Leading Results

This past weekend I took my nine-year-old son to the local Elks Lodge to see Chaotic Wrestling – the local independent professional wrestling promoter. I found out about the matches through the local newspaper (and I have said before, I still read them), so they did a nice job with PR – front page story and all. My son had a great time. It was kept family clean, and so when he said he wanted to go again, I thought that was fine. And that is where the marketing lesson in this starts.

So the first suggestion is to use a service like Eventbright for tickets. The only way for me to buy advanced tickets was to call some guy whose name and number was listed in the paper (I feel sorry for him for the amount of calls he probably got). Since I was planning this day-of the event, I figured there was no way I would get him, so we just showed up early. We got tickets, but I am sure there were others who did not since the Elks only seats about 300 and the place was packed.

The next opportunity for Chaotic to improve their business success came at the point of purchase for the tickets, videos and t-shirts. They only took cash. Now I understand why you might want to do that for if you are looking to dodge the service (IRS that is), but from an upsell /cross-sell perspective, the lost sales probably outweigh the tax implications. I don’t walk around with much cash in my pocket any longer, so the $20 to get in, plus 1 drink each plus popcorn, emptied my pocket. I could not have bought a t-shirt or video if I had wanted to. There are good, inexpensive, celluar based credit card systems out there. If you sell off site, use one.

Finally, there was no sign up sheet or way to give them my address and email to be put on a mailing list. Not at the point of buying the tickets. Not at the exit. Not in the program flyer. All missed opportunities to create a no-cost way to continue to market to me about upcoming dates or special events. My son even spent $5 of his own money to get a “Polaroid” picture taken with one of the wrestlers. It was in fact a digital picture that they printed out on site. But again, a missed opportunity – I would have gladly given them my email address in exchange for having the picture sent to me by email (and you know I would have given them a correct one)

So think about the points of interaction you have with customers that can be repeat customers. The points of interactions you have with prospects. Do you make it easy; even encourage them, to give you a way to contact them by email and permission to do? If not, just think about what you are missing. Do you make it easy for them to buy? To buy more? Don’t let your potential sales escape your grasp.

It always seems to happen. I have personally seen it about a dozen times. A company hires someone because of their special knowledge and talent – maybe it is to launch a new product; or to create a new route to market; or maybe to put in a new system.

That person shows up for work, full of excitement. Ready to be a change agent and help their new employer reach new success. They’ve got lots of ideas. They have lots of experience implementing those ideas. They know the pitfalls and traps. And what happens?

They start to create change. If they have done this before, they know how to educate and communicate. They know how to NOT create surprises. They know when to be patient and when to push. But change is uncomfortable for organizations – specifically for the people in the organization.

To use a modern character as an example – in this case Linus, from the Peanuts – Change is uncomfortable – it is the time when Linus’ blanket is in the dryer. (and I wish I could attribute that quote)

So what are the results from this change agent that was brought on to move the company in a new direction? Generally, not what was expected. Some things change, but resistance usually wears down the enthusiasm of the change agent. And when change doesn’t happen completely enough, or fast enough, the enthusiasm turns to skepticism or cynicism. So the change agent moves on. They are now the village idiot.

Machiavelli, in The Prince in about 1870 said “It must be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to plan, more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to manage than the creation of a new system. For the initiator has the enmity of all who would profit by the preservation of the old institutions and merely lukewarm defenders in those who would gain by the new ones”.

The epilogue that follows is almost always the same. The ideas, the concepts, the systems that the change agent tried to implement are eventually revealed to be mostly correct. And the company goes about, again, trying to implement them. This time ‘round, they may succeed – they may even bring back the change agent to guide them, because from the outside-in he is once again a prophet.

If you like this post, please pass it on. If you don’t agree, tell me why.

I have a couple of social media stories to share in this post – both related to Facebook. (this is a continuation of a series that has been posted on a sporadic basis. read through the archives to see more)

The first was a story that a colleague relayed to us. He told us about a friend that bought an ad on Facebook. His friend targeted women that were 42 years old. They worked for a specific company. They had one or two specific attributes in their “likes” section of their profile. His add found its intended target (his wife) and cost him exactly $1.00 to run. This is really interesting because it shows the targeting power of Facebook.

