3 Easy steps To The First Holiday Dad Has Had In Years.

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Does the prospect of going away on holiday away from your business fill you with dread?

Are you exhausted and teetering on the brink of burn out?

Are you feeling like you can’t take a break away as you are the only one who can do the key tasks in your business?

Give yourself a present this Father’s Day! By following these three simple steps you’ll be packing your bags in no time.

 

1. Identify your core business processes which are repeatable on many jobs.

If you can review what you do for customers, you will most likely find that there are core processes you perform over and over again in each job. Identify what these are so that you have a finite list of service offerings for your clients.

 

2. Break your business processes down into step by step tasks.

Next time you are doing a job in your business take some extra time and write down the step by step tasks associated with that job. The desired outcome here is a check list which can be followed and ticked off as each task is completed. The aim of this is to get the knowledge out of your head and documented, making it possible for another team member to do the job.

 

3. Collect knowledge using cloud base applications.

Capture the process of completing these key tasks via screen capture software such as Snag It. Set up a knowledge manage system and store videos for your team to refer to when they need to complete each task. Over time you will build a library of knowledge that team members can access at any given time.

By putting these three steps into place you truly can pack that suitcase. Start planning for your holiday now. If you would like further information on this download our e-book.

Specialising in Xero bookkeeping, Notch Above is a Brisbane bookkeeper and BAS Agent located in Alderley that offers Xero setup, as well as training and ongoing support. Notch Above can take care of all the bookkeeping tasks you would rather not do, like bank reconciliations, supplier payments, payroll services, debtor control and BAS returns.

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Small Business Marketing Pt2

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The top 10 must-have tips for email marketing

Part I of this guide focused on small business marketing on a budget and the tools to do this. There are many different ways of marketing to your customers, ranging from direct mail to telephone calls, online banners to radio ads, Facebook to Twitter. But businesses often see high returns from email marketing.

As Constant Contact says, that’s because people regularly check their email and spend a lot of time in front of it. Sending email is cheap, too, but how do you get your message across effectively?

  1. Build relationships with your readers
    Not all of your readers are the same. Some may be lifelong customers, while others will be new to your business, so segmenting your email lists is very important. Have a goal in mind when you send an email, whether it’s attracting new customers to your store, driving traffic to your website or simply raising awareness. That goal should dictate how you craft your message. Take your time to think this through, so your customers feel connected to you.
  2. Start small
    Don’t send your first email newsletter to your entire mailing list. Start small, with perhaps a few dozen or a few hundred recipients. Then watch the response. If it’s good, send it to more people. If it’s not, tweak and test out a new version.
  3. Make it easy to opt in and opt out
    Email marketing is permission based. That mean customers have indicated (through a sign-up form on a website or a number of other ways) that they want to receive emails from you. But they might change their mind. As important as it as to make it easy for people to receive your emails, you must also make it easy for them to opt out or unsubscribe. Be sure to follow their wishes, or risk being labeled a spammer.
  4. Personalise your emails
    If half your customers are middle-aged women then there’s no point sending them emails offering cheap football boots. Or is there? If their children play sports at school, they could be just the customers you’re looking for. This is why business information is so important. Never make assumptions. Use the data to find out what you need to know, then send the right offers to the right customers.
  5. Use good content to keep your readers engaged
    Think of the recipients of your emails as more than customers. Think of them as readers too. Give them a narrative, a story about the products you’re selling. Help them to engage with your products, to find a way to weave them into their own lives. Your emails should not just be used as a sales vehicle but also as an opportunity to foster relationships. Be sure to include helpful hints and best practices that will bring value to your readers. Keep your content interesting and fresh, and always relevant. You will build an engaged audience of loyal customers this way.
  6. Strike a balance with length
    It’s important to find the sweet spot in terms of the length of your emails. You need to figure out what’s going to be most effective for the majority of people on your list. Keep in mind that a lot of emails are read on mobile devices, so you’re working with less real estate. On the other hand, an email can be too short. If there isn’t sufficient content to grab your readers’ interest, they’ll move on to the next email. It’s all about testing out different options to find a balance that works for you and your readers.
  7. Get the tone right
    There’s a fine line between marketing emails that add value and are welcomed by the recipient, and ‘spam’ or junk mail which will be deleted immediately. Don’t go over the top with exclamation marks and wild claims. Try to use a friendly, authoritative but not arrogant tone. Your goal is to get the customer on your side and keep them there.
  8. Offer something of value
    There’s nothing wrong with simply listing your products and their prices. That’s useful information for people who are already looking to buy. But you can go further, to convert those who are undecided. Offer discounts for people ordering in response to your email. Two-for-one deals, discounts on multiple purchases, free shipping for orders over a certain value – there are plenty of ways to add value and get your customers to spend more.
  9. Track email responses
    With the right software, email marketing lets you track the response of your campaigns, by embedding unique links into each message. Some of the response metrics might include:

