By Javacia Harris Bowser, founding editor of See Jane Write Magazine
Earlier this year when I decided to start See Jane Write Magazine and decided to start charging for some See Jane Write Birmingham events I knew I needed to turn my labor of love into a business. And so See Jane Write LLC was born. While I’m certainly not looking to get wealthy from this venture (I’m only trying to avoid going broke from funding See Jane Write programming out of pocket), I am always eager to get business advice. Earlier this fall I had the opportunity to chat with Sean Mabey, senior vice president and director of small business strategy at Wells Fargo.
Wells Fargo prides itself on being more than a bank. Small businesses, Mabey says, can come to Wells Fargo for more than just a checking and saving account, but for business advice as well. “We, across the country, are hiring and training over 1900 bankers right now that specialize in small business and four hundred of those are in the Southeast,” Mabey says. “When they meet with the small business customer they can give them more than the basic checking and savings account. [This training] is going to allow them to do cash flow analysis. It’s going to allow them to understand how to run their business successfully.”
Mabey had these tips to offer for aspiring and emerging entrepreneurs.
You shouldn’t always trust your gut. Mabey says so often he sees new business owners who had an idea and some money and just jumped right in to entrepreneurship. Don’t plan to run your business on your gut. Do your research.
Never stop learning. “You need to look for ways to learn every day,” Mabey says, whether you’re learning from a CPA, a banker, a lawyer, or another small business owner. “You need to seek wisdom every day and there’s so much free information out there it’s more of a case of finding it than anything else.”
Get help. “Surround yourself with people who know what they’re doing,” Mabey says. “You have to get yourself with a team of people that know what they’re talking about.” This team could include a banker, an attorney or advisors who have been successful in their own business ventures.
Develop the perfect pitch. Whether you’re drafting a formal proposal to potential investors or just working on your elevator pitch, Mabey says you need to be sure you can do two things: “Can you explain how you plan on making money and can you quickly explain what you do so that anybody understands it?”
Listen to Vanilla Ice. You read that right. Mabey, sharing a lesson he learned from Chris Hanks of the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business, says that Vanilla Ice’s famous track “Ice, Ice Baby” is actually chockfull of good business advice. You remember how the song starts: “Stop. Collaborate and listen…” Entrepreneurs need to get people to stop and pay attention, they need to gather people and work well with others and they need to get folks to listen to them. The entire song can be tied to entrepreneurship, Mabey says, “even all the way down to ‘Word to your mother.’ You need to pay tribute to all the other small businesses that came before you because you have to learn something from them.”