Facts On Business Coaching

In every industry there are misunderstandings,, common myths, fictional stories and personal opinions. Business coaching is no different. The more popular this industry becomes the more susceptible it become to untrue allegations.

This article helps to shed some light on this industry and provide you with some business coaching facts.

Many of the business coaching facts found in this article are courtesy of survey results provided by the International Coach Federation. Others are the finding of separate studies.

Fact: There are over 25, 000 business coaches in the U.S. alone. Many of them coach both online and offline businesses. While business coaching may seem like the new kid on the block, the truth is the foundation is well established.

Fact: Over 40% of Fortune 500 companies use business coaching. Business coaching is not just for inexperienced entrepreneurs. Even large corporations and people with MBA’s utilize business coaching.

Fact: Coaching is about learning not teaching. Coaches are not teachers. They can teach you a lot but they are not there to teach you how to run your business. They may not know how to do things better than the client.

A coach can observe patterns and set the stage for new actions and then work with the individual to put these new, more successful actions into place. They are not there to do the work for you.

Fact: Most clients do not turn to coaches simply for monetary advice. They turn to their coach for help on time management as well as career guidance and business advice. To a lesser but still significant extent, they seek coaching on family, relationships, wellness and spirituality.

Fact: 98.5% of coaching clients said their investment in a coach was well worth the money

Fact: Coaching is a process not an event. The true process of coaching requires getting at the ‘root cause’ of deficiency. If your company is lagging there is a reason.

Business coaching is need to help get to the root cause. You have to be willing to accept the cause, overcome it and then begin changing the effect it has on you and your business. All of this is a process.

Fact: Coaching is not the same as consulting or counseling. Coaching is about creating a win-win alliance. Coaching looks at businesses holistically.

Fact: 61% of clients report having greater job satisfaction due to coaching.

Fact: Coaching can produce a 529% return on investment and significant subtle benefits to the business.

Fact: Not all business coaching firms are genuine. They will try to set up cult-like organizations. These organizations try to control businesses, push products on them, and do not have the business owner’s best interest at heart. This is why it is important to research an organization thoroughly, and ask your coach for qualifications and references before continuing to work with them.

Fact: According to most clients to be a sounding board is the number one role of a coach. They want a coach who will provide honest feedback and really listen to them. They also use them as motivators, friends, mentors and spiritual guides.

Fact: More than two thirds of clients attributed to their coaching a higher level of self awareness, smarter goal setting and a more balanced life.

These Business Coaching facts should help you see what you can get out of coaching but also what you may have been wrong about. A business coach helps your business performance by giving you an outside perspective.

They don’t build your business for you, complete tasks for you nor should they compare clients or coworkers within an organization. They help you reach your business goal by deciphering what is limiting your progress.

Gigaman For Your Business Why Switch To Gigaman

If you have decided to switch to GigaMAN service, then it’s about time to manage your network more easily. This allows you to monitor the network all the time, control business costs and stretch bandwidth solutions up to the last end application. The level of service preferences such as security and latency will manage the network congestion which are all part of the management you can work around with the service. Once you have decided to use GigaMAN service select AT&T as your service provider. The circuit is designed by its very own engineers and customized to meet your exisiting network needs.

A lot of networking solutions within the same regional area are constrained by physical scope of limitations. But GigaMan solutions can create direct and very reliable connections between disbanded locations. For this reason, GigaMan is the excellent solution for industries that require high levels of capacity, communication and connectivity requirements between locations

GigaMAN performance has outstanding service capabilities and product depth and stability that ensures business continuity. The velocity of GigaMAN is something you should take into account. The service integrates on-site applications and wire line with bandwidth requirements up to 10 Gigabyte and more. The applications required are scalable bandwidth, which promote growth of existing data applications.

Businesses with on hand operating network systems are bailed from incurring additional expenses, only made possible with implementation of GigaMan solutions. GigaMan is very compatible with many network configurations. They can also be plugged with existing gigabit switch and/or router directly for immediate access to many GigaMan services.

GigaMan is one of the most reliable fast networking solutions accessible in the market of modern networking solutions today. The high-speed connectivity in the Internet is capable of achieving data transmission speeds up to 1.0 gigabits per second, which is at least twenty-two times faster than the DS3 service, and over a sophisticated fiber optic network; truly an innovation.

The dedicated point-to-point optic fiber service is powerful and reliable. It utilizes the same transmission procedure as your local area network and allows you to capitalize on your enterprise local area network speeds as well as transmit diverse data between sites.

