Msnbc, your business is sponsored by american express. Dont do business without it. Hi, everyone. Im j. J. Ramberg and welcome to your business, a show dedicated to helping your growing business. For entrepreneurs who hit the sweet spot of success and make a fortune, it was certainly something that jim markham thought about. He made his millions from the hair care lines that hes created and sold. Each time he sold a company, he made a goal at relaxation and failed miserably. He has a passion for his craft and he could never quite quit the business world. He kept jumping back into the industry building yet another brand from scratch. Jim markham has definitely been around the block. His hair care empire includes five brands, 300plus products and well over a billion dollars in combined retail sales. Hes been in a position to hang it all up and enjoy the good life with the millions hes made multiple times. But he hasnt been able to do it. Jim knows hes figured out a formula for success. He still thrives from the challenges of building new businesses. You keep bringing what you did before into the next company and then what youve used to the next company and the next company and then you actually have a little formula. Jim made his first major mark styling hair for a slew of Silver Screen legends. The king of cool and the one known for his striking baby blues. They were both jims clients. The first time i saw paul newman, it was a delight. When i cut his hair, i said what do you think . He said, looks great markham. Although he made a name for himself, jims entrepreneurial spirit was there from the start. Ever since i was a kid and started cutting hair, i thought selling products was a great idea. People bought your product. By the late 1980s, he had two successful product lines. But abba, his third line truly showed his business sense. This line blended healthy ingredients that could deliver superior results, something most insiders claimed was impossible. Its real important to better what you did to make a better mouse trap. You cant stand on your laurels, you have to keep getting better. There was a 20 million offer. We sold the company. We could eat enough enchiladas or play enough golf. We liked the interaction of working with stylists and consumers, working with distributors. We loved developing product. Its all about passion. That passion propelled him out of retirement and right back into the industry he adored. To start yet another hair caroline. The concept for round four came from something completely unpecks ekted. A dear friend called me. She was diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer and said my oncologist gave me a do not use list. We formulated product that was saltfree, no known carcinogens. She loved them. Other people started saying these products are making my color last longer. Purology hit the market in 2001 with a line of clean, Safe Products that also protected color. An absolute game changer in the hair industry. By 2007, purology was a product powerhouse. Jim knew an offer he couldnt refuse was imminent. We had 12 different individual people trying to buy one would give us more money if i stayed for five years. I never worked for anybody in my life. No, were not doing that. We sold to loreal, it was an all cash deal and i didnt have to work for them. Jim recognized that he had become a man of many returns and so he was very careful about the noncompete clause. We had a short noncompete period, two years. We kept it short because we didnt know if we would come back or not. Signing a tenyear noncompete, it would keep you from doing what youre known for. Then the buyer always wants the longest period of time. They want to keep you out of the game as long as possible. After he made another fortune with purology, he and his wife cheryl tried to make a go at retirement. Yet again. But it didnt last long. Kept looking at products and how they sold and what was selling best. Why did people like it . We kept saying, we cant get out of the game. We said well, lets do this again. Jim jumped back in the game again launching color proof in 2011. Seeing your product going across the line and how big its grown, its really a wonderful thing. I believe that were all made to win. I think you have to choose to lose but were born whether you believe in god or buddha or whatever, i do believe were 100 prepared to win. Just have the confidence and trial and error and keep striving to win and youll win. You may know Kristin Cavallari from reality tv. You may not know that shes a hardcore entrepreneur. Shes the founder of uncommon james. Shes serious about her business. From designing jewelry to managing a growing staff and a brick and mortar store in nashville, this is a Company Getting more and more popular right now. In part, because of her new e entertainment show. Very cavallari. Whether you know her from mtv as part of the cast of laguna beach and the hills or her current show on e reality tv star Christina Cavallari ive loved every second. I really learned a lot. At the end of the day, im working with a wellestablished company. That was more me putting my name on something. I had final say. But i kind of didnt. Im answering to a team of people. She dabbled in sifrl successful ventures beyond shoes, including two best selling books and a jewelry business she started with a friend called emerald dove. Creatively she wasnt satisfied. Kristin wanted to start something that was all hers. Im in it. This is my baby. This is my company. For me its really fun because its the first time in my life i have complete creative freedom to do whatever i want. I have no one to answer to. Its the best for me. Its also challenging. But its more fun than anything else. She named the company uncommon james. The name uncommon james, james is my daughters middle name. It really is just because i love the name james for a girl even though its traditionally for a boy, making it uncommon. Wasting no time and no planning, kristin swung for the fences and started her own lifestyle business. With three distinct lines. Jewelry, home and baby. I just said, okay, im going to launch my own jewelry line. I