As the recession continues, restaurant owners need to find new revenue streams. One of the best ways of doing this is to expand your customer base. Here are some simple ideas that you can implement to increase your customer base and as a result your profits.
Make your menu affordable to everyone. Don’t leave anybody out
Lunch time is usually a time for customers to get in and out. You’ll always want specials on the board that are quick and easy; and cheap. You need to produce efficiently to get the customers in and out as quickly as possible. Dinner time is a more relaxed experience for customers. They will take their time when choosing menu options and they will look at a wider range of choices. It is always a great idea to offer options that range anywhere from $7.99 for a Spaghetti &Meatballs to a Heavy NY Strip for $18.99. You are, therefore, opening the menu to different customers and wallet sizes.
Advertisement on a Local Radio Station
If you can find a local radio station, usually it ends up being an AM station to advertise for you, it will significantly boost your sales. I did this with an AM station every Monday morning. The disc jockey would ask me questions about specials, my background, location, menu items, do we serve alcohol, etc. I was allotted a time slot for every week. I would often mention specials for the listeners and as soon as I hung up the phone, my phone lines would blow up before I was even open for business. The cost to me was around $170.00 a month. That’s a fraction of funds compared to advertisements in local newspapers or magazines. I had drones of people coming in to meet me that heard me on the radio.
Lucky Rock Bags
Take a box of sandwich bags, put a river rock in the bag to weigh it down, and include your menu, a coupon, upcoming specials, and locations. You throw these out on people driveways. The typical reaction when people call is that they received a bag in their driveway and this was the first time they were trying the restaurant or heard of you. Unfortunately, you will have a choice few that will be upset that the bag that actually landed in their driveway was purposively thrown in a bush or on their perfectly manicured lawn. I usually shrug these people off since they have never worked a day in their life in a restaurant. After all, we have free speech and this is a way for you to get your name out. That’s all I tell them.
Participate in Food Competitions to increase customer base
I have participated in these for a couple of years now and the feedback you get is incredible. There are hundreds of people that are walking around trying local fare. You can meet and greet the locals, tell them about yourself, and hand out menus. It’s also a great way for potential customers to sample your items before they visit your location.
Write a blog to gain customers
There are so many resources available on the web for you to write about your restaurant. Most of the time these websites are free and they will get the word out about specials you’re running, location, menu items, and other pertinent information about your particular restaurant. Some of the best websites for blogging on restaurants is chowhound, cooks, and pizza.com.
Have a Newspaper write an Article
An article about your restaurant is a great source of free advertising for your restaurant and can have a real impact on your business. A restaurateur that I know had one of the most popular newspapers from his area do an article about his restaurant in January 2007. They interviewed some of his best customers and asked them to put their two cents in. They took a picture of him cooking in his chef jacket. The article described his life as a chef, his background, and his favorite items to cook. He still busy 6 months after the article came out. This was due to the fact that the article had attracted new customers to his restaurant that ended up becoming regular customers of his. People were even traveling from 2 hours away to visit his restaurant.
Make a club and Email List
For example, you could form a pizza of the month club. Then twice a month you would provide the customers with an XLarge specialty pizza, 6 garlic rolls, 2 desserts, 2 salads, and one appetizer for $39.95. It’s your club, so you can do what you want to. Be creative. You can create an email list within this club to let your customer base know what the specialty pizza of the month is going to be or upcoming events.
Wine Tastings
Depending on your clientele, this is an extremely lucrative way to have other streams of income coming in. This is, of course, is dependent on if you have a Beer and Wine License. You can combine your food with the type of wine the wine guy has brought for tasting.
Cooking Classes
Provide classes to your customers each week about a particular aspect of cooking, a technique, a type of cuisine, etc. This can be worked around your restaurant hours. This is a great way to develop relationships with your customers.
Catering
This is a lot work and often times you need a lot of employees to help. You need a form of transportation that will safely transport the food without diminishing the quality. This requires planning and knowledge. For example, you need to know the portions sizes for a certain amount of people and have to remember to take every item you need for service with you. Catering can be a great source of new revenue, whether it be peparing food for private parties (weddings) or delivering lunch for local businesses.
Some of the ideas in this post come from an article by Lauren Axelrod, published in Business on August 2, 2008. To read the original article, click here.
Showing posts with label How to increase profits. Show all posts
Showing posts with label How to increase profits. Show all posts
Monday, April 20, 2009
Sunday, March 29, 2009
How Positive Psychology Can Boost Your Business
Here's a recent article from BusinessWeek.com that I hope you enjoy.
How Positive Psychology Can Boost Your Business
In tough times, entrepreneurs try the so-called science of happiness to build thriving companies
By Jill Hamburg Coplan
To understand how positive psychology—the so-called science of happiness—is being used by entrepreneurs, it helps to look at a company under siege. After all, it's one thing to talk about the connections between a positive mental state and a healthy company when a business is running well, turning a profit, and grabbing new customers. But tougher times really test entrepreneurs, separating those who hunker down and hope the worst will pass from those who use their strengths to find opportunity amid rubble.
Robert Aliota is determined to be, when necessary, one of the latter. In 2004, Aliota, the owner of Carolina Seal, an 11-employee Charlotte (N.C.) company that makes custom-engineered parts for DuPont (DD) and John Deere (DE), among others, learned that a competitor had pounced on one of his key segments. Worse, the rival had hooked ExxonMobil (XOM), a customer that had eluded Aliota.
Rather than hole up in anger or fume, Aliota followed a central tenet of positive psychology: capitalize on your fundamental character strengths, especially when things get bleak. Aliota's strengths include extroversion, optimism, and generosity. He had in the past referred business to the rival and toured its plant. Now he concentrated on cementing the relationship. Not long after, he got a call from his competitor: ExxonMobil needed a special part. Could Aliota supply it? Four years later, he and the onetime rival "are as closely allied as you can get without a legal alliance," says Aliota.
Coaches specializing in positive psychology are selling entrepreneurs a twofold promise. One is that optimism and cheerfulness have a measurable effect on the bottom line. The other is that happiness is a muscle you can strengthen. Aliota is buying all of it. "We're capable of thinking in a more positive way, but you need help to learn how," he says. That Carolina Seal has posted three years of double-digit growth, Aliota says, "is a lot due to the awareness we've gained." He hires for strengths rather than résumés, and when necessary, he redeploys staff to create a better fit.
His employees get more extensive training, and therefore, far more autonomy (Aliota took his first-ever two-week vacation this summer). Aliota begins and ends meetings with praise rather than criticism. And he has changed how he frames his mission. "We're a personal- and career-development company," he says. "It turns out the by-product is engineered rubber, metal, plastic, and foam."
POSITIVE PAYOFF
These ideas will no doubt ring a bell with anyone familiar with the work of humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow or any of the truckloads of pseudo-scientific career-coaching books. What makes positive psychology different, its proponents say, is a decade of clinical trials, making sometimes-controversial use of brain-scanning technology, that have measured and refined what happiness can do. They've looked at how much an upbeat mood, for example, reduces the time it takes a team of doctors to make a tricky diagnosis. They've found that a social worker will make twice as many visits to clients if he or she feels appreciated.
Positive psychology, in its current form, was born at the University of Pennsylvania in 1998, when Martin E.P. Seligman, then a Penn professor and president of the American Psychological Assn., made the study of positive emotion the theme of his tenure and developed a master's program for its study. Positive psychology caught fire, with Penn remaining the locus. In 2002, the University of Michigan's business school began offering PhDs in Positive Organizational Scholarship. In 2004, Case Western Reserve University began granting MBAs in Positive Organizational Development. Since then, hundreds of happiness-and-business researchers have taken on assignments at companies as various as Toyota Motor (TM), Ann Taylor Stores (ANN), BP's (BP) Castrol Marine, and Standard Chartered Bank, as well as the Scottish city of Glasgow and the U.S. Navy. Most graduates of Penn's master's program have fanned out to academia or big corporations. But a few, mostly from business-owning families, are taking the discipline to entrepreneurs.
