What Does Your Business Say About You?

They say that bad news travels fast, people just love to talk - so what are others saying about your business?
I recently read that if a person has a negative experience of your business they will tell 9 other people, but if they have a good, positive experience they will only tell 4.
Take a moment to think about your own recent experiences, either when you were out shopping or receiving a service from another business. What did you tell your friends?
Let me tell you of my experience yesterday.
I was in a well known bookstore and I clumsily left my gloves on the counter as I rushed off after making my purchase.
So first thing this morning I called the store to see if my gloves were still there.
After describing them to the assistant on the other end of the phone he assured me he had my gloves. I went on to explain that I didn’t live in the town and asked if they would mind hanging on to them until the next time I was passing in about 10 days time.
“No, we can’t do that,” was his reply, I was silenced for a moment until he added “if you give me your address I will make sure we post them on to you.”
Your customers are the best agent for positive word-of-mouth marketing, so how can you get them to talk about you?
Now, take this one step further, just think how much you could save on your marketing if you were to encourage your clients to spread the word for you.

Hampshire Winning Women Are Back!

We are really excited to announce our Spring programme.

Kicking off this evening January 22nd from 7.00 9.30pm
at the Lysses Hotel, High Street, Fareham.

Personal Power:
An interactive presentation by executive coach, Helen Battersby.
Recognise it; Own it; Increase it!
Discover the direct impact of thought on performance
Discover and experience what personal power is and how to access it quickly when you most need it
Take away a tool to test and improve your own levels of personal power

Prepare to feel different leaving from when you arrive!

February 26th 2009
Lisa Sturge of Laughterlines Coaching will be joining us for a guaranteed evening of fun.
Did you know that Laughter is good for:-

Circulation, Exercising the heart and lungs, Oxygenating the blood, Cleansing the body of stale toxins, Experiencing JOY and HAPPINESS, Encouraging a positive outlook, Giving a different perspective, Expression and creativity, Linking the left and right brain, Strengthening the immune system, Breaking down barriers, Reducing stress, Improving communication
FUN!!!

March 26th 2009

Penny Gregory - Colour and Style more details coming soon

To find out more about Hampshire Winning Women click here

Are You Pricing Yourself Out Of The Market

Three clients have brought issues about pricing this week.

The first wanted to sell her regular coaching service to a different target audience, at a 15% discount. Well, why not you might say. But think about it, here are a few more facts; the target audience wouldn’t be paying for the service directly an organisation would. Same service different price? I don’t think so.

The second and third questions were both posed by women who had issues around not knowing how much to charge. They had both carried out some essential research regarding what their competitors were charging and both of them felt they couldn’t charge ‘that much’. Why?

My inkling is that they aren’t 100% certain of their worth and yet these women are both experts in their field. If you aren’t feeling confident about the price you are quoting then your customers and clients will pick up on this. Comparing yourself to others isn’t favourable, my recommendation is to focus on what makes you unique, what makes you stand out from the crowd, what differentiates you from the herd and allow that message to come over in your customer conversations. After all who is making the objection here?

Of course you do have competitors but look on that as a healthy sign that your service is in demand. And if they charge less, does it necessarily follow that they are providing a better service? Of course, whilst you can create a business by offering the lowest price in your area it’s not a sustainable business model.
I think your expertise and experience governs how much you can charge. Heres a well known story to illustrate the point.An engineer gets called into a factory to mend a vital piece of machinery. The factory is loosing money because production has been stopped. Within just 10 minutes, the engineer has fixed the problem. He gave the machine a good kick and everything proceeded to run smoothly again.
The managing director was elated until he received the invoice for the engineers work. The charge was for £1000 "the engineer was only here for 10 minutes and all he did was kick the machine. How dare he charge £1,000?” The manager called the engineer and asked him to explain how he could charge such a ridiculous fee. The engineer confidently responded, "Kicking the machine: £50. Knowing where to kick the machine: £950".

Getting Started on Twitter

Many of you will know that I have started to using Twitter recently and have found it a good way to keep you guys up to date and to connect with others.
Getting started was easy but then I wasn't sure what to do next - luckily I came across this download, a guide to getting started from http://www.havemoreclients.com which really helped put together the myriad of applications that twitter has spawned.

I can highly recommend the guide to you too. It's got lots of info and it's free!

Speak to you on Twitter! Soon!