The second story comes by way of a business relationship we have with the agency White Rhino. They relayed the story of IKEA’s promotion on Facebook. A few months back, IKEA posted images of some of its ’show rooms’ on Facebook. The first person to tag a product on the image, won the product they tagged. Everytime someone tags a photo on Facebook, it’s posted to that person’s status update for all of their friends to see. So the contest and awareness of IKEA products spread like wildfire. Nice use of the media.

Do you have any success stories to share? If so, we’d love to hear them either by comment below or drop us an email.

I saw this comic strip in my newspaper today (yes, I do still read those too) and had to share it. (full credit and copyright to Mo Williams and Hillary Price at Rhymes with Orange)  I run a small business and most of my clients are small businesses as well, and after reading this strip carefully for a second or two,  the words of one of my first business partners was just ringing in my ears – The details matter – ALOT.  Yes, we all have mis-spellings and grammatical errors, but for those of us in marketing, well that is our image.

I have heard this a couple of different ways in the past few weeks. One company, a distributor, was talking about this from the standpoint that the value they bring to their customers – both the manufacturers they distribute for, and the retailers they deliver to – is in the information they provide to help each grow their business in a smarter manner. Anyone can deliver product, but their unique value is the information they can provide on how the manufacturer or the retailer is doing relative to pre-defined metrics.

I also saw a slightly different version of this in a tweet on twitter where someone (I can’t remember who) said “Go ahead and share your ideas publicly, the value is in the execution”.

I would propose that both of these comments are either side of the same coin. If your company (or role) is about ideas, then you create differentiation (and marketing advantage) by demonstrating your ability to execute on those ideas. If your company (role) is about production – taking physical action against a tangible product – then you can create differentiation with information that helps others in your value chain get outstanding results or learning.

The core of great marketing is the ability to declare, and then support, a remarkable (or unique) difference. If you don’t know what yours is, ask your customers. If they don’t know what it is, then it is time to really look at how you can use information and/or execution to create it. Be unique or become extinct.

I heard this the other day from a client’s customer that we were surveying on the client’s behalf. The statement made me go “huh”.  He was specifically talking about how much information was in his ERP system that would make his company so much smarter if they could get at it.  (My client’s product has helped him do that).  But the more I thought about the statement, the more I realized how much it applies to so many aspects of a business.

Its not just the information locked away in the accounting system.  Think about it. How much could you company know about its prospects if you could get the information from the head and notebooks of your sales people? (and don’t say CRM, because salespeople hate writing that all down).  What about the knowledge your telemarketer has from all those phone calls that went no where?  How about the product ideas and suggestions your customers have that would enable you to grow to new levels?

There is gold in that knowledge.  You or your company needs a process to mine it.  For the accounting data, that’s easy since there are good business intelligence tools out there that almost any small business can afford  (disclosure: my client KPI Online is one of those vendors). But what about the sales people’s intelligence.  Your customer’s intelligence?  What marketing processes do you have in place to make sure that it gets captured on a regular basis. Unstructured information is the lifeblood of most successful companies. If you can’t structure the data, you should at least structure the process to capture it.

Got any good ideas on this?  I’d love to hear your thoughts and ideas.

I am an Apple fanatic. I admit it (again). There are so many things they do right that I am willing to let slide the few they get wrong (see my post below). I love my iPhone. (I am not a fan of the touch keyboard, but for all the things the phone computer does right, I can let it slide). I think the true example of the great design of this product is my 21 month-old daughter – who while can’t read, has absolutely no problem running this device. I mean, come on, a design so intuitive that a toddler runs it correctly?

So what about your product or pricing or website? Is it so complex that an educated adult can’t get it? What are you striving for in usability? Great design (in your pricing, your product, your service process) is just another way to tell your customers you care and value them. The web is the equalizer. Design will set you apart because it takes time to get it right, and it creates an effective barrier to entry or competition. So invest the time in the little things. People (and toddlers) do notice.  What examples of great design can you share?  Please comment below.

Unfortunate events happen in relationships between customers and vendors.  Doctors run late for appointments. Items that you order fail to show up on time due to a snow storm and sometimes an airplane lands and doesn’t have a gate to park at yet.  We’ve likely all had one of these things happen.

But when you mix an unfortunate event together with a company policy that annoys the customer, your customer is much less likely to dismiss the unfortunate event as an annoyance and will hold you accountable.  As you can likely surmise, I am getting personal here.

