Ready to Face Challenges Head On? 5 Daily Practices to Develop Your Problem-Solving Mindset12/4/2023  The problem-solving mindset helps you in all areas of your business and personal life. We’re constantly confronted with problems. If you can learn the right skills and techniques, you can face each one optimistically and come up with solutions. This isn’t something you’re born with, it’s something that you must learn and develop. Anyone can master the problem-solving mindset. Here are 5 daily practices you can use to improve these skills. Practice Asking Why The first step in problem solving is to get to the root cause. We often don’t realize what this is, even when we think we do. This is why it’s useful to keep asking “why” until you get there. Take any issue you’re facing and try to figure out its source. Then, keep asking “why” until you’re sure you have it. If you start practicing this in your daily life when you face small problems, you can employ the technique for bigger problems. Work on Stress Reduction You need to be calm in order to identify causes and propose solutions to problems. You can’t deal with issues if you’re in a panicked state. A good way to prepare yourself is to practice some simple stress reduction techniques like deep breathing, visualization, or affirmations. Practice so that you can get into a calm frame of mind whenever you start to feel stressed. Draw Pictures Often when facing a complex or elusive problem, we’ll make a visual representation. This helps you see abstract things in a simpler way and can present a new perspective from which a solution might emerge. Learn how to think visually. Practice techniques like flow charts and mind mapping so that you can use them whenever you need to analyze any situation. Practice Active Listening Active listening is a skill where you listen to someone and then repeat back what they said in your own words. It helps by showing that you’re listening but also clarifies to make sure you understood what was said. There are a number of instances where active listening comes in handy in problem solving. One example is when identifying the initial problem. Someone may be describing the situation to you and active listening help you make sure you understand and summarize the most important facts. Exercise Your Brain Spend some time each day exercising your brain. This will help to improve your neurological functioning and push you to think outside your comfort zone, making it easier to think creatively and handle issues. Find something fun that gives your brain a challenge. Puzzles, logic problems, or games like Sudoku or chess are great, and you can access them via apps. Become a Master Problem Solver Problem solving is important in all aspects of your business and personal life, so start training yourself today to become a master problem solver. This is an essential mindset that you can’t live without. Are you ready to start growing your problem-solving skills? Check out, “Mindset Alignment For Acceleration In Your Assignment” This course teaches you how to align your mindset and transform your life and business. Experience Growth. Enroll In Mindset Alignment Course Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Coaching and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.
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 Changing your mindset can radically transform your life and business. Your frame of mind has a direct impact on everything you do. Adopting ways of thinking that are positive, creative, and growth-minded can help you achieve whatever you want. There are mindsets for that can turn your life around: Growth Mindset. Anyone can grow, change, and learn new skills. Abundance Mindset. There’s more than enough wealth and resources to go around. Creative Mindset. Express yourself, use your imagination, and generate new ideas in every aspect of your life. Problem-Solving Mindset. Any problem can be solved with the right process in place. Entrepreneurial Mindset. Opportunities are everywhere if you know how to recognize them. Here are 5 ways your life will improve if you adopt these mindsets: See Change as an Opportunity Change is unavoidable. You can respond to change in one of two ways. It’s either a threat to the status quo that carries risks, or it’s an exciting challenge where you can learn new things and find new opportunities. Adopting these mindsets will help you develop a healthy attitude towards change so it doesn’t derail you. Nurture Your Creativity Creativity is essential for all areas of your business. It allows you to express yourself in new and original ways and generate innovative ideas. People mistakenly believe that it’s the exclusive domain of artists, but anyone can learn to unlock their creativity and use it in all aspects of their life. This skill is useful for solving problems, identifying new opportunities, brainstorming, setting goals, and handling the everyday operations of your business. Reduce Stress These mindsets teach you to have a positive attitude, increased self-awareness, and a healthy approach to problems and challenges. A side effect of all this is that you’ll find yourself with less stress. What stresses you most now? Does a sense of scarcity make you feel panicked about the future? The abundance mindset teaches you recognize that there’s enough to go around. Are you frustrated that you can’t break out of your rut? The growth mindset will help you try new things. Even small adaptations in your way of thinking can have a big impact on your stress level. Build Relationships Mastering these mindsets will make you calmer, more generous, and more valuable to know. You’ll inspire others through your positive attitude and growth. You’ll build valuable relationships and create a support network of like-minded people who are also inspiring, creative, and growth-focused. Push Your Limits These mindsets will help you think bigger, plan better, and grow. You’ll become a lifelong student, embrace abundance, harness creativity, develop a process to solve problems, and seek out opportunities. How to Adopt the 5 Mindsets Are you ready to start adopting these 5 key mindsets? It involves learning skills and practices that absolutely anyone can master. No one is born a growth-minded entrepreneur. Start learning today and seeing results. Want to learn more about transforming your mindset and changing your life? Head over to the course, “MINDSET ALIGNMENT FOR ACCELERATION IN YOUR ASSIGNMENT” Mindset Matters Register For The Course Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger, course creator and Founder of Innovative Business Coaching and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.
