Entrepreneurs Tip:10 Hotel Sales Mistakes to Avoid in Today's Competitive Marketplace

10 Hotel Sales Mistakes to Avoid in Today's Competitive Marketplace

"We'll do all right if we can capitalize on our mistakes."

- Mickey Rivers

Mistakes do happen - that is human, understandable and part of our professional learning cycle. What we need to remember is to improve and learn from those mistakes by not repeating them needlessly.

Here are ten mistakes to avoid:

1. Not listening.

In this highly competitive marketplace in an uncertain economy, not listening to a potential customer is the surest way to NOT making a booking. If you are a hotel sales manager, this seems very elementary. We must remember however, we are dealing with multi generational buyers in the market, as well as culturally diverse professionals. This means allowing the prospect to talk about themselves, their company or association or their potential use of your facility. When appropriate, succinct responses allowing them to give you feedback is often a key missing in today's fast pace. There are many online resources to help improve listening skills, including a new one from Cornell's Judi Brownell, Ph.D. titled Building Managers' Skills to Create Listening Environments. While it targets the manager more than sales, it does provide an easy to follow structure for evaluating listening effectiveness.

2. Viewing the prospect as the "enemy" or an adversary.

In the process of sales, each party has a role and a position. It is not like an athletic competition where one party must WIN and therefore the other must LOSE. The term "win-win" was popularized by Stephen Covey in "Think Win/Win: Principles of Mutual Benefit" If the prospect is viewed as someone you are trying to outwit or outsmart, they are likely to be very hesitant to trust your hotel or services. Today's buyers understand the supply and demand aspects of revenue management. Your offering optional dates when you might have rate flexibility or other enhancements will demonstrate your professionalism and concern for an ongoing relationship. David Evans, an award winning career industry sales leader with Westin and Starwood, recently shared a quote with me he learned from an asset manager who David says manages a substantial portfolio "I never learned from statements, only my questions" Everyone wins is a much better way to succeed.

3. Not taking detailed notes.

We are in an information overload society today, yet the process of sales still has basics. The stages of sales include prospecting or qualifying, interviewing or meeting with the potential client regardless if they are an association executive or the parents planning their daughter's wedding, accurately noting the clients needs is crucial. The fact that you are taking the time to write down what they are saying tells them you care. It encourages them to keep talking, which means you have an increased opportunity to match your hotel's services and features to their needs. The notes you take also can become part of the sales file and are helpful the next time you meet and are looking to book the next meeting or event.

4. Not Following up.

A neat, professional and courteous follow-up note keeps you in the prospect's mind and lets them know you are detail oriented. Think of how many calls, emails and meetings we all face daily. The simple follow-up that arrives a few days after your meeting can make the difference in how you are judged. It is a sign of personalized attention in an era of impersonal contact.

5. Not keeping contact with past and current clients and customers.

Repeat customers are ideal, in that they do not need to be wooed each time IF they were satisfied. These people will not become repeat customers or guests unless they feel appreciated and acknowledged. I recall several major training accounts over the years at different hotels that were very cost conscious, with two trainees to a room and food budgets that was marginal to profitability. Our hotels managed to maintain these accounts over the years and increase the rates and budgets, even in times of economic uncertainly such as we face today. I believe the main ingredient for making these inroads was not financial, but the fact that these clients regularly were kept in the communication flow and interacted with even when the contracts were not in renewal time lines. When was the last time you contacted past and current customers?

6. Not Planning each day efficiently.

Almost all hotels have the challenge of asking sales managers to perform other activities. The argument of building team work, or responding to a staffing crisis or other reasons seem to pop up for why the sales manager does not have the time to do what they are hired to do: sell the hotel's services and products. To be effective, a sales manager needs to plan each week and day, allocating prime hours for selling, following up as needed, and measuring their activities against the marketing and sales plans. The crises will be there and teams must be supported, but regular planning and accountability is crucial.

