Small to Medium Enterprise

Flying Solo is Australia’s solo and micro business community.

Robert Gerrish, Sam Leader and Peter Crocker have developed www.flyingsolo.com.au from an e-zine and website with articles to an online community with forums and directory.

Understanding Micro Business Survey

In reference to the first Flying Solo ‘Understanding Micro Business Survey’ in 2008, Flying Solo founder Robert Gerrish said:

“Kate and the team at Tribe Research helped us with our ‘Understanding Micro Business Survey’ earlier this year. We were mightily impressed with the service and look forward to working together again in the future.”

In 2010 Tribe Research was again requested to setup the backend of ‘Understanding Micro Business Survey 2010-2011’ and analyse the data. The backend support included designing the survey, and the generation and maintenance of the survey online. Following the distribution of the survey to their community via their weekly e-zine and promotions on their website, we analysed the data and prepared the report.

You can download both reports yourself, just head to: flyingsolo.com.au/understanding-micro-business.

The report assisted Flying Solo in positioning themselves as experts in the anatomy of Australia’s micro business owners, and provided valuable statistics that they can use when talking to potential advertisers. They now understand their existing tribe better.

LaRoo, the owners of Mocks mobile phone socks

Launching in 2004 with 12 designs, LaRoo needed to undertake market research to identify designs to produce for the next Mocks season. Whilst LaRoo CEO, Lara Solomon, had a background in marketing and a general idea of creating questionnaires she was lacking practice.

Tribal Know-How Workshop hosted by Kate Tribe

LaRoo CEO, Lara Solomon attended our Customer Feedback: for small business workshop in 2006.

The challenges for LaRoo were:

• to increase understanding of survey design; types of questions and how to ask them
• to create a survey to see if LaRoo’s monthly store newsletters (mailed at a cost of $150 plus time each month) were really valued and used by the retailer recipients
• to develop an alternative to face-to-face research on the popularity of potential Mock designs, as these could only be collected in Sydney hindering nationwide predictions

Lara came away from the day with the tools for several new initiatives she has since implemented in her business, including:

• A survey for retailer customers, to explore their thoughts on service, the newsletter and promotional items. It has become an annual barometer of business performance and confirmed their newsletter was valued and service levels to retailers were about 90%. Since the workshop the survey has been instrumental in deciding on point of sale materials for stores.
• Redevelopment of an existing Mock design range survey, with improved questions and an online survey tool. The new survey had increased survey participants from about 100 to 300, broadening the range of participants and making it easier, cheaper and quicker for LaRoo to collect and analyse their research.

Overall, Lara’s attendance at our workshop increased LaRoo’s productivity, reduced their risks and enhanced their sales.

Lara has since sent other LaRoo team members to the workshop, to ensure that as Lara moves into other areas of the business, she maintains consistency when conducting research and their surveys are still designed to produce optimum results.

Lara was the 2008 NSW Telstra Micro Business Award winner and has published the book, Brand New Day.

Case Study: Song Division

How do you turn your tribe into raving fans? Most small businesses know they should be doing things like feedback forms, identifying trends, understanding your best and worst customers… but they often find it’s still on the “to do list”. Song Division knew they needed to do these things, and enlisted our help in developing a Know Your Tribe Strategy.

Song Division is a unique employee bonding experience where people – usually a group of employees – get to work with real musicians in professional venues.

Their clients bond by composing and recording their own song: no musical experience is required, but all employees get to act like rock stars!

Their first year focused on getting themselves out there, bringing in clients and coming up with ideas. However, Song Division soon realised that they needed feedback systems and procedures to ensure the continued growth of the business.

This is a common realisation in small business! While Song Division is a unique company, their business issues aren’t.

First, we had a great day at a Song Division session with staff from a large corporate. After reviewing the existing systems and procedures with Andy Sharpe (Managing Director), we discussed where he wanted the business to go, and who Song Division’s important stakeholders were. These are all crucial steps in developing a plan for collecting meaningful data.

Next, we set to work developing a strategy that Song Division could implement immediately. We went through the following steps:

• analysed how their clients moved through the buying cycle (looking at both the client company and their employees who participate, as well as event companies on-selling Song Division)
• designed separate surveys to collect relevant and usable data from each important stakeholder group
• developed a plan of when and how to conduct surveys for each of these groups
• designed a database plan to match the strategy so the data could be recorded in an easy and practical way

Song Division can now set up a database to be sure that their data will be collected and recorded in a consistent way. Now they won’t overlook changing client needs, and their knowledge will be continually updated.

Building a data strategy into your ongoing systems and procedures means you won’t have to go out of your way to get important information about your tribe – you’ll already have it!

Telephone interviewing and quantitative analysis reveal market insight

Earlier this year we worked with Reading Systems, producers of Phonica, a phonics based literacy software system for children and adults with reading difficulties and an accelerant system for younger children. Reading Systems Managing Directors, Dr Norman Swan [also presenter of The Health Report on the ABC] and Dr Jeffrey Tobias wanted to know more about their customers and where their prospects were positioned in the buying cycle. It was also important to uncover the prevalent attitudes and perceptions of parents and guardians about reading.

We conducted in-depth telephone interview surveys to understand the decision paths made by parents looking for ways to help their child learn to read. We created a market segmentation model to illustrate where contacts were at in the buying cycle and already. Dr Norman Swan, Managing Director, Reading Systems said:

“Reading Systems has put this model into practice with excellent results”

Adapted from the Spring 2005 Edition of our newsletter Tribal Voice