Kingston Business Today, March 2015 edition

MARCH 2015

YouR souRCe foR business And CHAMbeR news in tHe GReAteR KinGston AReA

Vol. 4 no. 3

By Mandy [email protected]

As an employee, feeling appreciat-ed is very important. Everyone wants to know that they are doing their job well and that their hard work is be-ing noticed. Usually that appreciation comes in the form of a raise, a good review or positive words, but for em-ployees of Tango Nuevo it was a trip to Cuba.

“We set out goals for the year at a meeting in January of 2014 and I told them they would be rewarded if we achieved those goals,” explained Tango Nuevo owner Gokhan Cifci. “They hit the target and I decided to close for a week in January, when it was convenient for the restaurant, and we all went down to Cuba.”

The goals set out at that meeting in-cluded monetary amounts for the year, but Cifci also wanted to see Tango Nuevo rank in the top five in terms of restaurant reviews in Kingston, some-thing that was no easy feat for a rela-tively new restaurant.

“It was motivation for them to work

harder and put more effort in and they did a great job,” said Cifci. “They re-ally showed that they cared and I saw that they felt like they belonged. That is very difficult, especially in the res-taurant business where there is higher turnover and more part time staff.”

Tango Nuevo opened in July of 2013 and serves Spanish and fusion tappas cuisine. Cifci always knew that the restaurant would be a success, and he saw the staff as being very impor-tant to that success.

“As an employer, if you find em-ployees that will give a lot that is so important. In the restaurant business, it’s hard to make a lot of profit, but you can minimize your costs. If your staff cares and they want to help that can be very beneficial.”

Cifci updated his staff on their progress throughout the year in terms of their goals and also asked them to have their passports ready when they met in the later part of the year. He was excited to reward his staff for their hard work and also saw the trip as a teambuilding exercise for the res-taurant.

“We really got to know each other better. The whole experience made me really happy with my choices in terms of hiring,” he said.

While the restaurant employees 24- full and part-time staff, only 16 were able to go on the trip to Cuba for a va-riety of reasons, but Cifci made sure that those who could not attend were given bonuses instead. He also invited a past employee who had moved on in the middle of 2014 to join them.

“I told her she could come if she wanted and she did. We also had a few boyfriends and girlfriends of staff members join us and a regular cus-tomer too. It was a great time and a great trip.”

The trip recharged staff and helped them get ready for the coming year.

While Cifci has no definitive plans as of yet, he is hoping to do something similar next year.

“I want to get all the staff on the trip this time. We will have another meet-ing in May and we will work towards a goal again. It was a great experience overall and I definitely want to do it again.”

Restaurant owner rewards staff with trip to Cuba

Gokhan Cifci is the owner of Tango Nuevo in downtown Kingston. Photo/Mandy Marciniak.

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February 2015

your source For business and chamber news

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Vol. 4 no. 2

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to house their businesses under one

roof, they jumped on it.

The space at 842 Gardiners Rd.

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tique since it opened a year ago.

“I’ve been working from home

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somewhere that wasn’t my living

room to have clients come pick up

their orders,” says Atkinson-Spen-

cer.She knew Dauncey because the

two recently collaborated on a wed-

ding cake that was decorated with

real flowers. “We were just chatting

casually and I said ‘oh, if you know

any soap makers or jewellery mak-

ers who are looking to share a retail

space, I’m in the market and Jane

said what about me’?”

While the businesses will remain

separate, the two hope to do more

collaboration in the future, and

become something of a one-stop-

shopping destination for those plan-

ning weddings and other events.

“It can just take a bit of the stress

out of it because it’s one less place

to go,” notes Atkinson-Spencer.

“We’re hoping maybe we can do

a package or something that’s an in-

centive,” adds Dauncey. “If people

book with me and book with Jen,

we can try to work something out.”

She notes that “we’re a great fit

because we both make everything

custom, made to order to the cus-

tomer’s specifications…instead of

something pre-made at a grocery

store.” Already, the two have been feed-

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“I realized when I was working

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lot,” laughs Atkinson-Spencer. “It’s

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room you can bounce ideas off of…

And I help eat all the leftover cake

– I’m super helpful.”

She describes her flower ar-

rangements as often having a bit

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“I came into floristry through

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they had an evening intro to floral

design. I was hooked after I did

that.”If given the freedom to create

her own style of bouquet, Atkinson-

Spencer often adds herbs and foli-

age from her own garden.

“It adds a little texture and scent

to it,” she remarks.

Appropriately, Dauncey’s signa-

ture style for cakes often incorpo-

rates floral designs.