7. Underestimating the client's savvy.

The role of hotel sales professionals is not to outsmart the client. You both have needs and budgets. The sales manager of today needs to follow the guidelines of revenue management, space allocation, maximization of resources and attempt to meet or exceed the budgeted financial targets. As a representative of your hotel, you are the conduit between meeting the client's needs and your hotel's ability to meet them. We just remember they probably know their challenges and problems better than we, just as we know the challenges in changing meeting room sets, or providing transportation to the airport during rush hour better than they. Clear and honest communication on both sides makes the difference, and we must remember to be transparent and accurate in that exchange of information.

8. Rushing the Sales Close.

The stages of sales include prospecting or qualifying, interviewing or meeting, presentation and closing. At any given point during these stages, your objective is to complete the current stage and move on to the next at the right pace. This means listening and following the lead of the person you are conversing with. If one attempts to close before there is a comfort level with any of the first three stages, there will likely be no sale.

9. Not keeping up to date or current with industry trends.

This industry has changed much in the past ten years. Technology is an essential part of it, as is the means of finding clients, booking reservations and communication to the outside world once they are at your hotel. Technology can also expose you to thousands of ideas without leaving your hotel.

10. Not taking Professional Pride in your appearance and in your hotel.

Synonyms for the world pride are conceit, smugness and arrogance. Additional ones though are delight, satisfaction and pleasure. In these days of business casual, it may be appropriate to forego the business suit on occasion. There should never be a time, however, when the professional appearance of the individual, the office or the hotel should be in question. Many brands are transitioning from inspectors for QA, saying the guests' comments and the online blogs are the real assessment of the every day hotel. This is not meant to be lecturing to anyone reading this - it is meant as a reflection of many years of observing what customers want and expect. It is also a reflection on the many real professionals I have been proud to be affiliated with in my career to date.

Reference:

Dr. John Hogan, CHE CHA MHS

[About the Author: John Hogan is a frequent guest speaker at industry events and advises hotel management groups and owners, lenders, asset managers and operators on industry 'best practices' and conducts reviews of quality in operations and marketing. Hogan's professional experience includes over 35 years in hotel operations, food & beverage, sales & marketing, training, management development and asset management on both a single and multi-property basis. He holds a number of industry certifications (CHA, CHE, MHS, ACI) and is a past recipient of the American Hotel & Lodging Association's Pearson Award for Excellence in Lodging Journalism, as well as operational and marketing awards from international brands. He has served as President of both city and state hotel associations.]

Boom in Market Research.

From around 10 people in the first few years to 200 people in two centres at Mumbai and Bangalore, Cross-Tab has come a long way to carve a niche for itself as a market research outsourcing provider.

During its seven-year-old history, Cross-Tab had enough brushes with fate to turn into a failed dotcom venture or a small outfit operating from one of the bylanes in Mumbai. But, Cross-Tab successfully negotiated both these challenges to scale up and re-invent itself as a market research outsourcing (MRO) provider. Today, the firm founded by three entrepreneurs — Kedar Sohoni, Ruchika Gupta and Praveen Gupta — operates from one of the spiffy new buildings which have sprung overnight in Malad, the BPO hot spot of the city.

“The entry barriers in this business are not high. But to grow and scale up — that is a high barrier,” says Mr Sohoni, about the firm’s journey from a start-up that wanted to leverage the internet for market research to a domestic market research agency to its current avatar as one of the leading third party MRO players in the country.

From around 10 people in the first few years to 200 people in two centres at Mumbai and Bangalore, the company has come a long way.

Not only have the entrepreneurs made this business transformation, but they have also worked with two sets of investors in the process. The initial investor, ICICI Venture, sold its stake to the Mittal group in 2003 and the new investment in some ways also catalysed the growth of the company in terms of getting another board-level person who could provide strategic inputs to the firm. Kedar, Ruchika and Praveen were IIM and BITS, Pilani graduates with experience in marketing and research, while Ashwin Mittal, who joined the board as one of directors representing the Mittal group, was a former strategy consultant from Cap Gemini in the US.

“The turning point for the company came in 2002-03. Till then, the firm was into market research for domestic firms,” says Ashwin, who after a year of being with the company as an investor was inspired enough to join it full time in 2004. The story goes like this: One day, when Cross-Tab was making a presentation to one of its clients, a senior executive in the audience from the client’s multinational parent was so impressed that he asked Cross-Tab to also work for them.