didnt have time to think about it. I just did it. I found a manufacturer and from there, i was unstoppable. I found a guy to create my website. It happened overnight. I busted my ass and launched within a couple of months and i launched with just me, one girl to help me ship orders and my website guy. Out of the office in my house. Out of girl box moments are captured in her e telephone show, very cavallari. I woke up so excited to check the orders. The newsletter went out and we had to take them off the website. Thats so bad. It looks bad on me. It doesnt fall on you guys. Im glad youre crying. Im glad you give a [ bleep ]. This is my [ bleep ] world right now. It got [ bleep ] this morning. Then she happened upon a perfect space to move her business in nashville and made another snap decision, to open an uncommon james brick and Mortar Retail store. I was looking for an office space and i stumbled upon this location. I just knew that for where this was in the city, being so close to downtown and with everything going on, it was a great location to have both the office and a retail component. So same kind of thing. I just decided okay, lets do it. I had enough time to think about it. I called a good friend, an interior decorator and he said how quickly can you turn this into a store for me. Making affordable pieces that mix and match. Im the only designer that we have. I dont really design the most traditional sense where i design a specific collection. Ill just sit down every month or so and just flush out a ton of ideas. Heres my collection with all triangles and heres one with all circles. Everything in my line is so simple and effortless that no matter what, theyre all cohesive. I have found that i do what i love and what i think makes a good collection. She loves when the design samples come in. Receiving samples in the mail is better than christmas as a kid. It is the best day of my life. Its so cool to see what i sort of scribbled up and then send off to my manufacturer and have it arrive as a piece of jewelry. Its the best feeling in the world. With the success of her tv show, everything in the store sold out quickly. A mistake she says shes not going to do when season 2. Truly, i have nothing in stock right now. Because the show, i knew that the show was going to make a huge impact. I didnt know to what degree. I found that everything the girls and i were wearing on the show, i mean, it went flying off the shelves. So i truly have seen firsthand what the show can do. Its crazy. Its the best thing in the entire world but now my biggest problem right now is keeping inventory in stock. Presumably, most of you are using social media to try to boost sales. And im guessing a lot of you arent seeing a lot from this social media. Did you know you could make big mistakes . Weve invited a guest to talk about four of them that could hurt your sales. The chief engagement officer at beyond 360. People know that they need to be on social media. They think at some point a lot of them give up because they sayi its not working. Right . Im spending all this time on it, but its not resulting in anything. Lets point out some of the things they could be doing wrong. Yes. The first one you have here is simple. Just about the bio. Sometimes we have to go back to basics. What about the foundation. I always say to my clients, think about the basics and think about the foundation when it comes to your social media channel. Are you using your bio effectively . Whats the most Important Information that should be in that bio. So that if somebody discovers you on social media first, they have a clear understanding of who, what, where, when, why. And also social media, a lot of the time could be the first impression. Thats what im saying. People might find you much earlier than anywhere else. Exactly. Also the bio and the banner on facebook, twitter, youtube are prime real estate. That banner is something that could be customizable. That banner is also something that we can tweak. If its a new product launch, new service announcement, pr announcement, we can customize them to make sure the most Important Information is up there. We can do that ourselves. Like tools like we can get our Graphic Design on and make sure were utilizing that real estate to solidify our branding and make sure nobody is confused by who you are and what you do. First things first, back to basics. Not having a calendar is number two. Where this comes into play, when it starts to feel overwhelming. Yes. It doesnt have to be. It doesnt have to be overwhelming. Heres most important thing. Before you start thinking about all the great content you want to create and how to post and when to share, first do you know where your audience is on social media . Just because social media exists doesnt mean that your target client is on every social channel. First, really understand the demographics of each social channel. What client might be on facebook might not be on snapchat. Know what social Media Channels you should put your energy into. It is changing. If you look at instagram, which is fast growing and you might have thought a younger base is creeping up. It is creeping up. But if youre appealing to the millennials and gen zer, theyre more active on instagram and snapchat than on a facebook. Ignoring comments. This is an easy one, right . Super easy. Super easy. Social media is being used for Customer Service more than ever. Millennial conditi millennial consumers expect it more than ever. Its an experience. Not a department. If you have a bad Customer Experience online, nine out of ten chances, they wont be a repeat customer. Dont ignore the dms. Get back to the comments within a 24hour time frame. That experience of the client or the consumer is going to be way more pleasant and appreciated because we really just want fact action solution. By the way, i think its fun. Not all the comments or complaints are just a quick comment on something you put up. Its fun to respond to that. Doesnt have to take so long. If you want to put notifications on to remind you, take ten minutes a day, look at your dms, respond to your comments, your clients, your consumers, they will be grateful for that feedback. Finally, not putting up fro pro duct or service information. This goes back to your first point. People may not go to your website. This goes back to the second point of the content calendar. Your calendar should be 80 fun be, engaging, valuable information that youre sharing through your channels. 