President Obama:

As you take power for what is the most remarkable statement our country has made in ages and having run the best campaign ever, we know you are taking over what will be the worst job in the world.

• We want your optimism to be contagious and your can-do-attitude to inspire us
• We are terrified you will tax us and hold us up as scapegoats, while we are survivors
• We are hopeful you will see us as family leaders not large corporate thieves
• We are one-third democrats, one-third republicans and one-third independents*
• We love your dreaming but worry we are not included in those dreams
• We care little about NAFTA but worry more about being virtual
• We want to give people jobs but aren’t sure we can carry them
• We believe we give service to society by virtue of the value we provide to customers, the people we hire and the young that we train
• Lastly, it’s always been lonesome as a small business owner and we have no expectations that government will help us. We love our country and want to see it, and you, succeed.

While the entire world is holding their breath as to what an Obama victory really means to them, fear, uncertainty and doubt have already gripped most small business owners. From losing or maxing out their credit lines, to fearing that consumer demand will simply dry up, entrepreneurship is in upheaval. On one hand, it is still the American dream for so many; on the other, it is a grim reality for so many who depend on it.

Regardless of their industry, tenure, or age, never before have most business owners been so apprehensive about their futures. Why? Because, all the institutions and resources they count on—particularly banks, big customers, skilled and available workers, and economic stability—are all in disarray. Whether they voted for Obama, believing that a recovering middle class will lift all small business ships, or against him, fearful that the new burden of regulation, health care costs and increased taxes will torpedo their plans, business owners are downright scared. And when entrepreneurs are scared they become inactive or at the very least stop expanding. Why? Because owning a small business is all about:

• Being confident that you know your threats
• Knowing how to avoid and exploit your threats
• Confidently spending the resources to do so

Why are business owners so nervous? Because for the first time in decades, they don’t know what to do. Nothing has prepared them to cope and face what is upon them. Wondering if they will have a working business at all has replace traditional “E Myth” goals of “working on one’s business” as opposed to working “in one’s business.” The new threats are not the same as the old threats and knowing how to even respond, let alone find the courage to invest the needed time, money and energy in the correct responses, is beyond the “pay grade” of most owners.

But before we can address these concerns, how did entrepreneurship get to this point? Since 1980, business ownership has grown from a wry dream for most to a total investment for so many. From under ten million in the 1980s to some 25 million† today, nearly ten percent of Americans depend directly on their own businesses for financial security and another ten to thirty percent are customers, vendors, employees or investors of small business. From being seen as outsiders or rebels, the small business owner has become in many ways the focal point of the American Dream. Large corporations spend billions marketing to them. This last election created “Joe the Plumber” and the small business owner’s laments of paying too much in taxes, having bad health care options and struggling for visibility and respect are daily themes our news media covers ad nauseam.

As importantly, the entrepreneurial movement has produced a new lifestyle and set of values. Magazines, such as Fast Company and INC. along with owners-only support groups such as EO and VISTAGE have sprung up to enhance the entrepreneurial way of business and personal life. Entrepreneurship is so ingrained in our society that it has outgrown the stereotypes of being part of one political party. A 2007 Fortune Zogby Poll of business owners reported that 37% are registered Republicans, 35% are registered Democrats and the remaining are Independents.

While the novelty of entrepreneurship has worn off, today’s business owner remains as much a lone wolf as ever. All of the 20% who survive their first five years† do so by quickly learning to sell, manage cash, find and keep good people and create satisfied customers. But over the last few years, multiple forces in the economy and society in general are converging into a perfect storm and threatening both established business owners as well as the dreams of emerging ones.

So in closing, President Obama, we as business owners are fearful of what you may do to us and the harm you can bring to our small businesses yet we wait with baited breath to see if you can deliver your promises and help us continue our American dream of successful entrepreneurship because “Yes, we can.”

* 2007 Fortune ZOGBY Poll of Business Owners

† US SBA

Recently, a group of very successful partners of law, accounting, investment, and M&A firms met me for lunch and explained why their partnerships worked so well. I was most taken with how their success in partnerships contrasted with the partnership pain suffered by so many small businesses. Why do partnerships work so well with professional services firms and are so challenging for the rest of small business? Whether it is several individuals, a venture capital, private equity firm or an angel investor, small business partnerships just seem to struggle more and certainly make up a smaller proportion of successful entrepreneurships than do lawyers, CPAs or financial money managers.

