Simon Ackland - Business Growth Blog

Would You Grow Your Business Down?

Article Written By: Simon Ackland | SMI Business Impact CEO| Business Impact E-Zine # 11

This statement doesn't seem quite right at first glance, but think about it.

Large companies globally are making cuts including reducing staff numbers, in response to the economic outlook. But will they end up just cutting costs at the expense of growth...and can they still expect to achieve growth in the medium term?

The point is, if you carefully grow your business down, rather than taking rash and ill-thought out cost cuts, you remain in control and it becomes a strategic move.

According to the January 2009 Dun and Bradstreet Business Expectations Report, which surveys 1200 business owners and senior executives, it was revealed that 54% of firms expect declining sales in the March 2009 quarter and 59% expect lower profits.

If expectations like this become reality, then the way forward requires careful thinking by business owners, boards and senior management to achieve continued growth regardless of whether the economy moves up or down. How can you adjust your business to meet market realities and still achieve some growth in profits? We all know it is not always possible, but you owe it to your stakeholders to try. The other point to remember is that when you come out the other side, will you be in a position to leverage the recovery? Here are a few ideas to consider.

Highly Targeted Niche Strategies
What about basic marketing? Most companies make the mistake of trying to market to everyone. Regardless of the state of the economy, it makes sense to adopt niche strategies, afterall, that would cost less...wouldn't it?

If you made targeted offers only to buyers, margins would be increased offsetting some downside from reduced sales. But what if the targetted marketing actually resulted in improved sales? That is highly possible if it is not something you have focused on in your business before.

Online Marketing
What about getting involved in online marketing in a bigger way? This can be very cost effective and automated...the opportunity to do more with less is great in this area. Online also means you can open up new markets...if sales decline in your traditional markets, what new areas could you open up by targeting the same client profile but through different media or in different places?

By the way, did anyone ever say you could only have one website? No reason why you can't run a number of sites designed to pitch a slightly different message to different groups. Just like we don't all want to buy a big Black car, provide some choice and alternatives...make your product or service appeal to new buyers with differing wants and needs. Where is the low hanging fruit for your business?

Social Network Marketing
Its not entirely about silly photos and flippant stories. Social networking is the new frontier in marketing for businesses now. In fact our Digital Marketing Agency has just released a new service for social network optimisation...basically we will create a profile for your business in the top 24 social network sites and create the book marks etc to get you going in this new market space. Don't reject it out of hand...there are 150 million people on Facebook alone and they offer very targeted advertising opportunities in addition to the no cost strategies.

It is all a matter of identifying the best strategies for your particular business and maybe tweaking your offer to suit. Generate some buzz, some viral marketing...you don't have to keep doing things the same old way!

Business Process Automation
SMI Business Impact has always worked with clients in the area of what we like to call "auto-piloting" their business. Most business processes can be systemised and documented for staff and there are many technologies that can assist. Our own research has identified products like Salesforce.com for client relationship management (CRM) and auto-responders on email marketing systems among others.

In addition we have identified an amazing business process automation and document management system that we will be introducing to the market over the next few weeks.

Like all good businesses, SMI is continually seeking opportunities to grow...afterall, why should we only do it for clients. To this end, we have signed an exclusive national distribution arrangement for this system that not only reduces costs permanently but also reduces staff resource requirements thereby producing not only improvements in efficiency but also substantial cost savings and hence ROI. Business process automation will allow businesses to:

• automate projects and processes
• provide enhanced compliance, control and audit trail
• simplify operations and staff training
• ensure consistency of company presentation
• automate document production, revision, storage and retrieval
• improve customer service
• fully customisable to your business; if you can draw a process on paper, it can be automated

This new product has 13 years of development behind it and a client list that includes a top 20 ASX listed company as well as clients in Canada and Israel. Full functionality and cost effectiveness is available to both SME and large enterprises.

There are amazing opportunities to improve your business, it just needs some focus and attention to work out what the best opportunities are for you in your particular market.

Need Some Professional Help?
Need help to work out how best to grow your business down?

What about a 3rd party view of where your business is today and where it could be? What you could do to avoid or minimise any downside from the economic downturn. What new market opportunities might suit your products and services?

Kick-start 2009 and request a F.ree initial consultation with an SMI Business Development Consultant and discover the upside in your business. Simply click on "Apply Now" and we will contact you or give us a call now on (08) 93648555.

To your business success and a prosperous 2009.

Simon Ackland

Lost...Client Leads From Your Website

Article Written By: Simon Ackland | SMI Digital CEO (the Digital Marketing Agency division of SMI Business Impact Pty Ltd)

Unlike the TV series "Lost", we show you how to Find them again by automating the lead generation from your website.

1. Are You Still Using Email To Collect Leads And Enquiries From The Web?
With the vast majority of websites using a simple email based form (or no form at all, just a phone number) for prospective clients to respond to, how many:

• disappear into a Junk or Spam folder? or
• simply get Lost or buried in a full inbox? and/or
• don't get followed up for days (or ever)

When these email leads are tracked down (if ever) and contacted, guess what the biggest response is? That's right, they don't remember you or your company and most can't even remember why they would have made an enquiry. How many sales is this costing you?

2. A fast response to new leads will improve your sales results
You (or your sales team) must act quickly while the prospective client is still 'hot' or at least 'warm'.

What if you didn't have to worry about lost emails and could simply click on the 'Leads' tab of your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system each morning and discover a bunch of new leads for the sales team to contact straight away. What if the information provided in the CRM even qualified the Leads so you could prioritise them?

