Business Made Easy Podcast

There are many ingredients required for achieving business success, There is, however, one secret ingredient that is essential in every successful business. While marketing, knowing your numbers, your team, your customers and sales are all important factors in making your business successful, There is one essential secret ingredient that is often overlooked and underestimated when it comes to ensuring success as an entrepreneur and business owner. This one ingredient alone has the power to drive results in any area of your business and accelerate your success. Without it, you will grind to a halt and suffer inertia. Use it wisely, nurture and build on it and you have every chance to take your business to levels you never dreamt were possible. Yet it very rarely gets discussed. We are discussing the secret ingredient to business success this week - Confidence. Confidence is the secret ingredient that keeps us moving forward, the ingredient that helps us take action in our business and our lives. The ingredient that gives us the strength and courage to do the right things and the right times in our businesses. In this episode we discuss Why confidence is the secret ingredient to business successThe different types of confidence and what they mean to your business success.Why building and working on your confidence will improve your business results.10 practical action items you can implement to help build your confidence in business

Are you just like everybody else in business trying to provide good customer service or are you providing your customers with a unique customer experience? There is a big difference between the two and an even bigger difference on your bottom line profit when you get it right. Today I take you through the difference and give you the tools you can use to provide your customers with a unique customer experience and turn them into raving fans in your business.

“People don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan” This saying couldn’t be closer to the truth when it comes to business and having an up to date and relevant business plan for your business. Yet so many business owners don’t do them and if they have done them they don’t update them regularly. This week we discuss in-depth why you need a business plan in your business. What makes a business plan so important and the benefits of a well-crafted business planWhy you need a business plan in your businessHow often should you do a business plan How often should you update and look at your business plan What happens if you run your business without a business plan.

Business process automation can be a huge efficiency gain to just about every business. It allows you to scale your marketing, your processes and product delivery. It is not however good for everything. Process automation can not replace or build human relationships and done badly can quickly and easily be damaging to your business. In this episode, we highlight two real case studies where businesses have automated their business processes at the expense of good customer service as an illustration of how automation can be more damaging than beneficial. In this episode we cover Why business process automation is great for business and can help you scale. Why it’s not so great Where it can go wrong and the costs of getting it wrong in your businessThe importance of building human touchpoints in your systems.How to map out your customer journey to exceed customer expectations

It is so easy to get caught up in life busy being busy. But are we being effective? Are we actually working towards or heading in the right direction for what is truly important in our lives and in our businesses? We explore the beginning with the end in mind approach to life and business this week. The idea of starting everything with total clarity on what is important to you in all aspects of life and staying focused on it can have a dramatic effect on the level of success you in your business and in your life. When we begin with the end in mind approach to our lives we become leaders of our lives as opposed to manages of all that comes our way. We discuss in-depth these concepts and how you can have a life well lead versus a life well managed. What it means to start with the end in mindWhy it’s such an important approach to business and life in achieving successHow easy it can be to lose focus and direction without a proper planThe importance of recallibrating regularly to stay focusedThe important distinction between a life well managed versus a life, well leadHow to implement an End in mind approach to life.

The use of video for marketing in your business is one of the most valuable strategies you can have when it comes to getting your business and brand out into the market place. But knowing where to start can be a daunting task not to mention overcoming the nerves to put yourself out there in front of the camera. We interview Holly Gillen this week on the podcast and she generously shares some of her key strategies and tips for overcoming the barriers and getting video marketing right in your business. Holly empowers online entrepreneurs to go from confused to confident on both sides of the camera & teaches them the skills they need to create not just video but Business Cinema™. Business Cinema™ is the way she likes to describe the next level video. Not creating content for creating content, but creating videos that have a plan, a purpose and a strategy. Videos that move your business forward and have a bigger purpose. Holly started her career video production in 2008 as a Videographer, Producer, and Editor working with big industry names including the Sundance Channel, Sony Music, Nick.com, HBO, Bono, Big Time Rush, Forest Whitaker and many others. Her skills and experience run the full gamut from Producing and Directing to Shooting and Editing, and she has translated those skills into a range of educational courses and services to support entrepreneurs in their quest for video stardom. Learn in this episode Why Video is important for marketing in your business.What makes video for marketing in your business so successful.Hollys 4 pillar strategy for formulating impactful videos.The techniques Holly uses to overcome nerves and fear of the camera.Getting started with equipment and overcoming the obstacles and confusion.The truth behind the myths when it comes to producing quality video in your business.

Cashflow in your business is everything. If you don’t have the cash you can’t pay your bills and your business won’t survive. Cash flow is also one of the biggest frustration areas that all business owners struggle within their businesses. The good news is that cash flow can be managed and it can be easily fixed and managed with the right tools and approach. In this episode, we take a deep dive look into how a business can improve cash flow and just where to look when problems arise as they invariably do. In this episode, you will learn, Why cash flow is important to your business.How to measure and plan your business cash flow for success in your business. The 7 key causes of poor cash flow in your business and how to avoid them.

It is very easy, particularly in the online space to loose sight of the fact that you are actually running a business. In this episode I take you through the distinction of a hobby versus a business and what you can do to identify what it is you are actually running, including steps you can implement to set yourself up for business success.

