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Posts with business management tag.
Prescription Without Diagnosis: (Ugly) Side Effects Are Going To Happen

In a world at a breakneck pace and of mediocre marketing, it
is more important than ever to know what you’re doing if you hope to attract,
let alone keep, consumers’ attention. 
Add to that the entire market essentially being mobile and you might not
be prepared at all to address your opportunities appropriately.

 

As things become more convoluted and confusing (add
consolidated at the vendor level) in digital, there are just as many opportunities
as there were five years ago, if not more. Trust us. The greatest areas of
change are (1) more businesses being online, (2) more solutions being provided
by manufacturers and turnkey providers, (3) software and automation becoming
more rampant and (4) the public having more access via mobile at breathtaking
speeds (read: they typically do not consume traditional advertising when
mobile).

 

What hasn’t changed much are the count of progressive
businesses, those willing to try new methods and technologies, applying
consumer feedback to businesses’ modeling and execution (especially customer
service) and the way businesses buy. Research, contrary to much perception,
really isn’t part of what executives and leaders facilitate or understand. When
is the last time you had a non-vendor evaluate your business’ performance, if
ever?

 

One thing that is creating massive side effects in digital
marketing is the silo-type approach to vendorship. At the beginning of the year
one of the Big Six manufacturers forced their franchises to choose between
three vendors in regard to “management” of their online reputation. This
created a real wrinkle for the retailers that (1) didn’t want to use the
companies for any/other services, (2) understood that the vendors, outside of using
existing automated software, struggle with actually properly setting up,
maintaining and responding to the reviews and (3) understood quickly that, many
times, just as many issues are created as are handled. Now consider this: What
are the benchmarks? What processes have been installed? When does the
reputation management process start?

 

Add to that you absolutely, positively will not succeed in
the online reputation management space without complete buy-in at every
franchise plus it must be supported throughout every organization, entirely top
to bottom.

 

From websites to search engine optimization, from mobile
websites to applications, from search engine marketing to text and live chat,
from customer relation management to integrated marketing, you can’t make a
decision without facts, capabilities, assessment, communication and absolutely,
positively a third party opinion.  Why
would a business make a decision today, with the potential to inflict damage on
their multi-million dollar operation(s) and the future of hundreds of people,
based on what another dealer is doing 800-1,800 miles away or what a vendor
says when they’ll ask a second, third or even fourth opinion on a treatment or
drug?

Are you aware of the side affect of taking the wrong or multiple drugs? Yeah,
you’ve heard the advertisements for sinus medication that basically tells you
that you can die from taking their product if you simple breathe or walk after
ingesting it.

 

So here it goes: buying a potential vendor’s product
(especially if you’re dead set on switching after being “disappointed” with
your present one based on doing no more investigation then compared to now) may
cause loss of customers, lower service penetration rates, bleeding inventory,
loss of margin, decreased customer satisfaction, painful penalties from
headquarters, general business seepage, night sweats for the rest of your life,
or death.

 

Go ahead, make decisions without paying attention to the
side effects. It will either require hospitalization (aka another vendor change
and admonishment toward your 20 Group partners), resuscitation (aka realization
that no, they can’t do that, or it’ll be no better) or dizziness (aka having to
actually ask someone who knows better that’s NOT on the hook of vendors).

 

Disclaimer: No doctors were harmed in the making of this
blog post

 

Best Practices: Professional Insight, Powerful Results

March 9, 2013 by Gary May 0
If It Were That Simple, You Wouldn’t Have Done It Yet…

Things are changing. So fast, they’re staying put, at least for the most part. It usually brings a smile to my face when they phrase “We’re doing well. Things could be better, but compared with (fill in competitor) we’re actually doing fine/well“, is muttered for two reasons. First, it’s part of our selection process and second, it’s part of the business’ selection process. “No, we’re not changing” is a great response, even though most can’t get it out of their mouths.

Recently one of our clients called to advise us that they were being pushed be their OEM to do some print advertising, their first in nearly two years. So they advised us that they’ll do it for two months, just to get the heat of their back. That made me think about what business owners and senior management do to simply make their business partners happy, or trying to make competitors worried, or to make a statement as well as a list of other, mostly ego-driven or self-centered, reasons.

Many businesses today are out of touch with their customers even though consumer sentiment and feedback is so readily available today, to the point of nausea. And we don’t ask. Heck, we can’t even get accurate sourcing at the point of sale today as “the fastest way around the system” is what most of those in sales will do because “I just want to sell a (fill in the blank) now”.

Logic tells us if something is easy enough, we should just do it! Logic also tells us most people won’t opt to do things that are deemed difficult so the few that do that harder work reap the greatest benefit. Most things that can increase results relatively quickly, given the proper attention, will absolutely give an unprecedented advantage. Yet most fall short. Well short.

Take, for example, call tracking. Why would you want to use your cell, at your desk, when you can kill two birds with one stone on the business’ land line (unless you have a more advanced CRM that can append a cell call to a customer record)? Convenience is not a reason, that’s called an excuse. Sure, there are reasons to have your land line forwarded to your cell, however it makes sense to get the most out of each contact, being somewhere you can easily take notes and/or check something online and more, simply by making/taking the call at your desk on a tracked phone. (Using this example due to the fact that for most car dealerships this is a huge pain point in accountability and tracking.)

Do we really think the top producing salesperson will drop 20-70% of their sales when pressed to follow a process versus letting them “do it their way” since nobody wants to “rock the boat”? That’s not likely to happen and,  better yet, it’s more likely to provide a boost in production.

More than ever we need to stretch the rubber band if we expect to succeed, not just get along. There are so many simple things that we can get done offering huge benefits in return. They may not always be easy, but they are worth it. The salesperson chatting on the front line may just be able to reach five more people today on the phone. But it won’t happen..

Because if it were really that simple, it just won’t get done. That, ladies and gentlemen, is a big issue.

 

Best Practices: Professional Insight, Powerful Results

June 26, 2012 by Gary May 0