9 Tips for a Better Company Culture

PRESENTED BY American Express OPEN Forum

For more key lessons from entrepreneurs, visit American Express OPEN FORUM, and join the conversation on Twitter with the hashtag #sharingadvice.

By Lauren Drell

Companies aren't built by individuals, they're built by teams with complementary skills. But recruiting good talent is half the battle — you also need to foster an environment in which your employees can flourish and grow.

We spoke with nine entrepreneurs to get their tips for building a great team and retaining the talent. Have any more tips? Let us know in the comments below.

1. Always Be Hiring

"Hiring is a continuous process, not a punctual hunt," says Alexandre Winter, founder and CEO at Placemeter, who advises you to avoid specific job descriptions. "Hire in tech, product or business, but only take people that really wow you." It's important to think about the person's career path, too — let them adjust to new responsibilities and be mindful of where they are and where they're going. Winter says one of the biggest mistakes you can make with bright and talented employees is burning them out by giving them too much work too soon.

2. Encourage Entrepreneurial Thinking

"Inside of a startup, each and every person needs to think like an owner and an entrepreneur," says Levo League CEO and co-founder Caroline Ghosn, who encourages people to ponder the thought, 'What would I do if I were running this company?' "Getting each and every person comfortable with asking for forgiveness, not permission, allows the entire team to benefit synergistically from their talents as a team being greater than the sum of our parts as individuals."

It's also crucial to hire and cultivate the "whole person," she says. "We foster open conversations about the well-being of our teammates, their personal needs and situations." That might include creating a flexible work schedule for a new mom or sending a developer to a coding bootcamp. In the end, it makes employees happier and healthier, makes them better at their job and increases productivity. "We care immensely about the success of the integrated person."

3. Remember That Your People Are Your Business

"Hiring is the most important thing you can do at a company at any stage in it's lifecycle," says Brett Lewis, founder of Skillbridge. "Great people versus okay people is the difference between success and mediocrity — and it is something that founders spend far too little time on early on." He also says that in the startup world, your sixth hire should be a recruiter, who can devote time to finding other fantastic hires.

4. Lead by Example

"As a leader in a company, everyone feeds off of what you do — the culture starts with you," says Unroll.me co-founder Jojo Hedaya. "If you come in early, are always focused and happy, it sets the tone for the rest of the team." Show passion for the company and its mission, set goals and expectations and work hard, and your team will follow suit. "I was always a believer that a great leader is one that gives a lot, but can also expect a lot in return," says Hedaya. "I always explain to the Unroll.me team that we are a family with the same goals and values in mind. We are brothers and sisters who would do anything for each other." Hedaya cautions that it's more than just skill that goes into a successful team — you need people to fit well. Everyone should be having fun and enjoying what they do, and if the best developer out there is difficult to work with, you're better off without them.

5. Character Counts

Baldwin Denim is based in Kansas City, and the mom-and-pop shop is in the business of people. "We want to hire really good people that communicate and exude positivity, and look at someone's character, first and foremost," says Matt Baldwin, who says Baldwin's employee retention is high, and the business often promotes from within. "Our employees have to have the same qualities as our brand — authenticity, quality and attention to every detail," he says.

6. Don't Underestimate Freelancers

Hiring someone is a big commitment — and what if it doesn't work out? For some kinds of businesses, freelancers make a ton of sense. "I like to say we have an army of freelancers, which means I can hire great talent without having to lure them away with a salary we could never afford," says Rachel Hofstetter, founder-in-chief of Guesterly. Plus, technology like e-payments and Echosign make compensation and paperwork simple. "Because we're a startup, we can move fast and treat them like we'd want to be treated."

Hofstetter also recommends hiring college students and recent graduates — they're professional, eager to learn, affordable and enthusiastic. Plus, if you're in the market for help in the tech department, these young people are likely ot be well-versed in the most cutting edge technologies.

