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Hi there.
Speaker:I see that you made it over to the new tips
Speaker:and talk portion of the podcast.
Speaker:These are bite-sized topics that I pull from community questions and
Speaker:things that I'm observing in the world of handmade small business.
Speaker:Today, let's have a conversation around the powerful impact you can
Speaker:have through small gestures.
Speaker:By the end of this episode,
Speaker:you're going to have our ideas.
Speaker:So things that you can implement into your business that will
Speaker:help you bring in more sales and attract more customers.
Speaker:This all got prompted by something that happened to me last
Speaker:week. And I'm going to tell you about that in a
Speaker:second. You know,
Speaker:the Maya Angelo quote that says,
Speaker:it's not what you say or what you do.
Speaker:It's how you make someone feel.
Speaker:That's the whole premise behind all of this,
Speaker:the power of small gestures and why they really matter is
Speaker:that they make people feel something.
Speaker:They make your customers feel.
Speaker:I feel like you see them,
Speaker:not just,
Speaker:you see people as a customer group,
Speaker:you see me as an individual,
Speaker:and that means something to us,
Speaker:and that makes us feel more connected,
Speaker:more supported,
Speaker:and more invested in your product and wanting to buy what
Speaker:you sell.
Speaker:So let me share with you what happened last week,
Speaker:I'm working with a virtual assistant in the Philippines to do
Speaker:the podcast,
Speaker:editing some of the social media posting,
Speaker:that type of thing.
Speaker:And she did something for me last week that was so
Speaker:unexpected. So out of the blue and truly affected my whole
Speaker:day, it was small,
Speaker:but so thoughtful and meaningful.
Speaker:And that's why it was significant and important.
Speaker:So what did she do?
Speaker:She's all the way in the Philippines.
Speaker:It's not like she sent me something in the physical mail,
Speaker:but she did send something to me in email.
Speaker:It was beautiful.
Speaker:She sent me a photo of a message that she wrote
Speaker:for me.
Speaker:So let me read this message.
Speaker:And if you want to see it,
Speaker:Oh, posted over on my Instagram page at gift biz on
Speaker:wrap to show you what she did,
Speaker:but she's practicing her calligraphy.
Speaker:So she wrote me a note,
Speaker:took a picture of that note and sent it to me
Speaker:via email.
Speaker:And the note said the world needs more people like you.
Speaker:Thank you for being you.
Speaker:I am beyond grateful to work and learn so much from
Speaker:you cheers to more podcasts.
Speaker:Love Michelle.
Speaker:I have to tell you when I opened that email,
Speaker:I thought it was just going to be regular communication that
Speaker:we do with each other back and forth.
Speaker:But it wasn't.
Speaker:That affected me so much,
Speaker:even though we've been working today,
Speaker:the other for like four years,
Speaker:it bonded us together.
Speaker:Even more.
Speaker:Sometimes I forget the impact that some of these small gestures
Speaker:can have until they get circled back and are done to
Speaker:me again.
Speaker:So that's what I want to do for you is circle
Speaker:back to you and reinforce the fact that these small gestures
Speaker:can mean the world to you and growing your business relationships.
Speaker:And I want to share with you a couple of things
Speaker:that I'm doing within both of my companies to also get
Speaker:these small gestures,
Speaker:because these can spark ideas for you,
Speaker:of things that you can do with your customers.
Speaker:Too many of you know,
Speaker:I have a company called the ribbon print company.
Speaker:You can find it on Instagram at ribbon print,
Speaker:and we sell custom ribbon printing machines there.
Speaker:One of the things I started doing last year and truth
Speaker:be told I've slacked off a little bit on this lately.
Speaker:So if you're a customer,
Speaker:you might start seeing this again.
Speaker:It's kind of kicked me to reinforce me to do this
Speaker:again. I use this app called BOM BOM,
Speaker:BOM, B B O M B.
Speaker:And what it does is it connects with my Gmail accounts.
Speaker:So I have a business suite Gmail account that we use
Speaker:for the ribbon print company.
Speaker:And what I do is I pick a certain number of
Speaker:people a week right now it's four.
Speaker:And people who either send in orders called in with questions,
Speaker:anything like that,
Speaker:what I do is I use this app BombBomb and it
Speaker:goes right from your email.
Speaker:You just click it and it's a video.
Speaker:It's not just audio it's video.
Speaker:So I can say to somebody,
Speaker:Hey Vicky,
Speaker:thank you so much for your business.
Speaker:I really appreciate it.
Speaker:Why did you to know that we got your order out
Speaker:right away?
Speaker:Appreciate you so much.
Speaker:If you have any questions,
Speaker:no, that we're always there for you.
Speaker:Goodbye. You know,
Speaker:and then what happens is it comes to them.