Their argument is simple. A decade of research suggests that happiness at work—defined as pleasure, engagement, and a sense of meaning—can improve revenue, profitability, staff retention, customer loyalty, and workplace safety. Many of the studies are preliminary. They aren't cross-cultural or long-term. But they strongly suggest that postive emotion increases creativity and problem-solving ability and aids in fighting stress.
Cheery thoughts aren't for everyone all the time. Plenty of jobs require anxiety, pessimism, and even fear, researchers say. Airline pilots facing ice shouldn't be optimistic. Nor should accountants spotting fishy numbers, or regulators probing corruption. No research, however, suggests that a dour outlook helps entrepreneurs succeed. Aliota's coach, David J. Pollay, grew up working in his family's business and now heads The Momentum Project, a consulting firm in Ocean Ridge, Fla. For most entrepreneurs, Pollay says, "negativity is just not necessary."
True enough, some say, but that doesn't necessarily mean a focus on happiness is the answer, either. Such noted psychologists as Harvard University's Jerome Kagan, who has studied temperament for 50 years, caution that the psychology and biology of happiness are little understood and vary dramatically across time, cultures, and individuals. "A suicide bomber who's really committed to the cause feels very happy the moment before he blows himself up," Kagan says.
Causality is also a problem: Does being cooperative, engaged, and generous make an entrepreneur happy, or are naturally happy people just more cooperative, engaged, and generous? Another criticism, buttressed by studies of identical twins, is that people's general baseline temperament, or set point, is between 50% and 80% inherited, making it very difficult to change.
But this much seems certain: People can take control of certain actions that will make them happier for a time, such as setting appropriate goals. They can add gratitude, hope, and a dose of self-control to each working day. And it's clear that happy bosses perform measurably better, building productive teams and inspiring loyalty.
WHAT ARE YOU GOOD AT?
Positive psychologists start by asking their clients to take a test that evaluates a person's strengths, on the premise that doing what we're best at naturally brings joy. Thirty years of Gallup surveys have found that the most successful companies are ones whose employees believe they get to do what they do best every day. (Only one-third of working people do.)
Penn's test, which measures 24 attributes, is free online at viastrengths.org. Such an analysis can help entrepreneurs figure out the most productive uses of their time, but it can also be useful in hiring. Having a spectrum of strengths on staff is crucial for small and startup businesses, says Tom Rath, the head of Gallup's workplace research and consulting arm.
Once an entrepreneur knows his or her strengths, it's time to put them to use. That's what Melanie Morlan, owner of FirstBreathe.com, a wellness and athletic training company in Spokane, Wash., needed to do. She spent a decade working with the U.S. Olympic Committee and professional cyclists, including Lance Armstrong, before taking time out to raise her son. She wanted to reenter the workforce by building a larger consulting practice than she'd once had, offering nutrition counseling, coaching in weight loss and stress reduction, and building a Web site and blog. But she couldn't get started. "I'd get scared and set up roadblocks," she says, telling herself she'd never succeed and ignoring her to-do list. She eventually called on Senia Maymin, a coach and, like Pollay, a graduate of Seligman's program. Maymin also holds an MBA from Stanford University, and she knows family business and entrepreneurship firsthand, having worked alongside her father and brother at their hedge fund and co-founding three tech startups. Maymin helped Morlan exploit her strengths, of which creativity is first. So if Morlan lost a valuable client or made a bad decision, instead of spending the afternoon moping, she would turn to designing and building her Web site. "Creativity stimulates me," she says.
OFFER PRAISE
Even if emotional qualities do not show up among your top strengths, positive psychology coaches recommend trying to build stronger bonds with and among your staff. Barbara L. Fredrickson, a psychology professor at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is studying the flip side of the adrenaline-fueled fight-or-flight response. She says an equal and opposite phenomenon occurred when our ancestors were content: Their brains flooded with with a stay-and-create chemical, possibly dopamine. Her theory is that while the anger-and-fear response kept us from being eaten alive, civilization's creations came about thanks to "happy" chemicals and what she calls the "broaden-and-build" state of mind they trigger. At work, that same reaction should make staffers more resilient in crises and more likely to be receptive to new ideas, while deepening collegial relationships and mutual respect. Despite the heavy theory involved, building stronger ties with those you work with can be as simple as offering abundant praise and recognition when appropriate; giving staff tailor-made rewards for performance; and letting them be themselves—maybe in the way they mark special occassions, maybe in the way they decorate their workspace.
Next in the consultants' toolkit is fostering appreciation. Studies suggest businesses succeed when their cultures are imbued with a sense of purpose—for owner and staff. Much work in that area has come from David L. Cooperrider, who heads the Center for Business as an Agent of World Benefit at Case Western Reserve University's Weatherhead School of Management. His workshop method, called Appreciative Inquiry, asks participants to reflect on, write about, and share aloud why their job and company matter. "There's a huge fusion of strengths, and every voice becomes part of designing the future of the company's business," says Cooperrider.
TRACKING RESULTS
If all this sounds too fuzzy for you, well, just speak with Juan Humberto Young, the founder of seven-person consulting firm Positive Decision Analysis, in Zürich. A positive psychology consultant and another Penn graduate, Young hears one criticism most: Positive psychology is too soft for numbers-obsessed business owners.
With a background running an asset restructuring unit at UBS, Young recognizes the importance of statistics. So every one of his clients measures his or her progress against customized metrics. An eight-store retail chain tracked its revenues—up 10% after three months. A bank watched its deposits rise 20%. And a hospital, long plagued by interpersonal conflicts, slow response times, and a backlog in the emergency room, saw the number of operations completed rise 8%. Young ties some of his firm's compensation to these results.
Even so, says Young, who teaches at Switzerland's prestigious University of St. Gallen, many still balk. When he worked at UBS, he recalls, even the craziest trading idea would get a serious hearing. But the idea that "to create appreciation will make you more efficient and profitable—that's very difficult for [clients] to hear."
INTO THE ZONE
The last piece of the puzzle relates to exercising power over the self. The father of this field, called "self-regulation," is Stanford's Albert Bandura, a pioneer on overcoming phobias and in designing disease prevention campaigns. Few would argue with the notion that change is difficult, but research suggests that if you can master self-discipline in something as seemingly inconsequential as your posture, it will seep into your work life.
Coach Maymin delves into this with her clients, many of whom seek her out when they are between ventures. She says that to be able to get routinely into the mental state that Mihály Csíkszentmihályi (pronounced "cheeks sent me high"), another founder of positive psychology, calls "flow"—complete absorption in a task—entrepreneurs must craft a workload that's challenging but not too tough. Its demands should fully use an entrepreneur's abilities, the same way endurance athletes train just at their physical limit. "In the athletic domain, everyone can see it," she says. Psychologically, too, "self-regulation is a muscle you can train over time." She assigns her clients a small, daily exercise challenge each week, based on research that says if you accustom your body to pushing just past its comfort zone toward ever-retreating goals, "you can do the exact same thing in your company"—push past your comfort zone and achieve goals once thought to be out of reach.
Including, perhaps, smoothing out a messy merger. CargoWise EDI was, until 2006, a 50-person software company in Mount Prospect, Ill., serving the freight-forwarding industry. Founder and then-President Cris Arens called for a psychology coach after a combination with an Australian counterpart quadrupled its size, bruised egos, turned longtime policies and procedures upside down, and dashed morale. During Christmas 2006, Pollay ran a daylong seminar to get CargoWise's top U.S. employees to appreciate their individual strengths and find common purpose. They recalled when they were at their best. They thought about the company's wider purpose: creating jobs that support hundreds of families; cooperating while doing something they enjoy; producing useful products that facilitate commerce. None of it was groundbreaking, but employees didn't usually articulate these things. They talked about negative forces that were beyond their control and vowed not to be derailed by them.
