Share your good news in the Brag Basket

Each Friday, I open the brag basket as a fun place to brag or promote yourself and your projects.

Last week, Kay Bell was excited to get copies of magazines she wrote for. Shashi was back, and thrilled with his first online TV experience, Jonny's Par-tay. He had a great message, "The message I hope to get across is help others to help yourself and achieve your dreams in steps."

You can brag on a friend, your own project, yourself, others, anything! You don't need special permission or anything. Just leave a comment right here, or DM beckymccray on Twitter. There's no deadline, so you can brag anytime during the week, and I'll open a fresh Brag Basket each Friday.

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Resources: Small Wander and V.Blog

Two new sites for small town small business people:

V.Blog - Another Oklahoma small business blog!

Dan Patino emailed me about his new site:

V.blog is a blog focused primarily on Small Business. Providing information on how to develop,build, and grow a small business. Discussions focus on Supplier Management, Health Insurance, Non-Profit Support, Technology, Financial Planning, Employee Benefits and Leadership

My goal is to assist entrepreneurs with tips and insights that will help them exceed beyond their wildest imaginations.

One of his great articles is called The Rising Cost of Pizza. Who couldn't use some help coping with rising business costs?

Thanks, Dan! Glad to meet you!

Small Wander

Small town tourism gets an upgrade at Small Wander:

Smallwander.com arose from the desire to help travelers find out about all the great things that are happening in nearby small towns. I also wanted to help small towns to work together to network and share information to plan new and unique events across regions. In today’s age, that means forming an interactive website, which would provide detailed information on where to go, what to do, and when to do it. Although travel directories exist, not many are database driven, many don’t break across regions, such as state lines, and few focus on the small-town experience.

What terrific small town and small business resources have you found lately?

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Are you in the Brag Basket?

Each Friday, I open the brag basket as a fun place to brag or promote yourself and your projects.

Last week, Shashi bragged on attending the Small Business Technology Summit. Chel bragged on Ed Roberts for being such a neat guy. An anonymous Wayne dropped in a commercial, too. Thanks, Shashi, Chel, and Wayne for bragging.

Fridays are doubly special. We are also celebrating Frozen Pea Friday for Susan Reynolds. I encourage you to join me and donate the cost of a bag of frozen peas (or more) to cancer-fighting research at the Frozen Pea Fund. Then come brag about it!

Regular brags on any topic are still welcome!

You can brag on a friend, your own project, yourself, others, anything! You don't need special permission or anything. Just leave a comment right here, or DM beckymccray on Twitter. There's no deadline, so you can brag anytime during the week, and I'll open a fresh Brag Basket each Friday.

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Handy Site on Regulatory Information

Business.gov, the official business link to the U.S. government, has new search features and content to help small business owners find information.

Business owners can now access information on starting and managing a business, including licenses, permits and regulatory information, on more than 9,000 state, territory, county, and city government Web sites.

Five common mistakes

(Editor's Note: Sam Carpenter offered this guest post on common mistakes. These certainly apply to small town small businesses, too.)

Five Common Mistakes People Make When Starting Up a Small Business

And How to Steer Clear of Them

By Sam Carpenter

Whether you’ve established a small business, are in the midst of launching one, or simply considering it for the future, it’s certain you want at least one thing out of this investment: success.

Here are five common mistakes people tend to make when starting up a small business – and how you can avoid them:

1. Business owners don’t create documented systems, or what we call, Working Procedures. It’s a simple equation: Systems = freedom. A working procedure is a documented way of performing a task that prevents problems, ensuring the task is performed properly and consistently. Procedures help you delegate and improve your scheduling ability. You work smarter and accomplish more with less effort; thus, work less and make more. By implementing documented system procedures, your employees are free to be creative because they don’t have to “wing it” each time they perform their job duties; everyone operates at a smoother pace because there is a proven, working process. Best of all, your people don’t have to be mind-readers or fortune tellers.
   
   
2. Owners don’t delegate. The reason a business owner can work a few hours a week, or take an extended vacation without stress, is because they have created systems, implemented written procedures and documentation, and have learned to delegate. I know, I know. You’re zealous, dreamy-eyed, and proficient, and as the leader of an organization, you’re committed to doing whatever it takes to get your new business off the ground. Well, my friend, successful people don’t work harder; they work smarter. This means focusing on what you do best, and delegating the rest. Ask yourself what you enjoy doing least for your business. Perhaps that’s bookkeeping or making phone calls to potential clients. Then, imagine literally giving away these mind numbing, frustrating tasks. Get rid of the “I am Superman” attitude and hire people who are trustworthy and qualified to take some of that weight off your shoulders.
   
