Entrepreneurial Journal

No Brasil nosso índice de mortalidade de empresas vem diminuindo, porém, em janeiro de 2019, o Boa Vista divulgou uma pesquisa apontando que em 2018, 96,5% das empresas do país que entraram em processo de falência eram Pequenas Empresas. O processo de falência, não significa necessariamente a morte da empresa. No entanto, aponta para o fato de a empresa possuir diversos problemas financeiros e estruturais. Contudo, em uma visão geral o número total de empresas que pediram falência em 2018, foi 13% menor do total de 2017. Já outro dado do IBGE aponta que o Brasil fechou mais de 316 mil empresas nos últimos 4 anos . Esse dado não esta contando o ano de 2020 onde devido à pandemia o número tem subido muito. Quando você decide empreender e fazer seus planos, você normalmente vê e imagina o lado bom das coisas, e tem que ser assim, com certeza! Mas analisando friamente fatos e dados, acredito ser muito importante colocar nos planos de todo o empreendedor um plano de saída do negócio, para ...

Você aprendeu bastante, esteve apaixonado pelo seu negócio e fez disso seu projeto de vida durante algum tempo, mas seu negócio acabou te dando mais dor de cabeça do que alegrias, mais dívidas do que lucro e muito mais problemas do que soluções. Apenas pela primeira frase desta matéria já fica claro que fechar as portas, quebrar, falir ou como quiser chamar, será muito bom pra você! Menos dor de cabeça, mais alegria, menos dívidas e mais lucros. Como fechar meu negócio e sair bem disso tudo? Vou deixar aqui algumas dicas, afinal já fechei uma escola de inglês, vendi uma, quase fechei outras duas, posso dizer que tenho um pouco de experiência. 1. Saiba Quando Parar O empreendedor é apaixonado, quando o empreendedor esta iniciando um negócio, ele produz o mesmo hormônio que produz quando esta apaixonado e que faz com que perca a razão e o medo, como diz  Mariângela Gerra  psicóloga especializada em ansiedade: "Em termos neurológicos, essa euforia induz a produção de substâncias ...

      Vida de empreendedor de primeira viagem é dura .Você fez planos, trabalhou duro, cuidou da empresa e dos funcionários como família e de repente tudo esta se acabando?  Se você esta quase quebrando ou em uma situação muito difícil com relação a seu negócio, gostaria de oferecer algumas dicas. Fique tranquilo que não tem nada de muito técnico ou cientifico nestas dicas, apenas dicas de quem já quebrou e se levantou algumas vezes, porém existe uma premissa básica para se manter no mercado, que é a qualidade de seus produtos e serviços.           Se seu produto ou serviço não tem qualidade, você vai morrer e continuar morrendo não importa quantas vezes tentar, pois o mercado não tem espaço pra você. Então sempre revise a opinião sincera do seu cliente, e tome ações reais baseado nestas pesquisas. Olhe na mídia o que falam sobre seu negócio. Fique atento sempre. Obviamente esta é uma reflexão que deve ser acompanhada de perto no dia a d...

This week I had the opportunity to evaluate the results we are achieving in our quarterly report. I like to compare some indicators to understand if our business is growing or not. I compare the first quarter 2018 with the first quarter 2017 and the last quarter 2017. The indicators I compare are: 1. Number of new enrolaments 2. Number of renovations (retention of students) 3. Total number of students 4. Profit. After have this numbers I realized that, all the things were better than 2017 except the number of new enrolments. I got surprised because in the other two schools that we have this number was excellent. After analyzing it I made a lot of plans for the second quarter for that school which had never achieved the goal. This friday I had a meeting with them (the sale department). But I felt something different, I can say that was an inspiration. We started the meeting, we read the report from last week, checked out what was done, and what was not, and after, we had to sta...

This week I learn one important thing about sales. I was thinking what the salesperson like the most? I asked for the salesperson that work with me, in one of our English Schools, and the answer was unanimous: - WE LIKE MONEY!!! -"That's great!" I told them. -What do sell to receive money? I asked: And they start saying many different things such as: I sell dreams, future, English course,  possibilities, better jobs, among others important things.          I asked them: - What does your client want? They answered: - better jobs, travel, freedom, among other. Exact that! Usually we don´t sell products, even services, we sell feelings, emotion and experiences! When we understand that, we will sell much more, but this is just the basics!          Have you ever imagine that you want money, I as you boss, want profit or in other words money, and your customer also wants money or in other words PROFIT. Your client is always thinking...

