Canadian Small Business Women

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Don’t Do Marketing & PR… Until you can answer these 5 questions

CHuntly

Marketing & Public Relations (AKA PR) should be an important part of your outreach strategy. After all, PR is defined as interacting with your public, and you need to do that to communicate your brand message to your audience. If you’re not trying to communicate with your audience, you are relying too heavily on the “if you build it they will come” strategy. In a world of social media and other online channels as well as all of the visual and informational bombardment on a day-to-day basis face-to-face, there is too much noise in the marketplace to wait for someone to notice you. You need to initiate the connection.

It can be tempting to jump on the first opportunity you see to get your brand “out there” without thinking too much beyond that you just want people to see you. However, just because it is the latest and greatest idea doesn’t mean it is the right one for your business.

You have a lot of options available to you when it comes to marketing and PR. The challenge for you as a small business owner is to pick the right options that will give you the highest return on your investment (of time AND money!).

Here are a few things you need to get straight before you jump on that latest and greatest idea you came across:

  1. What do you do? Be able to identify in detail what product or service you are selling.
  2. Who would be interested in what you have to offer? When you can answer this question, you will have identified your target audience.
  3. Why would your target audience want what you have to offer? This is an important step often skipped by entrepreneurs who are launching a business. You need to be able to articulate – in writing and when you are speaking to people – what makes your product/service so great. Along the same lines, identify what sets you apart from your competitors.
  4. Where does your target audience congregate? Do a bit of research to find out where they get their information from, what organizations they belong to, their social media habits, and what their buying habits are.
  5. What are your goals? Once you have identified who you are and who would be interested in what you have to offer, you need to set goals so you can identify what a successful marketing & PR campaign would look like for you. Is it sign ups? Website traffic? Awareness?

Once you have answered these five questions, you can sit down and use the information to decide what kind of marketing & PR strategy you should run. Your audience and your goals will dictate what channels you use to reach out and your product/service offering and differentiators will help you determine what type of content and messaging to use on each channel.

While it means you need to invest more time in the beginning to help set yourself on the right track, it is worth it in the long-term.

Candace Huntly is the Founder and Principal at SongBird Marketing Communications, an award-winning agency working to take organizational and individual brands to the next level. With a passion for all things related to creativity and strategy, she specializes in business intelligence, marketing & branding, content strategy & development, media & influencer relations, and social media. Basically, if you need to put your brand, product, or cause in the public eye, she will find a way to do it, while making the approach unique to you.

Connect with Candace

Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn/email/Website

How Brand Personality Shapes Marketing Strategy

CHuntly

There are a lot of factors that go into your overall marketing strategy – resources available is always a big determining factor. But one thing that often gets brushed aside for budget discussions is brand personality.

Once you have your budget in mind, it’s easy to look at industry competitors to get ideas, but you have to decide what the best approach is for your business. Maybe that huge tech-based campaign just isn’t right for you, even though it worked for someone else. You have to be able to deliver on the brand story you put out there.

While the basics of marketing planning will always remain the same, the delivery has to be unique to you. So, what are the basics of a marketing strategy?

  • What product or service do you have to offer?
  • Who is your target audience?
  • How will you sell to them?
  • Why will they buy from you?

That last point is what will help you determine your brand personality. You have to figure out who you are as a brand and what makes you different before putting together your strategy. Here are a few questions to ask yourself:

  • Are you modern or traditional?
  • Are you young or more mature?
  • Do you embrace technology or do you live by a more old school code?
  • Are you spontaneous and easy going or are you cautious and strategic?

The goal is to figure out where you lie in the spectrum of things and that will determine how you reach your customers and what type of messaging you will use to do it. For example, if you are a young, tech-savvy company, you will likely create your strategy based on the latest and greatest digital and technology trends. You might use a more laid back, conversational tone in your communication. On the other hand, if you are a more mature and traditional company, you might rely on a more corporate feel and formal tone with a focus on traditional face-to-face outreach and direct marketing channels.

Figure out who you are as a brand, and let that guide your marketing strategy, not what worked for someone else.

Candace Huntly is the Founder and Principal at SongBird Marketing Communications, an award-winning agency working to take organizational and individual brands to the next level. With a passion for all things related to creativity and strategy, she specializes in business intelligence, marketing & branding, content strategy & development, media & influencer relations, and social media. Basically, if you need to put your brand, product, or cause in the public eye, she will find a way to do it, while making the approach unique to you.

Connect with Candace

Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn/email/Website

Multiple Streams of Income … getting yours!

yvonne

 We seem to live in a world of wanting and needing more, and most times, meeting these needs requires money! For more than half the population or what we have come to know as the one percent, making more money is the key to unlocking all our desires. Even the scriptures aptly state that money answereth all things.