Around the same time, the company also became a member of the European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research and started getting a lot of enquiries for doing outsourced market research. The bulk of the work in outsourced market research involves processing information obtained from market research surveys, analysing it and generating reports. Conservatively, the opportunity in this space is estimated to be a quarter or $5 billion of the $25-billion global market research pie. Cross-Tab has already successfully made this transition.

It has also gone a step ahead in doing end-to-end work for corporates that comprises the full spectrum, from designing the survey and managing it to processing the end-results. “For global surveys, we also have tie-ups with partners in other countries,” explains Ashwin.

The challenges it now faces are those that come with scaling the business up to the next level — creating process and systems and also positioning itself in the global market for high-margin business opportunities. At this stage, the company does not have many of the resources that a larger organisation would have — such as a CFO or a human resources head. It also does not have a sales team, which is important if wants to address the corporate market directly. Its board also currently consists only the founders and three directors from the Mittal group.

Some of the initial steps in this direction are just being taken. A few months ago, the company recruited a global CEO with about 13 years of experience from no less a company than Microsoft. It also appointed Simon Chadwick, former CEO of market research company NOP World and who has worked extensively with the WPP Group, as a strategic advisor.

It now plans to set up a global advisory board that will guide the firm, and also give it contacts and credibility. But the journey ahead will not be simple. For one, the firm will have to compete with other MRO players in India (all the top players are estimated to be growing at about 80% annually) as well as global market research agencies, in some cases. Also, a few leading global market research firms have set up captives in the country enabling to compete on price points with Indian players.

But the untapped market opportunity is huge and growing. And Cross-Tab’s entrepreneurs have shown the stomach to emerge successful from tough situations, and the ambition to thing big when the opportunity presents itself.

Ashwin Mittal (L) & Kedar Sohoni Directors, Cross-Tab

About Cross Tab: An Overview

Cross-Tab provides offshore outsourcing and paneling services in the market research & analytics domain to global clients in North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific. They are also a full service market research agency in India, specializing in online research.

Cross-Tab's offshore outsourcing services for market research and data analytics processes help clients to reduce costs, improve productivity and gain access to the latest tools and technologies. This is done with short turnaround time, high quality and accurate service delivery from their service centers in India.

Cross-Tab is an online survey company having proprietary B2C and B2B online panels in India. Global online research companies and corporates are using Cross-Tab’s panels to reach online target respondents in India. Cross-Tab is presently developing online panels in other Asia Pacific countries to provide global online research companies with a better reach to the online population in the region.

Cross-Tab pioneered online market research in India, and is a leading online survey company in the country. Cross-Tab’s full service market research solutions are empowering clients, with the ability to make better decisions with speed, efficiency and cost effectiveness. Cross-Tab's research products and services enable clients to improve marketing strategies, develop competitive intelligence, increase customer retention and find out for themselves, what respondents have to say.

Cross-Tab integrates multiple research methodologies, so businesses have a bird's-eye-view of the complete customer experience. Cross-Tab is today working closely with many leading businesses and agencies across North America, Europe and Asia Pacific.

Their name Cross-Tab is derived from the term ‘CROSS-TABulation', an oft-used market research tool that examines responses to one question, relative to responses to one or more other questions.

Professional Memberships & Affiliations

Cross-Tab is a member of key industry bodies and adheres to their standard code(s) of conduct. We are members of:

ESOMAR (European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research)
CASRO (The Council of American Survey Research Organizations)
AMA (American Marketing Association)
MRSI (Market Research Society of India)

Philosophy and Vision

Their vision is to provide our clients with market research, data collection and data analysis solutions through an open and transparent relationship, aimed at achieving common goals and establishing long-lasting co-operations.

Cross-Tab's strategy is to understand the needs of the client and help them identify the best solutions, in the perspective of an optimal cost-benefit ratio. Towards this, we offer a high technology infrastructure with cutting edge tools, strategic inputs and resources that can help you redefine and reposition yourself and make bold growth in a competitive environment.