Here are some Professional Services Lessons and Small Business Implications that I took away from the discussion:

Lesson I: Partners with the same professional degrees and training form tight, loyal and like-minded groups.
Implication: Small business partnerships are founded by experts with unique and complimentary skills. Don’t expect different owners to think or act similarly. It will be harder and take longer to achieve the same esprit d’corps among small business partnerships.

Lesson II: The real definition of any Partner is to be a Rainmaker, who can land and grow clients, regardless of whether they have managerial duties in the firm.
Implication: Small businesses require strong operations, finance and sales/marketing in equal measures, so different Partners proficient in different functions are needed.

Lesson III: Successful partnerships do not pay compensation to equity partners based solely on their shares but on their performance and contributions to their firm’s profits.
Implication: Regardless of ownership percentages, small business Partnerships would be well-served to set up compensation plans based on their partner’s job descriptions and performance

Lesson IV: Professional services firms make new partners, regardless of their experience or financial buy-in, work in their firm for a couple of years before bestowing formal partnership titles. This ensures they “fit” with the Partners regardless of how they “look on paper”
Implication: Small businesses would be well-served to similarly “date before marrying” instead of rushing into the arms of new partners, VC’s or private equity firms.

Lesson V: Professional services firms recruit talented individuals by offering partnerships, especially to those with books of business that can produce immediate revenues for the firm. Partnerships also provide the firms with the ability to institute and enforce non-competes’ on Rainmakers, protecting the firm’s long-term cash flow and revenue streams.
Implication: Small business partnerships are usually created when partners bring different resources to the table including technology/inventions, operating ability, money and sales/marketing. As a result of these divergent contributions, it is not as easy to protect the firm from the power or departure of any one Partner.

Lesson VI: Partners in professional services firms build long-term client relationships which are leveraged through having less experienced/expensive professionals perform most of the actual “work.” Having the right amount of these professionals is critical to the Partnerships’ profitability.
Implication: Despite the personal relationships small business Partners build with their customers, much of the actual delivery of their firm’s value cannot be done by the partner. Consequently, maintaining the same level of trusting relationships is difficult. So is the actual delivery of consistent “work” in the form of products, especially through distributors or inexperienced professionals.

Lesson VII: The recurring nature of relationship sales allows Partners in professional services firms to wield extraordinary marketplace power by closely managing their clients.
Implication: The transient nature of most buyers and customers makes building relationships much more difficult, especially since sales are usually more transactional than they are relationship-driven. Few Partners in small business know their customers as well as their counterparts in professional services do, despite spending more time and money on formal sales and marketing.

Partnerships in professional services firms have been around for centuries and laws and business practices ensure many of these will continue for decades and centuries to come. The goal of the small business Partnership should be to learn and apply the characteristics that can work in their businesses and not try to imitate what cannot be applied to their businesses.

While downturns come and go, it can be hard to ignore a recession when the media puts in your face every day. So beyond living in complete denial, what’s a business owner to do? Why not recognize opportunities that recession can bring to your business?

Here are a few points to ponder:

• Despite everyone preaching to the contrary, demand for most products does not disappear or decline more than 10%. Demand simply morphs and transforms. Take a good look at what your customers are doing to cut back and recognize the choices they’re making and how you can exploit them.
  
  
• Identify what your customers want vs. what they need, as these change during a recession. Strangely, some wants actually grow during a recession as people compensate for sacrifice in the strangest ways.
  
  
• Fully understand the money vs. time paradigm. Your customers will always have more of one than the other, so figure out how you can exploit this.
  
  
• If business is slow, now’s the time to rebuild or extend your Best and Highest Use. It’s a great time to start initiatives and build for sunny days.
  
  
• Despite the credit crunch, money is much less expensive to borrow in a recession as the Federal Reserve Bank cuts interest rates. Hunt around, as money is there to borrow, and when you find it, it can be a bargain. Also negotiate aggressively with your service and resource providers. Many are much more flexible than you might expect.
  
  
• Find the underserved and neglected in your marketplace. There are many folks and businesses that are not being adequately provided because their suppliers have abandoned them for greener markets. How can you step in?
  
  
• Seek out and walk with winners. In any recession, there are many folks who actually do better. Find them, serve them and grow with them.
  
