Women Grow Business

“In every complaint there is a request.”

An email with that quote appeared in my inbox just before I starting writing this article.

Last week…

a new client contacted me to let me know about a distressing situation caused by a mix up in packing slips. Her gift recipients had gotten their packages, but since the packing slips had someone else’s name on them, they doubted whether the gifts were really for them.

Her email went on to say that her boss wanted to know how this happened and they both needed reassurance that if they were to use my company again, it wouldn’t happen again.

Ugh! You can probably imagine my immediate feeling of being kicked in the stomach.

How would you handle a situation in which you clearly screwed up?

If you haven’t faced such a scenario yet, it’s only a matter of time because we’re human and it happens to the best of us. What you say and do next is the important thing.

First, I recommend treating a client problem as an emergency.

Perhaps not a “house on fire” emergency, but you need to respond quickly. A client is evaluating how important she is to you based in part on how fast you address her issue.

Make sure you start your conversation by showing some empathy. “Oh my gosh! That is horrible! I am so sorry you had to experience that!”

You can disarm an angry person by agreeing with her because she’s expecting you to be defensive.

Instead, you’re building rapport by empathizing with her plight. Overlook this crucial element in handling the situation at your own peril.

Act promptly but don’t respond so quickly that you don’t take a few minutes to research the situation and think carefully about what to say and how to say it.

Your relationship and future business is on the line here. Write down a few options and either offer the best one or give her a choice.

If you need time to look into what or how something happened, say that and give a timetable of when you will have an answer.

I proposed:

- writing apology notes to each of the gift recipients, and

- offered a credit to the client for use on a future order, should she decide to work with me again.

She was thrilled with my “prompt and sincere response” and with both ideas and claimed she would like to continue ordering in the future.

If you truly don’t know what to do or don’t know what you think the client wants you to do, ask her. “What would you like me to do? What do you think is fair?”

Sometimes she doesn’t know either or doesn’t necessarily want you to do anything.

Many times people primarily want to be heard, to vent, so listen.

Lastly, thank the client for sharing her concern with you. She’s given you a huge opportunity to create a loyal fan.

She could have just as easily walked away from your business without saying a word and you would have never known why.

More from:

• Lori, as she asks, “Is your business delivering happiness?”
• How do you apologize to clients? from Freelance Switch
• Can saying, “I’m sorry” to a client create more income for you? from BSP@SPU

Image: dcmaster’s Flickrstream, Creative Commons

Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She shares happiness by helping business people show appreciation for and give recognition to customers and employees with The Gratitude Cookie™. With an understanding of the value of creating strong connections and experiences, she supports clients in increasing customer loyalty, referrals and profits. Connect with Lori on Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook.

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What would be the most fun thing I could do today?

That’s the question I’ve been pondering over the past few days, since reading “Delivering Happiness” by Zappos.com CEO Tony Hsieh. How can I make my business more fun for me and for my clients and vendors?

Clearly this “path to profits, passion, and purpose” (the book’s subtitle) has been highly successful for Zappos.

There are so many good lessons and thought provoking concepts in this book that I highly recommend reading it for yourself – with a pen and note pad nearby. Maybe just not right before bedtime though, because if you’re anything like me, you won’t be able to sleep with all the ideas swimming around in your head!

In the meantime, a few highlights.

Deep Connections = Happiness

Tony realized early on in his involvement with Zappos that a feeling of connectedness amongst everyone involved in the company was essential to success. He saw how deep connections brought a sense of stability and a sense of excitement and made everyone happier.

With a shared sense of purpose, people were there for more than a paycheck; they were willing to go all out for each other.

So he set out to deliberately create an environment in which people could connect and create shared experiences and memories and become a real family.

Ask yourself, how can I create deeper connections with my business partners?

Every Action You Take = Branding

Zappos never spent much money on traditional, paid advertising or marketing. The biggest driver of growth is repeat customers and word of mouth.

The company’s philosophy has been to invest in customer service and customer experience, which leads to more and happier customers and more word of mouth. The now well-known free shipping, both ways, and the call center that’s open 24/7 are two examples.

