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GH in the news- @Grasshopper
- Interested in getting an 855 number? We're taking reservations now - http://bit.ly/ailETt
- RT @chrisgeyer: excited i get to talk with more of our @grasshopper customers today as well
- RT @melilitts: I use @grasshopper as the main means of communication within my business, since our team is spread all over the US!
Entrepreneurs Archive
GH Group: Entrepreneurship the Second Time Around
Scott Miller of The Bee, guest posts over on Grasshopper Group. He provides some great advice on starting a business using the lessons he has learned over the years. Here’s an excerpt:
It’s Easy to QuitIn the early stages of a new venture, it seems that more things go wrong than go right. Its easy to get discouraged with lack of progress, software bugs, and slow customer adoption. Its even easier to quit and give up. However, its been my experience, that when things look the worst, there usually is some encouraging sign. Whether its a new customer, a new product release, or a successful marketing campaign, these wins need to be celebrated to keep morale up.
Read the entire post over at Grasshopper Group.
Event: How to Build Buzz Around Your Brand
Here at Grasshopper, we are all about trying to find new ways to help entrepreneurs succeed. However, one thing we’ve always believed in since day one is that creating buzz and WOM traffic for your brand is essential. It was crucial in getting Grasshopper off the ground and 7 years later is still a key to our success. In fact it’s so damn important to us that we have gone as far as to create a program to help you, our customers gain press!
To help share some wisdom about creating buzz we decided to partner with MassChallenge, another organization 100% devoted to supporting small business. MassChallenge and our Buzz Team have rallied some local experts together and are putting on a really interactive (and FREE) event for you guys next week.
The event will be MC’ed by our very own Ambassador of Buzz, Jonathan Kay and will include 4 short (10 minute) presentations followed by a Q & A with Jonathan. There will be tons of time to network and the event will be capped off by bringing all of the speakers on the stage for a panel. At this point all questions will come from the audience so really start to think about what information you want to learn from our “experts”! See below for topics, event details, and a link to register:
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Location: Microsoft NERD Center: One Memorial Drive Cambridge, MA
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Date: Wednesday, June 23rd
9 Common Myths About Entrepreneurs
There is something about entrepreneurial success stories that makes people uncomfortable. After all, the very notion of working for oneself flies in the face of convention. An example of someone who not only tried an entrepreneurial gig but thrived in it seems to demand explanation.
The question seems to be “How did such an unnatural event occur?” In response, a great number of social and cultural myths have formed around the idea of what it “really” takes to be an entrepreneur. Below are some of the most prevailing myths.
“It Takes Money to Make Money”
This is perhaps the oldest entrepreneur’s myth of all. The first thing out of a naysayer’s mouth when confronted with a successful entrepreneur is “he must have had an inheritance/been rich/etc.” In fact, the world is full of self-made men and women who did not start out with any great deal of money. Read more »
Entrepreneurship: U.S & Europe [InfoGraphic]
What it takes to become an entrepreneur varies greatly from country to country. Below, we illustrate some of the notable differences in entrepreneurship among the US and several European countries. Click on the image to enlarge.
May Edition: 11 Entrepreneur Posts from Around the Web
There are so many great places for entrepreneurs to get information; blogs, forums, Twitter, conferences, meet-ups, co-working spaces, etc, etc. Sometimes it’s hard to sort through them all!
To at least make one part simpler for you, and give you something to read this holiday weekend, I’ve put together a list of some of my favorite blog posts about entrepreneurship and business from the past month. I’m sure there are a hundred more out there but here are my favorites. Enjoy!
1. Which Excuses are Keeping You from Starting or Growing Your Business?
Overview: Matthew from Blogtrepreneur.com offers tips for those “wanna-be” entrepreneurs that are hesitant about starting a business. If you are on the fence about starting a business, this should inspire you to take a leap of faith and just do it! (or at least stop making excuses about why)
2. Entrepreneurs Test Before Starting Your Business
Overview: Kevin from dorm-room-biz.com gears this post towards internet entrepreneurs. It provides step-by-step instructions on how to set up an online marketing campaign for your business. Read more »
What Can The Boy Scouts Teach You About Being an Entrepreneur?
In 1997, the Boy Scouts of America quietly launched their Entrepreneurship merit badge. Sadly, despite the Boy Scouts’ best intentions, the badge did not receive much in the way of consistent support. But on April 29, the Entrepreneurship badge was reintroduced with a much stronger commitment. As Maria Popova of the Huffington Post writes, the badge’s return symbolizes “the increasing value of entrepreneurial thinking as a social problem-solver and a necessary lifeskill in the pursuit of success today.” The badge aims to promote execution, critical evaluation of business ideas and the fundamentals of capitalizing on market opportunities.
