Happy early summer to you wherever you are.  Here in Charlotte, we celebrate 5 seasons: Summer, Fall, Winter, Spring, and Pollen.  I am very happy that Pollen season is over because it was a bad one this year.  This is no lie - there has been more pollen on my car and back deck than snow for 2 years straight. My car looked ridiculous -  it was like a bucket of Peeps had exploded all over my windshield.  So I would get in my car and turn on the wipers and that didn’t clear it off, so I would hit it with wiper fluid and now there was this wet yellow mess all over my car. Fortunately, after I drove somewhere for a very important meeting in my Sunday best and opened the door to get out, most of the time wet yellow glop splattered down onto my shirt and pants so when I walked into the meeting I looked like I just finished making out with Big Bird. May as well stay home and play video games.

Speaking of video games, Microsoft has finally announced the arrival of its’ newest gaming system, the XBOX One. They’ve made a ton of hardware upgrades to it, have added a more sophisticated kinect system, and designed new controllers. It looks like it’s going to be pretty sweet (that’s a term I use with the kids these days so I still seem cool).

In fact, the XBOX One is so different that no current Xbox system games or peripherals will be compatible with it. Yep, the 360 and Kinect games you have will not work on the One.  Neither will your controller.  See what XBOX did there? They just pulled an “Apple iPhone 5 needs an adapter to charge on current Apple peripherals and so Apple sells 15 million adapters for $15 each” new revenue stream on you.  Luckily for you, Microsoft plans to support the 360 and Kinect for a while and even introduce new games on them.  But still - C’MON, MAN!!

Heres’ the fun part if you resell used video games. I’m talking to the small sellers, large retailers, and specialty shops like Gamestop here that share in the $4 billion in annual used game sales: Microsoft wants a big piece of that market.

You see, Microsoft and the other publishers and game makers don’t see a dime of secondhand sales of their products.  Personally, I would be just fine making a gazillion dollars a year creating and distributing games, but we’re talking about large publicly traded corporations and they do one thing - make money.  So Microsoft has figured out how to poop in your sandbox.

How?

Wellll, Microsoft is being a little shifty about this at the moment. We are all hoping that they are going to clear the air about The Plan in the next few weeks at E3, the giant annual video game conference that I have attended several times. It looks like it’s going to work like so:

1.  You’ll buy the game from a retailer. When you install it on the XBOX One, it will copy the game to the hard drive of the One and lock it in to the gamer profile of the person who installed it. It must be activated.  This will make the disc itself useless and unnecessary.  The only person who can play the game is the gamer it belongs to.  No more lending or borrowing games to others.

2.  It gets unclear after that, but retailers are being told that customers can still trade in games, but now they must unregister the game from Microsoft (which wipes it off the original owner’s hard drive) and then pay a hefty fee to Microsoft to reactivate it again. The rumor is that the fee is large enough that the retailer will have to resell used games for north of $50.00 to make any profit at all.

So the overall implications are that a) used game prices are going to go up - way up  b) buying and reselling XBOX One is going to be a giant, expensive pain in the rump, and c) looks like all those people not paying for games are going to have to pay to play - this will do a number on piracy.

I sold DVD’s, CD’s, and Video Games for almost 10 years.  That entire time I knew that the physical media was going to wither and die. I watched it happen firsthand with CD’s.  Let’s all be logical here - what is the point of making a physical disc, and putting that disc in a case, and then in a box with a manual, and then putting it on a truck and displayed in a store for you to buy when you can just download it? We are perfecting the delivery vehicles - iTunes, Xbox, Netflix, Amazon, cable - The need for physical items is literally ZERO now.  So if you didn’t see this giant iceberg coming then I don’t know what to tell you, brother.

It’s not the end of used video game selling, but it is absolutely the beginning of the end.  As I used to joke with my fellow large DVD seller friends, “Why oh why didn’t we just buy a Dunkin Donuts franchise?”

Best,

Kevin Harmon

kevin@redshortsmedia.com

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I love to blog and work with social media.  Let me know if I can help you!

