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, has made a name for herself as one of the best and most popular Enterprise Nation advisers in her sector. 

In this blog, Fiona explores how you can unlock the power of self-promotion as a small business owner. 

If you like what you see from Fiona, be sure to connect with her today. 

As unnatural as it may feel, we must be our own cheerleaders and our own best advocates. To do this, we must have confidence in ourselves and our offer. Self-promotion can make many of us feel uncomfortable. It goes against the grain. However, the root to business success is often mastering the art self-promotion.

You can be nailing every other aspect of your business, but if you can’t be your number one cheerleader, you may find your business stalling. While many of us are already tackling an element of self-promotion by being present on social media, how many of us can truly say that we have really come close to unlocking the power that great self-promotion wields?

For many serviced based entrepreneurs, you are your business and promotion for you and your business is often one and the same. Raising your profile will draw people to your business. Sharing your expertise and knowledge will increase trust in your business.

The first step is becoming comfortable with your offering. You are your own 

oint and this is as a result of your own unique combination of experience, knowledge and insight. Avoiding the trap of comparisonitis means accepting what makes up your USP and knowing how to leverage it.

When it comes to leveraging your experience and expertise there are many ways to master the use of your USP in self-promotion; from you directly sharing your knowledge through speaking or writing, being interviewed or profiled in various sections of the media, through to in-person networking and digital social media presence.

Ultimately, the power of self-promotion is two-fold: the doing, and the sharing. Taking the action, getting the media results, winning the speaking opportunities and sharing your knowledge is the first step, but how well you leverage all of this activity determines the impact that you can make on the audience you have already worked hard to build and attract to you.

Sharing your media wins, sharing your speaking credentials, sharing client results will show your audience how credible and brilliant you are. Leveraging your results through this sharing also turns your social media, website and blog into a comprehensive CV of kudos and credibility that is visible to potential clients and potential collaborators.

Self-promotion is to be embraced, not feared. You and your business deserve to excel. Unlocking the power of self-promotion will help you on this mission.

Connect with Fiona today and request a free discovery call. 

Fiona Minett, founder of Boss Your PR, is an award winning PR Expert and Educator on a mission to democratise PR for entrepreneurs and small businesses. Having spent over a decade in PR, including 6 years running a PR agency, Fiona now trains and coaches small businesses in taking a DIY approach to their visibility by making the most of savvy and cost effective PR techniques. She has written for the likes of Jewellery Focus Magazine, In Essence and The Oxford Times and spoken at trade shows and venues including MODA, Top Drawer, Allbright, Oxford Brookes and Harrogate Home &amp; Gift.

PR Expert & Coach

Unlocking the power of self-promotion

Consumer PR expert providing comprehensive insight, resources and training to ensure that any entrepreneur and business owner can do their own PR in a time and cost effective manner, achieving the same results as any PR pro.

Ensure you're your own biggest cheerleader!

Martin Knowles is an expert on all things sales, as well as a trusted Enterprise Nation adviser. 

In this blog post, Martin dives into the topic of sales objections, and how to overcome them. 

If you're a small business owner who would like to benefit from Martin's vast knowledge, 

Sales objections might not be what they appear. A lack of commitment doesn’t necessarily mean “no”.

It might just mean: “I have another question you’ve not answered yet”.

Being enthused by objections instead of fearing them could be the difference between a successful sales pitch or a long, depressing drive home.

What types of objections do you come across?

This can be tricky. Resist the temptation to knock objections out of the park. Surely the customer has misunderstood!

An objection tells you something went wrong with your pitch or presentation. Maybe you overlooked an important question or answer. Maybe you did too much telling and not enough asking.

Asking another question gives you the chance to understand what your customer is missing.

What’s In It For Me is something humans instinctively revert to. When you’re enthusiastic about meeting a new customer, you’ve already figured out what’s in it for you.

But have you really assessed what’s in it for them?

Can you clearly and simply describe the value potential customers see in you:

Price. If a potential customer isn’t saying yes yet, doesn’t that mean they are not ready to spend what you’re asking?

