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.
Mar 5, 2012 | Communication, Leadership
If you cannot state your mission in a very few words, perhaps less than 10, able to be expressed in 30 seconds, the time it takes for a ride in an elevator to the 30th floor, where the big boys live, try again.
I see many mission and purpose statements that are full of jargon and weasel words, that really convey little but the perceived need to make everybody happy, to conform to the latest fad management book, but by the time it gets to the factory floor, where it really matters, it means nothing.
To be effective, a mission statement should be a reflection of what all those in the business feel, what needs to be built, the answer to the question, “what are we doing here?”
So it is easy to wordsmith a statement, but it takes persistence, leadership, and determination to make any use of it.
Mar 1, 2012 | Customers, Marketing
The truth of wealth creation in the gold rushes, is that it was the blokes who sold the shovels, beds, grog, and horses who got rich, not the individual miners, with the odd exception for the really lucky ones.
It is still the same.
As markets commoditise, it gets progressively more difficult to make a bob out of selling the commodity, even the least cost supplier has trouble in the long run doing better than returning the cost of capital. However, those who sell insurance, currency hedging, heavy equipment, and the like, are all doing OK, so moving up the value chain, from the front lines to the rear supply echelons, to continue the analogy in the headline, makes more sense as time passes.
Feb 29, 2012 | Communication, Leadership, Marketing
We are pretty well immune to those who make promises, as we have heard it all before, and having been burnt, and burnt, we tend not to believe the hype this time.
Doesn’t matter if it is a colleague assuring us they will meet a deadline, a supplier “guaranteeing” performance of his offering, or a pollie telling us the train line will be built by the end of 2020, we have heard it all before.
The antidote is to stop saying and start doing, and let the performance speak for itself.
Feb 23, 2012 | Communication, Sales, Small business
Successful stories are always greater than the sum of their parts.
Great stories engage, enlighten, inform, and inspire, so to dissect the sum to explain the parts may seem easier than selling the whole thing, but it usually does not work. Telling the big picture, the big idea, the big picture, is a key to selling.
Try describing how a frog jumps to someone who has not seen one jump by dissecting it. You can describe the long legs, musculature, power to weight ratio, but that does not help much, better to show them the frog jumping.
Feb 22, 2012 | Management, Marketing, Strategy
Into the new year, most companies that have June 30 as year end will start the tortuous path of setting the new budget. I have seen the budget process take 6 months, and be as useless as a water pistol in a gunfight when it comes to delivering meaningful outcomes.
Two simple questions are often not asked:
- Why are we doing this?
- How are we going to get the outcomes satisfactory to the short term needs of stakeholders, and that also set the business up for long term commercial sustainability?
In other words, have a clear business purpose, and know what you have to do to progressively deliver on the undertakings.
