Sherie Griffiths

July 25, 2011

The entrepreneur’s kitbag – the No. 1 must-have is a must-have

Filed under: Business, Business Startup — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — sheriegriffiths.com @ 2:04 pm

Last week, I overheard a snippet of a discussion on Radio 2, about whether anyone can become a successful entrepreneur, or whether you need special qualities. That prompted me to look around at the most commercially successful people I know. They’re all at different stages in their businesses, in completely different industries, and on the face of it, they’re very different people – but they have at least ten things in common. I can’t put NOs 10 to 2 into a definitive order, but they are:

10 – a healthy disregard for time – none of them watches the clock when there’s work to be finished;

9 – The unshakeable belief that they deserve to succeed in their aims and therefore they can – and they will – actually, no, it’s beyond that -‘belief’ implies an element of faith in something it might not be possible to prove; but what they have is knowledge – they know they deserve to get where they want to go;

8 – Equal certainty that what their business does is of real value to its customers;

7 – Ridiculous amounts of energy, including the kind of stamina a distance athlete would envy;

6 – Blinkers – which are capable of filtering out everything except the business,

5 – Less subtlety than the average brick – somehow combined with the ability to inspire forgiveness from family, friends, colleagues etc, for behaviour which, from anyone else would, quite frankly, be unacceptable!;

4 – A powerful set of ‘bum springs’, or ‘weeble weights’ (my terminology) – so that when life knocks them over, they just bounce straight back up again!;

3 – More front than Southend and Blackpool put together and

2 – what I recently heard described as: ‘a constitutional aversion to spending money’.

So what’s No. 1?

Every business adviser you’ll ever meet will tell you you need to set goals. That’s fine – except that goal posts are notoriously easy to move – especially when the goal is a ‘nice to have’. I made that mistake when I got started – and I kept making it for several years! I’d think: ‘I want to earn x, so that I can do Y’. Y was always a nice to have – like a weekend away – very pleasant if I achieved it, but hardly the end of the world if I didn’t. What the people I’ve been talking about all have – and what I have now – is at least one imperative – a ‘must have’, or a ‘must to avoid’. These days, I’ve got one of each – a carrot and a stick. If I start to lose sight of the carrot, the stick catches me across the ankles. I can honestly say I’ve never been so focused in my life!

Now all I have to do is perfect the other 9…!!!

July 15, 2011

‘Who do you think you’re talking to?!’

Filed under: Business, Business Startup, Communication, Marketing, Marketing for Startup Britain, Marketing for Startup Britain, Media, Podcasts, Presentations, Startup Britain, Startup Britain, The Enterprise Gateway — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — sheriegriffiths.com @ 7:21 am

On tuesday, I was talking about Marketing for Startup Britain, the 5-day conference held in London last week, organized by Startup Britain and the Marketing Agencies Association.

Over the last few days, I’ve been catching up with people who were there. Some, like me, only managed one day; some managed two or three – and others did the whole week!
What I’ve been hearing has been, on the whole, extremely positive. I certainly came away inspired to change my focus on certain aspects of my new brand. Everyone else I’ve spoken to so far is in business, or going into business, for the first time and they’ve all said they learnt a huge amount.

Do you feel a ‘but’ coming on…? My English teachers would have the horros if they saw what I’m about to do, because they all told me NEVER to start a sentence – let alone a paragraph – like this…

BUT! one thing which has come through consistently about last week is that, while most of the speakers spoke very eloquently from a startup perspective, however long ago they started and however successful they’ve become, others seemed to be completely out of touch with their audience. I won’t mention any names, because they all gave their time with the best of intentions, but I’m told there was at least one whose presentation made no real reference to startups and who, away from the microphone, admitted having no interest in very young businesses. That leads me to ask what on earth they were doing there. The only answer I can think of is that they hoped some of the fledgling businesses would grow up to be something they would be interested in. There’s nothing wrong with taking the long view when it comes to building business connections, of course – but alienating people at the beginning by showing they’re too small to interest you, by talking to them about things which have no relevance to them, isn’t exactly a great foundation for a long-term relationship!

