3May
Tips and Tools for Social Media

Tips and tools for social media. While building up your content will require time and money, you can produce high-quality material with a smartphone and a few simple tools and tips. The main advantage of using social media is that it’s an inexpensive method of raising brand exposure.

Additionally, you might be able to reach your target audience on social media for a lot less money than you would with targeted advertisements.

Social media can be used to achieve a variety of goals, including brand development, credibility building, word-of-mouth marketing, and tightening ties with current clients. Alternatively, you may merely want to use social media to direct visitors to your website, where they may end up becoming paying clients. Remember to communicate with your followers on social media in addition to posting. If someone shows interest in your brand, be there, engage, and interact. Below are some tips and tools for social media success.

Be consistent.

Being consistent is the best thing you can do as a small business when you first start using social media. Too frequently, brands lose faith if they don’t start seeing results right away. Social media growth might be gradual, but like with other things, if you are persistent, you will see benefits. This entails regularly publishing content of a high caliber (at least once a week). There are several reasons why you do this.

The first is that you want users to have a clear understanding of your brand when they do land on your profile. Users will quickly lose interest and leave if your website contains little to no content. For scattered posts, the same is true.

You can share a story on social media. Users will understand what to expect from your page, what your voice is like, and what you have to offer when consistency and coherence are given priority. And in doing so, you’ll draw in your target segment.

Add variety to your content.

There is so much possibility for experimentation and creativity on social media. All too often, businesses adopt a single successful strategy.

Social media is continuously changing and evolving. Due to the addition of new features and shifting user habits on various platforms, what worked yesterday might not work today.

Keeping this in mind, experiment as much as you can with content types. For instance, you can only post videos on TikTok. On Facebook, though, you have the choice to go live, post pictures, run polls, and more.

For small businesses, the simplest approach for them to build their audience and grow their following is to create educational and/or compelling material.

We are not saying that small businesses should limit themselves to these two forms of content. They ought to experiment with all their content in order to determine what their audience prefers. However, this can be a good place to start.

Here are some suggestions to get you going:

Customer spotlights

How-to’s

Behind the scenes

Trends (viral sounds and dances)

Product features

Q&As

Facts about your industry

Quality over quantity.

This is true for both the platforms you use and the content you post. While posting frequently on social media is welcomed from a content standpoint, there is a catch. Your posts must all add value. If it doesn’t fit that description, think about a different tactic, such as sharing user-generated content or reposting brand-related content from a non-competitor.

Platforms.

A small business may not have the time or money to maintain an account on every social media network. Concentrate on one to three platforms that have the demographics of your target audience, and then move forward from there.

10Apr
How to Create & Maintain a Balance Sheet

Have you ever wondered how to create & maintain a balance sheet?

The balance sheet provides a summary of your company’s financial situation as of a particular date. The balance sheet explains in non-accounting words what your company possesses (assets), what it owes (liabilities), and what the owner’s interest in the company is (equity).

Essentially, if the financial statements are the story of your company, the balance sheet is the CliffsNotes. Your balance sheet gives you a clear image of what you own and what you owe, as well as a summary of your company’s financial status at a particular point in time. Below you will find information on how to create & maintain a balance sheet.

What are the main parts of a balance sheet?

1. Assets

Assets are the items that your company owns. They are often divided into two sections on balance sheets.

Current assets

Firstly, current assets include cash and other assets that you anticipate selling in the upcoming year. As such, inventory and accounts receivable are examples of current assets.

Fixed assets

Secondly, fixed assets are owned assets or equipment that the business uses to generate revenue from its operations. Fixed assets are things that will not likely be sold and that are bought for a lengthy period of time (longer than one year). As a result of wear and tear, their value depreciates over time. On the income statement, this modification is noted as depreciation.

2. Liabilities

Liabilities are the sums that your company owes to third parties in the next 12 months. More specifically, balance sheets divide liabilities into two divisions. Current liabilities and long-term liabilities.

Examples of current liabilities include accounts payable, credit card bills, sales taxes collected, payroll liabilities, and loan payments. Whereas, examples of long-term liabilities are term loans and mortgages.

