New Year’s Resolution Idea
2006 is almost history so it’s time to consider some resolutions for the New Year. Even if you don’t believe in making New Year’s resolutions, you likely want to improve your business or your professional status right? Sticking with that theme, why not consider the following:
Take an objective look at your competitors and make a list of the things they are not doing well. Pick out the areas your company is best equipped to take advantage of those current weaknesses and focus the appropriate effort on differentiating yourself versus attempting to do the same things well they are doing. There are plenty of “me too” companies out there so why not turn the tables on your competitors by attacking them where they’re weak for a change?
The beauty of this exercise is it can be equally effective for executives and employees alike. If you’re an employee looking to rise in the ranks, this will help set you apart from your co-workers and increase your perceived value to the organization. Executives should be making time for this type of analysis but many don’t because of the day-to-day operational concerns.
In the meantime, make it a great New Year!
New Year’s Resolution Idea
2006 is almost history so it’s time to consider some resolutions for the New Year. Even if you don’t believe in making New Year’s resolutions, you likely want to improve your business or your professional status right? Sticking with that theme, why not consider the following:
Take an objective look at your competitors and make a list of the things they are not doing well. Pick out the areas your company is best equipped to take advantage of those current weaknesses and focus the appropriate effort on differentiating yourself versus attempting to do the same things well they are doing. There are plenty of “me too” companies out there so why not turn the tables on your competitors by attacking them where they’re weak for a change?
The beauty of this exercise is it can be equally effective for executives and employees alike. If you’re an employee looking to rise in the ranks, this will help set you apart from your co-workers and increase your perceived value to the organization. Executives should be making time for this type of analysis but many don’t because of the day-to-day operational concerns.
In the meantime, make it a great New Year!
Attempting to Buy Word of Mouth? Bad Idea!
I’m sure many of you have read or heard about the Microsoft blogger “scandal.” If not, click here to read an E-Week piece on it if you wish. To summarize, Microsoft and AMD sent some prominent bloggers a honking Vista based laptops for them to test out. Initially they said the folks receiving the machines could keep them, give them away, or send them back upon completion of the “testing.” The next day, after some public outcry, they requested the PCs back. Good marketing idea; bad execution. Or was it really a good marketing idea? I say it’s terrible especially because of the execution–it backfired completely!
What were Microsoft and AMD really attempting? They were hoping to buy a favorable review from a few influential bloggers and gain some word of mouth marketing. This isn’t uncommon, but it’s a delicate tightrope to walk in order to keep things pure. The key to word of mouth marketing is honesty and the natural progression of the message. Once the public gets a sniff of anything that smells remotely of dishonesty, the word of mouth suddenly turns against the offender. Why is that? You’ve made the people who thought they were spreading something natural and believable look foolish. You’ve jeopardized their reputations. Buying word of mouth won’t work–it’s unnatural, and it makes people feel sleazy for engaging in such tactics.
Microsoft has been a pretty good marketer over the years, but this is a misstep for them that is disappointing to say the least. What did they really think would happen? Did they think the people getting the souped up laptops would write completely honest reviews after receiving a “free” machine? Of course not. Receiving anything of value for free is always well received, and it’s a great way to initiate a word of mouth campaign. If the goal was to gain positive word of mouth, the machines should have been given to some random folks in some sort of drawing without any mention of a review or how the machine was to be used. Let people naturally decide what they wish to do with the thing and if they determine they wish to write a good or bad review, let it occur naturally without trying to influence it in any way. Imagine how much someone would talk up such a product if they “won” the thing fair and square in a drawing of some sort. By picking out people with popular review based blogs, the motivation behind such product placement is rather obvious so any reviews would likely be met with a heavy dose of skepticism unless the products were sent without any prompting whatsoever.
Imagine answering your door and seeing UPS there with a set of boxes that you had zero idea about before hand. Your first reaction would probably be “I didn’t order this” then you’d probably open the boxes, look for clues as to what was in the boxes, then you’d try to convince yourself that someone made a big mistake in your favor. Eventually you’d begin to use the goods in time or try to send them back to the sender. Unless of course there was a letter outlining expectations–that’s where Mr. Softy screwed up. They obviously engaged the review bloggers in some sort of sign up process prior to sending these laptops out so there were expectations implied. That ruined the whole thing.
If you’re hoping to initiate a word of mouth campaign, allow it to happen organically and surprise people by doing something out of the ordinary. Then back away and let things progress on their own. That’s the best bet if you want things to spread quickly and keep foul play suspicions out of the equation.
Attempting to Buy Word of Mouth? Bad Idea!
I’m sure many of you have read or heard about the Microsoft blogger “scandal.” If not, click here to read an E-Week piece on it if you wish. To summarize, Microsoft and AMD sent some prominent bloggers a honking Vista based laptops for them to test out. Initially they said the folks receiving the machines could keep them, give them away, or send them back upon completion of the “testing.” The next day, after some public outcry, they requested the PCs back. Good marketing idea; bad execution. Or was it really a good marketing idea? I say it’s terrible especially because of the execution–it backfired completely!
What were Microsoft and AMD really attempting? They were hoping to buy a favorable review from a few influential bloggers and gain some word of mouth marketing. This isn’t uncommon, but it’s a delicate tightrope to walk in order to keep things pure. The key to word of mouth marketing is honesty and the natural progression of the message. Once the public gets a sniff of anything that smells remotely of dishonesty, the word of mouth suddenly turns against the offender. Why is that? You’ve made the people who thought they were spreading something natural and believable look foolish. You’ve jeopardized their reputations. Buying word of mouth won’t work–it’s unnatural, and it makes people feel sleazy for engaging in such tactics.
Microsoft has been a pretty good marketer over the years, but this is a misstep for them that is disappointing to say the least. What did they really think would happen? Did they think the people getting the souped up laptops would write completely honest reviews after receiving a “free” machine? Of course not. Receiving anything of value for free is always well received, and it’s a great way to initiate a word of mouth campaign. If the goal was to gain positive word of mouth, the machines should have been given to some random folks in some sort of drawing without any mention of a review or how the machine was to be used. Let people naturally decide what they wish to do with the thing and if they determine they wish to write a good or bad review, let it occur naturally without trying to influence it in any way. Imagine how much someone would talk up such a product if they “won” the thing fair and square in a drawing of some sort. By picking out people with popular review based blogs, the motivation behind such product placement is rather obvious so any reviews would likely be met with a heavy dose of skepticism unless the products were sent without any prompting whatsoever.
Imagine answering your door and seeing UPS there with a set of boxes that you had zero idea about before hand. Your first reaction would probably be “I didn’t order this” then you’d probably open the boxes, look for clues as to what was in the boxes, then you’d try to convince yourself that someone made a big mistake in your favor. Eventually you’d begin to use the goods in time or try to send them back to the sender. Unless of course there was a letter outlining expectations–that’s where Mr. Softy screwed up. They obviously engaged the review bloggers in some sort of sign up process prior to sending these laptops out so there were expectations implied. That ruined the whole thing.
If you’re hoping to initiate a word of mouth campaign, allow it to happen organically and surprise people by doing something out of the ordinary. Then back away and let things progress on their own. That’s the best bet if you want things to spread quickly and keep foul play suspicions out of the equation.
Are You Focused?
I engaged in an interesting activity today that shed a little light into why I’ve been so maxed out of late. I worked on a spreadsheet that broke down my hourly activities to quantify where the time goes and whether there are any areas I can reallocate hours elsewhere. Much of this came about because there are people in my life requesting more of my time and telling me I’m working too much. Well, I disagree with that—I need to invest more hours into the consultancy to get this thing percolating well enough to afford me the opportunity to cut back a little by hiring people to do the things I’m either not so good at or are better handled by someone whose job is to focus on that particular area. Right now, I’m not in that position so everything falls back on me–another of the beauties of starting and running your own business right?
Anyway, we ALL have a pool of 168 hours per week. Nobody gets more; nobody gets less. We’re all in the same boat when it comes to time (24 hours x 7 days = 168 hours). The average person sleeps 8 hours/day = 56 hours. I’m getting roughly 7.5 hours lately which equals 52.5 hours of sleeping per week.
The average person invests 40 hours/week into money making activities/work. I’m over that amount, coming in at 51 hours (6 days x 8.5 hours). Some weeks it’s more, but that’s a reasonable average to work from. The 168 hours are now down to 64.5.
Family, friends, and interpersonal relationships currently consume approximately 19 hours/week. 64.5-19=45.5 hours remaining.
The average person probably spends at least one hour per day in transit regardless of activity although that’s a pretty conservative estimate. Deduct 7 hours from the remaining hours, and we’re sitting at 38.5.
Factor in an amount of time it takes to get ready to go somewhere (shower, bath, changing clothes, etc.) each day which we’ll swag it at 3.5 hours (0.5 hours x 7 days; women likely take twice as long, but this is a personal exercise here). 35 hours remain in our average week.
I haven’t even allocated time for eating yet so let’s estimate that to equal 2.5 hours/day or 17.5 hours/week. Deduct that from the 35 hours, and we’re left with 17.5 hours.
I’m into health/fitness, riding bikes in particular. To derive benefits from any health related activity, it requires some time investment. During biking season, I probably ride anywhere from 10-15 hours/week, but it averages out to roughly 1.5 hours/day for five days/week during the off-season. That equates to 7.5 hours meaning we’re left with 10 hours in our week.
I watch television quite a bit to catch up on sports, news, business, and entertainment. This time has been cut significantly, but I probably still watch a couple hours of TV per day five days per week for that magical total of 10 hours.
We’re tapped out on the time for the week, and that doesn’t allow any time for life’s little unplanned twists and turns that force one to rearrange their schedule or postpone planned events.
If I were to cut back in any areas in order to focus more on the business, the obvious choices are television and interpersonal relationships. Life can’t be all work and no play though so the existing schedule will have to make due until things smooth out a little. When that will be is anyone’s guess, but it would be awfully tough to cut back there if the ultimate plan is to succeed (and it is).
How does your week breakdown by hour? Are you focused on the things you believe you should be focused on? If not, what areas can you reallocate to make things jive more with your desires? Do you have people seemingly tugging at you from every angle? How do you handle that? As always, please share your thoughts and ideas with us.
Are You Focused?
I engaged in an interesting activity today that shed a little light into why I’ve been so maxed out of late. I worked on a spreadsheet that broke down my hourly activities to quantify where the time goes and whether there are any areas I can reallocate hours elsewhere. Much of this came about because there are people in my life requesting more of my time and telling me I’m working too much. Well, I disagree with that–I need to invest more hours into the consultancy to get this thing percolating well enough to afford me the opportunity to cut back a little by hiring people to do the things I’m either not so good at or are better handled by someone whose job is to focus on that particular area. Right now, I’m not in that position so everything falls back on me–another of the beauties of starting and running your own business right?
Anyway, we ALL have a pool of 168 hours per week. Nobody gets more; nobody gets less. We’re all in the same boat when it comes to time (24 hours x 7 days = 168 hours).
The average person sleeps 8 hours/day = 56 hours. I’m getting roughly 7.5 hours lately which equals 52.5 hours of sleeping per week.
The average person invests 40 hours/week into money making activities/work. I’m over that amount, coming in at 51 hours (6 days x 8.5 hours). Some weeks it’s more, but that’s a reasonable average to work from. The 168 hours are now down to 64.5.
Family, friends, and interpersonal relationships currently consume approximately 19 hours/week. 64.5-19=45.5 hours remaining.
The average person probably spends at least one hour per day in transit regardless of activity although that’s a pretty conservative estimate. Deduct 7 hours from the remaining hours, and we’re sitting at 38.5.
Factor in an amount of time it takes to get ready to go somewhere (shower, bath, changing clothes, etc.) each day which we’ll swag it at 3.5 hours (0.5 hours x 7 days; women likely take twice as long, but this is a personal exercise here). 35 hours remain in our average week.
I haven’t even allocated time for eating yet so let’s estimate that to equal 2.5 hours/day or 17.5 hours/week. Deduct that from the 35 hours, and we’re left with 17.5 hours.
I’m into health/fitness, riding bikes in particular. To derive benefits from any health related activity, it requires some time investment. During biking season, I probably ride anywhere from 10-15 hours/week, but it averages out to roughly 1.5 hours/day for five days/week during the off-season. That equates to 7.5 hours meaning we’re left with 10 hours in our week.
I watch television quite a bit to catch up on sports, news, business, and entertainment. This time has been cut significantly, but I probably still watch a couple hours of TV per day five days per week for that magical total of 10 hours.
We’re tapped out on the time for the week, and that doesn’t allow any time for life’s little unplanned twists and turns that force one to rearrange their schedule or postpone planned events. If I were to cut back in any areas in order to focus more on the business, the obvious choices are television and interpersonal relationships. Life can’t be all work and no play though so the existing schedule will have to make due until things smooth out a little. When that will be is anyone’s guess, but it would be awfully tough to cut back there if the ultimate plan is to succeed (and it is).
How does your week breakdown by hour? Are you focused on the things you believe you should be focused on? If not, what areas can you reallocate to make things jive more with your desires? Do you have people seemingly tugging at you from every angle? How do you handle that?
As always, share your thoughts and ideas with us.
Product Differentiation
I frequently get asked “how can I differentiate my product or service when there are a lot of competitors doing the same things on a similar level?” My initial answer is ‘you just answered your own question within the question.’ That part about “a lot of competitors doing the same things on a similar level” should clue you in as to exactly how to differentiate yourself–vastly outperform them!
There’s only ONE low price leader. Once someone establishes themselves as the low cost provider, that game is over so it’s time to focus on differentiating in other areas under your control. It’s truly not that difficult, but it requires an ability to step back to reflect objectively and a common sense approach moving forward.
For example: I have worked for two systems integrators within the past five years. They are very similar in their product mixes (both are Nortel Distributors) and their current marketing strategies, but they couldn’t be more different in the way they approach the operation of their businesses. For starters, one is an old school distributor (we’ll call them Company A) and views things historically (several “glory days” stories pepper the organization) more often than not. They will frequently thump their chest while stating they were one of the original Nortel Distributors in the Southeast and have been doing this for 33 years, their business model works fine, there’s no reason to partner with other firms, and so on. Company A believes in soaking the customer for as much profit as they can on the front end in fear that they may never see another dime out of them. Their apparent belief is that if they don’t see another dime, they got their piece of the pie so who cares? To them, customer loyalty value is merely a cliché that can’t be justified on the income statement. Additionally, they are very old school in their approach to new customer generation. They still rely on cold calling quite heavily, don’t view the customer as a potential partner, and are oblivious to the benefits of community involvement to increase word of mouth marketing.
Company A won’t capitalize on the benefits of educating their workforce out of fear employees will leave for greener pastures as soon as they achieve an industry certification. Only when the manufacturer implements minimum educational requirements in order to remain licensed does Company A enroll employees into educational programs, and they do the bare minimum to maintain their license. It’s no wonder the place has the fears it does–it created them as a result of their own culture based mostly on greed. I rarely question my motivation to leave Company A, but I frequently question my decision to accept the job in the first place even though I learned a lot about what NOT to do in business as a direct result of having worked there. The positives I will say for Company A are: 1) they have some good people working there–just not enough of them (probably because they are cheap and lack long term vision), 2) they have a good manufacturer behind them even if Nortel has had its problems over the years and 3) they have soaked enough customers to keep the doors open for 33 years so they are doing something right even if the underlying motives are a bit skewed.
Side note: I’ve offered to work with Company A to help them improve things, but they view me as an evil ex-employee whose motives must be misplaced/misguided. Besides, what could an established distributor of 33 years possibly have to learn from little ole me? Never mind improving the business–that’s unnecessary!
The other company, Company B, actually listens to their customers, employees, and outsiders to try to improve their business as much as possible. They view the customer more as a partner than a means to pay expenses. Their mantra is to build a third standard deviation company. Company B truly wants the employees to succeed and improve themselves. They realize that the more expertise they have on staff, the more valuable their services become. When people leave, they don’t leave scratching their heads as to why they ever spent a day there to begin with, and they don’t trash the place to their friends, colleagues or current business associates.
Of the two companies, which do you think someone would be more inclined refer to a friend, colleague or business associate? Which has that word of mouth appeal? Which seems poised to grow? All of these things set one company far apart from the other in spite of providing similar products and services. Much of it starts at the top, too. If you have a dynamic leader guiding your company, you can efficiently seize market opportunities to differentiate yourself regardless of how many competitors do the exact same thing you do today.
Doing something much better and valuing your customers are distinct advantages that will lead you to the winners circle in time.
When "Full Sponsorship" is a Bad Thing
Among my circle of friends, we have a running inside joke about our favorite sports teams achieving “sponsorship” from a fictitious company called “Medicore” when they’re average at best. We don’t accept mediocrity (the company name’s obvious origin) very well, and we hate it when some coach, GM, or owner tries to sell us on the fact that the team we follow isn’t as bad as it truly is. The same could be said for business–there are a lot of businesses masquerading around under the Medicore sponsorship umbrella.
I look at a company like Penn Station, and it screams “medicore.” Their food isn’t very good, they boss the customer around trying to “train” them into ordering the way THEY want you to, and they are annoying with their insistence on calling their second rate French fries “fresh cuts.” #1, the fries are fries. They’re not very good ones at that–frequently overcooked with that flavor of overused cooking oil built in. No thanks!
Another medicore sponsored business is definitely Wal Mart. Yes, Wal-Mart is insanely popular, but it’s a chore to shop there. Standing in line for a long time isn’t an efficient use of anyone’s time, but it seems as though Wal-Mart has done a good job of making people feel as though they are getting this huge bargain by shopping there.
Engage in a little math with me for a second. If you had to put an hourly rate on the value of your time, what would it be? In my consulting business, I frequently charge $100/hour so let’s use that as a baseline. If I go to shop at Wal-Mart and find 20 items that would save me an average of $2 on each item (very generous assumption), my initial savings are $40. With me so far? Ok. When I go to check out, I’m going to stand in line for a minimum of 20 minutes on most occasions. If you take $100/hour and figure that rate up for the minute, you’re looking at $1.67. 20 minutes x $1.67 = $33.40 so my original big time savings have been dwindled down to $6.60. To me, that’s not worth the hassle Wal-Mart inflicts upon me to save a little money so I avoid shopping there regardless of the potential net-savings. The only way I’ll even think about going in there to buy something is during a snow storm (there’s one within walking distance of my home) or very early in the morning when no-one else is shopping (like 2-4 AM). Just because a business is popular doesn’t mean it’s good. It might just mean people haven’t valued their time appropriately and engaged in the little math equation we just went through.
Okay, you knew I couldn’t get through this without a sports take. Let’s look at Rick Pitino this year–he’s consistently trying to sell University of Louisville basketball fans that this year’s team is more like an Escalade in the making when most can see very clearly it’s more like a Kia Rio. It’s truly average and ordinary at best. It has achieved that dreaded “sponsorship” from Medicore, too. I hate it when my sports teams achieve this dreaded status.
Years ago, when John L. Smith (a.k.a. “Janelle”) was the head football coach here at UofL, we would passionately debate whether he could take us to that next level of football. I was even called an “ass” on an Internet message board for voicing my displeasure in the Liberty Bowl bathroom following another bowl game loss down in Memphis. Granted, John L. had taken Louisville from 1-10 the year prior to his arrival to five straight bowl games, yet his record was 1-4 in those bowl games; the lone win coming in the rather below average Liberty Bowl. It was Medicore sponsorship at its finest, and it was unsettling for many of “us.” One or two guys within our group would always try to spin it to put lipstick on the pig so to speak, but it wasn’t working for the majority who aspire to compete at big time levels. As things have turned out, we have a coach in place today that gets it (Bobby Petrino), and he rarely uses excuses when things don’t go as desired. He can be found on the sideline chewing guys out for missing an assignment after a first down when he felt the play should have resulted in a touchdown. That’s aspiring to greatness. Janelle would ignore the fact that his teams had zero discipline and were among the leaders in penalties each year (a trend which followed him to Michigan State and resulted in his eventual firing after this season finally concluded). As long as his teams finished with a winning record, all was seemingly okay in his world.
The Cincinnati Reds, my favorite professional baseball franchise, are kings of striving for mediocrity and spinning it to look as though they are trying to build a winner. I won’t bore you with the dealings of the past and broken promises made by the organization, but I will share one recent transaction that should sum it up: Mike Stanton! Talk about the epitome of mediocrity, and he’s in the twilight of his career so it’s going to be a stretch to get even average production out of the guy. It appears as though the boycott of the new stadium will live another year–not until they can finish a season above .500 will I step foot into their new park which is sad because I enjoy visiting the Queen City.
Bottom line: many companies and sports teams merely aspire to mediocrity so that’s exactly what they get. It seems as though the majority is okay with that because they don’t need things that are really good–just good enough will do. What’s my underlying point in all of this? When you set out to do something, don’t settle for “sponsorship” when you can achieve greatness. The choice is there to make so why bother messing around with half-assing something? Do it or don’t; there is no in between if greatness is what you aspire to. Achieving a fictitious sponsorship in this vein isn’t going to help you achieve anything worth taking about.