 The ultimate expert on your promotions isn’t you or a marketing guru. It’s your customers. They’re the only people who truly understand whether your promos are meeting their needs. All you have to do is listen to them and create promotions and sales events based on their feedback. Here are 5 things they’d be telling you about your promotions if they could. “Make It Valuable” The real purpose of a promo isn’t to offer a steep discount or cheap goods. It should offer value. A “great deal” is a product or service that solves a specific problem and provides tangible benefits. Create your promotions from the customer’s point of view. Don’t just make it cheap, think about how you can make it valuable. “Don’t Bother Me Too Much” Your customers will love you if you offer high-value deals throughout the year, but they don’t want you to bother them too much. If you pop up every week with another sale, they’ll start tuning you out. You should plan some valuable promotions during sales slumps, when you need a boost in income and they need motivation to buy. In between promos, offer helpful content that provides information that solves problems for your audience. If you do this well, they’ll pay attention whenever you pitch a promo. “Don’t Offer a Discount Right After I Paid Full Price!” The last thing a customer wants to see is a great promotion for a product they just paid full price for. If your timing works out like this, your efforts can backfire and you may even lose customers. There are a number of ways you can prevent this from happening. Don’t offer sales immediately following peak buying season – give it some time. Or, create a clearance sale for items that very few people have purchased. “Listen to What I Told You Last Promotion” When you start planning your promotions, go over past sales and look at successes and failures. The key is to duplicate successes and learn from the failures so you don’t repeat them. Your past sales history is feedback from your customers. They tell you what they think about your promos by buying or not buying. “Make It Relevant – And Personalized!” How well do you know your customers? Start with their preferences and tastes when you start crafting your offers. Try to understand what they want from you. Connect your promos to events in their lives and offer products they can use. The more relevant and personal you can make your promos, the more successful they’ll be. Building Your Successful Promotional Calendar When planning your promotional calendar, use feedback from your customers so you can create offers that are perfect for them. Want to learn more? There's still time to join Check out “Plan Your Promotions” Master Class You learn you how to set up a promotional calendar that that will help you achieve your business goals. Don’t Miss The Opportunity! Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Solutions and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.
 Well-timed promotions can help you sell more, hit your targets, and achieve your business goals. But it takes some planning and preparation to get the timing just right, while offering your customers maximum value. Before you can start planning your promotions, you need to ask yourself these 5 essential questions. Who Am I Targeting? First, it’s essential to know your audience. You need to know what issues and problems they face so that your offer provides a solution. You’ll also need to know their tastes, behaviors, and what motivates them when choosing the timing of your promos, the promo types, and the messages and communications that will accompany the promos. Do some research and gather feedback from the market. Follow your target audience on social media and interact with them. Conduct surveys or polls and ask direct questions. What Is My Business Objective? What do you want your promotions to achieve? The answer is critical. It will inform future decisions and will also help you determine if your promotions were a success. Your goal might be to grow your audience, increase sales, attract new customers, strengthen the relationship with existing customers, or bring back customers who haven’t purchased from you in a while. What Is Happening In The Industry? You can’t completely grasp the market landscape if you don’t know what is happening in your industry. What kind of promotions are already being launched and what is the response? Knowing this will provide insight into your target audience’s likes and dislikes. You may also have an opportunity to fill an untapped need. How Much Can I Afford to Discount? Before you get started creating promotions, you should have a realistic idea of what you can offer without breaking the bank. Set a price or discount that can withstand a high volume of orders. The same advice applies to service providers: Make sure you have enough time to deliver your service in the event that there’s a flood of orders. Digital products or free access to paid services are great promo ideas that won’t cost you a thing. Is It Appropriate for My Brand? Every promotion reflects on your brand, so make sure each one creates a positive impression. The promotion should be relevant to your products and services and complement your brand image. Too many promos can devalue your brand, so proceed with caution. Don’t create an association between your brand and cheap goods (unless you’re a value/budget brand). Creating Your Promotional Calendar Once you’ve answered these 5 questions, you’re ready to start planning your promotional calendar. The first step is to look at your sales data and find slumps throughout the year where you could benefit from a boost in income. Want to plan create your annual promotional calendar? Plan Your Promotions Master Class will take you step by step to plan, schedule and implement your promotions for a full year. Learn more HERE Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Solutions and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.
