In my personal experience I can say that two words describing the life of a budding entrepreneur come to mind rather quickly. The first one is “frugality,” and the second one is “discipline.”

There are other words that describe the life of an entrepreneur that may be more pleasant to think about–like “freedom”; however, the word freedom is more indicative of the rewards of frugality and discipline that will come in time.

I remember when I finally decided to take the plunge and start my first business. I was making really good money in the corporate world and I had some stock I could sell that was worth about $10,000 to get started. I knew I had two choices in how I could use that money. One was to use the money to buy materials, tools, and supplies to get the company started; the other was to sit on the money and use it to live on as I built my company and made my first profit.

I remembered watching a friend of mine who had decided to start a trim carpentry business. He had some seed money, he had tools, and he had an older van. I remember that he thought his business would be more successful at the start if he purchased new tools, a new van, news signs on the van, and other (according to him) essentials. He went out and spent his seed money—“betting on the come”–and then spent the next few months chewing his nails to the quick looking for a profit. He had new payments and a large overhead right out of the starting gate. Within a year he was selling his new van and tools and looking for a job. I believe his only mistake was that he started off with too much overhead and too many liabilities.

Now, that is not to say that in some cases upfront expenditures don’t exist or aren’t completely unnecessary, but as a budding entrepreneur you have to be very wise in your initial spending. Yes, it’s an awesome feeling to have a new van, new tools, and a new desk or office, but when the “new” bills start coming in faster than the initial profits—it can steal your momentum and your drive.

I thought through this memory of my friends experience and I decided to see how well I could move forward with what I already had in place. I made it sort of a challenge to myself to see just how frugal I could be as I began my new company. I decided to be as frugal and disciplined as I could with my seed money, and that I would not make any purchase until it became evident that I had to make the purchase to continue moving forward.

What did I do? I started a decorating company out of the back of a 1981 Toyota Hatchback. Yes (laughing) it was ugly. Yes, I was at times embarrassed, but I was able to see a profit rather quickly and I wasn’t chewing my nails to the bone and eating Tums every night before bed. As I landed each new contract, I would buy a new tool or some other supply I needed. Within six months I was able to pay cash for an old ford truck. Eventually, I bought a new truck and had custom signs made for the sides of the truck. Within three years I had installers working for me and all I did was handle sales. During the first six months the $10,000 that I had set aside was a life saver. There were times in the beginning that I had to pay myself a salary from that savings. I had learned a valuable lesson from my friend’s unfortunate demise.

Obviously there are a million scenarios to staring a business that are different from the above example; however, the principles are the same in almost any start-up business. Discipline and frugality are vital principles to live by as a budding entrepreneur.

Most people dream of owning their own business, but only a few really step out and take on the task of creating their dream. There is always one more distraction and one more issue, and they say to themselves– “If I can just get past this or that, I will start my own business.”

The truth is that it will never get easier, the distractions will never go away, and in this economy, it will always be a risk; however, it is doable and you should follow your gut because you only have one life. I remember the headline of an old show—“This is your life.” I think of it often because an old friend of mine who was successful used to tell me that all the time when I had a job and was dreaming of owning my own business. He gave me the same speech over and over again—this is your life, this is not a warm up act, it`s now or never. I had a cushy job with Georgia Power Company in the mid 1990`s but I was so unhappy and unfulfilled. My wife was determined to keep that ball and chain around my foot because she loved the security of that income; however, I had something inside of me that had to be set free. I dreamed of becoming a self-employed, self-made man.

Having said all that, what is the path to entrepreneurship? What is the best way to step out? What are some reasonable and solid first steps? There are a multitude of answers to these questions but I will give you my best advice based on my own experience.

Number One:

Decide what it is that you dream of doing. You may have several ideas but you must focus on only one of them—the others are a distraction. No matter what that may be–there is a way to present it and accomplish it in ways that no one else can but you. You have a unique talent inside of you that no one else has—you must believe that.

