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Sunday: Get started with realistic goals and a detailed business plan, and do your market research Monday: Learn strategies for building a network of contacts and how to handle meetings Tuesday: Learn how to get the product or service right and increase your margin Wednesday: Choose the most effective ways to communicate with customers and prepare useful marketing materials Thursday: Market yourself and your business and learn how to cut the jargon and describe what you do in 30 seconds Friday: Motivate yourself to work hard and ignore distractions and make a good impression as the face of your business Saturday: Avoid difficulties and problems through using personal planning and business planning tripwires -
The next instalment in Capstone’s brand new business series What You Need to Know About… These accessible books will get anyone up to speed, fast. . And this latest edition is no different. Who wants to read tomes and reams of start–up advice? Who wants to spend days researching on the internet. -
You are about to embark on one of the biggest adventures of your life. It's a daunting prospect, isn't it? An empty desk, no customers, no confirmed money coming in, and no one to gossip with. Welcome to running your own business. Every issue is now yours to wrestle with, and yours alone. But then so is all the satisfaction when things go well, whether that is mental or financial. This book expertly guides you through the principles of running and growing a successful business - including what to do when it's not going exactly as you wish. Crammed with practical advice - from assessing pros and cons to motivating yourself and adopting effective practices - it will help you find clear, practical solutions and prove invaluable as you tackle this great adventure. -
Electronic + Addicted (abnormally dependent on a habit) = edicted (hooked on technology). Technology can be a wonderful thing. It can also be a curse when it overwhelms us. If your phone, computer or other devices are beginning to rule your life, then you may be edicted. We don't have to be ruled by our machines. It's time for us humans to fight back. Revolution tells you how, with technology taming tips and simple things that you can do to regain control. Take the test and find out just how edicted you are - then learn how to cure yourself. 'I can't talk now, I'm on the phone' For those of us suffering from ediction, it's time to pause and think. Author and Plain English commentator Kevin Duncan has trained and advised some of the UK's top companies, including Saatchi & Saatchi and Shell, in how to cope with all this. This thought-provoking book grapples with just how addicted we have become to technology and offers a set of ideas to help wean us off our technological drugs and lead a more fulfilling life. It looks briefly at how we got here, tests you on how serious your condition is and then offers real solutions, including rapid sequential tasking (v multitasking), communicating concisely, using the best method of communication for the job, all while retaining your sense of humour and enthusiasm. -
Modern business is a blur of jargon with thousands of books all purporting to hold the key to relentless success. The working reality is often very different. This book distills and summarises all the best current thinking in business so that you can become an authority yourself - and quickly. As well as saving hundreds of hours of reading time, the reader is able to grasp ideas accurately, explain them authoritatively to colleagues and avoid being hoodwinked by those who claim to understand a concept when in fact they have got the wrong end of the stick. Books profiled include Nudge, Freakonomics, and Built to Last. -
Hard on the heels of the popular Marketing Greatest Hits comes volume II, a must-have compendium of everything you need to know from the best minds in modern marketing - abridged, condensed, and ready for immediate action. As well as saving hundreds of hours of reading time, the reader is able to grasp ideas with pithy accuracy, explain them authoritatively to colleagues and, crucially, avoid being hoodwinked by those who claim to understand a concept when in fact they have got the wrong end of the stick. 40 books - including Hot, Flat and Crowded and Emotionomics - are summarised in six short chapters, one-minute summaries, and one-sentence summaries to give an immediate feel for the subjects. All the wisdom forms an intriguing 40-point manifesto to inspire your approach. Praise for Marketing Greatest Hits Volume I: "Kevin Duncan has a winning way with words, making both volumes not only informative but highly entertaining. 9 out of 10." BA Business Life -
Today thousands of marketing books exist ready to bombard you with buzz words and secrets to marketing success, but by condensing and summarising current thinking in marketing this book gives you the chance to become an authority yourself - quickly and efficiently. This book presents marketing ideas from the profiled books clearly and accurately and will allow you not only to put these ideas into place but also explain them authoritatively to colleagues. Books profiled include The Long Tail, Meatball Sundae, Buzz, Affluenza and Blink. Saving you hundreds of hours of reading time Marketing Greatest Hits is vital for anyone looking to keep up with marketing practices Now. -
Start is a one–stop guide to getting your business of the ground. Written by someone who has actually been there and done it, it gets straight to the heart of launching your business, with no–nonsense ideas to help you start out with confidence and a clear direction. Pick up some essential tips like: ∗ Start with the idea. What is it and how will it realise your ambitions?What is the long–term plan? If you don′t know where you are going then you won′t get there. ∗ Simplicity is the key. Don′t overcomplicate things so that the idea is pecked to death by ducks. If you can write it on a postcard and explain it to your mum, then you can get started. ∗ Make clear plans. Draw up One–page business and personal plans to work out what you want in the simplest and clearest possible way. ∗ Decide what you want. Flush out whether you are building to sell, or just want the business to fund your lifestyle, then take the leap of faith and get it underway. Work hard, but don′t confuse being busy with being effective. ∗ Learn from experience. Realise when you are gaining speed but losing altitude, and have the courage to change things when they aren′t working well. All vital stuff, packaged and presented in a way that will help you put it into practice right away. So what are you waiting for? It′s time to Start. -
