Business was a little slow this month, so I took advantage of the extra time to take a class I’ve been wanting to take for a couple of years now – Profit Mastery – offered by the University of Alaska’s Small Business Development Center. The class was developed by Steve LeFever of Business Resource Services in Seattle.

If you are a business owner, manager, banker or anyone who has a say in the finances of a business, small or large – you need to take this class. I can’t believe that even the most savvy finance gurus wouldn’t get a lot out of this class. It’s a combination of videos, hands-on calculating and reading in your workbook and some discussion packed into four – 3 ½ hour classes. Your head will be spinning before it’s over – but wow is it worth it. I’m still digesting all that I’ve learned and can’t wait to start applying my newly-acquired financial management skills to my business.

Here are some of the most important things I learned:

• Seven of 10 businesses fail in the first five years.

• Most business owners and employees believe that if a business is not successful, all it needs to do is increase sales and profitability will go up. Not true. As sales increase, cash often goes down, not up.

• Every business owner should know their yearly fixed and variable costs, contribution margin percentage and “break even” point. Without these, you can’t set profit goals Think of profit as a fixed cost.

• Know how to do financial gap analysis so that you can understand the costs and related consequences of growth. Make sure the financial house is in order now so that as you grow, decreasing efficiencies will have a lower negative financial impact.

• Don’t borrow if you can’t pay it back.

• A business is typically worth what it can raise in cash flow.

• Every business needs a transition plan (this one hurt-I hadn’t given much thought to this).

Some of the main things you’ll learn in this class are how to use financial statements as management tools for your business; how to implement effective costing and pricing strategies; understanding, predicting and controlling patterns of cash flow; effectively managing growth; and, dealing successfully with a bank-if your business model requires a loan. I know, most of us don’t even want to think about this stuff. Math can be scary. When it comes to business ownership, for some reason we convince ourselves it’s better not to know.

But get this — 80 percent of the people running businesses today do not understand the general principles of profit mastery. If they did, just think how many more successful businesses there would be-and the impact that would have on our economy.

One of my clients, Rasmuson Foundation, asked me to do a guest blog post on media relations. Thought I’d share the same content, here on my blog. What are your tips for good media relations?

Media relations still relevant in a shifting media environment

“Media relations [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_relations] involves working with various media for the purpose of informing the public of an organization’s mission, policies and practices in a positive, consistent and credible manner… Media relations refer to the relationship that a company or organization develops with journalists.” – Wikipedia.org

With newspaper staffs shrinking to one or two reporters and the day of in-person radio reporting becoming nearly non-existent, a good number of Alaska nonprofits may erroneously conclude that the importance of media relations within their marketing/public relations plan has sunk to an all time low. I’d argue that exactly the opposite is true.

While more and more people are choosing to get their news and information from a variety of digital sources – keeping connected through print, radio and TV news is still important. Because staffs have tightened, however, it’s no longer as easy as sending in a news release and seeing your story in the paper or datebook calendar the next day. That is why it is still important to foster relationships [http://www.rasmuson.org/_attachments/reporters.pdf] with local media. Here are some tips on how to go about it.

Face-to-face
Think of it as media relationships, not media relations. Knowing reporters is still important. The day that a crisis hits your nonprofit agency is not the time to be scrambling to introduce yourself to a reporter. Most editors and reporters are willing to meet for a cup of coffee or for lunch. Check to make sure they’re OK with you paying for lunch (different media outlets have different policies on this – and don’t argue if they need to go “Dutch treat”). You don’t have to have a specific pitch, and it might even be better to schedule a meeting when you just want to share an update on your agency. Put together a list of future story ideas with possible timelines. Promise to let the media person know the next time there is a story opportunity – and remember to follow through on that promise.

