...and another thing

Call me a bandwagon jumper if you will, but I expect you've noticed all the media coverage of web 2.0, social networking and new media recently. Blimey O'Reilly, it's like journalists have suddenly got themselves a computer and the Daily Mail readership has finally entered the digital age. Apologies to my mother in law, an unashamed Daily Mail reader who's been online for ages! http://www.coombecrafts.co.uk/index.html

Some (but I guess not all) of you will already be aware of our Facebook group http://www.facebook.com/ NTU SPEED Project. When your dufus project co-ordinator set it up she was a little over excited and didn't read the manual...thus you have to be a member of the Nottingham Trent network to join it. Not a member? Catch yourself on and join us!

Are you using social networking sites to promote your business? If The British Library, Stephen Fry, Hilary Benn MP and countless others have woken up to the power of the social network, maybe you should too. Of course Chris Dykes has informed me that Facebook is over, but could someone please tell me where I should be looking next?

Oh yes, another thing. My last post included a promise of holiday snaps...this is Jack's urban surfing trick

SPEED update

Apologies, I have been remiss in keeping this blog up to date. Who would have thought that I would get too busy to blog? If I am honest, the other reason is my feeling that I send these words out into the ether and there they stay, trapped and unread! My inspiration came when a friend told me in the pub that she had read my blog! Imagine my surprise, she's not connected to SPEED at all, I had sent the initial posting to my long suffering friends and forgotten about it.

Did you know there is a Hive in Mansfield too? http://businesshive.ntu.ac.uk/event2.asp Based at the i-centre, hive@mansfield has been created to to support entrepreneurs in the north of Nottinghamshire. Mike Huxley, the Outreach Project Manager based in Mansfield has provided this link for finding suppliers of various products from China, India and Turkey for several Hive participants http://www.alibaba.com/ I believe our very own Dave Hammond http://www.muddesigns.co.uk/ has used this site for finding overseas suppliers of planters.

Another area we have been receiving many enquiries about is funding and finance. (oh yes, that old chestnut!) I had the following information from Claire Cox, Hive Operations Manager.

'You may be aware that The Hive’s Seedcorn Fund, a joint programme between EMDA and Nottingham Trent University has now concluded and is not likely to be repeated, at least in the short to medium term. We are therefore, looking for other options that might replace it but cannot suggest that there will be anything soon. Therefore, in the meantime can I remind everyone of EMDA’s East Midland’s Early Growth Fund (EMEGF) which might be an appropriate source of investment funding for some business ventures, at the right time.

The EMEGF is a £5m regional Venture Capital fund, sponsored by the East Midlands Development Agency, with the intention to support young start up and early stage companies in the region. The fund may provide funding in the region of £20,000 to £200,000 per company, in return for any equity stake. In addition, the fund expects their funding to be matched by other sources of finance, which may include the founders, Business Angels or other Venture Capital. http://www.earlygrowthfund-em.co.uk/main/default.aspx

As with any funding, it's a good idea to talk through with us before making any approach, as we may be able to point you in the right direction and even help you in drafting your application!

There is also to be another round of the Anubis Project http://www.anubisproject.co.uk/ aimed at technological (is that a real word?) innovators

That's all I can fit in for now, pics of the (v wet) holiday in Wales to follow...

We have been having a lively discussion in the Hive about customer service. We all experience customer service every day, so feel qualified to comment on it. Unfortunately, we prefer to moan about poor service, rather than praise the good.

Having been a shop girl myself at Husqvarna Studio http://www.husqvarnastudio.co.uk/ I know the frustrations of poor customer service from both sides of the counter so to speak! My philosophy was always to treat the customer as I would expect to be treated, telling them in good time about any delays, making sure I exceeded their expectations. Husqvarna Studio, Nottingham is a owner run business in a very small market, which survives and thrives on it's customer service ethic. Other businesses may offer similar products and price, but bossman Neil competes on his staff's friendly, customer oriented outlook. Believe me, it makes all the difference in a competitive market!

Maybe the fear of conflict or even the anticipation of conflict plays a role in poor customer relations. Funny really, because if you have bad news, it doesn't get any better the longer you put off that phone call. In fact, in my experience it just gets worse! If the customer has to ring you, you are only reacting, not acting on their behalf. Get it right and your customer will tell their friend, get it wrong and they will tell 7 of their friends! I might have the actual figure wrong, but it's alot!

So let me ask you this, is it good customer service to sell a product, accept the payment for it and then not contact your customer when there are delays? Or to ring a prospect with an offer they can't refuse, then not ring them back to ask for the order? What about having an out of date website (sewing machine dealers are notorious for this but guess what, not Husqvarna Studio!)

