By Elizabeth Gordon

You often hear about entrepreneurs getting lucky – getting on Oprah or selling their business for $50 million to a big conglomerate. When you hear these stories of seeming overnight success, it makes you think, “Wow, they are sooo lucky.” But what sometimes appears to be luck is actually the result of a well laid plan and strategy that is finally coming to fruition. Every time you hear the story of an entrepreneur’s big win, you are probably not going to hear about the 100 times before that they failed, but trust me, they did.

What allowed them to eventually get to their big win? They didn’t beat themselves up after they failed, nor did they let it make them fearful of taking future risks. Instead, they viewed each small failure as simply a stepping-stone on the path to success. The good news is you can improve your luck. When you recognize that there is no such thing as “the overnight success story” and instead make the goal of each day to move the ball one step closer to your goal, you’ll increase your odds every day. If so-called good luck is really just persistence, creativity and determination that have finally paid off, there are some ways to stack the deck in your favor.   (more…)

I recently attended Atlanta Women’s Network “WomenUp 2008” and in the program there was an excellent article on Facts on The Status of Women.  Some include: In 2006, women earned $ .77 for every $1 men earned.  Women make over 85% of consumer purchases. In 2006 in the US, there were 10.4 million firms owned
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By Audrey Burton Small business owners attend networking events to get clients. Much of the time, it doesn’t work the way they anticipated, and they often give up before really determining why it didn’t work. They move to a different group and are destined to repeat the same mistakes. First of all, let’s talk about
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By Sri Dasgupta “How do I connect with someone quickly?” This may seem like a simple question, but it’s actually a little more complex — and perhaps you know that already. When I work privately with clients on such a topic, it takes a few months! Still, here are two steps you can take right
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By Minesh Baxi Use these 10 questions to determine how focused you are on Networking I have at least 400 people in my network who receive information from me at least once a month I have a compelling 30-second commercial I focus more on selling through my relationships than on selling to people directly I have
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By Larry Baltz You’re sitting in a room full of eager business owners at a networking event. One by one, everyone stands up and introduces themselves, hopefully gaining the opportunity to find one or two new prospects in the crowd. Unfortunately, most business people stink at Introductions. Take for instance the remarks made at a
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By Bette Daoust, Ph.D. If an event falls into the area that is part of your expertise, find a way to attend and learn from others. Every time you attend an event, you should be able to come back with information that you can use for your own business. If you go through the display
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by: Patricia Weber Do you do any embarrassing things in business networking? Many of us who sell, at one time or another, might confess to some dozen or so common mistakes with business networking; these are just three of the top most regretful, most ineffective and sometimes embarrassing ones. If you find one describes you,
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by: Terry S. Hall The essence of business success is measured by achieving 100% of 3 key goals: Profit goals, Balance goals and Referrals goals. There are hundreds of books that have been written on each of these topics. Today we look at referrals. There’s no business like referral business. In fact, referrals are the
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You are the best! It”s time to believe that of yourself. When was the last time you told yourself how terrific you are? When did you last honor your competence, beauty, intelligence and strengths? If you”re like most of us, you”re quick to point out something you did that was “stupid” but when it comes
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