Number Two:

Find a mentor. This is a vital step. Even if you have a one-of-a-kind widget that no one else has ever marketed before, someone else has been there. Someone else has had to walk that path. Find a mentor that you can copy, emulate, and look up to for your pathway to the dream. Most successful people are glad to give advice, or, glad to mentor someone who is trying to follow a dream. Dreamers respect other dreamers.

Number Three:

Don`t listen to the other crabs in the bucket. There is an old story about crab fisherman. The story says that they don`t need to put a lid on the bucket they store their crabs in because the other crabs pull each other back into the bucket. Every time a crab starts to climb out of the bucket, the other crabs grab his leg and pull him back into the bucket and stop his escape. This is true of those around you in your life. Most people are afraid to step out of the normal routine in life—a job. If you go around telling others of your plans do not expect a lot of support.

Number Four:

Believe! You have to believe, and you cannot afford to allow anyone or anything to steal your dream!

There are many other stepping stones of advice that one could give, however, these four are the basic foundations that must be set in place if you are to succeed in your new adventure. This is what makes America great—we have the freedom to succeed–or fail, but failure is nothing more than an experience on the way to success for those who never quit!

Like most people out there, Greg Hampton and Andy Frigulietti wanted to work for themselves. Aside from that, they have a passion for art. With passion and dedication, anything is possible. Greg was glad to share his journey with Bossstart readers in this installment of “10 Q’s With…”, our question and answer series aimed at encouraging the entrepreneurial spirit.

Q: Tell our readers about your business, your passion, and what it is that you do? What’s your story? And what sets you apart from other businesses in your particular market?

“My name is Greg Hampton. I am one half of Burnstyles.com. My partner Andy Frigulietti and I started our business 2 years ago. Andy and I have been friends since we were zygotes. He is more like a brother to me. He understands that art is a huge passion of mine, creating it and witnessing it. It was his stroke of genius when he came to me with the idea of starting a business together. You see, Andy is the hardest working person I know, besides my dad. At one time he was working four different jobs. At this time he came to me and said, ‘Greg, I’ve got to slow down and when I do, I want to be my own boss’. He knew I was interested in trying to create a t-shirt line but couldn’t invest much money into it. Andy said with all his determination and hard work, he doesn’t have something to show for all that he’s doing. ‘I want to run my own business’, he said. I grew up watching my dad run his own business and knew that one day, somehow, I would like to run my own as well.

This is when Burnstyles.com was born. My passion from an early age has always been art. Ever since I could pick up a crayon and put it to paper, I’ve been drawing. In my teen years I became addicted to skateboarding. The technicality, the individualism and of course, the art. When I attended art school in Boston, some of the guys that I became close with were graffiti writers. Their styles and creativity was something so new and fresh to me. I had to be involved. I mostly photographed the pieces, but did get my hands dirty as well on some free walls. Burnstyles.com involves all of these things. It has the community revolving around skateboarding, some of personal art and my version of urban art. Not to mention the belt buckles we make from used, ridden skateboards. What I think sets us apart is everything that I put on a shirt, I feel like I had my hand in the image idea in some way. From the kids with the spray cans, to the animals with the suits on, each shirt is from my life and each shirt tells a story in itself.”

Q: What inspired you take the steps to becoming your own boss? Is this your first/only business?

“Two things inspired us: my dad inspired me and Andy was inspired by the work force he was stuck in. Both Andy and myself had never tried something like this before. We were both excited and scared to become partners in a venture that was new and at the same time foreign to us.”

Q: How much planning was involved prior to the start-up of your business? Can you offer some insight into that process?

“We didn’t really know how to plan for this. We knew Andy had saved some start up money and I started saving all my sketches and began putting finishing touches on work that was incomplete. We asked a friend how much it takes to make a website. He told us the cost, next we asked around through friends and family to see if anyone knew any website developers. We also looked at websites we liked. We tried to meet weekly to discuss images and functionality we saw in eye-popping designs.”

Q: In terms of running your business, what does a typical day look like for you; or is every day different?

“Everyday is different in the beginning of starting your own business. At Burnstyles.com one day we have t-shirt orders coming in, another day it’s a couple buckles and the next it’s simply the website fees or cell phone bills. We are busy trying to keep our business budget level and remember all the money coming in and going out. Checking in with our printer or I.T. expert is another thing we do periodically. Updating Facebook, sending out tweets or adding to our website blog is happening at least once or twice a week also.”

