heartharmony.com.au

We finally bit the bullet and moved our Small Business Ideas blog from a ftp published blog to one hosted on our own website.

Why did we do this? Well … the main reasons were to boost the page rank for our website combined with much better features and options on our own hosted blog.

While we have a permanent redirection in place, please amend your blogrolls to our new blog address

http://www.heartharmony.com.au/blog/

You can now also subscribe via RSS using the orange button on the top right of the page, or the subscribe feeds on the top left column. As we get to know our software a bit better, there will be more fantastic features joining our blog.

I look forward to keeping you up to date with copywriting tips, human resource strategies and business trends.

Ingrid Cliff

Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

Just a quick post to say we are back online. Transferring to a new web host can be a challenge but I am pleased to say that the guys at Host Gator were brilliant – they really did have 24/7 live support and everything appears to be ticking over perfectly.

It was fascinating having a day of no emails or website. I chose to take a mini-holiday and visit a trade-show that covered some of my personal interests just for fun. It was great having an IT free day (note to self – must schedule in at least one of these a week!)

Thanks for your patience during the upgrade.

Ingrid
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

Often businesses think about if they have outgrown a client – but do you ever think about if your client has outgrown you?

I had a call from one of my favourite suppliers the other day. We have become very close friends over the years and I happily refer stacks of people his way as I know his work ethic and quality of his work is impeccable.

The subject of the call … how I had outgrown his skill, knowledge and ability on the cutting edge stuff that I do, and how I needed to start searching for a higher skilled supplier.

This was a really hard call to take! But as a client I knew he was right. Over the years I have learnt a lot along the way and can mix it with the best of them in terms of geek stuff. My supplier is a brilliant generalist, but is not a specialist in the areas I now work within.

I admire my supplier’s honesty and ability to speak his truth even though it will cost his business money in the short term. I will still happily continue to refer people to him and still catch up for coffees as a friend.

Ethics in business – it is alive and well! Have any of your clients outgrown you?

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

If you have read my blog for any period of time, you know I love technology as a means to boost productivity. Technology can streamline your systems and make communicating with your clients a breeze. When it all works you save hours … when it doesn’t life can be hell!

Today I spent the day working on installing new affiliate software that integrates into Clickbank the company we use to drive our affiliate program.

The software itself is brilliant – but the manual that comes with it was “challenging”. It was obviously not edited by a freelance copywriter or written by someone with technical writing skills. It was therefore extremely difficult to follow and meant many wasted hours of trial and error before finally making everything work.

The lesson from this is many businesses write instructions for their products or services, or instructions for their clients. If these instructions are not professionally edited or checked with “real” customers you may be causing your clients endless frustration and potentially lose customers.

My tip if you are writing instruction manuals or sheets is to always have someone who knows nothing about your business to read it through and then follow the instructions. It is enlightening when you watch someone totally botch up what you thought was perfectly clear!

As an aside, if you are interested in promoting our Instant HR Policies and Procedures Manual or Employee Performance Reviews: Tips, Templates and Tactics, then check out our affiliate program where you can earn up to 50% commission on each sale.

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

Some people are predicting by Xmas petrol will be $2 per litre in Australia. This has significant impact on small businesses.

With your employees – some of them will begin to question if they can afford to continue to travel to your business if petrol costs continue to rise.

If you want to retain your team you need to look at options such as working from home a few days per week, petrol card bonuses once a month or organising car pooling within your office. Start NOW before you get the first resignation letter and tell everyone what you are doing – communicate clearly and repeatedly and you will head off some potential problems.

You also need to rethink all those meetings at different locations – you know the ones where people drive to your location for a meeting. People are going to start to ask – what is the return on investment for my petrol expense for attending this meeting?

This is a brilliant time to explore options such as Skype group chat or other virtual meeting technology.

Also look at the costs of your fleet on the road – maybe smaller cars are going to become your new company fleet standard rather than the big Commodores.

Petrol is a great opportunity for you to look at ways to improve your business bottom line and boost efficiency – if you just look at it that way!

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

One of the great things you can do for your clients is to send cards. They can be thank you cards (thanks for being a new client), happy birthday cards, happy anniversary (for the month a person became your client for the first time) or as I did this week happy new financial year cards to all of my copywriting and consulting clients from the last financial year.

Cards make you stand out from the crowd and help you to become memorable. A hand written card in the mail is a very personal thing compared to an email. Cards are a great client nurturing strategy – reminding clients you are thinking of them helps them to know you value them as a client.

It is also a great way to say thank you to people who have made a difference to your life – whether a client or the person who makes you great coffee at the Coffee Shop.

The trick to this strategy is to be organised.

Over at agoodsort.com blog they talked about some tips to get organised with cards. One of their tips includes pre-purchasing cards and writing a reminder in your diary or calendar about a week out from the event to remind you.

One of my clients uses a monthly concertina file with a list of upcoming events for that month along with cards for those events. They then post them out in the first few days of that month.

