How a Business Consultant Can Help You Grow Your Business

Most people mistake professional business consultancy as a troubleshooting exercise that a company undertakes to manage crisis. Even the business owners, especially the small and relatively inexperienced ones, have similar notions and avail of their services only in cases where management looses control. However, services offered by professional consultants need not be bound by such limitations. Business consultants, in fact, are third party experts who influence how businesses, as well as governments and institutions make decisions.

Business consultancy services must be availed to look at issues related to business in a broader perspective. Consultants, helped by their expertise in a particular field, as well as being from outside the company, can see things from a point of view which the owner or the top management may fail to see, because of their being deeply involved in the business. Here, business consultants would weigh the pros and cons of the strategy and the situation, often with a fresh perspective, and advice accordingly.

Often staying out of the main picture, business consultants provide resources, which the clients may not be in a position to provide for them. Usually, this resource is expertise, which may come by experience, knowledge, creativity or special skills. Time and workforce are other resources, which the client might not be able to spare, which can be provided by business consultants. Business consultants are either management consulting firms or Technical consulting firms, with expertise in their respective areas. Management consulting firms advise on various aspects of corporate operations such as marketing; finance; corporate strategy; assembly line or other manufacturing processes; information systems and networks, data processing; e-commerce; and human resources.

On the other hand, technical consulting firms provide technical advice relating to non-management activities, including compliance with various safety and health regulations, technology application, and scientific knowledge in fields like biology, chemistry, and physics. There are many large consulting firms which provide expertise in more than one area.

Many small and medium enterprises feel that consultancy services are only meant for large organizations and are really not suited to smaller companies. Many also feel that it might not really be worth appointing consultants as they are a costly affair and that increased revenue as a result of their services would not be at par with the costs involved. Nothing could be further from truth, as big as well as small and medium enterprise benefit from business consultancy and there are many consultants who are more than happy serving smaller clients.

Business consultants advice on business start up, help make business plans, formulate marketing strategies. These are the services related to business management and it directly affects the bottom line of the company. Apart from these, there are scientific and legal consulting services, which help firms follow the legal aspects of the business that are required to be followed by law. For example, a manufacturing or utilities firm might hire environmental consultants to assess whether the firm is meeting government emissions standards, in order to avoid penalties before government regulators inspect the property in question. Necessary changes can hence be made before a potential problem arises.

Thus, instead of shying away from appointing consultants, what is required is to identify the right consultant which would help the business and who would have the correct expertise required in that particular case. This would not only help the company to focus on their core activities, but would also ensure smooth operations which will ultimately reflect on the profits as well as the overall growth of the company.

Challenges with Start-up Consulting Businesses

Consulting business start-ups face many challenges in the early days. As a start-up, your consulting business may not have any clients, brand equity, contacts, cash flow or even business cards! Weaving your way through the start-up obstacle course can be trying — to say the least.

When I started my consulting business, I was full of confidence, but not much else. I had to learn about taxes, bookkeeping, invoices, contracts and other business basics. I had a good grasp of starting and marketing my business, but I was suddenly faced with managing client politics, chasing unpaid bills, taking debtors to small claims court, and dealing with “non-consulting” aspects of my consulting business. Early on, I’d expected to spend my time on pure consulting. I soon realized just how complex a “simple” home-based business like consulting can be.

All these years later, I’m pleased to say I’m still consulting. And that should serve as encouragement to anyone else who wants to become a consultant — or simply continue to survive as one. You see, although I had a steep learning curve in becoming a consultant, I managed to get to the top of that curve. Of course, there was another curve after that, but it wasn’t quite as steep. Making it over the early hurdles is harder than anything else you’ll face in your consulting career. But, if you stick with it, you’ll get there.

