Last week, I noticed that water was dripping from the ceiling of my lounge room.

Of course, I panicked. My husband was at work, and wouldn’t be home for hours. I couldn’t put the aircon back on, so was stuck in a hot house with my 11 month old son. As I wasn’t 100% sure that it was the aircon causing the leak, I didn’t know who to phone – a roofer or an aircon technician. So instead I phoned my local pest control man (obviously!) who over the years has become a personal friend, and asked him to stick his head into my roof to see what the problem was. Turns out, it was the aircon. He managed to do a band-aid fix on it, so I could at least get some relief from the heat, until we could get a professional out to fix the problem.

Long story short, we had an airconditioning specialist come out this week, and after about an hour of crawling around in my very hot roof, lots of banging, cursing, and thudding, and close to $200 later, the problem was fixed. When I asked the man what had happened up there, he said it was like a domino effect.

One small, very easily avoidable thing, had started a chain reaction that ended with almost catastrophic results. A small problem that would have been detected immediately through regular maintenance caused some of the straps supporting the ceiling unit to fail, which in turn dropped the ceiling unit on an angle, and subsequently the drain tray onto a roof support beam. This in turn knocked the drain pipe away from the drain tray, which in turn caused the drain tray to fill up the emergency tray, which then overflowed into my roof! This caused damage to a load-bearing beam inside my wall, the internal structure of my walls, not to mention the massive water stains and bubbling on my ceiling and lounge room walls, and the subsequent staining of my carpet from said dripping water! So now, as we wait for an insurance assessor to determine the full extent of the damage, I have been beating myself up because this “domino effect” could have been so easily avoided, if I’d just booked an annual aircon service.

The same kind of domino effect could just as easily happen in your business. Quite often, we overlook what we perceive as unnecessary, or unimportant steps, procedures or proecesses, which can result in catastrophic outcomes for our business. Sometimes it pays to have an outside professional come in and assess your business, and help you to create and implement steps that will ensure your business runs smoothly, without any awful surprises.

As an example, do you have Terms and Conditions of Trade documents in place for your business, in the event that you have to chase bad debtors? Many businesses do the work for their clients, and invoice afterwards, which may help to you to attract and retain clients, but what happens when a customer suddenly doesn’t pay? If your customer had signed a Terms & Conditions of Trade document, you would be in a much stronger position to recover money owing to you, than if you didn’t have any formalised documentation. In this situation, the domino effect could very easily bring down your business. Let me show you would could happen if you dodn’t get your clients to sign any formal terms of trade documentation:

You provide product / service to your client –> late paying or non-paying clients –> hours and hours spent chasing payment –> restricted cash flow due to late or non payment –> unable to pay your suppliers –> suppliers refusing to supply your business due to non-payment –> customers go elsewhere because you can’t supply –> income diminishes –> business closes!

Yet something so catastrophic could have been easily avoided, if you had just taken one simple step when setting up your business, and had a professional draft up some Terms of Trade documentation for you. A small outlay at the beginning could have saved your business.

This is only one example, and whilst this is obviously a worst-case scenario, my air conditioner certainly did get me thinking about how, if I’d just done something so simple, I could have avoided so much inconvenience and cost. So I’ve already booked my annual service for next summer!

Has anything similar ever happened to you in your business? Have you looked back, after a particularly bad experience, and thought to yourself “if only I’d done xyz, I wouldn’t be in this situation now”? Share your stories with us, so that other business owners can learn from your lessons.

If you’d like to arrange for a professional to take a look at your business, let me know, because I would be happy to introduce you to people who could potentially save you a lot of heartache down the track. You invest so much time and money into your business, don’t you think it’s worth protecting?

Till next time,

Lia…

Up until now (today in fact), my website was hand made by me, using Photoshop. It took days and days of designing, slicing, uploading, testing, more slicing, more uploading and restesting, until it was finally right. It looked good, but it was tedious to do any updates on, so I avoided doing them all together. Then all of my Photoshop files got corrupted, so I couldn’t update my site even if I wanted to, at least not without recreating everything.

So this weekend I took the plunge, and got fully immersed in WordPress. And I have to say, it’s really not as scary as I thought it was going to be. In fact, I love it!

