Are You Doing Too Much?

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Once a business is established, it’s common practice to add products and services in the name of diversification and the desire for more profits. It’s a wise business move to choose products and services that will appeal to customers you’re already doing business with.

But what’s the point of diminishing returns? When does adding more products become less profitable or even start losing you money?

Lego is known for its beloved interlocking toy bricks. The company has been around since 1949. You and your children have probably built many fun projects using their colorful, iconic blocks.

As with many other successful brands, Lego decided to diversify. The Denmark-based company added games, movies, clothing lines, and six themed amusement parks (Legoland). Lego added many new colors to the primary colored bricks originally available. Costs were added at a much higher rate than new profits to pay for all this diversification.

The once very profitable company began bleeding red ink. A new CEO (Jorgen Vig Knudstrorp) was brought in to fix the problem. One of the first questions he asked was this: “What do we need to stop doing?”

Beginning in 2005, Lego sold the theme parks and whittled down half of the brick colors. They became more efficient and creative at doing what they were good at by concentrating on less rather than more. By the end of the same year, Lego was profitable again.

Sometimes the answer to doing more is to actually do less. Doing less frees up time and resources to concentrate on the key products and customers that bring you the bulk of your profits. If you have too many services or products, start considering what things you should stop doing, so you can focus instead on what really matters.

If Sales Are Slow…

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You’ve probably heard the saying, “People like to buy, but they don’t like being sold to.” But you may wonder what it really means.

It means that people are buying what you sell. It means people are spending money. But it also means that people are only willing to open their wallets and part with their money if one condition is met first. That condition is met when you’ve presented a clear value proposition.

Wikipedia defines a value proposition as “a business or marketing statement that describes why a customer should buy a product or use a service. It is a clearly defined statement that is designed to convince customers that one particular product or service will add more value or better solve a problem than others in its competitive set.”

In plain speak, this means a prospect won’t buy from you until the value of your products and services is clearly presented in such a way that the decision to buy is second nature. This value must also be superior to what competitors are offering.

This value proposition doesn’t mean lowering your price or being the cheapest in the marketplace. That’s typically a losing value proposition. A winning value proposition is one where you add benefits that others can’t or won’t match.

Once you’ve defined your winning value proposition, it’s time to clearly communicate that statement with your audience via all of the marketing and sales channels available to you.

Sales will improve dramatically once you’ve articulated a clear and powerful value proposition. You’ll know it’s the right one when your prospects feel like they’re buying from you, not just being sold to.

The Power of Partnerships

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If you’re looking for a creative way to grow and create new business opportunities, you may want to consider a marketing partnership. By bringing two (or more) complementary companies together, businesses can tap into audiences they may not normally reach, providing exponential marketing exposure and increasing their customer base.

When considering a marketing partnership, it’s important to choose a company that aligns with your product quality, reputation, and overall business strategy. By partnering with a company that has a high reputation of providing quality products or services, you can not only increase your perceived value, but also provide customers with additional reasons to purchase from you.

Rather than joining forces on all aspects of marketing, many businesses create a marketing partnership that is targeted to a specific market sector or audience. They typically maintain their individual identities and continue to sell outside the partnership.

One example of a potential marketing partnership might involve a financial institution partnering with a real estate agent and/or title company to target home buyers in their area. By combining forces, both partners can offer potential customers a smoother path to home ownership.

If you need ideas for creating a joint direct mail marketing promo that can help you reach into new markets, build relationships, and increase sales, give us a call today.

About Your About Us Page

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One of the primary reasons a prospect comes to a website is to learn more about a business. The prospect wants to learn not only what you do and how you do it but — more importantly — why you do it. There are many competing businesses in your industry and community. Statistics have shown that one of the most visited pages on any company website is the About Us page.

Why is that? Whether you are a B2B or a B2C company, your prospects are people first. So it’s natural for them to want to know more about the people behind the company they’re considering working with. Prospects hire the people in the business, not just a faceless company.

Unfortunate Reality

The sad truth is that most company About Us pages are filled with industry jargon. Or they’re carbon copies of all the other websites in their space. This makes them boring to read and easy to bypass quickly.

Clues

You know you’ve landed on one of these About Us pages when the page is filled with boastful claim after boastful claim. You see words like “industry leading,” “unique solutions,” “award winning,” and “innovative brand.” With eyes glazed over, most visitors can’t exit these pages fast enough.

People want to learn about people. They already know about what you do from the other pages on your website. The About Us page should focus instead on why you do what you do.

How to Fix It

If your About Us page has these issues, the good news is it’s not difficult to fix. You need to get a pen and pad of paper. As you sit to think about re-writing the page, don’t be afraid to let some personality shine through.