"We're from the freight industry, so there was a lot of cynicism," says Arens, who calls himself "a blue-collar, down-to-earth person." But he also says the boost to morale was palpable. He brought Pollay back the next year to train the rest of the North American team. Now he's using the same techniques at HarneTech, his new green-building certification company.
Aliota at Carolina Seal says happiness science has led him to make lasting changes. For one, he regularly recalls and dissects his moments of entrepreneurial triumph, "times when I was truly in the zone, utilizing my natural strengths and having fun" as a sort of happiness fuel. One such moment came during a visit by respresentatives of a maker of giant water purification systems. Escorting the visitors on a tour of his newly renovated industrial facility, he introduced the whole staff by name. He shared the story of building the business up from two plastic shelves in his garage. He queried his prospects about their needs. During lunch, they connected over family and community matters. When Aliota and his prospects shook hands in the parking lot, the guests said they were ready to sign a deal—during a break, they'd canceled visits to two of Aliota's competitors.
To read the original article, click here.
How Positive Psychology Can Boost Your Business
In tough times, entrepreneurs try the so-called science of happiness to build thriving companies
By Jill Hamburg Coplan
To understand how positive psychology—the so-called science of happiness—is being used by entrepreneurs, it helps to look at a company under siege. After all, it's one thing to talk about the connections between a positive mental state and a healthy company when a business is running well, turning a profit, and grabbing new customers. But tougher times really test entrepreneurs, separating those who hunker down and hope the worst will pass from those who use their strengths to find opportunity amid rubble.
Robert Aliota is determined to be, when necessary, one of the latter. In 2004, Aliota, the owner of Carolina Seal, an 11-employee Charlotte (N.C.) company that makes custom-engineered parts for DuPont (DD) and John Deere (DE), among others, learned that a competitor had pounced on one of his key segments. Worse, the rival had hooked ExxonMobil (XOM), a customer that had eluded Aliota.
Rather than hole up in anger or fume, Aliota followed a central tenet of positive psychology: capitalize on your fundamental character strengths, especially when things get bleak. Aliota's strengths include extroversion, optimism, and generosity. He had in the past referred business to the rival and toured its plant. Now he concentrated on cementing the relationship. Not long after, he got a call from his competitor: ExxonMobil needed a special part. Could Aliota supply it? Four years later, he and the onetime rival "are as closely allied as you can get without a legal alliance," says Aliota.
Coaches specializing in positive psychology are selling entrepreneurs a twofold promise. One is that optimism and cheerfulness have a measurable effect on the bottom line. The other is that happiness is a muscle you can strengthen. Aliota is buying all of it. "We're capable of thinking in a more positive way, but you need help to learn how," he says. That Carolina Seal has posted three years of double-digit growth, Aliota says, "is a lot due to the awareness we've gained." He hires for strengths rather than résumés, and when necessary, he redeploys staff to create a better fit.
His employees get more extensive training, and therefore, far more autonomy (Aliota took his first-ever two-week vacation this summer). Aliota begins and ends meetings with praise rather than criticism. And he has changed how he frames his mission. "We're a personal- and career-development company," he says. "It turns out the by-product is engineered rubber, metal, plastic, and foam."
POSITIVE PAYOFF
These ideas will no doubt ring a bell with anyone familiar with the work of humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow or any of the truckloads of pseudo-scientific career-coaching books. What makes positive psychology different, its proponents say, is a decade of clinical trials, making sometimes-controversial use of brain-scanning technology, that have measured and refined what happiness can do. They've looked at how much an upbeat mood, for example, reduces the time it takes a team of doctors to make a tricky diagnosis. They've found that a social worker will make twice as many visits to clients if he or she feels appreciated.
Positive psychology, in its current form, was born at the University of Pennsylvania in 1998, when Martin E.P. Seligman, then a Penn professor and president of the American Psychological Assn., made the study of positive emotion the theme of his tenure and developed a master's program for its study. Positive psychology caught fire, with Penn remaining the locus. In 2002, the University of Michigan's business school began offering PhDs in Positive Organizational Scholarship. In 2004, Case Western Reserve University began granting MBAs in Positive Organizational Development. Since then, hundreds of happiness-and-business researchers have taken on assignments at companies as various as Toyota Motor (TM), Ann Taylor Stores (ANN), BP's (BP) Castrol Marine, and Standard Chartered Bank, as well as the Scottish city of Glasgow and the U.S. Navy. Most graduates of Penn's master's program have fanned out to academia or big corporations. But a few, mostly from business-owning families, are taking the discipline to entrepreneurs.
Their argument is simple. A decade of research suggests that happiness at work—defined as pleasure, engagement, and a sense of meaning—can improve revenue, profitability, staff retention, customer loyalty, and workplace safety. Many of the studies are preliminary. They aren't cross-cultural or long-term. But they strongly suggest that postive emotion increases creativity and problem-solving ability and aids in fighting stress.
Cheery thoughts aren't for everyone all the time. Plenty of jobs require anxiety, pessimism, and even fear, researchers say. Airline pilots facing ice shouldn't be optimistic. Nor should accountants spotting fishy numbers, or regulators probing corruption. No research, however, suggests that a dour outlook helps entrepreneurs succeed. Aliota's coach, David J. Pollay, grew up working in his family's business and now heads The Momentum Project, a consulting firm in Ocean Ridge, Fla. For most entrepreneurs, Pollay says, "negativity is just not necessary."
True enough, some say, but that doesn't necessarily mean a focus on happiness is the answer, either. Such noted psychologists as Harvard University's Jerome Kagan, who has studied temperament for 50 years, caution that the psychology and biology of happiness are little understood and vary dramatically across time, cultures, and individuals. "A suicide bomber who's really committed to the cause feels very happy the moment before he blows himself up," Kagan says.
Causality is also a problem: Does being cooperative, engaged, and generous make an entrepreneur happy, or are naturally happy people just more cooperative, engaged, and generous? Another criticism, buttressed by studies of identical twins, is that people's general baseline temperament, or set point, is between 50% and 80% inherited, making it very difficult to change.
But this much seems certain: People can take control of certain actions that will make them happier for a time, such as setting appropriate goals. They can add gratitude, hope, and a dose of self-control to each working day. And it's clear that happy bosses perform measurably better, building productive teams and inspiring loyalty.
WHAT ARE YOU GOOD AT?
Positive psychologists start by asking their clients to take a test that evaluates a person's strengths, on the premise that doing what we're best at naturally brings joy. Thirty years of Gallup surveys have found that the most successful companies are ones whose employees believe they get to do what they do best every day. (Only one-third of working people do.)
Penn's test, which measures 24 attributes, is free online at viastrengths.org. Such an analysis can help entrepreneurs figure out the most productive uses of their time, but it can also be useful in hiring. Having a spectrum of strengths on staff is crucial for small and startup businesses, says Tom Rath, the head of Gallup's workplace research and consulting arm.
Once an entrepreneur knows his or her strengths, it's time to put them to use. That's what Melanie Morlan, owner of FirstBreathe.com, a wellness and athletic training company in Spokane, Wash., needed to do. She spent a decade working with the U.S. Olympic Committee and professional cyclists, including Lance Armstrong, before taking time out to raise her son. She wanted to reenter the workforce by building a larger consulting practice than she'd once had, offering nutrition counseling, coaching in weight loss and stress reduction, and building a Web site and blog. But she couldn't get started. "I'd get scared and set up roadblocks," she says, telling herself she'd never succeed and ignoring her to-do list. She eventually called on Senia Maymin, a coach and, like Pollay, a graduate of Seligman's program. Maymin also holds an MBA from Stanford University, and she knows family business and entrepreneurship firsthand, having worked alongside her father and brother at their hedge fund and co-founding three tech startups. Maymin helped Morlan exploit her strengths, of which creativity is first. So if Morlan lost a valuable client or made a bad decision, instead of spending the afternoon moping, she would turn to designing and building her Web site. "Creativity stimulates me," she says.
