Steve Robinson's Blog (14)

Don't you just love passionate people?

Yesterday was the first meeting with a lovely lady supported by her husband on their start-up business.

From the moment we started talking, the passion she felt for the product she wants to sell was very evident and extremely infectious.

The couple described the origins and the inspiration for their new product. They…

A close friend mentioned that he was in a restaurant recently and was astonished at how poor the customer service had been - this was particularly disappointing as it was a good quality restaurant and still relatively new.

This comment coincided with another made to me by a friend who commented that she only ever seems to go to a restaurant 3 times - first to try it…

It's a great time to get gardening.

But I must confess, I'm not very good at it - but there are few things more enjoyable than seeing a plant you've put in the ground grow and flourish.

It's difficult not to draw significant parallels between gardening and…

After presenting at a recent seminar, in the Q&A session, one person asked a great question; "How can I make sure that I can run a successful and reusable marketing campaign?"

These are the 5 elements that I shared that I consider essential for any campaign to stand a chance of success.

In my opinion, the 5 essential elements are:

1. Define your Market Dominating Position (MDP)
2. Create an effective sales offer
3. Avoid the…

I've seen 2 social media posts recently where people have been reaching out for support (both with a very generic 'Looking for a business consultant' message which, in both cases, has turned out to be not quite what they were looking for).

Anyway, in both cases, they had a string of responses/offers on the social media platform, in one case over 100 separate…

Audrey Hepburn once famously said;

“Everything I learned I learned from the movies.”

I think she might just have been right!

If you have never seen the movie Cool Hand Luke played by Paul Newman, you are missing a treat. It's a gritty story of a man who refuses to accept the rules and will not conform to the 'norms' in a rural prison set…

At the MyBoard networking event yesterday, there were two really good questions raised about different business strategies.

One was asking about the development of a 12 month email strategy and the second was about how to make the most of social media. This second question seemed to really resonate with people as many people seem to find themselves doing…

I'd like to share a story with you that a previous boss told me many years ago that has stayed with me ever since. It's a story that I have referred back to many times and have found to be true in both business and personal lives!

As a boss, one of his (many) strengths was that he used very visual examples to make a point - and this is one fantastic example!

Let me start first with a little history.

From the moment we took to the…

You will often hear big name business speakers talk about the big name brands they’ve worked with and the marketing strategies those big brands have employed to drive the connections they make to consumers, especially in the B2C arena.

What you don’t often hear about is that many of these companies actually spend a lot of time trying to replicate small businesses!! 

There is a desire in big, lumbering organisations to mimic the…

I recently read a fantastic article in the Guardian where a 36 year old journalist, Stuart Heritage,…

I love making bread - it's a real Sunday treat for our family - I'll get up early and as the rest of the house is waking, the intoxicating smell of freshly baking bread, often parmesan and sun-dried tomato flavoured, is meandering it's way up the stairs!!

It's not always been good bread though.

A few weeks ago, I had an aberration and completely forgot to put the yeast in - I then tried to add it after the bread had…

There was a great piece of research done in the mid 2000's which proved that whatever we might be taught by the expression 'don't judge a book by it's cover', the truth is that we all establish our first impression in…

One of the very great pleasures of the Xmas and New Year holiday is being able to do things that you don’t normally have time to do – such as watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy … and we did!

Not only are they great stories, with fabulous cinematography filmed in stunning locations, but there are also some great lessons within the movies.

Gollum (or Smeagol) is absolutely focused on his Precious – no effort is wasted and nothing can deter him from his single…

There's a moment at the end of the 1973 Dirty Harry movie, Magnum Force, when Harry Callahan (played by Clint Eastwood) has just dispatched Briggs, the last bad guy, and he says, "A man's got to know his limitations"

It's a great line delivered by a great actor. The movie message was that people can often over-estimate their capabilities.

However, from a business perspective, it can often feel…