The Imapact of COVID-19 on Banks
COVID-19 has caused damage to global capital markets, creating severe instability and excessive volatility. The lockdown imposed to stop the spread of Covid-19 led to a sudden stop in economic activity across various sectors, affecting both businesses and employees. Companies that were dependent on direct client contacts, such as hotels and transportation, lost revenue streams, [...]
The post The Imapact of COVID-19 on Banks first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Gia Patterson
]]>The Imapact of COVID-19 on Banks
COVID-19 has caused damage to global capital markets, creating severe instability and excessive volatility. The lockdown imposed to stop the spread of Covid-19 led to a sudden stop in economic activity across various sectors, affecting both businesses and employees. Companies that were dependent on direct client contacts, such as hotels and transportation, lost revenue streams, and households that work in these industries lost income.
The banking sector was also impacted but in a relatively indirect manner. While banking services can be delivered remotely and without direct client contact, the sector’s connection to the real sector as a source of payment, savings, credit, and risk management services stretches the virus’s detrimental impact to banks and other financial institutions.
How it has caused problems for banks
Initially, businesses that ceased operations and lost revenue have been unable to repay loans. Likewise, families with members who suffered loss of employment were also unable to pay off their loans due to a lack of income. This decreased revenue and increased the chance of potential losses (if repayment capacity is permanently harmed), hurting profits and bank capital. Banks can expect significant losses as a quick recovery becomes less plausible, necessitating the need for additional provisions, further eroding their strong financial position.
Furthermore, banks have been harmed because bonds and similar financial instruments have lost value, causing more losses. Open derivative positions may also result in losses due to their unpredictable nature now. Banks are also seeing an increase in credit demand, as businesses, in particular, want greater cash flow to cover their expenses even when revenues are flat or declining. Borrowers have drawn down credit lines in some situations as a result of the increased demand.
Banks are facing decreased non-interest revenues as demand for their various services declines. With lesser economic activity, there are fewer payments and transactions to be made, and fewer security issues by corporations limit fee income for investment banks.
Effect on profitability and risk management
In mature markets, the low-interest rate situation, combined with the significant impact of COVID-19, is lowering core banking profitability. As a result, financial institutions turn to commission-based income from industries such as payments and technology.
The heightened credit risk of corporate and individual clients of banks is one of the immediate repercussions. Banks must discern between transient events that will be absorbed in a short period and longer-term effects that will necessitate management and reclassification activities to continue financing the economy and promoting its recovery.
The following are the most important factors to consider:
Given the unique nature of COVID-19, the forward-looking information, particularly how new information must be incorporated into risk parameters, must be carefully examined. This may last for a shorter period of time than cyclical downturns caused by economic-financial factors; the updating of the default rates, which must take into account any exemptions given by authorities concerning only temporary events of creditworthiness expiry, the concept of the most suitable timescales for revamping the recovery rates, to take into account in the positive effects, albeit eventually in the medium term deriving from the recovery rates, which could cause deferred payments.
Change in customer relationships
Although COVID-19 may cause a real-economy crisis, its impact on the financial system and the bank-customer relationship can be viewed as a positive disruption in terms of the sector’s digitization and ability to provide exceptional customer service.
Even the most branch-focused banks are being pushed to promote the use of avenues that were never a strategic priority for them. This is a challenging period, which banks must address by displaying genuine proximity to their consumers.
Banking operators’ comprehensive grasp of their service gap, which has become more apparent than ever before thanks to COVID-19, may make them even more motivated to speed the digital transformation road through partnerships with firms involved in financial technology.
Expected long-term impacts
Low-interest rates, which are nearly zero or even lower, will be here to stay for the foreseeable future. This will undoubtedly put further strain on bank profits.
Moreover, the trend toward digitalization could accelerate even more as social distancing becomes the accepted norm and physical interactions between banks and clients become ever more expensive. This could mean more branches closing and a greater reliance on internet and phone banking.
Furthermore, the crisis will increase competition for banks from fintech companies, particularly corporations like Facebook, Google, Apple, and Amazon. These big platform providers are expected to emerge stronger from the crisis with a significant cash pile.
COVID-19 was a crisis no one was ready for. Not having mitigations for an unexpected occurrence would always cause problems and additional challenges. Analyzing the full impact on the economy and financial institutions, coming up with appropriate responses and adapting to the changing world on the road to recovery are what banks will be focusing on in the near future.
The post The Imapact of COVID-19 on Banks first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Gia Patterson
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How Businesses Reacted and Adapted To The Covid -19 Pandemic
It’s exhilarating to start and run your own company, but it’s also difficult. Unexpected challenges will inevitably arise, even with the finest available coaching and preparedness. What matters is how you respond to the unexpected difficulty. In this interview series, we spoke with 20 business owners and CEOs from various companies in the United States on [...]
The post How Businesses Reacted and Adapted To The Covid -19 Pandemic first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Jed Morley
]]>How Businesses Reacted and Adapted To The Covid -19 Pandemic
It’s exhilarating to start and run your own company, but it’s also difficult. Unexpected challenges will inevitably arise, even with the finest available coaching and preparedness. What matters is how you respond to the unexpected difficulty. In this interview series, we spoke with 20 business owners and CEOs from various companies in the United States on how they handled challenges during the Covid -19 Pandemic.
INTERVIEW HOST
The host of this interview was Jed Morley. Jed Morley is the CEO of a leading payment processing service provider called PlatPay.
Table of Contents
The question we asked:
The pandemic encouraged many businesses to pivot and adapt to changing market conditions. How did you adapt? Did you introduce additional product lines or services?
Renee Bauer
Tasks have a funny way of stealing your time. When you stop focusing on how to scale your business and only focus on tasks, the growth of your business halts abruptly. Make sure your schedule has plenty of time to work ON the business and not just IN the business.
Paige Arnof-Fenn
My biggest challenge was that the people you start with are not always the ones who grow with you. The hardest lesson I learned when I started my company is not getting rid of weak people earlier than I did in the first few years of my business. I spent more time managing them than finding new customers.
I knew in my gut they were not up to snuff but out of loyalty to them I let them hang around much longer than they should have. It would have been better for everyone to let them go as soon as the signs were there. They became more insecure and threatened as we grew which was not productive for the team.
As soon as I let them go the culture got stronger and the bar higher. “A” team people like to be surrounded by other stars. It is true that you should hire slowly and fire quickly. I did not make that mistake again later on so learned it well the first time. I wish I had known it even earlier though but lesson learned for sure! Another key challenge has been about the importance of focus.
There is so much noise out there with social media, 24/7 news, climate change, etc. that for my clients and me staying focused with all the distractions we are bombarded with on a daily basis can be tough. So my top tip is to learn to give yourself permission to say no.
Whether it means passing on joining another committee, delegating to someone on your team to attend the event, sleeping in (no to an alarm clock), meditating, taking a walk, or just turning off my phone and computer (no I will respond later on my own schedule), simple acts of letting myself focus, relax and be present in the moment are the very best gifts I can give myself as an entrepreneur.
Like most small business owners and entrepreneurs there are never enough hours in the day to fit everything in so when something has to give it is usually time I have allocated for myself to think, exercise, read or just relax. What I have come to appreciate and realize in my 50s is that “me time” is not a luxury or pampering like it was in my youth, now it is maintenance! To improve productivity in my experience when you focus and do less you can get more done.
Emily Lawson
When growing a small business, things rarely go exactly as planned. Within the first few years of the company, we were still understanding the market we were in and figuring out how to produce consistent product. And then all at once, I lost three of my key team members (at that time we were more like a family), and the blow of their departure felt personal.
They all worked on the production of the product and were looking for other opportunities in life, which they all found within a month of each other. This left a gaping hole in the most important role in my company, the production of the product by hands that truly cared what they were producing and that I trusted beyond measure to produce our product. So, I adapted. I rehired and reworked our systems for an entirely new team, brought everything back to basics and got back into the kitchen. The result has put us where we are today.
It was a gift that they moved on and, in the end, we created a new system where people could thrive in their positions, and I made shifts that we didn’t even know we needed to make. These things happen often in growing a small business. All these common issues are things that we deal with and have learned to meet head on. I always have a plan B and have never wanted to give up.
Gary Kohn
The greatest challenge will always be getting past your own self-created boundaries. No matter how head strong the entrepreneur, there will often be moments of self-doubt, uncertainty and moments where you want to run in the other direction.
The solution is to keep pushing forward, even if it’s just for a small amount of time daily. Over those months and eventually years, the hard work and resilience becomes cemented and helps you get past the times that are extremely challenging. The well-formed habit of working daily on your dreams is hard to break, and will get you through the biggest challenges.
Ewen Finser
Challenge:
Having a Robust Business Process Documentation If you think documentation has an insignificant role in your business, think again. It is one of the most critical parts that every entrepreneur should focus on, especially when kick-starting any venture.
The documentation process is the structural backbone of any business. Due to the divergent workflow of your business (especially going online, being in a remote work environment, or adopting a hybrid model), your internal operation may be prone to inconsistencies, confusion, and unproductive staff if proper documentation procedures are ignored.
Most especially, when someone tenured or knowledgeable in the team leaves, no one knows what’s going on or how to move forward because there’s no black-and-white procedure to guide everyone.
Also, you will undergo a constant trial and error phase in starting your business. Thus, it requires a robust document-centric process to define what works and what doesn’t.
How to Overcome it:
Prioritize Creating a Standard Operation Procedure (SOP) I know this is an arduous process and painful process. But writing and paying attention to your processes will allow you to map your business process and growth. A straightforward way is to write everything down while you do tasks (or you can record it through video). Outline every process from start to finish. This will allow you to streamline your process, make more informed decisions and reduce errors in the long run.
Ian Sells
There was a time when I was still managing my first Amazon brand, that I would launch a product and it would fly and get sold out within hours. The thing with eCommerce is that it grows very fast. In my first Amazon brand, I was astounded with how fast the sales were going.
This success has caused me to be impulsive and expand my brand too fast. I impulsively made the decision to launch a lot of products at once. The thing was, I didn’t have systems in place to keep up with the growth my hasty actions has caused. You may say that it is a good problem. But it would not be a problem if I only planned well and followed a gradual process.
I didn’t have the capital to keep up with the sudden surge of order volume nor the manpower to handle the influx of orders. Basically, I didn’t have systems in place and can’t keep up with the growth. At the time, I was a one-man company. Lesson learned: Scaling your brand sinvolves planning and preparation. Don’t scale just cause the market is good. Scale up when you have enough cash, have the capacity to leverage hard and have the systems in place.
Sardor Umrdinov
I always associate my business with chess. Everything, like in chess, must be carefully considered from all angles before making a move. It’s impossible to predict every action with 100% certainty.
However, the beauty of this game is that it can be played by anyone because there are no predetermined goals or rules. I believe that if you always go with the flow, you will lose interest in being an entrepreneur. As a result, I enjoy taking risks because it keeps me on my toes and ready for any challenge that comes my way.
I took one of the biggest risks in 2016 for Home Alliance. I decided to design and develop our own software. We sought the help of Ukrainian developers because dealing with this process on our own would be impractical. We created our CRM system, and our profit margins increased by 15%.
However, by growing so fast, we couldn’t keep up. In 2017, the gross revenue growth slowed down. I didn’t make many projections. We had no process in place. It was me managing most of the things myself. There wasn’t enough coaching and accountability. We started becoming the limits to the growth of our organization.
When a company’s revenue reaches $10 million to $15 million, I’m sure it has a crisis. If you don’t adjust, the organization can die or get stuck. Then I learned to trust my people and let go of control. I started delegating and my team learned to delegate to their teams. This was our first step in developing accountability and structure. It’s more dependable. Rather than focusing on people, we’re focusing on roles and functions in the organization.
Every mistake is a chance to learn something new. When you fail, be kind to yourself. Analyzing yourself now will help you avoid repeating unpleasant situations in the future. Put your faith in your employees and team to take care of the most critical aspects of your business. Your company’s systems, corporate culture, and mission are the lifeblood of your company, and they will change regularly.
You will always maintain control and direct the direction in which the business grows based on how you handle these changes. I have learned to practice detachment as one of the most effective ways to manage change in my business and build trust with my employees.
Emily Martin
Too many tools…..as a first-time entrepreneur, I feel like it’s hard to decide what tools to use for which purpose. While I don’t know things about legal contracts and business operation, there are 15+ different platforms to decide to use for contracting and even then you don’t know what it means.
There are 15 different accounting tools but not all of them connect to the same banks. Also, there are HR management and payroll platforms but not for all types of employees.
It feels like when creating and growing your business you choose a tool that is good for now but then, it adds 10 other tools for other specific use cases. I wish there was just 1 tool – a business-use platform…. where accounting, payroll, contracts, etc. All were in 1 place. My advice is to find a founder with a similar business model to you and follow their tech stack and business setup.
