Even if you’re not a fan of reality shows, allow me to suggest you watch at least one episode of Shark Tank, which airs Fridays at 9 p.m. on ABC.Like most reality shows, little about it is not scripted or staged. But the drama that unfolds is educational nonetheless, if you are - or wish to become - the owner of your own small business.The Sharks are a panel of five billionaire (or at least multi-hundred millionaire) serial entrepreneurs who sit hungrily in their easy chairs, watching as three small companies per episode pitch them on the idea of investing a given amount of money in their …

On a recent episode of The Charlie Rose Show, venture capitalist and Netscape founder Marc Andreessen commented that the term “smartphone” was a misnomer. “What you really have,” Andreessen quipped, “is a supercomputer in your pocket.”That sentence set my head to spinning. Some quick research revealed that the average iPhone or high-end Android device of 2013 has roughly the same processing power of 1987’s ETA 10-E, one of the fastest computers in the world at that time, which had to be cooled with liquid nitrogen. Wow.What if everyone in 1987 had an ETA 10-E in their pocket? What might the …

Over the past 30 years I have worked with and presented before thousands of business owners across the country. From the very beginning I’ve been fascinated by one question: What separates the small fraction of businesses that succeed from the vast majority that struggle and fail? Time and again the answer has revealed itself to me as a single word: Marketing.Successful firms understand and employ Marketing on a consistent basis, and those that struggle don’t. It is as simple as that. Simple yes, but not easy. Why is it that, for most business owners, marketing is a mystery and sales is a …

December is a time of goal setting for the coming year. This is especially true for small business owners for whom the old adage “Plan your work and work your plan” holds special meaning. But what goals should you aspire to achieve in 2013? Higher revenues? Lower costs? Landing that one Big Fish account that’s been eluding you? Allow me to suggest that you shoot for a much higher goal. Make 2013 the year that you truly begin to manage your business and stop letting it run your life. Many non-entrepreneurs are under the misconception that small business owners “have it made” and so aspire to …