Let’s Talk Business MARKETING MEANS BUSINESS - Solutions for Small Business
Issue 03 April 2013
There is an increasing risk that the global economic slowdown will intensify the upward trend in insolvencies.
Small Business Bankruptcy to Hit Record Levels Australia’s small businesses are feeling the summer heat, with insolvencies at record levels according to one financial consultant. Greg Charlwood, Asia-Pacific Chief Executive of cashflow finance provider Bibby Financial Services, says businesses are taking longer to pay their bills, pushing up bankruptcy rates. Dunn & Bradstreet’s quarterly trade payments analysis, released earlier last month, shows businesses averaged 56.5 days to settle accounts in the December quarter, making invoice payments the slowest they have been since 2001. Big business is often the worst offender, taking more than 60 days to pay bills. “Deteriorating payment terms puts the cashflow under greater strain for smaller businesses – they still have to pay their staff on time, and with the economy slowing and retail spending drying up, cash flow pressures for many are at breaking point,” Charlwood says. Small business has been under other pressures for the past 18 months, with the global credit crisis
prompting local banks to reduce credit availability from early last year, he adds. “The combination of a longer wait for payment, less availability of credit, and a slowing economy puts cashflow under enormous pressure. We predict it will lead to record levels of insolvency among small businesses this year,” he says. Reports that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is expecting Australia’s economic growth will slide to almost zero this year add to the gloomy outlook for small business, which is the largest single employer group in Australia responsible for 3.6 million jobs. According to Dun and Bradstreet in their latest Business Failures and Start -ups Analysis (full report at bottom of post), the number of small businesses that went bankrupt over the last 12 months has jumped by 48%, although the December quarter of last year did improve slightly from the September quarter. However, the main trend in the last 3 years has been a 30% growth in business failures, more from Dun & Bradstreet CEO, Christine Christian: “One of the most startling findings within the report is that during the
Despite recent rate cuts, there is a palpable lack of confidence in the current operating environment. This is obviously one of the side effects of long standing global uncertainty and can often be enough to deter businesses from entering the market, irrespective of actual conditions. Outside the mining sector, sentiment is generally still poor and the strong Australian dollar is straining profits. This could lead to an increase in business failures in
December quarter, Start-ups during the December quarter in the manufacturing, service and finance sectors fell by nearly 100 per cent.” Between January and November 2012, 9,178 companies went into insolvency administration - up 22 per cent over the average of the previous year and 10 per cent compared with the year before, Australian Securities and Investment Commission data reveals. Most were small businesses feeling the pinch as consumers reined in spending and the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) started to call in breaks handed out in the global financial crisis, Dissolve company liquidator Cliff Sanderson said. "The driver of a lot of the small liquidations is the Australian Taxation Office and I think this is going to continue in 2012," Mr Sanderson, the report's author, explained.
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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Marketing - is there a Better Way? Tips To Help You Build Your Business - from Dennis Chiron Attracting Your Competitors' Clients
Great Customer Service Helps in Tough Times
Looking for new customers? It pays to consider who's already using your competitors' services or products. If you're wondering why those customers should do business with you, well, that's exactly the question you'll have to answer if you expect them to make a change and come over to you. So before you attempt to entice a customer away from a competitor, you must ask yourself these questions:
Little things make a big difference when it comes to hanging on to customers.
What can I offer that's different from my competitor? How can I bring more to my customer's business? How can my product or service add more value to the potential customer's business?
Once you've answered all these questions, there's one thing left to ponder: What is the competition doing that you can do better, and what isn't the competition doing that you can offer the customer? Suppose your prospective customer has been buying from Ace Widgets for a long time. It's likely Ace is taking that business for granted or even becoming complacent about the service they provide. That's a perfect opportunity for you to offer your new prospect a "teaser," such as a week-long free trial (or 30 days, or a discounted price, or whatever makes sense for your business) so he or she can see that the kind of value you offer makes your company much better than the competition. Then you can say, "If we don't prove ourselves, stay with your present vendor. I promise you, once you try our product, you'll understand why changing suppliers is good for your business."