In fact, Tony views the call center as a great way to increase the lifetime value of a customer because it’s an opportunity to create more “positive emotional associations” with the Zappos brand.

There are many, many stories about how well Zappos customer service reps listen to what their customers say and then take action to create incredible customer experiences for them.

These stories are not generated out of a PR department. In fact, Tony talks about how the company didn’t set out to get media coverage, but that it came as a result of their focus on improving the customer experience and building a strong corporate culture.

If your company is doing interesting things, the press will find out about it naturally.

What can you do to create outstanding experiences?

Problems = Growth

How many times have you wished your problems would just disappear so you could enjoy a smooth ride?

Ha, I’m smiling because over all these years of running my business and personal growth, I’m finally and really “getting” this concept.

As Tony says, “We grow because we take on new challenges, and we face even more new challenges because we’re growing. It’s an endless cycle, and it’s a good thing: it’s the only way for a company to survive.”

I add that it’s the only way for anyone to survive. The sooner you realize that those “problems” are disguised opportunities, the happier you’ll be!

How do you stretch yourself and your company every day?

Since Zappos’ higher purpose is to “deliver happiness to the world,” Tony concludes the book with the hope that it inspires readers to make their customers happier, employees happier or themselves happier.

What can be better than that?

More from Women Grow Business:

• Lori on reaping the rewards of consistency in business
• Thursday Bram on giving back by encouraging entrepreneurship

Image: hale_popoki’s Flickrstream, Creative Commons

Regular contributor Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She shares happiness by helping business people show appreciation for and give recognition to customers and employees with The Gratitude Cookie™. With an understanding of the value of creating strong connections and experiences, she supports clients in increasing customer loyalty, referrals and profits. Connect with Lori on Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook.

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Does your business have a revolving door?

Image: Kelly Midori, Creative Commons

What would happen if you were a customer at a store that changed its store hours all the time?

One Tuesday, when you show up at 2 pm, it’s open; the next Tuesday, it’s closed until 3:30. And the following week, it’s open from 9:00 until 1:00.

Might you get frustrated?

On top of that, this store changes its logo and storefront signage every week, as well as what kind of merchandise it carries.

Do you still want to be a customer?

That kind of inconsistency makes people nervous.

In fact, almost any kind of inconsistency, even if it’s not that extreme, makes people uncomfortable and if you’re in business, you probably don’t want to make your customers uncomfortable.

But you may unknowingly be doing just that.

Start with one of my pet peeves, your “from” name on your email.

When everyone only had one electronic device from which to send email, this wasn’t an issue. But now that you can send email from your desktop computer, your notebook, your phone, etc., you need to make sure your name on your outgoing email is consistent.

For one thing, it helps the recipient recognize when an email is from you and pay attention to it. Sending emails that arrive with “From” lines saying “Tim Smith” one time, “info at Our Company” the next and “TR314” the next is confusing to the recipient.

More than once, I’ve almost deleted an important email because I didn’t recognize whom it was coming from and thought it was spam.

Look at every piece of marketing material your company puts out, whether it’s online or off.

Does it have a consistent look and feel to it? Is the logo the same every time? Are your corporate colors consistent? You want your clients to feel comfortable and register a level of recognition.

Not everything has to look exactly the same and be boring; I’m saying make it familiar.

Think about what Starbucks does with its store interiors. You know you’re in a Starbucks when you walk in, but they don’t all look exactly the same.

They use similar elements to maintain consistency. Furthermore, a Cinnamon Dolce Frappucino® in Boston is going to taste exactly the same in San Diego. Customers expect, want and reward consistency.

When you pay attention to these details, you’ll create a greater level of trust with your clients, even if they don’t consciously realize it.

More from:

• Lori on the power of following up with customers
• Why consistency is so important in customer service from The Customer Service Zone
• Consistency in marketing from Good Marketing Ideas

Regular contributor Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She helps people show appreciation for and give recognition to others. The main (delicious!) tool her team uses to help accomplish this important feat is through The Gratitude Cookie™. A thin, crunchy cross between a butter and a sugar cookie, The Gratitude Cookie is so named because if you’re eating the cookies, you’re encouraged to think about something you are grateful for as you munch on each one. Connect with her on Twitter.

