Is it safe to quit corporate world and pursue a business road?

My recommendation is that, start your business venture at a small scale while you are working full time.  Work on your business part-time. Gradually gaining experience and knowledge within the industry you are in. Networking with other people who are in the business will provide valuable knowledge that they had gained through experience.

Demand from the growth of your business and clientele will actually force you to quit and focus on the business only. This normally takes a bit of a time and/or when you start getting orders that require you to work in the middle of the week. You will not be able to afford to take a leave every now and then.

The salary that you get from your employer will come very handy as part of your start up capital before you could start drawing a salary from your new business venture.

Starting small will give u a taste of what is really happening in the business world. If you are prepared to go through what you would have experienced, then grow your business till you resign.

I am not recommending – quit and start a business model. Start a business and quit as soon as the business can sustain itself and it is starting to generate profit. If business is not doing well and you also experience that you cannot cope with running a business, you can still close shop and keep your job. What would happen if you quit your day to day job and business does not go well?

I am sharing my recommendations because I have seen people who have resigned at work during soccer world cup 2010. They had hope they would make profits during that time and now they are miserable and broke. I have bruises and scars to prove that the world of business is full of experienced sharks with sharper teeth. You rest they eat you alive. If you are bold and swim with them, you will end up sharpening your teeth too.

To our success,

Baleseng ‘Basi’ Tau
Visionary Entrepreneur and Photographer
E-mail: tau@taa.co.za
Skype: basi.tau

Face Difficulties With a Positive Mind

Face difficulties with a positive mind, now matter how hard or bad your situation maybe always try to look on the positive side of that current situation. I have pasted a story I found on my e-mail about a facing difficulties with a positive mind.

 

‘This parable is told of a farmer who owned an old mule. The mule fell into the farmer’s well. The farmer heard the mule praying or whatever mules do when they fall into wells. After carefully assessing the situation, the farmer sympathized with the mule, but decided that neither the mule nor the well was worth the trouble of saving. Instead, he called his neighbors together, told them what had happened, and enlisted them to help haul dirt to bury the old mule in the well and put him out of his misery.

 

Initially the old mule was hysterical! But as the farmer and his neighbors continued shoveling and the dirt hit his back, a thought struck him. It suddenly dawned on him that every time a shovel load of dirt landed on his back, HE WOULD SHAKE IT OFF AND STEP UP!

 

This he did, blow after blow. “Shake it off and step up…shake it off and step up…shake it off and step up!” He repeated to encourage himself. No matter how painful the blows, or how distressing the situation seemed, the old mule fought panic and just kept right on SHAKING IT OFF AND STEPPING UP!

 

It wasn’t long before the old mule, battered and exhausted, stepped triumphantly over the wall of that well! What seemed like it would bury him actually helped him . . . all because of the manner in which he handled his adversity.

 

THAT’S LIFE! If we face our problems and respond to them positively, and refuse to give in to panic, bitterness, or self-pity.

Author Unknown

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Compiled for your success by,

 

Baleseng ‘Basi’ Tau

Entrepreneur and Photographer (Johannesburg)

E-mail: tau@taa.co.za

Skype: basi.tau

Branding For Small Businesses

WHY BRANDING IS IMPORTANT FOR YOUR SMALL BUSINESS – by http://www.diamatrixnews.co.za

Branding is more than a name, a logo or a design concept. Branding is your company’s legacy and it encompasses a promise of quality products or superb service to potential customers. As a small business, branding is therefore extremely important and it will greatly contribute to your success.

When you start a new business, you will need a budget and often branding might not get a big enough cut it.  This could have a negative effect on your products as they stand second or third to the competition. Make sure you spend enough time and budget on creating and developing a unique brand that will get the attention of your target audience.

Five reasons why you should look into doing professional brand development:

• Branding shows you take your business seriously: A poor brand can make it appear as if you don’t take your business seriously. It will therefore be very hard for others to do so. A strong professional brand will also motivate you to work harder at your products and services to further enhance the brand.

• Branding creates a unified voice: As a small business your marketing budget might be limited and that is why you need your company’s “small” voice to make a unified and lasting sound. Potential customers could start to notice and respect your company as a result.

