Book Preview:
SELLECOM: 101 Ideas for Marketing in the Telecom Jungle

We were treated to a sample chapter from a yet to be published book written by a veteran telecom reseller and marketing strategist.

by Alex Goldman ISP-Planet Managing Editor [November 1, 2007]

If you've been to ISPCON, you've heard Peter Radizeski give advice on marketing and business, and if you've been to the ISP CEO session, you've seen him run it. At ISPCON, his session is usually called The 50 Minute MBA: 50 Ideas in 50 Minutes, and our writeup of this session will run tomorrow here on ISP-Planet.

Radizeski has now written a book, SELLECOM: 101 Ideas for Marketing in the Telecom Jungle. A veteran telecom consultant and reseller, he runs Rad-Info, Inc. and is based in Tampa, Florida.

His book reads like the session. It's full of ideas you can implement and resources for further reading such as books, blogs, and websites, ranging from the website of the Small Business Administration to Guy Kawasaki's blog.

Seek and you shall find
If you're looking for advice, you're already halfway to an answer
I cannot help feeling, as I did at ISPCON, that the people who read this book or attend ISPCON are not those who need it most. But such people are unlikely to solve their problems. If you're reading this article, you're the type of person who might attend ISPCON or read a book about the ISP business and the good news is that you are likely to solve your problems.

Ideas in the book, of which we were provided one sample chapter, vary from the very broad to the extremely specific. You may find that the extremely specific ideas seem to be the most useful (such as where to find a sample business plan online), but some of the big ideas are well worth noting too.

Let's go back to Guy Kawasaki for a moment. If you Google his blog, you'll find several entries highlighted because of their popularity. One of those entries is The Top Ten Lies of Venture Capitalists. This is both big picture advice and very specific, but if you're considering taking on venture capital, do read it!

The big picture in the sample chapter focuses on your business plan. Many ISPs don't have a business plan—even today, in an industry that is consolidating and in which professional managers are replacing techie founders. Even if you have a business plan, some of the ideas, broad or specific, may help you improve it.

Listen in order to learn
The successful entrepreneurs we've spoken to take advice. The specific system doesn't seem to matter, but it is necessary to have a method of organizing your business. You could use Six Sigma like Russ Intravartolo, or you could use the E-Myth, or you could be using skills learned from a partial or complete MBA, or you could be working with a mentor.

The book asks one other question of you: why are you here? Not, "how was the earth created" but "why are you in this business and what is your goal?" Many small business owners find a pride of place. Rich Bader of EasyStreet in Portland loves the city and also feels that his business ties in nicely with Portland's core competence, which he sees as being open source software (and, I think, a good, healthy life). Others are happy to build a business that can stay in the family. Many are guided by their religion.

Running any small business is so difficult and time consuming that if you're doing it for the money, you will lack motivation. But if you think about your business, and keep reading the numerous business resources that Radizeski points you to, you may find not just financial success but also the satisfaction of building a business that helps many people. To get there, you may need to make explicit some ideals or ideas or dreams that you had before you ever obtained your first customer.

Radizeski has connected with a massive quantity of business literature. He has read the blogs of entrepreneurs and also business literature. Some of it can sound like cliché, and some of it can seem obvious, but as the football coach said (and others have said it before and since, but some clichés like this are useful and powerful), "when all's said and done, more's said than is done, so let's get out there and do it."

Read the words, take what makes sense to you, and use it.

—End