So I had the ‘opportunity’ to go to the dentist this week.  It’s not my favorite thing to do, although luckily there were no issues!

On this trip I distracted myself from the scraping and polishing by observing how they ran their operation.  Maybe  a lot of dentists are this way these days (I’ve been going to the same one for quite a while) – but they have things running like a well oiled machine.

It got me to thinking – what could other business owners learn from this?

photo by azrainman

Although it’s a medical treatment, there are a lot of similarities with other kinds of businesses.  They have customers who have an issue, they create the solution using fixed resources and generate revenue based on their team’s efforts.

What could you learn from my dentist?  Let’s take a look:

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Business growth can feel really challenging – you figure a few things out, you achieve some success and now you’ve got even bigger obstacles in front of you!

In fact one of the biggest mistakes made is when people talk about a growth curve.

Smooth Growth Curve

What does your growth curve look like?  If it’s not flat, then it’s probably like you’re on the uphill slope of a rollercoaster – sure it might be kind of steep but it’s smooth and if you just keep doing what you’re doing you’re going to move right on up the hill.

But here’s the secret – growth in the real world doesn’t look like that!  And if you’re working under the assumption that you just have to rev your engine a bit to get up the hill, then you’re going to be in trouble!

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Once again proving that it pays to spend some time on Twitter (at a bare minimum to see what people you know are up to and to pick up cool things they find interesting) – here’s a great video that I found very inspiring!

It’s a short film (16 minutes) entitled Validation and I think it says a lot about what motivates us and maybe an observation on how bad things are today (in terms of how we treat each other).

Check it out:

If you can’t see the video or it’s not working, you can find it online here:  Validation

I’d love to get your thoughts on the video?  Did any of it ring true for you?  Share your thoughts in the comments below!

Shawn Kinkade  Kansas City Business Coach

   photo by !!sahrizvi

Your marketing is a net that you throw out to capture the attention of your best prospects.  You want to snare those prospects (and only those prospects) with the information, benefits and outcomes that speak to their situation.  That’s not going to happen on a single visit or interaction, you need to get in front of them with the right message several times…in fact a big part of your marketing job is to stay top of mind as a value added resource so you’re a no brainer decision when they’re ready to buy!

One of the best tools you can use to build your marketing net is some variation of email marketing.  There are a lot of great reasons you need to be using email marketing with your business – here are few to get you thinking!

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   photo by Cesar R.

The internet is an amazing resource – you can learn how to blow the shell off of a hard boiled egg (actually used this a few weeks ago – it’s pretty cool!).  You can learn why the sky is blue (handy when the kids start asking questions) or you could learn the lyrics to ‘If I had a boat’ by Lyle Lovett (one of my favorite songs).

If I had a boat
I’d go out on the ocean
And if I had a pony
I’d ride him on my boat
And we could all together
Go out on the ocean
Me upon my pony on my boat

But what’s even cooler about the internet is when you stumble across those hidden treasures that really make you say ‘Whoa….’! 

I’ve been lucky enough to find two of those kinds of resources in the last week and I wanted to share them with you – hopefully you’ll find them as interesting as I did!

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