OFFER PRAISE
Even if emotional qualities do not show up among your top strengths, positive psychology coaches recommend trying to build stronger bonds with and among your staff. Barbara L. Fredrickson, a psychology professor at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is studying the flip side of the adrenaline-fueled fight-or-flight response. She says an equal and opposite phenomenon occurred when our ancestors were content: Their brains flooded with with a stay-and-create chemical, possibly dopamine. Her theory is that while the anger-and-fear response kept us from being eaten alive, civilization's creations came about thanks to "happy" chemicals and what she calls the "broaden-and-build" state of mind they trigger. At work, that same reaction should make staffers more resilient in crises and more likely to be receptive to new ideas, while deepening collegial relationships and mutual respect. Despite the heavy theory involved, building stronger ties with those you work with can be as simple as offering abundant praise and recognition when appropriate; giving staff tailor-made rewards for performance; and letting them be themselves—maybe in the way they mark special occassions, maybe in the way they decorate their workspace.
Next in the consultants' toolkit is fostering appreciation. Studies suggest businesses succeed when their cultures are imbued with a sense of purpose—for owner and staff. Much work in that area has come from David L. Cooperrider, who heads the Center for Business as an Agent of World Benefit at Case Western Reserve University's Weatherhead School of Management. His workshop method, called Appreciative Inquiry, asks participants to reflect on, write about, and share aloud why their job and company matter. "There's a huge fusion of strengths, and every voice becomes part of designing the future of the company's business," says Cooperrider.
TRACKING RESULTS
If all this sounds too fuzzy for you, well, just speak with Juan Humberto Young, the founder of seven-person consulting firm Positive Decision Analysis, in Zürich. A positive psychology consultant and another Penn graduate, Young hears one criticism most: Positive psychology is too soft for numbers-obsessed business owners.
With a background running an asset restructuring unit at UBS, Young recognizes the importance of statistics. So every one of his clients measures his or her progress against customized metrics. An eight-store retail chain tracked its revenues—up 10% after three months. A bank watched its deposits rise 20%. And a hospital, long plagued by interpersonal conflicts, slow response times, and a backlog in the emergency room, saw the number of operations completed rise 8%. Young ties some of his firm's compensation to these results.
Even so, says Young, who teaches at Switzerland's prestigious University of St. Gallen, many still balk. When he worked at UBS, he recalls, even the craziest trading idea would get a serious hearing. But the idea that "to create appreciation will make you more efficient and profitable—that's very difficult for [clients] to hear."
INTO THE ZONE
The last piece of the puzzle relates to exercising power over the self. The father of this field, called "self-regulation," is Stanford's Albert Bandura, a pioneer on overcoming phobias and in designing disease prevention campaigns. Few would argue with the notion that change is difficult, but research suggests that if you can master self-discipline in something as seemingly inconsequential as your posture, it will seep into your work life.
Coach Maymin delves into this with her clients, many of whom seek her out when they are between ventures. She says that to be able to get routinely into the mental state that Mihály Csíkszentmihályi (pronounced "cheeks sent me high"), another founder of positive psychology, calls "flow"—complete absorption in a task—entrepreneurs must craft a workload that's challenging but not too tough. Its demands should fully use an entrepreneur's abilities, the same way endurance athletes train just at their physical limit. "In the athletic domain, everyone can see it," she says. Psychologically, too, "self-regulation is a muscle you can train over time." She assigns her clients a small, daily exercise challenge each week, based on research that says if you accustom your body to pushing just past its comfort zone toward ever-retreating goals, "you can do the exact same thing in your company"—push past your comfort zone and achieve goals once thought to be out of reach.
Including, perhaps, smoothing out a messy merger. CargoWise EDI was, until 2006, a 50-person software company in Mount Prospect, Ill., serving the freight-forwarding industry. Founder and then-President Cris Arens called for a psychology coach after a combination with an Australian counterpart quadrupled its size, bruised egos, turned longtime policies and procedures upside down, and dashed morale. During Christmas 2006, Pollay ran a daylong seminar to get CargoWise's top U.S. employees to appreciate their individual strengths and find common purpose. They recalled when they were at their best. They thought about the company's wider purpose: creating jobs that support hundreds of families; cooperating while doing something they enjoy; producing useful products that facilitate commerce. None of it was groundbreaking, but employees didn't usually articulate these things. They talked about negative forces that were beyond their control and vowed not to be derailed by them.
"We're from the freight industry, so there was a lot of cynicism," says Arens, who calls himself "a blue-collar, down-to-earth person." But he also says the boost to morale was palpable. He brought Pollay back the next year to train the rest of the North American team. Now he's using the same techniques at HarneTech, his new green-building certification company.
Aliota at Carolina Seal says happiness science has led him to make lasting changes. For one, he regularly recalls and dissects his moments of entrepreneurial triumph, "times when I was truly in the zone, utilizing my natural strengths and having fun" as a sort of happiness fuel. One such moment came during a visit by respresentatives of a maker of giant water purification systems. Escorting the visitors on a tour of his newly renovated industrial facility, he introduced the whole staff by name. He shared the story of building the business up from two plastic shelves in his garage. He queried his prospects about their needs. During lunch, they connected over family and community matters. When Aliota and his prospects shook hands in the parking lot, the guests said they were ready to sign a deal—during a break, they'd canceled visits to two of Aliota's competitors.
To read the original article, click here.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
The Importance of Making A Personal Connection
Check out this recent article from the Wall Street Journal which explains the impact personal connections have on spenging decisions. As people are forced to cut back on expenses, they are far more likely to continue spending money at the businesses or with people with whom they feel connected to. Independent Restaurant Owners should make it a point to personally greet all of their customers. It puts a real human face on your business, making it more than just an other anonymous place where they go out to eat. You're what makes your restaurant special and different, don't be afraid to captalize on this.
The Guilted Age: Spending to Keep Others Afloat By Stephanie Simon
Melanie Ulle and her husband are scrimping these days, and she feels guilty about the exotic foods -- the hummus, the naan, the chai -- that she stocks in her already-full kitchen each week.
Truth is, though, she'd feel worse if she stopped buying them.
Ms. Ulle likes the couple who runs the small ethnic market by her Denver home; she likes their kids, who play by the register after school. She sees how empty their shop is now. She's heard they've both taken second jobs. So, despite her own pinched budget, Ms. Ulle feels compelled to help them out. Each week, she faithfully runs up a bill close to $50.
"It's the guilt economy," Ms. Ulle says.
And it's helping keep families afloat.
Ms. Ulle's spending is borne of the empathy that comes with knowing when you trim your budget, you're hurting others who may be much closer to the brink.
The burgeoning field of behavioral economics argues that people don't always weigh costs and benefits rationally, and don't always act in their financial self-interest. These hard times have revealed a new wrinkle to that illogic: Our budgets reflect more than our personal needs. Those families whose finances permit it sometimes spend with the needs of others in mind.
Donations to many charitable institutions are down, but that may not be the correct measure of the nation's philanthropic impulses. Writing a check to an institution is impersonal, abstract and easy to quit. Far more difficult is canceling the kids' weekly music lessons when you know the piano teacher's husband just lost his job. Or firing the house cleaner who greets you every week with a new photo of her baby.
There's more than a touch of self-interest mixed in with the altruism, of course. Those who can afford luxuries like private piano lessons and weekly house cleaning aren't keen on forfeiting such luxuries -- something families freely acknowledge. But they also say their decisions are shaped in part by the pain that cutbacks may cause others.
"What we buy or stop buying, when we buy, for whom, and how much we spend are never simply decisions to maximize our own interests," said Viviana Zelizer, a Princeton professor who studies the intersection of sociology and economics. "The monies we spend signal which relationships matter to us."
