Small Office, Home Office Information

When I was just a boy I had the unfortunate experience to have a mother who was a obsessive compulsive. It made life unpleasant at times for my sister and I and it must have been a terrible burden for my mother too.

Everything that was done … and I mean everything … had to be checked to make sure that it was ‘right’. Even something as simple as going out meant that we had to leave 10 minutes early so that we could check to make sure the front door was locked - not once but many times.

Perhaps in some ways that’s why I’m not the proof-reader in our small business

But my mum had a point and whatever you do, you should check it - thoroughly.

That was brought home to us just a few minutes ago when we were about to launch a press release for a project of our own that we had been working on. The announcement referred people to a website of ours that we have had up on the Net in its current form for several years.

As Toni was running a final check on the links in the announcement she landed on the web page and instantly found a glaring spelling mistake in one of the graphics. It’s been there for so long that we now can’t remember who produced that graphic for us … but that’s not the point.

The point is that we didn’t check it when we accepted it. We didn’t notice the spelling mistake but I bet a lot of potential customers did and there is nothing worse than a spelling mistake on a site that is all about selling our writing skills.

So, while I would never suggest that you become obsessive about checking your work or work that has been done for you I would suggest that you do check it several times before it goes public.

Writing good copy for a small business website is not easy. It really isn’t just a matter of sitting down at the keyboard, opening up your HTML editor and pounding away on your keyboard.

Unfortunately that’s exactly what a lot of people do and then they wonder why their website isn’t attracting the business they expected it to.

If you’re one of those people then perhaps spending a few minutes reading Common Mistakes That Can Kill Your Web Copy might be helpful.

I’m sure most small business owners think that, unlike big business, we can respond quickly to change. I’m certainly one who would subscribe to that idea but, just lately that has not been our experience.

Back at the end of October I made a post about the challenges that were confronting Toni and me and I said that I would share our experience as we faced that challenge. You will find that post here.

Of course, since then, I’ve hardly said a word about it. That’s because we can see the changes that we need to make but actually getting to the point where we can make those challenges is not that easy.

For several months Toni has been unwell - in fact, thanks to a GP who really had no clue, she was becoming severely malnourished - and in that time a huge amount of work backed up. Now that a specialist is in control her health is improving and we are catching up on that backlog but until we do get caught up we won’t be in a position to really start implementing those changes.

However, we are taking small steps along the way towards achieving our aims but talking about it while we’re in the middle of it all is not that easy.

So I thought I should let you know that I haven’t forgotten my promise to post about those changes - I certainly will do it but not just yet.

Here is a little bit of silliness from one of our other sites just to make you smile

Over the years there has been much hype about computers producing the paperless office. Of course, if that were ever going to be the case why were printers every developed?

But if you still believe that we will see a paperless office here is what could be the final nail in the coffin for the paperless office concept.

It’s a USB pencil sharpener and it even comes with a flashing light just to enhance your pencil sharpening experience.

But that’s not all because just to keep this amazingly useful little gizmo company there is also a USB shaver for men and a USB nail care system for the ladies.

Hmmmm - where will the silliness end?

For many people who run a successful small business the thought of taking their business online seems fairly simple - just build a website and put it up on the Net. Business will then start rolling in through the cyber door just as it does through the real door of their real shop.

In a few rare cases it can be that simple but that is not how it is for most people who want to take their small business online. And I’ve just put up an interesting case study about one successful store in the real world who found that taking their store online did not result in an increase in business … at least not to begin with.

You will find that article here

I read some interesting statistics the other day that made me wonder if small business people actually realise who they are selling to. Are your real clients - as opposed to the people who just come and have a look - men or women?

In America it’s been found that while lots of men look it is actually the females who buy and that includes the big ticket items. If you run an electrical store you might find that there are a lot more men in the store than women but the men are only looking while it is the women who are actually doing the buying.

Of course, once you know who is actually buying your product, you will then be able to better target your marketing and approach the people who have come in to your business.

One of my daughters, a highly skilled single young woman, went to buy a washing machine recently. She went in her lunch hour from work and a male co-worker just happened to accompany her. When a salesman approached them my daughter enquired about a washing machine and the salesman showed her and her co-worker a number of models.

But the salesman could not handle dealing with a female, he addressed all his comments to my daughter’s co-worker who had just come along for the ride. Even when my daughter told him that it was her who was interesting in buying the salesman continued to address the male co-worker.

Needless to say, my daughter did not buy a washing machine in that store.

Are you missing sales because you’re talking to the wrong person?

Here in Australia there are a few worrying signs beginning to appear on the economic horizon.

A well-known home-loan lender announced on Friday that he considered the real estate boom to have finished and house prices were beginning to fall. His advice was that if you were thinking of selling then now was the time to do it because the decline could continue for some years to come.