Take care of your customers, whoever they are, and they will look after you. Live up to their expectations and they will like you. Exceed their expectations and they will love you and stay with you!

End of Term

If you have ever wondered what the Hive does, and what we offer visit http://www.businesshive.ntu.ac.uk/activities.asp. I work for Phil on the SPEED project, although his role is much more diverse than that. The Hive is a dedicated business incubation unit, with facilities for start up businesses from with Nottingham Trent University and beyond.

What makes the Hive so dynamic is the range of people and businesses it's involved with. It's a fun place to work in and do business from, but supportive too. Not all the entrepreneurs are NTU graduates, nor are they all Business Studies graduates.

We have links with many of the schools, with students from Art and Design, Infomatics (that was a new one on me when I joined NTU!) and Education to name but a few.

There are a few SPEED entrepreneurs who are reaching the end of their placement. Marc Lee http://www.eyetxt.com/ Dan Breen http://www.uni-fied.co.uk/ and Stuart Hogg http://www.sphmarketing.co.uk/ have been with us for 12 months. Luckily we won't miss them for long, as one way or another they are keeping contact with us at the Hive.

Busy times ahead

It's quite an exciting time in the Hive at the moment. There are a number of new businesses getting started, with the June HeadStart programme just beginning and a new SPEED cohort joining us. We are losing a couple though, Nik Venios and Stuart Hogg are both moving home. We'll miss them!

Phil and I are planning our SPEED seminars which start on 22nd June. Phil is really keen to get away from the blackboard and get into a dialogue, which really gets you thinking about your business. Our aim is to engage you in the process of learning about starting up a business. We won't be telling you how to do it, more helping you find out how you will approach it. At the end of the day, we want our SPEED students to learn by doing and there's no better teacher than real experience!

We still need suggestions for topics, the list so far is- finding and retaining customers, getting funding, what happens when you set up a limited company and what goes into a business plan. If you want to add to that, either contact me directly or post a comment. If we can cover it on the sessions or in the blog, we will.

Jayne

SPEED Project Stuff

Typical, get all preachy about making regular contact with people and then get too busy to practise it! Sorry.

It's been a busy few days, the end of last week saw the SPEED project at NTU being audited, which was fairly painless. Thanks to Kawsar www.digicomsolutions.com and Marc www.eyetxt.com for answering questions and standing up to a bit of stick from our visitor!

Then the bank holiday came and went with wind, rain and chilly nights. I know this because a thin piece of nylon was all that stood between me and the elements. Yes, that's right we went camping, like the fools we were. Oh , we knew the forecast, but hoped against hope that it was wrong.

Today I am putting together a project file for our local SPEED Project, not the most scintillating task, but it has to be done.

I must say I am proud of NTU's presence on the SPEED project website www.speedproject.ac.uk, our fellows directory entries look very impressive. If you feel your listing could be improved, just email me any text, images or hyperlinks that you want putting on, as I have to upload the info.

A Staffs SPEED student has posted what may be a useful link onto the message board there. you will need to log in to view the message board. I'm not going to tell you what the link is, find it yourself!

June will hopefully be a busy month, with new SPEEDsters joining us and a workshop timetable starting. We have a module on the VLP now, which I am trying to populate. Any recommended texts, websites and questions gratefully recieved. The website, VLP module, blog and facebook group http://notttr.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2535691211 will only be as useful as you make them.

Cheers

Jayne

walk to work

The next 3 weeks are Greenweeks http://www.livingfortomorrow.org.uk/greenweeks.htm/, so in honour of that, yesterday I walked in to work.

I admit, I didn't walk all of my journey as I live a fair way out, so I got my usual bus halfway and walked the rest up Mansfield Road. It was good, the sun shone and I enjoyed most of it. I have decided that I can definitely get off the bus earlier and walk through the Arboretum to the Hive.

How did I find out about this event and why did I respond? I stumbled across it first in a newspaper article and details were emailed to NTU staff about a week ago. Importantly, they both had a call to action, get off the bus and walk etc. Then on the email you could sign up and pledge your action. It got me thinking about how we reach our target market, and more importantly how we get them to act upon what they see or hear.

Reaching your target audience is hard enough. When you have reached them, how do you make sure you don't waste the opportunity if they don't buy into your product or service first time? I think the simplest way is to capture details so you can make contact with them another time, so get them to sign up to a mailing list, enter a competition, anything to keep in touch with them.

One more thing, if you say you are going to send regular updates, do! That's the other difficult bit..