I hope you find my writing and business tips and observations useful. My business and blog are dedicated to helping businesses communicate clearly and reach their potential.
Read, subscribe to my newsletter, enjoy!Tash
Product Disclosure Statements – what are they?
Do you know what a product disclosure statement (PDS) is?
Many people now use them, and various companies refer to them in their advertising, but from personal conversations about things I write, I know many people don’t know what the term means.
A PDS is simply a document listing the key features of financial products are described; it is the little booklet you got about your savings account, insurance policy, super account and so on. Basic topics covered by a PDS include fees, options, inclusions and joining/buying the product.
There are variations between industrires and companies but generally the company has to make a PDS available before you buy their product – they can’t make you read it obviously but they must have allowed you that opporutnity.
A PDS is a point of reference when deciding between products and when you need to know something later (eg does my house insurance cover rising water or just floods?) Many PDSs are long and may not be visually appealing, but they are worth holding onto.
Avoiding writer’s block…
Have you had that sinking feeling of not being able to write when you need to? Time seems to tick by so slowly… but yet the deadline approaches so quickly.
A few weeks ago I gave some ideas on overcoming writer’s block but the ideal is obviously to avoid it rather than deal with it. The following steps can be taken whenever you have the chance to reduce the odds of reaching that situation again. I won’t say you will never face writer’s block again because sometimes it is just too hard to get motivated despite any preparation, but you can reduce the frequency of it!
Here are my ideas for avoiding writer’s block, but I’d love to hear your ideas as well in the comments below…
- keep a list of writing ideas so when you have time to write (for a blog, newsletter, articles, etc) you don’t have to waste time thinking of topics as well
- if you know you need to write a report, jot down notes as you think of them. For example, every time I write major news items for a particular client, I copy it into a document that will form the basis of their annual report in July. Having those topics already in place makes the annual report much easier to deal with.
- set specific times for writing so you know there is a deadline and you don’t have time to sit and worry. Make a separate specific time for editing and rewriting so your writing time is exactly that – writing time.
- try making a regular time to write. If you don’t consistently have things you need to write you could still use this time – rewrite web content, write parts of reports you know are coming up, write some standard email/letter responses for customers and so on. Being in the habit of writing at a certain time will make it easier to write when you have to.
- know your limitations, and do something about them before crunch time. That could be learning some writing skills (such as reading through my blog once a week), starting bigger projects ahead of time if you can’t write for hours at a time, or researching a writer/editor to help you.
- look after yourself leading up to your writing project – get a good night’s sleep, drink plenty of water, grab some fresh air and exercise, and so on. Being run down and uncomfortable within yourself won’t help you write efficiently or effectively
What else have you done to avoid being unable to write when it’s important?
Images in email marketing
A picture says a thousand words.
It’s true that a picture can convey a message very quickly and sometimes better than words, and can make any document more appealing. However, you need to be careful relying on images in your marketing.
Before making an image the central part of any email message, remember the following:
- many people (I’d guess the majority, in fact) have images turned off so they won’t see the image by default. If your email relies on that image, your email is not going to work very well.
Yes, sometimes people will accept images and then be able to see your message but I rarely do that if the image is pretty much the entire message as I want to know what it’s about before lowering my security – and I guess I’m not alone in that. - including a number of images, even if they aren’t the key message, can lead to a poor presentation of your email if images are turned off – not only are there lots of red crosses on view, but it may distort the layout of text, too
- people have different perceptions and ideas, and some see a half empty glass so think carefully about about how your image may be seen. It’s not so bad if a supporting picture is misinterpreted as if it is a key part of your message
- including many and/or large graphics makes your email much larger which may mean higher costs for you and again may limit it’s acceptance by all email servers
- text in graphics and images themselves won’t help your search engine efforts (for emails online as well as sent out) although it does hide words from spam filters. Technology may be changing this but for now it still matters!
So what do you think when you receive an email that is based entirely or predominantly on graphics? Are they as effective in getting your interest as text based emails?
And don’t forget to support your email marketing, too.
Gift certificate for business services?
Leading up to friend’s birthdays and Christmas, gift certificates for product-based stores and personal services (eg a massage or facial) are often considered as a convenient gift the recipient can redeem for whatever they want.
There is also value for the business giving out gift certificates – quiet promotions, value add, follow on sales and cash flow in particular.
So would you give a business service gift certificate?
Here are a couple of situations where I think it could work:
1. a friend has just started their business and is overwhelmed with the things to do’ so you give a voucher for a VA’s services
2. as a web designer you know there is more than good design required for success so with all projects above $x you give a gift certificate to a professional writer to kick things off
3. instead of giving a bottle of wine or box of chocolates, a business gives out vouchers for a business service to enhance clients’ business. Obviously they need to be complementary businesses with a similar market so a business coach could give out vouchers for bookkeeping, a designer could give a voucher for a printer and a writer could give gift certificates from an IT support business.
4. you want to give a friend/client the means of improving something about their business, just because you like them or you can see their business really needs the help
5. it is the anniversary of your business relationship or someone starting their business so acknowledging that with something that will further their business (rather than a hamper or bunch of flowers) gives more meaning to your gesture
Have you ever thought of giving a gift voucher for a professional service? If you’ve done it, how did it go?
When can a professional writer help?
It isn’t only people who ‘can’t write’ who use the services of professional writers like me; in fact, many of my clients can write reasonably well. However, there is a misconception that hiring a writer means you are stupid or can’t write so I thought I’d share a few examples of where people find it helpful to talk to a professional writer.
