A Cutting Edge Focus on Social Media for Business was the thrust of this week’s Ottawa Network event, but while each of the presenters offered useful insights on the abrupt paradigm shifts in customer and media engagement driven by Web 2.0, what struck me was that no matter how much some things change, they remain the same.

Chris Biber, president and CEO of SearchingWorks, started off the evening by reiterating that social media, be it Twitter, Youtube or a blog, is simply another set of tools in the marketing toolbox, while marketing itself is simply the “consistent application of common sense.”

It all begins of course, by taking the time to research and understand your customers. Who are they? Where are they? What interests them? And what are their needs and expectations? The same basic foundation that’s always been a requisite for an effective marketing program. The difference now, of course, being that social media allows for a much more candid and informal two-way flow of communication between company and customer.

But this is a conversation that cannot be dominated by a “me, me, me” approach. While companies and brands can make themselves part of the conversation and attempt to direct it, they can’t expect to control it. Nor will their audience respond favourably to anything that is blatantly self-serving or promotional.

Rick Radko, president of R-Cubed, drawing on his software-engineering background, took a different perspective and focused on the application of social media as an internal, rather than external, communications tool set. From online tools for document sharing and collaboration, to wikis, Rick talked about how “Enterprise 2.0″ is becoming the norm for organizations with teleworkers and remote offices, to keep staff in touch and part of a common corporate culture.

In particular, Rick touched on using a wiki to keep staff informed on everything from new corporate directives, to who down the hall is offering to car pool. It’s the digitization of that ubiquitous cork board that adorns staff lunch rooms everywhere, plastered with pushpins and dead-tree notices.

Lastly, Natasha D’Souza, founder of Virtual EyeSee, talked about the distinctions between the social media release, versus the traditional news release, an example of which she offered for a recent Mother’s Day event she held. As her example illustrates, the social media release tends to be less formal and directly addresses the intended audience. It also moves up the contact information and incorporates multimedia elements to support it, from pictures, to video and links to other relevant sources of information.

Two things in particular struck me about the structure of a social media release and how she used it.

First, is the volume of supporting content that can be added, in terms of pictures, video, links and so forth. In the good ol’ days of tree slaying, a comprehensive package such as this was called a media kit. Is the social media release, in its fully realized form, in many ways not simply the digitization of this traditional public relations tool? (Editor’s note: Actually, long before the term “social media release” was ever coined, savvy PR practitioners have been offering their contacts multimedia-rich content. And we’ve been hosting or delivering that content via electronic channels for decades. The web has made it easier for practitioners to do it all themselves but there are still some media formats — broadcast-quality b-roll, for example — that you probably don’t want to host yourself.)

The second point came when one attendee asked Natasha how she distributed this social media release. And this is where another classic and intrinsic element of marketing and PR came in. She researched the influential bloggers in the Ottawa area who would be interested in her Mother’s Day event and contacted them to pitch the event and direct them to her release. Proving once again that they’ve yet to come up with a social media tool that is a suitable substitute for hard work and old-fashioned solicitation.

Technorati Tags: public relations, marketing, social media, blogging, Twitter, wiki, Enterprise 2.0, Web 2.0

Recently, Francis fielded a question on LinkedIn about the value of running a survey to generate media coverage.

Surveys can be used effectively to position a company, but not if the company is perceived simply as a sponsor of an external survey. Francis cited the example of one IT consultancy that, on inmedia’s counsel, did away with its external survey of CIOs and instead realized much better media traction from publishing the results of an internal census of its own IT experts. The spotlight was shifted from a group of faceless CIOs to the consultancy’s own knowledge keepers, positioning the consultancy as an authoritative subject matter expert rather than a mere survey sponsor.

As the editor of a business publication, I saw almost daily news releases plugging a survey that, on the surface at least, provided profound insights into one issue or another of relevance to the Ottawa business community. However, the appeal factor quickly evaporated when, upon closer inspection, it was revealed that said survey was sponsored by a major credit card company or software vendor.

This made the objectivity of the data presented, and the conclusions drawn from it, immediately suspect to me. After all, the sponsoring organization would not go to the time and effort to promote survey results that didn’t support its own sales and marketing efforts, now would it? It was this obvious vested interest that made me reluctant to devote even a couple of hundred words of coverage with an online news brief.

When trying to come up with ingenious and cunning ways to engage with the media, there is, once again, simply no substitute for taking the time and effort to understand:

1. Who are the media that are relevant to your organization? Which ones have the clout to move your market and a focus that includes the products and services that you offer?