Q: What has been the most challenging part of your entrepreneurial adventure?

“The most challenging part of this has been finding a marketing specialist who can “get” our brand and what we are about out to the public. It is hard to get a person who is not just on the same page as us, but can get on our page. By that I mean trying to make sure our representative fully understands what Burnstyles.com is all about. We want people to understand it’s not just an apparel company, but also a lifestyle that evolves around it.”

Q: Besides the obvious of being your own boss, what is the most rewarding part about being an independent business owner?

“Setting up our own rules. Putting on specials or sales when we see fit. Hearing from the public and replying to them the way we always wanted a company to respond to us. When someone says they like something or don’t like something, we try to get back to them fast with an honest answer or reason for why things are the way they are. We also can ask why they liked or don’t enjoy the product. We are not a big business. So when someone calls us or emails us, you are talking to or receiving an email back from one of us; not someone paid to respond to emails or callbacks. When we do festivals or fairs, we enjoy getting the responses from the public. We take ideas and opinions into account and yet still stay true to the Burnstyles.com brand and beliefs.”

Q: How do you promote your business (i.e. Advertise, Endorsements, Contests, Social networking)? Or are there any marketing strategies that have helped your business? What about hurt your business?

“We promote sales and new designs mostly through our Facebook page or through Twitter. We do try to sponsor local skate competitions with 1^st, 2^nd or 3^rd place prizes. We did try to hire a marketing specialist but she was a bit out of the “loop” when it comes to the age of buyers, the different circles our customers thrive in and the mentality of a young vibrant company like Burnstyles.com. This person did attempt to get our name out there, but was unsuccessful at promoting to our demographic.  We also tried through Craigslist.com. We put out a small ad that said in a round about way that we were looking for marketing students to get their feet wet with a small start up company. We sent out packages containing 5 shirts, 2 or 3 buckles, about 150 small postcards, some stickers and business cards. We asked these participating students/volunteers to pass out the different articles in each package. They could do it on a street corner, college campus, nightclub event or any venue where our demographic of customers would be conjugating.

We said they could wear the shirts while passing out the other pieces of Burnstyles paraphernalia. Andy & I asked the participants to take photos with their phones or digital cameras, and send us them. The group with the best photo depicting them trying to get our name out there was going to win a small prize in 2 months. We would put their photos and names on our Facebook page and website blog. We set aside some money to purchase an mp3 player to send the winners. Out of the 8 groups we contacted, no one ever sent us an image, responded to our follow up emails or called us back. Our idea was a bust. We thought it was a good one but all we could do was trust that these people were going to fulfill the requirements we asked of them.”

Q: What’s next? What are your long term and short term goals?

“It has only been two years. We are babies in the business world. We are trying to hire a marketing rep and achieve more word of moth by passing out free t-shirts on college campuses. This September we hope to have a contract with local Universities School of Marketing. We are trying to get a student or two to intern for us, and get credit for doing so. This is still in the works.”

Q: If there was a way to do things over, would there be anything that you would do differently?  

“We wouldn’t have bought expensive cell phones. We do almost our entire Internet browsing on our home computers or on our personal smart phones. We don’t use our business phones as often as we thought, yet we still are paying the high monthly contracted bill. We would have looked deeper into our web designer’s background. Our first I.T. professional did not know enough about the type of website we wanted and the site crashed twice in the first 2 months of being live.”

Q: What advice do you have to those reading BossStart.com that you feel is valuable?

“Go For It! Do not watch other people do something that you know you can do better. Believe in your skills and try to define why you believe your product is better than the competitors.”

For more information on Burnstyles, Greg Hampton, or Andy Frigulietti please visit:

Website: www.burnstyles.com

Facebook: Facebook.com/pages/Burnstylescom/150458125003017

Twitter: Twitter.com/BurnStylz

Decision making is something many of us take for granted.  It involves weighing the current and future prospects of all related issues, and then heading in a direction that will maximize all of those factors.  In business this needs to happen swiftly to take advantage of an opportunity or to move on to other pressing issues (instead of wasting extra time and still making the same decision in the end!).

