Practical tips for women entrepreneurs

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CONTENTS
Statistics | Women entrepreneurs: hear them roar
Tip 1 | Be authentic
Tip 2 | Don't let economic gloom get you down
Tip 3 | Don't go it alone
Tip 4 | Give yourself a break
Tip 5 | Do some company soul-searching
Tip 6 | Team up to take it to the next level
Note | We specialize in helping women entrepreneurs market their products and services

Women entrepreneurs: hear them roar

Women are opening businesses at twice the rate of men, says Susan Wilson Solovic, author of The Girls' Guide to Building a Million-Dollar Business. According to the Center for Women's Business Research, three quarters of all firms are either half-owned or majority-owned by women, employing over 13 million people and generating $1.9 trillion in 2008 sales; these firms account for 40% of all privately held companies.

Self-employed women are more likely than other working women to have greater educational attainment, more likely to be in managerial occupations, more likely to work in non-traditional occupations, and likely to be older, according to the Alliance for Women.

Of all those women business owners, Solovic says nine out of ten want to expand their businesses, and four in ten want their businesses to be as large as possible.

Unfortunately, the Center for Women's Business Research reports that only 3% of women-owned businesses in the US gross a million dollars or more in revenue (half that of male business owners, at 6%)... but it can certainly be done. The existence of the Women's Presidents Organization speaks to that. To become a WPO member, a woman must head a firm making more than $1 million in revenue for a service business or $2 million for a product business... and not only are there plenty of members, most bring in significantly higher revenues than the baseline requirement. The average revenue level is $12 million, the average number of employees is 89, and the average number of years in business is 21.

How can you get there, if you're not there already? Below are some practical tips.

Be authentic

Susan Boyle's Britain's Got Talent audition video beautifully displays the hunger that even jaded consumers feel for authenticity. USA Today quoted Ken Tucker, editor at large of Entertainment Weekly, as saying Boyle clearly hadn't been groomed as a pop star, so she was perceived as the real deal. "People want their idols to be authentic."

People want the companies with whom they do business to be authentic, too. BusinessWeek has advised that the only way to cut through the noise of the modern world is to truly get to know your customers. "Authenticity in business is a distinctly 21st century concept made relevant by a confluence of factors," writes How to Stand Out? Try Authenticity author Sohrab Vossoughi. "The public's trust of businesses and institutions is in steep decline. Consumers' media savvy has pulled back the wizard's curtain on insincere marketing ploys that are only surface-sexy. ... Consumers seek meaning and a brand they can trust. They are busy at work on Web 2.0 platforms creating ways to cut through the noise in search of products and services that resonate with integrity and transparency; in a word, authenticity. That quest for authenticity is a call to action for any company intending to be relevant in the 21st century."

After all, when you call a company to resolve an issue, you want the representative with whom you speak to take ownership of your issue and solve it, rather than hide behind the policies of the mighty, faceless corporation, don't you? That's a desire for the kind of authenticity that you can provide as a small business owner. Even if the answer isn't what the customer would ideally like it to be, at least she knows she's dealing with a real person who's giving real consideration to her situation and her request.

Authenticity can help even more for women entrepreneurs whose customers are female. Carol Osborne, co-author of Boom: Marketing to the Ultimate Power Consumer, the Baby Boomer Woman, says baby boomer women in particular want a sincere relationship with the companies they patronize. (Read more at our marketing to women page.)

Don't let economic gloom get you down

During the current economic environment, more than one entrepreneur has sworn off CNN and other news outlets with positive results. It's discouraging enough to hear we're in a recession; hearing it over and over on every media outlet isn't productive... and it obscures an important silver lining: smaller, more nimble businesses with less overhead are better able to quickly adjust to changing economic conditions.

Smart businesses that survive a downturn in the economy emerge tougher and savvier, too. The Kauffman Foundation recently conducted a study and came up with some surprising results: more than half of 2009's Fortune 500 firms were launched during a recession or bear market, including household names like Burger King, MTV, CNN, FedEx, Intel, and Microsoft. Even television commercials these days note that the likes of AllState began during the Great Depression.

Don't go it alone

Have you heard the phrase, "Be in business for yourself, not by yourself"? There's a ring of truth to that. It's not that you can't succeed on your own, just that it's not necessary to be the Lone Ranger while you do. And you'll be in good company: the Center for Women's Business Research reports that women owners of businesses with $1 million or more in revenue are more likely to belong to formal business organizations, associations, or networks than other business owners.

Where to start? There's a plethora of such organizations who would welcome you with open arms, from local organizations to online forums to national associations, many with local chapters near you. Aio Design founder Tiffany Jonas, for instance, is active on the Strategic Coach forums for successful entrepreneurs (highly recommended) and is a member of the Charleston, SC Center for Women, among other things. Here are some other associations, forums, and resource providers:

~ National Association for Female Executives
~ National Association of Women Business Owners
~ National Women's Business Council
~ Women Presidents Organization
~ Asian Women in Business
~ Office of Women's Business Ownership Entrepreneurial Development
~ Women at Work
~ Woman Owned
~ Digital Women
~ Connected Women
~ W2W Link
~ iVillage's Home Office series

Give yourself a break

Many of the most responsible, hard-working, and successful women—among those likely to be business owners—can be impossibly hard on themselves. They'd never think to expect of others what they somehow expect of themselves! Many of the same women have a tendency to try to do too much in any given 24 hours.... and even Oprah notes that many women aren't on their own list of priorities.

