Business Made Easy Podcast: Recent Episodes
Jason Skinner
The Business Made Easy Podcast is packed full of business ideas, to grow your business from a small business into a large business. From tips on social media marketing, business management and finance to cashflow and growing, The Business Made Easy Podcast has got you covered. Business can be a lonely place at times but not anymore with our weekly episodes of business tips and advice. Whether you are starting out, wanting to grow this podcast is for you. It's for Online Businesses and Physical Bricks and Mortar Businesses.
There are many ingredients required for achieving business success, There is, however, one secret ingredient that is essential in every successful business.
While marketing, knowing your numbers, your team, your customers and sales are all important factors in making your business successful, There is one essential secret ingredient that is often overlooked and underestimated when it comes to ensuring success as an entrepreneur and business owner.
This one ingredient alone has the power to drive results in any area of your business and accelerate your success.
Without it, you will grind to a halt and suffer inertia.
Use it wisely, nurture and build on it and you have every chance to take your business to levels you never dreamt were possible.
Yet it very rarely gets discussed.
We are discussing the secret ingredient to business success this week - Confidence.
Confidence is the secret ingredient that keeps us moving forward, the ingredient that helps us take action in our business and our lives. The ingredient that gives us the strength and courage to do the right things and the right times in our businesses.
In this episode we discuss
- Why confidence is the secret ingredient to business success
- The different types of confidence and what they mean to your business success.
- Why building and working on your confidence will improve your business results.
- 10 practical action items you can implement to help build your confidence in business
Are you just like everybody else in business trying to provide good customer service or are you providing your customers with a unique customer experience? There is a big difference between the two and an even bigger difference on your bottom line profit when you get it right. Today I take you through the difference and give you the tools you can use to provide your customers with a unique customer experience and turn them into raving fans in your business.
“People don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan”
This saying couldn’t be closer to the truth when it comes to business and having an up to date and relevant business plan for your business.
Yet so many business owners don’t do them and if they have done them they don’t update them regularly.
This week we discuss in-depth why you need a business plan in your business.
- What makes a business plan so important and the benefits of a well-crafted business plan
- Why you need a business plan in your business
- How often should you do a business plan
- How often should you update and look at your business plan
- What happens if you run your business without a business plan.
Business process automation can be a huge efficiency gain to just about every business.
It allows you to scale your marketing, your processes and product delivery.
It is not however good for everything.
Process automation can not replace or build human relationships and done badly can quickly and easily be damaging to your business.
In this episode, we highlight two real case studies where businesses have automated their business processes at the expense of good customer service as an illustration of how automation can be more damaging than beneficial.
In this episode we cover
- Why business process automation is great for business and can help you scale.
- Why it’s not so great
- Where it can go wrong and the costs of getting it wrong in your business
- The importance of building human touchpoints in your systems.
- How to map out your customer journey to exceed customer expectations
It is so easy to get caught up in life busy being busy. But are we being effective? Are we actually working towards or heading in the right direction for what is truly important in our lives and in our businesses?
We explore the beginning with the end in mind approach to life and business this week.
The idea of starting everything with total clarity on what is important to you in all aspects of life and staying focused on it can have a dramatic effect on the level of success you in your business and in your life.
When we begin with the end in mind approach to our lives we become leaders of our lives as opposed to manages of all that comes our way.
We discuss in-depth these concepts and how you can have a life well lead versus a life well managed.
- What it means to start with the end in mind
- Why it’s such an important approach to business and life in achieving success
- How easy it can be to lose focus and direction without a proper plan
- The importance of recallibrating regularly to stay focused
- The important distinction between a life well managed versus a life, well lead
- How to implement an End in mind approach to life.
The use of video for marketing in your business is one of the most valuable strategies you can have when it comes to getting your business and brand out into the market place.
But knowing where to start can be a daunting task not to mention overcoming the nerves to put yourself out there in front of the camera.
We interview Holly Gillen this week on the podcast and she generously shares some of her key strategies and tips for overcoming the barriers and getting video marketing right in your business.
Holly empowers online entrepreneurs to go from confused to confident on both sides of the camera & teaches them the skills they need to create not just video but Business Cinema™.
Business Cinema™ is the way she likes to describe the next level video. Not creating content for creating content, but creating videos that have a plan, a purpose and a strategy. Videos that move your business forward and have a bigger purpose.
Holly started her career video production in 2008 as a Videographer, Producer, and Editor working with big industry names including the Sundance Channel, Sony Music, Nick.com, HBO, Bono, Big Time Rush, Forest Whitaker and many others.
Her skills and experience run the full gamut from Producing and Directing to Shooting and Editing, and she has translated those skills into a range of educational courses and services to support entrepreneurs in their quest for video stardom.
Learn in this episode
- Why Video is important for marketing in your business.
- What makes video for marketing in your business so successful.
- Hollys 4 pillar strategy for formulating impactful videos.
- The techniques Holly uses to overcome nerves and fear of the camera.
- Getting started with equipment and overcoming the obstacles and confusion.
- The truth behind the myths when it comes to producing quality video in your business.
Cashflow in your business is everything.
If you don’t have the cash you can’t pay your bills and your business won’t survive.
Cash flow is also one of the biggest frustration areas that all business owners struggle within their businesses.
The good news is that cash flow can be managed and it can be easily fixed and managed with the right tools and approach.
In this episode, we take a deep dive look into how a business can improve cash flow and just where to look when problems arise as they invariably do.
In this episode, you will learn,
- Why cash flow is important to your business.
- How to measure and plan your business cash flow for success in your business.
- The 7 key causes of poor cash flow in your business and how to avoid them.
It is very easy, particularly in the online space to loose sight of the fact that you are actually running a business. In this episode I take you through the distinction of a hobby versus a business and what you can do to identify what it is you are actually running, including steps you can implement to set yourself up for business success.
Today I talk about a common problem that many customers face - exactly how can they increase their revenue to reach their lifestyle goals.
We follow along the journey that my clients Bill and Sharon went through when using the formula developed by Jay Abraham to grow their business.
What is covered in this episode: * The Upside Down Business Budget * How making small changes in key areas of your business can make all the difference * How to work out the key metrics to track * Why you need to measure and track the number of initial inquiries your business receives * Ideas to start upselling to your customers * The 5 key areas to grow your business + Increasing the number of leads/inquiries into your business + Converting more inquiries into sales + Increasing the average spend per customer + Increasing the number of times a customer purchases from you + Increasing your gross profit margin
In today’s episode, we cover a topic that is one I feel very passionate about because I’ve seen it work time and time again - the importance of smiling in your business and life.
What is covered in this episode:
- How smiling can change our physical and mental state
- The benefits of smiling on your company culture, staff, suppliers and customer engagement
- Examples of how poor body language can give your customers a bad experience
- Smiling and its impact on your stress level
- How do you smile to help you relate with customers more quickly and improve your networking skills
- How to implement positive body language like smiling into your company’s culture
- The daily practices you need to implement to help make smiling a natural part of your day
There are essentially 3 freedoms that are most wanted and sort after by entrepreneurs as they battle the day to day of running a business.
They are:
- Money Freedom
- Time Freedom
- Mind Freedom
While the proportions in which we seek each of these may vary from time to time. When I speak with entrepreneurs, these 3 freedoms are important goals and drivers in why they are building their businesses and doing what they are doing.
- You will learn what each of the 3 freedoms are,
- Why they are important to us as entrepreneurs,
- The importance of identifying what they mean to you,
- Prioritising the areas of your business that will help you achieve success in these areas.
- Practical tips to help you achieve success in these areas of your business.
As humans, we make all kinds of assumptions, based on our surroundings and our past experiences. These assumptions, however, can often be wrong and ill-informed, and when it comes to business assumptions, very costly and damaging to our business.
In this episode of the podcast, we have an in-depth look and discuss why as humans we make assumptions, the dangers of making business assumptions and how to avoid them.
