The Downside of Being a “One-Stop-Shop”
Articles, Building a Valuable Company Before Jeff Bezos & Co. blew up traditional distribution channels, there was some value in being the local guy or gal. Being the local product retailer was a good business and being a regional distributor of a popular line could make you…
How Your Greatest Strength Becomes Your Weakness
Articles, Building a Valuable Company What’s your greatest strength as a CEO? Sales? Marketing? Operations? Whatever you do well, know that it might become your Achilles’ heel. As owners, we tend to invest in areas where we know we’re weak. We know we have limited…
5 “Strategic” Ways to Sell Your Company
Acquisition, Articles Did you know that Facebook acquired Internet messaging service WhatsApp for $19 billion? It represents the largest-ever acquisition of an Internet company in history. WhatsApp is a pearl for sure. The messaging service allows users to avoid…
How to Avoid the Switzerland Valuation Discount
Articles, Building a Valuable Company The Swiss are known to value their independence. They don’t use the Euro currency despite being sandwiched between France and Germany, and they never officially picked sides in the World Wars for fear of tying their wagon too closely to one…
Stop Selling Your Time
Articles, Building a Valuable Company If your goal is to build a more valuable company, stop selling your time. Billing by the hour or day means customers are renting your time rather than buying a result, which means that your business model lacks leverage. To grow, you…
Protecting Against the End Run
Articles, Preparing/Planning to Sell Your Business A football defensive coordinator needs to protect against an “end run,” a tactical play where your opponent sends the running back wide around the offensive line to try to evade the oncoming tackle. Just like in football, you have to…
Why the Future of Your Business Is Critical to Its Value
Articles, Building a Valuable Company As a business owner, you’re likely proud of the results you’ve achieved in the past, but when it comes to the value of your business, your future is critical. That’s why your growth potential is one of eight factors that drive the…
The Hidden Danger of Cross-Selling
Articles, Building a Valuable Company You've likely heard the adage that it is far easier to cross-sell an existing customer a new product than it is to find a new customer. And if your goal is to grow at all costs, then cross-selling makes sense. However, all of that…
3 Ways to Flip Repeat Customers into Subscribers
Articles, Recurring Revenue Repeat business drives the value of your company, and you can categorize these sales into one of two buckets: Reoccurring revenue comes from customers who purchase from you sporadically. They’re satisfied with what you offer, and they…
How to Turn Repeat Customers into Subscribers
Articles, Recurring Revenue Many people mix up re-occurring and recurring revenue, but one is much more valuable than the other. Re-occurring Revenue Re-occurring revenue comes from customers that have a re-occurring need for whatever you sell and buy from…