Mike Michalowicz's Blog, page 65
August 2, 2016
This Too Shall Pass
On a recent trip to the breathtaking island of Lanai, Hawaii, I witnessed an important lesson; It is human nature to believe that whatever is currently happening will likely happen permanently. But in reality, it won’t.
I was visiting the Lanai City Museum to read-up on the history of the island. A twenty-year-old video looped in the background. It shared a fascinating tale of the rise and fall of industry on Lanai.
The locals explained how the sugarcane industry had come and gone. They explained how cattle had come and gone. As the twenty-year-old video concluded, it explained how the pineapple industry has proven to be the only industry that has permanence. “It is here now. It is here to stay.”
Ten years later, Lanai no longer produced pineapple. If only they had known. But how could they? They’re human.
Today the industry is tourism. It’s the new great hope for the island. I just wonder how long it will last.
August 1, 2016
Episode 107: Is the Recession Over Yet? with James Coyle
Show Summary
Today we talk with Jim Coyle on: “is the recession over yet?” Jim’s response may be a bit hard to hear, yet eyeopening. Discover some insights about what’s going on in our economy and how to stay ahead as a small business owner. Welcome to Episode 107 of the Profit First Podcast!
Our Guest
James R. Coyle is the President of the Gateway Regional Chamber of Commerce, one of the largest and most active business associations in New Jersey. With nearly 1,200 members, Mr. Coyle’s primary responsibility has been to develop and implement a strategic plan to revitalize the organization and make it more politically effective by taking full advantage of the grassroot capabilities of its membership. This, combined with effective targeted marketing programs, has led to a tripling in the size of the organization. Mr. Coyle has also cut management costs and increased revenues, resulting in a substantial improvement in the financial position of the Chamber.
Mr. Coyle is also the publisher of and a columnist for the monthly business newspaper, Inside Business. The paper is an initiative of the Gateway Regional Chamber of Commerce, and has a readership estimated at 70,000. Mr. Coyle’s columns are considered a highlight of the paper and forcefully expound on issues of importance to the business community.
Within New Jersey political circles, Mr. Coyle has become well known. He played a major role in Governor Whitman’s 1993 election campaign, and has managed or advised numerous legislative, county and local campaigns on issues management and communications strategy. In 1994, he managed the 10th Congressional District campaign.
In 1995, Mr. Coyle was tapped by Governor Whitman to manage the day-to-day operations of the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities. At the Board, Mr. Coyle implemented a sweeping reorganization designed to move the Board away from a strictly regulatory function, to one that promotes open competitive markets. This involved developing and implementing a new communications strategy to inform the public, the industry and political decision makers of the new policy direction.
Prior to his work with the New Jersey State Government, Mr. Coyle was Managing Director of Coyle & Associates, his own public affairs and communications consulting firm. He has worked with clients such as AT&T, the Governments of Indonesia and Egypt and the Washington public affairs firm of Cassidy and Associates. His primary focus was to help his clients develop public affairs strategies and policy agendas for their dealings with the U.S. Government and foreign governments.
Before coming to New Jersey, Mr. Coyle managed a trading and consulting firm based in Singapore. His clients included the U.S. Department of State, the World Bank and the Indonesian Government. Mr. Coyle provided these clients advice on strategies to pursue in trade policy negotiations and investment promotion. In one case, he helped the Indonesian Government design new fertilizer marketing policies which proposed savings of over $100 million.
Prior to Mr. Coyle’s time in Southeast Asia, he was a U.S. Foreign Service Officer, and served as the Agricultural Attaché to Egypt. There, Mr. Coyle was responsible for administering one of the largest and most significant U.S. agricultural assistance programs in the world. He was also chief negotiator for the 1987 PL-480 agreement with Egypt. His negotiations resulted in Egyptian concessions saving the U.S. Government nearly $20 million.
Before going abroad, Mr. Coyle worked as an international economist and agricultural trade development specialist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture. He also was responsible for coordinating the budgeting process for USDA credit guarantee programs, and for developing marketing strategies for selling U.S. products in the Middle East.
Mr. Coyle holds a BA degree from the University of Colorado and a MS degree from Cornell University. He makes his home with his wife, Ellen, and his sons, Matthew and Philip, in Maplewood, New Jersey.appy (110 Lessons for my daughters).
Corporate Partners
Receipt-Bank – Software and service to make the gathering, storage & processing of bills, receipts and invoices as easy and as cost effective as possible for businesses.
Nextiva – VOIP phone providers for small businesses.