That may be why Jessica Gottlieb had no trouble canceling the monthly pool cleaning at her home in Studio City, Calif., after her online retail business tanked, costing the family thousands of dollars a year in income. "There were different guys coming out all the time. I didn't know them," she said.
But she's anguished about the gardener, who has been mowing her tiny patch of lawn for a decade. "He's watched my kids grow up from babies," Ms. Gottlieb explained. "He's a part of our world."
At $60 a month, she knows the gardener is a ridiculous frill; she could buy a push mower and take care of the lawn herself quite easily. But Ms. Gottlieb, a self-described softy, has decided that he stays. "I'm a big marshmallow," she said.
Financial coach Heather Tuininga, who is based in Seattle, counsels her clients to strip away such emotional entanglements when they're budgeting.
She recalls one client who bought breakfast in a local Starbucks three times a week because she liked the barista. Ms. Tuininga laid out the facts: The barista was friendly and no doubt welcomed the tips, but her client didn't owe the woman anything.
"Relationships based on financial transactions are not true friendships," she recalls saying.
Ms. Tuininga told the client she'd be better off using the $80 a month in Starbucks expenses to pay down her credit-card debt -- or to donate to a charity that could help more people in far greater need than one barista.
That's true, says J.D. Trout, a philosophy professor at Loyola University. But he sees empathy -- and the irrational acts of spending that spring from it -- as a trait to be cherished. People keep the gardener or tip the barista extra, even when they can't afford it, because they sense their common vulnerability in tough times, said Mr. Trout, author of the new book "The Empathy Gap."
"There may be better ways to spend that money," he said. "But we'd worry about someone who didn't have those feelings."
Workers in the service industry recognize the value of that one-on-one connection, and often work hard to build it. As the recession has deepened, for instance, Christopher McGraw has made a point of taking more time to greet customers at McKinners, the gourmet pizza restaurant he co-owns in Littleton, Colo. He nurtures a sense of relationship with his regulars by showing them a cellphone snapshot of his 19-month-old, Teddy, giggling in the tub. And he greets returning customers by name, asking them personal questions about their jobs or pets.
Mr. McGraw believes building those connections is a key factor in keeping his restaurant afloat. "I hear it all the time: 'We're back because we wanted to come see you.' "
James Jafari, a massage therapist in Indianapolis, makes a point of showing clients pictures of his nine-year-old daughter or talking about his latest family vacation -- anything that "will let them see me as a three-dimensional human being," he said. In this economy, he adds, "it's the personal relationships that are keeping me going."
That rings true to Mr. Jafari's client, Phillip Cox, who continues to pay for massages a couple times a month, even though he recently lost his job in investment management. Mr. Cox has cut back on other luxuries, like taking his family out to dinner. Logically, he knows that decision will ripple across the economy, hurting the busboys and waitresses at his family's favorite restaurants. But he doesn't know those people, so he finds it an easy cut to make.
By contrast, he can't bring himself to let go the woman who cleans his house twice a month, when he knows her car recently broke down. Nor can he cancel his massage therapy, when he knows Mr. Jafari's business already has dropped by 20%.
"I don't want my difficult situation to impact the people I support," Mr. Cox said.
He's quick to point out that he has a more selfish motive, as well: He wants to maintain his comfortable lifestyle as long as he can, in the hope that things will get better soon.
That expectation of recovery is part of what keeps Ms. Ulle shopping at the ethnic grocery, too. She loves trying out exotic foods, and she wants the store to be there for her down the road, when she no longer has to watch her budget.
In that way, her weekly guilt-economy grocery bill may be a sort of investment in the future. As she said, "it's not wholly philanthropic."
For the original article, click here.
The Guilted Age: Spending to Keep Others Afloat By Stephanie Simon
Melanie Ulle and her husband are scrimping these days, and she feels guilty about the exotic foods -- the hummus, the naan, the chai -- that she stocks in her already-full kitchen each week.
Truth is, though, she'd feel worse if she stopped buying them.
Ms. Ulle likes the couple who runs the small ethnic market by her Denver home; she likes their kids, who play by the register after school. She sees how empty their shop is now. She's heard they've both taken second jobs. So, despite her own pinched budget, Ms. Ulle feels compelled to help them out. Each week, she faithfully runs up a bill close to $50.
"It's the guilt economy," Ms. Ulle says.
And it's helping keep families afloat.
Ms. Ulle's spending is borne of the empathy that comes with knowing when you trim your budget, you're hurting others who may be much closer to the brink.
The burgeoning field of behavioral economics argues that people don't always weigh costs and benefits rationally, and don't always act in their financial self-interest. These hard times have revealed a new wrinkle to that illogic: Our budgets reflect more than our personal needs. Those families whose finances permit it sometimes spend with the needs of others in mind.
Donations to many charitable institutions are down, but that may not be the correct measure of the nation's philanthropic impulses. Writing a check to an institution is impersonal, abstract and easy to quit. Far more difficult is canceling the kids' weekly music lessons when you know the piano teacher's husband just lost his job. Or firing the house cleaner who greets you every week with a new photo of her baby.
There's more than a touch of self-interest mixed in with the altruism, of course. Those who can afford luxuries like private piano lessons and weekly house cleaning aren't keen on forfeiting such luxuries -- something families freely acknowledge. But they also say their decisions are shaped in part by the pain that cutbacks may cause others.
"What we buy or stop buying, when we buy, for whom, and how much we spend are never simply decisions to maximize our own interests," said Viviana Zelizer, a Princeton professor who studies the intersection of sociology and economics. "The monies we spend signal which relationships matter to us."
That may be why Jessica Gottlieb had no trouble canceling the monthly pool cleaning at her home in Studio City, Calif., after her online retail business tanked, costing the family thousands of dollars a year in income. "There were different guys coming out all the time. I didn't know them," she said.
But she's anguished about the gardener, who has been mowing her tiny patch of lawn for a decade. "He's watched my kids grow up from babies," Ms. Gottlieb explained. "He's a part of our world."
At $60 a month, she knows the gardener is a ridiculous frill; she could buy a push mower and take care of the lawn herself quite easily. But Ms. Gottlieb, a self-described softy, has decided that he stays. "I'm a big marshmallow," she said.
Financial coach Heather Tuininga, who is based in Seattle, counsels her clients to strip away such emotional entanglements when they're budgeting.
She recalls one client who bought breakfast in a local Starbucks three times a week because she liked the barista. Ms. Tuininga laid out the facts: The barista was friendly and no doubt welcomed the tips, but her client didn't owe the woman anything.
"Relationships based on financial transactions are not true friendships," she recalls saying.
Ms. Tuininga told the client she'd be better off using the $80 a month in Starbucks expenses to pay down her credit-card debt -- or to donate to a charity that could help more people in far greater need than one barista.
That's true, says J.D. Trout, a philosophy professor at Loyola University. But he sees empathy -- and the irrational acts of spending that spring from it -- as a trait to be cherished. People keep the gardener or tip the barista extra, even when they can't afford it, because they sense their common vulnerability in tough times, said Mr. Trout, author of the new book "The Empathy Gap."
"There may be better ways to spend that money," he said. "But we'd worry about someone who didn't have those feelings."
Workers in the service industry recognize the value of that one-on-one connection, and often work hard to build it. As the recession has deepened, for instance, Christopher McGraw has made a point of taking more time to greet customers at McKinners, the gourmet pizza restaurant he co-owns in Littleton, Colo. He nurtures a sense of relationship with his regulars by showing them a cellphone snapshot of his 19-month-old, Teddy, giggling in the tub. And he greets returning customers by name, asking them personal questions about their jobs or pets.
Mr. McGraw believes building those connections is a key factor in keeping his restaurant afloat. "I hear it all the time: 'We're back because we wanted to come see you.' "
James Jafari, a massage therapist in Indianapolis, makes a point of showing clients pictures of his nine-year-old daughter or talking about his latest family vacation -- anything that "will let them see me as a three-dimensional human being," he said. In this economy, he adds, "it's the personal relationships that are keeping me going."
