Regus collated the insight supplied by 15,000 respondents from its 1 million-strong business contact database.

Summary of survey (download) include:

- Social networks are now actively used by between half and three quarters of companies worldwide for various networking functions

- 40% of businesses globally have found new customers via social networks.

- Over a quarter (27%) devotes marketing dollars to social networking activity to both acquire and retain customers.

- Keeping in contact with business contacts is the main use of social networks (58%) followed by getting together with special interest groups (54%), discovering useful business intelligence (54%) and organizing, managing and connecting with customer groups (51%).

- Surprisingly under a quarter of professionals (22%) have used business social networks to find a new job

“With 55% of online Americans registered on Facebook, any reservations towards using social networking for business purposes seem misplaced. This survey indicates that organizations who have not yet ventured into the world of social networking may be missing out on sizeable business opportunities,” said Sande Golgart, vice president for Regus.

“This is particularly the case in the Netherlands (48%), India (52%), Mexico (50%) and Spain (50%), where the highest level of new customer acquisition via social networking was reported.”

• Let us develop the resources of our land, call forth its powers, build up its institutions, promote all its great interests, and see whether we also, in our day and generation, may not perform something worthy to be remembered.   Daniel Webster

• Long-range planning works best in the short term.  Doug Evelyn

• Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.  Dwight Eisenhower

• Leadership is a potent combination of strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the strategy.  Norman Schwarzkopf

• I wanted to be an editor or a journalist, I wasn’t really interested in being an entrepreneur, but I soon found I had to become an entrepreneur in order to keep my magazine going.  Richard Branson

• The entrepreneur is our visionary, the creator in each of us. We’re born with that quality and it defines our lives as we respond to what we see, hear, feel, and experience. It is developed, nurtured, and given space to flourish or is squelched, thwarted, without air or stimulation, and dies.  Michael Gerber

• I’ve always said that the better off you are, the more responsibility you have for helping others. Just as I think it’s important to run companies well, with a close eye to the bottom line, I think you have to use your entrepreneurial experience to make corporate philanthropy effective.  Carlos Slim Helu
  

1. There are things you can measure and things you can’t.

How much do you love your children? What’s the value of a poem? What is your life worth? Some things just can’t be quantified. In business, we often act as if everything can be measured, indexed and crunched with the numbers. Research can’t predict the kind of cars we will be interested in years from now, how an ad campaign will affect a consumer three months from now, or what the next popular fashion trend will be.

2. Just because you can’t measure it doesn’t mean it’s not real.

In 2003, Advertising Age ran a provocative story about advertising ROI—or the lack of it. The publication said that according to research, “Media advertising does the worst job of any marketing discipline in proving return on investment, and network TV is the worst of those media….”

If network TV didn’t work for advertisers, there would be no network TV. As business people, we know that TV works because it works on us as consumers. We may not be able to measure it with precision, but anyone who recognizes the Mac vs. PC guys, the Gieco Gecko, or the Budweiser Clydesdales can’t deny it. Passing judgment based only on what’s easily measurable is not a good strategy and often has a negative impact on your marketing campaign.

3. The best research is the real world.

The ‘real world’ means; your business meeting people in their everyday-lives. How they react to your promotions after a long day at work, on a Saturday-morning, or at the mall. How do people ‘receive’ your business when they encounter it within their lives.

For any research to be scientifically reliable, every variable other than the one being tested must be controlled. But in most marketing research it’s impossible to control all the variables, which means a certain amount of error is in every study. Where that error lies, and how significantly it affects the outcome, is always a mystery. That’s what makes it so dangerous.

4. People lie.

People tend to tell interviewers, ‘what they want to hear’.

More than twice as many people told telephone interviewers they were weekly churchgoers, while fewer admitted they gambled. People interviewed via phone were also more likely to say they give money to charity, exercise regularly, and brush their teeth twice a day.

Sometimes people won’t accurately describe their wants, needs, or behavior, and sometimes they simply can’t. As David Lewis, chief designer at Bang & Olufsen (BO:DC), put it in a 2008 Wall Street Journal profile, “You can’t go out and ask people what they need or want, because they don’t know.

People often ‘would be interested’, but they never think about it because it gets lost in ‘everyday’ activities or they don’t know ‘it’ exists.

5. If you blindly follow the research, you’ll lose.

Ten biggest business myths.  Things you hear, or, are told, that sound plausible, but just aren’t true.

1. You have more security here at Gigantabank than you do on your own.   Just not true.  One strategic shift, one downsizing, one reorganization, one boss with a bad hangover, and you are toast at Gigantabank.  You have no job security.  You just have less pay.

2. “You’re really smart!” When you are a buyer, every joke you tell is funny and every insight you have is brilliant.  Don’t try these jokes at home.  Most people see your position, not your fabulous personality and good looks.

