Posts Tagged ‘strategy’

Sequence

Friday, December 17th, 2010

Sequence is critical. A cart that is in front of the horse is hard to move.

Other, more business focused mistakes include:

Putting work before personal lifestyle

Putting strategy before tactics (endemic)

Putting “just do it” before planning

Putting product before market

Putting medium before message

Putting opportunity before criteria

I’ll explain each in more detail over the coming weeks and months but for now it would probably be very good for the development of your strategic thinking if you print this out, grab yourself a drink (any variety will work fine) and try to figure out what the hell I am talking about.

Failure to get sequence right leads to a lot of people working really hard and not getting far, like the cart before the horse.

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We need more turtles

Monday, April 12th, 2010

Craig S was kind enough to comment on my last blog post (Thick Skin) and even kinder in recommending the book “Rework” which I immediately ordered (it’s written by a team of creative computer nerds whom I very, very much admire at www.37signals.com)

Craig suggested that the book was a very interesting read, even if it was somewhat opinionated.

Here’s the thing though: when it comes to the quality of your small business (or your life, for that matter), your opinion is pretty much all you’ve got. Even when you listen to others and agree or disagree with them, it’s still your opinion of what they just said.

We’re a little like turtles in that we only make progress if we are prepared to stick our neck out.

So please: be opinionated (frankly, it’s the only way the world can change).

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Adapt or die

Monday, August 17th, 2009

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.” Charles Darwin.

“It is not the biggest business that survives, nor the most well-connected. It is the one that adapts products to meet changing client needs the fastest” Tom Poland (with apologies to the good Doctor Darwin)

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Marketing Development – Part 2

Tuesday, July 21st, 2009

I had a conversation with a switched-on business accountant this morning. His partners are worried about the natural attrition of clients and the fact that they are not replacing them fast enough. He said his partners are also sitting behind their desks staring at computer screens all day.

Not surprisingly, the partners do zero Marketing Activity (e.g. gathering referrals, approaching and engaging new clients etc) each week.

The reason that the partners don’t engage in Marketing Activity is two-fold:

1. They still think of themselves as “accountants” rather than “marketers of accountancy services”

2. They have not developed a clear and compelling approach that when executed has their prospects:
a. financially salivating and being very grateful that the accountant made contact
b. eagerly requesting more information
c. wanting to know the price
d. hoping like heck that they can afford it

That’s the work of Marketing Development and once you have created a clear and compelling approach then you can re-purpose it and use it face to face, on the phone, in your brochure, on the back of your business card, in articles, editorials, advertisements, on your web site etc etc etc until you have so many clients you create a problem of supply  – which is a better quality problem than not having enough clients and sitting at your desk worrying about it.

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Thinking the tough stuff

Thursday, May 21st, 2009

We seem to be wired to “do” more than we are wired to “think”.

Nike’s adage of “Just Do It” is great if it follows “Just Think It”. But if “Just Do It” comes before “Just Think It” then all the “Just Doing It” is probably just going to have you spinning your business wheels at a faster and faster rate: working longer, working harder but staying in the same place.

The hard work is not in “doing”, it’s in “not doing”. The hard work is in thinking.

That is … thinking about how you can tap into the specific unmet needs of a small slice of a large market and then expand from there. Thinking about how you can re-engineer your product so that it has features (or pricing, packing, promotions) that are more seductive to your Ideal Client than your competitors’ products. Thinking about your distribution model and how you will motivate and empower re-sellers to wake up every Monday morning thinking of ingenious ways to sell my product – with a passion.

There is a lot to think about and I don’t have all the answers but I do know this: one gram of good business strategy outweighs a tonne of hard work.

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First Base First

Tuesday, May 12th, 2009

Hopefully you are real clear on:

1. Who your ideal client is
2. What the specific unmet needs are that you are going to fill
3. How you can find them
4. How you communicate your product proposition to them in a clear and compelling manner

If not then invite you to think about it.

If so then there is one more strategic step that will make your business a whole lot easier: instead of asking your clients to hit a home run, get them to first base first.

All too often marketing invites prospects to engage in a product or service at a level that represents a home run e.g. the product proposition is too complicated, too expensive, too intensive, too whatever…

If your ideal client is someone wanting to spend a million or more on a new home then perhaps invite them to “first base” by offering a $499 land appraisal service.

Why? Because it’s five times easier and 80% less expensive to up-sell an existing client than it is to find a new one. So create a “first base” value proposition that is packed with so much value that it’s a no-brainer (“I don’t need to think about this”) for your ideal client.

Then up sell them like a seasoned MacDonalds pro: “would you like a million-dollar house with that sir?”

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Commercial Make-Up Sex

Friday, April 3rd, 2009

Engaging with your clients can be hazardous to your bank balance.

First, your new client’s expectation of the value you are going to deliver that may be at odds with reality.

You can avoid this pitfall by resiting the temptation to over-hype your product proposition. I sat in on a tele-seminar beamed out of California last week. Despite their “personal guarantee” to add “incredible value” what I witnessed was the audio equivalent to two peacocks (the presenters) engaged in an excited and frenzied one hour sales dance.  The complete failure to deliver on the promise was beyond disappointing, it was disgusting.

They over-promised and under-delivered. Better to do the opposite.

The second way you can avoid disappointed clients and a shrinking bank balance is this: when you make a mistake and a client is good enough to complain please consider the following steps:

1. Admit the mistake

2. Let them know that what happened falls well below your normal service/quality standards

3. Give them the commercial equivalent of make-up sex. That is, send them away with a smile on their face feeling that the pain of the mess-up was far outweighed by the pleasure of the make-up.

Saying sorry is not enough. Stamp your integrity onto every client complaint by more than making it up to them.

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Cheers to Moa Beer

Tuesday, March 24th, 2009

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A great example of product differentiation

What do you do when you want to enter a highly competitive market place that’s dominated by two huge international giants and (almost) every conceivable niche has been exploited by boutique players?

The answer is that you do something very, very, different (strategy) which is what the Moa Brewing Company of Marlorough in New Zealand have done.

The Moa beer (“A very rare beer …”) looks different (taller bottle – green with bright red cap – beautifully packed in a recycled four-pack carton) comes in 4 different varieties and every single one tastes different to anything else on the market. Plus it has a cloudy appearance in the bottle where almost every other beer is striving to be clear.

And Moa Beer is around 30% more expensive than other premium brands. The person who served me when I handed over $20+ for my first four bottles of Moa Beer (my other favorite Stella Artois is $15 for a six pack!) told me that her clients who try a Moa curse her when they come back to buy more because even though it’s more expensive they just love it!

Moa have not just created product differentiation at every level, they have also differentiated through price and through the whole experience of drinking a unique tasting and uniquely branded beer. Can’t wait to share one (or two) with my son who is going to visit this evening.

If you feel that your product is like one of many, take a leaf from the hops of the good people at Moa Beer and think about differentiating through product and/or pricing and/or packing and/or promotion.

One gram of good strategy beats a ton of hard work.

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