This list comes courtesy of Mike Michalowicz, The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur (love that guy)!
163 Ways to Become an Entrepreneur: http://bit.ly/vcbj
As you can see there are lots of variables and no right or wrong way. Entrepreneurship is kind of like art in that sense- express and interpret your vision whatever way you wish.
Today Mike Michalowicz, the Toilet Paper Entrepreneur did a video blog post on how to manage (focus) your time as a bootstrapping entrepreneur. Here is a link to the video post: http://bit.ly/COeK1
If you don’t know Mike, you should. He is a really funny guy, brings a lot of value to the business community and he has some incredible tips on how you can bootstrap your way to the top. Want to be featured on his blog (over 40k visitors a month)? There are a few ways:
1. Are you a CEO under the age of 30? If so, you can be featured on his site where he does a little online mini interview with you. If you click on the contact form and send me a message saying you want to be on TPE I can help you with that process.
2. For everybody and anybody else: Send Mike a really clever question via video and you could be featured in his vlog. I want to see you there so send in your question. It could definitely bring good traffic to your website or blog so make sure its current before you send your question!
Perhaps you might not be the producer or the director but you could still be a star 
The things that you did or didn’t do ”yesterday” add up to your success or failure today. 7 months ago I saw a trailer for a movie called the YES Movie (www.theyesmovie.com). YES stands for Young Entrepreneur Society. So as soon as I saw it, I said, WOW! That is cool, the folks in my community would love that and could benefit from it. So I wanted to get us involved with it. As evidenced in Exhibit A: Translation- The comments section of the video that is at the end of the post, I asked the Producer of the movie at the ground level- how can I get involved? And he promptly commented back (very much appreciate that) and said that I could help with the promotion of the video. Who else would ever see that comment? I don’t know… So I contacted the Director of the movie and founder of the YES Concept and Community Louis Lautman (always call from the top) and I asked how can I help YOU promote your movie? And he basically said, I am grateful of whatever way you want to get involved.
The Young Entrepreneur Society – Movie Trailer from Bernard Bonomo on Vimeo.
Big thanks to Toilet Paper Entrepreneur Mike Michalowicz and his trusty sidekick Scott Bradley of Networking Effectively. They are all over it today with their blog post “60 Great Customer Service Tips”. It’s difficult enough to get customers….but how you going to keep them once you got them…that is the million dollar question.
Not only is this list great for the community and long-term relationship building, it is the community as the 60 tips were contributed/shared by fellow TPE’s. Good Stuff! So do you think that Mike and Scott missed a great tip on their list? If so, be sure to add your favorite customer service tip and don’t forget to check me out at Lucky Tip #13. You’ll find the complete list here
The following video is a short clip of Scott Bradley sharing his 3 Sheet Story
Scott Bradley of Networking Effectively Shares His 3-Sheet Story from Toilet Paper on Vimeo.
This has totally got to be my looooongest post ever (for my adult readers out there) :)
This week Motrin made headlines when they launched a controversial ad (it’s relative) that blasted babysling wearing mom’s during get this “International Baby Wearing Week”; one of my talented and very respected designers got broadcasted by name, no less, on Twitter (not by me) because of his “inability to complete a project to a client’s satisfaction”; and this morning one of my favorite social media personalities Chris Brogan posted about the simple genius of Sheraton Four Points Hotel and their free water ad campaign (with clever packaging design/slogan). So being that 3 times a charm I decided today to blog about design and my experiences working with freelance designers being that BY FAR this is where the the largest part of my operations budget (probably 2/3) is invested and also it brings me the greatest returns (without a doubt).
The term ‘Creative’ is relative:
Before we get started…let’s just say what people think of great design is relative. It’s a preference. I am not a designer. I am an entrepreneur who is constantly thinking of what I think are the best ideas ever, lol. That’s the first thing. Choosing the best designer depends on a lot of variables, your personality, your culture and for some your budget.
(the photo above shows one of the favorite parts of the house- my one of a kind spiral staircase. I loved it in its raw form…and all its potential…it was actually made for outdoors. The designers thought of the clever idea to invert the treads and add wood to make it ‘warm’ and suitable for indoors and they also custom made the wooden handle which is actually one continuous piece…they accomplished the objective)
At any rate this brings me to my point- working with others in the creative space.
These Powerful 54 (yes, it’s a random Mike #, LOL)…are resourceful, small business marketing tips that came courtesy of my working angel, Mike Michalowicz, The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur.
The tips are yet another reason why his online community is so fab & successful…because he truly involves everyone in everything he does!
Here are the tips…mine is listed at #49
Do it all for Dummies video with Mike Michalowicz:
Hey,
As you very well know I’m all about teenagers who are making money not babies, that’s for sure. So it’s not like I’m encouraging you to be deviantly exploratory or even do that kind of ‘feely touchy full contact sport’ for that matter– I’m just sayin’, lol ;-) As a matter of fact, believe it or not I did not have my first kissy-touchy boyfriend until I was almost 19. Let me tell you, the anticipation building up to the big day not to mention his sales hype was so overrated. And how does this pertain to business?:
Underpromise and overdeliver.
That’s the point I’m getting at. You feel me yo’?
But never mind that, the subject of today’s post is taken from a cleverly titled fun article written by none other than the wild and crazy Mr. Michalowicz. Isn’t he hilarious? Check out the full article here: http://tinyurl.com/5gf9cl
Fake it til you make it….aka Bootstrapping for Teen Entrepreneurs! It seems as if the bootstrapping theme is popping up everywhere these days. Perhaps it has something to do with the downturn of the economy which should be a non-issue of the ultimate Renegade CEO. If nothing else, you should actually be doing better during ’recessions’ not worse. Because people want help and easier ways to do things. So stick with your niche (special product or service for special people) and you will do fine. AnyWHO, Last month I wrote an article called Po’ No’ Mo, How Teens Under Age 16 Can Make Money (see below) and in the last week there has been a Video Blog post by Mike Michalowicz called Living in Mom’s Room, lol, (video follows this post) and now my friend Jamila White’s new blog “Bootstrap Babes” (www.bootstrapbabes.com) has inspired an article in Entrepreneur Magazine (August 2008) entitled ‘Get Your Money’s Worth’ http://tinyurl.com/5u3f7e Most of these tips can be used by teen entrepreneurs with the exception of the credit card one, however here are 5 tips that ALL teens can use to get their business started today with little or no start up money:
The spirit hit me today. It was just a matter of time you know?
Yesterday a question posted on Linked In and it was- Who is your working angel?
About 4 months ago that would have been difficult for me to decide because there were so many people who had helped me in many different aspects over the years. But yesterday, without question and hesitation, only one person popped to the top of the mind. Mike Michalowicz was right on time. Mike is the founder of Obsidian Launch (a growth accelerator company for young entrepreneurs) and the author of the forthcoming book, The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur.
