Blogs

I was at an event the other day when I met a very smart, respected, and likeable business owner, named Ron. We got to discussing LinkedIn, and I asked him how many connections he had. He mentioned he had around 300, and then went on to proudly proclaim that he knew “all of them personally, save three or four”. That's great for taking care of your existing customers, I thought, but what about attracting new ones?

With this sister-site almost live, we're now seeking progressive companies to partner with. Would you like Anthill to sell your products and services using this new sales model?

The establishment of an NBN, as currently proposed, creates a legitimate concern: will Australia supplant one great big monopoly with another great big monopoly? If the controlling body of the NBN displays monopolistic tendencies in pricing and management (which it may have to do given the proposed level of investment), then what benefits will we really be creating?

I have lost count of the number of times my friends, colleagues, and business partners have made the statement, “Facebook is personal. It is not for B2B! Try LinkedIn.” I understand their sentiment. Since its inception, Facebook has always been an intimate space reserved for friends and family, or very close professional associates. But it doesn't have to be that way.

The National Broadband Network has been heralded as a groundbreaking advance but has also raised concerns that it will create just another monopoly. In this first of two parts, Tony Simmons argues that the NBN can at last bring to Australian telecommunications a genuine opportunity for competition and growth... provided we learn from past.

If you listen to most marketing experts today, you could be easily forgiven for getting lost in the vast number of social media channels and options. The most popular tactic of late has involved harnessing the power of crowds, often called 'crowdsourcing'. But consider the merits, or limits, of a crowd – defined by most dictionaries as “a collection of people.”

Last week, I posted a story that asked Anthill readers to suggest new revenue streams. The post was triggered by a theft (and the loss of some expensive equipment). The surprising flood of responses to this post, received by phone, email, tweets, Facebook messages and, of course, your comments had me both thrilled and alarmed. It also got me thinking.

Australia's richest business plan competition, offering $100,000 for one savvy Australian business, reached its conclusion at the Queensland State Library in Brisbane last Wednesday night. Does this company deserve $100k in seed funding? Heck, yeah! Now watch the clip.

Recently, I was in the market for a good business plan for my mobile account. I found Telstra the best in terms of network coverage, so I decided to give them a call to see if they could sweeten the deal. Happily, instead of the advertised three months of credit, I was offered six months. "Yes, sign me up!" Then, the salesperson said something very amusing...

Sebastien's plan was to present that model to the likes of Donald Trump and convince him to donate a portable shelter every time he builds a condo (for placement in areas struck by natural disasters). And convince Richard Branson to donate a flight to Doctors Without Borders every time a First Class ticket is sold. But like any entrepreneurial adventure, the universe had different ideas.

Last week, Anthill was the victim of a theft. The loss was felt immediately, not simply due to its effect on morale but also because the loss involved some important documents and many human hours of productivity. Now, there are two things that we can do: (1) Sulk; or, (2) Devise a way to turn a positive into a negative.

I'm often asked, 'What's the most important piece of advice you can give new business owners?' After much thought, factoring in seven years of interviews and coffee meetings with hundreds of entrepreneurs, from single person operations to international masters of the game, such as Bill Gates and James Dyson, and having built my own business over this time, there is one piece of advice that trumps all others.

This question was presented with an offer to voice my views and suggestions at the next SBDC board meeting on Thursday 21 September. Now, as many Anthill readers probably know, I'm not based in NSW. So, I don't feel qualified to answer. But I do know that close to 40% of Anthill readers do live in NSW. As such, I'm turning the question to you. If you have a suggestion for the SBDC, this is your chance to tell the PTBs (powers-that-be) what you think.

They surf the cusp of legality and debt recovery. They know that what they do is illegal but they are happy in the knowledge that the cost versus benefit of chasing them is too high. They know too that these same things will keep them off debt registers. What do you do to rat out the rats?

A study of hospital workers conducted by Chilterns University College in the UK found that nurses working for hospital supervisors with poor management styles had significantly higher blood pressure than nurses working for bosses judged as understanding and considerate. As a result, the nurses with bad bosses had a roughly 20 percent higher risk of heart disease. Are you giving your employees heart attacks?

Without the dramas over unstable structures and unsanitary accommodation, let’s be honest: who would really give a stuff about a tournament that’s perceived to be as marginal and obsolete as Britain’s decaying Commonwealth itself? Could Delhi be an unlikely saviour for the Commonwealth Games?

The motivation behind last month's 'casting-call' is now no longer quite so mysterious. It seems that Anthill blogger Sebastien Eckersley-Maslin has been chosen to take part in an online marketing campaign that will see him circuit the globe and follow his plans to create the world's smallest multi-national.

Reforming the board’s composition proved to be essential for the turnarounds at Credit Suisse and UBS. But in both cases it took a severe crisis to provoke the reform. Will other companies learn to reform their boards before they are hit by a crisis? Or will the old maxim continue to apply: no change without a crisis? Paul Strebel proposes five requirements to encourage healthy corporate governance.

Has Kylie Minogue made a deal with the dark-side of internet marketing in a bid to keep her record career rock'n'rolling? Or has her record company hired a 'social media' agency that somehow mistakenly believes astroturfng qualifies as a reputable strategy? Or maybe we simply have a rogue fan on our hands, with a penchant for hackery and a passion for gold hot-pants.

We wrote about Coca-Cola's 'Happiness machine' when it first appeared in an unnamed US university campus in January. Indeed, we asked whether it could be the 'worst viral campaign' ever, simply because it seemed so contrived. However, the pimped-out vending machine is back. This time, in Europe.