“I’ve done other cakes too but

that’s kind of my element,” she

says. “I like the flowers, the flow-

ing, the soft, the pretty, as opposed

to the geometric square.”

That said, she’s also made every-

thing from a bulldozer cake to a Star

Wars cake. As Kingston’s only pea-

nut and nut-free bakery, Safari is in

high demand for children’s parties,

school events, and indeed any sort

Match made in heaven:

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Jane Dauncey (Left) of Safari Cake Boutique and Jen Atkinson-Spencer

of Sage Flowers in their new store. Photo/Hollie Pratt-Campbell

Continued on page 5

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2 Kingston Business Today - Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Why is Financial Uncertainty a Concern?Simple ways to connect with your customers Many Canadians are stressed

about the details of their personal finances. People tend to bury their head in the sand and hope financial stress will go away. Individuals must learn to ask questions, read articles and not to feel foolish if they have not been involved in financial plan-ning.

According to a recent survey con-ducted by Leger on behalf of the Financial Planning Standards Coun-cil (FPSC), 42% of Canadians rank money as their greatest stress. Cana-dian women report higher levels of financial stress than men.

A financial coach can help to pin point where you are today with re-spect to your finances and to create a step by step plan to move forward to achieve your goals. Reducing debt, beginning to save using tools such as RRSP’s and TFSA’s. A qualified pro-fessional financial advisor can assist in identifying the status of your cur-rent situations and develop a strategy to assist you in achieving your per-sonal and financial goals. Planning, as with coaching is an ongoing long term process with progress evalu-ated at every step along the way.

Commitment to a plan or budget and accountability for the components of the plan are crucial to an individuals’ success in achieving their goals.

Understanding risk is also impor-tant. Risk is part of life. Without tak-ing the occasional risk, we may miss opportunities. The key is to take sensible risks that suit your invest-ment style. It pays to have a strategy based on a solid foundation. Begin to understand your personal investment style, time frame for holding the in-vestment. Options to diversify the mix of investments in your portfolio and the benefits of dollar cost aver-aging or spreading your investment purchases over time are all ways to achieve your goals.

By taking a long term approach to investing and understanding your tolerance for risk, you can build a strategy with the help of your finan-cial coach that will help provide a reasonable opportunity for success. The next step to reducing some of the stress in your life is to become active with your financial coach.

Susan M. Creasy CLU, B.P.H.E.,B.Ed.Susan Creasy Financial Inc.

Establishing and maintaining a lasting connection with customers is a goal for businesses big and small. Nowadays, ac-complishing that goal is easier than ever before, as businesses can take advantage of the Internet and social media to keep in touch with their customers and keep those customers abreast of sales or special offers.

But as effortless as it can seem to main-tain a connection with customers, estab-lishing the initial connection that makes customers want to bring their business to you time and again can be more difficult. While a great product or service is at the core of every successful business, savvy business owners know the value of con-necting with their customers on a deeper level. The following are some simple ways businesses big and small can con-nect with their customers.

Share your history. Sharing the history • of your business is a simple yet effec-tive way to establish a personal con-nection with your customers, many of whom may enjoy learning how your business started, especially if you over-came difficult odds before ultimately becoming successful. Sharing the his-tory of a business that has withstood the test of time also inspires customer

confidence, as many consumers cor-rectly feel that a company that has been around a long time must be doing something right to keep its doors open. Share your story on the company web-site, whether it’s the first thing custom-ers see on your homepage or under its own tab labeled “Our Story” or “About Us.” A story also can be shared via so-cial media outlets.Survey the troops. Surveys are another • valuable tool you can use to engage and connect with customers. Surveys allow businesses to learn what’s working and what’s not working with regard to pleasing their customers, and custom-ers will appreciate that you value their feedback and want to know how you can make their experiences more en-joyable. Surveys can be administered in person when customers visit your store. In such instances, ask customers to return the surveys on their next visit. Surveys also can be administered via email or social media platforms. When designing the surveys, include a section for comments where customers can in-clude any suggestions or concerns they did not have a chance to address when completing the original survey.

Promptly respond to emails and other • feedback. Customers willing to take the time to email a business to share their experiences or provide feedback, be it positive or negative, appreci-ate when those businesses respond in a timely fashion. A timely response to such feedback indicates that your business values its customers and their input. When responding to negative feedback, investigate any incidents or problems before responding so you are in a better position to address the cus-tomer’s concerns.Make it personal. Whenever possible, • personally respond to new customers to thank them for their business and en-courage them to return. As valuable as online customer surveys can be to your business, responding personally to sur-vey participants, customers or others who provide feedback, be it through a personal card or note sent via the mail or a personal message sent through social media, is a great way to foster a lasting and positive relationship with clients and customers, many of whom will likely spread the word about your thoughtful gesture to friends and fam-ily members.

