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You are here: Home / Archives for business credibility

Being Human

5th February 2019 By The ActionKnowHow Team

 

Being Human

When most people start a business they’re filled with the anticipation of success, recognition and financial reward.  The last question that anyone asks is, understandably, ‘what if something goes wrong?’. It’s vital, when you conceive that business plan, that you’re stoked with the maximum passion, so looking at what problems might crop up is for losers, right?

Some people (mostly those who have never run a business before) think that it’s ridiculous to consider the pitfalls and to build in some protection for the business at an early stage.  My opinion is that ‘it will never happen to me’ is a very human failing. It’s one of the reasons why we drive too fast in the wet, reach from the top of ladders for things that are too far away and ask for ‘just a small one’ even though we know we should have stopped drinking two glasses earlier.

If we had evolved to live risk-free there would be no difference now to what there was before a way of making fire was developed.

800,000 years BCE

“I’m thinking of having a go at fire-making tomorrow.”

“Rather you than me.  That stuff hurts if you get it on you.”

“Maybe you’re right.  Pass me another uncooked rabbit leg.”

But when we think about some of the things that have happened to other businesses we can see what has gone drastically wrong and take steps to avoid them. It’s dull stuff, for that I make no apologies, the most exciting things about your business are not likely to be those things that protect it, but you still need to do them.

1              Passing Off.  This is when your business name, logo, content or product is sufficiently like that of another business for you to be mistaken for them or your product/thing confused with theirs.  It’s particularly significant, therefore, if you occupy similar sector positions.

With logos and product names the weight will usually fall on the side of the party that can produce evidence that they hold a trade mark.  Without there being anything registered there’s a long argument to go through with legal expenses attached.

Probably doesn’t seem like a big deal when you are starting out, but 3 months in when you are destroying your logo, letterhead and cards and rebranding the web site it hurts. All because a solicitors’ letter landed telling you the errors of your ways and there isn’t enough cash yet in the business to get everything redone – you will be kicking yourself for not taking a bit of time to check out who else was using that ‘unique’ name you had thought of.

2              Much Wants More.  Offer someone a really good deal on something and they can take that as a sign of weakness or desperation and press to negotiate further ‘sweetness’ into the deal.   They’ll also expect the same deal in the future and, before you agree to it, imagine them referring to you as ‘the mug that works for almost nothing’.

People who want you to work for less money than you’ve already decided is a fair price, are being disrespectful of your skills. That doesn’t matter one bit unless it encourages you to chase the money and disrespect yourself too. Do it once and you can end up doing it all the time to the detriment of your business.

3              Over-Promising.  If you’ve done your numbers properly you know how long things take to complete whether you’re dealing with a service or a product.  If someone orders 200 of something and you only have 110 in stock, don’t tell them that they’ll receive all the product within 48 hours.

You don’t know when your delivery will arrive with you to send out to them because it’s out of your control.  If a service takes 6-8 hours to do and someone wants it done 10 times in four days you have, at best, nine hours per day when you’re not working.  At worst, four hours per day.

By the time you build in the mistakes that you’ll make as you only sleep for a couple of hours per day you know that this is going to be a dissatisfied client.  Be persuasive and talk about quality of end  results to buy more time.  Ask the client which of the 10 should be given the highest priority, which would they like to exclude from the mix.

4              Marketing.  Asda doesn’t spend £100m on marketing each year just because it can.  It does it because it works.  From the outside marketing can look like a bit of fluffy page decoration or screen activity, but from the inside marketing is very scientific.  Asda knows what newspapers its target demographic reads, what it watches on television and even what type of car it’s most likely to drive.

It knows that many of its’ younger customers also have young families and that summer holiday entertainment frequently involves a trip to the beach.  Seaside fish and chips is a luxury purchase when you’re on a low income but a disposable barbecue and a low-grade sausage, burger and vegetable kebab pack is perfect for feeding children.  Why not add in burger buns with your purchase?  Price bought individually 85p, but with a BBQ pack only 60p.

