Market leadership | No Smoke and Mirrors

How Do We Create: Repeatable, Sustainable, Profitable Growth in our organizations?…Study Both Market Leaders and Market Losers

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As leaders we are drawn to success stories. We study businesses teams that seem to defy the odds and win. Teams that realize profitable sustainable growth, even in the worst economic conditions, command our respect and admiration. However, for us as leaders to create teams that drive ; repeatable, sustainable, profitable growth we must study both the market leaders like Apple as well as those that were once leaders who fell from grace like Zenith.

I just finished another book that will definitely be on my must read list for business leaders; How the Mighty Fall; and why some companies never give in, by Jim Collins. As I page through the book once more I see page after page with highlights, underlining’s and notes in the margins. I have been a fan of Collin’s since Good to Great. I enjoy his non emotional, almost scientific approach to the dynamics of business.

Collins identifies the value business leaders can gain by studying companies who did not win and actually fell from grace.

I remember Zenith TV’s when I was a child growing up in Cleveland, Ohio in the 1960’s. They were the best TV’s. If you were to ask anyone who the leader in TV’s was they would have said Zenith back then. However today they are non existent. What happened?

How does this fall from grace occur?

What did they do wrong?

Is it something that was preventable or inevitable?

Are their common early warning signs we can watch for so our teams do not move from a position of “market leader” to “market loser”?

I particularly found his identifying the stages of decline brilliant as I have lived each with various clients over the past 25 years.

Stage 1: Hubris Born of Success

Stage 2: Undisciplined pursuit of More

Stage 3: Denial and Risk of Peril

Stage 4: Grasping for Salvation

Stage 5: Capitulates to irrelevance or Death

In addition to providing the common steps once market leaders often faced on their fall, he also provides what he calls; “markers” or early warning signs to see if your team is in one of the five stages of decline.

I highly recommend this book for business leaders who want to passionately serve their markets while increasing their shareholder value. In this book he draws on an analogy of how a “sick” business is like a sick person. On the outside they may look fine, but upon further investigation you find illness. If you find” Sickness” early enough you can take corrective action to cure the problem and avoid future pain. If arrogantly left unchecked, often due to the “hubris” of stage one, businesses become sick and it can be terminal.

How about your organization? Could your team be in one of the five stages of decline right now?

Does your business need a check up?

Does your team have a culture that would admit a problem?… or do you have Hubris? (Excessive pride that brings down a hero)

Are you battling an 800 pound gorilla in your market that is in denial? Is your team positioned to help your market when they fall?

I want to leave you with a couple of my favorite quotes from this book;

“The path out of darkness begins with those exasperatingly persistent individuals who are constitutionally incapable of capitalism”

“There is no law of nature that the most powerful will inevitably remain at the top. Anyone can fall and most eventually do”

“There are more ways to fall than become great…”

“Great companies can stubble badly and recover”

I think it was Lincoln who said; “those who do not study history are destined to repeat it” I recommend you and your leadership team read and discuss; How the mighty fall. I ask you humbly challenge yourself and your leaders to insure your team are destined for profitable growth and not a fall.

Buying Experience is a Differentiator When Products and Services are Similar

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How do you win the customer’s business when you have a number of competitors with products that solve the same problem as yours? A number of businesses quickly jump to lower prices, however we learned in my post: WARNING: Buyer’s say what salespeople do wrong? PRICE is not on the list!.. That price is not even on the buyers list of why they do not buy from you. So how can you differentiate your product or service in a sea of other possible competitors who can solve the same problem for your customers?

Make the buying experience your differentiator and you will win business.

When is the last time you rented a car? I travel quite a bit and I often rent cars when I arrive. This experience is typically a cold and “a matter of fact” experience. You get on the bus, drive to some parking lot, go into a building, wait in line, then the person behind the counter tries to ;

upgrade your car
rent you a navigation device
sell you insurance
sell you a gas option

It’s kind of frustrating as I am tired, I just flew 4 hours, it’s often late at night, ( always seems to be raining) and all I want is my “Fricken” car! Instead I have to run the sales gauntlet and it honestly the experience irritates me.

