No, this is not going to be a racy article, but it is a valid comparison of the topic at hand. For those who are native English speakers, that phrase in my title usually has to do with reproduction. That’s a topic I want to discuss with you in your home business.
When I got started thinking about my home business, I came from a technical background. I got to thinking about all the complex ways I would leverage my skills and setup a marketing system for my home business that would be ….well in my opinion, genius.
I got to figuring out all of how I was going to put this system together, and then it dawned on me as I was listening to a trainer in the home business area. This trainer was making the point that when attracting people to your home business, they have to see at least two things right from the beginning: The first is abbreviated like a radio station – WIIFM – or What’s in it for Me?
The second thing people want to see is that they can do it too! It hit me at that point that if I was working on some great marketing system that took a lot of the skills I have been blessed with, then it would require someone with at least as much technical skill as me to reproduce what I had done.
That’s why I picked the title. Reproduction is vital to many home businesses that are leveraged or networked. Whatever system you use for your home business, if you want others to join in and have success, then they have to be able to reproduce what you have done.
Whatever system you have for marketing your business opportunity has to be reproducible. Not only is it not a good idea to use some very complex technical system, it is also a bad idea to invest some huge amount of money into marketing, and then expect to attract people into your home business that want to be able to do it with little money.
If you haven’t yet joined a home business opportunity, be aware of the process you go through when you learn about one and decide if it is for you. Look for one that has a very reproducible system for growing your home business. If you can find that, then you have more of a mass appeal to many people from all walks of life and economic statuses.
No matter how good a product is, or how great a compensation plan offered, make sure every part of this home business opportunity is reproducible by the type of people you are looking to as your market. From marketing to enrolling to training – the best system is easy to use, and won’t scare people away or discourage them. Keep looking, there are many reproducible businesses out there!
Doing What Comes Naturally In Your Home Business
Doing Business In Asia: Don’t Reinvent The Wheel, Model What Works
One successful business attracting the admiration of people in Southeast Asia, if not the whole of Asia, may be Air Asia, the no-frills budget airlines revolutionsing air travel for millions in this region. Founder and former accountant Tony Fernandes went on a trip to the UK, came across the concept of budget airlines, and considered it, he says, a “no brainer”.
And so he started Air Asia, by providing a seat on a plane for any person at minimal prices, and basing the company in Malaysia, between China and India and Indonesia (3 of the 4 most populous nations on this planet.
As the slogan of his budget airlines puts it, “Now Everyone Can Fly”. More importantly for the entrepeneurs’ perspective, by always selling enough tickets to his planes and acquiring his first plane for a dollar from Malaysian Airlines, he says Air Asia has made money from day one.
Air Asia may serve as a template for anyone wishing to do business in this region. A number of lessons can be drawn from this.
In particular, Air Asia is one of many examples one may notice that simply re-models the product or service of another company in the likes of the UK or the US, and brings it to the Asian region where such a business has yet to be provided. Air Asia brought in no-frills aviation personnel with the relevant experience from Europe, and let them provide the expertise and details for effecting what is a proven formula somewhere else.
As some may put it, don’t reinvent the wheel.
That is not to say quite a bit of adaption needs to be done in the local market. Tony himself has said he had to go all the way to the Prime Minister of Malaysia of the day to lobby for liberalisation of aviation routes away from the national carrier, Malaysia Airlines. The right destinations still had to be chosen and Air Asia had to concede control of its Indonesia and Thailand subsidiaries to Indonesian and Thai nationals respectively to obtain landing rights in these countries and to comply with local laws. Not the kind of issues prevalent in Europe perhaps.
But besides admiring Air Asia as vibrant business that is not only making money but is changing the way people lead their lives in this region, the lesson to learn regarding doing business in this region may simply be this: don’t reinvent the wheel, just use what works. A degree of adaptation may be required to make the business work in its local environment, but essentially someone has made most of the mistakes for you somewhere else, and human needs and wants worldwide are all the same.