Try to leverage other founders who have already done it and understood the benefits of the software they chose.
Alex Lefkowitz
I’m Alex from Tasty Edits, a video editing company for content creators. I founded Tasty Edits in 2020 as a solo entrepreneur, and bootstrapped it to a team of 10 that has become the best video editing service on Google (in terms of organic traffic.) My answer is about managing crises and what to do when they occur. ———- Being an entrepreneur is hard, especially if you’re a solo founder, because the onus of finding a solution when something goes wrong is solely on you.
When you’re starting your business, solving a crisis doesn’t seem like a big deal because you have very few processes in place, thus, only a limited number of things can go wrong at any given time. As you build your business, however, the number of potential crises increases commensurate with the number of processes you create and the complexity of your workflow / supply chain.
I made the mistake of thinking that once something is done — in other words, a system is built or a process is created — it’ll work perfectly in perpetuity. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. At one point in late 2021 I found myself overwhelmed by multiple crises occurring all at once, causing me an insane amount of stress, needing to work non-stop for weeks straight, and ultimately questioning if I should give up on the business.
To make a long story short, I spent several weeks building a video order workflow and quality assurance system. The goal of which was to make sure we’re producing the highest quality edits to reduce churn. Shortly afterwards, I started working on building our own custom project management software, dubbed our Video Order Management Application or “VOMA”, for short.
Everything was advancing about as well as I could have expected until, simply put, it wasn’t. Seemingly all at once, several of our editors suffered personal emergencies, our quality assurance workflow brokedown resulting in angry clients, and software compatibility issues wreaked havoc on VOMA. Handling the stress of it all at once was too much to bear, and I vividly recall leaning against the shower wall with warm water running down my face thinking, “maybe I should quit.”
Luckily I didn’t. Through sheer perseverance I put my nose to the grindstone and worked non-stop for weeks until everything was resolved. Everything turned out ok in the end, but it was honestly very traumatic. My advice to new entrepreneurs who want to avoid a similar situation is to be prepared before things go wrong. In other words, actively expect that things will break (even if they’re working perfectly right now) and put a plan in place to fix them if they do.
That might mean setting up an alternative workflow system that you can easily switch to if your current one breaks, or having employees on call in case you need them. Another tip is to not build too fast, especially if you’re a solo founder. You’ll find that most problems present themselves within a week or two, so wait for them to pop up before starting the next item on your roadmap. Alternatively, find a cofounder who can help you shoulder the burden when something goes wrong.
Lastly, I’ll say that money can solve many of the problems you’ll face when something goes wrong, so consider searching for angel investors or pitching VCs. Tasty Edits is, for better or for worse, fully bootstrapped so this was never an option for me — you need to have the money ready before crises occur. In other words, don’t search for an umbrella during a tempest.
Michaela Vybohova
When I was starting my brand I had an idea how the industry works seeing it from the other side working as a model for other designers but boy was I wrong.
The greatest challenge I’ve had is how to get established and find distribution without a budget, i bootstrapped my business without any funding, I think that’s were most people struggle and are scared to even start a brand of their own.
Best way to overcome it is to start small, meaning that don’t go into major production ordering thousands of units and then sit on inventory.
If you are new, take baby steps, don’t do something that will bankrupt you if it doesn’t work out, ideally invest maximum 30% of your savings at the begging and whatever your returns are, invest it back into the company, it will take time but there’s a room for everyone and I believe you can make it if you play it smart.
Cody Miles
No one ever said running a business would be easy. As an entrepreneur, you’re always being surprised with new and unexpected challenges, what determines your success is how you handle them.
I started Ashore, an online proofing and approval software, with one goal: to make collaboration accessible to everyone. Today, our app is used by creatives worldwide, including the creative teams at Disney, Adidas, Uber, and Coca-Cola, but it took a lot of work to get to this point.
The biggest challenge we faced, hands-down, was funding. We bootstrapped Ashore, and without big investors, we had to rely entirely on our product to bring in capital. We couldn’t afford much. So, instead of employing massive marketing efforts, we focused on building relationships, and instead of hiring professionals with years of experience, we found people with hidden talent.
Eventually, we were able to overcome this challenge. To start, we focused on our sales and development velocity, as the amount of time it takes to gain a customer or to develop new features is a huge determinant of your trajectory. This helped us keep money coming in the door, which was vital to our long-term efforts.
For other companies facing funding challenges, I’d recommend doing the same. Focus on your sales and development velocity, make sure you have money coming in, and don’t lose sight of your long-term goals.
Rany Burstein
Our biggest early-on problem was a technical one. We started Diggz, our roommate finder web app, with a MVP version that worked great and quite fast. As we grew and acquired more users, our app slowed down and the user experience was quite bad.
At one point, our roommate search section took longer than 10 seconds to load. Our MVP wasn’t built for scale and we didn’t plan for it initially. To solve this problem, we sought guidance from several technical growth experts (who actually helped us voluntarily).
They advised us about what technologies to implement to speed things up and how to redesign our algorithm and database to work in a more efficient manner. We implemented multiple of the proposed solutions and that got our roommate search to load in less than two seconds. Major improvement.
This problem challenged us not to think only on how to make our app work today, but build it for scale and for continued growth. This lesson had an impact on any new feature we released since and we continueosly work to improve our user experience even when it seems it works well at the present.
While you don’t want to spend time and money building the perfect platform or app with all the bells and features from day one. You still want to keep your eyes on the road ahead, and not end up paying for “technical debt” later. Build things simple, but make sure you have a plan for scale, whether it’s your code, infrastructure or even team.
Mark Aselstine
Without a doubt, it’s government regulation and enforcement, especially when both of those things change consistently!
When we opened our wine club, we saw a number of court cases moving through the system, all of which seemed to suggest that more states would be open to more types of shipping of alcohol. That happened, but only for wineries and not for retail.
How can you overcome it? While government regulation is always going to change, especially after elections, there are almost always work arounds. Even in alcohol sales, which we’ve been arguing about in this country for over a century now, there are work arounds.
Sam Cohen
The biggest challenge I faced in recent years was finding suitable candidates for vacant positions after the Great Resignation. A lot of employees quit their jobs which left me in dire need to hire new people.
However, it was not as easy as I thought it would be. The applicants that were applying didn’t have the experience or the skills to fill in the role. So, I took a different route after constant failure to find what I had been looking for in potential hires.
I automated my accounts by using bookkeeping software’s like Zoho and QuickBooks. It took some burden off my shoulders, as I wasn’t manually doing the finances on my own. Therefore, I advise every young entrepreneur to automate any process they believe is demanding too much of their time and energy. This helps you to focus on what’s more important in the growth and stability of your business.
Michael Dean
The most unexpected challenge of running a business was how much goes into maintaining an online presence. If you are a business leader and you are not investing in your online presence, then you are missing out on endless opportunities for growth and longevity.
Consumers are spending more time on their devices than ever, so optimizing your business’ website and marketing for the digital landscape is crucial. When I first started my business, I underestimated the importance of social media and SEO, but now it is a top priority, as those are two major factors in securing my business’ audience and brand.
Having a good online presence includes unique social media content, an accessible website and consistent communication with your audience. All of these factors have the ability to set your business apart from your competitors, but it is up to you to invest the time and money.
Regan Ervin
Snippet:
I started my business on an ethical premise. The problem was that I needed excellent, agency-caliber storytelling to develop the concept and make it viable, yet I’d left behind my job to do the right thing (a financially risky choice). My now-partner and I began an unconventional creative partnership to help me accomplish all this, and it worked out for us.
Detailed Story:
Three years ago I started Capital E Advisors, a wealth management firm in the Kansas City area. Leaving an established firm to start my own business was a Jerry-McGuire-kind-of-moment for me. I had quit my job because I believed a large swath of the financial services industry had gotten some fundamental things wrong, and I was embarking to get it right.
I had a big vision, and knew the unique advantages I planned to offer our potential clients were compelling ones. The challenge I faced was communicating my business’ messages in a simple, effective way—and doing so without hiring a big agency with an even bigger price tag.
The answer to my problem was simple, strategic storytelling. I formed a partnership with a local creative director, Stephanie Klein, who used a combination of her academic background in fiction-writing and the StoryBrand marketing method to tell my story. Eight months after launching the new brand, we’ve been able to gain 250+ followers on both LinkedIn and Facebook, 100+ on Instagram, and high-relevance engagement on our Twitter.
We’re also very pleased with our client acquisition rate since then. Attached to this email is a simple case study with audience data and financial results included.
We credit our success to four distinct solutions. The first solution was a brand messaging guide with story-driven messages. The second solution was implementing those meaningfully and strategically. We implemented these messages on a new website, social channels, and a short video series. Implementing our guide also included a visual rebrand to match the messages we’d written.
The third solution —which powered the first two—was an unconventional, small-business-to-small-business partnership. Solution four was simple, but can’t be overlooked. We had a business model that was worth taking a bet on.
Solution Number One: Our Brand Messaging Guide
The brand messaging document was intended to make sure our marketing copy was purposeful and succinct (and it’s done just that). Creating powerful messages required a deep dive into the brand’s history and motives. Stephanie was emphatic that we were thorough with this part, reminding us that the story has to be deeply true for story-centric marketing to work.
We spent several days in interviews, ending the research with beers at a local brewery. Stephanie recorded the conversations, journalist-style, just like she had been doing all week. During that conversation, the four of us who were involved in the interviews collectively hit the answer we’d been looking for. A couple weeks later, she called me, saying she’d finished the first draft. It needed more work, as she’d indicated it would, but the feeling I got even at that early stage was that we were
telling our client’s story. And, by extension, our own.
The above order of the characters in our story is particularly significant. We know now that the most captivating stories for customers place them in the main characters’ role and help them imagine a successful journey with a brand. We found it to be crucial that potential consumers see one of our messages and feel immediately seen. This messaging step set us up well because we had a central checkpoint for our marketing strategy, something to make sure whatever we were writing aligned in all the ways we decided were important at the onset.
Solution Number Two: Implementing the Messages
We took on a massive amount of work to implement our messages. Maybe even more than we needed to. But it ended up being more fun than tedious. We built a website with the help of a local developer, spent a couple of days shooting the videos (and many weeks editing them). Once the brand was ready, we established social media objectives and channels to meet those objectives. The process took months, with a launch date almost a year later.
Stephanie shares her perspective of this stage here:
One of the coolest moments we had was after the brand was launched and we started running a social paid campaign. We’d been pretty thorough in our audience research, and we noticed that there were some big gaps in the potential audience and the current audience being targeted by other firms.
- We identified that millennial men of all ethnic and racial backgrounds, and women 35 and up, would be interested in the transparent promises of our brand, and we believed that there was data out there that proved this interest would turn into leads.
- After we launched the first brand awareness campaign, our click spend was incredibly low—and we discovered that 60 percent of our audience was women in the targeted age bracket.
- Finally, we noticed that the men who engaged with us were from a far more diverse age and race demographic than other firms were experiencing.
Solution Number Three: Building a Partnership
Like most new business owners, I needed to find a way to market my business without adding more financial risk than was fiscally prudent. A partnership was the solution, and we both had to take risks
to form one.
As I mentioned earlier, my big vision was difficult to convey. I was inspired, but I needed help captivating and inspiring others. I’m merely an entrepreneur with an idea, and I needed a creative with vision of her own to take this idea and mold it into a tale that can have an impact.
Finding the partner I needed required me to take a risk. Agency costs for the kind of project we completed are intended for corporations, and even small-scale collaborations with creative consultants (like the one I opted for with Stephanie) can eat profits in those early days. In my case though, the story and the business were so dependent on each other that I couldn’t see myself waiting to work on the brand.
I haven’t heard of a financial firm with a creative partner before, but doing it this way meant both of us could experience exceptional results. We feel great about the success we’ve found in this joint venture.
Stephanie’s perspective:
When we started negotiating, we chose to be transparent about our mutual business goals. If we hadn’t started this way, I don’t know if it would have worked in the long run. We ended up reaching an agreement that included profit-based compensation for me, and ownership of certain business assets at a second growth stage. It was a risk for both of us. There was risk for me because there was a lot of commitment involved up front, and for Regan, he was giving up a significant share of future earnings if we were successful.
I think the reason why this arrangement worked is because we both really believed in this idea. Regan was willing to take me on based on my passion for his story. He chose to overlook the fact that my corporate acumen was different than partners he may have envisioned having when he made the leap—he was a former COO at a successful investment firm; I was a former English instructor finishing an MFA degree.
When we met, I was wearing a teacher’s blouse and cardigan, and probably came off as a little reserved. I was definitely the unconventional choice, and it would have been easy to dismiss me as “not a good fit”. But he prioritized risk differently, and we’ve both benefited from it.
