Sometimes I sit and wonder if businesses are in the business of failing.

Why? Because there are so many instances of business owners that are willing to provide excuses to doing business, rather than seeking answers.

My grandmother always told me that if you’re not a part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.  I sure am seeing a lot of problems out there.

Now I don’t want anyone to think that I’m singling them out – this article has been around in draft form for quite a few months, I just happened to have a reminder recently that I should finish it and make it available for everyone to benefit from.

For businesses to succeed they need to be willing to

• Give that proverbial 110%
• Go the extra mile
• Think outside the box
• Bring your A-game
• Leave no stone unturned
• Take the bull by the horns
• Shift your paradigms
• Boldly go where you’ve never been

All these cliches are heard almost daily, and represent exactly what successful businesses do each and every day.

Yet so many businesses aren’t doing them.

Successful businesses won’t give you excuses of why they can’t help you.  They realize that you don’t care if they have had email problems. Successful businesses know that their clients want results, and they want it now.  They aren’t coming to you to for an inconvenience.

Think of it this way.  You stroll into your favorite clothing store to get a new shirt.  You see the exact one that you want, but it isn’t in your size.  So you ask the clerk if there is one in the back.

Do you want to listen to the reasons that your shirt isn’t available, or do you want someone to find your shirt for you? This can be from the back, special order or  another store.  It doesn’t matter where it comes from, you just want the shirt – am I right?

Answers to business aren’t always easy, and yet they’re rarely difficult.

Sometimes you just have to open your mind a little bit.  And here’s a huge secret on how to open your mind that can apply to almost every business out their.

It’s called Google.  or Yahoo.  or Ask.  or MSN or … you get the idea.  Search engines are your friend.  Learn how to utilize the Internet,  and you can master your business.

So what event is it that brought me to write this article?

In a word. Email attachments. (no pun intended)

I send and receive around hundreds of emails everyday.  And about once a month I will get a reply back that they can’t open the file that I sent them, which was a Word 2007 file.

Why should such a response be a problem for your business?  Let’s break it down.

Word 2007 has been around for several years.  It is a common business application that you should have upgraded too, or figured out how to deal with the issue in house.

Earlier versions of Word have converters that will read and convert the newer files, so that you don’t have to ask people to do your work and convert the files.

It gives a certain undertone of unprofessionalism.  If you can’t handle a Word attachment, how are you going to handle your other business affairs?

When I get a reply to convert the document,  I always convert it, and send it along.  I could send a link to the converter with the converted file, and in the future I may do just that.

This is where Google comes in.

If you are sent a file, and don’t know what the extension is.  Google it, and see if you can get a program that will open it.  There are freeware programs to almost every file out there.  It may not allow you to edit the file, but you can at least open it and read it.

So take this list of cliches, commit them to memory, and apply.  Your customers will thank you, and your business will grow because of it.