Tuesday 30 August 2011

Why MacDonalds Is NOT The Place To Meet For Business!!

MacDonalds has managed to market itself fantastically well to the consumer on all levels and you have to take your hat off to them.

When they announced the "Cloud WiFi" had been installed I thought wow they are now looking to get businesses involved and build up a loyalty from them too. I can't deny it I was impressed and thought they were a forward thinking company.

Until NOW due to their issues with car parking they have instructed "MET Parking Services Ltd" to discourage their customers by enforcing very unfair parking fines.

I have recently discovered that they have a strict rule on car parking which means that unless you can all turn up at exactly the same time and get parked and leave within a 60 / 75 / 90 min restriction then there is no point trying to meet there. It may be that this is their goal and driving the business man away from their eateries even late at night is what they want to do.

A £4.39 meal can very quickly turn into a £104.39 meal if you don't keep an eye on the time, I know it's fast food but then why have WiFi in the first place?

See this clip from Watchdog in 2010 where members of the public have been heavily peanalised for using the restaurant more than once in a short period too.

http://bbc.in/oneUKg

They have gained a parking fine of cash from this "PAST" customer and lost a lifetime of future sales. Not such good marketing in the end then because they stopped valuing their customers and focussed on dealing with a small issue by force not power.... What your customers say about your business is far more powerful than anything you can say whether that be positive or NEGATIVE!

Saturday 27 August 2011

WH Smith customers lose out to small print with McDonald's special offers



Here is a classic example of how large companies use psychology of the British shopper to get more sales.
McDonald's will have researched what % of WH Smith customers also buy from them. Then in an attempt to increase sales they have an exclusive offer for their customers. Which is where the vouchers being handed out all over the country come into play.
On the face of it this looks great until you go to redeem your offer.
On the small print you can see " not valid at restaurants with a drive through "
How many  McDonald's do you know that "DONT" have a drive through?
If you went to use an offer but found out at the counter you couldn't would you go or pay the full price?
Answer these questions and you will see how making you feel awkward will get them more sales.
On the plus side for those who read the offer correctly sales in the towns and cities high streets should increase and the consumer will be happy too.
The offers are good value and legitimate the term of the exclusion is where the issues lie.

Have a great weekend :-)


Thursday 16 June 2011

This Is Lyoness The Greatest Shopping Community now In The UK

Check this video out and if you have any questions then ask me! This is going to be massive in the UK and across the World too. Intelligent shopping using all the right things for people, business and good causes.

With Lyoness you get Cash Back with every purchase save money and join the shopping community of the future.


Videos Posted by Lyoness UK: This is Lyoness [HD] (2):


Looking forward to hearing from you soon.P.S. Remember you have a choice how you feel about things in life don't let others or the inner voice of doubt stop you from being who you really are!Enjoy life and have a great day...

Tuesday 14 June 2011

Community Marketing and what it really means to you

Well this is where marketing has been heading for some time.
There have been so many clever people showing how you can make people believe you are this or are that.
The old addage of people buy people is so much truer today than it has ever been. Your community buy from you first and foremost or rather it's what you stand for that they buy.
If you are looking for a one off sale then traditional advertising and marketing can work for you buy even then people research.
When was the last time you bought something new without checking it out on the internet or with a friend or member of the family?
Facebook and Twitter have formed their own communities and this kind of thing is going on all the time. So if you are not in touch you have no way of making sure your voice is heard.
From a business point of view interaction and communication have become the keys to success and these are major parts of community marketing. Positioning yourself as the expert in your field AND someone you can trust to do the best by their customers.
This isn't about being clever or trickery it's about being true to you, your business and your community whether it be a local community or an online community.
For help and advice on how to do this for your business get in touch I really am here to help : )

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Thursday 9 June 2011

ONE ENCHANTED EVENING WITH DAVID KENT A LEICESTER EXTRAVGANZA

ONE ENCHANTED EVENING
Great Meeting Unitarian Chapel, Leicester
Friday 24th June 2011

Lovers of musical theatre should not miss David Kent’s concert, One Enchanted Evening, at Leicester’s Great Meeting Unitarian Chapel on Friday 24th June, to raise money for the Chapel’s Grand Piano Fund. Accompanied by David Hubery at the piano, David Kent will be performing a selection of songs including favourite show tunes from Les Misérables, My Fair Lady, Joseph and South Pacific, as well as hits by Tom Lehrer, Bette Midler and ABBA. Tickets cost £7, which will include wine and nibbles in the Garden Room.