  

There is an old saying, “Things are never as good as you think they are or as bad as you think they are.” A recession is precisely so. Dont ignore it rather exploit it just as you would a growing economy. Doing so during a recession is a true test of your business mettle.

Rise up and seize it.

Has your small business been forced to tackle a “must-do” project like Y2K or ISO9000 where the only result was a big bill and lots of wasted time? After watching dozens of clients invest in search engine optimization (SEO) and reviewing my own experience, I am coming to believe much of SEO is electronic snake oil. Let me explain.

Defining SEO
Search engine optimization is supposed to elevate your website’s Google and Yahoo rankings by fooling their programs into believing your site is the best answer to key words. The pitch of SEO is that you can “beat the system” by adding special phrases, formats and styles to your website, so it will be “seen” by the web spiders and crawlers who will “tell” the search engines to rank it higher. Doesn’t this remind you of gambling in Las Vegas? Only in a casino would you spend your money trying to beat the odds against those who set the rules. And as soon as they catch someone “beating their system” like counting cards, they make up new rules that keep the odds in their favor.

But isn’t SEO the same thing? As business owners we bet our money on SEO firms to beat the Google “system” but we can’t even bluff Google since they see all our “cards” as soon as our SEO “expert” puts them on our site. So actually we are subsidizing Google’s R&D efforts every time we “bet” with our SEO secrets which Google immediately can and does learn from! But armed with fancy graphs and charts, SEO experts promise us “get noticed quick” schemes that will place our firm on the first page and ahead of all the other firms that aren’t smart enough to invest in SEO.

What’s a Business Owner to do?
Don’t throw out the baby with the bath water.

1. Basic SEO is good business.
   Tell the truth. The key words that truly describe your firm’s Best and Highest Use should already and always be throughout your website. For example if you install home theatre, your company name, website name, and website content should of course contain the words home entertainment and listing some key words is sensible.
2. Buying your way onto page one is not a shortcut for success.
   Think how you feel when someone says, “I sell insurance, cars or legal services.” I immediately assume the worst as they have commoditized themselves by refusing to narrow their focus, sharpen their offer or state what they do in terms that are special to me. The internet is no different and to expect to own a generic category such as public relations services online is per se evidence of a lazy, sloppy and probably incompetent business. If a business takes the time to focus and understand its best and highest use, the needs of a specific target market and to resolve specific kinds of pain or opportunity your message sends to the marketplace and the compelling way in which it will be received will not only impress prospects and clients but SEO engines. Therefore, the very activities that a small business needs to undertake are the very ones that need to benefit its online marketing.
3. If a business has been carefully targeted and positioned as discussed, then what is the real role of SEO?
   I’m not sure there is one. Before spending thousands of dollars to optimize my site, Birol Growth Consulting was on page one of Google and Yahoo. Today it is there as well. Why? Because by staying focused on a given message based on a best and highest use and pointed out a specific target market, there is no doubt of what I do and whom I do it. The key to me is to add content continuously, examples and links that continually pay off on the narrow positioning and target marketing you defined in the first place.

Conclusion
My experience with SEO is the same as it is with Las Vegas. It’s okay to dabble and gamble a bit, if you do so for the entertainment and the short term thrill you may get. But banking on either in lieu of focusing on your day job of narrowing your focus and pointing it at exactly who needs it is irresponsible.

Focus on developing content and proof that your expertise helps your target market and leave SEO to the pretenders and who have more money than brains.

By now, there’s no question the U.S. economy is mired in an economic slowdown. While your specific industry may actually be strong, slowdowns are epidemic in nature and have a way of leaking into otherwise solid sectors.

The simple fact is that expectations drive consumer behavior. A mindset of limitations is replacing an attitude of abundance. As a result, people are hedging their own bets and risking less.

All of this has put business owners in a precarious situation that they haven’t witnessed during the roaring ’90s. But that doesn’t mean your business has to stop growing just because the masses are taking a wait-and-see attitude.

Here are 12 tactics to help ensure your business doesn’t follow the downward trends.

Warranty and maintenance contracts that extend the useful life of the status quo.

Programs/products and services that promise reduced costs and greater efficiency will be more attractive than those promising increased sales

.

Channel power will go to those with paying customers or the ability to retain their margins.