3. Shareholders’ Equity

Shareholders’ equity is the value of the company’s obligation to shareholders. It is what the company owes you.

Equity includes:

The amount of money put into the business by its shareholders (startup cash you invested, etc.)

The amount of money generated by a business (amounts you have left in the business over time.)

Any donated capital.

Calculated equity using this formula: Equity = Total Assets – Total Liabilities

A Balance Sheet Preparation Guide

To produce an accurate balance sheet, you can use your accounting software. In every program designed for double-entry bookkeeping, the balance sheet is a standard report.

Firstly, go to the reports section of your accounting program and search for financial reports. The balance sheet should be near the top of the list, frequently right after the profit and loss (or income) statement because it is a common financial statement.

For the balance sheet report, some accounting software asks you to specify a time range. This can sometimes cause confusion. The balance sheet displays information as of a certain date. However, the profit and loss statement only displays information for a specific time period.

Furthermore, along with a financial overview of your company from the beginning to the balance sheet’s “as of” date, this data also provides a financial summary of your company.

The balance sheet’s objective

Primarily, balance sheets are utilized as a method for determining whether or not the accounting procedure produced accurate results. It is easy to spot an error on the balance sheet if assets do not match liabilities plus equity.

Contemporary accounting software does not allow for the recording of transactions that are not balanced, uneven balance sheets are an extremely rare occurrence. An uneven balance sheet typically denotes a software-related issue. Nowadays, balance sheets aren’t needed anymore. However, the balance sheet helps you measure your company’s health and make informed business decisions.

In short, a balance sheet is a critical tool for assessing your company’s health and making prudent business decisions.

How to make business decisions using your balance sheet

With a quick glance at the balance sheet, you can assess the financial health of your company. If equity is negative, which means liabilities exceed assets, that may be a sign that your company is having financial problems. Schedule a meeting with your accountant to discuss this.

Further, you can identify three key parameters from your company’s balance statement.

Current ratio

The current ratio gauges the capacity of your company to meet its short-term obligations. The equation is: Current ratio is equal to Current Assets / Current Liabilities.

The current ratio reveals how many times your company’s available cash can cover its current liabilities. Anything below 1 means your company won’t have enough cash or cash equivalents to cover its obligations over the course of the next 12 months.

Quick ratio

This is the quick ratio formula: Quick ratio: Current liabilities / (Cash & cash equivalents + Short-term investments + Accounts receivable)

The quick ratio, which measures liquidity, is frequently identical to the current ratio.

The ratio of debt to equity

The debt-to-equity ratio reveals how much of your company is financed by debt, or how leveraged it is.

The equation is: Debt-to-equity ratio = Total Liabilities / Total Equity

Keep in mind that we are now examining all liabilities, including long-term debt. Between 1 and 1.5 is a healthy debt-to-equity ratio. Anything above that may be a sign that your company is heavily leveraged. This can make it more difficult to find financing at a good rate.

Things to consider

The ratios are useful for making fast assessments of how well your company is performing in a few key areas. Evaluate the balance sheet, the profit and loss, and the cash flow statement in order to make good business decisions.

27Mar
3 Considerations When Planning to Sell Your Business

3 important considerations when planning to sell your business. It’s common knowledge when business owners reach retirement age that they lack a workable exit strategy. This is a step-by-step guide to help you get your company ready for sale while steering clear of any possible pitfalls. When getting ready to sell your company, bear these three points in mind.

Depending on the owner, this may entail selling to a third party or passing the business on to the next generation of the family.

The good news is that you can manage the financial aspects of exiting. Especially, if you want to sell and must find a buyer for your business. Many owners wait to deal with this issue until they are ready to move forward. Often, this causes one to feel stuck. It is not uncommon for the search for the ideal buyer to take three to five years. It’s important to keep in mind that, regardless of a company’s worth, the selling process can take a while. Here are three strategies to start planning your exit in order to do so on your terms:

1. Establish a timeline in advance.

The best time to decide how and when to sell your business is when you’re at the top of your game and not when you’re starting to slow down. Most business owners are most likely in their early 50s. They are not yet ready to retire but have plenty of experience to get the job done.