Article Resources:
Cross-tab.com
N Shivapriya is the cheif editor in the Economic Times, Mumbai and the article appeared in one of their successful columns called "Starship Enterprise.

Birth of a Salesman: Selling Learning to Solve Business Issues.

Birth of a Salesman: Selling Learning to Solve Business Issues

Perceptions about the learning function may be learning professionals' greatest frustration, but changing those perceptions is one of the most promising opportunities for impact. Moving learning to business-partner status requires an investment in yourself.

How many times have you seen the potential for a critical integrated learning solution overlooked until the deployment of a new operating process, a systems implementation or the launch of a new product or service - or worse yet, totally ignored until something goes wrong?

Learning need not be forced to limp in and turn lemons into lemonade, though. It should move beyond the role of a firefighter dousing the flames of poor planning and circumstance to the more proactive role of a building inspector to help make sure the house doesn't catch fire in the first place. To assume this role, however, learning leaders must sell the value of development programs.

Selling has several connotations. If you find yourself selling learning to a line-of-business head, promoting a packaged solution that fits in your current budget or asking for precious budget dollars and finding apathy or limited excitement, you likely are too late and have missed the opportunity.

Selling your solution is about selling yourself and your team's ability to execute - to build trusting relationships based on previous initiatives' success and indisputable data. Selling is about business partnering, not pushing your solution.

This requires a continual cycle of developing the relationship and educating decision makers about learning potential and performance. This kind of selling is key to building the kind of institutional trust and relationships that will be required to win support for learning's up-front involvement in the next critical endeavor that will require collaborative initiative.

It's important to remember that relationships are earned, and if organizational perceptions about learning's role are not taken seriously or shaped by creative and innovative solutions, they can remain a serious drag, damper and de-motivator to the entire learning enterprise.

Consider the sales process: It is not your one-size-fits-all idea in a box that should be accepted by any prospective customer you pitch it to. It is determining the business issue, drivers, potential of the solution, how the solution comes together, investment in dollars, satisfaction with the executed solution and return on investment. If you have been attempting the first with limited success, let's discuss how we get to the latter.

Rolling Up Learning's Sleeves

Given the demands on our time these days, it's easy for any learning professional to get mired in an unceasing cycle of process meetings in the learning organization. But this unfortunately comes at the expense of not moving our learning organizations forward to become better business partners - easily said, but not easily achieved.

Relationships with line of business leaders are never static. They either are gaining momentum and moving forward, or they're moving backward. If a business leader does not know your group, then you do not know your customer.

That's why knowing your business, building critical relationships, understanding how decisions are made and why they are made are so important. If you bring creative solutions and new ideas to shape the overall business, you can reshape perceptions about learning and add value to your organization.

In sales, there are "high-value questions." In the learning leader's situation, some of these may include:

a) What are the perils and challenges between our current state and our goals?

b) What does success look like?

c) What does failure look like?

d) Does a performance solution need to be part of the overall solution, and why?

e) Which performance indicators will inform the business about its early progress?

f) Which piece(s) of the implementation plan might require us to stay closely connected moving forward?

OK, so you have asked the questions. Now what? From here, it becomes similar to a learning analysis. You understand the problem, but do you understand the gap, the challenge? Would the decision maker agree with you? How does your approach distinctly map to the needs and fulfill the gaps? Can it be demonstrated? Is it logical and simple, or convoluted? Can you explain it in less than a minute? And the big question: Can you prove that you can execute the solution?

Once key decision makers understand the big-picture impact of the learning enterprise, they're far more likely to forge a relationship through which they can discuss the tools or capabilities the learning organization can bring to help solve the issue or increase the business' overall chances of attaining its desired objective.

Practical Advice on What Works

Sonserae Toles, director of the U.S.-based Learning Campus for Siemens, a global leader in industry, energy and health care, said there are two things any learning leader can do to help advance effective corporate learning.

First is to look at where your key clients reside structurally within the organization and to become well-versed in their specific body of knowledge to establish credibility and increase the chances of a more meaningful engagement. Learning professionals who already have expertise on a particular business line usually have a much greater chance of being perceived as a trusted partner than those who do not.