Our brain is the central organ in our ability to make decisions.  The better our brain runs, the better our decisions!  Food, sleep cycles, activity levels, and perceived mental stress all play a role in the decision making centers of our brains.  Understanding evolutionary development of our brains will help explain how this works.

As our brain developed, we first had the brain-stem.  This runs most basic centers like heart-rate, breathing, sleep/wake cycles, hunger, and blood pressure.  As we evolved into mammals we developed a higher center of our brain called the mid-brain.  This is our emotional center.  Emotions are, basically, really effective ways of remembering situations faster that are either dangerous or safe.  If we heard a rustling in the brush and a bear jumped out 30 seconds later, we would develop the emotion of fear with rustling brush.  The next time we hear rustling brush we automatically run away due to fear and are even more likely to survive because we get away from the bear faster.

Evolving further into human beings allowed us to develop decision-making.  We can control our emotional centers if we decide whether to listen to them or not.  Lets say we see our cousin enter the brush, then three minutes later we hear rustling.  The mammalian part of our brain would have us run away immediately, but the human part of our immediate stream of consciousness would say “I saw my cousin walk in there; this is the middle of the day; there are not often bears down here in mid-day; I don’t need to run away”.  Thus, a better decision is made based on more information quickly and easily.

In order to use the higher levels of our brain we must take care of the basic levels.  If we live on poor sleep, poor diet, low or excessive activity our brain shuts down the higher levels in order to focus on the brain stem and our basic needs.  When we eat a poor diet, chemicals in our brain diminish our ability to access the decision making center.  Instead, our mammalian brain tends to take over.  Ever see a child throw a tantrum shortly after a sugar-binge?  That’s their mammalian brain taking over.  Ever see a child who missed their nap throw a tantrum?  Same thing.  Ever see an adult get mad at their computer or yell at traffic when they had trouble sleeping the night before?  The emotional outbursts do not improve the situation, they are simply a reaction to a feeling.  All are examples of emotional outbursts taking place of calm, rational decisions.

Poor diet, poor sleep, too much or too little activity will create a stress response in our body that shuts down our decision making centers.  As a result, when that salesman comes in to discuss a better brand of computer for your company you may have to think about it for three days before deciding that the cost will not be worth the minimal improvement in productivity for your company.  Think of everything you have to put off while you debate the pro’s and cons of the purchase.  BUT, if you eat a better diet, get good sleep, and exercise the right amount that decision is made in a few moments, you’re able to continue on with your day, and you’re that much more productive in your business!

Eating a good diet, prioritizing regular sleep, and exercising right  will allow you to master your decision making.  It will happen both faster and more-often be the correct choice.  Make your health your priority and your small business decisions will thank you!!

Digital Business

The internet made many tools available to traditional entrepreneurs (more on that later) but it also opened up an entirely new place to do business. Think about the internet giants like Google and Facebook and you’ll get an idea of what the implications are. Some of the biggest companies out there today are doing all of their business on the web. In fact, the business models wouldn’t even exist without the internet.

You don’t have to be a huge corporation to make it in internet business. Ecommerce is available to anyone with a product, an online storefront, and a shipping account. Likewise, there are many entrepreneurs providing online services that wouldn’t be necessary without the web. Entrepreneurs now have a huge new playground to explore and take on with the internet.

Advanced Marketing

Imagine going back in time a few decades. How do you reach out to potential and current customers? The answer then would have been fairly simple: You would use the mail, print media, and broadcast media. That was about it. Can you imagine working in the same space today? You would be missing out on huge opportunities.

Today, the internet gives you the ability to reach out directly to customers. Whether it’s through email marketing, display advertising, pay per click, social media, content creation, or something altogether new, you have unprecedented access to customers. Not only that, you now have extremely precise tools to track behavior and the efficacy of one strategy over another. Marketing in the digital age is a powerful tool indeed.

