Thursday, August 13, 2009

The Speed of Changing Technology!

Picture me sitting in my favorite recliner in my living room, MacBook Pro burning the same pattern into my upper knees, taking a little break from the never-ending evening job that is my email inbox. I am, as usual, checking my personal Facebook account to see what everyone is up to and sharing with each other. In the corner of my eye I see one of the 200 or so friends that are online has sent me an IM. It's one of my business friends I met through BNI (Business Network International). He is the owner of a computer repair franchise in our area and someone who I sort of look up to in the computer repair arena.

We had run into each other a few weeks back at a Chamber of Commerce sponsored event where I happened to be running the Entertainment Tent (you can't call it a beer tent anymore) and he was volunteering for the Chamber. I never pass up an opportunity to network. Especially when there is live music and a micro brew or two involved. We happened on a conversation about the latest technology, iPhones, iPods, texting systems, and the Mac vs PC debate. You see even in his business he just doesn't see many service calls for Mac users. The majority of his business is PC and small network related. He mentioned his business has been hit or miss like most small businesses in this volatile economic period we are all struggling through. He is currently in a period of being quite busy and was relaying how many hours he had been working. I am always trying to help those that are in my networking circle so I offered to help out if he got too busy or ran into something Mac based that he might need help with. Which leads us back to the Facebook IM. He had a client with a critical need to have an iTouch configured to a new PC laptop and needed several applications downloaded to it and he had not had the opportunity to set one up before. I agreed to take the job for him as long as all the money went through his office (I always feel strange taking money from someone else's clients).

I decided that this would be a good opportunity for my 17 year-old daughter Danielle to "get her feet wet" in on-site service at a client's home. I would not usually do this but I happened to know the client from the same BNI group. My daughter as you can guess from her age is fluent in anything "i" related. iPods, iPhones etc. Upon arrival and after the usual networking banter we settled into the task at hand, finding out why they could not get the iTouch to connect to the new laptop. I let my daughter do the initial "driving", as I like to call it, as she is the expert in these devices. She quickly realized this would not be a quick fix. The client's iTunes account would not recognize the iTouch at all, no matter what she tried. We were able to answer lots of questions for the client while she was trying different things. The client is in her early to mid 60's but is very tech savvy for her age but this is completely new territory for her. Mobile technology is a basic cell phone in her world up to now. We even reminisced about the old days of DOS for a short while, totally confusing my daughter with the concept of an operating system that was command based with no GUI (graphical user interface). She just could not fathom using a computer without a mouse or touchpad to point and click.

I decided it was my turn to "drive" to see what the problem was while my daughter did some basic setups on the iTouch with the client. I quickly realized there were several issues to be addressed. First and foremost were 22 different updates to the operating system alone. The client thought that since the laptop had just been purchased two days before and that it was a Windows Vista Premium OS and a 64 bit processor that it would not need to be updated out of the box. This is an assumption made by many knowledgeable users. What people don't realize is that technology today is moving and changing at such a break-neck speed that even a brand new top-of-the-line computer is already falling behind the times right off the shelf. Can you imagine buying a brand new car off the dealer's lot and by the time you get it home in your driveway it already needs an oil change, muffler, and new tires? That is the closest analogy I can give you to a new computer that fresh out of the box needs 22 OS/Browser updates, 3 driver updates, and 4 hardware updates.

This did give me a chance to give my usual "lecture", as my daughter calls it, on automatic updates, virus protection, and backups. The Trifecta of any good computer maintenance program. If you want to keep up with the speed of technology today, you have to learn to automate these three important functions or you are just asking for trouble. I would give you my favorites for these functions but there are so many free aps out there that work so well and everyone seems to have their personal favorites anyway. Just make sure you are doing all three and test your backups to be absolutely certain you can restore your data from the backup file. It won't do you any good to have backed up all your files if you can't restore from it. I also showed her the proper use of "system restore". Always defragment, then set the restore point (name it for example "Before Widget Install"), then install any new software, and then create another restore point (name it "After Widget Install). that way no matter what you run into you will have a before and after setup at your disposal. Set up a scheduled restore point so that you never lose more than a weeks worth of files in case something goes wrong, and it will sooner or later.

There were so many updates I set it to continue to run them and made an appointment to come back to do the final setup at a later date. Maybe we can talk about how many 5 1/4 in floppies it would take to hold the same amount of files as her 16 GB iTouch will when we are finished. The speed of technology makes for some interesting conversation at the very least.

Friday, June 26, 2009

So we are officially in a Reccesion....Now What do we do?

That's right. You heard me. What do we do now? Lets take a lesson from our past. More specifically my past.

