I don’t like mobile phones, and I only use mine to talk or send text messages to my husband. I don’t even include my phone numbers, whether mobile or landline, on my business cards. Email, on the other hand, is another thing. It is email that I can’t live without.

There are lots of people who don’t share the same sentiments. There are countless business owners who push for giving more personalization to communication by picking up the phone and having a conversation with a client, one-to-one. There are also those who believe that one has to set-up an appointment or a call, then shoot an email right after for documentation purposes.

These people have a point though; and it is true that mobile phones are faster and more efficient than email. Also,  spoken language is harder to misinterpret. And I’m sure one time or another we’ve gotten that email that left us asking, “Was he serious?”

Even putting those benefits into consideration, I still despise the phone. I loathe having to reply to numerous text messages or having to answer unexpected calls during times that I need a little bit of personal space. This disdain is even more apparent now as I also have a baby to take care of. I never want to answer a ringing phone when I’m giving my baby a bath, changing her nappies, or lulling her to sleep. A ringing sound during those sensitive times makes me want to go ballistic and just throw the phone right out the window.

My opinion is that the phone works best for the traditional nine-to-five workers. They are always at their desks, always available to callers during office hours. Furthermore, for these traditional workers, it is a given that they should always have access to their mobile during office hours. One question though. Does this system really work for small business owners like yours truly? At least for me, it doesn’t.

As for small business owners like me, I believe that email works best. It gives me more control of when to read and respond to messages. Moreover, I find the email thread really useful as there’s written documentation as to what transpired during an email conversation with a client.

Dealing with only emails also entail a strict discipline. These messages can pile up with neglect; and then you find yourself spending a lot more time than expected replying to countless emails.

I just hope that everyone has been educated on email etiquette. There are messages that you shouldn’t be getting and there’s a actually a trend of over-communication nowadays that even the biggest and most professional of all companies are endorsing.  For me, I’ve got better things to do than answering a call or reading emails not addressed to me; and I just want everyone to know that.

Ever experienced getting dumbfounded trying to send a message across to someone? It didn’t matter how hard you tried changing approaches, how you rephrased your statements, or how you already simplified your explanation, but the other person still just won’t get it. Did you happen to find out what seems to have caused this sudden lapse in effective communication?

In situations like these, you would find that the other person just couldn’t care less. Oftentimes, you just have to crow out aloud or deep inside “you need to understand!” It can be a frustrating  experience indeed; but let’s have a quick look at a few symptoms when that communication barrier starts  getting in between you and your audience. We need to know these symptoms so that once we experience them, we can address them right away.

One symptom of failing to communicate is when you feel very frustrated that your audience is repeatedly not getting your point. In addition, another symptom of such is when you begin to feel defensive about your own perspectives. Furthermore, another very common symptom is that both parties get stuck in a conversation and neither person would budge. Another symptom of failing to communicate is when you’re beginning to view your opinions as ‘right’ and the other person’s wrong. Finally, you begin to approach a conflict with a ‘winner take all’ attitude rather than coming up with a ‘win-win’ situation.

The reason behind this frustration is our constant yearning to be acknowledged. We always want our opinions to be heard, and our point of view considered. We always need to feel esteemed, our contributions cherished, and our values supported as we try to influence other people in meaningful ways.

However, forcing your point of view to be recognized by others rarely does the job. In fact, it can even be counterproductive, as assertiveness might even turn into aggression. Perhaps the key to making ourselves heard is to change our mindset to us understanding rather than being understood.

Having this idea enacted is guaranteed to turn the tables. Shifting our direction from trying to win people over to focusing on the way we are communicating with the other person, takes our mindset from being me-centric, into looking at the relationship as a whole.

By concentrating our focus to understanding the other person, we’re sending out a signal that we’re also concerned with what that person thinks. Through this empathy, we can view things from the other person’s perspective. We can get to learn about their own beliefs, biases, personality, and attitude. Demonstrating this empathy also shows that we know how to effectively communicate; and it also shows that we are also willing to come up with a ‘win-win’ situation.

On a recent poll, about seventy percent  of small business owners have gauged themselves as ‘above average’ communicators.

With the outstanding poll results, the first thing that comes to my mind is what really constitutes being a good communicator? With the mentioned poll, I believe that the small business owners assessed themselves by referring to how well they get the message across via speaking and writing. At least that’s the way I understood the polling.

I’ve pondered on this poll result for quite a few days and I’ve gotten to a realization the someone who masterfully crafts words can still be deemed a bad communicator. How is that possible, you might ask? It can be done by the habit of not meaning what they say; and vice-versa.

Were we ever guilty of this? Let’s see if these examples can freshen up our memory.  If someone asks, “Do you mind,” but we really do mind, yet we still say “No, not at all.” Isn’t that a not-so-good way to communicate? Another example is when someone asks “How are you,” but we’re not really well, but we still reply, “I’m fine.” Some underlying reasons why we do this can include us not asserting ourselves or us trying to not to offend or upset someone. We somehow use this technique to influence others into leaving us be.

More often than not, this habit occurs when we’re upset. This strategy of us trying to influence others  is not really that helpful because, most of the time, our pent up feelings manifest themselves through other means anyway. Moreover, what makes it more baffling to the people around us is that if they take it as it is, then they’re wrong. On the contrary, if they recognize that we’re not really meaning what we say, then they wouldn’t be able to guess what we exactly mean.

Saying things as-they-are is quite difficult when we’re trained to follow etiquette and exhibit proper manners at all times. We were always told that it is impolite to give a ‘hard no’ as an answer; but it’s equally impolite to say “yes,” “not at all,” or “I’m fine,” even when we don’t really mean it.