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This is the fourth year Bob Burg and Thom Scott hosted the Extreme Business Makeovers aka #XBM, event in Orlando, Fla., and the first I’ve attended. After the rave reviews I saw posted all over social media sites last year, I knew I didn’t want to miss out this year.

It certainly lived up to its reputation.

One reason I was excited to attend was that the expert team of presenters included Felicia Slattery, Carrie Wilkerson, Stephanie Frank and Svetlana Kim, all of whom I’ve interacted with through Twitter and Facebook, but never met in real life.

Photo of Lori with Paul Martinelli © Lori Saitz, used with permission

And since the setting of just a few hundred people was more intimate than many of these kinds of event, I would have the opportunity to actually meet and talk with them.

Simon T. Bailey kicked off the event with a humor-infused story of the career-altering action he took while employed by the Walt Disney Company. And then he made a statement that I didn’t realize would be one of the most profound of the weekend.

“It’s not who you ARE that holds you back; it’s who you think you’re NOT.”

Simon says, “Shift, Baby, Shift.” He challenged the audience to shift the conversation and become game-changers within our industries. You need to Vuja de – to see what everyone else sees, but to see it differently (think iPhone and Zappos).

Action Step for You: Read at least two books a month from your industry. Pay attention to the trend of making emotional connections with our customers.

I never tire of listening to Bob Burg, who is the co-author of “Go-Givers Sell More” and an amazing human being. He discussed definitions of success, his own being “a feeling of peace of mind and genuine happiness based on having done one’s best to live up to their potential or having preceded a previous level.”

Then he shared his personal 13 Traits for Leadership and Development, based on those written by Ben Franklin in Ben’s autobiography. It’s that kind of personal disclosure and authenticity that speaks volumes about Bob’s own success.

Action Step for You: Read “The Autobiography” by Ben Franklin and create your own 13 Traits for Leadership and Development.

Carrie Wilkerson is the Barefoot Executive and she almost didn’t make it to #XBM because she was stuck in Ireland after the volcano erupted in Iceland. Bless her heart, she was able to sneak out of her house in Texas and away from her four children after only two hours of sleep to get to Orlando. On stage she delivered a hysterically funny presentation in which she promised that we all have an audience waiting for us.

Your audience is waiting for you. All you need to do to find them and “fill your stadium” is understand her four W’s – Want them, Woo them, Win them and Wow them.

Action Step for You: check out her blog post to see more details.

The weekend closed with Svetlana Kim’s riveting story of her immigration to the U.S. as a political refugee from Russia, using an airline ticket bought on the black market. She didn’t speak a word of English and had only $1.00 in her pocket when she landed at JFK in 1991.

She miraculously worked her way up from a cleaning lady to a stockbroker and has since become the author of “White Pearl and I: A Memoir of a Political Refugee,” an award-winning business and community leader and a Presidential fundraiser.

Action Step for You: Every morning when you wake, think of five things for which you are grateful.

As with most all events, it wasn’t just the speakers who made it so memorable, it was the relationships forged with other attendees as well. Not a lot of small chit-chat, at #XBM it was much more how can I help you and what can we create together kind of conversations.

A few weeks later now, it’s incredible to see what’s developing out of those connections. Join us next year?

More from:

• Marissa Levin talking about reaffirming your core values in the face of economic recovery
• Tinu Abayomi-Paul discusses researching financial options to expand your business

Regular contributor Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She helps people show appreciation for and give recognition to others. The main (delicious!) tool her team uses to help accomplish this important feat is through The Gratitude Cookie™. A thin, crunchy cross between a butter and a sugar cookie, The Gratitude Cookie is so named because if you’re eating the cookies, you’re encouraged to think about something you are grateful for as you munch on each one. Connect with her on Twitter.

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Calling all would-be foodpreneurs!