Enterprise Rental Car surprised me this week in Denver. I arrived and jumped on the bus and I was greeted by Tony who helped me with my bags and said…”Hi, thank you for choosing Enterprise and I will be your driver today.” This was a nice surprise versus trying to jump on the bus before the doors close. As we pulled away from the airport Tony went on to say “ we will have a short 8 minute drive to your car” hummm, it’s like he was reading my mind…I was just wondering ; how long will it take to get to the car, do I have enough time? We hear him on his radio informing the rest of his team he has 3 guests and he was 1 minute out. Again, interesting…maybe they will actually have enough people on staff so I do not have to wait in a long line as Dollar and Thrifty have made me do in other cities recently ?

When we arrive there are about six people waiting with clipboards. I meet Jody; “ Hi I am Jody and I will be helping you with your car and get you on your way, come on inside and we will do your paperwork…oh would you like some coffee or water?” Again, another interruption from the norm…this is pretty cool. So I hand her my driver’s license and credit card and wait to be pitched….nothing. She says “OK Mark please sign this form and I will meet you outside and show you your car.” A bit nervous as this is not what typically happens I stop her….”wait a minute, what about the gas options, insurance, and so on?” She smiles and said “we will discuss that outside let’s get you on your way” (so she gets it I want to move through this quickly? No way!)

She walks me outside and shows me cars and said these are your choices if you want those other cars over there it would be an upgrade, but that is up to you. I decline, but that was a much nicer way of presenting upgrades. She gets in my car, starts it, then walks around and inspects it for me. Every other rental company makes me do this on my own, if I remember… She shares the insurance options, I decline, she explains what will happen if I have a accident, but in an informative way, I was not feeling like I was being sold.

Jody then asks if she can help me with directions, restaurants, radio stations… (You kidding me? Am I on candid camera or something? ) I said no thanks, and before I jumped in I had to ask;

So Jody, what’s the deal? I mean I rent cars all over the US every week and no one has treated me this good…do you have a guy from corporate here today…are you guys going through training today?…. She said no, this is how we choose to do business here. We are one of the most profitable Enterprise locations and our supervisor trained us to treat people like they were only customer. She went on to say they are buying two competitors who will soon be under the Enterprise umbrella as well.

Jody shook my hand, and then gave me the office phone number and an emergency number…and away I went.

This overall experience was quicker than what I have experienced with Hertz, Dollar, Thrifty, Alamo, and significantly better. I promise you I will use Enterprise in Denver again, and try Enterprise on my travels next week in other cities… I hope this is a chain wide program.

When your competitors have products and services that solve your buyers’ problems, you can use the “buying experience” to differentiate your business and win future business.

How about you? Have you experienced amazing service that has made you want to use that business again?

Have you experienced service that made you never want to use that business again?

Hey Dollar, Alamo, Hertz, Thrifty executives…get out from behind your desks and rent a car from Enterprise in Denver and see what kind of experience your buyers really want!

( how many of your recent customers remember the names of the rental bus driver and the person who checked them in?)

How about your customers?…what kind of experience are they receiving?

Sales is a Science When You Have Strong Marketing….an Art When Your Marketing Sucks!

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Is sales and “art” or a “science”? It depends….is your marketing strong, or does it suck?

In my last post: Is Sales an Art or a Science I shared how I opened a recent presentation to business owners and their senior leadership teams with a question;

Is Sales an Art or a Science?

The responses were pretty predictable;

Felt sales was a science: 30%

Felt sales was an Art: 60%

Felt sales was both an art and a science: 10%

This was interesting, however I heard the soft comment I was waiting for: “It Depends…on your industry, team’s training, product, price, availability of sales tools, your web site….” (Perfect! Now we are going to have a discussion!)

Then they asked me…what did I think? Art or science? I said “yes” as sales is often both. I find where sales falls in the spectrum with art on one end and science on the other depends on the organizations competency in marketing.

Marketing? Yes, because the fundamental job of marketing is to have an intimate understanding of your market, its buyer’s problems, and how they set out to solve those problems. Competent marketing teams clearly understand the buying process, cycle and criteria. They create tools to help buyers buy.

Market Leaders

If you have a strong competency in marketing, you know your market, and its problems that need to be solved. You know the buyers; you have clearly stated buyer persona’s and you understand the buying process. Your message is clear and does not require a translator (salesperson) to help buyers understand the problems your products or services solve.

Market leaders have such a clear understanding of the buying process their sales is more of a science. The art in the sale for market leaders is the salesperson’s ability to ask open-ended questions and apply proven sales tools for the right step of the buying process that keeps the conversation moving to a sale.

In market leading organizations, sales are 80% science and 20% art.

Unfortunately less than 10% of organizations would be considered Market leaders. Those that are, dominate their markets.