In these unsettling times, great customer service can mean the difference between making a profit or barely keeping the lights on. Big companies spend big dollars to maintain customer loyalty, but smaller companies often focus on the transactions and forget to build the relationship. Although business owners and their staff are focused on serving your customers, there are really many things that you might consider improving. For example, many businesses don’t think of cross-selling to their customers or thanking them for their business or asking for referrals." Cross-selling literally means adding value to the sale by selling an additional and/or complimentary product.. And, how long does it take you to thank a customer for giving you their business? And if you don’t ask a satisfied customer for referrals, you are missing out on one of the greatest business builders of all time.
Dennis Chiron MarketingMeans Business 0451 184 599 dennis@marketingmeansbus iness.net.au Skype: dennis.chiron2
you with the energy you need to keep going and the will to take whatever action is necessary. What does enthusiasm have to do with sales? Everything. It is the outward manifestation of our inner passion. Enthusiasm often carries us far beyond any skill or talent we may have. Take two people who are vying for a job. One has enthusiasm and energy, but not much experience. The other one has experience and is-at least on paper-smarter, but lacks energy. Who would I hire? The person who demonstrates enthusiasm. There are many experienced salespeople. Give me someone with passion or drive; they'll go much further than anybody else.
Injecting Your Sales Efforts With Passion and Drive Enthusiasm. What is it, and how do we get it? It comes from the Greek word "enthios," which means "the god within." Isn't that an apt description? Think back to the times you've been enthusiastic about something.
TIP OF THE WEEK The golden rule for every business man is this: “Put yourself in your customer’s place.” Orison Swett Marden
Think of how enthusiasm has provided
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Glow-in-the-Dark Japanese Sushi a Big Hit TOKYO, Japan. The contamination of food from radiation leaked by Japan’s failing nuclear reactors has a surprising bright spot: sales of glow-in-the dark sushi are skyrocketing. “Call it food or call it a fad,” said Tanaki Toro, a famed Sushi chef in Tokyo, “but I call it spectacular. “You eat the sushi and then go clubbing, and you glow in the dark too. It’s so much fun!” One young clubber, who said her nickname was Hiroshima Hana, said she now attracts much more attention from young men. “They all want to dance with me.” Local Man Receives Computer-Generated Birthday Wishes A local man was pleased to receive computer-generated birthday greetings for his birthday yesterday from various websites, some of which he has visited in the past, and others he is sure he has never visited. "I didn't get any birthday greetings from real people," he said, "so it cheered me up to receive computer-generated ones." "I don't know how the computers know my birthday," he said. "That's a complete mystery. But it is nice that they know and that they remembered. Toyota's Problems Caused by Trying to Copy Ford Japanese automaker, Toyota, has filed a lawsuit against the
Ford Motor Company for inducing it to increase the acceleration of its vehicles, leading to a massive recalls of its automobiles. Toyota spokesperson, Homuchi Yumaki, said that Ford had maliciously planned for years to cause their company damage because of an overachieving accelerator pedal.
pedestrians.” Like all great put-downs, Mr Keating’s latest leaves the target unsure how to respond. However, a spokesperson for the Bike Riders Association of NSW said the Keating wouldn’t know: “He has never stepped out of his BMW to try and ride a bike” EASY PICKIN’S
Yumaki said, "We believe that Ford let us purposely let us steal ....er ... discover such a great accelerator, knowing full well the potential for our cars to lose control." Solar Industry Calls for More Sustainable Handouts With the government’s quota for renewable energy production filled, the solar panel industry is warning of a collapse in demand for new installations. This could make solar panel production the least sustainable industry in Australia. West Coast Solar’s Jay Funnell told The Sydney Morning Herald that ‘‘If the industry cannot effectively promote and sell their products at a reasonable price, the industry will be decimated”—which shows the kind of insight into market forces that kept shrewder business people away from solar panels in the first place. Keating: The Worst Kind of Pedestrian is the One Who Rides a Bike Former Prime Minister Paul Keating has described leisure bike-riders as “sandalwearing, muesli-chewing, bike-riding
Woman in Ningi Qld. recently had new security screens fitted on all her windows by a local firm. When completed, the screen fitter took the lady on a tour of the house, and she meticulously locked all the screens in place. The screen fitter came back early the next morning for a final check, to find the lady had gone to bed and had left the front door wide open all night. Now it’s Starbucks Store Inside Starbucks Store LONDON As if things weren't getting bad enough already with a Starbucks store every 100 yards on every High Street in Britain, the non-tax paying coffee pedlars are now planning more stores within stores. "The new stores will have Starbucks Extra stores within the Starbucks store. Of course none of these establishments will pay any UK corporation taxation but that's neither here nor there," CEO Johnsons Milkpaddle, said. The new Starbucks stores will create more poorly paid low wage jobs in the UK to sell the overpriced syrup drinks.