    • Who opened your email.
    • Which links in the email were clicked.
    • Who forwarded your email to others.
    • Who shared your email on social media.
    • Which emails led to sales, online reviews, event registrations and other destinations.

    This will provide insight into the type of information your audience is most interested in, and will give you a benchmark to improve upon every time you hit ‘Send’.

  10. Don’t spam!
    Sending out email ‘blasts’ of generic, over-the-top sales text is a waste of time – for you and for your customers. You’ll lose existing subscribers faster than you can sign up new ones. Effective email marketing takes time, thought, and consideration. You must be focused on building relationships.

Email communication is a good way to hone your marketing skills. Once you’ve mastered it, you can move on to other outlets, such as social media and mobile marketing. Although the platforms might be different, many of the skills and tactics required are the same.

Does your business need a mobile site

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First impressions are important

Your customers and prospects are on the move and often in a hurry. And it’s likely they’re on a mobile device while looking for products or services online. This means it’s vital you have a well-designed and well-written mobile site to make a great first impression. Without one, you could be losing valuable sales. It’s estimated that 57% of mobile users will leave your website if doesn’t load after three seconds. And 30% of users will abandon a purchase if the shopping cart isn’t designed for a mobile device.

A mobile site is a great way to quickly introduce your brand and offering to people. If you then decide your customers could benefit from a mobile app, you can look at going down that path too.

 

Think about what your customers need

Rather than think about mobile sites or apps as tools to choose between, consider the needs of your customers first. What will be most beneficial to them? Consider where, when, how and why they want to interact with your business. This will help you decide whether you need a mobile site as well as a mobile app.

 

How are mobile sites and apps different?

An app is a piece of software created for a specific purpose. It’s built for a certain type of device or mobile platform.

Apps are usually downloaded by customers once they have an idea about your product or service. If an app has useful content, is easy to use and provides clear benefits, it will give your customers a reason to keep using it. You can form a valuable relationship.

A mobile website is just a version of your website viewed on a mobile device. In the early days of mobile technology, most businesses had two versions of their site: the desktop version and the mobile version. This was popular for awhile but it started to cause problems and was costly to manage.

Today, well-designed websites are built to be mobile-friendly or ‘responsive’. A responsive site adjusts seamlessly to work on mobile devices, tablets and desktops. For example, large images that are unnecessary on a smaller device may be hidden. Menus only display when a menu button is selected. Other on-screen elements may be neatly stacked on top of one another when viewed on smaller screens.

Mobile sites and mobile apps have different purposes. You need to understand these before deciding where to invest your time, energy and money.

 

The advantages of a mobile site

Mobile websites are used more by customers and prospects who are engaging with you for the first time. Or they may be early on in the buying cycle at the ‘just looking’ stage. Here are some advantages:

  1. You can reach a broader audience
    Every mobile user has access to a mobile browser. So any new customer or prospect using a search engine will be able to find your business.


  2. It’s easy to publish and update content
    With a mobile website, it’s easy for you to make updates and changes to your content. This can be done using your website’s content management or publishing system. Changes and updates can be instant. Apps often take longer to update.


  3. Mobile sites are available across multiple devices
    A mobile website works on any device. You don’t need to create and maintain a different website for different browsers or platforms.