Air Asia may win your admiration, but it could even teach one a lesson or two about making your business work.
Doing Business In The Future - Business Process Management
Business Process Management (BPM) is a set of activities performed by organizations to improve or streamline their business processes. Since software tools are usually used to aid these activities, these software tools are referred to as Business Process Management Systems.
- Business Process Management Systems
Business Process Management has been in place for some time now. Due to the introduction of software tools, however, there has been renewed interest in the body of knowledge pertaining to BPM. These software tools make design and implementation of Business Process Management easier, cheaper, and more efficient. There are three categories of Business Process Mmanagement activities - design, execution and monitoring.
1. Design
Designing BPM involves capturing the existing processes in a business environment. These processes must be modeled in a way that they can be simulated and tested. Modeling these processes usually involves graphical representation methods that document the processes and stores this data in repositories.
2. Execution
Traditionally, to implement automation in a business organization, developers would have to be contracted to develop applications that automate certain processes. Unfortunately, the scope of these projects was often too narrow. The result of which is that the automation is not well integrated into the business environment since the automation only deals with a particular department or function. BPMS champions a method that pushes for the development of applications that encompass the entire business process. It aims to fully automate the business environment only stopping to query the user when human intervention is absoultely necessary.
3. Process monitoring
Process monitoring involves observing and taking note of the performance of the individual processes so that evaluation and intervention become more straightforward for the business organization. From the information gleaned from here, the business organization’s leaders can make further decisions on the direction the business process takes. The data from this activity can be used to generate different kinds of statistics that are necessary when having to make critical decisions. Business Process Management is an iterative process.
4. The Future
Although BPM strives to automate the mechanical processes of a business, there has been interest in developing BPMs that move into the territory of human judgment. Some of the processes involved in a business environment are not included in the automation because some sort of human decision is needed. With the growing complexity of information systems - especially studies into decision support systems and artificial intelligence - some human decision-making processes can actually be automated. This is the future goal of BPM, to futher automate previously unautomatable processes.
- The Business Process Management Ideals
In 1920, Frederick Taylor outlined three waves of business ideals in managing processes. These waves represented the ways of thinking business process engineers had.
Wave 1. Processes Set In Stone
They are secured in business policy manuals. The manual is the basis of the process, and the organization has to abide by it.
Wave 2. Processes Changed Once In A While
Using a one-time activity, changes can be made. This means that the business would have to build their processes around a fixed system since change can only come once in a while, and at a great cost.
Wave 3. Processes On-The-Fly
The primary consideration in such systems is flexibility to change. Businesses that adhere to this goal create business environments that can adapt to its changing needs. This setup also allows the business to constantly fine tune its operations. This wave is not about business-process reengineering. It is about maintaining an environment that is constantly on its toes, ready to adapt to the circumstance, and maximize its strengths while downplaying its weaknesses.
Change is the only constant, they say. In this modern day and age, this could not be truer. The survival of a business could very well rely on its ability to constantly tweak its processes according to the whims of change. With the growing body of knowledge concerning Business Process Management, the path towards a sustainable market advantage based on a streamlined, flexible business organization can only get clearer.
Doing Business In The World Arena
If you are at the top of a company and are in two minds about taking your marketplace global, it may just need a little push to get you off of that fence. Today global marketing and international business is something that is not at all hard to accomplish unlike before. And you don't need to finance this with oodles of cash. The business sector today is one with a climate that changes on a daily basis. Clients and prospective clients require change like the wind, and the marketplace both locally and globally has turned into a major rat race for people everywhere. Today it is even more difficult to rise to the top of the crop if you are not using the advantages and appeal of technology to make your business have a global presence.
The technology that you should be using to do business in an up-to-date way is audio conferencing. With some simple changes in conducting your company's telephonic business, you can be connecting to clients and partners all over the world, in real time. The evolution that has combined both the use of Internet technology and retro mediums such as the landline telephone has increased the level of ease for you to conduct global business according to your own needs.
