I will start this post with an admission – I am about to flog the horse that should have been dead, buried and forgotten at least 10 years ago.  Fax machines should be like phones with cords, tvs without remotes, ironing boards and other vestiges of electronics past.  They should be things that our children ask us about with a quizzical expression as if it to say “Really?  You sent documents over phone lines as sound?”.

Yet, I can pull up a handful of websites and there is the fax number, prominently displayed after the phone number and before the email address.  As if the small business in question would rather receive a fax than an email.  I can walk into a small business, like I did recently at the garage where I get work done on my car, and there it sits.  Again, really?

I wish I could say I am the only one to write about this but alas that is not the case.  I can f ind many articles on the same topic (like here, here and here).  And yet.  My hope is that none of you read those articles or, if you did, you just didn’t get the point until now, because of some pithy thing I have to say.  Because the fact is this:  fax machines are useless and should be retired.

Why?  Well first of all, to use a fax machines you have to first print a document, then stick it in a machine and then it prints AGAIN at the destination.  That means double the paper usage, especially if that document was electronic on your end and would never have been printed otherwise.

Second, some small businesses are still paying for a second phone line to support faxes.  The ones they get about 3 times a year.

Finally, faxed documents are almost always of poor quality, faint and smudged and often crooked with parts cropped off.  That is hardly a professional image to be presenting!

There are easy alternatives.  You can email that document directly from your PC.  If it was already printed and has a signature or the like you can scan the document and email it.  In fact for lots of reasons a scanner is a better investment today than a fax machine.  Not only can you get rid of your fax machine but you can scan and store your documents, reducing the amount of paper on hand.

So why do folks hold on to fax machines with white knuckles?  Inertia in some cases.  In others the business owners don’t  have the experience emailing and scanning.  Others have a faulty sense that a scanned document is “more official” or “more secure”.  Did you know that easiest way to forge a document is to cut out someone’s signature, glue or tape it to a document and then fax it?

For kicks and grins, how about keeping track of the faxes you send a receive each month.  Is there another way to send or receive that document?  Likely the answer is yes.  If you still have a few outliers (and I would honestly like to know what they are because I can’t think of any examples) you can use a service like efax.com to support those.

Let’s  the fax die its belated but natural death and simplify your technology this spring!

Photo courtesy:

I know you get a lot of email for your small business – we all do.  Whether you keep your email on your server or on your computer it can build up over time.  It is a good idea to clean up your old email from time to time to keep from running out of space and to speed up your email.  You may find you’ll even save yourself some time when you don’t have to search thru all your emails to find things.

Do you have a lot of old messages out there, in your Inbox or perhaps in folders?  Do you really need those messages?  Some companies do need to keep records of customer correspondence but others can get rid of it after a while.  So that is the first step – delete anything you really don’t need.

Do you have old messages that you need to keep but likely won’t access often?  Archive these emails; most email clients allow you to archive emails to a file on your computer.  This physically stores the email in a separate place from the rest of your email.  You can leave that file on your computer (back it up!) or, if you really don’t think you’ll have to access those email often you can copy that file to a CD or to your backup location.

Now that you have cleaned things up a bit, look at what you still have.  Are there ways to organize it using folders to make it easier to use?  This is a great time to group email in folders.  Common ways to do this are by topic, by sender or by date.

Next, clean out your spam or junk folders if you have them (and likely you do).  Finally, take out the trash by emptying your trash or deleted folder.

There, doesn’t your Inbox feel lighter, fresher cleaner?

This will be a short post today to make up for not posting last week.  I’ll get back on track later this week, I promise.

What is keeping you from leveraging today’s technology to provide stellar customer service?  I’ve noticed a trend in the reasons I’ve heard from small business owners and it ISN’T money.  This surprised me because you’d expect the main reason to be cost.  In today’s economy cost IS something to consider and any changes or additions to the technology you use to support your business should be carefully thought out and carefully planned and implemented.

No, the reasons I hear most start like this:  ”I still have to…” or “I would have to change…” or “I want…” – in other words, it is all about the business owner, not at all about the customer.  When I hear sentences that start with these phrases the following questions come to my mind:

When I hear “I still have to…” or “I would have to change…” I wonder, have you taken the opportunity to rethink your operational processes?    You might not need that step any more.  Or I wonder if you really understand the solutions you are considering.  For example, if your response to putting in functionality for customers to self-schedule appointments is “I still have to call them to confirm or change the appointment”, you may need to look at what the services provide.  Most of them allow you to apply rules to the appointments, maybe only existing customers can self-schedule or you can specify dates and times for appointments based on the service selected.  In addition, most of the services include functionality that automatically emails confirmations and reminders for you.
When I hear “I want…” my ears really perk up – this is where it is GENERALLY about you, your sales technique and need to deal with your customer in a way you are comfortable with, your needs and not your customer’s.  When you start with “I want…” keep in mind that today’s culture is getting more technology-savvy and more technology-centric.  Your customers have lots of options on how to interact with business and more and more often they want to choose their communication channels and deal with your business when it is convenient for them.