A new survey shows that the number of jobs in New South Wales that are advertised on the Internet has fallen for the first time in six months. The number of jobs advertising in October in New South Wales fell by 3,200 wikth the worst hit areas being accounting, administration and information technology.

The ANZ suggests that there has been a further modest incrtease in newspaper employment advertising around Australia but experts suggest that the figures indicate a slowdown in job growth is coming.

The Reserve Bank of Australia sees a greater risk of inflation increasing and suggests that the likelihood of a rise in the official interest rate has increased.

Similar trends seem to be occurring in the United States so the economy is somthing to watch at the moment.

It’s from Gateway and it depends on who you talk to as to whether this is really a laptop or a tablet PC or as Gateway calls it, a Convertible Notebook.

Whatever you might call it it’s just been released in the US and if I lived in the US then I could definitely see one in my future. After all, if it’s good enough for Bill then it certainly is good enough for me

You can find out more about it right here

I wish I could say that the hectic pace of yesterday has settled down again but I can’t - the pressure of work continues and I’m dashing this off in a few spare moments while I grab a coffee - 4.30pm and it’s only my second of the day.

Yesterday I rambled on about instant messaging systems and small business and today I would just like to add a one or two additional thoughts.

Using an Instant Messaging system to close a business deal is no more dangerous than using email or even the phone. The safest business deal is the one that’s closed with a firm handshake and an opportunity to look the other person in the eye.

Now of course, you can’t do that with ICQ, Messenger or any other IM but nor can you do it with email, the telephone or even mail so to think that doing business via IM is filled with danger is a little silly.

However, any prudent business person will always take precautions when it comes to doing business that way. We never start a text job until we have been paid at least 50% up front. There are simply no exceptions and anyone who wants to see the work before we see the money is politely told to look elsewhere for a writer.

We always ensure that every important business message is backed up. Most IM software have a history option but sometimes it is not enabled by default. If you are going to use an IM system for business make sure that the history option is enabled and even then copy and paste important conversations into a word document for further backup.

I’d like to say that we have never been conned by anyone who wanted to use our services and came to us via IM but I can’t. We have been caught but then others have been caught when work has come to them via email, letter or phone.

The risk is always there but you work to minimise that risk because doing business via IM is just too convenient to ignore.

small business

Wow, a couple of days ago I was looking forward to a few quiet days where I might be able to catch up with my work but it never seems to work out that way. Just as things began to settle down more work came in and I’m back knocking out a bunch of articles and reviews.

In fact I’ve been doing it for over 12 hours so far today (and it’s only 4pm as I write this) so I thought I should semi-escape for a few minutes just to try and regain my sanity. I say semi-escape because all I’ve done is take the laptop out onto the back patio to write this. At least I’ve escaped from the office for a short while.

Yesterday I posted a comment in a thread over on Home Office Voice about using Instant Messaging for business purposes – silly me because Martin immediately asked me to recount our experiences and so here I am.

Martin’s thread was commenting on the growing trend among businesses to conduct important business via one of the various types of Instant Messaging but to us it’s really nothing new.

Most of our clients are online and are a segment of the online industry that has almost always used ICQ to conduct business. We have been using it ever since we started in business and these days nearly every major order we get comes to us via ICQ.

We find that it is invaluable because anyone who relies on email will know just how easy it is for important emails to get culled by the various spam filters that most of us employ these days.

Now that is not to say that there isn’t plenty of ICQ spam because there certainly is but it’s not hard to tell the difference between someone who wants to talk to you about business and a dopey Russian Cam Girl who has been given a bunch of ICQ numbers to cycle through every day of the week.

There is also the problem of friends, and sometimes business associates who just want to chat and Toni frequently has her ICQ turned off for that reason. I’m a little less polite than she is and if someone just wants to chat a terse “Bugger off I’m busy” usually does the trick.

You may wonder about things like record keeping with business done via Instant Messaging but most have a history function and all you have to do is make sure that it’s turned on and then every word that’s exchanged is recorded and stored on your computer.

Of course, if you are worried about the informality of Instant Messaging you can always close the business transaction with a phone call or with an email but once you start using and Instant Messaging system you will soon find that even those final closing formalities are usually not required.

I’ve left the most important benefit of using something like ICQ till last and that is the fact that is usually occurs in real time. When you are discussing business via email there is always a gap on the proceedings while people are reading those emails but with something like ICQ you talk to the person and they respond almost immediately.

If you are a writer or a designer you get to pick your client’s brain in real time, you can ask relevant questions to clarify important points that might be missed via email and it’s easier for you both to understand each other.

Very few of our orders these days come to us by any other form of communication and we would be lost without it. Don’t be afraid of using Instant Messaging in your business transactions. Once you’ve have tried it you will wonder how you ever managed without it.