In a few days I will be opening up a new blog. About a week ago I met an amazing person, Coleman Tatum. You see I needed a tree taken down at one of my rental properties. Lightning had struck it and it was in danger of falling on my house. I had put it off for a while because I knew it would be expensive. Finally I called Tatum Tree Care and Removal company.

I reluctantly decided to hire Coleman and his crew. Something changed though when I got out to the job site and saw that he was so much more than a guy and a chainsaw. There was a big crew, a bobcat, a dump truck, and lots of workers. I found out that Coleman is one of the only tree service experts in this area that actually has insurance. If I had hired one of those other companies and someone got hurt I could have gotten sued!

I found out that Coleman actually has a degree in horticulture and over 25 years if experience in the tree removal business. At the end of the day I felt like he gave me an amazing deal. I am so glad that I hired a professional outfit instead of those other guys.

When it comes to hiring someone to do a job you need to not just look at price, but instead look at the job they are going to do for you. In business it is so easy to look at the bottom line and never look at who you hiring and the quality of the work that is being done. When you are looking to hire someone for your business here are three things you should look for:

Experience in the field.
Ability to do the job right.
Coverage in case of an accident.

If you keep these things in mind you will be able to hire people in your business to complete jobs that you can’t or won’t be able to do. If you don’t follow these tips you might get a cheaper price but in the long run you will pay for it. Good business people know that it is worth it to pay to get the job done right the first time. Plus as an added bonus I negotiated a deal with this business owner to do some work for him as well, so in the long run we both will win.

What are the various business services that I should consider?
Business services include a whole host of services including client refreshments, postal services, copy services, meeting rooms and training rooms, telephone handsets and call packages, wireless internet access, purchasing discounts and others.

The decision to opt for services are governed by your business needs. The trade-off is between engaging your own resources versus seasoned professionals of the service providers. The decision is between taking a longer time to get started versus getting started right away with the available and well oiled administrative services.

Can business services be customized as per my needs?
The range of customization of business services offered depends upon the service office provider. It could be an off-the-shelf package that offers little or no customization or it could be pick-and-choose from the boutique of services provided.

At a short notice the service options can be individually scaled to your changing needs and expanded to include the items and services that are most important to you.

As an example, the services of a business centre can be tailored to very specific needs. As an alternative to the full-service office, various combinations of services can be provided as well. In addition, they offer a variety of standard services: copier and fax machine, access to meeting rooms with state-of-the-art conference technology, etc. Professional staff answer calls in the company name; welcome visitors and handle clerical or secretarial work. The advantage to the clients is that all services are offered on a pay-as-you-go basis. In other words, they only pay for services and facilities they are actually using.

How much do I pay for it?
There are multiple different payment models for availing the business services. It could range anywhere from a completely variable option on a pay-as-you-go-basis, being partially variable or a fixed service with monthly, quarterly or annual payment options.

How can a business centre support you?
Serviced office provider such as Avanta offer an attractive business service package with NO hidden costs, which give its customers a clear advantage above the competition. Their goal is to provide you with the business services you need when you need them.

Business services for entrepreneurs or small businesses can be bundled with your physical office or virtual office membership at Avanta, and clients can purchase “Business Services on Demand” as needed. Avanta’s virtual receptionist will answer calls using your company’s customized greeting and route each call per your instructions. Each office at Avanta comes equipped with a full-service, IP-based PBX phone system featuring call routing, voicemail and low-cost long distance rates.

Why don’t you combine various business services such as internet connectivity, client refreshments and postal services into a simple, monthly package? This gives you the ability to forecast and plan their total cost when taking using a business centre in Delhi.

Listed below are some of the business services offered by Avanta India;

– Client refreshments

– Postal services

– Copy services

– Meeting rooms and training rooms

– FREE high speed wireless & internet access in communal areas

– Business support & purchasing

– Bandwidth & telecom packages including free local and intra-circle calls

– Telephony services

– Internet connectivity

The catering business, like any other is extremely competitive. To stand out from the crown and win new clients you need to be better than your competitors at promoting or marketing your catering business services. Here are a few tried and tested marketing tactics that you can consider to promote your catering business.

Advertising goes a long way towards spreading your message across the markets that you are targeting. Also consider dispatching press releases to local newspapers to grab attention. You can also tap into TV networks and radio shows when they, from time to time need people to interview for their food-related programs. Put time into understanding all the advertising options that are available, budget for some methods that you feel will work and then test methods against each other to find the winners that produce results to justify the expense.

Offering your customers extra services is always a welcome gesture as customers like to have a variety of choices. Up-selling is a common strategy for generating added revenue. Perk up your catering business by adding services such as flower arrangements or setting up fixtures for outdoor events. Try to up-sell clients on more expensive foods and beverages as well.

Ensure long-lasting relationships with customers by having unique products to sell. A competitive business such as the catering industry requires an innovative mind that can keep coming up with new ideas to impress customers while still offering quality and consistency. Sustaining their support through incentive programs like discounts and package deals are good tactics.

Having the largest range of unique products and services to offer can give you a competitive advantage when it comes to promoting your company.

Mingling with competition is always healthy! You may find that your products and services are not so similar after all and that you could benefit by referring each other to clients who are looking for specific services that one of you may provide better than the other.

Aside from having healthy competitor relations you should also develop a wider network of business associates. Introduce yourself to event-related companies like decorators, event coordinators and printers and cross promote each others services.

Study business models and other successful companies to find out how they promote their products or services. There is so much to learn from the great entrepreneurial spirit! Practice what they preach and see how you can extend their ideals towards your catering business.

Showing off your corporate social responsibility can also boost your catering business. Join charity cook-off events in the community to push for further free publicity for your company. Participating in worthwhile charitable programs could also create a positive attitude among your staff (as well as your clients) as they can see that you are running a business with care and gratitude.

If your business goals include staying competitive in your market, improving your professional image, and opening your doors to more customers and a highly utilized staff, then you need a proofreader on your business services team.

Let’s face it-very few businesses can afford to pay a full-time editor/proofreader and keep them on staff. That’s understandable. But not having a proofreader on your business services team has time and again proven detrimental. Here’s why…

1. Grammar and proofreading errors are costly and embarrassing. Grammatical mistakes are the easiest to fix before they’re printed, and the hardest to undo once they are printed. The little ones may go by the wayside, but the big ones oftentimes go down in the annals of history, at times taking a company’s reputation with it.

2. When an error is made, customers tend to focus on the error instead of the message. The result-a vanished sales opportunity, wasted money, and the most damaging of all-loss of customer trust and loyalty. After all, if a company can’t be bothered to produce accurate print media, what else can’t they be bothered with?

3. Beyond the basic printed typo, there are a plethora of errors that have cost companies-even corporations-plenty of profits. This host of print media and web copy errors can make a company blush, such as the misuse of accept/except, mediate/meditate (quite opposite meanings), and of course the always embarrassing six/sex and public/pubic.

For example, what happened when Old Navy launched their 2011 collegiate line? They printed an entire t-shirt line with a punctuation error: “Lets Go!” instead of “Let’s Go!”-a missing apostrophe that ended in catastrophe. Not only was Old Navy forced to pull an entire line of produced clothing already on shelves and featured in their online store (equals loss of inventory and money), they also became the subject of a firestorm of traditional and social media fodder, possibly jeopardized their reputation as a with-it clothing line and risking losing a multitude of collegiate accounts.