Start ups

You can find some interesting things on the web.  Guy Kawasaki's name crops up often and with good reason. He's an entertaining read and his enthusiasm shines through.  In Management Consulting News there is a short article on business start ups.  It's aimed at consultants although I think it could be applied to most business services companies.

He advocates services that differentiate you from you competitors and services that are valued highly by your clients.  Nothing new here, but Guy uses a very helpful and simple method to visualise how your business is currently performing and where it needs to get to.

I did like his tips on pitching and presentations, especially about giving background information on your business. I'm now down to one slide on the background information, but I've learnt the hard way.

And finally can't argue what he wants to be remembered for.

Philip Woodgate

Technorati Tags: small business  medium sized business  sme  smb  blogging accountants

Comments

[David Terrar]

Guy's only been blogging since December 2005, but is always entertaining. I particularly like his 10 20 30 rule of PowerPoint presentations:
http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2005/12/the_102030_rule.html

[dahowlett]

A business partner and I are working on a 1 page investment proposal. The old rules was 1 slide per 30 seconds of presentation. The new rule is 10 slides max. That suggests t0 me that if you can't get your pitch done in 5 minutes then you ain't concentrating on the essentials that drive decisions.

The 30 page prop can wait until due diligence is underway.

[Philip Woodgate]

That fits well with my keep it simple approach. I think we are seeing a trend towards transparency and clarity, making dressed up consultant talk less acceptable.

I remember one consultant's website where I could not actually understand what they did. Eventually, I realised they got focus groups together. As a friend of mine would say "they practiced the black arts of consultancy"

[S]

One way I suggest people get the pitches sorted out when they're on my training courses is to design around a colon.

Before the colon you specify the problem (briefly): after it you say how you can help. All too often people cut their presentation pitches too short (not too long!) by assuming the problem is obvious - which means their presentation doesn't have a context and appears irrelevant to anything.

In my case an elevator pitch would start with something like this:

Most people have to make presentations these days but not many of us are any good at it: our training helps with that last bit.

S