Who, and How Many are Your Suppliers?

In "What Porter Airlines chief learned pumping gas", Robert Deluce is quoted as saying "Never leave yourself with only one supplier; you must have choice and some tension to ensure value."

Now as soon as you read that you thought of stationery, computer accessories, and ground coffee, right?

Well, yes.

But as an entrepreneur, what do you value coming in more than stationery, computer accessories, and ground coffee?

That's right!

Cash!

Think of your clients as suppliers, your most important suppliers, for without your clients you don't get revenue, and without revenue you can't consider stationery, computer accessories, and ground coffee.

That's a fact.

Now Deluce said "Never leave yourself with only one supplier; you must have choice and some tension to ensure value", and if that is true of your suppliers, and if your clients are suppliers, then Deluce's statement translates into "Never leave yourself with only one client; you must have choice and some tension to ensure value", and how often have you heard that?

I am in touch with one entrepreneur who has one well-paying client, yet is unhappy with the relationship.

"So go get another client" I suggest, but Oh no, "better the devil you know".

Trouble is, once that client becomes unhappy with the relationship, my friend will be stranded high and dry.

As would you.

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How Often?

We all sat down and discussed "How often should I mail out my eLetter?".

Answers ranged from "It depends on your audience" through "26 times a year" to "3 times a year".

I think the best answer is to the question "How often?" will be found by following the path of thought that starts with "What is my goal?"

What is YOUR goal in issuing YOUR newsletter?

Write it down, write down the objectives (or sequence of steps you'll take to reach your goal), and you'll find the answer to your frequency question along the way.

Oh, sorry!

I forgot that you wrote all that down when you were planning your newsletter; just take it out an re-read it.

Again.

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Volunteers are Priceless

A recent tweet said " Volunteers are not paid; not because they are worthless, but because they are priceless." Hats off to those that share ...", but I disagree with volunteering in most cases.

Over my career I've found myself providing services for free to non-profit organizations who save a bundle through my suggestions, but run an office with a staff of ten, salaries, benefits and electricity bills.

A non-profit is not a non-revenue, and I fail to see why I should not take part in the revenue stream.

I quit all this 15 years ago when a non-profit asked me to drive 10 km north to stand by while they did their first mail-merge. Why stand-by? In case it didn't work and they used a few sheets of paper unwisely.

For a few sheets of paper I was to schedule 3 hours of my time, drive 10 km each way, ...

No. My time is worth more than that.

I am NOT priceless; I am worthy of my hire of any organization in the business world that has a revenue stream.

Especially if their revenue stream is greater than my revenue stream.

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Observations

"I didn't apply measurement to our marketing efforts in any sort of disciplined way,"

I learned this a couple of weeks ago when I was assembling a series of web-pages urging people to experiment and measure their efforts at vermicomposting.

Suddenly realized that "experiment" means white lab-coats and Bunsen-burners to most folks in the domestic market. And who wants to invest in a set of gram-scales, count worms by hand etc?

"I just want to have the worms eat my food scraps".

The Answer?

Abandon the words "experiment" and "measure" and use the one word "observations".

Anyone can observe; I mean, that's just using my eyes, right?

And it's not a problem to write down, in my own words, what I have observed ...

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Time Blocking

There’s an excellent little article on Time Blocking here, and I recommend you read it. Takes about 60 seconds.

There’s an excellent little time program here, and I recommend you download it.

Then start cheering as your backlog disappears!

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Thank You for Contacting

Thank you for contacting me at IHaveAWebSite. I will get back to you as soon as I can. Many thanks; I’m Me.

I don’t know about you, but I get a tad cheesed off when I am hooked up with an email address which uses an auto-responder to let me know “your call is important to us”.

I think it’s the height of insolence to use a robot to respond to my hand-crafted enquiry.

I think it’s ABOVE the height of insolence to use a robot to respond to my subsequent hand-crafted responses.

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What's Different this Christmas?

I can be a bit slow on the uptake sometimes.

It's just dawned on me that out of about 200 Christmas cards mailed out so far in the past month, not one has been returned.

Of course, now that I've typed THAT, there'll be a flood next week!

What's different between this year and past years?

(1) I have spent more time this year "touching" my contacts, either by phone, by email, or by letter; and issuing letters is one way to check on mobility of the addressee.

(2) My contacts are higher-echelon, the C-crowd, and CEOs, presidents and the like move around less than do middle-level managers and clerks.

There are probably more reasons, but it is comforting to know that this year my mailings are reaching their targets.

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The Proposal

My client’s client is having problems; I have a solution.

I submit a proposal for 10 hours work, and a few days later word comes back that “they like your proposal but think it should be only seven hours”.

My immediate reaction is to hit back, so I go to bed with a book, instead.

In the morning things seem much clearer.

I have 13 points now against the rejection, many of them knee-in-the-groin arguments, which never help in business relationships.

But I’m very proud of the first three, so I share them with you:-

• Client doesn’t know how to do it; that’s why they approached me. How can they know what work is involved?
• If Client doesn’t know what work is involved, how can they know how long it will take to do the work?
• If Client doesn’t know how long it will take to do the work, why do they think it can be done in 30% less time than I think?

My business, you see, is the application of logic to business problems, and this is just another business problem (mine this time) that can be resolved by the application of logic.

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Shift Desk Sideways

My second 10-foot length of plywood, a.k.a. "The Other Desk", shows no surface area. It has become a storage depot for stuff.

Office Rule:

• Tables and desks are for working on or at, not for storage.

