Meeting Topic
Introduction
As a business owner, the list of priorities can seem endless, and the advice can be overwhelming. However, getting the basics of business communication right can make a huge impact on your reputation and, ultimately, your bottom line.
Getting the Small Things Right by Charlotte Fitzpatrick
As a business owner, the list of priorities can seem endless, and the advice can be overwhelming. However, getting the basics of business communication right can make a huge impact on your reputation and, ultimately, your bottom line.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos once said, “Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.” Small changes can make a big difference in how customers perceive your brand and their overall experience with your company, so it’s important you pay attention to the details.
Consider the scenario of fictional couple, Annie and Mike, who invite their neighbours, Tony and Michelle, over for drinks and a BBQ in their newly landscaped garden.
After chatting, Annie and Mike discover Tony and Michelle have also recently engaged a landscaper to work at their property. However, the couples have had vastly contrasting experiences with their local landscaping companies.
Tony and Michelle share they’ve had a stressful time dealing with their landscaper, particularly around project scope creep, lack of detailed plans, timeline details, and the final bill. They’re warning their friends against using the company. Meanwhile, Annie and Mike had an amazing experience and happily shared their satisfaction.
What did Annie and Mike’s company do right, and what did the unsuccessful one get wrong? Improving communication can make a real difference in the customer’s overall experience.
Here are four small ways to enhance communication practices, which can ensure your business maintains a positive customer experience, and that your customers say great things about you.
Ditch the jargon:
Avoid using industry-specific terms when communicating with your customers. Simplify your language and gradually introduce technical terms as clients become more familiar with the process.
Be one step ahead:
Proactively provide information to clients, ensuring they don’t have to chase you for updates. Managing expectations and keeping clients informed about the process can alleviate their concerns and reassure them that everything is being taken care of.
Avoid radio silence:
Continuous communication is essential. Radio silence can lead to uncertainty, causing clients to imagine worst-case scenarios. Even when issues arise, be honest and transparent and communicate promptly with the information you have, demonstrating your commitment to addressing concerns.
Be an active listener:
Show empathy and actively listen to your customer’s questions and concerns, emphasising that you care not only about the end result but also about their experience throughout the process.
By focusing on these small but impactful changes in communication, businesses can greatly enhance their reputation and customer satisfaction. These simple practices can contribute to a positive brand image and ultimately lead to a more successful and well-regarded business.
Business is competitive and paying attention to the small things can set your brand apart. By prioritising effective communication and customer experience, businesses can build a strong reputation that resonates positively with their target audience.
Next Meeting Topic
Brand Strategy by Marijka Timmers
Introduction
The values that guide decision making in business often stem from the personal values of the business leader. Whether you’re driving your business through conscious alignment of your values already or you’ve not yet considered what these might be, subconsciously they’re still very much integrated in your day-to-day. Being intentional about your brand values and building them into your brand strategy and marketing content, helps connect you on deeper levels with your audiences. It also helps you recruit and lead a team in alignment with your innate code of conduct.
Read more detail below and consider your 3-5 core values. Share them with your group during your 1 minute pitch.
If you would like help defining your 3-5 core values, you’re welcome to access my free Brand Values module, from my Brand Blueprint programme.
Brand Values – A Fundamental Of Your Brand Strategy
Whether we’ve purposefully defined them or not, we all make decisions based on our value-system. We all hold hundreds of values that underpin our behaviour, and honing in on our core 3-5 can help us attract our ideal customers, partners and team members.
Like attracts like. When you have absolute clarity on what your brand values are and you and your teams operate in alignment with them, you can create a magnetism to your brand.
Brand values declare who you are, what you’ll take a stand on and how you’ll hold yourself accountable. They also help differentiate you from your competition and can help define your visual identity and tone of voice, through the psychology of good design and linguistics.
As business owners, we are often led by our heads. But, when defining our values, we need to dive into our hearts. We feel our way through it rather than over-thinking, analysing and logically debating it with ourselves. This is where the right brain leads in terms of creativity and intuition, because you eventually want your brand to evoke the same feelings and emotions in your audiences.
Consider your values as an individual. Consider your family’s values. Which ones do you feel strongly about? In most cases, they will be fairly similar.
Most importantly, they’re unlikely to be things that don’t change over time. For example, if caring for people matters to you, you may have a business value such as ‘human-centred’ or ‘better together’. You’re unlikely to wake up one day and no longer care about people – it’s a constant that you’ll take through life and business.
In branding and marketing, consistency is key. Your values help you remain consistent over time, even as the marketing changes and your business evolves. These are the things you’ll stay steadfast on and this is one way you can build understanding, connection and loyalty over time with all your internal and external peeps.
If you would like to learn more about how Marijke helps small businesses deliver marketing strategies and tactics that drive profit, while purposefully impacting those around you, please visit www.themarketingcollective.co.nz.