]]> http://www.startupnation.com/business-blogs/index.php/2013/06/03/hey-used-video-game-sellers-the-xbox-one-just-pooped-in-your-sandbox/feed/ http://www.startupnation.com/business-blogs/index.php/2011/08/30/the-future-is-comingand-you-wont-believe-it/ http://www.startupnation.com/business-blogs/index.php/2011/08/30/the-future-is-comingand-you-wont-believe-it/#comments Tue, 30 Aug 2011 15:28:20 +0000 Kevin Harmonkharmon http://www.startupnation.com/business-blogs/?p=4984 Hi gang, welcome to Noodle Baking 101!

It’s been a while! How’ve you been? Still in business? Growing? Circling the wagons? Custer’s last stand? Hey, you got into this entrepreneur thing because you don’t fear uncertainty - don’t forget that! This is fun! You could be like all your friends, who are right now being lectured by Bill Lumbergh about their TPS reports (shudders).

I’ve been thinking a lot about the future lately - my future, your future, Earth’s future, and the future of technology.  What are things going to be like in 20 years? 50 years? 100 years? I’ve been doing some research and reading on the subject of future tech, and I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that the future is going to look like magic to us 2011 dummies.

See, in terms of technology, the future is exponential in nature, not linear.  Perhaps you have heard of Moore’s Law? Gordon Moore was a founder of IBM, and in the 1960’s he observed that the number of components in integrated circuits had doubled every year from the invention of the integrated circuit in 1958 until 1965 and predicted that the trend would continue “for at least ten years”.  Well, guess what? The trend continues to this day - it is a perfect exponential line that has not changed since 1965, and looks like this:

Moores Law

What does this mean for us?  Well, futurist Ray Kurzweil, author of “The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology” and subject of the movie “Transcendent Man” (you can and should stream it on Netflix)  says that this line of exponential growth in the power of CPU’s will at some point become so dramatic that we stupid humans can no longer keep up with it.   He calls this phenomenon “The Singularity” - the point at which machines become smarter than us.  In fact, he thinks The Singularity is fast approaching - it is less than 20 years away.

I recently attended a Fandango event called “Transcendent Man”, which was a 2 hour Q/A with a pretty incredible panel of tech leaders and futurists such as Ray Kurzweil, Dean Kamen (inventor of the Segway and robotics guru), Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, Deepak Chopra, and several other amazing minds. They discussed The Singularity and its’ implications for humanity.  I left the theater needing a whole bottle of Advil and a shot of tequila. I had learned a lot - too much - in 2 hours.  Lets talk about the relevant points:

1.  HERE’S WHY I’M WRITING THIS FOR STARTUPNATION.COM!:  A lot of these inventors, entrepreneurs, and technologists are designing and developing technology that is still theoretical - in other words, the technology does not yet exist yet to build what they are designing!  Ray Kurzweil, for example, has become a multimillionaire in the last 30 years by designing products in exactly in this manner.  He invented the modern synthesizer in this way, as well as reading devices for the blind (Stevie Wonder has said that Ray has changed his life completely)

So, entrepreneurs, is your business model designed for 2011 or 2015? 2020? Are you coding for todays internet or 2014’s?  I suspect that the most wealth to be had in business ventures from here on out are going to be ventures that can most accurately predict the future and be right on top of it when it happens.

2.  Emerging technologies are amazing - and freaky - particularly in the area of nanotechnology.  Right now, scientists are programming atoms to compute as today’s circuits do.   Imagine a computer 100 times as powerful as the fastest computer in existence today that would fit inside of a red blood cell. Don’t worry - if that doesn’t work out, we’ll be building computers that small anyway. In fact, the majority of the Transcendent Man panel agree that in my lifetime (I’m 41), man will become a hybrid of man and machine.  We will all have millions of nanobots floating around our bodies, programmed to help us a) think better by assisting brain function b) keep our arteries clear of plaque, c) manufacture red or white blood cells, d) destroy cancer cells, and so on.  Let’s face it, people:  Technology is stronger than Biology.