   
3. Owners don’t use time wisely. Biological Prime Time is when your brainpower is at peak capacity. People function at maximum effectiveness about six hours out of a 24-hour day. It is important to take advantage of this interesting facet of human performance and it is critical to know precisely when your prime time occurs and then to use it wisely. Six hours out of a 24-hour day is not much. Presuming you wish to reach your goals sooner rather than later, it is best the tasks that contribute most to your primary goals are performed during your prime time hours and you protect those hours from interruption. Also, don’t start your day without a to-do list. Make a list of tasks and categorize them into business-building activities, client activities, and personal items. Then, prioritize, remove distractions, delegate, and stick to your plan.
   
   
4. Owners see their job, life, and business are holistic. You must change your fundamental perspective of the mechanics of the world. Take a position “outside and slightly above” your job, your small business, and your life. See that they are composed of linear systems and that these systems can be perfected, one-by-one. Understand that by perfecting a primary system’s sub-systems, the primary system will be perfected – and, although you take a non-holistic approach, your end product – your business – will be a highly efficient and entirely holistic, “Primary System.”
   
   
5. Owners don’t have a strategic objective or set of operating principles. A strategic objective is short, usually a single page in length, and is an individual’s well-though-out and carefully constructed “guidebook.” It defines overall goals, describes methodology, and prescribes action. It gives direction for making major and minor decision. It’s an essential instrument for a business and for personal life. General operating principles are typically a two- to four-page collection of “guidelines for decision making” that are congruent with the strategic objective. Essential for the work environment and in a simplified and shorter format, they also guide one’s personal life. An example of an operating principle would be “Do it now.” In other words, don’t delay an action if it can be done immediately. Just like any major retail outlet that updates inventories and databases at the exact time the transaction takes place, approach all aspects of your business with the same “do it now” approach.

Sam Carpenter, author and speaker, is president and CEO of Centratel, one of the nation’s handful of elite quality telephone answering services, and author of the new book, Work the System: The Simple Mechanics of Working Less and Making More. Success in life, business, and relationships can be yours, too. Sam's approach is not mystical or esoteric; it’s simple, mechanical, and attainable. Visit www.workthesystem.com to purchase your copy of Work the System today. A free download of “6 steps to working less and making more” is also available on the site.

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Failure is the secret to entrepreneurial success

Failure itself is not the secret to succeeding. Learning and improving by trying and doing, or learning from failure, is the secret to succeeding as an entrepreneur.

If you are not trying new things, your business is stagnating. Of course, not everything you try will work. Some efforts will be a big hit, and some will be a big miss. So you have to be ready to fail if you want to succeed.

That's easy to say, but how do you actually learn from failure? How do you get past the stinging feeling that comes with failure? Brad Bollenbach has written a landmark article about Learning from Failure, and he takes on some of these very issues.

Success is really just a checkpoint on a road graveled by mistakes.

Thank you, Phil Gerbyshak for pointing me to this article.

How have you learned from failure?

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Help fill the Brag Basket

Each Friday, I open the brag basket as a fun place to brag or promote yourself and your projects.

Last week, Jeanne and I were the ones to brag. Jeanne "OkieJ" bragged on our great trip to hear the Oklahoma Lieutenant Governor speak in El Reno. I bragged that our little group of Okies was celebrated on Feb. 9 at Here's to Good Women.

Fridays are doubly special. We are also celebrating Frozen Pea Friday for Susan Reynolds. I encourage you to join me and donate the cost of a bag of frozen peas (or more) to cancer-fighting research at the Frozen Pea Fund. Then come brag about it!

Regular brags on any topic are still welcome!

You can brag on a friend, your own project, yourself, others, anything! You don't need special permission or anything. Just leave a comment right here, or DM beckymccray on Twitter. There's no deadline, so you can brag anytime during the week, and I'll open a fresh Brag Basket each Friday.

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Business school for blogging

I'm going to a business school for blogging, SOBCon08.

This year’s event tracks entrepreneur bloggers and corporate bloggers alike, with an innovative format and a stellar cast of speaker/instructors.

Purpose
The SOBCon08 program guarantees to send each attendee home with a Business Action Plan that can be immediately executed for measurable success. The “mastermind” teams in which attendees will be interacting will provide uniquely deep working relationships that are more meaningful than the business card trading found at other conference/networking events.

Attendees
Seating is limited to 250 sold seats, plus guests.

Logistics
SOBCon08 will once again be held in the Chicago area from May 2-4, 2008.

