HOW to MAKE MONEY by SOLVING PROBLEMS and IRRITANTS | THE HAPPY PANDEPRE...

My Christmas treat for Filipino Entrepreneurs all over the world: How to be a Happy Pandepreneur. The complete seminar hosted by the Pasay City Government!

With yours truly, Anton Diaz, Miriam Quiambao, Rey Calooy, Ramon Lopez. 

Be inspired by success stories!

Be equipped on how to set up a successful business in and out pandemics with the PISO model:

Look for ... 

PROBLEMS (i.e. Pain points)

IRRITANTS and provide... 

SOLUTIONS as 

OPPORTUNITIES to set up a new service and business.

...Watch the video to find out the rest of our Happy Entrepreneur tips!

Subscribe now to my new YouTube Channel: Ardy RobertoTV is dedicated to all viewers who need inspiration, wisdom and instruction for LIFE's most important issues: Love, Faith, Family, Work...your Dreams! We're here to help you not just solve but ENJOY life's adventures. Come and join us and live LIFE to the FULLEST!

"When LESS is MORE" | Starting from ZERO again in this pandemic | The Ha...

Ang YouTube video na ito ay tungkol sa WALA.

Wala?!

Oo.

It’s about the blessings of having or starting in business with nothing. Wala.

I hope this encourages those of you who are back to zero or almost zero because of the pandemic.

The big idea or lesson that I want to share with you is this:

LESS IS MORE.

Yes! LESS IS MORE.

The less money you have in starting a business, the more creative, hard working and dependent you become on God.

Let me share with you two quick stories to illustrate my thesis.

First story.

When I was 27 years old, in 1994, I ventured into business—a retail store in Limketkai Mall in CDO and later on a Gary V concert.

I lost all my money in the Concert promotion business but okay lang because that’s what God used to break me and my ego and bring me to a Bible study with my girlfriend where I heard the good news and surrendered my life to Christ.

I learned to read and apply the Bible and that turned around my life, including my finances. (The how of that later on became the content of my 2010 #1 National best-selling book, Ang Pera na Hindi Bitin. I mention that in the hope that I can hopefully sell some more copies of my book.Haha. Order na sa ardyroberto.com , please please.

Seriously, the girlfriend who brought me to that Bible study became my first wife. And we also became business partners. We were becoming very successful in a direct selling business and at the same time growing in our faith.

And then she became very sick with life threatening systemic lupus. She should have died that time—that was the year 2000—but God granted her a healing miracle and gave her a second life.

Our finances though were still in the ICU as the sickness and hospitalization of Tingting, sucked almost all of our savings. The miracle healing though (which became a book—The Heart of Healing—bili na kayo please) encouraged us even more in our faith to trust in the Lord with ALL of our heart and not to lean on our own understanding.

So with little money but faith in our BIG God, who proved faithful and worthy of ALL of our trust and praise—Tingting and I decided to make another GO of business. We decided to let go of our direct selling business which was stressful to her and start another business. The business we decided to get into, we realized, was right in our backyard: we had learned to promote and organize small public seminars for my dad, a professor of marketing at AIM that time, as a small side line.

Tingting and I prayed about it—we would start a new business that would organize seminars and conferences. We also prayed for a name. And the name came on a Sunday service when the pastor called the flock to be Salt and Light of the world.

There. We had a name and a tag line: Salt and Light Ventures, Inc. Bringing out the BEST in you.

I mentioned that we had little money but big dreams powered by faith in our BIG God.

We had the name registered already, we had two desks in our lanai by the garage, an old laptop connected to dial up internet and a fax machine. But still didn’t know how exactly to start the business.

I’ll pause here first for dramatic effect because this is where the important crossroad happens. This is where the story gets to an important God moment—and I don’t want you to miss it.

Hingang malalim.

...Watch the video to find out the rest of the story!