7. Listen to Your Gut

If you get a weird feeling or sense of doubt about someone, trust it — you probably have reservations for a reason. On the flipside, if you have doubts about a current employee's contributions, don't be afraid to let them go. It's the old startup adage: Hire slow, fire fast. "Company culture is a proactive thing, it's not something that builds itself," says Alban Denoyel, co-founder and CEO of Sketchfab.

8. Give Employees Ownership and Flexibility

"We really encourage everyone here to holistically be happy, and excited," says Emmett Shine, CEO of Gin Lane Media. Shine says his agency seeks out ambitious, "auto-didactic" creative technologists who wouldn't be attracted to a traditional agency — there's an emphasis on what you create, rather than how much you create. "This makes our management structure as minimal and 'flat' as possible — encouraging our team members to take ownership of the things that we make, and their role in making them," says Shine, whose company also permits flexible scheduling to fit left-of-center lifestyles. "We really encourage everyone here to holistically be happy and excited. If that means taking a day or a week off, to be with family or go on a trip — then that's fine. A happy employee will be multiples more productive than someone not inspired, or stressed out about something."

9. Work to Maintain and Build Company Culture

"Arguably the most important decision you make as a startup or young company is who to hire," says Jeff Jackel, CEO of BuzzMob. "And this decision is no less critical when hiring the your fifteenth employee than it was for your third hire." He emphasizes that in these critical early stages, each hire should fit well and improve the company's efficiency and culture — if they don't, they're the wrong person.

While it's largely the CEO's responsibility to set and cultivate the company's culture, it's a never-ending task. "The importance of this nuanced element of business can't be underestimated or neglected," says Jackel, who spends one day per week focusing on company culture in one way or another. "Even the best products and services have fallen victim to a lapse in attention to company culture. If you constantly cultivate this as much as you do any other aspect of your business, you'll have an efficient office full of happy people."

7 Marketing Truths Every Business Leader Should Know

BY Steve Tobak | November 7, 2013|

"Marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department."
– David Packard, co-founder, Hewlett-Packard

If you ask 20 business leaders to define marketing, you’ll probably get 20 different answers. Why is marketing so hard to pin down? Probably because most marketers don’t understand it themselves. They spend their careers locked in a narrow purview and never really see the big picture. 

Its nebulous nature notwithstanding, marketing plays a pivotal role in business. 

According to the father of modern management, Peter Drucker, "Because the purpose of business is to create a customer, the business enterprise has two – and only two – basic functions: marketing and innovation. Marketing is the distinguishing, unique function of the business."

So, what is marketing? Legendary Silicon Valley venture capitalist and former Intel executive Bill Davidow said, "Marketing must invent complete products and drive them to commanding positions in defensible market segments." The man should know. He wrote the seminal book on high-tech marketing. 

Funny thing is, Davidow didn’t learn marketing in school. All his degrees are in electrical engineering. Steve Jobs, another brilliant marketer, dropped out of school. I’ve run marketing for a number of high-tech companies and my degrees are technical, as well. Not an MBA in the bunch.

So how do great marketers learn about marketing? On the job.

Startup companies are great places to earn your marketing chops because they’re all about developing innovative products and getting customer traction – and not much else. Besides, they’re always strapped for cash and needing people to wear lots of hats. That’s how I got started in marketing more than 20 years ago. Here are 7 truths I learned along the way that every business leader should know:

Marketing is like sex: Everyone thinks they’re good at it.
There are more posers in marketing than other fields, probably because the demand is strong, the supply is weak, and it’s easy to fake. As David Hornik of August Capital once said, “VCs like to think that they are marketing geniuses. We really do.” The reason, he says, is because “we can fake it far more convincingly than in other areas …” They’re not the only ones.

Brands win … still.
Many thought e-commerce would level the playing field and render branding irrelevant. Not only has that not happened, I can make a case for the opposite being true. Back in the heyday of AOL, Bob Pittman said, “Coca-Cola does not win the taste test. Microsoft does not have the best operating system. Brands win.” Big brands like Apple, Google, Coca Cola, IBM and Microsoft have never been more powerful.

