Jan 6, 2011 | Customers, Marketing, Sales
Word of mouth advertising has always been the best sort, people put great store in recommendations from those they trust. The extension of this recently has been what I call “word of mouse” advertising, enabled by the networking capabilities of the net.
Taking the idea further, the potential to engage your customers via various forms of social media, to the extent that they become advocates of your product is not only possible, but should be a key marketing objective.
Call centers have progressively taken over the function of a sales force, and technology, and India has progressively taken over the call centers. Perhaps there is an opportunity for high end goods to reverse the trend, use technology to facilitate the transactional end of a relationship with a consumer, but invest in call centers to build the engagement of consumers by personal contact.
Jan 4, 2011 | Change, Customers, Personal Rant, Sales, Small business
Australian manufacturing has been decimated over the last few decades, and whilst there is no single reason for this impact, the determination of the major retailers to use the opening of global sourcing options to reduce their costs and compete on price has been a major contributor.
In my patch, the food industry, a whole layer of mid sized Australian owned food manufacturers have simply gone broke, or sold out to multinationals consolidating manufacturing internationally, as FMCG retailers increasingly sourced overseas. The very few that are left are fighting a rear guard action, and will probably lose.
Therefore, when I hear retailers bleating about the competition from international retailers selling into Australia using the same tools the retailers have used on former Australian suppliers, I think “good one” The latest bleating culminating in an advertising campaign, and lots of appearances by Gerry Harvey amongst others, does nothing but encourage me to believe that the short sighted retail sourcing policies which are just about landed price, with no acceptance of the long term benefits of having a vibrant and innovative manufacturing sector are coming back to bite them on the arse.
Retailers have been dishing it out for years, thumbing their noses at any form of regulation of retail, ignoring the potential and growth of e-tail, it is illuminating to see how they are reacting to some of their medicine coming back to them, although the sales loss is currently only very small, and the consumers they want slugged with GST for online purchases are also their customers, unlikely to thank them for the GST led cost increase.
Get over it, and figure out how to compete on other than shelf price, meanwhile, a few of us are enjoying the sight of retailers squirming.
Dec 8, 2010 | Customers, Management, Sales
It is usually easier to find more business with existing customers that it is to find new ones, or to devote the resources to reducing customer churn. Nevertheless, most enterprises overspend their limited resources seeking new customers at the expense of their existing customers.
If you must chase new customers, there are 3 very simple questions to ask:
1. Do they have a problem you can solve?
2. Do they have the money and desire to take a risk with a new supplier?
3. Can you reach and communicate effectively with them?.
Three ticks, and you have some chance, two ticks and your time is better spent elsewhere, no ticks, wake up to yourself.
Nov 2, 2010 | Customers, Sales
A frustrating “customer service” experience recently reminded me of this lovely parody of customer service meets lean principals. If it wasn’t so true, it would be funny.
Getting customers is hard, and getting harder, so when one comes to your door it is for a reason, and the last thing you should be doing is making it hard to open.
Oct 31, 2010 | Customers, Sales
Sales is something we all do, all the time, professionally as well as in our private lives. We may not always be selling a product for an employer, but we will be selling our ideas, priorities, time, and experience, in some way. Here are some simple rules:
- Talk as little as possible, and listen as much as possible
- Recognise early, preferably before anyone else, when the horse is dead and get off
- Act short term to make the sale, but never at the expense of the medium and long term, as any individual sale is rarely the end of the relationship, unless you choose it to be.
- Lack of real understanding of the problems faced by customers, their external competitive and profitability challenges, and the internal organisational and operational barriers getting in the way of “yes”.
- Lack of product knowledge appropriate to the interaction of the person you are talking to.
Fix these, and the sale should be pretty easy.
Oct 7, 2010 | Customers, Management, OE, Sales, Strategy
Since man sought to organise themselves beyond family groups, geography has been the fundamental organising principal of almost all the institutions created, it was really the only thing that made sense. Everything from businesses to empires and the church(s) were geographically organised structures.
Since the 70’s, many commercial institutions have attempted to reorganise along a customer or product driven logic, largely with limited success. Geography and the transaction costs associated with removing the natural barrier of distance have conspired to make it difficult and costly, and the old management silos are hard to break down until the enterprise is in real trouble, as IBM was in the 80’s.
For the last 10 years at a huge rate the net has removed geography as a significant driver of organisational structures. It simply makes no sense to now have multiple overheads in neighboring geographies, when the net tools enable the sharing of everything immediate.
The outcome, structure your organisation to focus on what keeps it alive, customers!