Fundera – Single source online funding for entrepreneurs. Also offers an adviser program for CPAs, bookkeepers and business coaches.
Fundbox – The simplest and fastest way to fix your cash flow by advancing payments for your outstanding invoices.
July 29, 2016
July 28, 2016
Divide It Until You Do It
Have a daunting task that is too big to get started? Divide it into two pieces.
Can you do one piece now? No? Divide it again.
Still to big? Divide again.
Keep dividing until you have a small enough task to get started.
Now just do all the small divided-up tasks. When you are done, you will crossed that daunting task off your list once and for all.
July 27, 2016
Decisive Action
Good things come to those who wait.
Better things come to those who take decisive action.
July 26, 2016
Top 9 Tips to Increase Profitability for Gym Owners
Profit is key to sustaining any business and gym owners are not an exception. With as many workout types and preferences as there are people in the world, the most important part of opening a gym or fitness center is to figure out what you excel at and focus there first. But then what, you’ve opened your gym and have your first members, how do you make not just a living but create a profitable business for yourself for now and the future?
Many gym owners are personal trainers who open a gym to make more money. With the growth in the health and wellness industry over the last 5 years and the prediction it will be the next Trillion-dollar industry, there’s definitely room for you to have a piece of that pie, but you must treat it as a business not a hobby or as your own personal gym where you work out with your friends and family.
Here are 9 strategies from leaders in the gym and fitness industry on increasing profitably in your gym. They may not all work for every gym, but find one you can implement today and track the results as you increase your bottom line.
1. Go beyond your Profit & Loss and find other indicators to measure on a regular basis. For example, know what percentage of your revenue comes from recurring monthly memberships vs. one-time purchases. With this information you can determine many other areas to improve in your business. Nick Berry, CEO and Co-Founder of Fitness Revolution, www.frnation.com
2. Diversify. Some of your best clients will want personal training. Others will want group classes and within those classes you will need a range of levels. Provide both, but limit the numbers in your group classes. Your best clients will pay more because they are receiving more personal attention than they will in a large group class. Chris Cooper, Lead Mentor at www.TwoBrainBusiness.com
3. Cross-sell a system. When a client is purchasing personal training sessions, they also need to purchase nutritional services or massage therapy sessions or chiropractic. Fitness professionals can only do so much in the gym. The client’s whole health needs to be addressed. Sell a health system, not just personal training sessions. Also, because we are selling a health system we can market fitness and health, not price, but we can’t be sales people. We are fitness professionals. It is our job to educate clients about why they need all of our products to work together to increase overall health and wellness. Stephanie Joanne, Brand and Business Coach for Fitness and Health Professionals http://stephaniejoanne.com
4. Build Relationships. Support your trainers in building real relationships with clients. Focus on retaining trainers. The relationships trainers build with clients will lead to increased retention of clients. One way to retain trainers is to pay them more than they can earn by taking advantage of other opportunities available in your area. While this may seem counter to increased profitability, it’s much easier and cheaper to retain a current client than to gain a new one. The money you pay an excellent trainer is less than you’ll spend on marketing to obtain a new client. Craig Patterson, CEO MadLab Group, www.madlabgroup.com
5. Know and increase your retention. When a client buys a specific number of personal training sessions, know when that package is close to running out and know what conversations you are going to have with them so they realize the importance of continuing with personal training. Know their goals and work with them to reverse engineer how you’re going to get there together as you sell them a whole health system. If they’ve seen any results at all from their first buy, they’ll buy more. Stephanie Joanne, Brand and Business Coach for Fitness and Health Professionals http://stephaniejoanne.com
6. Increased brand awareness. Create a brand around your facility. Your clients are buying their home equipment, health supplements and fitness gear somewhere. If you can put your name on it and sell it to them for the same price, you make the profit, not the retailer down the street. One low risk model is to find a partner who will put a kiosk in your facility. Your clients can order their merchandise, pay for it and have it shipped to them. You have no inventory costs; your client gets what they’re already buying but with your name on it. You make a profit and your brand awareness will be increased through this client’s use of the product. Bill McBride, President and CEO of BMC3 and ActiveWellness. http://www.bmc3.com/
7. Find the right clients. First, you must understand your own value and be willing to charge for it. Second, find the people who are willing to pay you what you are worth; poeple you want to work with who want to work with you. When you find this sweet spot, you will be able to serve those clients better, achieve better results and keep them coming back for more. Adam Staneki, owner and coach at Fill Your Gym. http://fillyourgym.com.au/
8. Get referrals. Get creative. Think outside the box when asking for referrals. For example, for a gym that doesn’t usually give guest passes, let your new client know your guest policy. Offer to reserve a guest pass for their 5 closest friends and family members. Then call their referrals to let them know a guest pass is waiting. Or, when someone is taking advantage of a promotion near the end of the promotional period, offer to extend it to friends and family if they visit within the next 10 days. Stephanie Joanne, Brand and Business Coach for Fitness and Health Professionals http://stephaniejoanne.com
9. Find your niche. There are many types of gyms out there – what makes yours special? Again, this is the first thing you should determine when you open your gym. Once you figure out what makes you special, focus on attracting and maintaining your client base. Your profitability will increase as a by-product of serving a smaller set of clients better – more effectively, more efficiently, more profitably. Shannon Simmons, Profit Advisor www.netbooksaccounting.com
Some of these tips may seem obvious. Maybe you’ve heard them before but hopefully the examples will help you view profitability from a different perspective. It’s not only about increasing the Gross Income of your gym with the next new member. There are many other ways to increase your profitability.