Solution Number Four: A Business Idea Worth Betting On
When I launched Capital E, I had a big vision to genuinely help clients simplify their financial lives without sacrificing investment quality. I believed there was a better way to serve clients and I was eager to put this into practice. Under a standard fee structure, I aimed to deliver a robust, holistic client experience inclusive of estate planning, tax preparation, financial planning and unique investment management that prioritized value-added activities.
I knew how improved the results would be compared to traditional RIA outcomes, even from good firms. Stephanie had to have her own discovery of my idea. Her’s came from an outside perspective of what I was offering (one that was more similar to what my clients might have). But the important part was that, looking at it from either end of the idea, the business was a solid concept.
Stephanie’s take:
One of the things I like best about telling stories is this possibility on the horizon that I might discover someone with a really great story. I didn’t know when I met Regan that I’d get that feeling of epiphany. But during our early days of what we marketing professionals call “brand discovery”, I started to realize he had that indescribable thing I am always hoping to find when I met with a new client.
We connected over the logic (and yes, it was logic) of why he’d quit his incredible c-suite job at a respected firm to rally a small slew of clients under a different premise. As Regan described to me the systemic problem he noticed —across the investment industry—I realized he was pitching something brave. Smart. And in an industry nearly void of empathy—his whole idea was particularly empathetic.
In the investing industry, most clients hire their advisor to manage their money. Therefore, the advisor needs these clients to believe they are good investment managers. But studies repeatedly indicate the vast majority of investment managers underperform their benchmarks. Regan had data to show how he’d corrected this aspect, but the corrections he’d made for investment performance were only part of his overall plan.
He explained that the over-focus on investment decisions distracts from the aspects of wealth management in which advisors have a greater impact on their clients’ well-being. Regan reprioritizes the allocation of resources to those items he can control.
Truly knowing each client as a person allows him to identify the matters that are a source of financial anxiety and complication. Consulting with clients on financial matters that are important to them, keeping clients organized and on task, helping clients optimize their financial decision making, facilitating the completion of estate planning and tax preparation by professionals –these are the things an advisor can do to add value. After all, isn’t the experience of wealth the whole point?
This realization was my moment of epiphany. I thought of luxury brands I’d worked on and how honesty and adding holistic value was high on the “needs” list of Regan’s high-net-worth client demographic. I also thought of big brands who successfully told their disruptor stories and changed their industries.
For me as a storyteller, a disruptive brand with a big heart is one heck of an exciting find, especially since I could also see how the business could scale. The story and the scaleability combined gave me the courage to jump in with both feet.
John DiBella
The greatest challenge that my business has ever faced and had to overcome was the sudden demand for our services when the pandemic hurt. All of a sudden, everyone was working from home, launching their own online businesses, and looking for any edge that they could utilize to increase their profit margins.
And it felt like they all decided at exactly the same time that the one thing they really needed if they were going to be the best at what they were doing was SEO optimization. The sudden influx of business meant that we went from working eight-hour days to twelve-hour days, and we’re still locked into the same pattern, and it doesn’t look like anything is going to change anytime soon.
The greatest challenge my business ever faced is the one that it’s still facing, and that’s the incredibly enviable position of having more work than we can comfortably handle. It is a challenge, but someone has to rise to face it head-on, and that someone may as well be me.
Tequila Cousar
The greatest and unexpected challenge that I have come against as entrepreneur in business was creating content on a consistent basis that converts. Warming: in the beginning you will be fired up and may be finding customers or clients, but you need to create a long-term strategy for growth.
The best thing you can do now is to start creating content that converts. How? There are 3 fundamentals of creating content that converts into 1-3 clients.
The 3 keys are: results, pain points, and invitation to work with you. It really is that simple. You want to highlight the results in the headline of your content. Touch on the pain point of what they may be struggling with to receive results. Invite them to engage on your post or reach out to you.
Jim Rennert
There are so many challenges when you go to work for yourself. First and foremost, as an artist, you not only have to create the work, but you also have to find those who are interested enough to purchase it.
While most artists can create, not all artists can sell. And without sales, you can’t continue to create the work. So it’s important to find a gallery and build a loyal collector base so you have those consistent sales to continue creating more work.
In addition to that, the financial aspect is huge for most artists and was a challenge when I wanted to become an artist full time.
Typically, when a piece of artwork is sold, there are three people that get paid – the gallery that makes the sale, the foundry that produced it, and the artist that created it. Back in those days, the breakdown of payment was 1/3 for each of these people. Now, if a piece of my work sold for $3,000, the gallery would make $1,000, the foundry would make $1,000 and I would make $1,000.
The problem was, I then had to pay the foundry another $1,000 to make the next piece, so I couldn’t figure out how I was supposed to make any money. So, I had a decision to make. I could either open a gallery to receive 2/3 of that payment, or I could learn the casting process and receive 2/3 of the payment.
When opening up a gallery, you need a brick and mortar, a lease, employees and other aspects I didn’t want to take on. I’m a worker, and have always been a worker, so I knew I would be able to figure out the casting process. And that’s what I did. Learning the process allowed me to create my own work, have the independence to cast it myself and make my money go twice as far. To this day I still cast my own work and haven’t looked back.
My advice to everyone is to believe in yourself and keep going. It can be tough at times, but if it’s something you truly enjoy, go for it. And most importantly, don’t let those who can’t do what you can do determine your future.
Howard Birnbaum
Uncertainty is one of the biggest challenges that my business faced during the pandemic. Uncertainty in business can arise at any time, sometimes because of the global debt or sometimes due to the economic crisis. Due to uncertainty, many businesses tend to shy away from long-term planning and so did I.
A failure to plan your next 5-10 years can destroy the value of your business. Always plan for more reactive long term policies.
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The post How Businesses Reacted and Adapted To The Covid -19 Pandemic first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Jed Morley
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Entrepreneurs Discuss the Top Unexpected Business Challenges They Have Faced
Many firms were prompted to pivot and adapt to changing market conditions as a result of the pandemic. We spoke with a number of business owners in the United States to learn how some of the country’s most successful entrepreneurs altered their firms and added new product lines or services. INTERVIEW HOST The host [...]
The post Entrepreneurs Discuss the Top Unexpected Business Challenges They Have Faced first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Jed Morley
]]>Entrepreneurs Discuss the Top Unexpected Business Challenges They Have Faced
Many firms were prompted to pivot and adapt to changing market conditions as a result of the pandemic. We spoke with a number of business owners in the United States to learn how some of the country’s most successful entrepreneurs altered their firms and added new product lines or services.
INTERVIEW HOST
The host of this interview was Jed Morley. Jed Morley is the CEO of a leading payment processing service provider called PlatPay.
Table of Contents
The question we asked:
What is the greatest, unexpected challenge you faced with your business, that you’d like to warn new entrepreneurs about? Please share your advice on how to overcome it.?
Wiliam Scott Goldman
Having pioneered the field of Branding Law and working primarily with startups/entrepreneurs for the past thirty years, here are three very common but easily avoidable mistakes:
1. Using a brand name with the mistaken belief that filing as a corp. or LLC with the Secretary of State confers trademark protection.
2. Applying for a trademark and/or using a brand name without properly clearing it first with a thorough database search, including all possible variations, checking for similarities in sound, appearance and meaning.
3. Choosing a trademark that’s generic or descriptive rather than coined, arbitrary or even suggestive as generic marks are unregistrable and descriptive marks are considered ‘weak’ and difficult to enforce. BONUS: Mistakenly believing that hiring an independent contractor confers copyright ownership as a work made for hire.
Instead, the contractor automatically owns copyright unless otherwise assigned by written agreement.
Chris Kille
The greatest unexpected challenges I have faced in my businesses over the years have always been people-related. Daily challenges will occur in day-to-day operations, and usually, those can be anticipated and corrected without much damage.
Employees and talent, however, are a completely different story. Employees can be like the ocean: ever-changing, unpredictable, and even hostile at times. On the other hand, they can also be gentle, warm, and calming. Both perspectives can change without notice.
The past 2 years have been extremely challenging because of what has been going on in the world. People have been laid off and started their own hustle. Some have decided they do not want to go back to work altogether. Some have risen to the top and made the best out of a bad situation.
Now that things appear to be calming down, there are another set of challenges. Who’s coming back? Do we need as big of an office as before? Can people continue to work from home indefinitely? These challenges can be frustrating, but are also some of the most rewarding because building and maintaining a business is one of the most satisfying experiences an entrepreneur can have.
Chris Kille is the Founder and CEO of Payment Pilot- a financial technology company, and Elevate Outsourcing- a global outsourcing agency. He has been an entrepreneur since 2005 and has built and sold multiple businesses for a profit. He currently resides in Charlotte, NC with his wife, Kristen, and their 3 dogs.
Leandro Sandmann
The most unexpected challenge we faced was scaling quickly enough to meet the demand. Since ExitLag was originally created for ourselves and a few friends, we were not prepared for a lot of users to be using the software but word quickly spread and more and more people were interested in signing up for the software.
From payment approval to granting access to the software, everything was done manually. One day, there were suddenly hundreds of clients waiting for their payments to be processed and their accesses to be granted.
I had to spend the entire day grating access to the new clients and processing their payments manually. I learned that business can grow a lot quicker than you anticipate and you need to be ready for that growth.
Christina Russo
Too Much Content – The Right People For The Right Job When my friend Cassie and I started our business, we thought it would be a humble little site that maybe twenty or so thousand people visited a month and we never expected it to grow into the behemoth that it has.
Instead of twenty thousand visitors, our business now attracts more than three million, and as the site grew faster and faster, we had to research and create more and more content, and before we knew it, we were overwhelmed and had to face the truth.
If we were going to stay in business and satiate the appetite of our community, we needed to hire researchers and writers and we need to do it fast. So we reached out to the people who mattered most to us, our community of faces and readers, and within a month we’d recruited a team that knew exactly what kind of content we needed, as they were part of the community that we were trying to appease.
I never imagined that runaway success would ever be an unexpected problem that I’d have to deal with, but it was and I’m eternally grateful that the universe saw fit to throw that problem at us.
Paul Sherman
I never thought that hiring the right team members would be so incredibly difficult. This is especially difficult when you’re small because small businesses often need employees that can wear many different hats as they grow and figure things out.
I would warn entrepreneurs to be very careful about hiring people that are qualified but a poor cultural fit. This is hugely important when you’re a small business because if you have one bad apple in a company of 500, it’s not so bad; if you have one bad apple in a company of three, it’s a real problem.
We overcame this issue by focusing on word-of-mouth hiring and less on traditional hiring boards. At the time, and still very much today, I felt more comfortable getting a referral from someone I trust because that person knows me and what I’m looking for in an employee. This made it easier to hire people that were cultural fits for the company.
Annie Singer
The biggest surprise to me in launching my own business was the sheer patience it takes to be successful. After launching, it is incredibly common to enter a phase that my business mentor refers to as the “trough of sorrows”. During this phase, your business is growing… one user at a time.
It makes you question everything you know to be true about your business and your product. It might take weeks to get out of this trough — or it might take many months! The best way to persist through this challenging phase of business is to have a strong network of support, including your family, friends, and business mentors.
Anthony Martin
Insurance companies pool money to pay claims. They have a ballpark of the premiums they will receive and the payout they will have to make. The pandemic resulted in a increase in the number of payouts in the form of business interruption claims, travel, cyber liability and trade credit.
This means that payouts have seen a massive spike in a very short period of time. Even though certain insurance companies factor in unexpected events, pandemics are difficult to gauge as they occur rarely and lack historical data. Since we are directly in touch with insurance companies in our line of business, this has affected us as well.
Yuvi Alpert
Our industry typically relies on an in-person experience, as consumers often wish to have a tangible feel for the types of products we offer, so recreating that in a virtual environment was our biggest challenge.
Whenever a business, especially those in the fashion and accessories industry, utilize an ecommerce platform, finding the best ways to instill confidence in the consumer can be a difficult hurdle.
I never anticipated the amount of platforms and programs, content, and service outlets we would need to utilize in order to find that perfect combination. Definitely, recreating the consumer experience in virtual space was the biggest challenge I faced in my business.
Adelle Archer
When we started our business, we knew that our product was unique and rare, and although it touched upon several different market spaces, the greatest challenge was identifying the best ways to communicate that to the public.
The vast majority of startups are entering a well defined market space, where expectations are already set on what is required of a product and service. Ours was a completely new and different concept, and deciding how to promote what we did, both to stakeholders and the public, was more difficult than I had anticipated and presented great challenges. After much work, and some trial and error, we were able to overcome these difficulties and carve out our space.
Joel Jackson
It’s a challenge to find the kinds of people willing to listen. In the entrepreneurial space, you have a lot of talkers, a lot of aggressive salespeople – but not a lot of listeners. I started early at Honest, and no one noticed what we were doing, but we didn’t let that deter us. In the end, the entire diaper industry changed its practices because of what we did.