So What? gets straight to the point so you can cut through the noise and nonsense of work. Much of what we learn in our formative years is unlearnt in later life. As grown-ups we are often unable to answer the simplest of questions in a clear, direct way, and frequently have no idea why we are doing something. This can lead to crippling inefficiency in business, and goes some way to explaining why so many people spend so much time doing things that have no bearing on the true purpose. By behaving in a genuinely inquisitive way, you can get right to the heart of the matter and save yourself hours, days, and even months of anguish. The questions So what?, Why?, How?, and When? can be hugely effective when applied in the right context, and this book shows you how to use them. Once all the right questions have been posed, there is a final sure-fire method for testing whether something is relevant and helpful. By completing the sentence “Something must be wrong if…”, it is simple to work out if you are wasting your time. For example, “Something must be wrong if I don’t want to go to work in the morning.” So What? Shows you how to become truly inquisitive again. So let the questions roll. Pay attention to what the answers are. Learn from them and you will immediately improve your prospects of finally getting somewhere in life. -
How many times have you thought of something crucial to do and then forgotten it completely? That′s why people invented lists. And very useful they are too. If, and only if, they are used effectively. Put thirty things on a list, and it becomes too daunting. Put three things on, and there′s no point in having a list. And so we have refined the art of list writing to allow for about ten or twenty things to do. But in truth, most lists are rubbish. Randomly assembled, they do little to help the author navigate their way through the maze of stuff to do. After all, the only point of a list of things to do, is to get things done. Tick Achieve does just that. It shows you how to get stuff done, with lots of little techniques tried and tested on scores of individuals over 25 years. This includes the cathartic and highly effective process of writing a list of what you are not going to do. The author has trained hundreds of people in the art of getting stuff done. There is no Big Plan as such (contrary to what many other books suggest). It′s all about details, and they can be very easy to implement. Little things can make a massive difference. Once you get the hang of it, life gets easier. In a business context, and personally. You can sleep better and worry less. Concentrate on the things that matter, and leave out the trivia and irrelevant. Learn how to celebrate little bits of progress, look down your list, tick off a job well done, and shout Tick Achieve! -
SMART THINKING DOESN’T HAVE TO TAKE LONG This book contains 60 pieces of distilled wisdom. Read each piece of advice in one minute, or the whole book in an hour. The sticky note format allows you to use the ideas for personal motivation, or to stimulate teams in meetings. Growth, communication, innovation, creativity, relationships and thinking are all covered. It’s an ideal format for training. It is also out in Spanish, and there is a special Indian edition. Other translation deals currently agreed are in Korean, Thai,and Greek. Inspire yourself and your business with some Smart Thinking. -
I’m Kevin Duncan, author and Plain English commentator, and I’ve been collecting corporate gobbledygook for over 30 years. My first dictionary brought it all together in one place for the first time, with over 2,000 entries and explanations. The fully updated version, The Business Bullshit Book, is now out. There is also a new Indian version for anyone in that part of the world. -
BE AS EXCELLENT AS YOU CAN BE We can all be better in every aspect of our lives. Best-selling author Kevin Duncan has done it again, diligently drawing together 50 ingenious thoughts to improve your attitude, your approach to life and work, the questions you ask, the decisions you make, and even your timing. The Excellence Book is a life-affirming handbook to help you be the best you can be – whoever and wherever you are. -
Ideas are the fuel of business - it only takes one good one to make a difference. Distilled into this single, handy-sized volume are 50 of the most useful diagrams and visual techniques, many of which are used by consultants, academics, MBA students and smart managers globally to help them think of and create great ideas. -
The Diagrams Book has sold over 50,000 copies, and become an international best seller. It has topped the charts in WHSmith, Foyles and Waterstones, and done the same in Germany and Korea. It has been translated into Korean, German, Spanish, Japanese, Complex Chinese (Taiwan), and there is a special Indian version. Other editions on the way include Chinese (simple), Thai, Russian, Portuguese, Hungarian, Swedish, and Dutch. The 5th anniversary edition is now out, and includes brand new material. Kevin’s “How to do X with Diagrams” series of speeches and training have already been experienced by over 3,000 people. Combined with The Ideas Book, it makes a powerful training course in how to have a Point of View and a persuasive Line of Argument. Satisfied customers include News UK, Discovery Channel, The Guardian, EE, Strutt & Parker, Royal Mail, Maxus, Mindshare, Carat, Publicis, Yahoo!, Havas, Moonpig and JWT. -
THE SMART STRATEGY BOOK 50 WAYS TO SOLVE TRICKY BUSINESS ISSUES STRATEGY DOESN’T HAVE TO BE BORING OR IMPENETRABLE. Most strategies are too long and boring. Far too many contain language that most of us can’t understand. And in the end, a huge proportion of them end in failure. It doesn’t have to be this way. Best-selling author Kevin Duncan has read over 300 business books. Here he covers seven of the most common strategic areas: commercial, brand, customer, sales, people, innovation, and communication. His trademark no bullshit approach debunks strategic nonsense and provides any strategist with a brilliant handbook to generate smart strategy at any time. The book is out in October 2018. Click HERE to view a sample chapter.
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