Having a timeframe will help you make decisions in the interim and give the sale a clear structure.

2. Specify who the buyer is.

A crucial part of preparing your business for sale involves finding a possible buyer. As was previously mentioned, this is a lengthy process that should involve thoroughly vetting prospective purchasers to see if their values, objectives, and ideas for the performance and culture of the company coincide with yours. This is a drawn-out process that needs to be carefully considered. In this manner, you may guarantee that the business is run in your style even after your departure. (This still applies if you’re giving the reins to a close friend or family member.)

3. Consider the how carefully.

Once you have found your buyer, it is critical to think about how the deal will be financed. One possibility is that your buyer has enough cash on hand or bank financing to buy your company entirely, which is fantastic! However, another possibility is that the buyer lacks enough capital (either owned or borrowed) to finance the deal in a single transaction. Instead, you will complete an installment sale in which you agree to the buyer’s repeated payments to you.

These three steps can help you proceed in a way that assures you obtain the best financial result. This result can be good for yourself and for future generations of your family. Preparation is key to success, regardless of the path you choose, the value of your company, or the timing of your exit.

Furthermore, allowing yourself more time to get ready can lessen the emotional toll of departing. When the time comes, it will therefore feel less unexpected and more like a seamless transition into a joyful and carefree life after becoming a business owner.

7Mar
The Link Between Poverty and Entrepreneurship

Often overlooked in discussions about economic development, entrepreneurship and business activity play a vital role in promoting growth. Entrepreneurship and startups have the potential to play a significant role in poverty reduction. Startups can help to lift people out of poverty and promote long-term development by creating jobs and stimulating economic growth. According to the worldwide Entrepreneurship Monitor, small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) make up more than 90% of all businesses and more than half of worldwide employment. Startups can help relieve poverty through providing underprivileged individuals access to financial services

China’s remarkable story of lifting approximately 600 million people out of poverty since the late 1970s, following Deng Xiaoping’s market reforms, underscores the transformative potential of entrepreneurial ventures. Today, the idea of entrepreneurship resonates more than ever among the young generation, many of whom now aspire to start their own businesses.

In regions like Quebec, learning about entrepreneurship often occurs outside the formal school curriculum. However, a shift is noticeable in many economies that have recognized entrepreneurship as an effective strategy for poverty alleviation. Despite the challenges of financial scarcity, entrepreneurial initiatives can often achieve remarkable results with limited resources.

Developing Economies

Entrepreneurship not only uplifts individuals but also significantly contributes to economic development. It is a potent tool for poverty alleviation. Traditional jobs hinge on a country’s overall economic stability and access to higher education. But in many developing countries, quality education may not be accessible, and a fragile economy might not support traditional job growth. Entrepreneurship transcends these obstacles, offering opportunities for personal growth without the prerequisite of formal degrees.

Industrialized and Emerging Economies

Industrialized and emerging economies are increasingly acknowledging the value of entrepreneurship. With unemployment on the rise since 2001, European Union governments have launched various initiatives, providing entrepreneurs with education, advice, infrastructure, and funding. These efforts aim to foster a conducive environment for entrepreneurship. According to the European Commission, these measures have already shown signs of success, helping young people transition out of unemployment while creating economic value.

International Organizations

Major international organizations endorse entrepreneurship as a powerful tool to alleviate poverty and reduce unemployment. The World Economic Forum has long emphasized entrepreneurship’s importance, implementing programs to foster entrepreneurial spirit worldwide. According to the World Economic Forum, small and medium-sized enterprises in countries like France and the United States have significantly contributed to growth and employment generation.

Role of Charities

While charities provide essential short-term support to impoverished regions, they can inadvertently hinder long-term development by creating dependency. An entrepreneurial approach, on the other hand, promotes self-sufficiency. For instance, sending used clothes to needy countries is a well-intentioned act, but it may inadvertently discourage local entrepreneurship in the textile industry.

However, supporting entrepreneurship in developing economies requires more than just individual initiative. There are fundamental gaps in skills, capital, infrastructure, and regulation that often stymie entrepreneurial success. Reliable infrastructure is critical – an entrepreneur can hardly operate a factory without dependable electricity. Here lies a potential new focus for charitable organizations: investing in infrastructure, capital, and skills development, they can foster an entrepreneurial environment that promotes long-term growth and self-reliance.

