Category Archives: Entrepreneurship

Stop Thinking Like a Big Brand and Go Small

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I can’t help but to notice a pattern among small business owners and start-up entrepreneurs as it would seem that the buzz word among them is “global”. Now, don’t get me wrong as I’m not against being visionary and ambitious but overindulgence in this “global” concept can very well be a mindset that comes into your way in growing your business.

Take any sport as an example – you do not challenge the course with the highest difficulty when you start out simple because it will probably leave you injured or killed (depending on the type of sport). However, it is good to look forward in challenging that course in the future – when you’re fit for it.

So, why should you not think like a big brand? Here are 4 reasons:

#1: Budget

I’ll skip the part explaining the difference in marketing budget between a big brand and a small business but know this – branding and marketing is not dependent on how huge your budget is. Money simply has the potential to speed up the growing (or declining) process of your brand.

Thankfully, the web is favorable to small businesses especially with the introduction of social media. If your target audience is on Facebook, focus on building a relationship with them and grow your network organically. This will create long term traction for your business with significant savings on cost. Don’t be fooled by the misconceptions of social media.

#2: Manpower

With limited manpower on your team, you may not be able to go on a labor intensive campaign such as roadshows or huge events. Forcibly doing so may spread your workforce so thin that it may hurt your business in return. Instead, use this limitation to your advantage by being able to provide a closer communication with your customers.

One of the beauty of a small business is communication. Big brands often let the account managers, sales or marketing team do the job while in small businesses, you as a business owner work on it hands-on and that makes a difference. Focus on providing personalized services and that will keep you ahead of your competitors. Even big brands are moving into personalized services.

#3: Systems and Procedures

Big brands in general have various systems and procedures to keep them in check whether it is for sales, requesting for support or even to get a marketing campaign approved. Sometimes, it takes weeks to get a request approved due to the many departments involved. While the control is there, it is not what your small business should be doing.

Small businesses usually have the luxury of being quick and fluid in decision making thus allowing a shorter turnaround time. Use this to your advantage and keep the ideas going and experiment on them.

#4: Networks and Reputation

Most big brands are already well connected and engaged both online and offline. Having that said, it is likely that their marketing campaigns will automatically gain a whole lot more participation or visibility than what you can achieve with your small business.

Turning that around, you can establish your reputation in local communities and this is something big brands are unlikely to follow. Be targeted in your marketing campaigns and reach out to your target audience individually and grow together with them – this will lower your overheads but gives you a laser-point focus.

Go Small but be Scale-able

Likewise in start-ups or small businesses, instead of thinking about going global and becoming a big brand, think of how can you start SCALING your business towards becoming global. Remember, even big brands started small.

14 Attributes for Your Entrepreneurial Success from Silicon Valley Icons

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What makes a great entrepreneur? Is it the skills, the mindset, or perhaps the money? So I had a golden opportunity to attend a 2-day conference – Silicon Valley Comes to Malaysia and this conference brought together many great entrepreneurs including Shawn Fanning (co-founder of Napster), Jawed Karim (co-founder of YouTube), Jeff Hoffman (co-founder of Priceline.com), Konstantin Guricke (co-founder of LinkedIn), Naval Ravikant (founder of AngelList), Jonas Kjellberg, Paul Bragiel and many more to encourage and assist local entrepreneurs here in their endeavors.

Silicon Valley Comes to Malaysia

The two-day conference was filled with power packed sessions and the opportunity to network and build relationships with other entrepreneurs was amazing. I even bumped into Krystle (@mskrys) from Twylah for the first time beyond the avatar.

Okay, enough talking. Let’s (finally) dive into the 14 attributes of how you can make it as an entrepreneur I took home from the Silicon Valley icons themselves:

#1: Codes are the new literacy.

You cannot afford to be technologically illiterate when the world is now built on codes. Learn to code!

#2: Do something that can accelerate and you like.

Start something that is scale-able. Not because of the money, but because it is your passion.

#3: Know what your customers want.