If you can relate, try this: at the end of each day, write down one good thing you did for yourself. If a week goes by and you can't summon up more than a few examples, it's time for a readjustment. Make an appointment with a business coach who will hold you accountable for treating yourself well, or start blocking out time on your calendar to do what you enjoy. (If you need justification, think of it this way: if you're out with the two-week flu because you drove yourself too hard, your business will be without its leader, and that's not kind to anyone.)

As you're driving yourself to ever greater levels, too, take a few moments each day, week, or month to remember how far you've come.

"The happiest and most successful entrepreneurs know that keeping their confidence high on a daily basis is an essential ingredient for success," writes Dan Sullivan, founder of the Strategic Coach, an internationally acclaimed program for successful entrepreneurs. "When you’re confident, everything else seems easier. Creativity flows, and getting through the day is energizing rather than draining. One easy way to keep your confidence consistently high is to focus on progress."

Sullivan suggests making a habit of acknowledging progress on a regular basis. "In doing so, you constantly remain aware of the many ways you’re growing, including some you might have otherwise overlooked," he writes. Sullivan has created a tool to provide structure for entrepreneurs to measure their progress, which we recommend, but even if you don't use it, the concept works.

And remember, if you own a business, you're already well ahead of the thousands of men and women who have dreamed of entrepreneurship but haven't taken the plunge. "Many people are afraid to fail, so they don't try," writes Donald Trump—a surprising source for a page about women entrepreneurs, but his words ring true. "They may dream, talk, and even plan, but they don't take that critical step of putting their money and their effort on the line." You have, and that's no small matter. Give yourself credit!

Do some company soul-searching

Lisa Johnson and Andra Learned, authors of Don't Think Pink: What Really Makes Women Buy—And How to Increase Your Share of This Crucial Market, list 20 questions to help you learn how your company can more effectively reach women customers, but they'll work with other kinds of customers as well.

Start by asking yourself:

~ What motivates your customers to use your product or service?
~ What causes them to switch away from the competition to your firm?
~ For what reasons, spoken and unspoken, have they rejected your firm in the past?
~ Which underlying human needs can your company fulfill?*
~ Are there messages in your marketing that might elicit a negative reaction from prospects?

* Even the ones your customers might not admit, like a desire for prestige

If possible, supplement your brainstorming by forming an informal focus group of some of your best customers and asking them. (See Tip #3 in our article How to Work With a Web Designer for more details on forming focus groups.) You might be surprised what you find out, and how it can revolutionize your business.

Team up to take it to the next level

If you've gotten to your current level of success by dint of hard work and pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, that's excellent! But to get to the next level usually also requires the hard work and expertise of others, and there's no shame in that.

"One of the most difficult transitions for a growing business is morphing from a fledgling startup to a more established, mature organization," writes Solovic. "One of the first changes that you, as the CEO, need to make is to let go so you can work on the business, not in the business. ... If you micromanage, you get bogged down in too many minutiae to execute the strategic vision you have crafted. Your time gets eaten away. The business is driving you, instead of you driving your business. [P]ut together a crackerjack team of individuals and let them do their thing."

Depending on your situation, that may involve hiring people to work inside your firm, hiring consultants or other experts to handle individual projects, or both.

Consider your website. How advantageous is it to pinch pennies and end up with a website that fails to persuade customers to purchase from your firm, falls flat in building credibility for your firm, or even fails to operate correctly in modern browsers? "Expect everyone to review your Web site as a validation touch point," writes author Dominique Simpson Milton in Enterprising Women magazine article Creative Marketing Strategies. "This is your upfront reference. If your Web site is not professional, you are not ready to compete! Doors will not open. An investment here will provide worldwide dividends 24 hours a day."

Hire a professional web designer. Let her do her thing. (If this is a topic particularly relevant for you, pop over and read our practical tips on getting the most value out of your web designer, and/or order our free report on finding the right web design company.)

The same principle applies to other parts of your company: your crucial sales, marketing, finance, customer service, and operating functions.

We once knew a board-certified physician who specializes in a highly specific medical arena; so much so that she's one of only 120 board-certified physicians with that specialty in the world. (In the world.) Yet not long before we met her, she was huddled in her office, doing her own taxes to save money. Had she stopped to think, she might have realized she was shortchanging her customers and probably losing money in the bargain; according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are more than 1.3 million accountants in the US alone, and many of them would have been happy to prepare her taxes at a fraction of the cost she would have made by treating her patients. (Compare 1.3 million with 120. You see what we mean.)

In short, beware of being penny-wise, pound-foolish. What appears wise could indeed be wise, or it could cut your legs out from under you. In each crucial decision, take the time to make sure you understand which is which; ask the advice of a knowledgeable and trustworthy colleague or business coach if you're not sure.

We specialize in helping women entrepreneurs

We specialize in helping women entrepreneurs market their products and services to their target markets, including women customers and the mass affluent (annual household incomes of $50,000 to $200,000). We'll take the latest research on both of these groups and utilize it to strategically design web pages and other marketing for your firm.

If you'd like more information on working with us, give us a shout!

What would you like to know?

• If you’d like to find out more about us or our pricing, start with our about Aio Design page
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• If you'd like information on appealing to affluent online visitors, visit our affluent web design page
• If you'd like information on appealing to women customers, visit our marketing to women page
• If you’re looking for other information to help you, see our marketing articles page