The word failure is often used to describe a situation in which your desired goals were not realized at a specific point in time. There are many reasons that could have played a part in your goal not being realized and absolutely none of them have to do with your value as a person.

Let’s break down some of the ideas behind unhealthy views of failure and see how taking a more positive approach can help you realize success:

·         If you are trying out for the high school basketball team and you don't make the cut, this doesn’t make you a failure. It simply means that under these specific circumstances, the coach didn’t believe that you possessed the necessary skills to play on this particular team at this point in time.

·         What much of the pain stems from when not reaching a desired goal is your attachment to outcomes. If you define your own value...

What is the number one mantra for a business to thrive in any environment?

There is a lot of competition out there vying for your customers business. What makes you stand out? Why should this person spend their money with you?

When answering that question many business owners get tied up with the uniqueness of their product or their highly competitive price. What many overlook is the customer experience of buying.

What happens when a customer enters your store and the sales assistant ignores them? Or they research a product or service online, and can’t find what they’re looking for? They get frustrated and annoyed and you miss out on valuable custom.

So, what is the vital ingredient that gets customers through the door and coming back for more? It’s the customers overall buying experience.

Adopt the mantra  ‘Make it Easy for Every Customer.’

Make the buying process easy for your customer.

Make choosing the right product easy and effortless....

I am always looking for ways to improve profit in business so when someone asked me if what I was doing was actually producing income, I stopped in my tracks.

The truth is, I had been spending a great deal of time researching a certain project, believing it would be worthwhile, where in fact I could have been using my time to greater effect elsewhere. I was so enthusiastic about the potential of this project, I failed to manage my time in a suitable manner.

Persistence is an important trait in a business owner but there comes a time where you are throwing good money after bad. For me, this research time ended up being unproductive time because after due consideration, I shelved the project. If time equals money, I wasted a lot of both.

Do you have a product that is not hitting the mark or a business process that, in the long run, is ineffective? It is often the case that we continue to work with the products or processes we have without paying attention to their actual...

There are many factors that make up your consumer insights. The more information that you can gather, the more you’ll be able to target your market. These insights will help you answer who your audience is, who your customer is, what they need, and more.

There are many ways to gather consumer insights. You can collect information from numerous parts of your business. Social media, your website, and email marketing all come to mind regarding where to gather the information using native analytics software. You can also use Google Analytics to get even more insights. Once you have the software installed, consider the following.

* Customer Type – You probably have more than one type of customer that fits in with your ideal audience persona. It will help you to find out who they are using analytics with your social media, website visitors and more. This will help you create better-targeted marketing materials.

* Observe Real Time Behavior – You can...

Being a good decision maker can help you in business and life. It’s been said that highly confident people make decisions clearly and stick to them rather than changing their minds or being indecisive.

And even if decision making doesn’t come naturally to you, it is a skill which can be built on. Here are a few tips to help you:

#1 – Start small. Even making small everyday decisions will help you accomplish the bigger goal. Small decisions such as what food to eat at a restaurant are not to be underestimated. A good way to start is the next time you’re eating out, look at the menu and decide what you’d like to eat. Then put the menu down and don’t change your mind. Don’t ask your companions what they’re having and base your decision on that - make the decision on your own and then stick to it.

Small steps like this can be empowering and help you to tackle the bigger decisions to come in the future.

#2...

Even your toughest customers can be turned around at least 99 percent of the time. But it can sometimes take a while to get there. By following these tips you’ll have more of a chance to get your angry customers to become happy customers, or at the very least happy former customers that have nothing bad to say about you.

1. Answer Questions Fast – When anyone sends a question of concern to you, it’s imperative that you answer them fast. Especially in today’s time of "quick everything", if you take longer than 24 to 48 hours to answer your customer they’re going to get angrier.

2. Make It Simple to Contact You – Your customers should be able to contact you in multiple ways. If you sell expensive items, offering a customer service phone number is important. You can contract with a service inexpensively. In addition, offer an online help desk, email customer support, and ticketing systems to make it easy for them to contact you.