So starting this morning I’m going to be shifting stuff leftwards towards the other end.

Some item has to be taken OFF the desk and stored where it ought to be stored; even if that dumpster gets emptied twice a week.

The space it leaves will be occupied by something else, and the right-hand side of my desk will become clear.

By the end of the week, or even by the end of the hour, the desk should be a beautifully long and wide working area.

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Paying Double At the Door

“We have an event tomorrow, and 26 people have registered online but only handful have paid $10 online. When these unpaid who turn up at the door, will be charged $20. Can some one explain to me, why are they prepared to pay double at the door, while they can get away paying only $10.’

It's Simple.

I may get a better offer elsewhere before your event.

• When registration (online) is free, people will register.
• When it comes to parting with money, we all think twice.

And hedge our bets!

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You’re Right!

Don’t you just love hearing that?

Don’t you just love it when the other person puts you on a pedestal with those two words?

I know that those two words make me feel just GREAT!

So why aren’t I using them more often to make people warm to me?

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But What Really Blew Me Away

Another great little post from Seth Godin.

I’m tempted to reproduce it in full here, it’s so concise, but go read it for yourself.

I plan to spend more time examining what makes ME feel good at places where I do business!

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Business Tweeting

Almost a year ago I documented my Introduction to the World of Tweeting, and am gradually getting a grip, as we say in the trade.

One of the subtleties is recognizing that my target audience tends to be online during business hours, and tends not to be so attentive outside those hours.

So I’ve tried to tweet about important topics – new services, new products, strong blog postings of mine and so on - during business hours, and outside of business hours I schedule those tweets to appear early in the next business day.

In the early hours of this morning I realized that I can still keep my name in front of people by using this slack time-of-day to retweet other users tweets, thereby getting myself into their good books (“Thanks for ReTweeting me!”), without cluttering up the twitter space during business hours.

Like I said, subtle but, I believe, significant.

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Staying Ahead of the Avalanche - 2

I’m almost up to scratch!

This morning there were 19 stale addresses, and I have been churning out 15 per day, so that means I’ll probably get completely up to date tomorrow.

Or so I Thought

Part of my procedure is to research each contact on CNW before printing a letter; that way I get to add a personal touch to each letter.

But today, CNW is not slow; it is unresponsive.

My rate has dropped from one letter each 5 minutes to 30+ minutes per letter.

Not a Good Use of My Time

So at 2pm, with 9 outstanding envelopes, I’m calling it quits for the day.

Finishing on Friday instead of Thursday is not a big deal.

Better I do something useful than sit staring at the monitor screen, drumming my fingers ...

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Christmas Is Coming! - 2

In Christmas Is Coming! I outlined my plans for printing Christmas Cards.

I want to keep the essays flowing, and have been pondering who gets a card.

I figure to keep on my regular schedule of printing an essay-sheet (or “flyer” if you will), and mailing it off in a regular envelope to any contact who has not yet received two flyers.

Anyone with 3 or more flyers mailed, or people I’ve met face-to-face, get a card.

The rest, I fell, might see it as just too presumptuous of me if they received a card?

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5-Step Method to Cut Down Your Paper Usage

Unload the paper from the feed-bin or paper-tray in your printer.

Place the paper in a tray or shallow cardboard box at least 5 steps away from your printer.

From now on, to print a document, grab a sheet of paper and stand there using the manual feed of your printer.

I guarantee you’ll use significantly less paper.

And get more exercise.

P.S. You can save even more paper by downloading the free utility application ZoomP .

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Sleuthing that Mailing Address

Frustrated with the “Contact Us” page that has you fill out a form, with no bricks-and-mortar address?

So was I until I hit on the idea of clicking on the “Legal” button!

I think that they HAVE to post a mailing address; it’s the law!

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Running out of Picture Postage Stamps

Well, this is a mini-catastrophe.

I have just hand-signed about 50 letters to be mailed out, and ten of them have timely notes such as “Congratulations on your new appointment”.

But I’ve run out of my customized Picture Postage stamps.

Uh-Oh!

Those letters won’t go out until the next order comes in.

The less-timely letters can wait a week, I guess, but how I wish I had set aside ten stamps as an emergency-reserve for timely mailings!

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Coming Clean

About once a week we see an article such as this one in The Toronto Star.

A high-profile player resigns after being caught out.

It is never what they did and got caught at that does it.

It is always the denial that they did it.

• You seduced the president’s wife and denied it?

You don’t jump because you seduced; you jump because you were found out to have lied about whether you did or didn’t seduce.

• You falsified the company’s books and denied it?

You don’t jump because you falsified; you jump because you were found out to have lied about whether you did or didn’t falsify.

• You stole the cookie and denied it?

You don’t jump because you stole; you jump because you were found out to have lied about whether you did or didn’t steal.

Cliché alert: Honesty is the best policy.

If you did wrong, ‘fess up and keep your job/position/contract.

For one thing you’ll appear to be human, and humans love humans!

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Christmas Is Coming!

It is more than two months away, I know, but since my “touch” mailings go out every two months, it might be time to start thinking about Christmas messages.

I still have a carton of cards, snowy-scene, of the local church. That makes for a Christian-themed seasonal tasteful local effort.

I still have several cartons of DUCA cards .

This coming weekend I might gear myself to being able to print the flyer, and as well spit out a personalized card with its envelope. I’ve received compliments on my personalized cards before. It strikes a chord of automation in some minds. (“What a clever guy you are ...”)

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