 Promotions help you sell more, grow your customer base, and strengthen relationships with existing customers. Use promotions effectively by planning them a year in advance, connecting them to holidays and seasons that are relevant to your audience. But how do you get the word out? A promotion won’t succeed if people don’t know about it. Here are the top 5 ways to get your promotions noticed. Social Media Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter are great for getting the word out about promotions. Alert your followers and give your promotion a hashtag so people can find it. In the days leading up to the event, create a pinned post so it’s the first thing people see when they check out your profile. In addition to promotional content, share helpful information related to the products or services you’re selling. Email Marketing If you don’t already have an email list, build one and use it for your promotions. Email is an even better way to reach people than social media because it’s personal. Your messages go straight to the customer’s inbox. If your goal is to boost retention and build relationships with existing customers, offer exclusive deals to email subscribers only. They’ll be more likely to buy because it’s especially for them. Promote with Video Video content is a powerful way to communicate with followers and potential customers. Videos perform better on social media than other types of content. You can create videos promoting your sale, as well as short videos that provide tips or advice, with mention of your promotion in the description or within the video. Team up with a Partner Team up with another business that shares your target and collaborate on promotions. This will give you direct access to their audience, significantly expanding your reach. It also lets you leverage each other’s skills and expertise. This is a great opportunity to build your relationship with new people in your network. Paid Advertising Paid advertising is an effective way to get your message in front of new people. The only downside is that it costs you money. But it can be a profitable investment if you want to aggressively build your audience. You have a variety of paid advertising options, including ads on social media or search engines. Get Started Planning Your Promos Now that you know how to get the word out, it’s time to start developing your annual promo calendar. Pick times of the year where you need to boost sales and decide which holidays are relevant to your audience – and then get planning! Want to learn more about planning, scheduling and implementing your promotions? Register for: Plan Your Promotions Master Class Tuesday, November 14, 2023 6-8PM CST Learn More HERE Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Solutions and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.
 Planning promotions with a yearly calendar is a good way to achieve your business goals. Whether you want to boost sales during slow periods, or hold flash sales to motivate current customers to buy additional products, this is an effective and organized approach that gets results. It would seem like the more sales and promotions you offer, the more results you’ll get. But this isn’t always the case. If you offer too many, you run the risk of promotion overkill. Here are the top 3 reasons why you should limit your promos. Customer Burnout When you offer occasional promotions throughout the year, your customers will be excited. You can build buzz leading up to each and which could result into more sales. But if you run too many, your audience could burn out and your promotions will lose their effectiveness and novelty over time. One way to mitigate this is to mix up your promotions. Offer discounts on different types of products and services. Segment and target specific groups within your audience. Try to find the most important and relevant times of year for your promotions. Devaluing Your Brand Holding too many promotions can devalue your brand. People will see you as a business that offers cheap goods. Ideally, your customers buy from you because your products and services offer unique solutions to their problems. They love the value you offer, not just the low prices. For example, if you run a promotion once every two months like clockwork, people will wait until the next promotion to buy from you. They know you’re going to run it, so they’ll just plan their buying around the sale and never pay full price. Fewer Profits Offering constant promotions can also hurt your bottom line. If you’re always selling below the regular price, you simply won’t earn as much from your sales. You’ve put in the work setting your product pricing so that it yields a good return on investment. Promotion overkill will undermine these efforts. Promotions are a way to get a temporary burst of income when you need it. You should plan them during sales slumps when people aren’t buying like they usually do. This way, promotions won’t interfere with your regular sales. Finding the Sweet Spot Promotions are a great strategy but don’t overuse them. They should offer incredible value, not just a reduced rate. How many promos should your business run? This depends on your customers and your brand. Every target audience has their own sweet spot. Find yours by creating a yearly promotional calendar and testing it out. Act Now, Plan and Prepare Better Take action now and start planning, scheduling and implementing your promotions. Enroll in our Plan Your Promotions Master Class today. To Learn More Click HERE Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Solutions and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.