So the next time a customer says “I understand that I haven’t paid you for the last project yet, but would you like to discuss a new one?” Let’s not just nod and say “Alright,” then do slipshod work because of demotivation. We can tell them right away that it’s not part of company policy, but we’d be more than happy to hear from them once the balance has been cleared.

There exists such a fine balance between being frank and being tactless. If we can find this balance, and capitalize on it every time we communicate, then definitely we can give ourselves a pat on the back for being such good communicators.

The use of business jargon in marketing can be puzzling, uninteresting and boring to our customers; but as a business owner there is always that big temptation to lean towards it. We might want to sound like experts in the field or leaders in the industry, but our customers don’t really care. They want something that they can closely relate to; and as business owners, it is our job to provide them with that.

Tip Number One: Never use Acronyms

Never use acronyms unless they’re referring to something generally known like ANZ, UN, or such. As a general rule, avoid all types of acronyms in any material that get distributed to customers. Matter of fact, you’ll be very surprised as to how many people don’t even know what ASAP or RSVP means.

Tip Number Two:  Less Words, Less Mistakes

When you’re editing your materials, try cutting down what you want to say in half. You’ll be surprised at how much fluff can be edited  off your writing. Moreover, you’ll only retain the most important keywords that you need to get the point across. Treat each word like it’s worth about five dollars, and you’ll only be putting in the most important ones.

Tip Number Three: Set Appointments, Make those Calls, and Refrain from Emails and Text Messages

The number one cause of miscommunication is not meeting face-to-face or not talking over the phone. A lot of words can be misinterpreted on email because context such as facial expressions, bodily gestures, intonation, and emotions get lost.  As much as possible, set a meeting with your customer, or if this isn’t feasible, just pick up the phone and make a call. Emails or text messages should always be your last options.

Tip Number Four: Use Concrete Examples on your Proposals

One of the best ways to attract a customer’s attention to your proposal is to put in testimonials from real customers. Potential customers don’t really want to hear what you can do for them; but they’ll be more interested in hearing what you have done for people like them.

Tip Number Five: Present Clear Cut Options to your Clients

A client doesn’t want to hear the words, “It’s up to you” from you. What a client wants are clear-cut options with the pros and cons of each served on a silver platter. This not only makes options clearer to both parties, but it also gives the impression to the client that he or she is in control. More importantly, this also makes the decision-making process faster.

Tip Number Six: Stop Beating Around the Bush

Respect the customer’s time as how you want yours respected. In face to face conversations, don’t go dilly-dallying by going through irrelevant stories and such. Be straight to the point. Tell your customer why you’re in his or her office right away. Same thing goes for written materials. Treat written materials as your ‘one-minute-of-fame.’ Write down your proposition in a way that the sum up can be read by just a quick glance.

Tip Number Seven: Catch Key words and Phrases from your Client

Paying attention to key words and phrases that your client uses will help you determine your approach. For example, if the client uses a lot of words that are known to your industry, then you can use technical terminologies. If not, then you would need to explain everything in layman’s terms.

Tip Number Eight: Be Sensitive to Facial Expressions

Always be on the look-out for signs of doubt or confusion. Once you detect this, be proactive enough to anticipate the question and answer it.

Tip Number Nine: Check if your Mum would Understand

This is the best test in avoiding jargon. Pitch your product or service to your mum. Have her read your materials. If she doesn’t understand them, or you think she wouldn’t understand them, then you’ve used one word too many.

Tip Number Ten: Honesty is still the best policy

Persuade your clients with honesty. Transparency, rather than buzzwords, is always the key to any business deals.

Business conversations are quite difficult to manage; especially when someone throws you that one-million dollar question. For times like these, you can let acronyms save the day for you.

If you’re struggling to answer questions regarding your customers’ preferences, the company’s mission-vision, or your business’ core values, then it’s time to create your own acronyms.  Acronyms were created to make things easier to you to remember.

Our company is constantly approached by potential clients who’d like to engage in strategic partnerships with our business.  During these conversations, we greatly consider how ‘fit’ both organizations are with each other and how we’re projecting to work together to attain a certain goal. If the fit isn’t right or our values don’t jive, then we definitely won’t be a bit interested in a forging a partnership.

During these talks, of course, our organization’s mission, vision, and values always find their way into the conversation. And we are proud to make it known to everyone that we live by the CHARM code. That’s the trigger word; and we can go on and on about it for almost the meeting.

CHARM is our acronym for our organization’s mission, vision, and values. It stands for the Community is our number one priority as we strive to Harmonize work and life. Every associate is treated with Appreciation and Respect regardless of status. Finally, the M stands for whatever task that we undertake have should have Meaning. If we’re not going to do something that’ll be benefit the world, then there’s no point in us doing it.

This acronym has always ensured that everyone in our team is aligned with our organization’s motto. This not only inspires, motivates, and rallies everyone around a certain goal, but it also provides a helping hand in our decision-making as an organization. CHARM has made its way into our employee induction process. It has made its mark on our office’s walls and desktop screensavers. CHARM has even made its way into monthly meetings and employee performance appraisals. But most importantly, CHARM has made its mark onto the heart of everyone in the organization.

It doesn’t only attract attention of everyone inside the organization, but it also reaches far out. Having the acronym everywhere also attracts curiosity from potential clients or aspiring employees. Believe me, everyone from outside the organization can’t help but ask what the letters CHARM stand for.

And there you go again! That’s the trigger word: CHARM. Now, we won’t be able to stop ourselves from telling our story of what we do and how we envision the work that we do will have a positive impact on the world. We’d go on and on again. How’s that for a five lettered acronym?