How to Start a Marketing Consulting Business

There are some things to keep in mind when launching a marketing consulting company. You should remember that even small mistakes up front can have drastic effects later in the process. Below are some situations to avoid when starting a new marketing consulting company:

Don’t undervalue your employees – These days, most companies don’t care about their help because they see people as an expendable resource, when in reality there is too much lost in training and skill when you have to constantly hire on new hands. Having a strong base of core workers with knowledge and experience is worth paying a little more and treating them right. What you get in the end is immeasurable in terms of quality, and besides, if you lose them, how entrenched is the client with that person? You might be firing your business as well as your workers.

Don’t ignore the client – Many marketing consulting companies make the mistake of taking too much control in the advertising process. You need to remember that on any project, the stakeholders have the final say, so encourage their input and make changes when necessary.

Don’t take more than you can handle – Many times a company will overextend its reach by not saying no. The philosophy of satisfying all that you can in the short term never works, because as you spread yourself thin you lose the ability to focus on quality. Remember, there is no shame in passing up work to maintain a quality relationship with an existing client who may buy more in the future. Screwing up a $10,000 job is not work losing $50,000 of continuous work for the rest of the year, so take what you can manage and do it right. Your clients will notice and appreciate this.

Don’t knee jerk – So many businesses make detrimental and permanent decisions based solely on their last 30 days of business. Remember, the market isn’t always going to be great, so don’t expect it to be. If things take a sudden downturn, look at your past numbers and wait to see where things go from there. If the market is following a trend, then it’s not worth it to cut employees or other costs to handle a temporary problem.

Don’t market yourself through every channel – Despite popular opinion, most companies can get by without any direct marketing and advertising. Remember, no matter what service you offer, there’s always someone else who can offer it just as well, so get the best kind of advertising; your clients will talk you up if you do well, and that is worth more to businesses than all the ads in the world. For an example of a company that never marketed itself and succeeded, look at Starbucks. They never once filmed a commercial or radio spot, and I dare you to find a magazine ad for their stores, yet their coffee is know the world over simply by word of mouth.

Top 20 Opportunities as an Internet Marketing Consultant

As an internet marketing Consultant it’s hard to tailor in to reach each individual but at least I believe I’ll be able to give some definite direction to every subscriber.

Regardless of your career, you must realize that marketing is not a department but it’s the business and you must therefore from today, start thinking like a marketer if you want to achieve your financial objectives and stay away from debt.

Most Guru’s or Internet marketers will teach you ways of monetizing your business online and teach you on how to make money on the internet but none of them teaches you how to be a marketer.

For you to succeed online you must start thinking like a marketer and do so onwards.  You must try and see how you can make money in every way and every situation.

Let me break the news to you… Money is good.

Most arguments at home and in the workplace are a lack of money.

Money used as a source of power to do the wrong things and defy justice is evil on the other hand the lack of it can be a source of even greater evils, stealing, killing, and conning.

As you see the title above, it promises on 18 ways of making money online, before I reveal to you I’ve laid a foundation first, subsequently I’ve illustrated a cash flow quadrant that shows how all the money in the world is made. Thereafter, I’ve elaborated on the importance of being a marketer so as to make money online.

Lets get this clear, it’s not like I despise other careers and am obsessed with marketing after all who wants to be a “Sales Person”. However, if you change your attitude you will realize that no money can be made in the world unless a sale has been made. Other than just making money by being a marketer, you also improve other areas of your life, e.g.

• You sell your skills to others easily
• You get good social skills
• You pay for products at reasonable price other than hyped prices.
• You get others to agree with you more easily and much more.

Let’s head to the online Opportunities: but first answer the following questions:

Am I willing to run my own Business?

Am I willing to be a Marketer?

If you have answered positively, then I believe you are ready to embrace the context of Building an Online Business.  Below are the various opportunities and remember, my way is not way is not the only way, there are a million other ways. If you have all the time in the world, you might want to test every method out there or invent your own, just hope you don’t get lost in the wilderness and will make it eventually.

1. UzaNunua.com

It’s easy for me to write eBay as a portal for buying and selling but as a Kenyan am trying to remain in context to my subscribers and reveal to them opportunities that are for real and can make money for them. Here you simply list your products, whether it’s old furniture, used books, new or old cars or any form of services that can be paid for.