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From pop-up to permanent – Passionate Artisans is open for businessBy Mandy [email protected]

A group of local artisans who set up up a pop-up shop in November of 2014 are now happy to call that once temporary location home; Passionate Artisans, located at 28 Bath Road, re-opened on March 1 and they hope to continue providing a space for artisans and a unique shopping experience for the community.

“We were previously open Novem-ber and December and we had a great season,” explained local artisan and owner of Sew Helpful, Lynda Prescod.

“We were very happy with the atten-tion and response from the commu-nity so we decided to close for a few months, renovate and come back per-manently.”

The two-month closure allowed the artisans to revamp and renovate the space. The time also allowed them to recharge and get products ready for the permanent location.

The store re-opened with 18 arti-sans featured throughout, some old and some new.

“We have some of the original ar-tisans and some have left making room for new artisans. It is constant-

ly changing depending on what the products are and sometimes changing because of seasonal products too.” The shop held an opening celebration on March 7 and 8 and Prescod hopes that the commu-nity will keep sup-porting the space and the artisans.

“It is a lot of fun and it really is a collective project. We all contribute and help advertise and we all benefit

from the effort and the community is part of that too. We know there is a de-sire to shop local and that is what we are all about.”

Passionate Artisans is located at 28 Bath Road. For more information, visit www.passionateartisans.com or email [email protected].

Lynda Prescod of Passionate Artisans. Photo/Mandy Marciniak.

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2015 shaping up as a busy year for construction among the ‘Big 4’By Bill Hutchins

Some people like to muse that Kingston has two seasons – winter and construction.

While winter is still underway, the other season will soon be starting. And it promises to be a busy one.

Four of the city’s big government institutions – City of Kingston, Utilities Kingston, Queen’s University and CFB Kingston - unveiled their con-structions plans during a recent event hosted by the Kingston Construction Association.

The four institutions are planning about half a bil-lion dollars in combined construction activity that will span road repairs and expansions, water/sewer upgrades, new buildings, demolition work and facil-ity maintenance. Some of the work will start in 2015, while other projects will be spread over the next four years.

All of this bodes well for local construction indus-try, which will be kept busy for the next few years as the lucrative contracts are awarded.

Subject to approval from the Department of Na-tional Defence, military brass at CFB Kingston are planning to undertake more than $70 million in new construction activity at military sites in the city’s east end. These include;

-$46 million for a new Logistic Support Service building to oversee base maintenance, transportation and supplies,

-$20 million to build a new Peace Support Train-ing Centre,

-$4.5 million roof replacement, including Royal Military College’s iconic 1876-era Mackenzie

building flag tower and the Fort Frontenac Officer’s Mess,

-$250,000 repairs to RMC’s pedestrian bridge over Highway 2.

Queen’s University is also undertaking some big work, most notably the $22 million reconstruction of Richardson Stadium.

Meanwhile, the City of Kingston has approved $127 million in its four year capital budget, while Utilities Kingston has earmarked $215 million.

“We have some significant infrastructure spend-ing that’s planned over the next four years,” said Utilities Kingston president Jim Keech.

Among the highlights of the combined $342 mil-lion municipal investment;

-$63 million John Counter Blvd. widening and bridge work between Sir John A. Macdonald Blvd to Princess Street (2015-2018),

-$12 million to widen Highway 15 from High-way 2 to Gore Road (2017),

-$4.9 million to extend Centennial Drive north to Creekford Road(2016),

-$1.2 million to extend Cataraqui Woods Drive east to Sydenham Road (2016).

In addition, the city is planning road reconstruc-tion of Yonge Street this year, Princess Street (big dig phase 3) in 2016 and upper Johnson Street in 2018.

Utilities Kingston is making plans to begin an $85 million upgrade to its west end sewage plant next year while expanding sewer lines along Front Road and Days Road, in addition to other infrastructure upgrades around the city.

“It’s essential for development,” Keech explained of the underground water and sewer line replacement.

The city is also planning to convert the main floor of its building at 362 Montreal Street as the new Provincial Offences Court.

Some well-known buildings will be demol-ished: the former Oakwood daycare, Wally Elmer arena, Hangar #4 at Nor-man Rogers Air-port, wading pool and two buildings at Victoria Park. In some cases, the structures are being replaced.