You can’t let discouragement creep into your head. You have to be willing to put yourself out there. The key is to get your ideas in front of as many people as you can find. If you’re persistent enough and strategic enough, you will find those people who are receptive to your ideas. You never know which conversation will lead to success, so keep finding ways to put your product in front of people.
Gene Caballero
The thing I didn’t expect when starting my business was how lonely the journey would be. Immediate family and a few friends will always be supportive….sharing on social media, writing reviews, actually using your product, bringing food to the office at midnight, etc. Second-tier friends, like your bar buddies and old co-workers, just don’t understand the work it takes to build something from scratch.
They can’t fathom why you are not able to grab a happy hour or grab dinner on a Tuesday because you have to work. Slowly but surely, these friends will eventually quit asking and become mere acquaintances. There are 3 8-hour workdays in 24 hours…pick which two you want to work and you will be successful.
Nakia Whittaker-Woody
I am an entrepreneur, small business for 4 years now, my greatest and most unexpected challenge was Imposter Syndrome. I have been an Administrative Professional for 24 years and I am a ROCK STAR! But when translating those years and skillset to being a business owner, I cowered like it was day 1 of my career.
I would hyperventilate on camera, studied everything I could get my hands on, and still felt incompetent. I had never had any business experience or knew how to be an entrepreneur, so I learned to align myself with like-minded individuals who encouraged and supported me. I invested in some courses, because coming from Corporate, education equaled authority, thus helping my confidence.
I also invested in Mindset Coaching. It was an investment in myself, I was lucky to be associated with a great coach who was growing and testing her program using a Pay What You Can process. It was so instrumental in me learning to celebrate small things in my business, understand the reason for my pricing, and gave me the courage to increase my pricing to my expertise level.
David Jacobs
The greatest, unexpected challenge most successful business owners will face in the lifecycle of their company is successfully exiting from the business. With the success rate of finding a buyer and negotiating a transaction which closes close to 20%, most business owners will be unable to successfully from their companies after years and years of hard work and effort.
It is typically for successful business owners to receive unsolicited offers from time to time. While it is possible for a cold inquiry to result in a sale and a lucrative exit, most end up as wasted weeks or months spent supplying highly confidential materials for a due diligence process to a buyer who ultimately walks away. This happens because buyers reach out to hundreds of potential business owners per year but only make 1-2 acquisitions. After a few of these failed deals, many buyers conclude their business can’t be sold.
The most reliable path to a successful business exit is to find an advisor who understands your industry and can create a competitive auction between the potential buyers. The competition not only pushes up the transaction value, it also keeps deal structures and terms reasonable. A good intermediary will be able to properly package up your business for sale and then attract a large number of potential buyers quickly in order to create the needed competition.
Shaunak Amin
SnackMagic launched in 2019 and scaled rapidly. Our team now consists of in-house, hybrid, and remote employees across the globe. While flexible schedules offer a better work/life balance, we quickly discovered that good team collaboration doesn’t come down to workers being available at all hours.
Round-the-clock communications can put a significant amount of pressure on your team and lead to lower productivity and higher staff turnover. Fostering a good work/life balance for hybrid and remote employees across time zones comes down to managers and team members being mindful of everyone’s designated hours.
As projects require a significant amount of interaction, workers must be conscientious of when and how they contact their teammates to avoid a constant sense of urgency. We find that being considerate of time zones keeps the stress levels of our employees lower and reduces the chances of human error.
Becky Brown
One of the greatest business challenges that I had to face was learning how to set up, organize, and manage a remote workforce. As an executive, working remotely comes down to so much more than “work-from-home using a computer.”
First, it was the technology — I had to research, develop, optimize, and manage all of the technology necessary to run an efficient remote business. After all of that, I had to learn how remote management and leadership so that my whole team was up and running efficiently. If you are considering working remotely, you should be ready and prepared to do your research and optimization to make it all work. I hope that helps!
Zach Letter
Taking a passion and converting it to a business requires viewing that market differently, and making the transition from enthusiastic participant to a business creator represented my greatest challenge. It is very simple to critique a business from afar, passing judgement while not fully understanding the complexities they face.
]When taking my passion into a business model, I began to realize some of my unrealistic expectations, forcing me to make adjustments and thinking about modifications I never considered. Being able to merge my vision with the reality of business, and picking and choosing where I could realistically meet my goals was my biggest challenge.
Omer Reiner
The greatest challenge we experienced with our business was cash flow. We underestimated the importance of keeping healthy cash reserves in the bank to cover months where cash was not flowing in steadily, but the expenses, on the other hand, did not stop flowing out.
So we learned the hard way, and now we try to keep at least 3-4 months of operating expenses in a separate savings account just in case we have slow revenue months.
Jaclyn Strauss
Be aware that you don’t know what you don’t know. As entrepreneurs, we plan to launch our new company and feel quite confident that we have dotted every “I” and crossed every “T.” However, the truth is that you will have no way of knowing what the market desires until you launch your product or service.
Every entrepreneur should have completed numerous potential customer interviews, received feedback from a BETA version, or had a fresh set of eyes and ears on the concept and/or the product pre-launch. Before launch, these are all must-do items; however, the real valuable stuff comes in after the service or product is on the market. Be ready and willing to change paths, incorporate new ideas, change your target market, adjust your product/service for better market fit.
Do NOT resist what the market is telling you, or you will fail. We must be willing to listen, take the feedback as a gift and continue moving forward. Thinking that I had all of the answers and not quickly releasing this belief would not have been a recipe for my company’s success since the launch of my company. I am solving a real problem, but the way I am solving it looks different and feels different from what I initially thought it would be.
Overcoming the hurdle by being flexible and receptive to embracing the feedback has been the most valuable shift I have made on my entrepreneurial journey.
Nikhil Arun
Developing testing and vaccination products for governments, corporations, and communities in need during a pandemic was the hardest challenge we’ve faced. We were able to accomplish this by spending a lot of time understanding our customers and the intricacies of the issues in the pandemic to understand exactly what would help our customers.
When you do that, you recognize patterns and build solutions that address many problems at one. Doing this, we were able to deliver the first at-home saliva test, a way for organizations to launch their own tests, and a simple way for organizations to track and report vaccinations.
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How 20 entrepreneurs in the United States Adapted To Changing Market Conditions During The Pandemic
The Covid-19 outbreak wreaked havoc on the commercial sector, forcing several enterprises to close or file for bankruptcy. Thankfully, some people made it out alive and even stronger. Many business owners quickly adapted to the pandemic situation by converting to a digital office. Some pivot only to improve the corporate culture and flexible working paradigm, [...]
The post How 20 entrepreneurs in the United States Adapted To Changing Market Conditions During The Pandemic first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Jed Morley
]]>How 20 entrepreneurs in the United States Adapted To Changing Market Conditions During The Pandemic
The Covid-19 outbreak wreaked havoc on the commercial sector, forcing several enterprises to close or file for bankruptcy. Thankfully, some people made it out alive and even stronger. Many business owners quickly adapted to the pandemic situation by converting to a digital office. Some pivot only to improve the corporate culture and flexible working paradigm, while others offer any new product line.
In this series of interviews, we spoke with 20 business owners and leaders in the United States to see how the epidemic prompted them to pivot and adapt to new market conditions.
INTERVIEW HOST
The host of this interview was Jed Morley. Jed Morley is the CEO of a leading payment processing service provider called PlatPay.
Table of Contents
The question we asked:
The pandemic encouraged many businesses to pivot and adapt to changing market conditions. How did you adapt? Did you introduce additional product lines or services?
Paul Moody
Logan Mallory
The biggest challenge we faced was ensuring that we retained employees during times of change and uncertainty.
The way that we did this was by doubling down on the employee experience and employee engagement. With the Great Resignation looming, ensuring employees are happy and engaged is the secret to helping a business thrive by keeping turnover rates low and morale high.
A company’s performance overall can be tied back to one factor – and that’s employee engagement, for better or for worse. Increased employee engagement leads to happier employees, which in turn leads to a better customer experience, which means that we have happier customers as well, and happy customers remain loyal and become long-term clients.
Mark Pierce
The biggest challenge we faced was constantly evolving market conditions. We pivoted to adapt to the changing market conditions by re-focusing our efforts on services geared towards entrepreneurs.
We’ve seen an increase in entrepreneurship driven by the Great Resignation, so we’re more actively promoting our business formation services, and added a more robust offering geared towards entrepreneurs.
Tom Schaefer
I would say the greatest unexpected challenge is exactly that: dealing with the unexpected. In business, you can very easily fall into a mode of doing business as usual, where you expect the jobs and orders to come in just as they always have.
You get comfortable to the point that you can’t imagine the work not being there. It seems like a safe assumption until something like COVID comes along to disrupt that. The warning to new entrepreneurs would be to avoid being one-dimensional. Be able to work in multiple business sectors and keep a good variety of companies or products that you do business with.
If a certain area or sector has a lull or even completely disappears, have a contingency plan where you can swing your efforts into other areas.
Thomas Samuels
As a full-service trade show and exhibition company, we provide exhibit rentals and management services to a large number of clients all over the country. When the pandemic began, we had to quickly adapt to protect our clients, their customers, and their livelihoods by offering high-quality personal protective equipment (PPE) for our display booths and demo stations.
With venues having to adjust their events and safety precautions—sometimes without much notice—it was also important for us to ensure fast turnaround times for these new products in small and large quantities alike. We began to offer protective additions such as sanitizing stations, sneeze guards, and clear barriers, all of which help to keep our clients (and their employees) safe. Additionally, we began to print custom face masks and floor decals, incorporating our clients’ logos and branding into their public health protocols.
To account for the uptick in open air trade shows, we began to offer new outdoor curbside signs and flags, hanging banners, and weather-resistant tents, ensuring that our clients’ outdoor exhibits are just as impressive as their indoor booths. These new signs, displays, and safety products encourage social distance and physical separation, keeping customers protected and ensuring that trade shows can continue safely.
Brian Nagele
One of the most challenging tasks I faced as an upcoming digital marketer was staying relevant. Technology has infiltrated nearly every industry, and it’s accelerated the fluidity of customer behavior.
Print ads worked well for specific demographics, but they were no longer a leading tactic for marketers by the 2020s. Being an entrepreneur pushes you to be creative and always think one step ahead of your competitors.
Ultimately, my team spent countless hours not only strategizing for existing marketing clients but looking for new ways to keep scouting prospects for our startups in such a face-paced landscape.
That dry spell taught me that if I wanted to expand my client base, I’d have to meet people at their level and develop the agility to maintain their attention. Through humanized marketing – curating a social media presence and engaging within niche consumer groups – I was able to scale multiple businesses to multi-figure brands that sold for their value. If you’re looking to be a successful marketer, you have to run at the pace of your audience (or faster).
Stephen Light
A mission statement is why you start a business in the first place and is what keeps you energized and passionate. What I didn’t expect was how easily the myriad of moving parts involved in starting and running a business can get in the way of that initial spark, and how much work goes into continually recommitting and reminding yourself of why you began.
Entrepreneurs wear a million different hats and make a thousand decisions a day, and it can really bog you down. Continually recommitting to your mission is difficult but necessary, and entirely worth it. Schedule a specific time with your team to regularly reassess your mission statement and to take stock of anything that doesn’t align.
Scott Spivack
For instance, we’ve added an ‘Accessibility Adjustments’ feature on our website that adjusts the interface as per the user preferences. As a medical financing company, we get customers facing all kinds of health problems and physical disabilities.
With this feature, we were able to smoothen their experience. Here’s how it works: If a particular user selects ‘Seizure Safe Profile’, our website automatically eliminates flashes and reduces color. Similarly, if someone selects ‘Cognitive Disability Profile’, our website assists with reading and focusing. This has helped us earn the trust of users and build loyalty during the challenging times of the pandemic.
Marliis Reinkort
The greatest challenge that has faced my business so far, was definitely Covid-19, and as we know now, changed the world for everyone. I’m the CEO of Code Galaxy, which offers online coding courses to kids of all ages.
We teach kids coding, design and other technology subjects and skills in a virtual classroom. However, before the pandemic started in March 2020, we were a fully in-person coding school, about to open up a new location in Austin, Texas. Once the pandemic started, we were forced to close our in-person locations for an unknown amount of time, so we decided to make a pivot and transfer our business from in person to fully online.
Since our curriculum was already online and we had a good amount of courses available for kids, the transition ended up being easier than we initially expected. We had to create online scheduling systems, find a virtual classroom platform to run the classes, retrain our teachers and completely change our marketing strategy.
