Let's Talk Business

Discover how Behavioural Economics in Changing Busines - Alan Coote Talks to Dr David Halpen author of 'Inside The Nudge Unit'.

If you run a small business attracting new customers can be hard work, we have an alternative approach. We speak to The Design Council who can help if you have a great idea for a product but are struggling to get the right design. Who doesn’t get apprehensive about standing up in front of a group of people to give an important talk? We discover that sales managers and CEOs are turning to The Design Counci to overcome their problem. Getting distracted by emails at work is crippling productivity but short of switching it off what can be done about it? We uncover some new innovative technology. And, we reveal that rooms with high-ceilings have been found better for creative brain-storming, plus other insights. Join Alan Coote and Josh Alex on this week's Let's Talk Business at schedule time on Radio Monogram Media.

The customer is always right – right? No wrong because some customers cost companies more money than they make. So what can be done? Have you ever wondered how the price of a restaurant meal is calculated? Very badly apparently – we speak to a leading consultant to the trade who say’s sometimes we’re paying too much and surprisingly often too little. Netflix made over $8 billion last year in subscriptions. We tell you how to implement a subscription model. We've created more data in the past 2 years than in the rest of human history. How is that possible and what is it being used for? Join Alan Coote and Josh Alex on this week's Let's Talk Business at schedule time on Radio Monogram Media.

PayPal have announced that UK businesses have tripled their sales abroad in 2016. We talk to the Managing Director of PayPal in the UK to discover how. Are you the ambitious type, do you want to making it to the top and staying there? Picking your moment to step up the career ladder is fraught with danger. Move before you’re really ready and it will end in disaster. Luckily there’s a new book out which aims to help you – we speak to its author. We uncover what makes a great company name and what are the biggest mistakes? Join Alan Coote and Josh Alex on this week's Let's Talk Business

Extract from Let's Talk Business - Josh Alex and Alan Coote - Crack At News of Scotland's New Advertising Slogan - Let's Talk Business 3rd March 2017

We’re out on our travels once again. This week we take a trip to a national Franchise Show in London. It’s one of a growing number of shows catering for people who’d like a potentially easier route into running their own business than starting it from scratch. As we’ll hear, it doesn’t matter what your passion is or the experience you have, there’s most likely going to be a franchise for you. Hairdressing, business mentoring, cleaning, pawn brokerage, it’s all coming in the next few minutes. Plus, Josh Alex from the Business community website Fortune Copilot will be here. This time he’s discovered, incredibly, that there are several childhood traits which can reliably predict your future success.

You may not be aware but you’re wasting up to a quarter of your working week. We help you claim back those valuable hours. We chat to the author of a new book for entrepreneurs in which you can feature. If your business is not using video, we have advice to get you started. And we uncover one of the most amazing and useful statistics I think we’ve ever featured.

Wouldn’t it be great to understand what makes people tick? Especially when sometimes the people you have to work with are frankly just plain annoying - yes we’ve all been there. We talk to an expert who has a simple model we can use to better understand our co-workers. If you have a fantastic idea for a manufactured product how do you go about getting it out there to the world? We find out how to go from nothing to signing your first customers in a few short months. Some of the brightest brains in business are continually telling us to fail fast. But why? What does failing fast actually mean? We have a better alternative. And what are the World’s top 10 most powerful brands? I bet you get the top three wrong.

One thing you would have expected to disappear is direct mail marketing. But it turns out it’s very much alive and well. We talk to an expert of over 30 years in the business to find out how best to use this forgotten method of reaching new customers. Do you struggle to find a gift for your partner, and when it comes to spending quality time together, do you find you need to synchronise diaries weeks in advance? A new company called Date Night aims to help couples by solving these major problems. There's also news of research which reveals we believe we’re smarter than we really are just because we have access to Google.

We get out of the studio and go to one of Europe’s largest business exhibitions. If you’re looking to meet 10,000 other business owners and find out how to promote your own business all under one roof, then it’s the place to be. Also on the programme we find out how artificial intelligence is making its mark in business. It was once seen as too complex for your average business, but as we’ll hear later, you don’t need to have a degree in computing or statistics to be able to discover some really powerful information.

Small business owners know getting paid on time is vital. So what are the top tips for tackling late payments? We uncover the key steps to ensure you get the money you’re owed. Holding a party celebration for your business can be great for company moral. But they can either be a disaster or utterly brilliant. We find out what it takes to make a really successful work's party. It turns out that flying a military jet and running a business are more similar than you would imagine. For both, you need to make quick decisions to outmanoeuvre your opponent and gain the advantage. So what can we learn from the very best fighter pilots that will give us the competitive edge? If you have the urge to start a new business, then you could do worse than run it from home. We discover that quite a few of the world’s best known businesses started from the back room and garden shed. And how much does the average household spend on Christmas? We reveal all.

