Inform Magazine - Issue 9 - January 2022 by thebusinessescommunity

Issue 9 - January 2022

inform M

Keeping you “Inform”ed with all the news, products, services, events and opportunities available in St Albans!

THE

Nail Your 2022 Growth Plans with Peer2Peer Club Businesses COMMUNITY

Contents

What’s in store for you in this month’s Inform Magazine?

Make 2022 The Best Year for your Business

Celebrating Business Excellence 6 Talent Spot

Local Events

Top 10 Tops for Managing Time Effectively

Need to Downsize or Upsize your Ofﬁce?

#ShopLocal

Local Products

News Round Up

10 Tips to Succeed on Social Media

Planning Your 2022

THE

Businesses COMMUNITY

Happy New Year! Wishing you all a happy, healthy and prosperous 2022! If you run your own business, or are thinking of starting one, there is so much support and help out there for you right now! From putting plans down on paper at Peer2Peer Club on the 21st Jan, to using the 2022 Year Planner, to chatting with likeminded business owners at the jelly/co-working events. There’s tons of networking opportunities via the events page on the TBC website, and why not book in to see STANTA who offer FREE workshops and 1-2-1 advice. And if you are not a business owner, check out how to #ShopLocal and support local business via the #ShopLocal page of our website and via Inform Magazine - the digital magazine that brings you all things local for business and pleasure - if you are not yet subscribed to get a copy, you can do so here.

Plus - we want to hear from you - so if you have had a great experience from a local business, we want to know about it for our “Raving Review” page, know a local talent? Tell us about it. Share your news, stories, knowledge, experiences of this amazing city with us to feature in Inform. Simply email us at inform@ thebusinessescommunity.com Ooh, and get 22/9/22 in your diaries for the 2022 Woo Hoo Awards! Here’s to a brilliant New Year! The TBC Team x

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Make 2022 an awesome year for you and your business

Running your own business is challenging at any time, but, when you consider the last couple of years, it’s more challenging than ever. No business leader should be alone – ever. Everybody, no matter at what stage in your business career, should have a coach and/or a mentor. This support and guidance is often the difference between success and failure. However, options can be expensive, unreliable, “exclusive” with entry criteria. There is so much noise in the coaching space right now. Anybody can set themselves up as a business coach or if you’ve £40k or so to spend buy a franchise.

That’s why in 2018, 4 successful entrepreneurs decided the business coaching space needed a shake up – Peer2Peer was born. We started by establishing Peer Boards. This has been incredibly successful with over 100 business leaders now beneﬁting from being members of one of our Boards. SMEs are the wind beneath the wings of the UK economy helping to drive growth, job creation, creativity and innovation. We see this tenacity, drive and energy at every one of our Peer2Peer Boards. We recently conducted a survey amongst our members – CEOs and Business Leaders, from around the country.

Over 85% reported year-on-year growth in their businesses despite the challenges of both Brexit and Covid-19. To be a constant source of inspiration and support to business owners, CEOs and leaders, Peer2Peer continuously evolves its powerful and practical Skill Building content which is accessible to all members. Being part of a Peer2Peer Board gives members more clarity, direction and unceasing inspiration. Peer2Peer itself exists and thrives because of talented, forward thinking CEOs and business leaders. At the heart of Peer2Peer’s ethos is to make our frames, formats and focus available to every single business owner and leader. Launching Peer2Peer Club is the key next step for us. Peer2Peer Club is accessible to all start-ups, micro and SME business owner entrepreneurs. We ask only 2 things; ·

come with a mindset to share, learn and focus

Have the goal to want to be the best you can be and build the best business possible.

We will be sharing our unique “44-2” planning and execution frame. Attendees will be shown how to put their 2022 plans together and how to nail the ﬁrst 90days. They’ll also get the chance to learn how to improve their Marketing, Selling, Social and Productivity.

Join us, it’s absolutely free of charge until April 2022 (£49/month thereafter) - giving you plenty of time to see the value this will bring to your business. Find out more and book your free place for the 21st January Club here.

We ran our ﬁrst ever Peer2peer Club taster at Rothamsted Conference Centre on 29th November. It was a great success with over 90% attendees signing up to come again on 21st January. Our focus for our ﬁrst gathering of 2022 will be “Planning and Execution”.

