“Generating” Smart Marketing Decisions
I went in a local store yesterday to buy a generator. The owner told me he could have sold 100 generators in one hour. He also stated he had run out of the product four days ago. He looked bored with having to repeat his answer. Our conversation was quick and to the point.
He let me leave the store without doing a few key things that could have “generated” more business from me once the storm was over. Here is what I think he should have done:
- If his store was “flooded” with unexpected product requests and his shelves were empty, he should have handed out a rain check to motivate potential customers like me to return to the store to make a purchase after the crisis was over.
- He should have collected email addresses or phone numbers from people interested in the product that was closed out so he had a new list of potential customers for future sales. He could have then hosted an “after the storm shopping excursion” to bring back interested buyers into his store so they could purchase what they wanted at a later date.
- He should have added extra staff once the demand increased four days ago. Why not hire additional staff to greet new customers, inform them of the product they want to buy, and potentially place an order for them even though the product isn’t available right then.
I’m sure most small businesses wish they had a crystal ball to view unexpected demand cycles but we can’t. Instead entrepreneurs need to make quick, smart marketing decisions to capture the unexpected “flood” of new customers entering their business.
Sell to Deliver
April 20th we walked in the doors of American Furniture to buy a couple affordable couches for a new pool house my son and husband built together last year. Looking for something nice and not expensive, we found the perfect set. We were excited when the salesman said we’d have the couches delivered by April 26th, the day before my son’s birthday.
My son’s birthday came and went with no sign of the furniture. We were told the manufacturer had a backlog and the furniture would arrive May 4th. On May 5th, another call to American Furniture produced this response, “Sorry, it looks like your order won’t be here until May 18th now.” My more-than-patient husband said “Okay but I want the delivery fees dropped to make up for the loss time.” They agreed to the request which kept us content for the moment. Yesterday, we received a call from the company saying, “We aren’t sure when the furniture will arrive.” Incensed by the extremely poor policies, we started shopping again and vowed never to return to this retail outlet.
A promise to a customer is important, in fact vital, for most businesses in today’s economy. Broken promises affect future sales from the customer and even their friends. Friends don’t want people they know to experience poor business deals. At the same time, friends want to ensure their friends experience great business transactions. So no matter what the situation, a business owner must always do what is best for their customers by addressing problems, admitting to wrong doings and making the situation right.
In the world of a billion businesses, what you promise and how you deliver on your promises makes all the difference for your company today, tomorrow and years to come. Don’t sell to sell, sell to deliver. Keeping your corporate promises is not only the ethical way to conduct business, it is the only way.
Today’s blog post is meant for you to take a look at your corporate guarantee policies. Do you have one? Do you deliver on it? How do you make sure your customers get what they pay for? How do you handle customer complaints when they arise? How do you fix problems?
We can’t make our customers happy 100% of the time, but we must try our very best to deliver on our corporate promises.
The Perfect Business Moment
I was recently asked the question, “When did you know your business was legit?” It is an excellent question to ask an entrepreneur. Not only does it shine light on the importance of realizing we have created a worthwhile company, it confirms any doubts we might feel from time to time. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been in business – one month, one year, five years – we need to recognize we are running a plausible, successful enterprise to keep plugging away.
I hope you enjoy the moment I realized I was going to be a successful woman entrepreneur after my first “big” event in 1996 with my event management company Five Star Events.
“The exact moment I knew my business was legit was around 10 p.m. on September 17, 1996 the evening of the first wedding I was hired to manage. I was looking out at beautiful Skaneateles Lake under a starry night as the music of the band and the laughter of my clients filled the air behind me in the country club. I was so relieved the wedding ceremony and reception was a success for the family I was hired to help. The other reason this moment has been cemented in my mind is because that first big wedding client was my husband’s boss who owned a multi-million dollar company. My husband said to me as I left for the evening, “I hope the wedding goes perfectly… or we’ll both be out of jobs in the morning.” Not the most comforting thing to say but it was truthful! So when I took five minutes to relish the success that evening looking out at the lake, I knew I could run my own business and be successful. I have made sure to “relish” successful business moments ever since.”
Lessons for you today:
* Recollect the moment you knew your business was legit or successful.