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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Geoff Butler FAIM AP, MAITD MACE Principal/Business Improvement & Implementation Specialist Business Optimizers Mobile: 0414 943072 Fax: 3036 6131 Email: geoff@businessoptimizers.com.au Skype: business.optimizers1
Why Do Businesses Fail? Many attempts have been made to define what makes businesses successful, and unfortunately no one has found the secret formula to guarantee success. Certainly there are some common traits amongst high performing businesses such as passion, vision, unique marketing position. However, the jury is still out about what exactly will ensure market domination and long term success. Luckily there has also been a lot of research done on why businesses fail, and here there does seem to be a far more quantifiable theme. International research indicates that approximately 60% of all new businesses will disappear within the first three years, and 90% in the first ten. They don’t all went broke as many business owners will have simply have given up and gone back to working for someone else. Others will have been taken over by their competitors or moved into other markets, but the cold, hard statistics are still sobering for anyone considering venturing into the world of business ownership. The same research found that 90% of business failure can be attributed to faulty management – more particularly, poor financial management. If we can avoid these seven deadly sins, we may not entirely avoid the risk of failure, but at least we can maximize our chances of success.
Failure to plan properly before start up. Known as errors of omission it involves getting your structure right, having access to adequate capital, knowing your market, and determining your human and physical resource requirements. All of the things that a good Business Plan will tell you. The good thing about not planning however is that failure comes as a complete surprise, and isn’t preceded by a period of worry and depression. Failure to monitor financial position. Developing a profit plan and cash flow budget, then monitoring performance to determine variance is critical. Looking at the right ratios and benchmarking to determine stability and efficiency against industry figures and your own targets. Remember if you’re not doing so well and the rest of your industry is, chances are it’s your fault. Failure to understand the relationship between price, volume and costs. Understanding how each of your expense categories vary with sales so you can accurately determine your breakeven sales point. As a general rule discounting is bad! Failure to manage cash flow. The old accounting adage says that profit is a matter of opinion, but cash is fact. If you can’t manage your cash flow to maintain liquidity, it doesn’t matter how profitable you are, you will be shut down.
Failure to manage growth. Growth is good provided it is managed. Most businesses that go broke are highly profitable. They simply grow too fast and run out of cash to fund the uncontrolled expansion. Failure to borrow properly. Even bankers will agree that the worst product they sell is an overdraft, yet many business owners put their cash reserves at risk by using overdrafts to make major capital purchases. The golden rule of borrowing is to match the term of the loan with the life of the asset. Failure to plan for transition. In the end there are usually only three ways to get out of your business when you’re done with it. Sell it, shut it down or give it away (usually to your kids). With the emerging demographic bubble most owners seeing their business as a major component of their retirement income, planning your exit strategy early will become crucial. Potential investors will target well managed, systemized businesses that do not rely on the current owner for their continued success. There is no magic formula for success and avoiding the above will not necessarily guarantee you achieve it, but it at least gives you the best chance of realising your personal and business goals in the ever-changing world of business.
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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Faith it Till You Make It
Peter Athey Specialized Management Services 0405 318 449 www.specializedmanagement.com.au peter@specializedmanagement.com.au
Faith it Till You Make It in 2013 Published on January 10, 2013 by Steve Sisgold in “Life in a Body” Many years ago I heard the phrase "Fake it till you make it" and was always intrigued by it. It's the kind of phrase that can be interpreted and analyzed in many ways.