Traditional charity models, while generous, can inadvertently encourage dependency. A shift towards supporting entrepreneurship can stimulate social change and help eradicate poverty. Thus, charities should transition from providing immediate relief to building an entrepreneurial climate that encourages self-sufficiency, resilience, and prosperity.

26Feb
Avoid Startup Failure

A startup niche is what?

What exactly is a niche, and how does it help to avoid startup failure? It primarily refers to a specific target audience rather than a broad, generalized approach. By identifying demographics, geography, economic status, education level, and unique perspectives, you can tailor your messaging to a specific audience.

At a deeper level, it entails understanding your company’s position in the larger economic landscape. What differentiates you from competitors? Do you provide something unique that addresses a specific need, or do current offerings have flaws? Creating a distinct position for your company is critical to preventing failure. Developing a unique position for your company is crucial when identifying a niche market.

What is the value of a startup niche?

So, why is a startup niche valuable? Contrary to the common belief that targeting a larger audience is better, focusing on a specific niche offers several benefits:

Identity and distinctions

The first step in determining your startup niche is to devise a strategy for distinguishing yourself from the competition. It’s an excellent opportunity to begin developing your brand identity.

Knowing how and why you differ from other companies in your industry can help you set higher brand standards for yourself and begin steadily growing your company. Both now and in the future, your branding and marketing materials will be based on this.

Understanding of the audience

Knowing your niche entails understanding the perspectives and values of your target audience, which allows for more effective communication and marketing strategies. What are their distinct points of view and core values?

If you understand these, you’ll be able to communicate with your target audience much more effectively. Your ability to create more persuasive marketing and advertising materials will improve, as will the likelihood of acquiring a customer during a sales call. Better yet, you can use it to increase customer retention.

Competitive defence

By targeting untapped markets, you can protect your market space from competitors while also lowering marketing costs.

You won’t have to worry about competition invading your economic space if you can create goods and services that are genuinely distinct from those of your competitors. If you target a market that other businesses are completely ignoring, you will benefit from lower marketing costs and increased marketing relevance.

Offensive capabilities

By focusing on a specific niche, you can be more aggressive in your startup niche targeting, directly competing with your biggest competitors by providing better products or appealing to your mutual audiences in a more relevant, targeted manner.

An aggressive competitive strategy emphasizes actively changing your industry and improving all the time in order to stay ahead of the competition. The best way to compete with your opponents is to combine defensive and offensive strategies.

Beginning with the basics

So, how do you discover your startup niche? Here are a few steps:

1. Analyze your competitors to identify market gaps or opportunities.

Once you’ve decided on a basic business concept, begin researching your main competitors. These do not have to be direct competitors offering the same goods and services as you, but they must be related to your industry.

How are they currently putting themselves out there? Who is their target audience? What do they think of themselves? You can use this as inspiration to create your own specialty or try to completely deviate from these norms to differentiate your brand.

2. Conduct market research to determine demographics and trends.

If you have a few ideas for potential target markets or positioning tactics, begin early market research.

Statistic Canada has excellent demographic data for the entire country, and reading publications from major research institutions can help you better understand different populations. As you gain experience, you’ll be able to eliminate customers who aren’t a good fit for your company and start spotting more profitable prospects.

3.Gather feedback from potential customers by conducting surveys and focus groups.

Begin conducting surveys and focus groups if you have a prototype for the product you want to sell or something substantial to show people (such as a demo or 3D model of your product).

You can think about both the demographics you already have in mind and those you haven’t considered yet. What are your customers saying about your product? What do they think of the name of your company? Do they have any suggestions for how to improve? You can get useful advice if you pay attention to the responses of the participants.

4. Create buyer personas to better understand your target audience and guide your marketing and sales strategies.

At this point, you should have enough data to start creating consumer personas. These serve the same purpose as fictitious characters designed to represent the average person in one of your target audiences.

For example, you could create a client persona named “Jerry” to represent urban 30-something men. Customer personas can help you define your niche and make it easier to share information about your target market with other departments like marketing and sales.