20 promotional. About products, your sales, more pushing sales. So find the happy medium of the balance between your content calendar. Take one day a month, try to block out as much type as possible and create content in bulk. That will give you time back in your day. And then, as you start rolling out on content. Give yourself three months. Social media does not happen overnight. Traffic will not happen overnight. Give yourself three months to assess what content worked, what content didnt work, what formats were resonating better with your audience and then refine and repeat. Thanks so much, chelsea. Good to see you. Still to come, would you let an outside Software Vendor have access to your data . Two entrepreneurs start with plastic and trash in the ocean. N dont forget that the past can speak to the future. Im going to be your substitute teacher. Dont assume the substitute teacher has nothing to offer. Same goes for a neighborhood. Dont forget that friendships last longer than any broadway run. Mr. President. laughing dont settle for your first draft. Or your 10th draft. You get to create the room where it happens. Just dont think you have to do it alone. The powerful backing of american express. Dont live life without it. How do we convince i. T. Departments in enterprises to allow Software Vendors to access their data as it is now in the cloud . This is a trickier question than ever right now. Data security and data privacy is a super hot issue. We all know go gdpr in europe. The privacy laws are coming out of state. California has these rules. The first thing we have to do, if you want to access that data, the entity or people accessing it have to be vetted. We have to know theyre following the privacy rules and the various security functionality. Secondly, there has to be an objective purpose. What is this data access going to do for the stakeholders, for the business itself, for the individuals that desire to have it made . Its a complex issue. Its something we think about a lot at mind body. Were tracking the data of 68,000 businesses more than 50 million consumers. So its an important question. When you take your gashage out to the curb, its probably the last time you think about your trash. Some goes into land fills, some is recycled. A lot of it, unfortunately, ends up in the ocean and a great deal of that is plastic just left floating in the sea. Nbcs Kerry Sanders headed out to the water with millennial entrepreneurs who started the company for ocean and are cleaning up our coastal waters by fishing for trash. Just off the coast of palm bea beach, less than a mile from president trumps maralago, a picture postcard of one of americas most beautiful playgrounds. But its what lies below. In the Atlantic Ocean waters here that end up shocking and heartbreaking. On this day, we joined Andrew Cooper and alex schultz, two millennials who turned problem solving upside down. First, the problem. Its hard when you cant see it. To a lot of people, its not reporter teaming with plast irs. Each year, 17 billion pounds find their way into the worlds water ways. Somebodys telephone . Yep. Somebodys telephone. Ridiculous to find it here. Reporter like trying to count every star in the sky, andrew and alexs mission would seem impossible, ridding the worlds ocean of plastic and garbage and Everything Else that just does not belong. Are you surprised to see a tire down here . No, i didnt expect to see that, but im not surprised. You will find a lot of strange things down here. Reporter this struck these guys on a surfing vacation in bali. We saw a beach full of plastic. I said, hey, dude, how come no one is cleaning up the ocean . He said we clean it every day. Theres so much in the ocean it catches up. Reporter two buddies up ended traditional thinking. Instead of asking for money, they started a business. They would pay people and sponsor volunteer groups to pick up as much plastic as possible. What if we create a demand. We were like how do you do that . Reporter how would they hire 220 people in three countries and turn clean up into a business . They have been selling bracelets from recycled materials. Its funded by this . Absolutely. It cost how much . 20 a bracelet. Reporter so far, 20 bracelets sold. For ocean, cleaning up to clean up. Who is intimidating the ocean, green peace or tesla . The private sector is where action happens. Thats why we are here. For every 20, for ocean promises to extract pounds of trash. They salvaged 800,000 pounds from the oceans so far. Flood light. Straws are terrible. Straws, plastic water bottles. Reporter now, from two 20somethings, a business solution. Maybe. Is it offensive to call you garbage person . No. Reporter kerry sands, off the coast of florida. We have the top two tips you need to know to help you grow your business. Lets introduce the panel. Dottie is the ceo of the oldest and largest Real Estate Brokerage firm. Andrew is the ceo of Berlin Packaging in chicago, a Global Supplier of metal containers. Dottie, lets start with you. You have had Great Success in this career, this one and the one before. What is something you learned along the way . To build a great company, the assets are the people and if you involve them, if you make them part of it, of course its not profit, but theres also a purpose to your company. I think you get Brand Ambassadors and people want that brand and that company to win. How do you do that . Its easy to say you want to get people involved. Sometimes, as the ceo, you want people to do what is right. How do you balance that . We do a lot of things off site. People getting to know each other better and outside work. They really get this, i think the leadership has to paint the vision we are all a big family. I think we will root for each other. Its interesting to create a culture of,