Mar 14, 2012 | Customers, Marketing, Sales
Rarely does anything happen behind a desk, so why do you spend so much time there? Just like the old saying “the harder I work, the luckier I get” small business owners should say “the more customers I see, the greater chance of an order”
Most small business owners are usually specialists of some sort, they are not often sales people first, they are something else first, and it takes an effort to get out and sell.
Do the preparation, know the customer know how you can add value to his/her business, and get out there.
Mar 14, 2012 | Management, Operations
Retailing is under pressure, all the established retailers are suffering declines in profitability, and the media is full of retail CEO’s bemoaning the eroding margins.
Australians appetite for flat screen TV’s over the last couple of years were is amazing, we now have TV’s in almost every room in the house, and prices have dropped precipitously as volumes have increased, and we are unwilling to pay for fat retail margins.
Surprise, surprise.
The reduction of the 40% margins for retailers, delivering from $530-600 for a unit 2 years ago, to single digit margins and $40 through the till today has all the retail CEO’s crying poor.
The change in the retail competitive environment has not been matched by the performance measures bricks and mortar retailers employ, and their business model is becoming redundant.
Retailers focus on dollars through the till, product and category margins, and returns for floor space. Generally they forget that business is about making a return on investment until the AGM, not counting margins that get chewed up by working capital requirements down the supply chain.
E-retail is driving a stake through the heart of bricks and mortar retailing of electronics, and it will come in white-goods very soon. E-Tail retailers focus on the return on funds employed, not margins. When you take the customers order and 10% deposit before you pay for the stock, and get the balance COD, it matters little if the margin is $40 when the volumes are skyrocketing, because the funds employed are very low.
Mar 13, 2012 | Communication, Marketing, Social Media
This is a pretty common call amongst the junior marketing staff of my clients, most of them are familiar with facebook, they use it in their personal lives to fill a whole range of functions.
When asked “Why must we be on Facebook”? there is usually an awkward silence, and the standard response is likely to be something like “just because!”
Facebook, Twitter, and all the others are just tools, they are able to deliver an outcome, but it is the outcome that matters, not the tool, used to get there.
You measure the performance of a car on a journey in many ways, petrol mileage, comfort, handling, and so on, but the reason you get in the car is to get somewhere. Social media is no different, measures of the media themselves are just measures of efficiency, not measures of the outcome.
To make it worthwhile, to create engagement, to build a relationship, there must be something for the traveler at the end of the journey.
Mar 11, 2012 | Social Media
The phenomena that has been the Kony video over the last week, garnering over 67 million views at the time of writing this, on Sunday morning in Australia, has rewritten the Social media and charity fund raising record books. If there remained any doubt about the power of social media in the minds of those who seek to form and leverage public opinion, this will remove that doubt forever.
In the process, the focus of political power, the meaning of the word “politics” in its original sense, that of collective decision making by the people, has moved back to the people. We the great unwashed have at our disposal a tool that can bring integrity back to the process of government and decision making.
I have no doubt that the Kony video will bring forth claims of misused funds, personal agendas and ego courtesy of a wikileaks type process. However, the point remains, the world is now aware of a gross abuse that it has been able to ignore for 20 years, and should in conscience, ignore no longer.
That awareness was built in a week via social media, and the world just moved again!
Mar 9, 2012 | Change, Lean, Marketing
Out with the old mass market advertising and business model, and in with the new.
I shave, it costs a fortune, so much that I switched to disposable shavers without all the fatuous claims and high prices of the big brands. Each morning when I look in the mirror to shave I see a 60 year old bloke, a bit worse for wear, the square jaw rounded by too much living, extensive forehead, and none of this will be changed by using a 5 dollar blade instead of one that costs 50 cents.
However, I never saw the disruptive marketing opportunity demonstrated by this story about the Dollar Shave Club, but it is blindingly obvious when pointed out, in this case by my e-buddy Bill Waddell.
What other categories are so ripe for change?
Shampoo & conditioner, household cleaners, personal hygiene, are the three that jump to my mind, all associated with vanity.
The FMCG business model has changed, and for high value products that are easily mailed, like shavers, is breaking. A few categories are yet to have their margins decimated by a combination of house-brands and direct e-sales, but it will not be too long. Anything that can be sourced via the web, where the savings are sufficiently significant to off-set the inconvenience of having to remember to make a few clicks on your device, is at risk.
The fancy, expensive nonsensical advertising appealing to vanity rather than real consumer benefits, that support these products has had its day.
