Making your New Business a Success Hollywood Style

The story of the Blockbuster Business

By Andrew Ekwang

 There is always this great excitement about the next box- office big hit, the expectation of something new, fresh, entertaining that you just can’t let pass you by. Most of us have had such a feeling whenever Hollywood is worming up for something.

Have you ever thought of what it takes to make a movie a box- office hit?  What has to be done to create the excitement before the movie is released? And have you ever imagined these ideas can help your next launch of a new business, product, or even re-branding a great success?

Once a new movie is released critics are all heated up and movie lovers hit the theaters or a nearby video library and some online. We all enjoy those epic movies – those feet sweeping romantic sagas or the unforgettable adventures, we just don’t often consider the rough-cuts, the big breaks and days and nights of onset and offset production that goes behind the curtains. To us that’s the Hollywood magic?

Making this magic can be compared to producing and epic start up, an epic product or an epic re-branding. As an entrepreneur as you take this holiday a watch one of you best movies try and learn a thing or two from the filmmakers. And armed with your all-star cast (employees), prepare for a blockbuster year in business this 2012. You must still be asking yourself how I can do this, let me give you an offer you can never refuse – the eight epic tips for to turn your start-up, new product or re-branding into a box-office(Market) hit. My does was given to me by Erica Nicole of YFS Magazine.

Now get the popcorn ready, sit-back and enjoy.

Write your own killer script.

Hollywood can never take you seriously if you don’t have a script and most times a convincing one, likewise banks, investors, some of your big customers will never take you seriously without a good business plan, convincing profile or at least a smart business proposal. And when your blue print in now well researched and put together, you should ensure in can convince the people you are targeting and it is not only done to win a business or funding but will be followed. To put it in a few words – plan the whole thing up.

Sell yourself to the right people

You ever wondered were Paramount studios, Walt-Disney, SonyPictures and the likes get all these killer ideas and turn them into blockbuster movies; wonder no more Script writers or their agents hit their doors every day. Now you have your script in your hands, start knocking the right doors to put together the resources and then line up your dream team for the project. What I am saying here is you determine the right skill sets and the resources to get your project operational.

In this process it will not add a lot of value to shop you idea to your best friends, colleagues or any other persons who will not be able to contribute to its success. You will be tempted to go full swing in that direction trying to gain consensus from people unqualified to move the production process forward and may only be discouraged when your script meets critics from this lot. “Never allow a person to tell you no who doesn’t even have the power to say yes” (advice from Eleanor Roosevelt – you’ll need it at this time)

Become an Award winning producer

In Hollywood film-making, the writers involvement stops here, or at least becomes significantly minimal not in entrepreneurship or business, you just got a chance to step up to the most interesting role. When you turn up at work with your producer costume on - am talking to the managers, team leaders , project managers and directors and SMEs business owners, know you have come to take control over the production of the motion picture and you are ultimately responsible. So as a producer of your new company, product or the upcoming re-branding it you’re responsibly to guide it to the blockbuster success.

Learn to direct or find a seriously good director

Now if you are milt-talented and armed with the energy to pull this off, you can put on both the producer and directors hats or you can recruit a co-founder (director) whose talents matches your business needs.

A director is the most important person on set, armed with the clearest vision of final outcome and oversees the tactical execution of the cast and crew selection and ensure the flavor is not lost. The roles such as team development, delegation and detail management falls here. So who ever is directing your business should have a good grasped of strategy and tactics and most times some experience in the industry

Brace yourself for production hell

In the movie business production consist of long hours onset, a lot of moving things here and there and plenty of discomfort, the same could be said of start ups, new projects or re-branding. to create something from nothing takes more than just passion and resources available there will be allot of team disagreements and sometimes tradeoff, change in what you thought was already done but you need to stick on, work hard, encourage and  motivate the team and not lose sight of the final product expected.

Fail early and often in post production

Don’t be afraid to fail and believe me you it’s necessary to fail, failing early in production gives you the chance to correct your failures or improve before you release your work – in movie industry post production corrections include editing, re-shoots and marketing . Not everything is ever perfect at first attempt, prepare to fail 10,000 times just like the American Inventor and Businessman Thomas Edison to is credit we now enjoy the benefits of his persistence like the photograph, the motion picture camera, and even the electric bulb. Now if it doesn’t come out right the first time edit, re-shoot until you have it right.

Shamelessly promote your release

Your new business or product or re-branding is a new release and its perfectly okay to promote it shamelessly to your target market. Get to your profitable and viable audience and promote the features and benefits of your upcoming blockbuster. Get the message out first to your target market, remember romantic comedies and high school dramas are never targeted to the 55+ year old's. So get your “business genre “right and serve them well and on launch day I’ll only advice you to visit   YouTube and search for some of the best videos of the late Steve Jobs in a Apple launch or anything better.