2. Who on staff specifically covers your offering or the specific markets that you target?

3. What kind of content is the publication looking for and how can you provide it? When you pursue potential customers, you position your product or service as a solution to a problem. Attracting the interest of the media is no different. In Francis’s example above, by putting the spotlight on its own internal thought leaders, this IT consultancy was conveying the value it could provide to a publication in search of expert opinion and insight on pertinent issues and topics.

Answering these questions takes research and the patience and persistence to secure that all-important first conversation with an editor. This is relationship building based upon your ability to offer something that is relevant and valuable. Prove that you’re useful, and your foot is firmly wedged in the door. It is not about flogging today’s news release, though that does present a good excuse to pick up the phone.

Don’t operate under the false assumption that following this process faithfully is a magic bullet that guarantees results, or that great things will happen over night. It still takes time.

For one client, I have been working to place a leadership piece with a key publication since February. The editor held on to the draft we submitted for almost two months before coming back with requested revisions that essentially gut much of the article’s original focus and content. But he’s still interested. With another magazine that lies at the pinnacle of this client’s wish list, I have been touching base with the editor every few weeks for the past three months and finally hope to garner a firm commitment in June when work commences on a signature fall issue.

Invariably, great results are the result of this kind of furious paddling below the waterline, rather than something like a sponsored survey that can fall into the category of gimmickry. The sooner you take to the water and get to work, the sooner those media clippings will begin to add up.

Technorati Tags: public relations, marketing, media relations, pitching

No matter how busy we become and how far flung we are from the people we need to communicate with to carry out our work, there is still no substitute for good old-fashioned face-to-face contact.

In recent weeks, I have been working on a series of business profiles that will run in an upcoming supplement in the Ottawa Business Journal. These are largely 350- to 500-word pieces for which I must interview the principal of each business and perhaps a couple of reference customers. (Nothing validates your business more than a good reference customer).

Considering the size of the articles I must produce, I could easily garner the information I need over the phone. It would be quicker and more efficient from a time-management perspective. But I’ve chosen to visit each of these businesses in person.  They are all local businesses, so why not take advantage of the opportunity to interview the principals in their natural environment?

So much of the work I do at inmedia is with clients outside Ottawa and with trade and industry media spread across the continent and beyond. It’s refreshing to actually put a face to a name and enjoy the interaction of meeting in the flesh. A face-to-face meeting is by its very nature much more intimate and dynamic than two bodiless voices communicating across wires and networks. There is definitely something lost when you can’t look into the eyes of the person who is speaking to you. Body language is a critical part of any human interaction.

Nonetheless, we frequently have little choice but to conference by phone, (as I am about to do with inmedia client Xsilva Systems of Montreal, thanks to a service called Calliflower). And while communicating in this manner may not be as ideal as in person, there are ways to make the most of it. Richard Laermer at the Bad Pitch Blog offers plenty of helpful advice on the subject, and it all begins with planning ahead and staying focused on the matters at hand during the call.

Technorati Tags: communications, conference calls, clients

Ross Video is not as well known as some companies in the Ottawa area. And yet, it employs 300 staff between its operations in Ottawa and the small community of Iroquois about an hour south, and has enjoyed average annual revenue growth of 20 per cent since 1991.

Ross Video makes a variety of video-production equipment used for broadcast and live events.  Its products ship all over the world, with customers that range from major television networks, Scotiabank Place and the Vatican to the Red Hot Chili Peppers. The company’s success has earned it some kudos. It won an OCRI Technology Company of the Year award in 2005, a Gemini Award for Technology in 2007 and an OCRI Product of the Year award in 2008. Still, it doesn’t command the immediate name recognition as other names in the Ottawa tech sector. Perhaps that’s due in part to the fact that the Ross Video name lacks the infamy associated with some of those other names.

As an Iroquois boy myself, I couldn’t help but chuckle at the irony as second-generation chairman and CEO David Ross talked about the company’s obvious staying power at this morning’s OCRI Technology Executive Breakfast.

For anyone who knows it, Iroquois is a quiet village on the shores of the St. Lawrence River with fewer than 1,500 residents. It greatest claim to fame was its wholesale relocation to higher ground during the construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway in the 1950s. This humble setting is the hometown of a success story that has more than a few lessons to teach to the Ottawa technology community about what it takes to build a global player.

The company was founded by David’s father, John, in 1974 with seed money earned from the sale of his prized Second World War twin-seat training airplane and a bank loan for a grand total of $8,000.

