The simple truths about business
Since this blog is about home office women, it will be nice to discuss about what kind of business or work does home office women do. Today, I would like to start with a little description of what I do full-time. Then in the next post, I will talk about what I do on a part-time basis.
Personally, I have the privilege of running a seminar business from home. How? You may wonder. Alex and myself began our seminar business in 2003 and that was after a big setback from a failed restaurant business that lasted for over 2 years.
An unexpected encounter with our first speaker, Ron Kaufman led us to our first project in the seminar business and we are thankful to God that we have found ourselves an established business since.
Just last week, we had confirmed to being host to Father of Guerrilla Marketing, Jay Levinson. Jay is a big name in marketing and we are more than excited to host him in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Even though we have completed many successful events in the last 4 years, every new project is still a leap of faith for us. It is mind boggling to draw in few hundred participants to each event as well as a big task to pack the function room. If you ask me how we did it, seriously, it wouldn’t be possible without God’s help and blessings. Other than placing ads in selected media channels, we work closely with professional partners to market the event. The toughest but probably most effective task is telemarketing.
When we first started cold calling, it was challenging. It took lots of courage and willingness on our part to pick up that phone. It wasn’t easy marketing or selling to someone you don’t know. We faced rejections, rude responses, skeptics…etc. But the nice thing is, it does get better and more natural with practice. Is it something we love doing? Honestly, no. That’s why we have a lot of respect for sales people in direct selling.
Looking back, we have built a list of loyal customers and our events have earned us good reputation over the years. We continue to value our customers by providing quality and content-rich events by engaging top speakers in their specialized fields.
Here are some simple truths we learn in business:
- Be sincere in your marketing and selling. Stay true to what you profess.
- When you make a mistake, apologize.
- Value your customers by listening and respecting them
- Always overdeliver
- Be flexible
- It costs more to acquire a new customer than to keep an existing one, so do your best to keep one
- Believe in the power of referrals
- When the going gets tough, don’t give up, keep pressing on
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I agree with the simple truths you listed to become successful at running a business. May I add several more truths?
Create your own vision of filling a need better than anyone else
Create your business to allow you to shine, by identifying the things you love to do and do them and the things you do not like doing and have others do them.
The most important person in the business is you the owner. As the owner you are the head, and the body is the business. As you shine so does the business.
With growth comes change, and the need to do what you love more and delegate out even more, to work on the business.
Go with your own instincts and remember if you like what you are doing and do it your way, so will your clients.
March 21st, 2007 at 8:11 pm