Your About Us page is a selling tool. To sell more of what you do, you have to get the visitor to establish a bond with your company and trust you. To establish this bond, you must let the visitor know the people behind the company. A big part of your brand is your company culture. Your About Us page is an opportunity to tell visitors your story and what your culture is about.

Here are eight ideas to think about as you create the content for your About Us page. Weave them into your brand story.

  1. How did the company start?
  2. Why are you in this business?
  3. Avoid all hype and jargon.
  4. Say what you want to say in as few words as possible.
  5. Include a few testimonials from happy clients. It won’t seem boastful if others do the advocating on your behalf.
  6. Make it personable and interesting. Don’t be afraid to show the human and vulnerable side of your company. Your visitors aren’t perfect people either. So showing this side of your business allows your brand to connect and build a bond.
  7. Invite visitors to connect with you in other online places where you’re active (LinkedIn, Facebook, blog).
  8. Tell them where to go and what to do next. This is the “call to action” part of the page.

Tell them not just what you do and how you do it. Instead, tell the visitor why you do what you do. Your About Us page is the perfect place to share that message with the world.

The One Radio Station You Should Tune To

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57436356There’s a radio station you may have never heard of, but it’s one you need to tune into each and every day if you really want to grow your business. It’s called WIIFM, and it stands for “What’s In It For Me.”

Yes, this is a fictional radio station, and yes, it’s a bit cheeky, but the message is one you can’t ignore. Your customers are being bombarded with messages every single day. The only messages that will register are those which adhere to the WIIFM principles.

You must clearly spell out what’s in it for them, or your listener will quickly tune you out.

Here’s a good quote to remember from Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales:

“It’s actually surprising how many people don’t follow this simple guideline of courtesy. I often get long, tedious emails from people explaining to me in great detail how I can help them and how great it would be for them if I would work on their project, or endorse it, etc. But they fail to consider my context. Why should I care, and even if I do care, why should I act on this rather than any of a thousand other things?”

This is what your prospects and customers are thinking every time you broadcast your messages. So recall this quote when you sit down to create your message, whether in print, web, social media, or any other communication channel.

Are You A Little Bit Country or Rock n’ Roll?

To understand what your prospects want to listen to or what they regard as important to them, you need to speak with and understand your customers. Pick up the phone, conduct surveys, go visit your customers, and take them out to lunch or coffee. There are many ways to find answers to this very important question.

Rome Was Not Built In One Day

Pablo Picasso painted over 5,000 drawings and images that very few people cared about at the time. But during the same period, he also created masterpieces that the world loves to this day. Don’t expect to find answers the first time you visit a client. Keep asking, probing, and analyzing your findings until the answer becomes crystal clear.

Seth Says

If you’re not attracting the right prospects to your business or converting them into customers, selling products, or building a strong brand in your community, it may be because you’re not clearly stating what’s important to your audience. Seth Godin said it best:

“Ten years later and the ego pendulum has clearly swung in the direction of the virus. That’s what we brag about and what is too often measured. How many eyeballs are passing by is a useless measure. All that matters is how many people want to hear from you tomorrow. Don’t try to convert strangers into customers. It’s ineffective and wasteful. Instead, focus on turning those momentary strangers into people eager to hear from you again and again.”

Favorite Station

Building and growing a lasting business brand takes a little work. Attracting audiences that care about what you have to say comes down to providing value for the type of audience you want to attract. You now know how to find out what they care about. Take those findings and craft the type of messages your listening audience will never want to tune out. When you do that, your channel will become one of the coveted favorite stations of your listening audience.

How to Make Marketing and Sales Work Together Like Peanut Butter and Jelly

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Marketing is about telling your story. Sales is about having conversations.

From the point of view of marketing, every single business is unique. No two are exactly alike. The mistake occurs when everyone in the industry looks at what others are doing and copies it. The story is no longer unique.

To sell more and to make the job of sales easier, you need to position your marketing message in a unique way that resonates with and attracts the types of customers you’re looking for.

When you do this right, you will end up having conversations. Conversations that will ultimately lead to sales.

If you don’t tell your story, you can be sure that your competitors will tell the story for you. And that is not the story you want prospects to hear.

Stories and the Caveman

From the beginning of time, when early human beings drew paintings on cave walls, people have been telling stories. Stories are in our DNA. Stories connect one generation to the next. The human brain has a special soft spot for stories.

That’s why the most successful brands have a story wrapped up in everything they do. We’re bombarded with marketing messages every day. Why do we remember some brand messages and not others? Because those brands have planted a seed in our brains with their unique and interesting story.

No one forgets Coke and their story of a top secret recipe kept in a vault. Apple, Starbucks, and Virgin are among other brands that tell their story very well.

Why Do We Do It?