  4. You have flexible design options
    You don’t need to comply with the standards, guidelines and requirements of an app store or marketplace. You just need your website, a domain name (URL) and web hosting.

The advantages of a mobile app

Remember that mobile apps are more likely to be for people who already know something about your business. They usually have a good idea who you are and what you offer. You’ve given them a good reason to download your app. Here are some advantages of apps:

  1. Your customers can focus on a specific task or purpose
    Think about the common tasks your customers perform, for example, buying food, checking their account or browsing products. An app can provide a clean and simple interface that lets your customers do this quickly and easily. Plus, it provides you with a direct and uninterrupted marketing channel.


  2. You can provide a customised or personalised experience
    An app collects lots of information about your customers. This makes it easier to offer them personalised communication based on their interests, location, usage, contacts and more.


  3. Apps handle complexity well
    Apps are perfect for calculations, charts or reports for your customers. For example, an app can quickly provide financial history, fitness reports or listening recommendations.


  4. Your customers can use an app offline
    Apps provide your customers with access to your content or functions without an internet connection. So for instance, your customers can still read articles, listen to podcasts or browse product catalogues while offline. As soon as they’re back online, the app can then pass the stored information to your server or database.


  5. Quick to serve up content
    A well-designed mobile app performs actions much faster than a mobile website does. Apps usually store data on the the mobile device, in contrast to websites that generally use web servers. This means that mobile apps send and receive customer data swiftly.


  6. Extra functions are available
    A mobile app can be designed with a lot of elaborate functions. These are based on the gestures people use on a mobile device. Examples are ‘tap,’ ‘swipe,’ ‘drag,’ ‘pinch,’ ‘hold,’ and more.

Mobile sites and apps have some shared advantages

Whether you focus your attention on a mobile site or a mobile app, both offer some great functions. Whatever you do, make sure customers can easily:

  • Buy from you
    If you have an online store, your mobile site or app should provide an easy purchasing process.


  • Find their way around
    Always make sure your customers can achieve key tasks quickly and easily without frustration.


  • Call you
    Let customers call your business with one click or tap.


  • Find you on a map
    Make it easy for customers to get directions to your business without searching or typing your address.


  • Check your opening hours
    Business hours can be a selling point so display them prominently. If you’re an early-morning coffee shop, for example, you want parents to know you’re serving, when their kids get them up.


  • Sign up for alerts and emails
    Provide a quick and easy way for people to sign up for marketing lists and loyalty programs.


  • Share your content
    Make sure your social sharing buttons are prominent so that users can easily share your content.

Think about your business goals to get the most out of mobile

Your business may already have a mobile site and possibly an app as well. If you haven’t created a mobile site or an app, now’s the time to start. Like any business investment, some fundamental questions still apply:

  • What are your business objectives?


  • What do you want people to do when they find your business on a mobile device?


  • What do you need to provide to get new customers or prospects to take that action?


  • What are the pros and cons of a mobile app and mobile website for your business? Make two lists.


  • What are the costs and benefits for your business of each?

Mobile usage surpassed desktop computer use years ago. Now it’s not just about having a mobile plan in place – but about how fast you can implement it. The mobile marketing landscape is complex. But with a solid plan that fits your brand, and by working with the latest technologies, you can gain a competitive advantage.

marketing planning meeting

Small Business Marketing Pt1

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Marketing on a budget

Large businesses often have dedicated marketing departments with big budgets, because it’s not enough just to create a product or service – you also have to tell people about it.

Small businesses are at a disadvantage here, because they don’t have the funds or the staff to run big marketing campaigns. In fact the marketing manager in a small business might also be the PR manager, customer service representative and advertising director!

Constant Contact says small businesses have advantages in other areas. They can move fast, are nimble, and have access to tools that can help them do marketing on a budget. Connected tools are especially handy, using the cloud to quickly and efficiently dig into business data to find useful leads.

You probably already have the information your small business needs to conduct successful marketing for your small business. All you need to do is analyse it properly. Constant Contact has made it easy to stay in touch with your customers and persuade them to become loyal customers.