Our own Lori Saitz has a great event coming up for foodie-preneurs in the West Palm Beach, Fla. area, called You Should Sell That.

I asked her to tell me what made her decide to do this, and she said:

“Over the years that I’ve been building Zen Rabbit and promoting The Gratitude Cookie™ and Zen Crunch, I’ve frequently gotten phone calls from people asking how I got started. Last year I put together a 3-hour workshop to share some basics and tips. The problem was, there’s so much to know that 3 hours wasn’t nearly enough time.

“For example:

“When you’re starting a food business, some states permit you to use your home kitchen and other states don’t. But there are reasons why, even if you are legally allowed, you still might want to find space in a commercial kitchen. For example, the equipment in a commercial kitchen is just so much more efficient and you’ll probably have more space.

“Or if you have a cat or dog, no matter how well behaved the animal, and how much you clean that kitchen, at some point, fur WILL get in the food.

“There’s hardly an industry in which it’s more important to incorporate and insure your business than the food industry.

Knock on wood, but what if someone gets sick from eating your product? Even if it’s not your fault (they left your salad dressing out overnight, despite the recommendation to refrigerate, and then ate it and got sick!). You absolutely must have liability insurance. And if you’re not incorporated, you could lose every personal asset you own, including your home.

“No matter how good your brownies, granola, or salsa are, your product will not sell itself. Thousands of new food products are introduced to the market every year. What makes yours so special?

“I recommend telling a story about your recipe or journey; something that differentiates your treats from the next item and endears your customers to you.

Think Nantucket Nectars or Endangered Species Chocolate.”

Lori recruited Tim Lymberopoulos, co-founder of Fooducopia and, between the two of them, they created a much more comprehensive road map for the Start Up Food Entrepreneur. It’s two full days, April 30-May 1 in West Palm Beach, Fla.

During this two day workshop, the would-be gourmet food entrepreneur (that’s you) will get answers to the confusing questions and challenges that come up when starting out in this industry. You’ll go on a step-by-step journey to establishing your own company, including:

• Setting up your business structure
• Funding your business & establishing a budget
• Locating a place to produce your product
• Buying ingredients
• Getting distribution
• Deciding on a target market
• Choosing a company name
• Determining pricing
• Formulating a marketing plan that works
• Implementing creative, fun tactics to get attention & customers

Plus, you’ll leave with actual plans in place for going forward (not just the knowledge), a binder of recommended resources, and a strong network of colleagues to call on for support and feedback.

Sounds pretty neat, huh? You can get more information and/or register here, or contact Lori if you have more questions.

And remember to share your bounty with the rest of us at Women Grow Business!

More from:

• Lori on how an entrepreneur overcame hurricanes and more
• Monika Jansen asks, “Are you an entrepreneur or a small business owner?” at Grow Smart Business
• Building a values-driven business from Inc.com

Image © Ed Bullinger Photography, used with permission

Shonali Burke is editor of Women Grow Business and one of the country’s leading business communicators, who was named to PRWeek’s inaugural top “40 Under 40″ list of US-based PR professionals. She specializes in creating and implementing integrated (online and off), results-based, measurable communication programs for clients both large and small at Shonali Burke Consulting. An accredited business communicator, she is also Adjunct Faculty at Johns Hopkins University’s M.A. in Communications program and active in the local communications community as President of IABC/DC Metro. Talk to her via her blog, Waxing UnLyrical or Twitter.

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There’s a lot of talk these days about inbound marketing.

What’s that?

Well, most inbound marketing revolves around the use of Google, social media and blogs. In contrast, and just to clarify, most “traditional” marketing, such as cold-calling, email blasts, advertising, and direct mail would be called outbound marketing.

It’s a matter of pushing a message out when you want people to hear it vs. pulling interested parties in to your world when they’re ready to pay attention.

When I started thinking more about this topic, it occurred to me that not all inbound marketing involves the Internet. There is such a thing as traditional inbound marketing too.

Maybe you’ve heard of being a source of influence or a connector.

