Running your own business is nowhere near as tough as you might think. So what are you waiting for? Luke Johnson is Britain's busiest tycoon, with a personal fortune estimated at £120 million. From Pizza Express and Channel 4 to his incisive Financial Times column, Johnson has spent two decades on the business frontline. In Start It Up, Johnson sets out to inspire - and guide - every budding entrepreneur. He tackles the issues that really matter: finding the right idea, sourcing funds, and getting the best from the people you meet on the way - chiefly yourself. 'A must-read for inspiring entrepreneurs, probably the best book available on the subject' John McLaren, Management Today 'Part rant, part outpouring of useful knowledge gleaned from 20 very successful years in business. There is a great deal here that is good' Richard Reed, co-founder of Innocent Drinks, Financial Times 'For the budding entrepreneur, this clear, thoughtful and passionate how-to guide will be an excellent first investment' Economist Luke Johnson is one of Britain's most successful entrepreneurs with an estimated personal fortune of £120 million. He is Chairman of Risk Capital Partners and The Royal Society of Arts, and a former Chairman of Channel 4 Television. He writes columns for the Financial Times and Management Today. In the 1990s he was Chairman of PizzaExpress, which he grew from 12 restaurants to over 250; he also founded the Strada pizzeria chain and owns Giraffe and Patisserie Valerie. He lives in London and is married with three children.

    It’s about getting only the right things done.  It is not  a time management strategy, or a productivity technique. It is a systematic discipline for discerning what is absolutely essential, then eliminating everything that is not, so we can make the highest possible contribution towards the things that really matter.  By forcing us to apply a more selective criteria for what is Essential, the disciplined pursuit of less empowers us to reclaim control of our own choices about where to spend our precious time and energy – instead of giving others the implicit permission to choose for us.Essentialism is not one more thing – it’s a whole new way of doing everything. A must-read for any leader, manager, or individual who wants to learn who to do less, but better, in every area of their lives, Essentialism  is a movement whose time has come.

    You're probably tired of being told "you can do it if you just believe you can."You're probably tired of reading about tricks that made a particular sale ~ tricks that may have been appropriate to a particular situation, but not yours ~ and even if they were appropriate, how would you have thought of them at the right time?If you've read books on selling before or listened to "sales experts," you're probably tired of being pumped with hot air ~ told how you must "come alive," be full of enthusiasm, dominate the world around ~ all the things that don't happen to be a part of your basic nature.Well, this book isn't anything like that. In fact, this book was written to refute many cliches of selling that have been accepted without question for years.This book will prove to you, I hope, that the stereotyped image of the "born salesman" is a mistake. You don't have to remake your personality and become super-enthusiastic, super-aggressive, domineering. Not only are those traits not necessary, they are actually a hindrance to making sales.And you won't have to develop that uncanny ability to come up with the right answer at the right time ~ that super-human knack of having the brilliant flash of insight that is so prevalent in books on selling. Sure, given several days to think about it, the writer of a sales book can always come up with a solution to a sales problem. But how does that help you when confronted face-to-face with a question that must be answered now? This book will show you that you don't need such skills.This book can truly revolutionize your selling career ~ but only because it will show you that you no longer need to waste your time developing skills that are of no value to a salesman. For example, here are some of the points that will be made in the course of this book:-- Contrary to the accepted mythology, enthusiasm is not a virtue; it destroys more sales than it creates.-- "Positive thinking" is an unrealistic fallacy. The salesman who thinks negatively has a far greater chance for success than the so-called "positive thinker."-- Sales success does not come from convincing people to buy things they don't want.-- The salesman who always has an answer for every objection is also probably plugging along with a very low income.-- Extroverts don't make the best salesmen; they are invariably outsold by introverts.-- To be a good salesman, you don't have to be a "smooth talker".-- Another all-time sales fallacy is the statement "When the going gets tough, the tough get going". When the going gets tough, I usually take a vacation.-- The desire to be able to motivate others is unrealistic and foolish. A really-great salesman will never try to motivate anyone.Perhaps all of this sounds so far removed from what you've heard about selling through the years that you wonder how it could possibly be true. I intend to demonstrate the validity of these statements in two ways.First, my own experience verifies their worth. Almost invariably, in any selling experience where I've found myself, I have outsold everyone else around me ~ usually while working far fewer hours.In addition, I've seen these principles work for a few others, too ~ a very few, for they are unknown to most people.But there is nothing mysterious about them ~ and that brings us to second way in which I will demonstrate their validity. I will prove them to you. We will deal with life logically and carefully in this book. Everything will be proven in terms of the real world as it is ~ in ways we can both understand.

    A good idea can inspire one commercial. But a good insight can fuel a thousand ideas, a thousand commercials. An insight gives you an entirely new way of thinking about your business. Consider just a few of the breakthrough insights that Dusenberry's agency, BBDO, has offered their clients over the years: That General Electric's unifying tagline should be ?We bring good things to life.? That Pepsi should be targeting the ?Pepsi Generation.? That Ronald Reagan's 1984 reelection theme should be ?Morning in America.? That Visa should compare itself with American Express, not MasterCard. Talk about moving the needle!Dusenberry argues that these brainstorms don?t come out of thin air, even at a world class organization like BBDO. They are actually the result of a rigorous and disciplined process of insight generation, one that any manager in any type of business can adopt. Dusenberry explains this process?Research, Analysis, Insight, Strategy, and Execution (RAISE)?in plain English. And he offers examples of some of the greatest business insights of our time, from the birth of Federal Express to the positioning of HBO."Moving the Needle" will help businesspeople get to the heart of their toughest problems.

    

    “The rules of success are told in such a captivating way that I could not put this book down. Those seven rules guide salespeople – novices and veterans – to create a solid sales foundation.” - Lee B. Salz - Bestselling Author of Hire Right, Higher Profits

    If the stakes are high and you're expected to win, this book will give you the edge you've been looking for. Buy your copy today!