Marketing starts from the inside and works itself out

A client recently declared that he had a marketing problem. Asking a few questions, what he meant to say is that he had an advertising problem. His sales were steady over two years, but his costs were rising. His margins were shrinking. He wanted me to come up with a fancy, quick fix equal to a shot of morphine that could make the pain go away.

Marketing is simple but unfortunately not easy. The heavy lifting to turn a company around is usually more complicated than getting more customers. More customers translates to less customers in the long run if the business under delivers on its promises. 

Marketing is just a promise.

The unfortunate thing about our client was that his margins were shrinking due to improper cost controls. His business was stagnate because of a lack of systems and controls on product and service standards. An inconsistent product made the company a liar in its past promises.

The client wanted us to show him how to increase his sales by 30%. Instead we told him he had to plug the holes in the bucket before he went after more customers. We guaranteed a fix but it wasn't what he wanted to hear. He got his morphine from someone else. 

And that's ok. For us to help a patient, we need the patient to recognize our expertise.

Marketing starts at the top of any organization. The leader's relationship with the whole team will allow for a collaborative, team-oriented approach or insular, everyone-for-himself mentality. The leader needs to build systems that the team can experience personal and financial growth. 

An environment where everyone feels they have an opportunity to voice their opinions makes it family like. Motivation, morale, happiness and profits exist here. 

You don't have to do this. The alternative is cranky, unmotivated, backstabbers in which absenteeism, and productivity is always an issue. 

We all want profits in our business. 

There's a simple solution. It doesn't start with more customers.

Leadership and vision finds, trains and motivates happy employees. Happy employees serve customers who eventually become loyal. Following Pareto's Law, 20% of customers generate 80% of the profits.

 

Increasing profits starts with the leadership and vision. It's not an outside problem. Lack of profits is usually an internal problem. Before you spend too much money on advertising, fix the internal stuff and revenues will start to shift. Once the problems are fixed, advertising can then be used. Otherwise, increased profits will take time because word of mouth is the slowest form of advertising.

So if you have money to spend on advertising, spend it first by fixing the inside of your business.  

Advertising only speeds up the inevitable. A sucky company goes out of business faster with an increase in advertising budget.

Value versus Price

What's it worth to you?
Isn't that the definition of value?

The question that gets asked is, "What's it going to cost"?
That's the wrong question.

So much emphasis is placed on price these days. I tell clients that price, on the most part, does not matter. When we think about pricing a product for sale, the only question that needs to be answered is what is it worth to someone else.

Most entrepreneurs try to compete in the marketplace with a reduced price. Being a low cost provider is a poor strategy for most businesses. Notable exception being Walmart.

You're probably not going to be a Walmart type business in your category any time soon. So don't be the cheapest in your category.

Here's why.

1. Price is the easiest thing to copy and improve on. Competitors pay attention to others pricing strategies to copy them or beat them if they perceive a loss in market share. This is called a race to the bottom in which there will only be one business standing when it's over. And the one standing will be the one who is the most financially secure at the start of the process.

2. If the product or brand does not have qualitative differentiation in the marketplace, the product is dangerously promoted as a commodity. In the commodity marketplace, the only thing that matters is price. Whoever is cheapest wins the customer's business. It is not a sound strategy to have customers who don't care about a company. Customers who switch to competitors the minute prices are lowered are not good, nor loyal customers.

3. When the commodity game is played, loyalty is non-existent. Margins are miniscule as the entrepreneur lowers prices to remain competitive. If margins are halved, entrepreneurs have to work twice as hard to get reasonable profits. Working much harder in a low price environment with less financial rewards seems ridiculous. For example, would you rather sell a cup of coffee for 50 cents or for $5.00? There will be less customers if coffee is sold for $5.00. But at an average cost of 10 cents, profit is $4.90 for every cup sold versus 40 cents in the former option.  At 50 cent coffee, 12 coffees have to be sold to every one at the $5.00 option. Don't question the expensive coffee as an entrepreneur. Ask what value has to be given to get the customer to believe that $5.00 coffee is worth the purchase.

My wife is a sales shopper. Her favourite stores have trained her to wait for the special. She no longer believes the list price is the worth the value of the item based on periodic sales promotions. There are many like her who wait for the product to be discounted before they buy.

Discounting is an excellent way to encourage people to buy. If you're trying to move old stock, perishables, or discontinued items, discounting can be a great way to get it sold. Discounting is also the lowest form of marketing. It works. Discounting strategies bring customers in to buy. But at what price? If used incorrectly, customers will quickly learn that the value is less than the list price and wait for the discount, thus slashing your expected annual returns for short term profits.

Good entrepreneurs are long term growth visionaries not short term profit oriented junkies.

XYZ cement company was trying to figure out how to charge more for their bags of cement, when all the competitors were selling it around $5.00 per bag. The product was a commodity. Everyone knew it. With no competitive advantage, the braintrust of XYZ increased the price of their cement to $1000 a bag. At that price no one would truly buy their cement if the value in customer's mindset didn't increase. So XYZ increased the value proposition by including architect consulting, access to an engineer usage of computer drawings to aid in the design of the structure. Every bag XYZ sold was equal to 200 bags from their competitors. They became the leader in their area. They were extremely profitable and demolished two competitors in the process.

Value is the only thing that matters when pricing your product. He who provides more value to a customer will be positioned to thrive.

Learning from cribbage

Grandma and dad used to have daily crib games. The games were epic with pulsating voices coming from the kitchen when someone had a great hand. "Hot digitity", "Oh boy", "Sonofabitch", "Yee-haw" were a few I remember. There were others I'm sure.

I learned the game of crib from them. I watched them, counted the cards, looked for the patterns, and learned what to throw away and what cards to keep.

Dad took me under his wing and taught me all of the rules of crib over a few weeks. He regularly beat me as he showed what I could've played versus what I had played. He got all the good cards. I knew he liked to cheat, so I was sure he was dealing the cards crooked. But he got the right cards when I dealt too.