And so I’ve recreated my website in WordPress. I can easily update it, add to it, take things away, or change the whole look, within seconds. And now that I’ve started this new learning journey, I’m really excited to keep learning more. Because like any business, to grow, you have to keep learning.

When I first started out, I offered newsletter design & distribution services. And all people wanted were paper newsletters, printed and mailed out. Now, it’s uncommon to get requests for this kind of thing. Instead it’s all about electronic newsletters, email distribution, database management. And I had to decide to either stop offering the service, or update my skills to be able to accommodate this need. I chose to learn.

At least once a year, it’s important to take a good, long look at your business. Refer back to your business plan, and ask yourself some questions. Are you where you want to be? If not, why not? Is your offering still meeting your client’s needs? Are there steps you could take to improve? Do you need to move out of your comfort zone, and learn something new, to meet the demands of your target market?

We know that the fastest way to ruin a business is to stand still, so don’t take your clients for granted, because if you don’t move with the times to offer them what they want, they’ll find someone else who does. Never stop learning. Your clients will thank you for it.

Till next time,

Lia…

Most people hate it, especially when it’s directed to them just as they are about to sit down to dinner! It can be very intrusive if it’s not done properly.

Some people, very few mind you, love it! It’s an opportunity to speak to people, to make a connection, and to help someone fill a need that they potentially didn’t even know they had! And those that love it are generally very good at it.

Next to word of mouth, ‘Business 2 Business’ (B2B) telemarketing is possibly the cheapest and most effective way to achieve many of your business goals. If it’s done well, telemarketing can assist you, amongst other things, to:
- Generate leads
- Convert enquiries into sales
- Build and clean databases
- Follow up advertising campaigns

But another emotion that the word “telemarketing” can elicit is one of FEAR!! A business owner can generally recognise the value of telemarketing, but when the time comes to actually pick up the phone and DO it, we get scared. Scared of rejection. Scared of the idea that someone we call might not like us, or want to speak to us. It’s an interesting quirk of nature that, as human beings, we crave acceptance, and as such we fear rejection from people that we don’t know, and will probably never speak to again. But that’s precisely why most people don’t like telemarketing; because we’re scared of rejection!

One of the services that eSpire Solutions specialise in is B2B Telemarketing. Our professional team of telemarketers can take this daunting task off your hands, so you don’t have to be scared any more. Just a few of the things we can help you with are:
- Database cleansing
- Script development
- Appointment setting
- Lead generation
- Campaign follow up
- Advertising sales

We have a highly trained, professional and dedicated team, and WE GET RESULTS!

If you would like to find out more about our telemarketing services, or any of the services that eSpire Solutions can provide, don’t hesitate to give us a call.

Till next time,

Lia…

The beginning of the new financial year is a good time to put on paper some new year’s resolutions for your business. The last few days have probably been spent frantically getting all of your end of year affairs in order, sorting our receipts, paying bills, updating your accounting software etc, but now you can take a breath, and start thinking about the next 12 months.

- Has your business performed the way you had hoped it would?
- Did you reach your financial goals for FY08?
- What were your biggest business challenges?

Take some time to sit down and contemplate your business, make some notes on what you have achieved, what goals you may have missed, what things you need to change to achieve your goals this financial year, and what you could have done differently.

Analyse how your time has been spent. Have you been making the best use of your time? Do you put a value on your time, so you can see how much it is costing you to work in your business? If you don’t, you should!

Once you’ve looked at where your time has been spent, work out what things you could have outsourced, so that you could better spend your own valuable time in other areas of your business. For example, how much time have you spent going through your receipts and entering them into your accounting software package? If you apply your own hourly rate to this time, you’ll see it was probably a very expensive exercise. Could you have saved some money if you’d used a bookkeeper instead? The answer is probably “YES”.

And how much time have you spent on things like:
- Database management
- Data entry
- Internet research
- Email marketing

Again, if you had outsourced these kinds of tasks, not only would it be more cost effective to your business, but you would have more of your own time to spend in other areas of your business that you can’t outsource. Like maintaining a relationship with your existing customer base!

