I was really sad to hear this morning that Clinton Cards have gone into administration, which more than likely means they will disappear from our High Streets. As with lots of hot topics I had a look at Twitter to see what people were saying about it and I was sad but not surprised….  One tweet said it was no wonder they were going bust because they charged £3.50 for a card that elsewhere was being sold for 70p and another said Why would anyone buy a card from Clintons that cost more than the present?  There was a definite trend!

Clinton Cards seem to have made the big mistake of sticking to what they were doing even though their market had completely changed. Yes, we used to spend money on cards but that was because it was all we knew but then online cards came along and the supermarkets started everything but the kitchen sink and that included cards WAY cheaper than the card shops.

Clinton Cards unfortunately have failed to seek the advice of the people that could have told them the ket to their prosperity and that is…..their customers, and now its too late.

If you want to know what you are doing wrong or right then the people you should be regularly asking and I repeat REGULARLY, not every few years or when your profits start to dip (this could be leaving it too late) but ask them every time they buy from you, ask them every time you bring out a new range of products or decide to discontinue something – how many times have you heard loads of people say….. “Why did they stop doing X, I loved it” In fact there have been many occasions of products being discontinued, customers going mad and the product  being re-introduced ! What a waste of time and money that could have been avoided if they had just asked the customers opinion in the first place!

So – ask your customers their opinion regularly, give them an incentive for completing the questionnaire or survey etc and USE the information!

You can’t exist without your customers, give their opinion the respect it deserves !

Claire x0x

If you need help with your business, attracting new customers and making more profit then get in contact today, email me.. claire@bombshellacademy.com

One of my pet hates (Yes, another pet hate!) is when new businesses go all out to gain Twitter followers and Facebook ‘Likes’ – they are obsessed and seem to think this is the way to get business as quickly as possible, I see it all the time and so this Blog is to tell all those people that are guilty of this to STOP!!!!!

Facebook Likes and are all very well and good but unfortunately they do NOT equal sales. It is definitely a case of quality and not quantity that is important. If you have 1000 likes on your FB page and in actual fact only 2 of those are actually interested in what you are selling and the rest are just liking you because they think that you will like them and buy something off them then you might as well just have 2 likes!

The people you want to Like you are the ones that are going to tell others about you, spread the word and become your free salesforce, the other ones you want are the ones that are interested in you because they actually intend to buy a product like yours and when you build a relationship you can be the one that they buy from.

Unfortunately with Facebook and Twitter we seem to have lost a little direction when it comes to sales. The key to EASY sales is to build relationships. Let people follow you because they are interested in what you do, engage with them and build that relationship, let them like you and by keeping in their mind you can easily change them from an interested person into a buying customer…..  Only yesterday I saw a post on Facebook about a lovely wedding dress that someone was thinking of buying, it was strapless and they needed something to cover the top. I instantly commented that I knew a lovely lady called Kay that specialised (note SPECIALISED) in just such a thing, she is @wraporKay on Twitter and because I follow her, like her tweets, like her products and tweet with her she instantly came to mind and I passed on her details – in all likelihood a sale for her and how easy was that?

Don’t focus on getting follows and Likes from people that you have no intention of engaging with, concentrate on the few, get interested in them and they will do your building and growing for you

Claire xox

If you need help building and growing your business get in contact today claire@bombshellacademy.com

This blog post was inspired by the lovely Steven Carter Hewson, otherwise known as @carterhewson on Twitter if you want to check him out! How did he inspire me? Well he posted on Twitter that he had written a personal Blog put he was undecided whether to publish it or not – everyone, including me said Yes, go for it!

When we are in business its easy to put on your business head and keep it stuck there day in and day out, but in reality one of the big reasons your clients chose to work with you is not because of the price or anything else, its because of YOU!!!

People want to know who you are, more so now than at any other time people want to know all about the person. Its why reality programmes are so popular now, on X Factor its not the best singer that is voted for its the one with the best story. ITs why Facebook and other Social Media is not only so popular but also such an important and fantastic sales tool!

Your clients want to know WHO you are, they want to know all about you because they are buying from YOU, not from your company or your business but from YOU! Have you ever heard the expression people buy from people? Well its true. People want to buy from the person that they think is most like them, they want someone that has similar ideas and views as them, similar morals, similar sense of humour etc – you don’t have to be an exact copy of them, now that would just be spooky and weird but they think if you are LIKE them then you will do a fantastic job for them because you will instinctively KNOW what they want and how to please them.