It was definitely a challenge but now that we have fully made the switch, we are actually very grateful that we were forced to pivot the business model, since now we get to work with students all over the world as well as with schools across the U.S. to provide their coding electives and after school programs. It’s a more accessible, flexible and financially viable business model.
Learning from this experience, what I would like to warn all entrepreneurs about is that never get too comfortable with your current business model and always look for new trends and options to diversify your business. And once the change has to be made, in a situation like the pandemic was, even if you’re not ready, be open-minded and try to find solutions that can turn around your business quickly. Don’t wait and just start testing and experimenting to find out what works. The more you try, the higher your chances of success.
Ryan Reed
CHALLENGE 1
The home improvement sector is currently experiencing the most severe labor shortage in its history. Failure to break the labor code will stifle growth, profit, and cash flow. Some businesses can perish due to their incapacity to deal with the issue.
The second option is to “survive” rather than “thrive,” with an insufficient profit to compensate for the risk and work necessary to produce a little net pre-tax profit. As a result, many businesses are sacrificing potential earnings to develop and strengthen their businesses while also providing stability for themselves and their families.
CHALLENGE 2
Advertising, the web, exhibitions, events, and self-developed leads, such as canvassing, have all seen an increase in lead development costs. This, along with backlog and cash flow issues, reduces profitability and restricts expansion.
It’s vital to have a well-thought-out strategy for dealing with these challenges. It also needs to be consistent with a plan to make your company stable and capable of weathering unanticipated changes, which can come from a variety of sources: a lack of financing, changes in the current economy, high turnover, the cost or effectiveness of the lead generation sources you use, and so on.
CHALLENGE 3
The expense of acquiring, training, and sustaining employees rises for small businesses. The ease of finding a job due to Great Resignation, especially for persons with mediocre talents or bad experience, results in high turnover, borderline mediocrity, and increased personnel expenditures.
These three challenges can become quicksand for small, closely-held businesses. This nation’s expanding economy, consumer confidence, and disposable income produce a two-edged sword: the sparkle of higher revenue clouds judgment and lessens the caution required in concerns such as staffing shortages, mis-hires, and mishandled staff.
OVERCOMING CHALLENGE 1
To overcome challenge 1, you need to train your labor. You need a highly efficient training mechanism to train your workforce effectively. You may have to cut back on potential profit in order to retain your skilled workforce as it will be beneficial for you in long run.
OVERCOMING CHALLENGE 2
As the advertising cost has skyrocketed, you need to set aside a specific budget that should be solely used for marketing purposes. I know this will cut down significant portions of the profit but it will effectively generate many leads for your business and it’s a necessity for eventual growth and expansion of your business.
OVERCOMING CHALLENGE 3
Every business is suffering from a wave of great resignation. Coupled with challenge 1 you need to effectively manage your employees or it will put an end to your business. To tackle this provide your employees with good remuneration packages. Provide them with effective perks and benefits that are actually beneficial and provide value to your employees.
Sherrie High
One of the challenges about running a business is that you need to expect the unexpected! There will be unexpected expenses that you did not plan on for your business, slow periods where you may not get as much business as you thought you would, payment delays even supply increases.
Whatever it may be make sure you have the financial resources to keep your business afloat, a good budget plan which includes extra capital for these unexpected events.
Carolyn Barbarite
In business nothing ever goes exactly the way you had planned and as entrepreneurs you must be open-minded to change.
The most unexpected challenge that I faced with Javamelts Flavored Sugar is having to completely rebrand, reformulate and reintroduce Javamelts to the marketplace as a direct result of losing not only one manufacturing facility (co-packer) but the second one we had found.
This challenge, by far, was my most difficult because my original product was very labor-intensive to manufacture. I had to figure out a way, as fast as possible, to create a seamless, more efficient, better-for-you and packaged more conveniently product all at once. The trick for me was to PIVOT and not fight the situation. It was very important that I evaluate all of the pros and cons and go down the path of least resistance.
I simplified the ingredients, packaging and formulation to allow Javamelts to stay in the game. My advice to anyone who is faced with a tremendous problem or hurdle is not to resist the change that is inevitable. Gather the information, consult with a team of experts in that field as best as possible, ask for help and then make a sound, informative decision.
Most often than not the problem that you are having is meant for you so that you can learn so don’t be afraid to switch gears and prevail. The problems I had led me to creating better products, packaging and process overall.
Shira Truitt
Work/Life balance was my greatest, unexpected challenge with my business. After the newness of business wore off, no one wanted to hear about the business as much as I wanted to talk about it.
Moreover, I was spending extraordinary time working, but I was making extraordinary progress– and it was great! I was enjoying myself, my work, and my accomplishments.
I didn’t miss any of the big things, but my quality of life was diminished by the amount of work I was doing–even though I enjoyed it. I managed to overcome that by determining what, specifically, I would do if my business went as planned so that time and resources were not an issue. Then, I selected all the ideas that did not have a financial basis and that did not serve a dual purpose of helping me AND helping my business.
In that way, no change would be financially incentivized. Additionally, the changes that I choose to make would only impact me–not the business. I worked to implement those ideas by scheduling everything that was important to me and committed to keeping that schedule. That made time for things like a more meaningful prayer life, journaling, and exercise. I scheduled one night a month were work ends no later than 5:00 p.m. and I must do something I enjoy.
That lead to crafting, binge watching tv, and planning new opportunities. Additionally, I took classes at the local community college on everything from cooking to jewelry making and, even if I weren’t successful, I’d had a positive experience and raised the quality of my life for just those few hours.
That lead to meeting people with similar interests but from a different walk in life. I scheduled a monthly review of my activities so that I am intentional about maintaining this balance. The regimented nature of this decision took some time to get used to, but it has allowed me to be relevant in my community, meaningful time to reflect, a healthy lifestyle, and time to do the things I enjoy while my business continues to grow. As an entrepreneur, I could not ask for more.
Steve Silberberg
Marketing is a loathsome, never-ending Sisyphian task that not only drains my company’s finances at an unprecedented rate, but also drains my spirit and the amount of time I can devote to any and all other aspects of running my business.
It forces me to permanently assume the role of a repugnant, self-aggrandizing, narcissistic shyster in a desperate attempt at getting the fleeting attention of prospective clients through a dense fog of sales messages incessantly generated by unimaginably wealthy, over-capitalized business interests.
Devin Schumacher
The pandemic changes globally brought a new reality for the business and its own set of challenges. Pivoting during the pandemic is not just a concept for me but a reality we live with in the new normal of businesses.
Since our service is in digital marketing and transformation, I pivoted in this pandemic by onboarding new types of clients. I began developing campaigns for traditional companies that are new to digital marketing and diversifying our client base.
Alexa Allamano
Before the pandemic my answer would have been split between overcoming a store burglary and partnering with a flash-sale website that was a flop and left me with thousands of pieces of unsold inventory. However, the pandemic caused unexpected disruptions to my main sales channels – in-store retail, wholesale partnerships, and pop-up events.
My online sales had been the smallest growth area since establishing a storefront in 2014, but everything shifted to DTC during 2020. I shuttered my previous storefront and ended an unpleasant relationship with the lessor during covid lockdown, re-establishing in a new tiny storefront later that year.
Due to the size limit of the new space, I innovated Scan to Shop window shopping by merchandising my window display to be shoppable 24/7 with QR codes. Now my storefront drives business online and I am in-store by appointment (I also teach other store owners how to implement Scan to Shop).
Overcoming the disruption of a global pandemic requires flexibility, creative problem solving, and making hard choices on what best aligns with your business goals and values. Making those tough decisions centered around my ethics led my business to prosper in a way I couldn’t imagine before the pandemic. I gave up my dream store and created my dream life.
Kathleen Ahmmed
Speaking from personal experience, one of the biggest challenges that I faced at the start was overcoming the need to hire fast in order to fill empty positions in my business operations. This is because when you are first launching a business it can often feel like you are in a race with yourself to get things done and solve problems quickly.
However, when it comes to recruitment, this is a process that usually requires a lot of time and patience, because one wrong hire can often damage the reputation of your company by having a negative impact on employee morale, productivity, and collaboration, which ultimately leads to a toxic work culture.
And in my case, I was only able to see the effects of my hiring decisions much later in the startup process, as it was apparent that I failed to take into account other important factors like soft skills and cultural fit, with some of them either not meshing well with others, some lacking the necessary skills needed to communicate effectively with customers and others failing to collaborate with their team members in the field.
As such, I learned the importance of taking your time to do your due diligence and always hiring for intelligence, skills, and cultural fit first, because while it is easy to recruit people who are “good enough”, they can often end up being “detrimental” to your business progress down the road.
Ouriel Lemmel
The biggest challenge I faced when I started was that there was no model for my particular business. It was a new idea, and no one had really tried anything like an app to connect drivers with lawyers to help fight traffic tickets. So I did my research. I studied my market well and ensured my product is something people want and need.
Don’t stay in your own bubble. My partner is a very good check on that as we come from different backgrounds. I’m also fortunate to have great mentors, advisors, and friends that are super helpful. Most successful entrepreneurs I know didn’t wake up one morning and decide to become one, they’ve always had an entrepreneurial mindset. If you have a business idea or project, don’t be shy—try it.
Sam Cohen
The greatest, unexpected challenge was staying focused on business development. Sometimes the distractions are too heavy to resist. So I had to learn to manage my time properly. I will share how I did it and you can do the same too.
The solution is to reserve some time in your calendar for business development, and don’t let anything disturb you during those times. Also, you should try not to get too attached to any project because you will have to let go of all of them eventually.
Glen Bhimani
Marketing was my greatest initial and unexpected challenge.
Ultimately, it came down to an assumption I made. After spending years in the security industry as a guard, I realized most guards don’t care about the clients because they aren’t being taken care of by their employers.
That was when I started BPS Security. My company’s purpose is to provide a better security option at a lower price, so I developed an operations system that allows us to provide highly qualified guards who are well-paid so that they put their best effort into taking care of the customer. My assumption was that clients would find me because I had a website and was offering a better service at a lower price. That was a big mistake.
Because of that assumption, we spent several years without any clients at all: it’s a miracle we’re still standing. But when I finally realized we needed to work on our marketing and sales to actively let people know we are here, the business exploded! Even though it wasn’t all at once, it still exploded and today we’re one of the fastest growing security firms in the United States because of it.
I would love for new entrepreneurs to avoid my mistake: don’t assume people will come to you just because you’ve started your business. You need to find ways to actively attract clients.
Also, allow time for your marketing to kick in and begin working.
Our sales improved our clients drastically, but I had a business partner who would constantly argue for the first month that our marketing needed to be cut because it wasn’t bringing in new clients. I reminded him of exactly what I would tell new entrepreneurs: marketing isn’t a magic pill that works overnight.
Most of the time it doesn’t even begin to show serious results after two to four weeks. But marketing is a crucial part of building out your company’s reputation and improving your client base, and needs to be an essential part of your company at all times! Especially during difficult times.
These are a few of the very important things I learned and implemented that helped me overcome my marketing challenges:
Continue adjusting
The market is constantly changing, so you have to continually adjust as you go. One marketing campaign might not work super well, but another one might be incredibly effective. So keep trying different things and give them a few weeks to work before you cut them.
One of the ways we’ve developed such strong marketing is that we’ve continually revamped what we’re doing. Our website has changed multiple times in the last two years, and it has resulted in much higher leads and client acquisition every time we’ve changed it. So continually adjust your marketing and pursue what seems to work best after you’ve given it a few weeks to work.
Don’t expect immediate results
I know I mentioned this already, but understanding this is crucial. There are going to be marketing companies that tell you they can bring in hundreds of leads a month right from the start. They are frauds. Not because they can’t get leads, but because their leads are bad leads.
Good marketing requires time and effort, and as one of my mentors says, “great marketing has exponential growth.” Which means you might not see much right now, but it will grow and expand on itself if you keep at it diligently. Ours did, and now we’re getting regular news features and sometimes have more client requests than we have capacity to take on.
Be consistent
Marketing is a huge part of your reputation, so you need to make sure you have the same reputation everywhere. Your brand needs to be consistent, from your brochures, to your social media, to your website, to even how you answer the phone!
Building a consistent feel across every aspect of your company is a great way to work on your marketing, because it creates a more solid relationship between the company and the clients. If you look at your marketing assets and realize that your facebook page is completely different from your website, that’s a sign your marketing isn’t consistent and that your potential clients may not even know they’re looking at the same company.
Get feedback
Finally, getting feedback is one of the most important parts of marketing. Speak with your current clients to find out why they work with you and build that into your marketing. If you compete in the market on service or price alone, you’ll run yourself into the ground and won’t be able to compete with bigger companies. Find out what makes you unique and why your clients like working with you, then build your marketing on that feedback. When we began to do this, our marketing took a huge turn and began to show serious results.