Shannon Simmons, Profit Advisor, NetBooks Accounting Services, LLC
NetBooks Accounting Services is a Certified Profit First Professional Firm – Mastery Level specializing in partnering with gym owners to increase profitability. Obtain a free profit advisory call by completing the survey at www.netbooksaccounting.com.
July 25, 2016
Episode 106: Implementing Profit First With Frank DeBenedetto and Ralph M. Rivera
Show Summary
This week we have a great episode with Frank and Ralph, where we discuss how they have implemented Profit First from day one of starting their business! They share strategies and techniques of how they implement Profit First, which has become a great tool to keep minority partners actively involved/supportive of the business. Too add, by implementing Profit First, within the first two weeks of starting the business, the company took their first distribution check! Welcome to Episode 106 of the Profit First Podcast!
Our Guests
Ralph Rivera
My passion is building and marketing web products for niche audiences. As founder and CTO of several businesses, I love to see ideas become reality and build sustainable businesses that create real value.
Presently, I’m focused on two businesses that I am co-founder and CTO of.
Podcaster’s Toolbox, a SaaS platform dedicated to helping podcasters streamline the way they plan, produce and promote their podcasts.
And audIT Sales Presentation System, a SaaS sales presentation system for the IT and MSP industry designed to help communicate technical concepts in simple ways using color and infographics.
In 1999 my wife Carol Lynn and I founded Rahvalor Interactive, a creative marketing services company. In 2012 we launched the Web.Search.Social service line to help small and medium sized businesses make the most of web, search and social marketing. Web.Search.Social also publishes business and marketing articles as well as a podcast about challenging the status quo of the entrepreneurial journey.
In 2013, I became a partner and CTO at Triberr, an influence marketing platform that helps bloggers and brands to amplify their reach.
Aside from my professional pursuits, I teach web development at Manhattan College in New York City and am a member of the leadership team of my homeowners’ association as well as the local chapter of BNI.
I also love playing the guitar. Badly.
I currently live in Holmdel New Jersey, but I still consider myself a resident-in-spirit of the island of my birth – Manhattan NYC. In the fall of 2016, my wife Carol Lynn and I are going to spend a year being location independent and are going to travel the United States while working on growing our businesses.
LINKS: http://www.podcasterstoolbox.com , http://www.auditforit.com
Frank DeBenedetto
Frank M. DeBenedetto has spent the past two decades passionately helping business owners navigate the complex world of technology. His interest in technology began back in college when he had trouble finding someone to fix the computer he was using to write lab reports. After watching one of his classmates reinstall the operating system, he became enamored with computers and their impact on our lives. Frank has always been determined to keep pace with modern technology and, today, that path has led him to become a highly sought after expert in the area of cloud computing.
A graduate of Rutgers University, Frank holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering. While pondering graduate school, Frank began his career in the financial services industry with The Guardian. He became life and health insurance licensed and passed the Series 7, 63 and 24 securities licensing exams. Before finally shifting his educational focus towards technology, he earned two designations from the American College of Financial Services Chartered Life Underwriter (CLU) and Chartered Financial Consultant (ChFC). After a period of selling, Frank found his niche in helping other financial services professionals utilize technology to grow their businesses. Soon after, his entrepreneurial spirit took over and he left the industry to fully concentrate his efforts on building a technologyconsulting firm.