Once you’ve worked out the areas that you could outsource to better utilise your time, give eSpire Solutions a call, and we’ll tell you how we can partner with you to take those tasks off your to-do list.

Happy New Year!

Till next time,

Lia…

And so I have begun the process of re-inventing myself.

I’m currently getting new business cards done, and I’m creating a new website too. Both of these will complement one another, as well as fit in with my existing letterhead, invoice and fax templates, and email signatures. It’s important to create a presence that you are proud of, and that reflects how you want to be perceived. Many times, I have heard people advise new business operators to just get a business card or a website that is cheap, to get them started, and in the early days of starting a business, cheap is often the only solution. But be mindful of the message you are sending when you do this. Are you sending a message that you are a serious business person? That you focus on attention to detail? That you offer high quality products and services? Or are you silently communicating that you will take the “this will do for now” approach?

eSpire Solutions can help small businesses to establish their marketing materials and style guides to ensure that all marketing collateral they produce is working for them, and presenting a consistent, high quality message. Our team can also create logos, business cards, stationery and websites for you. Don’t underestimate the power of good quality collateral – it’s representing you, and reflects how you want to be perceived.

Is it time for your own re-invention? If so, then get in touch with us to talk about how we can help you.

Till next time,

Lia…

What a fantastic day! It was really interesting to see people walking into this workshop with quite negative feelings about telemarketing, and walking out 3 hours later eager to pick up the phone and canvas for new clients.

It was also really interesting to see different perspectives that people have with regards to telemarketing, as there are a lot of stereotypical attitudes towards it. Don’t get me wrong, I hate the 7pm cold calls right during dinner just as much as the next person, and find them a real invasion of my privacy and life, however B2B telemarketing is a little different. It is a very strong, powerful and legitimate business tool, which, if done correctly, can result in vastly increased sales / clients. And it doesn’t cost the earth! After Word of Mouth, telemarketing is probably the cheapest way of getting your message out there. And you get an immediate, measurable response. Sounds great, doesn’t it? So why do so many people hate it so much?

Personally, I quite like telemarketing. Like everything else, there are good days and bad days, but I love to have a chat, so being on the phone talking to people doesn’t phase me too much. And because I’m telemarketing on behalf of other clients, I don’t take it personally when I get rejections, as it’s not my heart & soul that’s gone into the product or service I’m trying to sell, it’s someone else’s, so I can maintain a professional distance and attitude.

It is a very intimidating thing for some people to do though. You are putting yourself out there to total strangers, allowing them to judge your products or services, and exposing yourself to rejection, which many people take personally. As human beings, we crave acceptance – it’s natural. So setting yourself up for rejection is not something that many people like doing. It affects our self esteem, and our self worth. Which is why we find it so hard to keep picking up that phone after multiple rejections.

Telemarketing isn’t for everyone. It takes a certain kind of person to be a successful telemarketer; someone with bucket loads of personality and a good sense of humour, as well as the ability to not take the rejections personally. After all, why should I care what a total stranger thinks of me. It’s not like I’m going to be dealing with them again. So I’ll end the call with a smile, a thank you, and move on to the next one.

If you can see how your business could benefit from telemarketing, but you just don’t have the drive or the time to pick up the phone and make that first call to a potential client, pick up the phone instead and call ME instead!

Till next time,

Lia…

One thing that has come out of it though, is that I’ve found a couple of unpaid accounts which have slipped through the cracks. They are only fairly recently overdue, so obviously I’ve followed them up, but this is probably the worst, and most frustrating thing, about running your own business. Chasing debtors…

A few years ago, we made the fatal mistake of mixing business with pleasure, and we took on a friend as a client. We had a good working relationship for about 2 years, but then things started to go sour when our bills were ignored, and always put to the bottom of the pile, on the assumption that because we were friends, we could wait, and we’d understand. Well, 12 month of chasing, and qute a few thousand dollars later, we certainly didn’t understand, and we’re certainly no longer friends! I’m happy to say that we did recover most of the debt, but there is a small amount that we’ve had to write off, and seeing this appear in MYOB this week reminded me of the whole episode.