          This week I had the opportunity to learn about ads and how to make an ad in Google AdWords. That made me think more about, how important is to choose the right words to attract people. I was thinking that in real life happens the same thing. If we choose the right words, we really can attract people to us and engage people in one purpose.           The challenge is to use just a few words to say everything you want, to engage and attract people to your purposes. That is a tough task. The big challenge in our days is not how to communicate, because we have many different ways to communicate what we want, the internet has an infinity of tools that help us to communicate to the world what we think, want and desire, but the real challenge is communication itself. Usually, we start speaking about one subject, we didn't finish talking about it and start another one, and this one is also not finished and we start another one, and so...

This week I studied about google adwords and how to drive traffic to your web business. I liked the video that adwords has, is very simple, but very easy to understand, specially if you are learning as me. What called my attention, was the importance of being specific, but not too specific, and take care with broad words. Example is if you sell shoes and you use the word shoes, in you ad campaign, It is ok but maybe your customers go to your store but they will finish not buying in your site. Anyways this is a good way to start to make a buzz about your web site, but the question that is very important is, how to convert visitors in clients. How to convert visitors in clients? The suggestion is use specific words such as basketball shoes for example, or running shoes. This way customers that look for specific products, can find it easily in your store. Another important thing is to use negative words. example: let´s say that you don´t sell kids shoe, so you have to use kids shoes ...

Once you create a web business, you have to work on it every day. It is a big ilusion think that after you have your on-line store it will start selling by itself. I saw some videos this week that give good hints for web business. I liked the idea to focus in one product and try to have at least twenty salles of it a day. after you achieve this result you are ready to grow your inventory or products to offer in your business. Another good hint was to search in Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest the trends related to your product. You have to discover if your product has a demand, if your product has demand more chances to sell it. Work with ads on Facebook, Google ads and Instagram is vital for people know that you are in business. As soon you have your first sales you have to understand that you must reinvest a big part of your profit in your business, to keep things going, ads, new products among other things. I will let a link from a video that I liked that explain well how to ...

Yes! after a long period of darkness I surrender to web marketing. This semester I started studying about web business and e-commerce. It is amazing how important it is for your business. In short you will launch your business in the world, but there are some important things to do or make before launch your business to the world. I read an article that call my attention as a beginner in building an e-commerce biz  , this article says something that we need to prepare our business: 1. Domain registration 2. E-commerce software 3. Design 4. Payment Gateway 5. Hosting 6. On line Marketing Maybe if you are thinking about start your e-biz and read it you may wonder that it is so complicated and give up the idea, but I can tell you for my my own experience, that is much easier than you imagine. Today there are many sites that helps you to open your website in a simple way, tools such as drag and mach, copy and past among other simple tools that helps you to build your website. ...

Yesterday, I had a very interesting situation, that I would like to share. This experience brought me a deep reflection, about my responsibilities and judgments. Three weeks ago, I hired a new salesperson to my team, as I was traveling to UK. two days after he started working with us, I asked my manager training him, I made a schedule with the manager, pointed things like: What to teach him and what would be his function in our company. During my stay in London, I was always asking my manager how was the new guy, if he was learning well, if he had some difficulty and everything related to his training. She (my manager) reported that, was all good, he had some difficulties but that is fine. When I arrived from my trip, I call the new guy and asked him to show me how to sell our product. the demonstration was a total disaster! I was terrified! I call my manager and asked her, how was the training to him. She explained and she started to say that he was very slow, and many problems, t...

I  consider myself a privileged person.  I was born from great parents, have the opportunity to know and live with my four grandparents and learn from them. I also have a great wife and two wonderful kids. I also have the opportunity to run my own business and with a great team. I have the opportunity to study in a great university and also know what's is right and wrong.      Right now I'm in a business trip in UK.  That is  an amazing country! While I'm here I was thinking about business.  Nowadays there are different ways to deal with people.  The behavior changed, the demands now are different,  there are many new techniques to learn and many books and courses teaching how to deal and negotiate with people. Now we have the web business that changed the way we deal with people, business model and the decision making process from customers are changing a lot!      With all these changes, there is one thing tha...

I was thinking about the changes that I have passed in this three years. In 2015 I started study again, but this time I was decided to start studying not with the goal to graduate in a certain period. I decided to study with a simple objective, Learn and apply my knowledge, I wanted to improve my life and the life of those who are around me. In this short time I studied mainly about finances and how to manage a business. The interesting was that I realize that I had to call someone to deal with our finances and "manage" our business while I was learning how to do it better. The other interesting thing is that the things improved! But the people next to me, think that the things improved because of the new finance police we adopted and because the "new finantial manager" we have contracted. It is so funny!! We are having better results with the sales department, with the pedagogical department, with the customer relations department, human resources department and ...