A graduate of The London School of Musical Theatre, David Kent is an accomplished performer who has starred in many West End and off-West End shows, including ‘Songs For A New World’ and ‘Creatures Of The Night’. He has released several acclaimed CD’s, including ‘As I Am’ and ‘One Enchanted Evening’, and is a pantomime veteran! He will be taking his own show, Uglies Do Edinburgh – the further adventures of the Ugly Sisters after Cinderella has married her handsome prince – written with co-star Dereck Walker, to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe this August.

Originally constructed in 1708, Leicester’s Unitarian Chapel is the city’s oldest brick building, facing the Highcross shopping centre, which is one of the newest. The Grand Piano Appeal aims to raise £900 to purchase a metal floor frame on wheels to strengthen the chapel’s existing grand piano and enable it to be moved more easily and safely.

So don’t miss out on an evening that will not only be thoroughly entertaining, but will also be raising money for a great cause!

Listings info:

Friday 24th June
One Enchanted Evening, starring David Kent
Great Meeting Unitarian Chapel
45 East Bond Street
Leicester
LE1 4SX
Tickets: £7, available on door
Advance booking: please call 01509 812236 or visit www.davidkentevents.yolasite.com
Doors open: 7.00pm  Showtime: 7.30pm

Tuesday 7 June 2011

Realtime Is The Marketing Of Today And It's Driven By Customer Opinion

Remember the days when you could put together your brand and marketing plans to tell people why they should buy from you?
Good old days weren't they?
But then your clients got smarter and wiser they no longer rely on you to tell them what to buy and when to buy. They now all research products, companies and service reports before they consider parting with their hard earned cash.
There are many businesses out there who are unaware of the new realtime movement in their customer bases I hope you are not one of them.
We all want reassuring that we are making the right choice in everything we do right?
Well so do your customers that's why they will look to see what your other customers are saying and they want it "Now" not in three days they want to know what your latest customer thought of your service "Today!"

With the internet there is so much information available for people to make informed choices from reviews on sites such as "Trip Advisor" "Amazon" "Ebay" "Thbestof" "Trusted Reviews" and many many more.

This is so important that you must not miss this:

"Your Brand is not owned by YOU it belongs to Your CUSTOMERS and what they say about you will either build or destroy YOUR BRAND in the market place"

This might seem a bit harsh to you but think about it sensibly, how they feel about your service and products is a direct reflection of how your business is performing. It's the mirror image of what you have created and is therefore information you MUST make sure you know.

Customer interaction will ensure you know your business and can continuously improve your business to match your customers needs desires and wants. Set up a system of customer feed back and don't be afraid of negative comments as they may be solutions to your biggest growth and opportunity.

With the positive comments make sure you get them out into the market place and attribute them to whoever made them. Include testimonials in your web content, flyers, brochures, newspaper adverts, radio adverts and remember to put them up in your place of work for everyone to see. It's amazing how a good testimonial about a member of staff can boost their moral and self belief and their work rate and customer service....

That's enough from me for now so go away and put your system in place and measure the change in your business.

Enjoy Great Things... you deserve to

A Great Testimonial From One Of Our Early Clients

David Balcon

David hired us as a Business Consultants in 2006

Top qualities: Personable, Good Value, High Integrity

“I have involved John in a number of projects for us over the past few years, and have always found him 
to be unfailingly helpful, with high integrity, and a strong desire to deliver the best value and results he can for his clients. His willingness to go the extra mile for people is just a normal part of his work ethic, and as a result it is always a pleasure to do business with him.”


Thanks David looking forward to hearing from you soon.

P.S. Remember you have a choice how you feel about things in life don't let others or the inner voice of doubt stop you from being who you really are!

Enjoy life and have a great day...

Wednesday 18 May 2011

What great news for the people and businesses of Leicester. The city is on the official tour route of the 2012 Olympic Torch Relay.

This really is great news as the people of Leicester have had little apart from the Leicester Tigers to shout about.
The city has a very diverse number of cultures all working and living alongside each other. This is great to a point but has tended to lead to a lack of combined focussed direction. To speak with many in the street they feel they are often second best, but nothing could be further from the truth.
At last there is a common cause that crosses all cultural divides that we can all get behind. The Olympic Torch Relay is a massive honour for the City of Leicester and I'm sure the celebration and greeting will be amazing for all to see.
The people and businesses of Leicester have an amazing ability to adapt to change very quickly while still delivering the service levels that people else where would love to experience.
With our very own Team GB being based very near by in Loughborough will add to the atmosphere. Roll on 2nd July 2012 when the Olympic Torch is paraded through the streets of Leicester and Abbey Park.

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Test your nerve on the high rope assault course at Leicester outdoor pursuits centre in Birstal

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Saturday 14 May 2011

One of the cleverest packaging solutions I've seen for a long time!

