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My life is spent exploring innovative marketing ideas and real-life business stories from around the globe, then translating them into advice, strategies and tips for small and big biz owners. Read on for my blogs on how the everyday – travelling, adventures, new horizons – relates to contemporary business.

I’m obsessed! You should be too. Here’s why.

I’m obsessed! You should be too. Here’s why.

Whitney Wolfe Herd turned Bumble into a multi-billion-dollar company by being obsessed with transforming the way people date. Melanie Perkins revolutionized graphic design by launching Canva. These aren’t just stories of entrepreneurial success....

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How a great customer experience drives business growth

How a great customer experience drives business growth

Coming into spring, I needed to reset and replenish my creative batteries. But I also had a mission to complete: to research whether a great customer experience still drives business growth at a time when digital tools are transforming the...

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The one unusual business metric I’m watching carefully

The one unusual business metric I’m watching carefully

Having just clocked up another birthday, there’s one unusual business metric I’m increasingly watching very carefully—sleep. If you’ve ever experienced disrupted sleep (hello, parents) and the chaos it can cause in how you feel emotionally,...

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Bad online review? Here’s what to do

Bad online review? Here’s what to do

Most of us have been there. Checking our business’ Google or Facebook reviews when we find an absolute stinker that talks about bad service, a terrible experience, a poor quality product, huge disappointment. Yeah, it’s gutting. Very hard to read...

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One business trip, seven travel tips

One business trip, seven travel tips

Anyone who travels a bit knows how much it teaches you, from strategies about upgrades and how to handle jet lag and where to eat. One of my longstanding top tips is to put away your phone, forget Google maps and walk two blocks back from the main...

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Common mistakes business owners make when seeking PR

Common mistakes business owners make when seeking PR

There are four common mistakes business owners make when seeking PR, according to Candice Gersun, the director and co-founder of Sydney business Reconnect PR. She should know. Candice has over two decades of PR experience. With the mission of...

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How to fix the one thing all small biz struggles with

How to fix the one thing all small biz struggles with

Along with walking uphill for hours with a backpack, what I’m obsessed with is market research. In life and work, I’m data informed. I do deep dive research on new cars, holiday destinations, skincare, movie choices, you name it. I have a business...

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How to get ahead now for next year

How to get ahead now for next year

Not sure where you’re at, but it seems about six weeks ago that it was New Year’s Eve and 2023 was all shiny and fresh. Now we’ve seen off winter, there are mince pies on supermarket shelves - I know - and people are locking in summer holiday...

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My best 2024 business advice? Take a hike!

My best 2024 business advice? Take a hike!

The best business advice I have for anyone wanting to get clear on goals and how to action them? Take a hike. Hiking has become my go-to when I need to plan. There’s something about being outside, disconnected, isolated that triggers creativity....

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IT’S CONFESSION TIME

IT’S CONFESSION TIME

Confession time: one of my driving life and work goals is to communicate clearly. Saying what I mean is important (as is meaning what I say.) Honesty and clarity have gotten me far, even when I’ve known that sometimes my feedback and thoughts are...

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Why taking play seriously is a great business decision

Why taking play seriously is a great business decision

Last year I did something which seemed so whacky at the time as to be almost happening to someone else. It brought together my fears, anxieties, my need to research and prepare heavily, some shopping for weird stuff, self-doubt, travel and...

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Why being a Super Consumer is as powerful as it sounds

Why being a Super Consumer is as powerful as it sounds

July brings not just a new financial year for me but a new trip around the sun. I’m turning 52 and among my gifts in 2023 is the knowledge I’m firmly part of the global force that marketers and media have dubbed the ‘Super Consumer’.  Yep, far from...

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How research into Boomer sex changed everything for one

How research into Boomer sex changed everything for one

Becoming single for the first time in 23 years triggered a life makeover for me in 2021. I moved house, swapped out my signature ‘50s floral dresses for tailoring and pantsuits, tried to overcome my aversion to cooking (cheese boards are putty in...

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why customer experience is your best biz weapon

why customer experience is your best biz weapon

By our second lap around The Tan walking track in Melbourne, a girlfriend and I had covered off relationships, kids and health and were on to our favourite shared topic—travel. I’m off to Europe soon and my friend mentioned her dad is too, flying...