3.  Keep an eye on 3D printing.  Right now, 3D printers can “print” out physical objects.  Dean Kamen is working on a technology that, when complete, could wipe out 50% of the worlds’ disease problems associated with polluted/bad drinking water.  Imagine shipping a 3D printer to the Sudan and telling it to print out another 3D printer, and then telling both to print out 3D printers. Then, tell the 6 printers to print out a water filtration system for a village.  This is the future of manufacturing, and its’ coming soon.

Here’s a 3D printer in action:

3D Wrench

4.  Robotics will get to the point of creating better, faster, and stronger body parts than our own.  As Dean Kamen stated (I’m paraphrasing) “Right now, we build artificial limbs for people who don’t have them. What happens when we can replace an existing part with a superior mechanical one? How many people would elect for that? I think it will be MANY”.

I think about his point often because I am a victim of severe arthritis in both of my knees and earlier this year a surgeon in Napa Valley told a robot to partially replace both of my knees.  The robot could perform the surgery better than the surgeon could and the surgery was done in less than 20 minutes.  So, now that I’m partially robotic, would I do it again?  You bet your sweet mechanical ass I would - in fact, I plan to have a robot in 2020 redo the surgery and possibly replace both my knees totally, because by then artificial knees will be stronger, faster, and better than even healthy knees.  By the way, I’ll also be able to swallow a pill which will reprogram my DNA to stop storing fat on my body and I will lean out naturally.

Believe me, I completely understand that this article raises questions:

Can we live forever?  I think we can.  I think we’ll be able to upload our consciousness into a computer and live forever.  Or, nanotechnology will be able to stop our aging process. Technically, that will be possible.  But the bigger question for me is: Do I want to live forever?
When the machines become smarter than us and we cannot intelligently keep up without them, why would they need us?  Hello, Matrix anyone? Terminator?  We’ve all seen the movies where machines are smarter and it generally doesn’t go well for the humans.  Ray Kurzweil is very optimistic that we’ll all get along, but there are others who are not.

And so on, and so forth, and holy crap I need some more Advil. PLEASE comment below with your thoughts - I’d love a good healthy conversation about all of this.

Um, have a nice day?

Kevin Harmon
CEO Red Shorts Media LLC
twitter.com/imadness
http://www.linkedin.com/in/thekevinharmon
kevin@redshortsmedia.com

Do I like my new life? Heck ya!

The real question is: When is it right to make big changes to your life? To jump from mommahood to mompreneur? To leap from a 9-5 job to pursue an entrepreneurial dream? To add extra hours of work to your day while staying in your current job to build a small business at the same time?

Transitions and changes can be difficult for anyone and everyone ….. I especially know this from my early training as a clinical social worker.  The reason for this is that transition is both terrifying and exciting.  So, what makes the change worth it?  What makes it much easier to move from point A to point B and remain optimistic?  How does one know they are truly ready for a change?

The first answer is Readiness.  Are you REALLY ready to make a change? Readiness, preparedness, and acceptance of the decision to change make all the difference.  Some questions to ask yourself in relation to your Readiness are:

• Did you fully think out your decision?
• Have you laid out a course of action?
• Do you have a short term and long range plan?

Right up there with being ready, is Ownership of your choice.  Even if you were let go from a position and decided to build something of your own, that needs to be your choice (rather than seeking new full-time employment).  When evaluating Ownership, think about the following:

• Who’s choice is it for you to break out on your own and pursue a business of your own?
• Are you prepared to sink a HUGE amount of your energy into your new endeavor?
• Have you allowed for “hiccups?”  AND, can you forgive yourself for small mistakes?
• Do you feel in control of your choices?

Lastly, Do you feel a sense of Accomplishment in the project, business, or responsibilities that you currently hold?  Can you close the door with Pride?  When thinking about your current life, ponder these points?

• When you reflect back, do you believe that you will be proud?
• Have you achieved what you set out to do in this chapter?
• Did you tie up loose ends?

