The Lean Season

Summer can be a lean season for some service businesses and in many cases, business owners are prepared for it. Customers are vacationing, perhaps putting off some purchases or services until September when life’s routine returns to normalcy. But if you’re a small business and this comes upon you unexpectedly, what can you do to make good use of that skimpier time?

Get your marketing in order! Set things in motion so that when customers have their heads back in the game, you’re ready for them.

Here are some ideas:

Look at your physical space. Can it use some updating? If you’re a shop owner, use this as a time for merchandising where you can invigorate your product layout. Take inventory of what’s selling and what products may be discounted to move them off the shelves and make way for the next season of items. If you’re in the service industry or in an office, this is a good time to get to all of that filing or to even put a fresh coat of paint on the walls. Whether your customers see it or not, it’s motivating to keep your workspace organized and refreshed.

Review your marketing materials. Are your print materials outdated? Can you create an inexpensive palm card to send out to draw new customers? Is your in-store signage looking good or could it be updated and brightened?

Go through your address book. Make a list of those people you want to target in the coming months. Don’t wait for your phone to ring; get out there and make new contacts or re-energize older ones.

Update your website. Websites need to be kept up to date. Some businesses don’t look at them again after they’re launched but realize that every time you make a change to your site, it goes up in the SEO (search engine optimization) ranks.  Besides, you want to make good use of your site and have an online platform that informs people about your business, so make it the best it can be.

Network. While business is slower, use the time to meet with local business networking groups. It’s an opportunity to get with like-minded people and brainstorm ideas or just make new contacts. Start with your local Chamber of Commerce.

Educate yourself. No matter what your industry is or how long you’ve been doing it, all of us can learn something new that will help our business. This is a perfect time to take an online course or attend some webinars to increase your knowledge. That will only serve to help your business.

Creative Vision is a boutique marketing form that works with small businesses. Give us a call (845) 988-8858 for a free consultation.

Educate, Don’t Sell.

Don’t focus on selling, focus on educating.

Think about it. When someone comes at you with a heavy sales pitch, you tend to tune them out. They haven’t developed your trust or established any basis for a trusting relationship. However, if someone talks to you about a product or idea, purely from the perspective of disseminating information or their viewpoint, you are automatically more engaged; more open to listening.

For this reason, we’ve found time and time again that a slow and steady email drip campaign is preferable to an advertisement. At each interval, you’re touching the person with new information in a creative and informing approach that they can choose to retain and act upon, or not. Each touch is a reminder that you’re there, your product is there, and there are additional benefits. You’re building awareness and encouraging a relationship. Every email adds another piece to the overall picture.

It doesn't matter if you’re selling insurance, financial services, or cookies. Email campaigns get results.

Think Before You Post…

While we agree that businesses should have a presence on social media sites and offer this marketing activity to many of our clients, there are rules to follow and you need to be mindful of your posts.

Don’t mix your business sites with your personal site. Period. Keep business for business. If some of your business associates happen to become friends, “friend” them on your personal site, but you should always keep these things separate. We see business all the time where the business owner is posting personal photos of their children or pets; your clients don’t need to see that. Some personal posts may even be “TMI” for your clients.

Another positive no-no is posting religious or political sentiments on your business page. Just as you wouldn’t bring that up in conversation with a client, don’t post in on a social media site. There are many examples when clients or customers are so turned off because they may not share a business’s opinions on these strong subjects that they actually “unfriend.” Your clients are Democrats and Republicans, Christians, Jews and Muslims and you want to remain neutral. So before you use your business page to endorse a political candidate or respond to any controversial posting, take a breath and move on. 

Effectively Manage Your Advertising

As a small business owner, you most likely don’t have anyone on your staff to manage your advertising. And chances are you aren’t actually managing your advertising as much as you are reacting to the multitude of calls, emails and visits from ad reps all clamoring to get your ad dollars. There is a better way.

By using an outside marketing agency, you no longer have to handle any of those ad calls as that becomes the job for your agency. They are the buffer and will deliver good or bad news on your behalf, while you remain unencumbered. And most importantly, they will make recommendations as to where you should be devoting your ad budget, and when.

Your marketing agency will take a broad look at all of the advertising possibilities and, with your budget firmly in mind, will strategically select those advertising opportunities that will afford you the greatest bang for your buck and that will target those audiences most important to your business objectives. Instead of a shotgun approach, they become the sniper who makes sure you’re hitting only those targets you select.

They are able to examine all of your marketing activities and determine what messaging will be best delivered by advertising and when to do that. They will take into account the frequency of your ads and the sizing, as well as making sure that your ad design is in keeping with your overall branding.

So don’t be overwhelmed when the ad reps start calling. Call your marketing agency - call Creative Vision and let us handle it for you. 

Summer Hours

Ahhhh…it’s almost summer and time for longer weekends. At Creative Vision, we always put in extra hours but in summer, we do try to take half the day on Fridays to extend the weekend a bit earlier and it works for us and those who work for us.

