You Are a Mogul

Tech entrepreneur Tiffany Pham, a graduate of Yale and Harvard Business School, is one of the most interesting and important young women in social media. She wrote the code for Mogul, an information-sharing platform for women, and developed it as CEO into an influential media app.

Based largely on her personal journey, with an upbringing that ranged from cosmopolitan Paris to suburban Texas, Pham emphasizes the importance of adaptation and persistence in this guide to pursuing a career, a new business, a lifestyle, or a dream.

Directed primarily at young women, as is the Mogul site, this book zealously promotes a no-barriers vision of opportunities for women who are willing to work hard and professional achievement their priority. "You've got to kill it and over-deliver on every task you are given," she advises. "If you are only willing to work during your office hours, you miss out on opportunities for so many fulfilling endeavors, and the ability to start having an impact now."

This familiar career oriented approach won't work for everyone, but for those who it enables the impossible may be possible.  

You Are a Mogul

How to Do the Impossible, Do It Yourself, and Do It Now

by Tiffany Pham

Simon & Schuster, 2018

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Selling More Than Honey

from In Business with Bees

"Consider that the equipment you are using is active for only a short time each year. The rest of the time it sits unused not earning you money, but still needing to be paid for. Can you remedy that? Yes. Provide services.

"You can essentially become a packer for other beekeepers who do not have the efficient machines or the extra time that you now do. They bring the honey, the bottles, and labels, and you fill and label for them...

"Another income generator you might consider is custom extracting. You use your equipment and their supers full of honey to put into their pails. This is especially nice for smaller operations that don't have the equipment you do, or for the hobbyists who don't have the time to devote."

In Business with Bees

How to Expand, Sell, and Market Honeybee Products and Services including Pollination, Bees and Queens, Beeswax, Honey and More

by Kim Flottum

Quarry Books, 2018

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Testing "How Asia Works"

Joe Studwell distills extensive research into the economics of nine countries — Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, and China — into an accessible, readable narrative that debunks Western misconceptions, shows what really happened in Asia and why, and for once makes clear why some countries have boomed while others have languished.

For anyone interested in a region that will shape the future of the world, this is an important text.

How Asia Works

by Joe Studwell

Grove Press, 2014

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Review: The Art of Social Selling

The author of this book defines "social selling" by pointing out what it is not.

"Social selling is not like buying a list of leads and cold calling everyone on the list. It is not a disruptive process, where you merely spit out a series of marketing messages, lead-generation offers, or coupons and discounts. Nor is social selling the equivalent of lead scraping."

The basic principles of social selling are not new, although the technologies of LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter differ from a beeper or a phone. They are based in the sales philosophy expressed by the imperative, “Don’t sell anything; make a friend instead.”

A digital marketing promoter and author of "Starting an Online Business All-in-One For Dummies," author Shannon Belew explains that effective social selling is nothing more than relationship building. "For most salespeople, this should come as good news. After all, the traditional sales process is just about that - relationships."

Whether you are on Google+ or Pinterest or Facebook, the principles are the same: seek out customers current and new, learn from what they are saying and engage them to build a sincere relationship. Every time you bring something of value to the conversation or service a need, you establish trust and build a reputation.

The Art of Social Selling

Finding and Engaging Customers on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Other Social Networks

by Shannon Belew

AMACOM, 2014

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Starting an Online Business All-in-One For Dummies

Why Go Google+ ?

Another advantage to having a Google+ profile is that you can connect your Google+ profile to your website and other social media profiles, increasing your exposure to prospective customers and helping your content be seen by a wider audience.

One way of increasing exposure is through the use of the "g+ share" button and the "+1" designation (the Google equivalent of a Like. For any content that you post, someone else can validate it as useful or liked simply by clicking the button to share it on their Google+ profile. When otherse see the content, they can click the "+1" icon to like and share the content from within Google+. 

As you might expect, the +1 is an increasingly important desiognation since it increases the visibility and reach of a piece of content. Of course, the use of Google+ may potentially help you show up in Google search engine results for related keyword searches. 

If you are a local business (as opposed to a national brand), getting the improved search result rankings may also make it easier for local prospective customers to find you or your business.

excerpted from:

The Art of Social Selling

Finding and Engaging Customers on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Other Social Networks

by Shannon Belew

AMACOM , 2014

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Review: The Digital Economy

Long before there was Google or eBay or YouTube and while Mark Zuckerberg was still in grade school,  business writer Don Tapscott penned a best-selling book titled "The Digital Economy" predicting that the "Internet" many people took for a passing fad or geekish novelty was destined to become a major driving force in the world economy.

Twenty years later, we live in the world Tapscott prognosticated, where institutions like newspapers, the post office, libraries and even banks are having to question their role in society and the "mass media" of just a decade or so ago now seems improbably small and even irrelevant.

On the 20th anniversary of its publication, "The Digital Economy" has been republished in a new edition for which Tapscott has produced introductory essays for each of the book's twelve chapters, discussing what has changed since the first edition.

The Internet is becoming a new mode of production that changes the way we orchestrate capability in society to innovate, create goods and services, and even create public value," Tapscott notes in an essay preceeding the original Chapter 1.  "The most important assets are contained in the crania of knowledge workers. The most effective work systems are social and collaborative, and increasingly thoughtful people everywhere understand that an economy based on greed is not only unworkable, it threatens the planet."

While much of the book is centered on corporations and their responses to new economic paradigms, it also offers plenty of insights and suggestions for small businesses and independent producers and social agencies and consumers who stand to gain from or suffer under this evolving economic model.

"The social world is transforming the way we create wealth, work, learn, play, raise our children, and probably, the way we think," Tapscott points out. As with changes in the climate, the choice is either to adapt or be overwhelmed by this transformation.

The Digital Economy

Rethinking Promise and Peril in the Age of Networked Intelligence

by Don Tapscott

McGraw-Hill, 2014

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Testing "The Digital Economy"

Two decades ago, The Digital Economy changed the way the world thought about the Web and Internet. While everyone else was in awe of “websites” and "dot coms," Don Tapscott was among the first people to argue that the Internet would fully transform the nature of business and government. It goes without saying that his predictions were spot on.

In this new edition of his classic work, the author provides topical updates with a sweeping new analysis of how the Internet has changed business and society in the last 20 years.

The Digital Economy

Rethinking Promise and Peril in the Age of Networked Intelligence

by Don Tapscott

McGraw-Hill, 2014

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