If the other services did not impress you, GigaMAN will amaze you with its rate of transmission. The GigaMAN service permits you to send out data at extremely high speed! If the DS3 service is fast enough and satisfactory, GigaMAN is way better!

There are actually several benefits involved including-providing secure transmission in your network for added security and expanding your network in order to meet augments in bandwidth requirements, which proved to be economical. With Gigaman’s Ethernet Internet solution, you also achieve cost effective solutions. Not only can you link your network through a familiar system and technology in the Internet, but you can also expand your network to keep up with the competitive bandwidth requirements of your company.

Since so many services are offered by many providers, you might be wondering what to choose? If you have not heard of GigaMAN service then it’s about time you should really consider taking advantage of its capability. People who have businesses to manage require connectivity solutions that are above average unlike what regular users need. Having fast connections are required by many business networks to promote the productivity of its services within a given time and to gain more profit from such services.

Background Of Franchising Business

Franchising is known to be among the available options that businessmen and entrepreneurs can use as business opportunities without having to go through the usual motions of having to brainstorm and hypothesize on studies that most business tycoons would initially make. Franchising can be seen today in local food chain stores like McDonald’s, Burger King and Subway. They are practically seen in all countries of the world.

Mixed Origins of Franchising
Franchising does not really have a clear trace of its background. There has been various information as to where the franchising business originated. These include countries like China, England, and Europe and of course the United States. It is even traced as far as the Middle Ages where the business opportunity issues back then was more on the lack of transportation for the goods to be transferred from one place to another. Other considered franchising as well as a means of establishing stands, vendors and a better means of being able to offer goods towards customers in other places within the coverage area.

Franchising at a Glance
Franchising is not a new term for defining business opportunities. It extends as far as home business opportunities for people who would want to be their own boss and hold their own business hours. Franchises would usually depend on the location to which franchisees would want them to be located, ideally in populated and commercialized areas for maximum exposure. Depending on the product or service to which the franchise caters, people can even do business from their own footsteps at home. This way the expenses to be incurred such as rent or warehouse allocation expense can be avoided, an expense that is certainly something tough on the budget allocation constraints of franchise owners.

Think Big but Start Small
A franchising business does not have to start big. Just like any ordinary business, it can start from the simplest and smallest business. Like most business endeavors, as long as they are managed properly, business can grow at an instant at any time. Franchises are not different from conceptualized businesses and the varying factor would be the people who would run it and how they would view such a business at a glance.

Placement and Scope of Target Market
Placement of franchise establishments, just like any other product that most people would be interested in today would have to analyze and survey the market class to which they would want to serve. It is not merely a place and operate venture. It requires gathering strategies and putting minds into action, the usual backbone towards success in business ventures.

There will always be issues concerning the target market and identifying what product or service to serve. This has always been the issue that makes businesses different from others and unless it is properly defined, a franchise or business will falter eventually if franchising business owners are not careful.

How To Write A Music School Business Plan

Your music school business plan is a document that defines your music school business with its objectives and shows how those objectives ought to be achieved.

Without a music school business plan it is unlikely that prospective “angel investors” and the like will invest in your music school business if that is your requirements to start-up or if you need to take it up another level

The plan should be customized for the likely lender or the investor. The substance of the plan should imitate the potential interests of the lender and persuade support for your music school business venture.

After completion,your plan also provides a powerful tool for monitoring the forward movement of your music school business. It will assist you to focus on the objectives set up in the plan.

You must keep your investor’s attention by making the detailed description as reader friendly as possible. Use simple, direct language and graphics to illustrate your points. Make sure your copy reflects the assured approach of the management team. Still, it is advisable to be realistic whilst presenting fiscal predictions.

Try to make the business plan as encouraging as possible but do not shy away from any observable problems there may perhaps be in setting up your music school business as your backer will more than likely have thought of them anyway; so if you can get their first and counter the likely questions before they think of them so much the better.

Make a lasting first impression by presenting the document in a clear and professional approach by using an understandable, uncomplicated design that conveys a proficient image and avoid jargon, keeping the subject matter concise and hard hitting. Any technical or supporting information should be provided in the appendices.

Keep all the figures between the main body of the document and your appendices – if you put large sections of figures in the body of your article you will distract your investor from the flow of the plan.

If your business is a new venture then give background information as to why you intend to start it. Affirm the considerable advantages of your product or service. Point to would-be markets and explain your pricing policy and promotion strategies. Identify the competition and outline your proposals for dealing with it. Be positive but brief.