Marketing is about understanding people.
It’s about determining what customers want, sometimes before they know it themselves. If you’ve got a knack for that sort of thing, trust your gut. Be your own focus group of one. And while it’s tempting to think of markets as amorphous virtual entities, remember that, even in the B2B world, every product is purchased by a human being in the real world.

Innovators don’t reinvent the wheel.
Some people are great inventors. They come up with wild concepts that nobody’s ever thought of. But great marketers tend to be innovators who turn inventions into things people can use. Marketing thrives on reusing ideas in new ways. The groundbreaking Intel Inside branding program was actually an ingredient marketing scheme – like Smuckers jam in Pop Tarts – adapted to the PC industry.

Marketing is too important to leave to the marketing department.
Marketing is the hub of the business wheel. It’s where product development, manufacturing, finance, communications, and sales all meet. Marketing’s stakeholders are every critical function in the company. Every member of the leadership team is an adjunct of the marketing department.

Markets are zero-sum games.
Contrary to today’s popular feel-good wisdom, in business, winning is everything. Every transaction has one buyer and one seller. If you do it right, buyer and seller both win. All the other would-be sellers lose. The real world is brutally competitive. Period.

You don’t need a big budget to create a big buzz.
By executing the right communication strategy, great marketers can create a groundswell of customer excitement and viral demand for a company or product that nobody’s ever heard of. And it can be done on a shoestring budget. Steve Jobs was a master at maintaining secrecy and controlling exactly how and when anybody learned anything about Apple’s products.

The truth is that great marketers are few and far between. Which begs the question, who exactly are you trusting the most important aspect of your business to? Something for you to think about.

Read more: http://www.entrepreneur.com

5 Simple Ways to Get Your Customers to Listen to You

BY Lindsay LaVine | November 14, 2013|

If you're in business, chances are you're trying to get someone – a customer or prospective client – to do something, whether it's call you, visit your website, or try your product. But in a crowded marketplace, how do you distinguish yourself from the competition?
Enter Tom Haley, Group Creative Director at Chicago-based Jellyvision Lab, an interactive conversation company specializing in providing personalized multimedia content on behalf of its clients. We spoke with him about how businesses can better educate and communicate with their customers. Here are his five tips:
1. Cut out what's not important.
It's important to make every sentence as clear and efficient as possible, Haley says. "If you can omit a word, a sentence or a paragraph that's not key to helping someone understand something, do it," Haley says. For example, if you sell lawnmowers and you're trying to explain why your lawnmower is better than the other lawnmowers on the market, the customer probably doesn't want to hear about the company's history.
"Don't presume the audience has any interest in what your message is," Haley says. Business owners are consumed with their business, but forget that for customers, their interaction with you is just a small part of their day. They want help, not necessarily the history of the product, Haley says.
2. Explain things before you name things.
If you work in a field with special terminology or jargon, be sure to explain the term and concept before using it over and over because people may not know what they mean. For example, if you own an insurance company, customers have heard of copays and deductibles, but may not know the difference between the two or what they mean. By explaining that a deductible is money that a customer pays before the insurance policy kicks in, you ensure everyone's on the same page.
3. When possible, use metaphors.
Haley says using metaphors can help explain complicated concepts to consumers. For example, if you're selling a complicated suite of business software tools, you could compare the solution to a busy restaurant, where the head chef efficiently directs her staff while keeping diners happy.
4. Be funny.
"Humor is at the core of what we do," Haley says. Jellyvision has found that people learn more and have a better experience if you can make them laugh. "It's not about jokes or gags," Haley says. "It's more about being human, approachable and personable." No matter what you're doing, always remember you're just talking to a single human being, Haley says.
5. Tell the story in chronological order.
In storytelling, it's easy to get the order of events wrong, Haley says. Therefore, it's important to use real-life context when you're trying to explain something to consumers. For example, Jellyvision created an interactive conversation experience for a utility company to educate its customers about how to read their energy bills. Instead of reading line item charges and trying to guess what they mean, you can start by saying something like, "Energy is generated in power plants, which is delivered to your home, but that process costs money, which appears on your bill as an energy charge."