2. Information Products or Digital products

People want to benefit from your expertise, but the problem is, you have not written it down, maybe you know of an accounting formula on excel that can remove duplicate records, or you have much knowledge on child care and pregnancies. People are willing to pay for this information. That’s why we buy newspapers, magazines and hardcopy books. Sometimes don’t you wish you could have all these on an electronic book in your computer or by just typing a few keywords on Google? You can start your own site and start selling eBooks and software. A personal friend of mine George Ngondo is a good example on the same. He’s the author of “The Effective Job Search Guide” cv-guide.net he started selling the book on book stores but today he’s making sales in the Global marketplace.

3. Work from Home

There are diverse opportunities in this one. You can be someone’s virtual assistant, or writing medical transcripts e.t.c. You can also do personal services e.g. article writing, web design and shared projects. Also you can identify with companies abroad who have interest in your country for certain products, you can therefore develop a site targeting local people, send introduction letters when you identify a buyer they ship for your client and you are paid some commissions without incurring investment costs. You can try AliBaba.com and see how.

4. Adsense

Adsense is a program from Google. Especially if you own a content website you can easily join and allow Google to randomly place ads on your site and every time someone clicks on the ads you are paid for it. You could earn a few cents per click or even a few dollars per click. I participate in this program in my other websites and I receive checks every my cumulated earnings reach USD 100.00

5. MLM – Multi Level Marketing

These programs use the same marketing model as the offline businesses like Tianshi Kenya and GNLD. They are based on a technology that generates a special link to its members. A good model is the success university. Where members pay a monthly subscription fee to access internet marketing materials and the members make more money by referring others to fall under them. In this category one needs to be careful just like in the offline MLM there is genuine programs like Tianshi Kenya and scams like the pyramid schemes same case applies to the online business.

6. Coaching/ Consulting

Hope you have seen ads of online universities and so on. There is much in this field that you can explore. If you are an accounting expert and employed in an auditing firm you can choose to monetize your expertise by put up a website to market yourself. There are entrepreneurs and business people who prefer to get expert advice from individuals as opposed to companies.

7. Web Hosting

Most people think web hosting requires one to invest in huge servers and a satellite of bandwidth, but that it’s not true. You can always become a reseller of an established company and get to repackage the products in your own way. Follow this link to become a reseller; all you need is a general purpose Visa card.

8. Social Network or Web 2.0

Yes social networks like face book, digg or stumble upon. You can start one that is more targeted. The owners of these sites do the task of gathering people of similar interests together and when everyone is busy doing their thing they sell advertising space on a pay per action or rental basis.

9. Free Lancer

Don’t wish there is someone who can develop your company Logo, do some emarketing campaigns, draft a terms and conditions for your services, update something on your site, draw a balance sheet or profit and loss account for your business. You can make money in two ways in this kind of opportunity. One you can develop such a portal for the local market or participate in bidding for those jobs in the global sites. Check rentacoder.com

10. Business Process Outsourcing – BPO

This is a more advanced business model of freelancing where you can set up a call center and bid for contracts from companies willing to outsource some of their processes offshore. You can start here: outsourcing.org, however to get big contracts you might be required to travel abroad to seal deals with targeted business partners. Learn more here, Business Process Outsourcing in Kenya

11. Paid Blogger

An example of a blog is Supreme Internet Marketing I can get paid to review a product A for a company X and post it here, especially if the product is beneficial to my readership. However, there are 3^rd party companies that link advertisers and bloggers and get bloggers paid from USD 5 $ to USD 100 per post. PayPerPost is one of them.