Finding your niche

It is not difficult to identify a profitable niche. However, you must conduct the necessary research. Follow these steps to identify a profitable niche in which your startup can thrive and succeed.

5Feb
5 Product Pricing Tips to Pump up Profits

5 product pricing tips to pump up profits. It’s critical for small businesses to keep their profit margins strong. Setting prices for products correctly is essential to both boosting present profitability and promoting future growth. The art of pricing for profit is a crucial skill that many entrepreneurs may not naturally possess, so it is imperative that small business owners develop it.

When deciding how much to charge for their products and services, entrepreneurs must take into account the time and inherent value of their work. Customers are frequently prepared to pay more for higher quality, which highlights the importance of strategic pricing. Establishing prices that are excessively high for low-value goods or too low for high-value goods can undermine consumer trust. Take into consideration applying these five pricing strategies to increase profitability and obtain a competitive advantage.

Retail to wholesale:

Calculate the costs of manufacturing and marketing the products. During this process, you must outline your marketing strategy. If you want to sell through retailers, you should budget for commissions. When approaching retailers, your selling price must match the wholesale price. Because shops resell products, it’s critical to avoid competing with them when deciding on retail pricing. The pricing formula is as follows: retail price = wholesale price x 2.5, while wholesale price equals total cost x 2. If you have a wholesale price of $40 and a retail price of $100, your total cost is $20.

Premium costs:

Companies with unique products use this method regularly and charge significant costs. If your product has a patent or trade secret that offers it a competitive advantage, you should utilize it.

Bundled offers:

Multiple items can be offered at a lower price than if they were sold individually. Frequent examples are Buy One Get One Free and Buy One Get One Half Off. This strategy helps you reduce inventory while enhancing the value perception of your customers.

Time-limited offers:

This strategy produces a sense of urgency and compels customers to purchase immediately. Consider using a discount or inventory countdown timer on product pages.

Psychological pricing:

Psychological pricing is a pricing approach that uses psychology or the subconscious to get customers to pay more. For instance, $6.99 is considered to be “cheaper” than $7. The idea is that buyers would view the somewhat reduced cost as a bargain and feel encouraged to make the purchase.

After putting a pricing strategy into action for a few months, review and revise your plan. Depending on the situation, you could need to adjust product prices, deal with a competitor, or adjust pricing to changing market trends. Don’t be afraid to change your direction when it’s required. A solid pricing strategy can help your business maintain its competitive edge and attract new customers.

18Jan
5 Tips on Scaling A Startup

5 tips on scaling a startup. When a business is being scaled up, one foot is in the startup phase while the other is in the maturing, scale-up phase. You are no longer a new startup with a strong sense of entrepreneurial spirit, an MVP solution, or Seed funding. However, you also aren’t (yet) a Fortune 500 company with tens of thousands of loyal clients.

Here are five of the best tips on scaling a startup.

Those that share your ideals will come to you

You must remain innovative, provide an interesting environment, and align your team’s beliefs if you want to draw in the ideal candidates.

This is a lesson that many people learn as they try to keep up with market trends. You must be aware that for your clients to make educated, comprehensive decisions, they need thorough supply chain sustainability data. There has been a rise in demand for environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data and reporting, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Businesses want and need to demonstrate to their clients (B2B) and customers (B2C) that they are abiding by international norms and that their supply chain conforms with laws governing everything from dangerous drugs to modern slavery. By providing essential supply chain data and transparency, you have strategically positioned your business at the confluence of two major market trends.

Plan and prepare the environment

It is crucial to put mechanisms in place before you need them if you want to scale successfully. Take your time to write out a detailed description for each position so that you don’t hire too many or too few people. Create a multi-day onboarding procedure that is well-structured and makes use of a variety of learning approaches.

If you are looking for investment for your business, this requires a thorough due diligence process. The truth is that investors in venture capital thoroughly investigate each company they potentially invest in. Investors are curious as to what else you are managing poorly if you are not set up correctly in a department like HR.