So – don’t be afraid to show your customers and potential customers who you are. Reveal a bit about yourself to them – tell them about your dog, your family, your favourite foods etc. Of course on the flipside keep in mind that you ARE showing yourself to customers and potential customers -you don’t want to start revealing that you are into satan worship or anything, unless of course these similar people are your target market (probably not! lol)

Reveal some, but don’t reveal TOO much is the key!

Claire x0x

If you need help building your business and attracting more clients the easy way then get in touch for your FREE Breakthrough session….. Email me now claire@bombshellacademy.com

In a post the other day I mentioned that customers primarily only buy for 2 reasons – Pain (avoidance) and Gain. Now in the Wedding Industry we are mainly on the happy side of things and the customers are buying for Gain, but WHAT are they gaining – a new dress, a cake, a photographer? Well yes all those things but the psychology behind it is a whole lot more.

When I talk about Pain and Gain what is meant? Well Gain is when people perceive they will gain from the purchase, they will gain things like peer admirations, higher standing in their social circle (why many people buy certain cars), makes you look better, makes you healthier etc. And Pain is reasons such as looking bad amongst your peers, losing money, losing health etc etc. The reason women spend billions on beauty products is to look better, but also because they don’t want to look old. The reason we all fork out on insurance is because we want to avoid the nighmare of NOT having it!

So what are your brides buying? Fancy stationery yes but more than that they are buying romance, one-upmanship on every other wedding they’ve been to, something that will add to the perfect day. In some way they believe that al the small things will make them look good, make the day happier and if they start married life with a perfect day then the marriage will be perfect too…..

Wedding planning is a perfect example of something that is booked because of the avoidance of pain – they don’t want anything to go wrong! And so is photography to some extent, yes the gain is that they have gorgeous images to remember the day but the pain avoidance is that they wont FORGET how they felt that day!

So, when you are marketing to your brides, instead of telling them what your selling, tell them what they want to buy – tell them what problem you are going to solve for them, tell them what they are going to gain from your product or service and tell them what pain they will avoid by working with you……

Claire x0x

If you want help with your business, I can offer marketing, mentoring and coaching all rolled in to one. Book your first FREE Breakthrough session, email me now claire@bombshellacademy.com

Me and my 4 month old daughter, well mainly me, are BIG fans of everything made by the company JellyCat – their range is awesome, unique, tactile, cute and all the soft toys look like they have real character. They are NOT cheap toys but they are made well and I reckon worth the money.

The other day I had a lovely surprise in the post and it was a JellyCat book about Cordy Roy Elephant. The JellyCat range of characters all have books to go along with them that tells a story of the character. They are lovely stories with pictures and the child can sit with the toy and read the story. Back to the book, I received the book in the post from JellyCat because I’d entered a competition or something somewhere, thats not the important bit, the important bit is that I was SO thrilled with this book – they normally retail around the £5 mark so its not a cheap freebie but by receiving this book they now have a definite sale of a Cordy Roy Elephant at around £20 and not only that they have a guaranteed life long customer (who will probably spend a fortune over the years)  and a raving fan that will tell loads of people about how fab they are.

How can you incentivise your waivering customers? If you add up the cost of freebies you have to be realistic about whether you can afford it but you must think ahead and work out whether you can gain long term from these same customers over the years ahead. Its why the supermarkets are so keen for your loyalty to the extent that they send you voucers worth quite a lot of money, they know that in your lifetime you will spend a LOT of money with them and if they can get your loyalty its worth it.

As a wedding supplier you probably only think you are getting a one off sale with your brides but if you are a photographer, after the wedding you can do pregnancy, newborn, family photos etc – the lifetime value of that one bride is enormous!  And there are many other types of products and services that can benefit from that lifetime loyalty.

