Tina Gleisner

Where to Find Tina Gleisner

Blogging is a way of life, but at some point you have to decide which blogs are the ones you're going to focus on. I've got several blogs now and unfortunately, this one didn't make the cut. Don't fret as my focus on marketing simply has a new home. Here's where you can follow me:

• Home Tips 4 Women, a blogsite where I write quite a bit and will soon be joined by members of the Association of Women Home Owners
• Marketing Solutions 4 Home Professionals, a blogsite (under development) where I share marketing tips (including those found here) and will soon be joined by marketing professionals who join the Association of Women Home Owners
• Handyman Nuts & Bolts, where I started a blog devoted to handyman type information, plus fun stuff going on in my life

You can also find me on various Social Networking sites:

ActiveRain (activerain.com/tinag), a community of 150,000+ Realtors and other professionals involved in real estate

LinkedIn, ... several different ways to connect there:

• My personal profile, www.linkedin.com/in/tinagleisner
• Group for home owners: Association of Women Home Owners
• Group for home professionals: Home Pros @ Assn of Women Home Owners

Facebook, several different ways to connect there:

• Personal profile: www.facebook.com/tinagleisner
• Fan page: www.facebook.com/HomeTips4Women
• Fan page: www.facebook.com/MarketingTips4Pros
• Fan page: www.facebook.com/HandymanTips4You

Twitter, where I decided one account was enough ... twitter.com/tinagleisner

Cultural Shifts Affecting Our Lives

Each of us tends to focus on the 2 or 3 most important things affecting our lives, be they personal or professional in nature. It helps to step back from your day-to-day activities, to see the big picture and one I find very challenging is the changing nature of the people around me.

Be they friends, employees or customers ... their social character is different from mine. When you're with these people every day, you can learn the difference more easily than when you're running a small business with short, intermittent interactions with 10s to 100s of people each month.

Pepperdine's (where I got my MBA) newsletter had 2 fascinating articles which I've included excepts from with links to full text. The world is changing, and I hope we're up to making personal changes to keep up.

• The Trybaby Syndrome by Charles D. Kerns, PhD

Trybabies focus on tasks and actions they can do well, but that have little or no relation to their success within an organization. This article identifies the Trybaby Syndrome as a performance challenge and introduces a "Performance Influence - Importance Matrix" to help managers identify the differences between so-called Trybabies, Spinners, Pass-Timers, and Corperformers.

• The Leaders We Need: And What Makes Us Follow by Michael Maccoby ... a book review

... the industrial age was rooted in a domestic model of the traditional family with a father as principal breadwinner and authority figure. This model privileged disciplined, bureaucratic leaders who set clear goals. Business was structured hierarchically with a well-defined pecking order where everybody took orders from the person above and gave them to the one below. The highest value was stability. That model faded in the 1970s.  

The 1980s privileged "The Gamesman," a politically savvy leader who treated work as a game to win. Corporations downsized and people worked "at will." The social character was team-based with short-term objectives and a focus on transferable skills.

Maccoby calls the new millennial interactives. Raised on twitch-and-click video games, their relationships are fluid and diverse. They are optimists raised to regard parents as "friends" with whom they align laterally as with siblings, creating an affectionate bond tempered by a freedom to critique. They want to collaborate with their leaders for the "common good" and are happy doing so in a virtual sphere.

 

Women's Buying/Reading Preferences

The Women's Business Center (WBC) held their 5th annual WBC Celebration & Showcase this week at CR Sparks in Bedford, NH. There were 45 women business owners exhibiting, including My Handyman. At events, I try to learn more about prospective customers including the best ways to build a relationship with them. I thought it would be helpful to share the results of my mini survey.

24 people completed survey cards and another 10 left business cards. Here's what I learned:

• Would you prefer to buy from a woman?   20 said yes ... 91%
• Have you heard about 4 Walls ONE Roof, a network of Women Owned businesses providing products and services for the home? only 2 said yes ... 9%
• Do you read The Mirror (year old, semimonthly magazine targeting women)? only 2 said yes ... 9%
• Do you read Applaud Magazine ( 5 yr old magazine for women)? had 7 yes responses ... 32%

Where do you look for women owned businesses? The responses varied quite a bit:

• Web was the clear winner here with 9 mentions ... 41%
• Networking, and women's organizations were clearly important to this group of women with 10 mentions ... 45% (WBC received 4 mentions, Business and Professional Women got 1, Southern NH Women's Business Network got 1 and WMW (not familiar with this group) got 1 mention. 

