Got grandchildren?

 

Personally, just a few years ago, I started with $5 and the current balance is $1,580.57

Take a second and see how!!

You can get your grandkids (or your self) started with as little as $5

Speed Wins Deals

 

A lot of people believe the biggest advantage in business is intelligence.

Or capital.

Or connections.

Those help.

But one of the biggest advantages I have seen over the years is something much simpler.

Speed.

The people who move first often get the deal.

The people who hesitate usually end up watching someone else take it.

I have seen deals, tax benefits, and opportunities disappear simply because someone needed another week to think about it.

Meanwhile someone else already moved forward.

Tariffs went up.

So did freight. 

So did everyone’s blood pressure. 

See how business owners are actually modeling these costs instead of just absorbing them and hoping.

Understand the Tax Details When Starting a Business

If you’re thinking about starting a business, make sure you understand your federal tax responsibilities before opening your doors. IRS Publication 583, Starting a Business and Keeping Records, covers the basics. Your business structure (such as a sole proprietorship, partnership, limited liability company or corporation) determines which forms you must file and which taxes apply, including income, self-employment, employment and excise taxes.

You may also need an Employer Identification Number for tax purposes, and you should be aware of your recordkeeping requirements. Starting a business is exciting, and getting the tax details right is important. Contact the office for assistance.

Businesses Regain Immediate Deduction for R&E Expenses.

If your business conducts research or product development, a significant tax law change could unlock tax savings. The 2025 tax legislation, commonly known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), reinstated the ability to immediately deduct domestic research and experimental (R&E) expenses.

This change reversed a key provision of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) that required businesses to capitalize and amortize domestic R&E expenses over five years and foreign R&E expenses over 15 years. As a result, you may have new tax-saving opportunities as you prepare your 2025 tax return and plan for 2026.

What the Change Means for Your 2025 Filing

Beginning with eligible 2025 expenses, businesses can once again deduct U.S.-based R&E costs in full in the year they're incurred. This can significantly reduce taxable income and improve cash flow.

The law also provides flexibility for prior-year R&E expenses. You can potentially accelerate deductions that previously you would have had to spread over multiple years.

Strategies to Maximize R&E Tax Benefits

Businesses should consider the following when assessing R&E expenditures:

Amend returns for prior years. Small businesses (generally those with average annual gross receipts of $31 million or less over the past three years) may be able to apply the rule retroactively. If eligible, you can file amended returns for 2022, 2023 and/or 2024 to claim immediate deductions for domestic R&E expenses previously amortized and, potentially, receive a tax refund for those years. You must file the amended return(s) by July 4, 2026.

More quickly claim remaining deductions. Businesses of any size that capitalized and began amortizing R&E expenses in 2022, 2023 and/or 2024 can accelerate their deductions for the remaining unamortized balance. You can deduct it entirely on your 2025 return or split it ratably between your 2025 and 2026 returns, rather than continuing amortization over the original five-year period.

Bring research activities back onshore. The immediate deduction makes domestic research activities significantly more attractive from a tax perspective. While under prior law, U.S.-based R&E already benefited from shorter amortization periods, the difference between an immediate deduction and a 15-year amortization schedule for foreign research further strengthens the incentive to locate R&E activities in the United States.

Consider the research credit. A tax deduction reduces your taxable income, while a tax credit reduces your tax bill dollar-for-dollar and is generally more valuable. You may be eligible for the credit for "increasing research activities," but fewer types of expenses qualify for the credit than for the R&E deduction. While you can benefit from both, you can't receive a double tax benefit for the same costs.

Seek Guidance

The return of the immediate deduction for R&E expenses can bring planning opportunities for businesses.

People who've never built anything love telling builders how to build.

Back in the 1950s a business owner named Sam had a small mom-and-pop store but wanted to open multiple discount stores in small towns.

Everyone around him told him it was stupid. They said small towns couldn't support it.

But Sam had done the research and wasn't flying blind. He ended up opening the first Walmart in Rogers, Arkansas anyway. Population 5,700.

That same year, Kmart launched in big cities with all the money and advantages. 

By by 1991, Walmart was the largest retailer in America.

Kmart filed for bankruptcy in 2002. While Walmart has around 5,000 locations in the US as of 2026.

Sam didn't ask the peanut gallery for permission. Others laughed at him but he bet on himself anyway. And the research he did early on is why his stores are still going strong today.

Unfortunately most business owners listen to the wrong people.

They get in your head when you're already stressed out and pretty soon you start doubting everything.

You need discernment. Listen to people who understand risk vs recklessness. Who've been where you're trying to go. Who understand setbacks, where to pivot but also when to push even harder.

Everyone else? Noise.

Stop taking business advice from people who've never run a business.

Who Are You Listening To?

 

When you run a business, everyone suddenly has advice.

Friends. Family. People who have never built anything.

They mean well most of the time.

But opinions from people who have never carried the risk of ownership can quietly destroy your confidence.

Entrepreneurship requires judgment.

You need to know the difference between reckless advice and experienced guidance.

The voices you listen to will shape the decisions you make.

3 go-to strategies when your prospect isn’t actively shopping.