A second, albeit underutilized tactic is to reach out to the communicators supporting the lines of business. "That communications person can be an extremely valuable resource. He or she knows what's happening within the organization, what the trends are and what other parts of the organization support the operations. Don't underestimate their role," Toles said.

Building relationships with other support services within the organization not only gives learning key allies in selling itself across the organization, but also puts learning closer to the business operations that drive results on a more regular basis.

Sheri A. Lamoureux, human resources executive for Energy East Corp., a super-regional energy services and delivery company based in the northeastern United States, said earning the support of the company's senior vice president and chief administrative officer, in addition to its human resources team, has been key to building the business case for enterprise-wide learning.

That was critical, she said, because for some time, the company wasn't managing or tracking the kind of training its employees got from external sources, so it wasn't really in tune with how learning was impacting its business. Had that situation continued, the organization might never have recognized - from either a business or succession-planning perspective - how important its learning objectives were to achieving its goals in the short and long term.

Before it could renew its impact, learning had to enlist the support of human resources and senior management by creating evaluation tools to measure the success of training and demonstrate a direct impact on financial performance, Lamoureux said. It also had to win the backing of skeptical business managers who had gone so long without significant employee development support that they wondered why their future performance hinged in any way on learning.

"The leadership of the organization is the most important component of this to be successful," she said.

Beyond that level of organizational sponsorship, the Energy East learning team had to not only understand its internal clients' business but also be capable of selling the benefits of engagement with learning in their language. That's the wellspring of trust between business managers and learning professionals.

"It's being able to deliver on what you say you're going to deliver on and showing them the results and doing it in the timeline you promised," Lamoureux said. "It's really as basic as that - and developing those relationships where they understand that you fully understand the business drivers and that you have the business acumen and can gain the trust and credibility. It's focusing on results."

Those organizational assets were evident in the execution of a workforce respect program that the learning team expected would drive an increase in employee complaints in the short term, but in the long run would actually create a more equitable working environment for employees. The learning team delivered the program, acknowledged both the pain and gain, but in the end, demonstrated not only a decrease in complaints but also a broader slate of benefits to the company.

Lamoureux said the practice of simply talking to business partners and being open to their suggestions and also being flexible and open-minded in terms of learning solutions can effectively demonstrate the kind of reciprocity required for meaningful partnerships.

It's also important for learning professionals to understand relationships are one-half of a critical success formula for selling learning and earning the trust of decision makers and business partners.

"Relationships can go a long way, but quite often we need to show the business rationale for what we're doing and how we're moving forward," Lamoureux said.

Successfully selling learning across the enterprise requires one to define the business case, gain consensus about it, execute the work and then measure and reflect the impact to build trust and win support for the next collaborative initiative with a line of business.

"There's both a trust and a data piece to that," Lamoureux explained. "Business partners can really only convince themselves. If you show them data and show them facts, it's hard to argue with that. And if it's coming from trusted source, that can seal the deal."

In summary, if you want to sell learning, you'd better know your customers, understand their pain and map valid solutions that have proven that they can solve that pain. Demonstrating the capabilities and relevance of yourself and your team as opposed to merely promoting an off- the-shelf solution will help you close that sale.

Reference:
Anthony A. D'Agostino and Joseph Daniel McCool
[About the Authors: Anthony A. D'Agostino is a vice president and principal in the learning practice of ACS. Joseph Daniel McCool is an author and an online columnist for BusinessWeek.]

Next Generation of Air Transport: Capt Gopinath

DREAM BIG, ACT FAST, BE DECISIVE

I am a 25-year-old mechanical engineer based in Lucknow. I have started a business aimed at setting up a network of movie exhibition units in villages, using low-cost projectors. I wish to create a chain of 10,000 movie units across rural India in a span of seven months. After nine months of experimentation, my projector now works fine for a 120-inch display, but I have having a tough time trying to raise the required capital of Rs 1 crore. My parents say they have spent enough on me and friends say they need money for houses, cars and bringing up kids. I tried banks and venture capitalists. Banks ask for income tax returns for three years, while VCs insist on a track record. Is it possible for me to get seed capital or will the money come only after my business begins to bloom? Should I slog for several years before I get basic capital. Please guide.