Read more: http://www.entrepreneur.com

Boldness as a business strategy

“I have a dream,” intoned Martin Luther King. “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed.”
When I sit down to write a sales page, blog post, media release or magazine article, I play this speech. Please know that I’m not deluding myself thinking I have anything as imperative or historically significant to say as Luther King did that fine day.
But I want to start big and bold. And if I stir up some controversy or invoke disagreement, mores the better.
When I write for business, I want to stir emotion. I look to question unconscious assumptions, to look at issues within a broader historical context, to explore the psychology behind transactional decisions, or address a trend I see as problematic. In business blog posts, I want to delve into the deeper issues behind things and, if I provoke negative feedback, I consider that a success.
Boldness is my business strategy.

Get noticed

The cornerstone of effective marketing is to be noticed – without this, your witty headlines, finely crafted prose and value-stuffed offerings will all come to naught.
But being noticed – especially for small businesses with limited marketing budgets – is becoming increasingly difficult, particularly in crowded marketplaces such as our Facebook news streams.

Know your values

Your company has values, regardless of whether you’re aware of these. Your corporate culture, your brand, and your internal communications all make up your values. It is your actions – not your words – that express your company values.
Articulating these values is the first step to be bold as a business strategy.
What do you value – and why are you insanely passionate about it? On the flip side – what do you find intolerable, abhorrent or ridiculously insane? This should be clear on your homepage, explored more deeply on your About page and ‘Our Values’ or ‘Our Mission’ pages, and peppered throughout your blog posts, your social media updates, your newsletters, media releases, advertising and other communications.

Name your adversaries

Making a public stand against the status quo will likely cause a bigger splash than declaring your positive values, though these are, or course, essential. Nobody respects a moaner with no plan to improve things.
Now before you write this off as radical and inappropriate, consider your clients and customers – at the point of purchase, are they more motivated by the negative or the positive? I’d suggest it’s the former.
A dieter who enrolls in Michelle Bridge’s 12-week Body Transformation is far more motivated to not feel humiliated during summer time at the beach. Avoiding humiliation, self-loathing, embarrassment or disaster is far more compelling to most people than feeling satisfied, proud, joyful or in control.

Think different

Apple’s ‘Think Different’ tagline worked because it went against the ‘sameness’ status quo, appealing to people who were keen to be seen as unique, innovative and creativity. That is, until Apples became ubiquitous.
The New York Times famous tagline ‘All the News That’s Fit to Print’, used since the late 1890s, was a public stance against the prevalent status quo – lurid news publications. This elevated the paper beyond a news publication, suggesting it was a platform representing credibility, trust and leadership. 

Repel people

Your values should be bold. They don’t need to sound like Luther King’s proclamation, but they do have to be rousing. Stating the bleeding obvious of what your clients expect is not a mission statement, it’s a waste of time and a missed opportunity.
When conceiving your mission statement, imagine yourself as Luther King giving a speech – not to your staff, who have a vested interest in clapping politely, but to a disinterested crowd rushing by, umbrellas fortified against the weather, running late for work and preoccupied with lists and worries.
Your mission statement seeks to engage, amuse, enthral, provoke and inspire.