If you have ever asked, ‘how can I make money doing the things I like?’ and are unwilling to give up you primary source of income, then you are faced with a challenge many face in today’s economy.

A good way of taking of this feat is to identify what suits you best, take it seriously by committing to it, and create a plan that makes you stand out from the rest. Here are a few strategies to help get you started

  • Explore a skill you have. Something you enjoy doing, which you can easily be offered in your spare time in return for a charge. Have you got a flair for decorating, interior design, fixing furniture, baking or making clothes? Whatever it is, you can use this skill! Many people have created successful businesses from making use of their skills on a part-time basis.
  • Provide a service using the web. The world has become a global marketplace, and taking advantage of this easily accessible platform brings you closer to the centre of creating an income. Services that you can provide on the web may include proofreading; writing articles and reviews; designing graphics and websites; or anything else that does not require a face-to-face interaction. Web services are good money makers, given that you provide services based on your skills.
  • Online Stores. Can you sell something that people from around the world would buy? Having an online shop does not require you to be constantly present. As long as you have a valid email, a proper payment tracking software, and desirable goods and services you can make more money. Items you could think of selling include unwanted furniture, traditional and vintage pieces, handmade crafts, accessories and clothing, etc.
  • Selling your knowledge. Are you good at giving advice and helping people find solutions to problems? Do you have the training and techniques that can mentor a person through a difficult time? Then you can turn your knowledge and wisdom into income. It is from such intellectual knowledge that consulting agencies, counselors and therapist make money.

Be aware that these ideas are not new, the only difference is the unique and special thing which you will add to make you stand-out, as well as planning and structuring your services professionally.

There is a quote that goes “A man’s gift makes room for him and brings him before great men.” The answer might very well be in your hands, but it is up to you to apply wisdom to you gifts, talents and skills, to make room for more money.

To learn about Yvonne’s latest book on Changing your Mindset for greater results, visit http://www.oliveblue.com/changeyourmindset/

Yvonne is an Author, Speaker, Change Consultant & John Maxwell Leadership Coach who is passionate about working with Individuals, Entrepreneurs and Organisations to help implement change they want and achieve their goals.   

She can be reached at: www.oliveblue.com . www.facebook.com/oliveblueinc . www.twitter.com/oliveblueinc.www.youtube.com/ChangeYouWantTV

Before you make your resolutions and set your goals, DO THIS first!

Uchechi

So, 2014 is about to come to a close, and I’m sure many of you have been thinking about resolutions you want to set in the New Year. I’m one for planning and setting goals, but late last year, I discovered something that I thought was just genius and I wanted to share it with you today. It may be the ticket that actually guarantees that you strive for the right goals; ones that you will actually enjoy pursuing.

So, what is this new method I’m talking about? Well, it’s from one of my mentors, Danielle Laporte, author of The Desire Map. The Desire Map’s core concept is that, because we set a goal in order to feel a certain way, we need to start from there (the feeling place). She says, “You’re not chasing the goal itself; you’re actually chasing the feeling that you hope achieving that goal will give you.” She calls these feelings, your core desired feeling. When we take this approach, we then set our goals based on how we want to feel. If you take a look at past goals you’ve set for yourself and your business, if asked, “why did you want it”, it really boils down to a feeling. Let’s take a goal to get 10 new clients for your business. It really isn’t just about the 10 new clients, but more about how getting those new clients will make you feel: the desire to reach more people with your product or service, feel accomplished, productive, and of service. Those are the goals you’re really going after, not just the number of clients.

Let’s take another example of a resolution many people have which is to lose weight, say 20lbs. It really isn’t just about the number 20, but really about how losing 20lbs would make you feel: the desire to feel fit, strong, healthy, confident and sexy. So, before you set your resolutions and goals this year, it is critical to establish your core desire feelings first!

Next year, my biggest focus is on my core desire feelings. My specific tangible goals, which are important to have, is now based on my core desired feeling not the other way around. So many times, we subscribe to society’s definition of success and achievement. We then strive to reach it, even though reaching it does not evoke feeling of success for us! You need to understand what success feels like for you, and then align your goals to those feelings. If we take the example of losing 20lbs, and focused on the core desire feelings of being strong, fit, confident and sexy, you can set goals to strength train and work out 3-5x/week, because that’s what it will take to feel that way versus just having a goal to lose 20lbs. Even buying that cute little black dress that hugs all the right places will give you the same feeling! How great is that?!

Another great thing about this is that it allows you to evaluate opportunities that come up through the year. So many times we lose focus on our goals or have the “shiny object” syndrome. However, if you have something to compare the opportunities against, it makes it much easier to decide what is best for you. You are then able to make decisions that are aligned to your values and missions.