If you keep thinking “I want…” instead of “They want…so I should…” you may find yourself left behind your more open minded and progressive competitors.

I started to write this post about some other more specific examples of how small businesses can use  technology to improve customer service but some of them were related to a company’s website – and since a lot of companies STILL have awful websites and a few don’t have a website at all, I thought it made more sense to start there.  With the training wheels on.  Next week we can take them off.

A good, relevant website is essential to providing good customer service.  How?  Any time you can provide answers to  your customer’s questions at their convenience you are providing good customer service.  Your website can be accessed from virtually anywhere at anytime, giving your customers (and prospective customers) instant access to the information they need.  Descriptions of services and products, fees and costs, contact information, hours of operation and maps or driving directions are a great start.  If you get a lot of the same questions over and over you can include FAQs.  Testimonials or references from other customers provide prospects with references that they can contact.  If you have service manuals, installation guide, instructions or other documentation, you can allow them to be downloaded from the website.  You can provide video clips or blog articles with educational content.  The possibilities are boundless.

Your website can be a storefront and a vehicle for your marketing and branding but it can also be the hub of your customer service platform.  Once you have the basics covered you can move on to providing even more service online.  A few weeks ago I wrote about providing customer self-service by allowing them to schedule appointments online.  In my next post I’ll expand on this customer self-service theme.  In the meantime, how do you provide customer service online?

In the last post I wrote about how important it is for small businesses to respond to emails from customers and to use it as a communication channel if that is what the customer prefers.  Face it, some people just feel more comfortable with the feeling of distance you get with email as opposed to phone or face to face conversations.  Personally, I like email because I can send and respond asynchronously, at my convenience.

There is another important aspect of email as it relates to customer service that I want to explore today – outbound email. This is where you send email to a customer that are not directly in response to a query or email from the them.

What kinds of email am I talking about?  Email that provides value or information to a customer that is not salesy or annoying.  Assuming your customer has given you permission to send them emails you can send newsletters with educational content, personalized emails with reminders, emails with coupons or specials.  Here are some examples:

• an accounting firm could send out quarterly newsletters with information about tax changes or tips on how to save money on taxes.  They could send out personal reminders when it was time to file quarterly taxes.
• an auto repair business could send out emails when it is time for an oil change, recalls or other routine maintenance.  In these they could provide coupons or services for those specials.
• a hardware store could send out seasonal newsletters that focus on “going green” or weatherizing homes or gardens for the upcoming season.
• a garden center could send out monthly gardening tips
• a hair salon could use email to send reminders for upcoming appointments

There is a marketing aspect to some of these; as a business owner you are hoping that your customer will be reminded about a service or product they need from you.  But beneath all of these there should be a strong vein of customer service, of providing additional incremental value to your customer.  It costs nothing or almost nothing to use Mail Chimp, Constant Contact or Aweber to send out targetted emails to your customers.

Do you use email to improve your customer service?  If not, is it time to look at your technology plan to add it?

This week I am going to start a multi-part (how many parts?  who knows?  Methinks a good number) of posts about using technology to improve customer service.   When I talk about “improving customer service”  I mean everything from reducing your your costs of customer service to providing better quality customer service over a number of channels.  You can see that this is a broad topic and will take a while to cover!  This week I’ll start you off easy with things we all should know…and yet I can give you many examples where even these simplest of processes aren’t followed.

You have to answer the phone.

It is probably safe me for me to assume that virtually all businesses have a phone.  When possible someone should answer the phone when it rings.  I can understand where some small businesses may have a cell phone as their main business number, say for a solopreneur consultant or the like.  In that case it is ok to let the call go to a professional sounding voicemail during meetings or while driving, etc.  Those voicemails need to be checked regularly and returned promptly.  And promptly means THAT DAY if possible.  I recently called a local dog grooming establishment to make an appointment to get my two labs, Jester and Cimarron, bathed.  I got voicemail or an answering  machine.  The first time I called I just hung up (potential lost customer).  The second time I called I left a message (the dogs were really smelly and it was very cold outside).  My message was returned over 24 hours later, late one evening when I couldn’t take the call.  I had to call a third time to make an appointment.  Turns out when I finally got there that my service was adequate and the cost reasonable but I am not in love with this place.  It seems to me that a service establishment like that thrives by keeping their appointments booked – why do they not have someone dedicated to answering the phone?  Why can they not return calls during business hours?  Or better yet, why don’t they look into allowing clients to book appointments online at their convenience?