I am writing this post coming back to Boston from Buffalo on Jet Blue.   I don’t fly them often, and since their unfortunate (there’s that word again) event at JFK a couple of years ago, I have tended to not fly them if JFK is in the itinerary.  But my brother has been having a good experience with them of late, and I figured with a direct flight to Buffalo, I’d be okay.  The flight left on time and got in on time and was just fine until we landed and parked – not at the terminal.  It seems that Jet Blue only has 2 gates in Buffalo and had a broken aircraft at one and the other was full.  So we sat on the ground for 25 minutes till we could park.   I thought of JFK and those trapped passengers, but figured “what the heck”, its an isolated incident, not worth writing or complaining about.   Until I got on my return flight.

Now if you want to guarantee yourself an exit row seat on Jet Blue, you can have one for an extra $10.   On Southwest, the equivalent would be to purchase the early-bird check in for $10 – which makes it more likely you get the seat you want.  I did not pay the $10 and took my chances.  So I was on the flight and there are 2 exit row seats open in front of me.   I moved up and took one.  No sooner than I had buckled the seat belt than a flight attendant showed up, asked me for my boarding pass and told me I had to pay for the seat if I wanted it.  He said it “wasn’t fair” since the other guy across the aisle had paid $10 for his seat.  And my point back was that the other guy was guaranteed an exit seat for that $10.  I wasn’t.  He got what he paid for. (I wonder if everyone else on the plane paid the same fare I did – I kind of doubt it – and is that “fair”) . Anyway, I had to move back to my seat and the exit row remained open for the flight.  And you can be pretty sure that I am not getting on Jet Blue again unless there is NO other choice.

So, my point in all this is that isolated events get dismissed – either one of those events that occurred with Jet Blue, by themselves, would not have really bugged me – both together, however, provoked a response because I really do question their commitment to having satisfied customers.  Its no different than the utility that wants to charge you for a home visit and then doesn’t show up, but won’t respect your time back by giving you the next visit for free or a credit on your bill.

Maybe I’m off base, and I know the customer is not always right, but letting the “little things go” earns you good will with your customers.  And goodwill in the bank makes your next mistake as a vendor a little easier for your customers to accept.

So is my thinking wrong here?   What do you think?

– Additional comments added February 11, 2010:  Jet Blue sent me a customer satisfaction survey to fill out.  When I my first comment was that I was unlikely to recommend them, they offered to let me leave the survey immediately (didn’t want bad news?).  But I continued.  2 pages into the survey, the survey tool froze.  Seems like they can’t get the feedback part right either!

To often, those of us who work in marketing spend forget that we have an internal audience as well as our external one.  We focus on getting our message out to our prospects.  Getting our brand assets right.  Creating product or services brochures to tell about what we sell. Etcetera.  What we often forget is that all our colleagues are also our audience.

I hear very often from marketing teams that they don’t get any recognition for the work that is done by their team; that they are always blamed by sales for not doing anything; that management thinks that money is being wasted (which sometimes it is).  For a “group” that is charged with communicating a company’s value, marketing teams are remarkably poor at communicating their value internally.

As part of a marketing team we often have the privilege of understand company strategy and direction on a broad level.  We know how we are going to communicate our messages, where and when. Part of your marketing strategy and focus has got to be internal as well.  How are you going to let everyone inside the company know about the next customer acquisition program? What are you doing to help them understand what the company’s social media strategy is? When are you going to tell them about your latest product in the words and positions that you are taking it to the market with.

Ultimately, the rest of the company you work for or with is you biggest supporter or your largest obstacle to success – what are you doing to market your value internally?

I was having a conversation with a client and he was telling me about a customer engagement, and said to me, I put about $500 in the “should bucket” with that one.  I stopped the conversation and asked him what the heck he was talking about.

He explained to me that he learned a long time ago that every time a customer said to him “you should have”, he knew it was going to cost him money.  So he calls it his should bucket.  I think it is a great way of looking at the work we do for our customers. Whether you are selling actually goods  (you should carry x-item) or services (you should have told me that…), the word should from the mouth of our customers means we did not meet expectations.  And yes, it will cost you cost money – either in lost sales of goods or re-doing work on the services side.

So, to make your should bucket smaller, think long and hard about if you have enough information to move your customer forward on your service (so they don’t come back and say you should have known) and if you sell products, be sure you know where the customer can get an item that they think you “should” carry.

What should you have done differently?  Any lessons you want to share?