The areas of your business that assumptions are easily made and how and why you should avoid them at all costs.
- What are business assumptions
- Why as humans we make assumptions.
- Areas of your business that assumptions are easy to make.
- The problem with making assumptions and how to avoid.
- How making the wrong assumptions can be costly and damaging to your business.
If you haven’t got your health you haven’t got anything.
Without our health, we really can’t do much, yet we fail to get regular health check-ups to make sure things are working properly.
As a business owner, we wear lots of different hats that bring a lot of different stresses, so it is very easy for our health to deteriorate easily and without us even knowing.
We have a responsibility as business owners to make sure we are the best version of ourselves so that we can maintain a long and happy life, while enjoying the fruits of our labour.
In this episode I discuss
- How important our health is to maintaining and running a successful business.
- How quickly your health can if left unchecked
- The importance of regular health checks and prioritising your health
- How to set up a regular health checkup plan as a part of your business & life routine.
Stephen Covey in his book The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People, in habit 7, introduced the concept of sharpening the saw.
What he meant by this metaphor, was that it is vital that we take quality time out and invest in our well being if we are to achieve what it is we set out to achieve with sustainable success.
In today's fast, busy passed world it is easy to get on the treadmill of tasks thinking that our business is going to stop if we do, or that our business will break if we take a break.
It’s simply not the case.
To be successful in business we need to slow down to go faster.
In this episode, I share with you the importance of slowing down and taking regular breaks in your business.
When you do this you come back more energised and equipped to tackle things in your business with greater effort, more efficiently and with clearer thinking.
We discuss
- How easy it is to get bogged down thinking you can’t take a break from your business.
- The challenges of scaling your business and being able to take breaks
- The importance of taking time out to sharpen the saw, by investing in yourself for better more efficient growth
- What happens if you don’t invest in time for yourself.
- How to go about getting started taking time out for yourself even when you feel there’s no way you can.
We interview Todd Austin from Fletch Digital this week and we have an in-depth discussion about Social Media Strategy For Your Business and how you can maximise your results..
For many business owners, Social Media can be a daunting minefield when it comes to doing it effectively and well.
Knowing just where to focus your time, energy and money with an endless list of changing trends and advice can make it seem impossibly difficult and not worthwhile.
In this interview, Todd breaks down the last trends and important areas that you should be focusing on with social media and how to get the best results for your efforts.
Having just come back from Social Media Marketing World Todd is brimming with the latest social media tips and strategies to help you find your feet in this space.
- Why Social Media strategy is important for every business to have.
- How social media is evolving and what you need to know to benefit from this.
- What trends are emerging in social media.
- How to develop an effective social media strategy for your business
- The takeaways and tips from Social Media Marketing World.
- The importance of building community in your social media strategy
Buying or starting a business is one of the biggest investments any entrepreneur will make. It is also one of the riskiest things that any of us will do in our lives.
There are so many moving parts to any business and there are also, so many roles and responsibilities that we as business owners are responsible and liable for.
The irony of this risk and exposure is that so many business owners fail or neglect to seek professional advice before starting or buying a business.
In this episode of the Podcast, we explore the importance of seeking professional advice, the types of professional advice that should be obtained and how to take action to avoid future costs and potential liabilities.
We spend a lot of time as business owners investing in the mechanicals of our business. They’re what I call the hard skills such as better marketing, better product delivery, more customers etc.
But what about the soft skills in our business?
Consistent investment in the soft skills of our business can deliver results over and over and what's more, the better we get at the soft skills the easier the hard skills that we struggle with are to achieve.
Your soft skills are the centre pin to providing better relationships in every aspect of your business.
In this episode of the podcast, we explore:
- Exactly what we mean by soft skills.
- What are soft skills
- Why are soft skills critical to your success in business?
- Types of skills you can invest in and develop
- The difference between EQ and IQ
Clarity in your business is the centre piece to achieving the success you are seeking. Without clarity you could be focusing on the totally wrong things, that aren’t going to give you the life you are seeking.
It’s so incredibly easy to be busy and distracted with the wrong things and without clarity there is nothing to bring you back to focus on what truly is are the most important priorities to be focused on.
We often speak of time management, prioritising our time and even trying to find more time. Without clarity and absolute direction it doesn’t matter how much team we each have as we will end up missing what we are aiming for.
- What exactly is clarity in business and in life, what does it mean.
- Why clarity is important in your business and in life
- How to pinpoint clarity
- How Clarity will help you stay away from distractions and help you better manage your time.
- How clarity will help you fast track the success you are seeking by helping you to focus on what’s truly important
In this episode, we are interviewing one of our members of The Business Made Easy Podcast Community, Phil Lichtenberger.
We are answering Phil's questions with regards to having a healthy cashflow in business, what are the things to implement and how to get clear with your expectations when it comes to payment terms.
We’ve all heard the saying it’s a six figure business.
But what is six figures really?
When people throw around the term 6 figures or even 7 figures you really need to look at what is being said in context.
I meet far too many business owners and entrepreneurs jaded because their business is falling short of the 6 figure benchmark.
My question is to you though - who is setting the benchmark your or somebody else?
In this episode I give you some practical thinking to help you get your goals and expectations into relevant context for you and your own set of circumstances, so that you can focus on what is actually the most important goals for you to be achieving and not for somebody else's circumstances.
We cover in this episode:
- What is six figures really?
- What questions to ask to get context on these benchmark numbers.
- How to identify what’s important for you and your circumstances.
- How by gaining clarity on your importance numbers you will be more free to achieve what you need to achieve not what somebody else is achieving.
- The importance of running your own race
- Learn from a case study and how James was virtually burnout working for what he didn’t know what he was working for.
- How bigger is not always better and how more is not always what you need.
Buying an existing operational business can be an exciting time. It can also be one of the most dangerous & risky times.
When you buy an existing business you are also buying a lot of potential for expensive mistakes to occur.
There are many components and moving parts to an existing business such as:
Customers, Suppliers, Finances, Taxes, Landlords, Financiers, Licensing Bodies, Marketing Collateral and Plant & Equipment to name a few.
A properly conducted due diligence of the business you are buying acts as a double check and verification of what it is you are buying and that what you are buying is what you are expecting to buy for your money.
There are many cases where purchasers of businesses have skipped having a proper due diligence conducted and it has led to very expensive mistakes and problems once the business is purchased.
In this episode we cover
- Why it can be a good idea to buy an existing business.
- The different ways you can buy an existing business.
- The risks and potential exposure you face when buying an existing business.
- What is a Due Diligence
- Why you need a professional Due Diligence when buying a business.
- The risks of not having a proper due diligence when buying a business.
Are you thinking outside the square in your business?
Too often we fall into a comfort zone of that’s just the way we do it in our business.
The danger is that the world and technology is moving at a rapid pace, a pace that is unstoppable and impossible to tame.
This means that our customer's expectations and needs are also rapidly changing.
If we don’t give ourselves time to think outside the square in our businesses we run the risk of becoming out of date and extinct.
If our competitors embrace change and reimagine the delivery of products and solutions to our ideal customers then it is going to be more competitive and difficult to compete in our respective markets.
In this episode we discuss:
- The importance of thinking outside the square in your business.
- Giving yourself free time to do big-picture thinking, to reimagine your product or service
- The importance of looking at every step of your customer journey and thinking outside the square in terms of technology or changes you could make to stay ahead of your competition in your marketplace.
- Don’t follow the herd from history, be a thought leader in your space and develop the new frontier.
Time is a precious resource that we all need more of, particularly in business.
If we waste it we can never get it back.
If we use it wisely, we can achieve many great results with it.
In today’s fast-paced world however, there can be a never-ending list of things all calling for our attention with never enough time to do them all.
In this episode I share with you my top 10 time wasters in business and specifically what you can do to stop them.
- You will learn
- Why minimising time wastage is crucial to your business success.
- Learn my top 10 time wasters in business.
