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Hiding email addresses leaves a sour taste

Published 24 May, 2013 | By Tash Hughes

Do you think email addresses should be hidden or open to your clients or members?

email symbol shwoing call us, write to us, but don't email us!

A business making it hard for customers to email them just doesn’t make much business sense to me. Yet that’s exactly what one organisation is doing to their members…

Today, I received an email from an organisation I’m a member of. {Disclaimer – I am only a member there because I haven’t made the time to move elsewhere – that time is now a high priority.}

Replying to emails

I did not like today’s email – I mean it was laid out ok and was polite and appropriate as far as the wording went, but I am not happy with the content. Largely because it showed that organisation is using member money to fund something completely unrelated, public and providing no obvious benefit to members.

I hit reply to tell them what I think. I doubt my voice will make a huge difference but I would feel better to be honest about it.

However, the email comes from a no-reply address.

Instead, I went to their website to grab their email address to use instead, but they only have an online form. So I even went as far as checking some letters they’ve sent me in the past – also the contact form URL instead of an email address.

So I can’t reply to the email.

And I am left feeling they are hiding from members. Feeling they are hiding from complaints. Feeling a bit uncomfortable and like I’ve touched something dirty with the way they are keeping contact details secret.

Selective email address use

Spam is awful – I hate it. So like many others I avoid putting my email address online in a way that spam bots can find it.

Yet that doesn’t mean my email address is hidden completely.

It is on my business cards, letterhead and certainly is the ‘reply to’ address for my html newsletter.

Other organisations put their email address on their site as a graphic – bots being unable to read graphics (well, so far anyway!) – or in words (eg write AT wordconstructionsDOTcomDOTau is an acceptable way for me to share my email address online.)

And it’s not like I’m talking about a small organisation that can’t cope with emails – a sole trader or other SMB may need to manage contact options, but a big business has more staff and even dedicated staff for customer service.

Is limited promotion the same as hiding?

What do you think?

Are they protecting themselves from spam or from complaints? Are they hiding their email address, even from members, or is it a reasonable business decision?

And I’d love to hear what you have done to promote or hide your email address, too.

Posted in Business Communications, business info & tools | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Finding the obvious may lead to jobs…

Published 21 May, 2013 | By Tash Hughes

What opportunities are you missing by taking things for granted?

I am not an expert in Microsoft Excel but I can use it competently and am aware of its capabilities even when I don’t use some features.

A graph produced in excel showing members vs unique visitors

This simple graph was produced from a table of data in excel for one of my clients. For me, it was an obvious way to produce a graph; for my client, it was a major challenge to know how to produce it at all.

And it hadn’t occurred to me that someone who uses Excel for various tasks wouldn’t know that you can easily create graphs from the data entered into Excel. It’s just obvious to me so I took it for granted that it was obvious to others.

Yet, that isn’t the case.

Graphs in Excel – not so obvious to everyone

A couple of weeks ago I did a presentation which included a simple graph on one slide. Afterwards, I was talking with a client and he mentioned wanting some graphs for a report he was working on.

 Long story short, he didn’t know excel would do that for him.

I set up that simple graph for him and now am managing a larger excel-based project for him. I say managing because it is a more complex graph so I have outsourced it to someone I know who is an Excel expert!

Missed opportunities

It has me thinking though. How many more graphs could my client have used, in reports or presentations or for his own use, if I had told him about excel graphs sooner?

How many clients could I have referred to my excel expert?

When we know something, it’s hard to remember that many others don’t know it or at least know it as well as well as we do.

Are there some obvious tasks or skills you aren’t seeing for your business?

I wonder what great opportunities you could find by spotting those obvious tasks and skills…

Posted in business info & tools | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

One coin, two sides; One budget, two perspectives

Published 17 May, 2013 | By Tash Hughes

There are always two sides to a coin, two side to a story and two perspectives to view things by.

sides of a coin, balancing attention vs avoidning costs

Which perspective do you chose? Or does it depend on the sides of a coin?

On Tuesday, the Federal Budget was announced.

I’ve read quite a few summaries of the Budget so I can write updates for clients. Some are better than others, of course.

Perspectives of the Federal Budget

However, my point relates to how small business is impacted by this Budget. Noting that small business got very little direct mention by the Government in this budget.

A number of business groups have released their view that Government ignored this significant sector of our economy. As advocates of this diverse group, they are annoyed because small business don’t appear to have been included.

Yet another business group or two has put out the view that small business was lucky to have avoided the attention big business got in the Budget. I for one am glad we don’t have to report PAYG each month, for instance.

Both views are based on the  same fact (little mention of small business) but are looking at it in different ways. I found that very interesting.

Posted in Business Communications, business info & tools | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Annual report tasks can be outsourced for many benefits

Published 15 May, 2013 | By Tash Hughes

While there are a few tasks you can outsource when preparing an annual report, one I love is checking edits.