All of us have a myriad of experiences behind us that led us to want something of our own.  For me, I “did” the retail thing, worked in a clinical counseling setting, escaped a bad start-up, and I AM a mom.  I look back on all these details with a smile and know what I gained at each step of the way, and I truly was READY for the next stage of my life.  Although, I cannot slam the door shut on being a mom, I know that I successfully finished one stage of parenting and it was TIME.  Time to tackle mommahood and my own thing at the same time….a brand new chapter.

While it is a major balancing act and sometimes I feel like I may need to clone myself, Do I like my new life?  Heck ya!

Are you ready for an electrifying change — to start something of your own?  It is really awesome!

Follow my adventure at http://backngroovemom.com

I had just finished reading through Josh Linkner’s brand new book, Disciplined Dreaming: A Proven System to Drive Breakthrough Creativity.

Linkner’s big idea: Breakthrough creativity doesn’t need to be random or something that happens only at the inception stage of your business. Creativity can be–and must be–cultivated systematically on an ongoing basis.

Linkner provides five simple steps to help you become a creative, innovative, dynamic powerhouse - both individually and as a company.

As a long-time friend of mine, I’ve had the privilege of watching Josh perfect this systematic approach to creativity as a successful entrepreneur who rapidly grew a business to over $70 million in sales and as a legit jazz musician where improvisation has been a constant.

He deduced from his experiences that rather than waiting for a-ha! moments to wander through the door, it was possible to establish an environment where breakthrough ideas are farmed and harvested predictably, like crops.

It’s one thing to develop a system that works for yourself, but in Disciplined Dreaming, Linkner successfully packages his ideas into appealing, usable insights in a step-wise process that even at 33,000 feet, are simple and obvious to follow. Totally doable.

His five steps (paraphrased by me) are:

1. Ask - Define your creativity challenge and foster curiosity and awareness of your business opportunity.
2. Prepare - Get into the proverbial “zone” to be creatively productive.
3. Discover - Explore and reveal every avenue to generate ideas and think innovativaly.
4. Ignite - Explode your creative thinking up to the next level to create extraordinary ideas.
5. Launch - Establish a specific framework for transforming ideas into action plans.

And Josh provides specific instructions for each step.

I am so psyched to put these steps to work with my team, and I know they’ll be equally into the process. It will not only bring fresh ideas to light and game-changing strategy, but it will also be A BLAST!

With its creative prescription at just the right moment in my life’s work, I know that this weekend read will have a sweeping, positive impact on what I crank out as a visionary entrepreneur. 

If you want to take your business and personal achievements to the next level, and if you’re wondering what you should be disciplined about today, I’d say, get yourself a copy of Disciplined Dreaming and start creating your future systematically.

Amazon link for Disciplined Dreaming: A Proven System to Drive Breakthrough Creativity

Let me give you a little background.  I was a Stay At Home Mom, Domestic CEO, Professional Volunteer/Giver of Time, and providing free support and life skills for the last decade!  I had casually looked into what going back to work would look like for me, and I did not like what I found.  Maybe I was not looking in the right place; Maybe I was not presenting myself in the right way; Maybe I was not fully committed; Maybe my creative energies were too strong.  Who knows?

What I did know was on this particular morning in October, I was raring to go! I was creating my own destiny, which I am pretty sure sounded like “blah blah blah” to my family.  I do not have a business background, but rather a post-graduate degree in clinical social work, so I really had no idea where to begin.   I did not let that stop me because I know how to listen and seek out others who can help.  Of course, I found StartupNation which quickly became a valuable resource.

By the end of that week in October, I ran my sliver of an idea by a trusted advisor, drafted a partial business plan, set up my own blog so others could follow my adventure, secured a business attorney who helped with non-disclosures for this idea/product, and Backngroovemom was born.  I began to work at such a rapid fury because I was so intrigued at the idea of creating something of my own.  I discovered many tricks and overcame huge hurdles.  Don’t get me wrong, I made many mistakes, and I am sure that I will continue to make a few more. I will give you a behind the scenes look at those tricks and mistakes…just not now.  I cannot give everything away at once!