He shared a secret about crib that I never witnessed in those games with Gramma. No one ever talked about this secret. I don't know if Gramma knew the secret skill my dad had. He showed me how to do it making me promise not to share it with anyone else.

Before Grandma died, I danced a few rounds of crib with her. She never beat me. She used to curse like a sailor when I vanquished her.

She could beat my dad, but she never triumphed over me.

Thinking back, it started when I was a youngin' of 6 years old. Gramma would flip the cards upside down and we would play Memory. Looking for matching cards, the winner would be declared with he who had matched more pairs.  My brain was young, uninhibited, free of pain, drugs, alcohol and stress. I never knew Gramma Grace to drink. But her downfall was a chain-smoking addiction to menthol cigarettes.

That was the only advantage I needed as a child.

As an adolescent, I didn't have that same competitive advantage as alcohol exposed me to a new world of enlightenment.

I was 14 when I started playing crib. To beat Gramma required a new competitive advantage. I had to cheat. Dad passed down his secret in my trust. And it worked. Gramma stopped playing crib as she got sicker and later bed ridden.

My dad's secret is not much of a secret anymore. A book and a movie came out 8 years ago exposing it.

Dad applied the Laws of Attraction to his cribbage game. He taught the rules of visualization to me.

Never once did I think this skill was transferrable to other areas of my life until I saw the "Secret" movie.

Gramma used to say I had a horseshoe up my ass. Luck had nothing to do with it. I wanted that card, visualized it, asked for it and was always giddy in thanks when it turned up.

We can cheat the game of life the same way dad and I cheated at crib. It's quite easy.

Questioning authority

I'm a product of the public school system. My kids are now being produced by the same system that created me and countless others like me.

On the way to school this morning, my daughter told me that she dared not question the rules at school. Some rules like respecting others, being polite and not yelling, running, swearing or disrupting others are regulations that show mutual respect for others. I accept these rules. And so should my children.

But there are other rules that have no bearing on respect. These rules are arbitrarily assigned by a person in authority because they can. The adult in me says these rules are ridiculous. Luckily I'm not a student at this school. As the parent, I must coach my children to think inquisitively.

My daughter is a unique little girl that questions all of my rules. What stops her from questioning her teachers? Does she accept all things said in the classroom? Is she thinking for herself or has she become a drone accepting all information as fact in school?

She worries about questioning the teacher about a banal rule for fear of making the teacher mad.

"Who are you more afraid of upsetting, me or your teacher?". She confirms that I am her biggest fear.
"Who has more power, me or your teacher?". She again answers that I have more perceived power.
"Why don't you question things you don't understand?". She answers that understanding the rules is not as important as obeying them in school

She's nine years old.

Everything she does not understand has to be questioned as long as she does it in a polite, courteous manner that does not disrespect the adult. Poor girl does't know that questions are the key to learning.

That's my fault. I take 100% responsibility for her un-inquisitive mind. Teachers beware. My child is being prepared for the world. She needs to question rules, why they exist, what would happen if they didn't exist, who made up the rule, how can the rule be changed and when will it all happen.

We've been taught to accept the rules, don't question them and just keep moving on as if we do understand them.  It reminds me of the scene in "The Time Machine" by HG Wells. The Eloi in the book are future descendants of humans in the year 802701. They are fed and treated like livestock for the Morlocks to feed on. Morlocks live underground and rule the planet. The Eloi don't question anything. They just live in a paradise like place with food, drink and pleasure. Only to be eaten before they get too old and tough.

The fate of the Eloi is to be eaten. Is that what we want for our children?

Do you like to be told what to do?

I always wanted to be a grown up. Now that I'm here, there are days, I wish I could be a kid again. I think there are many who feel the same way.

There was one thing I hated about being a kid. I didn't like to be told what to do. I didn't like teachers, parents and any other kid trying to control me.

Most want to do a job well. We learn this in school as we look for the affirming A on our test.

Some people need more direction. Some people require less. In either case, the reason we work with other people is compound the effort so it all gets done faster.

I escaped my childhood the day I entered the workforce full-time. There were protocols, rules, and roles. But as long as one did the job with interest, ferociousness and consistence, no one was questioned. No one directed, managed, or told me what to do until payroll costs started going up. To do the job, I was working 10-15 hours overtime per week. We all were in my department of 30 employees. The work had to be fully completed by Saturday at noon and we didn't have enough people to do it all.

I left that job when people started telling me what to do. I wanted to be lead. Instead I was managed. Unfortunately, most people in management roles think leadership and management are the same thing.

They are not.

You manage things.
You lead people.

By trying to manage a person, you diminish the person to a thing.

One of the biggest issues today in business is motivation of the workforce. Did you ever try to motivate a pencil? The damn thing doesn't move until you pick it off the desk and do the work for it.

Employees have roles in the organization. With motivation, they go beyond their specific roles to help the organization. Without it, they work 9-5, expecting a paycheck every two weeks. They don't try to excel. They don't try new risky things in fear of being fired. They do the job they were asked to do.

We crave leadership.

Entrepreneurs don't like to be told what to do. If you have an employee problem, the problem is a deeper issue embedded in a leadership problem.

You are the problem if you're supposed to be the leader.

If you fix the leadership problem, you will fix the employee problem.

Lead people. They crave it. They will love and respect you for it.

Ideas are combustible but only under the right conditions

Mazda used to have a tagline in their advertising that demonstrated the fun of driving their cars. A kid would say "Zoom zoom", as if playing with his toy cars while he tore up the livingroom carpet.

Thinking about that iconic usage of rhythm reminds me of the number one problem with entrepreneurs.

Everyone has great ideas. Ideas can come from anywhere.

It's the execution that most people struggle with it.
Heavy lifting and working toward a goal forces the entrepreneur into submission. The ideas multiply and spread like a virus. Yet the budding entrepreneur remains stagnate in a pool of submission and stink.

