In this age of social media and blogging, it’s more important than ever to make sure that your blog is marketing your business effectively 24 hours a day. There are so many mistakes that new bloggers make which can be easily avoided from the outset. Let’s face it; business people are good at what they do, but they aren’t always good at marketing online. The online world is a totally different animal when it comes to marketing, so take these tips to heart and make changes that will create a thriving blog marketing machine.

Content Is King

First, you’ve got to make your content it exciting and engaging for the reader. No one wants to come and read huge, long blocks of black and white text. Give people something useful that they can take away and use immediately.

Use subheadings, bullet points and personal stories to relate your message. People don’t have much time when they’re online. They tend to scan content, so make sure that your biggest points stand out and are concise and to the point.

Social Media Rules the World

Blogs that don’t have social media icons for sharing are doomed to failure. You need to have others sharing your content with their own networks of friends and family, as well as business colleagues.

Make sure that you have Twitter and Facebook share buttons on all of your posts. Give people a way to connect with you by joining your Facebook page or Twitter followers. If you want to connect with other business people, make sure to also have a place where they can sign up for your LinkedIn network.

Interact on Other Blogs

It’s also important not to put yourself in a “blog bubble” by never going and commenting on other people’s blog posts. It’s so easy to go read other blog posts in related fields and make comments while leaving a link to your blog.

When you can offer comments of value to a blog owner’s readers, you start to set yourself apart as an expert in your niche.

Don’t Ignore Your Own Tribe of Fans

When people are making comments on your blog, it’s important to join in the conversation. Often, people commenting on your blog will be surprised that you’re actually reading what they have to say and interacting with them. Remember that the original purpose of a blog is to interact and engage other people. You don’t want your readers to think that you have a stagnant website that you don’t monitor or read on a regular basis.

Make a List

When you’re writing your blog post, make sure to do lots of list templates. In other words, write a blog post such as, “10 Things You Can Do To Wow Them With Your Resume” or “5 Ways to Organize Your Office”, etc. People love these kinds of articles because it gives them a quick snapshot of information that they can take away and use.

Add an RSS Link

Make sure that you put a link somewhere on your site where people can add you to their RSS feeds. Often, people consume their daily news and updated blog posts using RSS readers. It’s important that you make it easy for people to get your content quickly every single day.

These are only a few of the ways that you can make sure that your blog is more successful with each passing year. Remember this is your own online real estate, so you want it to go up in value year after year. By interacting and engaging your readers, your business will grow faster and flourish on the social media platforms.

About the Author

Charity Cason is an author and online business trainer. She helps women create and grow online businesses that will thrive now and in the future. Her background as a TV Journalist and multi-million dollar real estate agent and broker has given her the knowledge to help other women live their dreams. You can find her 24 part audio interview series with successful female online entrepreneurs at http://CharityCason.com/marketinginterviews.

“The death of the traditional salesman has been greatly exaggerated,” heralded a recent column in The Economist (October 22, 2011). Why does the media always have to dredge up the Willy Lomans of the world every time the sales function is covered?

Sales has made leaps and bounds since Arthur Miller wrote that fateful play in 1949. Yet there’s been nothing traditional in sales for the past 15 years thanks, in part, to women making it a successful career path. When it comes to tradition, the challenge today is how to motivate the next generation to work in old-fashioned (read: unsocial as in media and societal interactions) work cultures. This is especially true within the sales field due to the disconnected nature of its reps to physical offices.

Here’s the rub, to quote another great classic: The next generation is all about “great expectations.” I teach and advise Gen Yers — also known as Millennials (born after 1980) — at the university level in sales and business ethics. When a student comes back from a sales internship and says, “They didn’t use my skills,” I know that the traditional corporate mindset was more about a “go-for” experience. Then when a VP of sales says: “Your grad left our company after a year,” I have to give him the bad news — “You didn’t engage your new employee the way she expected.”

Onboarding a High-Maintenance Generation

How do companies motivate and manage a generation of workers who grew up receiving awards and prizes for just showing up?

“They’re so high maintenance!” That’s what one manager recently shared with me about how much time she spends getting new Gen Y team members on board. She wonders: Is it worth it? Yes it is — if you learn how to leverage this new talent by focusing Gen Y behaviors on business goals and setting metrics for results. The paradigm shift to tap their creativity and technological savvy is not unlike moving from landlines to iPhones.

