The Australian Small Business Show

Hosted by Kristy-Lee Billett

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124

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Oct 2026

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About the show

The Australian Small Business Show has been created by small business owners, for small business owners. Your hosts Matt Heighway and Kristy-Lee Billett, who have both been running businesses for over 15 years, will bring our first hand experiences to offer insights, advice and inspiration to help you build a successful small business. Each week we’ll discuss one specific strategy, topic, resource or tip that’s relevant for every small business, and we’ll be inviting along some amazing guests and friends in business to share their expertise with you. Whether you're starting out, scaling up or a seasoned small business owner, this Australian Small Business Show is the show for you.

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November 7, 202620 min

Why Is It So Hard to Run a Small Business Right Now?

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Running a small business in Australia is harder right now than it has been in decades, and this episode explains why, so you know it isn’t just you. Hello and welcome to this week’s episode of The Australian Small Business Show. This week we’re talking about why it is so hard to run a small business in this country right now. When we recorded, the latest inflation figures had just come out and another interest rate rise looked likely. Small business is not a side note in the Australian economy. There are 2.7 million of us actively trading. We make up 90% of all businesses, employ more than 5 million people and contribute close to a third of GDP. (While researching, we also found there are around 15 different definitions of what a small business actually is.) Even so, it feels like small business is being ignored. The numbers on the other side tell the story. 14,000 companies entered insolvency in the 2026 financial year, and that doesn’t count the sole traders and family businesses that quietly closed their doors. Personal insolvencies are rising too, and many are business-related. That shows how business pressure eventually lands at home, especially for directors once PAYG instalments and super catch up with them. Research from MYOB and Xero found 65% of small businesses are worried about cash flow and 69% are worried about attracting new customers. COSBOA found 80% of owners are experiencing stress and anxiety, and in regional areas 77% report high levels of it. We talk about how worry stops people spending, which then hits other businesses. We also talk about how tight cash flow pushes owners into short-term decisions, like aggressive pricing, that hurt them later. The biggest point we want you to take away is that this isn’t about any one thing. It’s layered. Over the past three to four years there has been constant change to the Fair Work Act and the awards system. Employment costs are higher and it’s harder to engage contractors. Payday Super has arrived, which we actually support on its own merits. The credit card surcharge changes have been pushed back to 1 July 2027, but businesses still have to absorb the cost in the meantime. On top of that come the budget changes affecting trusts and negative gearing, and the new limits on borrowing inside self-managed super funds. Very little sits on the other side of the ledger. Even the $20,000 instant asset write-off is of limited use when nobody has spare cash to spend. This isn’t a doom and gloom episode. It’s us saying we get it, we feel it too, and you don’t have to carry it alone. We also share a family story about a grandfather who ran his own manufacturing business and spoke out against offshoring, and why it feels like history repeating. Next week we flip it around with five ways you can help your small business in this environment. Have you been asking yourself why everything in your business suddenly feels so much harder? This episode shows it’s the combined weight of many changes landing at once, and that thousands of other business owners are feeling exactly the same. Key Takeaways: Small business is a major part of the economy: 2.7 million businesses, 90% of all businesses, more than 5 million employees and close to a third of GDP. The pressure comes from many changes stacking up at once (IR reform, tax and super changes, inflation, interest rates), not from one single policy. Business stress doesn’t stay in the business. It flows into your personal finances, your director obligations and your home life. Tight cash flow can push you into short-term decisions, like aggressive discounting, that create bigger problems down the track. The credit card surcharge changes take effect from 1 July 2027, so it’s worth planning for them now rather than leaving it until next June. If you’re struggling, you’re far from alone. Around 80% of small business owners are reporting stress and anxiety. We want to hear from you: If you’re finding it tough right now, reach out to us on socials, even if you just want to vent. And if you’ve found a silver lining, please share that with us too. Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.

