Last week I received a call from a lovely gentleman who wanted to tell me how much he appreciated my article from last week, and how ‘spot on’ he thought it was. He spent a few minutes sharing his story and encouraging me in my pursuits as well.

I shared this occurrence on my personal Facebook page, and one of my friends responded with “So lovely! For someone to go out of their way to encourage another is a challenge for all of us to do it more!”. She, and the gentleman who called me, are exactly right.

It is amazing what simple, seemingly ‘little things’ can do for your business. I have had a few clients say to me recently “I tell everyone that you always reply quickly to emails”, because it impresses them that I do so as a matter of course.

Going out of our way to encourage, thank or assist people is something every business can do. However, let me state clearly: if your only motivation for doing something ‘nice’ for clients and colleagues is because of the benefits you expect to receive, think again! While you can integrate these things into your processes (and while they may benefit your business), unless it comes from a genuine motivation they are not likely to respond positively. That is, they will see through the charade!

An example of a gesture that I think is questionable is the ‘personalised’ birthday card from a large corporation, who you know has no personal contact with you, they simply have your birth date and name on file. Do you hang those birthday cards alongside the ones from family and friends? Probably not! Whereas a handwritten card from someone you deal with directly on a regular basis is much more likely to be taken for what it is: a genuine gesture. So any small business operators reading this, take advantage of your ‘smallness’ and do the little things that big business cannot do.

Michelle Grice writes a weekly column for business women in The Western Weekender

The older I get, the more I realise that in many instances, ‘common sense’ is not ‘common’! What seems logical or reasonable to me, is not to others. And I see this in business circles just as much.

The most obvious examples I have witnessed are in marketing and promotion. Recently I was attempting to register for an event via a company’s Facebook page. They had set up an ‘event’ page which had a number of posts on it asking people to ‘join us’, ‘register now’, ‘book your tickets’. The problem was, the link to buy tickets was nowhere to be found on that event page! I eventually found the link via their main business page, but I am guessing that many others would have given up and decided not to book.

Attention to detail is vital to ensure that you communicate important information – it is often the most obvious details that are forgotten. Wherever possible, particularly if you know you are not a ‘details person’, get someone else to read over your communications before finalising them.

It is so important, as the saying goes, to ‘put yourself in other people’s shoes’. You need to write all your business communications as though the reader knows nothing. Which also means that it needs to be written and laid out in a logical and sequential fashion. If you take too long to get to the point, or the ‘point’ is lost amongst other less important information, you will lose opportunities to engage people.

A big lesson I have learned over time (and still have to remind myself of), is to never assume. For example, if you were to write an email on Friday saying “Let’s meet next Tuesday”, you run the risk of someone assuming you mean Tuesday of the following week when you meant Tuesday this week. A simpler way in this example is to write “Let’s meet on Tuesday the 21^st of April”, that way there is no ambiguity or assumption.

Although there will always be circumstances where others will make their own assumptions based on their own version of ‘common sense’, paying more attention to detail will reduce miscommunication and give your customers a better experience when dealing with you.

Michelle Grice writes a weekly column for business women in The Western Weekender

I was driving through Penrith last week and noticed a business van in front of me. What made me notice the van was that the phone number was without a ‘9’ at the beginning of it. Although a ‘minor’ thing, this immediately told me that it had been a very long time since this business vehicle had been upgraded.

More importantly, it told me that this business does not have attention to detail. The older vehicle would not be an issue (assuming that it functions well and looks presentable). But the fact that they had not bothered to invest in some new signage on their car gave me a negative first impression of their business. If they haven’t updated their signage, what else is out dated? If they are not concerned about how their business presents (that is, their image or branding) then do they really care about their customers?

Those questions are assumptions. But they are assumptions that I wouldn’t want anyone making about my business. No matter what industry or sector your business is in, first impressions count. Your business should exude professionalism and first rate customer service. And everything that your customers see or hear about your business should show them exactly that.

The van with the outdated phone number might be an amazing business. But personally, there is no chance of me becoming a customer of theirs based on my first impression. It is always worth regularly checking over your branding – or better still, getting someone objective to look at your business with fresh eyes. And if you need some sprucing up, make sure you get it done quicker than the van without the number nine!

Michelle Grice writes a weekly column for business women in The Western Weekender