I haven't been on in a while, we have been extremely busy at Net-Flow Solutions. Man that sounds wierd in this down economy, but it is true. We seem to be adding 4 or more new clients every month. My sales forcasts for November and December are saying 1 or 2 new clients each month, BUT it is the end of the year and IT spending is ALWAYS zilch during those times...
Anyway... I am moving this Blog more away from about NFS... to more about myself... my thoughts and interests... beliefs about certain topics like Management, Leadership, Ethics, and more. So enjoy.
Let me start by saying that even though I am the principle controlling owner of Net-Flow Solutions in Atlanta, GA. I am just a common man. I own a house in the northern suburbs of Atlanta, own a couple of cars, have a wife, a daughter, 4 dogs, 1 cat, and 12 fish...
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Blogging
Today, I stumbled across a blog questions by Carolyn Deason, from San Antonio, Texas on CNN.com's website. She posted:
Before any advice is given, I think a statement of CONGRATULATIONS needs to be made first to you. Getting your product into a chain like Wal-Mart is very impressive in my opinion. Next, I believe your worries about the startup capital required for you to do business with Wal-Mart needs to be put aside for a moment. Instead you need to concentrate on the relationship you are about to make with one of the largest retailers on the face of the earth.
Education about your customer will be key to growing that relationship. I agree with I couldn't agree more with the statements of Charles Fishman – research and contact other owners/managers of small suppliers to Wal-Mart. Learn from their mistakes and profit from them! My advice – take the phone call one step further – if you can try to set up a face-to-face meeting where you are taking the person to lunch or dinner so that you can get their full attention on your questions. Have your list of questions prepared before you meet, and go over as many as possible. Put them in order according to importance.
After you have all of the research complete, then you can build the plan of how you are going to supply your product to Wal-Mart. The first steps providing locally, should not be too difficult to plan out, you know your business – how you manufacture the product and you know what the requirements are from the store – bar code system, etc. Take advantage of this planning by going four more points of growth. First - what would it take for you to supply to all the Wal-Mart stores in a 100 mile radius? Second – what would it take for you to supply all the Wal-Mart stores in your state? Third – What would it take for you to supply all the Wal-Mart stores in a Geographic region of the US (Mid-west, Northern US, Southern US, etc)? Finally – What would it take for you to supply all the Wal-Marts in the US?
While the last question of planning is a little out there, you should run the total projections for all these points of growth. You need to know what your projected sales growths will be for any of the three stages, what your projected revenues vs expenses will be, etc. All the core foundations of a good business plan should be in place.
If you are now going, but I don’t have an MBA or a degree in Business Administration, I get lost in all of the numbers and such - you need not panic here. First, there are free services out there like SCORE. SCORE "Counselors to America's Small Business" is a nonprofit association dedicated to educating entrepreneurs and the formation, growth and success of small business nationwide. SCORE is a resource partner with the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA). Their website is www.score.org and there is a ton of useful information there. Secondly, Small Business Association, www.sba.gov is also a great resource for helpful tools and possible financial planning strategies. Finally, there are business consultants like myself that can assist in growing your company whether it be in regards to planning, growth strategies, marketing strategies, or IT infrastructure strategies.
Again, congratulations! You have achieved more than you think, don’t be scared by the challenges that lay ahead, thrive with the opportunity that is facing you!
Regards
Mike Holland
Managing Partner
Net-Flow Solutions
www.net-flowsolutions.com
http://netflowsolutions.blogspot.com/
I got lucky and showed my shirts to Wal-Mart locally. They love them, and one store has already ordered $2,700 worth of shirts and plans to order more this month. Other stores wish to order as well. I am a home-based business, very small, in business less than a year. Wal-Mart pays their invoices net 30 and requires me to tag the shirts with bar codes. Once I am in their vendor system, I can sell nationally. It’s a great opportunity, but how do I afford the initial expenses to do business with Wal-Mart? It will run close to $6,000 to pay for manufacturing, printing, bar codes and tags. Here is my reply to her post:
Before any advice is given, I think a statement of CONGRATULATIONS needs to be made first to you. Getting your product into a chain like Wal-Mart is very impressive in my opinion. Next, I believe your worries about the startup capital required for you to do business with Wal-Mart needs to be put aside for a moment. Instead you need to concentrate on the relationship you are about to make with one of the largest retailers on the face of the earth.