I should have had one of those very new business people on my radio show yesterday – but technology threw a wobbler – so she’ll now be on in a couple of weeks. I’ll tell you more about her then.

All I’ll say now is that she was a joy to interview and the ideal kind of guest for the programme. There’s absolutely no point in my having the CEO of some global corporate on to talk about the trials of floating a company on the stock exchange, when I know my listeners are made up largely of home-based parents who are trying to get some kind of enterprise off the ground, or wondering whether, one day, they might be able to do it. Someone who, in a very dark time in her life, came up with an idea which she’s now going all out to make a reality, is much more relevant to them. Offering them someone who can’t identify with them is like trying to communicate with a non-English-speaker by SHOUTING! VERY! LOUD! AND! VERY! SLOW-LEEEE! – frustrating for all concerned – and completely pointless!

Whatever we’re trying to say and whatever medium we use – live presentation, radio, podcasts, phone, leaflets, website, social media – you name it! – knowing who we’re talking to and at least trying to speak their language is vital. Otherwise, we end up talking to ourselves.

July 12, 2011

The power of speech – especially when you start the conversation

Filed under: Business, Business Startup, Communication, Customer Service, Events, Marketing, Marketing for Startup Britain, Presentations, Startup Britain — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — sheriegriffiths.com @ 2:32 pm

 

Last week, five venues across London played host to a five-day conference entitled: ‘Marketing for Startup Britain’. Startup Britain is a private initiative supported by the government – although not financially. This event was staged with a lot of help from the Marketing Agencies Association and its members.

I first heard about the conference via Twitter and decided I had to go to at

least one day. I’ve been in business for seven years, but I’m currently preparing to launch a new brand and I could see some great potential networking opportunities. Also, I’m a firm believer in the idea that however experienced we are, we can always learn.

I finally made it on Friday, to the session called ‘All you need to know about marketing a startup’, which pulled together a lot of the topics from earlier in the week. It was a fantastic day, both from the networking and the learning perspective – of which, more in future posts!

Almost every presentation was streamed live on the web and recorded – so I’m now working my way through the ones I missed.

I started this morning with ‘The Power of Talkonomics’ by Bambos Neophytou, Head of Planning at the marketing agency, Exposure. ‘Talkonomics’ is a trademarked term, coined by the agency, to describe the influence of word of mouth on people’s purchasing decisions.

I watched the video very early in the morning and had to resist the temptation to applaud and cheer – in case I woke the neighbours! For years, I’ve been explaining the power of speech to clients. Recommendation by one customer to another is invaluable for any business –and when all that potential is harnessed on a grander scale – in a word, WOW!

Word of mouth en mass, as I call it, used to be the preserve of the big brands, with huge marketing budgets, who could afford luxuries like radio promotions. Whilst adverts shout at us to ‘BUY!’, the promotion talks to us about a product, via someone the brand hopes we trust – the presenter. Research shows that we’re more than twice as likely to buy something when we hear about it from someone we trust. Promotions also give us the chance to get involved, to experience the product firsthand (the quickest way to create an advocate) and entertains us along the way.

As I said, all this used to be the preserve of the larger brands – but digital media has put the tools into the hands of anyone with something to talk about. The trick for anyone looking to capitalise on these opportunities is to work out what exactly their potential customers talk about when they discuss their brand. Bambos pointed out that it often isn’t what we would traditionally think of as brand drivers – the fact, for instance, that driving a particular car tells the world we’re successful. Marketing people are always telling us to ‘focus on the benefits’. It may be true that we buy for the benefits – but more often than not, we talk about the features – and not always the obvious features.

I’ve recently finished an audio-visual series on customer service for a client – and, for better or worse, customer service, it seems, is one of the best conversation starters there is. (Just look back at my posts under the heading ‘The OOPS! Awards’ if you want proof of that!).

