Category Archives: Game Strategies

Stop: Think About It!

This thought might seem like a bizarre topic but, when you do stop and think about it, there are far too many decisions you make as a business owner that you probably don’t take the time to think through completely.

Okay, the first question you raise: Can you ever think through an issue completely? No … unless you have identified all the concerns related to that issue and have all the answers clearly defined.

Here’s a scenario: Someone who knows someone in your company comes in to ask for a donation to the youth baseball league in your community. Odds are you make that contribution at a level you’re comfortable with, unless you’re not a baseball fan or a supporter of youth activities. It’s kind of a guilt trip when you’re asked. How can you be against baseball? Or young people who want to play sports?

If you think about the request logically instead of emotionally, you weigh the variables, such as whether you have the budget allocated for that level of donation. Can you lessen your tax burden through the contribution? Will you gain any market visibility or brand awareness with the donation? Is it a cause you want to be identified with as a company?

That’s one example of the importance of taking a few minutes to weigh your options when asked for a charitable contribution, rather than just handing over the cash. Whether it’s financial or an in-kind gift through employees donating their time and expertise to the cause, take some time to think about it.

A suggestion that might prove helpful: Develop a decision making check list to stimulate the thought process when it comes to making critical choices for your company.

#1 might be – Will the choice help us make more money? Sub-factors for this check point might be: How soon? How much? At what cost?

#2 could be – Will this decision increase our brand awareness? Build customer loyalty? Or possibly detract from our brand identity?

#3 – Will this enable us to increase market share in the community or other markets?

#4 – Do we have the budget for this expenditure/donation/expansion?

#5 – What is required of our company to fulfill this obligation or complete this project? How much time will be required of our employees?

When we’ve conducted fund raising projects for clients, there is often a desire to conduct a volunteer project such as a bake sale or car wash. These are good events for getting people involved in a cause, but when one stops and thinks about it, these relatively simple events require loads of time for a small return. If your company or organization had to pay for the volunteer’s time, odds are the event would lose money!

A decision matrix such as roughly outlined above can reduce the risk of making bad decisions, and save money that might be invested in the wrong venture. And there are times when having an independent third party to provide counsel on the concept is well worth the investment.

Take the time to think it through!

Thanks go out to the community following this blog. We appreciate your comments and support and hope to continue providing valuable content for you.

Brand Your Work – Work Your Brand

Building A Commercial

The first step in building a commercial such as a 30-second TV spot or a promotional video for YouTube is to know your audience.

Basic demographics are age and gender. Understanding these basics for your audience, or viewer, are important because different age groups watch videos differently and each gender has different receptors for the message. The more clarity you have about your audience, the easier it becomes to design your commercial to get through to them and to influence their buying decisions. Remember that people, in general, prefer to avoid being sold and would rather make their own purchasing choices.

When you’ve determined which audience you’re targeting, part of the design work is to grab their attention. A good rule of thumb is to focus the attention-getting device (AGD) on your potential customers and what they are likely to want as the message relates to your product or service. Is the purchase for necessity, pleasure, or to avoid pain? There are other options, but we’re trying to keep this brief.

Once you’ve got the audience’s attention, the commercial needs to keep their attention or engage them to ensure the message is delivered as intended. Generally, you want to leave the viewer with an indelible memory, a positive perception, and/or an urge to buy what you’re selling. The hope is you will build brand identity and, if they like what they purchase, brand loyalty. You also want the viewer to stay through to the end, where you provide the call to action.

Know what you want them to do. That’s your call to action! Do you want commercial viewers to stop by your store? Would you prefer they call to set up an appointment? Send you an E-mail? Or do you direct them to your website for more information or to place an order?

Now that we’ve gone through the construction elements, let’s go back to the planning process. One of the worst reasons for producing a commercial for your business is “Everyone is doing it.” Know your purpose … and your audience. Whatever you attempt in producing a spot, you are building brand awareness. You want it to be favorable. Yes, you are trying to sell your brand, your product, your service, and maybe yourself, but keep in mind who’s going to be viewing your commercial. Why do they or should they care? Does the spot relate to them … or is it about you and your company?