Audio conferencing will certainly ease the flow of business communication. You will no longer have the added transportation expenses of physically moving from one meeting to the next. Further, when you conduct business with many of your associates at the same time, you save a lot more time, thereby raising productivity. This can be used to maximize profits for your business. Audio conferencing also offers many features that allow increased interaction between many of the participants. This will ultimately better the level of information your company is giving and receiving. In addition, because you are exchanging information at a much faster rate, you and your company will be able to reach better and quicker decisions if you need to.
Audio conferencing has quickly become one of the top business solutions used by organizations today. This means that you not only save money, but also boost your productive ability, which in turn increases your profitability. You can train your employees, conduct business, schedule department meetings, and form conclusions much faster with audio conferencing. If you are on the lookout for a good device to take your company to the next level and to the global marketplace, you would benefit by using audio conferencing.
The Opportunity Cost Of Doing Business
Opportunity may be seen as the existence of a situation whereby it presents itself to an individual or group of individuals to profit in someway by pursuing it in a certain manner? The results may yield a favourable outcome for the pursuer(s) but the reason only a small amount of opportunity is exploited to present its rewards is that along with most opportunity comes an element of risk.
It is almost possible to show this graphically illustrating the greater the potential, the greater the risk, e.g. A small business owner contemplates opening a bistro bar in a shopping centre with a potential yield of $100 000 per annum, risking $250 000 whereas Donald Trump may risk $100m on a new golf course development, with a potential yield of $10m per annum
Hence, in the world of business, the universal search is for opportunity! There is plenty out there so what stops us from taking it? As has been well documented throughout the years, people have vastly different attitudes to risk, thus by definition, vastly different attitudes towards opportunity. As a result many of these great opportunities are passed by in favour of security whereby the individual(s) dismiss the opportunity and move on? What governs this thought process?
We constantly are told through various mediums not to miss out on this opportunity - by simple reasoning and the law of numbers - a great ally if one wishes to use it correctly -
EVERY OPPORTUNITY CANNOT BE FLAWED! Therefore by failing to at least examine each opportunity is a gross mis-service to our experience in this life.
What many of us fail to realise is that we are economists constantly involved in decisions and choice under the constraint of limited resources - great to have the opportunity to examine an opportunity but held back by a famous, or infamous, economic concept- opportunity choice.
Opportunity Cost may be defined as the cost of choice, when output, time and money are limited. On a practical everyday level one may fail to even examine an opportunity, or examine an opportunity, but look at what this will cost to undertake.
This is where our thought processes enter the debate. Aside from the natural character of the individual(s) involved; this may involve how we are taught to think from a young age. Are we bombarded by positive or negative thoughts and statements from a young age?
Do we really believe that we will live forever and can take the assets that may be involved in an opportunity or have been accumulated over time with us? If we are lucky enough to have an opportunity it probably means we have been given an opportunity already. Circumstances, freedom from war, starvation or the basic need to devote every hour to survival- is it then correct, for us, even morally, to fail to examine an opportunity?
Luckily, we have tools with which to examine opportunity. The ability to do our homework, freedom to access any amount of information to aid us in our evaluation, the law of numbers and the aforementioned favourable circumstances.
Like them or not, the Americans produce great opportunity takers. Is this conditioning? They are certainly no cleverer than any other country's populace! They merely do their homework and apply the basics to each opportunity presented more than any other people.
The underlying message must be to at least examine every opportunity using the basics, irrespective of the final decision, producing a circular process:
Circumstances enable Opportunity. This gives us a chance to do our Homework. The Law of Numbers dictates that at least one Opportunity will work. The Opportunity Cost will help us make a Decision.
This method of Opportunity Seeking cannot fail to produce results; whether or not they produce the desired results, one at least owes it to themselves and those not fortunate enough to have opportunity, to examine it properly.
Refinance Mortgage: The Cost Of Doing Business
There is always a possibility of getting a no-cost refinance. Mortgage rates being what they are, this is, of course, a very welcome option. But lenders are in business to make money. Keep this in mind when you are trying to get a refinance. Mortgage problems make your entire fiscal situation even worse if not properly managed.