CAPTAIN GR GOPINATH Executive Chairman, Deccan Aviation

THE creation of a large capital is undoubtedly a critical requirement for entrepreneurs across the board, at every stage of their growth. To get an idea off the ground, however, the critical factor is not money but passion and commitment for your vision, which for the truly committed, is inexhaustible. From Dhirubhai Ambani to Narayana Murthy, the success stories of Indian businesses are rife with first generation entrepreneurs having no prior business education, funding or even experience. Indian entrepreneurs now have the advantage of a dynamic and robust economy acting as a fertile ground for their innovations, experiments and success.

Market Your Dream

People have to buy your idea, if they are to put their money into it. Do make sure you have a vision, a well researched plan in place and stay positive. Ask yourself: What is your vision? What is the relevance of your idea? Are You cut out for the grind? This will help you chart the different stages of development for your business, as you envisage it. Each stage of growth will require different strategy, approach and budget. You will have to don different hats to deal with different challenges and crisis in order to stay afloat and make a success. You want to set up a rural network of movie exhibition units. You can start with the prototype you have already built, make it work and build your product reputation around it. It also helps to build a committed team, and acquire the right know how to market yourself and your product effectively.

Build Your Credibility

If you have to get someone to fund your dream project you have to make them believe that your commitment is 100%. This cannot be simulated, only your sweat, toil and tears can speak for you. You have to be prepared to throw in everything that you have to realise your business concept. An investor will go along with you once he’s convinced that even though the failure of the venture would definitely be a setback for him, for you it will be nothing short of a financial catastrophe. I do not prescribe to any management theory instead I prefer to rely on my gut instinct which is backed by my own research and observation. In the early 1990s I stumbled on a news report about a Vietnamese born French pilot using helicopters to help foreign investors travel all over Vietnam. This made me think about the abysmal lack of helicopter services in India and the potential of the enterprise. The process of economic reforms had begun but commercial aviation was a negligible industry and air travel had remained stagnant in the past decades. Under the circumstances, getting finances for a helicopter looked almost impossible. It took my friends and I four long years to get a single helicopter on lease. By 1996 I had mortgaged everything I owned, borrowed heavily from friends and relatives. I succeeded in getting a few private investors on board and acquired our first helicopter and launched Deccan Aviation. While we earned profits right in the first year of our operation, my vision for Deccan Aviation was not just about securing an annual profit. We wanted Deccan Aviation to become India’s largest, most specialised and customer focused helicopter charter company. This required, further investments, a large fleet of helicopters and more financing. Until four years back, I drew a net salary was Rs30,000, but my company remains well supported by investors.

Early Mover

You must realise that the journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step. And If you want to dream big you must act fast and be decisive. The bottom line is if you have a vision and are willing to put all at stake, you will be able to prove your commitment and get support.

5 common Mindblocks against Entrepreneurship.

Mind Over Matter.

5 common mindblocks against Entrepreneurship.

TO EVEN those with a strong urge to start their own business, it seems ludicrous to give up a job in a comfortable atmosphere, with full benefits and generous bonuses. The fact is, it’s still a job — and you still wonder, every day, what it’d be like to work for yourself, not someone else. The following are the five common mental hurdles you must leap over to realise your dream.

You don’t have a lot of money in the bank

That’s a very good reason to shy away from quitting your job, isn’t it? But that just means you need to get a financial plan together. Consult with a financial planner who can help you map out personal and business finance goals. Some local colleges and community centres even offer workshops and classes on financial planning, usually at a minimal cost, so take advantage of them.

Someone mentions the words “business plan” to you, and you stare blankly

A business plan is not the be-all, end-all of starting a business. But it’s pretty important. Some think they don’t need a business plan if they aren’t planning on seeking financing from outside sources. But even if no one but you ever sees your business plan, it’s still important. It helps you put your goals in focus and create a written plan of action for your business. It’s almost like a detailed to-do list. Plus, you never know where your business will take you. You might get started and find out you need more money than you thought, and that’s where that handy business plan comes in.

