Good News is Marketable News

Marketing? I don’t have the money for that. Small business start-up Have you heard that? Maybe you have said that, I will come clean I have done both. But as the preacher screams from the Pulpit on a Sunday, “I have seeeeen the light”.

Yes, advertising and marketing are things that a small start-up business must and needs to do but as you have most likely mortgaged the farm, borrowed from all the kids piggy banks to get your dream going? The funds to do it are not always there so today I want to share with you some of the cost effective solutions I and others have used to get our name out there.

First up? Make this your daily mantra, “Good News is Marketable News” so be excited to get it out there. Use all available cost effective (FREE) ways and means to spread the gospel of your business.

If you get a great customer compliment get permission to brag about it on your Face Book and Twitter pages, tell the Customer you will share the good news and share their page as well so it’s a win/win.

Start a blog, and I know you might scream, “Hello” I’m not a writer and I can’t spell, well guess what neither can I and you can throw even the guru Sir Richard Branson in that mix of fellow Dyslexics.

Get you blog going on what you know and that’s your business, remember you started it because you have some talent that is marketable? So start writing about the same. Share stories, pictures, good news even jokes about your business. You don’t need to write War and Peace, even 200 words will cut it, just make it “Readable and Enjoyable” and I’m telling it’s the second one, “Enjoyable” that’s important. People don’t buy things from you because you are the former High School Spelling Champion!

Need some Press? Guess what you can write your own. http://www.prlog.org/  PR Log is a free PR Distribution service, so click on that link and create yourself an account and start sharing the good news about yourself and your business. Again, you don’t have to be Clark Kent or Lois Lane and write like the Daily Planet! Just keep it simple and honest and informative, the most important thing? Is to get the news about you and your business out there.

If you have a Mobile Web Site (From the Camel of course) then you can start posting, reviews, coupons, special offers and for the price of an SMS? Blast those specials all that good news to all your customers that have a mobile phone.

If you have a bit of Steven Spielberg in your DNA? You can even do a You Tube Channel but we will cover that one in another blog.

You can see there is so much you can do to get that Good News starting to travel, Marketing is the greatest buzz fun job of any business as people love good news. There is no need for you to be a genius just be honest. Finally, remember it’s all free, which means? No need to have a Bill Gates Bank account and you can give the kids the piggy bank back!

Enjoy the day and remember to get Socially Mobile.

Faceless Facebook

The Law of averages is reality; yep if you throw enough darts at a board sooner or later you will hit a Bullseye. If you keep at something long enough sooner or later you will make it happen and if you get enough Customer Complaints on Face Book? Sooner or later other people will read them!

At a recent meeting I can remember the conversation so well, Mr.Customer was telling me, “Facebook? That’s what my kids use to share stuff with their mates” Yes, we have a business page but nobody ever checks it or post’s on it. We are old school we believe in word of mouth, customer comment cards its worked for us, will leave it at that.

Then me and Mr.Customer logged onto the venues Facebook fan page and wow what a surprise, lots of nasty comments about the food and service. We then did a quick Google search and found that the venue had a few more, “Headlines” on other pages, yes the “Face Book Fan Page” the new word of mouth, had done a really good job on making sure the locals in the community, knew a lot about this Venue and what it doesn’t offer, lots of rocks but no roses!

With over a Billion users? The Law of averages is a pretty valuable statistic when it comes to the chances of somebody being Faceless on Face Book and writing something bad about you or your business and if you don’t monitor your page? The Law of averages will also come into play on the potential of this stuff hurting your business.

So does this mean you have to run out and spend money to hire a team of Social Media Marketers, to set up a campaign, run Competitions and all that? Or does it mean you take inexpensive route and you start drinking Red Bull so you can stay up late at night, post pictures in rapid succession of Cute Babies or Fluffy Cats, use your best Photoshop skills to add quotes about your business and end it with, “Like or Share” Yep, all the time thinking, this stuff is easy I got this!

Well, like we have mentioned in our last article, “DIY” is the greatest danger to small business so maybe running your Business page is not the same as a personal page which is what a ot of people think. Yes, the pictures of you dancing in a Tutu and your mates Birthday, or jokes from Friday night at the pub will work for those that Love your crazy ways, but a Business Fan page? It’s a totally different story.

The best method you can use for building a great fan page for your Business? Remember the Golden Rules. Less is Best, and be like a Morning TV show, “Entertaining and Informative”

So, if you’re going to begin with DIY for your Business Social Media? Keep it to a couple of posts a day, post articles and stories about your business or the Industry that you’re in that are “Informative and Entertaining” If your posting pictures make sure the picture has meaning and include relevant, “One Liners”  about your business, and most importantly? If somebody makes a comment rocks or roses always thank them and say something back. Ignorance is a killer in the world of Social Media.

Stick to Less is Best, be Entertaining and Informative and the Law of averages will guarantee that some of those Faceless Facebook people commenting on your page? Will at least have a smile.

Enjoy the day and remember to get Socially Mobile.

The greatest Danger for Small Business? DIY

Red Tape, Health Insurance, Taxes, these are some of things listed as threats to the survival and growth of a Small Business Start Up well that’s what I read when I Googled the subject.

I thought about it for a few minutes as I have started a few small business in my time, consulted to many and most of my customers with Mobile Web sites are small business so I thought “Yep” I should be able to think of a few Danger Zones and write about them. After thinking for a while longer over a scrumptious morning coffee I came to an interesting conclusion.

Yes, the items listed by the Business Brain trusts in copious amounts of articles found in Google are right. Red Tape and Taxes etc. can be a killer but I think there is a real sneaker in the small business closet that does more harm to the future of Small Business Pty Ltd than anything else and that is? DIY the pseudonym of Do It Yourself.