 

1. The Comparison Bomb

Still missing key incident alerts. Want a side-by-side breakdown?”

Create a little FOMO. You're not saying they're doing something wrong, you're hinting that others are doing it better.

This works especially well with execs. Because what do execs care about more than anything?

What their peers are doing that’s new, cutting-edge, and just might make them look behind.

You can’t get on their priority list if they aren’t in the right awareness stage. But you can make them think they’re missing something that already is.

2. The Invisible Cost Angle

“CPA engineers spend 5–10 hours a week untangling codes and chasing down undocumented benefits, but that time never shows up on any report. It just quietly kills sprint velocity.”

The best problems to highlight in outbound aren’t always the loud, obvious ones — they’re the silent ones your prospect has learned to live with.

3. The “Why Now?” Trigger

“Google’s phasing out third-party cookies, and marketing teams without a first-party data strategy are already seeing weaker retargeting performance. The gap’s only going to widen this quarter. Want to see how others are adapting?”

This works because it:

References a clear, time-sensitive shift Creates urgency Positions the solution as part of what top performers are already doing

Thanks for reading!

Sell the Problem (Not the Solution)

 

Nobody cares about your product if they don’t believe they have a problem.

That’s why most emails that pitch the product fall flat. Especially when you’re selling something new or nuanced.

Here’s an example from a client that sells a recruiting automation tool:

Bad message:

“Save hours per week using our AI-powered recruiting assistant.”

Better message:

“Most hiring managers are still spending 5–8 hours per week screening resumes manually. We found that most of them don’t realize how much qualified talent they’re missing because they can’t get to every applicant in time.”

This reframes the product from "automation" to "talent loss". A much harder problem to ignore.

Here’s another example from a client selling an internal knowledge platform:

Bad message:

“Centralize your company knowledge in one easy-to-use platform.”

Better message:

“Most teams don’t realize how much time they waste answering the same internal questions over and over. When knowledge lives in Slack threads and individual brains, scaling breaks down fast. Especially when onboarding new hires.”

People Building Right Now

If you are an entrepreneur reading this, know this:

Your work matters.

Your perspective matters.

Your leadership matters.

Whether you are running a growing company, launching your first service, or expanding into new markets, you are part of a long and powerful legacy of people who dared to build.

And if you support businesses, keep doing that. Refer them. Share their work. Speak their names in rooms full of opportunity.

Because when entrepreneurs rise, entire communities rise with them.

We celebrate your courage, your creativity, and your commitment to growth.

Keep building.

Keep leading.

Visibility Matters

Here is something we know to be true.

Talent alone is not enough.

Hard work alone is not enough.

Entrepreneurs deserve visibility. They deserve to be discovered. They deserve to have their products and services seen by the people who need them.

Too often, incredible business owners build quietly. They serve faithfully. They deliver excellence. Yet they remain harder to find than they should be.

This month, as we celebrate people in business, we also encourage them to take up space. To make their presence known. To ensure their work is discoverable.

If you are building something meaningful, the world should be able to find you.

The Power of Women Who Build

When women start businesses, they do more than generate revenue. They create opportunity. They hire employees. They support families. They strengthen communities.

They solve problems that others overlook.

They bring empathy into industries that desperately need it.

They create spaces where other women feel seen, supported, and empowered.

That is leadership.

And leadership does not always look loud. Sometimes it looks like consistency. It looks like showing up every day. It looks like sending one more email, making one more call, serving one more customer with excellence.

Positioning beats persuasion.

You don’t need to constantly convince people to work with you.

You just need to make it obvious why they should.

That’s the power of positioning.

Here are 3 ways strong positioning changes everything:
 
1️⃣ You attract the right opportunities without constantly selling.

When you clearly position yourself as the expert in a specific area, people already understand the value you bring.

Instead of chasing opportunities…

The right ones start finding you.

2️⃣ You build authority and credibility in your market

Strong positioning sends a clear signal:

“This is what I’m known for.”

Over time, your audience begins to associate your name with a specific result or solution.

That’s how reputations, and authority, are built.

3️⃣ You make the buying decision easier

Confused buyers don’t buy.

Clear positioning removes friction.

When people instantly understand who you help and how you help them, they can quickly recognise you as the right person to solve their problem.

Remember:

Persuasion works hard.

Positioning works automatically.

Focus on being known for something specific.

Everything else becomes easier.

👉 P.S. What do you want to be known for in your industry?

Own property? You're probanly depreciating it wrong.

If you own commercial or single rental property and you’re using standard depreciation, you’re spreading deductions over 27 or 39 years. Cost segregation accelerates that timeline dramatically.

Standard depreciation is painfully slow.

You’re waiting decades for deductions you could take right now. Certain building components qualify for 5, 7, or 15-year depreciation instead.

Six-figure deductions aren’t rare.

Business owners with properties worth $500K+ routinely unlock $80K–$200K in accelerated deductions. Your CPA likely never ran this analysis.

It takes 60-seconds to identify the opportunity.

Your property is one of your biggest assets. Make sure it’s also your biggest deduction. Stryde shows you exactly what you’re leaving behind.