Based on an onboarding model developed by the Center for Sales Innovation’s research, here are a few recommendations for managers who need to make the shift:

Just-in-time mentality: Provide plenty of structure for expectations. Remember: They were raised with tremendous self esteem and the freedom to ignore limits. Some Millennials lack time management skills because parents managed their calendars. Most are great at prepping the night before an interview or presentation. A few keys:

• Support planning to master skills over time.
• Foster an understanding of how learning directly leads to results/next project.
• Provide immediate feedback.

Sound-bite generation: Keep content short and focused. Keep in mind that Gen Yers have no patience for long instructions and details. However, they need to know how an application applies specifically to their jobs and projects. But they don’t want knowledge for knowledge sake — they can source it on the Internet. A few keys:

• Keep a career plan within their vision.
• Explain why decisions are made so they understand how their roles connect to the big picture.
• Be real about instructions — they need details — and set mutual expectations.

Get social: Learn new approaches to business. Text messaging, blogging, tweeting and Facebook are Gen Yers’ connection to the world. Help your company to embrace social media but do it in a thoughtful way by formulating policy around it; then allow Gen Yers to speak on behalf of the company.

• Invite these social media-savvy employees to teach other team members to engage prospects and customers to further sales and marketing goals, based on those who are open to receiving messages in new ways.
• Capitalize on their desire to volunteer for social causes to gain leadership skills and raise the company’s visibility in the local community.

Yes, the time required to onboard and manage new employees has surged but the payoff is building high energy, local and global citizens who are commited to making a contribution to the world. Every manager’s challenge is to help Gen Yers figure out how the job fits into their life plan!

About the Author

Lynn Schleeter (lfschleeter@stkate.edu) is director of the Center for Sales Innovation at St. Catherine University in St. Paul, Minn. At the University’s heart is the largest, most innovative college for women in the nation. St. Kate’s also offers a range of graduate and associate programs for women and men. The Center for Sales Innovation is a national resource for women in sales. It is advancing excellence in sales talent among women who want to enter the field and women who want to grow their leadership skills. For more information, visit www.stkate.edu/sales and St. Kate’s Sales Club on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pages/St-Kates-Sales-Club/122857674426872

You can also follow the link to read an op-ed piece that Lilly Ledbetter contributed to the Charlotte Observer on January 29, 2012 — the 3rd anniversary of the Lilly Ledbetter Act.

This month, President Obama released a new video asking for support of the Paycheck Fairness act, which would protect women who try to find out if they’re receiving equal pay and would make it easier for them to take action if they’re not. You can view that video below.

As President Obama says, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act brought us one step closer to equal pay for equal work, but there is still work to be done. Every step forward is a step in the right direction.

It used to be that the business landscape was a man’s world. Times have certainly changed!

Today, women are wielding more and more power on both sides of the business transaction.

First, let’s look at some facts from the consumer side. In family purchases that involve two adults (a woman and a man) women make:

• 94% of the purchase decision on home furnishings
• 92% of the purchase decision on family vacations
• 91% of the purchase decision on home purchases
• 80% of the purchase decision on healthcare
• 60% of the purchase decision on family cars
• 51% of the purchase decision on consumer electronics

It’s clear that in many cases, women are not just influencing the market; they are the market. And perhaps even more surprising is that these statistics have changed very little over the past ten years. In other words, women have been the market for some time now yet many executives have not taken action on this huge opportunity. And while these figures represent US households, the percentages are being exported due to technology driven globalization. Even in countries where you’d expect women to have no voice at all, thanks to computers and smart phones becoming more prevalent worldwide, people everywhere are getting informed and empowered, which ultimately has an effect on culture.

This brings us to the other side of the equation. Who is running and leading the companies that make the products women are buying for themselves and their families? Increasingly, it’s women.

In 2012, 18 of the Fortune 500 companies will have women CEOs at the helm. While at first glance 18 may not seem like a lot, it’s an all-time high and shows the steady pace of women leading the largest companies in the world.

Even more interesting is that we’re now seeing women lead companies in industries that have been historically male dominated. For example, for the first time ever, IBM chose a woman CEO, Virginia “Ginni” Rometty. Hewlett-Packard, another technology company, named Meg Whitman as their CEO in September 2011. These are just two examples of global, male-dominated companies now run by women.

And this trend isn’t just in the US. India, for example, has more women CEOs than the US. And over the past 30 years we’ve seen the number of women leaders in the Middle East, Africa, China, and Europe increase as well.

