The $242 Billion Business Of Corporate Gifting Pivoted From A Routine To A Priority In The Pandemic

Somewhere between the gratitude of Thanksgiving and the gift-giving of December traditions lies the industry of corporate gifting. Companies can deepen connections, build loyalty, and increase a sense of mutual value with both clients and employees through thoughtful, intentional tokens of appreciation. Here’s an inside look at this rapidly growing business as we head into the business gift giving season.

Read the full article at: www.forbes.com

Six Ways Going “Green” Can Boost Your Bottom Line

We’ve heard it over and over again: it’s important for the environment to work “green” or eco-friendly initiatives into our lives whenever we can. For individuals, the path to a greener lifestyle is simpler, but for businesses, an eco-conscious approach may seem difficult to integrate at first.  We think there are plenty of green initiatives your small business can adopt – and they’ll also be great for your bottom, and sometimes top, lines.
 
1. Grow your business by marketing your eco-friendly products, services and expertise
In every industry, there’s a largely untapped segment of buyers that values and is willing to pay for green products, services and expertise. Metro Sign & Awning (a Sales Renewal JointSourcing client), for example, wanted to cultivate new Partners who’d recommend their signage products and services in the Partners’ new construction projects. With our help, Metro created a series of white papers that helped Architects and Property Developers become more knowledgeable about green signage.  The idea was that by making these prospective partners more knowledgeable about something Metro was expert at (eco-friendly signage), the partners would come off as more knowledgeable in front of their customers. This brought more business back to Metro as well, creating a clever – and successful – marketing campaign that not only built their own business, but also enhanced their partnerships while doing double duty for sustainability.
 
2. Share the knowledge.
Do your products and services have a long-term environmental impact? Let your customers know how working with you can impact THEIR green initiatives and bottom line! Outline both the financial and ecological ROI on a sustainable product. Generate content that discusses how your eco-friendly products can reduce your customers’ carbon footprint or eliminate their waste over time. By leveraging your own environmental consciousness into a marketing campaign, you’ll encourage your customers to invest in your products and services, while also doing double duty for sustainability! You can also grow your partners’ businesses by sharing your own green expertise, helping your partners win more customers through the wisdom you’ve passed to them.
 
3. Think outside the (recycling) box.
Green initiatives at your company aren’t limited to benefitting ONLY your company. Get creative with your business’ approach to environmental friendly decision making. Understand your carbon footprint and consider participating in carbon offset programs to supplement and enhance any company policies you have already implemented. Use your business voice to align with policy initiatives that align with your company’s values. Customers in the modern era are heavily attracted to purpose-driven businesses that publicly share – and take action on – their values. You’ll not only be doing the earth a favor, but you’ll be gaining favor with and growing your customer base!
 
4. Assess your energy needs.
Are you leaving equipment or lighting on overnight? Are you heating a conference room you only use once per week? Minimizing wasted energy sources will not only help the environment, but will also put a nice dent into your energy bills. Switch to LED lighting in place of incandescent bulbs, and put your lights on motion sensors to ensure lights are turned off when not in use. Set computers and other office equipment to hibernate or switch into sleep mode during periods of inactivity. Consider switching to laptops, which are more energy-efficient than desktops, whenever possible. You may also be eligible for rebates on your energy costs if you’re upgrading to eco-friendly equipment, so contact your energy supplier to see what incentives they may offer!
 
5. Assess your physical office needs.
Your business’ office footprint is your own piece of the environment, and needs as much care and consideration as the great outdoors. Find an office that is the right size for your needs to prevent wasted energy from heating and lighting spaces that are unused. When upgrading equipment or furnishing your office or workspaces, shop secondhand when possible (something Covid has made a lot easier with all the office downsizing going on now). Look for energy efficient machinery, or for sustainably built furniture that will outlast other construction. Or, consider eliminating your rent bill completely by allowing your employees to work remotely! Remote offices reduce pollution from commuting to and from the office, and reduce your employees’ gas and wear & tear expenses, so it’s a win all around!
 
6. Assess your paper needs.
Printing and paper use is a prime target for small businesses to make an impact with a few simple changes. Printing on both sides of each sheet will cut both your paper waste and your paper cost in half instantly. Or, use the back side of printed papers as scratch paper for note taking instead of purchasing sticky notes or other notepads. Or, consider going paperless completely! With the proliferation of cloud computing, records storage and document sharing can be done without a single sheet of paper; marketing can be managed online through email campaigns, social media, and websites; even sales and accounting can be migrated to online payment programs and bookkeeping software. Never buy another ream, nor another clunky printer or copier, again!