Connectedness

Perhaps the hardest part about entrepreneurship in the past was something entirely out of your control. Oftentimes, the entrepreneurs of the past had no choice but to play by the rules that coincidence happened to choose. For example, you might have been an amazing salesperson without a lick of knowledge about managing manufacturing operations. Depending on the situation, your entrepreneurial success, or lack thereof, would depend on your ability to find someone who could help you in the areas you were lacking.

Today, you have access to everyone with an internet connection. The tools for finding a co-founder and the right team for the job have never been more accessible. It still isn’t easy, but at least now it isn’t impossible. Today’s world is full of businesses founded by people who might have been perfect strangers in the past.

The entrepreneurs of the digital age look quite a bit different than their counterparts from just a few years ago. Fortunately, the internet has made entrepreneurship a much more accessible and exciting venture for all.

About The Author:

Carolyn is a guest blogger on the topics of entrepreneurship and digital business. She is an expert on order management systems that work in concert with Shopify, 3dcart, and BigCommerce.

Whether an entrepreneur or a brand manager, your customer relationships are on the line every time you publish web content. Are you saying the right thing to the right people? Are you engaging in the right way? Get it wrong and you could damage the brand along with your reputation.

Increasingly consumers all over the world are turning to e-commerce. Whether clothes, books, music, beauty goods or toys this growth offers an opportunity to expand into new countries. Research by Nielsen says 85% of the world population has bought a product online. The highest percentage is in South Korea where 99% of those with internet access use it to shop. It’s closely followed by the UK (97%) and Germany (97%).

Your business might want to tap into these markets but to do so you’ll need to understand the consumer. This is where reputation management comes into play. If you’re talking directly to the consumer, which online networks make much easier, then remember the importance of communication, understanding different behaviour around the globe and using the best social networks to suit the market.

Choose The Right Channel

Facebook and Twitter might be king in the US but that isn’t true across the globe. Understanding that your target market in a different country and might use a different social network will affect how you promote your business and reach them. Half of Orkut’s users are in Brazil; Qzone has over 700 million users in China and is breathing down Facebook’s neck. While the US social media giant uses advertising to pay its way, Qzone sells tools to its users, meaning brands talk to consumers differently. In France companies build pages on Skyrock to reach its ten million users, that are more often men than women and are more commonly aged 18 to 34 (www.complex.com). The right social network won’t just connect you with your target market by understanding the user profile, it will help you understand your customer better.

Tailor Your Message

Knowing where to say it is the first step to managing an online reputation. Knowing what to say and how to say it is next. Consumers behave differently around the globe so you’ll need to research your target market. Understand their buying patterns and how they interact with brands. To post in multiple languages you should always opt for a professional translator or copywriter who understands the language.

The benefits of this are that they will be able to talk to your consumers in a more personable way, they will understand nuances of language that you might not. Language errors stand out to native speakers and mean they switch off, rather than engage, particularly if you’re selling yourself as a localized brand.

Be Open

Social networks have changed forever how we interact with brands. The key is in the phrase “network”. It’s a two way street and to manage your reputation you need to welcome and respond to feedback. A native speaker or translator will be invaluable during this process. As customers start to answer questions and engage with your brand it shows they are interested. Ignore them and they might think you, and your brand, are just not worth knowing.

67% of companies use social media and for many of them customer service is part of that (www.destinationcrm.com). You need to keep up with your competitors but also understand that a question, idea or feedback needs to be taken on-board. Responding to customers will also help you understand them even more.

Monitor The Conversation

You need to setup a regular system for monitoring what’s being said about your company online. Google Alerts as well as tools like MonitorThis and RepVine will track mentions of specific keywords across Google as well as other search engines. This is vital if you’re expanding abroad and Google is not the dominant platform. As well as monitoring comments about yourself, you can keep an eye on your industry. If you’re in the retail sector then you want to keep up with news in different countries. Set-up a variety of searches by choosing a few words in different languages that match the sector in your target market. Each day you’ll receive an update about what is being said and where. It will help you keep up to date with developments and understand the market better.

