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Breakfast September 11th

Challenges and Solutions to Business Development for SME’s in the current climate

Graham RoyceManager and Mentor for the

Limerick Enterprise Acceleration Platform (LEAP)

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The Challenges

Only Two

Survive Current Climate

and

Grow the Business

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Direction

• Clear Strategy– Marketing– Sales– Growth– Financial– Clear Business Plan (Map)

Creativity

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• Very Creative With Your Business– Check Products– Check Services– Change Quickly– Retrain if Necessary– Working Practises– Be Flexible – Focus on Emerging Markets– If you are at the Cutting edge stay a the cutting edge

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Connectivity

• Networking– LinkedIn– Business Clubs– Twitter– Plaxo Pulse

Make use of strong Diaspora well-connected Irish executives around the world

We need to work fast we need to think fast

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Support

• Know The Various Supports– Enterprise Ireland– City Enterprise Boards– County Enterprise Boards– EI Mentoring– Business Rings BNI etc etc etc– Be Tolerant of Failure (we are Intolerant)– We must support younger and younger start-ups

• Apple started as teenagers – Facebook started by teenagers – Microsoft university drop out

The Collinsons were ignored here in Ireland found funding in Canada - they sold for 3M

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Knowledge

• Know Everything– Know your strengths and weaknesses – Client Profiling– Service / Product Profiling– Market Size– Competitors– Buying Cycles– Birthday’s and Anniversaries

New Technologies

New delivery models like Cloud computing

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Market

• Market Research - Marketing Research– Market Surveys On-Line & Paper– Focus Groups– Study you Chosen Slice of the Market– Colours – Words – People – Industry– Export– Talk face to face with all customers / suppliers

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Process

• Don’t Reinvent– Booking engines– Book keeping– Methodologies – Markets– Tried and trusted business rules

– Silicon Valley – Good idea’s not afraid of failure– They have innovative universities attached– You have a venture capital community that’s known

Silicon Valley kick started a recession in the Fifties.

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Communications

• Know and Understand Communications– Internet– Phones– Email– Letters– General meetings– Language– Skype– TXT– Face to Face

Finance

• Cash Flow - Cash Flow - Cash Flow– Pre agreed payment dates– Talk to the banks & financiers– Invoice sooner– Know exactly outgoings and incomings– Prioritise

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Smart Business

• Change direction if you have to (R&D)• Innovation (Create Introduce Implement)• High Quality (Be the best)• Commercialisation (Understand the Market)• Export (Look at all Markets)• If technology is available use it (Internet - Cloud)• Stay Up to date(Spotify MuZu Iphone twitter)• Be unique (Business Models)

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Top tips

• Get referrals• Keep Customer Profiles up to date• Review all resources all the time• Be creative in selling• Make sure all training is up to date• Keep the company profile up to date• Monitor all staff give targets if necessary• If targets are not being met replace the staff• Keep all staff motivate• Watch the market stay in touch• Recognise opportunities

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Winning

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Communications My Details

• Graham Royce LEAP Manager• Phone 061 490152• Mobile 086 6089112• Email graham.royce@lit.ie• Email roycegraham@eircom.net • Skype greybadger• http://www.linkedin.com/pub/graham-royce/1/215/324• twitter graham_royce