The problem gets analysed and re-analysed. The solutions change. The work does not. And the work sits there waiting for the entrepreneur to grab the reins to ride the wild horse off into the sunset, where dreams exist and fairy tales come true.

But the entrepreneur becomes paralysed with intent. The term is analysis paralysis. The feeling is fear. Nothing is achieved without action.

An idea is like fire. Fire needs air to create the massive energy required to burn a stick of wood. Air equals action.

Dreams die every moment as another wannabe entrepreneur think up great ideas only to watch them suffocate without oxygen.

Question: What's the most important step toward action?
Answer: The first one.

Are you gonna let the smoke blow out your flame, or are you gonna fan the flame into the largest, brightest flame around? Once the flame takes off, you only have to direct the energy to where you want it to burn.

You can't light a good fire if you don't start with the right conditions.

It all starts and ends with the entrepreneur.
Ready to move yet?

Does purpose matter?

I often ask myself what is my purpose in life. As if there is some grand plan waiting for me to push the right button so I can achieve everything I was supposed to.

The grand plan thing must come from deeply entrenched beliefs about religion.

Is it possible that I have a purpose?

In a recent video, I saw the grandness of our universe and the size of our planet in comparison. Our planet is basically a spec of dust moving at 67,000 miles per second. Dr. Seuss may have described our Earth appropriately in "Horton hears a Who".

Yet our egos place us at the centre of it all. Humans fight over land, money and natural resources when none of it truly matters.

What matters is the current relationships we have with each other. People won't remember what we said. They will not remember what we did. But they will always remember how they felt in our presence.

Working hard to make a living, we forget that we are all on the same dust ball.

Maybe there is no such thing as purpose. Maybe we made it up to give our life meaning. Maybe there's no life after death.

All these answers are beyond my knowledge. But I know what I believe and that's what keeps me going.

Here's the only thing I know for sure:

We are living on a spec of dust spinning at 67,000 miles per second. We are insignificant outside our own selves.

I want to speak to the manager

Seven dreaded words when I managed a restaurant. My heart would miss a beat. I would tense up. The hair on my neck straightened. Was something so wrong the server couldn't fix it?

It hurt me to think that we did not do our best. I would ask the server what happened. Getting all the information, I would take a deep breath and go to the table ready for my lashings.

In most cases, the customer would thank me, offer praise to the staff or just want to say hi.

There were bad times. It is in those bad times, a manager is tested each and every time.

Here are my steps to handle a complaint.

Step 1: Listen and Understand
Let the customer say everything they have to say. Let them speak their entire mind. Ask questions to get more information. Don't offer a solution until you have all the information. A customer who starts to repeat themselves is probably done venting.

Step 2: Empathize and Acknowledge
Apologizing for a mistake is normal. Don't give excuses. A customer isn't always right, but they are about 95% of the time. Not all customers are equal. Asking a customer if this is their first experience with your brand is really important. A returning customer is more important than a first time customer. A first time customer can become a loyal customer if the stars align properly. But chances are if this is their first experience, and it's bad, they won't be back.

Step 3: Fixing the problem
Offer to fix the problem immediately. The manager's most important job during the day is fix this customer's problem immediately. Everything else becomes secondary. A fixed problem is a gone problem. A manager must always empathize that the customer's time has been wasted. All complaints need to be handled with tact. Putting a restaurant's immediate profits with this customer is not important. The future business is more important. If the problem can be fixed, offer a discount on this purchase but also on a future purchase. The rationale is to leave a customer with a remarkable last impression.

Step 4: Thank the customer
This is the most critical step. Saying something like, "Thank you for making my business better. I'm sure you're not the first person who this has happened to. You're courage in telling us has brought this oversight to our attention."

Most customers are not looking for freebies. They just want to be served. The very small percentage of customers that are potentially scamming the business is only damaging if you treat all your customers like thieves.

Picking up garbage

On a business trip recently with a business associate, I noticed that he was bending over. Looking down to see what he dropped, my eyes exploded in amazement. He was picking up a piece of garbage in the hotel lobby.

A piece of paper discarded as unimportant property. None of the staff saw it as important. My friend did. My friend is in the hospitality business. He's one of the nicest, most genuine people I have ever known.

I asked why he paid attention to someone else's trash. His answer was that his behaviour may change the employees behaviour. Although the hotel wasn't a client, he had programmed himself to be a model for change. Even if it meant picking up a stray piece of paper in a hotel lobby.

Yesterday, I went to the local coffee shop to drink a green tea while I worked. Another friend owns the place and a third friend is the manager. I chose my nesting ground and plopped my laptop on the coffee table only to find a discarded plastic cup and two paper bags filled with something that possibly might have been muffins.

Learning from my hospitable friend, I picked up the three pieces of garbage and went to the nearest receptacle to dispose of my undesired treasure. To describe the garbage can as filthy would be a compliment. It hadn't been cleaned in days, if not weeks.

Upon returning to my leased out chair, the crumbs on the floor reminded me of pebbles on a beach. I wondered if they were all from today or if the employees hadn't bothered sweeping this week. Maybe the sweeping is on the same schedule as the cleaning of the garbage can.

In either case, I listened to my heart. I followed my friend's lead in doing my part in removing the recognizable stuff.

I worry for my two friends who depend on this coffee shop for their livelihood. It looks like they are missing out on systems or they are not paying attention to details. Either way, it's a slippery slope.

It's not a customer's job to pick up the garbage. My hospitable friend does it. So will I. But most won't.

Leaving on a jetplane

I don't get it. Given the choice between working with a jerk and a nice guy, why would anyone give business to the jerk?

Maybe the jerk gives the best back rubs, pumps up the egos with pomp and circumstance and tells us how special we are. I don't let businesses that act like jerks anywhere near my back. I don't trust them. They probably have a knife waiting to steal my wallet.

Yet we accept jerky mediocrity in the airline industry.

In Canada we have two choices: Air Canada and Westjet. One has an extensive network while the other is trying everyday to prove its worth.

I had the pleasure to fly on the monster this week.