          "We are programmed at an early age to think that failure is bad. That belief prevents organizations from effectively learning from their missteps." by Amy C. Edmondson           People that learn how to learn, have more chances to succeed in life in relationships and in business. If we learn from our mistakes, we will progress. However, the best way is avoiding mistakes, and to avoid mistakes, you must have your mentors, take advices from them and act according instructed. Sometimes we want to try new alternatives, and the most cases we fail, but the question is: Is this wrong to try new ways new alternatives, new paths? For sure not! But you don´t need to try it alone. Talk to others listen to their opinion and after just after, take the decision.           You will fail! Fact. After failing you have some options: 1.        1.  Learn from it. 2.     ...

When we talk about family business we have to understand the fundamental role it plays in America's economy. Make up 80% of all U.S. businesses. Generate 40% of the nation’s GDP. Employ half the nation’s workforce. Comprise one-third of the Fortune 500 companies. But we have a problem with this business model: §Unfortunately, only 30% of first-generation businesses survive into the second generation. §Of those that do survive to the second generation only half make it to the third generation. §Why?  No management succession plan! How to make a succession plan? How to manage a family business? There is a blog that give  12 hints   on how to do it. Its extremely important to have well established the rules and to have a formal plan of ownership. Set some boundaries.  It’s easy for family members involved in a business to talk shop 24/7. But mixing business, personal and home life will eventually produce a volatile...

          I interviewed one of the biggest franchisees of Wizard by Pearson his name is Edgar and he has more than 10 Schools. I learned a lot with him and it was great to understand his point of view that is very different from many franchisees. One thing that let the Franchise market interesting is exactly that, everybody has to follow the rules from the franchise, but you can manage your business in a different way or have some attractions that can differentiate you even from other franchisees. This difference and his strategy was the most important to me in my interview.           I used some questions from the instructions and other questions that I was curious about the business, I didn´t ask about the fees and royalties because we have the same franchise and I already know about it. What I was curious about, was how he has more than 10.000 students how many new inscriptions he had a week and how to manage al...

Can you identify and fix a broken process? Every company has many different business processes. But what are they, exactly? In short, business processes constitute all the activities your company engages in—using people, technology, and information—to carry out its mission, set goals, measure performance, serve customers, and address the inevitable challenges that arise while doing so. Processes determine the effectiveness and efficiency of your company's operations, the quality of your customers' experience—and ultimately, your organization's financial success. Processes can also vary in their degree of formality. For example: Informal:  A customer asks you for a discount if they purchase double the normal amount of your product. There is no rule saying you can't provide such a discount, nor is there an established way to give the discount. So you give the discount. You have just created an informal process. The company hasn't documented this process as a ...

I already made many mistakes, and some friendships where trumble because something stupid I did. My impetuosity sometimes speaks higher than I would like. I have to remember, The only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it! Once, I and my friend were in a discussion about, how was the best way, to invest our company's money. I had one opinion, totally different from his, and I presented the facts, why my opinion was better than his, he just didn't agree with me, and when we realized we were arguing each other and that discussion was becoming stronger, and a feel of anger was contaminating ourselves, we just finish the discussion without any solution, and when we realized we didn't invest the money, and we were not talking each other anymore. Because one stupid thing we lost time, money and a good relationship. After sometime we talked about the situation and fortunately we solve our differences.  “A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion sti...

           With  Consultative Selling , salespeople engage in a dialogue with their buyers to deeply understand their needs and match relevant solutions. Needs are identified through a combination of preparation and effective questioning to uncover realized and unrealized customer needs. Consultative Selling advanced the product selling and solution selling approaches by layering in the dialogue skills needed to engage in customer-focused interactions that build trust, allow for depth of understanding, and pave the path for solution articulation that matches the customer’s precise priority needs.           Know how to make questions are one of the most important characteristics for a salesperson, because through these questions we can understand better the client´s needs. Understand the client is the most important goal of a business, if you understand your client, they will become loyal to your product or service, and most...

This week I learned a little more about marketing, and its demands, but there were two thinks that caught my attention: The first thing was some lessons that I learned from Phil Romano , here are some lessons that I learned from him: “Don´t be like everybody else” “Actions speak louder than words” “I like to create things” “Servicing a need is what prompts a good business” “Never think about making profits, think about service, giving the people what they want, and you will make twice as much profit” “Fear is a great motivator” Now the other lesson that caught my attention was: " Marketing is the whole business seen from the customer's point of view." –Peter Drucker This is what really matters when you want to sell your product and service. What matter most is the client needs and expectations, but what are the clients needs? we can categorized it in five needs: Stated needs : what customers  say  they want; for example, "I need a sealant ...