 

Five ways customer data contains hidden gold

Everyday business operations generate a lot of data. Emails to and from customers, POS (point of sale) records and social media interactions are full of valuable information. Analysts call some of this unstructured data, because it isn’t processed or ‘mined’ for business use.

That’s a shame – and potentially a financial loss – because this information can give businesses a boost. For example:

  1. Seasonal trends
    We all know that t-shirts sell better in summer months and woolly hats sell better in winter. But what about more subtle seasonal variations? What’s the best stock to carry halfway through spring, or at the end of autumn? Do trends follow the months of the year precisely? How much variation is due to the weather? POS data will help you out here, but only if you analyse it properly.


  2. Who’s buying what?
    These days it’s not enough to know that your customers are buying your products. You need to know which customers are buying which products. Age, gender, socio-economic demographics, all of this is vital marketing information. Loyalty schemes can help here, which is why so many businesses use them. But digging into your data will also tell you a lot about customers’ purchasing patterns.


  3. Multiple purchases – how are they linked?
    Your POS system will record every sales transaction, including details of products that are bought together. This can help you create special linked promotions, but first you have to get that information out of the system and into a readable form.


  4. Marketing new products
    Customers might like your product but want it to do new things, or do existing things differently. Before you start the purchase or design phase for an upgraded model, analyse your customer feedback on social media and email. It will tell you what your customers want, which will save you a lot of time – and help you market the finished product to them.


  5. Complaints patterns
    Are the same complaints cropping up time and time again in emails and on social media? Analysing this data will help you identify problem areas in your business and fix them. Then you can tell your customers about your improved service – which is a form of marketing for your small business.

So looking at business data can uncover valuable insights. It can tell you what types of products your customers prefer, whether they like purchasing in-store or online, what time of year and even what time of day a customer makes the most purchases. It can also tell you why they might return something they bought, and what new stock you should consider buying or creating.

Once you have this knowledge you can set up intelligent marketing campaigns to sell more of your products or services. But first you must extract the information you need.

3 Tips to work smarter, not harder

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The more efficient you can be in running your business, the more time you have for other important tasks. Small business accounting software provider, Xero, shares ways that you can work smarter, not harder.

  1. PLAN
    This should be the first thing you do at the start of the day. Start by writing down all the things you need to get done. Break the bigger and more complicated tasks into their component pieces so they’re more achievable and less intimidating. Now number the tasks in order of priority. (Try to get some of the unpleasant tasks out of the way first – it will make the rest of the day seem easier.)
    Keep the list somewhere visible so you can regularly check it throughout the day and cross off tasks.
  2. OUTSOURCE
    Virtual assistants are perfect to perform administrative tasks (like answering the phone, typing, research, presentations or social media) as needed, so you can only pay for what you use.
    Once you’ve found an assistant online that you like the look of, try them out with a couple of small jobs to see how they go.
  3. USE DOWNTIME
    As part of your daily planning process, make a list of small tasks that you can do at any time. These might be things like phoning back some clients, ordering stationery, finalizing a quote or paying a bill.
    Then when you’ve got a spare five minutes, whether it’s waiting for someone to ring you back or for a client to arrive, you can tackle one of these tasks and get it out of the way.

Specialising in Xero bookkeeping, Notch Above is a Brisbane bookkeeper and BAS Agent located in Alderley that offers Xero setup, as well as training and ongoing support. Notch Above can take care of all the bookkeeping tasks you would rather not do, like bank reconciliations, supplier payments, payroll services, debtor control and BAS returns.

Thanks for Xero for providing this article

highway high road

5 Secrets of Goal Setting for Successful Business Owners

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For most businesses – especially those just starting out – there is one main goal, and that’s to make enough money to stay afloat. Beyond this, however, in order to continue to realize success, all businesses should have a set of real, strategic objectives that they’re working toward. Here’s why setting goals is so important to your organization.