It is crucial that your backer (if that is what your plan is to begin with used for) believes in you and your lineup (if you have one). If you come to an financier having just had a brain wave…”wouldn’t it be fantastic to have my own music school business” – you’re going to get laughed out the door. You must make plain your awareness and confirm your know-how and skill-sets as well as any other managers involved in the music school business. If you need any staff highlight these in the appendices – it is crucial that any essential roles in the music school business are ironed out before you meet your financier – if it is a pivotal role you have need of for your music school business then you will not get the capital you need.

The importance of shopping cart in business website

Do you have a business website which is not at all useful? Are your frustrated that the shopping cart feature of your business website is not fruitful? Do you want to have a new website for your business and want it to be perfect? Then you no doubt need such a Website Development Company who can provide you with the best kind of service regarding the shopping cart feature. Why? Because one of the building blocks of a business websites is that of the shopping cart and if it is not done in a proper way then the whole website will crumble in no time.

When you approach an established website designing service provider then they can assure you to provide the best kind of service regarding the feature of the shopping cart. They are the one who are capable of providing you with the hassle free service and that also in an affordable manner. The shopping cart facility that they will create for your website will not only be user friendly but will guide your customers to have a perfect and trouble free shopping experience. And, it is needless to say that when your customers have a nice shopping experience then they come back again and again. That means enhancement in the client base in your business. That again means increase in revenue and eventually more profit.

Now when it is the matter of shopping card then there are some features which are essential. While hiring a Website Development Company make sure that you ask them whether they can provide you with those services or not. To start with your designer should create the shopping cart in such a manner that it will have the provision of displaying different products under different categories. This will help your customers to shop in a tension free manner. Also, in a shopping cart the registration of users for making a purchase is essentially important.

The shopping cart has mainly two parts the user sides and the admin side. A good designed will see to it that the admin side is also created in such a way that it can be easily handled. The admin side can be used to make various modifications on the user sides when needed. Also, it is used to keep a track on the various transactions that are taking place. In nutshell with the help of the admin side you can easily keep track of each and everything that is going on in your business website.

Business Plan Conclusion Tips

The business plans conclusion should sum up the opportunity the business represents with language targeted at the specific audience the plan is intended for (for example, investors or lenders). Without going into the detail allowed in the executive summary (a conclusion should be just a paragraph or two), the conclusion can offer a more personal appeal for consideration and funding. However, the conclusion should not depart significantly from the rational and professional tone of the plan. For example, it is never appropriate to write sentences along the lines of I beg of you to invest in this company, It would mean so much to me and my family, and Youd be stupid to not to jump at this opportunity.

Future Vision

The conclusion is also where it can be appropriate to return to your greater vision for what the company can become and speak about future possibilities beyond the five years detailed in the plan. This can include an idea of what the company can become in ten or fifteen years. It is recommended to focus on the companys potential impact for customers and the marketplace rather than its long-term financial impact, as it is increasingly difficult to put numbers to where the company will be so far ahead in the future. For example, you might say that the business will introduce a new level of quality in liquor stores and become a regionally-known brand over the next fifteen years.

Appendices

The conclusion is not actually the final section of your business plan. Supporting documents should appear in appendices after the conclusion. These appendices should include detailed pro forma financial statements, and may also include resumes of managers, partnership, supplier, and customer agreements, evidence of intellectual property, records of business licenses and permits, detailed results of surveys, focus groups, or competitive research, and letters of support.

The Importance Of Unity In Business

Unity is a term that many people may not associate with business. However, unity is a key principle that can be applied both to people and to technological systems in a business. Unity between workers and unity between systems can lead to vastly higher production; more importantly, unity and good morale leads to satisfied workers who will perform gladly, rather than simply out of duty or even lesser motivations.

Good morale is a symptom of unity in business teams. By good morale we mean esprit de corps — a fellowship that’s created by working together in a common enterprise. Sometimes we may mistakenly think of businesses always being about making money. Pragmatically this is true. However, the best businesses tend to incorporate something more abstract and usually more important than seeking for profits.

Take for example Howard Schultz’s philosophy about Starbucks. In his book Pour Your Heart Into It, Schultz mentions the aim of the company in creating a neighborhood oasis — a place where people can come in and ponder questions over a cup of coffee and listening to jazz. While the coffee is the product and the purpose of the business, the abstract ideal of creating an oasis drives what Schultz does.

In the same sense, business owners would be wise to give their workers something to unite under. What really matters for owners is identifying what’s really important to them and incorporating those ideals in their business as a rally point. For military members, service to country and the protection of personal freedoms are the ideals that unite them. While it’s probably quite hard to find better ideals than those used by the military in creating a business, it’s necessary to use something similar to it since by doing this people can feel like they’re part of something bigger than themselves.

