My Week as an #SBS Winner!

Evening folks, I hope the week is finding you all in good spirits! I have put this evening aside to update my blog as the last 10 days have been a bit like a whirlwind for me. My last blog update was written sat in Costa Coffee at Nottingham Trent Uni whilst I waited for my daughter to finish her interview for a Uni place this year studying Film and TV Set Design. It was very handy as I managed to write my blog, source new stock and buy some too! (We are yet to hear how the interview went ...willow branches are all crossed here)
That very day I was lucky enough to be #Purplebiz of the day on Twitter which is run by http://thepurpledog.net/ For those of you unaware of what this means, its a daily Twitter occurance. Purpledognet (@PurpledogNet) choose a different business everyday to promote on Twitter, it brings the chosen business lots of new followers, which in turn of course brings potential customers and leads. It really is a fab way of reaching a far bigger audience than many of us small businesses could possibly do on our own. All PurpledogNet ask, is that you in turn support other #purplebiz of the day winners and ReTweet.
So there I was, my phone pinging away with new followers, orders and enquiries in Costa, writing my blog..how fab is this? I was thinking. I managed to gain over 50 new followers by my #purplebiz win so I would thoroughly recommend to other Twitter users.
My week continued as normal, lots of behind the scenes stuff going on with sourcing new stock and finalising the orders from the fab British Businesses I mentioned in my last post. On the Saturday of that week my wonderful Hubby from here on in known as WH (Wonder Hubby! or Willow Hubby?)told me I was NOT working at all ALL DAY and off we went to London for the day..We had a fab day just walking round, doing the real touristy thing which when you live not far from London you never seem to do (or is it just us that never does it?) Our daughter's boyfriend had given us a voucher for Loch Fyne Restaurants for Christmas so dinner in Covent Garden Loch Fyne was on the cards and even better when its paid for!! I hadn't realised quite how much I needed a day to chill and stop obsessing about the business.
The next day was back to normal but with added vigour and a refreshed enthusiasm, and as usual on a Sunday I started thinking about what my Tweet to Theo Paphitis (the name behind Ryman's and one of the infamous Dragons from BBC's Dragons Den) Every Sunday, he runs a Small Business Sunday competition. You tweet him @TheoPaphitis using #SBS your business with a link and then sit back and wait. 6 businesses each week are chosen and they are ReTweeted by Theo to his followers (all 214,000 of them)
At around 9.30pm that night my phone pinged and I looked, then looked again...my phone said TheoPaphitis has ReTweeted you!! I was one of the 6 chosen businesses!
Well as you can imagine, I went a little crazy (just a little you understand) and from then til around 1am my phone did not stop. In the first 24 hours I gained around 200 new followers which is amazing!
The week that followed was non stop, I had a wonderful Gold Badge designed by @AquaDesignGroup  http://www.aquadesigngroup.co.uk/ that now takes pride of place on the website http://woodandwillow.co.uk/ I had a small piece written in our local Newspaper about my win, which I only found out about when I went to the village Post Office with my orders to be greeted with "Oh here's the celeb!You were in the paper yesterday!" I had written a Press Release sent it out to local Papers and TV but heard nothing back!

Then on the Wednesday afternoon, I had a phone call from BBC Radio Northampton about my win! Asking if I would like to go on the John Griff afternoon show the next day? Yes, I said, would love to (a could hear a voice in my head saying "You would love to? Are you mad? You can't do this you are too shy and a nervous wreck most of the time" But I had said yes so that was that.
My friends and family know how shy I am and their faces when I told them what I was going to do said it all! My WH (remember him?) and children were great they kept telling me I would be fab, amazing, brilliant etc.. But I knew they were thinking "Oh Lord what on earth has she done?"
Eldest daughter drove me to the studio the following day (that in itself was enough to give me the shakes, but I thought if I am thinking about her driving I won't be thinking about the interview)
By the time we arrived I was sure there would be no way I would even be able to say Hello let alone talk for around 5/6 mins about my business and the SBS win. But to my absolute amazement, I did it! And from the feedback I have received it seems I was ok! The 5/6 mins actually lasted 12 mins and it really did just fly by. I made 1 mistake calling SEO (search engine optimisation) CEO but apart from that it was great fun!

I  also had a members blog posted on the Mumpreneur website  http://bit.ly/zQOYoL that I had submitted in December and then forgotten about!

I was also asked to write a Guest Blog for LittleEnterprise.org  http://bit.ly/yqBlfm which was also nerve racking but great fun.

So really this blog post is, I hope, for all those small British Businesses out there who are working away furiously to get up and running. I really hope my week will give you hope that things can happen when you least expect them to!

As to this week at Wood and Willow, I am working with my web designer Martin at http://www.systemwizardry.com/ to add a whole new section on British Handmade so all the fab new products handmade by these talented people are showcased properly. My Zoe Corney and Barn Studio Sign ranges are now available in time for Valentines and Mothers Day. As are the handpainted Valentines Cards by Georgia Brown. So if you are not yet organised for these occasions do please take a look.

I am also very proud to be working with Andy Driscoll, his gorgeous range of products all handmade in the UK will be available on the website by next week!

I hope next weeks blog update will be as positive as this one, I am also hoping to get a Guest Blogger to write something for me! So watch this space....

Thanks for reading, if you would like to leave a comment, I would love to hear from you.