I've never been afraid of flying. But this experience made me happy to be on the ground.

The service at the gate was equal to my mobile phone contact centre. I'm used to it, so I accept it. But it was the lack of attention to details that nearly soiled my pants.

Sitting in seat 6B, I looked out at the wing to see a missing rivet. One rivet is not big deal I try to convince myself. The rivet had purpose. If not, it would not have been drilled. Now, it's gone. Does that mean the plane will fall apart? I don't think so.

I could've gotten over the damn rivet if I wouldn't have seen the peeled paint caused by a previous fire from the propeller engine. This plane had engine problems at some point in the past. Was the problem in the air or on the ground? Was I going to have to open the exit door? I heard the co-pilot but I hadn't listened to him. Would people depend on me to save them from this death trap? Doesn't the company see this as a problem?

I reached down to pull out the evacuation procedural manual to know my role in the worst of scenarios. In doing so, I pulled the back of the seat from 5B onto my lap.

In my panic, I wanted to abandon ship. I wanted to call my wife to tell her I loved her. I turned on my music and sunk into a make believe world where only unicorns and fairies exist. The reality was too real.

Luckily I am not afraid to fly. I know flying regulations are tight. If the jerky airline would have painted the wings and replaced the missing rivet and fixed the upholstery in 5B, I would not have worried. But this inattention to details made me worry about the potential bigger problems I couldn't see from my seat.

I don't trust this airline. I don't think they would ever hurt me on purpose. It's that they don't take care of me on purpose that pisses me off.

And that's the problem!

Special place

I spent the last three days on a special island. If you've never been there, you won't understand. If you're from there, you take it for granted.

It's paradise but not because of the weather. One day the wind chill was 30 below Celsius. The next day was plus 10. On the last day, it rained.

The people made paradisical. Just like any good business, the people are the defining characteristic of a great place.

This was my third visit here. I never noticed its magic on the previous two. It may be my age that appreciates it more.

Every where I went, someone was complimenting me. The street person told me he liked my scarf. The hotel employee acted like my mother. The stranger in the elevator told me a joke to get a laugh. Passers by on the street said hello as they walked toward their destination.

I had an accent to the natives. I was clearly an outsider when I spoke.

One could argue that people were less busy here. It's deeper than that.

These people are looking life in the eye. They haven't forgotten the only way to succeed is by working together.

There's something magical about island people. This island has 400,000 tenants. They act like we're all neighbors.

When I got home, I asked my wife why the server at the restaurant was so rude. She hadn't noticed. It was the second time that day that I felt under-loved in a business.

It hit me like a Codfish to the face on a cold day. I wasn't getting the personal care I got on my favorite island. My part of the country is extra special compared to the western front of this vast land. We got nothing on the folks further east.

One of the best employees I ever hired was a member of this island tribe. He was caring. He paid attention to customers. He worked his butt off. I always attributed his strengths to his expertise. My perspective has changed. He was brought up that way.

I hope the oil industry doesn't beat these wonderful people into big city, head down, smiles turned upside down, pickle sucking zombies.

Where ya to...

Hiring employees

Marketing your business from the inside out is the best way to ensure success as customers go through the trial stage with your company.

Internal controls, procedures and systems are required to ensure that not only you, the entrepreneur, but also any future hires act in a way that properly represents your new baby business.

The hiring of an employee is like pulling the pin in a grenade, and still holding the clip. If you let go of the clip, everything is lost. The easiest way to hold the clip is to create operations manuals for everything that needs to be done in that job. Create systems to ensure training of that employee and followup with ongoing evaluations.

Most businesses need employees. The successful ones know how to hire the best.

We all want the best. To get them requires hiring practices that are systemized. 

The definition of the best employee will vary depending on your viewpoint. Some are looking for the dependable, no bullshit, straight to the point person. Others will look for the caring, mother hen. You may want a little fun, but not crazy fun as a quality in your hire.  

The first step is identify the qualities you want in a new hire. You then find five questions you can ask looking for insight into your desired qualities. The person either has what you're looking for or they don't. Don't swerve from your objective. Don't settle. Don't hire anyone with a pulse. Don't put words in their mouth. Let them do the talking. It's time to listen.

I know one entrepreneur who defines his perfect hire by how they work on the job. In the interview he asks them if they would be willing to work one shift for free to see they would like the job. The candidate doesn't realize the most important part of the interview will be the observation of the potential employee in action. The entrepreneur looks for body language clues or facial expressions during the free work day to see if they are a good fit. This entrepreneur is playing poker and the candidate is showing him all his cards on the job. It's worked for him. Average turnover rate is under 1 employee per year for the past 10 years. At 10%, his turnover is well below the industry average of 150%.

Starbucks founder Harold Shultz was asked what his secret was to getting people to smile at Starbucks. His answer, "We hire people who like to smile". 

Can it be that simple?

But we can't hire the right person unless we first identify the characteristics of the right person. A good hire will grow your business. A bad one will shrink it. It's your job to know the difference.

As the Chetshire Cat says in Alice in Wonderland, "If you don't know where you're going then any road will do."

Marketing inside out

When we think of marketing, most confuse it with the 30 second commercials on TV that show big breasted women selling a can of beer. That's advertising and it plays a small role in the big business of marketing

Marketing is a broken up into the four categories. They are affectionately known as the four P's: Product, Price, Promotion, Place.

Promotion is comprised of advertising, street signs, decals, flyers, billboards, outside signage.

Price is your strategies on price. Any promotions you do that is price related is part of this funnel.

Place is your physical/virtual location. You may have a website, facebook page, twitter account and youtube channel. You may also have an email address, and physical location. If your place is a restaurant and it smells bad, customer probably won't buy from your company in the future.

Product can be physical or service related. In a service industry, time is sold instead of physical stuff. Time is still a product.

When we market our business, we need to market from the inside out.
Most focus on the outside in.

