I knew my husband was a keeper back when I was waiting tables and he noticed one evening that I didn’t have any clean work shirts hanging in the closet for my shift the next morning so he did a load of laundry for me. He thought it was funny that I found so much meaning in that simple little act, but it did mean a lot. It showed me he was thinking about me when I wasn’t there and that he did something to make my life a little bit easier.

In any relationship it isn’t the grand gestures that makes a bond stronger, it’s the little details woven in between that really matter and hold it all together.

I found a gorgeous pair of earrings on etsy (etsy is a commercial site for homemade and vintage-y stuff as well as arts and crafts supplies, etc.) a couple weeks ago. I have no idea how I ended up there and I didn’t know the seller from Adam but the earrings were pretty and sparkly and I could picture myself wearing them on a date with my husband with the candlelight dancing off of them. So I bought them.

I immediately received a standard, automated response from the system, thanking me for my order, but I also received a personal message from the seller, Laura, who owns the shop I bought my earrings from, Vintage Valise, personally thanking me for my order and telling me she’d ship it out that afternoon.

Then I promptly forgot about the earrings until I received them in the mail. They were wrapped in a lovely little box, tied with a ribbon, and this postcard was tucked inside the envelope they were mailed in:

Talk about a warm fuzzy feeling! I’ve been buying stuff online for a long time and very rarely do items come with a handwritten note, but when they do…wow! You really appreciate someone taking the time to do something like that.

I wouldn’t have remembered the name of the shop where I bought those earrings if I didn’t receive this card with my purchase even though I had received that email earlier in the transaction.

We get emails ALL the time. We never get a handwritten note.

They say that it takes 7-11 “touches” before someone buys from you. I don’t necessarily think that’s always true. When some of the touches are unexpected and delightfully personal, I think it can take less.

I think Laura is going to have a successful shop if she can convert every buyer into a repeat buyer like she did with me. All it took to make me love her was taking the time to write a thank you note that was personalized for me (noting my purchase and even spelling my name right).

The worst thing a small business owner can do is make his or her customers feel invisible. We all love those little details so why don’t we see more of them?

Do you do something personal like this in your interactions? Has it become part of your brand? Please tell me about it!

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There’s a restaurant nearby that keeps very irregular hours.

I’ve headed there for supper with my kids more than once, only to find it closed at 5:00 in the evening even though it had been open hours earlier for lunch.

For the past year or so, this eatery has been teaching us that you never know when you’ll catch it open so we don’t bother with it very much since with two young children, when we head to a restaurant we need there to be something there to feed them.

Of course, there’s no website for this restaurant so you have to call ahead for the hours and with no recording that tells you the hours, you have to assume it’s closed if nobody answers. The only other option is to just show up and hope for the best. With so many other options around for dining, this really doesn’t cut it.

Yesterday we drove by this restaurant on our Father’s Day travels and noticed it was open at supper time! But guess what? The parking lot was empty. On Father’s Day. Arguably the busiest day on the calendar for restaurants.

My husband and I had a pretty good idea of why there was nobody there and it’s proof that you can be doing everything else right – good food, good service, good prices – but if you don’t make things as easy as possible for your customers (keeping regular, memorable hours, posting a menu/hours/specials on your website or Facebook page) then you’re not going to do well.

If you’re reading this and you have a business with no web presence, you need to get in the game.

Even if it’s a simple one-pager with your hours, your contact information and key services/products, that’s better than nothing. Facebook makes it easy with their “pages” feature. They’re free and can easily serve as a make shift website.

Always remember that people are searching for you online FIRST and if they can’t find you there, you do not exist. It’s as simple as that. Give the people what they want – the chance to scope you out from their computer before checking you out – and you’ll be golden.

Operating a local business and not having a web presence for it would be like looking at a lineup of qualified customers in front of your store and telling half of them to go away, that you don’t want their money. You wouldn’t do that. Would you?

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I barbecued hamburgers for lunch today and as my two-year-old and I sat and enjoyed our meal, her cheerful chatter filled the air. Usually she makes up little songs or talks about her outfit, but today she picked up the mustard bottle and said something quite profound.

She said, “Mommy, what shape is this?”

I told her it was an hourglass shape.

She thought about that for a second and said, “I think it should be shaped like a hamburger.”

I looked at her in awe. My two-year-old seems to be a young branding and marketing expert.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. If all of us could look at the world with the same sense of creativity, wonder and openness to new ideas as a small child, business would be very different.