If you are a mom who thinks that somewhere deep inside you have just a tiny little ember or a huge flame of curiosity at becoming a mompreneur - here is my first recommendation:

-Sit down with a piece of paper and write down everything you have ever done.  I mean everything.  Even if you do not think it is relevant - write it down.  Include past and current work experience, volunteer experience, neighborhood committees and projects, the style in which you navigate your every day life, even extended family obligations.

-Take a hard look at your list - did you forget volunteering in the reading corner in your child’s class; negotiating your grandfather into a nursing home; managing your household budget? Do NOT leave anything out because these are all valuable skills.

-If you helped grandpa get what he needed in the nursing home, cutting red tape and how to negotiate on many different levels is a skill you hold. If you were in charge of the first grade reading corner, patience is part of your make-up.  How about managing the neighborhood block party? After that, you now know how to negotiate with many different ideas, wants, personalities.

-The point is that you may have a very unique skill set that you have neglected to pay attention to, and this can help you discover your own business in many ways.

-Make your list, consider your ideas, and think about what type of business these qualities lend themselves to……

At the beginning of my pursuit, my oldest son exclaimed “You cannot do this…I am only 9 - I still need you.”  He is now excited by my mission and contributes regularly (really).  My journey has come a very long way since last fall, and now I am so excited  to share on StartupNation an all-access backstage pass to the tour.  Until then, visit my blog http://backngroovemom.com to stay up to date with my “product”-tivity.

How do you get your product noticed in our current sea of product noise? Obviously, the way to be noticed is to wrap yourself inside a giant egg and be carried somewhere by the entire cast of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, right?

Yep, you’ll be noticed for sure.  Lady Gaga was certainly noticed when she pulled that stunt at last Sunday’s Grammy Awards.  Did you then watch her performance during the show?  Pretty underwhelming, don’t you think?

So, in other words, the Marketing was noticeable, but the Product disappointed.

What’s more important?

Let me ask you another question.  What would happen if you spent all of your energy making the best product possible? What if your sole focus became making a product that was so good it became its’ own category?

Make the best Product - everything else will become elementary.

Ever heard of Esperanza Spalding?  Me either.  On Sunday, she beat the marketing juggernauts that are Justin Bieber, Drake, and Florence + The Machine to win Best New Artist.  Justin Bieber alone has millions of Twitter followers, a hit CD, a hit movie, TV appearances, tons of radio play, and an army of pre-pubescent diehard fans. He was a lock for that award, right? Whoops.

Make the best Product - the rest will follow.

Ever heard of Arcade Fire? Some have - most haven’t. Yet again, they beat out music monsters Eminem, Lady Antebellum, Lady Gaga, and Katy Perry for Album of The Year.  How could a small Canadian relatively unknown band possibly think they could beat these gigantic forces of nature?

Make the best Product - commerce will find YOU.

Kevin Harmon

kevin_harmon@hotmail.com

I live tweeted the ENTIRE Grammys. Who wants to hire me to live tweet YOUR event?

Twitter.com/imadness

Rieva Lesonsky was Editor of that magazine at that time, and so, it’s an incredible thrill and honor when StartupNation collaborates today with Rieva on new and helpful advice for entrepreneurs.

I’m writing today to share with you that Rieva–now running her own business–and StartupNation have just released a new eBook for 2011.

26 Hot Businesses To Start Right Now! is the second annual kick-start, jump-start, fire-you-up, open-your-mind, take-action-now, whip-crackin’, break-on-through, fertilize-your-mind, start-it-up, breeze-to-read downloadable eBook that will leave you rich with ideas and inspiration for a business that fits you perfectly and equips you with the specifics to get started.

By reading this eBook, [click the image to see it] you will learn 11 hot trends and 26 hot businesses that you can start today. For example, you’ll gain insights like:

• Make it personal. Millennials (60% of all weddings by 2012) are demanding their wedding experience be more distinctive, opening opportunities for personalized wedding décor & accessories businesses.
• Make the world come together. Open a translation services business, and capitalize on a market that has experienced average annual growth of 22% since 2004.
• Sell plus-sizes. Sixty-eight percent (68%) of all U.S. adults (age 20+) are overweight and about half of those are obese. Make their lives easier by selling plus-sized products and apparel.