It’s so tempting – and often human nature – to respond to objections by dropping price. Please don’t!

First, before every meeting, decide what you will and won’t offer as discount. Work it out when you have a cool head and before the buyer’s eyes are on you.

There’s no shame in ending a meeting expressing how nice it’s been to meet someone and leaving without a sale. That’s better than flinging around discount in the hope it secures a deal.

Second, do you know what the buyer’s budget is? A good negotiator won’t give you a precise figure, but with the right question you should be able to establish a range within which they expect a solution to land.

If they reject your quote before you’ve established their expectations, they might be rejecting you because you’re too cheap!

A buyer who wants a proven solution that solves a number of issues might be put off by a new supplier offering a price that’s too good to be true. So, a deep understanding of what’s motivating them can make all the difference.

These few techniques should help you make progress in customer discussions. But above all, don’t take it personally. Rarely will a buyer reject an offer because you’re you.

Ask the right questions, listen and learn. And next time you’ll be wiser and a little bit smarter, ready to go again.

Connect with Martin today and request a free discovery call.

We're sales coaches, consultants and sales trainers and we're on a mission to help business owners love sales.
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How to overcome sales objections

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There are many ways to turn a lack of commitment into a sale...

Born during the first Covid-19 lockdown, 

 evolved from a living room dream into a business turning over many millions in its first year. But how did this at-home pottery pursuit grip the minds (and indeed, the gleeful, clay-craving hands) of the UK, as well as Europe and North America?

Co-founder Matt Clements, ahead of his much-anticipated speaking appearance at 

, sat down with Enterprise Nation’s content manager-cum-clay connoisseur Ryan Elliott for a whistle-stop tour of his entrepreneurial journey.

If you’re a budding or existing entrepreneur keen to hear from the very best and brightest minds in UK business, 

Tell me a little about your background, right up until co-founding Sculpd, did you always want to be an entrepreneur?

“Yes, I think from day one I’ve always been interested in entrepreneurship. When I joined uni, I started really trying to do anything that was entrepreneurial.

“One of the things I first went into was starting a water filtration charity, so essentially what we did that was we developed biosand water filters in the university and then worked with charities to build social enterprises to sell those to communities in Africa or wherever needed them and help people grow businesses around that.

“I started at uni working on stuff like that and found it really good fun. But then, instead of making the dive into a start-up or my own company, I went into a bigger company. I went into a consultancy, which is probably the upper end of the spectrum - a huge company with 500,000 employees and did the management consultancy work for big companies.

“That was great, but it didn't really have that entrepreneurial fun, that start-up kind of fun, so I stayed there for five years and then made a break to start Sculpd. So yeah, I've been at all ends of the spectrum really; started doing start-up work and have now come back to it after five years.”

Tell me a little about Sculpd and how you co-founded it

“Sculpd is a crafts experience company, and in particular we started off creating at-home pottery kits.

“We started this in April last year, so haven't been around too long. We started at the beginning of the first lockdown, with two of my good friends, and they’re co-founders: Giles and Guy.

“We wanted to build an experience-based company that could help people at a time of lockdown - do something with their hands. And pottery in particular has been one of these industries that has been very traditional; in some ways, you've had to go to a pottery studio, you'd have to pay a lot of money to get involved in pottery, and we just wanted to take that experience out to people's homes to allow everyone to enjoy it.

“So that was the premise of starting the business, and from there it's just developed; we've started releasing new kits, new craft experiences for people to do in their homes, and we’re also doing virtual craft pottery events.

“We started in the UK, and over the last year, we've expanded over to the US, Canada, and we're doing a bit of work in the EU as well.”

You mentioned about starting just as the pandemic hit, so a lot of existing businesses had to adjust to locking down. But how have you adjusted to the world opening up again?

“Yeah, it was a strange time to start. As I said, this started in the first lockdown. Back then, we actually started in my house - we did a lot of production work and at that time it was just me and my two co-founders on that.

“As the business grew, it was quite hard to hire people during the lockdown phase. We had to start with more friends and family, and that was difficult.