Cost
$450 for all three days

So if you aren't going to SXSW, this is your second chance to meet with me at a conference. Plus, if you visit the SOBCon08 site following a link here, you are voting for me in a contest to win a free registration and a couple of hotel nights!

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Income Tax Filing Season Scams

As filing season starts, cyber scammers are trying new tactics to steal personal financial information from taxpayers.

One type of e-mail message tells folks that their returns will be audited. The sender purports to be IRS and directs recipients to click on links that give senders access to their computers and their personal data. If you receive one of these phony notices, don't fall for it. Forward the solicitation to phishing@irs.gov and then delete the message.

Phone scammers are hard at work as well, saying that they need your bank account information to directly deposit the upcoming tax rebate.

Don't be fooled. The IRS never contacts taxpayers via an unsolicited phone-call or email.

You fill the Brag Basket while I'm out

Each Friday, I open the brag basket as a fun place to brag or promote yourself and your projects. This week, I'm going to be out of town most of today, so I need your help to cheer each other on, OK? Thanks!

Last week, Jeanne "OkieJ" bragged on her chamber of commerce honors. BarbaraKB offered a sweet brag on her father. I snuck in a brag because Barbara complimented the Brag Basket. Connie bragged on her fun interviews, and Whitney had tons to brag about in new media. Thanks Jeanne, Barbara, Connie and Whitney for bragging!

Fridays are doubly special. We are also celebrating Frozen Pea Friday for Susan Reynolds. I encourage you to join me and donate the cost of a bag of frozen peas (or more) to cancer-fighting research at the Frozen Pea Fund. Then come brag about it!

Regular brags on any topic are still welcome!

You can brag on a friend, your own project, yourself, others, anything! You don't need special permission or anything. Just leave a comment right here, or DM beckymccray on Twitter. There's no deadline, so you can brag anytime during the week, and I'll open a fresh Brag Basket each Friday.

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Tool: Directions via text message

Editor's Note: Tuyen Ho emailed this comment to me. Sounds like a very useful tool for small business people. I'd love to get feedback from anyone who tries it.

Hi Becky,

I read your 1/18 blog post re: Gene Marks "can't make these technologies work" piece. You mentioned a few mobile services like Jott. I'd like to tell you about Dial Directions (www.dialdirections.com).

DIR-ECT-IONS is the first nationwide free phone service for 'directions assistance'. Any cell phone user can dial D-I-R- E-C-T-I-O-N-S (347-328-4667); tell the voice-activated service their starting address and destination (address, business, or local event); and instantly receive a driving directions by text message. The service is free and works on all cell phones - no web plan or GPS needed. Only your carrier charges apply.

Here's a demo of the service: http://www.dialdirections.com/video_demo.html

Small business owners have shared wonderful stories about how they use Dial Directions:

• Owners tell their new customers to use it to get point-to-point directions to the owner's store/business, especially when someone rings them up and wants specific directions from a particular address (e.g. one UHaul franchise asked us for our free stickers and postcards about Dial Directions for his customers who are moving into a new neighborhood and need navigation assistance when they're on the go)
• Wedding and other social event planners turn their event into a destination by plugging in the event's name and address at our website. After that, the organizers simply tell attendees to dial D-I-R-E-C-T-I-O-N-S, ask for the event name and provide any starting address.
• Sales, delivery and contractors without access to a computer or GPS use just call D-I-R-E-C-T-I-O-N-S from their cell phones for navigation assistance
• Real estate agents tell their homebuyers to use D-I-R-E-C-T-I-O-N-S to help see multiple open houses without the need for pre-printing maps

Hope this is useful to you and your readers.

Regards,

Tuyen

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Business advice from Twitter-heads

My friends on Twitter are a pretty sharp group. I'm always marking tweets as favorites because of the great ideas and great tools we share with each other.

Annie Boocio "Banannie7" asked just the other day, "hey twitter, write a blog post for me wouldja? kthxbai" If you've seen my other Twitter tweet compilations*, you know I had something to share with her! So drop by Pixel Currents and read what Annie made of it.

K, thx, bai!


*Other compilations:

• What do you do after you fail?
  
• Inspirational quotes
• Social media for small business
• Business advice and idea from Twitter
• Business inspiration
  

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Promote your business in a new way

Reader Laura Fisher "Mitten" from Michigan offered a terrific idea for promoting your works anywhere you go.

This is a bit specialized, but my husband is a filmmaker and he puts clips of his work (his 'showreel') on his PSP (this would work with iPhone/iPod/Zune, too, I think). He'll stuff it in his pocket when he goes out somewhere he's likely to meet people and can just show people his work right there in hand. (The PSP's screen is gorgeous!)