- Why they make the list of the top 10
- Importantly how to stop them from eating up your precious time and start being more productive.
Confidence Blocks can be debilitating to your business performance. They can be happening without you even knowing that they are there. So what are they? How do you identify them? And, most importantly how do you overcome them so that you can get back achieving the success in your business you are looking for?
In this week's episode we are talking about, How to overcome confidence blocks in your business.
Specifically we are discussing
- What a confidence block is.
- What signs to look for when identifying a confidence block
- How to analyse a confidence block when you find one
- Why they are important to fix
- How to approach fixing them when you find one.
One of the most dangerous things to do in your business is to have all your eggs in one basket.
This week we take an in-depth look at a strategy to secure and grow your business profit using income pillars.
Pillars have been around for centuries as a way of sharing and spreading heavy loads in buildings and architecture.
But like in architecture Pillars can also play an extremely valuable role in sharing the load in your business by spreading and reducing risk and sharing and leveraging already existing overheads and costs in your business while growing your bottom line profit.
Specifically, in this episode we discuss
- The importance of spreading and diversifying risk in your business is not to have all your eggs in one basket.
- The strategy of building and identifying income pillars in your business.
- What we mean by income pillars in your business
- How Income Pillars work and how they will help you to spread risks and help you to secure and grow your business profit.
We can’t control everything that happens to us in our business. There are things that will happen from an internal perspective and things from a greater outside Macro perspective that are just going to happen no matter what.
We can, however, with proper planning and strategy reduce the risk of things happening in our business and lives and minimise the severity of the impact when and if they do.
In this episode, we discuss how to manage risk in your business.
- We discuss a practical approach and strategy you can implement to
- Fully understand the types of risks your business is exposed to.
- How to quantify the impact of one of those risk events happening in your business.
- How to prioritise systems and procedures to mitigate the effects of a risk event happening in your business.
- What happens if you don’t implement a risk management plan in your business no matter how big or small your business may be.
We all know time is a limited resource, we just cannot get any more of it. As an entrepreneur, we tend to wear a lot of different hats which can be stressful and overwhelming. Getting clarity around where it is that you should be spending your time is very important in order to set the right goals and strategy to run your business
Tune in to this episode as we answer one of our Business Made Easy Podcast Subscriber's Questions about how to improve time management to find more time in business.
In this episode you'll learn:
- The importance of prioritizing
- When is the right time to delegate tasks
- How to take advantage of technology to automate processes
We discuss how to grow your business profit in this episode by looking at your profit margin and doing a spring clean of your overheads in your business.
As your business grows it’s very easy for waste and inefficiency in your overheads to creep in and erode your profit margin. So a regular review of these costs is recommended.
Often as a busy business owner and entrepreneur we are focused on sales and making more income and we rarely review the expenses of the business. But one of the quickest wins you can have with growing your business profit is to review your overheads and expenses in your business and to tighten efficiency and eliminate wastage.
In this episode, you will learn
- Why your profit margin is so important to your business
- How the overheads and costs of your business can creep up and out of control.
- The types of expenses that can blow out in your business
- Why efficiency in your expenses is important and has an effect on your profit margin.
- Practical ways to monitor your overheads and ensure they are under control in your business.
We discuss how to grow your business profit in this episode by looking at your profit margin and doing a spring clean of your overheads in your business.
As your business grows it’s very easy for waste and inefficiency in your overheads to creep in and erode your profit margin. So a regular review of these costs is recommended.
Often as a busy business owner and entrepreneur we are focused on sales and making more income and we rarely review the expenses of the business. But one of the quickest wins you can have with growing your business profit is to review your overheads and expenses in your business and to tighten efficiency and eliminate wastage.
In this episode, you will learn
- Why your profit margin is so important to your business
- How the overheads and costs of your business can creep up and out of control.
- The types of expenses that can blow out in your business
- Why efficiency in your expenses is important and has an effect on your profit margin.
- Practical ways to monitor your overheads and ensure they are under control in your business.
It is common as a business owner to worry about how much to charge for our goods and services.
If the price is too high we may not make the sale or even worse the customer might make comment that we are too expensive and make comparisons to our competitors.
The truth is though, it is the business owner that has more of a problem with the price of their goods and services more than the customer does.
The trick to getting this area of your business right is to make sure the value of your offer to your customers is higher than the price, or at the very least your value matches your price being charged.
We discuss in this episode.
- The importance of your value being higher than your price
- How it is the business owner who has a bigger problem with the price of their goods & services than the customer themselves does.
- The customer is focused on the value of the transaction to them and how it is going to solve their problems and change their state.
- The importance of understanding your customers perception of quality.
- What happens when your value doesn’t exceed your price.
One of the most challenging tasks as a business owner is to get consistency in customer service and delivery within their business.
As your business grows and you employ more and more people to help you grow it is very easy for your customer service levels to drop or become inconsistent depending on who is doing what on a particular day.
In this episode you'll learn:
- Your customers are educated and spoilt for choice now and it is critical as a business owner that you have a grasp of delivering an exceptional customer experience every single time no matter how big or small your business is.
- Why delivering consistent and exceptional customer service every time is important to your business bottom line.
- Why it’s your role as the business owner to be the driver of the customer experience in your business.
- How to get your team and culture in your business aligned with your customer experience expectations.
- Systems and processes you as the business owner can practically implement to engage your team and ensure consistency as you scale and grow your business.
Business Burnout is real, it creeps up on you, it can strike without warning and when it does it can be detrimental to your business and more importantly to your health.
We have a good look at business burnout this week to identify what causes it, the effects it can have on your business and your health.
Learn 15 practical action steps you can do to avoid business burnout in your business.
In this episode we cover
- What causes Business Burnout
- Signs you are suffering from Business Burnout
- 15 practical tips to prevent and solve burnout in your business
When it comes to choosing the best accounting software for small business there is a multitude of options from basic cashbook solutions to enterprise level solutions with all the bells and whistles.
So how do you choose the right solution for your business?
In this episode of the Podcast, we explore how to find the best accounting software for your needs and we look at the various features of today's accounting software that can add streamlined efficiency to your business reporting and accounting systems.
You will learn
- What questions to ask when assessing accounting software for your business.
- What key considerations should you be thinking about before committing to buying accounting software?
- What functionality & tools are available to help you with efficiency and cash flow in your business.
- Learn about electronic document storage solutions to remove your paperwork clutter.
It is common this time of year to set New Years Resolutions.
But what about new year business resolutions?
Your business is the machine that fuels your lifestyle and life goals. With the start of the fresh new year in your business now is an excellent time to set some new year resolutions to improve your business and give your self every chance of further business success in 2019.
In this episode, I share with you 10 practical resolutions you can look to make in your business and help yo make 2019 your best year in business yet.
In this episode we cover
- Why it’s important to set New Year Business Resolutions.
- 10 Resolutions you can implement now in your business that will help you succeed in 2019 and future years.
Many people think of success as a straight line that goes from point A to Point B. But unfortunately, this is not the case and couldn’t be further from the truth.
The path to success looks more like a line that starts off straight and turns into a squiggly line like the diagram below.
You can, however, take action and put steps in place to straighten that line out as best as possible and give your self every chance to succeed at your chosen path.
In this episode, I give you 10 actionable steps to strengthen your path to success in business and in life.
These 10 steps will equip you with the tools you will need to not only ensure your success but ensure you achieve it in the straightest possible path.
In this episode, you will learn
- Why the path to success is a straight line
- Why clarity and vision are important to your success and how to achieve it.
- The enemies of success and how to avoid them
- The practical steps to practice and implement to ensure your path to success is as smooth as possible.
There is no question that email and messaging is one of the fastest and most efficient ways to communicate in your business.
While it may be a fast and efficient way to communicate, is it actually the most effective way to communicate with your customers.
It is far to easy to bash out an email response to a customer and move onto the next task of the day. But have we really built and developed a deeper engaged relationship with that customer or are we just reacting to a situation with the customer instead of being proactive?