Benefits of Gender Diversity

With International Women’s Day happening this month, you may have seen your news feeds filled with appreciation, support, and celebration of women everywhere. Though that hasn’t always been the case for women in the workplace, the gender gap is rapidly closing – and the economic benefits of gender diversity has become readily apparent. Study after study has proven that the inclusion of women in business environments has direct and indirect financial benefits. In the US alone, gender equality practices and policies could inject over $4 trillion into the economy in the next five years, with gender-diverse businesses in some sectors showing up to 14% higher average revenue and up to 19% higher average quarterly net profit than less-diverse counterparts. 
Why does gender diversity return such large economic benefits? One reason is that prioritizing gender diversity within the workplace allows businesses to draw from a much wider talent pool. With women typically obtaining college degrees at a higher rate than their male counterparts, this opens the door to more hiring options with a wider variety of experiences and viewpoints, while still maintaining a high level of knowledge and ability. Inclusivity has been flagged as an important employment decision factor by 85% of women, so not only does gender diversity grow the available hiring pool, it also actively attracts those highly capable workers away from other companies, giving your business the marketplace advantage when seeking talent. Increased diversity of opinions and viewpoints also enhances your business’ opportunity to think outside the box while simultaneously providing a better internal representation of your external market.
Once women are on board, incorporating gender diverse policies further increases creativity, retention, productivity, and loyalty. A culture of inclusivity boosts morale and promises greater opportunities for advancement and overall job satisfaction. Women are more likely to feel heard and able to safely communicate their ideas and feedback, making them more likely to stay invested in their work with a positive mindset. Additionally, gender diverse policies addressing issues like family leave and affordable childcare can facilitate a fusion and balance of family and career (which benefits men too); under such policies, women have experienced lower stress levels during pregnancy, were up to 93% more likely to return back to the workforce within one year of giving birth, and were more likely to increase their working time by up to 17% within three years. Building a more inclusive workplace keeps your talented employees working at higher efficiency and output rates for longer, while staying happier and more loyal, contributing greater long-term ROIs on your hiring practices.

Inclusivity in the workplace has been proven to provide businesses with clear, measurable advantages and successes over less inclusive organizations. Companies are more likely to hit financial goals, generate innovations, be considered high-performing, and experience better business outcomes when diversity is present and embraced through company culture and policy. Creating a gender-diverse environment in the workplace has also demonstrated large-scale economic boosts in many ways, as well, documented in a 2016 report from the United Nations.  When plotted against the gender inequality index, data consistently shows the most gender-equal countries are the most developed, have the highest income per capita, are associated with faster economic growth, and experience stronger national competitiveness. Gender diversity and inclusivity are key building blocks to business success and directly impact your business’ bottom line.
Assess your company’s diversity and inclusion levels, and learn how to enhance your current office culture and policies to produce greater business benefits, with this simple checklist from Glassdoor.
 

How to Grow, and NOT, Grow Sales: SalesMemes 53 Ask Before Doing

How to Grow, and NOT, Grow Sales: SalesMemes 51 Wasted Employees

How to Grow, and NOT, Grow Sales: SalesMemes 41 – How to be a hero for $200

A Cost Effective Way to Attract Prospects, Customers and Partners

Press clippings. Anyone who has worked in a large office as recently as the late 1990s knows what this means. “Back in the day, ” employees would receive packets of photocopied articles and news items related to their company and industry, delivered daily by the PR department.

This was not an inexpensive proposition, and companies needed to either have a dedicated department or hire a press clipping service.

Traditional clipping services still exist (and can run a company several thousand dollars a month), but in today’s digital age, monitoring and reporting on what’s going on in a particular industry can be affordable for any sized business. And that’s good news, because this kind of third party content can be a cost effective way to regularly attract prospects, customers and partners to your business.

Take, for example, Sales Renewal’s recently launched Sales Building Advice from Across the Web, where we offer actionable, practical marketing and technology advice to visitors. This broad-based content (sources recently cited include the NY Times, and Ted.com) is a perfect complement to the Sales Renewal focused content we also generate in our blog, infographics, and social media pages.