Market losers

If your team lacks a competency in marketing you will experience it for yourself on sales calls. Your team plays; “ feature and benefit BINGO” in hopes they rattle off all your features and benefits and at some point your buyer yells “BINGO” as they put the pieces together with the problem they have, and they understand how they “think” you solve this problem.

Market losers really do not know the problems their products solve for their buyers, the buying process, or buying criteria. In most cases their products were built from the inside out and marketing was tasked with “creating the need” for their products…losers!

Market losers launch products and believe they can “manage by objectives” and meet their goals by managing key performance indicators created without any knowledge of their market.

Market losers have high turnover as they replace those who fail to hit goal, and skilled team members leave to join market driven teams.

Market losers have websites that talk about their company, years in business, and they prepare the feature and benefit BINGO card for their buyers and salespeople.

For market losers 80% of sales is an “art”.

The CEO and CFO of market losing companies go crazy because there is a lack of predictability, and they can not “manage” their way to market leadership. In this model your salespeople need to disregard what marketing does provide, and listen to their buyers, understand buyer problems, and create their own sales tools that discuss how their product or service solves those problems.

The danger in this model is sales may be promising things your product does not do, and the message varies by salesperson and thus is not repeatable.

From my experience, I would say about 50% of the companies out there are Market losers.

They build products because they can and not because they should. They are sales driven or bottom line driven. They have high turnover and ironically the salespeople they are letting go today won awards for sales performance two years ago….so what changed?

From my experience 40% of companies are somewhere in between but striving to improve.

They often launch a product that becomes very successful and then have a series of launches that fail. As they grow, the leaders who knew the market are now “managing the business” and lose touch with the market and its problems. They forget it was their understanding of market problems that caused their success and often fall into the trap that they think it was their personal brilliance and or hut spa.

As I closed the discussion I asked everyone in the room to do two things in the next seven days….

Go out and meet with your customers and ask questions about their business and the problems they are facing, and how they try to solve those problems

Look in your top salesperson’s trunk of their car and or lap top and see the tools they are using

The good news is everyone can become a market leading organization and realize higher than market average profits, lower turnover and increased shareholder equity. When you clearly understand your market and buyers, and create sales tools to help buyers move through their buying process, you create a win-win-win.

So what kind of organization do you work for? Market leader? Market Loser? Or someplace in between? Why?

Is Sales an Art or a Science….it Depends on Your Marketing

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Is Sales an “Art” or a “Science”?

There is no general answer that applies to all organizations as it depends…..it depends on your team’s demonstrated competency in marketing. (Believe it or not)

An “Art “implies creativity as well as varietability and” science“is about process, method and constantly assessing and experimenting with process, and managing the process.

A number of clients over the years have stated their needs as; “I need you to create a repeatable sales process for our team”. However, in most cases they lacked a clear understanding of their market, buyers, buyer needs, probelms, and the buying process. They wanted me to study their “sales super star” and replicate them throughout their team. However sales processes built from the inside out produce marginal sales increases and often increase the gap between your team’s “sales speak” and “the buying process”. What you need to do is create Sales Velocity.

So what sould teams desiring to be market leaders to do?

I was asked to speak at a conference recently for business owners and their senior teams. Prior to my presentation, I reached out to the organization’s members and asked;

“In the areas of marketing and sales what topic would you like me to discuss?”

I could have discussed a number of topics, but I wanted to provide their members the maximum return based on their needs. I was interested to see if the recent and current economic environment in any way changed what I typically here when I ask this question.

The responses varied from;

How do we get our salespeople to sell new products?

How do we motivate our salespeople to focus on opening new accounts?

What is the best way to measure the ROI of marketing?

How do we align sales and marketing to reduce waste and increase productivity?

What is the best marketing vehicle to drive sales now? Quickly?

What is my take on “social media” and it’s ROI?

How can I be assured my next investment in a new product launch meets goal ?

I felt I could speak for a week and not do justice to all the questions independently, so I grouped the responses into two buckets;

What is marketing and how can it impact sales in a way that produces the greatest overall return?

How do we create a repeatable sales process that works, has an immediate and long term impact?

I shared my findings with the event coordinator to insure the direction I was taking would serve his association and his goals. He shared that the two topics I chose were like thorns in the side of his membership as they keep bubbling to the top of discussions. So I asked questions to better understand past discussions and he shared two comments his owners and senior leaders shared in private;

“Our salespeople are just not working hard enough, I know times are tough, but for what I pay them they need to sell through those objections”

“I think a large % of our overall marketing spend is a waste, fluff, and does not provide the return any other expenditure would be required to produce.”