* Remember to relive that moment when you are in the middle of a tough business period.
* Share the moment with other women who might be struggling to be successful. They will appreciate the sentiment.
I’d love to hear about the moment you knew your business was here to stay too!
Inventing Happiness for Consumers
As I hurried down the Thruway on a recent trip to Boston I was praying the Massachusetts Turnpike wouldn’t be congested and I could get to my destination in time. Sure enough 30 minutes outside of the city traffic came to a standstill. The clock was ticking and my blood pressure was staring to rise.
As I approached the jam packed toll booth, I quickly raced into one of the two EZ Pass lanes and sailed past fifty cars waiting in line to pay their toll. In that moment I smiled and thanked the inventor of my favorite invention of all time! I praise that innovator every single time I sail through a gate. I swear the ease of using the EZ Pass makes up for the increasingly high prices I pay for tolls!
Who invented this beautiful product? Was it a busy woman entrepreneur sitting for the tenth time at a toll booth on her way from Buffalo to Albany? Was it a visionary who conceptualized collecting millions of dollars for highways while making a good amount of “change” in the process? Who thinks up these original ideas and brings them to market?
My husband comes from a family of engineers. They always have an idea, vision or process they want to create to make life easier. But they aren’t the only ones who have innovative thoughts. Many women entrepreneurs do. Some have created original products; some are in the process of inventing new services. Since we had to “invent” the concept of our business to begin with, shouldn’t we be inventing new ideas and implementing them throughout our business journey?
I love finding and featuring women who have created original products, are in the phase of getting them patented and ready to launch. They have innovative minds. They take bigger monetary risks. They invest much more time bringing their concept to market. They are tough and resilient with a lot of lessons to share. We need to learn from these innovators as often as we can to inspire our own minds to think differently.
Today’s blog is to instigate the inventor in your soul. You know you have a new idea that needs to be born. What do you want to add to your business repertoire? A book? A product a client has been asking about? A new service you’ve seen a competitor offer? A complimentary item to something you already offer? What do you see and sense? Make sure you keep new visions written down in a journal or document on your computer.
Remember entrepreneurs are visionaries. What do you have up your sleeve that might just make someone like me very happy?
Engaging Business Breaks
The drive to Oswego was breathtaking. The orange and red leaves on the trees were swirling around in the wild autumn wind. The panoramic view of the country roads between Syracuse and Oswego confirmed this short business trip was going to be well worth it – if only for the picturesque view. Little did I know, I would gain great insight for today’s editorial by leaving work behind for a couple hours.
I was invited to SUNY Oswego to be a part of an accreditation interview for its Business School. Most accredited college programs periodically go through a rigorous internal and external evaluation process to earn official approval of its programs. I enjoyed lunch and conversation with an esteemed accreditation representative, another Oswego State business graduate, two members of the Oswego business community, and a sharp 19 year old business major.
As the evaluator asked us how we help Oswego’s business program, we gave diverse answers. The staff member’s responsibility was to form good “town and gown” business relationships so both entities prosper together. For the alumni board representatives, our goal was to promote the college’s business school. For the student, he advised younger classmates about upcoming coursework to make the process easier. For the community leader, she helped the economic development for the city and its relationship with the college.
As I drove home I realized the importance of taking time to be involved with something other than one’s work. As entrepreneurs we live and breathe our companies 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. When we agree to get involved with something unrelated to our daily entrepreneurial focus, we open ourselves up to new insight. If you read the success strategies today, you’ll find some terrific business take-aways from my time at the Oswego meeting.
Today’s post is to encourage you to take time away from your business periodically to meet with people unrelated to your company, to engage in diverse conversations that tantalize your thinking, and to share insights with people you normally wouldn’t meet. Although it was difficult to be away from my desk during a busy event week, it refreshed and energized me because I changed my environment for half a day.
Remember we all need breaks from time to time – breaks from our business, escapes from our workload, and getaways with new people. Meaningful time away from work can be a positive impact on our personal and professional development.
Business Wisdom from the One World Concert
Today’s business success strategies come from the wisdom that reasonated with me after the One World Concert held on October 9th at Syracuse University featuring the Dalai Lama. I hope they help you and your business today!