Never get your friend to test your product. Go to the customers.

#4: Given a choice and a limited budget, spend on marketing, NOT an office.

You want to have an office like Google but that can wait. Focus on growing your business first.

#5: You cannot do this alone. Get a co-founder.

You’ll definitely need help. If not for extra hands, you’ll need him / her for morale support.

#6: You’re not as smart as you think you are.

The day you think you’re smart, that’s when you grow otherwise. Listen to what others have to say.

#7: Surround yourself with people smarter than you.

Don’t get intimidated by smarter people. You WANT smarter people to work with you.

#8: Play the role you play best and let others do theirs.

Never designate a role that others can’t play their “A” game in.

#9: Build your team around their goals. Not yours.

Have your team know what they want to achieve and work towards their goal. Support is important.

#10: Document your failure.

Never brush a failure aside thinking you’ve learnt from it. Get to it and examine the cause of the failure.

#11: Don’t hire resumes. Hire character and integrity.

Past experiences do not matter. Hire based on who they are and their contribution.

#12: Don’t change the work to fit the people. Your people should fit a specific business objective.

Don’t change your objectives because of your team. Have your team fit into your objectives.

#13: You will fail. More than once. Get over it!

Failure is a part of life. What makes you think you wouldn’t?

#14: Compile data, connect the dots and ask the big question – “What can I do today that I couldn’t yesterday?”

Be aware of what’s happening outside your comfort zone. Look out for opportunities that wasn’t made available yesterday.

My favorite – Q: “What is the secret to success?” A: “When you’re busy looking for that, I was busy working for it”.

Which of the above resonates with you the most?

Entrepreneurs, Is Defense the Best Offense?

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A football coach was looking for a new player for their team. Along with his assistant, they went to scout for the perfect footballer for their team. After several sessions the assistant had his eye set on a player that jumped back unto his feet the moment he was knocked down – even after 3 times. “That’s the player we need”, he exclaimed. The coach simply replied “Get the player that knocked him down 3 times”.
– Anonymous

This short story came as a great and timely reminder for me. Preservation is important for entrepreneurs but the continuos spirit to overcome hurdles is vital. Often you hear stories of how entrepreneurs persevered and obtained success but what’s more important is to learn how did they break through challenges after challenges without getting tired.

Which player are you? Or rather, which entrepreneur are you?

One that is on the defense or one on the offense?

Why Do People Forget the Basics and the Essence of #SocialMedia?

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In my previous post, I mentioned how keeping the basics right can actually bring about success in business or even in life for an individual. Right before I clicked on the “Publish” button – it got me thinking:

If being successful is as simple as just getting the basics right, why do people still fail to grasp the basics? What is it that is stopping them from succeeding in what they do – in business, on social media networks and in life?

It is not the techniques. It is not the skills. It is not that you do not know how. It is not the unavailability of guides or mentors. Sometimes, it is not even because you’re inexperienced (or very experienced). It is your MINDSET. That’s the component with the problem.

Here are 3 mindsets that may be holding you back from achieving success:

#1: Ignorance

Do you remember picking up that new piece of gadget, chucking the manual aside and begin fiddling with it immediately? That’s ignorance. You know that there is help somewhere (like, by searching Google) but it is somehow too bothersome. You prefer to have it hands-on to get working on something immediately, to learn from experience, but ended up taking more time than you should or missing out on a ‘killer feature’ on your gadget – and that could cost you.

#2: Common Sense / Know-it-all

The commonly known common sense isn’t really that common. Remember the times where you told yourself “Ah, I’ll never forget that. It’s common sense.” and you forget it when you need it the most? That happens because you’ve told your brain to put that aside and if you label all your findings and knowledge as ‘common sense’, you’ll never find them when you need them the most. I usually compile all useful resources into Microsoft OneNote. It isn’t the best software around, but it does what I need it to do – taking down notes and organizing them into separate categories.