Measure commercial performance

Hollywood has made you believe they are there to entertain you, now let me remind you that they are also in business- with a profit motive at that. So do you have a system set to measure your commercial box-office collections? You should be in position to measure financial and other performances indicators, what have you grossed this week, this month, and this year all should be known to determine future profitability.

Prepare for and enjoy the Launch days, the premiers, the publicity that will follow, the distribution deals that will need to be stuck and industry awards and more  after all that’s what makes blockbusters lovable to everyone of us.

Business Competitiveness in the 21st Century Business Environment.

Why Local Manufacturers should rethink their Strategy

By Andrew Ekwang

“Industrialists want the government to ban locally available imports” headline from Daily Monitor 24^th October 2011 and the launch of the Uganda Competitive Investment Climate Strategy (CICS) at the Sheraton Hotel, Kampala recently are the two events that got me asking, “what is competitiveness? – the ability of a country (or firm) to provide goods and services which provide better value than their overseas rivals. And who is ultimately responsible for the competitiveness of Ugandan products on the Global Market?  - The Industrialist or Government?” in my own view our local industrialist should not blame imports a lot because in a global market goods and services move to the locations were there effective demand  is provided that demand can yield profits . 

The Ugandan consumer is obsessed with perception and quality –what will people think of the product am consuming? And is it the best quality my money can afford at this point? these two questions and many more run in the minds of consumers as they do their shopping, but do they really think about were this product they pick was made and if they do does that place screams quality and style? Take for example a young lady shopping for beauty products, if in her selection three products from Uganda, USA and China satisfies their selection criteria of quality and price, the made in USA most likely will be purchased based on the fact that USA beauty products always denotes highest standard.  This reputation US companies built over the years, and companies like St Ives put in their best to gain that recognition.

Industrialist requesting government to ban importation of locally available products and at the same time asking the same government to strike some trade agreements to help open export market for them is so contradictive and  at the same time its depriving the customers from choice. At all times in a free market or even semi- free market the ultimate decision maker is the customer and thus producers have to study the market, their needs, their perceptions on quality, style and price, their buying patterns and what makes them loyal, then making a product that is both of quality and appealing to attract buyers, that’s when branding comes in. Branding is so important that businesses spend millions ever month to keep themselves relevant in the market and  is considered  as one of the biggest driver of revenue, the highest number of i-phone users or even Mercedes Benz cars owners become customers because of what the brand stands for, and over the years these produces ensure they meet these expectations and if possible exceed it to keep and grow their market but not ask governments to ban competitors from outside markets when they know  that if they generate good customer appeal locally they will also need these markets to expand.

The dilemma our local industrialist must be facing is how to survive in a highly competitive and very open market. Raising questions like, how do you invest the little revenues in branding and production sustainability at the same time?  Where do they access the resources to open and facilitate R&D departments? Can the local human resources available deliver us the best competitive ideas? And if all these are possible then how do we achieve the best combinations of all these to produce the best result locally and internationally.  The biggest challenge is convincing the entrepreneurs and top management of these firms to realize that the local consumers are now as enlighten and demands quality and good appeal just like the US consumer and to believe that this consumer will buy from any producer willing to deliver both the quality and a competitive price. Then these businesses should decide if they want to just survive or satisfy these consumers and grow their businesses. If they chose the latter, then discussions on financing, technological investments, research and the right human capital investment can be achieved either through organic growth with well set objectives or partnerships with either other local or internationally recognized players in their industries to facilitate funding, transfer of both technology and knowledge to compete favorably.

It is in the hands of the businesses to manage factors such as Price relative to competitors, Productivity - output per worker, Unit costs, State of technology, Investment in capital equipment, Technology, Quality, Reliability, Lead time and Entrepreneurship levels that boost their competitiveness, governments will then come in to mange factors such as Exchange rate, Relative inflation, Tax rates, and Interest rates.  Much as I do believe competitiveness of local produces need to be boosted, I also do believe the produces themselves need to realize global competition is real and customers will always look for the best their money can afford, investing the little in areas of Process innovation and Improving relationships with suppliers to lower unit costs, Product innovation to boost quality, Sourcing from abroad where appropriate and studying the market needs and buying trends will provide a much more reasonable result than just banning imports.

8 Signs You're Scoring an F in Personal Finance

 By Andrew Ekwang

Failing a class in school is one thing. Failing your financial goals as an adult is another. Here's how to earn an A-plus in personal finance.