Your story should be not just about what you do or even how you do it. The story really should be about why you do it. That part of the story is what connects people with you and your business. That’s what becomes the story of your brand and business.

How Do We Do It?

This doesn’t have to be difficult to do. All you need is a pad of paper, a pen, and a quiet space to think. All you have to do is answer the question: “Why are we doing what we do?”

That’s a big, hairy topic, I know. But you have to tackle it and get it down on paper. If you can manage to answer it in an authentic way that captures the imagination of your prospects, you’ll make your marketing messages focused and much more effective. People may not remember you or your logo very well, but they will always remember your story.

In turn, that makes the job of sales much easier. It opens the door to conversations. Those conversations will lead to real sales. Your story will make it easier to reach prospects looking for what you do.

A unique marketing story told in an authentic way will make the job of selling much easier. That’s what successful marketing is all about.

The two go together like peanut butter and jelly.

Increase Your Facebook Following

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Even though Facebook has more than one billion active monthly users, many businesses still aren’t using it to its full potential. Here are a few easy ways to use Facebook to increase exposure, communicate with customers, and grow your business:

  • Offer Facebook fan-only specials that are promoted to fans who currently “like” your page. Encourage them to stay tuned for future deals as well.
  • Use Facebook as a quick way to spread the word on exciting flash sales that have short time windows to act.
  • Run contests via your Facebook page. Remember to read Facebook’s contest rules first, though, so you don’t violate any inadvertently.
  • Ask thought-provoking questions, create quizzes, and post survey links to encourage fan participation.
  • Add a Facebook social media widget that enables users to like your page without having to search for you on Facebook.
  • Include a Facebook link in your email signature, on your website, and on printed pieces such as business cards, receipts, statement stuffers, table tents, and newsletters.
  • Share exciting news about your company by posting updates on your Facebook page.
  • Don’t forget that Facebook is a social website. Use it as a way to communicate with your audience, rather than simply to promote your brand. Post interesting content you think will be relevant to your audience, and encourage people to share your posts and to comment on them.
  • Post photos from company gatherings, including grand openings, customer appreciation events, staff outings, and other celebrations. Encourage fans to tag themselves in the photos. This will allow their friends to see the photos and increase your exposure.
  • Request input and involve your fans in product decisions, such as new product launches, celebratory events, and preferred customer rewards. Share responses on your wall, and thank fans for their contributions.
  • Schedule posts in advance to be published at a later time to ensure your messages are delivered at the optimal time to reach your audience. Check out this Facebook help center post for step-by-step instructions on scheduling a post.

Like most types of marketing, Facebook requires dedication. While immediate results are unlikely, a well-nurtured Facebook account can help many organizations strengthen relationships and grow their business.

Why You Need a Competitive Advantage

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A successful business follows one core marketing concept: “Find a need and fulfill it.” However, there may be many players offering similar services and products in your field. This is where having a competitive advantage can lead you to the top.

To be in the top 10% of your field, you need more than just a competitive advantage. You must also communicate that advantage loud and clear through everything you do.

Competitive advantage is defined as “a superiority gained by an organization when it can provide the same value as its competitors but at a lower price, or can charge higher prices by providing greater value through differentiation. Competitive advantage results from matching core competencies to opportunities.”

In other words, when you create a competitive advantage for your business, you can win either by charging less than your competitors through improved efficiencies or by charging higher prices than others because of the added value you provide.

In 1985, Michael Porter, a Harvard Business School professor, wrote the definitive guide called Competitive Advantage. In his book, Porter defined three ways companies can have a competitive advantage:

  1. Being the Cost Leader: offering lower prices than your competitors by providing a reasonable value while still making a profit. Wal-mart is one company that’s famous for this strategy, but Costco may have mastered it even better. Low prices are in Costco’s DNA and have become the company’s competitive advantage. Costco still charges just $1.50 for a hot dog and a fountain drink. As prices increased, Costco began manufacturing its own hot dogs in order to keep the prices low. Massive buying power and a super-efficient distribution system, coupled with a lower-overhead warehouse business model, have allowed Costco to remain a leader with this strategy.
  2. Differentiation: providing products and services that stand apart from your competitors. This strategy involves creating a brand that clearly communicates how your company delivers value in a way others can’t match. The result is a product or service people are willing to pay more to receive. Starbucks has mastered the art of charging higher prices than its competitors by selling more than coffee. The company sells a brand and overall coffee-buying experience others can’t duplicate. Buying a Starbucks coffee includes the atmosphere the company creates for its customers. It’s an added value the company’s thousands of locations “sell” and which customers continue to buy into every day.
  3. Focus: providing your products and solutions to a niche target market that you know well. With this strategy, you understand your customers’ pains and problems better than your competitors. Therefore, you can offer the best solutions at the best price. Apple understands its target audience. While others have tried slashing prices to remain relevant, Apple has been able to innovate and charge premium prices because the company understands who its market is.

Where does your business fit in these models?

If you haven’t defined your competitive advantage or aren’t clear what it could be, first answer these questions to help refine your search.

  1. What is it exactly that you provide? What problems do your services and products solve? Be crystal clear on the products, services, and solutions you provide.
  2. Who are you serving? What is your target market? Who are your ideal customers?
  3. Who is your competition? This could include local businesses or Internet-based companies. It could also include services and products from other industries that your customers are purchasing to solve their problems.

Once you’ve completed these steps, the research phase is done. Now you must analyze your findings in order to discover where your products and services can realize a competitive advantage. The answer may not appear right away, so you must continue to revisit the process until it becomes clear.

Once you’ve found your competitive advantage in the marketplace, it’s time to communicate that advantage in every marketing piece and everything you do until it becomes a part of the DNA and culture of your company.

Please Give Me a Call

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With the recent explosion of marketing avenues available to businesses, it’s easy to forget some of the fundamental building blocks that go into making a company successful. Take, for instance, that telephone in your office. It may not be as sexy or new as social media, but it packs a much bigger and more immediate punch than tweeting or Facebook posts! Perhaps the most important method of communicating with your clients and prospects is still that little old telephone.

The phone connects your business with your audience in ways that email and social media can’t. The sound of the human voice and the interaction between two people on the phone can never be replicated or replaced by any other medium. That interaction can either increase or decrease your business in terms of traffic and revenue. Most callers will base their decision about whether or not to do business with your company on how they are treated on that phone call.

No amount of marketing and PR can overcome a negative experience on a phone call with your office. So before you move forward with any new marketing, make sure all that effort doesn’t go to waste when a prospect calls your business.

You can either pay someone or ask a friend to call your business and pose as a potential customer. Have the calls recorded. Review these recordings on a regular basis, and share both the positive and negative calls with your staff, along with items you find that need to be corrected. These are extremely valuable training times. It takes a little effort on your part, but the rewards will pay off for many years to come.

By making sure that all callers experience a positive event when calling your business, you have a strong pillar to continue building your successful business.

It’s 11:30. Are You Ready?

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Deadline Lessons from Saturday Night Live

Saturday Night Live (SNL) producer Lorne Michaels once said, “I say it every week: We don’t go on because we’re ready. We go on because it’s 11:30.” He went on to say that being “ready” is a state of mind, one you can condition yourself to overcome with regular deadlines.

SNL is a long-running late-night live television sketch comedy created by Lorne Michaels. The live aspect of the show requires an absolute commitment to being ready to go on air at 11:30 eastern time every Saturday. It’s a hard deadline. No excuses can be accepted or tolerated. The show begins with a topical sketch, at the end of which someone breaks from the skit and shouts: “Live from New York, it’s Saturday Night!”

But before the show airs each Saturday night, an entire week’s worth of preparation has gone into making that episode a reality. Monday starts with a production meeting where ideas for the following week’s skits are pitched. On Tuesday, the ideas chosen are turned into skits, and on Wednesday they’re reviewed to pick the best ones to move forward.

On Thursday, the skits are tweaked and adjusted as needed. The winning skits are rehearsed on Friday and then once more before a live audience on Saturday at 8 PM before the actual live performance at 11:30.

Whatever project you’re creating — whether large and elaborate or small and simple — you likely follow a similar process. Your ideas are put on paper, the best survive, an action plan to move forward is chosen, and deadlines are given. Everything is ready, so then why do some ideas and projects never get done?

Over-thinking, doubt, procrastination, and perfectionism are the enemies of deadlines. Each one can play the role of devil’s advocate in your head to delay and destroy deadlines.

The cure might be to learn from SNL and Lorne Michaels. Take imperfect action when necessary. When you delay, nothing can move forward. You can always correct course and improvise as you move toward your goals, but nothing can happen unless you make that leap of faith to take the first steps.

SNL has aired some 730 episodes since its debut and began its 38th season this year, making it one of the longest-running network television programs in the United States. It has produced countless stars, created immense wealth for the creators, and entertained several generations of audiences over the years. The live aspect of the show creates a certain drama that most other shows lack. Some of the jokes fall flat, and there are unexpected surprises in many shows that had not been rehearsed. But the actors improvise as needed, and the show always goes on.

SNL doesn’t go on air at 11:30 every Saturday evening because they are ready. It goes on because it’s 11:30. You may never be “ready” enough if you don’t commit to a deadline to go live. Set aside your fears and worries. Time is wasting, and you may never get another chance to go live again.