5 Tips for Business Success by Penny Spencer, Director of Spencer Travel

Penny Spencer is the founder and Director of Spencer Travel. Established in 1998 Spencer Travel is a multi-award winning company which has been voted Australia’s Best Corporate Travel Agency for the last 3 years in a row and is also a recent recipient of the 2012 City of Sydney Business Award for Tourism. Having worked in the industry for over 28 years and having built her own company from scratch Penny now shares her business and life lessons to aspiring female entrepreneurs.
There is no secret recipe for success. It is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out. And it goes without saying – action is the foundation key to all success.

5 Tips for Business Success by Penny Spencer

1. Love what you do
For me the most important things is being passionate about what you do. Travel was something that always interested me. When I first got on a plane at the age of 6 I knew I wanted to work in something to do with travel. The excitement of going somewhere new, the plane trip, being part of an adventure- I knew this was what I wanted to do when I grew up. Even after years of working in the Industry I can honestly say that I still love everything about what I do. I still have the energy for the industry and for my business. I learn something new every day and I love a challenge. All of that gets me out of bed in the morning – every day is a new experience.

2. Always go the extra mile
Despite having climbed the ranks of the industry and having managed many corporate travel agencies throughout my career, opening my own agency presented its own challenges. Whilst I had the passion and knowledge for the industry, figuring out how to run the business was something new for me.
In order to increase my business management skills I joined the NSW Government and ABN Mentoring program in my second year of running the business. It is not enough to just know your industry –you have to know how to run a business in your industry.
Running a business brings its own challenges and I constantly seek new ways to further enhance the growth of the business. I am committed to striking a balance with my husband and two young children and as part of this I work Tuesday to Friday giving me three days for my family. It takes a lot of persistence, stamina, energy and business ability to do what I do.

3. Be adaptable
There are numerous obstacles in every business, but I think the biggest obstacle is dealing with change and adapting to it. September 11 was a big obstacle for the travel industry as the phone stopped ringing and didn’t ring again for 6 months or more. You need to adapt to these sorts of obstacles, think of new ways of doing business, communicate with staff and clients and most of all believe in yourself that you can look beyond the obstacle and plan for the future.

4. Always re-educate
I continue to develop my business acumen never believing that I know it all. I love self-education. I strive for this regularly and acknowledge the importance as a Managing Director of a business to be accountable. I was a member of The Executive Connection for 5 years and have since joined EO – Entrepreneurs Organisation. I am a member of numerous advisory boards and industry groups. It is crucially important to stay connected with likeminded business people to ensure you never miss a beat.

5. Inspire your staff
You need to instil a sense of passion and commitment in your staff. Management need to make staff feel they are part of something they can be proud of. My businesses are successful not only in profitability but also in overall culture, respect and profile. Most staff have been with me for over 6 years. I have 4 staff that are part of our ‘10 year One Carat Diamond Club’ where staff receive a 1 carat diamond for 10 years of service. I strongly believe that ‘happy staff equals happy clients.’

5 Communication Tips for Engaging Customers

I know it is stating the bleeding obvious but these are the only methods to grow your business; To increase your revenue you need to get your current customers to buy more or get more customers. To increase profit you need to find a more efficient way of serving your customers that delivers greater value so they are happy to pay more. Achieving these objectives requires effective and resourceful management of your customer relationships. This requires engaging communication strategies with valuable communication. Here are some tips to help you do that.

  1. Know your customer profitability. In particular, who are your most profitable customers and your least profitable. Generally you will find that 20% of your customers will bring in 80% of your revenue. Analyse their characteristics to put them in groups; identify the common characteristics of each group. For highest revenue growth, target more prospects who are like your profitable customers and avoid the least-profitable types.
  2. Understand your customers. What do they value and what do they want? Where do they gather their information and how do they like to communicate? Knowing this will help you make decisions so you deliver the right message to the right customer at the right time via the right media channel. If you know what they want, you can provide it. If you don’t know, ask them!
  3. Define your relationship strategy. You want different relationships with each group of customers. The aim is to increase the loyalty and spending of your most profitable customers, therefore you want in-depth communication with them, individually if you can. As there is little business value in relationships with your least profitable customers beyond maintaining the connection, they should receive less communication that is more general in nature and lower cost to serve. This will help you get the best return on investment on your marketing and customer service spend.
  4. Plan your two-way communication. Create a plan for your communication with each group of customers; how often, which communication channel/medium, what message and what offers will you make so that you deliver just what your customer wants. Also be sure to plan how you will receive communication from your customers. A relationship requires two-way communication so you need to listen to your customers to understand them and know what they value. Be sure to save and analyse this feedback and information as it is very valuable to your business – especially if it is negative. It is best to know what you need to fix.
  5. Always focus on the value you deliver. In every communication, make sure you deliver value to your customer – in their terms and not just what you think is value. Ensure you have a message and offer that is valuable and important to them. Knowing your most profitable customers well means you can offer more of what they like and hence acquire more customers like them. Consequently you will increase you profitability and your revenue.

These are some of the tips for good customer relationship management. I know it is a lot easier said than done, but if you start with the right relationship and communication strategies for your customers, it will be a lot easier for you to grow your business. You can always call on coaches like me to help you execute these tips.

Janeen Sonsie

Janeen is the founder of Get Real Communication and an international speaker, coach and facilitator who is passionate about how people communicate and relate to each other in all relationships – both business and personal. For the last 20 years Janeen has been facilitating hands-on workshops with some of the world’s leading companies (such as Cisco, HP, Oracle and Microsoft) in over 10 countries around Asia-Pacific, the UK and the USA helping them improve their communication, relationships and profits. Janeen is available for business and relationship coaching.

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