Your ideal clients and your adversaries

Each business has ideal clients who stand to gain the most from your offerings, who will enthusiastically refer others to you, and who are a pleasure to do business with. Knowing your ideal client avatar and reaching out to them in all your marketing communications is imperative to your business success.
Your marketing should also actively repel others – people who don’t share the same values you do, who don’t appreciate or respect your process, and who don’t view your offerings as anything more than a commodity. Too many of these type of clients will suck the life force from your business – they sap your energy, destroy your staff’s enthusiasm and put pressure on your prices, terms and conditions.
Bold opinions will, in roughly equal measures, attract some, repeal others, and leave yet others unmoved. Haters on social media, your business blog or via email mean you’ve successfully pushed people’s buttons.
Ideally, you’ve identified a corner of your industry in sore need of reform. Not everyone will agree.
That’s a good thing.
Fight clean – engage in articulate debate, take complaints off-line and treat these as an opportunity to improve. But also recognise when debate is fruitless. Wish these people well and send them on their way. Delete, block and ban.

Be the business you want to use

We know that our clients and customers aren’t having wet dreams over our business. They’re thinking about their problems and worries, dreaming of better times ahead and carving out the ideal scenario for their lives and loved ones.
Our business is only of value when we help people negotiate their issues and experience their dreams. They love us for how we make them feel, and that includes the kudos from their association with our business. So move people – embrace your opinion, suggest a better way, write with passion and emotion and have fun with it.
A bold business highlights what’s noble, precious, transformative or empowering and what’s unhelpful, misleading, corrupt and in need of reform.
In so doing, you attract quality prospects, engender client loyalty and referrals, and better understand what’s coming up next – what the logical next step for your business offerings will be, which relevant trends will be insubstantial and which will be revolutionary and enduring.
Being bold in your communications is the first step towards becoming great.

- Culled from: http://www.copywritematters.com.au/boldness-business-strategy/#sthash.2XX7FhTL.dpuf

Boldness as a business strategy

“I have a dream,” intoned Martin Luther King. “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed.”
When I sit down to write a sales page, blog post, media release or magazine article, I play this speech. Please know that I’m not deluding myself thinking I have anything as imperative or historically significant to say as Luther King did that fine day.
But I want to start big and bold. And if I stir up some controversy or invoke disagreement, mores the better.
When I write for business, I want to stir emotion. I look to question unconscious assumptions, to look at issues within a broader historical context, to explore the psychology behind transactional decisions, or address a trend I see as problematic. In business blog posts, I want to delve into the deeper issues behind things and, if I provoke negative feedback, I consider that a success.
Boldness is my business strategy.

Get noticed

The cornerstone of effective marketing is to be noticed – without this, your witty headlines, finely crafted prose and value-stuffed offerings will all come to naught.
But being noticed – especially for small businesses with limited marketing budgets – is becoming increasingly difficult, particularly in crowded marketplaces such as our Facebook news streams.

Know your values

Your company has values, regardless of whether you’re aware of these. Your corporate culture, your brand, and your internal communications all make up your values. It is your actions – not your words – that express your company values.
Articulating these values is the first step to be bold as a business strategy.
What do you value – and why are you insanely passionate about it? On the flip side – what do you find intolerable, abhorrent or ridiculously insane? This should be clear on your homepage, explored more deeply on your About page and ‘Our Values’ or ‘Our Mission’ pages, and peppered throughout your blog posts, your social media updates, your newsletters, media releases, advertising and other communications.

Name your adversaries

Making a public stand against the status quo will likely cause a bigger splash than declaring your positive values, though these are, or course, essential. Nobody respects a moaner with no plan to improve things.
Now before you write this off as radical and inappropriate, consider your clients and customers – at the point of purchase, are they more motivated by the negative or the positive? I’d suggest it’s the former.
A dieter who enrolls in Michelle Bridge’s 12-week Body Transformation is far more motivated to not feel humiliated during summer time at the beach. Avoiding humiliation, self-loathing, embarrassment or disaster is far more compelling to most people than feeling satisfied, proud, joyful or in control.

