The customer experience is the name given to the customers' perceptions and feelings when they interact with a business. This is the total effect of the interactions that they have gone through, from using the website to speaking to the sales agent and receiving the parcel through the door. It is a broad range of things that constitute the customer experience. If your aim is to broaden your customer base or continue to get more of the same type of customer, then you need to focus on the customer experience. Here are a few ways you can enhance your customer experience and gain more customers.
Your Customer's Needs
You need to start putting yourself in your customer's shoes. Instead of viewing your products and services through your own business lens, you need to start viewing your brand as if you were your customer. Are you connecting with your customer? Do you solve a need in your customer's life? What is your understanding of the problems in your customer's life that your products and services are aimed at solving? Have you looked at your competitors and looked at how they position themselves in relation to these points? If you know what your customer's needs are, then you can start mapping out a customer journey with that as your focus point.
Think Deeply About Your Content
The customer experience relies on the content you produce. Content, like social media posts, are able to give you valuable data about how your custom behaves. It can show you which images and key messages resonate the most. The more you know about how your customer connects with your content, the better you will be able to use it for your specific aims. By analyzing the marketing metrics on your content, you will develop a great understanding of the ROI (return on investment) for each marketing channel with a view to focusing on the ones that work best. The idea is to develop better content on all the channels you actually need.
What Value Do You Offer
You need to focus on the value you offer your customers. It is important to remember that for the majority of customers, as high as two-thirds, the customer experience is more important than the price. So instead of trying to produce as much as possible, you should slow down and develop a better experience. You need to consider creating content that connects with your customer emotionally utilizing the value you are supplying. In a way to connect with them. A good brand has the power to elicit an emotional response in a customer by tapping into their desires. At every step along the way, you need to add value; even consider music for waiting room and the materials you use for your packaging. Everything needs to add value.
Conclusion
The customer experience is a way of seducing the customer into using you more often. You need a multipronged approach to dealing with this. If you focus on the customer's needs and the value you are offering their lives and produce high-quality content which highlights these points, you will produce a much better customer experience.
Scaling a business can be an exciting and challenging process. It involves taking a successful business model and replicating it in new markets or with new products. However, before you begin the process of scaling your business, it's important to make sure you have the right things in place.
Scaling a business requires a significant investment of time and money. Before you begin the process, you need to make sure you have a solid financial foundation. This includes having enough cash on hand to fund the expansion, as well as a clear understanding of your revenue and expenses. This will help you to create a realistic budget for scaling and ensure that you have the resources you need to make it happen.
Before you begin scaling, it's important to have a clear vision of what you want to achieve. This includes identifying your target market, understanding the needs of your customers, and determining the unique value proposition of your product or service. Having a clear vision will help you to make strategic decisions and stay focused on your goals as you scale.
Scaling a business requires a strong team that can execute your vision. This includes having a dedicated and experienced management team, as well as a skilled workforce. It's also important to have a clear organizational structure in place that can handle the increased workload and responsibilities that come with scaling.
As you scale, your business will need to be able to handle increased demand. This includes having the right systems and processes in place to manage your inventory, fulfill orders, and handle customer service. It's also important to have a reliable IT infrastructure that can support your growing business.
Scaling a business often requires forming strategic partnerships with other companies. This can include partnerships with suppliers, distributors, or other businesses that can help you to expand your reach and increase your revenue. Make sure you choose partners that align with your vision and values and have a clear understanding of what each party is expecting from the partnership.
Scaling a business often involves taking on new and unfamiliar challenges. Be prepared to pivot and change direction if something isn't working. Be open to new opportunities and be willing to experiment.
When scaling, you will have to think about marketing in a different way. Your marketing strategy will have to be more targeted and more effective to reach new customers. You might need to consider new channels and different ways of communicating with your target market.
As your business grows, it will become more complex. You will need to be familiar with legal and compliance requirements for your business, and your legal documents should be updated accordingly. You'll need to make sure you are compliant with laws and regulations, and that you have the right insurance in place through somewhere like Tivly to protect your business.
Scaling a business can be a daunting task, but with the right planning and execution, it can be a hugely rewarding experience. By making sure you have the right things in place before you begin, you can increase your chances of success and ensure that your business is well-positioned for growth.
As a business, promotion is essential and that promotion isn’t just confined to the online world and locally. When businesses travel to conferences and events, it’s an opportunity to market the business to a wider market.
Taking full advantage of these occasions is important as a business, whether it’s a new company or it’s existed for decades.
