Sun, 3 May 2020
When you think of today’s entrepreneurs, who comes to mind: Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Mark Cuban, or Jeff Bezos? Wrong. Today’s entrepreneurs are the owners of hair salons, restaurants, car washes, jewelry stories, and tens of thousands of other small businesses and professional practices that comprise the modern economy.
In his new book, “The Soul of an Entrepreneur,” author David Sax debunks just about every stereotype people have about founders, including their backgrounds, motivations, and measures of success. “David has his finger on the pulse of today’s entrepreneur, much as author Studs Terkel did in his seminal 1974 book, ‘Working,’ says host Dean Rotbart. “Genuine entrepreneurs who hear this podcast will take comfort in knowing their dreams and struggles are shared by so many others, while nine-to-five workers will discover the truth behind the entrepreneurial myth.” To order your own copy of "The Soul of an Entrepreneur," click here. Photo: David Sax, The Soul of an Entrepreneur |
Thu, 23 April 2020
Host and award-winning journalist, Dean Rotbart, and his multi-talented wife, Talya, recently co-authored a book about two Canadian entrepreneurs, Margaret and Riyaz Adat, who have become global role models for do-it-yourself charitable projects. The book, Perfectly Ordinary, Yet Extraordinary, recounts how the Adats, an upper-middle-class couple, used determination, focus, love, and limited personal resources to rescue a woebegone school in faraway Arusha, Tanzania, from the brink of collapse. This week, Margaret and Riyaz join Rotbart to share their experiences and lessons-learned, noting that anyone, no matter their resources, really can make a meaningful difference in the lives of others. The Rotbarts are donating 100% of the profits from their book, available from Amazon and Barnes & Noble to the students and faculty of the J.K. Nyerere School in Arusha. Photo: Margaret & Riyaz Adat, "Perfectly Ordinary" |
Sun, 19 April 2020
Wayne B. Titus III, a CPA whose Plymouth, Michigan, financial advisory firm, AMDG Financial, has assets of more than $150 million, digested all 800-plus pages of the $2 trillion CARES Act legislation to help his clients take full advantage of the various government programs aimed at helping employers and employees weather the COVID-19 shutdown tsunami.
CARES is complex, and without a guide such as Titus, many owners and entrepreneurs stand to overlook aspects of the mammoth government program that could make the difference between survival and bankruptcy. One step, in particular, is critical for all employers, Titus explains to host and award-winning journalist Dean Rotbart, who dubs Titus, “a small business paramedic.” Discover Titus’s #1 recommendation this week exclusively on Monday Morning Radio. Pick up a copy of Wayne Titus’s small business primer, The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Financial Well Being, here. Photo: Wayne B. Titus III, AMDG Financial |
Fri, 10 April 2020
Too often entrepreneurs and business owners burn out, giving up on the dreams that propelled them in the first place.
It happened to Dr. Dravon James, a pharmacist, and successful movie and stage actress. Having grown up in poverty on the South Side of Chicago, she eventually overcame multiple personal and professional hardships and formulated an approach that all of us can use to rekindle the fire within. Today, Dr. James is a successful author, consultant, and motivational speaker. Regardless of the obstacles we face, Dr. James tells host and award-winning journalist Dean Rotbart, we can rediscover our passion for what we do and pursue the life of our dreams. Pick up a copy of Dr. James’s new book, Freedom Is Your Birthright, here. Photo: Dr. Dravon James, Everyday Peace |
Sun, 5 April 2020
More than a decade ago, Robbie Kellman Baxter – a graduate of both Harvard University and the Stanford Graduate School of Business who worked as a strategy consultant at Booz-Allen & Hamilton – coined the phrase “The Membership Economy” to describe the trend of consumers to embrace subscription-based products and services. Popular examples include: Stitch Fix, Dollar Shave Club, Netflix, BarkBox, and Freshly.
Now, in her just published book, The Forever Transaction: How to Build a Subscription Model So Compelling, Your Customers Will Never Want to Leave, Baxter details how any business – big or small – can create and attract membership clients and keep them for a lifetime. Especially as people hunker down in response to COVID-19, Baxter, founder of the consulting firm, Peninsula Strategies, tells host and award-winning reporter Dean Rotbart that subscription-based business models are proving invaluable. To purchase a copy of The Forever Transaction, click here.To order fresh-roasted coffee from Creature Coffee, click here. Photo: Robbie Kellman Baxter, Peninsula Strategies |
Sun, 29 March 2020
Everything Was Going According to Plan for Michael Craig’s Creature Coffee, Until Coronavirus Arrived
In October 2019, host and award-winning journalist Dean Rotbart, invited Michael Craig on Monday Morning Radio to detail his quixotic quest to build a three-headed company, Creature Coffee, selling specialty blends at pop-up expresso bars, online, and at his bricks-and-mortar coffeehouse in Austin, Texas.