The download is jam-packed with a simple, easy-to-understand analysis of the market landscape and specific recommendations for businesses you can start now that have the highest probability of success in 2011.

The great thing about 26 Hot Businesses to Start Right Now! is that it can be read in a day, immediately empowering you to select a new business to start and to take the first steps in building your future as a business owner.

The eBook is a launching pad for your business with links to more than 20 additional resources.

By reading this eBook, you’ll tap into the insights necessary to create a small business blockbuster.

About Rieva, the author: Rieva Lesonsky, CEO and president of GrowBiz Media (www.growbizmedia.com), a content and consulting company specializing in small businesses and entrepreneurship, and SmallBizDaily.com, her daily blog. Lesonsky has been covering America’s entrepreneurs for nearly 30 years. She has appeared on hundreds of TV programs and radio shows, including the Today Show, Good Morning America, CNN, The Martha Stewart Show and Oprah, and can be seen regularly on MSNBC’s Your Business.

LEARN MORE HERE

… and START IT UP!!!

How does worm farming + raving + poker playing = Zappos?

What everyone knows about Tony Hsieh is that he’s the Zen Master of Culture at Zappos, a wildly successful shoe website that was just sold to Amazon for $1.2 billion - not bad for 10 years work.  I think what most people don’t know is how Tony got there.  What’s great about this book is that we get an honest account of a successful entrepreneurs’ childhood, upbringing, failures, and successes - all told to us by Tony himself.

Tony didn’t just show up as CEO of Zappos out of nowhere.  In fact, he began his career as a 9-year old worm farmer.  That didn’t go so well, so he started a newsletter - that failed. By middle school he was running a mail order button business which did quite well and gave Tony all the milk money he wanted. He got a job as a computer programmer in high school, and in college he started a food business.

After college, Tony quickly realized that working for The Man wasn’t all that exciting, even if The Man was Oracle.  So, he and his buddies got together and started a small company called LinkExchange, which they sold to Microsoft less than 2 years later for $265 million. That was a LOT of milk money.

He became a start-up investor after that, investing in more than 20 companies.  One of them was a small start-up called Zappos, whose founders had this nutty idea for selling shoes in the internet.  At the time, that was a ridiculous idea - Zappos needed a drop-ship model, and most shoe companies just didn’t have the ability to do that. Shoe suppliers wouldn’t sell product to Zappos either because they weren’t a brick and mortar store.

With Zappos, Tony had lots of issues and obstacles to overcome, and it didn’t take long before Tony took Zappos under his wing full time and became CEO.

What I really love about Tony and Zappos is that it’s actually a very typical “overnight success” story that was 10 years in the making.  Several times, the Zappos team was staring at bankruptcy and failure - they were literally making decisions on a monthly basis to continue operations.   Tony and the gang simply believed that it would work, and via pig headed determination, it finally did.

The last 1/3 of the book dives into the fabled Zappos culture and, finally, what happiness really is.   Personally, I think that culture is a very hard thing to define and describe.   Tony does the best he can by allowing several members of his team to contribute to the book and describe culture in their own words, and he discusses several ideas, such as the Culture Book. Tony loves poker, and draws a lot of similarities between poker and business and culture.  He also loved the rave scene and it’s easy so see how that scene became foundation for the ideals behind the culture of Zappos years later.

I don’t know how many answers are here for readers seeking to duplicate the unique culture of Zappos in their own organizations. For me, it’s hard to answer for myself the question “Is Zappos successful because of their culture, or does Zappos have a unique culture because of their success?”  I think the only way to really answer that question is if Tony applied his culture to other things.  How cool would it be, for example, to see a Zappos Airlines? Or a Zappos lawn care service?  Personally, I think Tony could take Delivering Happiness to the ultimate level by starting a multi level marketing company with “Ambassadors of Happy” spreading happiness throughout the world with products designed to make people happier.  Wow - I said a form of “happy” four times in that last sentence, and now I’m even happier.  Just said it twice more - I’m on to something.