Celebrating Business Excellence

The 2021 Woo Hoo Awards didn’t disappoint! Held in the fabulous Fowden Hall at Rothamsted Conference Centre on 2nd December, businesses of all sizes and stages came together to celebrate incredible achievements throughout a very tough year! The Woo Hoo Awards are all about recognising all different achievements from start ups to large corporates - and what makes them unique is that there is no judging and no “popularity contest” - it’s purely down to being nominated by a fellow peer!

Our headline sponsors, Willmott Dixon, kicked off the event with their opening speech by Ross Taylor, who shared the Values and Visions of the business including preserving the environment, committment to ongoing waste reduction, reducing their carbon footprint, procuring resources on a sustainable basis and awareness and adoption of best practice. Our host, David Jenkins of Brilliant Theatre Arts, was, of course, a “brilliant” compere for the evening - bringing the fun element to the awards event.

30 Woo Hoo Awards were given out by our super sponsors - you can read all about the winners, why they were nominated and more about our sponsors via the digital Awards Brochure here. Above are just a few of the photos from the evening - you can view them all, photographed by Jeremy Banks, here.

£735 was also raised in the process for Home Start Herts Woo Hoo! Get 22.09.22 in your diaries for the 2022 Woo Hoos! And, if you’d like to sponsor a Woo Hoo at 2021 prices, take a look and book here.

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Talent Spot KICK PISTOL

Take a look at local band, Kick Pistol, with their new single, Apparitions - if you like it, give them a follow on instagram @KickPistol 14

NO NONSENSE NO DRAMA NO FAFF

GRAPHIC DESIGN & COMMS FOR YOUR BUSINESS

EVENTS Check the TBC Calendar HERE for all events 7th January -

Jelly Coworking at Holiday Inn Express

13th January 13th January -

Athena St Albans South Jelly Coworking at Rothamsted Conference Centre

16th January -

Rothamsted Manor Afternoon Tea

19th January -

Athena St Albans North

21st January -

Peer2Peer Club Nail Your 2022 Growth Plans

25th January -

Create Your Employer Brand Story

26th January -

Excel For Business Owners Workshop

Do you have events you’d like more people to know about? They can be any kind of event, not just business - get in touch with us at stalbans@thebusinessescommunity.com to ﬁnd out more

Do Apps work for small businesses? With our world becoming increasingly online, and with the Smart Phone market set to continue to enjoy huge growth, it's easy to get caught up in the thinking that every business needs a mobile app. Too many business owners believe their business needs an app but when questioned as to why they think they need one, they stumble and aren't really clear on why. For many it's simply about giving them a warm feeling of being at the cutting edge of the latest trends, but can an app really work for your business and, more importantly, can a mobile app generate signiﬁcant returns for you? Find out more here...

Top 10 new year tips for reducing distractions and managing time more effectively These are my top 10 new year tips for reducing distractions and managing time more effectively. 1. For more focused time to meet deadlines use the Pomodoro technique. Set a timer for 25 or 50 minutes. Then take a break or do another task for 5 or 10 minutes. Then repeat. Read more here

Since lockdown whilst we are more understanding about distractions like the doorbell or the dog barking, we are still reluctant to shut out the noise of texts, WhatsApp messages and social media.

2. Turn your phone off, put it on silent or face-down so you can’t see the screen. If that doesn’t work, put it in another room so you have to get up to check it. 3. Turn off your emails for set periods of time. There are apps to help with this. Boomerang is one which allows you to schedule speciﬁc times when your emails will be held back during the day. Like a Do Not Disturb for emails.

4. Use delayed emails. If you don’t want to get a reply straight away or want to get some work done at an unsociable hour, it is useful to use the delayed email option in Microsoft Ofﬁce. 5. Stop accepting meetings during certain times of the day or days in the week. Have set times that you don’t allow any meetings, so you have time to do the work you want to get done. Schedule this in your diary and stick to it. Better yet, if you can avoid the meeting altogether, all the better. 6. Schedule certain types of tasks to be completed in the same time slot. For example, booking appointments can be done between 4 and 5 pm. 7. Delegate. It’s a skill that takes time and practice to master. But you must want to delegate, you need to know what to delegate and who to delegate to. To help with this I’ve developed the Three Column Technique. Read more here 8. Divert your phone. I recommend a professional phone answering service that you can use on a pay as you go basis and turn on and off as you need to. It’s important to choose a reputable company so your callers get a competent call handler without knowing it’s a call handler. Do your research for the best ones around. To save you time I highly recommend Jam. Learn more here

