There is too much overhead, too much ego, too many promises, too much indifference, too much fake, too much neatness, too much control, too many being lofty, too much distance. And not enough creativity, not enough differentiation, not enough honesty, not enough sincerity, not enough imagination, not enough compassion and not enough questions!

The words we use are changing in business or they should be! They describe what we value, what we do, how we think, what we relate to and how we connect. They are important to not only ourselves but our people and our customers. However, they are shifting:

Words of the past; everywhere, promise, safe, timeless, large, distant, normal, complicated, transactional, steady, conformance, communication, faceless, caring, short term, sophisticated, managers, serious, control, big, frustrating, groups.

Words of the future; provocative, curious, surprise, risky, delivery, partner, conversation, intimate, real, authentic, trust, challenging, thinking, leaders, niche, influential, refreshing, weird, fun, intelligent, long term, simple, individuals.

Being loud, being comfortable, being essential  doesn’t necessarily mean you stand out nowadays! 

If you make the sale…fabulous! Get on with it. However, if not, don’t fall into the trap that if the sales presentation isn’t successful then that’s the end of the relationship. Just because someone has said no doesn’t mean it’s forever. There is no such thing as rejection, just not at this moment in time (unless your prospect was wrong in the first place.)

Out of sight is out of mind. There are all sorts of reasons why people say no. Find out what that is and if the prospect is still worth pursuing then get them clicked into your customer and sales process.

- Send them something immediately that will remind them of you. Not just a boring letter, a gift, different leaflet with a simple message

- Get them onto your database and ensure they receive your emailers and any other marketing tactics you are using

- Build in another time to get to meet them say in six months. Go with a new story that’s intriguing

- Periodically, find an article that they will find interesting and email it to them saying you thought they would find it useful

- In every communication you send to them, always spell out why you are different

Thought you might find this post by Tom Peters interesting! Happy reading:

http://www.tompeters.com/entries.php?rss=1&note=http://www.tompeters.com/blogs/main/010840.php

Tom Peters posted this comment a couple of days ago on his blog. He has a point!

“I don’t invest in anything I don’t understand.”—Warren Buffett

Is there more to the current crisis than this?
I (more or less) don’t think so. - Tom Peters

These are the cuts we should be making:

1. Cut out the marketing that is not working for you right now. If you can’t measure the return on investment, you have a huge problem!

2. Cut out old style marketing and start looking at new ways and rapidly

3. Cut out the excess and be happy with just enough

4. Cut your own pay before cutting employees

5. Cut copying everyone else

6. Cut being mediocre and average

7. Cut not taking risks

8. Cut the moaning

9. Cut out blaming everyone else for the woes

As Colin Powell said “Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.” Mmmmm he has a point.

Word of mouth is still the most important form of human communication. It can be subtle, it can be extraordinary, it can be good or it can be ridiculously bad. Nevertheless, it’s one of the most important tactics in your marketing campaign. Today we are battered by all sorts of advertising and tedious messages trying to get us to part with our hard earned cash. In truth, we’ve closed our eyes and covered our ears. Bored with the rude interruption to our lives, tired of the repetitive messaging, companies apathetic to the things that we are really interested in and the insincere communication which turns us cold.

It’s all a little bit unconvincing. Anyone in the UK who has seen the recent series of television adverts from Nat West will know exactly what I mean. If ever, there was a company that’s lost touch with where their customer has shifted to then there is your evidence!

In essence, at this moment in time, it is word of mouth that needs to be at the forefront of your marketing campaign. Perhaps it’s the only persuasive tool that any of us respond to anymore, fuelled by the enormous amount of blogs, forums and social networks at our disposal. And, perhaps word of mouth is something we all need to deliberately weave into our marketing activities. In short, it may be the very thing that stops you from just surviving and actually helps you thrive.

Why can small businesses compete with the corporates? Because:

They have soul

They have passion

They have a sense of community

They have small teams that can make quick decisions

They are more intimate, personal and in touch with their customers

They can change their business models to fit new ways of marketing

However, small businesses need to get better at:

Reinventing their marketing…..period.

Differentiating themselves.

Executing at least some of those great ideas they come up with.

Employing leadership behaviours not management traits.

Investment not cost cutting.

Taking a hard, long look at what they need to change in the next 3 years.

The question is, are you making waves or just ‘bobbing’ along to see where all this takes you?

Perhaps I’m looking at things too simply but a small dose of reality and less irrelevant analysis is what is required. Why are businesses dropping like dead flies? Why are so many household brands failing? Why are a lot of us not feeling any sympathy for all those heading down a cul de sac with no turning circle at the end?

Common factors for the problems that, WOW, us small business people learn from:

1. Many businesses have borrowed too much to acquire their competitors or grow…..ego!

2. Many businesses have too much overhead, way too much….simple greed!

3. Too many businesses have failed to move with the times…..poor strategy, bad management and lack of foresight!

4. Too many businesses have not differentiated themselves in the market place and are still following a mass marketing route….plain stupid!

5. Far too many businesses have stunted their development by treating their people like any other resources….dumb!

If you are not different you need to be cheaper and if you are not the cheapest or not the most expensive what are you? You are in the middle, average and vulnerable because I, the customer, don’t see the value you offer. Failing to move with the times is unforgivable and unforgiving. Businesses are quick to try and get rid of ‘dead wood,’ now it’s the marketplace’s turn to naturally filter those with that have stood still for too long.

If you look at the wrong part of the problem, it can lead to the wrong solution!

1. You have problems with cash flow so you go to the bank for an overdraft to fund working capital. In most cases, the real problem; you actually don’t have enough customers. Your focus should be marketing and sales.

2. My staff don’t use their initiative and behave in the way I want them to. So you go out and get some management training for them. The real problem is probably you. You just aren’t leading them well enough!

3. I’m not going to market anymore, it just doesn’t work. Well, it’s not your product failing to attract the right customers, it’s your failure beforehand to correctly identify the real problem. Get your marketing thinking right before spending enormous amounts of money on the wrong tactics.

It’s all about intentionally reinventing the key aspects of your business. We need to be able to clearly make the distinction between the root cause of the problem and not simply the symptom. We need to definately know what’s going on without yielding to what we think is going on, which to say the least would be just poor management.