John Ross founded the company with two guiding objectives:

• Have a family-owned business
• Maintain control of his own destiny indefinitely

The emphasis has always been on building a company to last, rather than one to sell, which, as David stressed, is a tougher road that requires a far different mindset. It’s not enough to think a fiscal quarter or a year ahead, but a decade ahead. It is this emphasis on private control without diluting ownership through external investment, and the long-term business strategy this demanded, that has helped build a company well prepared for any economic downturn.

Among Dave’s best practices to build an enduring company:

• For its first 18 years, Ross Video sold only video-production switches and was hammered by recessions in the ’80s and ’90s. This taught the value of diversifying the product line to help make the company more resilient to downturns. One way was to develop more economical and stripped-down versions of its products. The Lamborghini model may sell well when times are good, but the Kia version will still sell well when times are tougher.
• But . . . don’t wait until a recession has struck to design the Kia model. When times are good, re-invest profits in research and product development. About two-thirds of Ross Video’s product line has been introduced within the past three years.
• Make sure your products touch on as many edges as possible with common markets, customers, materials, manufacturing processes and so forth. This drives a lean and efficient operation.
• Diversify the customer base, both by market and geography.
• Don’t sit on a pile of cash. Again, invest in new product development and diversification. “If the downturn is long term, the cash will eventually evaporate and only postpone layoffs.”
• Spread your technology bets. For example, don’t bet the company on some new emerging technology at the expense of older legacy products that still have a solid market. Again, diversify.
• Partner. Partner on marketing, sales channels, product development, manufacturing — whatever it is where your company is strong and another is not and vice versa. Ross Video has built a partner channel with more than 20 other smaller companies in its space that, for the most part, are in some fashion a competitor. And yet, these partnerships are beneficial on both ends.
• Consider carefully where there is the most benefit from outsourcing a process versus keeping it in house. Ross Video still prefers to keep its manufacturing inside the company and has taken advantage of new technologies to improve the cost efficiency of these operations.
• Take advantage of government funding, such as through IRAP or the SR&ED program.
• Customer service is critical, especially if you are second or third in your market. “People buy from people they like.”
• By the same token, “People work for people they like.” Treat staff with respect, invest in them and have regular celebratory events.
• Manage growth. Don’t be greedy and look to grow too fast. Ross Video has walked away from more opportunities than it has pursued.

Technorati Tags: Entrepreneurship, OCRI, Technology Executive Breakfast, Ross Video, business development, management, video production, manufacturing, marketing, diversification, product development

What is a brand? As the speakers at OCRI’s Zone5ive event emphasized this week (and anyone in the marketing or public relations space should have learnt long before they ever picked up their first pay cheque in the business) it’s much more than a logo.

Brand is the perception of your products or services in the minds of consumers, customers and clients, a perception that is created, moulded and reinforced at every point of contact with the audience you are trying to reach. These points of contact encompass everything from the treatment a disgruntled customer receives when they call a service agent, the reliability and functionality of your product and the tone of your advertisements on radio and television, to your image as an upstanding corporate citizen who is socially and environmentally responsible.

According to presenters Mike McGuire, managing partner at Wingspan Design, and Dennis Van Staalduinen, founder of Brandvelope Consulting, we tend to buy on emotion, regardless of how we may attempt to rationalize the utter logic and objectivity of our purchasing decisions. How we perceive a brand, rather than how we judge the features and benefits of a particular product, often decides our willingness to put cash on the counter.

However, part of how we perceive or favour a brand will be based on how accurately that brand reflects what we consider important, in terms of features and benefits.

For marketers, the challenge is understanding the consumer’s perspective and conveying that to the engineers and developers, while the engineers … well, the engineers need to listen to the customer-facing folks who are anything but engineers. Somewhere in the middle are the industrial designers, who must look backward from the customer’s perspective and focus on the functionality and aesthetics of a product, rather than whether it meets a certain technical specification. Apple is the perfect example of a company that has taken this to heart with a distinct brand that drools cool and exploits our propensity for emotional buying.

For a company looking to put a product on the market, the first question to answer is “What are people willing to pay for?” What they need, even what can make their lives better, doesn’t mean a bloody thing if it isn’t a product or service they are willing to buy.