Frank is the President and Chief Technology Advisor of Two River Technology Group, a technology solutions provider located in Shrewsbury, New Jersey. After many years of honing his technical skills in the enterprise, he brought his style of consulting to the small to midsize business marketplace. With an emphasis on managed services, managed security, and hosted voice over IP (VoIP), Frank has helped grow TRTG into one of the premier cloud service providers in the area. Today, he spends the majority of his professional time on new business development.
Frank has been quoted in many publications and is a regular contributor to several blogs, podcasts, and newspapers. He frequently speaks at seminars and webinars on current trends in technology and hes the author of a book that offers practical advice on technology to the small business owner. Frank enjoys spending quality time away from technology with his family and close group of friends. He is an avid Rutgers football fan and can be frequently found in Madison Square Garden at a New York Rangers hockey game. In his spare time, Frank enjoys reading Stephen King, playing the guitar, golfing and skiing. Frank currently resides in Middletown, New Jersey with his daughter, Evangeline.
LINKS: fmdb@tworivertech.com, https://twitter.com/frankienextdoor , https://www.linkedin.com/in/frankdebe...
Corporate Partners
Receipt-Bank – Software and service to make the gathering, storage & processing of bills, receipts and invoices as easy and as cost effective as possible for businesses.
Nextiva – VOIP phone providers for small businesses.
Fundera – Single source online funding for entrepreneurs. Also offers an adviser program for CPAs, bookkeepers and business coaches.
Fundbox – The simplest and fastest way to fix your cash flow by advancing payments for your outstanding invoices.
July 22, 2016
Convenience is Here to Stay
While price and quality are two important factors that customers desire, nothing beats convenience. Whatever you offer, you need to seek ways to improve its convenience.
Home used to be a treacherous mountainside climb up to a cave.
Water used to be a river one mile away.
Dinner was a hunt for meat, or a collection of berries.
Now…
Your home is a quick drive down a well lit street.A river is now a aucet, mere steps away from where you sleep.
Food is in a cold box a few feet from where you cook.
Convenience is why modern homes are far more common and caves aren’t so popular, why most people don’t have rivers running through their house, and why you probably picked up your dinner at the supermarket instead of foraging for it
The convenience game is far from over. Your job is to do more of it. How can food be pulled from storage to the refrigerator and be perfectly cooked as you pull it out? How can a bath happen while commuting to work? Convenience isn’t over, it’s just starting.
July 21, 2016
At Least There Is Firm Footing at The Rock Bottom
Rock bottom. I have been there. It was my version, and might not be yours. But either way, it sucks.
Rock bottom. When you hit it, sometimes you don’t bounce up. Sometimes you drag along the bottom.
Rock bottom. It is bleak down there, but you do have one advantage. It is a hard, firm surface to push off of to get back to the top.
July 18, 2016
Episode 105: From Corporate to Captain with Chris Murphy
Show Summary
This episode with Chris Murphy, we discuss the process of transitioning from a corporate position (where money is given to you), to starting and building your own business and being profitable while doing it! Welcome to Episode 105 of the Profit First Podcast!
Our Guest
Chris Murphy has a highly diversified background as a business owner and manager, financial analyst, and a consultant to entrepreneurial/owner-managed businesses.
He has over 17 years experience working in large, publicly-held corporations such as Ford Motor Company and Dell Inc., as well as owning his own entrepreneurial start-up companies.
He is co-owner and Director of Operations of Maximum FX Salons Spas in Austin, Texas and Founder of MotivePoint.
As a leader in marketing systems and Internet lead generation through social media platforms, MFX has been recognized by Salon Today Magazine, Modern Salon, Strategies Magazine, and Austin American Statesman.
Chris serves as a Certified Strategies Business Coach for Strategies out of Centerbrook, Connecticut.
In addition to speaking regularly at salons and spas across America, local Aveda Institutes and several local cosmetology schools, he has been a speaker at Neill Corporation’s Serious Business Conference held annually in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Show Links
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chrispmurphy
Blog: http://www.motivepoint.biz/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/chrispmurphy
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrispmurphy
FourSquare: https://foursquare.com/chrispmurphy
Corporate Partners
Receipt-Bank – Software and service to make the gathering, storage & processing of bills, receipts and invoices as easy and as cost effective as possible for businesses.
Nextiva – VOIP phone providers for small businesses.
Fundera – Single source online funding for entrepreneurs. Also offers an adviser program for CPAs, bookkeepers and business coaches.
Fundbox – The simplest and fastest way to fix your cash flow by advancing payments for your outstanding invoices.