Education about your customer will be key to growing that relationship. I agree with I couldn't agree more with the statements of Charles Fishman – research and contact other owners/managers of small suppliers to Wal-Mart. Learn from their mistakes and profit from them! My advice – take the phone call one step further – if you can try to set up a face-to-face meeting where you are taking the person to lunch or dinner so that you can get their full attention on your questions. Have your list of questions prepared before you meet, and go over as many as possible. Put them in order according to importance.
After you have all of the research complete, then you can build the plan of how you are going to supply your product to Wal-Mart. The first steps providing locally, should not be too difficult to plan out, you know your business – how you manufacture the product and you know what the requirements are from the store – bar code system, etc. Take advantage of this planning by going four more points of growth. First - what would it take for you to supply to all the Wal-Mart stores in a 100 mile radius? Second – what would it take for you to supply all the Wal-Mart stores in your state? Third – What would it take for you to supply all the Wal-Mart stores in a Geographic region of the US (Mid-west, Northern US, Southern US, etc)? Finally – What would it take for you to supply all the Wal-Marts in the US?
While the last question of planning is a little out there, you should run the total projections for all these points of growth. You need to know what your projected sales growths will be for any of the three stages, what your projected revenues vs expenses will be, etc. All the core foundations of a good business plan should be in place.
If you are now going, but I don’t have an MBA or a degree in Business Administration, I get lost in all of the numbers and such - you need not panic here. First, there are free services out there like SCORE. SCORE "Counselors to America's Small Business" is a nonprofit association dedicated to educating entrepreneurs and the formation, growth and success of small business nationwide. SCORE is a resource partner with the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA). Their website is www.score.org and there is a ton of useful information there. Secondly, Small Business Association, www.sba.gov is also a great resource for helpful tools and possible financial planning strategies. Finally, there are business consultants like myself that can assist in growing your company whether it be in regards to planning, growth strategies, marketing strategies, or IT infrastructure strategies.
Again, congratulations! You have achieved more than you think, don’t be scared by the challenges that lay ahead, thrive with the opportunity that is facing you!
Regards
Mike Holland
Managing Partner
Net-Flow Solutions
www.net-flowsolutions.com
http://netflowsolutions.blogspot.com/
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Customers from Mars
Normally I would put H-E-double L, but I am being nice. We have a customer that wants to always blame us for their issues. We walk onsite to resolve something, 2 weeks and a day later something else breaks and they are going "well you were here 2 weeks and a day ago, and now it doesn't work". I mean it makes you really want to fire a customer doesn't it? So let me ask a difficult question - Have you ever fired a customer?
I hate to admit it, but yes, and guess what I went back on the out clause we had, and we are still servicing them. And guess what they are the same client that 2 weeks and a day ago, we were onsite with...
So tell me what do you do when you have a difficult customer. I have heard some great stories...
One CEO of a local multi-million dollar IT consulting / managed services company drove up to the customer in his new Porche and said straight to the other CEO - "Your bleeding me dry with all your onsite service requests, you must start using the call center" Seems their contract included free onsite service with their MSP program, and the client was demanding onsite for every ticket. Nice trick by the client, bad move by the porche driver...
We have been winning their clients slowly and surely....
I hate to admit it, but yes, and guess what I went back on the out clause we had, and we are still servicing them. And guess what they are the same client that 2 weeks and a day ago, we were onsite with...
So tell me what do you do when you have a difficult customer. I have heard some great stories...
One CEO of a local multi-million dollar IT consulting / managed services company drove up to the customer in his new Porche and said straight to the other CEO - "Your bleeding me dry with all your onsite service requests, you must start using the call center" Seems their contract included free onsite service with their MSP program, and the client was demanding onsite for every ticket. Nice trick by the client, bad move by the porche driver...