October 31, 202621 min

The Legal Shortcuts Small Businesses Make and What It's Really Costing Them with Tracey Mylecharane

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Templates, a quick Google search and AI all look like a cheaper way to sort out your contracts, and this episode is about what those shortcuts actually cost you, which is usually far more than doing it properly. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. In this episode we are joined by special guest Tracey Mylecharane from TM Legal Atelier to discuss the legal shortcuts business owners are making, and what it’s costing them. Tracey spent the early part of her career in litigation, watching businesses, livelihoods and even marriages fall apart over disputes that the right documents and advice could have prevented. These days her focus is keeping business owners from ever becoming someone's litigation client. The most common shortcut she sees is the template, including the ones marketed as lawyer-drafted. A template is written for everyone, so it fits no one. The gaps usually show up around scope: unclear inclusions and exclusions, no process for handling variations, and a business owner quietly working for free as scope creep eats their profit. Trimming a template to suit yourself carries its own risk, because clauses link to each other, and removing one you think you don't need (confidentiality and intellectual property are common examples) can weaken the rest. Bringing a tweaked template to a lawyer for review almost always costs more than starting from scratch. Borrowing a contract from a successful friend has the same problem, since you have no idea how many times it's been copied, errors and all, before it reached you. The second and third shortcuts are piecing documents together from Google, and using AI. Tracey uses AI for brainstorming, but it isn't built to draft enforceable Australian contracts or give legal advice. It makes things up, it aims to please the person typing, and it never hears from the other party to the agreement. We've seen it confidently cite the wrong privacy legislation and insist it was right, and Tracey shares how lawyers are now facing disciplinary proceedings for submitting AI-generated case law that didn't exist. We're also seeing tax businesses built around AI-generated advice, which raises the same questions. The part we think gets overlooked is that your contracts are a client touchpoint. A generic, cold or obviously AI-written document tells a prospect you don't understand your own terms, don't care, or aren't as professional as you seem. That doubt can cost you the work before the document ever has to protect you. Tracey's view is that your contracts should look and sound like your business, and you should understand them well enough to be proud of them. Tracey Mylecharane is a small business lawyer and the principal of TM Legal Atelier. After starting her career as a litigation lawyer, she now works purely with small businesses, mostly service-based, drafting contracts that set them up for success and keep them out of disputes. She's always happy to answer questions from business owners who want more confidence in the decisions they're making. Connect with Tracey Mylecharane: Website: https://tmlegalatelier.com.au Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tmlegalatelier/ Have you been asking yourself whether the contract you're using is actually doing its job? This episode helps you see what a shortcut document could be costing you, both in protection and in the work you're not winning. Key Takeaways: Why "lawyer-drafted" templates still leave gaps, especially around scope creep, inclusions, exclusions and variations Why cutting clauses you think don't apply can undermine the rest of your contract Why having a lawyer fix a reworked template usually costs more than starting fresh What AI is genuinely useful for (brainstorming, clarifying questions for your lawyer) and why it shouldn't draft your contracts How your legal documents shape a prospect's trust in you, and how a generic one can lose you the job Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.