Big municipal recreation projects will get underway including construc-tion of Rideau Heights community centre and redesign of Shannon Park, expanding the track and field beside the Invista Centre to allow javelin, ham-mer toss and dis-cus throwing, and extending the K&P Trail from Dalton Avenue to Division Street.

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While making regular contributions throughout the year will optimize the time you are invested as well as dollar cost averaging of your money grow-ing in a tax sheltered vehicle, the reality for many of us is that we continue to make last minute con-tributions. This is much better than not taking ad-vantage of the program at all. The other important consideration is how you will invest the money. This is largely determined by your personal situa-tion, length of time before you will be invested and tolerance for risk. A financial advisor can help you

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New Empire Design Build celebrates 10 years of developing in KingstonBy Mandy [email protected]

Since 2005, New Empire Design Build has built over 500,000 square feet of new developments in Kings-ton. These builds include indus-trial buildings and plazas, and soon condos and townhouses, but it all started with one client looking for affordable land that was not too far from Toronto

“We did a design build and brought Lyreco to Kingston with a 215,000 square foot building,” ex-plained co-owner of New Empire Design Build Frank Casamatta. “Due to economics, they didn’t want to spend millions of dollars on land in the Toronto area so we looked at Belleville, Trenton and east and the nicest town that I found was Kings-ton.”

After that initial build, Casamatta and New Empire started looking for more opportunities in Kings-ton. They bought more and more land, most of it on speculation, and continued to develop properties throughout the area.

“For the past 10 years we have been in Kingston. I bought some land on the east end because I saw that there was a lot of residential development and they needed things to service the area. I got some pro-fessional companies in there and it

worked out well.”New Empire started developing

in 1989 and since then the company has developed more than 23 million square feet of buildings, including those in England and Italy. In Kings-ton, New Empire’s numerous design builds represent $75 million of in-vestment and $1 million in tax rev-enue and they continue to purchase and develop more builds.

“I just bought some property in Kingston and we’ll be doing four 12-storey condominiums and some other townhouses and plazas in 2016,” said Casamatta. “The price of land is decent and it’s a great city. I enjoy working with the City of Kingston and council and we’ve had very positive experiences.”

New Empire has also worked closely with KEDCO to find desir-able land and expand existing com-panies. Chief executive officer of KEDCO, Jeff Garrah, has enjoyed working with New Empire over the past 10 years and sees the develop-ments as positive for new and exist-ing businesses in Kingston.

“They are one of our largest cus-tomers in terms of buying land and putting buildings up on speculation,” said Garrah. “Building on spec real-ly demonstrates a sign of confidence in the economy. For us, we have new businesses who want to move to Kingston and having brand new

space is key to that move, but also for business looking to expand in Kingston, offering them new space

at a good price is a real advantage for us too.”

Location is also key to New Em-

pire’s developments in Kingston and for Casamatta that is one of the best things about Kingston.

The Lyreco building was the first build for New Empire Design Build in Kingston 10 years ago. Photo/Submitted

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Internet marketing key to success of all businesses, small and large, says Queen’s expertBy Hollie Pratt-Campbell

Did you know that 47 per cent of consumers conduct an online search before making a purchase, according to a study by the Business Develop-ment Bank of Canada? What’s more, 70 per cent say they trust consumer opinions posted online.

Indeed, a strong online presence is one of the most important mar-keting tools a business can possess, according to Queen’s School of Business professor and eMarketing expert John Pliniussen. These days, it’s about more than just strong cus-tomer service and competitive pric-ing.

“[Business owners] need to be

spending their marketing dollars to optimize the searches that consum-ers in Kingston do,” he says. “A lot of small businesses haven’t made that investment yet.”

For example, if a customer is looking to buy ladies’ shoes, types a search for her desired brand into Google and the first few stores that come up are in Syracuse, Ottawa and Amazon.ca, she might assume that no local store carries them when in fact this is not the case. As such, she is likely to either choose conve-nience and make the purchase on-line, or plan a day trip out of town.

Pliniussen explains that search engine optimization (SEO) and oth-er more recent internet marketing

techniques are not meant to replace traditional forms - rather, they are additions to a long list of skills busi-ness owners must already possess.

“You also have to continuously promote and engage the customers you already have, give them the in-centive to come back and encourage them to spread the word of mouth. And you do that online as well with testimonials, special contests, things like that. So it’s sort of a potpourri of marketing tactics that are impor-tant for small businesses.”