There are some people in the world on whom others rely for valuable information. The influencers know where you can get the best Italian food, view of the Golden Gate Bridge or deal on an HDTV. They know who you should connect with for your particular business issue today and are happy to put you in touch with her.

People call them. They don’t have to go out and shout about what they know or how they can help you. They’ve created an inbound flow through their reputation of listening, learning and then being generous in sharing knowledge. They get referrals and word of mouth business.

Their form of inbound marketing existed long before the Internet.

Chris Brogan, President of New Marketing Labs, was quoted at the Inbound Marketing Summit last year as saying, “Listening is the new black.”

Sorry, but this is not new.

This is the main component of traditional marketing, or building relationships, (which is what marketing and customer service is). Maybe the new part is applying it to online marketing.

But it’s always been the starting point for any kind of inbound marketing.

So what’s the relevance for you?

Think about all the opportunities you have to position yourself as the go-to person in your community. You don’t have to be the most outgoing, extroverted person either, if that’s not your personality.

Remember, this strategy starts with listening, which some of those more gregarious networkers don’t do! Be yourself, go out, get to know others and get to know what they know.

See, you don’t have to know everything yourself, you just have to know where to find information. Then you can connect others to it.

And pretty soon, you become that go-to person and, now, you’ve created your own, traditional, inbound marketing.

Resources:

• HubSpot on inbound marketing
• Beth Kanter’s musings on the subject (and book)
• Regular contributor Melanie Spring’s post on creating a sisterhood of women business owners (which is all about relationship-building)

Image: melgupta’s Flickrstream, Creative Commons

Regular contributor Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She helps people show appreciation for and give recognition to others. The main (delicious!) tool her team uses to help accomplish this important feat is through The Gratitude Cookie™. A thin, crunchy cross between a butter and a sugar cookie, The Gratitude Cookie is so named because if you’re eating the cookies, you’re encouraged to think about something you are grateful for as you munch on each one. Connect with her on Twitter.

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Making the connection

I attended a networking lunch the other day, and sat at a table where two people were discovering they have a common target market. They were making arrangements to meet next week and explore how they might work together.

My mind immediately put together how the one who specializes in financial services for seniors could use the other (a concierge car service for older people who can no longer drive themselves) for client appreciation. Not one to keep such a good idea to myself, I spoke up.

“Hey, Mr. Financial Services, do you realize you could use Concierge Car Service as a thank you to your clients after they close a deal with you? Maybe give them five hours of service if it’s appropriate.”

He said he hadn’t even thought of that, and he liked the concept.

From referral to cross-promotion

How often have you gotten together with a new contact to learn about what each other does and see if you can send each other referrals? Happens all the time, right? Maybe you share a few business cards from your database or the date of the next industry association meeting.

I challenge you to think more imaginatively. Is there another way you can work together or promote each others’ businesses?

Show your appreciation for business success

As you may have heard me rant about before, showing appreciation for your clients is critical to your business success. (Up to 68% of clients will stop doing business with you simply because they don’t think you appreciate their patronage.)

And if you’re not be in a position to hand out Kindles or Apple iPads as thank you gifts, all the more reason to get creative.

You can always afford… something

Think about who you know, or as you’re meeting new contacts, and how you can perhaps give their products or services to your customers in gratitude of their business.

Know someone who runs a car wash or a gardening store or a pet sitting service? Maybe you wouldn’t typically think you could help promote their business, but you can. Give your client a 10-pack of car washes, a nice plant or 3-days of pet sitting time. (Whatever you do, don’t give them $$ off coupons for these services! Tacky!)

Win-win

Everyone benefits here. You get all the benefits of happy, loyal clients. Your contact gets your business, as well as introductions to new potential customers. And your clients get acknowledgment that you value them.

Added bonus for you, your contacts and your clients will feel more indebted to you, because you did something nice, and will be more likely to send you additional business or referrals.

