Oct 27, 2009 | Leadership, Management
Yesterday I received a number of communications, by various means that broke all the accepted rules of grammar, spelling, and what an old fogey like me considers common courtesy, and it got me thinking.
Email, phone text, and now twitter and its ilk have had an adverse impact on our more traditional skill of communicating via the (pen and paper) written word. The substitute is a shorthand that breaks the basic rules of grammar, construction of sentences and paragraphs that evolved to clearly and unambiguously convey a thought.
And why is it that courtesy that we would normally be extend in a face to face encounter is ignored in an “e-exchange”?. The “e-shorthand” may work in the group where the jargon is understood, but often not in a wider context.
The use of electronic communication and its potential for misunderstanding due to the use of e-shorthand is now central to the way our communication works, so rather than trying to buck the trend, I concocted a few rules that may make email more receiver friendly, unambiguous, and easy to read for the non speakers of any particular jargon.
- Ensure the subject line states what the email is about.
- Never use the subject line to convey the message.
- Only communicate one thing in an email, anything more complicated requires a different form.
- Remember that the receiver needs to understand the context of the message, so ensure it is clearly expressed.
- Use numbers rather than words to convey quantitative issues (sales are up 35%, not sales are up substantially) to ensure understanding
- Keep it as short as possible
- Never send an email with emotional content immediately, leave it in draft form until tomorrow, to prevent regrets.
Oct 26, 2009 | Leadership, Management, Marketing, Strategy
Remember your history teachers, one who just had you remembering the dates of events, hard work remembering, and why bother anyway, but what about the one who told you about the people, and engaged you with the stories around the dates and events? It became easy to remember the details because you had the human stuff that went with it.
Building brands is the same thing, don’t just give out the facts, provide the stories that go with the facts, the human dimension.
Businesses have the same challenge when they set out to build a culture, it does not happen overnight, but when the stories that reinforce the culture are told, and celebrated, the behavior becomes embedded over time.
Building a brand, or a corporate culture takes persistence and consistency, and is a task that is never completed, just a work in progress.
Oct 25, 2009 | Management, Sales
Generating and qualifying leads is a key function that rarely receives the attention it deserve, and is rarely measured for effectiveness other than looking at sales results.
Like any process, if it can be measured against performance standards, improvements can be made, and in these interesting times, enhancing the productivity of the lead generation and qualification process can only lead to greatly enhanced outcomes.
Most leads emerge as knowledge that a firm is “in the market” that is, they already buy something that you could supply, from somebody else, but if that is all you have, price is the only lever.
Before trying to sell them on your price, set out to understand why they buy, what problem does the product/service offer, how does it make their life easier? Once you know that, the selling becomes a different process, and price is less of a factor.
A sales lead is only of real value when you know why they buy, so why not set about building information on the conversion rates y0u get with differeing levels of knowledge about the “why”, ie, measure the effectivenes of the lead at the first point where you ask for the order, and relate that to how much you know about the “Why”.
Oct 23, 2009 | Demand chains, Management, Operations, Sales, Small business
Demand chains are a representation of the drivers of “flow” through a supply chain, a concept familiar to those engaged in “lean” initiatives, when the motivator to the flow is demand rather than an ability to produce for inventory or against a forecast of sales.
Category management is a process of welding the drivers of demand, the consumer preferences and behavior to the supply of their preferred products, whilst maximizing the returns to the retailer, and others in the chain, as well as delighting the customer.
Few who claim to engage in category management would see the explicit link, as they are typically engrossed in the numbers, but it is there nevertheless, and the successful exponents recognise the link, and leverage the numbers for the sake of the outcome of the entire chain, not just for one link who happens to hold the power.
Oct 21, 2009 | Management, Sales, Small business
It is pretty obvious, although not always acted on that you should define the problem before you spend time trying to sell a solution.
There are many techniques to getting to the point where the sale can be made, libraries have been written, but in my experience, 3 simple questions will get you there. They are not easy to answer, but once you have, a sale is the easy bit.
- How can you help your prospect build sales?
- How can you help your prospect to decrease costs?
- How can you help your prospect to increase productivity?
Answer these, and you have the problem your product can solve defined, and the sell is easy, after all, who can say no to any of these being delivered. One of the rules I use, never go into a sales situation (as distinct from an information gathering situation) without at least 2 of these answered in some form.
Oct 20, 2009 | Leadership, Management, OE, Operations, Small business
Yesterday, I wrote about the process jig-saw that supports an implemented ERP system as it works to drive efficiency, but deliberately left out the hardest bit.
The most challenging changes necessary to make an ERP implementation deliver the value promised are the behavioural ones.
You can buy all the software in the world, but junk-in still generates junk-out.
Most ERP systems I have seen, if you take a wide view of what constitutes “ERP” is done on Excel. I have developed simple routines for SME clients using Excel, that whilst not fancy, automate parts of the operations planning processes, and generate substantial benefits.
Most sophisticated systems from the well known SAP to less fancied packages all have large chunks of data delivered by to them by a range of means, mostly spreadsheets, and the temptation for the individual is to leave well enough alone, and resist the dropping of their routines in favor of the expensive ERP package. Allowing this parallel system to survive beyond a short validation phase is always a mistake, as people revert to what they know as soon as there is an issue. When you jump in, you need to go all the way.