And while that's specifically for film, I would think anyone who does visual work - design, web design, whatever - could put together a little slideshow that could be shown on an iPod or Zune or PSP or whatever. A 'showreel' for designers!

So if you can take a picture or a short video clip that depicts your work, that's how you can carry it with you. What a terrific way to connect your online promotions to people who aren't online!

Need ideas for videos? We have a few small business video ideas for you.

[Photo by Josh Bancroft on Flickr, of a Dell X50V and Sony PSP showing mobile video playing possibilities.]

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Internet marketing for small town businesses

Editor's Note: April Groves mentioned on Twitter that she was working on an article about internet marketing in small towns. Although she wrote about Bryan County Georgia, her thoughts could apply in any small town. She was kind enough to grant us permission to reprint that article here.

Internet Marketing in Bryan County

By April Groves

I had the wonderful experience of attending the 2^nd annual BlogSavannah UnConference on Friday. I had the opportunity to run into a few other folks from Richmond Hill. They have businesses, and they are on the web. This got me to thinking – do businesses in Bryan County need a web presence to compete effectively in today’s commercial market?

Let’s consider this for a moment. A quick internet search shows that the major agencies in the county have websites. You can find tons of information on emergency services, education and government. You can pay property taxes, and the City of Richmond Hill has a new online water bill payment system. This tells me that our community does look for information and will do business online.

Another quick internet search also reveals that many local industries have a web presence. Health and Wellness, Real Estate, Non-Profits, Financial Institutions, Attorneys and a host of other businesses have a web address. Through folks that I know, I can also tell you there are some businesses that function entirely online. There is no brick and mortar structure – only a web address. This tells me that if you are in business and not online, your competition probably is.

I go one last time to the internet search. Not everybody is there. In fact, a few very successful businesses have not gone the way of internet marketing. This tears me into two directions. Either they are missing an opportunity for business growth or they really would not benefit from online exposure. I can’t help but believe it is the former and not the latter.

Recent statistics show that roughly 20% of media consumption comes from online activity. I am a bit surprised the number is that low. There is a major industry in town that has 80% of its prospective client base looking online before they ever step into an office or pick up a phone. We are in an age of email and eBay. Ask around to find out how much of last month’s Christmas shopping happened online. Find out where people go to order their favorite coffee, barbeque sauce or shoes. Are you surprised to learn that “Google” is a verb and not just a website? Do you know what a “Google” is? How about a “blog,” “PayPal,” or “Amazon”? While this terminology may or may not be your everyday vernacular, you can bet a large segment of the purchasing public knows just what I am talking about.

Why online? I can’t speak for everybody, but I can speak for a lot. Online offers an “in your pajamas at midnight” opportunity to search, shop, compare and buy – and then wait for the “on your doorstep” delivery which can be as fast as overnight in many cases. No gas, no carts, no lines – just a mouse and a credit card. Some are going there to make purchases, while others are going to investigate establishments they are planning to do business with. Shopping on the internet has become easier and safer, and more consumers are going there.

During the holidays we talked about “buying local.” It is an idea I believe in with a deep passion. However, I am like most folks with a busy schedule, kids to coordinate and not a lot of time to leisurely peruse through a shop or check out local service providers during normal working hours. I spend a good deal of time online with a cup of coffee early in the morning searching for consumer information so I can either buy it online or run a quick errand to pick it up. Can I find your business there?

Granted, I am only one voice. I would love to hear what you think about it.

April
www.aprilgroves.com

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The one and only Brag Basket

Each Friday, I open the brag basket as a fun place to brag or promote yourself and your projects.

Fridays are doubly special, though. We are also celebrating Frozen Pea Friday for Susan Reynolds. I encourage you to join me and donate the cost of a bag of frozen peas (or more) to cancer-fighting research at the Frozen Pea Fund. Then come brag about it!

Regular brags on any topic are still welcome!

Last week, Erica bragged on a well-received pitch, and for being considered for a professional race car driver position! How amazing is that? Kim shared her newly launched self-showcase. Linda dropped in just to encourage us! And Neenz bragged on Ryan Ozawa for his many Hawai'i projects. Erica, Kim, and Neenz, thanks for bragging! And thanks for the encouragement, Linda!

You can brag on a friend, your own project, yourself, others, anything! You don't need special permission or anything. Just leave a comment right here, or DM beckymccray on Twitter. There's no deadline, so you can brag anytime during the week, and I'll open a fresh Brag Basket each Friday.

New here? Take the Guided Tour. Like what you see? Subscribe. Want more stories? Read our shared stories from all over.