Small Office, Home Office Information

by Stuart Livesey

Well the rush and bustle of last week was over and done with by late Friday afternoon. There’s something very satisfying about bundling up a project and sending it off to the client and then dropping all the associated bits and pieces into their file in the filing cabinet.

This week brings a new project and some new challenges. We’re sitting down to work on a web design for a very different sort of small business client. The fundamentals are always the same b ut this client wants us to incorporate some features into their site that I never thought I would ever include in anyone’s website.

It should be fun and it’s something I’m really looking forward to

by Stuart Livesey

An interesting post over on Small Business Trends - Go Global Without Waiting to Grow Up aroused me from my pre-coffee torpor today. It’s encouraging and uplifting to be called a multi-national … even if we are only a micro-multinational

We’d never thought of ourselves as anything like that before - we’d just gone ahead and taken our business to the world before we ever began thinking about dealing locally. It’s worked for us … even though the exchange rate is becoming rather dismal … and it can work for you too.

If you want to take your small business to the world then start there. Don’t wait until you’ve grown up locally because that may never happen. If you have a product that you can sell on the world market then start doing that right now!

by Stuart Livesey

Life is rarely dull and boring when you run your own small business. It’s even less dull and boring when your small business focuses on several different areas. That’s certainly been the way of things around here for the last ten days.

Last week it was the text and web design for a nail academy, this week it’s been getting the web design basics right for a costume hire business and in between it’s been a huge amount of teaser text for a media company in the States. On top of that both Toni and I have been coming to grips with several new pieces of software.

We’ve been so busy we might not even be able to make the social gathering for the small business group here in town tomorrow night … and with all the nasty winter bugs that have been going around here lately that may not be such a bad idea.

by Stuart Livesey

It’s Sunday afternoon here and we’ve just finished a rather hectic day of organising large chunks of work for three clients. We don’t normally work on a Sunday and we really would like to work normal hours like everyone else but when you’re small business is involved in providing services for other small businesses I guess you’re never really closed.

You just have to be around … or contactable … when your clients have time to do business with you and for many busy small businesses the only time they have is the weekends. Obviously dealing with clients is not something that everyone wants to do but then doing work for small businesses often provides the biggest challenges and the biggest rewards.

And, because we’re flexible, we can take time off through the week

by Stuart Livesey

Decision making in small business is often something that’s done one the run. With a million demands on your time and your thought processes you still find time to make important decisions. And with all that stress impacting on you it’s quite possible to make the wrong decisions.

Even if you set aside time for a business meeting with your partner/s or others who may have some useful input you can still face a lot of distractions if you try and conduct the meeting while your business goes on around you.

Fortunately Toni and I learned early on that the best place to make important decisions was anywhere but right there in the middle of where we do business. In the past we’ve gone for coffee, gone for a walk, gone for a drive and even gone for dinner and invariably come up with the best solutions simply because we’ve been removed from all the things that would normally distract us.

You should try it the next time you have some important decisions to make, you might find that it works for you too.

Lunch three hours down the coast yesterday gave us plenty of time to make some important decisions and to stay focused on our core business goals.

When you decide to bite the bullet and employ a professional to design a website for your small business should you bother getting a written agreement or contract from the web designer?

We would suggest that you do because it protects both of you and where not the only ones who think you should; Small Business Trends thinks you should too.

… because we talk our clients out of making a purchase?

by Stuart Livesey 

Just recently we saw a major lead fizzle out to nothing. It was one of those potential jobs with a local small business that looked as though it was definitely going ahead and all the client needed was to see a formal quote.

We’d met with them, we’d listened to them, we’d answered their questions honestly and pointed out a few areas where they might need to adjust their planning so that their venture would succeed and everything looked very promising. They even had a ballpark figure before they got the written quote so they knew what it was going to cost … and then it all just fizzled out to nothing.

We’d put a lot of work and effort into preparing that quote so we’ve spent some time since then thinking about where we might have made mistakes.

This article - Things Aren’t Always What They Seem - has helped us see where we might have made those mistakes.

Now I’m not saying that we should have sold the product to the client regardless of whether we knew it would work in the way the client wanted and it to or not but it’s made us think about ways we could have better served the client and still been able to sell him something at the same time.

by Stuart Livesey

Many small business people have a huge problem in promoting themselves. They may be able to produce an incredible product but they either don’t know how or find it difficult to promote themselves.

If you fall into that category then you might find this thread on Cre8asiteforums helpful.

David Risley over at Webby Online is running an interesting six part series on how to get your small business website off the ground. You’ll find it both informative and challenging and it starts with What’s the Point of Your Website.

by Stuart Livesey

Can a company every fully recover from a branding error is an interesting question currently being asked over on the Small Business Branding Blog.

It’s also worth considering whether or not a small business can recover from any serious error of judgment. There are two factors that I would suggest could go a long way towards recovering from those mistakes.

The first is actually recognising you’ve made a mistake and not stubbornly refusing to see the forest for the trees and the second is not rushing in with undue haste to try and rectify the problem. When you do that you can make some even more damaging mistakes.

That’s just my two cents worth of advice learned after making as many mistakes as everyone else does