9. Streamline your to-do list. Research says we only cross off three things on to-do lists in a day. So instead of rewriting the whole list daily, at the end of each day write just three things to do for the next day. This reduces stress from guilt and increases our sense of achievement. Plus, it saves time writing out endlessly long to-do lists. 10. Work-life blend. Replacing the word ‘balance’ with ‘blend’ shatters the implication that our work or personal life suffers when we put more effort into one or the other. We know that our work and life is more of a blend. Some days we work harder and some days we play harder. We can enjoy both taking personal time and working hard. It doesn’t need to come at the expense of feeling guilty. For more tips on hitting the ground running in the new year, subscribe to our newsletter here. Contact us about how we can help you manage your time and distractions effectively, and to get a little superstar treatment, on: Email: info@jaxstarsolutions.co.uk Telephone: 020 3362 4436 Mobile: 07811 393520 Website: www.jaxstarsolutions.co.uk

Fed up working from home? Need to downsize or upsize your ofﬁce? Then consider STANTA Business Centre, Soothouse Spring, St Albans AL3 6PF

Current vacancies: Suite 3: 4-6 person unfurnished ground ﬂoor ofﬁce with kitchenette. 412 sq ft. £1391.67 (plus VAT) all-inclusive monthly licence

Offices to rent STANTA Business Centre’s USP is that there is plenty of on-site FREE parking and there is no long-term commitment to a lease; after an initial three months, the notice period is one month, so if your business changes, you’re not tied down. Budgeting is easy as there is an all-inclusive fixed monthly fee, so the only extra cost is your telecoms and broadband. There is also a large conference room, with WIFI and a flat screen TV which is available for tenants to use at no cost (up to 2 hrs per day).

Suite 18: 4-6 person first floor office with kitchenette 426 sq ft. £1443.33 (plus VAT) all- inclusive monthly licence

Suite 11: One person or two person desk space in a bright first floor office with shared kitchenette, microwave, toaster and coffee maker. Each position is approximately 7.8m2. £277.50 plus VAT allinclusive licence for each desk.

Want to start a business but don’t know how? St Albans Enterprise Agency, known as STANTA, helps micro businesses or individuals to start, grow and develop a business. 12 hours of support is offered AT NO COST! This consists of one to one business advice meetings and a choice of workshops to attend on such subjects as: • Bookkeeping • Business Planning • Introduction to Social Media • FB & Instagram for business • Blogging for Beginners • Search Engine Optimisation

For a very cost-effective solution - one desk is offered in suite 14 at a cost of £186.67 plus vat, All the information, prices and pictures are on the website: www.stanta.co.uk/premises/ ofﬁces-to-rent-in-st-albans

• Google Analytics • …… and many more

Call 01727 837760 for more details. St Albans Enterprise Agency (STANTA) Suite 19 Stanta Business Centre 3 Soothouse Spring St Albans AL3 6PF advice@stanta.co.uk www.stanta.co.uk 01727 837760

Local Products and Services #ShopLocal Accountants the barefoot accountant ltd Accountancy services for creative businesses www.thebarefoot.accountant

Advertising My Mustard Looking for targeted, cost effective, measurable results? Look no further. My Mustard & Google AdWords, a winning combination. www.mymustard.co.uk

Arts & Culture Trestle Theatre Company Trestle Theatre Company are a mask and physical theatre company running Trestle Arts Base where they offer creative workshops and opportunities, space hire, performances and training. Trestle provides high quality, creative opportunities to everyone. Find out what their current offer is at www.trestle.org.uk/whats-on

Business Coaching Talia Zamora I help determined achievers (specialising in those with Neurodiverse families) to become the go-to business in your ﬁeld and attain the income you desire! I help to form transformational strategies which enables you to live your dream lifestyle. www.taliazamora.com Peer2Peer Peer2Peer is all about helping business leaders build the best businesses possible, but to also, making sure they enjoy the ride. We’re an inclusive group, everybody is welcome as long as you’re serious about being the best you can be and building a great business. Simply ping me an email johnacton@dpi-europe.com