12. Domainer

This is not the same as web hosting or reseller hosting. In actual sense a domain is like a virtual real estate. You can register a domain add value and resell it as a website or you can secure premium domains and sell them at a higher cost than the annual rental. Right now .co.ke domains are up for grabs and you can reserve generic names that cannot be trademarked e.g. “capital”, “finance”, “love”, and “kiss” and so on the list is endless. You might make huge amounts of cash but it requires patience. Also be careful not to be caught up in trade mark issues and so on. You can reserve .co.ke domains at the cheapest rate possible on this link: http://www.superprofitsmedia.com/eac

13. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is what drives the internet. It means that you refer people to the product owners’ site and they and when they get to buy you receive your lion share of the commission. Some service companies give recurrent commission for the period the customer you referred is with the said company, while others pay huge one off finders’ fee or commission.  These companies use an affiliate tracking software that places a cookie on the buyers’ computer and when they register their details the customer is placed on the affiliates account. You can promote you special link on social sites like face book, email signatures or even on your website. You can try several affiliates and see how the system works. Use these links and register at no cost, send the links to your friends and try to monitor your stats inside your account.

http://www.superprofitsmedia.com/eac

*On the landing page try and identify an “affiliate” or “Partner” link to register. Have this in mind and try to identify such links and you might just land on a program that will earn you money. I will post more on this topic in the coming days.

14. GPT – Get Paid To…

Maybe you have received these kinds of requests on your mailbox. Get paid to take surveys, get paid to view ads, get paid to read email, get paid to surf, and get paid to send eCards and so on. As for me I don’t consider them to be serious sources of income especially if you are a serious business owner. However, research companies can adopt these methods to take survey online. I believe most people are more than willing to give more information in governance, banking and other sectors. There is potential though, I know people who earn a stable income using such methods.

15. Sports/ Gaming

These involve opportunities like playing online poker, games, online Casinos. It’s just a form of Gambling. I don’t recommend it, but if your lifestyle is such you can participate in the same. A word of caution: Avoid Scams, refrain from giving your credit card details, your residential address, banking details and form of personal information. People are cruel out there and may use your identity to commit cyber crimes. As much so, there is need to worry if you are dealing with a legitimate company.

If you dream of the jackpot today might be your lucky day. Try this link

http://www.superprofitsmedia.com/gamble

16. Trading

In its broadest sense it involves trading of commodities both locally and in the Global marketplace. There are stocks that trade stocks online or even much popular is the Online Forex trading. With online Forex trading when you understand the online technicalities you just apply the offline tactics of buy low and sell high. The beauty of it is the business is legitimate and in any business you are bound to make profits or losses depending on various factors including your decisions and timing. I know several individuals who have invested in these systems

Copy this link to download Forex trading software

http://www.superprofitsmedia.com/forextrade

You can as well trade in commodities by being creative. Sky is the limit. I’ve a friend of mine who started an online car bazaar with only a small investment of Kes. 35,000. Like I told you earlier Building a business online is just about being a marketer. Allow me to call my friend “Joe”. Joe invested in a website after visiting various car bazaars and agreeing on a commission per lead and per sale. He took pictures from the car sales yard and posted them on the internet. He started promoting his site using different methods including email marketing and he was able to make sales of cars he has not invested a coin in. When you continue learning from my tips your creativity is the only constraint that keeps you apart from making millions online.

17. Services

You can offer services online and charge per transaction. A good example is mamamikes.com. I’ve also seen other websites coming up offering directory services, classifieds and so on. As for me I write killer email campaigns that have proven to be a success, I also let Newsletter subscription services, hosted and local mass email programs, sms and autoresponder services among others. There is so much more I do I even forget to market and package all my services. Knowledge is power and it increases on using. I want you to be rich and/or stay rich by increasing your revenue streams. Now keep your ears wide open.

18. Membership sites

In offline thinking, why do people pay for membership clubs? It’s the benefits that come along. Today you can start your membership site where members pay a passive income on a recurrent basis and now it’s up to you to think of the benefits. A site like Success University uses an MLM and/or affiliate marketing program to recruit new members. However, the principal foundation is that members acquire resources and training at discounted rates and at a centralized place as opposed to otherwise gets the resources for themselves in scattered places.  There are unlimited ways in which you can create a membership site.