Claire xox

If you need help building your business or attracting more customers then get in contact to arrange a FREE initial Breakthrough Session. Email Now Claire@bombshellacademy.com

One of the biggest things I’ve learnt through my NLP training and counselling is how to change. Change is SO important and yet it is pretty easy to do, the trouble is we are all programmed to be scared of change. When I was a drugs counsellor I would see clients all the time that were in a dreadful situation and yet often they didn’t seem that keen to change. This is because their life, no matter how bad it seemed was actually working for them! We are programmed as human beings to survive, its our number one priority and so when things are bad we tend to stick to them, because we ARE surviving. Its the same in business, sometimes we get to the point where business is not good and we are literally living hand to mouth but we are reluctant to change things because although its not good we ARE surviving. If we change anything it might be the straw that breaks the camels back and we might NOT survive so we stay as we are, furiously treading water until we are exhausted. The sad part is, if we DID change and try something new then the probability is that the change will be GOOD!  The key is to change things that have little or no risk, don’t take long or require too much effort and cost little or no money. BUT you must give it a good go, don’t try to implement a new newsletter and then be disappointed after sending once thinking nothing has changed, you must be persistent!

The best way to convince yourself of change (no matter what it is ) is to have a brainstorming session for change Vs no change.

Once you’ve filled in all the boxes, best done over quite a long period of time because you keep on thinking of things then take a look at them. Lets take one of the most common ‘change’ issues – weight loss! Now people tend to focus on the Pros of Change when it come to weight loss, I’ll be fitter, healthier, look better etc, etc which is all GREAT stuff but isn’t enough to get you to change amazingly enough, the box you SHOULD concentrate on is the Cons of NON Change, so if it was me filling it out - I’ll probably be even bigger next year, I could get heart problems, diabetes, I wont be able to get up the stairs without being out of breath, I wont look good when picking my daughter up from school, my child might be bullied for having a fat Mum…. and worse case scenario……. I could die young because of my weight and not see my daughter grow up and leave her without a Mum…….. now THAT would make me change and would be WAY more effective to get me to change that the fact that I would wear a smaller dress size!!!

So – if you want to change concentrate on the Cons of NON Change, once you are on a roll the Pros of Change are the things that will keep you going, its all about PAIN and GAIN !!! And its the same for your customers when thinking about buying your products……….. Stay tuned, I’ll cover that in the next post!

Claire x0x

P.S – Need FREE marketing help and coaching? Enter my competition now, you’ll be glad you did

This blog post is inspired by a Tweet I saw this morning that struck me as really quite sad.  The tweet was about someone not delivering something that was promised, which is in itself bad enough but the person actually didn’t EXPECT the action to be carried out!  Can you believe that? What would you think if your customers actually didn’t expect you to fulfil their orders or deliver when you’ve told them you will? Do you think the customers that feel like that will end up going somewhere else? Of course they will, and they will tell everyone they know about the awful service they get from you.

There is a saying that you should always under-promise and over-deliver….. Thats the way you get happy customers! There is nothing more satisfying than ordering something and being told that it will be a couple of days and it turning up the following day, it makes you feel special and makes you incredibly happy about the service you’ve been given.

The very worst thing you can do with your customers is make a promise that you can’t keep, it is SO much better to be realistic and honest in the first place. If you cannot deliver then it is better to say you can’t, very often people are happy to wait for what they really want so if they like what you are offering they will more than likely hang on and wait.

So dont over promise something that you have doubt you will be able to deliver, always be realistic about your capabilities, you wont lost customers because of it, or very few but you WILL lose a lot of customers when you don’t deliver as promised…..

Claire x0x

If you need help with your marketing and your business growth then get in touch…….

I was inspired to write this blog after seeing an advert on the TV which actually made me cringe. I can’t remember what they were advertising because I wasn’t actually watching and all I heard were the words they were using. Now I’m a trained Counsellor and an NLP Master Practitioner and Hypnotherapist and for all those things WORDS are very important but they are also important for every one of us, especially if you are in sales, and if you are in business then you ARE in sales!

The words you use are what influences people to buy, especially on your website, in your brochures, through your tweets, through your facebook. The pictures of course are incredibly important but the majority of communication, especially in this social media world is in fact WORDS!

So, what are your words saying? If your spelling is bad then you need to use spellcheck – Fact! If your spelling is bad then you will be forgiven once or twice, it may even come across as cute now and then but the general impression you are creating is that you don’t care and your attention to detail is zero!

Also, be careful of the words you use. Never say cheap…. unless of course you work for the Poundstore, you can say it then but other than that you always are Value! Theres a reason that Tesco have their Value range – its dirt cheap stuff but they dont call it Tesco Cheap, its Value! Do you think they would sell anywhere near as many of these products if the name was different? At the other end of the scale they have a Finest range – its expensive, but its called Finest )

So how are you classing and categorsing your products and services? Do you have a cheap range? If you do change it! People don’t want to buy cheap, they want to buy Value, exclusive, finest, unique, original, bespoke (I know lots of you use this word).