Loyalties and relationships of convenience/laziness will be broken. In times of stress, relationships either deepen or disappear. Pick and choose your partners on both the supplier and the customer side. You can’t be all things to all people.

The transition from having not enough people to having too many people may be sudden. “Bargain-price” human resources can help increase customer service or search for new customers.

The challenge of focusing on the PACER circles (best and highest use, target market and customer pain) becomes all the more imperative. As demand slows down, every purchasing decision will be questioned. The practice of finding the best suppliers may be replaced by finding the one lowest cost supplier.

As people become more risk-averse to selling on the basis of fear, uncertainty and doubt will be effective.

Capital goods will be harder to get approved by customer finance departments. If so, they will be prioritized in the following order:

Those that improve profits

Those that increase sales

Those that decrease production costs

Those that decrease administrative costs

Technology factors. When tech capability greater than the market’s capability to absorb it, then price falls when everyone beyond the early adopters stop buying it. The minute the technology isn’t used, the value drops. Technology starts being given away and revenue streams devalued. Inevitably, the technology is adopted and price goes up, or more likely the next great thing replaces it as the cycle repeats itself.

Outsourcing may or may not decrease but the need doesn’t.

Leverage goodwill if you already created it with your customers.

Rethink the time versus money tradeoff. People may have more time to spend on tasks they formerly might have paid others to perform.

While there is no surefire way to avoid a slowdown, if you’re proactive in your approach odds are you’ll be better off then your not-so-prepared competitors.

In comparing the candidates from least attractive to most attractive for small business owners, they are as follows: Hillary Clinton (least attractive), John McCain and Barack Obama (tied)

Clinton : Voters, namely small business owners, are terrified of her health care views, taxes and worker’s rights. She will hurt small businesses a lot more than help them. If she is elected there will be a dramatic decline in business confidence levels which will, in turn, force them outside of their comfort level.

McCain: He is very logical. A true republican, he believes in lowering taxes, balanced budget and less government intervention. McCain is very quirky, but doesn’t give small business owners any confidence because he has never been a business owner - which is a major concern for the small business owners who look for that been-there, done-that knowledge. He is a maverick. He is a POW. Business owners can identify with this side of him because of the hero, “I’m a survivor” aspect.

Obama: Last night’s endorsement of the teamsters did not help him because this scares small business owners. But on the other hand, small business owners are disillusioned by all of the empty promises a certain president has promised to make - but hasn’t delivered on. His promise of hope is appealing, but lacks implication. Small business owners like the idea of his promise for hope and change. They are attracted to renewal and change and growth - anything better than the status quo.

Summary: Small business owners should find McCain attractive followed closely by Obama.

…but, if there is another national economic threat, such as a terrorist attack or more war, the vote will become economically driven. And because Obama has displayed negative thoughts regarding NAFTA, things could get very interesting, very fast.

In the middle of winter, Valentines Day prompts us to reopen our hearts to those we love. While pledging our love can be easiest in a new relationship, rekindling the burning embers in an old relationship can be harder or even worse , ignored. It is no surprise that lack of passion and communication is the number one cause of divorce.

Beyond your spouse, children and parents, isn’t your business the next “love” in your life? You have built, managed and protected it, but are you as passionate about it as when you started? What should you do to express or restore your love?

Here are three great steps to show your business your “love”:

1. Interview your clients and customers and to confirm what you think they love about your business. This is your firm’s Best and Highest Use and you can read more of this here
2. Then invest in providing them with more of your BHU at higher margins
3. Refresh and refocus your message, positioning, sales and marketing to tell more customers and prospects why they should love your BHU

Here are three steps to fall back in love with your business

1. Ask yourself what is your Best and Highest Use and is it still aligned with that of your business’ and what your business needs, you can link here for some help
2. If your BHU is still aligned with your business’ BHU, then stay in your business and work on fixing it quickly. Here is some help to do this
3. If your BHU is not aligned with your business, it is time to reconsider your future in or without your business. Here is a process to help you “know when to hold them and know when to fold them”.

Love is said to be the more important emotion, connection and driver of behavior for the human race. To not be in love with your business is crippling to your well being as well as that of your customers, employees and vendors who take their cues from you. So, if you are in love with your business, use this Valentine’s Day to show it the same love you do for that special someone or make the commitment to fall back in love with your business or move on and find your passion building and running something else.