Managing an online reputation shouldn’t be scary. It can pose a challenge particularly if you are expanding into new territories and are using different languages. Planning in advance, doing your research and hiring a professional translator will help you understand your new customers better and develop the best of online relationships.

About The Author:

Christian Arno is the founder of Lingo24, a provider of top translation services. Launched in 2001, Lingo24 now has over 170 employees spanning three continents and clients in over sixty countries. In the past twelve months, they have translated over forty million words for businesses in every industry sector, including the likes of MTV, World Bank and American Express. Follow Lingo24 on Twitter: @Lingo24.

“We started in 1998,” says Maung. “We chose the name Hissho because in Japanese it means ‘certain victory’. What we do is set up sushi kiosks inside supermarkets and send out a chef to make fresh products onsite.  That’s how we started.  Now it’s been 14 years and we have 400 locations.  We are no longer just targeting the grocery chains; we are also targeting educational institutions and some other restaurants too.”

In fact, Hissho Sushi has also expanded to service hospitals, corporate cafeterias, and airports.

“What happens is a retailer or grocer gives us the space, and it’s pretty much a turnkey project.  We go in with our product and our chef, and the customer picks up their order and pays at the cash register.”

Hissho Sushi currently has over 250 employees, as well as over 200 independent chefs or “chef partners”.  But in the beginning, only Maung, his fiancé, and his brother were involved.  Maung, who was recently honored as a keynote speaker at the Business Leader Top 50 Entrepreneurs 2012 event in Charlotte,  recalls the company’s humble beginnings:

“When I came to Los Angeles from Burma in 1989, I was more interested in doing a chain restaurant, but didn’t have any background or support.  I learned that it was much easier for me to get into real esate to earn money quickly.  So I studied real estate in California, studying English at the same time, and worked as a realtor for a few years to save some money. I was constantly looking for the next opportunity in the food industry because I thought that would be the next trend that people would be interested in.  At that time in California, sushi was getting popular and there wasn’t much on the east coast.  So I relocated to the east coast and looked for a place to make my headquarters.  I found Charlotte, and one of the major reasons it appealed to me was that I thought I could get the financing I wanted there.  But nobody wanted to talk to me without having a success story.  So I had to self-finance using credit cards and borrowing from friends and family.   I was pretty much spending all my life savings, putting everything in there.  And that’s how I started my company.”

Maung’s preparation and confidence in the quality of his product  helped maintain the company’s forward momentum during its early financial struggles. Maung attributes much of his continued success to Hissho Sushi’s company culture, the positive results of which were obvious on the smiling faces of every employee BossStart met at the 14th-Anniversary celebrations.

“For the first ten years,” Maung explains, “we didn’t really have a culture at all.  We were just working hard, long hours, six or seven days a week pretty much, with a limited amount of financing.  The company was growing, but our people were tired and we didn’t have much fun.  We were just focusing on growing.  Back in 2009, I picked up a book that one of my mentors had given me, called “Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t” (by Jim Collins).  And I realized that it’s not all about the money, and that chasing after the money would not be wise.  We can be better than this.  If we don’t have fun and enjoy working in our environment, we cannot last long.  It doesn’t matter how successful we are.  So at that point I started reading all the culture books on how to be a great company.  I read about other companies, like Starbuck’s and Google, to try and figure out how they do so well.  For the last few years I’ve been very focused on making Hissho Sushi’s company culture right.  We’ve had a Zumba trainer twice a week, and then switched to yoga classes twice a week; we have a little library, we have karaoke some nights; and we celebrate monthly birthdays as well as everything from the Chinese New Year to St. Patrick’s Day to Easter to the Burmese Water Festival.  We encourage our people to go out and help those in need.  We go to the Charlotte Rescue Mission to help out the homeless two or three times a year on holidays and to Classroom Central to stock shelves.  But mainly we try and have fun here in the office, day in and day out.  I think that if you do the culture right, taking care of your employees and making them happy, they take care of the rest.  We can preach to them about how to have the best customer service and how to make the best product, but if you do not take care of your employees, it won’t happen.  It’s very important for people to be happy.”