You’re not a supermarket and you probably don’t have a powerful research and marketing division, but you can make some intelligent decisions with some research of your own.  If you don’t know where to start then going into the marketplace blind will probably cost you more in losses than someone who can guide you. Look at some of our free videos on the TV page on this site for some cheap and cheerful research methods to start you off. This is not a step you can ignore; if you do you will burn money on marketing that does not work and it will be your fault, as you can do it differently and effectively if you take some time to learn how.

5              Family Opinions.  Perhaps this should really be number 1.  When you pitch a business idea to friends and family you may as well be talking to a nodding mirror.  No one in that group is going to tell you that your idea is a bad one (unless it’s going to adversely affect a sizeable inheritance) because they love you and don’t want to hurt your feelings.  Family opinions count for very little.  You need to have the opinion of a disinterested third party who has business experience and who monitors trends.

We don’t ever expect the worst to happen to us because we’re human and it’s built into our DNA to anticipate success.  We can move against the grain by asking all of the hard questions early on.  When we do that it’s actually less likely that something bad will happen. You can create a winning formula or go in blind and hope for the best. Depends on how much you can afford to lose and your attitude to gambling with your future.

 

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: being human, being human in business, business credibility, human error and business, minimising risk, over negative in business, over positive in business, taking business risks

Brands

18th February 2017 By The ActionKnowHow Team

Brands

Let’s keep this simple, it’s a subject often made overly complex by marketing agencies and brand consultants. In essence its the heart of your business. What do people think of when they think of your brand? What do they say about it? What does it mean to them? Its the logo, the content, the way everything looks, sure we all get those elements, but what drives it forward? Our brand is all about achieving a balance in your business, the right energy between life and work so the business owner focuses on the stuff that matters.

Once the get the message and values sorted out then the brand look and feel is the easy bit. It’s the development and what comes next that matters most. That is how far your brand will travel and how many customers will it touch? That’s where all the magic happens!

What is Brand Development?

We manage and develop the whole or agreed parts of your brand for you. We consult with you about your business, work with you on a strategy to develop your profits, negotiate contracts (remember the founders started life as lawyers?) and via our team, manage your brand assets – the stuff like logos, white papers, slides so it all looks part of the same brand. That may include consistency of branding, developing e-Commerce facilities or approaching potential leads and turning them into partners for your business. You may turn to us because you are great at getting business conversations going but fail to close the deal, or you may want help in identifying and reaching your target market. Whatever your challenge we are ready for it.

Profits and Business Growth

Our core expertise is taking you and your business to the next level of growth, it might be your business has all it needs to move forward in place but too few know about it, could be you want to move from bricks and mortar services to online eCommerce products. Whatever it is you want to grow into we can help any professional services business scale their business.

This is a premium service and we agree service levels and cost with you in advance. It is unusual for us to take on any clients who want this service for less than 12 months. We vet all clients we accept into this service and once accepted we agree a monthly retainer and/or commission element.

Prepare to be Challenged

It’s a high octane service, its intense and gets you results and this is reflected both in the cost and the attention you receive. You will work with one of the lead consultants and their team on a day to day basis and all projects are managed centrally using a project management tool to enable us to keep track of all that is needed. This is not a service for the faint hearted as we get to the heart of your business aims and ask the questions needed, that is not always a comfortable process as it involves looking at things you might avoid on a day to day basis. It also means staying on track with the plan so if you like to swap directions before allowing things to bed in then we are not the consultancy for you. Accountability and following the plan brings in results.

Our Flagship Service – the Cream of the Crop

This is one of our flagship services, we take it very seriously, as our reputation, as well as yours, is on the line, and so its important we develop a strong relationship of mutual trust and respect with you from day one. That means honest levels of communication and questions about your business and plans you may not be familiar with if you do not employ a team. We sit by your side – we are not your employees and we will ask difficult questions about staying on track and keeping focused to ensure you gain success, that means straight talking and a very clear understanding we are invested in your business. That’s why we often choose to take a results based commission element as part of our payment. Interested in taking this big step towards the business you once dreamed of? Contact us to make it happen.

 

Or use the form below

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Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Add profits, branding, brands, business credibility

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