This month we are celebrating our client Tuminds 16 years in business, delivering bespoke digital training to top teams worldwide.
When founders Rene and Pamela Looper emigrated from Holland to the UK in 1999, they renovated a beautiful old building into their first venture, Cluny Bank Hotel. Creating a strong online presence and booking system for the hotel, which wasn’t common at the time, led to the hotel’s success. Rene and Pamela realised that there were many top-quality hotels, but their lack of online presence didn’t reflect this and they weren’t visible to customers, which is how Rene and Pamela decided to start Tuminds, helping businesses with online training.
We caught up with Rene to see how things had changed in the industry over the years and the biggest takeaways from his business journey so far.
Early on, you discovered the potential of digital marketing and now teach others its benefits, but how did you realise this yourself?
All of it was self-taught; doing stuff, investing in things, and if it works, great, and if it doesn’t ditch it.
We had put all of our money into the hotel and had none left to put into marketing campaigns, so we used the internet and online bookings from day one to make it easy for people to buy from us without any hurdles.
Online booking wasn’t as standard as it is now and people were wary of it but we took advantage of all the tools available: websites, email marketing, social media, and databases. All of it was self-taught; doing stuff, investing in things, and if it works, great, and if it doesn’t ditch it. Online tools allow you to free up time to develop the business, spend time with clients, and streamline your work processes much better.
It is a steep learning curve, like a rollercoaster, and some things work other things don’t work, but you learn from them.
Did it feel like a risky leap selling your hotel to move into digital at the time?
In 2006 when we sold the hotel - we weren't 100% sure which route our consultancy would go. For the first couple of years, I did lots of digital training workshops for Visit Scotland because I had that hotel experience. When social media came about from the US, we also started sharing its advantages: You don’t have to contact a web designer to change things or upload photos, you can do it yourself. So, it was risky but it was a calculated risk.
We knew that advising tourism businesses on the power of word-of-mouth marketing on social media would snowball their businesses and be very effective.
What has been your biggest business success?
Sticking with it.
You have to believe in your product and be open to other opportunities that come your way.
In the beginning, it wasn’t on people's minds to do Facebook or Twitter, people thought it was a waste of time, but we stuck with it because I really felt this is a good opportunity for businesses to be more communicative with their potential customers, and a cheaper way to be visible to their target audience.
You can educate people on it but if they don't adopt it, it’s no use, so there were times I thought we need to do something else, but we stuck with it because I knew it was something that was growing so quickly and wasn’t going away.
You have to believe in your product and be open to other opportunities that come your way. Running a business is not straightforward, it goes this way then that way.
How did COVID-19 affect your business?
Covid had a very negative impact on many levels, but the silver lining is it opened up opportunities for businesses; Scotland is no longer our market, but the world is our market if you use the tools to make yourself visible. Businesses that had never considered online before such as a local bakery that now offers online orders and deliveries, or one woman who now teaches sheepdog training online, are thinking why did we never do this before?
We now speak to businesses in Canada, the US, New Zealand, because we had to open up online webinars instead of just face to face. If i had used this opportunity to deliver online training before covid, that would have been better.
We always said to businesses, to pay attention to their online presense, but some businesses felt there wasn’t a need for it for their business type. Then covid came and all of a sudden people couldn’t open up their shops or galleries, and realised people couldn’t order online from them, so many businesses started online if they weren’t already.
How has CRC helped your business?
CRC helps us to think more strategically about the business.
They don’t just deliver the financial services/accounting, but Calvin is a business mentor as well for me. What the CRC team have done, is not just look at the bottom line figures, the profits etc. but look ahead, look at the things that can be improved on, and have a discussion on a strategic level.
When running a business it’s easy to get caught up in day-to-day tasks and you forget to plan ahead. The team has helped me look ahead at ‘what are your objectives for the next 3 months, 6 months, year?’ setting some goals, and if targets are not being met - why not? If you don’t do that, you’re probably going to do the same thing next year that you did this year because you haven’t put goals into place, and that's what I really value about you guys and is really added value for an accountant.
Running a business is often lonely. Yes, you have a team of people, but discussing strategic and financial things - which you don’t often share with your team - with a team like CRC, business mentors who also works with other businesses, is very valuable.
What’s one key piece of advice you live by?
Believing in yourself and networking.
To build a business up over the years you need to go out there and talk to people, join membership groups, and business clubs where you meet like-minded people. Not in a salsey way, but a networking way. I remember going to networking events 5 years ago and people still reach out to me on LinkedIn from them now.
Talk to people that can help you grow the business.
You need to keep improving, keep networking, and then you start to grow. You never know when you're speaking to someone and in the future, they might reach out.
That’s actually how I got in touch with Calvin, I met him at a networking event and was very impressed. I didn’t need him at that point but 3 years later I remembered ‘that guy in Orkney; he’s nice, he’s young, he’s energetic, he’s forward-thinking, why not use him as an accountant?’
It really shows you how these things work!