The classic example that Van Staalduinen cited is the Segway, that two-wheeled gyro-balanced thingamajig from celebrity inventor Dean Kamen. For months it was hyped under the code names “IT” and “Ginger,” touted by the likes of Apple’s Steve Jobs as a revolutionary invention that would change the world and remake the urban landscape for the benefit of flowers, trees, people and puppies every where. And yet, the public at large had little idea what it actually was.

When it was unveiled, we got a high-tech scooter that did nothing that the humble bicycle hadn’t already done for us for decades, only stripped away the health benefits of physical exertion.

Nine years later, the Segway has sold about 30,000 units, whereas the investors had expected to sell 50,000 in the first month. A failure born of too much hype that failed to ask the critical question, “Will people actually pay for this?”

How about it? As you take stock of your business and attempt to chart a strategy to weather the downturn and emerge stronger on the other side, have you sought out the input of your customers and potential customers? Have you taken to heart what’s important to them, regardless of what’s important to you and your design team? Are you sure what you are planning to put out on the market is something people will pay for?

Think carefully, there’s little room for error or opportunity to beg more money from your investors and go back to the drawing board.

Technorati Tags: marketing, product development, market research, industrial design, Apple, Zone5ive

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There is no shortage of counsel that an economic rough patch is the time to ramp up, not reduce, a company’s investment in marketing and public relations. When potential customers are reconsidering or holding off on purchasing decisions, you need to be out there giving them a reason why they need to buy, and buy from you, now.

In the current environment, companies that are nimble and can adapt quickly will not only be the ones that survive, but will also be the ones that prosper as they take advantage of the confusion, fear and indecision of competitors standing on the sidelines wringing their hands as the same old way of doing things fails to yield the results it once did.

What needs to change is the message you are putting out. Everyone is feeling the pain of a recessionary economy. Our motto at inmedia has always been that it’s not about the technology, but about the business case for the technology. We always emphasize to our clients that their messaging must articulate how their product or service is the drill the customer needs to make that hole in the wall. (Or as the case may be, the patching compound that will make the hole go away.) Marketing and PR are crucial tools to convey how your product or service can address the most acute and top-of-mind pain points of your customers. They are also key to reaching and cultivating new markets.

Entrepreneur Magazine recently published a good article on where to avoid the temptation to drop the axe to cut costs. It featured a great perspective from Ann Handley, chief content officer at MarketingProfs. She emphasized the importance of marketing in a slump to maintain the volume of sales leads, and to adjust your messaging to reflect the current realities facing potential customers.

“If you sell washing machines, for example, and people don’t want to buy new models, you can stress how much they’ll save on maintenance and electricity with a more energy-efficient model,” she said.

Of course, adjusting your messaging and targeting new markets must make sense and hold the potential of a return greater than the investment. My catalyst for writing this post came from a radio ad I heard the other day from a company that is obviously thinking outside the box to reach a broader demographic of potential customers.

The ad came from retail pharmacy chain Jean Coutu and featured a fellow talking to his buddy about how busy he is taking care of the baby on paternity leave. His comment was along the lines of, “My wife does her part, but thank goodness for Jean Coutu.”

OK. Creative thinking on Jean Coutu’s part? Yes. An untapped market? Maybe. A big market worthy of the effort? Not so sure on that one, though I will concede it may catch the attention of a broader male demographic than just dads on pat leave. What’s important is that it demonstrates the kind of creative thinking that companies need to succeed in the current environment and the value of maintaining the marketing investment. (Consider this free plug I just gave Jean Coutu because I heard that ad and it resonated because I’m a father with a four-year-old.)

Technorati Tags: marketing, public relations, advertising, branding

“Venture capital is dead. It’s gone.”

Sir Terry Matthews didn’t mince words Thursday morning as the keynote speaker at OCRI’s Technology Executive Breakfast. Not that he ever does. And while some might argue that statement about the status of Canada’s venture capital industry, or at least its level of activity in the nation’s capital, may be a bit premature, that’s not the point.

The point is, who cares?

Matthews and partner Michael Cowpland began the first incarnation of Mitel in 1972 with persistence, sweat and a $4,000 bank loan. That was enough to get their first product to market in nine months. This was followed by Mitel’s breakthrough product: a PBX phone system with a software switch. Mitel beat out about 40 larger competitors to win a watershed contract with AT&T, the first time, Matthews said, that the telecommunications giant contracted out. That deal, and a $250,000 grant through Canada’s IRAP program, took Mitel from zero to a 20-per-cent global market share in five years and made millionaires out of penny investors.

