Tag: business

Fading markets, falling margins

Are we fast enough to recognise when our business is changing?

“They don’t pay for us to go to trade shows anymore,” lamented a journalist at a recent industry PR event. The era of international trips and freebies is over for most technology journalists and its passing is mourned by many of them.

Media junkets, industry conferences in exotic locations and management retreats to exclusive resorts are what businesses with fat profits can afford. Most of the tech industry is past that point as most of the sector becomes commoditised.

Slowly, vendors come to understand what a commoditised market means as Acer have with their announcement they will stop selling cheap systems while others, like Apple, have managed to avoid that trap entirely.

As technology changes, cheaper manufacturing locations appear and consumer preferences change many businesses will find their markets change. Some will identify those changes early and change course while others will wonder what has happened to their fat margins and why they can’t afford management, client or media trips to the Pacific or the South of France anymore.

That’s good for consumers, but a terrible thing for those managers who are little better than corporate bureaucrats and their friends in the media.

Interestingly, it’s the jobsworths and the overfed incumbents who are the slowest to recognise when their businesses are changing which is why there’s so much opportunity for smaller, smarter enterprises.

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Business is fine

Everything is good in business, until one day it isn’t.

“I don’t need high speed broadband,” snarls the businessman in a country town, “business is fine as it is.”

A hundred years ago this year the iconic Australian horse coach company Cobb & Co went into its first bankruptcy as it declined from being the dominant transport service of rural Australia.

Cobb & Co was founded in 1854 by four young Americans in the Victorian gold rush and grew around the expansion of Australia’s rural farming and mining industries. By 1900 the company had 9,000 horses travelling 31,000km (20,000 miles) every week.

By 1924 Cobb & Co was gone. Displaced by the motor car and restrictive state government rules designed to protect their railways.

Many businesses, including the management of Cobb & Co, thought the motor car was a fad. No doubt many at the time also thought electricity was dangerous and unnecessary.

Business worked fine as it was when stagecoaches carried the mail and bullock carts carted the crops, steam engines were fine to power the farms and businesses while the telegraph was just fine for those times when a three month letter to your customers or creditors in London or New York wasn’t quick enough.

All those businesses went broke. They didn’t go broke fast, it was a slow process until one day owners realised it was all over and then the end came surprisingly quickly.

That’s where many of us our today – cloud computing might be the latest buzzword, social media might be a distraction for coffee addled children of the TV generation and the global market might be just a way to dump cheap goods and services on gullible consumers – but markets and societies are changing, just as they did a hundred years ago.

Sure, your business doesn’t need fast Internet. Business is fine.

Stage coach image courtesy of Velda Christensen at http://www.novapages.com/

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The evolving business

Sometimes we have to disappoint old customers and fans

“Maybe people are less interested in what you do now,” said a listener after November’s Weekend computer spot, “I’d like to hear more about buying new computers.”

The listener was commenting that he didn’t find what I speak about interesting any more and that I don’t spend time updating the PC Rescue website.

What the well intentioned commenter didn’t understand is that businesses, and their owners, evolve in order to survive and stay sane.

In my case, I have the idiot savant’s ability to retain miscellaneous facts and see patterns. This works well in IT support and comes in handy when answering technical questions on radio talkback programs.

Those skills were so useful that the success of the programs and online columns distracted me from my own five year business plan. When I belatedly realised the business wasn’t meeting my personal objectives I moved on from the day to day operations of the organisation.

Another problem for being an on-air tech guru is that while there’s a demand for experts to answer computer questions, not many people want to pay for that advice meaning there isn’t really a market.

Indeed, giving complimentary advice had the perverse effect of damaging my own personal brand with the market, such as it is, believing I’d do everything for free, something my long suffering call centre had to battle with constantly (sorry Yvonne and Ash).

When it becomes apparent things aren’t working like we intended, it’s time to look at what we’re doing and figure out another course. Einstein said “insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results.”

When we decide to change some of our old customers, fans and followers might be upset; but sometimes what’s best for us and our business in this changing world means we have to leave some behind.