When you’re clear on your core desired feelings, you become an “intentional creator” of your life as Danielle puts it. As we all know, we start of the year with great intentions. However, along the way, we may hit some roadblocks. When we focus on our core desires, we are able to recognize when we’re not on it. We can’t control what happens, but we can control our reaction and experience of what happens. Focusing on your core desires allows you in those moments to take back your control and ask yourself; “what can I do to generate my core desire feelings”. This allows you to not be a victim to your circumstances.

Check out my two of my favourite gals in this video (Marie Forleo and Danielle Laporte) talking about the steps to match your goals to your core desired feelings here.

So when setting your goals this year, be clear on why you’re setting your goals and look to match them to your soul’s desires.

Uchechi Ezurike-Bosse is a Business & Lifestyle Strategist, Speaker and Writer, but most importantly, a proud Mother and Wife. Uchechi is Founder of My Empowered Living (http://www.myempoweredliving.com) a website aimed at helping women shift their mindset and live their passion! Whether it’s starting and building their dream business, or helping them create a lifestyle they crave, Uchechi is the modern woman’s secret to success! Visit Uchechi at www.myempoweredliving.com to get her FREE online video training series The 4 Keys to your Business Success! This free 4-day business training reveals her 4 key strategies needed to build a profitable and successful business, and how to put them to work in your business!

Social Strategy SOS

SocialStrategy

In the third post in this series, I discussed why you need to consider your customers as “users” and how you go about creating a User Persona to help you target your Content Strategy to your ideal users. Over the next 3 weeks of this series, we’ll finish fleshing out the remaining pieces of the content strategy puzzle, and this week we’ll tackle what is possibly the most perplexing and time consuming part of your digital business: your Social Media Strategy.

Do I really HAVE to have a social media strategy?

Social strategy is complex: there are so many social networks, and sometimes it feels like there is a new one every day.  How does a business owner know which ones to pay attention to, and which ones to ignore?  Engaging in Social Media can be extremely time consuming with little visible return on investment: It can be difficult to clearly see how a social media strategy can help your business.

But social media can also be a virtual goldmine of new customers.  It can be a way that you can develop a relationship of trust with your customers, engage in customer service activities, and even recruit new employees. Social media is here to stay and it is an essential part of every business owner’s sales, marketing, and business development toolkit.   A smart, targeted social strategy can deliver brand awareness, new customers, and even conversions, but it is important to understand why you’re doing it and what exactly you should do, and this is unique to each and every business.

Conversion has changed – forever.

Think about how your customers convert nowadays.  It used to be that customers would become aware of your brand or product through a limited number of expensive and highly controlled channels: perhaps through a television, radio, or newspaper ad, or perhaps through word of mouth.  Their decision to buy was made primarily at point of purchase, that is, when they saw your product on the shelf in the store: the “first moment of truth”, as it was called in the traditional marketing model.

Google has recently described a new model that very accurately captures the new way consumers become aware of, and make decisions to purchase, products and services today, and they call it the Zero Moment of Truth.  The Zero Moment of Truth is all about digital discovery: the extensive searching, recommendation reading, and consulting with Facebook friends that we now engage in before making a purchasing decision.  For products and services big and small, we rarely convert until we have had at least 7 and sometimes as many as 17 digital “impressions” or touch points with a brand.

ZMOTequation

This Zero Moment of Truth is perhaps the most compelling reason that each and every brand, every business selling every product or service, needs to ensure that when the consumer is engaging in this foraging behaviour, that they are there, building trust and clocking impressions that may lead to conversion.  These impressions come from your business website and your social media activities, especially what people are saying with you and about you in social media.

There may be a small segment of the population that doesn’t use social media, but this is a rapidly shrinking segment.  The fastest growing segment of social users is adults 45-54, and more and more seniors come online every day.  In many ways, Social Media IS the Internet, and the Internet IS Social Media.  It’s difficult today to grow your business without a strategy that covers how, for whom, and how often you will engage your customers in the two-way conversation that Social media has to offer as a marketing tool.

So Many Platforms, So Little Time.

Scheduling tools like Hootsuite make it easy to track and control the frequency of your social media communications, and they make it easy to post the same content simultaneously to multiple social platforms.  But while it may be tempting to try and broadcast your messages to multiple platforms at once, it is rarely a good idea.  In his book “Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook”, Gary Vaynerchuck makes a strong argument that business owners should heed: not all social platforms are created equal.  The kind of storytelling that works really well on Facebook for a particular user will not work on Twitter, or Linked, In, or Pinterest, or….

Knowing which platforms to prioritise is perhaps the most difficult part of your social strategy but also the most critical.  You stand to lose a lot of precious time if you prioritise a platform that really doesn’t work for your business, and you can even erode or undermine your brand if you post something clearly inappropriate for that platform: so how does a savvy business owner choose?