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Business Consultancy Good Beyond We work with forward thinking organisations that want to lead with vision and create healthy happy workplaces that change the world. www.goodbeyond.com/talk

St Albans Enterprise Agency (STANTA) Free business advice and training for Hertsbased micro businesses under 3 years old, but we specialise in helping businesses in postcode areas AL1-10 www.stanta.co.uk

Business Support Grow With Vision We help businesses do business better. From streamlining processes, to Software implementation and training, we show you ways of working faster and smarter. www.growithvision.com The St Albans Business Community Effective marketing for your business from a community you can trust www.stalbans.thebusinessescommunity.com/ work-with-us Mums UnLtd Mums UnLtd offers business support for Mums running or starting a business www.mumsunltd.co.uk Jaxstar Solutions Jaxstar Solutions is a Business Support service focused on assisting you to grow your business no matter the size. We offer several different services from a GDPR audit to a Xero Review and Fix package. For more information, get in touch today. www.jaxstarsolutions.co.uk/jaxstar-solutionsservices/ Accord HR Consulting Ltd Accord HR Consulting will help businesses to resolve their tricky people management situations. www.accordHRconsulting.co.uk

Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) Is legal, H&S, GDPR, HR, and pensions auto enrolment an expensive chore for you? Get it sorted in a day at no extra cost. Tap into the bargaining power of 165,000 members for key business services. We are not-for-proﬁt, all fees go to making business services accessible to all. Call Loreta on 07464 892 681 to discuss your application. Rocket Girl Coaching My life and work is dedicated to personal and organisational development to improve inclusion and understanding in society through Executive Coaching, Consultancy and Disability Equality Training. www.rocketgirlcoaching.com

Charity Harpenden Spotlight on Africa HSoA delivers projects in challenging environments, transforming the lives of some of the poorest people in Africa. www.hsoa.org.uk

Coaching Mark Ashley with 30 years of business & management experience, I help new or existing businesses grow, provide advice and a range of business services, including 121 coaching. www.markashleyltd.com mark@markashleyltd.com

Commercial Photography Striking Places Photography Professional photography for all your business photography needs. www.strikingplaces.com

Dance School Rinceoiri le Cheile Irish Dance Academy Irish dancing classes for boys & girls from 3yrs+ www.instagram.com/rcirishdance

Digital Marketing Wagada Wagada is an award-winning, results-driven digital marketing agency, working with ambitious companies to help them to reach their goals and acquire new customers through engaging and strategic marketing campaigns. www.wagada.co.uk

Darcy Salinger SEO & Analytics Service to help improve visibility within search engines jon.salinger@darcysalinger.com and www.darcysalinger.com

Family Louise’s Antenatal Classes Hi I’m Lou the Midwife. I deliver antenatal and hypnobirthing classes and offer antenatal and postnatal care. www.louantenatal.com

Family & Portrait Photography Annie Griggs Photography Capturing a wide range of photography genres, including families and children, business headshots, events and product photography. All at a high professional standard. www.anniegriggs-photography.co.uk

Finance Visionary Accountants Providing professional services including Tax Returns, Tax Advice & Planning, Management Accounts, R&D, Bookkeeping, Payroll & Workplace Pensions www.visionaryaccountants.co.uk/contactus

Flooring Carpet store Quality ﬂooring at affordable rates Tothecarpetstore@aol.com

Food Dizzy Bee Kitchen Food Gorgeous Granolas www.dizzybeekitchen.co.uk Rothamsted Manor Rothamsted Manor is a Grade 1 listed manor house in the heart of Harpenden, offering afternoon tea, music concerts, weddings, parties, wakes and much more. www.rothamstedenterprises.com/events

Graphic Design The Brandit Super simple, super effective, super amazing logos, branding and communications for your business www.thebrandit.co.uk

Hair/Barbering Headcase Barbers proper haircuts in an unpretentious environment www.instagram.com/headcasestalbans

Health and Beauty Karen’s Temple Spa Spa Experiences in your own home www.templespa.com/karenfrancis Caroline k facial treatments I offer luxury skincare treatments, procedures and products. For information or to book call 07949138145