Thank you very much to

Edwin D. Pages

for inviting me to this Family Culture online event. Thank you to

Dodong Cacanando

and Dr

Alvin P. Ang

for being part of this event as well.

Please remember to subscribe to my new YouTube Channel: Ardy RobertoTV is dedicated to all viewers who need inspiration, wisdom and instruction for LIFE's most important issues: Love, Faith, Family, Work...your Dreams! We're here to help you not just solve but ENJOY life's adventures. Come and join us and live LIFE to the FULLEST!

SUCCESS MINDSETS of Entrepreneurs | GO NEGOSYO | Ardy Roberto | SME Mark...

What are the success mindsets that an entrepreneur should have? 

What's the difference between being self-employed and being an entrepreneur?

What's the best way to  market and sell your products? 

How do you start a business? How do you spot opportunities in business?

All these questions and more are answered in this Go Negosyo seminar. 

This video also includes a powerful session on Marketing for SMEs by Mylene Abiva and closing remarks by then Go Negosyo Executive Director and now DTI Secretary Ramon Lopez. 

#GoNegosyo #HappyEntrepreneur #NegoSem #DTI #SME #SuccessMindsets #ArdyRoberto #MyleneAbiva #RamonLopez

Career Opportunities at Salt and Light 2011

Salt & Light Ventures, Inc.

“We Help Bring Out The Best In You”

6/F Liberty Bldg., 835 A. Arnaiz Avenue, Makati City, Philippines104 Benavidez cor. Trasierra Sts.,

Legaspi Village, Makati City, M.M. 1209 Philippines

Tel 813-2703, 813-2732  TeleFax 813-2745 email: ardy@saltandlight.ph

www.SaltandLight.asia

CAREER OPPORTUNITIES at SALT & LIGHT VENTURES

Have fun and learn while you work!

Fun, enriching, fulfilling learn-while-you-work opportunities at Salt & Light Ventures, Inc.

You might just have a bright, fun and fulfilling future with Salt & Light Ventures! We are the premier organizer and producer of world-class learning events, conferences and workshops. Salt & Light is expanding and is looking to hire two (2) Learning Events Coordinator and one (1) Guerrilla Marketing and Social Media coordinator. Here are the details:

LEARNING EVENTS COORDINATORS (we're looking for 2)

What you'll be doing.
Rub elbows with and learn from the country's top trainers, speakers and authors when you help organize our learning events and life-changing seminars. You'll also be coordinating with our event partners, suppliers, sponsors and the media. In short, you'll coordinate, assist our Program Director, and help manage the successful production and organization of our workshops, seminars and special events.

What you'll need to qualify for the job.
+We think you'll need at least 1-2 years work experience preferably in the service industry (e.g. ad agency, production house, HR consultancy, Training firm, events company, customer service, hotel and restaurant industry,etc--you get the idea).
+Being a college graduate is a major plus unless you dropped out because you were starting up a Facebook, Apple or SM.
+You will need to like dealing with people (speakers, trainers, customers, suppliers, media, and your co-workers) rain or shine whatever your mood...
+You must be able to communicate and express yourself (i.e. be able to write basic letters, proposals, respond to email queries and talk and meet with people)
+...and eye for detail is a plus
+...being a note-taker is a plus too (we'll teach you the valuable skill of Mind Mapping as a bonus on the job!)
+...And of course, you need to know the basics of office survival: Powerpoint, Word, Excel or Open Office. Knowing other stuff like Photoshop would be an advantage...and knowing how to blog, upload videos and other stuff onYoutube, Facebook etc is another plus.

This is a great job because you'll be working and learning from the country's best speakers, trainers, authors and thought leaders.
So, if you love learning, then you'll be a welcome addition to the Salt and Light team that's about to go international.

Age requirement. We don't want to be biased against middle-aged people but if you are to succeed on the job you will need to have the energy and enthusiasm of a 19 - 31 year old starry eyed, ambitious, go-getter kid. If you just happen to be 32 and above and have that kind of energy (and don't mind the starting salary), then by all means apply for the job!

