I believe all business is fundamentally the same.
How can all companies be the same? A restaurant is very different from a hydro-electric power station just as a bus service is equally different in essence to an accountancy practice. Aren’t they? I believe there are two key elements to all businesses: “Product or Service” and “Profit” or put another way, provide and survive.
What is the “it”- the essence of a business? Is it electricity from an HEP station, tax returns that save you money from an accountancy firm or the restaurant that serves hot or cold food on time in the manner you requested? The client is only interested in one thing – the end product or service they are buying. How that is produced or brought into being is irrelevant to them; as the producer or supplier that is your issue, not theirs. The company may have to employ specialist skills, knowledge of equipment, language and labour relations or specific motivational or managerial skills. These are of no interest to the client who simply wants product or service ‘X’ on date ‘Y’ for the agreed price.
The other element to any business is profit. A provider of products or services is not in business unless they are making a profit and without profit the company cannot survive. You might debate this point when it comes to loss leader marketing techniques and market share capture initiatives. At the end of the day the business must make a profit in some form or other in order to survive.
The combination of all the elements that go on behind the scenes cost money: manufacturing, learning, training, marketing, building, teaching and developing all take place to differing degrees prior to the product or service being delivered. Knowing the sum of all these costs and charging them to the client is the process of doing business.
Adding a mark-up on that cost is the principle of running a profitable business. The final price will be driven by what the external market forces allow, competition, cost of raw materials, costs of staff and the clients’ ability to pay. Fundamentally business is the supply of a product or a service to a client at a given price that will allow the business to continue to trade. All companies must provide and survive.
Why then, when looking at external advice and coaching, do clients demand or request specialists in their particular field? A consultant or coach working in a specific project in a key area of a business naturally will have specialist knowledge, be that IT Integration systems or HR Law. The more specific the remit and project the more specialised the consultant or coach needs to be. However when driving business growth in conjunction with motivation, strategy, communication and planning, an in-depth knowledge or experience of one particular area can hamper progress.
For example a consultant or coach working in the health and fitness industry might focus primarily on the day-to-day running of the health centre – areas such as staff recruitment, management, pool ph and chlorine levels, health and safety, cleaners, and class schedule. In contrast a non-specialist coach or consultant will focus more closely on the two fundamentals of business – provide and survive – member numbers, retention of members, quality of service, consistency of service and other sources of income. The pH levels in the pool are details that the client is not concerned about unless it goes wrong, so the process needs to be in place in the background, but the focus should be elsewhere on growing the business.
I appreciate the example is very general and includes a number of sweeping generalisations of both consultants and coaches and the health and fitness industry, so apologies to those who disagree.
This does not change the key point that a non-industry specialist’s objective view point will take the bigger picture view of the business without being constrained by the small details that do not affect the overall goal, which is to provide and survive.
Many years ago I started working for a large group of companies. On the first day I was given a thesaurus of jargon terms used by the company, it was several pages long. I realised that the focus was very much on the details rather than on the doing. This reinforces my argument that in order to provide and survive the business has to be made simple. If company staff need a dictionary to understand what is being said internally, how will the clients feel? The client simply wants product or service ‘X’ on date ‘Y’ for the agreed price. If the producers complicate that system and make it difficult for the client there will be always be a competitor elsewhere more than willing to take over.
Third party outside advice can be crucial to a business. I believe an objective, unbiased opinion can give a far greater return in the grander scheme; for that reason I work with all of the above. Give the client the product or service at a price that brings you the level of profit that will enable the company to survive to fight again another day. Provide and survive.
Archive
For February, 2011
If you are looking at Internet Businesses for sale because you believe they are an instant and easy way to make extra money working from home there may be other things you want to consider before making the final decision to invest in one.
Legitimate Internet Business opportunities certainly do provide a mechanism for earning a full time income online, or simply making extra money working from home, but this article suggests some factors you may want to consider.
It can be expensive.
If you are looking at Internet businesses for sale you are more than likely going to be interested in purchasing a successful business. In order to acquire such a business you may well have to pay a premium for it (bear in mind that someone else has already done all the work for you) that could represent (say) 5 or 6 times the value of the annual earnings of that business. This can represent a significant up-front investment, from $5000 to $200,000 plus, depending on the scale of business you are looking to purchase. After all, no one is going to give away a successful business.
Why not start your own Internet business?
Rather than looking at Internet Businesses for sale why not start your own? If the prospect of doing this (if you are a newcomer to Internet Marketing, or fairly inexperienced) fills you with horror, understand that it is just a process that you need to learn you and once you have learned it you can build business after business – and earn a six figure income online in a relatively short period of time.
Additionally, every dollar you create from day one is yours – you don’t need to see 2 or 3 years of profits to recoup the initial investment you make if you go down the Internet Businesses for sale route.
It may not work!
Today many Internet businesses for sale come in the form of a turnkey Internet Marketing system, often known as a business in a box. In exchange for your initial investment, which can range from a few hundred to several thousand dollars, you get access to pre-built websites and a ready-made marketing system that you simply need to personalise for yourself.
While there are many legitimate home business opportunities of this type available there is also a similar amount that simply do not work and some that are just complete scams.
The only way to make sure you do not fall prey to these opportunities is to make sure you undertake sufficient research before you make any investment.
In summary I would say this. Looking at Internet Businesses for sale and investing in one is certainly one strategy for making money online.
However, taking into account that starting an Internet business is much simpler today than (say) 10 years ago (e.g. fewer technical skills needed to build websites), it may well be that this represents a better option for some people.
Any new company which is entering in the business world should always be aware of the challenges it will be facing.
There is a fast competition in the trade world. There are thousands of business companies ready to compete. Through years they have became so efficient that they are carrying business transactions in seconds.
Now the question arises that how is this possible to carry business so fast. Business to business market is the solution.
Thousands of trading companies around the world are using online marketplace for the growth of their business. They have realized that online marketplaces are helping them to save their revenue and time. These established companies do not waist their revenues on marketing purposes here and there. They just use the hubs for marketing which is giving them maximum exposure that a company can possibly get.
The new companies entering in the trade world should follow this strategy of using the online hubs. Instead of placing ads in newspapers and on different websites, they can easily save their revenues by placing their trading leads only on b2b hubs.
These hubs are serving the business world as a platform where business companies from all around the world can get connected. These hubs are serving as meeting place for the traders to interact with each other.
Through these hubs making new business relations has also become very easy.
Now traders don’t need to travel miles and miles, from city to city and from region to region in search of new companies to establish business relations, as now they can find an online business directory on these hubs which provides data about thousands of companies. The days are over when traders travel from company to company and drop their visiting and business cards in offices.
Through these hubs many leading business companies have strengthen their businesses, in order to grow it faster.
The conventional ways of marketing can never promise maximum exposure, as certain new papers are read in certain areas and certain websites come across certain people, when they especially go to the specific web site address.
On the other hand these hubs are places where already there are companies present which are ready to sell and buy.
Importers, exporters, retailers and wholesalers from many different regions of the world are giving preference to this modern meeting place for traders instead of those conventional ways.
Without facing hassles they are able to save their revenues which were previously wasted on marketing and now they can easily use these revenues to make the quality of their products better.