19. Money Transfer Services

No matter how you automate services there still people who do not want to change and adapt to new methods. You can start a small business where, you can use your PayPal and/or Money Bookers account in and allow people in the Diaspora to send you cash through any of the above accounts and then submit the funds to their loved ones upcountry through m-pesa then earn some commissions per transaction or in percentage. You might need to find on the required licensing so as to run a fully fledged Business and win peoples trust.

20. Donations

NGO’s run on donations, so don’t be surprised. There are lots of Softwares and services out there offered out there where they are given for free and the users donate to support the programs so that they can continue benefiting on the same. There are products out there which are sold by donations i.e. there is no price tag, you just put the amount you want to pay and proceed to check out. In a society where people are obsessed with free things and no heart for charity, then you might not want to try this. Otherwise your efforts will be for nothing and offering your products henceforth might bleed you dry. Also if you believe in a course or some form of activism then this might be a good choice. Remember the Obama Campaign was purely run on donations from his supporters. If you have successfully run a not-for profit organization you might want to try this option.

10 Best Work at Home Business Startups

The internet has become a world of almost unlimited opportunity for those who are looking for ways to make an extra income. With all the problems that have arisen from the economic downturn and increased costs of living, more and more people are opting to “work at home” so that they can supplement the income from their day-jobs. Work-at-home jobs also allow people to make money in such a way that it does not mean that they have to compromise with the time that they spend with their families. This is because most internet based home businesses allow great “flexibility” when it comes to time. In fact; many people today actually prefer full-time work-at-home options to a “nine-five” job.

Listed below are the top-ten most common work-at-home jobs today (In no particular order of course);

Freelance Writing

Freelance writing is probably the most popular of the work-at-home options available today. Freelance writing is also the most “flexible” of the work-at-home options available today. To be a freelance writer all the skills/knowledge you really need is the ability to write well and a good command of the English language. Start up costs for most freelance-writing jobs are practically none – all you need is a fairly good computer and a reliable internet connection.

For more information on writing careers, visit the following sites;

www.copyblogger.com

www.writingcareer.com

www.writing-world.com

www.freelancewriting.com

www.freelancewritinggigs.com

Consulting

If you’re a professional in a specific field, why not consider starting your own consulting-services practice at home? Today, experts from several professional fields have chosen to provide their own consulting services. Such professionals range from medical professionals to legal and business professionals. You’d be surprised at how much people are willing to pay for what is essentially good advice. This is a flexible career choice that can be run entirely from the comfort of your home. Start-up costs would depend on the type of consulting services that you plan to provide. Although your business can be set-up at home, you will need a full-office set-up as well as software and other such materials related to your line of work.

Internet Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is when an individual undertakes the task of promoting a business for either a percentage in sales profits, or a fixed amount for each “lead” that is generated. According to a study published in Wikipedia; total sales generated through affiliate networks in 2006 was ?2.16 billion in the UK alone! Millions of businesses out there are ready to rely on affiliate programs that will help them to effectively market their products.

Today, internet-based affiliate marketing is a hugely popular option for most people who wish to work at home. Provided you do it right, this can be quite a lucrative venture. For more information on affiliate marketing and the best affiliate programs online, try visiting;

www.affiliatetips.com

Secretarial Services

If you’ve got a good command of the English language and good writing abilities, why not consider starting a secretarial services business? This small business can be started on a very low capital and can be run entirely from your home. All you really need to “start-up” an “online secretarial services” business is a computer, printer, phone, ream of paper and a set of business cards. You don’t even need a high end computer; all you need is one that will be able to carry out basic word-processing tasks. Your printer need not be fancy either; one that will simply allow you to get all your documents and business cards printed will do. This type of “online secretarial services business” is one that offers all the services that are offered by regular secretarial service businesses – except for the fact that all the services are provided online.

