Me and my Flymo!

June 14, 2010
Me and My Flymo!

Me and My Flymo!

Before you get any sudden ideas that I am a grass cutting, green fingers, gardening enthusiast let me promise you that there is nothing I hate more!

The very sight of the lawnmower makes my stomach churn, when the grass growing weather kicks in I always see the clear downside – grass that starts growing ..

For some reason last Saturday one of those strange once off events occurred – having returned from a meeting with a prospect (Saturday was the only day that suited, that’s us for ya!) a weird feeling came over me and I “wanted” to cut the grass and I was actually in good form about it.

I just don’t understand where the feeling came from. I was nearly whistling as I took the trusted Flymo from the shed (if it had feelings and could talk it would have been in fear watching me approach and would definitely have had a thing or two to say).

I grabbed the extension cable, grabbed my iPod and headphones, set the music on shuffle, hit that start button and off I went & what an eventful hour and a half I had.

The kids from the estate, recognising that this was an unusual occurrence were all excited and arrived over and started chatting (despite the headphones) with me and then started teasing by unplugging  the machine – did it bother me, nope .. I was in great form.

The music was kicking – I went through Human League, Faithless, Eels, Oasis, Free, Reuben Steiner and whole pile of other cool stuff, I had a great think about work, life and the universe.

A gentleman approached me (he had put me in the position of expert, I guess!) and asked me about the virtues of the Flymo as he had been warning his son against buying one .. “would you get electrocuted easily with the lead dragging behind you?” was his worry

Nah, just be careful and besides there is no need for petrol and servicing .. the Flymo is great I told him! I changed his mind but he did turn down an opportunity to try out the orange machine  for himself – he had his chance.

Before I knew it the job was finished, the grass was looking respectable, I cleaned the machine, put it back in its home and grabbed a bottle of cold beer and savoured a great job done and this very unusual occurance!

What next I wonder ..

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications

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Posted in Gardening | 6 Comments »

The New PR Guru’s!

June 10, 2010
PR Guru

The PR Guru

This week we started off round two of the PR course that we are doing for the South Cork Enterprise Board.

Can I tell you a secret – I love it !!

The first group were absolutely terrific, they bonded, we bonded, and we all learnt some great new stuff and had fun in the process.

Having a room full of business people all with interesting stories and all pro-actively pushing the door to try to make things happen for themselves is totally exhilarating.

.. among them we had people from an art gallery, an online antique jewellery business, en established Cork firm trying to make new waves, a ballroom dancer, an Irish festival crew, intern placement, oriental gifts, high end electrical installations, makeup experts and even a PR person sharpening their skills.

Listening to people sharing their issues and challenges and then taking these objectives and applying the PR process to it is really great .. and don’t forget about the Purple Cow – they had to hear a lot about that particular creature from yours truly!

Can’t wait for next week ..

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications, Marketing & PR

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Posted in Marketing, PR, Recession | 4 Comments »

Accountants and Marketeers Working Together?

May 11, 2010

Can these professions actually work together pro-actively and deliver excellent results for a client or for a business?

Tug Of War

Accountants and Marketeers pulling together?

At the beginning of 2009 when fear had totally gripped the whole business community I was staggered by the amount of clients ringing to cancel their Marketing activities – Advertising, PR and even some suggestions to get rid of their websites!

As someone who is a reformed accountant it made me cast my mind back to those days in practice and I had to question myself – when I was wearing those shoes is that the advice that I would have been giving my clients?

The logic is simple – Remove “unnecessary” expense to protect the bottom line.

With my marketing hat on I always question where current and future sales come from and I ask why did the business conduct these activities in the past?

Is attracting customers less or more important in a downturn?

Ok, we have to extract the best value for money, be extremely careful as to where every single euro is being spent and make sure that every euro must work hard in delivering value. However we just can’t cut out the activity totally.

Is this how accountants generally view Marketing?  Many of them don’t but I wonder do many think this way?

How about a scenario whereby the Accountant and the Marketeer work together for clients in devising proactive but yet prudent solutions that protect the business in the short term and the long term?

We have only ever once met a client with their accountant – Should this be the case?

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications

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Posted in Accounting, Irish Economy, Marketing, Uncategorized | 6 Comments »

Grace Under Pressure

May 5, 2010

Grace Under Pressure

Thank God for the Good Guys!

Many of you will have read the “Credit Control Warrior” piece I wrote having being inspired by the behaviour of a particular businessman, Famous.

Basically, if you read the piece you will have learnt that not only did he not pay his bill but he felt this was quite funny, the joke was on us. He laughed in my face saying “We would never get paid!”

The joke is on all of us who do our best at all times to behave honourably, pay our bills and behave honestly. If you think about it we are all subsidising these guys.

The circumstances of a changed economic climate have worked against many of us but this does not stop the honourable guys still behaving properly even when they just cannot pay. Once a gentleman, always a gentleman.