This Mia be one of the smartest packaging solutions I've seen for a long time. These are crackers that are best with certain types of wine. The packaging not only informs you how best to serve them to your guests but the label visually tells you the type of wine to use. The clear celethane window in the shape of a bottle is also a familiar way for you to see how much is left in the packet or bottle depending how your brain deciphers information.
This is a brilliant solution to make this product stand out from it's competitors.
P.S. You can buy these in The Deli in Kibworth Leicestershire they do a great latte coffee too :-)
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Sunday 8 May 2011

For The Businesses Who Are Not Sure If They Should Be Using Social Media As Part Of Their Business And Marketing Strategy

Well I just thought some simple statistics could make a little difference to your opinion of social media lets have a look:
Facebook has over 500,000,000 registered accounts with over 600,000,000 monthly searches that's over 2300 every second.

Twitter the new kid on the block only has 100,000,000 registered accounts but have a massively higher number of searches at around 18,000,000,000 to put that in context that's nearly 70,000 per second every second.

Just for the fact that people are searching for the services you offer or at least are interested in them should be enough for you to think and re-think about the value of social media. But the real value is not in the searches it's in the contact and relationship building you can do with clients and prospective clients.

There you have it a very short Blog but hopefully a though provoking one.....

Thursday 5 May 2011

Chewies a fantastic food and coffee shop in Steeles Village in London

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Thursday 21 April 2011

How to get your boat to come in!

Many business owners talk about the day they are going to make it. They will be a successful business person it will all be worth while when their boat comes in!
It will come as no shock to you that they have been saying this for years. what they have done is hand their future over to chance.
there are 3 types of prole in this world:
1 those who don't know what they want to happen
2 those how wait and wish for things to happen
3 those that make things happen
Which one are you at the moment? A good friend of mine puts it even simpler. You are either a waiter or a creator!
So to get back to the initial question of how do you get your boat to come in?
Focussed and sustained effort towards that goal. Positive thinking is nice but means very little withoir positive action.
So get your dreams out in the open focus on them and act towards achieving them.
Speak soon :-)

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Thursday 14 April 2011

Today's Marketing tip: Personalise your marketing to massively increase you response.

When you are putting together any marketing material bring some of your personality through. You can include images, hand written representations and even a snippet or two of your life story.
Remember it's you your customers buy at the end of the day so make it easy for them to say yes. All you marketing is about a communication between you and your customers the better the communication the more sales you will get.
Have a great evening!
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Wednesday 13 April 2011

Today's Marketing tip: Time Management doesn't have to take forever! 3 easy ways to manage your time better!

I thought it best to not send this too early in the day.
When you are putting together your marketing there is always a temptation to want it to be perfect before you send it. There are several takes on this:
1. Remember good in some, no most cases is good enough, it is more important to send out your marketing than it is for it to be perfect. You can always refine it as you go " test and measure". A nice phrase I heard explains it "ready, fire then aim".
2. Set yourself a deadline! This will stop too much procrastination and make you get on with it.
3. Make it easy to track if you over complicate this part of it you will have no time left to create new stuff.
There you go simple but true ways to save time on your marketing.
The most obvious one outside of this is to get someone else to do it for you. Have a great evening another tip tomorrow

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Tuesday 12 April 2011

Tuesday's Marketing tip: 90% of Businesses fail in first 5 years. How knowing your numbers will mean you are not one of them!

This is always a sensitive subject for small business owners to talk about. Many feel that such questions are about them and can feel challenged by this concept. As much as a PMA is important for a business the numbers will tell the owner if it's working or not.
So what are these mysterious numbers?
1. What is your average customer worth on a yearly basis?
2. How many customers do you have?
3. What is your average sale?
4. How often do your current customers but from you?
5. How many years do your customers stay with you?
6. How much do you invest in gaining new customers?
7. How many does this get you?
8. How many of your customers have referred a new customer to you?
9. How much do you invest in the incentive for referred customers?
When you look at the answers to these question and get your numbers it will be obvious where the changes need to be made. For example if you need to invest more than the value of a customer in your marketing to get a new customer it might be time to look at the way you are doing that. You will also see if you have a viable business before you run into too much trouble.
It's amazing how many people are not pro active in getting referred new customers. They just rely on passive word of mouth.

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Monday 11 April 2011

Monday Marketing Tip: Mastering your marketing!

Well hope you had a great weekend and here is Monday's marketing tip.
Mastering your marketing may seem a long way off especially if you are struggling to measure it all. The phrase "less is more" should be at the top of you list.
Marketing is not about doing hundreds of things a few times to see if they work it's about selecting 6 or 7 things that you know or feel are working and doing them hundreds or even thousands of times. Measuring your marketing is key and it is easier to measure a few things done well than it is to juggle loads of things done poorly.
This will take determination and discipline but once you master a few areas of marketing it is easier to introduce new ideas and measure them too.
Have a great week and look out for me in and around Leicester.
I am giving some of my Social Media tips to the Leicester city centre retailers on Wednesday night! It will be great fun and giving is always so rewarding especially in the long run :-)

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Friday 8 April 2011

Marketing tip for the weekend! How to get a brochure that closes a sale without you being there!