You don’t know anything about bookkeeping

Go ahead and admit it—it’s very freeing. Admitting you don’t know everything will only make you successful later, because it means you’ll have the courage to ask for help. Get all the advice and mentoring you can at this stage. There’s no shame in consulting with an accountant, an attorney, a long-time veteran in the field, and so on.

You’re not sure you have the dedication it takes to stick with it

There’s a simple way to solve this problem: Don’t start a business doing something you don’t like. If you hate getting up early, starting a coffee shop or a bakery is not for you. If you get impatient around children, don’t start a child-care centre or anything else kid-related. You have to love what you’re doing when you start a business, or you will not stick with it. It's no different than working in a job you hate.

You’re afraid of selling

That’s a big one, because if you’re an entrepreneur, you’re also a salesperson—that is, unless you figure out a way to bring a top-notch salesperson onto your team from the get-go. Chances are, you don’t have the money for that yet, so perhaps a better alternative is to psych yourself up to sell. If you believe in your product or service, you’ll find the confidence to sell it.

Now quit stalling, and get to work. You’ve got a business to start.

Reference:
(Adapted from Microsoft’s Small Business Centre website)

11 tips to grow beyond the start-up phase.

11 tips to grow beyond the start-up phase

HIRE PEOPLE WHO ARE BETTER AT THE JOB THAN YOU ARE

It’s a fact that companies are built by people, and the best people build the best and most profitable companies. Put simply, great employees may cost you 20 to 30% more in wages, but they can be twice as productive as mediocre employees. Invest in good people.

PLACE HIGH URGENCY IN EVERYTHING YOU DO

Always do everything you can today. Too many people treat their businesses as 9-to-5 jobs. Never put something off until tomorrow if you can do it right now.

GET CUSTOMERS COMING BACK

The road to profitability is through repeat business. Too few business owners set themselves up for long-term success. Your business grows when you add regular new customers on top of existing regular customers. Think of it this way: What if every customer you ever got stayed for life? How many regular buyers would you have?

MAKE DECISIONS QUICKLY

New companies don’t have the time or resources to stand still. General H Norman Schwarzkopf once said, “When placed in command, take charge.” It’s better to make a decision and move than to stand still.

DELIVER MORE THAN YOU PROMISE

If you tell a customer it’ll be three days, deliver in two. If you think it’ll be two hours, say three hours and surprise them. This is the best form of marketing ever.

PRICE YOURSELF FOR PROFIT

Don’t ever be the cheapest. You’re the little guy; you don’t have economies of scale. Big companies can make up in volume what they lack in margin. You can’t.

NEVER SPEND A RUPEE YOU DON’T HAVE TO

You don’t need a new desk, you need a cheap desk. Too many new business owners go and buy the best stuff because they think image is important. Listen, when you get profitable, you can have a big mahogany desk. Right now, just get a desk.

SET A BIG VISION

Start Small, Finish Big should be the title of your book. Don’t aim to be the best dog trainer in your city — aim to be the best in the country. Remember, building a business is a 10-year plan, not a one-year plan.

MARKETING IS MATH

Don’t ever let an advertising sales representative teach you anything about marketing. They will say dumb things like, “Half your advertising works and half doesn’t — and you’ll never know which half.” Rubbish. If an ad that costs Rs 100 gets you Rs 100 back in profit, it’s a good ad. One other tip: Image advertising doesn’t make sense when you’re not yet profitable.

LEARN TO SELL

There’s nothing worse than a business owner who isn’t willing to sell — or even learn to sell. No company makes money unless someone sells something, and you can’t just rely on people you hire to do the selling for you. If you want to grow a profitable business, you’ve got to learn sales yourself.

IT’S SIMPLER THAN YOU THINK

Before most people even go into business, they work it up to be far more complex than it really is. Business is very simple: Sell at a profit and keep at it. Overcomplicating the process won’t help anyone. If your business seems too complex, it probably is — so make it simple and watch yourself succeed.

Reference:
(Adapted from entrepreneur.com)

7 ways to Stretch your Marketing Budget

7 ways to stretch your marketing budget

MARKETING isn’t just an expense; it's an investment. The key is to market smarter and fully utilise your marketing budget. Here are seven ways to stretch your marketing rupees and increase your bottom-line profits:

Use free publicity:

It costs you nothing and builds credibility and awareness. So look for opportunities to be involved with community activities.