October 24, 202613 min

Surviving Q4 in Your Small Business

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. We're well into the final quarter of the calendar year, and after one of the toughest years we've seen for small business in a long time, plenty of owners are running on empty. In this episode we talk about how to get through Q4 without dragging yourself to the finish line. For tradies, retail and hospitality, this is often the busiest stretch of the year. For others it's a quiet period, a time to ride things out or a chance to get ahead. Neither is wrong, but they call for very different priorities. If it's your busy season, the focus is delivery. Get as much work done and invoiced as you can, keep your rosters tight, know your penalty rates so you don't get caught out, and chase your debtors before the break so clients aren't left waiting and you're not left short. If it's your quiet season, Q4 becomes project time: reviewing your website and content, sorting out your marketing, and getting next year's plan done before Christmas rather than losing January to it. Either way, we suggest picking three priorities for the quarter and letting the rest go. We also talk through the realities of a Christmas close-down. There are notice requirements for staff, and some awards limit your ability to close if employees want to keep working. Payroll, super and lodgement deadlines don't stop because you're on a break, so check with your accountant about what's due and have someone on call for anything urgent. Then there's cash flow. Two weeks closed, two weeks of catching up, then waiting to be paid means the real pinch often doesn't land until February or March, unless you plan for it. Finally, we look at why January is resignation season. People take stock over the holidays, and if their last couple of months with you were rough, they'll be thinking about a move. Q4 is the time to put real effort into looking after your team, thanking them, and communicating clearly with employees, customers and suppliers about what's happening over the break. Have you been asking yourself what you should actually be focusing on before the year wraps up? This episode helps you work out what kind of Q4 your business is having, so you can set the right priorities and finish the year on your terms. Key Takeaways: Work out whether Q4 is your busy or quiet season, then plan around that rather than a generic year-end checklist. Choose three priorities for the quarter so you're not pulled in every direction. Plan for the cash flow lag of a Christmas close-down, which can hit in February or March, not January. Check your award obligations and notice requirements before announcing a close-down. Put effort into staff engagement and recognition now to reduce the risk of January resignations. Tell customers, suppliers and staff early what will look different over the break. We want to hear from you: How are you approaching Q4 this year? What's different from previous years, what's stressing you out, and what are you looking forward to as things wind down? Let us know on our socials. Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.

October 17, 202616 min

How to Master the Mental Game of Being the Boss of Your Small Business

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. Nobody hands you a playbook for being the boss, and this episode is about owning that role, and the mental load that comes with it, on your own terms. Most of us go from being told what to do to being responsible for everything almost overnight, usually without any leadership or management experience in between. Every decision, every supplier negotiation and all of the risk now sits with you. And this isn't only about leading a team. Solo operators often carry even more decisions, and those decisions can weigh more heavily when they're tied directly to paying the mortgage or the rent. The rewards aren't guaranteed either, especially in the early years or in the tougher seasons every business goes through, no matter how experienced you are. We share how we each handle it. Getting support is a big one, from networks of other business owners to specialists who know more than we do. So is grit: being able to keep going and try again when things aren't going well, with the attitude that most problems have a solution. We also talk about making decisions quickly rather than sitting on them, remembering that the decision you make today isn't a forever decision, and moving away from measuring your success by how busy you are. As the boss, results matter more than activity, and being less busy through better systems is a goal worth chasing. (We also explain why decision fatigue makes choosing what's for dinner so hard at the end of the day.) If you have a team, there's the added pressure of setting the tone and culture, even on the days you're not in the mood for it. If you don't set a clear vision, someone else will, or five people will take your business in five different directions. We finish with what mastering the mental game actually looks like: owning the role rather than running the business by committee, being yourself as a boss instead of trying to become a different personality, putting the right structure in place, and surrounding yourself with the right people. That means your team, but also advisors, mentors, networks and suppliers who will tell you honestly when something isn't landing. Not everything will go perfectly, and a bad decision or a bad day doesn't mean your business is failing. We also share details of the PowerBoss Experience, 30 days of live small group mentoring that works through three foundations: understanding your own boss style, designing the right team structure for your business, and getting the right people in the right roles. Find out more at https://www.peoplepoweredbusiness.com.au/experience Have you been asking yourself why being the boss feels so much heavier than you expected? This episode is a reminder that nobody starts out knowing how to do it, and that owning the role, in your own way, is something you can learn. Key Takeaways: Why the jump from employee to owner leaves most of us without a playbook for decisions, risk and responsibility How to make decisions faster, knowing you can change course if one doesn't work out Why results, not busyness, are the right measure of your day as the boss Why setting a clear vision matters, and what happens in your team when you don't How to own the role of boss without changing who you are Why the right people around you include advisors, mentors and networks who will be honest with you, not just tell you you're doing great Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.