I am continually looking for new & creative ways to reach potential customers so the following questions provided some insight into ideas I'm considering:

• Do you do any home repairs yourself? 15 women said yes ... 63%
• Would you attend a home repair workshop? 16 of 22 said yes ... 73%
• Are you involved in school fund raising? only 2 said yes ... 9%

Some initial thoughts from reviewing this data:

• Professional women don't frequent the typical distribution points, i.e. grocery stores, that The Mirror & Applaud use heavily. A different approach to reach these women is needed.
• Professional women rely on their women's networking groups for support in their professional AND personal lives.
• Women are involved in maintaining their homes & want to develop knowledge and skills in this area so My Handyman should give this consideration.
• Professional women may not have school age children, which is why they're no longer involved in school fund raising.

PLEASE share similar information that you have and/or ideas about how to leverage this information. It's easy to click on "comments" and add your feedback for everyone to see.

7 Reasons People WANT to Shop Independent Retailers

With more emphasis on marketing to women, the way in which marketing happens will change. I thought the following list of 7 Reasons People Want to Shop Independent Retailers (from Rick Segel's The Retail Sign Manifesto, pg 24 ... sorry but this isn't generally available yet, but check out Rick's other great books/e-books) was very simple, yet powerful and begins to reflect what women want during their buying process.

1. Perceived better service
2. Contact/relationship with the owner
3. Knowledgeable sales staff
4. Unique merchandise
5. Less waiting time
6. Familiar faces
7. Community involvement

As Rick's e-book was about signage, here are his shortcuts to great signs:

• Inform (women want this more than men) - create signs that inform & offer information
• Sell word - add the sell words that create interest, i.e. new, different, exciting, just have ... can help make a sale
• Educate - teach your customer something they didn't know
• Entertain - it's all about creating fun experiences that keep customers in the store (retail) longer
• Emotionalize - any sign that plays on your emotion, such as signs with picture of babies or pets

Women's Role as Chief Purchasing Officer (CPO)

Marti Barletta, founder of The TrendSight Group, says "Women are the CPOs (Chief Purchasing Officers) at home and in the workplace. They control more than 80% of all consumer purchases and represent more than half of corporate buyers."

I love the CPO title! It clearly and elegantly communicates a key role that women play in our society. It shows how powerful women are through the purchases they make/influence.

What this means using USA statistics:
* 2005 gross domestic product was $12,456 billion dollars
* 2005 personal income was $10,239 billion dollars ... or 82% of the GDP
* 2005 disposable personal income was $9,039 ... or 73% of the GDP
* 80% of personal income controlled by women is $7,231 billion dollars

Women in turn have the ability to help business women succeed by seeking out and supporting women owned businesses. Women offer personal service and opportunities to form long-term relationships that just aren't possible when dealing with large, national/international businesses (true for most locally owned businesses).

Who better to lead the charge in tapping into the "women as consumers" than Marti Barletta and other members of the Women Gurus Network.

Buy Local & Support Your Community

Most of us don't realize how powerful our consumer spending can be but that's what Made in NH and your local farmers market are all about. I found a great brochure at a local shop the other day and wanted to share what it says. I couldn't say it any better. There's a website where you can learn about the local Independent Seacoast Businesses who sponsored the brochure.

1. Significantly more money re-circulates in your community when purchases are made at locally owned, rather than nationally owned, businesses.
2. Most new jobs are provided by locally owned businesses.
3. Our one-of-a-kind businesses are an integral part of your communities distinctive character.
4. Local business owners invest in their communities. They are owned by people who live there.
5. Customer service is better.
6. Competition and diversity lead to more choices.
7. Shopping at locally owned businesses is more energy efficient, thus reducing transportation costs and environmental impact.
8. Local businesses require comparatively little infrastructure investment compared to nationally owned stores entering the community. Public benefits far outweigh public costs.
9. Economic research shows that entrepreneurs and skilled workers are more likely to settle in communities that preserve their one-of-a-kind character.
10. Non-profit organizations receive an average of 350% more support from local business owners than they do from non-locally owned businesses.