As long as someone who is under pressure communicates with you, realises that you are out of pocket as a result and will try their best to sort you out I have no issue. Unfortunately we have a few clients who have been caught in the storm and thankfully they have not stopped being good decent people.

I Salute You

I Salute You

This morning I received an email from one such client who has been doing his utmost to sort us out on an unpaid bill. At all times he has been upfront and honest, he always returns calls, he always appreciates that we are out of pocket as a result of his misfortune and he has done his best to give us a few quid whenever it is available.

The email:

“Hope you enjoyed the long weekend.

Just wanted to let you know that I’m transferring €xxxx off the account in the morning – some modest funds came in from the sale of the leasehold but we couldn’t have money come in and not deal with your account.  You’ve been beyond fair and I sincerely want to clear the account faster than we have been up to this point.  This will leave us with a balance of just over €xxxx and I’ll increase the monthly payments on that.

Once again, thank you for your patience and understanding”

This is what I would call Grace Under Pressure.

I salute you.

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications

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Posted in Irish Economy, Marketing, Recession, Uncategorized | 5 Comments »

Get it off your chest Online!

April 20, 2010

Have you found yourself in the frustrating position of getting absolutely nowhere with a complaint?

Now this could be on a small scale in a corner shop, at a restaurant where you have had a lousy meal or it could be against one of the big guys. The old saying goes that a bad experience travels quickly with word of mouth as we do tend to share our frustrations with friends, loved ones and anyone that will listen! If anyone is really annoyed about something they tend to share it with a lot of people.

TripAdvisor Logo

TripAdvisor

Spreading the frustration has now got much faster and easier and with a much bigger reach with the onset of the web and the powerful free tools available including Trip Advisor, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and blogs.

These tools can work for you in that they can help get rid of that frustration and genuinely hurt the culprits but they can also help to actually resolve your issue to a satisfactory conclusion.

If your issue is with the “big guys” your activity online can really work in your favour and help to get that proper attention that you have been looking for.

The “big guys” and a lot of the smaller companies are very conscious of their reputations and are often carefully tracking what is being said about them online using tools such as Google Alerts and Twitter searches.

To demonstrate this point I will share with you a small real life example of how this worked for me.  I recently had a problem with one of our national phone service suppliers and was very quickly getting nowhere fast. After nearly 12 months of total frustration and the realisation that this problem was not being sorted out by the normal means I decided to write about my issue in my personal blog, carefully naming the offending company in a way that, if they were paying attention they would definitely notice!

Having completed my blog post I then shared the blog with my Social Media Community, my Facebook contacts, my Twitter followers and my connections and groups on Linked In.

All I had to do then was wait and see if my nothing to lose experiment would actually work ..

Within a few hours not only did I have a bucket load of responses from other people with similar complaints but I also received a call from the offending company in response to my blog issue!

Not in response to my complaint but to my blog!  To be fair to the guy calling he wanted to sort out my problem and I was able to take him through it in detail and within days the whole issue was sorted and I managed to negotiate a fair rebate, which I was told was impossible up until then.

Was this a company eager to satisfy unhappy customers or one that didn’t want to be “red-faced” online? – to be honest I didn’t really care, I finally managed to solve a problem that had been dragging on forever.

The lesson in all of this is that if you require it, you have a very powerful and effective voice available to you online if you choose to use the  tools available , to make your point.

However this can be a double edged sword!

Exactly the same can apply to your own business and you should pay attention to what is being said about you online.  Use the simple to use tools such as Google Alerts and Twitter Search and hear first hand about the good, the bad and the ugly!

If it’s good then highlight the unprompted testimonials on your website and in your newsletters and presentations. If it’s bad or it gets ugly then deal with the problem and don’t be afraid to share how you solved the issue online. Use the issue as an opportunity to show you genuinely care about your customers.

There is no hiding place online!

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications

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Posted in Customer Care, Irish Economy, Marketing, Social Media, Web Marketing | Leave a Comment »

High Five When You See a ’10

April 19, 2010

Isn’t it fabulous to see the amount of ’10 Registration Cars on the roads since the start of the year.

Last year people, even those with the necessary funds were wary about buying a new car due to the “what would people think” syndrome – we need the positive activity to set the wheels in motion for our economy!

So, the car sales are up 31% in the first quarter – if you think about it this is probably with about 2/3 of the garages that were there last year and the good chance is that the existing garages are well down in staff numbers – time to start recruiting I wonder? Maybe a little bit premature? Whichever way you look at it – it leads to a higher tax take for the government and an industry starting to move again and some funds are back in circulation. All of those garages and car salesmen have money to spend elsewhere.

From what I can gather those sales are probably less than they should be – a few car salesmen I have spoken to have been telling me that accessing cars is a difficulty due to pessimistic predictions when they were placing advance orders – you will be lucky to get a new 5 Series BMW before next September!