Health and Wellbeing Victoria Bell Nutrition Nutritional therapy programmes supporting women with digestive health and the perimenopause www.victoriabellnutrition.co.uk Forever Living (the Aloe Vera Co) by Nicky Packman I can advise on and supply a wide range of Aloe Vera & Beehive based products to help support skin, digestion, gut health, immunity, mobility and general wellbeing for all ages. www.thealoeveraco.shop/GkHcYFOe Moveology A wide range of treatments to help with injury recovery and ﬁtness improvements. www.moveology.co.uk

Home and Decor Verulam Tile Warehouse Ceramic, porcelian, natural stone wall and ﬂoor tiles for inside and outside. www.verulamtilewarehouse.co.uk Blissfully Organised Professional Organising www.blissfullyorganised.co.uk

Illustrator Hannah Sessions Design I offer bespoke illustrations of your house/ school/ favourite place. Makes a great gift and now have some packages to choose from. Get in touch. www.facebook.com/hannahsessionsdesign

Insurance Broker EIC Insurance Services Limited We help business owners sleep at night by protecting the things they care about www.eicinsurance.co.uk

Language Services Atlas Translations We offer personal, certiﬁed and professional language services. A world-class, ISO 9001 and ISO 17100 certiﬁed translations agency. www.atlas-translations.co.uk

Marketing

Popdance Learn fun dance routines to pop music from the 80s, 90s, 00 and current pop track - for all ages and abilities www.popdance.co.uk

Amber Mountain Marketing Cost Effective Marketing Communications Book a free power hour too boost your marketing here; www.ambermountainmarketing.co.uk/ contact

Positive Reflex Therapy I offer deeply relaxing, rejuvenating and destressing Reflexology and Reiki treatments in the comfort of your own home or workplace. www.positivereflextherapy.co.uk

Joolz Joseph Email Marketing Services & Training. Marketing Motivation and Mentoring for small businesses. Find out more at JoolzJoseph.com www.joolzjoseph.com

Music Kick Pistol Show your support for local indie band, Kick Pistol, by following them on Instagram www.instagram.com/kickpistol

Networking The Business Network South Herts Visit us to enjoy networking with likeminded people and an educational seminar www.business-network-south-herts.co.uk/ events-seminars The Athena Network Bedfordshire & St Albans Business Networking and Development Club for Women in Business www.theathenanetwork.com/katecherry or email me at kate.cherry@theathenanetwork.com Women In Business Network Connections, Support, Business Potential for Women In Business through networking www.wibn.co.uk

Network and Internet Countriﬁ Networks We provide advice, guidance and solutions for improving your internet and wireless coverage around your home or business. We also offer a range of CCTV and Alarm solutions. www.Facebook.com/CountriﬁNetworks

Ofﬁce Space BubbleHUB bubbleHUB is a new, high end coworking space in the heart of St Albans www.bubblehub.co

Optometrist EYES on St Albans We ROCK your new eyewear..! www.eyesonstalbans.com

Painters and Decorators St Albans Decor Kitchen Cabinet Painters + Renovations Painting and Decorating www.stalbansdecor.co.uk

Performing Arts School Brilliant Theatre Arts We are youth theatre and drama school combined offering training through performance. Aimed at young performers aged 7 - 21 who have a serious interest in performing www.brillianttheatrearts.co.uk

Print Macpro Design & Print Ltd. Providing professional artwork, design and print to local SME’s. Visit our website for more information www.macprodp.com

Photography Stephanie Belton Photography Portrait photography for families and businesses www.stephaniebelton.com Immersive Walkthroughs We create unique 3D virtual tours to help you promote your business www.immersivewalkthroughs.com/tourexamples

Retail Atelier Ferrari Monti ladies made to measure www.ferrarimonti.com Dress Up & Dance Dancewear, dance shoes, gymnastics clothing, fancy dress costumes for sale and hire, accessories and costume make up www.dressupanddance.com Floral City Goodbye Flowers, Floral Gifts and Flower Subscriptions www.ﬂoralcity.co.uk