• Being a warm hearted person to all we meet will open up doors. Although the Dalai Lama was talking about being warm hearted to people from different 
backgrounds, nationalities, religions and beliefs, I believe being a “warm hearted” entrepreneur endears customers, vendors and staff and helps the business owner become more successful over time. Lesson: Open up your hearts more often and you’ll find a way to create a more loyal following and a stronger business in the long run.
• Dave Matthews, my favorite singer, sang his new song “Mercy” and one of the lyrics says “Stand up for what we need.” When I created Women TIES it was a concept that needed to be embraced over time. No one truly understood the “new world” I was trying to create. After I had to cancel my very first event, I dug deep and had to believe very strongly in what I knew I wanted to create. I had to keep “standing up for what I needed” in my business life. Lesson: Remember to always stand up for what you need to be happy and 
prosperous in your business life.
• At the beginning of the concert, 30 national and international musicians sang “Imagine” by John Lennon. One united voice can move thousands of people and change the world. Sharing the message of financial equality for women is my message that is embraced by women who are involved with us. Our one united voice continues to foster economic ties across this state helping to change the future financial world for women. Lesson: Find what your core message and mission is and share it with as many people as you can so it is heard by thousands to change the world the way you want it changed.
• As the Dalai Lama said, “just one person with their one idea can start a revolution to change the world for the better.” Lesson: You are that person! Embrace your personal mission and go change the world for the better.
A Pink Globe
Dangling from my neck was a crystal blue globe given to me from my sister when I launched my first company in 1995. The necklace was to symbolize how my company could grow one day into a global enterprise. It was a sweet and positive message.
I had forgotten about the globe necklace until last night as I prepared for the One World Concert “Common Ground” at the Carrier Dome featuring the Dalai Lama. I dug through my jewelry box to find it gently lying at the bottom. As I put it around my neck, I remembered the hopes I had as a young entrepreneur wanting to create a company that could reach across the oceans one day.
As I listened to the wisdom of this great spiritual leader, I heard one statement that spoke to my entrepreneurial soul. The Dalai Lama said, “Community is the key to success.” He was talking about our personal communities made up of friends and family, our local communities and of course our world community. When I heard the word community, I thought of the community of women entrepreneurs I know, belong to and foster. I believe if more women create stronger local, regional, state, national and international communities with other women entrepreneurs, the more successful we will all become. We will become richer in every sense of the word.
Two seats away from me at last night’s concert sat a bubbly woman who introduced herself. Five minutes into our conversation she told me she owned a business in Rochester. I told her how I have come to love Rochester women after bringing quarterly events there for 2 years. Within minutes we were bonded because we started a conversation and discovered we shared “common ground.” Only by engaging in new conversations with people we do not know or do not understand, opens up our world.
Today’s post is to encourage you to have more conversations with women in different regions, in other parts of this nation and with our sisters acros
s the globe. We stand on common ground and a united spirit more than you can imagine. It’s up to us to open up and invite women from everywhere into our lives. By embracing a larger, global community, we will find more success.
Someday I hope to buy all the women entrepreneurs I know a beautiful pink globe to wear around their necks to symbolize the united global spirit and financial success of women entrepreneurs everywhere. Until that day, join me in creating more success by embracing all the women entrepreneurs you meet no matter where you are.
The Golden Business Rule
Women cherish their relationships. Whether it’s valuing a relationship with a significant other, relishing bonds with their children or appreciating long lasting female friendships, women thrive when they are involved with others.
Conversely women don’t like when relationships end. It is difficult to walk away from valuable bonds with people we care about. I once had someone say to me, “Tracy stop getting emotionally involved with your clients. It’s just business.” I realized this person had a point but it was hard to stop caring when you value the people you are involved with.
I believe what makes women entrepreneurs more successful than men, is our ability to form meaningful relationships with vendors, clients, associates and other entrepreneurs. Our willingness to do right by the people who invest in us, and who we invest in, helps us develop strong, powerful bonds that ultimately helps us economically. It’s a main reason women do so well when it comes to relationship selling.
So when it’s time to end a business relationship for all the right reasons, entrepreneurs and business professionals need to remember to be respectful,
direct and honest with others on why the relationship is ending. These conversations can be difficult depending on the degree of commitment between the parties. But the golden rule states you should treat others as you would like to be treated.
