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By Sandra Holtzman, May 11, 2013 9:36 am

This is the title of an article just published in The New York Law Journal (I’m one of the authors).  It’s a cautionary tale about fundraising.  It gives relevant details about the JOBS act and how that applies to fundraising – and it’s not the panacea many are mistakenly making it out to be.

It’s also about losing focus on the prize – moving your business forward – while distracted by the dazzle – the allure or promise of raising capital any way you can.  The article details what’s legal and not legal in the world of raising money for your company.  I hope you use it as a guide to do your fundraising the correct way so you can avoid the fate and outcomes (jail time?) of this unfortunate company.

http://holtzmancom.com/teamwork_latest_news.php

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By Sandra Holtzman, April 6, 2013 9:05 am

Recently, as an entrepreneur panel and pitching event was winding down (http://www.levin.suny.edu/innovateny/), I found myself chatting with some entrepreneurs who were anxiously discussing a big pitch they had the next morning. One woman asked if the clothes she was wearing would be okay for the pitch. She was surrounded by a small group of business experts. Everyone offered her advice…change your blouse…the skirt works…maybe you should wear a suit and not be so casual even if you’re pitching the entertainment industry…etc. I finally leaned in and said quietly, “wear what you feel comfortable in…you don’t want to worry about your clothing when you’re doing a presentation.” A look of relief washed over the entrepreneur’s face.

There was more of an exchange on multiple topics and again near the end I made a suggestion…” remember, if the audience interrupts you with questions go with the flow and answer them. Don’t worry if you don’t get back to your presentation. This is more important.” So many presenters answer a question (some don’t even do that) and instead of going back and giving the audience (in the case of investors, they are usually the ones directing the conversation) your canned presentation, let them lead you to where their interests lie. First, it shows you are flexible and connected to the conversation. Second, is says that you are not rigid and insisting on the presentation. The purpose of being prepared is so when this sort of thing happens, which is virtually all the time, you can go with the flow.

More useful tips are offered by David Holloway, management consultant http://sangira.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/WPPDF-Entrepreneur-Pitching.pdf and by Entrepreneur with some serious tough love advice http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/201826

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By Sandra Holtzman, March 23, 2013 10:08 am

Everyone loves top 10 lists.

So now that we’re ending the first quarter of the year…here’s some helpful directions to focus on in your marketing and business (they are in no particular order of importance)

1.       Integrate your marketing
As much as everyone would really love “the answer” and that it be just one thing…social media is the “one” at the moment…that’s just not how marketing works. Marketing is an eco-system that includes social, PR, collateral, branding etc.

2.       Put in a call to action in every piece of marketing you do
This may sound self-serving but it actually helps direct the customer to the key next steps in order to buy your product or otherwise engage with you.

3.       Create content that is valuable to your customers
This includes helpful tips and case histories that will help move the prospective forward to become a customer.

4.       Communicate
Tweet, blog, get your voice out there and heard.  I posted a jobs graph from another source a while back and suddenly it’s been “Pinned” by dozens of people on Pinterest. Who knew?

5.       Do primary research with your customers
Ask them open-ended questions about what’s important to them about your product or service and what will drive them to buy it.

6.       Listen to your customers’ answers
The information may be different from what you expected. Welcome the face that you do not know it all and keep your ego out of it.

7.       Follow-up after the sale
Thank your customers. If they have feedback (which you should solicit) listen to it and if something is wrong, make changes or otherwise implement their feedback.
Follow-up again.

8.       Identify your influencers
Build a relationship with them either on-line or in person.

9.       Brand yourself, your product, your company
Remember, you are your brand.  Use experiences and stories to help with brand identification. Your customers will also help you create your brand.

10.     Write better subject lines
It’s a crowded, competitive world out there…make sure your communications are opened.

Sandra Holtzman teaches CEO 035: Licensing.
She is the author of Lies Startups Tell Themselves to Avoid Marketing.

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By Sandra Holtzman, February 9, 2013 10:10 am

We’re usually so busy trying to get started in marketing that we tend to forget that once we start, we need to continue. What happens if we don’t?

Today’s guest blogger,  Aruna Inalsingh (http://www.animarketingservice.com/) provides some insight into marketing, measurements and meltdowns of the corporate variety.  Aruna is President and Found of Ani Marketing Services Ani Marketing Service, and has years of experience providing strategic marketing solutions for a wide  range of companies, products, and services, starting their new programs and improving their existing ones.

“As a career marketer, one of the most common client requests is for a direct correlation between marketing investments and business revenues.  The reality is that it is indeed hard to quantify direct success from marketing programs.  Although with digital media, it’s getting easier, as you can track the number of followers, visitors, clicks, and online sales– especially if you don’t have any brick and mortar stores.  Furthermore, it is true that marketing takes time, resources, and/or money – ask Walmart’s CFO, Charles Holley!