Interesting…..

So I decided to open this presentation with a question for the room;

Is Sales an Art or a science?

Before I share where this discussion went….

What do you think?

Is sales in your organization an Art or Science? Why?

If you could pick Art or Science, what would you prefer sales to be in your organization? Why?

I will share in my next post the results I observed and any feedback and comments on this post. I will also share the desired state and my answer to this question.

Hey Delta, …Buyers Make Decisions in “their timeframe” Not Yours! Your Goals do not Matter to your Buyers

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Organizations that create objectives based on their needs and timelines and not their buyers miss key indicators and create frustration for their internal and external customers. Why do so many organizations create goals and key performance indicators from high within their organizations and not from the market and buyers in market?

Most organizations lack an intimate knowledge of their buyers, their problems, and buying process so they operate in “gut and intuition mode.”

When organizations start building market driven goals with an understanding of the problems their products and services solve, key indicators and EBITDA objectives are met and exceeded.

If you have not gathered it from previous posts, I fly a great deal. Domestic travel has become more of a necessary evil experience (with the exception of South West). I have traveled on business now for over 25 years, so I remember when air travel felt like the airlines valued me and my business.

International travel has become even more challenging. I traveled from Phoenix to Manchester England recently on Delta. I had a long layover in Atlanta and then 7 1/2 hour flight over the pond and I was in business. The first leg of my flight left Phoenix at 6:10 AM. so based on the rules for international travel I had to check in at the airport by 4:00 AM. Luckily I do not live too far from the airport so I set my alarm at 2:45 AM. I arrived, parked the car, took the parking bus to the terminal, went through security and arrived at my departure gate.

I settled in with a book I have wanted to read by Jim Collins and I was not looking forward to my 5 hour layover in Atlanta,… but you have to do what you have to do.

The gate agent announced;

We are overbooked on this flight and we are looking for 4 volunteers willing to take the later flight and we will give a voucher to be used for future travel…

I went up to the check in counter, and found I could indeed take the later flight and still have a hour to make my connection in Atlanta. However, since I was already at the airport, I decided to decline.

In about 15 minutes another announcement needing volunteers and her voice seemed more desperate. ( don’t customers know how important it is to Delta to get volenteers now?)

As the boarding time approached we heard additional announcements and eventually they found their volunteers who had “flexible” flight plans and they received later flights and cash vouchers. ( while our take off was delayed)

Hey Delta…when did your system know you were oversold?

Is this the ideal buyer experience for your service? …I think not.

If your system knew within 24 hours of the flight it was over sold, it sounds like you have an unresolved problem you need to solve that may actually turn into a service your customers rave about and save your bottom-line profits…Interested?

If you have the technology to remind me to check in 24 hours prior to the flight, …can you leverage that technology to request volunteers for overbooked flights 24 ours ahead of check in? If so I would have volunteered for free to have a few more hours of shut eye!

How about your organization?

Do you set sales goals and timelines based on your needs versus the markets? How’s that working for you?

Are your sales objectives and timelines created by internal Hippos who have a dated understanding of your market?

Or are your goals developed with a clear understanding of your buyers, their buying process and criteria?

Let me ask you a key question….

What % of your sales team met or exceeded their sales goals last year? If you are like most organizations as high as 70% of your team missed their sales objectives last year.

While on this topic let me ask you another question:

What % of your salespeople received a goal increase this year?…( that many huh?)

So let me get this straight, 70% of your team missed their sales objectives in 2009, and 100% received a goal increase in 2010? Am I the only one who has heard Einstein’s definition of insanity? [Hell, chances are you have used it in meetings with your team, why not look in the mirror when setting goals?] So your employees also suffer whn goals are made wiout an understanding of your buyers?

So what happens next?

Objectives are missed

Goals are adjusted down or inventory far exceeds actual sales, and EBITDA objectives are missed…again

And / or you discount your product or service so buyers react to your goals and timelines

Market leaders understand goals should not be a shell game, and they must be created from a clear understanding of your markets and how (when) your buyers buy.

Market losers create objectives in their Hippo watering holes called boardrooms with little or no understanding of their buyers, buying timelines, and buying process.They focus on their needs and not those of their buyers. They demand buyers to buy on thier timeline.