Today’s blog is to inspire you to embrace business endings as much as you embrace business beginnings with respect, appreciation and honest communication. I’ve always loved the quote, “a beginning is another beginnings end.” Embrace change within your business especially if long time vendors, customers and associates move on. A time of change means the door is opening for different relationships to emerge and they might just be what you’re looking for.
Living by the Golden Rule in business will not only help you be a wiser business person, it will enrich your life because of how you feel about yourself and others you work with.
Pining Over Pinterest
For months I had been receiving requests to join Pinterest. Like most busy entrepreneurs, I didn’t have time to stop event planning and promotion to learn about this new social media marketing venue. I thought Pinterest was an old fashion scrap board gone online. Why would I spend time pinning photos to an online scrap book when a pile of work sits on my desk?
But there is beauty in education. After Becky Bayne explained briefly how to use Pinterest during her technology program at last week’s Women TIES Retreat, I decided I had to learn more on how it could truly help me market Women TIES members. What I learned was exciting and addicting! For the last three days, I have been posting images of my paid member’s logos or photos with a link to their website on a special Pinterest board called “Fantastic Women Entrepreneurs You Should Know.” Pinterest has now given me an additional way to promote our members to a larger and different audience than through Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.
Known as an insane marketer, especially for the women in my organization, I have been spending two hours a day pinning our paid members’ information to this special Pinterest board. I’ve been engaged in asking questions and seeking answers to make Pinterest an additional promotional value for our members. With an open mind and a willingness to be educated, I have produced another valuable marketing avenue to help brand women entrepreneurs’ names.
Today’s blog is to remind you that education is an essential component of growing a business. We cannot grow a company without learning. By learning we open up our minds to potential new services, products, avenues for growth and connections. Gleaning tidbits of real, applicable ways to help your business expand or assist your customers is something every woman entrepreneur must have on their priority list.
I hope you take some time this week to check out my new Pinterest board and learn more about the women pinned on it so far. I hope you also continue to educate yourself through events, books, online courses and colleagues to keep improving your mind, your company and your entrepreneurial future. It’s extremely powerful and exciting.
Living Fearlessly
9/11 taught me one thing – fear. I use to love flying, in fact my stepfather flew small planes when I was in high school and I enjoyed taking off on weekend trips to Lake Placid. Once in the air, I felt free and content to be surrounded by blue skies and puffy white clouds. My feeling about flying changed as I watched the second airplane hit the World Trade Center Tower on 9/11 and later found out a dear friend and his family was aboard. For three years after that horrible day, I could not fly. I couldn’t look at planes. I didn’t want to know when anyone I knew was flying. Fear had seeped in my spirit.
So when I was planning this year’s Retreat looking for speakers and came across Joleene DesRosier’s inspiration to face fear by jumping out of an airplane, I knew I needed to have her speak. Not only because of my new fear of flying, but because I have been paralyzed at times, like most women entrepreneurs, taking huge risks along my business journey. Whether the risk was opening the door in the first place or learning to function after losing a well paying client or having to reorganize the enterprise to make more money, women business owners face fear.
It doesn’t have to take an enormous tragedy like 9/11 to produce fear sometimes it’s small decisions or quick lessons that stop us in our tracks. But we know the only way to survive and thrive is to push past fear every time we face it. I’ve done that many times since 9/11 flying once a year to my favorite place in the world, 
Sanibel Island. The last few times I’ve needed a morning mimosa to get me on the plane but I can tell you once I’m in the clouds again, I’m grateful to be on the plane and I’m extremely happy to be alive every time we land safely!
Today’s blog post is to encourage you to be brave and courageous in small and big ways anytime you face fear this month. I’ve learned the hardest part about fear is making the decision to do something that’s scary. Once you make up your mind and walk out, or jump out, the door, you free yourself from the crippling emotion fear produces. We become joyously fearless from that moment on.
I am really looking forward to Joleene’s inspiration on “Free Falling Through Fear to Grow” at next week’s Women TIES Retreat. I know her speech will help me see flying differently. I can’t wait because I am so ready to start soaring again, instead of being scared. How do you want to live life?
Women TIES 