Didn’t Do It Enough

 

A lot of business owners believe progress comes from the perfect strategy.

The perfect hook. The perfect offer. The perfect timing.

So they slow down and analyze everything.

Meanwhile someone else is simply doing more.

More ads. More conversations. More attempts.

They fail faster. They learn faster. And eventually they win faster.

Execution exposes what works.

Thinking about execution does not.

Why your pipeline keeps stalling.

 

Most business owners diagnose the wrong problem. They look at a dry pipeline and think: I need more outreach. I need better follow-up. I need to post more content. So they do. They post. They follow up. They make more calls. And the pipeline still feels like it's one slow quarter away from panic. Here is what is actually happening. The problem is not your volume. The problem is that your market cannot tell you apart from anyone else. You are not invisible because you are lazy. You are invisible because you are comparable. And in 2026, comparable is the most expensive place to be. Think about the last time a prospect went quiet on you after a great conversation. Think about the last time a client you had worked with for years went to someone else without even calling you first. Think about the last fee you had to defend or discount just to close. That is not a follow-up problem. That is a positioning problem. Here is the distinction that changes everything. There are two types in every niche right now. The first type competes. They send outreach, they post, they chase referrals, and they pray that timing works in their favor. When the market softens, their business softens with it. When a client goes quiet, they have no idea why. Their revenue is not a system. It is a streak. The second type compounds. They have a point of view the market can recognize and repeat. Their content does not just get impressions, it creates conversations. Their network is not random, it is curated with the right buyers, candidates, and connectors. Their follow-up is not "just checking in." It is a structured engine that turns warm interest into closed searches. The difference between these two is not skill. It is not relationships. It is not even luck. It is that one of them became the standard in their niche. The other one is still trying to be found. So how do you move from the first category to the second? Four things have to be in place. First, your positioning needs teeth. Most have a niche but not a POV. A niche tells people what you do. A POV tells people why you are the only one worth calling. If a prospect reads your profile and cannot immediately understand your standard, your specific perspective, and the exact problem you solve, your positioning is leaking. The fastest way to reduce fear in your business is to get that clarity locked in. Second, your network needs to be a pond you stocked on purpose. Random connections create random results. Those who build real inbound have ecosystems, not audiences. They are consistently in front of decision-makers who can actually pay. Building that takes intention, not volume. Third, your content needs to convert, not just reach. There is a massive difference between content that gets likes and content that generates conversations. Proof-led, POV-driven content does one thing: it moves someone from awareness to trust to a booked call. Motivational posts do not do that. Industry noise does not do that. Content built from your wins, your standards, and your specific insights does. Fourth, your follow-up needs to be a system, not a mood. The majority of revenue is lost not in the pitch but in the silence that follows it. If your follow-up depends on you remembering to circle back, you are leaving searches on the table every single month. A structured nurture engine turns warm interest into pipeline without requiring you to carry the whole business in your head. When all four of those things are aligned, something shifts. You stop chasing. You stop blending in. You stop being compared. You become the name people repeat in the room when a search opens up. That is what it means to be the standard in your niche. And that is the only position in recruiting that compounds over time instead of decaying. If you want to see exactly how this works in practice, reply to this email with the word STANDARD and I can walk you through the framework and how it would apply to your desk.

Does this work better than posting?

 

A LinkedIn tip that surprises most people.

Your comments matter more than your posts.

Not random comments. Strategic ones.

Brian, just pulled 86K impressions from a single comment.

Not a post. A comment.

Why this works:

When you comment on posts from people that your ideal clients already pay attention to, you show up in the right rooms without fighting the algorithm.

Add a clear point of view, and people notice.

The simple move to try:

1. Follow your prospects and their industry leaders on LinkedIn.
2. Click the bell on their profile so you get notified when they post.
3. Check your notifications each time you're on LinkedIn.
4. The moment you see a new post, go and leave a comment.
5. Add one clear thought. Not, "Great post, Brian." Try harder.
6. Do this consistently, at least 5 per day, but aim for more

The hard part isn’t knowing this.

It's knowing what to comment on and what to say without sounding generic or like a bot.

Are You Really Building?

 

Income vs Enterprise Value

Most people think wealth is about making more money.

Bigger months. Bigger launches. Bigger years.

But income alone does not create freedom.

If the money stops when you stop, you built a job. Not an asset.

Real wealth is created when you own something that works without you.

A business. Special free tool. A system. A repeatable outcome people will pay for again and again.

That is enterprise value.

RAISE AWARENESS

Raising awareness through email and social media is vital in your marketing because it connects you with your target audience where they engage most.

By sharing valuable content, you build trust and recognition, educating prospects on how your services can benefit them and keeping your business top of mind for future engagement and conversion.

LinkedIn rhythm that actually works!!

 

Here’s something most people overcomplicate on LinkedIn.

It’s not about posting every day.

It’s about having a clear, repeatable rhythm.

And the latest algorithm is all about highlighting content that stays within common themes that you post and comment about.

In fact, commenting is more important than it ever was.

We find many of our clients struggle with sticking to a consistent method for commenting and posting.