They give you something to measure. Napoleon Hill once said, “A goal is a dream with a deadline.” Without real goals, you’ll have nothing to measure and no real way of knowing what you’re doing right and what could use a little tweaking.

Goals help develop and foster teamwork. Setting, communicating and measuring goals is an excellent way to bring everyone on your team together and get them working collaboratively and cohesively toward achieving those objectives.

They help to identify areas of need. Without real, measurable goals, how can you know if what you’re focusing your efforts on is really achieving results? If you don’t understand exactly what you’re working toward, it’s much more difficult to identify areas where you’re wasting time, money and other resources.

Goals provide motivation. Lofty objectives, like “increasing sales” or “growing your team” don’t really provide any motivation for achievement. That’s because they are vague and non-measurable. With real goals in place and deadlines to back them up, you’ll know what needs to be accomplished and by when, which will provide the push needed to actually get things done.

Goals help to bring the big picture into focus. When goals are defined, communicated and put into motion, you and everyone on your team will be better able to see how every business decision affects those goals and the role each individual plays in the big picture of success. For instance, by defining a budgetary goal that includes both revenue and expenses, it becomes much clearer how things like making large purchases and landing that new big client can directly affect the end result.

While every business is different, and will have unique goals to work toward, one thing remains constant across every industry and business size: the need for setting and achieving strategic, measurable objectives. Only by doing so will you be able to continue to realize success and drive the future growth of your business.

Specialising in Xero bookkeeping, Notch Above is a Brisbane bookkeeper and BAS Agent located in Alderley that offers Xero setup, as well as training and ongoing support.  Notch Above can take care of all the bookkeeping tasks you would rather not do, like bank reconciliations, supplier payments, payroll services, debtor control and BAS returns.

Lost in Venice: How Software Support Helps You Navigate a New Application

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Have you visited Venice? Rising out of the Venetian Lagoon like a dream, Venice is a tangle of enchanting laneways and canals lined with Renaissance-era palaces and churches. It is beautiful to behold and ranks as one of Europe’s most celebrated destinations. In Venice, there are no cars, tooting Vespas, or even bicycles. Visitors to Venice explore the city on foot or by water taxi or gondola.

Venice is a maze of anonymous streets. Very few streets have names, making most maps essentially useless. One of the great pleasures of Venice is to toss away the map and simply lose oneself in this magical labyrinth. But if you are trying to find your way back to your hotel at night or trying to find your hotel fresh off a train from the mainland, Venice’s no-name streets can prove frustrating.

Navigating a new software application can feel a lot like being lost in Venice: lots of beautiful dazzling features, but when you are trying to get from point A to point B and encountering dead ends at every turn, things start to lose their lustre.

Every software application comes with its own bible to study: a veritable paper storm of how-tos and FAQs. There are online forums, hours and hours of instructable videos, and detailed infographics. It is the equivalent of navigating Venice using an unwieldy folding map and a Lonely Planet guide book that could moonlight as a doorstop.

A dinky-di Venetian, does not need a map to navigate his or her city and neither does a visitor. Getting to grips with a new software application does not mean slavishly committing to memory  every command and process. It is simply a matter of unlocking the logic that underpins the software’s design.

The logic that underpins the layout of Venice is simple to grasp and once you do the city is actually easier to navigate than a metropolis with street names.

Venetian addresses are different in that they do not locate a business or residence on a street but in one of Venice’s six districts, called sestieri. For example if the address of your hotel is 5609 Cannaregio, then your hotel is located in the district called Cannaregio, not Cannaregio Street–it doesn’t exist.

Using a starting point like a bridge or a water taxi stop at the edge of a particular district, it is simply a matter of noting how the numbers above the doorways change. Simply follow the increasing or decreasing numbers to find your hotel. A big change in the number, means you may have crossed into another neighborhood. Simply turn around and go back the way you’ve come.

The path to unlocking the power of a software application is revealing the underlying logic that informs how it is laid out. And to do that you need access to expert users who spend their days navigating the software.

Notch Above offers new Xero users as well as more experienced users valuable insights into how Xero works. Sign up for your personal training session with one of our Xero experts.  You can answer questions specific to your business one on one with us from the comfort of your office.  You will come to know Xero the way a local knows his or her hometown.

