Never underestimate the power of word-of-mouth communications when it comes to promoting a product or service. I recently witnessed an example of how quickly a good (or bad) word can spread about a product that I’d like to share.

This spring and summer, the gnats in our area have been vicious. They swarm, they bite, and they basically drive you crazy. On Independence Day, we were sitting on our patio with some lifelong friends, and the gnats began to attack. My friend ran to his vehicle and returned with some amazing, natural, gnat repellent that he said you can only get at two certain retail chains.

At my next opportunity, I visited our local Red Wing Ace Hardware store (one of my favorite places to shop) and asked about this product, Bug Soother. They had never heard of it, but looked it up in their computer system and ordered a 12 bottle case. I stopped two days later and bought 4 bottles because I didn’t want them to get stuck with 11 bottles of something they might not sell just because I asked them to order it.

This stuff worked so well and smells so good that I couldn’t help but tell people about it, and I let several people try it when we were getting “bugged” by these gnats. I didn’t actually witness this, but I heard within a few days people were lined up outside the store one morning waiting for them to open so they could get their own bottle. The store has apparently sold hundreds of bottles to date and can’t keep it on the shelf.

No one has ever told me they saw it on TV, on the internet, or any other kind of media, but word has spread around the area by word-of-mouth. We should all strive to have our customers so excited about our products and services that they spread the word about us like I just did for this product and store.

- Ken Hilton, President

As I write this, we are approaching a very important date in the history of the United States. This may sound a little strange at first, but I choose not to celebrate the 4th of July. Don’t get me wrong, our offices will be closed and I will be taking the day off. However, I will be celebrating Independence Day, it happens to be on July 4th.

I feel we have developed a tendency to recognize, observe, and celebrate dates rather than the events that made the dates important to us. So, while I think it is important to remember the special events that happened on a date, it is even more important to recognize why that date is important.

These thoughts can carry into your business management, as well. Every day, week, month, and year we run a variety of financial reports to track how our business is operating. We look at a Balance Sheet and get a snapshot of the financial health of our business, but do we dig into it and determine what actually caused the changes on this report? We run an Income Statement, P&L, Statement of Farming Activities, or Statement of Revenue and Expenditures (depending on your type of organization), but do we take the time to drill down and determine why the business is heading in the direction it is?

Every country and business has events and reports that they recognize and review at certain times of the year. Let’s make it a point to remember the reason we are running these reports, and especially the reason we are celebrating these dates.

- Ken Hilton, President

Seeing the recent severe weather devastation throughout the central United States has a tendency to put things into perspective. Our thoughts and prayers go to all those affected by the disaster. It sure makes Minnesota winters easier to handle.

We know that some of our valued customers were directly affected by the tornadoes. As a company, we at Red Wing Software will do what we can to help our clients who were affected by the storms get back to business and resume some sort of normal operations.

If you are subjected to a disaster of any kind, we will do whatever we can to help minimize the impact on your business recordkeeping tasks. Please call on us if replacement software is needed, help is needed re-installing programs or backups, or for any other task that our support staff can assist with.

This is a good time to remind everyone about the importance of data backups and disaster recovery plans. We can help with the replacement of your programs, but it’s up to you to have current copies of your data. Please count on the staff at Red Wing Software to help in any way we can.

You may not be able to tell by looking out the window, but the calendar says spring is here. This would be a good time to do some spring cleaning of your financial data.

Do you have some customers or vendors in the list of names in your database that no longer exist? Maybe you have some accounts that just don’t apply to your business anymore. These items are just making lists longer and harder to filter through to get to the information that you may be looking for.

Here are a few things you can do to spruce up you data. First, before you do anything that you haven’t done before, or may be uncomfortable with, make a backup of your data.

Depending on the software you are using, you may be able to mark unused list items as “inactive”. This could significantly reduce the size of these lists, and make finding useful information easier. It is often not possible to just “delete” these items, as they may have been used in transactions and they need to be available for historical reports.

You also may be able to “combine” items in a list. For instance, it is easy to accidently create two different names in a list just because you didn’t think the item was there. Combining the two names will make your reports more accurate and concise.

How long has it been since you checked to make sure your inventory is up-to-date? Several minor mistakes in inventory quantities or values can make a big difference, and your financial statements may not be accurate because of these issues.

Of course, it’s always a good idea to make sure all of your systems are providing you with the most valuable information for the management of your business, but if you haven’t spent a little time keeping up with these tasks, it might be a good time for some spring cleaning.

Some things never change; the sky is blue, the world is round, and it’s cold in Minnesota. However, some things are always changing, like the technology you use to keep your business running and profitable.

Have you recently checked how current the hardware and software you are using to manage your business is? I know, it’s running fine, and if it works, why fix it? Well, if you ask any of our knowledgeable support staff, they can recite from memory some real horror stories of people that felt that same way and wound up losing valuable information. Maybe the computer crashed and the backup wouldn’t restore on the new computer because the operating system couldn’t read the old format, or there wasn’t even a device in the new computer to insert the backup into. Or, the old software couldn’t transfer the data into the new program.

Red Wing Software is continuously updating our products with new technology to ensure that our customers don’t fall into the trap of losing information because of system crashes or outdated hardware. However, this requires users of our software to stay current with their Red Wing Software products, and transfer their data to new programs when they are available. We occasionally “sunset” a product, which means we stop updating and supporting that program. When we do that, we always provide a way to get most, and usually all, of your historical data into the new, replacement product.

If you receive notification that one or more of your products is about to “sunset,” it is important to contact us to learn about your options for moving your data forward and making sure you maintain and secure your important financial information.