Let me give you an example of an outside-in perspective. Imagine you have a billion dollars to spend on advertising your little restaurant. You dominate the airwaves on TV and radio. Everyone in your market know you exist, where you are, and what the current promotion is. They drool over the food on TV and the next day they go to your restaurant. The first day is a Monday and your restaurant is packed with hungry people who saw the ads over the past week. The cooks are overwhelmed. The average table gets food in 45 minutes. The servers are running around like chickens and the food is cold by the time it gets to your table. Not to mention the server didn't refill your pop once, nor did she look at you when she handed you the bill. The food looked nothing like the TV advertisement. The service was poor and slow. You don't complain but you won't be back.

I'm exaggerating the obvious. But many entrepreneurs have poor standards internally and when customers stop coming, they think the problem is an outside marketing problem. When in fact, the problem is internal. Fix the internal problems first. Be awesome at what you do first. Word of mouth is the most effective form of advertising.

It works really slow.
Advertising speeds up the inevitable. If your company sucks, more people will find out faster with advertising. It works the same if your company is awesome.

Start with being awesome.

Five levels of marketing

Opening a business is a scary, challenging, exciting adventure. On the birthday of our baby business, the hard part of marketing our business begins. Will customers come in? Will they come back? Will they love us enough to share with their friends? Will we have enough customers to buy our product to stay in business. The greatest gift a customer can give a business besides his money is sharing positive experiences with friends.

Marketing is a discipline most people don't understand. There are basically five phases to marketing that happen in the mindset of customers.

1. Awareness
2. Trial
3. Reminder
4. Loyalty
5. Sharing

The first step in marketing is awareness. If customers don't know you exist, you'll have a hard time surviving. If you spend more money on a high traffic location and attribute part of your rent to your marketing budget, you'll save in the long run making customer aware you exist. It's really important that you ramp up as quickly as possible in this step because time is money. And you probably sunk most of yours in your new idea. So the quicker customers start coming in, the better chance you have to survive.

Once customers are aware of your existence, you have to solicit trial. A customer that doesn't try your product will never know if you're any good. Trial comes from creating a compelling reason for a customer to stop in. Some discount. Some have giveaways. Others have a special grand opening that creates energy around the building pulling customers in. The trial step in building customers is where you'll find out if they like your product or not.

Most business owners think they've made it at the trial stage. A lot of customers coming in, checking out the offerings, maybe buying product. Sales are high. Spirits are high. Expectations are usually low from the customer perspective.

Once a customer has tried a product, there has to be a compelling reason to return. If the product doesn't fill a perceived need or if the company isn't perceived as superior to its competitors, the customer will probably not come back. Using reminder tactics as marketing can be very wasteful. Direct Mail is seen to be one of the best forms of offline marketing to a customer. Yet a 2% response rate is considered successful. The profit from the response usually doesn't pay for the marketing itself.

But if you do get return business and the reminders start working, you may be on your way to a loyal customer. A relationship with a loyal customer is a marriage. Once they become loyal, they see past the business's shortcoming. They accept and love the business for what it is.

When you can identify your loyal customers, your biggest return on marketing investment will be from them. The more they share stories and the more they refer you to their friends, the busier you will get. That's word of mouth. It happens by being awesome to a group of people. Be careful not to use your new loyal customers. You wouldn't want to lose that customer you worked so hard to get.

A story about cows

I hate cows. It comes from my youth. The neighbouring farmer never tended to his fences and the cows used to trample my dad's landscaped lawn. Mowing it was a challenge with beastly hoofholes. The lawnmower wheels would get stuck in them forcing me lift and tug on the mower only to be met with a new challenge a few feet away.

Mowing was my job. Taking time away from valuable playtime, I hated mowing anyways. So the addition of potholes made my disdain even greater as I directed my anger toward my thousand pound nemesis.

Cows are good for two things: Hamburgers and Ice Cream.

There is nothing special about cows. Cow lovers will argue that they are pretty. That they are the backbone of our economy. I have one word for Cow lovers: Blah!

We learned in school that a dog goes woof, a cat goes meow and a cow goes moo.

Wrong!
Cows don't moo.
Have you ever heard a cow wail away? Mooing is not in their vocabulary. The french say that a cow goes "meule". More appropriate in my opinion. Even the French need to give the sound more emphasis. A cow sarcastically screams from their stomach a sound that repeats no less than three times. The sound is a cross between a cat in heat and the sound of someone getting punched in the gut.

Between the sound of these beastly demons and their escapades on virgin lawns, I loathe them.

Despite my loathing, I have learned something great about cows. They are everywhere and no one cares about them except those that benefit from their existence: the farmer's family.

There's nothing remarkable cows that forces the average person to stop and take a picture of them. I don't ever remember seeing a Facebook post or a picture tweeted on cows. No instagram, Pinterest. No first page news in the local newspaper. Nothing. Because no one cares about the unremarkable.

Businesses can be like cows. Unremarkable with the only ones caring about them being the owners friends and family.  50% of businesses fail in the first two years of operation because enough people didn't care enough to continue supporting the cow-like enterprises.

If you want to get into business, do your family a favour. Don't become another unremarkable cow.

In Seth Godin's epic book, "Purple Cow", he explains how a purple cow will gather attention. It will force a bystander to pose questions. People will talk and share the remarkable while contributing the popularity of the cow. This cow is different. It isn't normal. It's beyond remarkable. It's shareable.

And most importantly, in its remarkability, it becomes memorable.

We have enough cows. Don't contribute to the problem. Be part of the solution. You'll benefit greatly both financially and emotionally. I hate cows. I love purple cows.

We need more of them.

Help wanted

In general, people have a major weakness. We don't get help when we need it.

I'm not sure if we don't like to ask for help or we don't have the tools to recognize that we could use a helping hand.  We put on the brave face and project a position of strength so no one thinks we're weak. The inability to seek help when needed is a fragility. In trying to be strong, we become weak.

It must come from childhood experiences. Think of the things we've heard when we were hurt as children. Adults would say things like:
"Your tough, tough boys don't cry",
"You're not hurt",
"Take it like a man",
"Suck it up",
"Stop crying".

