One of the wonderful things about running a small business is that you know what’s going on; well of course you do, you are doing most of it.

And because you know what’s going on, because your right hand talks to your left hand, you can get through most customer interactions without making too many mistakes.

Clearly not so at the big end of town.

On Monday 2 March I tentatively signed up for an Aircard from, well let’s just say BigTelco. That in itself was far from pain free but it’s a story for another time. On signing up BigTelco gave me a delivery date of Friday 13 March, unlucky for some, and they were at great pains to tell me that I would have to stay home all day so that I could receive the Aircard in person.

A few days after signing up I realized that the Aircard deal probably didn’t really suit me, so I called BigTelco and cancelled. Easy, done in just a couple of minutes.

Friday 13 March came and my Google calendar helpfully reminded me to stay home all day to wait for the Aircard. Having cancelled said card I knew I didn’t need to stay home but I happened to be having a full writing-at-home day anyway so I did. And I must confess, as sneaky little part of me couldn’t help but half expect the doorbell to ring and the Aircard to be on my doorstep.

I was wrong.

The courier and the cancelled Aircard arrived, rather randomly, on Wednesday 18 March at 10:15am.

The lovely thing about doing business with a small business, is you rarely get a visit from the 'F up Fairy' ;small businesses listen, they don’t make mistakes.

Normally I listen to music rather than books when I go for a walk, but I am a woman, I make exceptions. And so last week I found myself, after discovering both audible.com and a particularly must-hear-now book, striding along to the sound of a gravelly American.

The reason that I would not normally countenance listening to a book while walking (or driving for that matter) is that I read a lot of non-fiction and, rather annoyingly, I simply find it impossible to read without making notes. It’s a little like having a nervous twitch, the more I try not to make notes, the more I do.

So although I was willing to give it a go (if only to save time by exercising brain and body simultaneously) I thought I would find the listen-and-walk scenario deeply frustrating; especially as I deliberately didn’t take a notebook and pen with me. Thought it might have looked rather odd.

Anyway, the whole thing was fantastic. I can’t remember much of what the gravelly American said, but something must have been useful, for by the time I got home I had worked up a whole new concept for a business piece.

So I’m going to carry on taking the gravelly American on walks with me, if just to get my brain thinking creatively. And nyway, I can always listen to him again, at home with a pen in hand.

 I was idly listening to the radio this morning, on my way to the post office, when the presenter (who sounded like a Simon so let’s just call him that) said “I want to know which Coldplay song you would like me to play next, so just text me now on 19xxx. “

It sounded so much like he was talking to me that I almost ignored the fact the number he read out clearly wasn’t a private mobile. I nearly did something that I never do; I all but texted “Violet Hill” to a radio station.

I didn’t actually do it; a moment of sanity reminded me that far from texting a friend I would have been sending a message to the computer and back office of Today FM. Still, it made an impression.

And it got me thinking about what an upside down world we live in. Big organizations do everything they can to make us feel like we are connecting with an individual (Simon) rather than a machine (Today FM), while, ironically, us Kitchen Table Tycoons pretend to our customers that we have a machine (“one of our team will call you back”) when really we are just the genuine individual article.

Here’s the juice: would we get more business if we dumped the pretence of being big and were overt with the fact that our customers get to talk to us, the boss, directly?

 

I agree it sounds unlikely but it is eminently possible to have a small business with a big brand. My good friend Carolyn Stafford tells you all about how to in her book of the same name “Small Business Big Brand”. You can find out more about it here.

If you are feeling lucky, are interested in marketing and have 5 minutes up your sleeve, why don’t you complete Carolyn’s marketing survey;  you may win a copy of the book.

The survey is on Facebook,  takes 5 mins to do (do it with a cuppa) and at the end it will show you how you are doing, marketing-wise, against the competition.

Here’s the link to the survey

http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://www.surveymonkey.com%2Fs.aspx%3Fsm%3D8gTjHzj264YEO1bea3Uv_2bg_3d_3d

Randwick Ritz, a hugely popular small independent cinema, is nestled between restaurants, beauticians and a dance shop.

 

The closest restaurant to the cinema used to be a bistro while the rest are almost exclusively Thai. Makes sense, movie goers are looking for speedy tasty pre-movie food.

 

About 2 months ago the Bistro transformed itself into The Spanish Fly, a tapas restaurant. We tried it and the food was both fantastic and quick.

 

So we sort of made it our regular and because we go to the early-evening movie never had any trouble getting a table.

 

Until last night that is, when it was fully booked; a feat that the Bistro had never achieved.

 

It seems The Spanish Fly has become the pre-movie movie dinner place.

 

How did it manage that?

 

 I don’t think it’s because of its location –after all it didn’t work for its predecessor the Bistro – but rather because the type of food it serves, Tapas, is authentically quick.

 

Of course the Spanish Fly does great service and great taste – that goes without saying. But the real difference seems to be that as a pre-movie diner you get to enjoy a quick bite to eat rather than a bite to eat quickly.

Which just goes to show that, depending what you do with it, the same opportunity (location, pre-movie diners) can be the foundation of a roaring success or something that’s really just a bit ho-hum.