Speak at local organisations:

Every organisation is looking for speakers for their monthly meetings, so offer to share your knowledge with them. You'll get exposure to groups as an expert and meet lots of new people who might be potential clients.

Write articles:

Contribute to newsletters, newspapers, industry journals and your own Web site. Sharing information builds name recognition, which helps bring in clients.

Create a web site:

Websites are a must. You’re missing a great opportunity if your business doesn't have a presence on the web. It’s a very cost-effective way of letting people know about you and your products and services.

Partner with others:

Look for businesses with complementary services to create cooperative advertising campaigns so that you have a pool of money.

Participate:

Look at ways that you can get more involved in the organisations you already work with. This helps build your name recognition by being involved on committees.

Connect:

Networking is the most effective way to meet people. People like to do business with others they know. Networking takes little money, but it does take a time commitment because you must be consistent in your networking efforts.

Marketing is an important part of any business operation. The challenge is finding cost-effective ways to get your name out without going over your allotted budget. Strategic planning is important so that you have a purpose with each marketing dollar you spend. Some people will just randomly select marketing activities, which is a huge waste of dollars. Creating a marketing plan that incorporates the above seven tips will help you have a focus and a variety of venues to reach existing and potential clients and keep your financial picture on track.

Reference:
(Adapted from Entrepreneur.com

Eight Costly Marketing Mistakes.

Eight Costly Marketing Mistakes

MARKETING ONLY IN THE SLOW TIMES

To grow your business, you need an ongoing, targeted marketing programme you can manage year-round along with the day-to-day demands of your new business. One mistake start-up entrepreneurs often make is to put marketing on the back burner and focus exclusively on the few customers they’ve got. Marketing only during the slow times dooms you to living on an economic roller coaster.

FAILING TO FOCUS

Often, start-up marketers fail because they try to tackle too many types of prospects on a limited, start-up budget. Going after everyone who will listen is a shortcut to failure. On the flip side, when you narrowly focus your marketing efforts on a qualified target audience, you’ll get spectacular results.

OVERLOOKING TESTING AND RESEARCH

So you think millions of people will want to buy your product or service. What makes you so sure? Before committing lots of cash to launching your new business, do some market research. The internet is your best source of published information. You can test the market using surveys. Testing can keep you from making costly mistakes based on false assumptions about your product, service or customers.

RELYING ON JUST ONE OR TWO TACTICS

It’s only natural to rely on the marketing tactics you’re most comfortable with. If you like meeting and talking to new people, you may focus on networking. If you’re shy, on the other hand, you might rely solely on direct mail. Such singlemindedness is a major marketing mistake because it prevents you from exposing a full range of prospects to your message.

UNDERSPENDING ON MARKETING

It’s just as important to set aside marketing funds as it is to budget for tools you’re going to need to run your business. If you go to a bank for financing, you’ll be expected to show the banker your marketing budget — because without marketing, there’s very little chance you’ll be able to repay your loan. Even if you’re funding your company without help from a bank or other lender, you need to follow the same guidelines.

FAILING TO PRESENT A PROFESSIONAL IMAGE

Your marketing materials sell your company image to the world. To be successful, you need a cohesive family of tools that stand up to those of even your largest competitors. If you hand out shoddy, poorly produced marketing materials to prospects, don’t expect to be picked for plum jobs. Also be aware of how your company ‘sounds’ when prospects call.

IGNORING CURRENT CUSTOMERS

As your business grows, you may become so focused on getting new customers that you overlook current customers. That is a major mistake, since it generally costs more to win a new customer than to ‘resell’ to an existing one.

OVERLOOKING WHAT TECH CAN DO FOR YOU

Contact management software and e-mail marketing are just two options that can streamline your marketing efforts and improve your productivity. Without a good contact management programme, business contacts may be lost and call-backs missed. Don’t overlook these valuable tools that can help your business grow.

Reference:
(Source: Microsoft Small Business Center)