How to shift your business and make marketing work for you
Marlene concluded the event with advice on how to market a new product.
Hirsch’s Entrepreneur Workshops hosted virtually on a weekly basis by two of South Africa’s top businesswomen – Margaret Hirsch, executive director at Hirsch’s and business coach, and ActionCOACH Marlene Powell – have proven to be an excellent tool for entrepreneurs, fledgling and well established, to help them turn their businesses around.
Last week the duo were joined by guest speakers Daniyel Berry, an image consultant, and Butler Academy’s Newton Cross who both, during lockdown, successfully shifted their businesses to an online platform.
Daniyel, owner of Style Me consultants, realised during the pandemic there was a need in the market for good quality reusable masks, so she launched her own line.
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With her close network and strong business relationships she was able to create a sustainable and profitable new business that included many other lifestyle products and said this was the reason her business thrived.
“To be honest, I hardly marketed. I used my existing relationships and the business just took off. I was also lucky enough to be one of the first in the game,” she said.
Newton spoke about the passion that drives his business and how, through his passion for teaching, he managed to move his butlers training programme to an online platform.
“Moving to an online platform helped my business even more because besides the training, we now have other content such as videos and photographs the students get to keep and continue to reference,” he said.
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“I was lucky enough to find my passion and it’s with this that I started the Butler’s Academy.
“Skills can be taught but passion and personality comes naturally.”
Margaret added, “It is so important to find your passion. You can’t work for years and years doing a job you hate. You will never get to where you want to go.”
She also spoke about how their online store grew tenfold during lockdown and that they were happy they had established the online store well beforehand.
Marlene concluded the event with advice on how to market a new product.
“You need to find a gap in the market when introducing a new product to market. Don’t think you have failed just because it didn’t sell,” she said.
“Try to shift your business into another category that would best fit your skills and target audience and take advice from professionals.”
This week’s Entrepreneur Workshop is focused on The Power of Marketing, with a fantastic line-up of powerhouse speakers who all own their own marketing companies – Ntsiki Mkhize, Nox Magwaza and Dimakatso Moloantoa.
The workshop takes place on Friday from 11am to noon.
Follow the link to join the Zoom session: https://bit.ly/3i74NM5
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