There is no one to blame. The adults were reiterating what they heard in their childhood. We perpetuate the problems as we continue to reinforce these same behaviour with our own children.

As an adult, I am wired to not ask for help. It takes every ounce of my humbleness to seek out help. I don't even like to ask a neighbour for a hand.

This year, I'm working on an exciting project. There's a lot I don't know. I have a choice.
1. Seek out help, pay for good advice and kickstart the project into high gear.
2. Learn how to do it myself, make a bunch of mistakes and eventually, hopefully, get my project off the ground.

Do you see the dilemma? I have a choice. I have to spend time or money. The one that is least important to me will be the one that I will spend.

Even if money is most important, I will waste more of it in the second option as I make small mistakes that will cost me.financially.

There is only one right answer. The wrong answer will waste both resources.

As we start to understand ourselves, we will realize where certain beliefs and actions originate. In analyzing the effects of our upbringing, we learn that the longer we wait, we waste both time and money.

It will cost you some money to get the right help. But getting no help will cost both time and money.

Cry when you skin your knee. Someone will help you. I guarantee it.

Oh beard, where art thou?

At fifteen, little black strings penetrated my baby face to declare that I was a member of the male subset of the human race. I felt special. I was growing up. I was no longer a child needing to be told what to do.

Some called it peach fuzz. Others asked if the cat licked my face. It didn't matter.

I was a man.

There was the goatee experiment. My facial hair was like a pair of women shoes. I could do different styles with different outfits. Three days after a shave and the follicles would re-emerge from their hiding place to take their rightful place on my face.

My first job out of school did not permit beards. I was allowed to have a moustache but I felt sleezy with one. Too many bad 70's memories reinforced a decision that I didn't want to be associated with THAT crowd.

So I went bare face as the wishes of a job. During my time at the anti-beardite company, I met a wonderful woman who became my wife.

She didn't like facial hair because it irritated her face when I kissed her. I liked kissing her, so I had no problem with compromising with a daily shave.

20 years have passed. I still like kissing my wife, but I wanted one last beard. One last beard to end all beards on my face. It's winter. There are no worries about tan lines. They are no concerns about it being too hot. I am still a man. So I let it grow.

Some of the black hairs have retired and moved to warmer climates. The new owners of my face don't take care of their property. They lack personality. They are bland in their colourless environment. They co-exist with their black brothers. But they're taking over. Each day, more of their white friends are moving into the neighbourhood.

Worst is they're moving to other parts as well. Soon they will control the whole territory. I could paint the neighbourhood. But that would be fake. I am a man so I take it like one. I'm an older man.

Better to have hair still growing than not have any at all.

For one last hoorah, my beard continues to grow. It is the longest it has ever been.  I feel like a different man when I look at myself in the mirror. I don't like it more or less. It's just different.

And different is what I needed right now to get my butt in gear for this year.

It's working. Now to figure out the kissing thing...

Winners vs losers in pro sports

I love watching the sports highlight package every morning. Watching the finals in any sports competition is something that gets me excited. The storylines, the individual players, the characters create a play suitable for Broadway or Hollywood. The excitement and exuberance with winning is a vicarious moment.

In observing recent interviews by two professional athletes I saw the difference between a winner and a loser. Both athletes are considered all-star performers at the elite level. Both have had personal success in their respective journeys. Neither have won the championship in their elite sport yet. One is destined for greatness and one is going to struggle to get his name remembered with the passage of time.

Phil Kessel is a professional hockey player. He is a consistent point per game player, which puts him in the top 5% of all players in the NHL. He has been criticized as a selfish player, a player that can't make others around him better. In his sixth year with the Toronto Maple Leafs, his coach got fired. When asked what he could have done different to prevent his coach's dismissal, he called the reporter an idiot. He asked the media scrum if they thought the firing was his fault. He got mad. If this was the only flare-up, I would not pass judgement. But it's not. The team's leadership, which Kessel is included, stopped saluting fans after a fan tossed a jersey on the ice in disgust for their poor play.

His attitude to the media may be an indicator to his attitude in the dressing room. If it is, a poisonless team cannot be built around him. He's rotten. He's a good player, but probably a bad teammate. His character is now being questioned.

Andrew Luck is a professional football player. He was drafted first overall in 2012 NFL entry draft because of his total package as a player/professional. Even as a 21 year old kid, his professionalism makes Kessel look like a child.

Last weekend, Luck had to play a football battle which could have been scripted the "Best quarterback of all time" vs "The next one". Luck is "The next one".

In the media scrum, one reporter asked Luck if he could take the "Great" one. Luck's response was one of quickness of wit. He asked, "Do you mean like one on one?". With a reference to a boxing duel or a basketball match, he broke the question with humour. He then said, "I don't face him, our defense does. If our defense does a great job and I do what I'm supposed to, we could beat their team".

He rephrased the question to a team approach. He didn't look at individual glory or praise. He knows it's a team game in which he plays a leader's role.

Luck used the media to promote his team. Kessel is used by the media to promote the media.

Luck will win a championship because he already thinks like a winner. Kessel may not. He thinks like a loser.

Respect can not be earned

I like to zag when everyone else is zigging. The road less traveled can be frightful and a delightful experience at the same time.

One of my zags has to do with respect. Most believe respect has to be earned. I disagree.

Respect is given, whether we like it or not. I had to respect my parents. If not, there were consequences. I had to respect my boss or I got fired. I have to respect my wife or she will eventually leave me.

Get the point?

It is not respect that is earned. It is trust. If I don't know you, I may withhold trust as I get to know you better. As I observe your behaviours, your personality, your thoughts, I will grant you little bits of trust along the pathway to a trusting relationship.

We trust our parents. They cared for us when wild dogs could've eaten our eyes out. There's a primal trust there.

I respect my parents because they respect me.

Giving respect to a complete stranger's thoughts, actions, beliefs when I first meet them comes from the need to be courteous and polite.  They deserve my respect until they don't. They lose my respect as they lose respect for me.