Women's Marketing Has ARRIVED!

An amazing shift in marketing is beginning and for women, it's great news. Why? because women buy differently than men, and there's more information being shared about marketing to women  ... so advertisers will understand women's unique buying needs and support them (wonder if that's why I don't like shopping?) Maybe you haven't seen signs of this change so let me share what I'm seeing, starting with local NH media:

• Applaud Magazine - started by Susan Caldwell back in 2002, provides a way for NH women to  "network and support each other ... women can share their stories - how they got started (their businesses), how they have survived, and what they have achieved ... women can be resources for each other, sharing information about our goods and services." Yes, I'm advertising in this magazine!
• The NH Mirror - is a new (2006) twice-monthly women’s magazine published by the Neighborhood News (multiple community papers in the Manchester area).) It's full of local stories, photographs and advertising about women’s issues ranging from health and wellness to business and parenting. You can contact my friend, Dixie Goodell (603- 314-0447 x14) for more information on advertising in this publication.
• Maine Women's Journal (NH online yet) - is a quarterly magazine for connecting women to each other and the issues that affect their personal and professional lives. The publication also provides access to critical resources, opportunities, products and services.

The topic is more visible on the web. A newsletter I received this morning from Rick Segel, Marketing to Women, prompted this post. He lists 10 ways in which women differ from men starting with using soft sell tactics as women resent being pressured. What this article reinforces for me ... use techniques that are comfortable for you!

Other great web resources for marketing to women:

• Favorite so far is Holly Buchanan's Marketing to Women Online - Holly started in radio copy writing, moved to other advertising roles and now works on transforming websites to convert visitors into customers.
• Michelle Miller's blog, WonderBranding: Marketing to Women - has some great stuff but what I found most interesting was the reverse discrimination (against men) in women centric businesses like kitchen renovations and weddings
• Marti Barletta has coined the term PrimeTime Women - women from 50 to 70 years old, "Boomer women are currently in PrimeTime and they are the healthiest, wealthiest, most active, educated and engaged generation of women in history."

Business Card Basics

Now that I'm focused on building my network of High Powered Women in NH, I've finally found a technique for organizing the business cards I've collected since opening my business. I was baffled for a long time with ... which ones to save? how to sort them? organize them so I could find one? With a little bit of technology, here's what I'm doing with all the collected cards. I'd love to hear about techniques you've found to manage this terrific resource:

• Using a CardScan device, I'm adding people to my Outlook address book
• Using Outlook categories to identify communication each person may be interested in
• Downloading Outlook contacts to Excel and scrubbing data
• Uploading Excel data to Constant Contact to update distribution lists

What's important here is my strategy for connecting with people in my business network, and across the multiple facets of my life. Here's one way to distinguish the different roles you play personally and professionally:

• People interested in helping me building my business ... my blog community
• Home owners interested in learning ways to maintain and enhance their homes
• Realtors who can leverage the My Handyman newsletter to build their business
• Contractors who provide services to home/small business owners, can utilize the My Handyman newsletter directly (share with their customers) or indirectly (get ideas)
• Plus my friends and family around the world are enjoying the opportunity to watch me grow professionally, as I grow my business

After I finish filing my stash of business cards, I hope to handle new cards better by:

• Explicitly asking people if it's okay to send them one/both newsletters
• After meeting someone, follow up with an e-mail reflecting how we connected plus an invitation to opt-in for one/both newsletters

Some great articles on the proper etiquette for giving and using those cards you collect:

• How to Organize Business Cards for Effective Contact Management - several articles
• Business Protocol and Etiquette to Increase Sales and Help Develop Better Business Relations based on Dr. Jan Yager’s award-winning book Business Protocol: How to Survive & Succeed in Business, Wiley, 1991 was originally published in the Entrepreneurial Women’s Network Newsletter, March-April 1996. Copyright© 1998 by Dr. Jan Yager, www.JanYager.com