Category: Advice
Motivate Your Sales Team With These 3 Steps
Day in and day out, sales pros face rejection in their work. The highs can be euphoric when you land a major sale, and the lows can be brutal when you don’t. Keeping your sales team excited about their jobs, and focused on achievement, can be challenging for this reason. But it’s worth doing —…
4 Team-Building Techniques That Work for Small Business
Having a cohesive team is crucial for any small business, but building one isn’t easy. Simply putting together a group of people is not “team building” — it takes specific actions and experiences to allow employees to come together into a unit. And as the person running the show, it’s up to you to know…
Why You Need a Marketing Strategy, and 3 Steps to Build One
Marketing your business is no easy task, especially with the countless number of marketing activities that exist today. So, how do you know which are the right ones for your business? It depends on your marketing strategy. What exactly is a marketing strategy? Simply put, it’s a marketing plan of action. A well thought-out marketing…
Webinar Recap: An Insider’s View to Securing Capital to Grow Your Business
Last week we teamed up with our small business education partner SCORE to provide an insider’s view into the new world of business lending in a live webinar. Ty Kiisel, contributing editor at OnDeck, spoke to nearly 300 live listeners to demystify the new landscape of small business lenders. He covered the five major types…
Want to Market Your Small Business Online? Start With These 3 Simple Things
Using the Internet to market your business doesn’t require expensive tools or a fleet of social media strategists. In fact, harnessing the power of the Internet for marketing your small business all starts with three crucial areas. Master them, and you’ve got a foundation to execute an online marketing strategy that brings results. 1. Web…
4 Rules for Handling Conflicts With Your Business Partner
The one certainty with a business partnership, as with any close relationship, is that conflicts will arise. But when you’re working very closely with another person or group, it can be easy to get emotional and lose sight of the larger picture, particularly when the stakes are high and money is on the line. A…
5 Rules for Conducting Killer Job Interviews
The interview is the meat in the sandwich of your hiring process. A huge amount rides on getting interviews right—you have maybe 30 minutes to determine whether someone is a fit to join your team, and to leave a good impression on them. But few small business owners are trained in how to ace interviews…
How to Hire the Best Person For Your Small Business
Hiring is one of the most critical, and difficult, tasks for many small business owners. You may wind up with an urgent need to fill a position, but you don’t want to just hire anyone — finding the best possible person is critical. Still, how do you find that person, and still have time to…
OnDeck Customer Success Story: CyberImaging Systems
Hal Wilson of CyberImaging Systems needed a short-term small business loan to help him over a cash flow crunch, to meet some marketing expenses, and ramp up for a new customer. After completing the application, he had the cash he needed in less than 24 hours. Check out what he calls the three benefits to…
How to Keep Your Best Salespeople Happy (And Selling)
Salespeople may seem easy to find, but top-performing salespeople are not. Once you’ve put the time and resources into attracting a top talent, or developing skills in a new hire, you’ll want to invest time and energy into retaining them. To accomplish this goal, and hold on to your best salespeople, follow these 4 steps:…
OnDeck Customer Success Story: Procraft Interiors
When Tom Bernard wanted to expand his New York construction company, Procraft Interiors, the bank wasn’t too interested in helping him access the money he needed. After noticing a social media add for OnDeck, he decided to give us a try. It didn’t take long before he had the capital he needed to expand and…
Don’t Enter a Business Partnership Until You’ve Answered These Five Questions
In many ways, entering a business partnership can be compared to entering a marriage. There’s an intense level of trust and commitment required from the people involved, and the relationship takes ongoing work and attention in order to thrive. Which means that, just as you would consider many factors carefully before getting married, so should…
6 Ways Marketing Can Make or Break Your Business
The point of marketing is to show current customers that you value their business, and to win the attention of potential customers. A business that consistently shows how much it values customers can consistently win customer attention. Here are six areas in which marketing can lead you to make decisions that will help your bottom line,…
A “Fair” Personal Credit Score Can Cost You
We’ve talked before about how a low personal credit score makes it harder to get a small business loan—along with how a good personal credit score often leads to more favorable loan terms and lower interest rates. Credit.com has introduced a Lifetime Cost of Debt calculator that gives you visibility into what credit might cost…
The 4-Step Guide to Reclaiming Your Time, While Still Growing Your Business
There’s a trap that many small business owners fall into, often without realizing it. Days are constantly packed, and the work week only seems to get longer, but there never seems to be enough time to slow down and handle certain tasks. Business consultant Joanne Macdonald has created a system for escaping this trap, and…