That rings true to Mr. Jafari's client, Phillip Cox, who continues to pay for massages a couple times a month, even though he recently lost his job in investment management. Mr. Cox has cut back on other luxuries, like taking his family out to dinner. Logically, he knows that decision will ripple across the economy, hurting the busboys and waitresses at his family's favorite restaurants. But he doesn't know those people, so he finds it an easy cut to make.
By contrast, he can't bring himself to let go the woman who cleans his house twice a month, when he knows her car recently broke down. Nor can he cancel his massage therapy, when he knows Mr. Jafari's business already has dropped by 20%.
"I don't want my difficult situation to impact the people I support," Mr. Cox said.
He's quick to point out that he has a more selfish motive, as well: He wants to maintain his comfortable lifestyle as long as he can, in the hope that things will get better soon.
That expectation of recovery is part of what keeps Ms. Ulle shopping at the ethnic grocery, too. She loves trying out exotic foods, and she wants the store to be there for her down the road, when she no longer has to watch her budget.
In that way, her weekly guilt-economy grocery bill may be a sort of investment in the future. As she said, "it's not wholly philanthropic."
For the original article, click here.
Friday, March 27, 2009
A Website with Online Ordering = Real $$$
When you start taking online orders from your website, in a few short days you will find yourself saying "Why did I wait so long?" When your customers order from your website you'll soon realize that: your staff makes less mistakes, your customers spend more money, and your customers have a better experience.
Statistics show that customers who order online spend anywhere from 8%-12% higher than those who order by phone. It makes total sense. On the phone a customer is under a time constraint and can often feel rushed by an order taker. Online they can take their time, see your whole menu and often add more items to their order. I run across restaurateurs who tell me that they can't afford the cost of processing an online order. If the average order is 8% higher and the cost is 3% to process, you are up 5% ... and this is just the obvious benefit... think of the (added) hidden value:
1. When customer-A was issuing that bigger order, your employee was not taking that order but making one for customer-B.
2. No Mistakes! The order comes out in black and white. No mistakes in quantity, items, delivery address AND if you choose to process credit cards online, it is often already paid!
3. And what about that customer who hung-up and decided to order from your competition because your phone lines were busy! No such thing in online ordering.
4. Also, think of that night owl who wants to order for his team's party tomorrow, but there is no one in your restaurant to take an advance order!
5. And how many can - in all honesty - say that they do not order the same thing over and over again. Online platform allows the customer to quickly reorder from old orders...
Bottom line: I think that restaurant operators who look at the 3% cost completely miss the boat! I'd venture to say that their argument to save 3% is awfully short sighted. Your restaurant makes more money when your customers order online. After a few weeks of taking online orders, successful operators realize the best way for a customer to place an order is online and they start to look for tools to make this happen.
There are many ways to get your customers to order online. Here are some simple must dos!
1. On your menu you must print in LARGE letters, ORDER ONLINE at yourrestaurant.com
2. Train your staff to let customers know that they can order online (T-Shirts with your restaurant's website address on them, maybe?)
3. Create in house displays that tell your customers that they can order online
4. If you have a phone recording, tell them on the message. Especially on the closed message. This way they can place an order even when the restaurant in closed.
5. Create a reason for them to order online. Many online ordering systems lets you create a loyalty program and a first time discount.
More sophisticated techniques include:
1. In print or radio campaigns include an online coupon code that gives customers a discount when they order online.
2. Create a google adwords campaign to enhance the traffic to your website. The more visitors to your website, the more online orders you will get. This is also a great way to get new customers. 3. Develop a marketing campaign with the email's you acquire with each online order(If the ordering platform you use doesn't give you complete ownership of your customer emails you have the wrong ordering platform). Keep yourself in forefront of your customer's mind with subtle, yet systematic email campaigns to your database of online customers. Remember, you are just a click away when the customer thinks of ordering online!
If you continue to have a quality product and excellent customer service your online channel will grow naturally. It is the way of the world. By implementing some of the techniques from above you can increase your online traffic exponentially. Given the choice of ordering online or via phone, most customers find ordering online easier.
Plus, this is another tool that helps independent restaurant owners level the playing field in their battle against large chains and franchises (most of whom are already profitting from this technology).
Statistics show that customers who order online spend anywhere from 8%-12% higher than those who order by phone. It makes total sense. On the phone a customer is under a time constraint and can often feel rushed by an order taker. Online they can take their time, see your whole menu and often add more items to their order. I run across restaurateurs who tell me that they can't afford the cost of processing an online order. If the average order is 8% higher and the cost is 3% to process, you are up 5% ... and this is just the obvious benefit... think of the (added) hidden value:
1. When customer-A was issuing that bigger order, your employee was not taking that order but making one for customer-B.
2. No Mistakes! The order comes out in black and white. No mistakes in quantity, items, delivery address AND if you choose to process credit cards online, it is often already paid!
3. And what about that customer who hung-up and decided to order from your competition because your phone lines were busy! No such thing in online ordering.
4. Also, think of that night owl who wants to order for his team's party tomorrow, but there is no one in your restaurant to take an advance order!
5. And how many can - in all honesty - say that they do not order the same thing over and over again. Online platform allows the customer to quickly reorder from old orders...
Bottom line: I think that restaurant operators who look at the 3% cost completely miss the boat! I'd venture to say that their argument to save 3% is awfully short sighted. Your restaurant makes more money when your customers order online. After a few weeks of taking online orders, successful operators realize the best way for a customer to place an order is online and they start to look for tools to make this happen.
There are many ways to get your customers to order online. Here are some simple must dos!
1. On your menu you must print in LARGE letters, ORDER ONLINE at yourrestaurant.com
2. Train your staff to let customers know that they can order online (T-Shirts with your restaurant's website address on them, maybe?)
3. Create in house displays that tell your customers that they can order online
4. If you have a phone recording, tell them on the message. Especially on the closed message. This way they can place an order even when the restaurant in closed.
5. Create a reason for them to order online. Many online ordering systems lets you create a loyalty program and a first time discount.
More sophisticated techniques include:
1. In print or radio campaigns include an online coupon code that gives customers a discount when they order online.
2. Create a google adwords campaign to enhance the traffic to your website. The more visitors to your website, the more online orders you will get. This is also a great way to get new customers. 3. Develop a marketing campaign with the email's you acquire with each online order(If the ordering platform you use doesn't give you complete ownership of your customer emails you have the wrong ordering platform). Keep yourself in forefront of your customer's mind with subtle, yet systematic email campaigns to your database of online customers. Remember, you are just a click away when the customer thinks of ordering online!
If you continue to have a quality product and excellent customer service your online channel will grow naturally. It is the way of the world. By implementing some of the techniques from above you can increase your online traffic exponentially. Given the choice of ordering online or via phone, most customers find ordering online easier.
Plus, this is another tool that helps independent restaurant owners level the playing field in their battle against large chains and franchises (most of whom are already profitting from this technology).
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Tips to Increase Your Business Thru Email
Here's some helpful information from Michelle Keegan, who is one of Constant Contact's email marketing experts, that illustrates how every independent restaurant owner can increase their business by using email to build a lasting relationship with customers...
"My advice to businesses is to think about how many times during the year/quarter/month a customer needs you, or your products or services, and let that be your guide to determining how often to reach out and touch your audience. Think of this number as a minimum, then build from there.
Your business could be a marketing consulting firm, a software company, a nonprofit, an educational institution, a car dealership, a florist, a restaurant, a vineyard, a rock and roll band - you name it! Success and profitability is all about creating loyal customers (e.g. clients, users, donors, buyers, diners, drinkers and fans) and driving interest, repeat business and referrals.
Since it is roughly six to twelve times less expensive to sell to an existing customer than it is to acquire a new one, the value of customer loyalty and repeat business is just too compelling to ignore.
