With the holiday season upon us, it’s important to have a clear plan of how you’re going to market to your customers (existing and prospective!) during this period. I recently wrote about how to create a holiday marketing plan, but what about some low cost practical marketing ideas to go with that? That’s what I’m going to look at here.

Every year the holiday season creeps up on me. The leaves begin to fall and the temperature starts to drop and before I know it there are holiday ads on the TV and stores are stocked floor to ceiling with decorations, stocking fillers and gift wrap.

You may remember the other week when I wrote about fatigue and ways to reduce it. We’re always chasing that perfect work/life balance so we’re getting the best of both worlds, but it’s easier said than done. Fortunately, there are a number of ways to help with this.

As Thanksgiving approaches, it reminds me to be thankful - thankful for my business, thankful for my customers and, above all, thankful for my employees (without whom I wouldn’t have either).

Learning how to lead a team can be a case of trial and error, often involving learning from past mistakes. There are many management styles you may wish to follow, and there are even more to avoid, as shown in our latest infographic.

Aside from the great stuff your business provides, whether it be products, services, great customer service or awesome coffee (and, let’s face it, everyone needs awesome coffee!), none of this can happen without a healthy cashflow.

Even in this day and age, female entrepreneurship isn’t as common as one would hope. That’s why it’s time to celebrate these strong innovative women who make The Cradle of Liberty such an amazing place.

When making a new hire, it’s important that the onboarding process is handled carefully. If it is not done correctly, then you could end up with a number of issues: hiring the wrong person for the job, seeing a rapid turnover rate, or having clashing expectations of the new employee’s productivity and role, for example.

Let’s experiment. When it comes to growing my business I’m definitely not one for standing still - I don’t prescribe to the ‘wait and see’ mentality. Instead, I like to try different things all the time.

I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking that I could do with a few more hours in the day? Recently I noticed that I was getting to the office earlier and leaving later, but I still seemed to have things left on my to-do list every night.