“One common denominator for all successful business is that they discovered a way to earn profit by solving someone’s problem. Information products are developed by confronting an obstacle, finding a way to overcome it, then showing others how they did it.

There are three essentials for a business which comprise the factors of creating and maintaining an Extreme Competitive Advantage: You, Your Brand, and How Your Product/Service is a Solution.

You are The Star. You bring to your business what you have created, accomplished, or overcome. You are the reason your business exists, whether you are selling a service, information, or a gadget. If you aren’t in the equation, your business won’t exist.

Your brand is Your Story. Years ago, just out of college in my first writing job, a colleague was lamenting that she would never be able to write a book because all of the good ideas had already been written about. While there is some truth to that, everybody’s story is different, and how you present it will be different, too. Your story, your brand will be unique because you are unique. So when you start thinking about your brand, look at your story. What makes it different? What makes you different? Bring that to your business and you will see your brand develop.

Your product or service is The Solution. When you weave the star and the story together, you create and maintain extreme competitive advantage as a support for your solution; it requires looking at several levels of your business, from branding and marketing to product development and R&D, budgeting your resources and staying nimble in your decision-making—in short, developing your Extreme Competitive Advantage. Here are six things to consider as you bring your Star, Story, and Solution to life:

1. Have a profound reason for your business.

The fact is, like a book theme, there aren’t a lot of segments in business that need more offerings. As a result, you will need to look for either a trend-related reason to be in business or for a service advantage that you can provide. What do you know that someone might need or desire that they can’t find anywhere else? What service do you provide that sets you apart from anything that is currently available? How can you position yourself to be distinct in your market?

2. Create Strong Positioning.

Stand out from your competitors. Be clear and dramatic, dynamic and different. What sets you apart? What do you offer that makes people take notice of you and your business? What is the best way of making the presentation of your solution to the world? Everything you do establishes your brand. Look at companies with strong brand appeal. You notice them because they offer something different, or they say it in a way that the market notices.

3. The Continuous Development of Unique Assets is Key.

We’re all very familiar with the iPod. It’s revolutionized how we listen to music, added another tool to share information, and changed how people view Apple as an innovative technology company. For a short time, Apple relied heavily on this unique asset to give them a competitive advantage. However, within months, many mp3 players became available from other companies. So, they came out with other models to cover more of the market; they added new features; they continued to develop new products. Now they’ve developed the iPhone. What Apple knows is that although they have a unique asset, their competitive advantage will go away over time. They need to continually develop new ones to maintain their competitive advantage.

4. Maintain an Economic Advantage.

This is a key area that too many businesses lack. Wise use of budgetary funds will help you to maintain profitability over your competitors. Pricing is important, as is perceived value to the customer. The more unique your offering, whether it is service or a product, the more ability you’ll have to offer products for premium prices and bigger margins, ultimately attracting customers for whom price is not a factor.

5. Build Complex Business Systems.

Systems are very important for the flow of your business. Another way they are important is that the more complicated they are, the less likely it is that your competition will copy them, allowing you to maintain your competitive advantage.

6. Use Speed and Agility.

You must be mentally, physically, emotionally, and financially agile to maintain your competitive advantage. Staying a step ahead of your competition requires you to be at your best in all areas.

As you build your business, support The Star, Story, and Solution with these six aspects of creating and maintaining a competitive advantage and you will move ever closer to the Success Phenomenon.

Copyright 2007 © Marilyn Schwader

As a Writing and Life Coach, Marilyn uses humor, compassion, and a strong sense of a writer’s abilities to support and motivate her clients to become published authors. Her purpose in life is to give a voice to subjects that benefit others. Her mission is to provide truthful, clear, and motivating information to those who passionately desire more in their lives. Her vision is to use her two passions-coaching and storytelling-to convey this information to as many people as possible. Click here to contact Marilyn.

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Tags: information, maintain, ethics, business, competitive

“Being a businessman for a number of years I’ve come across many situations where its easy to bend the truth a little. Even in certain sales courses I took early on in my career, they would teach us, not to lie, but to not talk about some things that may kill the transaction, deal, or contract. This is called being dishonest. The unfortunate realization here is that its easy for people in the business world to pick up these bad habits and make what I call ‘short term money.’ This is the type of business income that only comes around once, no repeat…and no referrals.