Culture matters a lot

When you find outstanding people, you don’t want to let the competition steal them away. Hiring not only requires time away from routine activities but also costs money. While studies on the expense of a new employee have varied, estimates frequently go beyond $6,000 per candidate. At the heart of our onboarding process is culture. Even before they acquire any technical information about their work, your new hires should sense that right away. Making sure people feel valued is essential, especially when everyone is working from home.

Details are crucial. For instance, email a gift card for Uber Eats on their first day at the company. With a note saying, the meal is on us. Make sure administrative paperwork is finished and that they have their equipment before their first day.

Simple solutions are needed for complex problems

Another tip for scaling a startup is that simple solutions are needed for complex problems. It’s not simple to find qualified people to fill a variety of specialized tasks. Again, plan forward and keep an eye on the future. Momentum reinforces itself, therefore purposefully recruited amazing team members in the first round of hiring. Now you know who to talk to first when hiring someone, great people know great people.

However, great people also like to collaborate in a productive environment with other great people. As part of the hiring process, ensure that team members are exposed to a variety of coworkers. Participating in the hiring process with your employees is another possible aspect to consider. It’s just another way that prosperity feeds prosperity.

Reward the proper behavior

Some developing businesses run into problems when they reward an outcome, such as closing a deal, even if someone pushed others to do so. Or completing a project on time despite the fact that the team leader expected everyone to work late at night and on weekends. If you want your culture to be strong, make sure you’re rewarding behaviors that encourage colleagues to perform at their best and that align with qualities that are fundamental to your culture. One idea to consider is peer recognition and a reward program that is linked to daily operations. One can use their points to donate money to a good cause, buy gift cards, or transfer them. Giving them away to recognize others for outstanding efforts.

You can obtain insightful data with this system. Which teams are interacting with one another? Do marketing and sales exchange more points than usual? This information provides you with clues about what needs your attention. Keep track of this data because it can help you to determine whether teams are collaborating and working well together.

To scale a business successfully, you must have the foresight to realize the benefits of developing a solid team. Additionally, every touchpoint in scaling a startup is crucial because it is so difficult to recruit new talent in the market nowadays.

15Dec
Understanding Term Sheets: A Comprehensive Guide

Term sheets are crucial elements in various business transactions, especially in the world of startups and venture capital. Although they can be daunting at first glance, understanding them is key to successful negotiations and partnerships. This blog post will demystify the term sheet, guiding you through its complex nuances in a clear, accessible manner.

What is a Term Sheet?

A term sheet serves as an agreement that outlines the fundamental terms and conditions for making an investment, without being legally binding. It serves as a template to develop more detailed legal documents. By setting forth the key terms of the investment agreement, it provides a fundamental framework for business negotiations.

The Anatomy of a Term Sheet

Typically, term sheets consist of two main sections: the economic terms and the control terms.

1. Economic Terms: This aspect covers how the financials of the deal will be handled. The terms include details such as the valuation of the company, investment amount, price per share, and liquidation preferences.

2. Control Terms: This outlines how control will be divided among shareholders. It discusses the details about board composition, voting rights, anti-dilution provisions, and protective provisions.

Let’s delve into these key terms a bit more.

3. Valuation

Valuation refers to the worth of the company. It can be before or after investment. The pre-money valuation plus the investment amount equals the post-money valuation. Understanding this is vital as it affects the percentage of ownership you get for your investment.

4. Investment Amount

This is the total capital that investors provide to the company. The amount is usually provided in exchange for an equity stake in the company. The exact amount of equity depends on the valuation and the total investment.

5. Price Per Share

You can calculate this by dividing the pre-money valuation by the number of outstanding shares before the investment. This determines how many shares an investor will get for their investment.

6. Liquidation Preference

The order of payment in the event of a company sale or liquidation is determined by the liquidation preference, which dictates who receives payment first and in what amount. A “1X” liquidation preference means investors get their money back before other shareholders see any return.

7. Board Composition

This section specifies who will sit on the company’s board of directors. It’s essential because the board has significant influence over the company’s direction.

8. Voting Rights

These outline how major decisions are made. Investors often ask for voting rights on certain significant issues, such as issuing new shares or selling the company.

9. Anti-dilution Provisions

The protection mechanism ensures that investors’ stake in the company remains intact even if the company decides to issue additional shares at a lower price per share than the investors’ initial investment.