#3: Complacent

When it comes to social media, learning happens everyday. You stop making progress the moment you decide to stop learning. Some businesses tend to relax when they’ve achieved what they set out to do thinking that the success stays with them. The truth is, your fans and followers can feel it when you’re laid back and eventually lose interest in you. It is important to keep your game up consistently and never remain too comfortable.

What do you think? What are the other thoughts that can derail one from being successful on social media?

How to: Be Successful in Business? Back to Basics

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Startup Weekend MalaysiaRecently I have been invited to the Startup Weekend Malaysia to experience the program and mingle around with people with great ideas. If you’re wondering, the Startup Weekend is a global initiative to assist aspiring (serious) entrepreneurs in making their first step to realize their business ideas. Each participant is given the opportunity to pitch their ideas to the room in 1-minute and the top 10 ideas (based on votes) will be selected and that’s where the real work begins – from forming teams, brainstorming, market research to prototype development.

The beauty of this program? Everyone leaves with a developed business idea. Cool, huh?

As I was listening to the individual pitches, observing and talking to these entrepreneurs, it made me once again realize the secret ingredient for success – whether it is in business, social media campaigns or even in life – and they really are the basics, nothing fancy or extraordinary.

One of the plenary sessions at the Startup Weekend Malaysia

Here are the 7 basic attributes to be successful:

#1: Dream

Every participant that came to the program had a dream – an idea, a business plan waiting to be fulfilled. They’ve probably been sleeping on it ever since it popped into their heads and they are just waiting for the opportunity to get it started.

What About You?: Do you have a dream? Do not be afraid to dream. Ideas only stop coming because you allowed it to. A rule – don’t set boundaries to your dream. Dream big!

Further reading: It’s time to dream!

#2: Passion

Even though the participants were only given 1-minute to pitch, their passion and enthusiasm is unmistakable. They are eager to see their business idea come to live and they obviously do not care if the rest thinks it is a silly / inviable idea. It’s theirs and they are proud that they own it.

What About You?: Do you have an idea but am afraid of what others might think? Stop yourself from thinking that way and let your passion take over. Sometimes, a silly idea turns great through passion – simply because you never stopped believing.

#3: Action

Passion is put to test when the participants are required to form teams to actually work on their ideas. This is where the participants had to really do something about it – to make the idea work, beyond just talking and sharing.

What About You?: Maybe it is time for you to take action and put that passion of yours to good use. Sitting on it won’t do any good. Action makes things happen.

Further reading: Passion without Action is dead!

#4: Determination

Let’s take a step back – even before the participants had to form teams, they had to gather votes from everyone present as only 10 ideas with the highest votes will be given the opportunity to form teams to drive the idea further. I particularly remember this participant, Aaron, that came up to me saying “Sir, will you give me an opportunity to share my idea with you?”. His idea wasn’t extraordinary but his passion and determination (and preliminary idea research) won my vote.

What About You?: How determined are you to make your idea a reality? Remember, it is always easier to give up but being successful in most cases, is like running a marathon. It’s a long journey but the reward is great.

#5: Team Work

It is interesting to see how the teams were formed at the Startup Weekend. Almost every team were looking for a developer, marketer and finance person simply because they understood that they cannot do it alone.

What About You?: No man is an island. You’ll definitely need a team to make up for your weaknesses. Get your team together and you’ll find that that’s the best decision you’ve ever made! It also helps you focus on what you need to do – managing and keeping the vision intact.

#6: Focus

From time to time again the participants were reminded to build a MVP – Most Viable Product, forgoing fancy features and functions and focusing on the must-haves, the actual benefits that the consumer wants.

What About You?: It is easy to get caught up with the cool features and add-ons of your plans but if you do not have anything to begin with, your ideas are nothing to begin with. Focus on getting the core benefits right THEN the add-ons. Remember, build a MVP!

Further reading: The 2 Secret Ingredients for a Successful Product

#7: Anticipation

People say that when Apple is building the very first iPhone, they already have the iPhone 4 and the iPad in mind, just waiting for the right time to roll them out. Build with the future in mind! Anticipate opportunities for expansion and problems that may occur.