According to Bain and Company:
A 5% increase in retention yields profit increases of 25 to 100 percent.
Repeat customers spend, on average, 67 percent more than new customers.
It's All About Communication
Communication is a critical part of any relationship. Take a lesson from small businesses that long ago grasped the dynamics and importance of building customer relationships through communication. They nurture their customers over time by learning and remembering individual preferences and interests. They acquire this customer information directly from customers through personal interaction. And they keep in touch with customers on a regular basis ensuring their organization remains "top of mind."
Statistics show that it takes six to seven contacts before you can turn a prospect into a customer. All that contact can be expensive and time consuming. That's where email marketing becomes a critical part of any organization's marketing efforts.
Email Turns Prospects and Visitors into Loyal Customers
Email marketing enables you to proactively communicate with your existing customers instead of passively waiting for them to return to your Web site, visit your store or office, call you on the phone etc. With email marketing you can solidify existing relationships, initiate new ones and convert your one-time visitors, buyers and members into repeat business and long-term customers or contributors.
No matter how your visitors, prospects and customers found you; perhaps you paid for search engine placement, sponsored a newsletter, rented an opt-in list, placed a banner ad, distributed a flyer or sent a postcard; email marketing adds to your bottom line because it allows you to maximize your investment in those expensive and time consuming marketing efforts and improve the return on investment (ROI) of every dollar you spend to obtain new business and develop profitable customer relationships.
According to DoubleClick, good email marketing wins over consumers:
Well-executed permission email marketing campaigns can have a positive impact on consumers' attitudes towards companies. 67% of US consumers said they liked companies that, in their opinion, did agood job with permission email marketing. 58% of consumers said they opened those companies' emails, while 53% said that such emails affected their personal buying decisions.
Why is Email Marketing the Answer?
Email marketing is one of the most powerful marketing tools available today. It is easy, affordable, direct, actionable and highly effective. When you add email to your marketing mix, you spend less time, money and resources than with traditional marketing vehicles (e.g. direct mail or print advertising) And, with email marketing, you can communicate more quickly which means your time-sensitive information is disseminated in minutes, not days or weeks - and you can see the results of your efforts instantly.
Email marketing is at it's most effective when used in communications to your existing customer list or "house list" as a means of customer retention.
Communicate More Information, More Often
Email marketing is an affordable way to stretch a tight marketing budget. It can cost as little as fractions of a penny per email! With a response rate five times greater than direct mail and 25 times the response rate of banner ads, email marketing is the most effective way to increase sales, drive traffic and develop loyalty.
Unlike direct mail, there is virtually no production, materials or postage expense. So, with email marketing, you can easily and affordably create more communications that are valued by your customer, and you can make those communications support and enhance your brand in a way that substantially differentiates your company from the competition.
Your communications can include newsletters, preferred customer promotions, new service announcements, event invitations, greetings and much, much more.
Easily Measure and Improve Your Results
The benefits derived from most types of marketing and advertising are very difficult to measure. With email marketing, however, you can easily measure the number of emails sent, emails opened, bounce backs, unsubscribes and click-through rates.
You can also tell who opened your email, which links in your email motivated the most clicks and, even more specifically, who clicked on each link. All of this useful information can help you send highly targeted campaigns to the individuals most likely to respond to your offer, thus improving your results going forward."
For a free 60-day trial of Constant Contact's email marketing service, click here.
To read the rest of Michelle Keegan's article, click here.
"My advice to businesses is to think about how many times during the year/quarter/month a customer needs you, or your products or services, and let that be your guide to determining how often to reach out and touch your audience. Think of this number as a minimum, then build from there.
Your business could be a marketing consulting firm, a software company, a nonprofit, an educational institution, a car dealership, a florist, a restaurant, a vineyard, a rock and roll band - you name it! Success and profitability is all about creating loyal customers (e.g. clients, users, donors, buyers, diners, drinkers and fans) and driving interest, repeat business and referrals.
Since it is roughly six to twelve times less expensive to sell to an existing customer than it is to acquire a new one, the value of customer loyalty and repeat business is just too compelling to ignore.
According to Bain and Company:
A 5% increase in retention yields profit increases of 25 to 100 percent.
Repeat customers spend, on average, 67 percent more than new customers.
It's All About Communication
Communication is a critical part of any relationship. Take a lesson from small businesses that long ago grasped the dynamics and importance of building customer relationships through communication. They nurture their customers over time by learning and remembering individual preferences and interests. They acquire this customer information directly from customers through personal interaction. And they keep in touch with customers on a regular basis ensuring their organization remains "top of mind."
Statistics show that it takes six to seven contacts before you can turn a prospect into a customer. All that contact can be expensive and time consuming. That's where email marketing becomes a critical part of any organization's marketing efforts.
Email Turns Prospects and Visitors into Loyal Customers
Email marketing enables you to proactively communicate with your existing customers instead of passively waiting for them to return to your Web site, visit your store or office, call you on the phone etc. With email marketing you can solidify existing relationships, initiate new ones and convert your one-time visitors, buyers and members into repeat business and long-term customers or contributors.
No matter how your visitors, prospects and customers found you; perhaps you paid for search engine placement, sponsored a newsletter, rented an opt-in list, placed a banner ad, distributed a flyer or sent a postcard; email marketing adds to your bottom line because it allows you to maximize your investment in those expensive and time consuming marketing efforts and improve the return on investment (ROI) of every dollar you spend to obtain new business and develop profitable customer relationships.
According to DoubleClick, good email marketing wins over consumers:
Well-executed permission email marketing campaigns can have a positive impact on consumers' attitudes towards companies. 67% of US consumers said they liked companies that, in their opinion, did agood job with permission email marketing. 58% of consumers said they opened those companies' emails, while 53% said that such emails affected their personal buying decisions.
Why is Email Marketing the Answer?
Email marketing is one of the most powerful marketing tools available today. It is easy, affordable, direct, actionable and highly effective. When you add email to your marketing mix, you spend less time, money and resources than with traditional marketing vehicles (e.g. direct mail or print advertising) And, with email marketing, you can communicate more quickly which means your time-sensitive information is disseminated in minutes, not days or weeks - and you can see the results of your efforts instantly.
Email marketing is at it's most effective when used in communications to your existing customer list or "house list" as a means of customer retention.
Communicate More Information, More Often
Email marketing is an affordable way to stretch a tight marketing budget. It can cost as little as fractions of a penny per email! With a response rate five times greater than direct mail and 25 times the response rate of banner ads, email marketing is the most effective way to increase sales, drive traffic and develop loyalty.
Unlike direct mail, there is virtually no production, materials or postage expense. So, with email marketing, you can easily and affordably create more communications that are valued by your customer, and you can make those communications support and enhance your brand in a way that substantially differentiates your company from the competition.
Your communications can include newsletters, preferred customer promotions, new service announcements, event invitations, greetings and much, much more.
Easily Measure and Improve Your Results
The benefits derived from most types of marketing and advertising are very difficult to measure. With email marketing, however, you can easily measure the number of emails sent, emails opened, bounce backs, unsubscribes and click-through rates.
You can also tell who opened your email, which links in your email motivated the most clicks and, even more specifically, who clicked on each link. All of this useful information can help you send highly targeted campaigns to the individuals most likely to respond to your offer, thus improving your results going forward."
For a free 60-day trial of Constant Contact's email marketing service, click here.
To read the rest of Michelle Keegan's article, click here.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Using Bribes ("Free Gifts") to Boost Your Profits
Here's an excerpt from an article titled "Guerilla Bribes" by Jay Conrad Levinson, the creator of Guerilla Marketing. Every entrepreneur, especially small business oweners, can benefit from doing a little Guerilla Marketing. This article discusses how effective bribes can be at generating leads, increasing name awareness, thanking customers, boosting store traffic, and the amazing results they have with every demographic.
