Last week I had the pleasure of presenting to a networking group in Bolton who have been meeting monthly for some time now and growing their businesses through a sharing of common experience.

This group was a Ladies Lunch and Learn Networking Group.  A group made up entirely of women entrepreneurs, hence my comment about sharing a common experience.  I was asked to present “Tune Your Business Radio” which speaks to the key areas to fine tune at the beginning of the year to ensure your business gains a strong foothold on its way to building success.

My preparation for the presentation was a little different than usual, as I was the first male to ever step foot into the realm of this female networking group.

I have been presenting workshops and facilitating for over 20 years now in many different industries including construction, nursing, not for profits, small and large business and some government agencies. All of these clients have their own diverse issues, as would a core of women business owners. I have been fortunate enough to work with Momstown.ca, which is a group of exciting momtreprenuers across Canada, so I understood some of the issues around entrepreneurship and motherhood, and the time and resources it takes to do both successfully. However I wanted to do a bit more research.

A couple of issues that I chose to focus on included the allocation of time to the family and the business, and the lack of mentoring resources for professional women entrepreneurs. It is critical that sound business practices and understanding the threats and opportunities that exist within the business are used in guiding the business along the bumpy road we have been on for the last few years. Sometimes it is all too easy for any of us to just throw in the towel and give up our entrepreneurial dreams to take an easier route to financial stability. As the old adage goes, working smarter is the key. Creating dialogue with clients using the variety of mediums out there will give you client-centric feedback as opposed to rumours and educated guesses. Understanding and recognizing true business potential at the start of the year makes the road to success much smoother, utilize facts to avoid basing goals on false potential. Understanding the position your business occupies in the client’s mind, and using potential based planning methodology will take hours off your weekly work routine, hours that can be spent with family.

As far as the mentoring and networking resources go, I am glad to see that there are many groups like the one I spoke at springing up in every city and town.  I believe it is crucial for women to have support mechanisms from other women in business. Check in your areas for groups such as Boards of Trade or Chamber of Commerce women’s groups, and Zonta, however don’t restrict yourself to women only networking or business groups.  There are many business issues that are common to every business, and being aware and informed about those issues will guide your future planning. Support, understanding and affirmation, are required to be successful, combine that with great mentorship and we all have the tools for business building.

By Stephen Rhodes

Esteemed Canadian poet and author @MargaretAtwood has praised Twitter as a literacy tool.

Speaking  at the nextMEDIA conference in Toronto, Atwood proclaimed that we should celebrate Twitter and other internet-based communications as drivers of literacy rather than something to be dismissed. FULL STORY HERE

My favourite quote is this and  it has the Twitterverse abuzz.

“People have to actually be able to read and write to use the internet, so it’s a great literacy driver if kids are given the tools and the incentive to learn the skills that allow them to access it.”

Twitter is a shorthand to a deeper learning experience, a deeper reading experience.

Seldom do I receive a tweet that doesn’t redirect me to something interesting that requires reading to fully enjoy. Fact is, Twitter keeps me reading all day long whether on my smart phone, tablet or laptop.

Bravo Ms Atwood.

What do you think?

Getty Images Photo from huffingtonpost.ca

By Stephen Rhodes

Got that thousand yard Christmas stare;  the vacant look on your face as you stand dead centre in the aisle of your local shopping centre, at least until someone elbows you out of the way?

Christmas shopping can be a terrifying experience.  And as I get older, buying for older friends – many of whom have a houseful of stuff just waiting to be de-cluttered – is even scarier. They have spent a lifetime collecting stuff they don’t need. Daunting.

Enter the gift card. What a marketing phenomenon! Maybe it is not as esthetically pleasing as the big box under the tree but surely more practical.  It gives Christmas Eve shopping a whole new meaning and I don’t even have to go to the retailer whose card I want to purchase, because some marketing genius has placed oodles of these things on racks in convenient retail outlets like Shoppers Drug Mart and Canadian Tire. Even better, I can buy a gift card online and email it to the intended recipient as a simple bar code.

I know, I know, I sound like the Grinch. Hi, Merry Christmas. Check you inbox for your gift. And if you don’t like the card, you can swap it for another. Ho Ho Ho.