There are three factors to consider:

1) What are the various social platforms “good at”?

2) Which of the social platforms do your users tend towards?

2) What is the nature of your business conversion funnel?

1) A Brief Primer on Social Media

There is much crossover between the various major social media platforms: all of them are, of course, social, meaning they are about engaging in a dialogue with others.  But because each one operates in a slightly different way with different rules of engagement, they require different kinds of Storytelling.

Twitter

  • Has over 230 million monthly active users
  • Twitter followers are 60% more likely to recommend you than a Facebook Liker
  • The average age of a Twitter user is much higher than Facebook, at 39 years
  • 70% of Twitter users expect to hear back from a brand, and 53% want that response within the hour
  • Twitter is good for establishing thought leadership, expertise, for sharing news, and for customer service and customer relationship management

Facebook

  • Facebook is the largest social platform in the world: if it were a country it would the third most populated, after only China and India
  • Facebook does have an influence on purchasing behaviour, even if not a direct one. Your Facebook fans are more likely to convert than non-fans.
  • Facebook is great for visibility in social search
  • Facebook is getting into the retail game with Facebook shops if you are selling a product
  • The new killer app on Facebook is the short video

YouTube

  • Has moved from being primarily a video search engine to a powerful social platform where many brands have been born and built. Khan academy, for example, and Justin Bieber.
  • Web videos are a great way to reach out to new and current customers and generate inbound links to your website
  • Because it is owned by Google, embedding YouTube videos on your website gives those pages a double-boost in Search Engine Optimisation

Google Plus

  • Great for local businesses, reviews, and Google search “juice”
  • Ties your business address into a Google Map and ties into other Google services

Linked In

  • The largest professional network, you must have a personal page on LinkedIn; it is far more common to connect with business contacts on LinkedIn than to keep a Rolodex or stack of business cards or emails.
  • Linked in generates 200% more leads than the other social networks

Pinterest

  • The fastest growing as of December 2012
  • Pinterest is very visual, about ‘things’, items they find interesting, but it works even for small businesses that aren’t visually stimulating.
  • Pinterest is good for referral traffic because the source of the pin is a link to your site, especially images you might be posting in your blogs. Even if you don’t maintain a page or presence on Pinterest, installing a “pin it” button on your website pages is a good idea

2) Where Are Your Users Hanging Out?

The short answer is, everywhere.  But you have to narrow that down a little to come up with a feasible strategy.  It’s important to note here that there are multiple social platforms not listed above, many of them attracting niche audiences where you might find a treasure trove of users interested in exactly what you have to offer.  This article outlines 60 niche social networks and it is worth doing a bit of digging to see if any of them resonate with your business goals.  Another tool that you can use is socialmention.com; social mention searches blogs and social networks for topics or brand mentions and can be a good way of finding out where conversations are taking place that align with the kinds of conversations you want to be having with your customers.  And social crawlytics at socialcrawlytics.com can be very insightful, generating a report that will tell you which pages of your website have been shared in social media, where they have been shared, and even by who.

3) What is the Nature of Your Conversion Funnel?

Typically, the more expensive the product or service, the more touch points the consumer will require before purchasing.  What are you selling, and how many touch point’s do you think your customers need before they buy?

Is your product or service more suited to an active discovery process or a passive discovery process?  For example, if I need an emergency plumbing repair I tend to engage in some very active discovery to find one.  I search Google and will probably call the first few service providers I see.  Social Media is better at passive discovery, at marketing products, services, and ideas that consumers don’t need right away or in an emergency.

Do you have a lot of competitors, so will need more touch points or more visibility in the market, or very few competitors?  Are you in the B2B or B2C market?

How much customer service does your product or service require?  And how much brand awareness do you already have in the market?
SocialStrategySOSWorksheetImage

Document the answers to these questions on this worksheet; by indicating on the sliders in the worksheet where your business lands on these various conversion factors will give you some pointers towards which platforms you might want to prioritise as well as the frequency of posting you might want to consider.  Note that the worksheet is more art than science and is intended only as a starting point: they only way to really get good at social media is by doing it, so start small, perhaps with your LinkedIn page, and build slowly using the worksheet as a guide.

The biggest question the Content Strategist has to answer is “Do I need a website AND a Social Strategy”?  The answer is yes, for a myriad of reasons, not the least of which is the findability of your content in Search.  Next month, we’ll cover Search Engine Optimisation and Influencer Marketing, the two biggest ways you can make your website work for your business.

For more resources and information on Content Strategy and to download a detailed description of what content strategy entails, go to analyticalengine.ca/resources or download a Content Strategy Info graphic at http://bit.ly/1qY9tYp.

