Pleasure Delaying Concepts in Business

A couple of years ago I watched the movie Vanilla Sky and within the complexities of the film was a concept of ‘Pleasure Delaying.’ Although a little more amorous in connotation than the meaning behind this post, a Pleasure Delayer was someone whom, although strongly attracted to someone, would wait until the last possible moment to make a physical, sexual gesture, therefore delaying pleasure. Apparently, the reward is ever-so sweeter after one has waited.

Delayed Gratification has been studied for many years. Persons who have the ability to take rewards but choose to wait because the reward is greater after waiting, tend to find life itself more rewarding. A 15-year old TIME article presents this case well.

As it relates to business, think of the difficult, daunting tasks that must be completed in order for your business to succeed. And of course, there are pleasurable activities that are either a result caused by the hard work or are available in addition to the hard work. In the case of the latter, consider this – which scenario is better?

A) Doing the fun stuff while knowing all the while that laborious, difficult tasks are ahead? Is that truly enjoyable?

B) Or, taking care of the hard work, then basking in the pleasure of fun or leisurely activities – knowing that the hard part is behind you?

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Smart Entrepreneurs use ION FreshStart.

Before you start your business plan, identify the three C’s.

Company
Business owners may be experts on the product or service they provide, but is (s)he an expert when it comes to the company? Sure, the company is highly dependent upon the product or service, but a company is more than that. What is the company’s purpose? Its mission? Its philosophy? Why is your company offering this product or service? Why is this is a great idea?

Competitor
Identify your competition. What do they offer? Is it a good product? Do they maintain a large market share? Why are they considered competition? How will you compete?

Customer
Who is your customer? The demographic? Why do they want or need your company’s offering? How do you know this?

Once you have identified and understand the three C’s, you can move forward drafting a business plan.

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Find additional information for business plan building in ION FreshStart’s Advanced Business Planning

Progressive Rights Management: Learning a Lesson from YouTube

Mac, iWork and a Little Help

A couple of days ago I visited the Apple Store in midtown Manhattan. I was amazed, but not surprised, at how many people were in the store. I could hardly move through the sea of Apple customers. With the surge in Apple’s popularity, I have to assume that many people looking for business plan solutions for Mac are new to the Mac’s operating system and its applications. ION FreshStart is creating a new section on the website for assistance with these types of things. Currently, we have a trouble-shooting page that identifies some of the issues one may have with our Advanced Business Planning kit if you are new to iWork.

Trouble Shooting Page: http://ionfreshstart.com/troubleshooting.html

For information about our Advanced Business Planning kit visit: http://www.ionfreshstart.com

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Find Your Inner Diplomat

ION FreshStart is pleased to present our Guest Blogger: Kevin Cullis of MacGetIT

To Business Plan or not, that is the question
by Kevin Cullis

“When the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail.” This quote from Abraham Maslow, famous for Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, explains an overuse of a familiar tool to solve all the problems that one meets. Do you use a hammer for all of your tasks? How about a screwdriver? Wouldn’t think so, but we all have a tendency to do this.

In business, this is no different. The first question of every startup is: Where’s your business plan? In most cases the entrepreneur asks: Should I write a business plan or not? Answer? It depends.

Depends on where you are in starting your business.

You can start a business within a few days and start it and run it successfully without a business plan for a short time. The critical answer to the question is when will you need to write it? At some point it will be essential for your business to write one.

Writing and completing a business plan is not the main concern for any budding entrepreneur. It is the entrepreneur’s exercise in planning that is the most important skill to learn, not completing the plan. Planning prepares you for potential problems that might occur with your thinking and processes, especially if you have never worked in a business before. Planning can cut the potential financial and other risks to a manageable size to make money or to avoid larger problems altogether.

Your plans will never be perfect.

Google, Apple, Starbucks, and PayPal, according to the book Getting to Plan B by John Mullins, all started with a business plan. When the results were not being achieved as they expected they changed their plans. Mullins reiterates in his book some great business advice from 1937 for budding entrepreneurs:

“If the first plan you adopt does not work successfully, replace it with a new plan; if this new plan fails to work, replace it still with still another, and so on, until you find a plan which does work. Right here is the point at which the majority of men meet with failure, because of their lack of persistence in creating new plans to take the place of those which fail.”

The quote, from Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich, was published in 1937 during the Great Depression. The definition of insanity (and in some cases insane persistence) is doing the same thing over and over expecting different results. Your business plan will change to fit the market’s needs and wants.

Thomas Edison stated, “Anything that won’t sell, I don’t want to invent. It’s sale is proof of utility, and utility is success.” Your plan includes your product or service, marketing and sales plans. If you’re making a profit, then you’re successful and your plan worked. If not, you need to review your plans and see where the problem lies and fix it.

In John C. Maxwell’s great book Failing Forward he says that the average number of failures for serial entrepreneurs is 3.8 times before they are successful in business. Entrepreneurs do not get deterred or see themselves as a failure. They see failure is a part of growing and learning, to become better entrepreneurs producing better products and competing in the world of business. Failure is really redefined as “testing,” you test and keep testing until you succeed.

Now go. Step out. The world is waiting for your ideas. Every entrepreneur has a $1,000,000 in them. What’s yours?

To check out Kevin’s new book, go here > How to Start a Business: Mac Version

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How to Start a Business: Mac Version

ABOUT KEVIN:

Kevin Cullis is a former Air Force officer. He has his Masters Degree in Administration, as well as over 12 years of face-to-face experience selling both Mac and PC hardware and software solutions to businesses, including three years with Apple. He loves helping entrepreneurs and small business owners integrate, utilize, and optimize the use of computers in their sales, marketing, and management processes. How to Start a Business: Mac Version is his first book. Contact him at kevin.cullis@gmail.com or visit his web site, http://www.macgetit.com for more tips about starting a business with a Mac.

Alan Watts was a British philosopher, writer and speaker and is one of my all-time personal favorites. Above is a quick talk titled Music and Life, animated and produced by South Park’s Trey Parker and Matt Stone. In my opinion, it celebrates the entrepreneurial rebel in each of us – as we realize that the rules that society enforces simply feel wrong and unnatural. And although the talk was given a half-a-century ago, it still resonates with applicable wisdom.

Dragons’ Den is a popular television show on the BBC in the UK. Eager entrepreneurs pitch their business ideas to a group of venture capitalists, hoping to secure investments as well as business advice. In exchange for the investment capital, the VC (or Dragon) receives a percentage of the company’s stock. The Dragons question the entrepreneur about his/her ideas, business acumen and future forecasting. The Dragons, if interested, can make an offer individually, or in conjunction with other Dragons.

Some have asked about our Financial Workshop components in the Advanced Business Planning kit and surprisingly, most questions surround the salaries and wages worksheet.

Some popular questions are: Can I add employees mid-year? If they receive a raise the next year, will I be able to show this?

The Financial Workshop can handle that. Let me give you some details:

You enter:

Some preliminary details like employee name, base salary, and applicable percentages related to salary. You also enter the MONTH that the employee started receiving his/her salary that year.

The Financial Workshop calculates and displays for each employee:

Base Salary
Commission
Bonuses
Benefits
Payroll Tax

The worksheet then breaks-out the data showing:

Full Salaries for each employee per year by month, with monthly and annual totals.
Benefits for each employee per year by month, with monthly and annual totals.
Payroll Taxes for each employee per year by month, with monthly and annual totals.

The worksheet accommodates five years of reporting.

For more information about the Financial Workshop, go to: www.ionfreshstart.com/included.html