What About You?: It is all about preparation. A scalable product will definitely have a larger potential and you may just capture the attention of investors are venture capitalists. Always be on your toes – you’ll never know when you’ll need to sprint forward ;)

Do you remember the time when you were just starting out? What drove / motivated you? I would love to hear your experience :)

 

Setting the Temperature: How Hot Are You?

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Have you heard of the term, party pooper? These guys are no fun. They step in and very often than not, kills the mood of the entire environment. How about people filled with enthusiasm and zeal? Are they contagious?

Believe it or not, people have the ability to change the temperature of the room, from hot to cold and vice versa and how hot (or cold) it can go depends on that particular someone – in most cases, the leader.

The leader sets the temperature of the team and the environment he / she is working in. The leader’s goals and beliefs will be transferred to the environment, affecting the performance and the mindset of the surrounding people and will eventually evolve into what it is called ‘culture’.

“In other words, the leader can be liken to a termostat where he / she sets the temperature of the room.”

Having the right temperature

Many books on leadership often talk about how leaders should be always a step ahead and how they should lead by example. What they really meant is that by being a step ahead, they are constantly ‘heating’ up the room temperature through action for others to ‘warm up’ to it – an environment that allows one to feel uncomfortable just staying put and has to keep up / adapt to become comfortable again.

Notice how authors do not talk about being too far ahead of their team? Heating up the temperature too much kills whatever that is inside it. I’m not against goal setting and vision casting, but sometimes a vision too big can become insignificant, impersonal and unreachable (e.g. we want to have a profit of 10 million within the first year for a start up company).

It is important for leaders to know how to control the temperature in the room. Personal conversations, corporate visions, individual goals, support, your mind set and etc are all part of setting the temperature right.

“The trick is really to have a vision that your team can see for themselves and to take ownership, a goal that is challenging yet attainable – and be there to make it happen with them!”

a leader sets the room temperature

Let’s heat things up

What is the level on your termostat? Are you hot? cold? Or just at room temperature? Effective leaders changes the climate of things when they are around and you can definitely do that too! It starts with yourself!

Have you been into a ‘hot’, ‘cold’ or ‘room temperature’ situation before? I’d like to hear your experience :)

An Interesting Beginning to 2011: Positioning for Opportunities

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In case you’re wondering – this site also reveals part of my happenings in life, injecting a little bit more flavour to the site as a whole; something lighter than the usual information dosage :)

I know it has only been a month into the new year but 2011 has been great (and really busy) for me. There are tons of exciting projects lined up this year including online consultancy projects, branding events and more!

Openminds Resources have also recently secured a consultancy project with one of Malaysia’s largest chocolate retailers / manufacturers which is really exciting to the team as it also allows us to get an exclusive insight to the chocolate industry in Malaysia and not to forget, delicious chocolate tours. I will also be sharing updates on this project, granting you – awesome readers insight as we take on this project on online positioning, marketing and social media.

Interestingly, I was also offered an opportunity to be a part time lecturer at one of Malaysia’s top IT universities – Asia Pacific University College of Technology & Innovation (APIIT / UCTI). This is definitely an interesting experience as I too, graduated from the very same university.

Standing and sharing in front of the students is an humbling experience and yet another learning curve! I actually look forward to the classes as this will also give me the opportunity to connect with the students and to hopefully inspire them to be future entrepreneurs and leaders as they inspire me to take on new heights.

What About You?

I hope it has been an awesome beginning for you! If you’re on the look out for a start-out point, here are 3 simple ways you can create your own beginnings!

#1: Position Yourself for Opportunities!

They often say “be at the right place at the right time”. Easier said than done, but you can always position yourself in situations that opportunities can come. It may be taking on a leadership role, participating in networking sessions, attending conferences, taking up new responsibilities or even standing in for your colleague at work – opportunities often come in ways we don’t expect it to. The trick is to POSITION ourselves to run into those opportunities.