Understanding the importance of Internet marketing, he says, will continue to become more and more important in the future.

“[Future generations], they don’t

know a world other than online, and that’s where they start. Whereas I knew a world before computing; my generation knows both sides of the coin but we are also more and more comfortable with [online shop-ping].”

Is online shopping in part the cause of recent local big box store closures like Future Shop and Tar-get? Probably not, says Pliniussen.

“Shopping is one thing, buying is something else. I don’t think you or I or anybody we know has bought a television or a stereo online. Most people will shop online, get an idea of what the best prices are and then go buy it at Costco. There are sev-eral alternatives. The closures in

Kingston are simply a result of the market changing.”

As for small businesses in the downtown and elsewhere, Plinius-sen says it’s all about Internet mar-keting, combined with traditional assets like great customer service and quality items.

“All downtown stores across Can-ada have a dilemma. It’s not only the Internet, it’s how you get people to go downtown versus the suburbs, the malls or box stores. What works downtown are specialty, niche stores that have great service. The one that come to mind is [Bagot Leather Goods] at the end of Princess. The service is great, the price is good, they’re still there.”

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Does pay per click (PPC) advertising live up to the hype?By Geoff Josey

By now, whether you sell online advertising or are an advertiser yourself, we have all at some point come across pay per click (PPC) advertising; the most common are Google pay per click or ad words. I am talking about those ads at the top of Google that no one ever clicks on. Well maybe you do, but I definitely don’t.

Last week, I met with a client who works with an SEO/website optimization agency and I was told that the agency recommended they cancel the online advertising with me and increase their Google Ad-Words/PPC budget. My response was, “so to them it’s only about clicks when people are searching through Google”?

I went to explain that from talk-ing to the agency myself I had learned that the advertisers’ click through rate with my platform is equal to the PPC program, and I didn’t even let him in on my secret that we now have added audience extension/retargeting to their cam-paign. We are now at least doubling the PPC click through rate, which I will share the next time we go over stats. I am not trying to say that on-line marketers should not have this presence or that it is not valuable,

because it is - especially since these are high quality clicks. What I am saying is, if this is where an online strategy stops, you will be left out in the cold.

First off I am going to explain what this client (a local car dealer) is doing with Metroland. They have a content marketing strat-egy with monthly content, online business profiles on our local news site and goldbook.ca, IP targeted video overlay im-pressions and a lot of them, audience extension/retarget-ing targeting those in the market for a new or used vehicle. Overall, the pro-gram is performing very well, with about 250,000 impressions being served up over the course of the year (yes, that’s 250,000 sets of eye-balls) with a click through rate be-tween .2 and .7 per cent depending on the month and promotion that we are running.

The click through rate is 2-7

times the national average, so this is performing exceptionally well. And, of course, there is the content on a high traffic local news site, all searchable through Google, which separates them from the competi-t i o n and increases

brand aware-ness. I could add in the social media benefit but that is an-other blog.

The early stats are s h o w i n g h u n d r e d s of reads. The article is show-ing up on page one of Google and pro-v i d i n g e v e n m o r e c l i c k

throughs to their site. You can’t get a more engaged click than one that comes from an article that was just read on a product or service their company provides. We also have profile views and yet again there have been hundreds of

them, in addition to hundreds of YouTube views on the video.

I am not picking on Google - I am actually a huge fan. But, if your online strategy is 100 per cent pay per click advertising, you are miss-ing out on online marketing plat-forms with many benefits such as the ones illustrated above. You are missing out on sales and valuable loyal customers that your competi-tion who does have a strong plat-form is getting. Online advertising is about more than just clicks (read my previous piece “it’s about more than just the click”). Potential cus-tomers go online to find out infor-mation so they can become more educated buyers. They are reading news stories and this is just the tip of the iceberg. You need to have a platform where you become part of this experi-ence and that in-cludes platforms such as content marketing, video marketing, audi-ence extension, retargeting, deal sites, mobile marketing, im-pressions and more, including Pay Per Click.

If PPC is all you are doing all you have is a deal, so in other words you are looking for price shoppers selling based on price. Isn’t it more likely that potential customers are typing in key words looking for more information so that they become a more informed buyer than to see who simply has the best price?

I will end on this note: as a busi-ness owner looking to attract cus-tomers who are surfing the web, you will obtain loyal customers by getting them engaged in your prod-uct or service, and the internet is the perfect place to do that. What you need to do is plan a well thought out online marketing strategy.

Follow me on twitter @geoffjosey


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Documents

Kingston Business Today, March 2015 edition