Market Losers get frustrated because objectives and key timelines are being missed, and they try to “manage” their way to bottom-line objectives.

What kind of company do you work for?

What kind of a leader are you?

If you are a Hippo, when is the last time you left “the watering hole”?

When was the last time you bought or used your product or service?

When was the last time you talked to a potential buyer for your product?

Are you dictating when buyers must buy?

The solution is obvious….

Get out in your market and get to know your customers and potential customers today. When you do you will discover market problems and see opportunities for your team to solve those problems.

Who knows, you may also create raving fans who value a few extra hours a shut eye more than a $400 travel voucher.

Are Your Salespeople Selling In The “Domain of Losses?”…If so It’s Costing You

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The economic climate has changed the buying process, and thus the sales process as I discuss in my blog: Are you Enabling your Sales Force or Emasculating them?. Buyers are taking longer to make purchases, they want better prices, extended terms, some of your competitors are making irrational price proposals just to pay their light bill, and there are now more people and they are often C-level executives the buyer’s company involvd in the buying process.

Having led sales and marketing teams for over 20 years, through good and bad times, some of your salespeople may be in a dangerous ( and costly) place…

The Domain of Losses.

We’ve either been their personally or witnessed the following.

You are in Las Vegas, or another gambling location and you (they) are wining. It feels like you can do no wrong; you are “lucky” tonight. Then something changes…the dealer at the blackjack table, new dice, a new ball for the roulette wheel and the next thing you know you are losing. Bet after bet you are loosing and very quickly you are no longer playing with the house money you won but now you are dipping into your own. What was fun and the time of your life has become something that makes you anxious and irritable. You know you should walk away and live to fight another day, but a strange little voice whispers to you; you will have to bet more to get back to where you were when you were wining. Most of us can resist this voice and walk away.

However there are those few who enter a dark, anxious and fearful place; The Domain of losses. In this zone studies show people make unethical decisions when they are under goal. Their desire is to see those chips (commissions) grow rapidly again and they start making irrational long shot bets to get whole again. As the losses continue to increase the aggressive irrational strategies increase and the losses grow exponentially.

If any of your salespeople are in this fearful and irrational place after missing quota for a number of months and having little if any personal commission contribution,…

you must pull them away from the table. (Their market) or it could cost you for years.

What signs indicate a salesperson is in or may be in; The Domain of losses?

1. Every sale has a price concession

2. Customers pay their invoice short due to un-communicated “deals” your salesperson gave them to get the sale.

3. The salesperson’s Accounts Receivable exceeds other regions selling the same products by 10 days or more.

4. You notice an increase in expenses

5. They complain about product quality more than other sales representatives selling the same product in other regions.

6. They focus on features competitors have and your product lacks

7. When asked to create a plan to correct their performance you receive a strategy that is basically doubling down. Their entire year hangs on the thread of landing that new account they have been promising they would close for the last six months.

8. You lose key customers in their region who have been with your organization for years

9. As an individual they are living beyond their means

10. They act alone, no sense of teamwork or trust in other department competencies…” I’ll have to do it myself”

11. You receive complaints from your internal customer service and accounts receivables about this person, their mistakes, and poor overall attitude with the rest of the team.

12 . You catch them lying to you about meetings they had with accounts

If you read the above and you have someone on your team with three or more of the above you need to help them push away from the table (market) as.. .

They are scrambling in fear, when they should be focusing on real opportunity.

As the leader you must recognize the warning signs early and take bold corrective action;

pull them away from the table
seek to understand their fear drivers ( income, job loss, loved one pressure)
help them rewrite the stories , thoughts that have become beliefs in their minds with tactics and outcomes their irrational thoughts could not see
if they do not change quickly…Fold (their membership on your team)

Having been a salesperson and managed salespeople for years,we are a rare breed. Ideally you want someone who understands their market, your product and the problem it solves for the buyer, and they have relationships built on trust with their key account buyers. The trouble is this requires skill, art and science. I prefer the Mavericks who break though the roadblocks to a sale than the Gelding’s waiting for direction on how to overcome the objections they are experiencing.

When the chips were flowing in regardless of what your team did, they did not need to be all that good.

Challenging economic environments will help you to quickly identify the sales leaders from the sales losers.