Christine McGlade is a Business Analyst, Content Strategist, and Usability Consultant.  With over 25 years experience in the media business, Christine helps small business, social enterprise, and Not for Profits how to leverage the power of the Internet to grow their business.  Learn more about Christine at analyticalengine.ca

6 Tools to Help You Prioritise More Effectively

yvonne

If you are looking to effectively manage your workload or personal goals; or a manager with many priorities to juggle; or a business owner with decisions to make on what product, service or market; it can seem slightly overwhelming at times trying to make the right decision with limited time and resources.

The following are six tools from simple to technical that can help you make better decisions, manage your time, and prioritise more effectively.

 

  1. Clearly stated vision and goals

Knowing what to prioritise starts with having a clear vision or picture of what you want, where you want to go, and why it is important to you, and also ensuring your goals are SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic & Time-framed). This will help keep you focused what is important in line with your goals and making the right decisions.  Get more information Business Goals Setting or Free eBook on Setting SMART Goals

 

  1. Pareto Principle and Analysis

This principle – also known as the 80:20 Rule – suggests that by focusing on your topmost (20%) important items, you are able to gain the most benefits or results (80%). A simple approach to applying this principle is: List of all items that need to be done, prioritise in order of what is most critical and important, and focus your effort on the top 20% or more of your list. For more info on Business Application or for Personal/Business Application

 

  1. Action Priority Matrix

This one has always stuck in my mind – not everything that is urgent is important, and not everything that is important is urgent. And that is why prioritisation is important. Both individuals and organisations are able to use this tool to can quickly spot critical items, quick wins or low priority items to help best plan and allocate their time. For more information on Business Application or for Personal/Business Application

 

  1. Decision Matrix Analysis

This can be used in a variety of ways to make decisions on what tasks to focus on or decision to make.  With this tool, you can prioritise a list of tasks that need to be completed while at the same time taking a variety of factors i.e. cost and time into consideration. Get More Information

 

  1. Ansoff Matrix and the Boston Matrices

This is mainly a marketing and management tool to help prioritise the right business service, product or market to focus on. And can also be used to make career type of decisions. Both are extremely similar in nature and lead to similar types of result. It can help you:

  1. Evaluate and prioritise opportunities based on level of risk
  2. Prioritise opportunities based on the attractiveness of any particular market and how likely you’ll be able to take advantage of it

For more information: Business Application or Personal/Business Application

 

  1. Your Trusted Calendar and Task List

This can either be a physical paper calendar/task list or smartphone function that provides a physical reminder of what you need to focus on a daily basis. Smartphones come with a task list app such as ‘Reminders’ that can help you manage and schedule your activities. Some of the popular apps today are Evernote (free and premium plans available), Any.Do (free), and Remember the Milk (free).

To learn about Yvonne’s latest book on Changing your Mindset for greater results, visit http://www.oliveblue.com/changeyourmindset/

Yvonne is an Author, Speaker, Change Consultant & John Maxwell Leadership Coach who is passionate about working with Individuals, Entrepreneurs and Organisations to provide the tools and help implement change, drive results and achieve their goals.   She can be reached at: www.oliveblue.com . www.facebook.com/oliveblueinc . www.twitter.com/oliveblueinc.www.youtube.com/ChangeYouWantTV

 

 

 

“B2B” Communications: It’s About Time!

Sheralyn

 

Funerals that offer “creamation” services and companies that say their products or services are “Quiality” – what is your first thought? It they don’t show this much attention to detail on services they are trying to sell us via the internet, I guess we shouldn’t expect too much in terms of their service overall. You might have thought from the title that this would be a blog about “Business to Business” Communications and in a roundabout way it is. But that’s the problem with abbreviations – not everyone has the same understanding of their meaning and a breakdown in communication is the result. What I really want to address today is more about a “Back to Basics” approach to communications. Concepts like “yes, grammar matters” and the lost art of conversation. If we are open to learning how to do these things well, it’s possible our “business to business” communications will improve too.

Spelling matters. Grammar matters. Most of us can’t parse a sentence and don’t know a dangling participle when we see one but we sure as heck know (or should know) the difference between “its” and “it’s.” If you don’t (and this is not shameless self promotion by any means) you had better hire someone who does! Your business might depend on it. Utilizing technology, we tweeted a query not too long ago asking for your input – does it matter to you if spelling isn’t accurate on a website. Would it deter you from buying a product or service if the website contained language inaccuracies? The response suggested overwhelmingly that consumers would indeed bypass a poorly written website, choosing instead someone who took the time to get it right. The perception is clearly that attention to such detail really does matter.