Social media
Many media people and outlets are active in social media. Popular platforms today include Facebook [http://www.facebook.com/] and Twitter [http://twitter.com/]. Make sure you follow the media outlets you work with, and make your presence known. Comment on their Facebook posts. Throw out story ideas when they ask for something that fits with your organization. Give them story leads, even when it doesn’t benefit you or your organization. They’ll remember that you were helpful, and they’re more likely to cover your story once you’ve established yourself as a reliable and credible news source. Media often message me on Facebook, so I set my smartphone to message me when I get a message via Facebook, ensuring that I’ll be timely in responding to requests.

Professional organizations
Several professional organizations in Alaska give annual opportunities to interact with media including American Marketing Association (AMA)-Alaska Chapter [http://www.amaalaska.org/], Public Relations Society of America (PRSA)-Alaska Chapter [http://www.prsaalaska.org/], Alaska Professional Communicators (APC) [http://www.akprocom.org/] and Alaska Press Club [http://alaskapressclub.org/]. PRSA usually has media panels or roundtables during monthly membership luncheons where you can directly interact with media. Several members of Alaska’s media are members of APC. AMA often features media as monthly luncheon speakers. Alaska Press Club also is a great way to get to know working press. You can join as an Associate member for $45 a year. The Press Club’s Journalism Week, which is usually held in March or April each year, includes workshops and speakers that are relevant to media, as well as to public relations and marketing professionals. The awards banquet and social functions during J-Week offer great opportunities to meet media, especially representatives from Southeast Alaska and rural Alaska who might not get into the larger hubs of Fairbanks, Anchorage or Juneau very often.

Email
Most media get a LOT of email messages every day. So, your job is to stand out from the clutter. Be short and concise with your idea or pitch. One editor recently hinted that it’s a good idea to put Alaska in the subject line of an email, since she gets so many news releases that aren’t relevant to the Alaska market. Get to your point, and offer to follow-up with more detailed information or photos. Don’t bother sending attachments or huge photo files with your message – most media outlets won’t open them, and they’ll be really irritated if you clog their email box with large files. Ask how you can help, and make sure you answer calls or emails from media promptly.

Framing
Even as you develop year-round relationships with journalists that do not rely exclusively on story pitches, it’s advisable when the day finally comes to pitch your story that you present it from the human perspective. If your nonprofit offers social services, for example, frame your pitch [http://www.rasmuson.org/_attachments/Framing_Mar_07.pdf] from the perspective of the beneficiary; if your nonprofit promotes the arts, lead with an example of how the arts positively impact your community.

Looking for more tips? This article on 10 Ways to Make A Reporter Fall in Love with You also has some other great ideas, and the Rasmuson Foundation website includes a “Communications Toolkit” with links and tips here [http://www.rasmuson.org/index.php?switch=viewpage&pageid=145].

Here at KD/PR Virtual, we’re thrilled to see that Facebook has redesigned business pages. They now look, feel and operate a lot like personal profiles. KD/PR Virtual’s Jordan Hanson shares some of the new features, and how they may affect the Pages you administrate.

• Post as Page – Admins can now Use Facebook as a Page and interact with other Pages in the same way a user can. You can also interact with the Pages you admin as a FB user (admins weren’t able to do this before the new Page layout) by switching back to your personal profile.
• Pictures – Much like the new profile, pictures will be displayed across the top of your wall.
• Tabs – Navigation has been migrated to the left of the page, under the profile image. This may cause issues if your Page has a lot of tabs, they will pushed down and could become hidden. Also, the names of static FBMC tabs for your Page may not display correctly.
• Information tab – The information tab is disappearing. Now, all of your Page’s information will be housed strictly under the info link.
• Notifications – Page admins can now get e-mail notifications when someone posts to a Page or comments on a post. Don’t forget to change the e-mail notification settings for each Page you admin.
• News Feed – Admins now can keep track of other Pages your Page “Likes” through a News Feed for your Page.
• Static FBML – As of April 2011, creating static FBML tabs will be no more. The process will be a little more difficult for do-it-yourselfers. If your Page currently has static FBML tabs, they should continue to work, you just won’t be able to create any additional tabs in the same way.