If your creditor is not earning income by charging direct costs for the loan, those fees will be integrated into the loan or you will be paying through an interest rate that is higher than normal. It is true that some banks offer true no-cost loans but not a lot of them do. Make sure you read your agreement thoroughly. You can get a Good Faith Estimate. When you do, ask the lender to guarantee it. Legally, Good Faith Estimates do not have to be guaranteed. This makes them almost worthless. However, lenders will guarantee these estimates if they do business with you.
It is a complex thing to seek refinance. Mortgage transactions have many costs attached. These include, loan discount points, processing costs, administration costs, application costs, and many others. Lender charges can be negotiated by the borrower. Some of them can even be waived. A Yield Spread Premium is the money that banks give to mortgage brokers for bringing your loan. Ask about this beforehand as you might have received a lower interest rate if the lender did not pay the broker a Yield Spread Premium.
What Is The Downside?
The bad things about a refinance? Mortgage refinance fees you pay to acquire the loan for one thing. You might not recoup these fees for a number of years. Another is the extension of the amortization period. You may be qualified to shorten it but you simply may not want to pay more each month. Also, a mortgage refinance makes the entire mortgage just that much bigger. The position of your equity will be affected by the refinance. Mortgage will increase if you take out the refinance in cash
Bill payment is something people do with a refinance. Mortgage payment is not the priority for them. They also use the cash to pay off credit cards. This is not a wise course of action. You will only dig yourself deeper into debt.
And The Upside?
Sticking with the home long enough will help you break even on the cost of the mortgage refinance. Lower interest rates and monthly payments will greatly improve your cash flow. You can also shorten your loan period in exchange for higher mortgage payments. Finally, the cash you obtain can help you in another investment. You just have to make sure the rate of return is higher than your interest payments.
Clearly, there is a lot to learn about mortgage refinance. A lot of it depends on your particular situation. As with most things, seeking professional advice will yield better results. Make sure that the counselor understands your situation and what you intend to do with the refinance.
Can You Succeed Your Home Business With Doing Bare To Nothing?
Many times you read headers that say something like: ¡°earn huge incomes from working a few hours a week¡±. Would that really be possible? Probably more often the answer is no instead of yes. Why is that?
The answer to this question is rather simple. Just think in basic economics. Economics say that in an open economy, and the Home Business is just that, businesses that are very lucrative will sooner or later attract competition. Why is that? Because businesses, read people, always try to find the best deal. The best deal is the place where the earnings compared to the investment are most favourable. Thus, when many people would start doing bare to nothing but still earn large amounts of cash, this would attract many more other people. Thus, competition would increase and increasing competition means you need to do more and more, or start to work ever cleverer, to reach the same results in income. The fact that when people join a business that claim they have this magic formula and announce this to the world, you bet that many more people read it and join it. Because everybody uses that same business format, everybody is doing the same and you are creating an arena where you will need to put in more efforts than the average to make it work. You just created a market where there is suddenly a lot of supply of the same thing. However, there are for sure people out there that can claim they do not need to do too much and still make a decent living. This has to do with the supply and demand equation. The demand is still higher than the supply. This balance will eventually shift.
If you are still not convinced, just think of it in another way. Your income needs to come from somewhere. In many cases it is about selling some kind of product. It doesn¡¯t matter if you are in as an affiliate, who needs to recruit sellers or other affiliates, or you are in as a salesman for the actual product. You will need to start moving in order to earn that income. No company will ever give you money for not bringing in any earnings.
But then you might think, I just advertise with Google Ads or with whatever, and the customers are pouring in. Of course, the power of marketing can be great. But think again. You are probably not the only one who is doing advertising. That means you must be very good or do a lot of advertising, which by itself can be expensive, to bring in the customers. Either way, you will need to invest in it, whether it is in time or money.
Still, it can be very rewarding to have your Home Business. But if you start with the expectation of having an easy ride, you might have a rude awakening.