You have to have email and check and return it regularly.

It boggles my mind that in 2010 there are still some businesses that don’t have email and or don’t integrate its use regularly into their business processes, yet it is true.  Of course, if you are one of those that doesn’t use email, you probably aren’t reading this article either.  I sure hope you have a friend that prints it out for you and either hands it to you or puts it in an envelope with one of those stampy-things.

I believe that small businesses should embrace email; it is convenient for you and your customer.  It allows your customer to reach you when it suits them, even before or after business hours.  When using email keep the following in mind:

• check it regularly, at least at the beginning and end of each day, more if you can.  Go thru all of it and handle it in some appropriate way. I recently responded to an email I received…later when I saw the sender she claimed not to have seen my response.  When I expressed surprise she admitted that she gets hundreds of emails a day and didn’t always get thru them.  In today’s world not getting thru email (or having someone get thru email) is not an acceptable business practice.  Especially when you send an email and are looking for a response!
• Commit to responding within a certain amount of time.  Consider responding to email with an autoresponder that tells your customer when to expect to hear back from you.  For example, an autoresponder might say “Thank you for your email, it is important to us.  Emails received by close of business will be answered that day, otherwise they will be answered on the next business day.”
• Answer customer questions or concerns politely and completely.  Assume that the sender wants to communicate via email or ask them if you can communicate differently.  Nothing is more annoying than to send someone an email and for them to respond with “call me”.  If you need specific information to interact via email, let the customer know what that is.

I know phone and email are so ubiquitous to barely be considered “technology” but we have to start somewhere.  Next week we’ll take a baby step beyond that.  In the meantime, as always, I’m interested in your opinions on this – how do you use technology to improve customer service?

It appears that a) a lot of small business owners don’t know what “cloud computing” is and b) regardless of whether they know or don’t know they are wary of it. In this post I will clearly and simply explain what it is and hopefully clear up some of the myths and misunderstandings about cloud computing.

Wikipedia defines cloud computing as “cloud computing” is Internet- (“cloud-”) based development and use of computer technology (computing)”. Clear as mud, huh? This is simplest way I can think of to explain what cloud computing is: if you are doing something without installing hardware on your computer or a computer on your local network, you are involved with cloud computing. A great example is email – if you use Gmail, Hotmail, AOL mail, Yahoo mail or anything similar you are using cloud computing. You are using computers and programs that live in the cloud we call the Internet.  Facebook, Youtube, Flickr, Twitter – yep, all in the cloud.

But what does this have to do with business, especially small business?    Essentially it means that as a small business owner you have lots of opportunities to choose whether to buy software (and likely hardware) or choose a vendor to supply services virtually over the Internet.

What are some concrete examples?  What about (lists not inclusive):

• file storage and sharing.  You can buy and install  file server and connect it to your network or use a cloud-based solution like Egnyte, Dropbox, Google Docs or Box.net
• email.  Too many examples to mention, starting with our friends at Google.
• accounting.  Good old friends Quickbooks can be run online as well as newcomers like Freshbooks
• CRM.  Salesforce.com is a pioneer of cloud computing; other entrants to the fray include Batchbook (I talk about them here), SugarCRM, Zoho and Highrise
• Word processing and spreadsheets.  In this post I talk about Google Docs, Zoho and the like
• Document Management.
• Reporting and analytics.
• and the list goes on and on.

What are the pros and cons of using cloud computing?