10. Protective Provisions

These are rights that allow preferred shareholders to veto certain actions by the company, giving investors a degree of control over decisions that could affect their investment.

11. Deciphering the Term Sheet

Term sheets have significant implications. It’s crucial to understand that the terms stated will lay the foundation for the final, legally enforceable investment agreements. Therefore, while the language of term sheets may seem dense, a thorough understanding is critical. Consider consulting with a legal professional who understands startup financing to ensure your interests are adequately represented. While doing so may incur some expense, it could potentially save you a significant amount in the long run.

Conclusion

Understanding term sheets can feel like learning a new language. With a clear breakdown of the core elements, it becomes less daunting. These documents are crucial to ensuring all parties have a shared understanding of the investment terms. Having a solid grasp of the structure and purpose of term sheets will better prepare you to navigate the world of business finance and investment.

13Dec
Strategies for Working with Influencers

Working with an influencer is a good strategy to expose more people to your business. Utilizing their unique viewpoint, you may ask them to share with their audience their impressions on your product or service. Approaching an influencer about endorsing your good or service can be frightening if you don’t know where to start. Below we have outlined strategies that can help small and medium-sized businesses adopt the best methods for working with influencers.

Transmit a clear offer

To get things going, make a very specific offer so the influencer can decide whether it might be something that works for them and that they are willing to endorse. Make sure to specify the types of posts you want (Stories, TikTok, etc.), the payment amount, the time frame for posting, and the scope of work. Although it will undoubtedly change from there, having a solid starting point makes the process much simpler and will allow the influencer to quickly decide if this is something they are interested in.

Include influencers on your social media pages

On your Instagram and other social media, highlight the work of influencers in your industry. This fulfills a variety of functions. First, folks who follow the influencers may stumble upon you because you connect to their favorite individuals or companies. Then, it’s possible that those same followers will start following you too! Lastly, your support for their brands can even spur well-known influencers to reach out to you to discuss future collaborations.

Allow for creative freedom

Give the influencer you’ve chosen some creative flexibility to carry out your campaign. Since influencers have knowledge from prior experiences, it is generally preferable to have a two-way collaboration when working with them. Certainly, it’s important to offer them a thorough explanation of your ideas, but after that, give them some creative freedom. By doing this, the content you create is distinctive and simultaneously appealing to both of your audiences. Consider it in this manner. You selected this influencer because you enjoy the content they produced. Keep in mind that they are the ones that know their audience the best and what content will appeal to them. Let them provide artistic guidance and asset suggestions.

Set reasonable goals and help

One thing you should remember if you want to work with influencers is that they won’t be able to do everything. You also need to put in some work. Make sure that you’re setting the right expectations for the influencer you are working with. It is important that you supply the appropriate tools ( product samples, information, etc.) to ensure that your product or service is accurately portrayed.

Before approaching an influencer, do some homework. Research them, learn what they like, the people they follow, their areas of interest, and the reasons they enjoy those things. Then, ensure that your brand is appropriately represented in that environment, so that when the influencer posts about it on social media, customers will get an authentic portrayal of what your brand stands for.

Finally, create trust with your influencer from the start so that when they post about your company, it doesn’t feel like simply another paid post, it feels natural and true.

List your deliverables, campaign objectives, hashtags, and tags

Give the influencers you’re working with a one-pager that includes all the information they’ll need for the campaign, such as brand handles, campaign hashtags, the objectives to keep in mind, photo specifications, and brand story, to set them up for success. When shooting and producing the content, it makes their job seamless.

To save costs, collaborate with other brands

By splitting the cost of influencers with partner brands, small businesses can cut spending. When you cohost events, competitions, and influencer outings with other businesses, your company has exposure to even more extensive marketing opportunities than it would ordinarily have. By selecting non-competitor brands, you may still make use of all the collaboration’s advantages without giving up any potential market share.

If you can, pay immediately and on time

Influencers share terrifying tales about companies that are slow to pay or, worse yet, just disappear altogether. Although it’s not always simple to maintain control, it’s crucial to go above and above to ensure timely payment and clear communication about when it will be made. Pay earlier than anticipated as a bonus.