With a new year to tackle as a business, here are some tips to help promote your business on the road at events and conferences.
In order to get your business on the lips of everyone at the conference or event, it’s good to create a buzz. Wherever your stand is placed, it’s all about how you create excitement with your stand. This could be by giving out flyers or being more vocal when it comes to presentations and drawing attention from passersby.
Creating that excitement is something that can do wonders for any business looking to generate customers/clients during these events and conferences.
Any opportunity to promote your brand is going to be useful so make use of this in different ways. From television screens that have a presentation repeated constantly to small vinyl stickers that you can hand out to event guests with your brand on them.
The more noise you can make when it comes to these events the better. It’s certainly useful to make use of any opportunities that you can in order to promote the business further.
Freebies. Who doesn’t love a good freebie? A freebie can go a long way when it comes to convincing someone to buy something from your stand or simply raising awareness of your brand the next time they come across you.
Look at what freebies or samples you can provide to those who are attending the event. A little really does go a long way in converting leads to customers.
To help with garnering interest in your company and for building that all-important client base, consider providing a sign-up form. This is helpful when it comes to collecting data and is the standard for many businesses to use when setting up at a business event or conference.
While paper sign-up forms are easy to do, it might be worth adapting to digital forms to make it easier to process when it comes to collating it all after the event and inputting it into your database.
Most conferences and events nowadays will have their own dedicated feeds on social media. Try to get on these as often as you can and be active with your own social media accounts too. It’s important to show a willingness to support and engage with those who might be attending or watching the event closely from afar.
Promoting your business at events and conferences is an absolute must, so make sure you’re doing it properly.
For a small business, marketing can be the difference between success and failure. However, it's not as simple as it once was. You need to be aware of the different options that you have at your disposal today to get the most out of them. In this article, we'll look at some ideas that you can use right now to market your small business effectively.
Having a website is essential for any business, but especially for a small one. You can use your website to advertise your company and generate leads. You can even put up photos of current projects you are working on so potential clients know what you're capable of doing. If you want to get advanced in the realm of marketing, take a look at HubSpot's blog post about how to create an effective landing page for your company's website.
Social media can be an incredible tool if you know how to use it. In addition to being a great way to connect with clients, social media is also a great way to promote your business and create a community around your brand. You could use Facebook groups or even Snapchat stories, depending on what's best for you. If you share the story behind your business and the values that drive it, people will feel connected with what you're doing on both personal and professional levels.
You could also try sharing images of happy customers wearing their clothes or using their products (like an adorable cat in bed reading an eBook), as well as highlighting features of those same products/services. You may also want to share some fun facts about what makes your company unique or behind the scenes sneak peeks, if one thing stands out about the product its durability then mention that! And finally when promoting new items make sure they're easy for people who visit the page; this means featuring links at least once throughout each post so users don't have trouble finding them later down in the comments section after following links back up top first.
Email marketing can be a great way to build a relationship with your customers and get them to buy things from you. You can use email marketing to promote your business, but also to promote specific products that you have for sale as well. There are many different ways that you can use email marketing, so it's important to think about what kind of messages will work best for your business. Marketing is very beneficial and different forms of marketing will be different for different types of companies, you can use the best marketing automation software for it to be more effective.
The key takeaway here is that there are many different ways to market your business. You can use some of these ideas or all of them, but you must do something so that potential customers know about your product or service.
I can’t believe 2022 is almost over! During the Creative Freedom Retreat last week, we began planning for 2023, and I think this particular episode is a perfect way to end Season 7 of the Creative Freedom Show and segway into the new year.
I’ve been in the online world for almost 30 years (zoinks!). I've been a business coach for almost 20 years. I've seen a lot, done a lot, and worked with many different clients in that time: direct sellers, solopreneurs, and now creative entrepreneurs. Over time, I put A LOT of content out there. Some of it resonates, some of it doesn’t, and in the process, you’re left carrying this sort of hodgepodge of “stuff.”
At the end of 2021, I got real clear that my message wasn’t landing with my right audience. Being in the online space for so long, I felt challenged to find someone I could trust. Someone who got ME. And most importantly, someone who wasn’t going to snow me (if you know, you know!) but would help me figure out exactly what I wanted my new messaging to be.
For the final episode of Season 7 and 2022, I’m sharing my interview with Dr. Michelle Mazur - where we demystify the process of rolling out and/or pivoting your message to reach YOUR right audience. Bonus: I’m also sharing the messaging guide we created for my business, so you can see how this works.
