tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-52461796102811259072011-11-28T07:45:38.775+08:00this blog is about my ramblings and interesting stories to tell during my journey as an entrepreneur. It also has stuff about my business ventures, successful and failed ones.Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comBlogger341100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-380677627594130992010-07-03T09:10:00.000+08:002010-07-03T09:10:51.513+08:00

If you've got a website, but not doing anything to drive people to your website, you're probably not getting much sales out of that investment. If you haven't got a website, you're seriously at the bottom of the learning curve, but no worries, those that have got one but do not market it aren't very far ahead, you can still catch up. You'll probably have heard from your children or your

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-6002433288305331612010-07-03T08:51:00.001+08:002010-07-03T08:53:07.550+08:00

When I started in business back in 1999, I probably wasn't as I am today. Many women entrepreneurs build confidence over the years, although I (think) I lacked in confidence, but I had a great ambition - that was to succeed in any business I did. And of course, my ambition for my business then was to build my own brand of apparel and have my own specialty shop was a little overly ambitious. And

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-44064164238932845952008-02-02T11:53:00.000+08:002008-02-02T12:01:56.844+08:00

Chinese New Year is that time of year when there is over-consumption of nearly everything and for some businesses - it is pulling off all the stops to get consumers spending (yes possibly even their last dollar).Many of these displays are made of large cardboards, plywoord, and large marketing posters, flyers, promotional material are printed all just for this CNY. After this Thursday - all this

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-67484111812864006772008-01-30T19:59:00.000+08:002008-01-30T20:13:44.623+08:00

I have been guilty in the First Degree (not of love), but of not posting on my blog!Yes I have been so pre-occupied with my businesses since December. That was when Ozone had organised a mega barter event, and it had a fantastic turn out of several hundred participants, Ozone barter members and public as well.My own guests (mainly my family, friends and some of my business friends), dropped by

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-41549616354566197222007-10-25T08:54:00.000+08:002007-10-25T09:05:29.890+08:00

It has been slightly over a month since I last posted. Yes it seemed really like ages. And I probably might have aged tremendously since the last post. If you cannot see me (what an obviously ridiculous question to ask a reader), you can't see the tired look in my eyes.But I digress. Today I am writing about my barter trade events. It's the Exam Period again. As predictable as the sun rising from

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-35188338441891723132007-09-17T14:40:00.000+08:002007-09-17T14:41:50.788+08:00

Barter vs Cash, the clash of the titans? Perhaps, but one reason many businesses give for not bartering is that they need cash for their business to survive. This is true, but if we look at the bigger picture, greater efficiencies and optimisation of resources can be achieved with bartering. Based on economic ideology, running an economy (or business) at less than optimal levels causes wastage.

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-59216540833220846262007-09-16T17:37:00.000+08:002007-09-16T17:40:27.606+08:00

Any business that provides services is in a good position to barter. Why is that so? Their business is time based, and time is extremely perishable. You cannot sell the service that you were offering yesterday. And that is why the old adage "time is money" or "time is more precious than gold". Electricians, plumbers, air-con service contractors can offer their services on full barter. Did you

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-21482310877301674362007-09-05T10:53:00.000+08:002007-09-05T13:55:58.886+08:00

I have recently heard of a spate of more entrepreneurs canvassing for business under the banner of social entrepreneurship. Having seen the abuses of NKF, other non-profit organisations, I nevertheless retain some scepticism about this. Perhaps I am a little bit more traditional, business should always be business, and social work is more like a charity, but when the charity adopts a more

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-83397107627390062172007-09-01T15:56:00.000+08:002007-09-01T16:06:23.948+08:00

Haven't been posting for a while I guess. weeks before the 24th August, it has been a roller coaster ride of events from organising, coordinating and planning for this event. My chapter's open house - Visitors Day. We had a record turnout of nearly 50 guests (on top of our 21 regular chapter members). We packed the place to the brim. Will be posting these pictures of the event on our chapter

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-61182688923100743672007-08-23T08:47:00.000+08:002007-08-23T08:58:44.908+08:00

Thought I would post something that is a tad-outside topic for a while, but keenly interesting for some of those out there who are daringly entrepreneurial. Before the ghost month started, I told my biz partners that "Hey this month, I'm going to be very busy you know, and I'll try to leave the office before it gets dark..ok, u guys "jagar" yourselves hor"...my partners assumed that I was being a

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-49953723372005964162007-08-23T07:48:00.000+08:002007-08-23T07:56:42.068+08:00

Sent email and tried calling SNEF a couple of times yesterday in the morning all the way till mid-day. Didn't get a response from them. (haiyaz-sigh, they're not interested in doing my biz)..ok take it elsewhere. Call our Gahmen agency - WDA workforce development agency, (whoa impressive leh), got proper call centre setup, tell them that SNEF didn't call me and all that. Before the day is out I

