It’s Spring, sunny and time to take action! What is one thing you can do every day to grow your business?

Today I’m attending the local author appreciation fair in Folsom, California. My son James Ashman wrote a fiction book, The Lupine Prince, and he is one of the local authors who will be recognized at this fair.

Have you ever considered writing a book? There are good reasons as business persons to do so.

As we near the end of 2009, it’s our tendency to slow down in our networking efforts. It’s a very busy time of year and we tend to feel we just don’t have time to attend one more networking event.  So stand out and take the opportunity to attend one more networking event before the end of the year.

Now is the time to prepare for the New Year. One of the best ways to market your business is to build trusting relationships. You build trusting relationships by networking and getting to know people and what they do. Take a sincere and personal interest in them. Find out who their ideal client is so you know who to refer to them.

Start planning today to grow your network so you can start 2010 on the right foot. Make it a point to connect with at least 2-3 new people and follow up in January over a cup of coffee.

It’s bound to happen. We’re only human and we all make mistakes. We try very hard in our businesses to put processes in place so that we don’t make mistakes. But it happens. So what do you do when it happens?

Here’s my opportunity to be authentic and admit that recently we made a mistake on a client project. Of course it was completely unintentional and accidental. Upon review we still don’t even know how it could have happened. But it did. Our client brought it to our attention in a very kind manner. He knew it was accidental and unintentional. Though the mistake couldn’t actually be fixed, he expected us to offer some sort of compensation for the error. And we completely agreed!

We were mortified that a mistake had been made! This client is one of our favorite clients. We really enjoy working with him and we weren’t sure if this was going to be the end of our working relationship. We needed now to make sure we lived up to our customer service superheroes policy. So we discussed exactly what we could offer this client to make amends for this mistake. We wanted to be sure that what we offered far exceeded any expectations he had.

We called our client and apologized for the mistake, no excuses. Then we proceeded to explain what we could do to make amends. We made a generous offer of additional time at no charge and offered to take on a project we knew he needed done at no charge. We wanted to make sure our client felt well taken care of and hoped he’d continue working with us.

Our client was very happy with our offer of additional work at no charge! He explained that he’d wondered how we would handle the situation. He realizes that mistakes happen and that it’s the way they are handled that makes all the difference. He was very excited to continue working with us and had a project we could start on immediately. He was so impressed with the results of that project that he offered to write a testimonial if he hadn’t already (he already had though).  We continue to work together and our client continues to refer others to us.

Yes, we will make mistakes. It’s how we handle them that determines the outcome. So here’s my 3 simple rules on how to handle mistakes:

1. Own up to your mistakes. Take responsibility for what you did. Don’t make excuses. Figure out how the mistake was made, if at all possible, and then put into place processes to prevent that mistake from happening again.

2. Apologize. Give your client a sincere apology, without excuses, for what happened. If you used a sub-contractor and the error was made by your sub-contractor, you still need to take responsiblilty.

3. Make generous amends. This does not have to be monetary. It can be additional time or product. Be sure your client feels they got more than enough compensation. If the error resulted in a $500 loss for your client, make amends of double that value.

When you own up to your mistakes, apologize, and make generous amends, you’ll find that your clients appreciate your openness, honesty and integrity.

Four months ago a prospect contacted me to create a spreadsheet of all her contacts. She’d been collecting business cards and scraps of paper for sometime and wanted them all in one spreadsheet so she could upload them to a contact management tool. She explained it would take her several weeks to compile all the contacts and send them to me. We agreed upon the cost and she said she’d be in contact in a few weeks.

Knowing this client was very busy and was going to be compiling scores of contacts from different places, I scheduled to follow up with her in three weeks if I hadn’t heard from her. So three weeks later I sent her an email asking her if there was anything I could do to help her with the compiling since I knew she wanted to get these contacts uploaded to her contact management tool in time to send out cards before the end of the year. After a few emails back and forth in which I sent suggestions she replied, “I truly appreciate your professionalism.  You are inspiring me to get moving!”

Several more weeks passed and I still hadn’t heard from her so I sent another follow up email reminding her that I was available and asking again if there was anything I could do to make it easier on her end. Though she still wasn’t quite finished compiling all her contacts she said, “Thanks for keeping in touch.”

Now over three months had passed and many of you may be thinking, “That client is so disorganized she’ll never get the contacts compiled. You’re wasting your time following up with her. It will never turn into paying work.” Wrong! It did take longer than she hoped to compile all the contacts. However, she really does want this project to be done.

After nearly four months the check and contacts are in the mail and this project will be completed in time for her to send out cards before the end of the year. Yes, it did take some time to follow up. The client appreciated that I took the time to stay in touch. And who do you think she’ll call when she needs additional work?

So don’t write off those prospects that seem to be dragging their feet. No, don’t pester them. But send a friendly and helpful reminder. Perhaps send some tips they can use. Let them see that you are interested in helping them and providing valuable information, whether or not they are yet a paying client. Developing this type of relationship does pay off!