If you are the person in fear mode, doubling down to get caught up you first need to;

Recognize what you are doing , and that it never works

Connect to your fear driver

Challenge your fear driver(s) to see if they are true

If not true- you need to intentionally re-write the thoughts that become beliefs so you leave the domain of losses and your fears subside so your creative problem solving returns

If true ask for help

As CEO, has your VP of Sales said something like: “you are right, Bob’s numbers are way off and his expenses seem high, but he has always come through in the past” make both of them leave the table.

How about your team?

Do you have any team members in the domain of losses?

Could other departments also enter this zone? If so provide examples.

Has a key account complained recently about their bill being wrong?

Is your entire team in the Domain if losses?

Have you pulled team members away and helped them return after training to exceed expectations? …Tell us about it.

As the leader you must be constructively paranoid about your buyers, their buying process, sales, and sales team members.

If you see any of the indicators I discussed above do yourself a favor and pull them away from the table sooner than later. Your shareholders and key accounts will thank you, and when you change your salesperson’s perspective… they will thank you.

(Ok thanking you probably is a push…, they will perform and you will go home at night and be able to sleep)

You Got a Minute to Win It…Your Buyers’ Attention

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When you are shopping for a new item where do you start? If you are buying a snack or Diet Coke you find the nearest source. However, when you set out to buy more substantial products most of us start shopping with an internet search. Information once only available through a salesperson is now available on web sites, in chat rooms and blogs. Where most organizations’ web sites fail is their message is about them, how great they are, how many years they have been in business, who some of their key customers are, and awards…blah …blah….blah.

Market leaders know their web site needs a concise message that clearly states the problem they solve for their buyers because today you have less than a minute to win it…your buyers’ attention that is.

Have you seen the new game show on Sunday nights titled; “You’ve got a minute to win it.” I predict this show will not only be a huge success but it will have entrepreneurs creating home minute to win it games and consumers will be making their own contests based on what they have seen on television.

As our family watched this new game show we found ourselves cheering for the contestants as they attempted challenges of varying difficulty. I thought how similar these contests are with the environment most marketers face when trying to capture consumer interest on line.

Your web site should not require practice for consumers to win (find answers to their unresolved problems)

The contestants on this show have all practiced their challenges at home prior to appearing on the show. So they practiced balancing bolts strung on a chop stick and bouncing a ping pong ball over three consecutive plates and into a fish bowl. What we as business people can learn for this includes;

your potential customers do not want to learn how to win , practice finding, the problems your product and or service solves for them
It is your responsibility to test and keep testing your web site and adjust it so potential buyers “get it in a minute.”

The moral of this blog post is;

*when your marketing team knows they have a minute to win it in terms of customer attention they will boil your message down and clearly explain the problem your product or service solves for buyers in your market. When done properly you receive more traffic, more page views, a reduced bounce rate, more inquires that turn into more leads, and ultimately more sales.

So how about your web site and your message…if you asked a potential customer to view your site would they understand the problem you solve for them?

Does the imagery on your site also clearly show the problems you solve for buyers in your market? Not sure?

Print your home page and give it to potential customers. Potential customers are buyers in your market that could use your product but you have not sold them in the past. Set your timer for a minute and ask them to quickly read and view your web page. [Warning; if you are a C level executive and chose to try this you will not like the answers you receive if you are like 90% of companies] If you are a market leader clearly explaining the problems you solve and not playing “feature and benefit bingo” hoping your buyers figure out what you do, you will enjoy this exercise.

You have a minute to win it in terms of customer attention when they are shopping on the internet.

Your web site must clearly state the problems you solve for your buyers in your market, ideally in the voice of your market. If you fail to do so they will be gone in a click to other sites until they find one that does not require practice to master.

How about your companies’ web site?

Do you understand the problems you solve in less than a minute? (If your answer is no you are really in trouble as you have more product knowledge than your buyers just starting their buying process)

Do you have the courage to ask potential customers to take the win it in a minute challenge on your web site?

Is your current web site a virtual brochure that requires customers to play feature and benefit Bingo to understand your message and the problems your product or service solves?

You have a minute to win it with buyers shopping on line for solutions to solve their problems. Your website must clearly state the problems you solve for your buyers in less than a minute or you loose the game.

Start-up’s….Like Wiring a House With The Power On…and getting zapped

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The start-up phase is often one of the most difficult phases for entrepreneur as they often try to gain market knowledge while trying to meet sales goals. You know you should gather market data, but you often have limited cash, you are the chief cook and bottle washer, and you need to make sales to fund your future growth.