Dishonest business people generally don’t last in the world of business, and if they do, they struggle. They struggle to put deals together and that is because dishonesty creates many unwanted headaches. Its common for them to get used to doing business a certain way, the unethical way, and they continue to repeat the same mistakes.

The rewards you get from being honest in your business practice are immense. Fellow associates will respect you way more. Clients will refer your service or product, oftentimes not because of the product, but because of you! Your credibility will soar. So, if you want to fly like an eagle and soar with the birds?

Tell me the truth. Only imminent success will follow. Try this, imagine yourself being honest, its not very tough. Actually, once you get used to it, its easy. Go figure. Lets all grow……together.

Sam Hachem is a local Edmonton, Alberta businessman and recognized Real Estate expert. Business ethics play a big part in him maintaining a strong business practice.

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Tags: business, ethics, honest, maintain, management

Two small business owners or possibly businessmen walked up to another newspaper vending machine. One deposited the proper coins and opens the door to take his paid for newspaper. Then he asks his companion if he would like one as well? A second newspaper is removed without payment. The companion then jokes about receiving 2 newspapers for the price of one.

I personally witnessed this scenario. What I did was to take the necessary coins from my own pocketbook and deposit them into the machine. I opened the door and then closed the door without taking a newspaper. The two small business owners or executives now stared at me in disbelief.

As I approached the restaurant door, one of the businessmen opened the door, but he could not look me in the eyes. He knew he did wrong, but he thought that no one else would see. And he probably else thought that everyone else does it so why not?

Business ethics is all about character. And character is all about doing the right thing when no one else is looking.

I call this self leadership because if you cannot lead yourself well by demonstrating character when no one else is looking how can you lead others?

One of the most consistent complaints that I hear from small business owners is about the lack of work ethics such as employees who do not give an hour of work for an hour of pay. Yet, how many of their executives, supervisors and managers are doing the same thing?

Possibly, these two small business owners thought that rank had its privileges or that they had already paid their fair share? Earning a certain position does merit some additional benefits, but rank does not give permission to steal, to be disrespectful, to be unethical.

Given that our actions are open to everyone to see and hear, we in the business world must be consistently executing the right actions through our work ethics demonstrated by our self leadership skills. For failure to do so, will only cause us harm sometime down the road or the path to the restaurant door when we fail to notice who is observing our business ethics.

How is the leadership character in your organization? Get this free self leadership checklist.

Do you need some additional business coaching training services Then visit the business coaching training gym.

Leanne Hoagland-Smith coaches small businesses to large organizations and high school students to entrepreneurs to double performance by closing the gap between today’s outcomes and tomorrow’s goals. Please feel free to visit this site and explore how she can help you from the free articles to the improvement tips.

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Tags: business, ethics, honest, maintain, management

Are you ethical in your business dealings? Are you ethical in your personal dealings? There are many people that would say that your business ethics and your personal ethics have absolutely nothing to do with each other, but truthfully they have everything to do with each other because there is no such thing as business ethics. You are either ethical in life or your not!

I look at the state of business in America today and I believe that the lack of ethics and character are a large part of the downturn in our economy over the past years. Some may say that there have always been scandals in business and government and I would agree with that but at no other time in history has it ever been as excepted as it is today. In today’s society people think it’s just business as usual if they have to lie and cheat to get ahead. As terrible as that sounds it is true! Where do people get the idea that being unethical is ok? In large part I think they see the scandals of former presidents, CEO’s, right down to the people on their children’s school boards making unethical decisions and doing unethical things. This problem will only continue to get worse until we, the American citizens stand up and say no more! We need to begin teaching Americas youth that there is right and there is wrong. To many people are to busy worrying about doing what it takes to get ahead whatever the cost , to realize the example we are setting for the next generation.

Are you willing to cheat on your golf score? If you go to the grocery store and the cashier gives you change for a $20 bill when you only gave her a $10 bill do you correct her? The sad thing is that most people are willing to cheat on a golf score and would not correct the cashier. With that being said if people are willing to cheat on their golf score than why would they not be willing to cheat on their taxes or not follow through with a business deal? People don’t think of not correcting the cashier as stealing but it really is! If someone is willing to steal from the grocery store where they shop, than what would stop them from stealing from your companies expense account? There in lies the problem. Now you have to understand I don’t come to you with this all figured out nor am I up on a high horse looking down on anybody but I do believe we all need to work a lot harder on making honest and ethical decisions in our lives and having a zero tolerance policy for those we associate with . We need some true leader to stand up and say no more. It starts as just a few people and then it becomes infectious and will continue to spread. What we are striving for is to restore ourselves as men and women, to rewind to a time when you could seal a deal with a handshake and your good word after all, a mans word is his worth (this applies to women too). It is up to you and me to demand of those we deal with on a daily basis to have high moral standards and a strong code of ethics!