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-15427448676805286832007-08-22T08:07:00.000+08:002007-08-22T08:44:20.205+08:00

The move towards making Singapore a "Age Neutral" workplace - is ideal, but also for many it is a requirement to stay alive (not just for the mature worker, but also for the business). I've sent an email to Singapore National Employers Federation (or SNEF), about the grant scheme to hire older workers. Hope to shed more light on this for all the people who read. Ozone barter - one of my companies

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-63853546603000618142007-08-21T21:44:00.000+08:002007-08-21T21:59:59.127+08:00

Hey I'm not talking dirty, I'm actually talking about brand visibility. In Marketing we want brand visibility. So how do we get brand visibility leh?? As the saying goes - say easy, do is hard, marketing on a shoe-string budget is really not easy for Small businesses. Even being in the barter business, we try to get our marketing all on barter, so it doesn't cost us any cash, the coverage is not

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-17967234917199391562007-08-20T18:13:00.000+08:002007-08-21T21:38:16.117+08:00

Ever wondered which coffee sells the best?Let me tell you - a branded coffee. Any of our daily "CuP of LiFe" or as I sometimes like to call it my elixir, if it were branded, you would be willing to pay for it. Spinelli and Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf some of the foreign entrants onto our uncultured (in coffee terms) territory, being a marketplace of -local roast (normally with additives into the

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-67579571361824101482007-08-16T08:07:00.000+08:002007-08-16T08:33:53.826+08:00

After reading the attention grabbing headlines on my Todayonline - that sneaks into my inbox at about 7am, I thought I had to post it up for all to read. The thing that I felt was a bit silly was the "Free HR Course" which comes as the sub-header. As if a Free HR Course is going to help SMEs hire mature workers? Its not going to happen. No it's not that we cannot hire mature workers, SMEs can

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-62265257498554789222007-08-16T08:04:00.001+08:002007-08-16T08:06:50.609+08:00

WANT TO HIRE OLDER WORKERS? HERE'S HOWFree HR courses to help small firms hire and retain mature workers Cheow Xin Yicheowxinyi@mediacorp.com.sgMORE help is on the way for SMEs looking to hire older workers.Following the 2005 "Advantage! Scheme" to spur firms to recruit, retrainor re-employ mature workers over 40, smaller businesses can now get helpin implementing their human resource (HR)

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-89126213721211385392007-08-15T16:26:00.000+08:002007-08-15T17:57:54.897+08:00

Its been a short while, but having written so many posts in such a short time, it felt that I needed to continue that momentum and continue writing, but suddenly I felt flat short of stuff to write about (temporarily I hope). I'll be attending the 11th Infocomm Commerce Conference tomorrow. Here's my pass - to the event, at least this time I remembered to register early.

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-51711408050762862782007-08-13T14:17:00.000+08:002007-08-13T14:50:29.883+08:00

This kid did this in one month-impressive, but nothing new. Its as classic as stock trading, as we know about trading - its about timing. As pricing fluctuates, he has to always hit the nail on the head each time to ensure that he is able to make a decent profit. Its good that he knows where he is good at. That's the key, to him performing this successfully. I think this kid grasped the concept

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-77909910979855043292007-08-12T08:11:00.000+08:002007-08-12T08:23:22.864+08:00

After writing my post about "I"m Lovin' It", I went over to read Andrew Wee's Blog, who's now in HK probably enjoying himself with his family at HK Disneyland (a place which I'm not the type to enjoy). Anyway, I digress. He wrote on his blog saying that "What you need to have a successful business is its ability to operate without you."Which is very true as well, perhaps this is the idea that

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-18092744260458702502007-08-12T06:34:00.000+08:002007-08-14T17:56:30.371+08:00

Its 6.30am on a Sunday - why am I up? Basically because I have nothing else better to do than to do my work? Why because I am devoted to my business and simply can't miss a second doing work for it. Sounds loony? Yeah it probably is, and everyday I look at this crazy-nut case and ask - why the heck are we in business, the profit margins are good, but not fantastic, sometimes customers come up

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-22667416205927093972007-08-08T21:12:00.000+08:002007-08-08T21:42:31.352+08:00

Bold Leaps is a magazine that is published by a friend of mine, and insofar, has been trying very hard to get this magazine into places, getting recognition for it as The Publication that is read widely by the SMEs in Singapore. I think that Bold Leaps - after being launched at the start of this year - has reached a milestone. Its nearing its 1st year anniversary and it is still around. Not that

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-86132368299816416162007-08-08T17:37:00.000+08:002007-08-08T21:11:50.297+08:00

Singapore is about to have the Inaugural Aviva Ironman 70.3 SingaporeTriathlon on Sept 2. Having corporate sponsorship like Aviva it is set to be one of those sports events with large corporate sponsorships. As a matter of fact, we have just barely started out with Triathalons in Sg not very long ago - now we're talking about IRONMAN. Wow...a close friend of mine (Fishlike Aquatic School) told me