Salary: This position's starting pay is P16,000 to P18,000 depending on your qualifications and experience with quarterly team bonus and incentive plans and annual profit sharing. If you prove to be excellent then there will surely be room for professional growth, career advancement with salary increases or additional incentives.

Send us a letter why you think you'd do well and enjoy this job together with your latest cv to ardy@saltandlight.ph and cc to ella@saltandlight.ph. Pls put Learning Events Coordinator in the subject. God bless!

~~~~~

GUERRILLA MARKETING & SOCIAL MEDIA COORDINATOR (1)

What you'll be doing.
The Marketing Coordinator will assist and help implement the Guerrilla Marketing and social media marketing plan of the company. You'll also receive training from our guerrilla marketing trainers, our resident marketing gurus (Dr Ned Roberto and Ardy Roberto) and be paid to learn entrepreneurial marketing.

You'll also rub elbows with and learn from the country's top trainers, speakers and authors when you help market and sell our learning events and life-changing seminars.

Qualifications
What you'll need to qualify for the job.
+We think you'll need at least 1-2 years work experience preferably in a marketing, marketing communications, online/digital marketing, PR or sales position.
+Being a college graduate is a major plus unless you dropped out because you were also starting up a Facebook, Apple or SM.
+You will need to like learning about guerrilla and online marketing (reading books, surfing for information, attending marketing seminars) and applying what you've learned at the job
+You must be able to communicate and express yourself (i.e. be able to write basic letters, proposals, respond to email queries and talk and meet with people)
+...and eye for detail is a plus
+...being a note-taker is a plus too (we'll teach you the valuable skill of Mind Mapping as a bonus on the job!)
+...And of course, you need to know the basics of office survival: Powerpoint, Word, Excel or Open Office. Knowing other stuff like Photoshop would be an advantage...and knowing how to blog, upload videos and other stuff onYoutube, Facebook etc is another plus.

This is a great job because you'll be working and learning from the country's best speakers, trainers, authors and thought leaders.
So, if you love learning, then you'll be a welcome addition to the Salt and Light team that's about to go international.

Age requirement. We don't want to be biased against middle aged people but if you are to succeed on the job you will need to have the energy and enthusiasm of a 19 - 31 year old starry eyed, ambitious, go-getter kid. If you just happen to be 32 and above and have that kind of energy (and don't mind the starting salary), then by all means apply for the job!

Salary: This position's starting pay is P16,000 to P18,000 (or maybe even P19,000 to P20,000 depending on your qualifications and experience; and even more if you know how to do graphic design as well); enjoy quarterly team bonus and incentive plans and annual profit sharing. If you prove to be excellent then there will surely be room for professional growth with salary increases or additional incentives.

Send us a letter why you think you'd do well and enjoy this job together with your latest cv to ardy@saltandlight.ph and cc to ella@saltandlight.ph. Pls put Marketing Coordinator in the subject. God bless!

Salt & Light Ventures, Inc. is the only Filipino learning events producer and organizer to have won both international and local awards, including: Entrepreneur of the Year (Entrepreneur Magazine), Golden Quill Award for Achievers & Leaders Seminar, Anvil Award for The John Maxwell Leadership Summit, Gold Award DM Asia Awards (Singapore), Finalist - Cannes Advertising Awards (France), Gold Araw Award at the Ad Congress.

Organizer: Buzan Creative Thinking Seminars | Guerrilla Marketing Seminars | Achievers & Leaders Summit | Customer Experience | 7 Qualities of Excellent Administrators | From Employee to Entrepreneur | Servant Leader Workshop | Mindstorming with Eric Villarama | Developing a GM Mindset | Strategic Thinking & Visioning with Agnes Sarthou Ph.D. | Managing your Finances 101 | Dr Ned's Marketing Series | The EQ Leader

www.saltandlight.asia

Are you being criticized?

In the early 1960s, opinionist William F Buckley, Jr., wrote: 


"The Beatles are not merely awful, I would consider it sacrilegious to say anything less than that they are godawful.... They are so unbelievably horrible, so appallingly unmusical, so dogmatically insensitive to the magic of the art, that they qualify as crowned heads of anti-music."