With a Ph.D. in Communication and 25+ years of experience working with solo service providers to Fortune 50 corporations, Michelle has the cred and experience to take your complex ideas and distill them into a persuasive message that powers your marketing, copy, and sales. She is the Founder/CEO of Communication Rebel, where she helps change-making business owners, entrepreneurs, and speakers become thought leaders by taking a stand with their 3 Word Rebellion. She is also the host of the Rebel Uprising Podcast and author of three books, including 3 WORD REBELLION: Create a one-of-a-kind message that grows your audience into a movement.
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Theme music: “Big Time” by Ikoliks, Artlist.io
Ever been on a bad date? I mean a really bad date? One that was so bad you felt the urge to write a song about it? Have you ever been the subject of a song about a really bad date?
I’ve kissed a few frogs in my day, but none of them warranted the kind of song that Nile Rogers of the famous music group CHIC wrote back in 1981. He went out with a woman and at some point in the evening, she started expecting him to use his celebrity status for her benefit. The nerve!
This young lady may well be the first person to ever be canceled. Seriously. You may not know her name, but that date was so bad that Niles went home and wrote the song “Your Love Is Canceled” He equated cancellation to the way television shows are canceled. They’re just gone… never to be seen or heard from again.
Boycotting and public shaming has been around for a very long time. But thanks in large part to the rise of social media, Cancel Culture has become a popular tool to villainize celebrity types - even folks that are only famous in their industry. And Cancel Culture Vultures are at the heart of that.
Podcast Show Notes
Inside this episode, we're talking about:
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Theme music: “Big Time” by Ikoliks, Artlist.io
If you want to protect your business and make sure that your workplace is kept safe and secure at all times, the actions you take will matter a lot. If you’re not able to keep your workplace secure at all times, you’re going to eventually regret that, and that’s not what you want. So read on now and find out what you can do to avoid security problems in your workplace.
Have Processes That Are Followed Consistently at the End of Each Day
First of all, you should ensure that there’s a process in place that’s followed each and every day at the end of the day when it’s time to shut the building. There should be someone whose responsibility it is to ensure all of the doors and windows are properly locked at the end of the day. It’s the best starting point for workplace security.
Train Employees on Security Matters
Training your employees on matters surrounding security is important because when a security issue does arise, it’s most likely going to be your employees who are dealing with it on the ground level. So ensure your business has strong training strategies in place that you feel cover all of the most important matters when it comes to security in the workplace and things like that.
Put Strong Cybersecurity Safeguards in Place
These days, when it comes to security, you can’t only focus on the physical security issues that are obviously important but also issues around cybersecurity too. You want to make sure that there are strong safeguards in place that are going to make it possible for you to avoid any attacks or attempted hacks that might come your way. Things like firewalls, VPNs and antivirus software are all key.
Use ID Badges in the Workplace
Having an ID badge protocol in place will make sure that you can tell who should be in the building, who’s authorized to be there and who isn’t. If you see someone without an ID badge in your workplace, that should tell you that something is not right and that said person shouldn't be in the building. So find a way to create a photo badge system that works for your business.
Know Who is On-Site at All Times
It’s also important to know who’s on-site at all times. You need to know who’s visiting and how many people are in the building. This matters from a safety point of view, but it can also help fi a security issue does occur. You can then look back and see if there was anyone in the building at that time that might have been the source of the problem.
As you can see, there are lots of things that you need to think about if you’re going to fully avoid security issues in your workplace. Workplace security is not something that you can afford to overlook when so many threats exist out there, both in terms of physical harm and the damage caused by cyber crimes.
When marketing your business, you need to be careful of which tactics you use. Certain marketing methods could see you facing a lawsuit or heavy fines. Many people adopt these tactics without even realising that they could be deemed illegal. Below are 7 examples of the marketing mistakes you should be avoiding.
Using images without permission
When using images from third-party sources within your marketing, it’s important to always ask the owner of these images for permission. Images are protected by copyright law - if the owner has not stated that anyone can use their images, you must get permission first, otherwise you could get sued for copyright infringement. Many photographers and artists charge people to use their images, however royalty-free photos and images do exist. These can be worth using if you’re a small business on a tight budget or simply looking for images for blog posts. Make sure that you also credit images when you use them - even if they are royalty-free.
Copying another company’s logo
It’s also important that your logo is original. While it’s okay to take inspiration from competitors’ logos, you should be careful of making your logo look too similar - if this competitor stumbles across your logo, they’re likely to sue. This is particularly the case if the logo you’ve copied is trademarked. With so many companies out there, it is possible to accidentally come up with a near identical logo, in which case you may be able to defend yourself. However, if it’s obvious that you’re aware of the competitor, then you likely won’t be able to get out of the lawsuit.