Entertainment also gets people chatting – which is why I’m about to start work on a series of comedy sketches, for a businesswoman with a cracking sense of humour – and a serious commercial message. Some clients are a bit nervous about making entertaining downloads or putting together live presentations with too much fun in them. Obviously, the audience is key here – if you’re talking to a group of people who see levity as a lack of professionalism and you need them to see you as the ultimate pro, you probably shouldn’t try to make them laugh; but generally, I’ve seen time and time again that education might bring you appreciation, information will make sure you’re remembered – and entertainment is guaranteed to get you talked about in very positive terms.

July 1, 2011

‘So what’s stopping you? – too much thinking is really bad for business!

Filed under: 'So what's stopping you?', Business, Business Startup, Communication, Media, The Enterprise Gateway — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — sheriegriffiths.com @ 9:39 am

Last Thursday’s radio show was the last in the series (just for the time being) of ‘So what’s stopping you?’ with Steve Dickinson of Dickinson Coaching. This time, we were talking about over-thinking.

We’ve all heard the expression, ‘Failing to plan is planning to fail’, haven’t we? In fact, we hear it so often it’s become a bit of a cliché. Like all clichés, there’s a lot of truth in it, especially in business. Running headlong into a project just because it excites us as individuals is no guarantee of success. Other people might not share our enthusiasm; there might be a lot of competition in the particular market – and if there isn’t, that might be because there’s no money in it. These issues would probably have come to light if we’d done a bit of planning – and we may even have found ways around them.

There is a real danger, though, at the other end of the spectrum, of potentially great ideas being strangled at birth by too much thinking. Listening to other people – especially those with more experience – is vital; but too much advice – and too much reliance on it – is as dangerous as not enough.

Then there’s the more personal kind of over-thinking which can destroy our own confidence – the kind that can start with, ‘I don’t think I’m very good at…’ and end with, ‘I can’t do…’

If you’re a thinker by nature – someone who likes to plan everything down to the last detail – you might well believe that’s just how you are and you can’t change. I know that because I’ve done it myself; but very recently, I broke the habit of a lifetime – had an idea and made it happen within a week. For the first time ever, I’m working on the basis that ‘done is better than perfect’ and I have enough business experience now to fine-tune the project as I go. Yes, I could have spent six months meticulously planning and refining. The control freak in me would have found a certain satisfaction in that; but this project is far more use to me – and my clients – out in the big bad world than it is on the drawing board.

Oddly enough, doing live radio has helped me to become less of a control freak. When everything is pre-recorded, there’s a real temptation to go on re-recording or re-editing indefinitely, in search of absolute perfection; but in a live situation, all you can do is make sure you’ve thought enough (but not too much) beforehand. Once it’s out there, it’s out there. I can illustrate that from very recent experience.

Aside from the interview with Steve, I did last week’s show on my own – without my regular colleague, Alison, who was on holiday. The whole three hours was live – no pre-recorded ‘packages’ to give me breathing space. There were several things in there which I had to do for the first time, like the weather forecast (which has to be fitted into thirteen seconds just before the news kicks in automatically), travel updates (which obviously have to be delivered clearly and logically – because people listening on the move aren’t giving you their full attention and the information you’re delivering could change the whole shape of their day) – and an interview which I didn’t know was happening until ten minutes before it went out.

Now, I interview for a living. At the moment, it’s the major part of my programme-making; but normally, I talk to the interviewee in advance, we prepare the questions together etc. This time, there was no such luxury. All I had beforehand was the girl’s name, where she was from – and the fact that she wanted to talk about ‘fish pedicures’! Still, I’m told I pulled it off.

The weather was interesting. Before the first forecast, I rehearsed it aloud three times –but the mouth went into reverse almost as soon as the mic was up. The next three were done without rehearsal – and went smoothly and to time.

The show as a whole wasn’t perfect – but what really mattered was that it got better as it went along, the feedback afterwards was great – and I learnt so much from the experience.