1. It can be fast and inexpensive to get started.  Whether you have a new business or an existing business, using a cloud-based solution can dramatically cut down the time to get up and running and reduce your initial capital outlay.  If your business needs change rapidly, using cloud-based solutions allows you to add features quickly or even move to another solution more easily.  On the flipside, as your business grows you may find that the capital outlay of in-house applications is less expensive than ongoing costs of a cloud application.  You should always read the fine print and make sure that you can easily retrieve your data and move it to another provider should you outgrow your first choice or if you are unhappy with the service you are getting.
2. Your systems and data are easily accessible.  Wow, this is a big one; think about it, you can access your data from anywhere, anytime.   Using the business center in the hotel where you are vacationing and want to check your Quickbooks?  No problem!  Your salesperson drops their pc in the lake?  Don’t worry, their contact information is safe in the CRM system in the sky.  Cloud-based applications support virtual offices and working from home “out of the box” so to speak.  Downside?  You only have access to your applications and data thru the Internet.  No Internet access?  Internet down?  Have a slow internet connection?  All of these can affect, in some cases dramatically, your access to your business information.  As a business owner you have to weigh the risks of not having access to the costs of controlling your own access (and remember, if you don’t have electricity you are likely SOL anyway).
3. Your information may not be secure.  On one hand, it may not be secure in your office either.  Is it backed up regularly and is that backup in an offsite location?  Is it on a computer or server that is secured properly on the Internet?  Is it physically secure from theft, natural disaster, etc?  Many small business owners don’t pay attention to these factors, making their systems and data LESS secure in their own office than it would be anywhere else.  Most of the companies that provide cloud-based services have shelled out a lot of dough to make sure their systems are secure, safe and stay up.  That said, not all of them do it the same way or in the same degree.  As a small business owner you should sit down and assess the level of risk you are willing to take and with which kinds of data.  Then, as you look into cloud-based applications, make sure you understand each suppliers security precautions and service level agreements.
4. You can concentrate on your business, something you are probably pretty good at.  You can leave the care and feeding of computers and systems to the highly trained and compensated personnel that work for the service providers.  It can be distracting and expensive to maintain technology; most small businesses are better off spending their energy and money somewhere else.

Bottom line? My take is that most of the cloud-based applications are good, safe and secure and are getting more so every day.  While you should certainly thoughtfully assess your individual needs, especially where accessibility and security are concerned, I believe small businesses should seriously consider cloud-computing for many of their needs.  Determining where it makes sense and how to transition your applications should be part of your technology plan.

How do YOU feel about the cloud?

Photo attribution:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/8769295@N07/ / CC BY 2.0

I thought I’d start a regular feature (maybe bi-monthly) about the software tools and services used at Clearly Simple Solutions. Of course, there are caveats to this, namely that this post reflects what I use and think is cool at a  specific point in time. What seems like the perfect tool today may not fit the bill tomorrow and I may already have a new favorite. You never know.

I’ll kick off the feature with my current favorite, Batchbook. Batchbook is a “social crm” (the company’s moniker, not mine) from Batchblue. I’ve been using it 6-8 weeks now and so far so good.

How did I chose it? I wish I could say I took copious notes at the time I was reviewing the options, but I didn’t. Personally, I cared about a few things:

• ease of use

• ability to import and export contacts

• to-do list management

• ability to keep track of communications with contacts

• some simple way to do campaign management

• low cost

• web-based

Of course, even though I was looking for a tool for my own business, I was on the lookout for tools that would work well for my small business clients as well. So I discovered a funny thing about CRM tools for small businesses – there are a lot of good ones. I felt like there were a lot of viable choices.  Many small business are successful with Highrise, ZohoCRM, SugarCRM or one of the other major contenders. What it came down to was, well, personality.  What I mean by that in this case is how was combination of design, functionality and support suitable so using it isn’t a chore?  In my case, Batchbook fit the bill.  The site and the tool had the right feel, the right vibe and the right level of functionality; not too little (some are barely more than contact list), not too much (in some the sales and marketing features made me cross-eyed).  I haven’t used the support directly myself yet but the forums and FAQs are easy to use and suggest friendly, quick customer service.

What do I like?

• It was easy to use right away.  For me, reading instructions is what you do after you can’t figure out how to do something.  I very rarely have to read instructions for Batchbook.
• The error messages, when you get them, are clear.
• It is easy to find things.
• Nothing is “in your face” or shouting at you.
• It is way easy to import and export contacts.  You can also add contacts by just forwarding an email to Batchbook.
• I love the social media connections; for each for my contacts I can monitor their Twitter activity, LinkedIn and other social outlets.
• Although I have way too many contacts for the free version, the next level up is attractively priced.
• And the tags and supertags are way cool – anything you can’t do somewhere else you can do with them.  Finally, it integrates well with Mail Chimp which was a pleasant surprise.

What could be better?

• Well, it could be faster, for a start.
• If you add a contact with tags it is two steps instead of one.
• Reporting could be seriously juiced up – I know I am a reformed software engineer but how can you do good queries with no parentheses and no ability to search for null or empty fields?
• What is up with no Facebook integration?

