Archive for Organisation
It has to suit YOU!
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Choose a date that suits you!
One issue with social media is you can be too accessible to your customers and their thoughts.
I recently saw some posts on Facebook from a number of different people trying to find a date for a chat and/or an online party plan style sale. The gist of the posts were trying to find a date that suited everyone. It seemed that every customer had an opinion in the date and time, leaving the poor business owner in a tizzy because she was having trouble choosing a date.
Whenever you are trying to choose a date for something, you will always find there are people who can’t come. You can’t please everyone. The best thing to do is make sure the date suits YOU!
It may be that an evening after the kids are in bed is best, or first thing in the morning. There will always be someone who can’t make it, that’s a fact of life.
The best thing to do is to have an alternative available. For example:
- If you are running a webinar, record it for those who can’t attend
- If you are having an online party, give customers the opportunity to order from a catalogue before hand
There will be some things, for example a market night, where you may not be able to offer an alternative that exactly matches what you are doing, however by having an online shop, people can still purchase from you.
One thing to keep in mind - it is your business, it has to suit you and your family.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------- For your daily dose of business mums websites and blogs, check out Business Mums DailyFriday Five - Uses for e Books
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It’s a great idea to create e Books and reports for your business to share your knowledge and give tips and ideas to your customers. Most people can think of one or two ways to use them in their business. In this post, I will share 5 ways you can use eBooks in your business.
- Sell them - this one is obvious. E Books can be a great product to sell and bring in additional income to your business. A product such as e-Junkie makes selling e Books easy.
- Incentive for newsletters - e Books are a great way to grow your email list. Give away an e Book in exchange for people signing up to your email newsletter list. You can send the e Book through an auto responder, or simply have a download link on the confirmation page.
- Goodie bag giveaway - there are many opportunities to include items in goodie bags. If you have an e Book, you can either print it out or burn it to a CD and use it as an insert in goodie bags. Make sure it is branded with your business so those who read your e Book can follow you up.
- Gift with Purchase - e Books can make a great gift with purchase. You can either email it to people after they have bought your products or provide them with a download link. You could also either print it out or burn it to a CD to include with the package you send out. How you present your e Book as a gift with purchase will depend on what you sell and how people buy from you.
- Strategic Alliance Offering - some of your strategic alliance partners may be looking for e Books to use as a promotion or reward for their customers. If you have an e Book, you can offer it to some of your strategic alliance partners for them to give away. Again, make sure it has your business details on it so readers can follow up your website if they want further information or to buy from you.
While printing an e Book or burning it to a CD may seem a bit odd, if you are able to do this, you can end up with an additional promotional tool for your business and a new group of people who will read your information and be exposed to your business.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------- For your daily dose of business mums websites and blogs, check out Business Mums DailySimplify your business with Strategic Alliances
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Doing too much? Simplify with Strategic Alliances
Do you ever find that you are offering too much in your business? Especially if you keep adding on more services in response to your customers needs, or want to keep adding them. As a business mum, this can be an easy trap to fall in to.
One way you can still offer extra services to your customers without creating more work for yourself is to team up with some strategic alliance partners who offer the services your customers are looking for.
This can work in a number of different ways:
- Affiliate Program - if someone is offering an awesome product or service you want to recommend to your customers, see if they have an affiliate program. This is essentially a program where you get a commission on all sales, usually through a unique link added to your website.
- Reciprocal Agreement - if you have a product or service that your alliance partner can use, and they have one that you can use, then have a reciprocal agreement. This doesn’t have to be a formal agreement unless you want to set one up. It can be the sort of thing where, for example, you provide workshops and your alliance partner provides products.
- Reselling - if someone has a product you would like to recommend to your customers that would fill a need, see if you can resell their products instead of re-creating it. For example, if you sell hair accessories for little girls, you may want to resell other products for little girls, or products for Mum.
There are other ideas you can use, these are just a few that can help you provide a wide range of products and services without you having to do all the work!
For more about strategic alliances, join the Strategic Alliance Success club. This is an amazing resource that will help you with all you need to know about creating strategic alliances for your business (and yes, they are a strategic alliance partner of mine).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------- For your daily dose of business mums websites and blogs, check out Business Mums DailyGreat tips for business mums
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I love it when others have written some great tips that I can share with you. I’m a big believer in not re-inventing the wheel, so when someone else has written a great article, I want to share it with you.
Over the last couple of days, I’ve had 2 articles sent to me that I thought would be good for you to read too.
The first is 10 Tips for Moms Who Run Businesses. Yes, this is an article from the US. There are 10 great tips here, including making sure you look after yourself, something many of us forget to do.
The second is Avoiding the mumpreneur pitfalls, an article from Flying Solo. There are 5 great tips here, including a warning about putting unrealistic expectations on yourself and what to do with things go wrong.
Both these articles are worth reading and applying the tips that are relevant to you. I found them useful and I’m sure you will too.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------- For your daily dose of business mums websites and blogs, check out Business Mums DailyDoing “Mum Stuff”
Posted by: | CommentsAs a business mum, there is a certain amount of “Mum Stuff” I need to do in a day. This could include helping out at school, doing some baking, housework, washing, and tidying, not to mention being “Mums Taxi” taking the kids to extra curricular activities and friends places after school and on the weekend.
So, what do you do, and how do you get it all done?
I aim to get as much business work done while the kids are at school as possible so much of the “Mum Stuff” is done while the kids are home after school or on the weekends. Occasionally there are days like today when I’m not feeling particularly motivated, I’ll do some of the “Mum” tasks.