Brainstorming is a favorite activity of mine. I love to exercise my creativity and I think that is a pretty solid benefit to my copywriting clients.

I sit down sometimes with a pad of paper and a pen and just write down ideas. I make lists of words that will resonate with my target market and try to think up possible package ideas or new services I could offer.

My little girls are very creative and my youngest suggesting that a bottle of mustard should be in the shape of a hamburger is one example how they like thinking up new ideas.

Is there a hamburger-shaped mustard bottle in your business?

I don’t think my daughter is ready to launch her own business yet, so you can’t call on her to help you. But you can do the same thing for yourself!

All you need is an open mind and a clean piece of paper. Write down some ideas and expand on them. Don’t worry about being perfect. Don’t worry if they don’t make sense. A two-year-old doesn’t care about that. They just say things that their little minds create. Try it. You might be surprised at what youcome up with!

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I put a lot of brain power into creativity. I live, breathe, eat and sleep creative ideas. So much of my heart and soul is poured into developing intelligent, snappy, fresh and creative ideas that it truly enrages me when I see someone ripping off someone else’s creative idea and passing it off as their own.

Plagiarism is low, people. I know for a fact that nobody would stand up and argue that fact and I bet I’d have a hard time finding someone who would admit to being a plagiarizer. That’s because they would not be popular.

Dictionary.com defines plagiarism as:

“the unauthorized use or close imitation of the language and thoughts of another author and the representation of them as one’s own original work.”

You caught that, right? Plagiarism does not just apply to content, but taking someone else’s idea and passing it off as yours also counts. And do you know what plagiarism is?

Blatant theft.

When someone takes someone else’s idea and claims to have been the one who thought it up, well…that person doesn’t realize how small this world really is. That person is also not flattering the original concept creator. I can assure you that the person who had the idea in the first place is pissed off.

People. Stop taking other people’s ideas. It isn’t cool and you will be caught and your reputation will be in the toilet. Trust me. Karma is real and what goes around comes around.

If you can’t come up with a creative idea, nobody is going to fault you for that. Seek help. Call me! I help entrepreneurs with their creative brainstorming and I have enough creativity for both of us and some to spare.

It’s way more satisfying to come up with something on your own than it is to steal someone else’s intellectual property. Plus it’s way more legal.

If you contract me as your creative consultant and you pay me to come up with your ideas, I won’t tell anyone. We can pretend those ideas are yours. Part of your payment goes towards keeping my mouth shut.

So there you have it. You know how I (and anyone else who invests time and energy into creative thought) feel about plagiarism. People who do it suck. Don’t go there. Any money you invest in hiring someone to help with your creative needs will cost less than the damage done to your reputation in the long run when you’re caught.

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(If you’re reading this post from your inbox, you’ll get more out of it by clicking here to view photos!)

My 4 year old daughter came home from preschool last week with a picture of a penguin that she had drawn.

I still can’t see a penguin in that picture no matter how many different ways I look at it.

The thing is, my daughter is very talented when it comes to drawing. At the age of four, she’s actually better to draw than I am, so I knew there was something going on when I saw that picture.

Don’t get me wrong, we’re not crazy parents putting pressure on the child to be the best artist in her class, but this was obviously not my daughter’s style.

I was looking at it and going, “Look, Daddy, Casey drew this beautiful penguin at school today.”

Then Casey said, “I copied off of Jane.” (I’ve changed the name to protect the innocent.)

Aaaaaahhhh. That made sense.

I told Casey I would rather see a penguin that she drew by herself without copying off of anyone.

She quickly churned out this photo:

See the difference?

I had to try to explain to my daughter that she could do a better job if she did her drawings on her own, without copying off of anyone else. As I was explaining this to her, I realized that lots of adults still don’t get this.

If you’re marketing your business in the way that everyone else in your industry markets their businesses, just because you think that’s how you should be promoting yourself, did you ever stop and think you’re basically being a copycat?

There’s an excellent chance that if you’re trying to be someone you’re not, you’re stifling something great inside by doing so. Like my daughter’s own penguin drawing.

Market with your own personality. Be authentic. Be yourself. Make your own unique, individual mark on the world and be proud of it.

You’ll attract better clients, you’ll do better work and you’ll have a happier existence.

It’s true what they say, you know, you learned everything you needed to know about life before you finished kindergarten. Think about it. Would your teacher let you get away with copying off your neighbor?

Didn’t think so.

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