There's a simple duality. You'll have my respect on day one. Respect me back and you'll have it to the end of time.

Where this whole respect thing gets hard is when I think of the relationship with children. I love our kids. But they don't always respect us. Silly little manipulators don't know any better.

In reviewing my respect values, I found that I disrespect my little manipulators in return for their childish banter. They need my respect no matter what.

As is usual, there has to be an exception to the rule.

Karma

My kids' favourite expression is "curse you karma". They stole it off a cartoon they used to watch.  When I'm disciplining them, they say that karma is waiting for me. Karma is their answer to right all of the wrongs of their world.

In a 9 year old's words, the definition of karma is that bad things will happen to someone who does bad things.

She doesn't see the other side. Good things will happen to someone who does good things too.

Although I believe the laws of attraction are true. We manifest into our lives what we do and want.

Karma gets blamed. Karma gets congratulated. Karma gets too much credit.

Can we agree that bad things happen to good people? And good things happen to the bad guys. Is it not our perception of those things that influences our opinions of the result?

Recently a friend complained about crap that happened to her only to be hit with an even deeper problem. She then wished bad karma on the perpetrator who caused her latest angst. I've been there. I knew exactly how she felt. The burning anger that needs to point blame on someone else. Is it not easier to blame someone else for our misfortunes than take 100% responsibility for them?

When we get beaten up, negativity distorts our vision and instead of figuring out how we can dust ourselves off, we wish ill on someone else and thus perpetually continue to attract crap into our lives.

When we are clear of anger, we know this can never work, but emotion knows how to cloud our view.
The negative thoughts are within us. They are daggers piercing our own soul. In wishing bad karma on someone else, we poison our own future. And we don't realize it.

Another friend who is a cancer survivor has a view of the world that is filled with rainbows and unicorns.. I've never heard her talk bad about anyone. Cancer slowed her down but did not disturb her eternal optimism.

Everybody has crap in their lives. Everybody has happiness. It is what we focus on that expands our universe. It's our choice what manifests into our future.

So if you have a choice, why wouldn't you choose happiness?

Eyes are windows to the soul

In public, everyone looks so serious. Their faces look like they just sucked on a pickle. As an introvert, I can look serious when my heart is clapping with joy. I love people but they tire me easily. I need an escape hatch when I'm around a lot of people to keep me energized.

When I was 20, someone told me it was important to always look at people in the eyes. I have studied eye behaviour without much luck. I watch the shifties as people look around when I'm talking to them. Do they look around because they are searching for an answer or are they looking for a lie? Body language plays a role in these observations but I gotta figure out the eyes before I go to the rest of the body. Have you ever observed the person who can't maintain eye contact and wondered if you're freaking them out or if they have something to hide?  There's the shy person who is so timid that they only thing he hides is his personality. He can be mistaken for a shady character who has something else to hide.

It's been tough for me to read a person through the eyes until yesterday.

Yesterday, I listened to the soothe sounds of John Denver while was I grocery shopping. Not only did music give me a rhythm, it gave me the mental"exit stage left" I was looking for. The rhythm gave me peace. In that solitude, I noticed people while I tapped "Thank God I'm a Country Boy" on my shopping cart. Most importantly I woke up to facial expressions. The music was my invisibility cloak. I was alone in my musically entrenched world. Under the cloak, I noticed everyone had a rhythm. The eyes were the dead give-away.

The racy eyes were in a hurry. The tired eyes wanted to go home. The hot eyes were mad at someone or something.

Eyes are supposed to be windows to the soul. I've tried to read people through their eyes before but it's never worked. Like a voodoo magic trick I expected the eyes to tell me everything I wanted to know. My mouth got in the way. As the mouth acted like the school bully, desiring attention, my ears were the mother hen accepting all sounds as fact and nurturing every word as a child needing attention.

My ears and mouth get in the way of my eyes. My ego pushes some of this. I try to keep him in the box, but he jumps out when we call his name.

With music in my ears, not listening to anyone and not thinking about what is being said, my eyes demonstrated an inexplicable beacon that I was never able to find.

My eyes will not deceive what my mouth has translated and which my ears have accepted as fact.

Eyes are absolutely windows to the soul. I finally experienced it for the first time.

Growing old

Do we stop playing because we grow old or do we grow old because we stop playing?

My grandfather was 92 when he died. He played games up until his death. He loved to laugh and thoroughly enjoyed a good teasing.

One Christmas, I vividly remember my elderly grampy lifting my wife on a set of bathroom scales to find out her weight. He was at least 85 at the time. She kicked and screamed as he hoisted her on the liar's pad.

His body failed him in his nineties. His joie de vivre did not.

I think we grow old because we forget how to play. Play like a school child. Play like no one's watching. Even if they are, who cares? Having fun is not a bad thing.

I'm my true self when I laugh out loud while slapping my leg. Yet I protect that laughter in fear of someone discovering the playful, youthful, lightening eyed me.

If you ask a child what they want most out of life you'll hear they want to grow up. If you ask most adults what they want most out of life, you'll hear the opposite answer. Adults want to stay young. Not the peer pressure, no experience in anything young. Adults are looking for experiences in which they can feel young.

Feeling comes from doing. What are you doing to stay young.

The older I get, the less I care about what others think about me. Dancing in the middle of the grocery isle, embarrassing my kids is so much fun. Not just because of the look I get from them. It's also from the adrenaline rush of doing something I would never have done as a young man. It's like streaking in public without removing the clothes. That's a story for a different time.

Keep playing and youth will follow you around like a hungry cat.

Joy is not just a woman's name

I believe we are born to experience joy.

Joy is not found with money.
Joy is found in serving others.

Do you want joy? Help someone today.

I try to lead a healthy, helpful life. I stop to push cars out of snowbanks. I listen to others and their woes in business. I am giving of my time and my knowledge.  But stuff can get in the way. I get busy and don't notice the small things. I don't always see that person who could use a simple hand. My body is here. My mind is thinking about the next thing that has to be done. I get busy with work and forget to look life in the eye.