In this episode, we explore:
- Why email is not always the best way to communicate in your business.
- The benefits of picking up the phone and having a human to human conversation.
- How picking up the phone and having a real conversation can build trust and rapport with your customers.
- The downside of email communications in your business.
- A simple set of rules you can build in your business around identifying when to pick up the phone and have a real conversation with your customer.
In this episode, I give you the tools and a framework to start your year new off on the right foot.
It is common for people to not worry about their New Year planning until after the New Year has started.
The problem with this approach is that January is nearly over before you gain any traction and start moving towards your goals.
I provide you with a system and framework that I use to turn this approach on its head and start your planning process now for the new year you have momentum when the New Year kicks off.
In this Episode, you will learn
- Why it’s important to start your New Year Planning Now
- How to start your planning now to give your new year every chance of being your best yet
- A framework and System that I use and you can adopt to easily get started now.
Is your thinking above or below the line?
We all have things that happen to us on a daily basis. Somethings are a result from our own decisions and actions others are totally outside our control and we can’t change them.
What we can change though are our choices and the way we respond to the things that happen and it is the sum of these choices that determine our end destination in business and in life.
This week we discuss a mindset tool that will help you to change the way you think of problems and situations when they arise and guide you to make more clear and better decisions.
In this Episode, you will learn:
- To identify your thinking when situations arise
- A mindset tool you can implement to make better decisions.
- The distinct difference of thinking above the line or below the line when it comes to problems.
- The benefits of implementing this level of thinking in your life.
Lack of time to get things done is one of the most common frustrations and complaints from business owners. There just never seems to be enough hours in the day and the things to do list just keeps growing.
In this episode of the podcast, I discuss how you can solve this perpetual problem in your business and we take a good look at practical solutions such as outsourcing business processes to help you focus on the important things that need doing in your business.
I will share with you
- The difference between working in your business versus working on your business.
- How to create productivity blocks of time in your week.
- A practical system to identify the valuable work you should be doing and the time zapping work you shouldn’t be doing.
- The importance of outsourcing business processes to create capacity and how to go about it.
The director of first impressions is arguably the most important role in any business.
It takes 7 seconds to make a positive first impression with any potential new customer. It is the director of first impressions role to shine your business in the best possible light with any potential new customer, so they must use this 7-second timeslot effectively in order to create a great first impression and a positive relationship momentum with your business.
If they get it wrong and don’t form a great first impression it can be very difficult to recover from and in a lot of cases, it’s impossible to recover from. If the potential customer does become a customer then it puts a lot of pressure on the rest of your organisation to build the relationship back up.
In this episode you'll learn:
- What the director of impressions role is in your business.
- Why it’s the most important role in your business.
- What happens when your director of first impressions gets it wrong.
- How to get it right.
- Metrics you can put in place with your director of first impressions to measure effectiveness and performance in the role.
Communicating with your customers is one of the most important things you can do to grow your business.
When you communicate better with your customers you leave them feeling in safe hands every step of the journey with you.
You trust and rapport with them and if you do an excellent job you turn them into raving fans of your business and brand.
In episode 65, we discuss the importance of effective communication with your customers and systems you can implement in your business to achieve this no matter how big or small your current business.
Learn:
- The importance of effective communication in your business.
- How to identify exactly what your customer needs to know
- How to set clear expectations for your customer every time.
- Systems to implement consistent and effective communication with your customers
Growing your business can be a confusing and daunting task. Knowing where to put your time, energy and resources so they maximise your results is costly and expensive if you get it wrong. On top of this, there are only so many hours in a day and you can’t afford to be wasting them.
In this episode 64, I give you a simple 3 step process to help you get clarity around exactly what your business needs to grow and increase your bottom line.
At the end of this episode, you will have a clear and solid framework to apply to your business to identify exactly what your business needs to go to the next level.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- A practical 3 step process to apply in your business to help you identify what areas of your business you need to adjust to drive growth in your business.
- The key areas to focus on to achieve growth in your business.
- Ensuring your business is in good condition and has the resources to be able to grow profitably.
- The importance of knowing the critical numbers in your business to monitor performance and growth.
- Why you need to check and monitor your numbers regularly.
Learn how looking after yourself in business is one of the greatest investments you can make for the performance of your business and your ultimate success.
We discuss the importance of building customer relationships in this episode.
Specifically the importance of building value-based relationships, that are not transactional but deep and long-lasting.
Value-based relationships are built with honesty, trust, and integrity, they aren’t for a quick sale or quick win.
Value-based customer relationships can’t be fake or non-genuine. They take time and patience to grow.
But when they do they deliver a rewarding and profitable business that will keep your customers coming back time and time again. With a value-based approach you will win more business, keep more business and you will have better advocates for your business and brand.
In this episode you'll learn:
- What is a genuine value-based customer relationship
- What is not a value based relationship
- Learn the finer points from a real-life case study
- Learn the formula for building a value-based customer relationship.
Learn 7-time saving strategies to improve your productivity in business.
Time is a precious resource we all only have the same 24 hours in a day, and we can’t get any more of it. Even more severe we can’t get it back when it’s lost or wasted. '
Success in business comes from doing the right things at the right time. It's imperative that you don't waste the time you have with un-necessary distractions. You can't get the lost time back.
Social Media and shiny new objects that cause distraction are occupying more of our day. They draw you in and make it difficult to maintain focus on what's important.
In this episode, I share with you 7 strategies to improve your productivity in your business. 7 strategies that will give you back your time and help you achieve greater success in your business.
It’s not too late to finish the year strong and make it your best year ever.
There are always obstacles and reasons and excuses why it’s hard to achieve your goals and with the end of the year and holidays seasons around the corner there are going to be even more reasons why achieving your goals may seem impossible.
You can still achieve your important goals for the year despite the distraction and seeming lack of time.
We take you through a 5 step program to reprioritise, refocus, take action and finish the year strong, making it your best year ever.
A must listen to episode if you are serious about achieving success in your business.
You will learn
What holds us back this time of the year
The importance of finishing the year strong
The importance of revisiting your goals and recalibrating to finish the year strong.
My 5 step process to make 2018 year your best year ever.
Knowing which social media platform to use in your business marketing can be a daunting task, every day there seems to be a new tactic and strategy and not enough hours in the day.
You start down the road on one platform only to be drawn to another due to new information that’s come to hand. Then you change back and forth. It’s like social media pinball.
What is worse is when you try to be on all at the same time without any clear strategy.
Adopting this approach has a high chance of nothing working and a lot of wasted time. Without proper thought, planning and strategy for ultimately what you're trying to achieve.
In this episode you'll learn:
- The behind the scenes strategy of social media marketing.
- We look at an effective way to approach social media marketing in your business
- The importance of choosing the most effective social media platform.
- How to choose which platform is going to give you the best results for the least amount of effort and become a pro at it.
Business Burnout is real, it creeps up on you, it can strike without warning and when it does it can be detrimental to your business and more importantly to your health.
We have a good look at business burnout this week to identify what causes it, the effects it can have on your business and your health.
Learn 15 practical action steps you can do to avoid business burnout in your business.
In this episode we cover
- What causes Business Burnout
- Signs you are suffering from Business Burnout
- 15 practical tips to prevent and solve burnout in your business.
Starting and building a business can be a daunting thought at the best of times.
The emotion and excitement often get the better of people and they just jump right in and start implementing and building without considering the consequences or direction of what they are trying to actually build.
You wouldn’t build a house without a clear solid plan and proper preparation beforehand and nor should you build a business without one also.
When you build a house there are clearly defined stages and steps that need to take place so that things are solid and stable for the next stage and so on.
For example, you wouldn’t start putting the roof on if you haven’t built the walls. It just won’t work.
Business is exactly the same you have to follow the right steps and stages in order to be successful and achieve what your vision.