Everything was going according to plan for Craig until a few week’s ago when Austin’s South by Southwest mega-event was cancelled due to coronavirus, and rapidly thereafter the city’s mayor ordered all dining areas closed. Like tens of thousands of American small business owners, overnight, Craig found his business endangered, and his many baristas without work. Not just a statistic, this week Craig shares his very personal struggle to survive the fallout from coronavirus and live to fight another day. Photo: Michael Craig, www.CreatureCoffee.co
Direct download: Creature_Coffee_Update.mp3
Category:Successful Entrepreneurs -- posted at: 1:54pm MDT |
Sun, 22 March 2020
Twenty years ago this month, Henry Dubroff threw caution and reason to the wind and – after quitting his safe job as editor of the Denver Business Journal – headed west to California to launch his own, independent, weekly business newspaper.
Dubroff’s Pacific Coast Business Times defied the long odds, and today, with the largest full-time team devoted to business and financial news on the central coast, serves readers in Santa Barbara, Ventura, and San Luis Obispo counties, including, of course, Oprah Winfrey, just one of many prominent area residents. The secret of his survival, and that of all successful entrepreneurs, Dubroff tells host and award-winning journalist Dean Rotbart, is to know the community of customers who you serve and become an integral part of it. [The conversation with Dubroff is adopted from the Business News Visionary Awards oral history of Dubroff, recognizing him as one of 52 journalists whose foresight and efforts have transformed the journalism profession during the past two decades. For additional information, visit http://www.newsluminaries.com/.] Photo: Henry Dubroff, Pacific Coast Business Times |
Sun, 15 March 2020
The coronavirus is wreaking havoc on businesses large and small, curtailing travel, sporting events, and gatherings of all manner; even weddings. For many owners and entrepreneurs, it portends financial disaster.
But this week’s guest this week, Evan Morgenstein, a veteran talent agent who specializes in representing social media mega-stars, sees a path for companies to not only survive coronavirus but to thrive. As Evan points, all the people who are confined to their homes, working from home, or planned to attend now-canceled conferences and entertainment events, will almost certainly be surfing the internet and watching more television than ever. That makes this the perfect time, Evan contends, for companies to use strategic influencer programs to bolster their brands and their revenues in ways that will continue to serve them long after the current health crisis passes. Join host and award-winning journalist Dean Rotbart for a timely examination of influencer marketing. Photo: Evan Morgenstein, CelebExperts |
Sun, 8 March 2020
When some of America’s most successful blue chip investors and securities analysts want to increase their exposure on CNBC, Fox Business Network, Bloomberg TV, and other financial broadcast networks, Zach Leibowitz is their go-to PR guru.
Zach is executive vice president and head of broadcast operations at Dukas Linden Public Relations. In the past year alone, Zach and his colleagues have landed their clients on more than 600 broadcast segments. That’s an incredible track record. Zach’s proprietary formula for getting TV producers to showcase his clients is applicable to any business seeking visibility, whether it operates on Wall Street or Main Street. This week, Zach gives host Dean Rotbart an exclusive, behind-the-scenes tour of what makes TV producers say, “Yes.” To subscribe to Monday Morning Radio on Apple Podcasts click here. Photo: Zach Leibowitz, Dukas Linden Public Relations |
Sun, 1 March 2020
Growing a business from one employee to more than 3,000 in three decades is a notable achievement, regardless of what field you’re in. Journalist and entrepreneur Matthew Winkler did just that at Bloomberg News.
When billionaire businessman and 2020 presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg had the idea of starting a financial news organization back in 1989, his first hire was Winkler, who at the time was a reporter with The Wall Street Journal. Winkler signed on as editor-in-chief in February 1990 and proceeded to build Bloomberg News into a global news and money-making juggernaut. Host and award-winning journalist Dean Rotbart joined Winkler at Bloomberg’s Manhattan headquarters earlier this month to talk about Winkler’s journey and what other entrepreneurs can learn from his experience. Dean’s interview with Winkler was conducted as part of Dean’s special “News Luminaries” project, honoring journalists who have had – or are having – exemplary careers. Beginning on Thursday, March 12th, and each week thereafter, Dean will post an oral history with a prominent 21st century journalist at www.NewsLuminaries.com. Other journalists participating in the oral history podcast include: Andrew Ross-Sorkin of The New York Times and CNBC; Randall Lane, chief content officer of Forbes; Steve Adler, editor-in-chief of Reuters; Maria Bartiromo of Fox Business News; and Charles Duhigg, best-selling author of The Power of Habit, and now a writer for The New Yorker. If your company or professional practice would like to help support www.NewsLuminaries.com, contact Dean directly at 303-296-1200 or email him at dean@mondaymorningradio.com. Photo: Matthew Winkler, Bloomberg News |