We let joy slop around the busyness barrel, hoping to find it in some elusive cranny.

Have you ever noticed it is more fun giving a gift than it is to receive one. Joy is inside all of us exploding at the seams waiting for us to help someone out.

One of my goals for this year is to be a better person. Part of that goal is to perform 4 random acts of kindness per month. That's one per week. It can be as easy as buying the next person in line at the coffeehouse a warm beverage.

I'm sure I'll learn a lot about this random acts of kindness thing. Wish me luck. No, wait. Luck has nothing to do with it. Wish me success.

My joy depends on it.

What's the definition of good scotch

I hate to admit this but I know as much about scotch as I know about women.

My friend Daniel can speak at lengths about the six regions of Scotland and the distinct taste each of the regions produce. Watching him talk about scotch is theatre. Entertaining, informative, and drunk with delight, he shares his love not from the upper deck where only nose-waving snobs exist. The one thing I remember about Daniel's instruction is his definition of a good scotch.

As he starts his soliloquy, he asks, "What's the definition of a good scotch?".

Answer: One that you will enjoy.

In looking for other answers to elusive questions, I found the same answer to a lot of life's pressing questions..

What's the definition of a good exercise routine, good diet, good life, good family, good house, good job, good business, good vacation?

Enjoy!

Goals for 2015

It's a new year and I just finished my goals for the upcoming 365 days.

Don't misinterpret me. These are not resolutions. I gave up resolutions a long time ago. These are things I want to achieve for the year. There are only five of them.

The Fab Five is what they will be called. 

Two of them are personal goals in trying to be a better person. The others are business related as I aim to achieve my business objectives.

I spent a week thinking about the Fab Five. I don't want to waste another year. I want to achieve something remarkable. 

It started with a review of what I want out of my life. A real question that isn't easy to answer. It starts with knowing what one wants. Knowing, not thinking...

I went wrong last year by allowing my goals to be dependent on someone else's decision. It became unrealistic in the short term because everything I wanted to do last year depended on someone agreeing to sell me their business. Which they didn't do. They will want to sell me their business someday but I can't control that right now.

So this year, with the dream still lingering like a musty pair of unwashed underwear, I set annual goals that were achievable and were not dependant someone else's decision.

So here are my goals for the year:

1. Weigh 170 lbs

2. Be a better dad/husband/person

3. Make $150,000 this year

4. Start a coaching company

5. Buy two businesses with two operating partners. Both have to be found.

Each goal has a minimum of five actionable items or smaller goals that will result in the annual goal being achieved. 

For an example, I've identified five things I need to do to be a better dad/husband/person.

- Do dishes for my family five times per week

- Clean two bathrooms for my wife each week

- Mop kitchen floors each week

- Perform 4 random acts of kindness/month

- Find a church to expose my kids to the word of God and go at least twice/month.

So there you have it. 

It's a new year. A clean slate... What are you going to do different this year? 

Resolutions are for the fragile, good intended dreamers seeking change but not willing to do the work.

Goals are for the strong minded, fierce competitors fighting the distractions of life to make it better for themselves, their families, and their communities.

Are you a fighter or are you numbed by the electromagnet field from your television?

Technically you're not qualified

You're not qualified to own or open a business. If you know that, then you have a chance at success.

Most take their skills they've developed working for other business owners and try to transfer their technical skills to an entrepreneurial endeavour.

50% of businesses fail in the first year. Half of those who started their businesses last year are no longer in business today.

Are you sure you want to open your own business?

If I've scared you, you have two choices. Go get a job or continue to walk the entrepreneurial path.

If you're looking for money, go get a job. Owning a business might be the single fastest way to lose money if you don't know what you're doing.

And if you never owned a business, I'm gonna say this, "You don't know what you're doing"!

That's the bad news. It gets better. I promise.

To succeed in business as a new entrepreneur, you have to realize that you know nothing about business. Sure you have skills. You may considered an expert in your field. Your field is your field. Entrepreneurship is not. Transferring the technical expertise into a business is difficult. You are not an expert in entrepreneurship. You haven't done it yet.

Michael Gerber in "E-Myth Revisited" calls this the Fatal Assumption. "Knowing technical skills in a company does not mean one knows how to own a business that does technical work".

To paraphrase, "Just because you know how to fix cars does not guarantee success in owning your own a garage."

Don't fall victim to the fatal assumption. If you want to get into business, I commend you. Be smart and humble enough to go back to the bottom of the ladder and learn from scratch again. You don't have the expertise of owning a business.

Don't pretend you do. You'll hurt yourself and your family if you end up in the 50% of failures. 

Time and money are not related

So you want to open a business. You think a business could solve all of your problems. It will probably be the start of even bigger problems. But that's a story for a different day.

What are you looking for?
Time or money?

They are not related to each other.

Time is a finite resource. It's like oil. There's only so much of it. Once it's used up, it's gone forever. Money is not.  Money is like the sun. It's not always around when we need it, but we need it to survive in this world.

Money gives us time back. It's not about the fancy cars, warm vacations and cavernous homes. We on the search for time.

Time gives us freedom, and flexibility.

Chances are if you're starting out in business,  you can't have both in the beginning. You have to earn the right to have both.

Better question is what are you willing to sacrifice to get what you're looking for?

You will have to sacrifice a lot of time and some money to get there.

How does that make sense? You have to gamble both to get hopefully one of them back in abundance?

It's simple math. Every investor knows that. Invest money wisely and through compounded interest, you get more money back in the long run. Time plays by the same rules.

Do you respect time? Most don't.

If you do, it respects you back.

Money doesn't respect anything. Don't worship it. It's like the pretty girl who dates the head banging crack smoking loser. It doesn't make sense but the less attention you pay to her, the more she's attracted to you.

That which we chase eludes us. Let money chase you so you can get your time back.

Invest your time wisely. It's the only thing that matters.