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Cloud Computing Explained: 702 Sydney Weekends

This month’s 702 Sydney Weekend spot looks at cloud computing.

What on earth is cloud computing? Is it just another IT buzzword or something that you can use in your home and business?

On the November 20 ABC Weekends show, Paul and Lex Marinos discussed what cloud computing is and how it can help you.

We also helped out listeners with various computer and tech questions, including the following;

Malware

Sue was caught out by the DNS Changer Trojan that was recently busted by the FBI. Probably the best fix for this is downloading and running the free Malwarebytes software.

Our IT Queries site has instructions on the somewhat convoluted process for removing this Trojan and other viruses from your computer.

Synchronising an iPhone with iCloud and Google Calendars

One advantage we have with the cloud is that it means you can use devices anywhere, however there is a bug where iPhone calendar functions aren’t synchronising with Google Calendar.

Unfortunately the problem is the iCloud and Google services aren’t compatible on the iphone so one has to be turned off.

If your preference is to use the Google services, then you will have to turn off the iCloud services through the iPhone’s settings app and turning off all of the calendar and contact settings.

You may then want to check your Google services are being synchronised through the iTunes settings.

Sharing data between laptops.

One of the advantages with networking is that you can share data between computers. Sonya wanted to know how she can setup her windows 7 laptops to share data to an external drive.

The best option is to use a Windows 7 compatible Network Area Storage device that sits on the network.

For the setup to work, the network name has to be the same on all three devices, Microsoft has instructions for setting Windows7 network name and the hard drive will have the instructions included for setting it up correctly.

It’s also worthwhile using Microsoft’s Active Sync software to synchronise machines as well so you have files stored on your computer.

If you missed Sunday’s ABC program, there’s more details at Netsmarts’ Cloud Computing explained and The Networked Business, we’ll also be running a Demystifying the Cloud webinar on the Australian Businesswomen’s Network at the end of November.

That will probably be the last ABC 702 Weekends spot for 2011 unless there’s something else that comes up.

Subscribers to our newsletter get early notice of any upcoming programs and other useful information on getting more value online. Don’t miss the next program.

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So you want a business grant?

The promise of free government money is seductive, but is it real?

“Funding Available from $1000 to $500,000! Get an advantage over your competitors or give your business the Government Funding boost it needs to be more successful!” Is the promise of a website offering to find grants for your business.

Free money from the government sounds good and, as we’ve seen in the various Quantative Erasings and bank bail outs around the world, it sometimes is free.

Rarely though is cash really “free”, usually there’s strings attached and government money is no different.

Why do governments give business grants?

First we should understand why governments make grants, subsidies and loans available to businesses.

Governments have various objectives with their programs; they could be to get unemployed workers back in the workforce, to improve skill levels or to encourage exports. Whatever the motives are, they have clear criteria for giving money away.

One area they don’t give funds for is to “Get an advantage over your competitors” as that website. That’s clearly not the role for governments and they’d be rightly criticised for doing so.

The paperwork storm

Contrary to what some media outlets portray, most public servants take their responsibilities seriously and don’t give out taxpayers’ money unless the application clearly meets their programs’ objectives.

Meeting the objectives is important, because the public servants – and their political masters – are held accountable so they will make sure the business receiving the grant or subsidy has actually done what they have promised to do.

This is where things get tricky for business owners and managers who have received government money. Completing the paperwork to prove you’ve met the objectives will be time consuming.

Drive a cab

Often it would have been more cost effective to drive a cab rather than spend hours filling in government paperwork.

There really is no such thing as free money, there’s always a cost. While sometimes there are good reasons for applying for a government program, free money should never be your objective.

It’s also worth keeping in mind that services offering to find government money for you will usually take a cut of the grant as commission. Also, they won’t help you do the follow up paperwork, that’s your expensive problem.

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Is your business killing you?

Building businesses can hurt your health.

It’s hard work running a business and often we hear stories of the tycoon who drops dead from a heart attack or finds themselves divorced, friendless and penniless at the end of many hardworking years in building up their venture.

Being an entrepreneur means you live in your business as much as work in it, but it if we’re not careful it can kill us.