What steps will you take to ensure your future in business and in life? I know for me it is a daily battle to do as I say to be on time to tell the complete truth and point out unethical things to those who are doing them and help rectify the situation. Let us stand together as one united nation and demand that our government, businesses and families stand on a foundation of strong principles and values. Only we can make the difference! Here’s to a brighter future and a stronger nation, god bless!

To Your Success

Chad DeMay

Better Health & Spreading Wealth, earn 3-5k or more while enjoying life

Visit this website

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Tags: business, ethics, honest, maintain, management

Whether they admit it or not, what drives businessmen in their day-to-day activities is profit, and more of it, to the maximum, if they may have their way. And yet, in the Permits or Licenses required of them by the government before they are allowed to operate, they so virtuously declare as their mission to render service to the people by selling and making available various day-to-day necessities. And rightly so, as they are authorized to put up business not only to enable them to raise profits, but more importantly so they can assist the government in extending to the populace the basic services and commodities that the government is not in the position to deliver, that is, for a fee or for value of their commodities involved.

However, for humanitarian and ethical purposes, the businessmen’s desire for more and more profit should be tempered with compassion and social concern. Compassion in that the prices they label on their goods should at least be proportionate with the purchasing power of the customers. Social concern in that businessmen should take into consideration not only the amount of profit they may be able to earn from those who can well afford, but that they may also have to be able to supply the
basic needs of the rest of society who may not be that well off.

And that, to my mind, is the most basic gauge whereby the ethical standard of business should stand.
It might not be unethical, per se, to be able to sell commodities at prices much higher than a 5% or 10% profit margin, that is expert salesmanship, but it certainly is not right when you insist on that price even when you know that your present clientele can afford only so less. In fact, this is one reason for government to implement price control ceilings on certain commodities in the interest of some sectors of society.

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Eleno Enojo – EzineArticles Expert Author

Tags: standards, maintain, ethics, ethical, standard

One of the serious problems that businesses face these days is business ethics problems. When put simply, these problems are conflicts between the interest of a business and that of the employees/customer or the society in general.

No matter how hard the management of a business tries to set and maintain high standards of professional ethics, these conflicts do surface at some point of time or the other. One does not have to dig deep to find the reasons for these conflicts either, as they are inherent in the very nature of business.

Any person joining a job wishes to be paid as highly as possible. In contrast, cost minimization is always high on the priority list of the employer(s). An employee wishes to have the minimum work hours whereas the management is always striving to reach the peak of productivity.

When it comes to the customers, they want to have the best possible products on the least possible prices. At the same time, the manufacturer tries to produce an item at the lowest possible cost and put as high a price as possible.

The society expects the corporate world to bear their social responsibilities – being environment conscious, making investments in sports and education, maintaining clean surroundings, etc. For a business entity all these will mean additional expenditure.

The million dollar question, in the face of all these demands, is how do you overcome this situation, if at all these can be overcome?

The answer lies in ‘balance’. No one can argue with the fact that businesses are established to maximize returns for its owner(s) and, in some cases, shareholders. Still, the business establishments can achieve this goal while behaving ethically – helping its employees, giving to the customers’ products worth their money and serving the community in general.

By following ethical norms and investing in social sectors, the business will earn the respect and confidence of the customer. This way the business may not make fast bucks or what is termed ‘go for kill’ but the results will start to show with time. In long term, it will be a boon for the brand and will enable the business to get to high profitability rates.

Similarly, if a business takes care of its employees, it will have happier and more productive workers. This, in turn, will make very positive effect on the productivity of the company.

If a business takes care to reduce waste, encourage recycling and preserving energy, it will not only aid the environment but will also help itself. Using these means, a considerable amount can be saved which can then be put to better use.

There is no denying that even a responsible business outfit will face business ethics problems. However, they can be countered using business ethics acumen and insight.

Kip D Goldhammer owns and operates this Website

Business Ethics

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Tags: standards, maintain, ethics, ethical, standard