Page administrators can make the change to the new Page layout now (once you make the switch, you can’t get back to the old layout), or be automatically switched on March 1. All in all, I think that most of these changes are positive, but there will be a learning curve as people get used to the new layout.

Most people hate public speaking. Call me crazy, but I really enjoy it! Of all the things I’ve done to promote my virtual PR firm and my own talents, getting in front of a group, sharing some advice and showcasing some of my work has by far been the most beneficial way to bring in new business.

 Earlier this month, I had the chance to speak to a group of women dynamos in Anchorage, all of whom are a part of a fairly new group called the Association of Women Entrepreneurs. 

At the podium during a WE talk in Anchorage in August

As part of this talk, I shared by Top 10 Dos and Top 10 Don’ts for running a small business.  Of course, I gained much of this knowledge by learning the hard way, but I think the ladies got a good laugh or two out of my mistakes and blunders as a small business owner over the last 10 years. Maybe I even saved a couple of them from a painful experience.

So, I thought I’d share by Top 10 Do’s (with a little explanation of each). I’ll tackle the Don’ts in a future post.

 Top 10 Do’s For Owning a Small Business

Bookkeeping

Get a good accountant – stay on top of the financials and IRS obligations and have someone else handle your billing.

When I first went into business, a colleague who had owned a firm for several years told me not to do my own billing. I didn’t listen for about four  years. But then, I slowly came to the realization that instead of doing accounting work, I could be billing more PR consultant work. Once you get more than three clients, let someone else handle the billing. It will more than pay for itself.

Get agreements in writing (client agreement, subcontractor agreement)

I haven’t had a lot of trouble with clients not paying or subcontractors burning me, but I did start putting things in writing, and guess what? Clients and subcontractors took me more seriously. Having everyone understand the terms of the agreement ahead of time is just smart business. That way, if anyone ever has a question, it’s right there in black and white.

Have a website

I didn’t think I needed a website because most of my work comes from word of mouth. What I didn’t realize was the time that a website could save me.  Potential clients used to call and ask 20 questions, then ask to meet. Now, they call, and I refer them to my website, then ask them to call back if they are interested in talking further. More often than not, a potential client has already been to my website, has a clear understanding of who KD/PR Virtual is, and they say “I want to hire you.” That has saved me a ton of time.  I landed a large hotel chain client this year, and they told me that I was recommended by a local business, they checked out my website, and knew they wanted to hire me right away. That work alone has more than paid for the costs of my website.

Have a dedicated work space with a door that closes, even if you work in your home.

Maybe it’s me, but closing the door is imperative for me to concentrate on the task at hand, and to avoid distractions. Most of my clients know that I work from home, and that I have a Chocolate Lab office companion and two rowdy boys. But it’s not professional when the dog barks or the kids can be heard screaming in the background. You simply cannot be professional without that closing (and locking!) door.

Network, even when you don’t need more sales or new business

After 10 years of PRSA, Convention & Visitor Bureau, Chamber and other networking opportunities, I can honestly say that work comes from constantly being out there. I can run into someone at a Business After Hours, talk to them for 15 minutes, and two years later they will call me with a business lead. I network harder when I need new business, but I never stop it altogether.

Tap into free or paid professional development opportunities

Nearly every free, or low cost seminar I’ve attended has resulted in at least one important nugget of advice or information. Many people think that if it’s free, it’s not worth it. I would argue the opposite when it comes to professional development opportunities. Some of the best advice I’ve received was from a counselor at the University of Alaska Small Business Development Center. I never paid a penny for it.

Mentor others, it comes back in referrals and business.

I can’t even count the number of people who I mentored, then ended up directly competing with me for PR business in Anchorage. Sometimes it hurts. I’ve had “friends” steal clients. But I keep the attitude that “there’s plenty of work for everyone.” I know I’m lucky to be in a small market where the economy is pretty stable and there is a lot of opportunity for all. But I still think you hold your competitors close to your chest and it pays off in the end. And, doing good work always pays off, so don’t sweat the small stuff. Sometimes, I get more satisfaction out of seeing someone I helped along the way succeed, than I do from my own good work. It feels great.