Page of text marked with edits

Early drafts may contain a lot of edits!

That is, when the designer returns a draft to me, someone else goes through and checks the designer has implemented all the changes I requested.

Why check everything? Well, I trust the designers I use, no question about that. However, they are human so may have missed something or misunderstood what I wanted. Or they could have made a simple error (eg made $654 into $664 instead of $646).

Benefits of outsourcing edit checks

Having someone else check those details has two major advantages in my eyes:

  1. I don’t have to do it! Ok that is really a third reason as my original point was that it saves me time to not have to do it, but it’s not something I enjoy either
  2. by not reviewing those small details as often, I am better positioned to actually read the report and thus spot issues with the flow or tone of information. If you see the same words and images over and over, it gets much harder to see errors – like putting space between writing and proof reading

I guess you don’t need to find a highly skilled person to outsource checking edits, either – as long as they are detailed orientated, it isn’t a hard task. I am lucky to have found someone I trust for many tasks as he not only checks edits have been made but will suggest other potential improvements he notices, too.

Outsourcing frees up time

To me, this is the perfect example of outsourcing and leaving me more time to use my writing skills.

What is the perfect task for you to outsource?

Do you outsource that task?

Posted in Business Communications | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Are you communicating your business direction?

Published 10 May, 2013 | By Tash Hughes

A few days ago I posted about the employee engagement survey conducted by AIM. And how poor many rank communications within their workplace.

One tool to improve employee engagement is to clearly communicate your mission and value to your employees – this same survey showed that is significant. Presumably because people can feel where the business is heading and thus find ways to contribute to that direction.

why are we here? What are our goals? Team questions to develop a mission

A mission and vlaues statement is about answering basic questions on the business direction and aspirations.

Value of a mission and vision

64% of the AIM respondents said their organisation gets a positive return from having a mission and value statement.

I admit that I am one of those who think a mission and values can be a waste of time. But apparently they can be done well enough to inspire many employees.

I like the fact that, of those aware of their employer’s mission, 64% believe those values are reflected in their operations. Part of my cynicism is that a mission is just words on a page unless taken seriously – it appears many businesses are taking them seriously.

The survey summary states that employees being aware of a business’s missions and values…

  • more than doubles the belief in management cultivating a good organisational culture
  • increases employee loyalty (by a factor of 1.5)
  • makes it less likely they will change employers
  • makes it more likely to care about the future of the business

Use of a vision and mission statement

Further break down of the survey results shows that micro-businesses (ie have 20 or fewer employees) are less likely to have given employees a clear mission or values.

Of course, micro-businesses may have closer relationships within the business (the owner of CEO is more likely to be involved with all staff if there are only a dozen or so of them!) so a written statement may seem less necessary.

However, it if has benefits and makes it clear for new employees, and reminds existing employees, maybe a written statement is worthwhile for micro-businesses, too.

Does your business have a written mission and values statement? If so, how public is it – who knows about it?

Posted in business info & tools | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Are you communicating well within your business?

Published 7 May, 2013 | By Tash Hughes

Maybe you are, but a recent survey from the Australian Institute of Management (AIM) has shown that only 39% of respondents classed two-way communication between management levels as ‘effective’ or ‘very effective’.

Of course, that means 61% consider it moderately effective or worse. That’s a big number.

Note for micro-businesses (with 20 or fewer staff) 59% rated it effective or very effective while 50% gave that rating if staff levels between 21 and 50 applied. Staff rate this effectiveness less as the business size grows, which makes a certain amount of sense.

Communication message across a bridge over a busg creek

Communicating effectively is the only way to get your idas across to others – and to get them to help you implement your ideas.

Communications is important

On a positive note, the survey showed many people will stay in their current job because they have a great relationship with co-workers.

So the question is, how do businesses improve communications within teams and from the leadership to everyone else?

I think the key is wanting to communicate – the hows and skills can only do so much if management wants to keep secrets and power to themselves.

Improve communications ideas

From the survey itself, some ways to improve that perception of two-way communications include:

  • 57 % believe management listens and responds to employee concerns – so actively listening is a clear method for making improvements
  • 59% stated that being valued and understood is a major factor in employee engagement – that comes back to listening and ensuring communication really is two-way
  • 55% agree and 43% strongly agree that is it important to be acknowledged for their work – communicating appreciation of people’s efforts and skills could make a huge difference in their happiness and loyalty. Yet only 54% felt appreciated by their employer…

 

Posted in business info & tools | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Making a change can attract interest

Published 1 May, 2013 | By Tash Hughes

On my way to Canberra yesterday, I listened to the flight attendant’s safety message.

Aviation fire truck

A fire truck is a not-so-boring safety precaution at airports

Obviously we are meant to do this every time we catch a plane but it isn’t the most interesting speech you’ll ever hear so it is, uh, challenging to stay focussed on it.