#2: Talk Opportunities!

Do you have something that you’re absolutely passionate about? Whether it is keeping up with the latest technology updates or getting a promotion at work, you need to talk about it. Not just talk, but talk to the right people – the more the merrier. Make yourself available to these opportunities. Some people create blogs so that they can talk and share about their passion and blogs are a powerful way to express yourself and get noticed… even by your boss!

#3: Push Your Limits!

I’m sure there are times where you simply feel powerless or already at your limit. Your creative juices stopped flowing and you’re stagnant at where you’re at. At times like these comes BIG opportunity! Instead of focusing on your limitations, identify what exactly is putting a cap on your limits and work towards removing them! When this happens, new opportunities are opened to you and you’re ready for greater heights!

Moving Forward

Opportunities come and go and it is often up to us on how we make the most out of them. For those of you that are celebrating the Lunar New Year, this site is now in red in conjunction with this joyous celebration!

May 2011 be filled with great opportunities, good health and endless blessings!

How to: Create a Winning Strategy!

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how to create a winning strategy

One common mistake marketing leaders, entrepreneurs and business owners make is to consistently look for winning strategies outside of your own four walls. True, there are times where ‘thinking outside of the box / walls’ comes in handy but often than not, there is a high possibility that you already HAVE that winning touch and you just do not realize it.

The question to ask yourself is really just this: What is your unique selling proposition? By answering this question truthfully, chances are, that is the key to outperform your competitors – simply by leveraging on the resources, skills, knowledge, tools, systems and talents you ALREADY have!

#1: Identify your strengths first before strategizing

Look inwards – put on paper what you do best. What makes you stand out – Is it customer service? Or a unique product? What talents or resources do you have at hand – Web designers? Programmers? Sales teams?

Once you have these down, work on a strategy that leverage on your strengths. Use them wisely and you may have already won half the battle!

#2: Look at your competitors’ strengths

Look outwards – see what your competitors do best. It is crucial that you acknowledge their strengths and identify how are they different from you so that you can have a strategy that stands out in the industry, and that they cannot copy (at least not that easy).

#3: Make provision for GROWTH

Many people strategize for the now. You need to have a strategy for the tomorrow. Have a strategy that lasts and is able to adapt to changes – simply because things change – especially when it comes to technology. You may have the world’s most advanced software to manage a storefront but your competitors may have an improved version the year after. It happens.

Here’s to greater victories in 2011!

Still Waiting For Success?

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Happy Monday! We are already in 2011 – are you in it full swing yet? Or are you still waiting to commit to your plans, strategies and success? Wait no longer!

The later you start on your plans, the higher the slope you’ll have to climb as you’ll be racing against time, success stories of other people and greater ideals. Why not create your own success story for a change? This image I found really says it all:

wait no longer

What is YOUR Success Plan?

May it be taking up courses, setting goals, attending conferences – the secret is really to just go out there and make it happen!

“Don’t wait for success, go make it happen!“

The 2011 Challenge

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BLESSED NEW YEAR, EVERYONE!

How did you spend your new year’s day? Have you got all your resolutions on paper yet?

I don’t know about you but it would seem that humans in general, are procrastinators. We tend to leave everything to the very last minute and will only work when we are forced to do so. Such is seen in education – at school, we were forced to study whether we liked it or not but after we graduate, we no longer are forced to study, no longer forced to improve ourselves.

What does this have to do with 2011?

The keyword here is to CHALLENGE yourself. You only stop moving forward when you stop challenging yourself. Set higher goals and do not get stuck in the comfort zone. CHALLENGE to remain motivated. CHALLENGE to achieve greater success. CHALLENGE to stay ahead of the game.

Let 2011 begin by saying “I choose to challenge myself”.

If you’re wondering how the new year celebration was like in Malaysia, here’s a video I found on YouTube:

Have an awesome 2011 ahead! CHALLENGE – that’s my theme of the year. Will that be yours, too?