1. writing about yourself. I’ve had a few people who are excellent writers ask me to write their website about us page or a business profile as they don’t feel objective enough to write about themselves
2. writing specific items. It takes some different skills and knowledge to write web content and technical reports for instance, so I have clients ask me to write their procedures but write their own web copy.
3. they don’t like writing. I don’t like doing data entry or researching differences between mobile phones, and I don’t expect that everyone likes writing as much as I do 🙂 Many of my clients are relieved to be able to hand me their written needs so they don’t have to face it themselves – and because it leaves them time for what they do like doing (hopefully!)
4. writing takes time – and we’re all busy. For my clients who can write, time is usually the biggest reason they hire a professional writer – they are simply too busy to write their own material. In many cases, I can write it faster than they would have anyway, so it saves them time in two ways really.
5. consistent and effective results. I write all the time and can set aside blocks of time for clients so what I produce for them is consistent (within that document but also with their other materials) and effective whereas they have more distractions if they try writing it themselves so the result is often less than optimum.
Can you relate to any of the above reasons for using a professional writer? How do you deal with such situations if you don’t hire professinoal help?
Choosing a newsletter format to suit
As a communications person, I do more for clients than just write. Recently, I reviewed the newsletter process for a client.
Initially, they were sending out a paper based newsletter but introduced an email version a few years ago. About a year ago, I helped them make the html (email) version shorter and more suited to emailing. The purpose of the recent review was to consider how to present their newsletter moving forward.
Here are some of the key points I considered before making a recommendation that suited the client’s needs:
- their subscriber list was about one third postal addresses so stopping the paper mailing wasn’t an option in the short term. The break down of the mailing list is a critical factor in such decisions
- the people my client sends newsletters to are literate and technology friendly so emails are acceptable, although an older sub-set still prefer paper-based communications for important news
- my client wanted to maintain a copy of the newsletters on the site for 2 or 3 years so we couldn’t purely do html emails in an email program (ie we had to make a version available on the website)
- sending an email costs a lot less – for my client, it is about $0.15 per email and $2.00 per letter, and that’s a typical price range
- emails and pdfs can contain hyperlinks to make the newsletter more interactive, but they are easier to insert and adjust in an email
- an html page can be emailed easily but doesn’t print so well, especially if you want to print to the edges of the page for a professional finish
- for branding, a paper/pdf newsletter must match the email version so having them designed at the same time will give the best results
- creating multiple pages on a site (ie one article per page) for email links is time consuming but it is difficult to direct readers directly to an article within a pdf
- there is software (and free to use websites) that can convert pdfs into html so creating a pdf for print and having it converted into html for emailing is an option. However, the I found the final product is not polished or professional enough for me to recommend it to a client
- a pdf attachment on a website is ok but sending a pdf attachment as an email newsletter is not – many spam filters will stop it, it looks messy and is larger than necessary so a pdf that can be printed, put on the site and emailed is not a solution
There is no one size fits all answer to the question of paper or html newsletter, but the above points may help you decide. What other factors do you think are important?
What other small businesses are doing online
About two thirds of small businesses using online marketing in some way say that new customers find them through search engines. Would you agree that is a key way that customers find you? If so, what are you doing about your search engine results?
The American Express OPEN small business search marketing survey (March 2011) has a number of statsistics to show where small businesses see online marketing impacting their sales.
While it is a list of survey results (yawn, yawn!) it is a summary so easy to read and can give some useful insights for trends within small business which is useful for comparisons and particularly useful if you sell to that sector. My opening questions are also examples of how you can use this information to assess your own online marketing.
Read the report and let me know what you learn from it…
Superannuation increases?
There is a move to increase the basic super contribution rate for employers on behalf of their employees, taking it from 9% to 12% (in a few increments).
The Australian Institute of Superannuation Trustees, AIST, (and others I believe) have an online petition to show the Government the concept has the support of the general population.
Do you support it?
Maybe you haven’t even thought about it so here are a couple of my ideas on the topic:
- an extra 3% of your salary each year has to give you a better chance of financial security in retirement so who would argue with getting it?
- we’re often told we have an aging population so I have long thought I will need my own money (super or otherwise) as there may not be much of an age pension when I retire – again, more super from an employer has to help that!
- an extra 3% on top of employee’s salaries could easily add up for any business owner so businesses may find the concept stressful, but
- it isn’t immediate so businesses can prepare
- if businesses have to increase prices to meet the 3%, living expenses will have another increase
- base salaries (for new employees) may get reduced slightly so that packages aren’t significantly higher and that again may leave people financially tight in the present
From a purely super point of view, I totally agree with moving the minimum to 12%; from an overall perspective, I’m not so sure what is best and will need to read up on the potential impact – and I’d love to hear some different opinions from business owners, too.
Press release or media release?
Which term do you use and prefer?
Traditionally, people would send an announcement to the newspapers to share news so it became known as a press release.
With the introduction of radio and TV, press releases had more uses than just newspapers; now, if you have news to share you may send it to any combination of newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, websites and newsletters.
The term media release covers all forms of media so seems more appropriate in most circumstances now than a press release. I certainly consider that I write media releases, but I am comfortable talking to people who still use ‘press release’.
I wonder if age or work background impact much on which name people use – what do you think?
Advertising dates
Just a quick reminder to keep things up to date – or avoid anything that makes the date obvious. 
Today I heard a radio ad offering 10% off everything until the end of March. Two days ago, that would have been an effective call to action; today (being the 1st April) means I have 12 months to take up the offer.
My assumption is that the business didn’t mean the ad to be run today and don’t really want to run their sale for 12 months! Whether it was error or belatedly providing the required airtime by the radio station, it is a good reminder to check dates carefully!
Have you come across any funny faulty dates?
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