It's not What you know, but Who you know

The art of networking when you own a business is absolutely vital and as business owners ourselves we were very excited to have the opportunity to meet Dhea Bartlett, a leader in relationship marketing. Dhea simultaneously runs a number of successful networking groups alongside her own business SendOutCards.

Send Out Cards is an App that allows you to type personalised messages and deliver real greeting cards to your clients.

"It is a fantastic tool for businesses to introduce themselves and to keep in touch. It acts as an easy follow up system, which is great for business owners who are short on time and are bogged down with the day to day activities. The system lets you create templates allowing you to keep track of a prospect that has yet to come on board. You can produce general marketing cards as part of your relationship management, but I would keep it simple and personalise it for each client."

Be remembered, not deleted

It's so important to appreciate your customers and to always thank them. Customers will forget what you say but will always remember how you made them feel.

"If you treat your customers well, they remain loyal. I often think of the scene in Pretty Woman where Richard Gere is in a fashion boutique and instructs the shop assistants to make Julia Roberts feel like a million dollars. It's so important for your buying experience to be top notch".

Making customers feel appreciated and valued has always been a focus for Dhea throughout her career and gave her the inspiration to delve deeper into the differing aspects of marketing.

"I began my career as a teacher, I met a man, went to Singapore, taught there, and then came back to Perth. I took the opportunity to have children and to do a degree in Marketing. I landed a job with a top cosmetics company and quickly became their top seller. It was a great role, which I loved but the time came to return to Melbourne. I went back to teaching for a while but realised it wasn't the path I wanted to pursue. I decided to try something new and took a risk on running a jewellery party plan business. I did really well, and attribute the success to always making the host feel special which led to further sales down the track."

The party planning gave Dhea an invaluable opportunity to utilise her marketing and sales skills and led to the beginning of her current business; SendOutCards.

Break through the Digital Clutter

"On any given day I can receive over 600 emails and most of them I'll delete and marketing emails require you to read them on the spot and often take action immediately. With SendOutCards the whole point is to remain front of mind. It provides your clients and prospects with something tangible that reminds them of you. When you celebrate others, in this case your clients, real relationships form"

What I love most about receiving a card, is getting one with my name on it, especially if you have an unusual name like mine. The beauty of the card is that you can print your company details on the back, so when the envelope is thrown away your contact details are still there. Highly personalised cards are also less likely to be discarded especially if they have an offer on them"

The Rules of Engagement

Often in business people do not follow up and fall into the trap of taking it personally when a prospect says ‘No'

It has been well documented that "…48% of sales people don't follow up on a prospect and 25% make a second contact and then stop. With 80% of conversions being made on the fifth – twelfth contact."

"As a rule I always follow the 80% Relationship Management and 20% Marketing".

There are many facets to effective customer relationship management. Having a healthy mix of tailored social, print, email and web marketing will foster a long term relationship with your existing and future customer base.

Networking Queen

Dhea alongside her successful business also runs a series of tailored Facebook networking groups and real face to face networking.

"When I was in a larger company I used to like sharing ideas in meetings so when I started SendOutCards I was by myself. I found networking groups to be a great support."

Dhea started the Heartlink Network in Brighton that is built on a unique business-networking model that provides safe, intimate, non-threatening networking opportunities for women. It is dedicated to showcasing, advertising, enriching and empowering professional women in business. It is business exclusive. Dhea didn't want to leave anyone out so began an online Bayside Women in Business group (Victoria) that has a more informal approach to business networking. The group is business focused, however, Dhea keeps the Facebook page fun, interesting and engaging with themed days for posts, including Monday: Hot Offer, Thursday: Recommend Day. A great example of using patterns in your social media to engage your followers.

Words of wisdom

"My advice to those starting a business is to establish a really good ‘why'. Your why needs to be strong, so that when you encounter the tough/low/bad days you bear your ‘why' in mind. Also, have a good mentor, especially as a solo entrepreneur".

To find out more about SendOutCards please visit Dhea'sIdeas. To join Heartlink or Bayside Women in Business please make a request via Dhea's website www.dheabartlett.com