Everyone agrees that math, English Language and the science subjects are so important that ministry of education confirmed they should be compulsory. Now imagine in your adult life all aspects as school subjects, Personal finance would be so important that you must make compulsory to master. Ever wondered what it feels like scoring an F in any or some of the compulsory subjects! - more like suicide. Don’t commit that suicide with Personal finance. Am no guru in this Personal finance issue, but I’ve learnt a lot in the past few years and just feel it’s my responsibility to share these insights of avoiding an F in this very crucial subject.

1. You don't have an emergency fund.

In life, you should expect the unexpected, such as the sudden increase in cost of living, sickness or even loss of a job (some will call this negative thinking but it’s a fact). The last thing you want to do is be caught off guard and be forced to rely on credit from friends, money lenders or a bank loan that could get you into deeper financial trouble.

Establish an emergency fund of at least three to six months of expenses. And don't delay. You should start building your emergency fund as soon as you get your first paycheck ok if you are already late, as soon as the next paycheck. This will not be an easy task so you better of starting small and training yourself to respect the practice.

2. You don't know how much you have in your bank accounts.

Have you ever slotted in your card in that ATM machine, and the next message you get is “Can’t perform this Transaction due to insufficient funds”. Or paid by check and got called back the check bounced because of insufficient funds in your account. If you haven’t count yourself a little luck if you have you know what it feels like. To ensure you'll never write a check for more than what you have, you should always know how much money you've got in all your accounts.

I love Ugandan banks they make getting an overdraft on personal accounts a little uneasy, so you can’t exceed your 0 balance level unknowingly unless is for loan repayment delays or charges. But if you're running your household like a business and balancing your cash regularly, that shouldn't ever be a problem. Consider using easy to understand money management software like Microsoft Excel to help manage your finances more closely if you two or more accounts with many transactions in a month. 

 3. You don't understand the difference between a want and a need.

One of the biggest impediments to getting our personal financials in order is the inability to properly distinguish between our wants and needs. Understand that when taken down to the most basic level, all of us have only four or five primary needs. Those needs are food/water, clothing, shelter, transportation, and health care. Everything else is a want. After you ensure the needs and secured sit-down and properly priorities the wants include there the personal savings (emergency fund) at number two or three.

4. You don't know how much money you spend.

It's pretty simple: The amount you save is the difference between how much you make and how much you spend. But it's tough to save anything if you don't know how much you can afford to save. That's why it's important to take a critical look at your expenses so you know exactly how much money you are spending. This will never be exact considering the unexpected events like sickness, or relative or friend calling for bailout.

Audit your expenses by writing down everything you spend your money on for a couple of months. The trick is to be as detailed as possible. Try to capture even the smallest purchases. Here is a budget worksheet to help get you started. When you finally have a figure compare with your earnings and factor in your savings. Remember even though you don’t follow this by the book, it’s better to stay in the know.

5. Your tastes exceed your spending capability.

Understand that this is not a problem so much as an excuse. Kind of like your son arguing that he's getting an F in his class subjects because the teacher doesn't like him. When your expensive tastes starts impacting your ability to save, you're in for trouble you need to look for a way, stop or at least reduce then trim it down. If your tastes exceed your budget, ratchet them down a notch or three and stop making lame excuses.

6. You can't say no.

Many people do understand the difference between wants and needs, but they have trouble saying no anyway. Being able to say no is a crucial skill in the world of personal finance. Those who can't will always have the most trouble keeping their personal finances on an even keel.

Master the art of saying no, a little trick master first the things you already have, from there whenever you see a product you feel you want, ask yourself if you already have something similar if so give it to yourself that it’s the reason you will not buy that today, practice it for some time and you will see the difference.

7. You're an impulse shopper.

Impulse buying is a nasty habit, can become an addiction that can best be cured slowly but surely by careful planning.

Establish a household budget. Before going out to shop, know exactly how much you will be spending at each establishment and make a shopping list before you go to the supermarket or the mall, if possible carry exact cash and leave home the ATM card, if you use a credit card it might need you to be a little more faithful to the shopping list. In short, think before you buy.

8. You worry about what others think about you.

People who worry about what others think of them suffer from a desire to keep up with the latest trends. There are many reasons why people do this, including: the urge to advertise their success in life (be it real or imagined), the desire to have what others have, and instant gratification. Whatever the reason, once they reach the checkout counter, they tend to ignore this little slice of reality: Unlike the celebrities they tend to follow (who have also seriously cut down on spending recently), they probably may not or can't afford it.

Andrew Ekwang is  SMEs Trainer with Analyst Business Solutions(Finance and operations)