Well the sun is shining and everyone is feeling much better. The retail and housing markets are starting to move.
It's time if you are B2B to make sure you have a brochure for the prospect to "think it over" or "can you send me something in the post?"
Both these are just a reason for you to send some of your hard earned profit to go in their recycling pile.
However there is a way to capture a few of these time wasters and get them interested in you and your business.
Make your brochure a valuable information pack about their industry sector and how using a product like yours improves their business or saves them from a pitfall. But don't give them all the information leave the actual way and total value to them for you to go out and explain personally.
Curiosity on how they can do better or protect themselves from doing worse is a powerfull thing so use it! :-)
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Thursday 7 April 2011

Leaflets and 5 simple ways to get the best results from them

Leaflets just one way to promote your business yet most of the time they cost you more than they return.
Have you ever wondered why?
Do you plan to fail?
Sounds a strange thing to say in this modern day of positive thinking but look at it this way. If you plan to fail 95% of the time knowing that you will still make a profit it's better than needing to succeed 50% of the time to break even.
If you know you only need a small response from your flyers to make a profit it's easier to see the point of sending them out.
Let's look at 5 ways to make leaflets work for you.
1. Make sure they are of value to the prospects you are sending them to. Write them as if they were coming through your door.
2. Have a trackable offer that is unique to the leaflets so you don't have to ask where people found you as you will already know.
3. Keep to one message sell one specific part of your business or have one call to action "to claim your offer phone us now!" or "pop into our showroom to claim you special offer" don't mix the message by trying to sell all of your business on one flyer.
4. Give them some credible information from a valid source that also reinforces why they should buy your product " One of the main reasons 95% of businesses fail in their first 5 years is poor and inconsistent marketing" The Marketing Group.
5. Make sure they are not a one off. It is much more effective to send 1000 flyers to the same targeted prospects 10 times than it is to send out 10000 flyers out just once.
Follow these 5 marketing rules and you will more than quadruple the response from a campaign that doesn't.
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Thursday 24 February 2011

Wednesday 23 February 2011

Leicester County Council Budget Where Would You Make The Cuts?

The Leicester county council will be announcing their toughest budget cuts for years. Based on the following information where would you make the cuts?
Total Budget £688M of which £350M is finding for schooling leaving £338M to work with.
£59M is spent on children and young people. This pays for school improvement services, youth services and 300 children in care.
£51M is spent on Highways and transport maintaining 4000km of roads 3000km of paths 61000 street lights and subsidise 82 bus routes.
£29M on recycling and waste management handling 320000 tonnes of household waste per year.
£125M adult services such as social care supporting 12300 older people, also those with disabilities and mental health issues. Residential care, homecare, meals, equipment and adaptations, day service and supported living.
£11M on Libraries and Museums.
We decided to cut £5M from Highways : £7M from Recycling as should be making money: £5M from adult services through organisational change: £3M from Libraries.
This will save £20M per year but we have no idea how structure of each sector is set up. The top wage earners are CEO on £193K with a top tier wage bill of £3.9M.
My big question must be what was the unaccounted for £59M spent on? A rather large sum to go under the heading of Miscellaneous don't you think?
So over to you now what would you have done?
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At BBC Radio Leicester to Talk about budget cuts for Leicestershire

Fly High And Enjoy Life
John Hill

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Latest Summary Of Business Conditions In The UK From The Bank Of England

Below is a link to the Bank of England's monthly summary of business conditions in the United Kingdom, as reported by the Bank's Agents.
http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/agentssummary/agsum11feb.pdf.
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Sunday 20 February 2011

Julie my superhero friend is running a special coaching day at The Worlds End at Ecton Northants on 26th March

Julie is a fantastic inspiration to everyone she meets and will be out to change peoples lives by showing them they are not who they think they are.
She will explain that we are living our lives through a false script and how to recognise when it is ruling your life. To find out more ring 07876550764
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Wednesday 9 February 2011

St Martins Cathedral In Leicester Add Conference Facilities At St Martins House

St Martins Cathedral have recently refurbished the old Grammar school to a superb standard. They now have conference facilities in what is called St Martins House and to top it all they have joined with Hotel Maiyango to do the catering. This gives city centre location with car parking making it very desirable for many local businesses. This is the start of the revitalisation of Leicester as THE business Centre for Midlands Businesses.
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