If we stopped and quit everytime someone "important" criticized us, then our "music" would stop. Keep on singing your song. Keep on writing that book...

Chapter 1: A Sure Thing - Adventures in Entrepreneurship

"I'm... going... to... be... rich."

That was me talking to myself slowly, savouring the thought of a rich "me", after Bobby, my friend (a former P&G manager turned entrepreneur) showed me the Best-case-scenario Lotus 123[1] spread sheet of the Gary V. concert project that we were going to produce to make tons of money and at the same time promote the retail casual clothing store, TEED, that we had just put up the year before.

Talk about the proverbial hitting two birds with one stone! We were geniuses and Bobby and I looked at each other agreeing silently with our Cheshire cat smiles that we were geniuses, albeit in our own minds.

I was actually feeling like one of those cool jeans and t-shirt clad young entrepreneurs in their 20s that you read about who were on the verge of success.

Bobby and I were scheming and talking with really good pepperoni pizza in our mouths in the cramped studio that I was renting from an elderly lady who lived next door with her dad, her daughter and her three children. This family turned their garage into a studio and had the courage to charge P7,500 a month (a fortune in the early 90s) for the space to unsuspecting suckers...like me.

There was a room above me which happened to be rented by my girlfriend, Tingting, and her sister, Chilet.

The room next to mine was where my landlady's father slept. The walls were so thin that I could literally hear my landlady's father breath when he slept. If I had cared, I would have blessed him whenever he sneezed. But I was too full of myself to say "bless you." (That's what happens, I guess, when you're young and ambitious and have two more years of car payments to make. I just didn't care enough.)

Anyway, any picture of two guys talking about making money while eating pizza with their hands in a studio carved out of a garage and you've got the makings of a success story. Come on, you've got to agree. Every entrepreneurial success story I had heard of or read seemed to involve one or two young punks who had dropped out of school or from the corporate world, eating pepperoni pizza with their hands and talking about conquering the world from their dinky garage cum office.

I had just decided to resign from a well-paying job in an international publishing company to start up two different businesses. It was a decision that I made without too much thought or prayer (simply because I did not know how to pray or really believed in it). I had a next to the corner office in Citibank Tower with a view of the park and if I played my cards right (meaning suck up to our Jewish publisher in Hong Kong and promise that I'd make more money for him next year)—who knows, I would have had that corner office in another year or two.

But I had all these ideas of the different businesses that I wanted to put up and they had a life of their own. They all whispered to me during the day and in my sleep like baby Aliens growing in my tummy, begging not to be aborted and blasted away:

"Squawk! Start me up!"

"Squawk! Start me up!"

"Do it now! Do it now!"

I remember writing in my journal that I knew I wouldn't have peace until I had become an entrepreneur. I had worked for seven years and had the "7 year itch." At that time, there were no Masters in Entrepreneurship (ME) courses offered at the Asian Institute of Management (AIM) where I could get a scholarship if I wanted to (being the son of a professor). There was no Entrepreneur Magazine being published in the Philippines yet to help scratch that itch. There were livelihood courses on Prawn farming and dress making and stuff like that but that was about it.

Inc. Magazine published out of Boston and Guy Kawasaki's book about his adventure as being part of the team of Steve Jobs, when he founded Apple, watered the entrepreneurial seedling in my soul. The fertilizer and sun that brought the seedling into a sap/tree was a book that I am sometimes ashamed to name. The book was called "How to Work a 4-Hour Day."  (But hey, I guess there is nothing to be ashamed of that now, because there is a newer book published in 2008, titled "Work a 4-Hour Week"!)

That title got me excited. But please don't get me wrong. I was a hard worker. Having worked in a start up magazine before sometimes required me and my team to work 23 hour days straight to make our publishing deadlines. I liked the thrill and bragging rights of having done that especially to my friends who worked in banks.