Further, suppose that each of these new leads had received an automated email response saying that their enquiry had been received and they would be contacted within 24 hours. That would demonstrate professionalism and reinforce the relationship straight away with the prospective client, and the CRM would provide strong support to ensure the contact was made within 24 hours.

That would speed up the sales process wouldn't it? Not only would you make more sales, but the ROI on your overall marketing expenditure would be vastly improved...imagine, a happy CFO!

3. Client Relationship Management (CRM) is the answer
SMI Digital is the digital marketing agency of SMI Business Impact which specialises in strategic planning, business development, marketing and business automation services. To discover the best all-round CRM solution for our clients, we have tested and investigated many options. What we found was that Salesforce CRM provides the best mix of:

• ease of use,
• no on-site software (fully secure web based),
• super-fast roll-out and
• the ability to automate both the sales and sales management business processes in small companies right through to multi-national sized corporations.

But the key is to find a system that suits you and that allows you to achieve the automation and improved sales opportunities by being fully organised.

SMI Digital: Dedicated to building your business through digital and web based marketing and business development strategies

NEED PROFESSIONAL HELP?
If you don't have the time or expertise, let our team of Digital Marketing, Marketing and Management Consulting experts help you. SMI Digital specialise in helping small to medium sized businesses build their sales and marketing knowledge and systems to increase lead generation and sales conversion; client, shareholder and stakeholder relations strategies; international digital marketing and business development; online sales systems; email marketing; SEO and social media optimisation; web advertising; brand design; website design and development.

Contact us today for your
F.REE Digital Marketing assessment

What's stopping you?...and no, its not the economy

Article Written By: Simon Ackland | SMI Business Impact CEO| Business Impact E-Zine # 10

Why is it some businesses prosper while others struggle? It happens in all markets so it can't be blamed on the economy.

This is a topic worth thinking about while preparing for the New Year. A New Year with more turmoil than we have experienced for the last 5 odd years, so a timely reminder that we can still have permission to be positive.

From our experience, there are 7 things that people regulary do that stops them getting the job done. Let's eliminate these for 2009, get some results and minimise any downturn effect.

1. Chasing Perfection
Forget it! Just do it. Get going. Too many people try to get everything just right. They paralyse themselves and end up doing nothing or missing the prime opportunity timing.

Who cares if there is the odd spelling error. Better to have your article or newsletter or whatever out there working for you. If you are working on a new value proposition, adopt one now and use it...before long you will discover how to improve it, but in the mean time you're out getting some runs on the board.

Your key focus should be on success, not perfection. And that means taking action now!

2. Not marketing...
There are many excuses trotted out about marketing, some we've heard include...we're in a technical business; our shopping centre does the marketing; we are accountants and we don't do that stuff.

What a load of rubbish. You don't have a business if you aren't marketing. The only expenditure in your business that produces profit is marketing. Its measurable. Its accountable. If you don't do it and are still successful, you are either lucky enough to be in a business with such a short fall of providers that it is like a monopoly or you are actually grossly underperforming!

And what about the economy heading south? How bad will it be? What if a new and credible competitor comes in and gazumps you? If you maintain a degree of marketing at all times, it will be easy to 'rev up' your business when needed; protect your position; survive a downturn or simply increase return on investment...more profit and business value!

3. Fear of Failure
So many people hold themselves back because they are afraid. You get up and make a speech and forget something...so what. Move on. No one will hold that against you.

You call a prospect on the phone and they say no; so what, move on to the next one. Nothing is going to hurt you. Having your business fail around you will hurt.

4. Hanging out with the wrong crowd
If you hang out with loosers, eventually you will become one. Find people who have done what you are doing and succeeded. Seek mentors who have achieved results and done what you are targeting. Find people who can help you do things better.

5. Not Articulating A Clear Value Proposition
It doesn't always have to be unique (often called the USP...unique selling proposition) but it sure helps if you can find something or some element about your offering that can make it unique...something that sets you apart from the rest.

If you only sell your product or the features or price, you are in a commodity business and end up competing head to head with every other provider. Create some clear differentiating value and you can own your own market.

Everyone is looking for value. They will always throw out a smoke screen..."We don't have that sort of money!"...in order to avoid being sold something. And it will work if you can't build the value offered to such an attractive level that they can't afford to say no.

6. Poor time use
So many people are constantly late and we let them get away with it..."It's okay" "Not a problem". But its not because it effects us as well. Make people accountable and they will change their tune over time. Start meetings without them. Don't go over old ground in a meeting if it was covered before the late person arrived.

What about this simple one...booking too many things too close together. We all do it and it stops us getting things done.

7. Not having a Rainmaker
Its got to be someones job to bring in new business. Its no good as the head of the business saying that you're (say) an architect and that's what I want to do. If you want to be a technician or professional, then go and work for someone else who has the marketing and business development skills for you to take advantage of...or employ someone else into that role.

A good rainmaker will be both assertive and persuasive; have the ability to talk on many subjects and be good at thinking on their feet; won't take rejection badly; can frame issues well and in a way that solves the clients problems or meets what they are looking for. There is no point talking product or service until you have determined a real need and can identify the value you can deliver to solve that problem.

Every business needs a rainmaker; not having one definitely holds your business back.

Need Some Professional Help?
Need help to work out what's stopping you getting things done?

What about a 3rd party view of where your business is today and where it could be? What you could do to avoid or minimise any downside from the economic downturn.

Kick-start 2009 and request a F.ree initial consultation with an SMI Business Development Consultant and discover the upside in your business. Simply click on "Apply Now" and we will contact you or give us a call now on (08) 93648555.

To your business success and a prosperous 2009.

Simon Ackland