Speaking of the Grinch, a consumer watchdog is advising against giving gift cards this holiday season, saying they often go unused and put restrictions on recipients. “Actually, if you see a gift card hanging on the wall, you should run in the opposite direction,” said Bruce Cran, president of the Consumers’ Association of Canada.

Surveys show 86 per cent of people like giving gift cards, but only 40 per cent of people like receiving them. He says 40 per cent of gift cards never get used even though there are companies that will convert your gift card to cash. What a boost for the economy.

Gift cards are a $6 billion a year industry in Canada. I don’t think they are going anywhere soon, and for me it makes buying a gift for that impossible to buy for person easy smeasy.

View our Winter Newsletter.

For those of us experienced (old) enough to remember the channel 7 news from Buffalo in the 70’s and 80’s, “It’s 11 o’clock, do you know where your children are?” was the phrase that led to the nightly news. It was a reminder for all parents to know where their kids are at all times.  In business today knowing where your sales are now, where they will be next month and the long-term projection  is critical to success, yet most businesses don’t analyze their sales strengths, weaknesses and potential until it’s too late.

It’s no secret that if you stop making calls, you will notice  a decrease in sales, and by the time you notice it you are already into the next cycle of ramping up time required to get relationships and sales back on track.  This can cost months of revenue, has cost many salespeople their jobs and has led to many small businesses closing their doors unable to keep up with expenses. How do we get into this cycle, more importantly once in it, is there a quick and effective way to get out?

Time is every businesses enemy, and in bad economies, it seems to work twice as fast against them. Clients react quickly to change, looking for better service, a more reliable business relationship and lower costs.  If you are not on top of your customer contacts, not providing the level of service your clients have grown accustomed to or you are not being competitive, then clients move elsewhere. Sometimes sales tracking, prospecting and diligent client cultivation gives way to reactive, time-consuming measures taken to survive and keep the ship afloat. We quickly lose sight of the simple things in the business that have made it successful.

There is a solution to the problem, and as with most problems the solution starts with the recognition that there is a real issue. Revisit previous years, paying attention to details like number of clients, average order size, buying frequency, seasonality of sales, and types of products or services supplied.

What is different?

Are you promoting your business as much?

What have you cut in order to save money?

Are you listening to your clients?

Are you aware of new competition?

Is there potential for growth?

Once you have some answers to these questions,  planning takes over to eliminate the weaknesses, and build on the strengths. Yes, it is work, and yes there will be a lag between actions and results, but with the proper planning, guidance and sales support you will be back on track. Don’t lose sight of something as critical to your business as sales. Know where they are, where they will be, and where they have been at all times.

View our Winter Newsletter.

Once a year we take time to remember those who gave their lives in wars fought on foreign soil, defending our rights and freedoms that we enjoy today.  The Highway of Heroes was aptly named in honour of those who most recently have given their lives in military duty. 

Today in Ontario and Quebec business will go on as normal with a brief respite at 11 AM to observe a moment of silence, while in other provinces it is an observed holiday. I don’t know why in our two provinces it continues to be a day of work instead of a day of remembrance, especially given that the young people of today are face to face with the reality that people they know and love may not come home again.  I didn’t face that in my generation in Canada.  I had many relatives who fought in WWI and World War II, some of whom may not have returned home to their families, and as such I had never met them.  There was no real impact.  My wife’s father fought in Korea, a war that wasn’t even recognized by the Canadian government until a scant few years ago. 

Today is different.  When we hear about young soldiers who have lost their lives it strikes hard that indeed, this person could have been our own son or daughter, niece or nephew or the next door neighbors child, or someone that my kids knew from school.  Reality hits much closer to our own comfort levels today. I will take an hour to watch the proceedings at our local Cenotaph and forget about work for a while today.  I urge everyone to take more than a moment today. A simple pause to reflect does not do justice to those in the service.  They deserve our utmost respect and support.

After the moment of silence today, why not take finger to keyboard or pen to paper and write your local politician and let them know that Remembrance Day is important, more important than Victoria Day or any other Bank holiday.  It is a day where everyone in Canada should be united in their support of all people past and present who committed to the service and those who gave the ultimate sacrifice.