"The polite phrases for bribes are "advertising specialties" or "free gifts." Whatever term you use, know that bribes work on all demographic groups. Bribes do a bang-up job of empowering your marketing. Unlike premiums, which may require a purchase, bribes are given for free and offered for free. Their primary purposes are to generate leads, increase name awareness, make friends, thank customers, boost store traffic, introduce new things, motivate people to act, and create an unconscious obligation to do business with you.
During the nineties, the most popular bribes in the United States have been T-shirts and baseball caps, jackets, headbands, writing instruments, desk and office accessories, scratchpads, and glassware and ceramics. Mousepads and screensavers are moving up fast. So is free information.
Marketing people invest over $15 billion on bribes each year. Reasons: they fit almost any marketing budget; they complement other media; they can be directed to selected audiences; people jump through hoops to get them for free. About the only disadvantage is the teeny-tiny space available to say anything to the recipient. There's usually room for your name, possibly your theme line and logo, but that's it.
So, do these bribes work? Well, 40% of people can remember the name of the advertiser as long as six months after receiving the free gift. And 31% use the gift at least one year after receiving it. That's not even counting the high response. And the goodwill.Probably the most popular of the old-time bribes were calendars. Today, with the average household having four calendars, you might be smart to consider them again.
A recent study proved that free gifts not only increased mail response, but also raised the dollar purchase per sale a whooping 321%. Naturally, they generate positive feeling about you. And those feelings often lead, not only to sales, but also to closer relationships. Guerrillas are always trying to increase the number of their close business relationships.
Once you've made the decision to try a bribe, ask these five questions: 1. How many people do I want to reach? 2. How much money do I have to spend? 3. What message do I want to print? 4. What gift will be most useful to my prospects? 5. Is this a unique and desirable gift? Would I want it?
If you can show a handsome color photo of the enticement while offering it for free, you're about to be hooked by this sorta sleazy, but very human method of increasing responses, traffic, leads and profits.
Every guerrilla knows that the most powerful word in the language of marketing is "free." They've learned that it correlates directly with the most powerful goal of marketing a business -- profits."
To read the original article, click here.
This is one of the many reasons why TaDa came up with our Incentive Certificate Program which allows our members print an unlimited number of certificates for complimentary vacations that they can use to market their business.
"The polite phrases for bribes are "advertising specialties" or "free gifts." Whatever term you use, know that bribes work on all demographic groups. Bribes do a bang-up job of empowering your marketing. Unlike premiums, which may require a purchase, bribes are given for free and offered for free. Their primary purposes are to generate leads, increase name awareness, make friends, thank customers, boost store traffic, introduce new things, motivate people to act, and create an unconscious obligation to do business with you.
During the nineties, the most popular bribes in the United States have been T-shirts and baseball caps, jackets, headbands, writing instruments, desk and office accessories, scratchpads, and glassware and ceramics. Mousepads and screensavers are moving up fast. So is free information.
Marketing people invest over $15 billion on bribes each year. Reasons: they fit almost any marketing budget; they complement other media; they can be directed to selected audiences; people jump through hoops to get them for free. About the only disadvantage is the teeny-tiny space available to say anything to the recipient. There's usually room for your name, possibly your theme line and logo, but that's it.
So, do these bribes work? Well, 40% of people can remember the name of the advertiser as long as six months after receiving the free gift. And 31% use the gift at least one year after receiving it. That's not even counting the high response. And the goodwill.Probably the most popular of the old-time bribes were calendars. Today, with the average household having four calendars, you might be smart to consider them again.
A recent study proved that free gifts not only increased mail response, but also raised the dollar purchase per sale a whooping 321%. Naturally, they generate positive feeling about you. And those feelings often lead, not only to sales, but also to closer relationships. Guerrillas are always trying to increase the number of their close business relationships.
Once you've made the decision to try a bribe, ask these five questions: 1. How many people do I want to reach? 2. How much money do I have to spend? 3. What message do I want to print? 4. What gift will be most useful to my prospects? 5. Is this a unique and desirable gift? Would I want it?
If you can show a handsome color photo of the enticement while offering it for free, you're about to be hooked by this sorta sleazy, but very human method of increasing responses, traffic, leads and profits.
Every guerrilla knows that the most powerful word in the language of marketing is "free." They've learned that it correlates directly with the most powerful goal of marketing a business -- profits."
To read the original article, click here.
This is one of the many reasons why TaDa came up with our Incentive Certificate Program which allows our members print an unlimited number of certificates for complimentary vacations that they can use to market their business.
Monday, March 2, 2009
The National Restaurant Association's Industry Forecast for 2009
The National Restaurant Association’s forecast for 2009 projects that while overall restaurant industry sales will increase in current dollars by 2.5 percent over 2008 figures, the numbers translate to an inflation-adjusted decline of 1.0 percent. But this doesn’t have to be your destiny. You don’t have to continue rolling up your sleeves and going to work each day, doing the same things over and over, somehow magically believing and hoping, maybe this year will be different. (Go to http://www.restaurant.org/ to read the original press release)
To get different results you have to do something different. The Travel and Dining Association (TaDa) is here to provide you with a coordinated group of programs to help you market your restaurant and increase your profits. There are only 3 proven ways to increase your profits: attract new customers, increase visits from existing customers, and upselling your existing customers. TaDa has programs to help you excel in each of these areas. Or are you willing to settle for the standard pre-tax profit level in the restaurant industry of 3.8%? Which would equate to just $25,589 in profits on restaurant sales of $673,404.
If you join TaDa, you won’t have to be complacent about low profits any longer. Did you know that the single most cost effective way to increase sales is to personally invite your existing customers back more often? And that other owners who have done so, in combination with using a customer database, direct response marketing and an effective referral program, have increased sales as much as 64% over three years while industry sales were increasing just 3-5% per year. And of course an 18% net profit on a larger sales volume is so much better than a 3.8% of the old smaller sales volume, providing owners over $270,000 in pre-tax profits instead of $25,000. These are the kind of results that change your life and retirement plans.
TaDa will help you implement and automate the processes mentioned above, and has numerous other programs to help you increase your profits. For example, TaDa’s Travel Thru Dining sweepstakes lets you offer your customers the chance to win a trip to anywhere in the world valued at $25,000. TaDa also has a Restaurant Ambassador program which motivates high school students to graduate by rewarding them with a free trip and computer while allowing you to harness the power of community goodwill and make it work for you. Our members also receive professionally written press releases which they can distribute to their local media outlets to garner free advertising for their restaurant.
To get different results you have to do something different. The Travel and Dining Association (TaDa) is here to provide you with a coordinated group of programs to help you market your restaurant and increase your profits. There are only 3 proven ways to increase your profits: attract new customers, increase visits from existing customers, and upselling your existing customers. TaDa has programs to help you excel in each of these areas. Or are you willing to settle for the standard pre-tax profit level in the restaurant industry of 3.8%? Which would equate to just $25,589 in profits on restaurant sales of $673,404.
If you join TaDa, you won’t have to be complacent about low profits any longer. Did you know that the single most cost effective way to increase sales is to personally invite your existing customers back more often? And that other owners who have done so, in combination with using a customer database, direct response marketing and an effective referral program, have increased sales as much as 64% over three years while industry sales were increasing just 3-5% per year. And of course an 18% net profit on a larger sales volume is so much better than a 3.8% of the old smaller sales volume, providing owners over $270,000 in pre-tax profits instead of $25,000. These are the kind of results that change your life and retirement plans.
TaDa will help you implement and automate the processes mentioned above, and has numerous other programs to help you increase your profits. For example, TaDa’s Travel Thru Dining sweepstakes lets you offer your customers the chance to win a trip to anywhere in the world valued at $25,000. TaDa also has a Restaurant Ambassador program which motivates high school students to graduate by rewarding them with a free trip and computer while allowing you to harness the power of community goodwill and make it work for you. Our members also receive professionally written press releases which they can distribute to their local media outlets to garner free advertising for their restaurant.
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