In this episode, you will learn
- Why each stage of building a business is the same as building a house.
- The critical stages of building a business to be successful
- Why it’s important to follow each stage in order to provide a solid foundation for the next stages and each subsequent stage.
- Why it’s important not to miss a step in building a successful business.
Business owners usually have a good idea that things aren’t right somewhere in their businesses, but often not know where to start look to see what’s wrong with their business.
We look at a case study this week of William and Laura who weren’t getting results but didn’t know where to start looking to fix things.
We have a look at William and Laura's situation and I take you through the exact steps we used to identify the problems they were having and the action steps they implemented to turn things around.
This is a practical episode that can be applied to any business that may not be performing and getting the business owners desired results.
In this episode, you will learn
- The importance of seeking professional help to fix problems.
- The importance of Margin and understanding your Breakeven point in your business.
- The importance of Cash Flow Planning and how to fix problems.
- The importance of constantly making adjustments and fine tuning your business along the way.
Business is an important part of life for an entrepreneur and while we do everything in our power so things don’t go wrong, it’s a major fact of life that things are going to go wrong from time to time.
There are lessons that we are all learning as we go along on our business journey and they tend to be mistakes that we say we’ll never make again.
But there are also things that go wrong that are totally outside our control. That can go wrong and really rock our world when it comes to our business.
In this episode, we dive deep into what to do when these things go wrong. How to approach it to minimise the damage and fallout and recover in better shape as a result.
In this episode we discuss
- The types of things that can go wrong in your business.
- What to do when things do go wrong in your business.
- Practical steps and actions you can take to minimise the impact to things going wrong in your business.
Taking on a Business Partner or going into business with a business partner can often be an attractive idea.
After all, it can be lonely at the top right?
There are many and varied reasons the idea of taking on a business partner can be an attractive proposition but it is critical that you do it under the right circumstances and fully educated on the positives and negatives and what it means to bring in a partner to your business.
I answer the following questions and provide an overview in this episode of what partnership is all about and how to do it right.
- What a business partnership is
- Why you would want to take on a business partner
- Why you shouldn’t take on a business partner
- Some of the pitfalls of taking on a business partner.
- A model that can work well for a business partnership.
There’s a great saying in business “Do It once and do it well”
But what if you have to do it more than once?
What if your definition of doing it well is completely different to others in your business?
What if the person in charge of the task is absent?
Systems in Business play an important role in making sure the tasks, steps and processes in your business happen as they should and how they should predictably every single time without fail.
Systems in Business also act as a control and checking mechanism in making sure that the important things that should be happening are happening and efficiently.
While the Saying do it once and do it well is relevant in business I also believe more important is the saying “do it more than once turn in it into a system” in your business.
Both profit and cash flow are critical components to running a successful business. Profit is what generates cash flow and cash flow pays the bills and keeps your business running. But they are two very separate things.
We discuss in this episode:
- The difference between cash flow and profit
- Why it’s possible to have a high profit with little cash flow
- Why you can have cash flow with no profit
- Tips you can use to improve your cash flow
It is common and normal to get excited about starting your very own business. Maybe you’re passionate about a particular project or area that you think would make a great business. Maybe you have just always wanted to be your own boss and have some freedom in your life.
Whatever the reason you should always start with a well researched business plan.
The importance of a business plan can not be overestimated when it comes to starting and running a business.
A good business plan will:
- Explore the viability of your business idea
- Explore the opportunities that exist in your selected market
- Prevent you from making costly mistakes
- Prevent you from entering into high risk transactions
- Give you clarity and transparency about what you are signing up for.
- Ensure you are entering into a commitment that will achieve your goals both personally and financially
Business Culture is one of the most important elements to business success. Yet it’s so rarely discussed, mentioned or identified.
Business owners spend countless dollars & resources on marketing and growing sales to attract new customers. Yet often fall down on the promise once the customer is in the door.
Business Culture is the glue that keeps your team happy and feeling the love for your organisation. It’s the glue that keeps your customers coming back and loving your brand.
We go through a case study in this episode and highlight
- What exactly is business culture
- Why it is critical to your business success
- When you have happy, valued team members they are happy to show up and serve your customers.
- Actions you can take to identify and improve the culture in your business.
How bearing your vulnerable side more can benefit the growth of your business.
For some people, the idea of showing their true personalities in business can be a frightening and daunting idea.
However, it is more important than ever to be building personality and story into the branding of your business.
This week we answer a listeners question in helping them to be more vulnerable in bringing out their personality in their brand.
I share some simple tips you can employ in any business to help your personality shine through without the fear.
A Customer Experience Strategy is one of the most critical things you can have in your business. Gone are the days of just providing great customer service. Your customers are now more informed than ever when they engage with your business. In Episode 48 we go through examples of how the little things can zap the overall customer experience in your business without you even realise it's happening!
Barry and Angela had a life long dream of owning their own business. Angela, a full time teacher on a great steady salary, Barry an electrician who had been on the tools all his life since leaving school. They dreamed of becoming their own bosses and take back control of their lives and financial freedom. In this episode you will hear Barry and Angela's story and the process we went through to make their ultimate decision.
It can be common, as a small business owner, to wake up and not want to get out of bed at times when it all seems to be getting too much. So why do we do this to ourselves?
What is the secret sauce that gets us through this turbulent highs and lows? Listen to Episode 46 as we discuss the secret powers of persistence v's perseverance.
Matthew Barnett from Bonjoro knows all about delivering an exceptional customer experience to grow your brand and weld customers to it. Technology has allowed your customers to be more educated and informed when they are making buying decisions so it is imperative that, when they come to your business they are acknowledged, made feel special and appreciated. We talk about the importance of building these relationships and why they are so important to your business success. We also discuss how, with tools like Bonjoro, these relationships are easy to scale and deliver effectively and efficiently in your business.
It's a contest between death and taxes as to which is least favourite but, as the old saying goes, they are the only two things that are absolutely certain in life. The reality is, while nobody likes to talk about it and we put off doing any planning around it, NOT doing anything is only making things more difficult and traumatic for those we leave behind. Today we talk about why it's important to have your estate plan under control and the types of considerations you should have when doing so.
Kent Sisco is a an entrepreneur in the true sense of the word. Kent has been an integral part of some of the largest software development companies in the world, including being one of the original design team on Microsoft Excel. Not only does Kent share his interesting journey throughout his career but he shares also the lessons he attributes to his success in business. Kent has just released his new project called SPEARE which is a modern day word processor for busy content creators and he shares the journey that led him to design and build this product. Take a listen!
A commonly used strategy to increase the sales and income in a business is to offer a discount to entice more customers to buy. But discounting can work out more expensive than you might first think. Episode 42 explores the true cost of discounting in your business and how a 10% discount can cost you a lot more than 10% profit on your business bottom line. Tune in with Jason Skinner right here!
LinkedIn is a social platform that has had a lot of changes added recently and is quickly becoming a game changer in terms of engagement on social media. We chat with Mary Charleson, author of 5 Minute Marketing about Native video, the importance of building a business community and what's working in the marketing space for her at present.
Episode 40 of The Business Made Easy Podcast Jason Skinner gives us an in-depth look into what the break-even point is in your business, how to calculate it and why it's so important to growing your business and taking your profit to the next level.
In this episode you’ll learn:
- Discover what is "Profit Margin" in your business and why it's important.
- Learn how to calculate your Break Even point and exactly what it is.
- Examples of adjustments that can be made to improve profits margins on individual sales passed
Entrepreneur, public speaker and author Chris Brogan shares his 'Tell it how it is and be Real' approach to business and marketing. We also have a great discussion on the emergence of Block Chain technologies and how he sees them being useful far beyond Crypto Currencies to become an integral part of business processes in the future.
Feeling overwhelmed at the amount of options out there for business tools and software? In Episode 38 I share with you 5 great tools I'm currently using to efficiently help grow my businesses and deliver the results I'm seeking. I share the honest pro's & con's of each to help you make the right choices!