We have been winning their clients slowly and surely....
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Mobile Computing Wars
Just like the late 90's when the Browser Wars started between Internet Explorer and Netscape, we are now seeing the 00's becoming the Mobile Computer Wars - Will it be the trustworthy Blackberry that has the market lead? How about the new comer - the iPhone - with the marketing genius of Steve Jobs behind the wheel of the ship? Or will Microsoft shove everyone off the ladder of successful sales like they did with Netscape for browsers, Apple/OS2 for Desktops, Novell for Networks, Lotus for Email.
Currently (according to Canlsys, Inc research) Symbian OS has the largest % @ 65% primarily because of overseas use. Second is Windows Mobile coming in at 12%, RIM (Blackberry) @ 11% & iPhone @ 7%.
However, all news hype lately points to iPhone taking a greater market share - up to 20% points of usability. The problem with statistics of this sort is that it doesn't seperate personal use from business use.
Right now, RIM and Microsoft are litterally head to head in the corporate world. Microsoft has taken a large % of shares because for the IT staff to hook a Windows Mobile phone to an existing Exchange Server requires no real additional steps or purchases. Yet, if you want Blackberry you need to add a Blackberry server if you want full functionality. iPhones use IMAP to connect to an Exchange server but from personal experience can be hit/miss in regards to performance.
With the new iPhone ready to roll, this war will be an interesting one.
what do I use? I don't want to be biased, but I love the new PPC6800 from Verizon.
Have a good Day!
Currently (according to Canlsys, Inc research) Symbian OS has the largest % @ 65% primarily because of overseas use. Second is Windows Mobile coming in at 12%, RIM (Blackberry) @ 11% & iPhone @ 7%.
However, all news hype lately points to iPhone taking a greater market share - up to 20% points of usability. The problem with statistics of this sort is that it doesn't seperate personal use from business use.
Right now, RIM and Microsoft are litterally head to head in the corporate world. Microsoft has taken a large % of shares because for the IT staff to hook a Windows Mobile phone to an existing Exchange Server requires no real additional steps or purchases. Yet, if you want Blackberry you need to add a Blackberry server if you want full functionality. iPhones use IMAP to connect to an Exchange server but from personal experience can be hit/miss in regards to performance.
With the new iPhone ready to roll, this war will be an interesting one.
what do I use? I don't want to be biased, but I love the new PPC6800 from Verizon.
Have a good Day!
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Why all the Microsoft haters?
Recently I was reading blogs trying to decide do I really want to spend time Blogging, and then I stumbled across this post: http://www.allbusiness.com/technology/software-services-applications-information/10206906-1.html
Now, I must start off and be honest, last year, I approached Allbusiness.com about becoming a blogger, and filled in all the paperwork but never heard back from them... But I didn't mind because since then I have been extremely busy and feel that I would have let Allbusiness.com and the readers down.
Today, I feel I can devote a little time each week to creating a few blog entries here and there across the internet to help give advice to other small business owners. So here i am just surfing over the last couple of nights, and I stumbled across this blog telling small business owners to use this wonderful site/application for scanning documents and document storage.
Very Green, and very cool to list something like that. However, a few minutes after reading the blog and moving on I started thinking, why would you limit them to scanning existing documents to a web hosting site? Why not give the client a "Complete tool" - perfect choice - SharePoint from Microsoft. So I hit the back button a few times to where i was back at the post and then I started typing a reply to his post.
His reply was to slam sharepoint and Microsoft. My question to you is why are there some many Microsoft haters in the world, and if there really are that many haters, why 90+% of all workstations are Microsoft OS and Office and 90+% of all corporate networks are Microsoft OS driven and finally why 90+% of all email systems are Microsoft Exchange?
Give me a feedback!
Now, I must start off and be honest, last year, I approached Allbusiness.com about becoming a blogger, and filled in all the paperwork but never heard back from them... But I didn't mind because since then I have been extremely busy and feel that I would have let Allbusiness.com and the readers down.