Now it’s important to note that so far we’ve just been talking about CEO spots at major corporations. Add in the number of female CEOs at small and mid-sized companies, female upper level managers, and female entrepreneurs, and you can see that we’re actually talking about a large number. And these are numbers you wouldn’t have seen twenty years ago. So women are definitely making their mark and exerting their business power.

The New Hard Trends

Some people may say the rise of female leaders is surprising. I say it’s 100% predictable. In my book, Flash Foresight, I make the point that in an uncertain world, you have to ask yourself, “What am I certain about?” Strategy based on uncertainty has high risk; strategy based on certainty has low risk. There are a number of certainties in today’s world that make the rise of women obvious.

Relationships are number one.

The number one certainty is that the future is all about relationships. Even though we live in a technology-driven world, it’s still a human world and relationships still matter. This is where women shine.

Most people and even scientists and researchers agree that women and men think differently in terms of relationships. Women are more adept at relationship building. If we have too many leaders in an organization who are men, we don’t have a balance and we don’t have the ability to grow relationships with a holistic approach. That’s because men tend to be informers while women tend to be real communicators.

This is important and timely, because we’re shifting from the information age to the communication age. Social media is all about communicating and engaging, and women have the upper hand here. So the shift in business from informing to communicating provides great opportunity for women leadership.

The big picture matters.

Women are intuitively great “system-thinkers.” In other words, rather than just look at the piece of the puzzle you’re responsible for and executing on that, which men tend to be very good at, women are adept at looking more holistically at the entire puzzle or system and seeing how the various pieces go together.

Obviously, it’s not that men can’t be system-thinkers. But over the years as men were in leadership positions—not just the CEO level, but all lead managers—they focused on “give me the job to do and I’ll focus and get it done.” That’s certainly important, but sometimes that mindset works against you as things become more interconnected.

Collaboration is key.

Women tend to seek agreement and work at being more collaborative. In fact, women seem to be far better at collaboration than men are. In the past, business was about cooperation, and we cooperated because we had to. Men are great at cooperating. But in this new totally networked and connected world, we need to find and develop new levels of collaboration.

Everyone has heard of “silos” in companies. We have massive silos in all sorts of industries. The key is to break those silos down and get people communicating, collaborating, and working together. No job is just a technical job; every job is also a human job.

Passion counts.

When women are excited and passionate about a product, a service, a company, or whatever they are doing, they become extremely driven from that emotion. Men, on the other hand, strive to hide their emotions. Having an emotional drive can be very powerful in leading a business, product launches, and any initiative. This is not saying that men can’t be passionate. It’s just that male-dominated groups are one-sided and tend to downplay the positive benefits of emotion and passion as a force to drive innovation and growth.

Taking risks (carefully) is essential.  

Women are now starting to do something that’s been a male trait for a long time: They’re becoming risk takers. Men are hard-wired to be risk takers, and they make decisions fast. Sometimes it’s not always the right decision, but it is a decision. Unfortunately, this often becomes a ready-fire-aim approach. Women, on the other hand, tend to analyze, think things through, weigh all the elements, and then make a decision. Today we’re seeing more women taking bigger risks in shorter amounts of time. Part of this is due to the increased speed that information is available. This combination of thinking first and acting fast is certainly good news, because the old rule of business was the big eat the small; now the fast eat the slow.

A Brighter Future

Granted, some people may say all these elements are generalizations, but there is truth in generalization. So while all these traits may not apply to every woman, if you look at the group as a whole, these things tend to be true.

So the bottom line is that diversity has always been an unbelievably powerful force in any company—not just racial diversity, but male-female diversity too. All diversity gives you better solutions to challenges, allows you to solve problems faster, and enables you to see opportunities better. This is crucial, because over the next five years we’re going to be transforming how we sell, market, educate, train, communicate, collaborate, innovate, and much more. Thanks to today’s rapidly evolving technology, we’re witnessing the biggest game-changing transformation that any of us have ever lived through. And we’re going to need a variety of thinking, diversity, and people working together in a collaborative, communicative way to make a positive and productive transformation possible.

As we look to the future, we’re going to see the number of female business leaders growing even higher because we need the balance. We need the creativity. We need men and women working and leading together in business and in government. So if you’re a man reading this, support the women in your organization to reach new heights. And if you’re a woman reading this, think about your career. Plot it out. Make it happen. We need you!

