Gaetan started with jewelry and soon added her incredibly adorable baby hats. She’s now adding beautiful knit cowls!  She is having a ball, learning new skills and adding customers–all in her spare time. Could life be any better?  Probably not.

Wouldn’t your business do better if you followed Lu’s example?  Try it for 30 days and let me know.  I bet you’ll be pleasantly surprised!  Thanks, Lu!

Curiosity opens our minds to new ideas and people.  Just because I own a web-based business for women over 55 doesn’t mean that is what I read about exclusively.  I read about fashion, decorating, architecture, travel, technology, cars, inventions, business, fiction AND almost all the books my grandchildren read so I will know what they are thinking about.  From this love affair with the written word I have “met” many of the fascinating women on my site, many of the fascinating women I have written about in my After 55 column or in these blog entries and have had more darn fun connecting with people at gatherings and being able to keep up my end of the conversation.  You know that these conversations lead to . . . who knows where?

Questions expand horizons.  Take a look at every part of your business and ask, “Why do I do it this way?  Is there a different/better way? What would be best for my client?”  If you take this step seriously, you may find some surprising answers.  You may not want to continue a product or process.  You may find a much better way of being useful to your client. You may discover a new profit center.

Being creative doesn’t require anything more than a curious mind, good questions, and pencil and paper.  Oh, the places you will go! — Thank you, Dr. Seuss!

Just last week, I went to a noon lunch and learn featuring a local movie critic.  I am not a movie fanatic like my husband, but I simply needed to get out of the house.  Wow!  It turned out that it was hosted by the library, and I made two new community contacts there. The informal talk wasn’t about movies. It was about the changing face of movie reviews and how he is responding by taking his work to the internet and his own website, the place of YouTube and his challenges in connecting with his followers.  Now this was far more interesting to me than I expected and I got some new ideas, contacts and a delicious lunch at a restaurant I had never visited.  When I say, “Get out!” I truly have your best interests in mind; I’m not being crabby.

If you haven’t heard of the site, either, it is a quick way to get into the conversation about your particular business.  HARO is an acronym for Help a Reporter Out.  Three times a day you receive an e-mail listing 25 to 30 inquiries from reporters, writers, whatever.  If one is related to what you do, you contact the writer and go from there!  Easy, quick, free!  Three wonderful words for an entrepreneur.

What would you do if someone invested $10,000 in your business? How would you spend it?

$100,000?  $1,000,000?

At first I thought it was a cute set of questions, but as I started to consider the possibilities I saw that what I was doing was writing a different kind of business plan.  We After 55s are many times used to doing everything ourselves.  These questions stretch us in more ways than one.  Go, Barry!

1. Trust Yourself. It’s important to be confident in your area of expertise. You should feel extremely comfortable talking about your specific area.

2. Do Not Over-Think It. In your presentation, share the information you would want to receive without the extras that sometimes take away from the real message.

3. Have a Great Time. Begin with the intent to truly enjoy sharing information and ideas that you are passionate about and expect that your audience will be just as excited to receive the information.

Good points, aren’t they?  If that isn’t enough to get you comfortable in front of your chamber of commerce, contact Gillie at gilliehaynes@aol.com and find out what it will take to raise your star power.

1. Access to opportunity: Is age, gender or race a factor? How can you maximize those factors to your benefit?
2. Access to capital:  Make sure your business is well-capitalized and know where you will get the capital.
3. Be knowledgeable about being an entrepreneur: Know what it takes to start, build and grow a business.  Work FOR your business, not IN it!

Good points, Sharon!  Too many times we just start on a whim because we have read about some super-successful person who did . . . probably if we scratched the surface, we would find a different story. There are no born entrepreneurs–there are successful entrepreneurs who have succeeded because of Sharon’s pointers.

Wise salespeople know that selling is about finding a need and filling it. Networking is about finding a need and offering to help find a solution. People will always be glad to see you coming, you will build up enormous good will, you will learn a lot from a lot of people, and you will have more fun!  Networking isn’t working–it’s meeting new potential friends and increasing your knowledge base–sometimes with yummy muchies, too!  Go forth and network!

A friend of mine’s market research business has been very hard hit; she is now using the research skills she has honed over the years to do forensic research on companies and products.  Same skills, different focus–and the possibility of weathering the storm.  Keep thinking of new ways to offer your products, reposition your products and solve customers’ problems in new ways.  Your most important product is between your ears–THINK!

One the lighter side —

“Then remember the story of the poor farmer who lost his crops to a drought, battled disease in his cattle and watched his barn go up in flames after being hit by lightning. Somehow, he maintained his pleasant disposition and sense of humor. How did he stand it, his neighbors wondered.

“Well, it’s like this,” the farmer said. “In the Bible, it says, ‘It came to pass.’ But it never says ‘It came to stay.’ ”

Mackay’s Moral: Your biggest worry should be that you are worrying too much.
– Harvey Mackay