Stealing written content from other websites
Did you know that written content on other websites is also protected by copyright? Nabbing a few sentences from a competitor’s website could see you facing legal action if the competitor finds out. While you can take inspiration from other websites, it’s important to try to make all written content original. No copying and pasting! Hiring copywriters could be a solution if you don’t have the time to write your own original written content.
Badmouthing your competitors
You should also be careful what you say about competitors in your marketing. Making your competitors look bad could be viewed as defamation. This is a sueable offence and could cost you a lot of money. It’s for this reason that you rarely ever see brands attacking each other (and if they do, it’s usually only ever done humorously or indirectly). In fact, it’s often best not to mention your competitors at all.
Adding recipients unwillingly to your mailing list
When building a mailing list, it’s important that your subscribers willingly sign up. Adding random people to your mailing list is classed as spamming - which is illegal in many countries around the world. Even if you’re certain a customer would value being on your mailing list, you must encourage them to join of their own accord. Make sure that you also provide a link in all your emails that allows people to easily unsubscribe at any time if they no longer want to be on your mailing list.
Posting fake reviews
Creating a fake account and writing a positive review of your company (or a negative review of a competitor) can be tempting. However, it’s actually illegal in many countries if you get caught. Instead, you should always try to acquire reviews naturally. You can of course ask customers to leave reviews. However, it must be the customer who is writing and publishing the review - you cannot write a review on their behalf.
Using false claims in your advertising
Lying in business is generally never a good idea. It’s particularly important to not deceive people with your marketing strategies. False advertising is illegal and some companies have faced huge fines for it. What are some examples of false advertising? Using incorrect stats or studies to back up claims is one common example. Claiming that a service is a certain price and then charging a different figure is another example of false advertising. And there’s also the common false claim that a product can do something that it can’t do (such as claiming a toy is waterproof, when it isn’t). To avoid all these forms of false advertising, it’s important that you only use information about your product that you know is accurate. If you’re unsure of a fact, research it first. Make sure that any studies also come from trusted sources.
Big hair, neon colors, the Rubik’s cube, and capri pants are all the rage. At a high school in Philadelphia, three kids are trying to start a new musical group.
Instead of using their own names (Grimaldi, Morris, and Nelson), they decide to call themselves “Unique Attraction”. Three more classmates joined their group, eager to bring their R&B stylings to the masses.
This budding group of vocalists worked hard and persisted despite graduations, creative differences, and other changes to the group. They got a big break when they snuck into a concert and crossed paths with Michael Bivins of the newly formed Bell Biv DeVoe.
Talk about perfect timing!
Seizing the opportunity, they did an impromptu performance, which led Bivins to give the group his phone number. Eventually, they called, which led them (eventually) to being signed by Motown Records as the soulful quartet known today as Boyz II Men.
B2M didn’t hit the big time immediately. They got a PHONE NUMBER.
They still had to graduate, for one thing! And practice... and call Michael Bivins... and practice!
This story of not-so-overnight success points to a common problem I find when clients come to me wanting to be the celebrity of their space. Most people think they have a visibility problem - “ooh, I just need to get in front of more people! I just need more eyeballs on my work” and while that may be true, it’s usually more of a capacity problem that’s causing the visibility problem. That's what we're exploring in this episode.
SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT: If you want help with YOUR capacity, I'm doing a One-Time-Only special event at the end of November. Stop being a best-kept secret and build your custom roadmap to celebrity status in your niche. Join me for the Unleash Your Star Power Workshop!
Inside this episode, we're talking about:
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Theme music: “Big Time” by Ikoliks, Artlist.io
If you could have any superpower, what would it be?
Not long ago, when people asked me that question, I’d say “invisibility” almost without thinking about it. But then I realized that, for as much as I thought being invisible might be cool, I also very much wanted to be seen. Being invisible was really more about wanting to stay safe - which, as we discussed in a previous episode, is really an illusion and all about being comfortable. Something, kind of the opposite of what building a business is about.
Being invisible - especially in your business - has advantages… some hidden advantages that you’re probably not even consciously aware of. Today, we’re going to shine a light on these perks of invisibility so that you can make some empowered decisions about when to step into your spotlight and when to stay carefully tucked away in the shadows.
Inside this episode, we're talking about:
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Theme music: “Big Time” by Ikoliks, Artlist.io