If you're worried about losing your current job to advancing technology fear not you may not need to be too concerned as new breed of employee and business will be required. According to one expert you'll become a 'Judgement Worker'. Is this you? We have news of a podcast especially for female entrepreneurs. And, we looking at the hot technologies for business in 2017. These are exciting areas that you’ll really must know.

We all like a good story don’t we? Marketers encourage business owners to tell their story to new customers; how they started, the trials and tribulations they went through. However, we hear from a business advisor who says you are missing the point as most customers couldn’t give a damn. Paying someone to get a job done is easy if it’s a few quid but not if the project runs into thousands, or millions of pounds. But we hear in the news on a weekly basis that the cost of one large-scale project or another has doubled. Of course, there are 1000s more less public projects which overspend and don’t make the news. We discover why. On the subject of planning, have you ever wondered why things always seem to take longer than you expect? This phenomenon has a name - it’s called the Planning Fallacy and it can have dire consequences. Is there a scenario when getting your customers to jump through additional hoops is a good thing? In actual fact it just might be.

It’s a special programme for you this time. We take a trip back to the most popular items we’ve had on the show this year. It’s the time when you’re planning or have maybe even started your New Year resolution. We look at why you’re more likely to keep your resolution now than almost any other time of the year. It wouldn’t be the season of goodwill without a trip to a pub, especially one that brews its own beer. Is the UK a good place to start a new business and how do we rank against other developed countries in the world? – We’ll find out. If you have always wondered how to set the best price for your product we have some excellent advice for you. And we reveal what it takes to be an entrepreneur.

Do you love your customers? Well maybe not all of them all of the time. But much of your effort and money spent loving your customers is wasted, says an industry expert, because you’re focused on the wrong thing. We’ve all been forced to work in a team of people who we’d never chose as friends and yet we’re expected to get along with them for the good of the company. We hear from a behaviour psychologist and team builder who can explain why problems arise between team members and how to fix them. In this week’s business insight, we discover the most powerful word in the English language. There’s shocking news of just how attached we British are to our jobs even when we're on holiday. We launch Fortune Copilot, our new community for small business owners and entrepreneurs.

What’s in a name? If you’ve ever tried to name a new business, then you’ll understand how long you’ll agonise over it - going around and around then, when you test the idea out on friends and family, you realise no one remembers it. Don’t worry, we’ll tell you how to create a memorable business name. If the prospect of public speaking brings you to your knees then we have help. We’ll chat to an award-winning presenter and author who says Public speaking is easy if you follow a few simple rules. We find out the surprising links in customer service between a well-known noodle bar and a low-cost airline. With much uncertainty for UK businesses all help is surely welcome. We find out what a new online community, aimed at transforming businesses with smart ideas, has to offer.

Author's Stories - Sarah Haywood - Dashwood Hare And Friends by Hosted By Alan Coote

Do you trust online reviews? There is now really concern that companies are systematically paying for reviews to make their business look better than it really is. This activity has shot up by a third in a year with less than one in five people saying they can tell the difference between a real and fake review. We speak to Chris Daly the Chief executive of the Charter Institute of Marketing to find out what can be done about it? As the country’s polices forces launch their Christmas drink drive awareness campaigns, there is another more wide spread problem of people using a mobile phone whilst driving. But we lead business lives and being in contact is colleges friends and family is part of modern life and many cars have hands free facilities is using that OK, we find out? Also, it can be really difficult to stand out from the competition especially in a competitive market. Investing time and money just to improve your product seems like the only answer but we look at an alternative.

Can giving employees bonuses harm productivity? That’s one of the many questions posed by international bestselling author Dan Ariely in his new book 'Payoff'. We talk about his outcome and hear of several other unintuitive conclusions he's reached. We speak to a former bank manager who was so worried about the lack of knowledge kids have about money, he decided to do something about it. He's switched jobs to become a writer and has now published a set of books called financial fairy tales. New research has uncovered that older people approach decision making very differently from young people. In this week's business insight we have three fascinating insights into the ageing mind. And we discover that some companies may have gone too far and lost the plot in trying to build relationships with potential new customers. Isn’t it the case that if the price is right then people will just buy it?

Starting your own business from scratch when the idea isn’t proven can be too much of a risk for many people. If this is you then buying in to a franchise could be a better solution, if you have the right personal attributes that is. We discover what type of person you need to be to make it a success. Are you a procrastinator, perfectionist, just lack confidence sometimes, or have you just lost your Mojo? Many entrepreneurs, business leaders and manager share these same issues. They can be career-limiting. We find out how to get over these issues so you can get your work and life back on track. How long does it take to master something new? The popular belief is that it's 10,000 hours. To put that in to perspective, that’s like having a full-time job for 5 years. However, we reveal that there is a proven method of becoming pretty good at something 500x quicker.