If it were me

The government here in Australia has recently announced:

“Small business gets a $2.7 billion package of tax breaks that includes an extra $600 tax deduction for any small business that buys and installs a $2000 computer before the end of June.” – SMH

Now if I was in the business of selling computers I would look at combining this with some internal offering. Thus, I would say something like “Did you realize that the government now provides an extra deduction for computer purchases before June? Did you also realize that we’ll also give you a free printer as well?”. Or even perhaps something along the lines of “The government if offering a $600 saving on computers to help the country avoid recession. We’ll give you a free copy of Office as our part in helping to boost the economy”.

I use these as examples, obviously you’ll have to work out the numbers for yourself but I think there is opportunity to piggy back off what the government is attempting to do with your own offering. It should appeal to customers in two ways. Most importantly, it should represent some saving or benefit to them. Secondly, it should show that you are trying to do your bit for the local economy as well. Thus, customers should buy from you and support your business.

Hopefully this illustrates that developing marketing concepts for your business isn’t that difficult no matter what the economic conditions. All it takes is a little creativity and the ability to look at the situation from the customers point of view. In this case the key is tying an offer to something the mainstream media is focused on and then going that little bit further so you stand out. You have to offer something extra to get people to buy from YOU and not the competition!

Participation

I look at politicians all over the World as they struggle to use the ‘R’ word (which is recession). Everyone else knows we are in a recession and maybe even headed for the ‘D’ word (which is depression). Another group of people that I’ve watching with interest are those who claim, they ‘are not participating in the recession’.

I think that is a very noble sentiment but it isn’t realistic. Why? Well if everyone else around you, your customers, peers, suppliers and so on are in the middle of a recession how can you choose not to participate? Unfortunately, in this day and age everything is so intertwined that we depend on those around us heavily. When they sneeze we catch cold.

A wise person once said that a smart person can’t control their situation only their reaction to it. Face it, we are in a recession. Face it, we are going to see reduced cashflow. Face it, times are going to be tough. Don’t try and fight something that you can’t change, look at your reaction to the situation facing you.

What steps have you taken to solidify your business? What actions have you taken to reassure your customers that you’ll continue to be there to help? What actions are you taking to grow your business? Hang on there. Did I say GROW?

Well, yes in fact I did. Again, the key again is how you react to the situation. What we are going through now will not last for ever. However, we may never see opportunities like these again. Consider the opportunities to purchase assets at historically low levels. Look at the opportunity to repay debt at the lowest interest rates seen. Look at the opportunity presented to you because your competitors are wobbling or falling.

Participation in the recession is mandatory. Once you understand and accept that you then need to consider how to use the recession to your advantage. I never said that it would be as easy as it was in the good times but there is still opportunity there for those who are prepared.

Tell me, where do you stand? Do you have your eyes closed hoping all this mess will disappear? Or do you have your eyes wide open, searching for every opportunity? The choice is yours. The grounds rules have changed. Participate or die.

Do email less

I thought that I’d let everyone know that I’ve registered the domain www.doemailless.com as a method of focusing attention on our productivity improvement training. The domain points to our normal email productivity page that includes the free document The problems with emails document as well as links to our Overcoming email frustrations books for Outlook 2003 and 2007. Finally, you’ll also find a brochure on our productivity seminars.

Our productivity seminars can be customized to suit any business environment and include your own internal policies and procedures. However, the main message still remains that most businesses are losing at least 1 hour per day, per employee to inefficient email use. When you start adding up the cost to business we believe our seminars more than pay for themselves.

Email is not the only part of the smarter productivity services we can offer. We can show you how to streamline your existing business practices, integrate low cost technologies such as OneNote and SharePoint to really save money and get things done. We even offer higher level training and mentoring to ensure that the critical components of your business are working most effectively.

For more information about our services simply contact me via director@ciaops.com.