Words can be incredibly influential, so chose them wisely…….

Claire x0x

If you need help with your marketing or growing yourself and your business then get in touch today – email me Claire@bombshellacademy.com

My lovely new daughter is currently being very challenging indeed. She cries because she is hungry, because she is tired, because she is bored, frustrated, has poo’d, because her teeth are starting to hurt or because she just wants a bit of attention. Whatever the problem is……. she cries and this is because at 4 months old it is the only tool she has at her disposal and it is the only way she can communicate with me. The other day I was outside, silently counting to 10 (more like 100) because she was crying yet again and I started to think about one of my most favourite quotes,  from Abraham Maslow - ’If you only have a hammer you tend to see every problem as a nail’

Marketing can be like the nail – people have a downturn in trade and they start to think about the nail and get out the hammer, and if it doesn’t work at first they either get a bigger hammer or they just hit harder and harder. The more tools you have in your box the better when it comes to marketing. You may have had a successful way of marketing in the past but if it dries up then what do you do? It is really important to constantly have a really good marketing campaign going and that could involve Email marketing, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Telesales, Wedding Fairs, Leaflet distribution, Mailshots, Blogs, Competitions and advertising (as a last resort of course, you probably already know how I feel about advertising!!!) .

So ALL these marketing tools compliment and develop with each other so that when you have a slight dip in business, rather than getting out a great big hammer all you have to do is up the volume in all areas just a fraction and it will make a BIG difference to the amount of clients you attract.

So – start developing that marketing campaign and acquiring those skills and you’ll never be short of business again. And of course if you need help in either of those things then just give me a shout and I will be happy to help

Claire x0x

Delivering low-cost marketing solutions to the Wedding Industry

I love the series The Apprentice’ and one of the reasons I love it so much because its a great way to see how NOT to run a business. For all their fancy titles and apparent business skills and knowledge not many of the candidates have a clue and I think they’d find running their own business actually very difficult indeed.

Last night they had to buy vintage items and then sell them for a profit in a shop. One team definitely seemed to get it right and went to a Car Boot Sale and got some really nice bits and with the help of being provided with a lovely looking (free) shop to display them in they made a healthy profit after just a couple of days. But we all know in the real world our costs would have included rent, petrol, heat, light, advertising, flyer production etc and the profit would have been a lot less.  While I was watching I was just WILLING one of the candidates to come up with a plan of action that actually WOULD work in the real world, I wanted someone to say…… “Lets concentrate on 70′s products” so that everyone buying things would buy the same, the shop would have a consistent feel about it, they could name it consistently and even the people selling in the shop could have dressed in the same them – it not only would have been awesome to watch but would have been a REAL winner!

But why you may ask would you want to limit your customer base, because thats what specialising does right? Wrong! It’s true, if you don’t specialise then in theory EVERYONE is your customer, but are they really? Lets imagine a town where on one street everyone sells Wedding Stationery – I know, it would definitely be the prettiest street in the country, but all the little shops would be competing for all the business and the brides would be walking up and down the street looking for their ideal Wedding Invitations and going in one shop after another. So if you were in the shop and a customer walked in chances are they would look around and then go somewhere else to look at what they’ve got.

Now imagine you have a ship on this street and you thought, ok, I’m not going to compete on price with everyone else I’m gonna specialise and I’m only going to sell Wedding Stationery with a Butterfly theme. Now, you are limiting yourself to customers because not everyone wants Butterflys but equally you would know that everyone that came through your do was interested in the Butterfly theme that you were offering and so you wouldn’t have to waste any of your time or effort on someone that had no intention of buying from you. Not only that but every single bride that WANTED a butterfly theme would come to you and BUY from you because you are the expert on the Butterfly theme – why would they even think of going to someone that did everything for Butterflys when you are the expert? They wouldn’t!

So yes, you would have less customers coming through your door but the chance of you making a sale from those that come through that door are WAY higher than everyone elses chances of a sale, and at the end of the day, the amount of people that LOOK at your product does not effect your profit, only the ones that actually BUY do!

I look forward to the next instalment of The Apprentice to see what gem that throws up.

Claire xox

If you need help with growing your business or increasing your profits then email claire@bombshellacademy.com to arrange your FREE Breakthrough Session