Retail Flagship Wines A great range of delicious wines, Champagnes, Ports, Spirits and craft beers www.ﬂagshipwines.co.uk, Flagship Wines on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook Lift Your Spirits Online We aim to ‘Lift Your Spirits’, explore gifts that create a true understanding of our Company’s name. www.liftyourspirits.online Lou Murphy Styles Styling and shopping with French fashions from Captain Tortue www.facebook.com/ groups/1620092258294835

Senior Care & Dementia Care Tea & Memories Reminiscence Vintage Tea Party Activity for Seniors. Suitable for groups in care homes, community care venues, or private homes. Ideal for celebrations. Email terri@teaandmemories.co.uk Tel: 07505 141707

Telecommunications Trio Telecom Trio Telecom are rate 5* on Google and provide local businesses with Voice over IP phone systems, broadband and ethernet connectivity, and call answering and virtual numbers. www.triotelecom.co.uk/contact-us VOIspeed Ltd VOIspeed offers a fantastic business phone system with collaborative tools ideal for hybrid working that can be used anywhere on any device. www.voispeed.co.uk

Video Production Yellow Lizard Media Professional video production for a range of industries, services and events www.yellowlizardmedia.co.uk

Web Design Gold Nugget Designs Bespoke WordPress websites that get your business seen! www.goldnuggetdesigns.co.uk/websiteworksheet

Amy Wybrow Artworks Get in touch here for any design and artworking queries.

LOCAL PRODUCTS Lets feel good! Find all these items available from local businesses -

Haircut and Finish Cut and Finish at Tielsi from £42 Find out more here

Sessions in Organisation Get organised in 2022 with a session with Blissfully Organised Find out more here

Support your Local pubs Check out The Lower Red Lion on Fishpool Street - with a hearty welcome and a hearty ﬁre. Find out more here

Facial Primer Smooth Affair, Facial Primer and Brightener from Eve and Adam Beauty Clinic £36 Find out more here

Fitness at PureGym St Albans Workout whenever you want at PureGym St Albans - £24.99 Find out more here

Grow Your Business Feel fantastic about the year ahead by Nailing your 2022 Business Growth Plans with Peer2Peer Club FREE! Find out more here

Breathwork and Relaxation Make 2022 a relaxing year with Stacey Landau’s yoga, breathwork and relaxation classes Find out more here

Delicious Food Vegan Mango Coconut and Coriander Curry from Plantopians - £13.95 Find out more here

Do you have a product or service to offer in St Albans that you would like to feature in an issue of Inform Magazine? • • • • •

Simply send us: an image of the product or service a simple sentence about it how much it is a link to where people can buy/order from you

That’s it - we want to make #ShopLocal as easy as possible for people in St Albans Send your info to stalbans@thebusinessescommunity.com

Based in the heart of St Albans, The White Rooms brings together the perfect blend of modernity and comfort whilst delivering the very highest standards of service. The White Rooms is the perfect venue for workshops, meetings or small company events. www.whiterooms-viewing.co.uk

Start 2022 stress-free! Need help with your self-assessment tax return? We can prepare and submit your tax return on your behalf and take the pain away... Get in touch with our friendly team of specialists today. www.visionaryaccountants.co.uk/tax-returns Insta: visionary_accountants Twitter: visionaryaccts Facebook: visionaryaccts

We’re excited to offer a FREE trial of our unique, co-working space. bubbleHUB is designed to help business owners collaborate, achieve their goals and do their best work. Find out for yourself with a free day trial! www.bubblehub.co/free-trial Insta: @bubblehubco Twitter: @bubblehubco Facebook: @Bubblehubco

The Counselling Foundation continues to be open across Hertfordshire for provision of emotional support in these difﬁcult times. We aim to make counselling (in person or via video) accessible to all and therefore fees for counselling are based on affordability ( starting at £5). www.counsellingfoundation.org Email: foundation@counsellingfoundation.org Instagram: @the_counselling_foundation Twitter: @Counselling_Fdn Facebook: @TheCounsellingFoundation

Often people will come to us requiring language services, but are new to the industry. Maybe they’re unsure about formatting, proofreading, how invoicing works...the list goes on! To help clear up our clients’ most frequent queries, we posted a video on each day of November last year, with a personal message from each member of our friendly team! Check out our Client FAQs on LinkedIn here or our website here @atlastranslate