Collaborations with influencers can benefit your company greatly. You can increase brand awareness, foster brand trust, and increase sales by collaborating in meaningful ways.

Use the most effective influencer collaboration strategies now that you are aware of them.

29Nov
Building an Advisory Board

Building an advisory board is an overlooked tool that is very beneficial to a business. It consists of a hand-selected group of advisors that believe in your leadership and are there for the sole purpose of providing strategic advice for your business. They are aligned with your culture and mission and are committed to your success. However, forming the perfect advisory board for you may take quite a bit of planning in order to see a strong return on investment. Do not worry though, that is why we are here to help and give you guidelines before you build your own advisory board!

Know who you are and what you stand for

Complete your Values, Mission, Vision, and Strategic Plan first. You must know what you stand for, why you exist, and where you are going. You must be able to articulate this to any prospective board member. Think about creating an advisory board composed of people who have already achieved what you are trying to achieve so that you can learn from both their successes and their mistakes. In addition, you must be able to share your target customer profiles and your competitive landscape.

Goals/plan

Create a set of objectives you want your company to reach. By outlining your goals, it allows you to select members that help you reach these objectives. This also sets expectations for your advisory board members. It gives them an idea of what their role and purpose will be while serving on your advisory board. By creating these expectations, it allows you to get exactly what your company needs. The wrong advisors will be a waste of time and money and can potentially lead you down the wrong path.

Choosing the right people

Diversify

After outlining what expertise you and your start-up may lack, it is time to start looking for the right people. Selecting the right advisors is just as important as selecting the right employees. Each person should bring a different background, that way your advisory board will be able to cover every area and offer different perspectives. For example, cybersecurity is now a critical addition to any board. Typically, you want to aim for a small group ranging from no more than 4 people. If you choose carefully then a small group of people will suffice. The smaller the better since it will make for easier communication between you and your members.

Term of Membership

It is often difficult to recruit advisory board members: it is always more difficult to terminate their membership. Advisory board members tend to get comfortable with their positions and take initiative to remove them as personal criticism. Therefore, it may be useful to appoint members to a specific term (one, two, or three years) so that an active step has to be taken to renew membership, rather than to withdraw it going forward. This issue might be particularly important when an advisory board is first being established.

Mentors

Members of an advisory board are composed of people who truly care about the success of you and your company. They have no legal obligation or equity in the business, they act only as your mentor and their main goal is to give you advice. With that being said, you will want to seek people you know within your professional network. This way they will be more willing to mentor you. However, be careful in choosing friends or family, as they may not always give you the most honest advice. Not to mention having friends or family on your advisory board may result in conflict/relationship issues that you will want to avoid. You need people who will be brutally honest and willing to challenge your ideas in order to bring different perspectives to the table.

While reaching out to people within your professional network may be easier, you should also aim to seek people outside your network. Finding members of higher stature might be more difficult but extremely beneficial for your company. They will add credibility and this will play an important role when your start-up is in the early stages of funding. It will give your company some traction, which is crucial in the development of any start-up. Not only will it add credibility but also it can expand your professional network and form contacts that can be very useful in the long term.

How to find mentors

At ProMontreal entrepreneurs, we offer a mentorship program where anyone part of the Jewish community can apply and we will connect you with the perfect mentor for you. Over the years, we have connected with successful entrepreneurs and lawyers who are eager to see start-ups succeed. If you check out our mentors on our website, you will find a list of them on the page already.

Compensation

It is important to remember that the people on the advisory board have no equity in the company and are merely there to guide you because they want to see your company succeed. In the early stages of your business venture, it’s a good idea to reward them with dinners, entertainment, etc. It does not need to be a lot but still something to demonstrate your gratitude for their help. As your company progresses, then you will want to think about higher compensation, maybe even a salary but that is all entirely up to you.

You may not have all the expertise in any business venture you dive into but that is normal. Advisory boards can be helpful and fulfilling, or they can be a waste of time. In the end, you get out of them what you put into their creation, development, and operation. That being said, there are many tools to help you realize your vision so do not be afraid to take the risk.