If you run into a dead end in Xero, we will turn you around and put you on the right course again. Think of us like a hotel concierge providing you with directions you need to explore the highlights of a foreign capital.

Specialising in Xero bookkeeping, Notch Above is a Brisbane bookkeeper and BAS Agent located in Alderley that offers Xero setup, as well as training and ongoing support.  Notch Above can take care of all the bookkeeping tasks you would rather not do, like bank reconciliations, supplier payments, payroll services, debtor control and BAS returns. 

We Vote for OneNote

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If you’re anything like me, you’ll get your finest inspiration at the most inopportune times. Light bulb moments will come half way through downing a good bottle of red with friends or mid-way through a 5k run. One option is to try and lock the revelation into your brain for later recall. The other option is to whip out your phone or mobile device and jot down the key ideas. We spend more and more of our life on the run and the chances are more and more of your staff is doing the same.

Whether visiting with clients, between meetings, or having inspirational moments while at the gym, the potential need to jot down notes, thoughts, ideas and images while on the move is increasing. Enter OneNote, a powerful note program with some great advantages for the user.

OneNote was developed by Microsoft as part of the Office suite but as a standalone version it is available for free on various platforms, including the iPad, Mac, Windows, Android, and iOS devices. It allows users to create notes and supports inserting images, photos, web clippings, audio files, and more into files. Here are our top reasons for loving OneNote.

1. Access and edit notes anywhere

The most recent version of OneNote can take advantage of the Microsoft Office365 cloud services, making this tool more accessible than ever before. Previous versions required a manual sync in order to access the application on different devices. Now it is automatically synced on your Office365 OneDrive meaning that you can view and edit your notes from anywhere in the world on any device that has an internet connection. Supported by Windows PC, Mac, iOS, Android, and Windows Phone, makes this application extremely versatile.

You can create your notes on your computer and then retrieve them from your mobile device, or vice versa. If you have access to a computer that doesn’t have OneNote installed, you can simply find the application on the Web. Go to your OneNote page on the internet, log in to your account and use as normal.

2. Organise data in notebooks

The cool thing about OneNote is its capacity for diversity. You can create a bunch of different notebooks for a variety of different subject matter. For instance, you might create a notebook for personal use, one for client information, and another for content and blog ideas. Each of these notebooks will then contain their own sub-folders with colour-coded tabs making it visually easy to organise files.

The ability to colour code is a particularly useful feature if you are working with a large volume of data. If the colour coding isn’t helping, searching for specific data is straightforward with a convenient search function.

3. Third party integration

Rather than looking longingly at some nifty or useful feature on a different application, you can simply integrate it with your OneNote. What does this mean? It means that OneNote is not limited by its own built in capacities thanks to third party integration. The latest version of OneNote has a new cloud API that allows other applications to be used. You can enjoy many more features because you are not confined to the features that are native to OneNote. One of the apps that you can use is OneNote Clipper. Install this on your browser and use it to automatically save clippings from the Web in just one click.

4. Work on important tables

OneNote is not only for jotting down simple notes and thoughts, akin to what you might jot down on a notepad. OneNote also allows you to create tables, which are a particularly useful method for creating databases or for comparing and listing data. Going one step further, OneNote also enables you to sort data within a table, designate header rows, change the colour of the cells, as well as insert an Excel spreadsheet into your notes.

5. Write handwritten notes

For those of us that brainstorm through jotting down notes, drawing diagrams, mind maps or other visual features, One Note has got you covered. Providing you are using OneNote on a supported touch capable device, you can write notes and draw using a stylus or your fingers. This is especially helpful for jotting down quick notes or reminders about what to insert on a page. Circling or underlining a word or group of words is quick and easy to do.

Technology moves pretty fast! Keep up with the times and find out how OneNote and other tech innovations and updates can support your business productivity. Get in touch today!

Author

Ben-Headshot-2

Managing Director of Grassroots IT

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www.grassrootsit.com.au