The Secret To Small Business Success !
As a former Award Winning Small Businessman I have learnt that to succeed in Business, you need to give outstanding Customer Service and if you fail to do so there is always a competitor waiting in the wings ready to replace you.
This involves staying in tune with your customer’s needs and desires.
It is so easy to fall into the trap of not planning ahead and sticking with; sometimes outmoded weak means of doing business.
Marketing is a key area where a lot of businesses fail. The Yellow Pages ran a very amusing add on Australian television a couple of years ago with a type of slogan that became a national catch-cry, ‘Not happy Jan’! In this commercial, the unfortunate employee/partner ‘Jan’, was being chased and shouted after by the Business Owner for neglecting to place their add in the latest Yellow Pages.
Everyone who was dissatisfied in any way, from poor customer service to even missing out on a favourite parking state at the local Shopping Centre, was quoting this phrase amongst social circles.
This was very clever marketing on behalf of The Yellow Pages and it sure worked as they were inundated with calls from current and established Business Owners, anxious to ensure their add was not left out of the latest edition. Now, almost every Business chooses to advertise in this directory, but maybe not for much longer? !
A while back I came across a report from the USA titled ‘How To Unsubscribe From The Yellow Pages’, instructing its citizens on the process of de-listing from phone book publications.
If you are involved in Small Business your traditional means to advertise may be under threat! It would seem that a number of U.S. Cities are now taking the view that such publications are not only, ‘Unsolicited Mail’ and an Environmental Nightmare, but also an indication of property vacancy, prompting serious security concerns!
As a result, in what could soon become a ‘ World Wide Trend‘, numerous Councils including Boston, Cambridge and Minnesota are considering proposing legislation that would require each phone directory publisher to establish a “Do not receive Registry.”
Think about it, when was the last time your customers called their phone company and requested a directory be delivered and dropped on their doorstep?
According to the Star Tribune:
“…85 % of telephone directories are dumped into the regular trash, even though it has been illegal to do so since 1992. State pollution officials call it one of Minnesota’s biggest solid-waste problems.”
The Solution…
The Internet!
Phone numbers, addresses and business directories can all be found on the Internet. It’s much faster than flipping pages and if you have ‘Skype’, you can click on the number for instant connection, plus it might result in saving some trees from unnecessary destruction.
So, If you want to succeed in Small Business, it is imperative you stay in tune with your customer’s needs and desires, so they will have no cause to say to their friends,‘Not happy Jan’!
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Filed under Small Business Phones by on May 6th, 2011. 
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