Make sure you’re doing what you really love to do. This is very important. Don’t be in the crowd, chasing after the trend or chasing after the money. It’s not all about the money. You need to focus on what you love to do the most, what you’re passionate about.  There is no other way around it.

To learn more about Philip Maung and Hissho Sushi, please visit:

Website: HisshoSushi.com

Facebook: Facebook.com/HisshoSushi

The issue is with the executive function of our brain. There are billions of bits of information entering our brains at any moment and then being interconnected and disconnected from all the other billions of bits; however we “notice” only a small minority of these.  A section of our brain just behind our forehead is our executive center or seat of consciousness.  It controls what our “mind” focuses on.  When my executive function has difficulty honing in on one topic (I hear that car/I remember I need to send an email/I’m listening to my music/I type an email response/I see the dog walk by me/I remember I have to get my tax bill sent out/I see a different dog…),  this means when I actually get back to writing this blog, I have to re-read what I just wrote in order to come up with the next sentence.  That was lost time, that was potential free time that is now lost forever on inefficiency.

I have found it beneficial to first put my tasks into two categories: ‘The Creative Mind’ or ‘Auto-Pilot’. My creative mind is when I have to come up with novel ideas, suggestions, or information.  This is the time that I need to be calm, without pressure, and without judgment.  We require a respite from the creative work and need some mindless, auto-pilot tasks that do not take nearly the amount of energy that being creative does.

I am a strength coach who designs strength/conditioning programs for all walks of life.  When I write programs I need to come up with novel ways of improving people, allow them to learn the capabilities of their body, not over-burdening their stress responses, while keeping their mind entertained with variety.  I must balance how much pushing, pulling, lifting, squatting, jumping and running they do so as to not create too much in one area and not enough in another.  For this, I need to be creative.  I need freedom of thought to make new connections, develop new combinations of exercise, and apply that directly to the individual.  If I cannot control my executive centers I won’t be able to focus long enough to get all this done.  However, this control is EXHAUSTING and I need breaks from it or I get worn down quickly.

Auto-pilot tasks are the mundane things that we have all done hundreds, if not thousands, of times already.  The auto-pilot functions may even be former creative mind functions that occurred so often that they have become entrenched in our psyche forever more.  I need only moments of peace and clarity to bang out a few auto-pilot functions and these do not make me exhausted like creative functions.  These are things like answering email, formatting a referral letter, scheduling a new client, book-keeping/billing, etc.  I can do these tasks with other high pressure issues going on, when I may get interrupted.  Because the auto-pilot tasks are so “automatic” when you return to the task you pick up immediately where you left off!  No lost time!

When you’re first starting out in business, nearly everything is a Creative function and that is why being a new-business owner is so exhausting.  However, acknowledging this and acknowledging the fact that you need rest after creativity should allow you to ease your mind.  If you need a break, take it! You can’t be creative otherwise.  Sometimes that’s a 20-minute cat nap. Other times, it’s a week in Jamaica.  If you follow this process, you’ll eventually turn some of those creative moments into auto-pilot tasks and you can get more done each day.  A little auto-pilot, a little creativity, a little rest, repeat!  Then, if you’re successful, you can teach the auto-pilot tasks to others (the teaching is creativity, so be sure to rest afterwards) and then you have room for more auto-pilot tasks and more creativity!  More done in less time = Efficiency!

Stress is powerful.  You’ve probably heard of the insane, super-strength that humans are able to exhibit during times of heightened stress.  For example, there is the age-old story of the frightened Mother who lifts a car off her trapped baby.  A simple Google search will yield dozens of these types of stories.  The fact is that stress releases certain pro-hormones into our body, which makes it possible to achieve that which we cannot normally achieve under normal day-to-day life.

Now, lifting a car off a trapped child may be a bit of a stretch, but the reality is that entrepreneurs tend to live under a constant load of stress.  And this stress is often what causes successful entrepreneurs to accomplish so much with so little.  Of course, that is the backdrop of most successful business stories—a group of guys and gals get together and accomplish significant progress with little resources.

But Doesn’t Stress Kill?

