. Encourage your employees to turn their computers off at the end of the day — imagine what a difference turning off a roomful of computers overnight can make.

Here’s an example. Say you have 8 computers in your office — In a typical nine-to-five work environment, that’s 16 hours of electricity you’d save, per computer, per evening. That’s 640 unnecessary hours of computer run-time per week that you could be saving. See how things can add up?

Another great way to save on electricity is installing motion lights in your office, break room, and even bathrooms. If you need a security light in your building, consider installing special lights that don’t use as much electricity, and turning everything else off at night. Your new, reduced electricity bill might shock you.

Cut out the disposables

Many workplaces have a break room, and break rooms are typically stocked with paper plates, plastic forks, and paper towels. To cut down on things that need frequent replacement, consider purchasing dishes. While this can be expensive, it doesn’t have to be — if you can spare twenty bucks, head over to your local Salvation Army and stock up. There are frequently gently used complete dish sets to be found on the cheap, and hilarious used coffee mugs are always an interesting conversation piece.

Or, consider asking your employees to bring their own — if you mention that you’re cutting costs to avoid layoffs, are your employees likely to argue with you?

Eliminate the extras

Many companies have a culture of providing happy hours, lunches, pizza parties, or other extras. But in tough times, those extras need to be the first to go. Again, your employees should be able to appreciate that their sacrifice is going toward a good cause — enabling them to keep their job.

If cuts of this type seem a little too drastic, you might try changing the structure of these extras to increase production. If you frequently offer a monthly lunch outing, consider turning it into a challenge — the top five earners this month get to go out for lunch instead of the whole office. This will keep your costs down while keeping your employees focused on the bottom line.

These are just a few examples of simple things you can do to cut costs around the office. Don’t be intimidated by having to be the “bad guy” — get your employees together, explain that your ultimate goal is to retain jobs, and ask them to help you brainstorm. If your staff knows where you’re coming from, they should be eager to help out and sacrifice the little things.

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