Developing strong customer acquisition and customer retention strategies are extremely important to your business’ longevity and to your online reputation. Though the cost associated and overall time spent to acquire customers is typically higher than that of customer retention, both elements have a direct effect on a business’ success and should be regarded equally. With the ever-growing Internet and Social Media space small and large businesses alike have enormous opportunities to reach new prospects and hold on to their established clients.  

The connected customer has emerged as the driving force in a world of constant innovation, mobility, and disruption. New technologies have put customers in the driver’s seat of the marketplace giving them power over which brands sink or swim in the digital age. Businesses that treat customers with awareness and intelligence and put the customer experience at the centre of their business strategies will succeed in this new connected world. So what defines the connected customer and how can businesses keep up with their evolving expectations?

Being small doesn’t mean going unnoticed.  Think about David and Goliath.  Smaller in size, David strategically used his slingshot to attack Goliath’s weak spot.  And, just as in business, small businesses need to maximise their strategic strengths to enable their business to appear larger than it actually is while still celebrating their competitive advantage over their larger counterparts.

Each year we set ourselves five goals to help keep us focused on business and personal growth.  We got together in December and worked through the five most important things we want for Connect Plus in 2017 and to keep us accountable here they go!

The New Year sees many of us many goals we aim to complete by the end of the year, and 2016 saw the girls at Connect Plus Plus make some lofty goals.  So how did we go?

There is no stopping it now, Christmas is coming and with it the opportunity to make 2016 your best yet by rolling out a Christmas campaign based on the feeling of Christmas rather than yet another discount-driven promotion or having your customers shop elsewhere. We've pulled together a few of our favourite things, Christmas Blog style, to help you through the Christmas planning for your business. No time to delay!

Last week we headed off to the Taking Care of Business Roadshow which has been travelling the country over the past month.  If you weren't able to get along here are some of the tips which we picked up. Thanks to Craig Foss, Minister for Small Business, the Government has rolled out a series of initiatives to help the small business owners in New Zealand.  It's great to see the Government start focusing on small business, after all, 97% of businesses in New Zealand are classified as SME. Here's what we learnt.

As Christmas closes in (only 5 days as I write this) I always wonder how in today’s business environment we still have the great New Zealand shut down.  Every business is claiming to be “customer centric” and yet many are closing the doors today for a summer vacation (I have even seen signs in retail stores saying they are closing from 24^th December to the 5^th January – sacré bleu!!). 

It's that time of the year ... You can almost hear the palatable sound of stress levels rising around you as everyone is not only wondering if they have been naughty or nice but also counting down the days till the end of their working year.  Not for those of us in retail world though, we are just hitting our sales stride.

In Retail as Managers and Leaders we are often taught that we are the “fixers”. Often we are allocated this mind-set from our superiors who ascertain store performance, store procedures or members of our team have flaws and vices that requires “fixing” in order for the business to move forward and become successful.

But if it isn’t broken why fix it? 

It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas.... Yes that time of the year is fast approaching and stores are already starting to stock Christmas products and promote the dreaded ‘C’ word!