These results are not surprising to me, nor should they be for anyone. You wouldn’t expect your doctor to “sort of” be able to practice medicine and I’m sure you rely on your mechanic to really “get it right” when he is working on your engine. It only makes sense that the same level of care and attention to detail would go into the website that advertises these services yet it always surprises me how often this fails to be the case. Time after time we come across websites like the one offering “Quailty” repairs. The thing is, as much as I advocate a return to the basics, technology can actually help us with these kinds of errors because all anyone has to do is hit “spell check” on their computer! Sure it might not catch the difference between the correct use of “here” vs. “hear” but that’s where the B2B education kicks in.

Communication is so many things. It’s about listening, speaking and writing and it is about the “ability to express or exchange information.” (1) How we interact with one another in every aspect of our lives is governed by effective communications. To do it well takes plenty of practice. It is a skill we should continually improve upon throughout our lives. Entire courses on networking are taught to business professional and really, isn’t this just an opportunity to teach people how to have a conversation? We need such courses because so many of us have now become completely reliant upon technology and all the abbreviations associated with it that we have forgotten how to talk to one another. Indeed, we have forgotten how to look up and into the eyes of people who are sitting right next to us! We are rational (sometimes!) reasoning creatures gifted with the ability to orate and yet it is a vanishing art form.

Therefore, I dare to say this. It’s time we got back to the basics. Put down our tech devices and learn the ability to speak and interact with one another. Bring grammar back into our schools and teach kids that while efficiencies gained from “ttyl” abbreviations work in some situations, they do not work for all. We need to learn how to spell and how to put a sentence together the “good, old-fashioned way.” Technology is a wonderful thing but it is only as smart as the user and what we put into it. “Garbage in, garbage out” as the saying goes so let’s recycle those old school dictionaries and put them to good use. From the perspective of your business, here’s why it is so important. Research shows that 59% of consumers would not use a company that had spelling or grammar errors on their website and that fully 70% of people notice these mistakes and feel it shows “an obvious lack of care.” (2) Further, if the average person only spends between 10 and 30 seconds on your website, being memorable because of your errors is not the right way to get noticed!

In educating ourselves about effective and efficient means of communication without the use of technology we might then be better able to apply that knowledge when we do use it. Building a great, error free website that helps tell the world what you can do is vital. Technology IS important but so is how we use it. Communication skills: good for life – and good for business too!

 

(1)MerriamWebster

(2)realbusiness.ca.uk

As Owner and Principal partner of “Writing Right For You” Sheralyn is a Communications Strategist – working together with entrepreneurs to maximize profit through effective use of the written word. Looking for web content that works, blog articles that engage or communications strategies that help you get noticed?  Contact Sheralyn today. Sheralyn is also the mother of two children now entering the “terrible and terrific teens” and spends her free time volunteering for several non-profit organizations.

Sheralyn Roman B.A., B.Ed.

Writing Right For You

Communications Strategies that help you GET TO THE POINT!

416-420-9415 Cell/Business

writingrightforyou@gmail.com

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How good is your Customer Service?

Martina New

 

We all know “The customer is King”. What are YOU doing to make your customers feel like Kings and Queens, and wanting to come back to you again and again? After all, customers are our businesses’ life-blood.

During a recent workshop by Jayne Huhtanen, of FocalPoint Coaching of Toronto, attendees learned how to propel their customer service to a whole new level. But first things first:

 

Why is good customer service so important?

An unhappy customer is a company’s worst enemy! They can undermine and damage your reputation, whether justified or not. With today’s Internet based news feeds and social media it doesn’t take much to dish the dirt on any business via Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube. We know we can’t please everybody all the time, yet it is important to keep our customers happy (or at least satisfied enough not to campaign against our business).

Jayne sees customer service as four key areas: Service, Satisfaction, Staying, and Success.  Firstly, you want to provide not just good but amazing customer service, with which you hope to reach or exceed customer satisfaction.  In turn, that will lead to customers staying with you as a repeat client and contributing to your success. For most companies, 80% of business comes from 20% of clientele, so repeat clients are essential.

Providing excellent customer service and satisfaction requires knowing each customer`s wants and needs, and what their expectations are in terms of your product or service. One way to find out is by simply asking directly, getting brief feedback forms, or conducting customer satisfaction surveys.

One such method is the Net Promoter Score (NPS), which uses just one basic question: How likely is it that you [the customer] would recommend this company to a friend or colleague?  The resulting scores fall into one of three categories:

  • Promoters (rating you 9-10  in customer service, with 10 being exceptional): loyal enthusiasts, who will keep buying, and referring others;
  • Passives (rating you 7-8): satisfied but unenthusiastic customers, vulnerable to competitors; and,
  • Detractors (rating you 0-6): unhappy customers, who can damage your brand and hinder growth.