I have another client that, for all intents & purposes, is the ‘perfect’ client. Except that so far, I haven’t been paid. And I’m not talking nickles & dimes either, it’s a significant amount of money (and face it, for us small business operators, any amount is a significant amount!). I’m getting promises that the money will be in the bank “soon”, but I can’t find “soon” on my calendar, so I really don’t know when to expect this payment. And what makes it worse is that I have to pay subcontractors from this payment. Now, they have done the work, in good faith, so why should they wait for payment? Fact is, they won’t wait, I’ll pay them regardless of whether the client pays, as it’s my client, and not their problem. But it astonishes me that, time and time again, large companies think that they can take the ‘little guy’ for granted, and just not pay their bills.

There are so many benefits to running your own business. Flexibility, freedom, financial independence, work/life balance to name just a few. But there are definite perils. And unfortunately, chasing payments is one of them. It’s not something that would put me off doing what I’m doing, but it’s certainly something that I am going to keep a closer eye on now, and try to manage more effectively. And to my client that hasn’t paid yet – don’t ask me to do any more work until you show me the money!

Till next time,

Lia…

However, working from home can also get a little bit lonely at times. At least, it can for me. Whilst I am generally very busy on my work days, I am also a very social person, and I do sometimes miss the social environment that is readily available if you work outside the home. I find that I use my online networks to fill this social void for me, but this can often result in a lot of time not being used quite as effectively as it should be.

This week, I found myself working for a new client, and it involved me having to work offsite for 2 days, assisting with a few seminars that my client was running. What a lovely change it was! I met literally hundreds of people, and had an opportunity to talk to so many of them. I had a blast! The work was rewarding, the client lovely, and the chance to get out of the house and ’socialise’ whilst working was a really welcome change for me.

Whilst I wouldn’t change my job or my working conditions for the world, I think it’s important to ensure that as a ‘virtual’ worker, I don’t put myself into a pocket that means I only work inside my home. Sometimes it is really rewarding to be able to do something a little different, and it gives our clients confidence in our ability to be flexible enough to meet their occasional ‘non-virtual’ needs.

It may not be for everyone, and I know that some people specifically do not offer their services if it means travelling to a clients’ location, however for me, I think it was something I needed to re-invigorate me and shake up my routine a little bit. It is also very empowering to know that even though I have chosen to work from home to allow me the flexibilty to always be in a position to support the needs of my family, that I also still have a viable and important place out in the face-to-face world.

Till next time,

Lia…

The question made me remember my own first networking meeting. It was terrifying! I stood outside of the venue for about 10 minutes, having a massive internal debate with myself about whether I should actually enter or not. I finally decided that I had nothing to lose, so took a deep breath and walked in. I was greeted by some very nice people, who took my money, gave me a name tag and then cast me adrift into a sea of total strangers, who all seemed to know one another, leaving me as the only “newbie” in the room.

One of the reasons I chose this particular event to attend was because there was a guest speaker that day who I was very interested in seeing. So instead of trying to mingle (that was just too scary) I took a seat, and pretended to look busy, going through my bag, making sure I had lots of business cards.

After what seemed like an eternity, someone came and introduced themself to me. I could have hugged that person, I was so grateful! And so I started ‘networking’. The session began with a game of ‘network bingo’ which, as cringe-worthy as it seems, was actually a fantastic ice breaker. By the time it was over, and the guest speaker began their presentation, I had made some ‘friends’ and didn’t feel anywhere near as uncomfortable as I had done only 30 minutes prior.

As a result, I have since joined that particular group, and I attend their functions regularly. I always make an effort to seek out any “newbies” and introduce myself to them, so that they don’t feel quite so uncomfortable. It’s such an unusual situation for us to put ourselves into – voluntarily entering into an environment that is so foreign to us, exposing ourselves to the scrutiny of total strangers, and yet we find ourselves going back again and again. After you get the hang of it, networking can become quite an addiction.

I’m yet to gain any clients from my networking efforts, but I am confident that with time and effort, I will forge relationships with my networks that will result in referrals and clients. Till then, I’ll keep putting myself out there!

Till next time,

Lia…