I have a young friend whose brother recently returned from duty where his vehicle ran over a landmine.  Over beers one night the stark reality of war was put to music.  Please give a listen to Karl’s song “Only a Soldier Understands.”

I had the pleasure of attending a trade show for the promotional products market last week. First off, I have to tell you that I love going to trade shows and exhibitions especially for new products.  It comes from my days as a youngster attending TV and appliance trade shows with my dad. It was a world of wonder to a 12-year-old seeing the glitz and the hype and the barkers, not to mention leaving with a bag load of freebie stuff. I recognized that networking (chatting up the people in the booth) resulted in building relationships, and I would often see the same people for several years in a row. “Hey you’ve grown” was a phrase I heard a lot.

Last week, I was a little disappointed, not with the show, it was very well laid out and promoted, but with the sales skills of some of the representatives manning the booths. I should also mention the total lack of people at some of the display booths. How can you justify the expense of participating in a show if you have no live point of contact? Enough about the no-shows the majority of business owners are far too smart to let that happen.

As I moved down the aisles I was tempted by an array of colours, freebies, contests and noise. The noise  is like music to my ears as a sales trainer.  The sound of the booth hosts inviting you in, recognizing the company name, offering up a handshake, asking the right questions.  Questions like “do you use promotional incentives”, “have you seen the latest”.  I was most impressed by a guy who read the name of my supplier on my badge and said “Oh you use Richard”, I said “do you know him?” and he replied “no, but I need to meet him if he deals with you”.  Corny, maybe.  A little hokey, yes. A sound foundation for relationship selling? Definitely!

The booths that I walked past, and I do mean literally walked past, contained no enticement, maybe a small dish of hard candies on a barren table with a stack of business cards.  There was no noise, no chatter.  Often the two booth hosts were too engaged in their own conversation to notice my interest or total lack thereof. One guy was on a cell phone with his back to the guests, another lady was adjusting her make-up, and yet another man was eating in the booth, and leaving crumbs on the nice clean carpet. I have been to enough shows in my life to make the split-second decision, if I don’t see or hear anything that catches my interest or at least one of my senses, I walk on by.

Time, effort, cost vs result measurements will tell you if the trade show was a success.  You can blame poor results on a great number of things, but your company’s lack of effort in sales lead generation should never be one of them!

By Stephen Rhodes

OK, hold the fort. Your are tweeting 10 times a day. You update your Facebook page 5 times a day. You write a blog twice a week and …..you are still waiting for floodgates to open.

No one writes, no one calls. In fact, you’re wondering if anyone is listening at all.

Most businesses today are better at capturing basic information about their customers than they used to be. Name, address, a phone number and/or an email.

It takes time to build an audience in Social Media. It takes two seconds to pick up the telephone.

Imagine a customers’ reaction when you call to ask for their opinion on a new service or product line. No sales pitch. I just want to know what you think.

Technology can become an excuse for not talking to our customers.

Do you let that happen?

By Stephen Rhodes

Every business has compettion. If you think not, think again.
I once had a newspaper publisher tell me he had no competition. He said he dominated the market for print advertising.
On our way back from lunch I stopped into a convenience store to buy a pack of gum, and on a series of racks outside the store were a number of free publications promoting houses, cars, rental properties etc. All of them contained advertising. Inside the store, there were a few more publications, containing a significant amount of classified advertising. I suspect they were all making money.

Sometimes we don’t see clearly. Understand what you sell. Search out the competition.

If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck well then it must be ….  Not always!  During my 25 years in training and development I have seen a great number of “elite” programs come and go.  I have seen “experts” in their field give absolutely terrible workshops, and time and time again I have seen companies who want to pay the minimum to get the maximum in terms of knowledge transfer, retention and results. How many times have we bowed to expert opinion only to learn later that maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to hang on their every word like lemmings?

The word expert has many different connotations to different people.  Experts, when I was young were elders who had life experience.  Then I grew to learn that experts possessed specialized knowledge on certain subjects such as teachers.  Now, I am a little confused as to what criteria is used to anoint experts, because there are so many of them out there. When faced with such a dilemma I head to the dictionary and Wikipedia, figuring the answer lies somewhere between. An expert can be anything from a reliable source, a person with extensive knowledge and training, may have credentials through education and practice, a sage thinker or someone who has more knowledge than an average person. The key attribute that runs through all definitions is they must be recognized by peers and have proven authority.

The last test is the truest in my opinion.  How would an expert prove that they are an expert?  Testimonials would be a good start.  Letters from clients, peers and other experts stating that there are valid reasons why this person should be given your ear. This goes back to my question about who checks anyways.  In training and development situations whether it be sales, leadership, teamwork or other forms of workshops and activities, the person responsible for sourcing the trainer needs to be diligent in finding a person with the knowledge, skills and experience to properly facilitate the training. This is accomplished through checking of credentials.  You wouldn’t hire an employee without a background check.

There are billions of people on the planet who are self-proclaimed experts at something (I can hang a spoon from my nose!) Each day I see more examples of people with expert credentials that may or may not fit the definition.  Who heard of hoarding even 5 years ago, yet there are experts at dealing with the problem.  Anyone who uses social media seems to be an expert, but I defy them to stand toe to toe with the likes of Chris Brogan.  Even website optimization has thousands of experts ready to make your site number one! (64,900,000 hits on Google) A quick check of the “expert’s” background, experience and testimonials will give you a good idea if they are experts or merely more knowledgeable than the average person.

I was once told that if you pay peanuts you get monkeys.  Now that certainly isn’t always the case, as many experts may have very reasonable fees. In my experience with organizations, some are truly motivated to train and understand the cost benefit relationship, and others train for the sake of training at the lowest cost, then argue that the impact was negligible or unmeasurable, and don’t venture into the human capital development field for many years. It is relatively simple for those that want results.  Check credentials, meet with the facilitator to discuss desired outcomes and be reasonable in your cost/result expectations. It might look like fantastic training, sound like fantastic training, but if you don’t check you might be “ducked”

Embracing technology may be a little more difficult for some than others, I offer myself up a living proof, owning a phone that performs functions I’ve never even heard of.

Perhaps it is age, maybe stubbornness, or could it be that not adapting to technology offers an excuse to take advantage of situations that may arise in business. I have been told over and over again that ignorance is no excuse, so why is it that large corporations with the tools and resources at hand continue in the “do as we say, not as we do” mode of business operations?

Here in Canada we recently had a mail strike, which hurt a great number of small business, especially in the area of collections. Small business owners may not have adapted to online billing and payment, or want the added expense of accepting credit card fees attached to the use of credit cards for payment.

Large businesses have, for the most part, been quick to put in place methods of money collection and invoice payment in order to decrease the days outstanding on accounts. This is smart business. The question I have is why do some companies still operate from the ‘dark side” and utilize the dreaded “reverse onus”?

Reverse onus is not some maneuver from skateboarding or free style skiing, but a method of deflecting the fault from a company position to a consumer position. I recently received two Sears invoices within a matter of days.  The first of course was one that was posted right before the mail strike and was never delivered.

The second one was the most recent month, complete with the outstanding balance and interest on the overdue balance. I wasn’t about to pay the interest, especially at an annual rate of 29%. When they were called, the customer service department (who is never part of the decision-making process but is expected to take the brunt of customer anger) responded that the onus was on us to pay our balance by alternative methods, such as at the store or online.

The “reverse onus”, is est defined by the ill-considered Rogers, “do nothing and get billed” tactic from years before. I immediately responding “why isn’t the onus on you to change your billing procedure to make customers aware of what they owe in response to the mail strike.  You could send an e-mail, or use the idle billing staff to make reminder calls, even automated calls”  Dead silence on the other end.  “The interest charge has been removed, as a onetime favour in this instance”, was the response I received moments later.

A favour? Our main job as business owners is to ensure that we operate and serve our clients in a way that makes it easy and comfortable to do business with us.  It can be a huge competitive advantage in a crowded marketplace.

Technology works for both the customer and the business, and ignorance is not an excuse for reverse onus. Obstacles to continuing the business processes should be recognized, and removed in a common-sense fashion. That’s just good business!