October 10, 202618 min

What Happens When You Swap an Online Business for a Bricks-and-Mortar Shop? With Special Guest Kate Toon.

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. This week we are welcoming Kate Toon back to the show. After 15 years running a successful digital marketing education business from a hut in her back garden, Kate recently purchased Umina Beach Book Nook, a 20-year-old independent bookshop on the NSW Central Coast. The previous owner was ready to close the doors, Kate's accountant and financial advisor both told her it was a terrible idea, and she bought it anyway. She's refreshingly honest that she knew nothing about retail, leases, stock or the software going in. The results so far are a mixed bag, and Kate doesn't sugar-coat any of it. Revenue lifted 42% in the first year and the shop was tracking at around 8% net profit, which is solid for retail, before a forced relocation and renovation swallowed those gains. She ran a crowdfunding campaign to fund the move, raised around $10,000, and copped criticism for it. We talk about why sharing the hard stuff openly on social media built a community that rallied around the shop, and why so many people who never like or comment are still quietly watching. We also dig into why customers are walking past cheaper, faster options to buy locally. Kate's view is that the shop survives on community rather than books: story time, book clubs, cheese and wine nights, and a space that adds something to the town. She makes a strong case that the only real edge a small business has over big brands is that there's an actual person behind it, so be as quirky and real as you can rather than settling for mass-produced "quirk". And if you're thinking about buying a retail business, Kate's advice is to go in with your eyes open. Selling might take up 20 to 30% of your time. The rest is marketing, community building, events, partnerships and coming up with the next idea. Kate Toon is an award-winning business mentor, digital marketing coach and author of several books. British-born, she moved to Australia at 24 and has worked in advertising and digital marketing ever since, building a successful online courses and membership business before buying Umina Beach Book Nook. Connect with Kate Toon: Visit Umina Beach Book Nook on West Street, Umina Beach, a short trip from Woy Woy Station. Have you been asking yourself whether your small business can really compete with bigger, cheaper, faster competitors? This episode is a reminder that people still want to deal with a real person, and that being honest, human and a little bit different is an advantage big brands can't copy. Key Takeaways: Get advice before you buy a business, and expect to keep learning on the job even when you've done your homework. Sharing your challenges openly can build a loyal community, and for every person who comments, many more are watching. Customers will pay more and wait longer to support a local business that adds something to their community. Your edge over big brands is that you're a real person, so lean into what makes you different. In retail, selling is a small part of the job; most of your time goes into marketing, events and community. As AI-generated content grows, there's a real opportunity in offering the human connection people are craving. If you're on the Central Coast, pop into Umina Beach Book Nook and follow Kate and the bookshop on socials to show your support. https://uminabeachbooknook.com.au/ https://www.facebook.com/UminaBeachBookNook https://www.instagram.com/uminabeachbooknook/ Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.