Got you thinking? Here’s more:

• … of Lori’s writings on customer service at Women Grow Business
• Eco & Budget-Friendly Client Appreciation Gifts from Biznik
• 12 Ways to Thank Your Customers from BusinessInfoGuide.com

Image: Charlie Nguyen, Creative Commons

Regular contributor Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She helps people show appreciation for and give recognition to others. The main (delicious!) tool her team uses to help accomplish this important feat is through The Gratitude Cookie(tm). A thin, crunchy cross between a butter and a sugar cookie, The Gratitude Cookie is so named because if you’re eating the cookies, you’re encouraged to think about something you are grateful for as you munch on each one. Connect with her on Twitter.

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As a successful business person, you probably have an effective system for staying in touch with your prospects throughout the sales process.

But do you have an equally effective system for staying in touch with those same people once they’ve become clients? Or after their project has been completed?

If not, you could be missing out on significant opportunities.

From hot water heater to just… hot water

I was talking with a neighbor the other day who was having issues with her hot water heater. She’d had someone repair it in the past, and was perfectly happy with their work, but she couldn’t remember the name of the company she had called then.

If the company had the foresight to stay in touch with her, they could have gotten even more business from her, as well as from referrals she might send their way.

Think about how busy you are and how much information you’re required to retain every day.

Your customers are experiencing the same overload, so it’s highly unlikely they’re remembering you and your company unless you are reminding them you exist.

Pick your popcorn

Sure, you can overdo it and become a pest. I’m not suggesting you use the Popcorn Factory method of emailing customers every other day with a new promo.

Depending on your business model, you could send out a weekly, bi-weekly or monthly newsletter with useful, inspiring information.

Or cards to celebrate random “holidays” (did you know that the first week in March is National Write a Letter of Appreciation Week? Or that the 14^th is Potato Chip Day? And no, I’m not making this up!).

Or you could implement a strategy that gives your clients more personal attention, something almost all humans crave.

Last year I experimented with calling my clients just to see how I could help them, in a way not necessarily related to my business’ product. I had gotten the idea from a vendor who had called me to ask what she could do to help my business – was there anyone she could introduce me to? It felt so good to know that person wanted to help me, I was eager to see how it worked from the other side.

I was surprised at how caught off-guard they all were, as if no one had ever called with such a question unless they had an ulterior motive. Most of them didn’t even have an answer. But it gave me an opportunity to reconnect with them.

You might not get more business from them immediately, but this is about strengthening the relationship.

And over time, those who consistently check in with their clients are the ones who create a better customer experience, have higher customer loyalty and more referral business.

More from:

• Coach Jaynine’s Blog on the necessity of follow up in customer service
• Creating a follow up schedule
• How to follow up with customers and give them the gift of attention

Image: Mathew Winchester, Creative Commons

Guest contributor Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She helps people show appreciation for and give recognition to others. The main (delicious!) tool her team uses to help accomplish this important feat is through The Gratitude Cookie(tm). A thin, crunchy cross between a butter and a sugar cookie, The Gratitude Cookie is so named because if you’re eating the cookies, you’re encouraged to think about something you are grateful for as you munch on each one.

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Remember back in the day when the worst thing that could happen to a business owner was that the customer would leave without comment and then tell a few of her friends about the bad experience?

Back in 1998, when Chief Executive Salesman Jeffrey Gitomer published his book, “Customer Satisfaction is Worthless, Customer Loyalty is Priceless,” he claimed customers would tell three people if you did a good job, 10 if you did a great job, 25 if you did a bad job and 50 if you got into an argument with them.

Now that we all have access to Twitter and Facebook and Yelp and all the various other social media tools, think how quickly those numbers multiply, for good and bad. Instantaneous feedback, shared with thousands can be a blessing or a nightmare. It all depends on how you, as an entrepreneur, handle your issues and manage your reputation.

You do have control

At first thought, you might think that you have no control over what your customers say about your business. You do your best to provide quality service and let it go at that. In reality, you do have much more control.

Are you encouraging your customers to talk about you? Whether they have something good or bad to say, as a business owner, I want to know.

Back in the “old” days, restaurants had comment cards that you could drop in a box at the front or mail in to corporate headquarters. But as a customer, you couldn’t be sure anyone was really reading them or taking action on your comments.