And what else does all that mean? – well, that is a lot of positively motivated individuals driving around in their new cars – a new car is a great feeling – well done! It does put the rest of us in the mind for a new car – it’s a positive target to have for all of us. I want to buy a new car in 2010 – that’s a goal for you.. try to make it happen.

The “confidence wheel” is simple and this is what will get our country moving again, not any superb government policy – in my view their attempts to positively mobilise Ireland have just not happened. On the jobs creation front there has been zero strategy – the government have even slashed budgets in “job creation” departments, I’m deadly serious – if anyone has the time to check budget allocations, check out if budgets in government departments with the agenda of helping new business have been increased? – I promise you they have been cut in the same way as everything else, strategy – I don’t think so!

Ok, so there is positivity creeping through and that is coming from “us”, from pure positive attitude.

Performance will follow “positive attitude” – despite the odds, so keep it going.

While we are on the “positive” agenda and this is so critical for recovery I can finally report that the house across from us has been sold!

The sale seemed to be almost completed and then fall through a few times in the last 9 months. The same banks that would have handed out a mortgage at double the price have eventually approved a loan to our new neighbour (and they have picked up a fabulous bargain at the bottom of the market) at half the price. Something wrong somewhere!

Sherry Fitzgerald - Sold!

The Big "Sold"

The amusing thing is the sign put up by, Sherry Fitzgerald the auctioneers – in the same way that I am saying to celebrate the ’10, the auctioneers are celebrating the ‘sale’ with giant ‘SOLD’ text across their signs.

Well done to whoever is completing purchases out – high 5 when you see a  ’10 and celebrate those ‘Sold‘ and lease agreed signs – things are looking up, celebrate the positivity that is all of us ..

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications, Marketing & PR

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Posted in Irish Economy, PR, Recession, Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

Protected: Credit Control Warrior

April 10, 2010

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Businesses Still Opening despite the odds ..

March 29, 2010
Karizma - Turkish Barbers

Karizma - Turkish Barbers

Despite the odds new businesses are still opening up in the middle of this economic climate.

What is this due to ?

Is this an entrepreneurial spirit that just cannot be crushed? – unique individuals, who despite bucket loads of advice not to do so, struggles to raise finance from powerless and frightened bankers,  little incentive to even bother trying and poor support from any government bodies – and they still decide to risk their money without a safety net and take the ultimate plunge and open up a “new business”.

Thank God – the landlords, the shop fitters, the signage guys, the staff, the local councils and the revenue all benefit & maybe the odd Marketing & PR Company!

I absolutely celebrate inside when I pass these new stores/businesses.

Long live the entrepreneurial spirit, it won’t be broken!

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications

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Posted in Irish Economy, Irish Politics, Recession | 3 Comments »

Students “Doing the Business”

March 29, 2010

CIT Student Prize for InnovationI had the honour and pleasure of being one of the judges at the Cork Schools Enterprise Finals at CIT in Cork this month. This initiative was sponsored by Cork County and City Enterprise Boards.

It basically consisted of transition year students starting a business and running it as a project as part of their development. In my section I was judging the City entrants with Natasha Lynch from Essential French and we had 6 good contestants to review. It was a pity there weren’t more entrants from the City but I guess the schools are quite busy these days – I would recommend it to any school as it seemed like a fabulous experience for all of them.

It was incredible meeting these enthusiastic students, who showed us their business plans, their ideas, their “inventions”. They shared with us their real-life experiences including “power struggles” and disagreements, disappointments and successes along the way. They poured their energy into all of their projects and already you could see how these unique experiences will stand to all of them.

To all of those students, their teachers, CIT  and the Cork City and County Enterprise Boards – I salute you!

To the winners (which from my point of view was everyone who participated and learnt valuable life lessons) well done guys, you deserved it. To the guys from my old school Spioraid Naoimh, keep up the good work – next year you might be in the prizes!

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications

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Posted in Marketing | 1 Comment »

Get Results – Complain Online!

March 1, 2010

This is just a very simple follow up piece on an issue that I was having with Eircom, which was dragging on and on forever.

Basically I was pretty much getting no satisfaction, I was being passed from pillar to post and getting nowhere fast.

In the meantime I read an interesting article about how many years ago a guy in the States blogged about lousy service he had received from Dell Computers. Once he had blogged the post was noticed online and soon there was an avalanche of people with the same problems & eventually Dell spotted the commotion, reacted and more importantly took the issues on board and sorted out some serious issues they were having.

Eircom

Eircom Business

I took the same approach and put my frustration on my blog (I circulated this through Facebook & Linkedin) and found that while no one in Eircom was listening through the normal channels the story online was quite different!

Within hours I had a guy onto me directly from Eircom responding to my blog post. The issue that had been dragging on forever was sorted within a week (well hopefully, when I get the credit I will know it is sorted).

On the positive side the issue was sorted, on the negative why did it take an online post to get a reaction?

The power of online media ..

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications

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Posted in Customer Care, Marketing, PR, Social Media, Web Marketing | Leave a Comment »

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