So far today I have done some baking and changed the sheets on the bed. It’s a beautiful sunny day, so I”m hoping to get all the washing on the line so it will drive before the rains come in the next couple of days.
“Mum Stuff” can also be an effective procrastination tool - if you let it. It can be easy to see the pile of washing or the kids toys around and deal with them before you do any work for your business, especially if you work from home. It can be easier if you work in a shop or office outside home as the constant reminders are not right in front of you.
Schedule in your Mum tasks as you would any other task. You may put aside an hour a day, or whatever works for you, to do these tasks, or even a morning or day a week.
If these tasks are getting too much for you, then outsource. I have a cleaner who comes in on Friday mornings to clean, all we have to do is make sure everything gets tidied. I know of some Mums who outsource their ironing and gardening.
Doing “Mum Stuff” is important, but it can be tempting to let it take over so nothing else gets done.
What are some of your tips to help you get all the Mum Stuff done as well as your business tasks?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------- For your daily dose of business mums websites and blogs, check out Business Mums DailyDon’t be a hero
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Does the lady in the picture look like you? Are you trying to do everything - housework, business tasks, childcare, not to mention spending time with friends, your hubby or partner, and trying to squeeze in a little bit of time for yourself?
Recently I saw a post on Facebook asking how other Mums do it. My simple answer is “Don’t be a hero, get some help“.
A lot of business mums tell me they don’t have the money to get help in their business. Getting help doesn’t have to cost a lot. One thing to do is teach your children to do things around the house. Are they able to make their beds, put their clothes away, even make their own lunches for school? Depending on their age, there are a number of things around the house they can be responsible for.
If your children are not old enough, consider hiring a cleaner. I have one that comes once a fortnight and we pay $50 for 2 hours. It’s fantastic as she cleans the toilet, bathrooms, and vacuums, as well as any other tasks she can fit in that 2 hours. It saves a lot of stress and I know things get cleaned.
On a business front, there are many ways you can get help. This may include outsourcing your book work to a bookkeeper, or getting someone else to look after your website updates. If your children are old enough, you can get them to help out too.
Another thing to remember - if you were working for someone else, you’d be working 9-5 (give or take) and in the evenings you could relax. Add this to your schedule and make sure you take evenings off. Same goes for weekends.
If things start getting on top of you, then give yourself permission to let something go.
One great example I read on a blog was from Annette Piper. She recently “played farmer” while her husband was overseas. You can read an account of her fortnight here. She apologises in a later post for being quiet on her blog. Something had to give, so her blog went quiet.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------- For your daily dose of business mums websites and blogs, check out Business Mums DailyHobby to Business - Automate “stuff”
Posted by: | CommentsAs you are reading this, I am on holiday (well not technically a holiday, more just a break from work). I have scheduled this post to appear the Wednesday after Christmas so you can still read my wisdom.
One of the things I learned the hard way is not to do everything yourself. The beauty of the Internet and technology is that there are many things that can be automated. Scheduling blog posts is one of them. The message that appeared on Christmas day and this post are a couple of examples I have used. I also schedule posts when I get inspired to write something. This way there aren’t 5 posts on one day, then nothing for 2 weeks.
Another example of how I automate things is with the sale of reports and ebooks. I’ve signed up to a great service called e-Junkie that handles the purchase and delivery of the ebooks. The first I know about a sale is when I receive the money in my PayPal account. The beauty of this is that even when I’m not around, people still get their orders.
There are many other ways you can automate “stuff” in your business, these are just two examples. Automation takes away a lot of pressure to be at your computer 24/7 and your customers still get their products or information.
What are some ways you’ve automated “stuff” in your business?
Getting “stuff” out of your head
Posted by: | CommentsAs business owners, often we start off doing everything. All our systems and proceedures are in our heads and trying to explain them to others can be tough.
One of the best ways I’ve found to get this “stuff” out of my head is to get someone else to help! Carolyn has come on board to help with the magazine, and one of her first tasks is to get everything out of my head and on to paper.
Katerina from Twinkle Lily has video’d herself making her nappies and other products and accompanied this with a proceedure manual to give to her manufacturers so everything is made correctly and she no longer has to do it all.
One of the biggest advantages of getting your work processes written down and out of your head is you can pass it on to someone else to do. You can also sit down and work out what it is that you want to do and what it is you need or want to get someone else to do.
It also frees up a lot of brain space so you are free to concentrate on the things you love to do in your business.
Hobby to Business - Evaluate your plan
Posted by: | CommentsEveryone talks about business plans and having a plan. Did you know that a plan is a living document? That means you CAN change it, in fact, you should regularly evaluate your plan to make sure it’s working for you.
I publish a magazine, the Business Mums Magazine, and had a plan for it. The plan stopped working a while ago and so I have spent time evaluating it and have decided to do a relaunch next year. This has taken a huge amount of stress off me, and it’s giving me time to put a new plan in place.
Melinda Brennan from WAHM Biz Builder spoke about this at the Pamper Your Business day last week. You can order the audio of this from here. Having a plan helps you to stop becoming overwhealmed and helps you to be pro-active in your business.
If you have a plan that is gathering dust on the shelves, it’s time to dust it off and evaluate it to make sure it’s still working for you.
Thursday Tips - Getting things done
Posted by: | CommentsYet again, I’ve found a brilliant blog post with tips for my Thursday Tips! This time they are from Melinda over at Virtual Sanity.
A little while ago, Melinda shared her tips on How to Get Things Done. She lists 5 tips, including getting organised and delegating tasks. Read the full post on her blog.
I know for many Business Mums, getting things done can be a challenge.
Do you have any tips to add to Melinda’s list? Please share some of your tips on how you get everything done you need to get done.