That being said, here’s a story we like to tell about the value of marketing, which is exemplary of scientific proofs where you cannot prove if something is true, but you can prove if something is not true:
Seiko Watches was founded in 1881.  They were a strong believer in marketing, and with an ongoing commitment to invest in company promotion, within a short amount of time they developed a solid reputation for affordable and reliable watches. Seiko had a monopoly on this market until 1930, when Citizen Watches was established. Citizen wanted to be the Pepsi to the Coca-Cola, if you will. Citizen proceeded to invest as much money in marketing, if not more than Seiko, to achieve a similar brand recognition (and revenue stream). It never happened … until 2008. The global financial crisis in 2008 hit everyone hard. Seiko and Citizen had to make strategic decisions. Seiko decided its brand was strong enough to temporarily sustain itself with a skeletal marketing staff, and Citizens decided to maintain as much of its marketing program as possible, in context of its diminishing budget. In 2010, when Seiko was ready to re-invest in its marketing program, initial research showed that the consumer market thought Seiko had gone out of business and therefore had turned to Citizen as the market leader. It took 2 years of marketing withdrawal to ruin the 127 year old Seiko watch dynasty. Today Citizen has a similar brand and market value to Seiko.”

Sandra Holtzman teaches CEO 035: Licensing.
She is the author of Lies Startups Tell Themselves to Avoid Marketing.

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By Sandra Holtzman, January 26, 2013 8:05 am

There’s a new book, that just came out, called “Significant Business Results…   Ten sales secrets that your competitors know and use!”  The author is Franne McNeal, a serial entrepreneur, business coach, the youngest person ever to be awarded a training contract with the City of Pittsburgh among other things such as restructuring, training and development at such places as PNC Financial Services, and SmithKline Beecham.  She’s a certified Kauffman Foundation FastTrac facilitator, and Adjunct Faculty for the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses Initiative. She started her first business while still a student at Princeton University.  I occasionally facilitate with Franne and she is an amazing force.

So why should you care about Franne’s credentials and book?  Well, creating your product is only part of the story of a successful entrepreneur. You then have to get it out the door (or to shameless plug the first chapter in my book, “Lies Startups Tell Themselves to Avoid Marketing” – “ If I build it, they will come”.. I guarantee NOT if you don’t market, which goes hand-in-hand with sales).  Franne tells you how to accomplish this in 10 steps – with exercises and examples sprinkled throughout the book at just the moments you need them to help you get to the next step. Her 10 chapters give you an idea of what you will learn when you read the book (and grow your business if you practice them):

1-      Define Your Target Market
2-      Create a Powerful Offer
3-      Use Testimonials for Social Proof
4-      Generate Unlimited Leads
5-      Create Immediate Sales
6-      Use Scripts to Increase Sales
7-      Create Repeat Business
8-      Double your Referrals
9-      Reverse Risk to Increase Sales
10-   Create Added Value

It’s a great book for your armamentarium – even if you know most of the topics covered, it’s always good to have a refresher.

Sandra Holtzman teaches CEO 035: Licensing.
She is the author of Lies Startups Tell Themselves to Avoid Marketing.

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By Sandra Holtzman, January 5, 2013 9:23 am

Image provided by Shutterstock http://www.shutterstock.com

The transition from analog to digital has enabled the reach and focus of PR and marketing messaging exponentially. These transitions are nicely described by Lucy Siegel (http://bridgebuzz.bridgeny.com/). With these new powers, it’s important to make sure that your storytelling is aligned with your branding and that both have been influenced in some way by your audience (let’s call it customer-focused storytelling). This not only strengthens your story, but your brand as well.

Even the new technology has a new wrinkle, as Janet Falk (http://www.janetlfalk.com/) tells us. It’s crowd sourcing and user-generated content — when companies actively solicit input from target audiences. She provides a familiar example: The 1995 campaign to select the next color of M&Ms is now a contest for user-generated video commercials. Contestants are rewarded with seeing their work displayed on the company website, inevitably shared among a like-minded audience and often voted upon. The grand prize winner gets monetary compensation and digital fame. In the process, consumer packaged goods companies relinquish a measure of control and yield reliability of authoritative sources to the unknown contestants, whose agendas may or may not align with specific corporate goals beyond increasing brand awareness.

The benefits of digital storytelling come with more responsibility, in the form of having to monitor both the effect your story is having, as well as your audiences’ reactions to the story (for instance, bloggers without journalist credentials and audiences with agendas).

Sandra Holtzman teaches CEO 035: Licensing.
She is the author of Lies Startups Tell Themselves to Avoid Marketing.

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By Marguerite Moore, December 15, 2012 2:19 pm

You have all heard the expression “Cash is King”. Did you ever think that it applies to the way you manage your business? Well read this!

As you manage your business from day-to-day you need liquidity, that is cash. Cash is required to pay your bills from suppliers to your utilities bills and even your employees. So, where is this steady flow of cash coming from? Your customers!

