Posts Tagged ‘business owners’
The Self-Managing Business
By MARK RIFFEY - What does it take to create a self-managing business? Is if even possible?... more
Horseradish and the Pursuit of Perfect
By MARK RIFFEY - What insignificant thing brings people back again & again?... more
What’s Your Growth Plan?
By MARK RIFFEY - Are you a doer or an operator? Your growth path depends on the answer.... more
Getting Started, Part Two
By MARK RIFFEY - Last week, we started talking about a young man asking for advice getting started in his handyman business.... more
Getting Started, Part One
By MARK RIFFEY - How do you get started in a handyman business? Part one of a two part series.... more
Unmet Needs
By MARK RIFFEY - Is there anything that we aren’t doing for you that you wish we would take care of?... more
Always Done It That Way?
By MARK RIFFEY - A review of systems that fails to review readiness for the next three to five years of operation isn't doing you any favors.... more
Ask Questions While The Answers Still Matter, Part 1
By MARK RIFFEY - Timely questions can save a client relationship and pay years of dividends to your business.... more
What Would They Do To Put You Out Of Business?
By MARK RIFFEY - How would they price, market, sell, deliver, service, and communicate?... more
Planning 2018 Got You Wrapped Around The Axle?
By MARK RIFFEY - How to find two hours a day of quiet time to get your 2018 planning finished.... more
What’s Freedom Mean To Your Business?
By MARK RIFFEY - When you ask business owners why they started their company, you frequently hear these words: Freedom and opportunity.... more
Headspace, Creativity and Cartooning
By MARK RIFFEY - The blank slate is a challenge. But why?... more
I Went To The Gym Once. Didn’t Work.
By MARK RIFFEY - Going to the gym once doesn’t produce ideal results. Neither does inconsistent execution. Consistency breeds trust, unless you're consistently bad.... more
Fuel The Rise Of Two Pizza Teams
By MARK RIFFEY - How can Montana communities fuel the formation of two pizza teams?... more
Using Comfortable Tools
By MARK RIFFEY - Is there a balance between complacency and thrashing from tool to tool?... more
Selling Someone Else’s Products
By MARK RIFFEY - When you consider selling someone else’s products, it’s critical to assess whether the product is germane to what you do.... more
The Ingredients Of Effective Criticism
By MARK RIFFEY - Today we’re going to use a common political event (and some football) to discuss the effective delivery of criticism.... more
Why Your Growing Company Needs To Work Slower
By MARK RIFFEY - When you work slower, you create time and space to help eliminate the bumps and potholes in your processes. “Slow is smooth” takes shape. ... more
The Premium Price Lesson Taught By Craft Beer
By MARK RIFFEY - Testing new product / service / price tiers could result in a new way of doing business.... more
Is It Better To Keep A Customer, Or Replace Them?
By MARK RIFFEY - Well cared for clients tend to buy more, buy more often, & for a longer period of time.... more
Training: Improves Sales, Improves Ops
By MARK RIFFEY - Do your people know your products & understand your prospects' problems?... more
Accepting Change – How Can You Help?
By MARK RIFFEY - Your challenge: Determine what’s necessary to reduce resistance to the point that your prospects will consider making a change. ... more
Where’s The Friction?
By MARK RIFFEY - What do you repeatedly force your clients to do that they simply shouldn't have to do?... more
Work, Caring, And Filtering Employers
By MARK RIFFEY - Are you looking for a solid, well-run company to grow with? This will help.... more
“Sink Or Swim” Isn’t Training
By MARK RIFFEY - I'll go back because that guy made a routine purchase memorable.... more
Listen to Clients. They Say The Darndest Things
By MARK RIFFEY - When you listen to clients openly and without an agenda, the value of what you learn can be huge.... more
Leads: Like a Friend Who Needs Advice
By MARK RIFFEY - A good list treats leads like a friend who needs advice.... more
Being Prepared For Employee Turnover
By MARK RIFFEY - One of the most expensive activities your business can experience is employee turnover. When employees leave, a piece of the company leaves with them.... more
Client Care and Feeding – A Strategic Responsibility
By MARK RIFFEY - The custody, guardianship and defense of your clients is a strategic responsibility.... more
Try A Dashboard To Share Your Metrics
By MARK RIFFEY - When your team can easily wrap their heads around the numbers critical to their department, it'll change their behavior.... more
Encourage Them To Climb The Ladder
By MARK RIFFEY - Every business should seek ways to provide an ascension ladder for their clientele - and create the desire to climb it.... more
Is There Truth In Your Advertising?
By MARK RIFFEY - It takes one time for people to lose trust in your advertising. ONE TIME.... more
What Halftime Advice Do You Give Your Staff?
By MARK RIFFEY - Halftime provides a natural break in the action to reflect, assess, adjust and re-engage. For a company, use them like a timeout.... more
Protecting Traditional Assets Isn’t Enough
By MARK RIFFEY - Are all of your most valuable assets being protected, or only those your insurance & bank care about?... more
Consistent Experience
By MARK RIFFEY - How does your sidewalk reflect on your ability to credit a payment or deliver a meal?... more
When Hiring, Choose Commitment Over Ego
By MARK RIFFEY - The difference between a strong business leader and a weak one is easily detected: Who do they surround themselves with – and why?... more
Chaos, Panic And Other Delights
By MARK RIFFEY - How your team handles recovery from a mistake is often more important than the mistake.... more
Keep Your Eye On The Ball
By MARK RIFFEY - After every election, it's painfully easy to lose focus. Don't.... more
Warming Up Your Cold Email
By MARK RIFFEY - With double digit below zero weather arriving in Montana this week, the last thing any of us need is a cold email.... more
Brainstorming A 2017 Business Roadmap
By MARK RIFFEY - Ready to start working through the first task on the detailed 2017 business roadmap that you painstakingly carved out over the last month? ... more
Preparing to Sell Your Business…Or Not
By MARK RIFFEY - As you get a little older, one of the natural things you start to think about is “What am I going to do with this business?”... more
The Smell (or Aroma) Of Sales
By MARK RIFFEY - Sales is tough work. One of the things that makes it challenging is starting a conversation with someone you don’t know.... more
Focus Isn’t Enough
By MARK RIFFEY - When it comes to your business, what drives your decision to let something slide a little, be it a day, a week or "forever"?... more
Don’t Forget the Ice
By MARK RIFFEY - Does your merchandising save your customers a trip? It should.... more
Are you Using Your Marketing Data Effectively?
By MARK RIFFEY - Presumably you have a budget and as a part of it, income / revenue goals. How certain are you that you’ll hit them this month?... more
The Ups and Downs of Complexity
By MARK RIFFEY - Business people (myself included) seem to have a habit of making projects more complex than they should be.... more
It’s Time To Sell Something
By MARK RIFFEY - Selling the right product to the right person so they can do what they need to do (or get what they want) is honorable work.... more
What Are You Afraid Of?
By MARK RIFFEY - Is your business clinging to fear-driven artificial barriers? Limiting thoughts had my software company stuck on a sales plateau.... more
New Project Idea? Do This First
By MARK RIFFEY - Wouldn't it be nice to know if a project was going to fail after two weeks rather than two years?... more
The Danger Of Presumption
By MARK RIFFEY - There are many ways that assumptions can endanger your projects. The key is to have a process that does as much as possible to eliminate them.... more