And while sheer persistence and hard work were part of the secret sauce for Mitel’s success, and for every success Matthews has had since then as the man behind the creation of more than 80 high-tech ventures, he cited an even more important ingredient: the core competency of partnerships.

Partnerships build technology clusters. Partnerships allow a company to capitalize on another’s strengths without having to carry the overhead of developing a  particular area of expertise in house. Partnerships take advantage of another’s time and money invested in R&D to compliment your own.

Matthews holds Nortel’s utter aversion to partnerships to blame in no small degree for the company’s misfortunes.

And while there undoubtedly are challenges in the marketplace at present, Matthews insisted there is a resurgence at hand as ambitious and nimble entrepreneurs of the next generation make their mark. They just need a commitment of time and mentorship from those with experience and money to invest. Venture capital is irrelevant. Time is what’s important.

Matthews’ approach is to find the key contact in a post-secondary institution passionate about commercializing ideas into start-up companies to help him cherry pick the cream of the crop from among new grads. He wants to work with the handful who have the drive, ambition and adaptability critical to surviving and thriving in tough times. He puts these teams together, puts his resources behind them, and sets out to identify and develop a viable product and market niche. By engaging with the market, he will guide this team through the process of honing, refining and focusing the idea until there is a viable business ready to be formally launched.

In return for this intensive mentoring and a high-pressure work schedule that pays little attention to weekends and holidays, each team member is paid the lofty salary of $25,000. However, what they should be paid but are not is parlayed into ownership stakes in the new company.

Matthews believes there is no more effective way to quickly bring a product to market. And being first to market is the only way for North America and Europe to compete in a global economy that is now flat with few if any true trade barriers. With Asia pumping out engineering talent that works for a 10th of what ours does, trying to compete on cost is a death sentence.

So the next time you hear someone pining for the return of the good ol’ days of the telecom boom, or whining about the demise of the venture-capital industry, do as Matthews does and take a chapter from Darwin: it is not the strongest or the most intelligent that survive, but the ones most capable of adapting.

Technorati Tags: Terry Matthews, Mitel, Nortel, startup, IRAP, venture capital, OCRI, business development, commercialization

There is no question that we PR types are often taken to task for blitzing the world with news of little relevance or importance or, at least, for failing to ensure that the news is relevant and important to the hapless targets in range of our scatter guns.

In an ongoing series of posts chronicling his study of the pitches that flood his inbox, research analyst Josh Bernoff has been examining why three quarters of the PR email he receives is irrelevant. He makes the point of saying, “I really like working with PR people, I just don’t like all of their tactics.” After working for 14 years as an analyst and being barraged by tens of thousands of emails during that time, he believes his exercise in navel-gazing is well justified.

Among the points he makes is that far too much of the email he receives is related to research areas he covered years before, but is not relevant to what he is doing now. Obviously, too little research is done to ensure information in a contact database is up to date.

The simple fact is, things change. Publications fold and people move on to new jobs or assume new responsibilities. When it comes to those media contact and editorial calendar databases to which many of us subscribe, their accuracy and timeliness is often dependent on media outlets voluntarily responding to requests to update their information. I can say from previous experience as a business journal editor bombarded by irrelevant pitches that such requests often go unanswered.

In the end, the most effective way to verify if a particular journalist or editor is an appropriate target for the news you have to pitch is to visit their publication’s website.

Case in point. We recently re-engaged with a client after a two-year hiatus to put out some news for them. It had been a long time since we created their target media list and we emphasized the value of budgeting into the project the time and cost necessary to go through the list one name at a time to verify and update the information.

They saw our point, and thankfully so. Forty to 50 per cent of the contacts we had were no longer accurate for reasons that included staff turnover, defunct publications, and changes to the email addresses and phone numbers of those contacts who were still appropriate targets for this particular client’s news. If we hadn’t undertaken this process, up to half our outreach on this client’s behalf would have been a misfire.

Not all media outlets are forthcoming on their “Contact Us” or “About Us” pages with individual staff bios, beats covered and contact information, but most are. It can be tedious to visit dozens of websites to dig up and verify this kind of information, but without a doubt, it is the only assured way to get your client’s story where it needs to go.

Technorati Tags: pitching, media relations, contact databases

A recent example of how not to manage the hack-flack relationship provided some entertainment value for the Twitter crowd and profound embarrassment for the National Post earlier this week.

The war of words between marketing consultant April Dunford and Post writer David George-Cosh in such a public venue (though as you can see for yourself, most of the venom was flowing one way) demonstrates the importance of keeping one’s rants private. That’s what e-mail is for.