We chat with Amber Hawley & Maelisa Hall from the My Biz Bestie Podcast. Both successful entrepreneurs and business owners in their own rights, they have found each other and established a close support network to make it through the day to day ups and downs of running a business. In this episode we talk about the importance of establishing a network of peers who understand your journey, who are there to support you and how to find these people in both the online and offline world. Thanks for listening
When it comes to email marketing, we often hear "Nobody reads emails anymore" or "email marketing is a waste of time".
This couldn't be further from the truth, your email list is still one of the most important marketing assets you can have in your business growth toolbox.
In Episode 36 of The Business Made Easy Podcast, Jason Skinner discusses why your email list is still one of the most important assets you have and what you can do to improve your open rates and engagement levels of your email marketing efforts.
A few simple tweaks to what you are currently doing and a different approach to your email list and the drafting of your emails will deliver you far better results.
In this episode you will learn.
- Why your email list is one of the most important assets in your business.
- Why email marketing is still very much alive and an effective way to engage with your customers and potential customers.
- How to look at your email marketing in a different light that delivers the results you are looking for.
Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income catches up with Jason in San Diego to chat about all things entrepreneurship, his journey in business, the work involved to achieve success and how he approaches business life and his strategies with You Tube and business going forward. A not-to-be-missed episode on The Business Made Easy Podcast!
Are you just like everybody else in business trying to provide good customer service or are you providing your customers with a unique customer experience? There is a big difference between the two and an even bigger difference on your bottom line profit when you get it right.
Today I take you through the difference and give you the tools you can use to provide your customers with a unique customer experience and turn them into raving fans in your business.
Dinesh Rudra is the founder of Light Animations, a company that specialises in helping companies to communicate effectively to their people through the use of animated instructional videos. Dinesh shares his framework for communicating effectively within your organisation, no matter how difficult or complicated the message. Enjoy Episode 33 of The Business Made Easy Podcast!
It is very easy, particularly in the online space to loose sight of the fact that you are actually running a business. In this episode I take you through the distinction of a hobby versus a business and what you can do to identify what it is you are actually running, including steps you can implement to set yourself up for business success.
Perna Malik talks us through the fundamentals of what makes engaging copy, why it's so important to have it right in order to grow your business and the framework to make sure your copywriting does the job it's meant to do. Prerna also shares some great tips and traps to avoid when writing good copy.
In this episode we answer one of our listeners questions to address a common frustration in business and entrepreneurship.
- How to set priorities in your business when you have limited time.
- The importance of setting vision and strategy in you business.
- Why you need to establish the role of CEO in your business.
- The Quadrant of Priorities from Stephen Covey
- How to deal with the noise and speed of technology as a business owner
- Learn about the big rocks versus the small rocks.
- The four generations of time management.
If you are wanting to drastically improve the results from your business marketing efforts and dollars spent you need this episode. Learn why people are not seeing or listening to your Social Media posts and practical tips to change the game with the marketing results in your business.
What is covered in this episode:
- The importance of knowing your ideal customer avatar
- Knowing your most profitable existing customers.
- Why you need to do this framework before you start writing your copy or advertising
- How to start defining your customer avatar
- Why you need to constantly be refining your customer avatar
- Why you need to know where they absorb information from - what do the read, watch, listen to?
- How knowing their pains and objections can help you connect quicker
- Knowing their online behaviours
- How to find out this information
- What to do if you have multiple customer avatars
Hear from the Master of Marketing John Dwyer this week as we discuss practical tips to grow your business and improve the results you're getting from the marketing efforts in your Business. John has a wealth of knowledge and ideas when it comes to practical direct response marketing ideas to grow your business. He shares his stories of how he persuaded comedian Jerry Seinfeld to take on the Greater Building Society campaign as well as other practical case studies you can use to generate ideas in your business. A must listen episode for anybody wanting to grow their business.
What is covered in this episode:
- Why experience counts when using marketing experts
- The power of direct response marketing compared to branding strategies
- Tactics to get your customers to sample your products
- Using competitions to drive warm leads to your business
- The background on the Jerry Seinfeld campaign for Greater Building Society
- The results that can happen when you are thinking outside the box
- The power of persistence and not giving up
- The frustrations of leaving money on the table with your existing customers
- The difference collecting data on your customers can make
- The power of text messages in your marketing
- The value proposition vs discounting
- Increasing your perceived value
- Making it easy for customers to buy from you
- Why discounting isn't the answer to build revenue
- Selling the benefits not the features
- The power of Facebook Live video marketing
Michael Gerber in his book the EMyth introduced the concept of the Technician, The Manager and The Entrepreneur. In this week's episode we discuss adopting a CEO mindset in your business and practical steps you can implement to move your from being the technician on the tools to the CEO growing your business.
What is covered in this episode:
- The changes you will experience adapting from working for a corporation to being your own boss
- What exactly is a CEO and what role do they perform
- The difference of working inside and outside your business
- Why these concepts apply to you whether you are a solo business owner or manage a team
- Why the owner of the business and a CEO are two distinct roles
- A large business is just a small company that has done the right things
- The journey of starting a business and the traps that owners can fall into once you start growing
- Why you need to stop and look at what you have built by taking a day out of your business to have a CEO day
- During your first CEO day it is important to:
- Brainstorm everything out of your mind
- Allocating a CEO and time that will spent in that role each week
- Identifying who are the owners/shareholders of the business
- Identifying the organisational structure required and role descriptions
- How to make your CEO day non negotiable
Do you feel like running your small business zaps every last bit of energy out of you? Feeling like your stuck and don't know how to move forward? Today's guest is Linda Binns, author, speaker and Breakthrough Energy Expert who specialises in getting small business owners unstuck.
What is covered in this episode:
- The changes you will experience adapting from working for a corporation to being your own boss
- How your energy affects all areas of your life
- How you show up each day and the trickle down effect it can have on your team
- Why what you think the problem is, often isn't the actual problem
- Why you need to step back, reset and then work backwards to avoid overwhelm
- Spending time on things that won't reach your end goal
- The importance of creating and celebrating small wins
- Mastering the things you are good at to help reduce overwhelm
- Making sure you are aligning your actions with your overall business and personal goals
- The key to success is taking smalls steps and taking action regularly
- The big impact just small changes to your thinking can make both professionally and personally
- The danger in comparing yourself to others
- How Facebook Ads is working with Linda right now in her business
Updating your Facebook page each day doesn't constitute a digital strategy for your small business. Today we talk about what it is and how it can help to future-proof your business.
A Digital Strategy is one of the most important documents you can now have in your business. We are all familiar with the importance of having a clearly defined and documented Business Plan for our business, to set our vision and strategy.Very few businesses however understand the importance of a clearly defined & . documented Digital Strategy. In this episode I outline what a digital strategy is and how it is so much more than a scheduling posts to Facebook and Social Media.
What is covered in this episode: * What is a digital strategy and why you need one * Case studies of businesses that didn't have a digital strategy and the impact that had on their industry * Why a digital strategy is not just your social media and marketing activity * The different components of a front-end and back-end digital strategy * The digital life cycle of consumers * Identifying where your customers fit in the digital spectrum * The importance of identifying the trends in your industry and how that can impact your product delivery * Why you need to build your business on your own assets such as your website and not on rented land or third party assets that you can't control such as YouTube and Instagram * Back-end digital issues you need to consider around protection and security
Ty Crandell is a widely recognised authority when it comes to business finance and getting it right from the outset. This week we discuss the importance of your credit rating when applying for business finance and Ty shares his proven tips and strategies for making sure you set things right from the get go.
Ty has been featured on Inc., Entrepreneur Forbes & FOX and is the author of two popular books - Perfect Credit and Business Credit Decoded. It’s a great episode for anybody wanting to structure their business finance correctly.