To turn your customers into promoters, there are five levels of customer service:

  1. Meet expectations: The bare minimum of service, not getting major complaints but also no loyalty; failure to meet expectations even once is seen as reason to leave; customers gladly switch to a competitor who wows them with a lower price and/or better service.
  2. Exceed expectations: Building customer loyalty; may lead to increased profitability; customers willing to pay more for this better service; helps avoid the Law of Diminishing Intentions, i.e. customers going elsewhere.
  3. Delight customers: Touching customers on an emotional/personal level; this increases client retention; showing them you truly care; makes it hard for competitors to pull them away.
  4. Amaze customers: Propels your business to a whole new level; you treat your customers better than gold; your amazed customers are keen to actively refer you.
  5. Not meeting expectations:  Not meeting customer expectations unintentionally or maybe intentionally because you’re trying to get rid of a ‘bad customer’ who is never satisfied regardless of the level of service; this customer and you are just not a good fit.

Here are just a few of the things you can do for good to excellent customer service: Always follow-up, offer help and solutions immediately, provide incentives or compensation, have personal interaction (by telephone or in person), be accountable, send hand-written thank you cards to repeat or major clients or small appreciation gift, hold client appreciation event, and offer finder’s fee for referrals.

We each have our own style, of course, and what makes working with us special. Importantly, always be friendly, sincere, and over-deliver, then as long as your product or service is top-notch, you should have no problem delighting and retaining your customers!

Sources:

Martina Rowley is the founder and operator of Beach Business Hub – THE co-working space east of the Don Valley. She combined her passion and experience in the environmental sector with her community engagement side to create a local work environment where space and resources are shared. She fosters and facilitates collaboration, networking, and learning for and with small business owners and new start-ups. Contact her at:http://www.beachbusinesshub.ca, on Facebook and on Twitter

Your Brand Values and Governance Model: Developing Your Content Strategy

GovernancePlanning (2)

Part 2 of a 6 part series on Content Strategy for Your Business

 

In the first post in this series, I outlined what a content strategy is and why it’s a critical part of your digital business model.  Over the next 5 weeks of this series, we’ll go through a full content strategy, but where to start?  Sometimes it’s best to start at the end.

 

Governance: Start Your Strategy at the End

When it comes to Content Strategy, A Governance model is perhaps the most important factor.  Why?  Because if you understand up front what it will take to create, measure and maintain your online business communications, you will be more realistic and strategic when you develop your content strategy.  In this post I’ll outline what your governance model will include, and then go into some detail on the creation of the first piece of your content strategy and resulting governance model.

What do I need to Govern?

Online business communications are the basics on your website, which might include

  • Your Home page
  • An “About Us” page or section
  • A services Section and/or product pages
  • Your contact page
  • Campaign based landing pages

Depending on your business goals, it might expand to include content marketing such as

  • Email communications such as e-blasts or newsletters
  • Blogging or articles
  • Info graphics or tools

And depending on your customers and where they are in the sales funnel, it might include brand awareness tactics like

  • Social media: Twitter, Facebook, Linked IN, Instagram, and Pinterest…
  • Influencer marketing

 

Governance of your content strategy means managing these communications, and it is like running a second business, your digital business.  It is part marketing, part sales, and part corporate communications.  And like any business, you need a plan: that’s what Governance is.

Your Governance model brings together all of the pieces of your content strategy into a structured, executable plan of action.  Putting a realistic and actionable governance model in place means being very clear about your brand values and goals, your customer needs, knowing which platforms your ideal customers are using, and which blend of content types will give your brand voice consistency and regularity, and then putting it all in a calendar.

 

A Governance Model Outline

 

Your governance model will be made up of:

1) A clear statement of your brand purpose.  This can be in the form of a mission statement, or it can be in the form of a message map, elevator pitch, or Value proposition (also sometimes called a unique selling proposition or USP).

2) A customer avatar or persona that describes your ideal customer

3) A clear idea of the conversion funnel for your ideal customer and which content types, on which platforms are likely to reach them.

4) An editorial calendar outlining when and what you are going to create or curate and some handy tools to keep it all running smoothly.

These things need to be written down!  Don’t keep it all in your head.  I keep my governance model in front of me in the form of sticky notes and charts pinned to a large piece of foam core that serves as my content strategy whiteboard.   Knowing that these are the building blocks of your content strategy governance model, you can sketch them out very high level, and over the next 5 weeks we’ll fill in the blanks, starting this week with Brand Values.

 

Your Brand Values: Let’s Clarify

What are your brand values, and what are your business goals?  By getting this down very clearly you will have some good material for your About Us page and a guide that will help you with your future content, customer, and platform decisions.  The problem with typical mission statements is that they are very high level and often include a lot of jargon.  For this reason I prefer to create more tactical artefacts, such as a Message Map or Value proposition.