About the Author

Daniel Burrus is considered one of the world’s leading technology forecasters and business strategists, and is the founder and CEO of Burrus Research, a research and consulting firm that monitors global advancements in technology driven trends to help clients better understand how technological, social and business forces are converging to create enormous, untapped opportunities. He is the author of six books, including the NY Times bestseller Flash Foresight: How To See the Invisible and Do the Impossible as well as the highly acclaimed Technotrends. Be sure to check out Volume 2 of Daniel’s Know What’s Next Magazine; an annual publication on strategies for transforming your business and future.

In other words, women small business owners are playing an incredibly important part in job creation in the United States as more and more women take control of their own careers, start their own businesses, and create jobs for more people.

A new infographic from BOLT Insurance Agency offers a visual representation of how women small business owners are impacting job creation in the United States. Using information from the U.S. Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy and the Center for Women’s Business Research, Infographic World designed the infographic shown below.

Take a look and learn more about how women-owned small businesses are affecting job creation (23 million new jobs), economic impact ($3 trillion), and more.

Via: Bolt Insurance

For many, a New Year represents a chance at a fresh start. And business owners are constantly in search of ways to reinvent themselves; to capture that next edge that will help them grow their business and better serve their clients. Thankfully, there are a number of ways to do it. To get you started, we’ve picked three resolutions you should make for your business in 2012.

1. I’ll only solve problems

It’s a common pitfall among small business owners. You love what you do and you want
to do it all. Well guess what? You can’t – at least not if you plan on being financially
successful. As a business owner, your job is to focus on delivering exactly what your customer wants – not what you think they might want. In 2012, keep that at the forefront of your mind when approaching your work.

2. I’ll meet with clients and prospects in person

Communication has gotten easier, but that doesn’t mean it’s gotten better. From social media to texting and email, we’re communicating all the time, but losing the essence of good communication in the process. Pick up the phone and set-up an in person meeting with a prospect or client. Do it often, in fact. You’ll be amazed by how much more meaningful those relationships become, and how much more you can accomplish by meeting in person, too.

3. I will be seen
Attend networking events. Get serious about email marketing. Stay steady on social
media. Let others know that you exist as often as possible. If you’re not promoting yourself at full throttle, can you expect someone else to?

What are your goals as a business owner in 2012? Share them with us!

Image: flickr

Implementing an effective PR strategy, particularly for any start-up business or company which has little or no experience handling communications, may seem a daunting task, but as we all shake off the apathy of returning to work and prepare for a successful 2012 in the spotlight, I have developed a series of PR top tips.

Make time to plan – having the best of intentions and an enthusiasm to get started is all well and good, but without effective planning and thought, your PR outreach will be inconsistent, not on message and lacking clarity. Developing a strategy doesn’t need to be a long drawn out process, it just needs to include a clear breakdown of what the main aims and objectives of the activity are and how the proposed PR activity will help meet those objectives. Who you want to reach out to and what you want to say to them in addition to the mechanics to do this are also vital, so incorporate target audiences and media, key messages and tactics.

Be realistic – when it comes to PR it is very easy to get over enthused and plan in lots of outreach, be it the draft and issue of press releases, media briefings, event attendance or speaker opportunities, but remember all of these things take time, so realistically consider how long each of these tasks take and which of them are priorities. It will be much more beneficial in the long term to do one thing well each month instead of lots of little things which are rushed and not seen through to their full potential. PR is about building a brand or profile over time so a steady drip feed of interesting and relevant news over a long period of time is likely to be more impactful than lots of little infrequent bursts of activity.

Consider your objectives – having a clear goal in mind when planning PR activity is essential, so identify what your business objectives are and how PR should be aligned to help you meet them. For example if your long term objective is to successfully exit and sell on your business but the short term one is to encourage people to buy and use your services, there are two quite clear and separate roles for the PR to undertake. The first is to raise the profile of your goods or service to the people who might be interested in buying it. The second is to make your business an exciting investment proposition to influencers, peers and investors in your sector. Both will need to be targeted with different key messages and although sometimes overlapping, normally through different media.

Who are you talking to and what are you saying – identifying your key audiences and messages is the lifeblood of any successful PR strategy, often bringing with it a lot of soul searching and ego squashing. Any passionate business leader, be it a senior executive or entrepreneur, generally believes that their business or product is worthy of national acclaim and as such should be spread across the national print and broadcast media. When it comes to successfully executing a PR strategy however there is an important element of reality checking to undertake. If you are a local hairdresser and you are looking to attract people who live within a 20 mile radius, embarking on a full-throttle national media relations campaign would not only be unlikely to be viewed to the people you are actually trying to entice into your salon, but it is unlikely that the national media will be interested in taking your news. Ensure that the media your target is relevant to the audience that you want to speak to and that you are sharing news with them that they want to hear.