Speaker:It gets delivered to them in their email box,
Speaker:through a link,
Speaker:they open the link and then they see that message.
Speaker:I get so much positive feedback out of doing that.
Speaker:I can't even tell you.
Speaker:And there are other apps out there that you can do
Speaker:this with.
Speaker:I like BombBomb.
Speaker:Cause I like doing it right when I'm in front of
Speaker:my computer or it's more efficient for me.
Speaker:But another app that you can use for this is called
B O N J O R O.
Speaker:And that one is just an app on your phone.
Speaker:So you can speak right into your phone,
Speaker:think of how nice this would be for brand new customers.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:you've never had them before you recognize that this is an
Speaker:order from someone who you're not familiar with pop on and
Speaker:just say,
Speaker:Hey, you made my day by placing that order of that
Speaker:gorgeous pink crocheted hat that I just made.
Speaker:It's one of my favorites.
Speaker:Can't wait to send it to you.
Speaker:And then it goes,
Speaker:and then they receive the message,
Speaker:turn this around and think about how you would feel if
Speaker:you were receiving that from somebody and how special and meaningful
Speaker:it is and why is it special and meaningful because not
Speaker:many people do that.
Speaker:Right? And one of the things that you might say about
Speaker:this first example,
Speaker:I have a couple more examples to share with you here.
Speaker:But one of the things you might say to me about
Speaker:this first one is Sue.
Speaker:It's not scalable.
Speaker:Like there is no way as I grow bigger,
Speaker:I'm going to be able to call every single person who
Speaker:places an order or every day be able to do that.
Speaker:Think of this in a different way.
Speaker:Think of if you only were able to reach four people
Speaker:in one day,
Speaker:that's four people that you never would have reached if you
Speaker:weren't doing it at all.
Speaker:Yeah. Some of these things aren't going to ever be scalable,
Speaker:but that's okay.
Speaker:If you can continually on a very small step of basis,
Speaker:be deepening relationships with two or three customers a day,
Speaker:or even say a week that's more than you were doing
Speaker:before. Also with the ribbon print company when people place orders.
Speaker:So it's not when they're just buying the ribbon printer,
Speaker:but they might be regular customers.
Speaker:And they're buying supplies.
Speaker:We will include a printed ribbon with some type of motivational
Speaker:quote in with their order.
Speaker:Laurie is the one who does this.
Speaker:She loves being creative and does the printing and add some
Speaker:fun graphics of the ribbon and finds a fun quote,
Speaker:just like the one that I was saying earlier.
Speaker:And so then when people open their orders,
Speaker:they see a ribbon with a motivational quote,
Speaker:along with their packing slip,
Speaker:along with their product.
Speaker:Anything else that we needed to include in that particular order?
Speaker:We've gotten so many comments about how much people are liking
Speaker:these ribbons and guess what they're doing,
Speaker:they're sharing them forward too.
Speaker:So not only are the people who are receiving their orders,
Speaker:seeing the ribbon since it was like a motivational inspirational gift
Speaker:that we're giving them,
Speaker:they're sharing them forward.
Speaker:I think that is so cool.
Speaker:And especially when people are ordering multiple times,
Speaker:they're going to get the same quote because we change it
Speaker:out once a month,
Speaker:we have them sitting right on our shipping station,
Speaker:right near where all the orders go out.
Speaker:So we pick one up,
Speaker:put it in the order.
Speaker:So it's not like we're printing one every single time in
Speaker:orders placed,
Speaker:right. Story from total party is saying,
Speaker:love, getting those coats.
Speaker:And I see a couple of customers here.
Speaker:So you guys know that that's what we do.
Speaker:And like I said,
Speaker:we've gotten great feedback about that.
Speaker:And it's very fine.
Speaker:And we've just put it into our system.
Speaker:Any of you have ribbon printers,
Speaker:copy it,
Speaker:do the same thing if you want to.
Speaker:And there's other ways that you could put a spin on
Speaker:this two handwritten notes.
Speaker:Again, I get the fact that this isn't,
Speaker:but it's something that you can do short term or sometimes
Speaker:maybe for brand new customers,
Speaker:total party.
Speaker:I hang them on my bulletin board for inspiration.
Speaker:Yeah. And I think Anita keeps all of them and has
Speaker:a stack of them.
Speaker:I think she just keeps them and that cause she can
Speaker:reproduce them on her own ribbon printer too.
Speaker:Anyway. So that's another thing we do something else that I
Speaker:do within the podcast.
Speaker:So this is over on the gift biz side is anyone
Speaker:who's a guest on the show.
Speaker:International guests is a little bit harder because it gets very
Speaker:pricey in the shipping.
