What do you think of the 2.5% VAT cut?

What do you think of the 2.5% VAT cut? It seems to have sparked a lot of debate on other sites. I think the main issue with it is the inconvenience that it will cause to small business owners for not much benefit. For instance, many small businesses will:

• need to update price lists
• need to update literature
• have to upgrade accounting software to ensure 15% is included in there
• lose additional cashflow that VAT brings

And I'm sure you can think of half a dozen more disadvantages. Not to mention the fact that very few larger businesses will pass the saving to their customers while many small businesses, particularly those in service businesses will have no choice.

I know there is not much that I, or anyone else can do about it now, but it would be interesting to hear your views.

The Lowest Form of Marketing

I had an experience the other day that I hate with a passion. I consider it to be the lowest form of marketing and what's worse the person doing it often has no idea that's how they're coming across.

The technique is to pick holes in what someone else has done in an attempt to sell their own products and services. So for instance, if you ask for comments on your new website (as I did once), these people would tell you how terrible it is and pick hole after hole in it and then point out how they could do a better job for you.

The other day it was presentation skills - unfortunately the person concerned then had the cheek to follow it up with an email reiterating what she could do for me. And received quite a curt response from me explaining why I wouldn't be using her services, but that I could help her improve her marketing technique (let's see how she likes it).

So, if you ever get experience of this marketing technique in the future, please don't put up with it. It's a terrible form of marketing and the person concerned deserves to know that it's bang out of order. And if you've ever done this yourself (which I hope you haven't), make sure that you never do it again in the future...

The Art of Setting Goals

I was with a client the other day who was talking to me about setting goals for her business for the coming year. She was pretty stuck on how to do this - from how she should word the goals to what they should be. So let me explain:

Goals in your business help keep you motivated and focused. Whenever I don't feel motivated, I know that 9 times out of 10, it's because I don't have a clear goal to achieve. When I set a goal, I always feel much better.

Goals should be for you and you alone. Don't worry about what anyone else might think. You don't have to share them or let anyone see them. I recommend that you write them down and then carry them around with you (in your wallet or your purse) so you can look at them often.

When you write them down, they don't have to look pretty or be spelt correctly - as long as you can look at them and know exactly what you mean, that's ok.

But, and this is a big but - you must BELIEVE that you can achieve them. If you find yourself writing down a goal and then thinking 101 reasons why you can't achieve it, scrap that one and start again. In order for goal setting to work for you, you must believe that you have a fighting chance of achieving them - if you don't believe this, who else will?

They must be goals that you are really passionate about and want to achieve. When you write them down, they should make you feel excited and feel that you'd happily get out of bed for no pay to get them done.

Feel free to set personal goals as well as goals for the business - make them challenging, but believe you can achieve them. Set some, but not too many - more than 6 or 7 in a year may make you lose focus.

And remember that Barrak Obama had a dream too - to become President of the United States. Now, I'm sure that he had people saying to him "you'll never achieve that" or "what if", but he believed and his dream has come true. So what's your dream?

Do you watch business programmes?

I've just finished watching "The Restaurant" and along with programmes like "The Apprentice" and "Dragon's Den", they provide a great insight in how not to do things.

But, I'm constantly amazed by how many business owners don't watch them.

I know that we've probably had enough of reality TV shows in the UK and I know they can get a bit repetitive too. But, if you're in business, they can give you ideas, provide opportunities and most of all help you learn what not to do.

After all, they're on TV - let them make the mistakes and you learn from the experiences and put the right stuff into practice in your business.