3. “There is almost no risk to this”.  A good definition of risk is that more things will go wrong than can go wrong.  Nothing is without risk.  Your job is to find the risks, define them, see if you can contain them or live with them, given the return offered.   Nothing is riskless.

4. “This time it’s different”.   Not that I can tell.  The laws of supply and demand, risk and reward, greed and fear, have remained constant since men got up on two feet.   And I suspect it always will.

5. “It’s not about the money”.  When someone tells me this, I am then sure it is about the money.

6. “You can tell me”.  No, you can’t.  When someone entrusts you with confidential information, anyone you give it to won’t trust you to keep a secret.  And, they are likely to pass it on, no matter how sincere they seem at the time.   Keep your own counsel. As Ben Franklin said,  “three can keep a secret if two are dead.”

7. “We are Best-in-Breed”.  If dogs could talk, this would matter.  But who is going to tell you, “we are just a second-rate operation, please do business with us”?  Internally and externally, it is in the interest of everyone to assume they are the best and brightest.   Hopefully, you will be able to tell the difference.

8. “We have no politics here”.  This is true, but only if you have a lights-out, industrial clean room with robots.  If there are people involved, there will be politics.  Even in the Bible, they just had Adam and Eve, they had politics.

9. “Everyone is doing it” This is the surest ticket to a custodial experience that I know.  Not only is everybody usually wrong, but they are probably treading on a fuzzy white line.   If everybody is doing it, you probably shouldn’t be.

10. “My word is my bond”. If your word is so good, why won’t you commit yourself to paper?  Because they don’t intend to keep their word, and don’t want a record, that’s why.

Gilbert’s Secret Rules of Business Success

It is very important to continue personal growth and progress when starting or running a new company.  Many entrepreneurs, business owners and managers over look the need to constantly improve their knowledge, skill set and people skills. The logic goes; your level of  ‘wholeness’ (lack of a better word) as a person directly affects your disposition, your vision for the business and the kind of people you attract, to do business with you or to work for you.

This is great article I came across:

How Personal Growth Fuels Business Growth

Written by Chukwuma Asala for Gaebler Ventures

Most business plans focus on the break-even point of the business which is the point when the cost to produce the products or services is equal to the revenue generated. This is the benchmark for most start-up businesses and an indicator that profit is just around the corner. Or is it?

Most veterans in business understand that an organization only grows as fast as the leader spear-heading its growth.

Even if you may be seeing a profit in a new start-up, remember this: fast growth and permanent growth are two different things. If you have fast growth, that is awesome. But fast growth is not an indicator and definitely not a predictor for permanent growth.

Personal growth of the leader is the only real indicator for where the organization is going. Profit is actually a lagging indicator and is a result of the personal growth the leader experienced months before.

Why is personal growth so important and just how is it correlated to business growth and profit?

Duplication

A person who is driven to succeed will attract other people driven to succeed. A person who is ambitious will attract other people who are ambitious.

Get the point? You attract who you are, not what you’re looking for.

John C. Maxwell, a guru on leadership, advocates that if you want a certain type of person in your company you must first ask yourself if you possess any of the attributes you are looking for. If you don’t, then forget it. It won’t happen until you possess those qualities.

Most people always talk to the CEO of a company and deduce right then and there whether or not they would want to work for that company. Why? Because the company is usually a reflection of the leader.

Your employees will do half of what you do

In business, your people will always do half of what you do right and double what you do wrong.

This can be dangerous but also a blessing in disguise if you’re up for the challenge. If you are a hard worker, chances are your employees will mostly be average workers. If you usually work half days and your employees see you doing that, they will come to work to surf the web and get nothing accomplished.

As a leader you live in a glass house with the lights on. Everyone is always watching you regardless of if you want to be watched or not. Raise your expectations for excellence and this will permeate through the whole organization.

People follow growth

Most people want to be part of a winning team. A winning team is a growing team and a growing team has a growing leader. If you stop growing, the people in your organization will stop growing and the business itself will stop growing.

Your organization will only grow as fast as the people running it so make sure to always be setting the example.

Chukwuma Asala is an international student from Nigeria who is studying to earn an MBA from the State University of New York in Albany. He has analyzed more than 20 industry case studies throughout his education thus far, and hopes to bring some of his business knowledge to Gaebler.com.

We can some times get so caught up with the newest and greatest tech, we forget the power of some of our older business tools. The business card is still a great tool to promote you or your business. One of the greatest pluses of using business cards is that you, generally make some kind of personal connection with the person to whom you hand your card. Personal connections last longer. When you speak with a person and tell them about your business then hand them a business card that is professional, well-designed and appropriate to your buiness, your chances of making a positive impression increase.

Elements of a good Business Card

1. Use standard sizes

Many people professionals get tons of business cards and organize them in binders of some sort. You want your card to be able to fit in the card pockets. Loose cards are usually stuck in the back of the book and you risk your card being lost.