Faith It Till You Make It!
Although I get the power of speaking as if you already have what you want in your life I, like many others, have had problems with the word fake, which is defined as an imposter or sham.
Faith it till you make it. I have tried both ‘fake it till you make it’ and ‘faith it till you make it‘ and I can’t impress upon you enough that the latter gets you by far the best results. The difference is almost magical. Why, when we decide on something, does it materialise, and sometimes all we have done is talked about it? Other times of course, it can seem a neverending battle barely worth the effort but we still get there in the end. The blunt facts are that business people don’t have every skill necessary to do everything that needs to be done every time. So how do we bridge the gap? You already know! Faith means “confidence or trust in a person or thing” in this case, the thing is “you”. It is also defined as a belief that is not based on proof or factual evidence. You already have an invaluable ability that is indispensable in business. You have that ability to bridge the gap between what you have and what you need. These are the questions I ask of myself when I need to resort to my ‘faith it till you make it’ mode. 1. What is the pay-off? Is the return
on investment going to be greater than the energy and focus and monetary investment required? 2. Has anyone else ever done it? 3. Am I passionate or committed enough to follow through and circumvent any obstacles? 4. Are there any barriers to entry?
insurmountable
There is no evidence or proof that you will succeed but somehow, you do. It has likely happened to you before and you should draw on that experience to help you have faith in you. It’s not magic! In business, if we did not have faith in our own abilities, we would never try anything beyond our comfort zone. So, if you get good answers when you question yourself, give it your best, use the faith you have in your own ability to fuel the fire. You can’t fake that! Send Hate Mail to: peter@specializedmanagement.com.au M: 0405 318 449
I know the person who said it had the intention to motivate people to act as if they already had achieved the goals they desire, as a method to enroll others to believe in them or their service, but nowadays, with all of the deceit and exposes in the daily news, any form of "spin" doesn't feel good. Faith is defined as having confidence or trust in something or someone. When you "faith it till you make it", then you don't need to be an imposter. You instead have faith in who you are, and what you offer, and that energy exudes and broadcasts so clearly that you magnetize what you want naturally. Take a few moments to focus on something you want to create in your life. First, are you telling others or is it just an inner desire? Next, do you talk about it in a positive assured manner or a defeated or negative way? How much faith do you have in creating your desires? If you're not faith-ing it till you make it, what action can you take or support do you need to get your confidence and belief quotient up?
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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Dan Buzer Profit Mechanics 0414 567 188 www.profitmechanics.net/ dan@profitmechanics.net
“ … Why Would You Take Your Car For A Regular Tune-up & Service, But Not Your Business? …” If you don’t tune-up your car and get it regularly serviced, it will lose performance, become dangerous to operate or even stop working altogether, right? So why don’t people take their businesses for tune-ups? Here are the top 3 reasons we regularly see… 1. They don’t know their business is performing badly or even that it’s actually broken. 2. If they do know there’s something wrong, they try to ‘save money’ and fix it themselves. 3. They don’t know who to take their business to for a check-up or even worse, they go to someone they think knows what to do but they actually don’t! One of the biggest lessons to learn about business is the science of how to see exactly how it is performing. Not just the big picture, but all the smaller operations that contribute to the total results. Successful business operators are good at identifying and measuring exactly what should be happening and what is or is not happening in a business. The challenge with most businesses is the indicators aren’t easy to see.
Have you ever stumbled across a business owner that just seems to have the Midas touch when it comes to business success? What is it that these rare, relaxed and often life balanced people know that many other business owners seem to be missing? Do they use a business consultant or business coach? The answer is … they have a process that gets the results that we all intended on getting when we started our business. Building a profitable business is a skill that can be applied to any product or service, once you understand the process that leads to making more profit. When someone shares with you what steps to take you’re on your way to getting better results. A good business consultant or business coach will ask for information to work out how much profit your business is making because this is the outcome of all the business activities. With training, understanding and some tools (often as simple as a spreadsheet), you can start tweaking functions of your business and clearly see the results on your bottom line and most importantly, in your bank account! The amount of profit in your business is directly linked to you taking the right steps in the right direction. But what are the right steps? What is the
‘right’ direction? Some businesses just go around in circles! Without a clear road map it’s easy to get caught up and not realise what you’re doing. WHAT ARE MECHANICS BUSINESS?