Build a Message Map

A message map is perhaps the most tactical artefact you can create.  It is quick and relatively easy to put together and is a good guideline document if you need to write something quickly such as a product launch announcement, or if you need to give something to your employees so they know the talking points on a particular product, initiative, or your business generally.  CEO’s or PR writers use message maps if they are preparing to do a media interview, for example, or write a press release.

Watch this video about message maps, or use this basic formula, starting with a Twitter-friendly headline.  This means a short, maximum 140-character statement about your brand or product.  Then, write down 3 key points about your brand or product, making sure they are short bullets.  Finally, for each of those three points, come up with a few supporting facts, statistics, or stories that bring the point home.

 Message-Map-Diagram (2)

 

Clarify Your Value Proposition

 

Creating a value proposition using this template from copyhackers will give you a little bit more range of options in terms of how you might talk about your brand as a whole.  Copyhackers has an excellent suite of worksheets and tools for all aspects of content strategy and a great process for figuring out your value proposition, that has you think about your brand and your service(s) or product(s) by filling in this grid.  In the left-most column, write down all of the statements you can come up with that describe the benefits or features of your brand, service(s) or product(s), then really ask yourself if that statement gets a “tick” in the boxes to the right.  When you have a statement that ticks all the boxes, you have a great value proposition!

 

Christine McG
My favourite tool is taken from the book “Gamestorming” because it brings customer target into the mix, and it is visual and easy to fill in the blanks.  Try to make a few of these until you find a combination that feels right.

 

 

elevator-pitch (2)

Once you have a clear idea, or collection of ideas and statements on what you have to offer as a business, the next step is having a very clear picture of your customer: knowing what they want, and where they are going to find it.

Over the next 3 installations, we’ll cover

  • Your Customer: figuring out what your customers want, who they are, and where they are.
  • Social media strategy: we’ll answer the question: do I need a website AND do social media? (The answer is, yes!)
  • Editorial and Content types: we’ll look at creation vs curation and finding the right balance for your brand and your customers, and why you need a schedule. Regularity and consistency is key to building audience.

 

This sounds like a lot of work

I could spend all of my time on creating and maintaining content.  But obviously then I wouldn’t be running my business.  Every business owner has to be a sales and marketing pro these days, however, and much of that sales and marketing activity is contained within the governance model of your online content strategy.  It’s important to find the right balance-or governance model-for your business.

 

For more resources and information on Content Strategy and to download a detailed description of what content strategy entails, go to analyticalengine.ca/resources or download a Content Strategy Info graphic at http://bit.ly/1qY9tYp.

Christine McGlade is a Business Analyst, Content Strategist, and Usability Consultant.  With over 25 years experience in the media business, Christine helps small business, social enterprise, and Not for Profits how to leverage the power of the Internet to grow their business.  Learn more about Christine at analyticalengine.ca

What’s in a name?

Jennifer J

We spend countless hours trying to figure out the perfect name for our business. It is important. The right name can help you be the talk of the town. A bad name can fade away and lead to obscurity. So how do you pick the perfect name? Do you name the business after yourself? Do you pick a name that describes your service or product? Or, do you create catchy new words like ‘Google’ or ‘Zappos’?  Determining what to name your business comes down to three things:

–          The industry your business is in;

–          What is the vision you have for your business; and

–          Your long term plan for your business.

If you plan to be the main commodity of your business, e.g. an expert in a particular field, a coach or a speaker, than you should name the business after you. Should you go on to produce books, products and pod casts, the only thing that isn’t changing is you. Naming your business after yourself allows your customer and clients to identify your expertise. You also have the flexibility of creating different products whilst not having to be locked in to just one.

Should your long term plans include selling your business one day, you should consider a name that describes your product or service. However, this is not a hard and fast rule. There are many businesses where the owner became the brand and the business was subsequently sold.  However, remember that if you intend to sell your business, the name is likely trademarked which prevents you from using the name for future ventures. This includes your own name.

When considering the name of your business, it is important to determine what it is you are trying to communicate. This can be determined by using your mission statement as a guide. Once you have this clearly defined, it is important to consider the following when creating a name:

–          Pick something that appeals to your niche and that your niche will identify with;

–          Something that is not too long and confusing;

–          Don’t use plain language that won’t stand out in a crowd;

–          Avoid clichés;

–          Avoid unusual spelling; and

–          Try and adopt a name that gives some information about your business.

Once you have picked a few names make sure to check whether your names have already been trademarked or are in use. You want to ensure you are not infringing on anyone else’s rights.Failure to do this could lead to legal battles down the line and significant money spent when it could have been avoided.

You also want to check if the domain name you’d like to use is still available. There’s nothing worse than coming up with a brilliant name only to find someone else has already purchased the domain.

Happy naming!

Jennifer Jampala is a budding entrepreneur, traveller and yogi. She is passionate about building businesses, relationships and experiences. Follow Jennifer on Twitter @JenniferJampala

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