Summer hours have always been a standard at big NYC public relations or ad agencies, as well as other larger businesses and it was a time of year that employees looked forward to. After all of the late hours and even working weekends throughout the year, this was reward time. It meant you’d get out at 1pm on Fridays and have time to catch the early jitney to the Hamptons or try to beat the traffic to your summer house on the Jersey shore.

We’re wondering whether that applies to small businesses. Does your business use “summer hours” to motivate or reward employees? We believe shortened or altered workweeks during the summer months can be a great way to make your staff happier and more productive with no cost to your business.

That’s right…more productive! Summer hours don’t necessarily involve a shorter workweek. Many companies add time on to the rest of the days of the week so that employees can leave early on Fridays, or have every other Friday off. So as an employer, you can think of it more as an exchange of hours. Even if you don’t take this approach, and you actually give your employees every other Friday off or every Friday afternoon off, you’re likely to find that employees are supercharged to get their work done before that magical Friday hour approaches.

If you’re considering offering summer hours, here are some things to consider:

• Summer hours need to be offered to all employees equally. If that won’t work for you, then you need to figure out a different type of summer reward. 
• Make it clear to employees that if an urgent or emergency situation arises, you might have to rescind summer hours one week. 
• If you’re struggling with what type of summer schedule would work for your business, consider getting employees’ input—being on the front lines, they often have more insights into how to handle workflow.
• Once you create your summer hours policy, be sure to communicate it to all employees so there are no misunderstandings. Make it clear that summer hours are a privilege, not a right, and that your policy will change back to standard hours if workers abuse the privilege.

Summer hours can be a great way to reward your staff, take some time off yourself and save money on utilities and other expenses.

5 Tips to Tackle Your Small Business Marketing

Every business owner knows they should focus time on marketing, but between doing the daily work, meeting with clients, returning phone calls and emails, it seems it’s 10 p.m. before you sit down to think about it. And who can focus at that hour?

We find this to be the case with many of our clients. They know what they need and want to do, but there doesn’t seem to be enough hours in the day. Here are a few simple suggestions that may help:

• Create a “to do” list every day and incorporate one marketing-focused item. Just as you would not skip returning a sales call or getting to the bank, DON’T skip your marketing task. Make it a priority!

• Don’t bite off on too much. We are often overwhelmed because we think we need to do it all at once. Relax. Take a tiered approach. Today, carve out 15 minutes and call your local ad rep to review your ad schedule to make sure it’s up to date. Tomorrow, review your website and give a critical eye to what may need revision or freshening. By tackling one small element each day, you’ll be surprised at the end of the week how much you’ve accomplished!

• Get out of the office. Take face-to-face meetings. So many of us are overly dependent upon Facebook or email and don’t make a point of getting in front of our colleagues or potential customers. Take a lunch with a business associate. Stop in at a networking function. It doesn’t have to be something lengthy that will take you away from work for hours…just something to maintain your outside connections.

• Open a “Business Info” file. Ideas come at us from a variety of sources throughout the day. If you read an interesting article – even if you can’t read it in full – copy it into your file to read later. The same holds true if you’re listening to the radio and hear a good interview or learn of a good book. Copy it into your file so that when you do have a greater amount of time to devote to marketing ideas, you have them saved in one place!

• Look to your competition. There’s nothing more motivating for your own marketing than seeing what your competitors are up to. If they can do it, YOU can do it!

And we’re always here to help!

Broaden Your Network

We've been fortunate in our careers to work with some of the very best along the way. As a result, we've built a network of very solid professional relationships – many of which continue to this day. It is through these contacts and others that Creative Vision continues to grow.

There’s no science to this; you do your best and good things result. You surround yourself with people of integrity and good things result. You gain referrals and more people want to work with you. It’s the nature of business and it is important to note that every person you meet along the way is an opportunity.

That’s an organic process, but what about all of the networking that doesn't happen organically? Most often, networking must be intentional; something that you plan. How do you begin?

First, create your intention. Ask yourself what you hope to get out of an opportunity. Is it new leads, new referrals or a social outlet to talk shop and combat isolationism? Once you know your purpose you can chart your course – whether it’s face-to-face networking groups in your area such as those provided by chambers of commerce, civic organizations, or BNIs, online networking via social media, or more non-traditional opportunities such as some of those found in social settings like book clubs or hobby groups.

Then consider your approach. We’ve found that the “speech” you might prepare in your head often falls flat. People see that coming and may start to tune you out before you’re given a chance. It’s best to open a dialogue and exchange information through conversation rather than something contrived. This goes for online and social media interaction as well. Let it flow.

If you choose to take the face-to-face route and meet people via organizations, be prepared to get involved. There’s nothing worse than being part of a group in name only. These opportunities allow you to demonstrate your talents for a common cause so potential customers get to witness you in your element.

Whatever course you choose to take, approach it with openness and professionalism. And keep putting yourself out there. You’ll be surprised at the results.