THE OF
PROFIT YOUR
There are 3 components of business that form the base to its profitability. Understanding how to generate quality income, manage databases and have systems in place to consistently attract the best customers for the business. Successful business operators monitor and nurture the drivers of these areas constantly. Some activities are neglected or considered ‘not as important’ as other activities and this often has a compounding effect on the profitability of the business. The key is to learn how to measure and identify how each area is performing and to have the results fed back to the manager with facts, not opinions. Learn the mantra … “What you measure we manage and what you manage improves”. If you would like to experience a complimentary review of your business that takes less than an hour, call Profit Mechanics on 1800 838 767 and we’ll rush an easy to understand Business Diagnostic Tool to you! Dan Buzer
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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Ron Court AMC Dip (Funerals) MQJA JP (Qual) OH&S Advisor 0419679619 roncourt@aapt.net.au
edges or are they rounded edges? Headsets Do you use headsets instead of holding your phone between head and shoulders?
WORKPLACE HEALTH & SAFETY Making Your Workplace Safer We all have a place where we conduct our work from, be it in our own office or at a work place.
Consultation is the first step in developing your risk controls. Talking to your workers about safety is a legal requirement. But it is also smart management.
Workstation Is your screen at a comfortable reading distance? The screen is place at about an arm’s length from the operator.
There are many common solutions for controlling hazards and risks in the workplace, which can be readily implemented. But it is not enough to simply eliminate the obvious risks – by law employers are responsible for controlling all potential safety hazards in their workplace. Where solutions are not obvious, employers should use a process to help them determine the most effective control measures.
We all know how frustrating it can be when we sit down and find that our work station is uncomfortable and after a while our neck or shoulders start to ache, did you know that there is a way of setting up your work station to reduce these problems.
Are they lightweight and comfortable with volume controls?
Does your chair run freely?
The screen should be directly in front of you.
placed
The top of screen should be at or just below your eye level
Can you get close without obstruction to your workstation? (Leg room).
Can you adjust the height of your chair so your thighs should be parallel to the floor with feet resting on the floor?
Are the characters in the display readable, clear and image stable?
Can the position and contrast of the screen be by user if required?
Is your back rest angle right for you?
Are you affected by glare on the screen? (use an anti-glare screen)
Are your forearms parallel with the floor or slightly angled downward?
Is your keyboard in a comfortable working position?
Desk and Chairs: Can you easily adjust your chair from seated position and have five star base?
Do you’ve a document holder to prevent continuous turning of your neck?
Is your desk area cluttered?
Does your work station have sharp
Your workers can make a significant contribution to improving workplace health and safety. Regular, proactive consultation can help identify issues in the workplace and build a strong commitment to health and safety.
You can get information about your OH&S obligations and other valuable OH&S resources both in hard copy and online from their websites. http://www.deir.qld.gov.au Always seek independent legal advice on what is applicable to your situation. Ron Court OH&S Advisor 0419679619
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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Paul GILLMORE DFS
your file.
Founder and Director
How do you stop this? By simply being aware that this occurs and never applying for any credit contract unless you are sure that you wish to proceed.
Southern Cross Financial Services 07 5429 5561 0402 685 032 paul@sc-fs.com.au
The Secret Life of your Credit History CRA, CRAA, Credit File, Veda File etc are all the same. They are a record of your credit history. There are similar files for bad tenants and some professions which are designed to identify and foil people who repeatedly do the wrong thing. Initially it worked as a good thing to hold people accountable but it has steadily metamorphosed to being like a big stick that financiers can use as duress in unfair situations. For example, many of know of someone who has had a telco register a negative entry on their credit history unnecessarily and the heartache it causes. The net effect is that a creditor can demand that you pay a bill otherwise they will register an entry that will be on your credit file for the next five years. Further, only they can request its removal. This can be extremely unfair especially when it comes to a mistake or ‘bill shock’ for costs that you were not aware of such as overseas roaming or hidden costs in your contract. Credit history files are essentially negative in nature meaning that if you apply for a loan, an entry is made – it doesn’t register whether you decided to take the credit or not, were knocked back or whether you were just researching and comparing online.