Setting the stage

Now for example, a restaurant could have tent cards on the tables encouraging patrons to write a review on Yelp. In return, everyone who submits a review gets a coupon for a future visit. They don’t have to submit a favorable review to get such a “reward,” just an honest one.

Certainly, positive and negative feedback would be valuable to the establishment in improving their customer’s experience. And if the restaurant is encouraging public feedback, it goes a long way to making the statement that management actually cares about what kind of experience they are creating.

So you may not hand out comment cards if you’re in a professional service business, but you can still set the stage for feedback. For example:

• Encourage your clients to post their opinions of your service on your web site or your blog, or anywhere else that might be appropriate.
• Call them once the service has been completed and ask if they were treated well and if there is anything your business could do better.
• Ideally, (with the client’s permission) you can record these calls and post the audio.

The bottom line is that you can use this new level of transparency to your benefit. And for your competitors who choose not to play along, well, they’ll face an accelerated death (that they’ll blame on the economy).

More from:

• HubSpot on how Dominos is using customer feedback
• dp dialogue on how social media has changed word of mouth marketing
• Lori Saitz and three ways business can cultivate customer service

Guest contributor Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She helps people show appreciation for and give recognition to others. The main (delicious!) tool her team uses to help accomplish this important feat is through The Gratitude Cookie(tm). A thin, crunchy cross between a butter and a sugar cookie, The Gratitude Cookie is so named because if you’re eating the cookies, you’re encouraged to think about something you are grateful for as you munch on each one.

Image: Justin Silva, Creative Commons

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I am truly grateful for all the amazing relationships I’ve developed through social media!

I have met some of the most wonderful people, some of whom have become clients, others with whom I’ve built synergistic partnerships. It continues to astound me how strong these connections can be.

I would not be part of the Women Grow Business community were it not for Twitter!

And my encounters continue to reaffirm my belief that people in this world are all one – more similar than different.

Since first reading Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich
I had been interested in experiencing the power of a mastermind group. I am most grateful for the opportunity to participate in a mastermind facilitated by business coach and mentor Fabienne Fredrickson this year.

As part of this small, handpicked group of entrepreneurs
I was challenged to stretch my beliefs of what was possible for my business and personal life. Our “sacred circle” unconditionally supported and cheered for each other through all the struggles and accomplishments.

There are a lot of fantastic business mentors with mastermind programs; I highly recommend finding one that fits for everyone who’s working on creating a successful business and fulfilling life.

Image Aim High by Sean Rogers1, Creative Commons

It’s very difficult and there’s absolutely no reason to do it alone.
Before this next declaration I’m about to make…let me first say that my company as it is now is not going away. I am very grateful for the insight and foundation Zen Rabbit has provided. I needed the experience of running Zen Rabbit in order to gain the knowledge and make the connections necessary to pursue this new venture.

Sometimes what seems pointless or frustrating or without obvious purpose is really preparation for the next step. Once you realize this truth, a whole new horizon opens up and you – okay I – can hardly wait to get going!

Okay so now I’ll share!
I am creating information products and workshops to help start-up food entrepreneurs build wildly successful businesses. And I’m very excited about it!

How about you?
What business accomplishments or decisions are you most grateful for this year? What favorable outcomes developed – those desired and unexpected?

More from:

• Lori Saitz and her Women Grow Business series on customer service;
• Carla Briceno and 4 insights from 2009 as a small business owner;
• Gayle Laakmann and her popular three-tier approach post to entrepreneurship — with one suggestion to experiment often, carefully, and singly.

Guest contributor Lori Saitz is founder of Zen Rabbit Baking Company. She helps people show appreciation for and give recognition to others. The main (delicious!) tool her team uses to help accomplish this important feat is through The Gratitude Cookie(tm). A thin, crunchy cross between a butter and a sugar cookie, The Gratitude Cookie is so named because if you’re eating the cookies, you’re encouraged to think about something you are grateful for as you munch on each one.

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