Do you have a website?

You’re aware that the internet is one of the most popular and cost-effective methods to promote your company, your products or your services. You know that a website can be one of your biggest business assets but did you know that a poor website can be even more damaging to your business than no website at all? Think about it, there’s no embarrassment clicking off a site that doesn’t grab you (unlike face to face where people tend to be more polite!). If you’ve got a website that’s doing nothing to help you grow your business, today is the day to ask yourself what you’re going to do about it...

How easy are you to contact?

Have you ever felt really compelled to buy or request further information on a website, only to be turned right back off again when it takes you 947 minutes to find the contact details? Yes, me too! Make sure your contact details are clear and visible on every page of your site. If you have long pages, place them top and bottom (and even somewhere in the middle!)!

How’s your traffic?

Whether you’re selling a service or promoting a product, it’s really important that you make sure your website is working as hard as it possibly can for you. You’re sure to know how many contacts (or sales) you get from your site, but do you know how many people visit your site each day, each week or each month? This is super important! Think about it….envisage a supermarket, with the aisles full, but no one at the checkout! Hard to imagine? Many websites are exactly like this – lots of visitors, but little or no contact or selling. This is often unbeknown to their owners because they don’t look at their site traffic! Even hugely successful online businesses have made improvements to their bottom line thanks to a bit of traffic analysis. Maybe it's worth a look at yours?

Your profitable customers

Do you know exactly who your profitable customers are? What makes them profitable? Do you know exactly what they buy from you; when; how often and at what price? Do you really know them? Do you always relate to them personally when you communicate with them? Have you ever asked them to buy more from you? Are they buying your competitors goods or services when they could be buying yours? Do you know exactly what percentage of your entire customer base is profitable; does it change; is it something you monitor? What are your thoughts on your unprofitable customers? Food for thought, but worth a nibble nonetheless!

How do you set your prices?

When setting your prices, what do you think about first? What you're selling or who you're selling to? Quite often, it’s more important to think about who you're selling to than what you're selling. At one time a cup of coffee was a cup of coffee. Today, that cup of coffee comes with a whole language of its own and choices broader than Charlton Heston’s shoulders! Starbucks doesn’t just sell coffee; they sell community, status, and experience. We pay dearly for that experience - what we pay for goes way beyond the 2 centimes worth of coffee they serve us. This is a great example of how price no longer directly relates to product. It's quite a tough one, but applying this logic to your products or services, you can not only drastically improve your bottom line, you'll have loads more success appealing to the top end of your market. Maybe it's time to review your pricing policy?

Your Customer Service Policy

No Customer Service Policy? Think it sounds too grand for a small biz – think again! On the days when you’re not quite as motivated as usual or not “firing on all cylinders” a Customer Service Policy will be what sees you through! If you haven’t got one, start thinking about it now. Have you ever asked your customers what they think of your service? If not, it’s a great excuse to “touch-base” with them today. How important do you think customer service is? Think about your own buying experiences before you dismiss it as trivia! Identify your successes and your failings and act on them. Exceptional customer service is a great way of adding value to your product or service at zero cost. Once you have your policy, spell it out on all your promotional material- it’s one of the best ways to set you aside from your competitors.

Your elevator pitch

Imagine the future of your biz depends on you being able to describe or sell it to someone in the short time you spend with them in a lift from the ground to the fourth floor! Your success depends on getting into your short pitch – who you are; why you are a major factor in their future happiness/success/wealth; what only you can do for them and how they should get in touch with you. Once you’ve done that, you’ve got an elevator pitch – once you’ve got it, use it - it's particularly powerful in networking situations!

Your USP’s (unique selling points)

USP's are the unique reasons why your customers choose you and not your competitors. What are YOUR USP’s? Although this is probably one of the hardest questions you’ll face in your business, it's well worth the struggle of identifying them. Aim to identify at least 3. If you’re really stuck, ask your customers! At the end of the day these are your biggest and most important selling points. Once you’ve identified them, get to know them (broadcast them whenever you get the chance!); get them on all your publicity; make sure they appear on your website before scrolling - treat them as your major message to the world!

Know your competitors

Even if you think you’re unique, you have competitors – sorry! It’s essential to your business success to know who they are; know why you lose out to them and to know what they're doing that you’re not. Once you know a bit about them go and buy from them; find out how you can identify their customers (it’s not as impossible as it sounds!) and how you can communicate with their customers to persuade them to try your product or service. If all else fails, look at the possibility of working in partnership with your competitors or even taking them over. In tough times it’s often the small nimble businesses that end up gobbling up the monsters – it could be you!

How's your Sales Process?

Even if you don’t respond to customer enquiries, you’ve got a Sales Process (in this case, it’s to do nothing!). To help grow your biz: first and foremost realise you’ve got a Sales Process; second analyse it and finally see where you can improve it. Timing, wording and personalisation are the top three ways to streamline your Sales Process. Take a long hard look at yours today. Look at your competitors (if necessary buy from them!). If all else fails, put yourself in the shoes of the buyer – is your Sales Process good, bad or downright ugly? Be honest with yourself – even small improvements can make a huge difference to your bottom line!

Advertising to boost your biz?

If you're thinking an advert or two might give you that extra push your business needs to get the tills ringing, there's a few things worth thinking about beforehand. First, know the difference between brand and direct response advertising. Don’t even consider brand advertising unless you’ve got a budget the size of a Bengal tiger. Second, know exactly what you want your potential customers to do and make sure you ask them to do it in the ad! Third, choose your publication very carefully and speak to other advertisers in your sector to see if it's working for them. Then, make your advert as simple as ABC – get your potential customer's Attention, present the Benefits of choosing you and ask for Contact. Also, never advertise on the left hand side of a printed publication and fight with all your might to get your ad "above the fold". Finally, NEVER pay the published price for your advert!

Get some PR for your biz

Knowing the difference between PR and advertising is essential. Without that knowledge you're wasting your efforts! To succeed with your own PR campaign you need a story; your message must be newsworthy, current and appealing to the readership of the publication you're targetting. If you're going to give it a shot, try not to send the same message to different publications – target your message to each readership and you’ll stand a much better chance of success. Choose your publications for a reason – start small and build up – make your mistakes with the minnows not the mammoths! Present your story on one side of A4 max and include an eye-catching photo. Be objective about what you're planning to send – if you were a journo – would you print it??? Send it on a Friday afternoon – chances are they’ll have had a long lunch and be desperate to fill next weeks columns!