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The post How 20 entrepreneurs in the United States Adapted To Changing Market Conditions During The Pandemic first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Jed Morley
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20 Entrepreneurs From Europe & North America Interviewed On The Challenges They Encountered During The Pandemic
As a result of the outbreak, many businesses were forced to pivot and adjust to changing market conditions. Some were able to make the necessary adjustments, while others were forced to shut down. We spoke with 20 business owners and leaders to learn how they made changes to their companies and all the challenges they [...]
The post 20 Entrepreneurs From Europe & North America Interviewed On The Challenges They Encountered During The Pandemic first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Jerome Knyszewski
]]>20 Entrepreneurs From Europe & North America Interviewed On The Challenges They Encountered During The Pandemic
As a result of the outbreak, many businesses were forced to pivot and adjust to changing market conditions. Some were able to make the necessary adjustments, while others were forced to shut down. We spoke with 20 business owners and leaders to learn how they made changes to their companies and all the challenges they encountered during the pandemic.
We’ll also go over some strategies you can use to overcome any obstacles that come your way.
INTERVIEW HOST
Hello, my name is Jerome Knyszewski, I’ll be the host of your interview today. I am the CEO of HeavyShift. My specialties are online reputation marketing and SEO. Looking forward to reading your insightful answers and publishing your featured interview.
Table of Contents
The question we asked:
What is the greatest, unexpected challenge you faced with your business, that you’d like to warn new entrepreneurs about? Please share your advice on how to overcome it.?
David Ciccarelli
You’re going to hear no a lot. “But that’s not unexpected.” Sure, you probably expect to hear no. But you likely aren’t expecting to hear no quite as often as it actually happens, and it can be a devastating blow to morale to new entrepreneurs after hearing it over and over and over (and over) again.
Here you are, a new entrepreneur with a fantastic new idea or improved way to do something, and you just know it’s going to be revolutionary—or, at the very least, successful enough to become a profitable business. You’ve done your research, you’re ready to pitch to investors, you’re ready to find business opportunities and partners, and you’re ready to take on the world, bolstered by hope and excitement.
And then the NOs start rolling in. “It’s not a good time.” “We don’t typically take on projects like this.” “This isn’t a good fit.” “You just don’t have the data to back this up.” “Do you really think this will work?” “Is there even a market for this?” These statements keep piling up, most often accompanied by a resounding “no.”
Be ready for this. Be ready to hear no 50 times for every yes. And, perhaps most importantly, don’t take no for an answer so readily. As a young, green entrepreneur, hearing “no” can be disheartening and is often easily accepted, because who are you to be questioning established business folks on their “no”?
Sometimes, no means no and the door is closed, but in business, “no” can actually mean “not right now” or “there’s no room in the budget this year.” Hearing “no” can actually be an invitation to get creative and find ways that your proposition will be of benefit to your intended business partner or investor without breaking the bank or creating additional work on their end.
Rejection can also be an opportunity for you to re-evaluate your position and the information you’re putting forth. Are you missing something? Does something need to change in order to better resonate with your intended audience? Analyzing the potential shortcomings in your planning will help you to better approach it next time.
Better yet, don’t be afraid to ask for genuine and transparent feedback from those who said “no” in the first place. Ask for clarity and an explanation as to what exactly made them reject your proposal so you can take that away, fix it (if possible), and come back stronger. In short, seek ways to turn “no” into “yes” and don’t accept defeat so easily.
Samantha Odo
I am Samantha Odo, a licensed real estate expert at Precondo. We take pride in adhering to high-quality journalistic ethical guidelines, and we retain journalistic integrity to assist in making the best decision per necessities.
With the pandemic and the following restrictions, entrepreneurs and business owners faced several challenges. I, as a realtor, was one among many others who stuck at home, not able to mark my presence in the industry. As a realtor, it was challenging for me to meet both sellers & buyers.
However, technologies stepped in as a big help. Meeting my clients online and giving them a virtual tour of properties they are interested in was convenient for me. It resolved many problems I was facing.
Loren Howard
When I first started as an entrepreneur I did not understand the importance of marketing your business. You can do everything ‘technically’ but without the proper marketing and sales funnel in place your business will never take off. Invest time and money upfront into marketing your business for a successful launch!
Alex Gastle
As entrepreneurs we are excited about our business and what it can do for paying customers. This excitement and the potential we see is often what drives us in the early days to work harder and persevere through the tough times getting started.
In my experience, the side effect of this excitement is that entrepreneurs struggle to remove themselves from their own excitement and view their business from their eyes of their target customer or user persona. Tech entrepreneurs love to focus on the fancy features of their new app in everything they do without having a crystal clear understanding of the problem their product solves and how their target users are solving that problem now, without their new app.
This doesn’t mean researching your competitors, that’s different because you’re all trying to solve the problem in a new way. Speak with as many people as you can to discover what they are using now to solve the problem and then apply that back to your own business.
Your perspective will change on things like what features are most important, often the features that an entrepreneur is most excited about aren’t the features that target users will gravitate to. If you can get a handle on this, your product development time, sales and marketing will all become much easier.
Adam Millman
As an entrepreneur, being able to be nimble is key. You quickly learn that you can’t get too attached to certain ideas, and being able to pivot accordingly is an incredible strength for any business.
More often than not, the first iteration of any product/business may not be the best — it takes countless versions, tests, and ideas to get to the end product. Down the line, you realize how necessary every step was in order to get to your final product/business.
My advice on how to pivot with the most ease is to build a strong team. A cohesive team that compliments each other’s strengths is a perfect recipe for a nimble, quick-thinking business. You need several voices trained onto one razor-sharp vision, bringing perspective and ideas to the table without clouding the end goal.
Lisa Richards
Constant fatigue was perhaps the most unexpected challenge I encountered when starting my business. The crazy hours, the intense work involved, and the pressure to make sure the business succeeded really took a toll on me, physically, emotionally, and mentally.
However, as the business grew, I was able to find a pace that allowed me to keep the business thriving while still managing to protect my wellbeing. I also learnt how to delegate more effectively, which enabled me to rest more, and to focus on the areas in my business where I could make the biggest impact.
Lillian Brummet
I’m not sure how far you want the story to go back but here is a brief overview of my life: My mom married 5 times; 2 of those were abusive… and so I was on my own at 13.5 years old. My 2 older brothers were on their own before I was, both left at 16.
I supported myself, paid rent, worked hard labour jobs to get by and partied hard – often sheltering young people who needed to get away from their home life, giving them a place to stay until they figured things out.
At 20, I put myself through a university level of grade 12, meaning I took the extra hard, more advanced courses in math, biology and science, etc. so that I could qualify for university. At the time I was thinking of becoming a biologist. Met and married my husband Dave around this same time, and started a business providing home maintenance services for upper-class clients.
Ran that successfully for 6 years before being in the middle of a 3-car pileup that had me in full-time physio (5 days week, 4-5 hours per day) for over a year. I had to close my business – and fell into chronic depression, something I struggled with most of my life, and developed an anxiety disorder (which I struggle with today). At that point I changed directions – began studying the world of writing as a profession, and haven’t looked back yet.
I chose this career because I needed to feel like my life had value, that I was leaving a positive legacy and using every moment I was given to the best of my ability. I entered this field in 1999 as a freelance writer, later becoming a staff writer, columnist and assignment writer.
My greatest adversity early on in the career was having the confidence that my voice had value in the clammer that already existed. I overcame this by ensuring what I wrote was unique – researching recent writings about the topic to find out what was missing, what wasn’t addressed, what I did or did not like about the published materials, and then I would find an angle that I could write about filling a negative gap.
Both my parents (mom & step dad) committed suicide in 2009, forcing us to reconsider the direction of our lives and reminding us of the tragedy in waiting for a tomorrow that may never happen. Instead of buying a home in the big city, we moved to a smaller city about 3 hours drive from our home town.
Since then I have worn many hats; at one time I wrote book reviews professionally; donating over 700 books to our local literacy organization because of this task. I also wrote product reviews professionally, and still offer this service on our blog.
I ran a popular talk radio show for about 7 years or so; it ran 3 x per week, 1 hour per episode, called Conscious Discussions Talk Radio. Around this same time period I also ran the Author’s Read podcast for a few years. About mid-point in our career we had another crisis.
Dave had been working shift work while we both worked ourselves thin refurbishing our first home and running the business. Both of us were exhausted, diminished by the weight of heavy grief after the suicide of my parents and the cancer diagnosis of his biological father (the last of the parents).
The stress was beginning to affect our marriage. We all decided, the dad included, to move to our dream location before it was too late. Life is just too short to wait for tomorrow to live your joy.
So after a year of looking at properties we sold everything, packed up, bought a house (another fixer upper), and began our new lives here as of 2012. This also meant revamping the business so that it better represented our current projects, including a few book updates or publishing new editions. That was 10 years ago.
Since moving to our dream location (in the Kootenay Region of BC, Canada), and caregiving for the dad who passed 4-5 years ago; we have been methodically converting the abused lot over to the little park it has become – and in doing so have gained certification with bee, pollinator and wildlife organizations. Our home, too, has become energy efficient via the many upgrades we have done.
Our business donates 10% of the profits to wildlife, bee and pollinator, pet rescue and seed saving organizations. Our business includes Dave’s music studio, percussion accessory products and services, as well as numerous award-winning non-fiction books and 2 popular blogs.
In 2020 we relaunched the business with a new look, logo, colours, design, new bio’s and profiles and updated everything from social networking sites to our main website. We also launched Dave’s Drum It With Brummet blog. We realized we needed to learn better skills to deal with changing business needs.
Starting in 2020 I began taking a number of online courses to better understand SEO, Keyword Management, E-commerce and online advertising (Facebook & Amazon Ads).
In ’21 we released 2 books and due to all of the marketing and other efforts I am proud to say that we appeared in the media more than 125 times that year and our main blog, Brummet’s Conscious Blog, has had a huge increase of visits as of late.
In December (a 31-day month) we saw #143,000 visits, in January (also a 31-day month) this increased to #346,788, and so far in the past 9 days of February, we saw #134,547 visits. The blog has helped us solidify long term networking relationships and discover new ones, because of kinds of submissions and interviews that we accept.
For instance, just last month I put in a few weeks of work following up with the 940 connections we made last year. For those we had a positive interaction with, our message simply stated our gratitude and interest in continuing to network and offered a few ways we might be able to support feature them on the blog. For those who did not reply, we were able to reach out again with a slightly different approach.
I find I get about an 8% additional return on investment using last year’s work. Four years after the dad’s passing we are finally in a place where we can face the emotional journey of publishing his work. We are currently working on what we hope to be a trilogy, celebrating Dave’s late-father’s lifetime collection of poetry, short stories, family memoirs and photos.
I speculate that the first 2 books will be published late-spring ’22. This is our way of honouring his dad, and doing our part for future generations of this family. Bio: Lillian and her husband Dave are the team behind Brummet Media Group, high-fiving cheerfully as they pass each other on the way from checking off one item or other from their long to-do list.
Their business includes Dave’s music studio and percussion accessory products and graphic design work as well as numerous award-winning non-fiction books and 2 popular blogs. Find them online here: https://linktr.ee/LillianBrummet
Danny Neeson
What I’ve learned through each entrepreneurial venture is that the biggest challenge can oftentimes be yourself. When you face obstacles or challenges, your determination and work ethic are what will either make or break you. Business owners need to dig deep and face the battles within themselves to transcend beyond their self-made limitations and see the potential that others might miss.
Confidence isn’t always a natural thing; it takes strength and courage to show up every day and believe in what others won’t. Know what you bring to the table every day!
Ravi Davda
“I was young when I left my corporate job to start my first business. I was earning a great salary in a banking role, and I left it to start with nothing. If there’s one challenge entrepreneurs should know about, it’s getting through those first months or even years without taking a proper salary.
Even if/when you do make money, it’s likely that you’ll be reinvesting some, if not all, of it back into your business. This is tough, especially for people who have never been there or have always had a stable salary. It takes a lot of sleepless nights and a lot of determination. Don’t underestimate this if you’re starting a new business.”
Alessio Lorusso
My name is Alessio Lorusso (Forbes 30 Under 30) and I am the founder and CEO of Roboze (roboze.com), the most accurate 3D printing technology in the world for high-performance super polymers. Roboze is a startup based in Houston, TX, and Italy.
As an entrepreneur who has built a successful company starting in a region of the world where there are few investors (Southern Italy), attracting initial outside investors was the most unexpected challenge, and I can share some lessons learned.
Looking back, I realize that one of the reasons for my success was because I had confidence in myself and the strengths of my innovation which I built when I was 17 years old, by developing the world’s first 3D printer without belts.