Know your finances

There are some who believe that a business plan and cash flow projection are unnecessary, they are wrong and at best are falling for survivor bias.

Insufficient capital is the main reason why good businesses fail, it’s also the leading cause for marital breakdowns and the failure of business or personal relationships.

Not understanding your finances means you have no idea whether your business is really profitable or if those returns are sustainable. If you don’t realise the cash position of your venture than you are at real risk if there’s an unexpected change in the market should an unexpected event like sickness or a tax bill arrive.

Take a break

If you don’t take an occasional vacation you are at risk of genuinely going mad. You need some time away from the grind to recharge your batteries.

Getting away from daily work issues also helps your business as it’s an opportunity to see the wider perspective of the markets and society you operate in.

Exercise

Many of us don’t get time to exercise, which starts to slow us down both physically and mentally. Even if our businesses are a success, we may not have the health to enjoy the benefits. Remember the guys who die of a heart attack at 50.

Eating

Coupled with not exercising is having a bad diet, because we don’t have time to eat well we often end up eating convenient junk or not have a balanced diet. Take time to grab a healthy breakfast and lunch.

Poor work practices

When we stressed, racing to get a job done or under pressure, we often take shortcuts or break regulations. This can be anything from a truck driver not respecting driving time limits, a plumber not lifting heavy goods properly through to a consultant not changing the tyres on their car because they didn’t have time to be off the road.

Either way, not respecting safe working practices can be catastrophic for the business person and those around them.

Have an objective

Your business plan should have objectives for your business on a 12-month, one year and three year horizon along with an exit plan.

An exit plan could be building great apps, revolutionising your industry, amassing a retirement nest egg, handing the operation to the kids, franchising the business, a stock market float or making a trade sale.

Whatever your reasons for being in business are, having a clear objective to work towards helps guide you through the morass of daily tasks in running a business.

Ditch the negative people

Whingeing, whining negative customers will drag you down, similarly with business partners and employees who will bitch and moan about customers, the government or staff. Successful businesses are run by optimistic people.

Be objective

The flip side to negativity is undue optimism and a lack of objectivity. It pays to have a realistic view of where a business is going and often that vacation helps you get the objective view needed.

When you get a great business idea it can difficult to let go, so that’s why we need the ability to step back and understand who we are, why we are doing this and where we’re going with the project.

Even if our businesses are successful, we need to be a position to enjoy the hard work and return on our labour.

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Is Google drowning business?

Are there too many online services?

The launch of a pages function for Google+ allowing businesses to create a profile on Google’s social media and identity management service is welcome.

What jumps out immediately is there is no integration with Google Local, meaning that businesses will have to create another online profile and learn the nuances of it.

Right now big and small businesses are being confused by the proliferation of online tools and the problem is made worse by advisors maintaining you have to be on each service actively talking to your customers. That’s nice for a corporation with unlimited funds and resources but a tough ask in the real business world.

By adding another service – that doesn’t integrate with Google’s myriad of services let alone outside platforms like WordPress, Facebook and Twitter – Google are making it hard for businesses to allocate the time and resources to the online world.

What’s more, the terminology is confusing; Google’s rebranding of Local to Places started this and now we’ll see business owners and managers confusing Google+ Pages with Google Places.

That confusion will be understandable as right now the terminology between the two overlaps and it will be difficult to explain the difference to business people who have many other issues to worry about along with this.

One thing we can be sure of is there will be a whole range of strategies tied into Google+ Pages that might, or might not, affect search engine results and – given the ongoing nymwars debacle and the similar mess with Google Places listings – there’s a strong likelihood this program is going to get bogged down in opaque bureaucratic procedures.

It seems different divisions within Google are running their own races; Adwords isn’t talking to Blogger, Analytics aren’t talking to Local and the team running Google+ are taking advantage of senior management’s obsession with social at the expense of Google’s core competencies and their advantages in the local and mobile sectors.

Right now businesses are struggling with the plethora of online services and how to use them in their organisations, Google have to break down their own silos and start integrating their services to make it easier for managers, entrepreneurs and proprietors to use these platforms.

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