Integrate a monthly working plan – creating an overarching strategy which illustrates the clear mission of the PR over a specific timeframe is essential, but on a day-to-day basis a more user-friendly working plan needs to be incorporated to break down the monthly tactics and deadlines. Again, this doesn’t need to be an exhaustive document, just a simple table outlining that month’s activity e.g. one press briefing with a tier one target media or planning and attendance at a trade show.

Continually evaluate and amend – sometimes things don’t always go to plan and what may seem like an excellent idea during the planning stage may have lost its appeal by the time it comes to roll it out, so take time to continually evaluate the success of campaigns and monitor the news agenda both in your sector and in the wider business world to see what impact it could have on your outreach. A story about an intake of new employees and series of job openings at your firm might work as an impressive ‘bucking the trend’ story when others news around the time may not be quite as optimistic.

————–

Georgina Dunkley is a PR account director at Punch Communications, a leading integrated PR, SEO and social media agency. With over nine years’ experience in the industry she has extensive experience handling projects across a broad spectrum of sectors including technology, business-to-business and business-to-consumer. A media relations expert, she also handles strategy planning, crisis management and investor relations for a number of her clients. For more information visit http://www.punchcomms.com/, follow http://twitter.com/punchcomms, + https://plus.google.com/114373547150700086909?prsrc=3 or like http://www.facebook.com/punchcommunications.

Image: flickr

Many of the business owners we work with say they’re ready to get 2011 behind them. January 2012 beckons as business objectives glisten with potential revitalization and realignment. The drudgery of doom and gloom financial news has worn us all down and we welcome a little holiday frivolity, frugal as it may need to be this year.

Plenty of good news remains in 2011 for business owners yet to capitalize on three last minute tax planning tips that keep more cash on hand for 2012. It is imperative to work with trusted advisers to determine set the best course for you and your company, but these tips lower taxable income and, in some cases, lower the company’s or business owner’s tax bracket.

1.) Defer Income – Seasoned seasonal guidance, yet many business owners overlook it. The US legislature failed to settle on an agreeable tax reform plan in 2011, and tax reform during a tax year is about as popular as a centipede in a sock. Chances are tax rates will remain the same until 2013; thus, if you can afford the luxury of deferring income now, push it into 2012 and reduce your 2011 taxable income immediately. Two examples:

• Defer pending invoicing, if possible, until January.
• Max out contributions to 401(k) or other retirement plans. Don’t have one? Tap myriad benefits now by starting before you sing “Auld Lang Syne.” Increase business deductions, defer personal income and be a hero to your employees by starting a plan with or without a matching fund component. Execute the plan by year-end and many plans will allow contributions by you and your staff for 2011 for months into 2012.

2.) Accelerate Expenses – Sage advice in any tax year – for both personal and business tax planning. This can make a dramatic difference in your total taxable income if you qualify for deductions. A couple of examples include:

• Buy now; cut your tax bill later. Purchase extra, necessary items such as Q1 2012 inventory or pay 2012 property or E&O insurance early.
• Purchase lager equipment or opt for early renewal of subscription software
  Of course, cash-strapped companies may not have this luxury, but those who often also find themselves getting more for less by scoring year-end promotional pricing.

3) Charitable Contributions – If you have computers, cell phones, motor pool vehicles or other old equipment you no longer use, consider donating them to charity. Cash contributions, year-end auctions and other forms of donation count as well and may be just what you need to trip the trigger on a lower tax bracket for you and your business. In some cases, the deduction passes through to your personal tax filing, but not if you own a “C-Corp.” If you own a C-Corp, the business takes the deduction.

That brings up another great year-end task: evaluate your corporate structure. If you own a C-Corp and ever plan to sell your business, start discussing a change in entity classification now. A nasty double taxation penalty shocks many C-Corp owners at the closing table. If you make the election now, you face a 10-year recapture period before escape paying twice the tax upon the sale of your business.

Here’s to stronger 2012 as entrepreneurs worldwide gain more experience navigating the new global economy!

