I’m trying to get back on track with my blogging, and I wanted to put out a request for editorial ideas for 2010.  We will be working on the CBO’s print editorial calendar, as well as ideas for our e-newsletter, webinars and web original content.  We will be looking at what relevant and practical topics we need to tackle to enrich our readers and website visitors in the coming year.

I’d love to have your feedback as we work through our ideas.  I just attended an invaluable three days at the Construction Financial Management Association (CFMA) annual meeting last month and, as always, returned with a multitude of editorial ideas. But I’d also like to hear from our readers, print and online, about what you need or want to read more of to help you get through and manage your business during this very difficult time.  What do you have questions about, what are you struggling with, what wonderful new concept, investment or product is helping you or what is driving you crazy?   

Let me know what you think and what research we can do here to get you the advice you can use to maintain and/or grow your business right now—and I’ve heard more than once lately, “maintain” is the new “grow”.  It would be nice, though, to defy the odds and effectively cut expenses and build business just enough to show some growth through this period.

Help us to help you.  I look forward to hearing from you. 

Great customer service is a requirement for repeat business from clients. And repeat business probably represents a significant portion of your business, or should—that and referrals, also the result of a satisfied customer. It is not only important to provide excellent customer service, but to also remind your customers of that fact regularly so they don’t forget. You can do this in very inexpensive ways. 

Create a customer satisfaction survey to send to your clients after a job is complete. Make it simple, one page, and provide them with a stamped envelope so all they have to do is fill it out and return it. Ask them to rate the job you did, ask about timeliness, cost, communication, courtesy, cleanliness and safety issues. Ask about how your staff performed. Give them 1-5 boxes to check—good to poor. Within this survey, you can also ask for quotes to share with others on promotional material and ask for referrals from them at the same time. Thank them when they respond, and if you get negative responses, then address those issues with them and with staff in the hopes of saving the client and improving your service.

If sending this survey out throughout the year is too difficult to manage, do it once every 6 months or once a year to all your clients served since the last survey was sent. This is a simple way to both find out what you did right as well as what you did wrong. It shows that you care about your customers and it reminds your customer that you are still around and want their business again.

OK, so here is my first blog—now that I have started, there’s no stopping me…. 

We are excited about our new blogging section and hope that you find it interesting and beneficial.  We have enjoyed seeing all the comments posted so far for our other bloggers.  What would you like to read about?  Let me know what we can write about to make this site the one you go to first every morning.

How has your business been in the past few weeks/months and what is the outlook for you moving toward year-end and into 2009?  What kind of changes do you anticipate making to keep your bottom line positive?  Will those changes relate to equipment, people, cash flow, marketing or technology?  Where do you expect to focus your energies, cut back or re-evaluate to deal with a volatile economy?

Now is certainly a time for action, reflection, and…well, more action.  None of us can rest on our laurels or assume that what has always worked before will continue to work.  We must be educating ourselves, reading and listening to all that is going on around us.  That is why I blog now, that is why I went on Twitter this weekend and started to Tweet (check this out http://twitter.com/tambram and follow my tweeting).  You may want to Tweet as well, or blog to market your business.  I have also been on Linked in (www.linkedin.com) for a while—a business network you might consider as a marketing tool.

We must all look for how to better market ourselves, better provide for our clients, better run our companies, better manage our staff so we can stay in this business until we no longer want to or no longer can work.  That is our challenge—a big one.  But learning something new every day just makes it more fun to get up every morning.  What is something new you learned today?