My job at this particular international publishing company required me to read or review new business or self-help titles from 3 or 4 big publishing companies including McGraw Hill, Simon & Schuster and Harper Collins. I decided which books got featured in our Books By Mail, mail order catalogue (you can tell that this was during the pre-Amazon days) that was doing really well—well enough to get noticed by the big bosses.

I read the book during office hours (which tells a lot about my work load and my corporate work ethic) and I kept on reading until I found out how to work a 4 hour day (and not get fired.)

It turns out that you could only really work a four hour day—surprise, surprise—if you owned your day. Most employees don't own their days enough to tell their bosses that starting today they would work 4 hour days; but their production output would be like they worked 8 hours ("so please Boss, allow me to work just 4 hours a day"). What the author concluded was that it was best if you could own your day—just like those who owned a business.

This sounded good to me. But looking back, I didn't realize that most of us in that office were really just working 4 hours a day. I mean the other 4 hours in our 8 hour work day could be spent this way:

·       1 hour semi-long lunch (12noon sharp to 1pm) at the corporate canteen; or when the bosses were away a looong 2 hour lunch at the Talipapa (fish landing),

·       15 minutes in the nice corporate men's room brushing teeth and talking about where we were going after 5pm),

·       1 hour talking to a colleague planning our next vacation to Boracay and how much it was going to cost,

·       45 minutes reading the newspaper to scan the competition in the business pages or check out their advertising (yeah right) and well, fill up the crossword section

·       45 minutes buying (including taking orders for others and try to look helpful and caring) and eating "merienda" from the entrepreneurial lady who went from office to office selling greasy "turon" (banana fritters), "balut" (day old duck eggs),  or cheese pimiento spread in pan de sal.

·       15 minutes for ______________ (fill in the blank yourself).

(Of course, this may be a little bit exaggerated if I'm being really dishonest.)

Anyway, I guess that book gave me a picture of what could be my typical day as an entrepreneur. I could work hard for 4 hours and then have enough time to do the "important" things in life. Make a marriage and family work, play golf, watch movies, contribute to society or volunteer and make the world a better place to live in.

And so I took the plunge.

My best friend in the office, Bernie, and I submitted our resignation letters at the same time. I would received about 3 months salary as separation pay and I thought that would be enough to keep me afloat until I hit paydirt with the two businesses that I was going to start up or had already started up in the few months before I had resigned. First was the T-shirt/casual clothing store that I started with my golfing friend, Bobby, which we positioned next to the Levi's outlet in the one and only real Mall in Cagayan de Oro City; the other business was a List Rental and Direct Marketing agency that I was going to start with Bernie, whom I ate "turon" with and talked about golf and future vacations.

I borrowed money from my Dad, at that time the professor of International Marketing at AIM, to help start business #1. Although I had some savings, that money was "no-touch" moola for the wedding that Tingting and I had scheduled to happen in a year or two.

Actually, funds or no funds, I preferred it—the wedding—to happen sooner, because something weird was happening to her. All of a sudden she was talking about us "living in sin." I told her that, technically, we weren't 'living in sin' because first, she lived upstairs in a separate room from which she tiptoed to my room when everybody else was asleep, and secondly, I loved her and we did agree that we were going to get married.

I was surprised that she didn't buy that reasoning being the smart woman that she is and the irresistible agent-007-of-entrepreneurship-man-on-the-verge-of-untold-riches that I was. (And by the way, she said, aside from thinking that having premarital sex was a bad idea, Tingting thought our concert project which we decided to make into a two night concert deal, was also a bad idea. That she had this "bad feeling" about it.)

