Starting up
I'm terrible at remembering names.
I was never great. After having my children, my pregnancy brain did not completely go away (for those of you who have never been pregnant, when you are, your memory is shot!).
So I've gotten used to writing a person's name down after meeting them.
CONTINUED >>
What do you do when someone posts something unflattering about your company on a blog? Do you respond?
We’ve received this question a few times from our viewers and each time it has elicited a different response from our show panel. This is far from a black and white issue.
CONTINUED >>
This week, I'll be interviewing Karen Gordon Mills, the new head of the Small Business Administration -- the government agency that provides support to small businesses.
What questions do you have for Mills?
CONTINUED >>
I'm a big fan of finding a mentor or a counselor to help you launch or grow a business, but that doesn't mean everything they tell you is right.
Lately, a couple of entrepreneurs told me horror stories about advice they got early on in their careers.
One woman who runs a successful fashion Web site told me this week that a small business counselor actually discouraged her from leaving Corporate America and starting her own firm.
Thank goodness she didn't listen.
CONTINUED >>
I keep hearing lately how a recession is a good time for people to start businesses.
Call me cynical, but this sounds like something a crazy person would say, or someone just being counterintuitive to get attention. There’s a lot of that has been going around lately.
“It’s completely counterintuitive,” agrees Thomas Koulopoulos, author of "The Innovation Zone: How Great Companies Re-Innovate for Amazing Success.”
But he still thinks there’s some benefit to unleashing your entrepreneurial dreams during a crummy economy.
CONTINUED >>
I attended a trade show down south last week and was surprised at how busy it was. In spite of the economy, attendance by both exhibitors and attendees was strong.
In fact, many companies I spoke to told me that this is not the time to skimp on marketing. While most of them are not planning any over-the-top campaigns, they're still continuing with efforts to attract leads and customers. So in light of that I wanted to go back to a story we did a while ago on "Your Business" called Trade Show 101.
Now more than ever, if you spend thousands of dollars on a trade show, you want to make sure you get a return on that investment.
CONTINUED >>
Earlier this week I hosted a panel for NJ Entrepreneur about turning hurdles into opportunities.
The room was filled with entrepreneurs, many of whom said that although the economy is a worry, as business owners they're used to dealing with challenges.
Paul Lewis, a serial entrepreneur who founded four companies (two of which he took public, and two of which were acquired by Fortune 500 companies) is working on his fifth company. He had some heartbreaking but wonderfully inspiring (and quite funny in the way he told them) stories about the many challenges his companies have had to overcome.
CONTINUED >>
This week my father came to the taping of the show. He's an entrepreneur and an investor. My mother was an entrepreneur. Both of their fathers were entrepreneurs. My brother is one too. And so am I.
Clearly, there's something in our blood.
CONTINUED >>
We're debuting a new segment in the show in a couple of weeks where we get small business owners’ take on important questions from the floor of the nation’s biggest trade shows.
Earlier this week I went to the 2009 Toy Fair at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York. As the mother of two kids, I found it hard to walk through the show and not get distracted at every turn, but once I got my fill of testing out new toy trucks and pens that light up, I did get the chance to get to the task at hand: Getting a reading on how the companies at the show feel about their prospects in this economy.
CONTINUED >>
This economy has got me scratching my head a lot lately.
There are just so many things I don't get, especially when it comes to financing. We're told constantly that banks, venture capital firms and other lending institutions are reluctant to hand out loans, and tons of small business owners I talk to tell me they're being squeezed because of the tight reins on financing right now.
So how the heck did a company that hasn't made a red cent get $35 million in venture capital money?
CONTINUED >>
