If you’re entering entrepreneurship, you’ve probably heard 1,000 times that the customer is always right.  

Here’s why I think this is wrong:

Although I know your customers are the ones who actually make your business money, it is your employees who will help drive the success of your company.  They are usually the ones taking care of the customers, so you need to make sure you take care of them.

Granted, understand I’m not saying the employee is always right.  Of course, you need to be careful of those toxic ones in your company.

When I started my first business, I made sure that money wasn’t everything for me.  I had come from a position in Corporate America where they didn’t care about us or the situation they were putting us in. They just needed to make a dime.  I vowed that I would never put my employees in a bad situation just so I could make a dime.

As the owner of a company, your employees should know that you...

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today is a great day to talk about an important concept of being thankful as an entrepreneur.

So many times we’re focused on the end goal, which is very important.  However, along the way we forget to celebrate the little things.  I’m probably one of the worst at actually looking back and celebrating the small victories.  I suffer from the ‘now what’ mentality.

If we never take that time to celebrate how far we’ve come or acknowledge the small victories in our business, we will burn out.  Sure you may not be as far as you hoped, however, you’ve probably learned a lot and have come a long way in that time.

One of the things I talk about is to write down the questions you don’t know the answers to when you first start out. If you’ve been putting time every day aside for your business, I would bet a ton of money, that if you went back to those questions, you would be amazed...

This is a concept I have learned to deal with in this business.  I have found it to make a massive difference in my business.

As human beings, we love comfort.  We love to put ourselves in positions where we know the answers. We know we’re not going to be challenged. Lastly, we know there will be no surprises.

However, I would look at it this way.  

"Do you really want to be the high school quarterback who never wants to go beyond his glory days?"

Many entrepreneurs want to be at a certain level, but they put themselves in the uncomfortable positions to get there. Here’s a great way to measure this.  When you’re at events or find yourself surrounded by certain people, ask yourself "Are you usually the smartest and the most well-connected person in the room, or is it the opposite?"

I’ve learned that instead of hanging out with people where I knew I was ahead of the game, for ego strokes, to make myself constantly uncomfortable.  I...

Rock Thomas has a history of successful businesses, and after mastering real estate decided to help others master the skills required to get from six to seven-figures.  He's a Best-Selling Author, Seminar Creator, CEO of Rock Thomas Intl, and M1- March to a Millionaire

Tell me your story, what was in your head in starting your first business from farm kid mentality to being your boss?

Being raised on a farm, having a Good Work Ethic, Skills, Talent, and Connections as a mind frame.

On the farm, I Noticed that the “City Slickers” that took riding lessons on their farm had nothing to do while waiting around, so I decided to put up a table, bring my mom's coffee machine and sold them coffee.  Soon I was also selling them hot dogs because they were also hungry.  From there I got excited to make money. From there I drove a taxi in Austrailia, then modeling in Asia, oh and a pilot's license at the age of 16.

Many people get stuck.  You need to Say...

When starting or building a business, many people wonder if they should bring on a partner.  I’ve been fortunate to have quite a bit of experience with partnerships along with building businesses by myself.  

When you’re starting a business it can be very tempting because it can help in two ways. One, getting it off the ground and two, it's only half of the financial load to get started.  However, you also have to be sure you understand that this is about as important to you as is a marriage.  Nothing shows the evil side of a person more than money.

Before you step into anything, make sure you are okay with getting into uncomfortable conversations with this person.  You must understand roles and make sure you’re both willing to carry the load equally.  If not, then the distribution of the company should reflect the workload.

I stepped into a partnership where I was willing to do whatever it took.  Unfortunately, I’m used to...

Jess Bahr is the Director of Page Strategy at Social Flow, in addition, she offers Pinterest courses on her website JessBahr.com.  Jess has run Pinterest ads for some of today's top brands and is a huge advocate of using this social site to build your business.  I couldn't wait to sit down with her and get some tips and tricks to get the most from it.

You run some of the largest Brand Social campaigns, Tell us about yourself and How you became interested in Pinterest?

Some of my original clients were launch partners when Pinterest opened up their ad platform, but when Pinterest opened their ads to API , Social Flow became a partner for that. My clients started incorporating Pinterest with Facebook and Twitter campaigns and comparing the performance of all three against one another. Pinterest outperformed and allowed a lot of brands that you wouldn't traditional think were native to Pinterest, which allowed for so much opportunity.

This is uncharted...

 
This is one of the few things where I'll recommend that you should be thinking more like an employee than an entrepreneur.  When we're employees, we understand our value, and it’s very rare where we will settle for anything less.  Usually, if we're job searching, it’s because we are
pushing for more.  Yet for some reason when we switch to an entrepreneur, we're afraid to ask for what we know we are worth.
 
Here are some tips to help you set your value so you can stand strong in asking what you are
worth.
 
1. Your unique selling proposition (what makes you stand out) should never be the cheapest.You end up attracting people who don't value you.  There's never been a time where someone has gone in cheap, and they suddenly have this epiphany 6 months later that you're worth more and they should pay you more.  The cheap ones are usually the biggest
pain in the butt clients, they make you work the hardest, and the ones who never really...

So many times I see entrepreneurs jumping in and getting excited because their product could be used
by ‘everyone’.  When they begin to market, they’re so afraid of losing a sale that they exhaust
themselves.  Not only time wise but financially, because they are trying so hard to get in front of
everyone.
 
I know it seems counter intuitive because getting in front of only a select few would mean more
sales, right?
 
When you’re starting out, this is going to be the best approach to take because it’s going to end
up saving you a ton of time and a ton of money.
 
It’s important that you’re very clear about what problem your product or service solves and who
specifically it solves it for.  It’s going to help your business grow in several areas.
 
First, it’s going to be a lot fewer resources because you’ll be able to cast a much smaller net.  You’ll know
exactly who that net is going to get in...

If there’s one thing I would encourage you to master as an entrepreneur, it’s networking, but selecting an event can be overwhelming!  

I preach a lot about networking, and how important it is to get out of your business to meet and connect with others.  If you don’t have live events on your yearly calendar, you could be missing out on a lot of potential business.  As entrenched as we are in social media that allows us an ‘easy’ connection to others all over the world, ignoring that face-to-face time with other entrepreneurs can be detrimental to your business.

As entrepreneurs, we also don't have a ton of free time.  If you’re in the trenches of your business (like most), finding that time away can be difficult.  For me, deciding on events to attend comes down to a few important factors. 

First, as much as I love inspiration, the most important thing I look for is the ‘how’.  I want to walk out with...

In today's online world starting a service based business can feel like a pretty simple task.  However, most people get in and find it's not quite as easy as they think.  Maggie and Brittany of Scoop Industries specialize in helping service-based companies grow.  They were kind enough to come by and give some tips and tricks for getting your service-based business discovered, and how to put the systems in place to grow!

*Below is an actual transcript from our podcast.

I think in service-based business, it feels like it's really easy money.  However, the cash never seems to come quite as easily as you think.  What is your advice for getting that first client?

First off, I love this question because I think this is where we kind of think some sort of alchemy is going to happen where we're you know going to set up a Web site and there's going to be a business.   But ultimately I think when you're starting out it comes down to three things:

1, If you're...