Now we get to the point of the article.  Our belief is that not all stress kills, and not all stress is bad for your health.  This is where it is essential to understand the differences between good stress and bad stress.  Good stress empowers, boosts efficiency and productivity, and tends to fuel us, whereas bad stress kills us.  Your goal as an entrepreneur should be to learn how to manage good stress, while eliminating bad stress.

So What’s the Difference?

This is a tough question to answer directly.  It is difficult to bring objective language to the table because bad stress is very much a personal experience.  We like to think in terms of effect.  If you are feeling stress from some aspect of the business, such as trying to find a merchant cash advance to meet payroll, and it is resulting in heavy amounts of fearful thinking, depression, despair, loneliness, etc., then that is, most definitely, bad stress.  However, if you feel pressure, but that pressure is driving you to prepare, work harder, concentrate, and set goals, that is, most likely, good, healthy stress.

For example, if you have a looming deadline for a big project and you feel slight anxiety, but a ferocious competitive drive to meet the deadline and work efficiently, that is great.  That is similar to what an athlete would feel before a major competition.

Staying Healthy

As an entrepreneur, you must learn to differentiate between good and bad stress.  Good stress is healthy as long as you manage it appropriately and do not let it turn the corner into bad stress.  Bad stress is what doctors are referring to when they inform us that stress raises the risk of heart disease and other related illnesses.

Therefore, as soon as you ever feel yourself experiencing bad stress when seeking a merchant cash advance in order to meet payroll, or any other related experience, take a break.  Reach out to a business partner or mentor, and analyze the root cause and seek to correct the issue so that you do not let bad stress become an acceptable way of life.

Successful entrepreneurs understand the difference between good and bad stress and the best ones have mastered an ability to manage good stress and eliminate bad stress.

What is a PageRank? Why should I care? How does a PageRank benefit me? These are all good questions. A PageRank is a numeric value that represents how important a web page is on the web often referred to as ‘PR’ in regards to the online world. Google considers and discovers when your website is LINKED to another site, that a vote is being cast on your site. Think popularity, when your link is among other sites Google starts to give you a PageRank. You should care about your PageRank because it can significantly increase your online presence, let alone your traffic. To give you an idea of what a good page rank is; there are only 12 websites total with a PageRank of 10 – Google being one of them and USA.gov being another. There are close to 150 domains PageRanked 9 – with Facebook being one. Now I bet you’re wondering, ‘How does a PageRank benefit me?’ and ‘What should my PR be?’ Read on for this week’s 5 Ways To Help Build And Improve Your PageRank……

Guest Posting

Guest posting can be extremely effective in generating traffic to your site and helping build your PR. For example, if your site is a PR1 and you find a way to get an article that you have written for a high profile blog to be published, if done properly, your link should be included in the article bio or somewhere throughout the article. Best way to tackle guest posting is to search for the best in your industry and find a way to write guest posts for them. Most will have a curriculum and submission process already in place.

Submitting To Search Engine Directories

Submitting to search engine directories is one of the first things you should do when trying to increase your PR. This is the easiest way to get a free link to your site. Most directories are free which makes for a no-brainer. Be on the lookout for how to submit to search engine directories on www.bossstart.com

Commenting On High Profile Blogs

Commenting is important. Be sure not to be spam or just comment on a post or topic that has nothing to do with your site or what you wrote. Start out by finding a few blogs that deal with your industry and try to bring value to the topic. What I mean by that is to try answering a question someone posted in the comment section; do this a few times before including a link for your site in each post. It’s professional and makes you look less spam-y. Once you start, stay active and join the community that your business is in.

Consistently Creating And Publishing Articles AKA Blogging

Being consistent is important. For example if you typically post once a week, then make sure to post at least once a week. Define a goal for your blog and make it happen. Publishing new content keeps your site fresh and lets Google know your snot a spam site.

Keyword Optimization

Making sure your site is optimized properly with industry specific keywords is important. This helps Google know what your site is about, making it easy to relate and direct searches to your site. When you reach this point, your PR should already be improved and the rank will continue to increase when you start receiving a decent amount of search engine traffic. Strive for a PR ranging from a 3-5, but by no means stop if you exceed a 5.