2. Make sure all your basic information is on the card

Your name, title, company, address, phone and fax numbers, email, URL of both your company’s website and your blog.  Don’t forget a logo.

3. Add a line that explains what you do briefly

Don’t assume that people know what your job title means or know what you do. This is especially important for people that may get your card indirectly.

4. Be creative

Throw your potential clients a curve ball. Be creative with your design… something to demand attention… The sky is the limit as long as your design remains appropriate for your business.

There never seems to be enough time to do all the things that you need to get done. Everything and everyone seems to demand a chunk of your time and it makes it very difficult to allot the proper time to building, expanding or simply maintaining your business. Not having enough time is an issue that most entrepreneurs, business owners, or managers struggle with. Think of all the things that require your precious time; family, friends, life-events, unexpected events, etc.  Lack of time becomes an even greater issue with start-up and home-based businesses because the business owners, in many cases, still have to keep the 40-hour-a-week job; at least in the beginning. Here are a few tips on how to squeeze in a few more minutes of productive, business time.

1. Work after work

- For those of you that still have to keep the day job to keep the lights on…. this one is for you!  I have seen plenty of people that have great business ideas and great intentions, but they put no time into making the ideas reality. They come home in the evening from the day job and can’t find any energy or the will to go back to work!  Working after work is unavoidable for any one wanting to be successful at building a business. We all get tired and home seems to have a way of presenting so many ‘better’ things to do. You must fight the urge to get home and stop working for the day. If you can’ t resist the urge of home, it may be best to find a place that you can go for about an hour before you get home… for most, the later in the evening it gets, the harder it is to get started on a project.

2. Identify tasks that can be completed while ‘doing’ something else

- There are times that I just need to brainstorm on an idea, write some notes, and do some reading. These are all activities that I can fit in while I am ‘doing’ something else. Think of the time spent sitting in traffic or sitting on your living room couch ‘spending time with the family’ ; these are perfect times to write a few notes or do some light reading. At the barbershop or hair stylist…. perfect time to be a little productive… if nothing more than organizing your thoughts.

3. Make minor schedule changes to allow more time for your business

- How often have you canceled the lunch date because a friend called you with something you wanted to do?  Ever decide to miss an appointment (doctor, dentists, stylist,etc.) to hang out at home?  Use that same mind set when dealing with getting things done for your business.  You will and have changed your schedule for much lesser things. Next time you cancel an appointment or reschedule, use your newly freed time to get something done for your business. I will even take it a step further; next time you have an appointment or event, defer and put in some time on your business.

4. Delegate

-This can be tricky for the small business owner, but a little creativity goes a long way. Because small businesses, generally, have a small number of employees or none, it is a bit more difficult to find people that know enough about your business or that you are comfortable enough with letting them perform some of your tasks for you. Consider this; many tasks that you need to perform do not require business-specific knowledge! Do you have a friend that can type really well…. maybe get them to type that proposal for you. Know some one that does graphics…. need a logo… you see where I’m going.

word of caution: Don’t abuse people.  Show your appreciation for the help people give and if you get some one to do extra or are readily available to help you …. pay them a little something!

5. Invest in and fully utilize your personal tech

-You have iPods and MP3 players….. ever think of getting some of your ‘reading’ done while doing your yard work or washing clothes. There are tons of audio books and industry podcast that you can load on to your portable audio devices.

-Use your cell phone’s internet connection for something other than directions, shopping and chatting. Do some of your internet marketing or follow up on all the emails in your inbox.  Did you know that your iPhone and many smart phones have applications that allow you to read ebooks?

And don’t forget… the age old voice recorder! Still great for documenting ideas. Just think, how many great ideas are lost because they were not documented.

-The laptop is a priceless business tool that is very under-utilized. Even without an internet connect, it is a work horse.  Some tools become so common place that we take for granted the power. Take a minute, one day and explore some of the software you have on your computer. Take a look at some of the capabilities, of some of the most common applications (like MS Word, Adobe Acrobat). Don’t be fooled… you don’t need the newest laptop (or desktop) to have enough power to do more than you will ever want to do. Keep this fact in mind when purchasing computers. A small business budget can be very tight but, you can find great deals on refurbished computers.

Get connected. A laptop is a great tool by itself, but when you connect to the internet, it becomes exponentially greater. The internet is often taken for granted as well. We get caught up with shopping, socializing and email, we forget the amount of information that is available on countless topics.  To add to that, it is a great place to market and conduct your business.

-Make it fun. There are interesting tech gadgets that help with all kinds of things from keeping your coffee warm to scanning a line of text from a document.

Understand, all work and no play is no way to live, but if you want to achieve financial independence and hopefully, a more secure financial future you have to be willing to make some adjustments and be creative to make the time to handle your business tasks.