 If you plan your promotional calendar a year in advance, this will help you generate a steady income while offering great value to your customers. When planning your promotions, there are many types to choose from. Here are 5 popular and effective promotion ideas to inspire you. Flash Sales A flash sale is a very short, limited-time offer. It can last just a few days or even a few hours. The idea is to offer a deep discount in a short window of time – and then it’s gone. Make sure that your Flash Sale is not something you offer every month just to generate sales but, something offered periodically such as twice a year to motivate people to purchase your offer. Seasonal and Holiday Sales Seasonal and holiday sales are promotions that are linked to an annual event or time of year. This includes Valentine’s Day, summertime, or ‘back to school’ sales. These promotions are effective because they’re tied to important events in your customers’ lives, making your sale relevant, memorable, and meaningful. Annual Sales Another option is to hold a major annual sale. Create a promotional event that your customers will look forward to every year. Annual sales are often used by businesses that rarely offer promotions. Choose a time of year when sales are slow. For example, if you have a dip in sales in January, this is the ideal time to hold your annual promotion. You can also use your annual promotion to fill a gap in your calendar, during a quiet time when there isn’t a relevant or exciting holiday to celebrate. Clearance Sales Clearance sales allow you to get rid of excess stock or items that aren’t selling. Offer a steep discount to motivate people to buy. BOGOF BOGOF stands for “buy one get one free.” Most commonly, BOGOF means that you’re offering two items for the price of one, but it can also refer to product bundles or free upgrades with purchase. The idea is that your customer can buy a product at regular price and get something else in the bargain. Pair products that people typically buy together, or products that can be used together, and increase the value of the BOGOF offer. Creating Your Profitable Promotional Calendar How do you put these promotional types to work? Analyze your cycle, pick the optimal times of year for your promotions, and then create the right offer for your target audience. Want to learn step by step how to plan your promotions for a quarter, six months or even a full year? This is a great time to plan for 2024. Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Solutions and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.
What Entrepreneurs Can Learn from How CEOs Think No matter how small your company or organization, you can learn something from how CEOs think. Even if you’re a freelancer or solo entrepreneur, you can use what you learn from CEOs to grow your business and lead it like a pro. Here are the ways CEOs think differently than the rest of us.
CEOs Look to the Future A CEO has two major concerns. The first is to make sure the company is growing. They have a vision of where the company should be 5, 10, even 20 years from now. Their job is to understand all the moving parts and steer their organization to those goals. Even if you’re a freelance service provider or the owner of a simple ecommerce store, you also have to grow your business so it doesn’t stagnate. Motivating Your Team The second major concern is to motivate and inspire their team. CEOs provide leadership. If you have employees or even virtual assistants, you can keep them motivated and communicate your vision to them. Like a CEO, choose the right people, inspire them, prepare them with everything they need to realize your vision, and then get out of their way so they can use their skills to get results. Maintain the Big Picture View The CEO is the one person in a company who is uniquely able to see the entire organization from a birds’ eye view. Maintaining the big picture doesn’t mean you don’t care about details, but it means you’re not getting bogged down in all the daily tasks. You should focus on the details that are important and outsource and delegate tasks that take away time from planning your strategy for growth. Focus on Your Core Values Every business, no matter how small, has core values that define why they do what they do. There’s a reason you started your business. You wanted to solve problems and make the world a better place. A CEO never loses sight of this, no matter what else they’re doing in their business. Like the leader of a big company, you should always keep your core values in mind and act in accordance with them. Communicate Like a CEO CEOs communicate effectively. This means not just being a good communicator, but also communicating the right things at the right time. If you’ve spent time in a big organization, you know that a good CEO is responsive to their staff, but they also control communications so they have uninterrupted time to work. Strategic Thinking A CEO always has their own ideas. They can always propose something in a timely manner. They think strategically, so they always have a plan. When sudden decisions need to be made, this leader already has an idea ready to propose. They aren’t easily surprised by changes in the market because they’ve already considered every possibility and have a plan ready for each. If you can cultivate these traits in your business, you’ll see better growth and more efficient operations. Master the traits and mindset of CEOs and you’ll see immediate benefits to your business. Enroll in the course that will transform your thinking to “Think Like A CEO” Learn strategic CEO thinking. Secure your spot in our course and discover the CEO mindset that sets apart industry leaders. Don't Miss This Opportunity! Enroll NOW! Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Solutions and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.  One of the many things that make CEOs different from the rest of us is their ability to continue learning new things. It is this accumulated knowledge and experience that allows them to lead their organization in the right direction and make key decisions. Anyone can learn like a CEO and enjoy the benefits of doing so.