“So, challenge number one: hiring people was difficult. I think the second was purchasing from suppliers in those times as well, because a lot of the suppliers we work with completely shut, so it was very hard to even get in touch with some people to buy products.

“Logistically, I think it was very difficult during those times as well. Even just getting products sent to us – you’ve probably seen a lot in the news about freights. We were having a lot of orders not arriving, so a lot of our time was spent trying to fix that as well.”

What are the biggest challenges facing young entrepreneurs in general today?

“I think the first challenge is getting started. I've had a lot of ideas in the past, and the idea will only come to fruition if you execute on it. It's really just that phase of pushing through the idea stage and really executing on it - that will allow you to move forward.

“In the past I've had this a lot; come up with loads of ideas, spend a week on them, and then they kind of disappear and they don't come to anything. I think it was a little bit different with Sculpd because I was working with two good friends.

“We also had the pressure of lockdown. At the time we thought the lockdown would only last one month, back at the start. You're probably the same, we didn't really know what was going on, we thought one month and then we'll get back to our lives again. We did think this product was perfect for lockdown: we've got to do it now, and if we don't do it now, we've missed the boat.

“We had that pressure to make us go forward with this. We built the site, we acquired and sourced all the product in 10 days - essentially, we had that pressure to execute. But I think the one bit of advice would be: if you've got an idea, and it doesn't have to be the most amazing idea in the world, get it to the point of testing it in the market.

“We launched with just 10 kits. We sold 10 kits (we wanted to see if they sold, they did sell), so then we bought 100, and then it's just snowballed from there. So, one bit of advice: just get it to market, test your idea, then if it works go forward.”

Can you give us a small taster of what you’re planning on talking about during StartUp 2022 and what you hope to achieve there?

“We just want to talk through our journey so far – of starting a business in lockdown, starting it from the living room and just all the challenges of getting the business to where we are now.

“We've now got a business with 20 people, and turned over £5m in the first year, so I would just like to speak through that journey and also the international journey as well.

“We managed to launch in the US and Canada and there were significant challenges in doing that. At points I wished I could just speak to another founder that has done that, to get some tips, because there's always the boring stuff as well, such as tax. I just wanted to speak through with someone.”

To hear from Matt and his fellow Sculpd co-founders at StartUp 2022, be sure to secure your tickets today!

I&apos;m Enterprise Nation&apos;s content manager! If you&apos;re an adviser who would like to write a blog post and feature on our website, please get in touch.

Content Manager

StartUp 2022: how Sculpd is igniting a pottery craze on both sides of the Atlantic

Co-founder Matt Clements delves into the world of clay-based entrepreneurism...

Since launching in 2005, the Enterprise Nation team has helped thousands of people start and grow their businesses. Led by founder Emma Jones MBE, Enterprise Nation continues to be the most active UK small business community and a leading campaigning voice for small business. Joining Enterprise Nation connects you with resources, community and connections you need to reach your business goals.

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I may be pale and Male but I'm certainly not stale! New ideas and ways of doing things are the way in which I have kept relevant to my clients and their customers since I started 17 years ago.
My Management Consultancy Business has been going since I left Carlsberg as the Sales Development Director. I offer two key services:
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2) Consultancy Services by the Day for larger organisations with Field Based Sales people. For them, I do what no one else is doing, which is to go out on Accompaniment with them. This helps me to see them in action and deliver the help and support to get the right results where it matters most - in front of their customers.
I love helping people see Sales as a positive activity and I tend to try and make it as easy and fun as possible. What helps me to be successful is my genuine interest in people and what makes them tick as well as improving Businesses and how they can generate more sales.
For more information, please check out my website: www.jmrsales.co.uk or my LinkedIn profile for Customer testimonials.

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&lt;p&gt;Got a burning question on how to create your own website, improve your SEO, or which collaboration tools your business should be using? Click here to Live Chat now with a Vodafone Digital Adviser, for free&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#000119"&gt;.&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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Not sure where to start? Make a Plan today.

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Why join Enterprise Nation?

We help people start and grow great businesses

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Latest member stories

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Rachael Howourth

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The Enterprise Nation community by numbers

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