 

 

 

 

Ideally you would arrange all the stuff on your computer in logical files so you can find it.

Ideally you would back up daily or weekly.

Ideally you wouldn’t get your computer stolen.

It didn’t happen to me but it did happen to my friend Jude yesterday. So after commiserating with her I dashed home to back up. Well it’s taken me all day to reorganise my files into something that resembles a useful order and then to do all that boring backing-up.

But it’s done

Daily Juice: Note to self; save logically and back up

One of my friends sends fabulous personal thank you cards regularly to her customers, referrers, contacts.....in fact pretty much anyone that she thinks needs to feel special (and it's such a good technique that this coming week I will Daily Juice how she actually does it).

I saw her today and she looked a bit less-than. And the reason? She had spent all day writing the cards.

She knows that the cards are her statement, that they win her business, and that they are important.

And she loves doing them.

But it's hard, hard work.

So her less-than look reminded me that success comes from doing the right things again and again and again and again...not just the once.

And It's not glamorous!

Boffins at Harvard did an experiment; one Tuesday they gave two groups of people $20 to spend. The first group were told to spend the money on themselves and the second group were told to spend it on others.

On Tuesday night both groups had their level of happiness tested, and guess who felt happier? Yes, the group that were told to spend the money on others.

Todays juice:

Two ways to get happy into your business:

• Make a donation today to something or someone you feel strongly about
• Give your employees (if you have any) a few dollars to donate.

PS….my donations……I’m going donating 10% of author royalties from How to Bake a Business to Sydney Children’s hospital.

Dear Nigella

Straight off my Santa wish list, my fabulous Mother-in-law sent me your “Nigella Express” for Christmas.  I cooked up a few stove top savoury dishes pretty much straight away – all easy to make and tasted good. Just as promised.

So tonight I decided to quickly whizz up some Chocolate Mint Cookies in preparation for a little gathering I am having at my home tomorrow morning, confident in the knowledge that you will guide me comfortably and efficiently through the process.

But Nigella, what happened. You let me down, you started confusing me, you changed…

 

First of all you told me to put the oven on at 350F, but you didn’t tell me the Centigrade. Are you feeling forgetful? I am fortunate that my oven doesn’t understand numbers higher than 250 so I quickly realised your mistake and I fixed it with a Google. Just for the record, I think you meant 177C.

Then you started talking about “cups”. A cup of sugar? In “How to Eat” and “How to be a Domestic Goddess” you always spoke to me in grams. What happened, did you lose your scales? As luck would have it I do happen to have a set of (unused) “cup” measures but I think I need you to show me how I measure a cup of butter without making an almighty mess.

And talking about butter; when did you start buying “sticks” of the stuff and, more to the point, where on earth do you buy it?

Oh Nigella for someone so precise I was rather surprised when you just directed me to use “flour” in this recipe. You left me wondering whether you meant “self raising” or “plain”. I took a punt and went with the latter  - which was just as well as no sooner had I taken this bold step than did you tell me to add some Baking Powder to it. I am now seriously worried about you. You and I have been friends for a long time and I have never known you to tell me to use two ingredients where one will do just as well. Have you forgotten that the nice people at the supermarket sell “self raising” so that we don’t have to bother with the Baking Powder bit?

Nigella, I really don’t wish to overwhelm you with my observations so I will stop my ramblings here; save for one last question, what, in heavens name, is “powdered sugar”? I rather think that you mean icing sugar, but if so, darling Nigella, why on earth don’t you just say that.

Oh. Oh Nigella. I was just closing your book (in only mild disgust because the cookies turned out to be fantastic) when I noticed the little red circle saying “as seen on the food network”. Hmm. We don’t have a “food network” do we? Well not in Australia where I live, nor England whence you and I hail. But they do in America, don’t they.

So I understand it now, you haven’t gone all odd at all. It’s Mother In Law. She has been unfaithful. She has been canoodling with amazon.com and deserted, if only momentarily, amazon.co.uk. And somewhere, there is another version of your glorious book which talks to me in weights and centigrade and understands that we buy self raising flour and icing sugar, and, most probably, knows that the brown things I cooked tonight weren’t cookies at all, but biscuits.

 

Today’s juice: have you changed the way you say things in your business. Maybe described your services differently or rebadged your products? While it might make complete sense to you, such changes confuse us mere customers. We are creatures of habit, we trust you because you are familiar. So please, unless you really have to change your terminology, don’t.

Just finished reading Maggie Alderson’s hilarious and slightly sad “How to break your own heart”.

The book has nothing to do with business and everything to do with 37 year old Amelia who is aching to have children and is married to a man who point blank refuses to start a family.

The no-baby-round-here husband runs a wine brokerage business called Bradlow’s and somewhere towards the middle of the book Amelia refers to the “immaculate service that was all part of the Bradlow’s image”

I love that word. Immaculate. It’s not in the fluffy genre like ‘quality’, ‘great’ and fantastic’, instead it’s tough and exacting. Something to really live up to.   So today’s juice: Is immaculate service part of your brand? Should it be?   Oh yes and if you have time, take a break and read the book. It’s fun.