Your accounts receivable levels are important to watch. Bills are usually collected on a 45 day basis. Some customers may even pay sooner than that. Those customers are gold.

You should indicate clearly on your invoices what the terms of payment are. These are usually 10/20 net 30, meaning that if the bill is paid within 20 days, then the customer is entitled to take a 10% discount on the amount due. You benefit by collecting on that invoice sooner rather than later and having the money to run your business.

But consider the customer who pays in 60 days. This customer is costing you money! You are actually financing this customer to the tune of 36% a year. That is an incredible financing charge. Did you ever realize that you were becoming a bank by not collecting on these invoices? Therefore, it is critical to your cash flow to collect the amounts due you promptly. Hence, the time value of money. A dollar today is worth more than a dollar tomorrow.

A good tool to use that can be provided by your bookkeeper is the Aged Accounts Receivable Report. This report will indicate how long your invoices are outstanding and which ones to watch closely for delinquency. Your current ratio will be improved with monitoring.

Follow-up calls to customers are important to remind them that the invoice is due. These calls will also reveal to you whether the order is received in good order and if the customer is happy with the shipment. Sometimes a customer will not pay on an order that is unsatisfactory because he is a small business and he is just too busy to make that phone call to you; he just holds the goods instead of returning them to you.

If a customer is strapped for cash and cannot pay the total amount of the invoice, then you must ask him to pay something right away. Making an installment plan with him is beneficial to you and to him. You must collect something in order to make it easier for you to meet your cash demands, and he has just reduced the amount outstanding on that bill.

Now you understand why “Cash is King”.

Margo Moore teaches BE 261 Starting a Small Business, CEO 001 Setting a Course for Your Business, CEO 002 Knowing Your Market, and CEO 003 Formulating Your Financial Strategy.
She is the author of Love and War, the Human Side of Business.

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By Sandra Holtzman, December 8, 2012 8:12 am

Image provided by Shutterstock http://www.shutterstock.com

Everyone is stressed this holiday season.  The opportunity is ripe for both shoppers and store personnel to be rude and abusive (particularly when stores hire part time or seasonal help who haven’t been properly trained).  But there’s a very simple way to break out of this cycle and turn a potentially bad experience into a memorable one – which is something we all want. Michael Hess has a great post on CBS News Moneywatch about how you say something during the holiday season being crucial to creating a good customer experience.  Here’s one example he gives:

Say this: “Let me help you with that” or “How can I help you?”
Not this: “You need help?”

This is great advice not only for the holidays but every day.  And this practice can be used in writing business documents, such as business plans as well.  For instance,

Don’t say this:  “Our sales goal was to increase business 40% this year but we only made it to 15%”.
Say this:  “We increased business 15% this year and are working towards a 40% sales goal.”

The second phrasing puts a positive spin on the situation. Just as importantly, it tells the reader that you are in control of your business or situation.  The reader, particularly an investor, is going to look more favorably upon this positively stated situation.
In the long run, this kind of speaking can change the way you think towards a more positive outlook in general.

For other examples, check out the link to the blog.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505143_162-57556281/good-service-language-makes-for-happier-holidays/?tag=nl.e857&s_cid=e857

Sandra Holtzman teaches CEO 035: Licensing.
She is the author of Lies Startups Tell Themselves to Avoid Marketing.

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By Sandra Holtzman, December 1, 2012 9:39 am

Images provided by Shutterstock http://www.shutterstock.com

When you’re starting a company you’re going to hear a million “no’s”.  No to your money raising requests, no to giving you referrals, no from referrals that were given to you. The list goes on. But the key is to keep persisting.  Eventually there will be “yeses”.

I have been a certified woman-owned business for many years.  I go to lots of meetings. I meet lots of nice people. But no work.  Even when I was the agency for a division in a Fortune 500 company, I could leverage my certification within the company.  And I tried. More recently when I started work with another Fortune 500 company, I mentioned that I was certified (I already had the work through other channels) and they took my certification credentials.

Most people I know, in many different businesses, gave up on certification  because it was too time consuming.  They went on with their businesses.  I keep plugging.  And two weeks ago it paid off.  A “prime” contractor (that is the company who actually gets the contract – usually a larger company) contacted me and wanted Holtzman Communications to work on a piece of business that they had obtained with the City.  They actually went to the certified data base and sourced me. Along with others but that’s fine.  Suddenly, all my years of persistence and staying on lists etc. is starting to pay off.

It’s never been tougher  for start-up businesses looking for connections, work, and especially cash.  Lots of people are going to tell you no, and processes may put you off.  But if you have a good product or service, then you just keep going because you will prevail. But you have to believe in yourself and have all the properties above. In a good way of course.

Sandra Holtzman teaches CEO 035: Licensing.
She is the author of Lies Startups Tell Themselves to Avoid Marketing.