Think different

Apple’s ‘Think Different’ tagline worked because it went against the ‘sameness’ status quo, appealing to people who were keen to be seen as unique, innovative and creativity. That is, until Apples became ubiquitous.
The New York Times famous tagline ‘All the News That’s Fit to Print’, used since the late 1890s, was a public stance against the prevalent status quo – lurid news publications. This elevated the paper beyond a news publication, suggesting it was a platform representing credibility, trust and leadership. 

Repel people

Your values should be bold. They don’t need to sound like Luther King’s proclamation, but they do have to be rousing. Stating the bleeding obvious of what your clients expect is not a mission statement, it’s a waste of time and a missed opportunity.
When conceiving your mission statement, imagine yourself as Luther King giving a speech – not to your staff, who have a vested interest in clapping politely, but to a disinterested crowd rushing by, umbrellas fortified against the weather, running late for work and preoccupied with lists and worries.
Your mission statement seeks to engage, amuse, enthral, provoke and inspire.

Your ideal clients and your adversaries

Each business has ideal clients who stand to gain the most from your offerings, who will enthusiastically refer others to you, and who are a pleasure to do business with. Knowing your ideal client avatar and reaching out to them in all your marketing communications is imperative to your business success.
Your marketing should also actively repel others – people who don’t share the same values you do, who don’t appreciate or respect your process, and who don’t view your offerings as anything more than a commodity. Too many of these type of clients will suck the life force from your business – they sap your energy, destroy your staff’s enthusiasm and put pressure on your prices, terms and conditions.
Bold opinions will, in roughly equal measures, attract some, repeal others, and leave yet others unmoved. Haters on social media, your business blog or via email mean you’ve successfully pushed people’s buttons.
Ideally, you’ve identified a corner of your industry in sore need of reform. Not everyone will agree.
That’s a good thing.
Fight clean – engage in articulate debate, take complaints off-line and treat these as an opportunity to improve. But also recognise when debate is fruitless. Wish these people well and send them on their way. Delete, block and ban.

Be the business you want to use

We know that our clients and customers aren’t having wet dreams over our business. They’re thinking about their problems and worries, dreaming of better times ahead and carving out the ideal scenario for their lives and loved ones.
Our business is only of value when we help people negotiate their issues and experience their dreams. They love us for how we make them feel, and that includes the kudos from their association with our business. So move people – embrace your opinion, suggest a better way, write with passion and emotion and have fun with it.
A bold business highlights what’s noble, precious, transformative or empowering and what’s unhelpful, misleading, corrupt and in need of reform.
In so doing, you attract quality prospects, engender client loyalty and referrals, and better understand what’s coming up next – what the logical next step for your business offerings will be, which relevant trends will be insubstantial and which will be revolutionary and enduring.
Being bold in your communications is the first step towards becoming great.

- See more at: http://www.copywritematters.com.au/boldness-business-strategy/#sthash.2XX7FhTL.dpuf

Boldness as a business strategy

“I have a dream,” intoned Martin Luther King. “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed.”
When I sit down to write a sales page, blog post, media release or magazine article, I play this speech. Please know that I’m not deluding myself thinking I have anything as imperative or historically significant to say as Luther King did that fine day.
But I want to start big and bold. And if I stir up some controversy or invoke disagreement, mores the better.
When I write for business, I want to stir emotion. I look to question unconscious assumptions, to look at issues within a broader historical context, to explore the psychology behind transactional decisions, or address a trend I see as problematic. In business blog posts, I want to delve into the deeper issues behind things and, if I provoke negative feedback, I consider that a success.
Boldness is my business strategy.

Get noticed

The cornerstone of effective marketing is to be noticed – without this, your witty headlines, finely crafted prose and value-stuffed offerings will all come to naught.
But being noticed – especially for small businesses with limited marketing budgets – is becoming increasingly difficult, particularly in crowded marketplaces such as our Facebook news streams.