Anyway, I felt bad about not being able to "express how much I loved her" that no matter how much I tried to seduce her with my wet puppy eyes, bottom line was she didn't want to make out with me anymore.

Alas, being an optimist, I looked at the cup as half-full. I thought to myself, "Fine...okay, I'll go with her vow of celibacy. Now, I'll have more energy to pursue my entrepreneurial start-ups." (Which looking back without rose-colored glasses, was really a lame excuse, because there was always Lipovitan, the precursor of Red Bull.) But I was so full of "Think and Grow Rich" positive self-talk that if she had told me to take a hike, I would have taken it literally and hiked to Mt. Kilamanjaro...or Mt Everest. Take your pick. I was going to climb every mountain, search near and far, follow every rainbow...ta da ta da ta da.

I didn't care if my future wife was going Julie-Andrews-Sound-of-Music-pure on me.

I was going to be rich. (And heck, I was going to show her! I was planning to surprise Tingting with a honeymoon in Paris and a new house to come home to afterwards.)

As I looked at the spreadsheet that Bobby left, the concert promoting business actually looked even more promising than the retail shop business itself. And hey! You know who we got as our very first concert artist to promote? The very best. The concert King. We tried getting Lea Salonga and then The Eraserheads, but through the advertising rep in the office who moonlighted as an agent dabbling in tv and entertainment, we were able to book THE Gary Valenciano.

Bobby told me that the last time he performed in Cagayan de Oro, there was literally a stampede for tickets.

Gary V was the concert king and no one had ever lost money producing a Gary V concert*. Definitely, I was not going to be the first one.

"I'm

going

to

be

rich."

I said that to myself in my best positive self-talk voice ala James-Earl-Jones'-"This-is-CNN"-voice-over that I could muster.

It was a statement that could only be matched in history by the definiteness of the Titanic's engineer when he said, "This ship is unsinkable."

++++

[1]For you kids out there, Lotus 1-2-3 was the spreadsheet app before there was Excel. So this dates me back to 1993.

Copyright Ardy Roberto, All Rights Reserved.

Introduction to Adventures in Entrepreneurship

Adventures in Entrepreneurship

The ordinary guy’s guide to taking the leap of faith

By Ardy Roberto

Introduction

"Jump! Jump! Jump!"

I was a chubby 9 year old boy standing on the edge of a diving board looking down and through at what seemed like 3 stories of white air space before I could make out what was a patch of water.

The Olympic size swimming pool didn’t look so Olympian in size anymore.

What if I missed the target and smashed my face on the side of the pool? What if I dove and broke my neck? My mom would kill me! What if I fell flat on my chest and the air got knocked out of me and I ended up floating on my stomach, a victim of drowning by stupidity. My Dad would be so ashamed.

“Go! Go! Jump! Jump!”

My cousins and friends who had brought us to this new country club in the south were egging me on much to the amusement and wishful thinking of my three sisters who I am sure, in their thoughts, were egging on my private fears of death and dismemberment. For them that would have meant one less sibling to share the new Sony Trinitron tv and Betamax in the house. And that was a good thing...for them.

I was about to climb back down the stairs to a lower level diving board until a friend appeared behind me wet and frazzled and eyes extra rounded from the high of having just jumped. He smiled and nodded at me. He was alive. And his neck still seemed to be in the right place.

And so I closed my eyes and jumped.

It was so wonderfully frightening that I did it again—this time with my eyes open. And again...and again until the old folks were shouting at us to quit jumping to have our cold spaghetti and fried chicken lunch.

I slept that night with my young soul satisfied.

I hope this book does the same thing for you, dear reader. You may be standing on the edge of your office or home looking out the window wondering what it will be like to take that plunge into entrepreneurship. I hope that this book will give you the same reassurance and encouragement that my friend’s smile and nod gave to me that enabled me to jump.

Here’s to your adventure.

Blessings,

Ardy Roberto

++++

Did you know that the word “entrepreneur” is actually french—and it means “adventurer”? Cool!

+++