Hello again everyone! I hope your weekend was a great one. For many it was the beginning of the long-awaited pro football season (and week 2 of the college football season). For me, it’s still baseball season – watching my beloved New York Mets continue our run to the post-season (fingers crossed!). (Oh, and by the way, hockey season starts in exactly one month!)

Anyway……you’re not here for all that. You’re here for great reading for business leaders. So, here you go. Here’s this week’s roundup of great articles.

• Where did all the startups go? U.S. entrepreneurship near 40-year low cnnmon.ie/2cfOVYC
• What do you have to do EVERY DAY to build a billion-dollar business? entm.ag/2cGdJuy
• Why Apple’s focus on it’s camera upgrade makes so much marketing sense: on.inc.com/2cczKNk
• Need some cool PR ideas for your startup? bit.ly/2ccnX1A
• Here’s how Target is working to up its game in the grocery area: read.bi/2cIHFHP
• What can be learned from the strategy crisis at Netflix? bit.ly/2cAKCpD
• Some tips to help you target Facebook ads: bit.ly/2bRhB7h
• Why are consumer startups back in the limelight with investors? tcrn.ch/2c2fqju
• Theranos just keeps stepping in it, don’t they? bit.ly/2cEwRKA
• Some lessons we just seem to learn too late in life: on.inc.com/2cyBYL6
• Has your personal branding gone TOO far? bit.ly/2c4cmBA

One idea that kept rolling around in my head last week was the idea of focus. Too often we find ourselves trying to take on way too much and focus on way too many (sometimes divergent) goals and strategies. I advocated that now might be a good time to consider scaling back and refocusing your business on the most important things, the things that will help your business grow. Here are a few tips I shared:

• Focus your company on only 2-3 strategic goals at any given time. Allow your team to understand the business’s priorities.
• Find a singular “voice” that truly reflects your company brand – and use it consistently across all channels.
• Choose the 2-3 social media channels where your target market “lives” – and actively participate on those.
• Focus like crazy on a carefully-chosen, well-understood target market – and solve a clearly-defined set of problems.

And since focus was a focus of mine last week, I also wrote a blog post about how to go about recognizing where your business is unfocused and how to get things back in-line and targeted. You can read it and comment here: The Power of Only A Few. I’d love to hear your thoughts!