Welcome back from the festive break and welcome to 2022! If you’re a woman in business in the local area we highly recommend you add networking to your marketing plans, come along to one of our virtual meetings to see how we can help you this year! Contact me to book one of our January meetings kate.cherry@theathenanetwork.com

Shop French Fashions from Captain Tortue for ladies sized 4-24 with at least 50% OFF everything in THE BIG SALE in January. Sign up to my newsletter here for all the latest fashion news and offers @loumurphystyles

Looking for a pleasant place to work? Then STANTA Business Centre is the answer - no central St Albans trafﬁc and plenty of on-site parking! We have desk spaces at two pricing levels and a 4-6 person ofﬁce available on a no long-term commitment basis. The all inclusive monthly fee makes budgeting easy. email advice@stanta.co.uk or look at our website for more details: www.stanta.co.uk/business-premises

DIY Popdance In Primary Schools and Nurseries - do you have a teacher with a dance or PE background working in your school? Did you know that you can run Popdance Kids and Tots classes internally? Find out more at info@popdance.co.uk

Superstar Communicator, supporting the development of your female talent is essential. Having worked with organisations globally, we are now offering conﬁdence, communication and leadership workshops for your female talent. Let’s arrange a chat. Download our brochure Here

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January’s online Art of Breathwork and Relaxation is part 1 in the Stress Relief Series. Within each experiential session you will gain more tools to reduce stress load and bring you back into balance. Find Out More Here Instagram: @staceylandau.yoga Facebook: @staceylandauyoga

The Super Simple Package with The Businesses Community We all know that running a business can be a very busy place! There’s so many places we need to be to promote and market what we do! So, we want to make things super, super simple for you! How amazing would it be for you to get a reminder email every month with a link to a super simple form where you: • • • •

Add your headline Add a paragraph of text about what you want to say (news, products, service, event etc.) Add a call to action link (where you want to take people to ﬁnd out more or buy from you) Add an image/logo to accompany the feature

And we then work our magic, make it all look beautiful and promote your business in the News Round Up email and within Inform Magazine which goes to our active, ready made, and engaged audience of thousands for you - to inboxes and across social media! All for just £11/month, or just £99/year! No brainer! Easy peasey! Takes 2 minutes to do! Make sure your business is front of mind across St Albans in 2022! Super simple! Yet super effective marketing for YOUR business! Find out more and book here

10 Tips to Succeed on Social Media 2. Add Value with your content

1. Optimise your profiles On all social media platforms, your profile page is like your shop window. Your audience will look at it and decide if they want to join your community. Make sure you make your bio’s all about your audience, they should feel you are talking directly to them and that you solve their problems with your products and services. What you do and who you do it for should be clear, it sounds obvious but I do many audits and find this not to be the case!

2. Engage Social media is all about being social and building relationships. Have conversations with your followers, on accounts that share your audience and in your direct messages. The more chatty your social media accounts are the higher your posts will be ranked by the algorithms and you’ll form stronger connections with your audience.

Make sure your content inspires, educates or entertains your target audience. Be relatable and make them feel seen, heard and understood. Solve problems with tutorials, how-tos, tips and tricks or inspire with case studies, sharing results. Valuable, entertaining and consistent content, leads your audience to see you as the expert, so that come back for more. These people now have you top of mind and will be ready to buy from you when you promote your product or service.

3. Embrace Video Content According to a Cisco report, online videos will make up more than 82% of all consumer web trafﬁc and people are more likely to buy a product or service if they’ve seen a video about it. If you’re not already creating video content for your social media channels, it’s time to start. Go behind the scenes from your business or an event, show how your product is made or used, share your top tips or a tutorial, bust some industry myths, answer an FAQ or go Live! Remember to hook people in in the ﬁrst few seconds of your video, keep it short and give them a reason to watch until the end.

4. Collaborate

7. Check your Insights

Getting yourself in front of other people’s audiences is a great way to grow your online presence but it can also help to add value to your existing audience. Go live with another business that can help your audience, for example, a social media expert could go live with a videographer to help share tips on video making and how to use video in social media - a win-win for both accounts and audiences. Guest blogging and sharing others’ posts can also help to increase your reach and create a community around your brand.

Use your insights to identify if there are any trends in your topperforming posts. Maybe a similar subject theme or content format. What is your audience engaging with most? Which content drives the most website trafﬁc? Is there any evergreen content that you can post again and again?