Today, I feel I can devote a little time each week to creating a few blog entries here and there across the internet to help give advice to other small business owners. So here i am just surfing over the last couple of nights, and I stumbled across this blog telling small business owners to use this wonderful site/application for scanning documents and document storage.
Very Green, and very cool to list something like that. However, a few minutes after reading the blog and moving on I started thinking, why would you limit them to scanning existing documents to a web hosting site? Why not give the client a "Complete tool" - perfect choice - SharePoint from Microsoft. So I hit the back button a few times to where i was back at the post and then I started typing a reply to his post.
His reply was to slam sharepoint and Microsoft. My question to you is why are there some many Microsoft haters in the world, and if there really are that many haters, why 90+% of all workstations are Microsoft OS and Office and 90+% of all corporate networks are Microsoft OS driven and finally why 90+% of all email systems are Microsoft Exchange?
Give me a feedback!
Welcome
What a better way to start a new blog site, but to say "Welcome". Welcome to my blog & Welcome to Net-Flow Solutions.
This first blog will be about Net-Flow Solutions, and about myself.
Net-Flow Solutions is an a Complete IT Solutions firm. What is Complete IT Solutions? What I mean by this is that we offer the following solutions to our clients:
Our clients include large companies like: Avery, EARNEST Parnters, LLC, and Inland Seafood to small busineses like Dealer Perforance Group and Bank of Atlanta. As you can see from just that small sample, we work in every industry as well.
Now about myself. My name is Mike Holland, and I am the founder of Net-Flow Solutions. I started the company in 2005 after deciding to leave a top networking position with a Top 50 law firm in Atlanta. My career before the law firm includes spending several years as the IT Director for Speer & Associates and prior to that working for LEXISNEXIS as a Staff Engineer. In addition, I also served 6 years on the National Board of Directors for the Network Professional Association (NPA).
I am dedicated to helping the local communities and other charities. I am a Past Master of Roswell Lodge #165, a member of North Fulton Scottish Rites, and am member of Grand Blanc Lodge #571. I am married to a lovely lady named Marcia, and have a beautiful stepdaugher named Cameron. Together we live in Milton, GA with 4 dogs and a cat. My wife and I enjoy spending quality time with our daughter and pets, but when we have some free time, we enjoy playing in both the WPT and WSOP events.
So enough about me, once again Welcome.
This first blog will be about Net-Flow Solutions, and about myself.
Net-Flow Solutions is an a Complete IT Solutions firm. What is Complete IT Solutions? What I mean by this is that we offer the following solutions to our clients:
- Managed Services - 24/7 Call Center Support
- Hosted Exchange
- Hosted SharePoint
- Online Backup / Disaster Recovery Services
- Anti-Spam Solution Provider
- IT Consulting Services - Network Infrastructure
- IT Consulting Services - Database Development
- IT Consulting Services - Website Developmenet
- Value Added Reseller - 1400 Partners including HP, EMC, Dell, Microsoft, Cisco, Lenovo, Symantec and many many more
Our clients include large companies like: Avery, EARNEST Parnters, LLC, and Inland Seafood to small busineses like Dealer Perforance Group and Bank of Atlanta. As you can see from just that small sample, we work in every industry as well.
Now about myself. My name is Mike Holland, and I am the founder of Net-Flow Solutions. I started the company in 2005 after deciding to leave a top networking position with a Top 50 law firm in Atlanta. My career before the law firm includes spending several years as the IT Director for Speer & Associates and prior to that working for LEXISNEXIS as a Staff Engineer. In addition, I also served 6 years on the National Board of Directors for the Network Professional Association (NPA).
I am dedicated to helping the local communities and other charities. I am a Past Master of Roswell Lodge #165, a member of North Fulton Scottish Rites, and am member of Grand Blanc Lodge #571. I am married to a lovely lady named Marcia, and have a beautiful stepdaugher named Cameron. Together we live in Milton, GA with 4 dogs and a cat. My wife and I enjoy spending quality time with our daughter and pets, but when we have some free time, we enjoy playing in both the WPT and WSOP events.
So enough about me, once again Welcome.
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