—

Perry Sheraw is the Executive Vice President of Corporate Development at eBusiness Appraisals, a top online source for business valuations and strategy. Still an active writer in the business and financial investing fields, Perry began her writing career at the Cincinnati Enquirer as a Personal Finance and Business reporter. She now lives in Washington, D.C.

Image: flickr

You could say there are two kinds of websites: those that are enjoyable, and those that are downright painful to use. The more pleasant the site, the more we tend to gravitate toward it, spending more time there and going back more often. So how can you ensure that your website is providing that positive experience, as opposed to making your customers want to pull their hair out? Just follow these three essential rules:

Quality of information: Without the right content, everything else is pointless. Ask yourself: “What do my visitors want to see? What specific information are they looking for? What would they find most useful? And what do they NOT want to see (what would annoy or frustrate them)?” By giving people what they seek, you’ll make their lives easier, leaving them happy and more likely to return to your site again and again.

Ease of use: How you organize your site’s pages and the information on them can make a big difference in helping your visitors find what they’re looking for. To use the needle-in-a-haystack analogy, if you have a big messy pile of hay with the needles buried in the bottom, people will either give up looking before they find them, or be so exhausted upon reaching the needles that they’ll never come back again. Better to have your hay organized in small, neat piles with the needles sitting in plain sight on the top where they are easy to find! And while you’re at it, if any of your “hay” is old or rotten (read: outdated or unnecessary), get rid of it. The less clutter there is on your site, the easier it will be for visitors to see the things that really matter.

Overall experience: This is the icing on the cake! With a pleasant atmosphere that personifies your company, visitors get the “big picture” of what you’re offering, along with an enjoyable experience to keep them coming back time after time. Strive to make your website a reflection of your business, to show new visitors what makes your company unique, and if you have brick-and-mortar storefront(s), to give an experience consistent with what they would get in person. Take The Container Store, for example: if you’ve ever shopped in one of their stores, you know that they’re very neat and tidy, streamlined, and it’s generally easy to find what you need. Their website is the same: a clean appearance, organized product menus, and again, it’s easy to find what you’re looking for. And all of this embodies The Container Store’s mission to help people become more organized.

Providing a helpful, enjoyable online presence can improve your business at every stage: new visitors get a great first impression, first-time customers will be pleased with the experience and more likely to return a second time, and repeat customers will remain loyal not only for the product or service you provide, but also for the pleasant experience they have every time they come to your site. Use these guidelines to craft a better online experience, and you’ll be well on your way to more, happier customers.

About the Author

As owner of CreativeGem Designs, Barbara Austin creates sparkling print, web, and identity designs to help passion-driven entrepreneurs capture the attention of their target markets. For a treasure trove of marketing tips, design advice, and freebies, subscribe to her newsletter The Diamond Mine.

The key to being a great manager is to monitor your staff’s performance, identify strengths and weaknesses, and ultimately make sure your team is working productively. There are many approaches to motivating your staff and rewarding them for hard work and success, from a mention in a meeting or in a internal publication to a promotion in the company hierarchy.
Whilst these methods work great on a longer term scale, staff need incentives on a more regular basis in order to reach goals and gain work life satisfaction. Recognising this need within your team makes you a fair and dedicated manager.

Changes in work culture

Where the demands of work have increased, so have the expectations for rewards. Many companies will offer great social reward opportunities from the start of an employment contract and this can be a great way to gain and retain great staff. It is always important to remember that as well as individual rewards, group incentives work well, building moral for the company and better communicative relationships between teams and departments.

Individual Rewards

Individual rewards can be presented for best performances over the financial year or quarter in monetary or gift form. It is important to personalise these gifts to an extent, considering the source of vouchers or gift depending on the person. This will show your staff that there is an element of personality to the company and build positive work relationships for you. Depending on the tasks you carry out as an organisation and the deadlines you have to meet will mean you can vary the terms of your incentives, it may also take time to get the best procedure in place; requiring some trial and error.

Group Incentives

A great incentive for teams or departments are social activities, either attended as a group or tickets for events offered to the few highest performers. Not only is this an individual reward but it can be enjoyed amongst the team. Team building is one of the most effective tools for productivity and improving office communications, so this has two way benefits. Always ensure you set the boundaries and time scale for rewards, and also have a plan if the goal is not reached. All these elements will be relevant to what your organisation does and the roles that are within it, so you will need to decide the upon the best approach.

The power to maximise out put and boost motivation is in your hands so make sure you have a strategy set in place from the start and begin to see the benefits.

Image: flickr.