Kill the enemy with kindness

Clients want to work with positive people. They don’t like whiners. My dad always told me, “take the high road.” So, when someone says or does something mean (and yes, the agency business can be a bit cut-throat at times) I kill them with kindness. More times than not, the clients will say “I like your attitude, I want to work with you instead.” Trust me, it works. (I’d like to take this opportunity to thank those who have been mean. I appreciate you sending me the business!)

Tap others in your industry, consider forming a group for networking/biz referral

Ever heard the saying “you don’t need to reinvent the wheel?” We sometimes forget that there are lots of other people out there doing the same thing we do. They might be in other cities or even other countries, but they are one of your best resources. So why not tap them?  One of the smartest things I ever did was join PRConsultants Group. I haven’t received very much business from this group, but I have 39 other PR Consultants around the country to tap for ideas, advice and to do great PR work for my clients. Collaboration is smart. So figure out who can help you be better, and team up.

Find others who share your same vision and get them to join you/work with you. Then, trust them.

Without my team of amazing co-workers, KD/PR Virtual would still be what it was when I started a decade ago – an independent practitioner PR firm. I was shocked to find out how many talented people were right here in Alaska who shared my vision for work/life balance and who were more loyal than any other peers I’d worked alongside. When you share a common vision with someone, they’ll prove they’re trustworthy and you all can prosper together. The last two people I’ve added to my team were hired because I followed my gut – I knew they shared my vision. They’re the best subcontractors anyone could hope to find.

I’m always refining this list, so if you have suggestions or personal experiences you think would supplement these, send me a comment.

This month, I took a couple of days off and went dipnetting. For non-Alaskans, that is the easy way of filling the freezer with salmon by scooping fish with a net. Yes, it’s legal for Alaska residents, and it’s incredibly fun!  We got 17 red salmon for a couple of hours work.

While out on the river, I caught myself feeling guilty about taking a couple of days off of work, and wondering if I’d regret the smaller paycheck that comes with fewer billable hours.  Then I remembered, that’s why I went into business for myself. So, I’d have the flexibility to take off when I really want to, and to be there for my boys as they grow up. I had to remind myself to sit back and enjoy the ride on the roller coaster.

When you think about it, doing public relations consulting for a living is a lot like riding a roller coaster. At the top of the roller coaster hills –life is fast and furious. There’s never a second to spare and you have so much to do, you can’t see straight. Every client seems to need every project now. A good PR person juggles 20 or 30 balls a day, making each client believe they are the only one calling. They make all the deadlines and don’t let anyone see them sweat. I’ll even admit, I’m one of those who enjoys the pressure and thrives when the workload is heavy. Maybe it’s my substitute for the daily story deadline and the rush that came with covering breaking news at the TV station years ago.

You get through the crisis or deadline, and settle into a valley of quiet. You finally have a chance to catch your breath, clean off the desk enough to see the table top again and manage to get to those business management tasks that have been on the back burner – pro bono work, updating the company website, balancing the checkbook and updating the calendar.

Then, the worry starts to creep in. Why are things so quiet? Why don’t I have a full schedule next week? Do I need to go get another client? Who have I not heard from in awhile, and why haven’t they called me?

After being in business for more than 10 years, I still find myself letting the worry creep in from time-to-time. I remember someone telling me just after I started my business that you have to expect the peaks and valleys in the workload as a part of being an independent consultant. They promised I’d learn to enjoy the valleys and take advantage of free time when business is slower. But I still feel guilty when I sneak away for a swim midday or simply take an unplanned day off.

I now know that the lull will only be temporary. More work will come in a matter of days, and worrying is not going to make a bit of difference. In Alaska, the summers are short and July and August are the best times to take off of work, enjoy the outdoors. I’m pretty good at fishing. Maybe one of these years, I’ll become a pro at riding the roller coaster.

Image Credit:  www.ace-clipart.com