When they feel that way, and are fairly compensated for their work, they will work hard. If business owners fail to incorporate lasting values and ideals into their businesses then they are likely to lack the unity among workers that would propel their business into the stratosphere. The principle of unity must also be applied to technological systems, although the application of unity to technology occurs by a far greater concrete process than applying it to people.

With technological systems some businesses have found it wise to hire consultants who are experts with given technological companies. Microsoft consulting occurs regularly as businesses hope to take full advantage of the rapidly advancing software tools being produced by Microsoft and other large companies.

It is important to make sure that systems work together since businesses rely increasingly on technology to function. While the increased functionality unlocked through the internet and software for businesses is potent, oversight in producing harmony between systems can cripple a business. Whether through avenues like Microsoft consulting or in house consulting, businesses must have unity within their systems as a basis for a unified working force.

When unified people work on unified systems the best results can be achieved.

How Will You Convince A Prospective Investor To Fund Your Business

As I have written before, investors are risk managers and are very careful and selective in what companies they make investments. Now that you have a list of investors that you are contacting for your company, you need to prepare to answer their tough questions. Investors will want to know why they should invest in your company. It can be very difficult to convince them if you dont have everything ready. Furthermore, you need to have to answer the three major questions that are mentioned below correctly. This is not easy to do and I highly recommend hiring legal counsel and accountants to get all the legalities and numbers correct before you begin to meet with your investor.

How much capital do you need and where will it go? This is the question that when answered right is the million dollar question. Investors want to see how the money they invest will be spent. You must convince the investor that your management can manage the money that is invested correctly and efficiently to generate the revenue and profits that the investor is looking to get from his investments in your company. The point is clear. He wants to see numbers. This is why I highly recommend you hire an accountant who can manage the money properly. You also need to have a plan laid out with milestones that are set which the investor has to agree with and you need to give an approximate time when each of these milestones that are to be met.

Once an investor finds that all the answers to the three questions are correct, he will give you your investment in a series of tranches. Each tranche will be given on some set conditions, which are all set to meet each of the agreed upon milestones. This is why you need to be good with your numbers, and your accountant should be competent in budgeting the money. With every tranche, you need to have a percentage for employee and staff salaries (which also includes the salaries of all the management), product development, real estate, etc. If your numbers are not right or realistic, you will not get funded.

What is the forecasted valuation of your company? This is a question where realistic numbers and projections really count. A companys valuation is basically the projected value that a company can gain in the future as it functions in its relevant market. Though investors love to see high figures, its not wise to hype up your figures and have a higher than realistic numbers. Investors can see right through that. For example, your relevant market may be a multibillion dollar market, your company will not be worth billions of dollars, at least not for a while, unless your product or service meets a demand that has not been met. This case, however, is rare. You could make a few million dollars, but your company will not have the same value as the entire market, thats impossible. So how can you get the right answers for this question?

When you are preparing your companys valuation data, you need to have projections that are as accurate as possible and you need to be prepared for how to answer the investor when he asks if your profits drop below ten percent. This is very important, because investors have their market analysts who constantly analyze markets and are always on top of the latest market news and forecast the future based on current market trends. You need to do the same and you should have people who can analyze the markets just as effectively as the investor does. You need to be able to see eye to eye with the investor. Being well prepared for this question can give you the biggest chance of winning that funding.

How do you plan to exit? What do you mean by exit? Well, investors like to invest in a company for a certain period of time, say between five to seven years and then they want to exit and collect their profits. This is why you need to prepare an exit strategy. There are all kinds of exit strategies available, but even though they are needed, you should think more about building a valuable company than having an exit strategy. Investors can see the difference between an entrepreneur who wants to found a company simply for the sake of building a modest company and then selling it and an entrepreneur who wants to have a serious company and wants to be with this company for the long haul. This type of entrepreneur is more valuable to the investor, because a company that generates value and equity will provide greater profit for the investor and make the investor more interested in funding this entrepreneur. Furthermore, a company that generates value over time can also require less liquidation because the profits can be so big that there will be enough pie for everyone, both the investor and the entrepreneur. After all, an entrepreneur starts a company to have something for himself first. Investors are there to help the entrepreneur and to gain a profit from their investment from the entrepreneurs company. Investors have the same thing in common with entrepreneurs, that they both want to make money, the difference is that investors after a particular time period, will want to exit the company through some of the following strategies.