Start-up leaders need a strong emotional intelligence as many days you feel like you are; wiring a house with the power on and you keep getting emotionally zapped.

A number of years ago my wife was redesigning our upstairs bathroom and asked I change the electrical outlets from a cream color to a solid white. So we turned the lights on in the bathroom and I went to the fuse box and flipped switches until the bathroom light went out. I started to remove the outlet and saw a small spark. I thought to myself…”That’s odd as I know the electric power was off…” (My perceived truth) so I continued removing the old outlet. Zap! Next thing I knew I received a shock that sent me up against the wall and I fell into the bathtub. I latter found a new truth…the lights were on a separate circuit than the outlets so I was trying to change the outlet with the power on.

One of the most exhilarating as well as frustrating things you can do is launch a start-up company. Like I discussed in a previous post you feel like a plate spinner with more to-do’s than hours in a day. I go on to discuss how we can’t let the most important plates drop. I have discussed in earlier blogs how 2/3 of start-ups fail within 18 months. The main reasons we are all aware of for start-up failure include;

run out of cash
lack of a market driven plan
if you have a plan, your sales expectation is too high, too soon
if you have a plan, you have an unrealistic understanding of the buying process and cycle
trying to sell the need for a product you launched because you could and not because you should
market is not large enough
customers do not want to pay to solve the problem you solve
stress

Assuming your product and or service solves an unmet need, and you have a large enough market who are willing to pay you to solve their problem, the real danger for entrepreneurs is getting zapped by stress during the start-up season of your business..

To keep you from getting emotionally zapped from stress during the often hectic start-up phase, there are five key Biblical lessons I learned from a sermon recently.

1. Don’t wear yourself out – build the discipline to determine what is important, urgent, and focus on what is :urgent and important

2. Don’t shut out others – the reality is you can’t do it alone. Now more than ever you need your network, family, and friends

3. Don’t just focus on Negatives – that’s what market losers do. Keep your eyes on the prize and look for bright lights of opportunity as you launch.

4. Focus on your physical and Spiritual health – far too often those mounting to-do’s make us drop or delay other key areas of our lives. If necessary put time on your calendar for your fitness and faith.

5. Anxiety and fear are the product of looking back or too far into the future , focus on what is in front of you now, and leverage what you have. The quickest way to stop creatively solving roadblocks is to become fearful.

What about you? Have you experienced stress during the start-up phase?

What advice do you recommend to entrepreneurs in the start-up phase of their business?

What zapped you most in your start-up?

Choose to be a Builder in 2010….not a Wrecker

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I enjoyed a recent column in our Scottsdale Republic by Michael Ryan. He published a poem tiled; “Which am I? “ He was not sure who the author was but the message lives even stronger today than it did seven years ago when he first shared it.

When times get tough we usually see one of two behaviors in organizations;

Teams begin infighting and blame-storming

Teams unite, grow stronger, and emerge as market leaders

Ryan goes on to discuss how “Instead of working together to solve problems, some people seemed more willing to battle one another.” I see this far too often with large clients in which managers retreat to their silos and start shooting missiles at each other instead of competitors.

So I have to ask…

what kind of a team do you work for?….

A market leading team that discusses real issues and works together to solve them?

Or…

A market loosing team of managers so concerned with covering their own rear ends they wouldn’t know an unresolved market problem or a roadblock to providing a positive customer experience if it bit them?

No matter how others in your organization may be acting under the pressure you have a choice.

Chose to be a Builder.

( less than 10% of your team will choose to be builders)

I hope you enjoy this poem as much as I did.

Which am I?

I watched them tearing a building down.

A gang of men in a busy town.

With a ho-heave –ho and a lusty yell,

They swung a beam and the sidewall fell.

I asked the foreman, “Are those men skilled.

And the kind you would hire if you had to build?”

He gave me a laugh and said “No indeed,

Just common labor is all I need.

I can easily wreck in a day or two

What other builders have taken a year to do.”

I thought to myself as I went my way,

“Which of these roles have I tried to play?”

Am I a builder that works with care,

Measuring life by the rule and the square?

Am I shaping my deeds to a well-made plan,

Patiently doing the best I can?

Or am I a wrecker who walks the town,

Content with the labor of tearing down?”

– unknown author

I would like to add a few lines….

If you have played the role of wrecker you should not despair,

As wrecking is easy for those who do not care.

To add value, now that is the to pass through the camels eye,

It is there leaders are born solving problems that arise.