Bringing It All Together CEOs have wide-ranging interests that all feed into their business decision-making. They know all the key information they need about their company, as well as their employees, their business performance, the industry, and the competition. They know a great deal not only about their business but about other topics as well. For example, they bring information from other industries into theirs. They might be following trends in other industries that they can learn from in their business. Knowing What You Need to Know Although they have casual knowledge on a variety of topics, they’re also good at determining which information is most essential. CEOs don’t have time to know everything down to the smallest detail. This is useful, for example, when holding meetings with business partners. They know what questions to ask to yield just what they’re looking for. They don’t need to know everything, but they need to know enough. Learning from Peers and Mentors Everyone learns differently, but research shows that CEOs learn in a slightly different way than the rest of us. They are more likely to learn from peers or mentors than from traditional educational materials or classrooms. They’re also more likely to be avid readers. They read about business and their industry, but also widely on a variety of unrelated topics. Failure is a Valuable Teacher One key feature of the CEO’s view on learning is how they see failure. Along the way to becoming a successful CEO, you make many missteps. Decisions need to be made quickly and decisively. Sometimes, you make the wrong decision, and it can be disastrous for your business. However, a CEO sees this as a valuable learning opportunity. This is one of those valuable experiences that will inform future decisions and help the CEO move the company in the right direction in the future. Always Open to Learning If you’ve ever known the CEO of a company, you’ll find that they possess an insatiable curiosity. They ask many questions, even about things that don’t seem essential to the business discussion. They’re always seeking something new. This isn’t just for business, but also for the constant self-development that leaders need. It’s no exaggeration to say that one of the key jobs of CEO is to learn. You can learn like a CEO without running a huge business. By studying the way these individuals think and learn, you can help your business run more efficiently and grow faster. Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Solutions and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality.  If you’re a freelancer or solo entrepreneur, then you’re running your own business. Even if your business is just you on your own, you have to take over the role of CEO. In order to do this, you need to adopt the CEO mindset. Anyone can do this and see the benefits. Here are the keys to how you can approach your work like a CEO.
Focus on Results Did you know that 80% of your results come from only 20% of your activities? Do you know which of your daily activities make up that 20%? For a CEO, results are everything. They’re aware of which actions produce which benefits, and they focus their energy here. A CEO doesn’t waste time on activities that don’t get results. Always Trying New Things You can think more like a CEO by constantly trying new things. Leaders of companies are driven by an insatiable curiosity. One great way to cultivate this is to try one new thing each day. Purposely seek out new experiences and areas to learn about, even if they don’t seem strictly related to your business. Get Out of Your Comfort Zone Humans naturally fall into patterns, but these can quickly turn into ruts. If you want to think like a CEO, learn to recognize when you’re stagnating and seek out new challenges. Never back down from a risk when there’s great potential reward. CEOs are fearless risk-takers because they know that facing risk, whether you succeed or fail, is a great learning experience. Look at the Big Picture As the leader of an organization, a CEO has to always take the big picture view. This means looking at your company from the top down, considering its place in the market, its history, and where it’s going. The big picture view means not just looking at the next week or month, but the next five or ten years. Connect to Your Core Values Why did you start your business? Do you think about this every day? Reconnect with the reason you started. What big change did you want to make in the world or in the lives of your customers? Clarify your core values and keep them in mind at all times. Use them whenever you make key decisions. Think Strategically A successful CEO is never surprised by even the most sudden change in the market because they’ve considered everything and made a plan for anything that could happen. Stay one step ahead of competitors and industry changes by considering possible outcomes and how you would respond to each. Then, when it comes time to make a major decision, you can do so quickly and decisively. No matter where you are in your business, start thinking like a CEO now and you’ll see your business grow and get closer to its goals. Join Our Community of Thinkers Connect with like-minded individuals and learn from the best. Enroll in "Think Like A CEO" to be part of our exclusive Innovate Academy Membership community. Pat Simes is a Business Strategist, blogger and Founder of Innovative Business Solutions and Innovate Academy. She currently resides in the Midwest and is committed to inspiring and empowering entrepreneurs to transform their vision to reality. |
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