Remember, too, that your commercial may not reach everyone in your intended audience, and will more than likely also be viewed by people outside of the audience you’re trying to reach. Both scenarios are okay.

What’s your budget? Fancy graphics, animation, and acting or modeling talent can rack up a big expense without any consideration for scripting, shooting, and editing the video. Plus you generally have to pay if you’re airing commercials on TV or cable channels. There are ways to reduce the expenses such as shooting two or three spots at a time, but either way, it’s best to have professionals help with production because your reputation, and brand, are on the line.

Consider, too, that you need to understand the time frame involved in producing a commercial. Concepts and script writing need to be thought through, modified, and finalized with your approval before the shoot can be scheduled. The logistics of finding a location, getting permission to use it, and then setting up the various shots takes time. The process of finding the right talent takes time, too. Remember to add in rehearsal time and get talent releases as well.

When you shoot video, shoot from several angles and do numerous takes to ensure you have enough material to work with when you get to the editing booth. Think of and take all the shots you think of so you can avoid returning to the location to shoot something you forgot you needed. Editing requires time to enter video, audio, graphics, and manipulate the sequences between scenes.

Sure, you can shoot some video with your smart phone and post it on YouTube, but is that the image you want to portray of your company?

Take the time to think things through, and get help if you need it!

Brand Your Work – Work Your Brand

Managing Priorities

You own a business. You need more customers. You have to complete payroll. You need to manage inventory. Invoicing to be done. Bills to pay. And, oh yeah, you have a family that likes to see you once in a while.

These are all priorities in one sense or another, and they can add stress to your life when everyone of them is due … today!

An easy solution: Delegate. However, what if you’re it? The owner, sole proprietor or only member of the LLC, sales person, order filler, and, basically, the only employee? How does that alter your priorities? What if there isn’t anyone as well trained or as knowledgeable about the task to get done as you are? What if you lack trust in someone you could delegate it to? All kinds of challenges for managing priorities.

You bear the ultimate responsibility, so broaden your shoulders, delegate what you can, and get what you can accomplish done. What you are unable to delegate effectively become your priorities for the day.

Two schools of thought.

1) Do the easy, simple and quick tasks to get them out of the way so you don’t have to worry about them. When they’re done you can tackle the larger, more important tasks that require more time and energy. You will still have to deal with interruptions.

2) Tackle the most important task first. If it truly is the most important job and must get done, then it doesn’t matter if the smaller tasks don’t get done because the big job has to get finished.

The first school of thought may seem inane, but if you have more energy and fewer interruptions later in the day or after you’ve cleared the small jobs, it can be a viable method of managing priorities.

The second seems more logical, and could be, depending on when you have the most energy to tackle that type of work. And, if you procrastinate on the big one, the other tasks will pile up and frustration will decrease your overall productivity.

The magic formula lies in assigning priorities to the tasks on your plate. A #1 or “A” priority should require your attention before a #4 or “E” task. Again, delegate if you can. What also helps is an understanding of approximately how much time the tasks on your To Do list are going to take. If generating a report for shareholders only requires a few key strokes and a review of the information, bump that up on the priority list because it is going to shareholders, and they like information in a timely fashion.

Each day is different, so keep that in mind, along with the realization that procrastination is also a decision … to do nothing about the task. Perhaps it wasn’t a priority after all.

Somewhere in this mix needs to be a priority on yourself and your family. Schedule yourself some “Me Time” and have some fun for a change. Go out to dinner, or catch a movie you’ve been wanting to see. Take a road trip. Go see your parents or grandparents and visit for a few days. Life is too short not to enjoy it.

A good friend, Jay, shared a saying that is appropriate: How likely are you to say to someone on your death bed: “I wish I had spent more time at work.”?

Brand Your Work – Work Your Brand

How Well Are You Communicating?

The ability to communicate is a vital skill in today’s world.

Good communication relies on feedback and goes both ways.