How It Works

On a regular basis, we review online publications, websites, blogs and other sources of information relevant to your company and industry and select the most interesting, informative and, sometimes, fun items, publishing them on a dedicated page on your website, as well as on your Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+ pages.

So wherever your prospects, customers and partners come into contact with you, your industry knowledge and expertise will shine through (and is another reason for them to bookmark, like or follow your company).

The News Service not only helps demonstrate your firm’s knowledge, but also keeps your site and social pages fresh – providing a rationale to come back often (plus, search engines really like it too).

Think of it as a clipping service for the modern world. To learn more about this new, cost effective service, contact us .

Helping Grow MA Small Businesses

Sales Renewal to Offer Strategic, Sales and Marketing, and Tech Assistance to MA Small Businesses

New Site, Fast, Helps Healing Festival Get Off to a Great Start

Our staffers hail from several time zones in the United States, and our clients are even more spread out, but with fully half of the Sales Renewal team located in Boston, the Marathon bombings hit us hard and left us wanting to help in some way. When the opportunity to get involved in the One Family Music Festival arose, we jumped on it.
We’re pleased to report that the May 12 One Family Music Festival was a success – thanks to everyone’s generosity, over $23, 000 was raised for the One Fund Boston. The festival also brought the families of Boston together to sing, dance, create art, and celebrate the strength and beauty of the city. It was a day that allowed many families to begin healing from the pain caused by the tragic events surrounding this year’s Boston Marathon, and to reclaim the city for its children.

Website Design: Speed with Style

Sales Renewal is proud of its role in the festival’s success –creating and running the festival website. Within two hours of being approached for help, we had purchased the One Family Music Festival domain name, hosted the website, and set up a customized skin. 24 hours later, the full 10-page site was up and running, along with a customized Facebook Page that was used to connect the artists, sponsors, and attendees to the site. We kept the site updated as performers were added to the lineup, as videos were created, as special programs were developed, and as sponsor after sponsor came on board with monetary, food, and other donations. We continue to maintain the site today, including the Photos section, which serves as a central location for various photos of the event.

Mobile-friendly Site for Families on the Move

And while the turnaround was quick, quality was not compromised. We chose to use a responsive design for the site, knowing that the majority of our visitors would be young parents looking for festival details on their cell phones. This was a good move, as 46% of website visits in the days leading up to the festival came from mobile devices. We also made sure the site was optimized for search – within one week of the site going live, we were drawing 5% of the visitors from organic search traffic – a percentage that can often take several months!
Of course, the festival couldn’t have succeeded without the dedication of an extremely hard-working group of people who brought all sorts of talents and donations of time, money and expertise. The Sales Renewal team offers its sincere gratitude to everyone who contributed to the successful festival for a very good cause.
To Boston!
– Audrey Trieschman

Proud to Support One Fund Boston, Music Festival

We’re glad to wrap up the month with a little good news: Sales Renewal is a proud sponsor of the One Family Music Festival! The event will be held Sunday May 12, 2013, and 100% of the proceeds benefit The One Fund Boston.
The One Family Music Festival will be held at the Exchange Conference Center and Boston Fish Pier, 212 Northern Avenue from 12 noon until 5pm. Card-making and other art activities for kids are hosted by Kidcasso and Catching Joy. (It is Mother’s Day, after all, so some sweet presents are in order.)
We’re most excited that, thanks to a very generous donor and countless awesome businesses and individuals, all of the proceeds from the event will go directly to The One Fund Boston, aiding those most directly affected by the tragic events on the day of the Boston Marathon.
Creating a website for the One Family Music Festival was a small thing, but it was a thing we could do – and when given the chance, it was a thing we had to do.*
The pier is going to be rocking on May 12. There will be laughter and love, loud music and bad dancing. We can’t wait. Will you be there? And even if you can’t be there, will you please donate to The One Fund? Every bit helps.
To find out how you or your business can pitch in to help even more, contact the festival organizers at the One Family Music Festival website. Sales Renewal’s press release is available here.
*Our staffers hail from several time zones in the United States, and our clients are even more spread out, but fully half of our team is located in Boston. And, this is one of those times when zip codes don’t seem very important. Please, if you can in any way, join us in supporting The One Fund Boston.