IPO or also known as an initial public offering is when a company prepares to go out to be publicly traded in the stock market. This can be a rather tricky exit strategy because there is a certain kind of capital involved in executing this strategy. When a company prepares for an IPO, it will need to get a special financing known as mezzanine financing.

Management Buyout is another common exit strategy that companies can liquidate. This exit strategy is when the management of two companies work together with the ultimate goal of the management of one company first gaining control of the other company by working with the management of that company and eventually buying that company out.

Leveraged Buyout is an exit strategy where the company is also bought out by another company, but in this case, the buyout is leveraged by the buying company from company debts and other financial deficits.

Whatever the exit strategy you want to go for, you need to keep in mind that your company should first and foremost generate value. That should be your first objective, and how the market goes and how your company manages in the market should determine your outcome.

Catchy Business Slogans And What They Say

With the number of businesses competing for customers today, it is important that businesses set themselves apart from others. They can set themselves apart in various ways such as promotions, development of new products, purchasing incentives, and many more. Slogans are another way for businesses to get ahead of other businesses.

Slogans are catchy phrases used by businesses as a way to be remembered. The goal of slogans is to associate a phrase with a business so the business is more memorable to people. The idea is for people to always have the slogan in their mind. This should entice people to become a customer of this company.

Several different types of business slogans exist. Company slogans are one type and are used to describe the entire company. These slogans try to tell about the company, about their philosophy, their goals, and other elements as well. These slogans are very broad as they aim to reach many people.

Other types of slogans used by businesses can be developed around a particular product. It is just as important to market the product as it is the company. By making a product memorable, a company will help to promote the product. People that hear the product slogan have a higher tendency to search out the product. This has the potential to increase the number of sales and revenue.

Website slogans are yet another type of slogans businesses can use. Many businesses prefer to have a slogan for their entire company and then a different slogan for their website. These slogans are slightly different because the slogan is designed with the website in mind. Although the slogan is exclusively for the website, the website slogan needs to also keep in mind the slogan for the business.

Many people believe slogans must rhyme or use humor. This is not quite true. Successful slogans can be serious or even just use one word. As long as the slogan accurately portrays the company or product, the slogan will be successful. This is the key to successful slogans.

Creating successful slogans requires a special art. Many online websites offer programs to develop catchy phrases businesses can use for their slogan. Advertising companies offer the development of slogans for a fee. These companies are well versed in how to create successful slogans for companies, their product, their website, and all other businesses needs as necessary.

An Automated WordPress Plugin To Build Local Business Directories

With changing times people want information to be readily available with the click of a mouse. The usage of Internet has made communication and business processes easier and far more efficient. Google, Bing, Yahoo are some of the most used search engines for business, products and general purposes.

Most of the search engines return dynamic content for business searches. There is no categorization of the search results. A better way to access local businesses is to use Local Business Directories. It does most of the work to simplify the search by classifying search results in categories based on the topic. The customers can then choose the appropriate business listing by navigating to the appropriate Local Business Directory.

What are local directories?

Local directory is a all-inclusive business directory for cities complete with ratings, reviews and maps. It is through Local Directories one can get all the information needed at one place instantly as well as compare the businesses.
One can find local businesses in a specific city for a specific category (e.g. Restaurants). To find a restaurant, spa, saloon near you in minutes with all the required details about that place like Reviews, Rating and much more a local business directory can be used.
If the local business directory gives accurate and relevant information along with full Google map integration with directions, It would be a great help to customers to connect with the business being listed.

So how does local business directories work?

Business Owners submit their business information to Local Directories like Google, Yahoo Local, Microsoft Live Local etc, so that people can search and find the relevant business information.
To promote the business, business owners just need to fill a form contain all the fields to fill their business details which describe their business throughly which in turns get displayed in search results.

Benefit?
-Free and Quick way to advertise business .
-Eliminated the old time-consuming way of finding business like Yellow Pages.

How to create a Local Business Directory on your website?
There are tools available to generate Local Business Directories in WordPress using Plugins.

There is one such plugin (WPLocalPlus) available which can help in getting all the business listings on the website just by pasting a small shortcode in the wordpress blog which not only generates a directory listing, but also helps to create all dynamic content instantly.

So,What is WPLocalPlus Plugin?
It’s an awesome automated Plugin to generate automatically updated Local Business Directory Websites with Real User Reviews, Maps and Offline Coupons with the functionality of putting ads on your website.
WPlocalPlus fetches the rich and most relevant local business listings/Content which dynamically enhance the functionality of your WordPress Blog which in-turns gives you an ability to quickly create new local business directory websites .