Celebratory meeting- Tues 25th May 2010

We want to talk about our noisiest networking event yet...and to suggest what you can do to make sure that it is.

Simply this, ask someone to come with you. That way, by the end of the evening new people will know about you and your business.

Need to let them know what to expect?

Here's our plan...

7.30pm We welcome you and we have a few announcements to make
7.50pm You introduce yourself, your business and the person you've brought

to the whole room
8.20pm We'll review your priorities by examining responses to the questionnaire
8.50pm Tea / Coffee - a chance to chat: networking activity 1
9.00pm Group brainstorming: networking activity 2
9.30pm Finish

Re-appointment:
We are delighted to be re-appointed by the County Enterprise Board and would like to thank so many of you for your positive endorsements of our work over the last 12 months. We really enjoy contributing to a re-energised SWIBN and we will continue to bring our own brand of enthusiasm and challenge to you for the remainder of 2010.

We'd also like to acknowledge Liam Kiely at Sligo CEB and thank him for his ongoing commitment to the development SWIBN, for the funding which allows us to offer FREE events for members at a time when budgets are so tight. We owe it to each other to make the most of this resource.


Thank you - Amanda and Oonagh (SWIBN Facilitators)

Recession busting tips from SWIBN

SWIBN combined forces with Sligo Chamber for a special event on April 27th to welcome EU Ambassador for Female Entrepreneurship, Judy Greene.

Prior to Judy's presentation we asked members for their recession busting tips - "What changes have you made in your business in the last 12 months?" It took just 15 minutes to generate a list of actions taken by Sligo's pro-active business community. Perhaps you are asking yourself what changes you should make in your business? We've created a useful checklist to help get you thinking:-

Money:

• Return to the old bartering system
• Seek money in advance on certain assignments
• Progress payments on large assignments instead of waiting until end
• Offer discounts regularly

Managing costs/reducing overheads:

• Stop printing statements and email statements at end of each month. Saves on postage and gets a quicker response
• Weekly stocktake
• Renegotiate rent, reduce staff costs ( reception and cleaning staff)
• Only turn on necessary lights
• Operate 'just in time' - to reduce amount of stock held
• Cancel mobile broadband account - use wireless broadband in office and wireless broadband in public areas

Marketing and new media:

• Implement more innovative and personal ways to market the business
• Text promotions
• Build marketing plan using Facebook, Linkedin and Blogger which is free to promote business
• Upgrade website and create a blog
• Build profile via TV programmes - i.e Home Chef

Clients:

• Go out to customer instead of waiting for customer to come in
• Set aside an hour each day to set up appointments in diary
• Follow up within a few working days with your recommendations based on review of client needs
• Re-visit clients on a bi-weekly basis
• Follow-up appointments made when patient is in the clinic
• Send out reminder calls for appointments

Pricing:

• Focus on core/most profitable part of business
• Pricing remains same as 2008/9 - no increases

Training:

• More time on training
• Cross training

New product format:

• Changed photo products - more flexible for smaller sites
• Bank loan to change office into apartment

If you have any recession busting tips to add, please don't hold back. If you are reading this blog, we'd like to hear from you. What's working for you and why?

When Many Heads are Better than One

Mary Whelan of the creativethinkingnetwork in action at SWIBN/ March 30th 2010. Photographs Frances Muldoon

The last 12 months has proved one thing. Members get real value from meeting and sharing ideas. It's not surprising given that many of us work on our own and have limited opportunity to bounce ideas around. Feedback consistently highlights this 'positive group effect'. We invited Mary to run a short workshop to build our skills around 'idea generation' and in so doing, help us to profit from our network's biggest asset.

Mary ran 3 distinct exercises and here's what you liked:

• Her Seekers/Finders game. Beneficial and value for money
• Workshop was inspiring, practical and fun
• Got the brain going - take all ideas (even the wild ones) on board
• Ideas came from people in different businesses
• Got one great idea from our speed dating
• Mary's techniques are new in themselves - would love to work with her again

Could your business benefit from being blitzed by ideas? Mary says it's simple and anyone can do it. The key is to have an open mind and the right attitude - as Henry Ford famously said " whether you think you can or you can't, you're right".

From the newly re-named Sligo Women in Business Creative Network (SWBCN)!

Napkin Sketches and Networking

Networking in person is all about good conversation but sometimes in that critical moment when we get to say what our business does, we struggle to find a meaningful explanation.

For our February event, in addition to re-running the elevator pitch workshop, we decided to reach for napkins. This time we began to draw out what we do, by sketching. And after that, we used the pictures to get talking - here is Ursula Schweiger at work.

Members' described their understandable fear of drawing " I'm embarrassed to show my results" but this was the only real negative. On the plus side, comments illustrated that informal sketching can help to:

• focus and make you think clearly about your business
• be specific, less general
  
• made talking more relaxed
  
• more fun
• more creative
• more associative (a trigger for new ideas)
• helps simplify technical processes

Memory: perhaps most important of all, when members were asked what they remember about each other, images it seems, are easier to recall than words.

We'll post a gallery of sketches so that you too can see the range of specialist business operating from Sligo in the North West of Ireland - each drawn on one side of a napkin.

Record attendance kick-starts 2010 for network

Enough of hearing from outside speakers! Members of the network made it clear they wanted to hear from each other this month.

19 members with just 90 seconds, a slide and a prop proved that being concise is key to getting your message across. Businesses ranged from the traditional - family locksmiths, Alison Smith to the brand new. Bua Marketing was presented for the first time by the talented Aoife Porter.

Did it work? Feedback was overwhelmingly positive "an excellent format and great way to hear about, as well as to promote business". So we've decided to do a re-run in February, with 20 more women business owners competing to get noticed in 90 seconds (that's not long - it's probably taken you just half that to read this blog)