Having the courage to often stand alone, to be a part of the solution,

When their peers partake in political pollution.

Ok, so I wasn’t meant to be a poet. But I have worked within a number of organizations that lack leaders willing to be a part of the solution. When we focus on the problem and not attacking the person we are often called “heretics”.

The best way to add value to the team is to be a builder and not a wrecker.

( there are far too few builders these days)

Builders identify and solve problems. They flip what is perceived by most to be a problem and turn them into opportunities to add value.

Wreckers take the easy route quickly criticizing and tearing down creative new ideas and they often overlooking roadblocks and broken processes for perceived personal safety.

So who will you choose to be in 2010?

Thanks again to Michael Ryan for the above Poem.

Technorati Tags: Market leader,builder,market loser,wrecker,creative problem solving,solve unresolved problems,identify road blocks

“Colonel Custer had a plan “…What To Do When Your Plan Is Not Driven by Market or Internal Truths and You Lack a Market Driven Motivation

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After writing my post: Third Part of truth …Motivation; Are You willing to go the extra mile like Chick-fil-A? I had someone contact me with a question I thought was worth sharing.

“I read your last post and I can’t agree more with gathering market truths, assessing internal truths ( particularly after recent lay offs) and having a motivation to make a difference in the lives of those in your marketplace….

But what do you do when you work for an organization that built a plan based on old market data, an inflated view of internal capabilities ( that assumes we work 18-20 hour days) and a motivation that is singularly focused on making our owner wealthier and not changing the lives of those in the market we serve?”

Having helped a number of companies in a variety of industries over the year’s… shame on me for not expecting this question. Not only have I personally faced this dilemma, I know a number of people trying to obediently execute plans that were written from within their organization and lacking market data today.

I enjoyed the conversation with this young man, and below is what I advised him to do;

Gather current Market Truths

Chances are, at some point your leaders were market driven based on the growth they have experienced over the past 20 years. At some point however they started relying on their own personal guts and intuition and forgot the true market sensing process that empowered their original growth. The first thing I advised him to do is assess the market truths of today. Once complete, compare and contrast the plan you were given to execute in relation to current market truths. Note the strategies and tactics that are in alignment and call out those that are no longer rational based on new data.

Write a market truths document

Highlight strategies and tactics in your current plan that are no longer in alignment with the market of today

Asses your internal truths, capabilities, discard to-do’s that do not support your road map

If your team lacks a motivation to serve your market, create one

Write a plan you will execute based on the information you have shared and allow some flexibility

As we closed the call this young manager said “we have a plan, but I am sure Colonel Custer thought he had a plan too…”

Yes, I am sure he did. But he too underestimated the competition and lacked a clear understanding of his market realities. He had scouts warn him that he grossly underestimated the size of his completion but he failed to listen. Is it any wonder this famous battle was over in less than an hour? ( kind of like how most new products are off the shelf within 18 months)

The people I always wondered about were his men…I am sure most were seasoned military soldiers and by nature trained to take and follow orders. However there had to be a few heretics in the ranks and I wonder if they had the courage to speak up, did some dissert the night before the battle, or did they knowing walk into their own demise? History states a number of his men were seen running from the battle when it was obvious all was lost.

If you are asked to execute a plan that is not market driven based on the current realities of your market today, you owe it to your team ( and yourself) to present current market data.

Leaders do not just state the disconnections their plan has with the market realities, but they also provide possible new strategies, they become a part of the solution.

Be a leader… and if you are a member of a team that frowns on gathering current market data to create market driven strategies your have two choices;

Stay on the team and expect to be to do driven, chasing outcomes of the day

Leave the team and seek out market leading organizations that value writing plans strategically based on current market data

I could tell he did not like the second option , (nor did I when I felt the need to leave one of the teams I served when their plans were so far from market truths I experienced physical health concerns as I attempted to be a soldier and follow orders.) I was much younger then and I was still under the erroneous assumption that the Hippos in the room were the most knowledgeable.

How about your organization…do you believe the plan you will execute in 2010 was written with current market data?

If you answer is no, what do you plan to do? Why?

Have you ever presented your Hippos current market data that was contradictory to the plan they gave you to execute?

(Would love to have an expert jump in here on the effects on employee physical health when they attempt to execute plans that are not in alignment with the market realities of today)

Technorati Tags: Market driven strategy,market driven,market leader,market data,market sensing,chasing outcomes,market truth,internal truth