Fact is; most of us prefer to deal with companies that have personality (or a personality), rather than the cold clinical impersonal approach often associated with larger companies.

To overcome this problem, big companies spend millions of $$$ in creating the kind of friendly, personal, caring image normally associated with small business.

Yet, surprisingly, a lot of small businesses hide behind what comes naturally. Many fear that customers won't buy if their small business is seen for what it is ... a small, personal and in some cases, one-person business.

When you think about it, a small business has a huge natural advantage. The owner can be the personality in his or her own business. They can become the Colonel Sanders of their own business.

Alternatively, there's nothing to stop a small business doing what the big companies do. Any small business can have a designer create a unique character for them. The business could have its very own Ronald McDonald or Colonel Sanders type character .... and it needn't cost an arm and a leg to create.

One of the first businesses I ever owned was a shop selling handicrafts. To "front" the business, I created a craftsman-like character who resembled Gepetto from Pinocchio fame. I called him Andy Kraft (a play on the wording handicraft). Andy featured on the shop frontage, on my letterhead and in all my advertising. Although I employed staff, the business was perceived as being a one-person business operated by this wise, old, craftsman character called Andy Kraft.

A few years later I started an up-market gift store and called it Austin Gray. I thought the name sounded more "posh" than my real name. Although I wasn't in the store very often, whenever I was, people would call me Austin.

Both these stores were successful operations and each had it's own unique personality (character) to front the business. It worked! And, I have Andy and Austin to thank for my success in those businesses.

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