October 3, 202616 min

3 Reasons You Are Stuck as the Bottleneck with Your Team

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. If your team brings you every problem, every decision and every disagreement, the standard advice is that you need to delegate better. In this episode we argue that delegation usually isn't the real problem, and that delegating more can leave you doing even more hand-holding. We compare it to a trapeze: you hold a team member's hand to swing them to the next platform, then you have to catch them again for the one after that. We unpack the three underlying reasons business owners end up as the bottleneck. The first is not understanding how you naturally operate as a leader. We walk through four boss styles: the Driver (direct, wants people to get on with it), the Cheerleader (makes work fun and inspires the team), the Peacekeeper (avoids conflict and wants everything calm) and the Perfectionist (loves data, analysis and detail). Every style has blind spots. A Driver, for example, will often hand over a task and then swoop in and fix it because that's quicker, which only teaches the team to wait to be rescued. The second reason is structure. Most small business teams get Frankensteined together, adding a person here and another there to solve whatever problem is in front of you. What works with two people falls over at ten, and the org chart ends up looking like a spider's web with reporting lines crossing everywhere. When nobody is clear on who makes which decisions, everything lands back on your desk. We also talk about how good intentions, like giving people extra responsibility so they feel valued, can create double and triple reporting lines that confuse everyone. The third reason is the people themselves: lovely people hired for roles that no longer exist, the wrong personality for the job (a big-picture Cheerleader as your bookkeeper, for instance), or gaps where nobody on the team has the skills you need. We finish with the order to fix it in: get to know yourself as a leader and put practical hacks in place, build the structure your business needs right now, then find the right people to fill it. Have you been asking yourself, why does every problem still end up on my desk, no matter how much I delegate? This episode shows you where to look instead. Key Takeaways: Why delegating more won't help if the team is still relying on you for every answer How the four boss styles (Driver, Cheerleader, Peacekeeper, Perfectionist) shape the habits you create in your team Why a Frankensteined structure with unclear reporting lines sends every decision back to you How to match people to roles based on what the role actually needs, not just who you like The order to fix it in: yourself first, then structure, then the team Why taking the slower route and coaching your team to bring you solutions is a gift to your future self Free webinar: Want to go deeper on this? Join a free one-hour webinar on 13 October that walks through all three reasons in detail and helps you work out which one is affecting you most right now. Register at https://www.peoplepoweredbusiness.com.au/delegation Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.

September 26, 202618 min

How We Are Using AI in Our Small Businesses (and you can too)

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. Last week, Loren Bartley showed us how she uses Claude Skills as her marketing team. For some listeners that was a big leap. So this week we've stepped it back and shared the everyday ways we're using AI in our own businesses, so you can borrow what works for you. We start with the one habit we'd recommend before anything else: keep your own source of truth. The tools change constantly, and custom GPTs are being retired as we speak. So every set of instructions we give an AI lives in a Word document, Google Doc or spreadsheet that we own. When the next tool comes along, we hand those instructions over rather than starting from scratch. From there we get practical. AI is now our starting point for building lead generation tools. Quizzes and calculators that once took a week or two to build, or cost over a thousand dollars a year in software, now take a morning. We use it to read our weekly Google Analytics and Search Console reports. It tells us which old blog posts are quietly pulling readers every week, shows when tools like ChatGPT have found us, and gives us a short list of actions. We've rebuilt one of our websites page by page so AI search can find it more easily, and learned a lot about the technical side along the way. We're also turning static membership templates, like a guide to difficult conversations, into tools that build a full script in the user's own style. Just as important is what we're not handing over. We don't use AI to give client advice. We've seen it make things up, and if you didn't build the advice yourself, you can't deliver it well. We're also not using it to write our thought leadership, including our weekly newsletter, because it still doesn't sound like us. We finish with a few extras. We talk to AI by voice rather than typing, including a weekly planning conversation on a Sunday walk, and the outputs are noticeably better. We also share some personal uses: fixing a struggling hibiscus, a 12-week fitness plan, and tracking the value of rookie footballers' collectible cards. Have you been asking yourself where AI should actually fit in your business, and what you should keep for yourself? This episode gives you a practical starting list, plus a simple way to protect your work as the tools keep changing. Key Takeaways: Store all your AI instructions in a document you own, so you can move them to a new tool without losing your work when platforms change. Use AI as your first stop for building lead generation tools like quizzes. Ask it to talk you through your options before you pay for software. Feed your weekly analytics reports into AI to find out which content is working, whether AI search is finding you, and where to focus next. Turn static templates into guided tools that do the implementation for your clients or members, not just the instructions. Keep advice and thought leadership in your own hands, because you can't deliver advice well if you didn't create it. Try speaking to AI instead of typing, since conversational voice notes often produce better quality outputs. Tell us how you're using AI We'd love to hear how you're using AI, in your business or at home. Come and share your tips with us on Facebook, Instagram or TikTok. Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.