I am lucky enough to have had a grandfather that was at one time (in the 40's thru the 50's) a small grocery store owner in an old part of N. Lansing, on Grand River Ave. on the eastern end of what they now call Old Town. Old Town is an area where businesses have recently banded together to create a little oasis of commerce and recreation. An eclectic mix of art galleries, small restaurants, a micro brewery, and unique boutiques. They also have several Festivals that bring people in from all over the Lansing area. More info can be found here: http://www.iloveoldtown.org/.

What these wonderful folks/businesses may not know or remember is that this is not the first time their particular little part of Lansing has gone through this type of transformation. Which brings me back to my Grandfather, Arthur Victor Choiniere who in 1943 decided he had had enough of building trucks for Diamond REO and wanted to go into business for himself. Of course everyone in the family told him he was crazy to quit the factory with the threat of world war looming over the United States. But my grand father said "even in war people have to eat", so he bought the little store from a gentleman that was leaving to go to Europe to fight in the war.

Now my grandfather didn't know much about running a store but he had a natural ability to "read" people. To listen to their problems and find a way to help them in some way. Even if he never sold them a thing. This of course is what we call "Customer Service" today. Though I don't think what my grandfather did could be compared to what we now expect from businesses as customer service. Not by a long shot. You see, he never was happy with the quality of some of the products he could get to resell to his customers. Especially the meat products. He used to smoke his own meats in a homemade smoker out behind the store because he could never get a good enough product for his clientele. He made his own sausages, hams, bacon, and hot dogs. People would come from as far as Detroit to buy meat from Choiniere's Grocery. Alfred P. Sloan Jr., CEO of General Motors used to buy his meat from that little store when he was in town for meetings.

That was just one of many little things he used to do to keep his customers coming back. Things like bartering with local businesses when they needed groceries but had no cash. He would barter with the pharmacy, the Dime Store next door, the owners of the A&W Rootbeer stand down the street would barter meals and rootbeer floats for supplies from the store, and Doc Porter (and his wife/nurse Gladys) would barter medical services for groceries. Doc, bye the way, delivered yours truly and all three of my sisters over a span of eighteen years and was the only doctor I ever went to until he retired the year I turned fourteen.

When my wife Wendy and I were running our printing company, one of the questions I used to like to ask groups of business owners was "What is the best form of advertising you currently have?". I would get everything from radio and TV to newspaper ads and the internet. Thinking back to my grandfather I would always say "Yes, those are all legitimate forms of advertising in use today but you are overlooking your greatest form of advertising you already have, Your Current Customers!". It was as true in my grandfather's time as it is today.

Word of mouth advertising is still the best and least expensive type of advertising you will ever have. Now how do you cultivate this form of advertising? The first step is great customer service. Any company can make a client happy when things are going smoothly. The truly great companies are the ones that realize when things go wrong you have got to make it right with the customer. No matter what! I don't care if you lose money on the transaction. If you treat them right they will come back. If you cheap out on them or try to hold a tough stance on your company policy you will not only lose that customer, you lose every potential customer that person could have referred to you! Try to balance that sheet in the long run. If you want to really see word of mouth put to it's full potential look into the local chapter of BNI (Business Network International) http://www.bni.com/ in your area. It is quite probably the best kept secret in your town.

The second step is thank your customers for doing business with you. I know it's considered old fashioned and out of date but a simple thank you card is still the best way to thank your customers. If you don't want to go to the trouble of hand writing a card there is a company that specializes in sending cards using an online interface where you can create and send your own custom cards called Send Out Cards. If you want further information about them use this link: www.sendoutcards.com/larry_wendyaustin . Let me know if you are interested in trying a free test by sending out a card to one of your customers. I'd be glad to set it up for you.

As the old saying goes "That which is old is new again." Or as my grandfather use to say "Treat your customers as good or better than you would want to be treated and they'll be your customer for life". There is a lot of wisdom to the simplest of customs, now isn't there.




A New Approach to Profit....A New Beginning.

Hello Chasers of Profit!

No this is not going to be all about chasing profit and the general greedy nature of business today (although you will find plenty of that here). This page, this "Blog", as they are well known these days, is going to be more about " The Pursuit of Happiness" as it is granted to us by the Constitution of these United States of America and signed by a group of brave men who were at the time giddy with the thoughts of Freedom from tyranny and persecution the likes of which we cannot even imagine today even with our "freedoms" being whittled away as they are in the name of National Security. Sorry, I tend to climb aboard my personal soapbox now and again, do bear with me when I do.