On Tuesday, the Qantas staff acknowledged one of the complaints about these safety messages by starting the presentation with

We know you can operate a seat belt, but we want to give you a few tips on using ours today.

A different message

It was a bit more human to acknowledge most people are smart enough to use a plane’s seat belt so it felt friendly and more interesting than ‘here’s how to do your seat belt up’.

However, just the fact that it was different to the usual safety blurb got my attention. And kept me listening to see what other changes they’d made to their message.

Unfortunately, that was the only deviation from the normal approach.

It certainly wasn’t like Air New Zealand’s safety video!

Nor is it now standard at Qantas. My return flight used a video to present the  safety message and it was routine. And I didn’t really pay any attention to it.

When’s the last time you listened to a flight safety message?

When’s the last time you consciously changed something in your business to keep it fresh and attracting attention?

Posted in Business Communications | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

A great idea but poorly implemented

Published 23 April, 2013 | By Tash Hughes
Smiling woman on the phone

great service makes us smile

Let me tell you a story of a great idea from a service provider…

Great service…

Today, I received a SMS from my daughter’s school telling me (and other parents on the list) that the kids  had arrived safely at camp.

I think it’s a great idea to give feedback like that; it builds trust and loyalty, reduces parental concern and therefore probably means fewer calls to the school to check all is good.

Many similar activities could do this same thing quite inexpensively. For me, it’s something like an emailed ‘your annual report has gone to the printer’ or ‘I submitted that guest blog post for you.’

Can you think of a way to use this idea in your business?

but details count.

The problem with today’s message, however, is that my daughter left yesterday so I would have hoped they arrived at camp about 24 hours before I got the safely arrived message.

Yesterday, the SMS was a great idea.

Today, not so much. At best, it makes them look a bit silly or slack. At worst, it worries parents about why it took 24 hours longer than expected to arrive at camp!

As they say in comedy, timing is everything!

* Image courtesy of 123RF

Posted in Business Communications | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Taking breaks makes you more productive, less overwhelmed

Published 22 April, 2013 | By Tash Hughes
overwhelmed businessman at his messy desk

No one can stay productive at a desk like this without regular breaks

How often do you feel overwhelmed with things?

How often do you feel quiet – no tweets, emails or status updates firing at, no phone calls or client/boss requests, no attempts at reducing a to do list?

As I mentioned a few days ago, I heard a webinar in which Matthew May spoke about his book,  The Laws of Subtraction (6 simple rules for winning in the age of excess everything).

I intend reading this book, and will review it in this blog, as I am very conscious of how much stuff business people have to deal with. We’ve always had to deal with multiple roles (accounts, marketing, sales, staffing, production, etc) but now we have digital presence and technical changes to keep up with as well.

I am also thinking of reading one of his other books, The Shibumi Strategy (A Powerful Way to Create Meaningful Change). It sounds interesting and apparently is written as a story rather than in typical business book mode.

 Taking and making breaks

Matthew’s fifth law is ‘break is the important part of breakthrough’ and I think that will be a very interesting chapter. I think breakthroughs can change lives – whether it is a breakthrough new product that changes the world or a simpler breakthrough on a better way to deal with a difficult client or finding a new tool that will save you time.

Any break from routine/habit/patterns can make us look around, take notice and see the things we take for granted most of the time. Then we can be more creative and find solutions or new ideas.

I like the idea of regularly getting away from my desk – and by regularly I mean once an hour or so – but I admit I often get caught up in things and stay working for longer than I probably should.

So I want to ask how you fit breaks into your working day/week. Is it something you plan or do you ‘go with the flow’?

What do you do in your breaks?

Posted in book review, business info & tools | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Limiting information engages imgaination

Published 18 April, 2013 | By Tash Hughes

 Today I heard a webinar based on the book The Laws of Subtraction (6 simple rules for winning in the age of excess everything). Matthew E May, author of the book was interviewed by Suzi Dafnis of ABN.

 His third law hits a similar theme to what I often write so I wanted to share it.

Beach at Ricketts Point, Victoria, in black and white

Limiting colour can engage and stimulate imagination and thought

Law #3: Limiting information engages the imagination

This law is commonly stated as the cliché ‘less is more’ and writers are often told to ‘show not tell’ for more powerful writing.

Giving all the facts leads to overload and disinterests people so I suggest writing as little as possible to suit the message.

But I like Matthew’s twist – I believe it is true that too much information stifles imagination. Giving enough information to set a foundation is enough.

What information can you limit to get people’s imagination working in your favour?

Matthew gave the example of Steve Jobs launching the first iPhone – he showed one, explained some of what it could do and then said no more until it launched a few months later. And something like 20 million people signed up to buy one before it was on sale. That’s a lot of people acting on limited information, isn’t it? 

* Image from Word Constructions

 

Posted in book review, Business Communications, business info & tools | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment
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