Tony digs into the meaning of happiness and what it is at the end of the book.  He approaches it from a scientific point of view, so if you get real excited about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and Happiness as a Fractal, then you’ve come to the right place.

As an entrepreneur myself, I think the thing that Tony has shown me the most in “Delivering Happiness” is that money isn’t always going to make you happy.  When Microsoft purchased LinkExchange, they gave Tony an additional sum (millions) to just “hang out” for a year.  Guess what - that didn’t make Tony happy or fulfilled, so he actually quit and gave that money back to Microsoft.  At Oracle after college, Tony’s job was ridiculously easy and high paying for his age, and yet he walked away from it because it wasn’t fulfilling him.

“Delivering Happiness” is a good, honest account of how a failed worm farmer became the Culture King.  I really enjoyed reading it, and I think you will too.

You can read more about the Delivering Happiness movement here:

Delivering Happiness

You can buy the book here:

Buy it on Amazon

Enjoy!

Kevin

@imadness on Twitter

bye gang

Sorry, that institution got among the lowest ratings in a Pew Research Center study that was recently released. The Pew Center polled Americans to determine who they trusted least and who they trusted most.

Small business owners - you should be proud. America trusts YOU most.

More than churches, our President, labor unions, the Federal Government, small businesses reign supreme in the eyes of the American public.

Here’s a ratings chart that shows the results:

	Positive	Negative	Other/ Don’t know
Small business	71	19	10
Technology companies	68	18	14
Churches & religious orgs	63	22	15
Colleges & universities	61	26	13
Obama administration	45	45	10
Entertainment industry	33	51	16
Labor unions	32	49	18
Federal agencies and depts	31	54	16
National news media	31	57	12
Large corporations	25	64	12
Federal government	25	65	9
Congress	24	65	12
Banks & financial inst	22	69	10
Pew Research Center March 11-21. Figures may not add to 100% because of rounding

Just edging out Congress as the least trusted institution are banks and financial institutions. I figure it’s the mortgage crisis and recent bail-out ballyhoo that has so terribly tarnished the perception of banks, coupled with the lack of lending at this critical juncture for Americans.

It’s good to be SOLID when it comes to reputation and perception on the street. It’s a big help when us little guys and gals go toe to toe with the behemoth corporations and compete with our service and product offerings.

Be proud to carry the small business torch, folks - not only do you live it, but America “gets it.”

The second thing I would do is to look at other businesses similar to what I’m thinking of doing and figure out what it is that I can do differently, or do better, than what my potential competition is doing. If there is no potential competition in the area or demographic that you are looking at, then you don’t have to be quite so creative. In fact, it might be better to leave some of your more creative, which usually means more costly, ideas on the back burner in case someone decides to take your idea and open business next door or down the block. If that happens, then you will have something up your sleeve that can put the competition back in its place.

Then, research! Research! Research! The web is a valuable tool and one which you can use to find out how other similar businesses are doing. Your research should identify the demographic that you will be targeting, how close is the nearest competition to where you would like to do business, and what percentage of the market share like businesses have. Your research should also answer all of the money questions, such as what will the start up costs be, what is the profit margin, how soon you can expect to start making a profit and what will the monthly expenses be for all operating expenditures. If you have a question in your mind, it should be answered, on paper and honestly. And if the answers don’t add up to a positive, then definitely reconsider the business model you are mulling over. On the other hand, if all your numbers add up to making a profit within the first six months, then you have a fantastic, wonderful, can’t fail (maybe) business model and you should pursue it.

Finally, if you cannot find investors for your business model, then you should seriously think about finding a different model to pursue. Most investors have either experience or instinct when it comes to what works and what doesn’t. You may be able to convince a bank to lend you the money, but if you can’t get at least one investor on board, it may be time to do a serious reality check and can one business model in favor of another. Listen to the investors you talk to. If you hear the same thing out of more than one mouth, chances are they are right…and you are wrong.

Choosing the right business model is critical to success. The perfect balance of heart and mind should help you to choose the most successful business model.