Today I talk about a common problem that many customers face - exactly how can they increase their revenue to reach their lifestyle goals. We follow along the journey that my clients Bill and Sharon went through when using the formula developed by Jay Abraham to grow their business. What is covered in this episode: The Upside Down Business Budget

In today’s episode, we cover a topic that is one I feel very passionate about because I’ve seen it work time and time again - the importance of smiling in your business and life. What is covered in this episode:

There are essentially 3 freedoms that are most wanted and sort after by entrepreneurs as they battle the day to day of running a business. They are: While the proportions in which we seek each of these may vary from time to time. When I speak with entrepreneurs, these 3 freedoms are important goals and drivers in why they are building their businesses and doing what they are doing.

As humans, we make all kinds of assumptions, based on our surroundings and our past experiences. These assumptions, however, can often be wrong and ill-informed, and when it comes to business assumptions, very costly and damaging to our business. In this episode of the podcast, we have an in-depth look and discuss why as humans we make assumptions, the dangers of making business assumptions and how to avoid them. The areas of your business that assumptions are easily made and how and why you should avoid them at all costs.

If you haven’t got your health you haven’t got anything. Without our health, we really can’t do much, yet we fail to get regular health check-ups to make sure things are working properly. As a business owner, we wear lots of different hats that bring a lot of different stresses, so it is very easy for our health to deteriorate easily and without us even knowing. We have a responsibility as business owners to make sure we are the best version of ourselves so that we can maintain a long and happy life, while enjoying the fruits of our labour. In this episode I discuss How important our health is to maintaining and running a successful business.How quickly your health can if left uncheckedThe importance of regular health checks and prioritising your healthHow to set up a regular health checkup plan as a part of your business & life routine.

Stephen Covey in his book The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People, in habit 7, introduced the concept of sharpening the saw. What he meant by this metaphor, was that it is vital that we take quality time out and invest in our well being if we are to achieve what it is we set out to achieve with sustainable success. In today's fast, busy passed world it is easy to get on the treadmill of tasks thinking that our business is going to stop if we do, or that our business will break if we take a break. It’s simply not the case. To be successful in business we need to slow down to go faster. In this episode, I share with you the importance of slowing down and taking regular breaks in your business. When you do this you come back more energised and equipped to tackle things in your business with greater effort, more efficiently and with clearer thinking. We discuss How easy it is to get bogged down thinking you can’t take a break from your business.The challenges of scaling your business and being able to take breaksThe importance of taking time out to sharpen the saw, by investing in yourself for better more efficient growthWhat happens if you don’t invest in time for yourself.How to go about getting started taking time out for yourself even when you feel there’s no way you can.

We interview Todd Austin from Fletch Digital this week and we have an in-depth discussion about Social Media Strategy For Your Business and how you can maximise your results.. For many business owners, Social Media can be a daunting minefield when it comes to doing it effectively and well. Knowing just where to focus your time, energy and money with an endless list of changing trends and advice can make it seem impossibly difficult and not worthwhile. In this interview, Todd breaks down the last trends and important areas that you should be focusing on with social media and how to get the best results for your efforts. Having just come back from Social Media Marketing World Todd is brimming with the latest social media tips and strategies to help you find your feet in this space.

Buying or starting a business is one of the biggest investments any entrepreneur will make. It is also one of the riskiest things that any of us will do in our lives. There are so many moving parts to any business and there are also, so many roles and responsibilities that we as business owners are responsible and liable for. The irony of this risk and exposure is that so many business owners fail or neglect to seek professional advice before starting or buying a business. In this episode of the Podcast, we explore the importance of seeking professional advice, the types of professional advice that should be obtained and how to take action to avoid future costs and potential liabilities.

We spend a lot of time as business owners investing in the mechanicals of our business. They’re what I call the hard skills such as better marketing, better product delivery, more customers etc. But what about the soft skills in our business? Consistent investment in the soft skills of our business can deliver results over and over and what's more, the better we get at the soft skills the easier the hard skills that we struggle with are to achieve. Your soft skills are the centre pin to providing better relationships in every aspect of your business. In this episode of the podcast, we explore:

Clarity in your business is the centre piece to achieving the success you are seeking. Without clarity you could be focusing on the totally wrong things, that aren’t going to give you the life you are seeking. It’s so incredibly easy to be busy and distracted with the wrong things and without clarity there is nothing to bring you back to focus on what truly is are the most important priorities to be focused on. We often speak of time management, prioritising our time and even trying to find more time. Without clarity and absolute direction it doesn’t matter how much team we each have as we will end up missing what we are aiming for.

In this episode, we are interviewing one of our members of The Business Made Easy Podcast Community, Phil Lichtenberger. We are answering Phil's questions with regards to having a healthy cashflow in business, what are the things to implement and how to get clear with your expectations when it comes to payment terms.

We’ve all heard the saying it’s a six figure business. But what is six figures really? When people throw around the term 6 figures or even 7 figures you really need to look at what is being said in context. I meet far too many business owners and entrepreneurs jaded because their business is falling short of the 6 figure benchmark. My question is to you though - who is setting the benchmark your or somebody else? In this episode I give you some practical thinking to help you get your goals and expectations into relevant context for you and your own set of circumstances, so that you can focus on what is actually the most important goals for you to be achieving and not for somebody else's circumstances. We cover in this episode: