Small Business Growth Problems

You hear, or read so much about small business being the backbone of the economy,

small business growth problems

Small Business growth can mean problems

about economic recovery by small business growth. What you don’t hear about are small business growth problems and why some small business choose not to grow. An article I read recently dealt with a few of the reasons. While written for the American market I’m sure those of us in business worldwide can totally relate.

Small Business Growth Problems

Here are just 2 examples of issues that a business owner faces when the business grows.

1 – Bureaucracy. With growth comes more government regulation and bureaucracy, more forms to fill out and paper work in general, greater responsibilities and with this more costs. Unless you have a background business administration the likelihood or having to [Read more…]

Small Business Help – Couples working together in business

Running a small business is stressful, so couples working together in business must

Randy Rubin and Craig Rubin source: Crypton

be doubly stressful, or maybe 4 times. And yet there are well over a million couples working together in business in the USA. So how do they make it work? Here are some great tips from Randy and Craig Rubin, owners of Crypton a textile company, on business and work balance for couples.

Tips for Couples Working Together in Business

HE SAYS: Split your roles. Make sure you and your wife have specific duties. For example, Randy focuses more on the legal, marketing and retail sales, while I am more [Read more…]

How do you use Social Media in Small Business

I was quite happy with my social media efforts for my kids shoe shop until I came across an article by James Debono which has got me thinking. Do I use social media in small business correctly and if not what should I be doing.

Here’s an extract from his blog

how do I use social media in small business

is this a marketing site or a social site?

Social media for small business should be more social and less about marketing. Those businesses that see it as another vehicle for advertizing their products and wares will find a very mute audience.

To make the most of social media, small business needs to have a complete change of strategy.

 

Apart from the fact that the facebook fan page was started as ‘that is what you do in business these days’ I am not doing a good job on the ‘social’ front. What I have turned it into is a place where I can contact customers quickly, at no cost, with what’s new in store  and advising any specials. There is nothing social going on. So is it a bad thing that  I’m not creating warm fuzzies with cutesy pics and sayings?

More from James:

Many businesses want to get involved in social media because they see it as a free means of marketing their company information. It is NOT!

Social media provides the unique opportunity to engage with mass audiences on a more personal level, which can help increase awareness, boost revenue, establish authority or create stronger customer loyalty.

 

Whoops, looks like I’m doing it all wrong. I am having real difficulty in thinking that my customers want to engage in a ‘more personal level’, or maybe  it’s my own bias. Don’t get me wrong, Iike all the inspirational quotes and cute dog and cat pictures that I get from friends on my personal facebook page. I just think that there is enough without a shoe shop doing the same, I can’t see how it would  establish my authority or promote customer loyalty. Or am I missing the boat? There must be a middle ground and the only way to find out is to test it.

The use of social media in small business will differ from industry to industry. I certainly don’t want to alienate my customers by posting too often, or not enough. So my plan of action over the next couple of weeks is to add a few little snippet’s here and there and try to be more engaging. Lets see if my valued customers want this sort of interaction by responding with  posting comments and sharing.

click here for the small business help facebook page

Is there such a thing as work life balance in small business?

Do you think that having work life balance in small business is achievable? And what

is there such a thing as work life balance in small business

about in the start up phase when there is even more pressure to work 24/7. Is it necessary to sacrifice family relationships in the name of business?

As I was growing up my parents  had businesses so I was aware, when starting my own small business, of the challenges and time effort required. My perception was that both Mum and Dad worked, all day and half the night, but were rewarded for all the hard work with businesses that enabled them to have, ultimately, a comfortable lifestyle. So it wasn’t until the last 2 of my children were teenagers that I started my children’s shoe store, and yet with that prior knowledge I didn’t fully understand the implications. [Read more…]

The importance of logo in business

My bricks and mortar business is changing, it has too. I’m moving from solely children’s shoes and adding a sprinkling of women’s’.  Why I’m doing that is another post. But now I’m worried about the importance of logo in business. Is my cutesy shoe lace logo going to distract from the image that I hope to portray in the future. Do I have to change it?

importance of logo in buisness

Do I need to change my logo?

[Read more…]

Do customer service expectations continually escalate

I’ve been sitting here reading yet another article on customer service and thinking Customer service expectationsyeah,yeah, same old, same old, yadda, yadda, yadda ***. Then is suddenly hit me, there is an expectation gap between customers and businesses. Not only that but customer service expectations continually escalate, they are expecting more and more.

Customer service expectation gap

I learnt a little about ‘the audit expectation gap’ when studying Audit for my Accountancy qualification, this goes quite away back now so I’m relying on memory. In audit it’s about the users of audit reports. There is an expectation of auditors to pick up issues like fraud within in a business. And given recent  events around the globe you can see that it is/was just not the case.

Like wise there is also an expectation gap between customers and business. Customers demand, in the name of the all important customer service, for businesses to go above and beyond what you as a business owner would consider reasonable.

Examples of customer service escalating

Here are 2 examples of what I mean, that have happened to me in the last month.

1 – I have been importing a brand of children’s shoes into New Zealand. Now we have laws governing faults of products and that the goods are required to be fit for purpose. A customer emails me on the ‘brand’ website from the other side of the country and says that some sandals that were purchased in September and given to a child as a Christmas present had fallen apart on the second wear… and that it was not a sizing issue as the shoes still fitted. Now, what happens allot is that people buy pre-walkers ( as in before walking) and expect then to last when a child is walking around on rough surfaces, most are simply not designed for this. Also they can say the fit and actually be way too small!

The first port of call with a product issue is to go back to the retailer, who then deals with the manufacturer or distributor. So I asked the customer where she purchased the shoe. The email I got back was that they were purchased in Perth, Australia ( for those who may be unaware, this is a completely different country) and the style was not one that I carried. I apologised and said that there was nothing I could do. This was the truth as I had stopped importing the shoes, have not many left and have no contact with the manufacturer. Even if I still did deal with them they could not have done anything anyway.

This was not good enough for the customer and she was never going to purchase the brand again.

What can I do, if I refunded her in the name of good customer service then I would be out of pocket, and ultimately this means less money to feed my children. There is a cost in buying goods overseas that are ‘cheaper’ and ‘better’ – but that’s another subject.

2 – I served a customer who was looking at some sandals.  I didn’t have the the correct size, so kindly ( I thought) in the name of good customer service wrote down the style and style number so that she could search on the internet for them. She came back 3 weeks later with piece of paper in hand and insisted on trying the sandals on again to ‘check on what size she should buy’, which was written down as well. I had to get a few sizes bring them out for her to try on again. A complete waste of my time and energy, she had NO intention of buying from me.

Conclusion

These examples show what’s happening in my world, that customer service expectations continually escalate. Because people know that businesses are scared of a bad reputation they will now go to extremes in what they expect the businesses to do. In the food industry there are some customers who go out of their way to find fault to get a free meal. How much do we have to take? So much depends on your buisness, the relationshio you have built up with that customer, your local legal requitrements and your financial circunstances at the time. However, I dare to suggest  that there has got to be a point where you as a buisness owner can say STOP that is far enough. Customers that expect Customer Service that boarders on exploitation should not be tolerated.

*** apologies if this terminolgy is incorrect, you learn quite a bit watching too much TV, but you don’t necessarliy pick it up and use it correctly, remember I’m on the other side of the world 🙂

 

What happens with the incorrect pricing of goods

Have you ever made the mistake of incorrect pricing of goods in your business?

Did you explain to the customer the error and ask them to pay more? or did you

incorrect pricing of goods small business help

Incorrect Pricing of Goods - what do you do

accept the loss and carry on. I would imagine that it would depend on the difference between the correct and incorrect price.

In the store next to mine, a staff member put a necklace on sale with a retail price of $165.00 down to $10.00. The customer was unaware of this obvious (to us) error, and the owner, who happened to be serving at the time continued with the sale as if nothing was wrong. Of course what she could have done was pointed out the error and asked the customer to pay more. However what would that have achieved? Possibly an irate customer and a stressed out owner.

Just last week I had a similar situation in my store and it was all my fault. I had put some boots on sale on my online store for $89.00 instead on $189.00. You can imagine my frustration when the order came trough & I had to process at the $89.00. So I just sucked it up and called it good customer service. Vowing not to make the same mistake again.

The legal situation will vary from country to country ( or state to state) so it’snot something I can go into in depth here.

Incorrect pricing of goods in advertising

If this was a case of an error in advertising to the public at large, sometimes a disclaimer in the advert may go some way to provide a remedy to the business, so that they may be able to charge the correct price. In many countries there are laws on false advertising so double or triple checking all advertising copy is the best policy. My hope is that in this case of incorrect pricing of goods, common sense will prevail. Well it may be a faint hope.

Is it a case of providing good customer service?

In my first example, this can be seen as simply good customer service. The owner was able to control her feelings, and, well lets face it, slight rage, and continue the sale. If the other tack was taken, the worst case result could have been a customer walking out of the store unhappy, maybe telling others of how she was ‘mislead’.

It’s a hard decision and again my view is that it would depend on the size of the error. If the customer knew or suspected of the incorrect pricing of the goods, as you can often tell, and was trying to take advantage that is a different story.

What do you think? Have you had any experience with this from a legal perspective in your part of the world. And have you had conflicting legal opinions. How would you cope with the incorrect pricing of goods? would you put it down to providing good customer service? It may pay to ask your local small business association on their views on the legal aspects what can be done when the goods have been priced incorrectly.

 

Small Business Help – Lessons to be learnt from a small business start up

small business start up

Small business start up requires time and money

Most people think that a business start up will be easy, no not easy, not in the way you might think. They know that it will take time, effort, money, but they know that they will succeed in the end, that’s were it’s easy. Easy peasy. However the reality is that most business fail within 5 years, and why? they run out of time and money. In my opinion there is a co-dependant relationship between the two. If you have the money, then in time, your business will break even, get into profit, give you an income. The other option is to run out of money before that important time when your business takes off. Then the result is mostly business failure. It’s called being under-capitalized. Don’t get me wrong, there are some businesses that will never succeed as they are not commercially viable, but there are those that simply run out of money and time. Here is a business start up lesson we can learn from.

Lessons to be learnt from a small business start up

Todd and Trish Hughes have been working out of their home everyday for the last several months, trying to get their start-up business off the ground.

“It’s called the Family Market,” said Todd Hughes.

“A mom and pop store where you go in looking for quality meat, for quality produce,” said Trish Hughes.

“Has a little bit of Huckleberries, Trader Joes, a bit of Cozanos,” said Todd Hughes

“It wouldn’t be something you’d see at a normal grocery store,” said Trish Hughes

“We enjoyed the lifestyle we had, in turn we didn’t have the family that we had here,” said Trish Hughes.

Since that time they have used up almost all of their life savings of nearly $80,000. They have a building lease, a business model in place, and Todd says an interest in the community. All they need is a $200,000 loan for equipment and initial inventory. But so far every bank has turned them down.

“When you think of the American Dream and to think that we’re almost there and when banks aren’t lending it’s frustrating,” said Todd Hughes.

With their bank account getting low and options running out, this couple is close to having to give up that dream.

“You keep getting kicked in the gut and keep trying and at some point you do have to do other things to get food on the table,” said Hughes

Now it’s looking like all they can do is hope that one day their dream will come true.

“It’s been fun to do it and we know it would work, but it’s just finding that relationship that believes in it,” said Hughes.

I do hope they turn their business around, it’s all in the time and money equation. And this not a one off, it’s common for thousands of businesses around the world asking themselves ‘can we hold on until we turn a profit’. Be warned that a small business start up may cost you more than time and effort.

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Small Business Help – Good customer service

Here’s a lesson in good customer service, don’t forget to have a easy way for good customer servicecustomers to contact you. Whether it be complaints, complements or general queries, customers should be able to contact your business. I sure can relate to the situation below on an important aspect of good customer service written by JEFF BERNTHA.

Good Customer Service – remember the communication channel

Here was my recent experience. Someone managed to copy my credit card information and use it to make an in store purchase. So I first contacted the credit card company. Will they do anything to find out who did it? No. They told me it was cheaper for them to write the false charges off as a loss then it would be to spend time investigating.

So then I contacted the store where the crook used a card with my account information. I was hoping they could use surveillance video to find the culprit.

The charge was made on a Friday. I contacted the store the next day.

They said they couldn’t help me because I needed to contact their corporate office. When I did that….there were 9 options on an automated phone, none of them said, press 1 if your credit card was stolen, used at our store and you want the criminal stopped.

So I finally reached someone who told me I should contact the online division of the company. What? The crime did not happen on line. Someone made the charge in person.

So I had to send an email to a general complaint form. Have not heard back.

I also contacted the police department where the crime happened … Have not heard back from them either.

So if you want a career that pays a lot stick with medical or law school. But if you really want to stand out; look for a customer service program.

How have your experiences been with trying to contact businesses? Similar to the above I would suspect. No matter what the reason, good customer service includes the ease in which customers can contact your business. And don’t forget to contact the customer back acknowledging that the complaint (or otherwise) has been received and what the next steps are to resolve the issue.

Click here to visit the original source of this post

Small Business Help Marketing Tips

When I started to read the article below, the word innovation turned me off, I didn’t associate the headline that was given with small business help marketing tips. It’s funny that a single word can do that, sometimes it all depends on your definition of the word and how it has been used to and by you in the past. In the English language so many words can mean the same thing & also one word can have various meanings. So when I discovered that Steve Strauss was referring to innovating marketing practices I took notice. Here’s the small business help, marketing tips he shared:

 

Small Business Help – Marketing Tips

 

Right, and wrong. It is a correct assumption in that innovation is indeed too much work for some small businesses. That’s fine, understandable even. Innovation takes time and money, and those things are sometimes in short supply. So yes, if you don’t want to innovate, we can relate.

But it is equally true that being innovative in your business and with your products can be the secret sauce that allows you to stand out in the vast sea that is capitalism. There is no shortage of competitors who want to steal your clients, and if they innovate and you don’t, they just may. Moreover, innovation fires up the team, invigorates the entrepreneur, wows customers, impresses potential clients, and, when done right, grows your business.

Let me give you an example: A few weeks ago I was invited by Symantec (a company I previously did some work with) to a product launch at the world headquarters of Tesla Motors in Palo Alto, Calif. Let’s just start there. That’s an innovative way to launch a product, is it not? Rather than sending out a boring press release, showcasing their products against the backdrop of some incredibly cool $100,000 sports cars captured one’s attention. [Read more…]