Steve’s parting shot last week was, ‘If there’s something you really want to do, just go for it.’ I’ll second that. Yes, do some planning and preparation. If you’re very passionate about an idea, it’s quite useful to make yourself step back a bit and try to look at it more objectively, to see it in the wider context of the market you want to go into, the trends and so on. Failing to plan without that knowledge really is planning to fail – but don’t plan it to death. If circumstances allow – if it doesn’t need too much investment to get started – there’s nothing wrong with testing the water by jumping in. Very few people ever learnt to swim by sitting on the side and watching.

 

I’m taking a couple of weeks off from the programme.  It all starts again on 14th July, with a brand new series: ‘The only way is enterprise’ – looking at the influence of the TV show ‘The Only Way is Essex’ on local business – should be fun!

June 22, 2011

‘What’s stopping you?’ – ‘no’ doesn’t necessarily mean ‘no’

Filed under: 'So what's stopping you?', Business, Business Startup, Communication, Media, The Enterprise Gateway — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — sheriegriffiths.com @ 10:42 am

Last Thursday’s radio show, the third episode of ‘What’s Stopping You?‘ with Steve Dickinson of Dickinson Coaching, was all about one word. It’s one of the smallest words in the English language, but it can strike terror into the toughest of us. Just the thought of having to say it – and, worse still, maybe having to hear it – can send perfectly rational, intelligent adults scuttling in the opposite direction!

So what’s the word? It’s ’no’.

The fear of rejection is one of the biggest hurdles most entrepreneurs ever have to get over. First comes the big idea – closely followed by the fear that if we put it into words, people will laugh and tell us we’re being daft. If we pluck up the courage to go public, next comes the need for support, financial or otherwise – with the fear that no-one will actually want to back us hot on its heels. Even when we’re up and running, the fear of rejection keeps rearing its ugly head, in various guises – in relation to prospects, clients, suppliers, financiers etc.

This little word has so much power because we’ve learnt to associate it with disapproval – and we’ve learnt to associate other people’s approval with our own wellbeing. That association has sound evolutionary roots – like the fear of loud noises with which we’re all born. We need other people in order to survive. It also has psychological roots for many of us – because as children, when we heard the word ‘no’, it was often a loud noise from an angry adult – who was responsible for our survival.

Fast-forward a few decades and you have an adult who backs away from asking for what they really want and need as a form of self-protection and so misses out on invaluable opportunities. That’s a big enough obstacle in normal, every day life – but in business, it’s a real disability!

On Thursday’s show, Steve explained how it’s possible to turn the fear around, by shifting focus from ourselves to the person we’re afraid is about to say the dreaded word. He set out three reasons why people say ’no’ – none of which have anything to do with personal disapproval:

1 – fear – they’re afraid they’ll hear something they don’t want to hear, or be pushed into doing something they don’t want to do;
2 – lack of information – they may not put it into so many words, but they don’t fully understand what we’re asking; or
3 – for their own reasons, they really don’t want to do what we’re asking.

Whichever it is, it isn’t about us – it’s about them.

Most of us don’t enjoy saying ‘no’ any more than we enjoy hearing it. As a result, we sometimes say ‘yes’ despite our own fear, lack of information, or knowledge that whatever we’re being asked to do really isn’t for us. I have a friend who very rarely says ‘no’ – although that doesn’t mean he can be railroaded into anything. He’ll say things like, ‘Sorry, I can’t’, ‘I don’t think so’, or ‘I’d prefer not to, to be honest’. Cop-out? Maybe – but I have to say I never go away with that awful feeling of personal rejection. I leave with a sense of understanding his reasons – the focus is on him, rather than me.

I studied Spanish for a short while at university and one of the first things I learnt was that if, for instance, a friend asks you if you fancy going out for a drink, just saying ‘no’ is considered very rude – you’re expected to explain why.

Since last week’s programme, I’ve come to the conclusion that worse even than having someone say ‘no’ is having them say ‘yes’ if they’re worried about, or not sure of, what they’re letting themselves in for – or they really don’t want to do it but are too scared to say so!