What is covered in this episode: * How to get business credit when starting out * The different types of business loan structures * The problem with using your personal credit to build a business * The global trends with niche lending programs offering alternates to the big banks * Tips for approaching lenders to obtain finance and how to make the right impression * How Artificial Intelligence is changing the way credit gets approved * The three C's of business lending * How risk affects the costs of credit-based finance * Why you need to get money before you need it
On today's solo episode I want to encourage you to stop the overwhelm and put a pause button on your social media marketing. Why? There is a good chance you are leaving money on the table but not servicing your existing clientele to the fullest.
Today we review exactly how to find and service your most profitable customers.
What is covered in this episode:
- Why you need to put the pause button on social media and acquiring new customers
- How to use your existing customer database in finding untapped revenue
- Why it is cheaper to service your existing customers more than finding new clientele
- How to identify your most profitable customers
- Completing the ideal customer worksheet
- The importance of having a customer list/database
- Identify problems can you solve to incease your offerings to your most profitable customers
- The easy way to increase revenue through upselling to your existing customers
- 'Disneyifing' your customer service
- The danger in over automating your business and dehumanising your customer service
- The benefit of creating customer advocates for your business
Today on the show I talk to online entrepreneur and mentor James Schramko about his new book Work Less, Make More.
James is based in Sydney Australia and has started, developed and sold multiple successful businesses.
A passionate father, investor, surfer, husband, coach, mentor and lover of freedom, James excels in making the complex world of business simple so that your quality of life can improve.
When James started online he was a General Manager working with Mercedes-Benz commanding a large team of employees in a multi-million dollar business by day and an online marketer by night.
Since buying his first laptop in 2005 James has sold well over TEN million dollars online.
What is covered in this episode:
- How he meant from working for car dealership to surfing everyday
- Why it is less risky to have multiple income streams
- How the choices you make generally dictate your results
- The black hole of personal effectiveness
- Why working more isn’t the answer
- The importance of tracking time and working out your effective hourly rate
- The talent trap
- Knowing that all tasks are not equal
- The importance of having an offer that converts
- Why the shiny latest software isn’t always the answer to business efficiency
- Cashflow, tax and the profit formula
- The benefits and growth of the recurring subscription model
- Identify compromises in your business
- Understanding the importance of owning the racecourse - that is the asset that you can control and use other platforms to bring people to your asset
- The problems of building on someone else’s land
The first episode for 2018, Jason sets the seen for the year on the content and layout of material to help you grow your business and have your best year in business ever.
From interviews to one-on-one teachings. The Business Made Easy Podcast will be bring you all the tools and resources you need to master your Social Media, Your Customer Experiences and the Management of your business in 2018.
What is covered in this episode: * Jason's approach to business planning in 2018 * How Jason changed the way he spends his New Year day * Go back and listen to Episode 20 to hear about goal planning and strategy * The 3 areas of content for The Business Made Easy community this year - + marketing; + customer experience + management * What topics will be covered in these 3 areas over the year * Sharing your goals with the Business Made Easy Podcast group in the private Facebook Community.
Today we discuss the importance of not only having a business plan but the process behind the plan.
The actual process of sitting down and doing a business plan, to me is probably one of the most fundamental things that you should do in your business.
To make it easy for you to create your business plan make sure to download our Free Business Plan On a Page template and implementation guide as discussed in this episode.
What is covered in this episode:
- How a business plan can help create a more profitable business with less stress
- Why the strength of the business plan is in the actual process of putting it together rather than the end document
- How often you should do your planning and why regularly reviewing is so critical
- The Ten Steps to putting in place a dynamic actionable business plan that grows with you and moves with the dynamic business environment in which we now operate.
Links mentioned in the show:
Download our Free Business Plan On a Page template and implementation guide
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Today on the show I talk through the process I use to set business goals. This year I am taking a different approach to planning by setting my goals over my Christmas Break, rather than in the New Year when back at work.
Click here to join the private Facebook Group and share how you are planning your business goals for next year.
What is covered in this episode:
- The first step is get yourself in the right environment when setting your goals
- What equipment to have on hand when doing your planning
- The benefits of mind mapping and how Jason uses Mindmeister for his planning
- Identifying the critical elements of your life that matter to you eg family, health, faith, travel, education
- The two step process for each critical element - what you are grateful for and what do you want to achieve in the following year.
- Why we don’t focus on what we haven’t achieved
- The questions to ask when creating SMART Goals - Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely
- Identifying what you need to stop doing and what obstacles why be in the way of achieving your SMART goals
- Setting quarterly milestones to measure process
- Sharing your goals and milestone with a business coach, accountability partner or mastermind group
- Example of a Mindmeister Planning Template
- Sharing your goals with the Business Made Easy Podcast group in the private Facebook Community
Today on the show talk we are joined by Ian Paget, founder of Logo Geek, a UK based graphic designer located in Manchester, who specialises in logo and brand identity design. He works with inspiring entrepreneurs and businesses looking to take their brand identity to the next level.
What is covered in this episode: * How he started a business from his passion for logo design and typology * Starting a business from a 90 000 followers on Twitter * How he used Buffer to grow his Twitter community by posting regular content twice a day * How to use Twitter to find your target audience * Why having a personal profile picture instead of a logo helps to boost your twitter engagement * Choosing where your target audience hangs out on social media to focus your marketing efforts * The value of hashtags on Twitter * Time management tools for managing your social media * The main purpose of your logo and the first impressions it can make * The importance of a Brand Statement * The dangers and costs to consider of a cheap or free logo when starting out * Colour, typefaces and other design features to consider when designing your logo * Why it doesn’t matter what you or your family think of your logo, it is important what your target audience thinks * Why you need to ask specific questions when getting feedback about design * Why quality matters in all your touch point * How being a podcast guest is helping Ian and Logo Geek with their SEO and backlink strategy
Today on the show talk we are joined by Greg Merrilees, founder of Studio 1, a web and design agency specialising in custom-made websites.
What is covered in this episode: * The business journey Greg went out from designing a T-Shirt to a fully fledged web and design agency * How to reach out to online influencers * The importance of offering value upfront * How a podcast and some high-end coaching helped Greg to grow his business * Why a written blog post is still an effective tool for Google * The first thing a new business should do before looking at their branding * The importance of an offer that converts * The importance of a consistent brand across all your platforms * The six stages of persuasion and how to apply that to your online presence * Why your copy needs to be about your customer, not you * The 5-second rule * Design or Copy - which comes first? * Why you shouldn’t put your best content on just social media * How to get on getting social proof when starting out and the power of your story * Why you should begin by starting a conversation with your customers when they are visiting your website * Mapping our your sale process * Why Greg recommends Shopify for e-commerce businesses and Wordpress for established service businesses * The ownership issues with self-hosted website platforms such as Wix * What to look for in a business coach
Today on the show talk about cashflow and why it can make or break your business.
What is covered in this episode: * Why cashflow is like petrol in your car * The problems that can be caused by not having a cashflow budget * Why you can show a profit but have no cashflow in your business * The importance of understanding your working cashflow cycle * Ways to improve your cashflow and working captial cycles * Why all types of business need to understand cashflow * The difference between a normal budget and a cashflow budget * Why the banks will ask for a cashflow budget when lending money
In today's episode, I answer Vanessa’s question of how often she should review the financial statements of her new small business.
What is covered in this episode: * A case study of a two examples of contrasting customer service from a local type shops and the impact it can * The importance of word of mouth * The danger of only reviewing your financial figures at tax time * A case study how the financial statements idenfity theft within the business from a new employee * Why it is important to prepare your financial statements at least monthly * How regular financial statements can help you be more strategic in your business * Key Performance indicators for your business * Why accounting software Xero is a great solution for your small business accounting needs * When to outsource your financial reporting * Why to avoid desktop accounting software and the benefits of cloud accounting programs
In this episode I am interviewing Jo Muirhead who is the Director and Principle Consultant of Purple Co, the Purpose for People Company, helping people return to work following injury, illness or trauma.