I hope to bring you, through this brave new medium, a forum of ideas and more than a few great resources for improving your "bottom line". I will try not to make it too technical or overwhelming.

You will find I have a varied background (see the About Me section on the right of this page) and a unique set of skills when it comes to business and the making of profit. Even my hobbies turn into money making ventures. I just can't help but see profit in anything I do.

Several years ago now a good friend came to me wanting to borrow my tools (I have a large collection of woodworking tools and at the time had a very large pole-barn in which to house them) to make some outdoor furniture. As luck would have it, he had plans for Adirondack chairs and benches with him. I personally think, that timeless design, with the arched back and wide arms just begging to have a cold adult beverage sitting on it, is a design perfectly suited to my kind of recreation. I began helping him build his first chair, showing him how to use each piece of equipment and its safety features. Soon I became frustrated by the directions and the way it was coming together. I helped my friend finish the first chair and as soon as it was completed, started changing the plans to make my own design. Hiding the hardware out of site while making it more comfortable, adjustable, and durable. In a matter of days I had engaged the services of another good friend (and his tools) and American Wooden Works was born. To date we have made dozens of chairs, love-seats, coffee tables, end tables, swings, picnic tables....... the list goes on and on. That is my curse, my lot in life, to profitize everything I see.

I hope as I write these posts, you will begin to see the profit in those things you run across in your everyday life that you enjoy to do or that puts a smile on your face in your own personal "Pursuit of Happiness"!

A little used but simple (and necessary) device.....

Before starting on any possible money making venture you really should put some serious research and planning into it. See if there is a market for the product or service, decide who your target market is, and see who, or what possible competition you will be carving up the profits with. There is one other step I see many new enterprises ignore that is probably the most important above and beyond all of the previously mentioned elements of planning. All those elements are a part of the most important device you will need. The Business Plan!

A recent article in the Enterprise section of the Wall Street Journal stated that "when it comes to planning, small businesses need some improvement". The story went on to report some scary statistics concerning small businesses:

1. Only 13% have an annual budget in writing,

2. Only 14% have an annual business plan in writing, and

3. Only 12% have a long range plan in writing.

In all, nearly 60% of small businesses have no plans on paper at all! This could be a major reason why over 80% of small businesses fail within three years. The Journal goes on to repeat the old adage, "if you fail to plan, you plan to fail".

But small businesses and entrepreneurs aren’t the only culprits. Many large corporations and multimillion dollar enterprises operate without a business plan. Whenever I call on a consulting prospect, I always ask about their business plans. It amazes me how few have a written plan. And of those who do, very few employees below the level of the owners or corporate board room even know about it.

There are many excuses for such haphazard management, but no justifiable reasons. Downsizing has eliminated a swatch of middle management who used to develop such plans. Some say that the volatility of the global markets makes such long range planning useless. Cost or lack of time is often mentioned as a deterrent. Family run and privately held businesses seem to think they don’t need it, since they have been successful for years without formal planning.

I once spoke to a group of experienced consultants and entrepreneurs, professionals who are paid very high fees to advise clients and customers on the benefits of business planning. Of the 65 in attendance, only 17 had an annual business plan. Only 8 had a marketing plan! I have asked dozens of self-employed professional photographers if they had an annual budget on paper (No!). I asked further how they could possibly determine their hourly rates...and they tell me they charged as much as they thought their market would bear, (not what they needed to be profitable)!

Sound business planning doesn’t have to be costly or time consuming. It should also be a "living" document, not some report printed, bound and sentenced to the filing cabinet in your office. Plans should be reviewed quarterly, with variance analysis reporting (actual figures vs. planned figures vs. last year's figures). It is also very simple to do. Your local Small Business Administration office can help with small business planning and their services are free!

I recently read an article from another consulting firm talking about the same topic. This is their annual procedure:

"Each year during the last two weeks of December (our slowest period), we develop the following: a long range plan, a marketing plan, a sales plan and a budget. The long range plan (3 years maximum) is a revision to last year’s plan, and it updates our goals and objectives for the coming year. The marketing plan lists the markets we need to improve in, new markets to penetrate, and those we want to drop. The sales plan lays out which services to concentrate on, the mix we expect, and how we expect the revenue to distribute. The budget lays out our revenue and detailed cost on a monthly basis, and projects profit, taxes, and expected payroll contributions. We can then accurately forecast our "breakeven" points for fees and income.

Each is done on one 8 ½ x 11 sheet of paper, and remains on the wall above their desks to be seen every single day."

Who says planning has to be difficult? Take the time to lay out your own business plan. I promise you will not only learn from the process but you will also give your business their most valuable tool for success!