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-2947424177690744912007-08-07T23:22:00.000+08:002007-08-07T23:33:06.804+08:00

I have been griping about the state of my corporate website for Ozone barter, and my biz partner had gone to NTU to give a talk at Nanyang Technopreneur Centre, I think probably on our obviously favourite topic of Barter Trade. What does this have to do with my corporate website? Luckily for all of us, I had at the final 11th hour changed it to make it look a tad bit more chio that how it used

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-68526070524955844062007-08-07T07:28:00.000+08:002007-08-07T07:41:05.916+08:00

http://www.asianfoodchannel.com/index.php - is the home page of AFCI would need to confess - one of my favourite channels has to be Asian Food Channel (or AFC for short). I would say that this is a fairly newly setup channel. It takes programs from UK, US, Canada, Singapore, Taiwan, Japan and Korea, and actually mash it together into one cohesive channel for food loving singaporeans. Actually

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-78525832235772352622007-08-05T14:15:00.001+08:002007-08-05T14:32:55.784+08:00

Another weekend has passed, just yesterday, it was also a sunny day, but we spent most of our time indoors and nay was a second wasted while we packed and hauled all our Ozone paraphernalia into my notoriously sickly looking green coloured van - that was waiting for us patiently in the car park. Luckily for me this round for our Business Opportunity Fair, we had all our sales team (much larger

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-79462233816070091002007-08-02T22:42:00.000+08:002007-08-02T22:49:16.709+08:00

A new member that has just joined my business barter community - and their product, Women's Boosting products, Lingere and its peripherals. And to imagine that the owner of this business is a man! Although I was tickled by it, but it is true that businesses that know how to market correctly to women stand a good market position and profit. Just take his competitors in the market - Eros, Triumph,

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-66018505857757795702007-08-02T09:51:00.001+08:002007-08-02T09:53:58.881+08:00

One of our Ozone members had recently launched a printed flyer campaign with door-to-door distribution. I've not seen the flyer yet, but I have always been sceptical about direct mailers, as unsolicited direct mailers normally are good for branding rather than actually having people taking a specific action. But why do people still engage in such activities if it doesn't bring good results? My

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-68259007914331169122007-08-01T12:57:00.000+08:002007-08-01T12:58:59.923+08:00

For all entrepreneurs - they always have one regret, not being able to clone themselves. Although my lawyer and my other friend who is a franchising consultant says that it is possible to do so - just franchise your business. It is not really true that you can "clone" yourself when you get a franchisee. Because they can never really be you. Time is of essence, perhaps that's why not many

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-24820226214406203752007-08-01T00:08:00.000+08:002007-08-01T00:20:40.729+08:00

it is lamentable that Singaporean Entrepreneurs with a small exception of a few do blog. It's good to blog sometimes, because there isn't really another avenue to really crap about stuff that you dislike. This is not my first blog but this is probably one of my first "psychotherapy" blogs. Wonder what I mean by that? It's my avenue to air grievances, problems, gripes and anger with the rest of

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-28624953562944624952007-08-01T00:06:00.001+08:002007-08-01T00:06:44.809+08:00

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-52659982460932860282007-07-30T19:29:00.001+08:002007-08-01T12:51:04.630+08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMC8ICm9Ei0Bob may not be talking directly about being an entrepreneur, but rather about being an employee and stuff like in the workplace. But I still think that it is very relevant for entrepreneurs to place themselves in the shoes of their employees. It is very hard sometimes for entrepreneurs to view from the perspective of others, as time is always so critical

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-21382906119992590672007-07-30T16:14:00.000+08:002007-07-30T16:15:42.691+08:00

I recall one of my partners got to know this guy that coined "blogopreneur" of course there was never such a term, but in our day and age, things can get invented when we invent them. Just imagine if we had allowed more of such creative and innovative attitudes, our world would have progressed even much faster. But perhaps there is a time and place for all these to fall into place.In my searches

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-66181924989800624272007-07-29T22:21:00.000+08:002007-07-29T23:05:02.441+08:00

Many people are blogging for profit - why? Blogging offers free hosting, a system that allows easy uploading of information on a regualr basis, and avenues that allows easy promoting of their website. It offers the non-web savy individual an easy avenue to customize their own website to reflect their personal preferences, and having a platform to easily update it without having to know much about

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5246179610281125907.post-6805525261345105302007-07-29T18:35:00.000+08:002007-07-29T18:49:50.000+08:00

it has been long time since I blogged, but I endeavour to write more about my entrepreneurish knowledge, so that others can read about it and perhaps I can reflect about it in future. Being a serial entrepreneur can sometimes be really tiring you know. Lots of stuff to do, making sure that everything turns out well. But in the meantime, I'm trying to fiddle around with the template of this latest

Yian Tayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04878859244116694487noreply@blogger.com