What is covered in this episode: * The role of Rehabilitation Counsellor's as allied health professionals * Jo's journey building her business from practically nothing to the success it is today * The story behind Purple Co * Finding purpose * The importance of purpose in our overall health (physical & mental) * The rise of chronic diseases * Why the Purple Co's business model is set up using sub-contractors * The importance of creating a community within the team * The advantages of outsourcing * Learning from mistakes throughout her career and her business journey * The importance of having someone to help keep perspective * Giving yourself permission to make mistakes and learn along the way * The lessons learnt from the journey * Having your marketing and sales strategy in place * Things that are working really well in her business
On today’s solo episode I talk about a common issue I see amongst business owners especially around this time of year is overwhelm.
What is covered in this episode: * What overwhelm can look like in your business and life * Ways to deal with overwhelm in your business * Why all business owners will be affected by overwhelm at some point in their business * A real life business case study of a tradie and how overwhelm affected his business, relationships and overall well being. * Why you need to make time to reduce overwhelm * The importance of keeping a clear head through exercise * How diet can affect overwhelm * The impact of sleeping cycles on your health * Getting rid of toxins by drinking the right amount of water throughout the day * How to use a mind mapping tool to get your to-dos out of your head * Planning out a day of your week to work on your business, not in it. * Creating capacity by stealing time * The importance of removing distractions and excess noise in your day * Outsourcing to help tasks that you as the business owner shouldn’t be working on * Systemising repetitive tasks * The need to try and not be so hard on yourself and why you need to celebrate the little wins * Why you need to surround yourself with supportive and positive people
Links mentioned in the show: Mindmeister
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Today on the show I am joined by Dr Shannon Irvine, productivity business achievement mentor and founder of not-for-profit Mosaic Vision.
She is the founder of Mosaic Vision, a non profit that serves AIDS orphans in rural Uganda Africa. The mission of Mosaic Vision is to restore the lives of AIDS orphans. Dr Irvine is also a Phd in Psychology with an emphasis in neuro-psychology and neuro-plasticity. She uses her credentials to help the orphans in Uganda thrive.
Dr Irvine is also a business mentor who loves helping others master their thoughts, habits, emotions, and schedules to live the life and business that honors God and their priorities.
In this episode:
- The business journey for Dr Irvine and the lessons learnt
- How she juggles being a successful business owner, charity founder and a mother
- Why cookie cutter systems may not always be the best fit for you
- Why getting an outside view of your business is important
- How to create the work and life balance that you want by understanding how your brain works
- Importance of seeking out the right mentors for your personal development
- Why you need to know how you are ‘wired’ and what are you superpowers
- How to measure your time spent in checking our emails and social media account
- Planning the night before for the three things to do the next day towards your big goal
- The steps to take to reducing the amount of time you spend checking your email
- Identifying that email is other people’s priorities, and not yours
- The physical impact on our brains of having notifications constantly interrupting our thinking
- Putting systems in place to protect yourself from yourself
- The impact her charity work in Mosaic Vision is making to AIDS orphans in Uganda
- Breaking down your to do list
- The impact of completing 3 x 15 min tasks can have on your brain and your feeling of success
Today I talk about a common problem that many customers face - exactly how can they increase their revenue to reach their lifestyle goals.
We follow along the journey that my clients Bill and Sharon went through when using the formula developed by Jay Abraham to grow their business.
What is covered in this episode: * The Upside Down Business Budget * How making small changes in key areas of your business can make all the difference * How to work out the key metrics to track * Why you need to measure and track the number of initial inquiries your business receives * Ideas to start upselling to your customers * The 5 key areas to grow your business + Increasing the number of leads/inquiries into your business + Converting more inquiries into sales + Increasing the average spend per customer + Increasing the number of times a customer purchases from you + Increasing your gross profit margin
Today I am joined by Ben Amos from Innovate Media and the Engage with Story podcast where we talk about importance of formulating a story when using video in your business marketing strategy.
What is covered in this episode: * How to craft an engaging story to connect with your customers through video * The importance of being strategic with video online and knowing how that affects your production budgets * Knowing the end goal when crafting and creating your videos * Common pitfalls business owners fall into when creating video messaging * Why placing your video on YouTube alone is not enough to get a return on investment * Cutting through the noise and clutter online by crafting a compelling video strategy * How overwhelm leads to lack of action by business owners when it comes to creating video content * Why content needs to be mapped out and aligned with your overall business strategy * Tips for starting out when using video in your business * Why focusing on the tactic or tool such as Facebook Live in the first instance instead of strategy can be wrong approach * Understanding who your audience is before starting to use video to promote your business * Why you need to know what you want your audience to do, feel or act before you start producing your content * The power of storytelling to move people to take action * The four pillars of a story structure a business can use: people, place, purpose and plot * Why the hero is not the business. Understand who you want to help. * How Ben is using video in his own business to create wins by producing video for specific social media platforms * The new video vertical format Facebook is recommending for their ads platform * Why video is a must for any marketing strategy
Today is a solo teaching episode where I introduce you to my Upside Down Business Budget.
What is covered in this episode:
- The surprising question that not many business owners know how to answer
- What is the Upside Down Business Budget and why it is so important to your business
- Why every business owner needs to know their sales and turnover targets
- Two business case studies that demonstrate the importance of doing the budget and examples of pitfalls and risks they faced without knowing their sales revenue targets
- The framework in completing the free Upside Down Business Budget worksheet:
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- How to work out to work out exactly what you need for the lifestyle you want - time to get detailed!
- Working out your Return on Investment (ROI)
- Operating costs
- Tax considerations
- What to do once you have you have completed the worksheet.
Today’s guest is a successful lifestyle business owner Gordon Kerr from Duffy Down Under who hires self drive electric boats on the Gold Coast.
What is covered in this episode:
- How Gordon and his wife identified a gap in the boating market on the Gold Coast
- The impact of having eco-friendly business
- Starting a tourism business in one of the worst national flooding disasters in Queensland’s history
- The unpredictability of business when starting out
- Getting yourself known when entering a new industry
- The marketing and website evolution Duffy Down Under has come through over the past 7 years
- The importance of referral and word of mouth for business growth
- How fast business is changing and why you need to be constantly keeping up with digital marketing trends
- How buyer behaviours on mobile technology is changing
- Making it easy for people to do business with you
- The importance of a web presence for a physical businesses
- Evolving your business offerings over time
- Creating a family and lifestyle business
- The importance of planning and knowing your numbers prior to starting your business.
- How to avoid your business becoming a ‘money pit’
- The two rules of business Gordon lives by
- Gordon’s priority Lead Time Management system
- Two technology shortcuts to make you more productive
- The importance of making changes quickly
Today is another solo episode where I discuss the importance of making it as easy as possible for you customers to do business with you.
I’m a strong believer you can never make it too easy for people to deal with you.
What is covered in this episode:
- Why it is important to make it easy as possible for customers to interact with you
- The one thing McDonalds does to make it easy for customers to order
- The trap of selling instead of focusing on how the customer feels when entering your store or purchasing from you
- Areas to identify when examining your customer experience
- Examples of poor customer service and how lasting impressions can make all the difference
- Why you should never penalise your customers for doing business with you
- Creating advocates instead of just customers
Today’s guest is Greg Cassar who helps small business and entrepreneurs with his digital marketing mastermind, The Collective.
What is covered in this episode:
- Why going to events is in important in growing your network and opportunities
- How Amazon is dominating as an e-commerce platform
- The power of the Fulfilment By Amazon program
- The impact Amazon will have on the Australian retail market when it launches
- The power of targeting in Facebook Ads
- Value first approach to social advertising
- How using video ads can help get more people to know like and trust you
- What is remarketing and how it can help to develop a longer relationship with your potential clients
- How knowledge and being smart with his time is helping Greg to grow his business
- The Pay-Yourself-First mindset for managing your time
- The importance of playing the long-term game.