This innovation, de facto eliminated the issues linked to the rubber belts regularly used in desktop 3D printers: distortion, wear, inaccurate repeatability, and the need for frequent calibrations. It was thanks to this invention that I then founded Roboze, which now employs over 100 employees, has facilities in Italy, Texas, and Germany, and has attracted numerous investors and key strategic partners.
For startups like mine that are not located in the more traditional hubs, it is a greater challenge, and it often takes longer to attract initial investors, than for startups located in Silicon Valley, Israel, or the UK. That is why, in order to start growing relying just on initial funds from my savings, I needed to outline a growth path that had very little margin for error. This can be accomplished by learning in-depth about the market you are in, having a clear vision of your goals and what it takes to get there.
Typically, especially in early stages, there are fewer people who support you, believe in you, and help you when you want to create a new innovative company with the intention to disrupt a segment of the market. So, you must be focused enough to know when to take risks, believe in yourself, have the courage to do things differently, and not be afraid of failure.
Failure must always be taken into account, it’s part of doing business. However, staying focused and having a direction that you pursue consistently (avoid the “shiny ball syndrome” at all cost) without ever losing motivation despite obstacles will allow you to grow sufficiently to become attractive to investors, wherever they may be.
Humza Khan
All of us, and especially business leaders find discomfort in uncertainty. Because of the pandemic, supply chain struggles, and labor shortages, uncertainty is more pronounced today.
Those unknowns lead to short-term myopia. Many people shy away from long-term planning in favor of immediate concerns. Uncertainty drives business owners and executives to hunker down, and customers to stop spending.
While this might feel right, failure to strategically plan and stay focused 10, 5 or even 3 years into the future can end up eroding tremendous value. The world is simply not going to end. Plan well. Be agile. Yet don’t lose sight of the milestones and goals you intelligently set in the first place.
Taylor Ryan
A risk management plan! When you run a business, be prepared for more significant losses than you initially anticipate so that the company can survive in the event of a crisis.
This was certainly one of the hardest parts of starting and running my own business. Life is full of surprises, especially in business. There’s almost certainly going to be a few expenses that you did not anticipate – tax changes, changes in the financial market, new competitors, a global pandemic.
Small businesses often generate relatively low income. Therefore, even small financial turbulences can lead to their complete collapse. It’s crucial to factor risk management into your financial plan: Be prepared for the worst, and a crisis will cost you much less. This is the best advice I can give anyone who is planning to start a business.
Ellenor McIntosh
One of the greatest challenges I’ve had to learn is effective time management. More often than not, new entrepreneurs can find all their time being consumed by the new business venture they’re pursuing. You work tirelessly to make sure this becomes a success, that you forget about everything else.
All your energy and time go into your business that can ultimately end up working against you. Pouring all of your energy into work, you forget to take time for yourself, and you realise that other important aspects of your life will eventually take the backseat.
Over the years, I have come to appreciate that less can be more, and apply this to certain aspects of my business. Overworking yourself is not adding benefit to your business’ success, but rather you’ll find yourself feeling stressed and overwrought. Learning how and when to ‘switch off’ has been such an indispensable lesson and is something I have come a appreciate more and more as my business continues to grow. Switching off can mean different things for everyone.
For me, that means taking time away from work to do a completely unrelated activity. Whether that was going out with friends, starting up a new hobby or just taking time to myself to decompress at home – carving out the time to focus on just you are something I firmly encourage all entrepreneurs to do.
I find by doing this, it can significantly affect your mental and physical wellbeing for the better. When you’re in a good mental space it reflects in the work you do. You are taking the time to ensure that you are in the best shape possible to successfully run your new business venture. Some of the methods I’ve found that has greatly helped me overcome this has been setting feasible deadlines with certain tasks and projects, and effective time allotment on tasks set for myself and others under my management.
I realised that while setting deadlines is a great start in managing my time more effectively, I also had to learn to discipline myself in sticking to them. It can be so easy to find yourself doing a little extra on that one project or working a little later than the time you set for yourself, but once you fall into the habit of constantly working overtime, it can be extremely difficult to come out of.
This is why it’s so important to implement these ‘guidelines’ for yourself near the beginning and act in accordance with them. Once you learn how to stick to the guidelines you’ve set, whether it’s to do with time management or something else you struggle with, you’ll notice how much smoother and more efficiently your business venture operates. Ellenors Bio: Just to introduce her, Ellenor McIntosh, is one of the few young, black female entrepreneurs in the UK, and is paving the way for others to follow.
Having graduated from the University of Bedfordshire with a Bachelor of Science (BSc), Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Elle has used her science background to create the formula for her innovative creation – Twipes. Twipes is the world’s first truly flushable and biodegradable wet wipe, that’s 100% plastic-free! When flushed, Twipes are completely dispersed in just 3 hours, and will fully biodegrade within 7 days. Co-founded with her long-time college friend, Al Borz, they boldly set out to start their own business.
And after 5 years of much research and development, their resilience paid off with the success of Twipes. Elle has been the recipient of multiple prestigious awards, namely the Princess Diana Award in 2017, awarded the Forbes 30 under 30 in 2020. She has even been recognised by the Mayor of London and featured in Time-out Magazine in 2021 for her (and her co-founder’s) innovative product. She is not only making strides in the entrepreneurial world as a successful young, black woman but also in the world of single-use items, with her cutting edge and ingenious creation of Twipes!
Cliff Auerswald
My name is Cliff Auerswald, President at All Reverse Mortgage, a top-rated financing and mortgage company.
The greatest challenge new business owners are going to face is when they hit the bottom of the J-Curve. At that point, business owners find out that most of their initial assumptions about their product and market are wrong, so they don’t see much return for their effort. And then the money and morale start to dry up.
In order to escape the bottom of the J-curve to enter the periods of steep growth and traction, new business owners need to be open to changing their ideas. They might need to change their ideas about the product, market, or strategy (sometimes, all three) in order to keep the company alive.
Rachel McMichael
When first starting out and trying to build an audience, it’s easy to believe that any visibility means your business is doing well, when getting in front of the right audience (those who need your product, program, or service the most) is actually the true goal.
So many beginner entrepreneurs try to create content that attracts the most people (quantity), rather than creating content that attracts their ideal customer (quality). But a popular business does not necessarily equate to a profitable business. A larger group of followers might get your business plenty of “likes”, but a group of qualified ideal customers is what will give you the sales and conversion you’re looking for.
Christiaan Huynen
Shift in people’s buying habits. The next level of online shopping has taken over the ecommerce industry. More engrossing digital experience is now the trend in selling.
Consumers are shifting into an “experience economy” wherein they want not only the item itself but also the act of the digital purchase. Products are big because of their curated content and with the influence of social media, the fear of missing out is fostered in the e-commerce business.
This trend changed the way our company designs logos, websites, brand identity and many more. An appealing graphic design is not enough to increase lead generation nowadays.
Alexej Pikovsky
“The greatest and unexpected challenge was the lack of paid traffic opportunities on platforms such as Google, Facebook, and Tiktok. Our initial business idea was to build a CBD marketplace with a diverse growth channel mix including pay per click.
Not having the ability to pass through Google and Facebook algorithms was an unexpected challenge and prevented us from growing as fast as we wanted to. The way we overcame it was by doing a lot of search engine optimization and influencer marketing. We have invested a lot into content and technical optimization, as well as building up a database of influencers.
In addition to that, we scaled up revenue from adding a services business providing value add to brands on our marketplace, as well as acquiring non-CBD brands under our alphagreengroup.com banner.”
Ryan Walton
“The most unexpected challenge for me, which applies today and when I started the business, is how obsessive you become with working and how hard it is to switch your brain off.
It’s really prevalent in my life – that addiction to work is a really big challenge because you’re suppose to live a life of balance which encompasses and embraces relationships and friendships outside of work. You can easily find, without knowing it, that your business can take over your life. My advice to new entrepreneurs would be to try and create a balanced life ahead of time before starting the business, form those positive habits and not experience burnout as a result.”
Alice Ojeda
“One of the big challenges we faced as we grew was scaling our systems. By systems I mean, how we built our website, where we hosted our subscriptions platform and our email marketing provider. When you start, it’s easy to go for the free trials and cheap start-up offers on digital providers.
It’s worth bearing in mind though the cost of switching as you grow and whether the platform you’re about to choose is the one you really want to lock your business into for the long-term. For example, we’ve migrated our subscription platform twice now and it was a real headache. To save this, do your research and choose carefully – start as you mean to go on.”
Pavel Stepanov
In the last 4 years of operation, some of the major unexpected challenges we have faced are finding and retaining good talent and leadership. It can be hard to find people who think similarly to you and want to see the company go in the right direction.
Finding employees who understand the company’s mission, and have the company’s interests in mind has been a struggle. It’s also been a challenge to find good leaders who can lead by example, be good trainers and mentors, and build up team morale and productivity.
Hiring someone can be scary, as you are taking the chance to trust them with part of your company. That’s why in the beginning, it was hard for us to let employees go, as you do invest and put faith in them that they will do well. When you let someone go, you’re letting them and yourself down, at least that’s how it felt in the beginning.
I ended up finding out that when you hire people who don’t think similarly to you, it can be harder to take on new projects together. Again, hiring was fast and easy – even fun and exciting. However, there have been times when people proved they didn’t have what it took, and it took a long time for us to decide to let them go.
For aspiring entrepreneurs that will hire someone for the first time, please keep in mind that they should not be qualified on paper only. Assess whether or not they were a good fit for the company. Make sure that the people you will hire always have the best interest of the company in mind. Bring on hard-working people who have a vision for your company and want to grow with you.
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The post 20 Entrepreneurs From Europe & North America Interviewed On The Challenges They Encountered During The Pandemic first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Jerome Knyszewski
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Why Melinda Gates Spends Time ‘Letting My Heart Break’
One of the richest women in the world devoted decades to preparing for a pandemic. As the valedictorian of her Dallas high school, Melinda Gates delivered a graduation speech that included a quote attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson. “To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived,” she told her classmates, “this [...]
The post Why Melinda Gates Spends Time ‘Letting My Heart Break’ first appeared on Tekrati and is written by admin
]]>Why Melinda Gates Spends Time ‘Letting My Heart Break’
One of the richest women in the world devoted decades to preparing for a pandemic.
As the valedictorian of her Dallas high school, Melinda Gates delivered a graduation speech that included a quote attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson. “To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived,” she told her classmates, “this is to have succeeded.”
Decades later and billions of dollars wealthier, Ms. Gates says the quote is still ringing in her ears. “That’s been my definition of success since high school,” she said. “So if I have an extra dollar, or a thousand dollars, or a million dollars, or in my case, which is absurd, a billion dollars to plow back into making the world better for other people, that’s what I’m going to do.”
As the wife of Bill Gates, the Microsoft co-founder, Ms. Gates now has the capital, clout and connections to have an impact however she pleases. She is one of the richest people in the world, a leading voice in global health and an advocate for women’s economic empowerment. As a face of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, she is also a lightning rod for critics who say billionaires have too much sway over public policy, as well as for conspiracy theorists who harbor darker fantasies.
The Gateses have been sounding the alarm about infectious diseases — and the need to fund vaccination efforts — since the late 1990s. That was when, during travels in Africa and India, the extreme poverty they saw prompted them to reflect on how they might use their wealth to make a difference.
“We just kept saying: ‘What’s going on here? Why isn’t the infrastructure here for roads? Why aren’t we seeing more people who are doing well economically? What’s happened?’” Ms. Gates said. “We started to think about what philanthropy’s role might be and realized that the best place to intervene, if you want somebody to live a full and productive life, was to start with health.”
Since then, the Gates Foundation has given away more than $55 billion, much of it directed at efforts to eradicate disease in the developing world. It has helped to all but wipe out polio, and has poured money into programs aimed at ensuring that poor countries have easy access to vaccines.
When the coronavirus pandemic hit, the foundation turned its attention to the vast and complex project of developing vaccines for the new virus, and ensuring that they could be widely distributed. So far, the foundation has contributed nearly $500 million to coronavirus response efforts. Earlier investments by the foundation are paying off as well — one of the drugmakers it previously funded, BioNTech, has developed a successful Covid-19 vaccine with Pfizer.
Ms. Gates is more optimistic today than she was a couple months ago. Vaccines that appear to be safe and effective are beginning to be deployed. Treatments for the virus have improved. And President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. has made beating back the pandemic his top priority.
“The Biden administration will re-enter the global stage and be a participant in making sure the whole world gets vaccines,” Ms. Gates said. She added that the virus team assembled by Mr. Biden was “a very strong, eminent group who are wise and thoughtful and very reasonable.”
Yet Ms. Gates was realistic about the challenges ahead. Vaccine hesitancy is on the rise, disinformation is running rampant on social media, many Americans still refuse to wear masks, and cases are surging again.
“We still have a stretch of very dark months ahead of us,” she said.
This interview was condensed and edited for clarity.