Analysis of the success and failure of doing business in China
Why some foreign-funded enterprise became successful when entering the China market while others fail, and why some grow relatively faster than the rest? Reasons to explain all these are complex and varied. The following factors can determine how well or bad foreign-funded enterprise fare in China:
1. Establishment and implementation of enterprise's development strategy. In China, successful MNCs and foreign-funded enterprise will definitely implement long-term development strategy, adopting a long-term outlook for their business, unlike other unsuccessful companies which do not look far and only concentrate on short-term gains. Besides adopting a development strategy that is of long time horizon, the strategy will need to be a flexible one as market conditions are constantly changing due to the presence of globalization. The enterprise need to be flexible as to react immediately to any changes without affecting its business operations.
2. Leadership of the top management plays a decisive role in deciding the success of the company. In face of greater competition brought about by globalization, management today will need to possess stronger judgment, decision ability, adaptability and greater foresight. Ability to look far is crucial as one need to be able to foresee unforeseen circumstances in order to be ready at all times to react to any changes.
3. Form key competitiveness for the enterprise, and grow together with the economy. Treat your staff with an open heart, cultivate the enterprise’s values and vision constantly into them to foster togetherness within the organization and strengthen the organization’s strengths. .
4. Build and strengthen the institutional framework and economic system of the enterprise. MNCs usually will establish main or Asian headquarters in key cities in China. Beside that, research and development centre, training centre and logistic base will also be built. Therefore it is vital for the organization to have a strong organization structure dealing with its cash flow, flow of information and manpower movement in order to ensure its success in China
5. It is essential for the foreign-funded enterprises to understand the China’s culture, especially regarding the culture of Guangxi (relationship), so as to be able to gain the popularity and trust of China population. With a good relationship, business can become smoother and probability of failure will be greatly reduced. Stronger bonds can also be built with the customers, suppliers and partners.
In Business – An Opportunity Lies In Doing What Others Do Not Do!
In business, the best way of making money is to find an opportunity in the market doing what others won’t do or are not prepared to do.
In the last 10 years a big business boom story in Scotland has been the hand car washes where they clean your car in a conveyor belt system. They tend to have 3 or bays and each bay can hold 3 or 4 cars. I go to the one in Dundee that opened 3 years ago.
One guy will soap your car another guy will use a large sponge to scrub the soap into the ingrained dirt and finally somebody else spray it all off. Much better than an automated car wash which might scratch your car? After you have had your car washed, why not go to the interior cleaning bays where they hand clean the inside whilst you wait in the waiting area sipping tea and catching up on the daily news.
Once you have an idea, focus on it. Don’t let other people distract you and move you of tangent. You will find out that what was just a glimmer of your imagination, starts to grow arms and legs and over time becomes a lot more solid.
After all – any idea worth its salt has to be given three years at least before you see the full benefits!
If you must copy a great new business idea then make sure that you do it better, much better! Think – don’t react to a simple idea and just copy it. Try and improve on it by a wide margin otherwise you will have zero USP (unique selling point). Spend quality time evaluating how you could improve on it. This is where some good intelligent friends really come in handy.
If you are still struggling for ideas, why not look at a franchise opportunity. Don’t look at the old established franchises but instead check out the new ones that are emerging. Why do I say this? If you get in at the ground floor of an opportunity then it becomes easier to expand into other territories near you. If you go for the more established brands then territories are harder to come by. You can also pick up newer franchises for a lot lower initial outlay then an established brand.
Make sure you do your homework first, and speak to existing franchisees about how they are faring with their business. It is also worthwhile doing a check on the company selling the franchise. It is very important that you back a financially stable company.
Economically – this is the best time to become an entrepreneur. The economic outlook is generally rosy, inflation is low and banks are lending money at historically low rates. It has never been a better time to look for a serious business opportunity.
After all is said and done and you have chosen the business opportunity that you are going to go with, then roll up your sleeves, do not let anybody distract you and prepare for some hard work.