This whole stink seems to have been sparked by the perception that a phone call was not returned quickly enough. Well, striking while the iron is hot are words any PR practitioner should live by when opportunity comes knocking. Be that as it may, tact, courtesy and professionalism should rule any interaction between those with stories to write and those with stories to pitch.

Thanks to social media, any one of us can easily find ourselves in the public eye. We will be judged by how we act and conduct ourselves toward others. It’s your image, your personal brand, that’s on the line.

Technorati Tags: social media, April Dunford, David George-Cosh, media relations, Twitter

“Even if there’s blood on the street there’s always somebody making money. You just have to make sure you’re on the right side of it.”

The son of poor Croatian immigrants, he sold his first company for $100 million in 2000. His second company, launched in 2003, is now the largest privately held IT solutions provider and integrator in Canada. When not residing in one of his posh homes, he holds court in CBC’s Dragon’s Den.

Robert Herjavec is a living example of what hard work and vision can achieve. He took the stage to close out this week’s 2009 Ottawa Business Summit and treated his audience to his insights on what it takes to achieve business and personal success.

I scribbled furiously the entire time he spoke and have distilled his pearls of wisdom to the following:

1. There is no stereotypical external factor for success. Fame and fortune is not reserved for the beautiful people in the world, nor can a successful person be judged by appearances. One of his neighbours has a company with 12,000 staff, an original Monet on his wall and a 15-year-old car in the driveway. And, bad people do succeed. “There are people who beat their dog and run a great business.”

2. However, he has never met a successful person who didn’t have a purpose, and that purpose must be more than the accumulation of wealth. If all one pursues is money, they will hit a wall. Herjavec’s goal was to build the best company in its industry. The money followed.

3. Achieving that success requires vision. When he started his second company, the problem was too much available money and not enough vision about what it should be. Money keeps you in the game. It doesn’t make a good company.

(Geez, have we learned that lesson in Ottawa after the VC excesses of the tech boom?)

4. And on that note, with particular relevance to Ottawa: If you build a better mousetrap, the world will not beat a path to your door.  There is no such thing as a good idea. It’s all about execution. Sales and marketing. And while he would hire the fellow who can sell ice to Eskimos, Herjavec would much rather have the fellow with the foresight to sell water in the desert beside a broken-down bus.

5. “Discipline is the art of doing what is necessary even when you don’t want to.” Inaction is easy. Citing his own recent experience running a marathon for the first time and the amputee with a prosthetic leg who passed him, Herjavec put it plain: “Winners find a way, losers find an excuse.” Which invariably means, ”For you to win, somebody has to lose.”

6. The importance of leadership, which he defined as the ability to get people to do something they wouldn’t otherwise be able to achieve–lift them from their comfort zone.

7. It’s all about sales. “Nothing matters until you sell something.” Which also speaks to the value of branding and marketing to drive those sales. But after sales comes service - sales may sell the first night in a hotel room, but service will keep the guest coming back.

8. Business is a sprint. “You’ve got to go now.” It’s better to take action than sit around planning the next five days. Once you secure an opportunity, then it becomes a marathon.

9. Feed the whales, not the minnows. Especially in a tough economy, devote your time and effort to those prospects, those core customers, who will support your business in tough times. He didn’t cite the 80-20 rule, but it obviously applies. For example, Herjavec’s business positions itself around high value, high touch service. When faced with a customer who likes to shop around and bargain hunt just to keep his suppliers on their toes, his preference is to dump them in favour of more loyal customers who appreciate the value of what they are getting for their money.

10. And when it comes to suppliers for your business, it’s a love/hate relationship. At the end of the day, your business is your business and they’re looking out for their business, not yours.

11. Learn to focus, which he defined as the ability to make the most of the 24 hours in a day and ”distinguish the truly important from the urgent that happens every day.”

12. Your business is not your family, it’s just business. Avoid emotional attachments.

13. Make it fun and be resilient. Nobody likes a negative person. What’s important is not what you say, but how you make people feel. There may be really bad days when you just want to walk away, but that just proves you care. What’s vital is having the resilience to believe that tomorrow will be a better day.

14. It’s not who you know, but how brutally honest you are with yourself. “The worst lies you tell in business are the ones you tell yourself.”

15. And lastly, business is like a game of Whac-A-Mole. Keep swinging until you hit something.

Technorati Tags: entrepreneurship, management, Robert Herjavec, Dragon’s Den, Ottawa Business Summit