THANK YOU READERS! YOU DID IT!
You helped make Small Business Saturday a SMASH HIT for small business. USA TODAY reports that “Small Business Saturday is a big hit”!
They report that it went viral.
I LOVE that they had a great day and I am so happy that our online magazine, JenningsWire, along with our bloggers and readers helped share the message with their social communities.
So, small businesses, keep the ball rolling by stocking products that have market demand and run a few special promotions. Hey, if you can’t beat the big box stores, join ‘em but offer expanded services, especially offer the products: a great positive attitude, a smile, and a feeling of good will and good cheer.
Hey, there is no crime in wanting lower prices. I want them too.
But I also want life to be easier – I want less traffic, less hurry up and buy it and get home and get it done. I want to be able to slow it down a bit. You know, stop and smell the roses? Meander. Talk to people along the way. Look at the decorations. Stop for hot chocolate. Enjoy the small town experience.
I think this marketing campaign would work for small businesses. The marketing campaign I would create for this sector is called “SHOPPING LOCAL & LOVING IT!”
So what would this campaign look like? Reasonable pricing on items that you know will do well with the lifestyle of your customers alongside some specialty products that the big box stores don’t bother to offer but you think your customers will love. Of course, brush up all of the latest marketing strategies on ‘how to entice your customers to buy more’ (while not being in their face to buy more).
Please, and this is a big please, enjoy your job.
And make sure your employees enjoy their jobs as they are the face of your business to the customers. With all of the business pressures facing small businesses, it is not unreasonable to expect the owners to be less than happy. But the big, self-defeating, going of out of business problem comes in when the owner’s bad mood impacts the moods of the employees and the employees are mean to the customers (guaranteed to happen when the owner is not around to see it).
I know, we had a mean lady who owned a new coffee shop that the town really needed and really wanted to succeed. And she was mean. And everyone referred to her as “the mean lady coffee shop”. And then there was the mean toy lady . . . Sometimes when I think of shopping in that toy store, I don’t go there because of the mean lady. She never makes eye contact, the customers seem to be invisible to her and her staff is the exact same way. It’s like they look at you, but don’t see you and they never help you find anything.
Definitely mystery shop your store. You know all of the reasons why.
Annie Jennings is the creator of JenningsWire: The World Of Success online feature magazine.
