Innholdsfortegnelse for Summer 2021 i Entrepreneur's Startups

Now is not the time to overlook the power of digital marketing. It’s been a turbulent year for business owners and consumers alike, and to reengage your fans, a personalized approach is key. Gone are the days when marketers could get away with sending a mass “We miss you!” email to inactive subscribers, hoping to lure them back with discount codes. Instead, savvy companies should explore new technologies, target their audience with intention, and rely on analytics to learn more about their audience. Follow these three tips to recapture shoppers’ affection (and dollars). 1 Invest in new technology. To expedite innovation within your own business, invest in forward-thinking technologies offered by young startups. Earmark 10 percent of your marketing spend as a “test and learn” campaign budget. Once you get…

Eighteen classes of schoolchildren were tested for their IQs. The results weren’t shown to students or parents. Instead, their teachers were simply given a list of which ones scored highest, along with these instructions: Do not treat these students differently than the others. What happened next may have taken place in a classroom, but it can light a path for our own adult careers. Here were the results, originally produced in this study in 1965 but repeated many times over: After eight months, all the students were given another IQ test. Among the children not identified as unusually gifted before, there were no notable changes. But among the students who had scored highly before, four-fifths scored at least 10 IQ points higher the second time. A fifth gained 30 points.…

Are you a shaky dreamer, an idea machine, or a hopeful founder? As I’ve coached A many entrepreneurs, I’ve found that everyone tends to fit into one of these categories. Shaky dreamers have an idea but not the confidence to move forward. Idea machines have so many ideas they struggle to pick one. Hopeful founders have the motivation but no idea where to start. Each category comes with its own challenges, but the solutions are largely the same: To start a great side hustle, you need to approach it with focus, reality, self-awareness, and a problem-solving mindset. Here are three steps to choosing the right idea. STEP 1 Get to know yourself. Think about what you’re interested in, what you’re passionate about, and what your strengths are. Brainstorm areas that…

DOGTOPIA PREPARES FOR PANDEMIC PUPS “FOR A DOG, the pandemic has been the best thing,” says Neil Gill, president and CEO of Dogtopia. When offices shuttered and employees shifted to working from home, pups enjoyed spending ample time with their owners. As a result, the dog daycare, boarding, and grooming franchise saw sales plummet by 80 percent in April 2020 alone. But in the long run, Gill sees a very different trend: The pandemic may ultimately be a great thing for his industry. “Most organizations miss the signs of a tipping point, but that’s because a tipping point isn’t one single event—it’s a series of events,” he says. As he sees it, here are the factors combining for a doggy business boom. First, the pendulum already swung back his way.…

You think it’s hard getting to the top? Try staying there. The accelerated churn rate of the S&P 500 indicates that at least half of today’s top U.S. companies will get replaced by new ones over the next decade. That is a mind-boggling market value of $16.8 trillion up for grabs. And the craziest part is who replaces the old market leaders: It’s often companies that, just a few years before, were considered scrappy little startups. So how does a new company rise to slay a giant? It doesn’t happen by accident. It’s as if the two are playing a game of chess—except the incumbent has been playing the game for years, and the startup is entering halfway through. The startup is at a severe disadvantage. Normal strategies won’t work.…

How to begin? The answer is so simple that it’ll sound stupid: Make the decision to begin. Everything stems from a commitment to take the first steps. You can make excuses all day, but nearly half of U.S. workers already have a side hustle. They have struggles, too—but they’re pushing ahead. Here are the steps that helped me when I started my first side hustle at my kitchen table more than 20 years ago, when I was broke, inexperienced, and overwhelmed. They can help you, too. STEP 1 Ask these questions. It’s important to find a side hustle that is a good fit for your skills and lifestyle. Ask yourself: • How much time can I dedicate to this? Establish this up front and commit to it.• How much income…

When Peter Handy meets virtually with customers, video chat just won’t do. He runs Bristol Seafood, an upscale fish-supply startup, and wants to wow them with new fillet cuts and food presentations. So instead of sitting at a computer, Handy stands in front of a 55-inch “smart board.” It’s called a Vibe, and it’s a little like those election-night touchscreens you see on CNN. But the Vibe is made for collaboration; it functions like a whiteboard but also integrates with platforms like Zoom, making it easy to see other chat participants, share your screen, work together on sketches, share files, annotate documents, and more. “It’s all about how you can make your business stand out right now,” says Handy. As entrepreneurs try to improve their businesses remotely, a new industry…

As we move through 2021, there’s a palpable desire to get “back to normal” as A quickly as possible. But in the business world, getting back to normal would be a big mistake. No doubt, last year was tough and tragic. Yet there have undeniably been significant and positive changes in the way we work, learn, and grow as business leaders. So now, as we inch back to whatever “normal” means, it’s important that we cling tight to these three valuable lessons learned from 2020. 1 Embrace flexible schedules. I’ve toiled at organizations that attempted to encourage at-home offices. One manager’s opinion can impact the entire team and create different policy interpretations across departments, causing frustration among staffers. But now we’re all old pros at working from home! Since employees…

We are living in a moment of abundant opportunity. That might sound unrealistic, or at least untimely, given what the pandemic has put our world through. But the past 15 months have revealed new opportunities in the ways we learn, work, and live. Entrepreneurship is no longer just a business term. It’s a way of life. We have all been forced to reflect on what really matters to us as individuals, as leaders, and as entrepreneurs. Instead of seeing each of these three distinct areas as disconnected parts, now is the time to create one healthier whole. As you set out to reinvent and reinvigorate your life as an entrepreneur, don’t back away from opportunities simply because you can’t predict the final outcome. When you hesitate, it’s harder to gain…

I have been spending a lot of time over the past few months talking to people about why they hesitate to start something new, and their answer is often the same: They’re afraid. I can relate. I’ve built and sold multiple businesses, selling my last company for $235 million, and I was afraid every time—of failing, of rejection, of letting people down. I’m still scared. We’re all scared! The key isn’t to eliminate our fears but rather to learn how to face them and move forward. To do that, I created a simple four-step FEAR process: STEP 1 Feel your fear. Fear is a survival instinct. It protects us from danger and allows us to survive. But our minds often don’t know the difference between an existential threat (saber-tooth tiger!)…

When Dog Haus launched in 2010, its concept made a lot of sense…for the year 2010. Its mission was to elevate stadium food into culinary masterwork, and it did so by selling dogs and sausages decorated with ingredients such as bacon, pastrami, caramelized onions, and arugula. The three founders, Hagop Giragossian, Quasim Riaz, and André Vener, dubbed their concept “craft casual,” and they built fun, large, airy venues to serve customers. Dog Haus has grown to 48 locations since franchising. But in the decade since, much has changed with how Americans eat. People increasingly order food through Grubhub or Uber Eats. Dog Haus responded by expanding its reach through ghost kitchens—delivery-only facilities with no seating, parking, or signs. Then, when the pandemic hit, foot traffic dropped even more—and the ghost…

We thought we knew best. Meetings had to happen with everyone in one room. Relationships were built on specific experiences. Work demanded certain specifications. Then a global pandemic proved us wrong. I first realized this in COVID-19’s early days. I have two young boys, and they developed an impressive intuition for whenever a camera or a microphone was on. I’d be making my podcast Build for Tomorrow, or giving a virtual keynote, or interviewing someone by Zoom, and they’d come bursting into the room. I’d try to wave them off, but it was pointless. They’d yell. They’d jump. My 5-year-old beelined toward the camera while making farting noises. Then I switched strategies. I embraced the chaos. I started including their interruptions in my podcasts. I’d put a child on my…