Speaker:But you know,
Speaker:in the beginning of the podcast where I ask about the
Speaker:motivational candle,
Speaker:I ask people if they were to tell us a little
Speaker:more about themselves by way of a motivational candle,
Speaker:what color would the panel be?
Speaker:And what would be a quote,
Speaker:the color because people who are listening are all creatives and
Speaker:you can learn things about people with favorite colors,
Speaker:right? Or the colors that they select.
Speaker:And then they explain why they chose that color.
Speaker:And then the inspirational quote always moves on to good conversation
Speaker:just to kick off the podcast.
Speaker:But then we take that quote and we put it on
Speaker:ribbon and attach it to a candle and send it to
Speaker:them as a thank you for being a guest on the
Speaker:show. So I'm thinking about other things that maybe you do,
Speaker:whatever you make and whatever you provide.
Speaker:Maybe there's a little something surprising that you can put in
Speaker:the box along with orders,
Speaker:Catherine of classic legacy was on recently and she got a
Speaker:candle and she says,
Speaker:I love mine.
Speaker:I have it on my shelf in my video studio area.
Speaker:That's wonderful.
Speaker:I love that,
Speaker:Catherine. So those are three things that I do within my
Speaker:business, the BombBomb email responses.
Speaker:So it's video and audio,
Speaker:very personable,
Speaker:takes two seconds to do the ribbon messages in orders that
Speaker:are inspirational.
Speaker:Also show people other things that they can do with their
Speaker:ribbon printer.
Speaker:So that's kind of fun.
Speaker:It's kind of a sideline benefit,
Speaker:the candles that we do for our podcast,
Speaker:guests with their quote.
Speaker:And you notice that with each of those,
Speaker:it's a little bit personalized.
Speaker:That's the point of these smaller gestures is that there's an
Speaker:element of personalization again,
Speaker:to the point where you are seeing the customer.
Speaker:It's not like you're just sending it out to the masses.
Speaker:Catherine saying,
Speaker:I send extra charms or medallions with each of my orders
Speaker:and also include a handwritten note.
Speaker:Perfect example,
Speaker:hopefully as you're listening,
Speaker:you can be thinking,
Speaker:okay, well maybe I haven't done anything like that in the
Speaker:past, but here are some ideas that I could easily Institute
Speaker:in a couple of other ideas for you.
Speaker:I was just thinking,
Speaker:I just now told you what we do.
Speaker:And now I'm thinking about what other types of things by
Speaker:extension you could do exactly what Katherine was just talking about,
Speaker:doing a handwritten note.
Speaker:I also remember I got this beautiful,
Speaker:beautiful charm from at Hazel charm shop.
Speaker:And when my mom passed away,
Speaker:Kathleen sent me a special gift.
Speaker:It's a heart.
Speaker:And then it says,
Speaker:mom, in the middle of it for another gift,
Speaker:I ordered a charm from her and included in.
Speaker:There was the smallest little heart made out of the same
Speaker:material that she makes these terms out of.
Speaker:It's a wire material.
Speaker:And it was just so special to have that included in
Speaker:with the gift.
Speaker:Absolutely beautiful,
Speaker:special, totally unexpected.
Speaker:And then what could I do with it?
Speaker:I could keep it for myself or I could pass that
Speaker:little heart on with the gift that I was giving or
Speaker:I could give that hard onto somebody else.
Speaker:Right. But still just by me talking about it tells you
Speaker:that I remember,
Speaker:and I was touched by that as well.
Speaker:And I can go on,
Speaker:there've been so many little gestures like this that I've received
Speaker:and I'm sure you have too,
Speaker:if you think back different things that surprised you,
Speaker:you weren't expecting,
Speaker:I guess that's kind of the same thing as being surprised
Speaker:just out of the blue,
Speaker:did it need to have happened?
Speaker:That's the thing,
Speaker:you, it,
Speaker:wasn't something that needed to have happened for you to still
Speaker:be happy with them.
Speaker:It's just that over the top thing,
Speaker:cherry on the top,
Speaker:right? That's what makes it so special.
Speaker:And again,
Speaker:I want to remind everybody that the whole reason you're doing
Speaker:this is of course to show gratitude and appreciation,
Speaker:but then also you're deepening your relationship and people are going
Speaker:to remember that and they're going to stick with you and
Speaker:they're going to watch when your new collections come out and
Speaker:they're going to want to come visit you when you're at
Speaker:a craft show,
Speaker:it's great for business all the way around.
Speaker:That's a wrap.
Speaker:They get to the point kind of girl.
Speaker:And this is what you can expect from these quick midweek
Speaker:sessions. Now it's your turn go out and fulfill that dream
Speaker:of yours,
Speaker:share your handmade products with us.