The perspective of a credit assessor in a loan processing centre is : If you took the loan or contract, it is subtracted from your total ability to repay; OR if you didn’t take the loan then there is something wrong ! TIP: EVERYTIME you apply for ANY kind of credit contract, an entry is AUTOMATICALLY placed on your credit file BEFORE they even begin to process the loan ! This applies to mobile phones, land lines, store cards like Coles Woolies, Myer or David Jones cards, buy now with ‘X’ number of days interest free loans, pay day loans, short term loans, credit cards, personal loans, home loans EVERYTHING ! So, for example, you could be researching a better credit card deal online and to get an answer you may be required to enter your details and click on “Submit” or “Apply”. When you do, BINGO, a credit entry is automatically placed on your file. Do this with half a dozen cards and you have half a dozen entries which the credit assessor will view negatively. It can apply to home loans too. You might search on line, you might walk into several branches or you might have an inexperienced mortgage broker put you up to several lenders and again, you have several entries on
If you are being pushed to apply or submit just to get an answer then an alarm should be screaming in your ears! If you cannot gain enough information to make a fully informed decision before you apply for the credit contract then there is something wrong and please back off. Your mortgage broker or bank should be able to tell you if you fit the lenders criteria before you commit. If she can’t tell you then she doesn’t know enough and you should find a better bank or broker. Your credit history is extremely important to you and you should manage it well so as not to disadvantage yourself in the future. After all, you usually only find out that there is a problem AFTER you decide to buy your home, car or apply for any credit contract. I recommend that you obtain a copy of your credit file and check to ensure that it is in order. If not, you can approach companies who placed entries and negotiate a resolution BEFORE you want to buy your next home or car. It’s cheap and it can save you a world of pain and embarrassment. Southern Cross can help you or you can do it yourself but do yourself a favour and uncover the Secret Life of your Credit History File.
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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Marketing Tips to Grow Your Business Word-of-Mouth Marketing What if there were a way to build your business, year in and year out, regardless of fluctuations in the economy or the activities of your competition? Well, there is. It's called word-ofmouth. Word-of-mouth marketing truly is the world's best-known marketing secret. You're probably wondering how anything can be both the "best-known" and "a secret" at the same time. Easy. Practically every business person knows how important word-ofmouth marketing is. Yet many people don’t truly understand how to build their business through word -of-mouth. Some people think that word-ofmouth is a little like the weather: fairly important, but not much they can do about it. Many others think that it's just about good customer service, but it's not. Don't get me wrong--good customer service is critical for the success of any business, but if you expect happy customers to talk about you a lot-think again. For the past two decades, I've talked to thousands of business owners about word-of-mouth marketing and customer service. I've described how the "average unhappy client" can talk to dozens of people about their bad experience. I've then asked them if their "average happy client" truly talks to as many people as a potential unhappy client. In two decades, no one has ever said yes to that question!
Communication is an exchange – a simple but vital concept. Sometime we approach interchanges without considering how the other party will react. Cultivating an awareness of how another person is likely to react to your communication is key to effective communication. With NLP, a good salesperson matches the customer’s posture, body language, and mood.
Unfortunately, people are more likely to talk about your business when they are unhappy than when they are happy or satisfied. Therefore, good customer service generally reduces "negative" word -of-mouth. However, the good news is, there are many things entrepreneurs and business professionals can do to positively impact their business through word-of-mouth. Sharpen Your Communication Skills The best communication happens when each person understands the others' perceptions and biases. An effective way to get inside another person's head is through the use of NLP – Neuro-Linguistic Programming. NLP, in essence, means that you gain the ability to relate to a person, through empathy and mutual understanding, and communicate at their level. …. In other words, you “Connect” with them. By “connecting” with another person, you have the key to any successful relationship; and the key to developing any successful relationship is Communication.