I have a pile of great Thank You cards and postcards in a drawer that whenever I get great service I jot a note to the company and post the card off that day with the outgoing mail.

Whatever your system, a little bit of organisation will generate great results – both in terms of customer retention as well as the nice feeling you give to other people when you remember them.

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

In HR World, Spherion conducted a survey that found 19% of office workers reported they had stolen office supplies for personal use. Only 22% felt guilty and 74% knew that it was wrong.

When I was in government we tracked the amount of office supplies ordered over a few years and discovered some very interesting trends.

Office supply ordering spiked at return to school times and end of financial year. It could be merely that all companies advertise office supplies at that time so people were more aware of them … or it could be they were being lifted with greater regularity for personal use by the 17% who owned up to stealing supplies in the Spherion survey.

In many companies I worked with, the arrival of a new mega catalogue of office supplies was greeted with as much joy as the arrival of the coffee van bearing free cakes for everyone. People would line up to read the catalogue and would pore for hours over the pages.

For some reason people love stationery! One of the best examples of capitalising on this passion is the store Smiggle. If you don’t know what Smiggle is you obviously don’t have primary school children or teens. Smiggle dominates that market with funky office supplies. The store has major pester power – kids plan their trip to Smiggle with as much excitement as going to a theme park. If you don’t have Smiggle stationery at school you are part of the uncool crowd.

But it’s only office supplies!

What about the humble pen and eraser can make people so excited? I am still trying to work that one out – but there is something about office supplies that can make grown people go gaga and kids turn into pestering monsters.

If you have a Smiggle store near you – check it out. Spend some time in the store trying to work out what about their products is unique. It is not the prices, it is definitely not the service or decor of the store. They have something that is very hard to define and they have captured a particular niche market.

Me … I am off to Officeworks tomorrow for my end of financial year office supplies buying blitz (bring on the archive boxes!).

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

Last week we upgraded to the latest version of Quickbooks for 08/09. Unremarkable you may think.

Well – Quickbooks has done a great job on “pimping” the look and feel of their program for better usability. The one thing they still haven’t done after all these years is work out the documentation side of things. You have the help file which is average at best … but if you really want to learn the package you either need to pay to attend training or go and buy a book.

I decided on the Quickbooks for Dummies series – doing my research on the net as to what was available and which was the Australian edition that matched the latest Quickbooks software.

Then it REALLY got interesting. I wanted the book yesterday so thought I would just pop down to the local store to get it. My thinking was … end of financial year, with all the people wanting to ensure they were doing the right thing financially bookstores would be swimming in the top selling guide for one of the two major financial pieces of software. Wrong!

4 major shopping centres and countless bookstores later … Some major booksellers couldn’t find anything to do with the Dummies series (even to order it in – what planet are they living on). Others could order the US edition but not the Australian edition.

I finally tracked down a copy of the essential manual in time for the start of the new financial year in an obscure book-store miles away from home (but it was still cheaper and faster than ordering on line).

The good news was the Quickbooks QB for Dummies Australian Edition manual was great – I learnt lots of tips and tricks I had not heard of before and now have everything just about in readiness for the end of financial year.

The lesson for me was how unfocused were all of the major booksellers on what else was happening in the world.

End of financial year happens each year. Each year people will want to get ready for tax time, improve their financial knowledge and generally get organised. And yet not one store had a display table or promo with end of financial year books and office supplies. They didn’t have any stock of the top selling books (even MYOB books had disappeared in most bookstores).

This is a major lost opportunity for the booksellers. They are missing a peak selling opportunity by not creating a promotion that matches the main calendar events.

For your business – what have you done to reflect this time of year? Do you have any special promotions or services that tie into the end of financial year? If not … why not?

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

One of the job markets that is really crying out for people is copywriting. People need people who can write great words … words that get attention, generate action and help websites get found in the massive e-marketplace.

I have been speaking with a number of my colleagues lately and we are all in the same boat. We would love to be able to subcontract out some of our work if we could find the right writers.

Some of my colleagues specialise in writing short articles for the web, others in editing brochures, some ghost-write and then there are people like me who love “long copy” websites as well as all other web copy and corporate writing.

If you currently write and are interested in subcontracting … drop me an email, and with your consent I will pass on your details to my colleagues (or keep you to myself!).

If you have thought about writing I can also refer you to some great courses to polish up your skills. Drop me a line and I will send you a link to some sites.

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words

The best businesses all have passion woven throughout them. Passion for the product, passion for serving the customer, passion for solving a particular challenge and passion for giving back.

Some days it is hard to remember what your particular passion was with your business. On those days it is great to check out the inspiration of other businesses fueled with passion. Pink Heels blog had a great post about a few businesses inspired by passion – businesses run by women who left the relative safety of a J-O-B and who started their own business.

If you are having “one of those days” – rediscover your inspiration by checking out passionate businesses and see what makes them great.

Ingrid Cliff
Heart Harmony

Putting your business into words