• Branding creates expectation: Spending time and money on building a brand that your customers can associate with will create a sense of expectation. They will expect that your product or service will be the solution to a specific problem they have which will ultimately lead them to buy it.

• Branding motivates the customer to choose your product: With enough motivation from good branding a potential customer can turn into a customer. If there are several similarly priced products on the shelf that all promise the same thing but your branding (with regards to packaging, product message and all-over advertising) triggers a favourable memory in the shopper they will buy-into your product.

• Branding motivates brand loyalty: Branding has the power for people to become a loyal fan of the brand and not just the initial product. With good branding any future items you bring to market will have a favourable response. It is your job to ensure that all products or services you bring to market convey the same or enhanced brand quality that customers have become accustomed to.

All businesses start out small. Apple started in the garage of Steve Wozniack who teamed up with Steve Jobs and today the brand is one of the most popular in the world. A successful business has as much to do with good branding as it has to do with superior products and services. With the right research and approach you can take your company further than you’ve ever dreamed it could go.

This article has been brought to you by => http://www.diamatrixnews.co.za

I hope this has been a very useful article to all Small Business people who have read it. Please share it with friends and colleagues

To our success,

Baleseng ‘Basi’ Tau

Entrepreneur and Photographer

E-mail: tau@taa.co.za

Skype: basi.tau

Katlego Gabashane Live @ The Victory Theatre

Sister Katlego entertained us at the Victory Theatre, Louis Botha Avenue. I am glad and excited that she is now taking her music career to a higher level. We were mesmerised by her deep and mellow voice. All I can say is wow!

She really performed beautifully and we are waiting for her to release something so that we could listen to her now and again. I will make it a point that I will attend another gig where she will be perfoming. There is more to come from her.

It was an honour for me to be one the professional photographers at the venue. I focused solely on her. Her backing bands was also well prepared and it flowed very beautifully with her voice.

Jah! bless. Mo’ Fire Sister!

 

To our success,

 

Baleseng ’Basi’ Tau

Visionary Entrepreneur and a Photographer (Johannesburg)

Email: tau@taa.co.za

Skype: basi.tau

Self Portrait

Snapped by my cousin who happens to be a photographer and a motivational speaker – Bateng Motshwane.

We were playing with our cameras at a client’s premises.  What can you do if you are an hour early and your client is 1hr 15minutes late. Well we practiced and improve our skill for that time. Due to not having more objects to photograph, we became main objects of our own photos. i saw this picture in my mind and forced him to see it in his mind. After several shots, he gave me what I needed at the time. I love the way he captured me. I was not in deep thoughts, but he captured my facial expression very well, the way I wanted. He is a good student on mobile art photography school. 🙂 🙂

“A good photographer will take good photographs with mediocre equipment easier than a poor photographer will with expensive gear”. This is a very interesting statement and so true. I have seen and met immature (wanna be) photographers boasting about their gears and not about their photo and art. To them having an expensive camera means you are a good photographer and having an entry level camera means you are not a photographer. My answer to them is, let us compare the photos. An expensive camera will not help you to compose and design your photo. Expensive cameras do not have a composition button, as a photographer you need to know how to compose a photo so that the output should be be appealing to the eye. Catchy photos are memorable and are not designed by an expensive camera.

The simpler the better.

To our success,

Baleseng  ’Basi’ Tau

Visionary Entrepreneur and a Photographer (Johannesburg)

Email: tau@taa.co.za

Skype: basi.tau

Innocent Walk

I captured this woman walking in the morning. I liked the way she walked. I saw innocent and the wall with clean straight line finished what I was seeing. She looked very frail and i loved the way she hang her jersey over her shoulders.

An innocent walk in the morning. This is one of the artworks that speaks with me very dearly. I really love old women in my photographs. They are like babies. I see innocence in their faces. They are cute.

She is a sister/mother/aunt/wife and granny to someone.

““Innocence ends when one is stripped of the delusion that one likes oneself.”
― Joan Didion, On Self-Respect”

To our success,

Baleseng  ‘Basi’ Tau

Visionary Entrepreneur (Johannesburg)

Email: tau@taa.co.za

Skype: basi.tau