September 19, 202625 min

Building Claude Skills to be Your Marketing Team with Loren Bartley

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. This week we're joined by Loren Bartley, founder of Impactiv8, who helps service-based businesses build more profitable marketing systems in partnership with AI. Loren runs the AI Mega Success Academy and AI Mega classes, along with speaking, team training and coaching, and she's built out an AI "marketing team" of around 150 Claude skills that now do the work she used to need a much bigger human team for. We get into what a skill actually is, and why it's a completely different thing to a prompt: a skill is a saved, self-contained set of instructions for one specific job, built with your standards, your examples and your edge cases already baked in, so you're not explaining yourself from scratch every time you need something done. We also talk about why narrow, specific skills beat one giant "do everything" skill every time. Cramming every instruction into a single skill means it has more to read, more decisions to make, and a much higher chance of missing something or getting it wrong, not to mention the extra cost of all those unnecessary tokens. A skill that does one small job well, and does it brilliantly, is worth more than one skill trying to do it all. For anyone starting from scratch, Loren's advice is clear: build your brand voice skill first, because that's what stops your content sounding like generic AI output. From there, look at the repetitive, mundane tasks eating your time, and build skills for the things you already know how to do well before you try to hand over tasks outside your own expertise. She also recommends pacing yourself, building and actually using one skill at a time rather than ten at once, because each new skill needs feedback and refinement, much like training a new team member. We finish with the practical how-to: turning a chat you were genuinely happy with into a reusable skill, using Claude's record feature to walk it through a process step by step, or asking it to research frameworks for something outside your expertise and turning that into a skill. Loren also explains "coordinator" skills, where one skill knows which of your other skills to call on for each part of a job, and how Claude Projects let the same skills work across multiple businesses or clients, because the business-specific knowledge lives in the project, not baked into every individual skill. Have you been asking yourself how you're supposed to keep AI output sounding like you without rewriting the same instructions every time? This episode is our answer. Key Takeaways: Understand what actually makes a Claude skill different from a prompt, and why that difference is what saves you real time Know which skill to build first (brand voice) and why it lifts the quality of everything that follows Learn how to spot the repetitive, mundane tasks in your business that are worth turning into a skill Build skills for what you already know before trying to build skills for work outside your expertise Understand coordinator skills, and how a "team" of skills can work together to complete one job See how Claude Projects let you reuse the same skills across different businesses or clients without rebuilding them Loren Bartley Loren Bartley is the founder of Impactiv8, where she helps service-based businesses build more profitable marketing systems in partnership with AI. She runs the AI Mega Success Academy and AI Mega classes, and offers speaking, team training and one-on-one and small group coaching, with a particular focus on helping business owners build their own AI-powered marketing teams using Claude skills. Connect with Loren Bartley: Website: https://www.aimegasuccess.com/ Claude skills resource: https://www.aimegasuccess.com/claudeskills Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.

September 12, 202616 min

Marketing in the AI Era: What's Actually Changed for Small Business Owners.