You and Bill have been warning about the risk of pandemics for a long time. How has the last year diverged from your expectations?
Melinda Gates: You can project out and think about what a pandemic might be like or look like, but until you live through it, it’s pretty hard to know what the reality will be like. So I think we predicted quite well that, depending on what the disease was, it could spread very, very, very quickly. The spread did not surprise us.
What did surprise us is we hadn’t really thought through the economic impacts. What happens when you have a pandemic that’s running rampant in populations all over the world? The fact that we would all be home, and working from home if we were lucky enough to do that. That was a piece that I think we hadn’t really prepared for.
What do you think should have been done earlier at the start of the pandemic?
Melinda Gates: We can look at how this disease traveled around the world and see that the countries who locked down first, they’re doing better. Many African countries saw it coming and locked it down early. Their replication rate just never got as high as many other countries. And that is a good thing.
We should have said sooner that if you’re going to go out, wear a mask. I mean, the fact we’re even still debating that in the United States makes zero sense. Most people get in a car today and know that to save their own life, they ought to wear a seatbelt. Most people would agree that having drunken drivers on the road is a bad thing, not only individually but for us as a society, because it causes more deaths.
Well, masks are just the right thing to do right now. It is insane that we’re at this point in this pandemic, in the United States, and we’re still debating whether people should wear a mask when they go in a store to buy their groceries.
What do you believe are going to be the most serious challenges to conducting an effective and comprehensive vaccination campaign in this country and around the world?
Melinda Gates: We do know how to get the vaccine out, even in very remote circumstances. Some of the vaccines will be much harder than others and require very substantial cold chains, so those will be hard to get out around the globe. But there are vaccines coming right behind those, so I’m quite optimistic.
The disinformation has been incredibly harsh, and it affects people’s lives. But I’m also hopeful that as the vaccine comes out and people see that it’s safe and efficacious, they will start to take it so that they can go out and return to normal.
To what do you attribute the rise in vaccine hesitancy? Is it as simple as disinformation?
Melinda Gates: I think, quite honestly, the advent of social media. If you’re a conspiracy theorist and you get connected to somebody else who maybe has heard of the autism problem that didn’t really exist, those things start to connect, and then those conspiracies start to replicate. We’re at a point of a lot of distrust in the country and all over the world. We know people are more polarized. Disinformation is just too easy to spread, and that’s going to cost people their lives.
To what do you attribute the rise in vaccine hesitancy? Is it as simple as disinformation?
Melinda Gates: I think, quite honestly, the advent of social media. If you’re a conspiracy theorist and you get connected to somebody else who maybe has heard of the autism problem that didn’t really exist, those things start to connect, and then those conspiracies start to replicate. We’re at a point of a lot of distrust in the country and all over the world. We know people are more polarized. Disinformation is just too easy to spread, and that’s going to cost people their lives.
Say I start to believe PizzaGate and I start clicking all the theories of PizzaGate. What I’m going to get served up on my social media channel is lots more things about conspiracy theories. And if I don’t have anybody pushing back on that, and I’m going down that wormhole, I’m going to start to believe more and more and more disinformation. That’s just not good for society. Between social media and people’s own anxiety and the polarized nature of our country, all these pieces have combined to make sort of a perfect storm around vaccine hesitancy.
Are there some people who will never get vaccinated, never wear a mask? Yes. We’re already seeing that in places in the country. But I think the more important question is: Will there be a broad set of people that will take this vaccine? And I think the answer to that will be yes.
You and Bill have been subject of conspiracy theories, too. Why do you think they’ve targeted you specifically?
Melinda Gates: I don’t know. I just think that fear is there, and so people are looking to point to somebody or some thing or some institution. And then once it lands on that person or institution, you get sort of a pile-on effect because of social media, and it’s deeply, deeply concerning for society. Our democracy depends on facts, and we depend on having real facts out there to keep ourselves safe and healthy.
Do you believe that the Trump administration’s politicization of the vaccine development process is contributing to that hesitancy?
Melinda Gates: Absolutely. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was set up to give scientific information and guidance to health commissioners in every region of the United States. That agency needs to be left to do its job in terms of real scientific fact. And same thing with the Food and Drug Administration. The F.D.A. is our gold standard. It’s how we know our vaccines are safe and efficacious. So they need to be independent organizations and left as independent so that we can trust them. Unfortunately, the opposite of that has happened during this current administration.
Do you believe the United States will be able to recover its leadership position in public health?
Melinda Gates: People are looking to the U.S. and saying: “What’s happened? What’s going on?” But I do believe our F.D.A. will hold. I do believe our C.D.C. will hold. I do believe the institutions we have will hold over the long term. I’ve traveled to many different countries and seen where they don’t have good governance or good institutions, or they don’t have a free press. We are lucky to have those things in the United States. And, yes, they have been eroded to some extent, some of them, and, yes, our position in global leadership has people scratching their heads. Can it be built back? Yes. Definitely.
Do you believe it’s appropriate for drug makers to profit from the sale of vaccines in the midst of a pandemic?
Melinda Gates: I think they should make a small profit, because we want them to stay in business. And at the end of the day, they are beholden to their shareholders. The question is how much profit. And I think during a pandemic like this, it should only be slightly above the marginal cost of the vaccine.
Do you accept the line of criticism that says big philanthropy has too much power right now, that individuals, not governments, are making decisions that shape educational policy and public policy?
Melinda Gates: I think that’s a critique that is well worth listening to and looking at. In our philanthropic work, there isn’t a single thing that we don’t work on in partnership with governments. Because at the end of the day, it is governments that scale things up and that can help the most people. There is a healthy ecosystem that needs to exist between government, philanthropy, the private sector and civil society. And when you get that ecosystem working at its best, no one party in that ecosystem has too much power.
You know, if Bill and I had had more decision-making authority in education, maybe we would’ve gotten farther in the United States. But we haven’t. Some of the things that we piloted or tried got rejected, or didn’t work, and I think there’s a very healthy ecosystem of parents and teachers’ unions and mayors and city councils that make those education decisions. I wish the U.S. school system was better for all kids.
Do you believe the tax code should be changed in ways that address some of the enormous economic disparities in this country?
Melinda Gates: Bill and I completely agree if you’re wealthy in this country, you benefited from the system, you benefited from the amazing infrastructure of the United States, and so you have an obligation to give back. And we don’t have a tax policy that is appropriately taxing the wealthiest. I’m not an expert on tax policy, but I will say this: A lot of wealthy people are making a lot off of their capital gains, versus their ordinary income. And I think that’s one place we ought to look at tax policy.
How do you reconcile the enormous privilege that you have with the acute suffering that so many people are experiencing right now?
Melinda Gates: It’s something I’ve pondered a lot. There’s no explanation how you get to be in this situation of privilege. There’s just none. But I spend a lot of my waking hours, when we’re not in a pandemic, traveling and meeting other people and doing what I call letting my heart break. I’ve worked in Mother Teresa’s home for the dying. I’ve slept on people’s farms in Africa. I do meditation every morning, and I’ve had days of tears thinking about people I know who’ve lost a loved one. It’s going to those places where your heart really hurts for everybody, not just your own sense of loss.
And so I cry a lot, and then I come back and I say, “How do I take what that person shared with me and what I learned, and how do I plow that back into the work to try and make the world better, or to convince a global leader that they ought to give more money to malaria, or care about people getting a vaccine on the other side of the world, or care about a child not getting a proper education in certain cities in the United States?” I just try to constantly remember that it’s a privilege.
Originally published on Nytimes.com
The post Why Melinda Gates Spends Time ‘Letting My Heart Break’ first appeared on Tekrati and is written by admin
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WhatsApp Testing New Feature That Fact-Checks Forwarded Messages
We’ve all received fake news on our messaging apps. Sometimes family members or friends forward links to websites claiming outrageous things, such as garlic being a cure for COVID-19. If fake news was bad before, it’s worse now under a pandemic. So, WhatsApp is currently testing out a new feature that lets users fact-check forwarded [...]
The post WhatsApp Testing New Feature That Fact-Checks Forwarded Messages first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Irene Hawkins
]]>WhatsApp Testing New Feature That Fact-Checks Forwarded Messages
We’ve all received fake news on our messaging apps. Sometimes family members or friends forward links to websites claiming outrageous things, such as garlic being a cure for COVID-19. If fake news was bad before, it’s worse now under a pandemic. So, WhatsApp is currently testing out a new feature that lets users fact-check forwarded messages.
WhatsApp Against Fake News
In a blog post, WhatsApp said it adds a magnifying glass button in chats to help users double-check forwarded messages. By clicking on the button, users can upload the message to the web without seeing the text itself. This way, users fact-check any incoming messages while protecting themselves from fake news.
Before, WhatsApp used two arrows to tell users that the message contains a viral post shared “through five or more chats.” WhatsApp added both features to protect the privacy of the app.
WhatsApp is adding a feature to make it easier to fact-check forwarded messageshttps://t.co/48FTBLKG9X pic.twitter.com/QFYwB4LBpg
— Gizmodo (@Gizmodo) August 5, 2020
WhatsApp, Facebook, and Fake News
Facebook is notorious for spreading hoaxes to its millions of users because of a lack of fact-checking. Gizmodo has reported on the spread of anti-vaccine conspiracy theories on the platform.
Public outrage forced Facebook to reject all anti-vaccine ads and to ban all accounts that spread these types of ads. In an email, the company also told Gizmodo that Facebook limits hoaxes by connecting people to expert information on any topic. The company also reduces the number of channels where fake news could spread.
When WhatsApp Users Can Try the New Feature
Currently, WhatsApp would limit the new feature to users in Brazil, Italy, Ireland, Mexico, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States. However, users in those countries can try it on their iOS, Android, and desktop apps.
The post WhatsApp Testing New Feature That Fact-Checks Forwarded Messages first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Irene Hawkins
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Virtual Healthcare Company Teladoc Sees Spike in Revenue
Health service thru the internet now seems a better idea, especially with the pandemic forcing people to stay at home. Revenue Growth Teladoc, a company that provides virtual healthcare services, reported an 85 percent increase in its revenue, which was even beyond Wall Street expectations. Shares of the company climbed by 4 percent on Thursday, [...]
The post Virtual Healthcare Company Teladoc Sees Spike in Revenue first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Irene Hawkins
]]>Virtual Healthcare Company Teladoc Sees Spike in Revenue
Health service thru the internet now seems a better idea, especially with the pandemic forcing people to stay at home.
Revenue Growth
Teladoc, a company that provides virtual healthcare services, reported an 85 percent increase in its revenue, which was even beyond Wall Street expectations. Shares of the company climbed by 4 percent on Thursday, with stocks rising to about 170 percent this year.
With the health crisis, people prefer to move most of their routines online. This includes talking to doctors, which led to the volume of their platform visitors ballooning to almost 2.8 million. Forbes noted that younger demographic of users are increasing faster.
Their first quarter for this year is already doing well just a bit before the pandemic takes its toll on many Americans. At that period revenue saw a rise of 41 percent, with more global users subscribing to the service. Both paid memberships and visit-fee-only access to the platform are rising. Furthermore, more than half of their visitors for the first quarter are first-time users.
What Hypergrowth in healthcare businesses looks like. @teladoc has been able to grow online traffic between double digits to triple digits over the first 30 weeks of this year! This translates into blowout 2Q: https://t.co/TEJVA9itag #Hypergrowth pic.twitter.com/DuPSqEWlWR
— Abel Ang (@abelang) August 3, 2020
Chat Through Teladoc
Jason Gorevic, chief executive officer of Teladoc, told CNN that about 15 percent of their total site visitors would prefer to opt out seeking medical care if it means going to actual clinics. He further noted that among the purposes of those using their online services include intending to treat common ailments like the flu.
Teladoc is an online platform where users can talk to qualified doctors from different expertise. Such type of service is also known as telemedicine, which offers very convenient and not to mention safe as it eliminates the need to actually travel to the offices or clinics for diagnoses that can be dealt with online. Such remote transactions are more relevant during a pandemic.
Teladoc physicians can also give digital prescriptions, with medicines that could be bought over the internet as well with various drugstores shifting to online selling. The platform has also thousands of professionals that deal with mental health, including psychiatrists, therapists, and social workers. It was also reported that more people are even seeking dermatology treatment.
Upward Trend for Telemedicine
But there is still increasing competition in the telemedicine space. Another company called Gobal X has also launched their new Telemedicine & Digital Health fund recently. Earlier this month, the company has completed acquisition of another telemedical services company InTouch Health that caters to hospitals. This could be Teladoc’s answer to increasing demand for their virtual health services. InTouch Health made partnerships with hundreds of hospitals and healthcare systems.
The post Virtual Healthcare Company Teladoc Sees Spike in Revenue first appeared on Tekrati and is written by Irene Hawkins
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