The technique works because relating to another person at their level helps to develop a strong relationship, and establish trust and rapport. Five Rules for Online Retailing To really make e-tailing a source of profit and growing market share, businesses need to think through every step of the equation, from what they should sell to how they can maintain customer relationships. To learn what it takes to be a successful e-tailer, follow these five rules that have been proven to be effective: 1. You don't have to put the whole store online. 2. Turn your inventory as quickly as possible. 3. Customers like to see what they're buying.
4. Keep
shipping costs to a minimum, and don't overcharge your customers with excessive delivery costs.
5. Use the Internet to get to know your customers and their demographics better than ever before.
Cheers! Dennis Chiron
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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Why You Need a MOBILE Website
ACMA media release 5/2013 – 1 February Smartphones use doubles in 2012
Smartphone ownership is Australia is soaring and mobile traffic is exploding at the seams. Mobile traffic makes up at least 20 per cent of web traffic, and that number is expected to rise. You probably already have a website, but is it mobile friendly? In today’s business market having a mobile-friendly website is not extravagance; it’s a necessity in order to be competitive and relevant. Most new business website developments include a mobile friendly design (called responsive design) instead of it being an add-on after thought. This gives you the edge in the marketplace by making your website easily available to the masses that now browse the internet on their iPhones and iPads. A mobile-friendly website is a website that is compatible with any device, be it smartphone, laptop, netbook or computer, at any screen resolution. Unlike print media the view port dimensions of your website change with each of these devices. If it can't fit in it creates scroll bars (which people hate) and sizes itself down so that the text can't be read then users have to use finger gestures to enlarge the print. Most will walk away at that stage, looking for a site that is more userfriendly. Chances are, your website can be pulled up on a smartphone, but it probably won’t look very good. In fact, if you have anything fancy such as Flash, it won’t work. Since people are using their smartphones over their laptops in many cases, you can’t rely on a traditional website to represent your business.
Almost half of Australia’s adult population now own a smartphone. Take-up soared by 104 per cent to 8.67 million units over the 12 months to May 2012, according to research released today by the Australian Communications and Media Authority.
Miriam Battersby, dip MultiMedia, International Webmaster Certification. MIMBEE MULTIMEDIA (est 2002)
Smartphones and tablets: Take-up and use in Australia also found that 9.2 million Australians went online via their mobile phone and 4.4 million accessed the internet using a tablet in the six months to May 2012. The number of mobile internet subscribers increased by 22 per cent to 22.1 million subscribers at June 2012.
Online Business Website Consultants
Compared to other mobile phone users, smartphone users were:
Woorim , Bribie island ph 34101071
nine times more likely to go online via their handsets
four times more likely to purchase goods online
three times more likely to stream or download audio or video content
three times more likely to pay bills online
twice as likely to access social networking sites.
admin@on-line-biz.com
If your website doesn’t work on a smartphone, all it takes is five seconds for your potential customer to move ahead to a competitor that has a mobilefriendly site. There are some other factors to take into consideration as well. For example, users want a simplified experience when searching for on-the-go information. Gone are the days when people sit in front of their computers, carefully peeling back the layers of a multi-faceted website. Users want information fast, with quick loading times and simple interfaces. This is why they turn to their smartphones for information, and why you must have a solid mobile site.
This is driving broader innovations and emerging services, such as mobile payments—for example the report finds that ‘Digital wallet’ products are an increasingly popular method to pay for goods and services on the go. The report notes that continued rollout of mobile network upgrades, growth in 4G coverage and the increased use of WiFi hotspots are key drivers for the increase in smartphone ownership. In the June 2012 quarter, over two million Australians used a WiFi hotspot, 32 per cent up on the previous year.
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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KEEP IT LOCAL Business Working Together BRIBIE BETTER BUSINESS INC. “Aspiring to achieve a Combined, Progressive and Dynamic Culture for all Local Businesses� Proudly supporting our Members and other Local Businesses
Marketing Means Business 0451 184 599 Email: dennis@marketingmeansbusiness.net.au Web: www.marketingmeansbusiness.net.au
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