And it’s always worth asking. They might actually say ‘yes’ and mean it.

On tomorrow’s show, Steve’s advice is ‘Stop thinking – it’s really bad for business’. To find out what he’s on about, listen at 3PM on 97.8 FM if you’re in the Basildon and East Thurrock area, or online anywhere else, at http://www.gateway978.com.

If you have any ideas for topics for future programmes, please get in touch.

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June 20, 2011

‘If I’d known then what I know now…’

Filed under: Business, Business Startup, Media, The Enterprise Gateway — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — sheriegriffiths.com @ 9:32 am

Sound like your mother? Yeah, mine too – although I have to admit, I’ve heard myself say it more than once recently.

My excuse is not age – absolutely not! I’m talking about business.

Many of us start out with a good idea (or what we hope is a good idea),some knowledge, skills and experience which may or may not relate to it – and an awful lot to learn about how to turn concept into reality – and more importantly, reality into cash. Some lessons come quickly, others sink in only after years of taking the wrong road, possibly going around in circles – and losing, instead of making, money in the process!

It’s as true in business as it is for parents and children – you can’t make someone else’s mistakes for them. The only way most of us really learn anything is by our own errors; but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be armed with good information from the beginning. More and more parents these days warn their kids about the dangers of alcohol, tobacco or harder drugs. Ok, so plenty of those kids still go off and try one or the other – or all three – but they don’t do it in ignorance.

In a business context, there are lots of courses, books and organisations designed to forewarn and forearm new entreprenneurs – to make sure they don’t start climbing the business mountain without at least some of the right survival gear in their kitbag. Yet still, people set off without the basics. I was talking to someone this morning who said that a workshop she recently heard about, dealt with sales by saying, ‘Go back to your office, write a plan and start calling people’. Hmm… yeah, well, that’s a start – but only just – and it does nothing to allay the concerns of the new would-be business person who’s thinking, ‘But I don’t know how to sell!’

A couple of weeks ago, I heard myself say: ’One thing I’ve learnt, which I wish I’d known from the beginning, is…’ – and it got me thinking: each and every one of us who ever set up any kind of enterprise must be able to point to at least one thing they’ve learnt from the process which, if we’d known it from the get-go, would have made our climb up the mountain a whole lot easier, less draining (financially and otherwise) – and more productive.

My ’one thing’ relates to how money is made. When I started out, I always said, very firmly, ’I don’t do numbers. I do words – but figures, forget it!’ I won’t bore you with the origins of that belief – but I will say it turned out to be one of those shadows on the wall that I was talking about last Wednesday. I eventually discovered that not only was I perfectly capable of doing the maths, if I didn‘t, I wasn’t running the show – whoever had a handle on the pound signs was doing that for me – or maybe in spite of me.

So that’s one thing I wish I’d known when I started – but the main one is the very simple fact that to make money on low-cost products or services, you need high volumes of sales, and to make money on high added value, high cost products etc, which aren’t going to fly off the shelves at the same rate as the cheap stuff, you need a healthy profit margin. Yes, I know – it’s really straightforward – but no-one told me – I had to work it out by exhausting trial and expensive error. My O- and A-level economics teachers would both be appalled to hear me say that – but there it is.

When I started out, I tried to sell what were effectively premium services (because they were very time- and labour-intensive) to people with shoestring budgets. I made sales by trimming back my financial costs as far as possible and passing those savings on to the customer. That meant cutting back my margins until they squeaked – or was it my bank manager squeaking…? Customers loved it – well, who wouldn’t enjoy getting five-star service for one-star prices?! The only person who wasn’t quids in was me!

A week or so ago, I put the question out on Twitter – ’If you’re in business, what’s the one thing you know now that you wish you’d known when you started?‘ I had some really interesting responses – and now I’m asking you…?

I’m thinking of pulling the answers together for a radio show called ’The business jigsaw’ – so there could be a bit of free publicity in it for you!

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