5. Seek interaction Don’t just broadcast, start a two-way conversation. Ask questions, how is your audience feeling? Can they relate? Invite them to comment and message you. Reply to all comments, ideally with another question and nurture those relationships. Don’t underestimate the power of your direct messages, this is often where the most leads will come from.

6. Be consistent Consistency is key on social media. Find a posting schedule that’s realistic and sustainable for you and stick to it. Of course, it’s ﬁne to take holidays now and again but just make sure you tell your audience and when they can expect you to be back.

8. Keep it simple We are all so absorbed in what we do that we can easily make the mistake of presuming our target market know much more than do. Share bitesize, easily digestible content and remember that just ONE simple piece of information to you can make a huge difference to your followers. Keep captions easy to read too and avoid overwhelming people.

9. Be Authentic Don’t be tempted to be like others on social media, you’ll lose trust from your audience but also ﬁnd it exhausting. Keeping it real, showing the good and the bad and letting your audience get to know, like and trust you is the only way to be truly successful on social media and you’ll get rewarded with an engaged and supportive community.

If you need any help with your social media marketing do get in touch, I offer 1:1 training, audits, strategy and mentoring as well as online workshops.

Planning your 2022 Are you looking at planning your 2022 soon? Planning ahead can be a powerful tool for achieving what you want, but where to start, what to cover and how do you make it happen. Joolz shares a simple guide to planning effectively. Your annual business plan should consist of goals and milestones to guide your operations for the year ahead. It will help guide you and your staff in the right direction. I have been reﬂecting on why I haven’t done what I wanted this year (too busy with other things which is great but frustrating at the same time) and it made me realise why I need to plan properly. So I thought I would share it.

Where are you now? For many people, this year’s new year begins with a review of their previous year. What went well, what could you improve on? Anything you want to avoid at all costs? We have previously written about the power of reﬂection and it’s a good thing to do before you start planning. The Wheel of Values is a good way to do this as it looks at different aspects. It can be done on a personal or professional basis.

The Wheel of Values In each of the 8 sections, write one of your values and mark the number you feel you are at right now. 1 (inside) being not happy and 5 (outside) being that you couldn’t be happier. Once you’ve circled the numbers, join the dots (and maybe colour it in). In an ideal world you’ll be balanced in your responses. A bit like a literal wheel it needs to be well-shaped and balanced to turn. When you look at your wheel, if anywhere stands out as needing some work that may be where you want to focus your efforts. Download Now

What do you want to achieve?

Set a schedule

This actually has 2 purposes - what do you want to achieve with your plan and what do you want to achieve in 2022?

Spend the time planning out the detail of your goals - what, when, who and how are the questions you need to answer and write it down.

If you are happy with the last year and want more of the same and growth in a similar way then great. Your plan is about that. If you have some serious rethinking to do, then you need to focus on that within your plan and how you do that. Then set some goals for the business but also for you personally. I won’t bang on about SMART goals here but do think about if your goals do meet the criteria. Especially are they speciﬁc enough and achievable. It can help to set a big goal for the end of the year but put in the milestones in between to help it feel more manageable and keep you on track.

What will help or hinder you? One of the mistakes I have often made is to try and do everything on my own. I get in my own way, get distracted and overwhelmed. So spend some time thinking who or what will help you achieve your goals. Additional staff, a coach or a power hour with an expert maybe. Also, what will hinder you? Do you have the time, knowledge and motivation to do it or will lack of any of these stop you reaching your goal.

For example, a growth plan may have weekly or monthly goals as rows in a spreadsheet with columns for each of those. As someone who always had the prettiest revision plan at school this is something I do well!

Reflect and Refine But this is where I struggle... It’s important to make time on a weekly or fortnightly basis to revisit your plan and reassess how you are doing. Reflection is vital to keep moving forward. What is going well? What isn’t? Why not? How can you change things? If possible think about some kind of accountability as well. That may be joining a local business club or accountability group. It may be an informal agreement with another business owner or 2. But this how to ensure you achieve your goals!

Whatever you want to do in 2022, good luck! To ﬁnd out about email marketing training, or any other questions please get in touch. hello@joolzjoseph.com

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Inform Magazine - Issue 9 - January 2022

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