Yes DIY Accounting, Marketing, Sales, Design, Websites, Human Resources, some of the things that are needed in Small Business for success but we might not have the funds to pay for? Can in the end be the end of our small business.

Yes I have seen Websites for Hairdressers that look like they have been created by motor mechanics, brochures with more spelling mistakes than a kindergarten kid, bookkeeping that blokes are in Jail for and the Unfair Dismissal Tribunal has a long waiting list!

Now you may at this stage be throwing your hands in the air spilling the morning Nescafe all over the floor and screaming, “I know but I can’t afford professionals”

Well I know, I have been there and I get it, but again in this wonderful world we live in, Google and the Internet Can save us. Yes not only can Google be the Provider of all sorts of Information on why we fail, it can also be the saviour with information and instruction on how we cannot fail. Moreover if you throw in its cousin, YouTube? Wow you can even watch Videos on how things can be done.

Now you may be thinking this Google and YouTube advice goes against the grain of this whole blog? Well if you follow experts and watch them it’s a cut above DIY and it’s a lot better than opening the box and not following instructions like so many people often do.

Other things that can help?  Friends and Family with the assets, talent and experience you need and have no shame in asking for a lifeline. Remember if you have a service or product? Bartering has been around since Adam was waiting for the apple to ripen! So offer a haircut or a Car Service as swap for that bit of advice or help.

The internet has also made the world smaller and now you have young fresh University graduates all over the world sitting and waiting at the Kitchen table in far way lands praying for work to do, and it can be a lot cheaper than what you have locally. Odesk, Freelancer are services than can hook you up with the talent you don’t have but need at a fraction of the cost you might normally pay.

So my fellow Small Business Owner, fear not and smile as you refill that coffee cup as there is a light at the end of a sometimes dark tunnel, so scream “High Ho Silver” fire up the Internet and start to find OTHERS to do things for you.

Enjoy the day and remember to get Socially Mobile.

Straw that Broke the Camel’s Back

Many people ask me how did we come up with the name Camel and Straw for a business. Well it’s pretty simple, if you do a Google search on the term, “Camel and Straw” you will get this: “Last Straw, The Straw the broke the Camel’s back” followed by a bunch of stories behind the quote screamed by many which is, “That’s it, that’s the straw that has broken the camel’s back”

I know this to be true as that’s the quote I also yelled out when I had one too many “Broken Back” business moments. That was the moment I decided to start something new and I decided that having the name “Camel and Straw” would be a constant reminder I would never let my back be broken again.

Ok, preamble and explanation over with let me get to today’s point.

IF your involved business you will most likely have had a “Camel and Straw Moment”  they are not nice, can be soul destroying let alone bank balance destroying and it can be hard to lift back up from  Broken Back Business, but I’m here to tell you, YOU CAN.

“Easy for Him” you might be saying, well think about those people in Business you read about every day, you admire and whilst your opening the door to your humble little small business you mumble I wish I was like them.

Yep, people like Richard Branson, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs (RIP) those people that earn enough to buy a new Ferrari every hour of their lives, fly private jets (Except Steve Jobs he has Angel Wings so no need to Drive) all of them and thousands like them didn’t just walk into work one day and yell “Sim Salabim” and they were an instant success. Each one of them had a Broken Back Business moment, each one of them had what they thought was the “Last Straw”

You maybe saying right now, “But those guys are smarter than me, that’s why they can keep going”

Wrong, most self-made millionaires possess average intelligence. What sets them apart is their openness to new knowledge and their willingness to learn whatever it takes to succeed.

You now might be saying, “Yes but they had the money to learn, to buy stuff to make the business work” Well guess what? A new and free University opened a few years ago, it’s called the “Internet”. You can Google your way to the answers to almost any question you may have that will throw a bandage on that damaged back, and you can have another go at getting the keys to that Ferrari!

Embrace the moment, never stop asking questions and most importantly never give up and one day? You never know a small business guy seeking a bandage to ease the back pain, may Google for help, and not Richard, Bill or Steve may come up, your name might be the answer.

Enjoy the day and remember to get Socially Mobile.

Happy Little Vegemites

Vegemite? Yes it’s an Australian spread that as children we grew to love. Its black it taste bitter and I think you have to be an Aussie to enjoy it as very few from other Countries do, but we love it.

We love it that much that a phrase was invented to describe a mode of Happiness, “Happy Little Vegemite’s” Yes, when people would ask you how things going, how’s the mood of the team, how are your customers? You could simply exclaim, “They are happy little Vegemite’s” and all would right with the world no more questions would be asked.

I thought about this phrase when I read a quote from one of the legends in today’s Management world, Sir Richard Branson of Virgin fame. He said, “Happiness is the secret Ingredient for successful business. If you have a happy company it will be invincible” Wow.

I thought about it, I agree with it but I then wondered, how many Businesses today really think that way? Do they all have that feeling written into the Business Plan, part of the Company mission statement? Is it part of the ten commandments of good governance?  Possibly not.

Would a “Happiness” culture be so bad as a primary objective of a Company? Well staff turnover would be down as everybody would want to stay; sick days would be less as people would want to come to work. Would it change our customer’s attitude? Think you will find complaints less and loyalty more so revenues would increase and the advertising budget might be less as your customers will become your salespeople.

So maybe just maybe as you’re driving into the office, shop or factory today? You might consider putting, “Happiness” on the agenda of that morning meeting, and create a crew of, “Happy Little Vegemites”

From the Camel, have an awesome day and remember to get Socially Mobile.