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How and why to choose a Business Wingwoman

How and why to choose a Business Wingwoman

My career has seen me do a ton of stuff I’ve loved. Running my own businesses, writing books, speaking on global stages, leading $140 million business. But my latest obsession—I really want to call it that—is being a Business Wingwoman. It’s not...

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What planning travel made me realise about business

What planning travel made me realise about business

During our marriage, my ex-husband always took charge of the travel plans (and hosting our dinner parties. The man was a natural.) I just had to rock up with my passport and bag. Now that I’m single, the travel plans are my remit and I’m planning...

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How to beat the hidden cost of business at its own game

How to beat the hidden cost of business at its own game

At my age and level of experience—so far my fifties have been about being bashed up by life and having a really interesting time discovering resilience and gin—I know it’s normal to feel down sometimes. Poor mental health is part of normal mental...

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How to do the Three Capes hike and still be laughinG

How to do the Three Capes hike and still be laughinG

  After I did the Larapinta hike earlier in 2022, everyone wanted to know the blow by blow of how each day panned out. Seems like so many people are abandoning classic ‘luxury’ holidays in private villas for the adventure of travelling the...

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The unlikely thing you should be doing noW

The unlikely thing you should be doing noW

When my kids were small, I loved my life. Loved being a hands-on mum. Loved creating and running successful businesses amid the school drop offs and the organised chaos. Loved building a family, with all its traditions and tedium and small...

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BRANDS, WHERE THE BLOODY HELL ARE YA?

BRANDS, WHERE THE BLOODY HELL ARE YA?

Noosa, you were fantastic. Weather that saw me up at 6am and in the ocean just after the first beach coffee of the day. Fun outdoor dining with fresh seafood and cocktails that made me feel 20 again. It felt like not just summer but other cool life...

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The good news insurance company you should know abouT

The good news insurance company you should know abouT

I have a friend whose husband works in insurance. He’s an expert, the guy you want to call before you take out holiday insurance or decide on a home and contents policy. It’s just that most people don’t know about his day job—insurance gets such a...

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WHAT THE OUTBACK TAUGHT ME ABOUT BUSINESS

WHAT THE OUTBACK TAUGHT ME ABOUT BUSINESS

(Picture credit: Tegan Paisley) Before I walked the Larapinta Trail I thought a lot about what hiking for six days on a route classified for hard core experts would give an inexperienced and not particularly fit suburban mum. Blisters, sure. Tears,...

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Why customer experience costs nothing but is priceless

Why customer experience costs nothing but is priceless

The morning after we arrived back in Alice Springs after finishing the Larapinta Trail walk in May, I headed straight into town and into Outbush in the Todd Mall. Opened in 1986, the locally owned business stocks everything you need and then some...

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My Top 10 Trek TipS from LARAPINTA

My Top 10 Trek TipS from LARAPINTA

Since it opened in 2002, the Larapinta Trail in Central Australia has morphed from a favourite local walk to a world famous trek with up to 5000 walkers each year. Now that I’m one of them, I’m being asked a lot if I would recommend it...

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Day by day—how the Larapinta Trail unfolds

Day by day—how the Larapinta Trail unfolds

The growing popularity of the Larapinta Trail lulls people into a sense of false security—gee, if Felicity from publicity is doing it, it can’t be that hard. Trust me, capturing global attention doesn’t mean the trail is getting any easier! The...

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Elvie shows us how to stand out from the crowd

Being different in life takes courage. From wearing something that takes confidence (anyone back into mini-skirts yet this winter? Terrifying but fun) to saying publicly that you support a certain viewpoint to deciding you’d rather go to Adelaide...

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Ash Barty, my bush hike and you: the common thread

My first thought when Ash Barty suddenly retired wasn’t—as seemed to be the burning question—what’s next for this rockstar 25 year old. It was ‘huzzah, there is a serious professional who understands it’s all in the planning’. The world No 1’s...

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The lie you’re telling yourself

Even though I was in my early thirties when I first fell pregnant—hardly a teenager—I had mixed emotions. I was ecstatic at the idea of being a mum, but I remember also thinking, ‘I am not ready for this’. I had a house, security, a job, savings,...

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Why I really agreed to hike for a week in the DESERT

I’m not a runner. Yet this week I found myself at a local oval at 5.30am, puffing through laps with a running club. That same night I hit with some girlfriends and a coach at the tennis club. Now? I’m sore, I’m tired—and I’m excited. My new fitness...

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