Sharp Thinking

Only 100 days until Christmas! 🧑‍🎄

That might sound far too early to be thinking about Christmas, particularly if you’re not in retail or hospitality.
But for every business, the final 100 days of the year are worth thinking about.💭

Not necessarily for Christmas promotions, but for your existing customers.

Who haven’t you spoken to for a while?

Which customers could you thank?

Where could you strengthen a relationship before the end of the year?

And what could you do now to make sure your best customers go into 2027 feeling valued?

Customer retention rarely comes from one big gesture.
It’s usually the small things, done consistently, that make the difference.👍

100 days is plenty of time to do something meaningful.

I’ve loved working with this start up consultancy and helping bring Terry Associates Consultants to life.

I started by helping develop the strategy, positioning, brand and marketing approach, before supporting with the implementation too - from developing the website with a specialist agency to putting the marketing foundations in place and creating a 12-month bank of optimised content ready to use.

More recently, I’ve also helped the founder put the right ongoing marketing support in place so he can focus on building relationships and growing the business.

It’s been a great project to be part of, and feedback like this is always lovely to receive. Thank you Dave.👏

Throwback to a wonderful evening at the newly rebranded West Kent Chamber Annual Summer Soirée.

I can’t believe this was already two weeks ago!

Having missed last year’s event, it was lovely to be back, catching up with so many familiar faces, meeting new people and enjoying such a beautiful evening at Penshurst Place.

A huge congratulations to everyone involved in the Chamber’s rebrand. The move to West Kent Chamber of Commerce feels like an exciting new chapter, recognising the thriving business community across Sevenoaks, Tonbridge and Tunbridge Wells.

As someone who has worked with businesses across West Kent for many years, it’s fantastic to see the Chamber continue to evolve and support such a vibrant local business community.

Thank you to everyone at the Chamber for another brilliant evening. 👏

June was all about listening.👂

Listening to business owners. Listening to customers. Listening to markets. And listening to what the data is really telling us.

Over the past month I’ve spent time mentoring businesses through West Kent Business, supporting both early-stage start-ups and more established businesses looking to diversify and enter new markets.

I’ve also spent much of June immersed in customer research, interviewing customers, analysing feedback (anyone who knows me knows I love to create a graph or two!) and presenting findings to clients.📈

One thing that continues to surprise me is how much insight can come from simply asking customers the right questions. Customer surveys (which are relatively easy to implement) and interviews are often overlooked, yet they can uncover opportunities, challenges and assumptions that would otherwise remain hidden.🫣

Alongside that, there have been plenty of conversations with fellow business owners, including a brilliant evening at the enTWine Summer Festival.

Looking back, the thing that has struck me most is how often the answers are already there.

We just need to take the time to ask the questions and listen to what people are telling us.🙋‍♀️

I’m also excited to be in conversations about supporting more businesses through mentoring programmes in the future.

More on that soon.👀

Is your business visible in AI search?😳

More and more of us are using AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity to research suppliers, products and services before we ever visit a website. This raises an interesting question. If a potential customer asked an AI tool for recommendations in your sector, would your business be mentioned?

Many businesses are focused on social media, networking and Google rankings. All of those things still matter. But AI is becoming another route people use to discover businesses.

The encouraging thing is that the businesses most likely to be referenced aren’t necessarily the ones producing the most content. They’re often the businesses that:
- Demonstrate expertise
- Clearly explain what they do
- Answer customer questions
- Share useful insights
- Build credibility and trust

In other words, many of the same things that make good marketing work in the first place. The technology may be changing, but the fundamentals remain remarkably similar.👍

Visibility still comes from being useful, relevant and easy to understand.

Have you thought about how your business appears in AI search yet?

10/10 evening at the for the Summer Festival ☔️🎈

The rain may have had other ideas, but it certainly didn’t dampen anyone’s spirits.😊

There was laughter, singing, dancing, brilliant food from , lots of familiar faces and plenty of new ones too.🍔🥗

One of the things I love most about running my own business is being part of such a supportive local community. It’s easy to get caught up in work, so evenings like this are a great reminder of the value of stepping away from the desk and spending time with wonderful people.

A huge thank you to everyone involved in organising such a fantastic event. The effort, attention to detail and all the little touches didn’t go unnoticed.

We even raised some money for St George’s Childcare along the way.

Proof that a successful summer festival doesn’t necessarily need sunshine... just great people, good food and a car full of balloons. 🎈

One thing I hear regularly from business owners:

“I feel busy all the time, but I’m not sure what’s actually moving the business forward.”

That isn’t usually a sign of laziness. Or a lack of ambition. It’s often a sign of operational noise.

Sales.
Delivery.
Staffing.
Admin.
Client issues.
Marketing.

When everything feels urgent, it’s hard to find time to think strategically.⏰

And that’s often where businesses get stuck.

Growth doesn’t usually come from doing more. It comes from creating clarity around what matters, what drives revenue, what can wait and what should STOP.

Sometimes the biggest value a strategy brings isn’t a new idea. It’s simply reducing the noise.🎧

Today I turn 50.🎈

Which feels slightly surreal to write.

So many memories keep flashing before me, and it’s made me think a lot about my 30 years working in marketing and all the things that have changed along the way.

At university, I wrote a dissertation on branding called ‘Is it really more than a paint job?’. 30 years later, I’m still fascinated by what makes people choose, trust, remember and buy.

Since then, there’s been agency life (where I met my husband), corporate roles, start-ups, running my own business, brilliant people, hard lessons, reinventions, and a huge amount of change.

Marketing looked very different when I started. Fax machines, CD-ROMs, and long campaign lead times all felt completely normal and hold some of the most wonderful memories.

And if I’m honest, the last year has also reminded me how important perspective and resilience are.

50 feels less about age and more about perspective. And despite everything that’s changed over the years, I still genuinely love what I do and feel lucky to be doing it.☺️

April packed plenty in.

✅ Running a webinar with Small Business Britain

✅ Delivering AI training

✅ A brilliant day at the British HR Awards in London

✅ A trip to Las Vegas

✅ Welcoming two new clients

And a few moments that reminded me how valuable it is to step outside the day-to-day occasionally.🚪

A month of contrast and variety - different places, different conversations and inspiration in all of them.💬

Now onto May, which has always been one of my favourite months.

Bank holidays, birthdays, hopefully some warmer weather… and longer, lighter days.☀️

Keeping up the annual tradition. May the 4th be with you!🪐⚡️

Enjoy the bank holiday.