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. We sat down this week to talk about something that's been frustrating Matt for months: marketing that used to work just doesn't anymore. The core concepts of sales and marketing haven't changed, but everything around them has sped up, and the touchpoints that used to build a relationship with a customer now have to happen faster and smarter than they did even a year ago. The biggest shift we're seeing is where people go to find answers. It's no longer just Google, it's AI tools, and even when people are on Google, it's often Google's AI doing the summarising. That means the old SEO playbook of giving away just enough to get someone to click through doesn't work anymore. Your content has to actually answer the question, properly, or AI skips straight past it. Matt's been rebuilding his own website with this in mind, researching what's landing in those AI-generated answer boxes and making sure his content earns a spot there too. But being found by AI is only half the job. Once someone does land on your website or your socials, they're still checking whether they like you, whether they trust you, whether you're their vibe. That hasn't changed, and if anything it matters more, because trust has taken a hit across the board now that so much content is AI-generated. Kristy-Lee's approach has been to let AI analyse her own analytics and tell her what's resonating, without letting AI write the content itself, because the trust piece has to stay genuinely hers. We also talked about where to actually spend your energy. Referrals, recommendations, testimonials and Google reviews matter more than ever. Your email list is one of the only things you truly own. And rather than trying to be everywhere, it might be smarter to pick two or three platforms and do them properly instead of spreading yourself across five. We'd love to hear what you're noticing in your own marketing right now, what's working, what you've quietly stopped doing because it wasn't earning its keep anymore. Come find us on Facebook, Instagram or TikTok and tell us. Key Takeaways: Why the fundamentals of sales and marketing haven't changed, but the speed and format of every touchpoint has Why website and blog content now needs to directly answer questions to be picked up by AI search tools, not just rank in Google Why trust matters more than ever, and why that's a reason to be cautious about outsourcing your content creation to AI Why analytics are worth paying closer attention to right now, and how AI can help you interpret them without writing your content for you Why referrals, testimonials, Google reviews and your email list deserve more of your attention than chasing every new platform Why focusing on two or three platforms you can do well may beat trying to maintain a presence everywhere Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/

September 5, 202616 min

Single Person Risk: Is Your Small Business Too Reliant on One Team Member, One Client or One Supplier?

Join the waitlist for The Australian Small Business Show Club by clicking here. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Australian Small Business Show. In this episode we unpack single person risk from three angles. On the team side, we talk about what happens when one person holds all the knowledge in your business, prompted by a recent client experience where a well-structured team was still genuinely shaken by one unexpected resignation. We discuss why documenting processes and SOPs properly, rather than letting a team member build their own undocumented system, is the single biggest thing you can do to protect your business, and how much easier that's become with AI tools that can help capture a process as you talk it through. We then move to client concentration risk, sharing our own experiences of losing a client that made up a significant share of revenue, and why we think 20% of income from any one source is a sensible ceiling to work towards. We talk honestly about how easy it is to let marketing slide once a big, comfortable client comes along, and the flow-on risk of giving one client enough power to push down your prices as well as your time. Finally we cover supplier risk, particularly relevant right now given how many businesses across industries like construction are going into liquidation. We share an example of a manufacturing client who built a genuine three-tiered supplier strategy, with backup suppliers they maintained real relationships with, not just names on a list, so they were never completely exposed to one supplier's problems. Across all three, the common thread is control. If someone else, whether that's a team member, a client or a supplier, holds the power in the relationship, your business carries real risk. Have you been asking yourself, "How reliant is my business on any one person?" This episode gives you a practical starting point for finding out, and for building in the contingencies before you're forced to. Key Takeaways: Document your processes and SOPs properly rather than letting critical knowledge live in one person's head, and use AI tools to make capturing them easier than ever Aim to keep any single client below 20% of your revenue, and keep marketing running in the background even when a big client makes it tempting to stop Build genuine backup supplier relationships before you need them, not just a name in a drawer you've never actually ordered from Watch for situations where a team member, client or supplier holds enough power to start dictating terms, whether that's pricing, timelines or decisions Assume loyalty isn't a long-term plan; build a simple contingency matrix so a resignation, a lost client or a supplier collapse doesn't mean panic stations Connect with Us: If you're an Australian Small Business Owner, we'd love to connect with you on socials. You can give our Facebook Page a like here: https://www.facebook.com/theaustraliansmallbusinessshow Or follow us on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/aussmallbizshow/ We’d love to hear from you. Subscribe to The Australian Small Business Show newsletter by visiting our website here: https://www.theaustraliansmallbusinessshow.com.au/ Disclaimer: The information shared on The Australian Small Business Show is general in nature and does not constitute professional advice, legal or otherwise. We recommend consulting with your advisors on your specific circumstances.