Know your values

Your company has values, regardless of whether you’re aware of these. Your corporate culture, your brand, and your internal communications all make up your values. It is your actions – not your words – that express your company values.
Articulating these values is the first step to be bold as a business strategy.
What do you value – and why are you insanely passionate about it? On the flip side – what do you find intolerable, abhorrent or ridiculously insane? This should be clear on your homepage, explored more deeply on your About page and ‘Our Values’ or ‘Our Mission’ pages, and peppered throughout your blog posts, your social media updates, your newsletters, media releases, advertising and other communications.

Name your adversaries

Making a public stand against the status quo will likely cause a bigger splash than declaring your positive values, though these are, or course, essential. Nobody respects a moaner with no plan to improve things.
Now before you write this off as radical and inappropriate, consider your clients and customers – at the point of purchase, are they more motivated by the negative or the positive? I’d suggest it’s the former.
A dieter who enrolls in Michelle Bridge’s 12-week Body Transformation is far more motivated to not feel humiliated during summer time at the beach. Avoiding humiliation, self-loathing, embarrassment or disaster is far more compelling to most people than feeling satisfied, proud, joyful or in control.

Think different

Apple’s ‘Think Different’ tagline worked because it went against the ‘sameness’ status quo, appealing to people who were keen to be seen as unique, innovative and creativity. That is, until Apples became ubiquitous.
The New York Times famous tagline ‘All the News That’s Fit to Print’, used since the late 1890s, was a public stance against the prevalent status quo – lurid news publications. This elevated the paper beyond a news publication, suggesting it was a platform representing credibility, trust and leadership. 

Repel people

Your values should be bold. They don’t need to sound like Luther King’s proclamation, but they do have to be rousing. Stating the bleeding obvious of what your clients expect is not a mission statement, it’s a waste of time and a missed opportunity.
When conceiving your mission statement, imagine yourself as Luther King giving a speech – not to your staff, who have a vested interest in clapping politely, but to a disinterested crowd rushing by, umbrellas fortified against the weather, running late for work and preoccupied with lists and worries.
Your mission statement seeks to engage, amuse, enthral, provoke and inspire.

Your ideal clients and your adversaries

Each business has ideal clients who stand to gain the most from your offerings, who will enthusiastically refer others to you, and who are a pleasure to do business with. Knowing your ideal client avatar and reaching out to them in all your marketing communications is imperative to your business success.
Your marketing should also actively repel others – people who don’t share the same values you do, who don’t appreciate or respect your process, and who don’t view your offerings as anything more than a commodity. Too many of these type of clients will suck the life force from your business – they sap your energy, destroy your staff’s enthusiasm and put pressure on your prices, terms and conditions.
Bold opinions will, in roughly equal measures, attract some, repeal others, and leave yet others unmoved. Haters on social media, your business blog or via email mean you’ve successfully pushed people’s buttons.
Ideally, you’ve identified a corner of your industry in sore need of reform. Not everyone will agree.
That’s a good thing.
Fight clean – engage in articulate debate, take complaints off-line and treat these as an opportunity to improve. But also recognise when debate is fruitless. Wish these people well and send them on their way. Delete, block and ban.

Be the business you want to use

We know that our clients and customers aren’t having wet dreams over our business. They’re thinking about their problems and worries, dreaming of better times ahead and carving out the ideal scenario for their lives and loved ones.
Our business is only of value when we help people negotiate their issues and experience their dreams. They love us for how we make them feel, and that includes the kudos from their association with our business. So move people – embrace your opinion, suggest a better way, write with passion and emotion and have fun with it.
A bold business highlights what’s noble, precious, transformative or empowering and what’s unhelpful, misleading, corrupt and in need of reform.
In so doing, you attract quality prospects, engender client loyalty and referrals, and better understand what’s coming up next – what the logical next step for your business offerings will be, which relevant trends will be insubstantial and which will be revolutionary and enduring.
Being bold in your communications is the first step towards becoming great.

- See more at: http://www.copywritematters.com.au/boldness-business-strategy/#sthash.2XX7FhTL.dpuf