Below, we’ll take a look at the Boy Scouts Entrepreneurship badge requirements, and what they can teach you about being an entrepreneur.
Define Entrepreneurship Realistically
One striking feature of the Boy Scouts Entrepreneurship badge is how it begins by asking you to define entrepreneurship, as well as the entrepreneur’s role in the U.S. economy. Yet, a glance at the requirements page shows that it is not sufficient to merely theorize on what entrepreneurship is. To earn the badge, you must find and interview a real-life business owner and ask them:
- How they came up with their business idea
- How they raised startup capital
- How well the business is doing today
Grasshopper Invades Canada (Toronto to be Specific)
Well, the Grasshopper Buzz Team is at it again. We are heading to another city (or country in this case) to meet local entrepreneurs and share some free drinks! Only this time it’s a bit more exciting than usual…
For the first time in Grasshopper History (–> Insert Star Wars Theme Music) we’re going to be able to offer Local Canadian Numbers (currently in beta but available to everyone in the next couple of months)!! We decided in honor of the occasion we needed to do something fun.
So what did we do?
We partnered with a great organization and decided to throw a fun event. We joined forces with the Canadian Youth Business Foundation (CYBF). Not only are the folks over there just as passionate about helping entrepreneurs as we are, but they do some great things to inspire & mentor young Toronto entrepreneurs.
On June 1st at 6pm Grasshopper and CYBF will take over the roof deck of The London Tap House. Read more »
Women In Tech: Up & Coming Female Entrepreneurs
The shortage of female entrepreneurs and executives has long been lamented by business and academic leaders. As Harvard researcher Vivek Wadhwa told BusinessWeek in February 2010, there has never been a female Wall Street CEO. According to Dun & Bradstreet data from 2004 (the most recent available), only 19% of the 237,843 firms founded that year were primarily owned by women – including only 3% of tech firms.
Ultimately, Wadhwa contends, the relative lack of female tech entrepreneurs reflects a “societal failure.” But others, like Illuminate Ventures CEO Cindy Padnos, hold that female-led tech firms earn higher revenues using less capital. Today, Grasshopper examines several female entrepreneurs who will, as Padnos predicts, “lead the next wave of growth in global technology ventures.”
Caterina Fake
Caterina Fake is best known for co-founding online photo sharing giant Flickr in 2004. Fake started the company with the help of then-husband Stewart Butterfield and the free service rose to popularity in a breathtakingly short time. By March 2005, Flickr was acquired by Yahoo! for a reported $35 million price tag.
Flickr made important contributions to the “Web 2.0″ revolution both before and after the acquisition, including social networking, photo tagging, community open APIs and photographic algorithms. Read more »
Why You Should Pick a Virtual Office
Opening and maintaining an office is one of the costliest moves a new business can make. The obvious expense is the monthly rent, but the financial investment in running an office far exceeds the rent. At minimum, you will need desks and chairs. Most companies eventually want filing cabinets and a water cooler (plus scheduled delivery.) Of course, an office also needs its own Internet connection.
All these costs (and others) are why veteran entrepreneurs advise going without an office early on. That said, some businesses objectively need things like a professional mailing address, a business phone system and meeting areas.
Virtual Receptionists & Assistants
Entrepreneurs frequently take on loaded schedules and find themselves shoving repetitive tasks to the back burner. Traditionally, the solution has been hiring assistants whose sole jobs are to complete those tasks. However, it is actually not necessary for an assistant to physically work beside you in an office. A growing number of entrepreneurs are hiring virtual assistants instead.
Is The Government Stimulus Plan Doing Anything For Entrepreneurs?
Every recession inspires government leaders to enact an economic stimulus plan. The assumption is that market downturns are intolerable and can only be cured by political intervention. Yet, it is unclear whether stimulus packages like President Barack Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 stimulate anything other than government spending.
The way to know for sure is to determine what, if anything, such plans do for entrepreneurs. John T. Reed, a Harvard MBA, points out that what actually needs stimulating is business profits, which supply the money for defense, Social Security payments, employee salaries/wages, business taxes and ultimately, the stimulus itself.
What Was Stimulated
The question of whether the stimulus is working, therefore, is really a question of whether it helps entrepreneurs be more profitable. Some aspects of the stimulus do appear to help. Read more »