Customer Services

Thanks to the advancement of technology, today it’s possible for you to log in to a company’s system from the comfort of your own home. This is what makes it possible for many companies today to hire remote customer service agents.

Graphic Design

Graphic designing plays an important part in the business world – particularly in advertising. Even the representation of a company using logos, colors and text is an aspect of graphic design. The entertainment industry makes use of a graphic designer’s expertise when it comes to creative aspects such as visual storytelling, decoration and scenery. Other areas that find a use for graphic design in the entertainment industry include novels, comic books, magazines, blogs and programs and props that are used on-stage.

A graphic designer has the advantage of having a wide range of businesses or industries to choose from. These industries or businesses include, but are not limited to;

· The Advertising industry

· The Magazine publication industry

· Product packaging industry

· Web designing industry

Thanks to the internet, graphic designers today can offer their services online.

Web Design

If you’ve got knowledge of web design and computer languages such as HTML, CSS and PHP, you can consider working at home as a web designer. This can be a very lucrative venture – if you’re good enough at what at what you do. You may work for a specific company, or you may choose to freelance as a web designer.

Teaching

Today a surprisingly large number of parents are opting to get their children home schooled. This also provides qualified teachers an opportunity to work at home – thanks to the internet. It’s not only home-schooling students that you can teach however. For instance; if you’re qualified to teach English, you may also teach adults who wish to learn English as a second language. You may choose to work independently or register with a company that will get you “in touch” with clients.

Notary Signing Agent

If you’re looking for a work-at-home opportunity, do a little research online and find out if a notary signing business is right for you. Did you know that you can make a significantly good income with a notary signing business? After just a single course of training, a notary signing agent can actually earn up to $50 to $125 per transaction.

A notary public or notary signing agent is an individual who obtains and notarizes legal documents. Thus a notary signing agent has to be knowledgeable in the procedures involved in the presentation and authorization of legal documents. A notary signing agent is also known as a loan signing agent, mortgage loan closer or closing agent. To train as a notary signing agent, all you have to do is go through a notary agent training course available in your region. And if you want to be a notary signing agent you have to be prepared to invest in training yourself to be one.  For more information on notary signing agents, try visiting the following sites;

www.notarypublic.com

www.notarytrainer.com

Word Processing

Do you want a small business opportunity that will allow you to make a sizeable income without taking up too much capital, or too much of your time? If you’re a good writer and if you’ve got a good command of the English language, why not consider starting a word processing business?

A word processing business is probably the easiest one to start, what’s more; its low maintenance too! This business is also one that can be run on a very low capital. All you need to start up the business is a good computer, a printer and a reliable internet connection. Your computer and printer need not be “high end” either. A basic computer that can carry out word processing tasks and a “letter quality” printer that can churn out clearly printed documents will do just fine.

The internet and easy payment schemes such as pay-pal have considerably increased the potential for work-at-home jobs. The internet has also become an extremely indispensable entity in most households today. This means that the internet has also become an invaluable marketing tool which most business will want to make use of. This in turn means that the internet holds great potential for those who wish to make an extra income. In fact, some people actually opt to run internet-based home businesses – full time.

Infosys Launches Business Consulting in the United States

In a move that may ease concerns about so-called offshoring, India-based Infosys Technologies on Thursday said it has created a U.S.-based business consulting unit. The unit, Infosys Consulting, is concentrating its initial hiring in the United States, and plans to bring on roughly 500 people over the next three years, the technology services company said. Infosys Technologies and other India-based companies such as Wipro Technologies have emerged as significant players in the information technology services market. But their success in winning deals with U.S. companies has sparked concerns about job security.

Infosys overall has about 22,000 employees, with roughly 18,000 based in India. Kris Gopalakrishnan, chairman of Infosys Consulting, hinted that the backlash against offshore outsourcing played at least some role in the company’s decision to launch a division in the United States. “We definitely are investing in the (U.S.) market,” he said. “We’re creating some jobs.”