Other than those small quibbles, so far so good.  Not only do I like the tool, I have recommended it to a few friends.  The folks at Batchblue don’t know me from Adam so this is an unbiased opinion.  Tools like Batchbook are ideal for small businesses.

What do you use for YOUR small business?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/juhansonin/ / CC BY 2.0

What kind of planning do you do? Do you take some time to think about your business and set goals for the coming months? A lot of us do this at the end of the year for the coming year but of course it can be done at any time and should be done regularly. Without some sort of planning your business has no direction. Your strategy or plan tells others (and yourself!) where you want to go. If you think this is only for big businesses you’re making a big mistake. This planning doesn’t have to be fancy; you’re the audience so write it down however you like. (I do recommend writing it down though, if you don’t does it really exist?)

A technology plan is an extension of your business plan that addresses how you will use technology in your business to support the business goals you set. Simple as that.

Ok, saying it is simple, putting it together is a little more involved but not complicated. Here is how it goes:

• First, review your business goals and objectives. Even though you are putting together a technology plan, it is really about your business and any investments you make have to support your goals and objectives.

• At a high level, outline your current environment. Who are you customers? What technology do you currently have in place? How do your employees and customers use the technology you have? Are there any risks or vulnerabilities in your current environment? For example, can your systems and processes handle more business? Are they outdated or out of support? Are you covered in the event of unavoidable outages? Are you covered in the case a key employee leaves or is unable to work?

• Determine if there are opportunities to further your business goals and objectives by adding or removing technologies. Can you save time or money but using an email service instead of sending your newsletter manually? Do you have a good way to keep track of your customers? Are your  employees able to fully serve your customers’ needs when they are out of the office?

• Look at your current state and the opportunities and determine a strategy or set of strategies to tie them together. Think about what might have to change operationally if you make these changes. Will you have hire more people or can you do with fewer? Who will be responsible for maintaining and using the new system?

• Determine the cost and benefits of executing on a specific strategy and make sure you know how you will measure success. Are you expecting your sales people to be more effective and make more sales if they have the ability to produce quotes at your customer site? How many more?

• Define a list of activities, including how long they will take, how much they will cost and whether there are any dependencies. Take small bites; make one change and see how it does before making another one. You don’t want your business to implode or your customers to be confused as you work through your technology plan. You also won’t want to make a lot of big investments at once.

The result of this is your technology plan. It is a road map to how you will move forward with technology to accelerate your business. It might look intimidating; it doesn’t have to be, though you may need help. An experienced technology adviser or consultant can lead you thru the process, especially where you are evaluating new technologies. New applications and tools spring up almost daily; an expert will keep up with what is going on and help you identify possibilities.

For an example of technology planning go to http://clearlysimplesolutions.com/what_we_do_tech.php.

Most of the small businesses I talk to, even the tiniest of them, know that when they need legal advice, they need to see their attorney.  Beyond that, they will proactively seek the counsel of their attorney on a regular basis as things change with their business and as they have to make decisions that affect it.

The same goes for their financial needs; most of them have a CPA that they see at least once a year at tax time.  Most accountants would recommend more regular visits at key times in the business cycle to help with future planning.  For example, if you need a new vehicle for your business you should consult with your accountant BEFORE you purchase to make sure the type of vehicle you choose will maximize your tax benefits.

Yet, when it comes to the technology businesses use, they are often left adrift with no help.  Some businesses have a simple website set up by their cousin along with some boxed software they use for billing and accounting.  Others have had consultants build fancy websites and other solution providers in to set up networks and more complicated systems.  In both cases though, these businesses have set no overall technology vision that supports their business plan.  They don’t know if the “pieces” they have fit together, if they are paying too much for overlapping technology, or how much they are wasting on “shelf-ware” they never use.   It is like they are standing way to close to an impressionist painting.  All they see are the dots, not how they combine to create a beautiful flower.

Worse than that though, they don’t have anyone helping them identify opportunities where technology could accelerate their business.   Often there are ways to leverage technology to increase revenue or reduce costs…if businesses only knew what was available.

Today, every kind of business is more and more dependent on technology (like it or not!).  This dependency will only grow.  As a small business owner it makes sense to seek out the advice and counsel of an overall technology advisor.  Someone that can help you see the painting for the dots.  You have a business plan, and maybe marketing plan and a sales plan.  You also need a technology plan that ties these all together.

For an example of what a technology plan is and how it works you can go to http://clearlysimplesolutions.com/what_we_do_tech.php.

It is almost the beginning of 2010 – do you have your technology plan in place?