When you think about your ability to communicate with your customers, being able to connect with them is critical when it comes to marketing your products and/or services.

Pay attention to some of the commercials you may watch on TV these days. Is the company or product message promoting the company or trying to connect with the consumer? Most miss the mark.

Texts. Ask your customers how they would like to receive messages from you. Many with smart phones are now open to receiving text messages, but use caution and avoid overwhelming them with sales pitches. A text is an attention getting communication and generally warrants a response for the sense of urgency. Trying to sell the receiver something is usually considered a major turn-off.

E-mail. E-mail messages may seem like stone age communication with newer technological developments, but they have been a stalwart of electronic communication methods for more than 15 years. E-mail messages that are meant to be read are best kept short. Attachments are okay, provided they are relevant to the general message. Assuming the recipient has received an E-mail is a false assumption. Just because you hit “Send” is not a guarantee the recipient got it. It may have wound up in a spam filter or lost in the cyber mail system somewhere.

If you realize someone you are exchanging E-mails with is responding promptly to your E-mails, pick up the phone and call them!

F2F. While we could elaborate on communication methods and styles for an entire year, one of the most important is face-to-face (F2F) communication. Yes, some believe it’s a dying art form, but it is still ranked high among the most effective ways of communicating with another person. Laugh if you do this, but think how ridiculous it would be to text your spouse while he/she is in the bathroom and you’re in the living room. Go and talk to them, even if it’s from outside the bathroom door!

Face-to-face communication is a two-way process. The difficulty in the process, which is why some people avoid it, is in listening to what the other person is saying. Our natural tendency is to say something and then look like we’re listening while we’re thinking of the next thing we want to say. It’s a more common occurrence than you might think.

Demonstrate interest in what the other party has to say. Listen and learn before you determine your response. Consumer complaints are best handled by listening, and asking what the customer really wants. Many times, they just want to know you care and that they are going to be heard.

Listening is a key skill for business owners and managers, too. When you hear what your team members are saying, you may discover new opportunities to explore or potential problem areas that can be averted with the right action.

How you communicate reflects your brand, too. More in weeks to come.

Brand Your Work – Work Your Brand

Put The Right People In The Right Position

The right strategy for positioning your employees can add to your bottom line.

Managing employees is an art form in business that requires an owner or manager to take the time to think things through. Avoid rash decisions. While it is often difficult to retain good employees, placing them in a fulfilling role with a certain level of responsibility can reap benefits and keep them challenged.

One of the keys is understanding each of your employees. What motivates him or her? What makes them tick? Is it money, autonomy, authority, interaction with customers or other employees, or a steady paycheck? The more you know about your employees, within legal guidelines, the better expectations you can set for them and the more accountable they will be. Most employees want to make a difference and have an impact on the world, so if you – as an owner or manager – know what their expectations are and how they might fit with your corporate objectives, the easier it becomes to provide them with an outlet to achieve their goals and contribute to the company’s mission at the same time.

Make sure your mission is clear to every member of your team, and share your passion for the business so your vision becomes everyone’s vision.

Your best sales person may be ill-suited to become sales manager. A sales manager may be the wrong person to be promoted as head of production. Your graphic artist may be inappropriate for filling the shoes of the company’s social media manager.

Here are some simple steps to get you closer to puttng the right people in the right place:

1) Create a description of the work responsibilities and expectations, including anticipated customer interaction;

2) Compare the candidates’ qualifications, ambitions, and goals to the description;

3) Take some time to think through the implications of selecting the person who’s right for the position, including how long they’re likely to last in that job; and,

4) Trust your gut.

If you need to bounce your choices off an independent third party, consider engaging Brand Irons. If you need to think about the transitions involved, take the time. Better to wait on a decision than make the wrong one. Think, too, about whether your choice makes the most sense or if you need to consider other candidates.

Brand Your Work – Work Your Brand

Focus On Your Customers

One expert might advise that you focus your business on sales in 2014. Another might suggest you focus on productivity. Those may be good suggestions, but your focus should always – repeat, always – be on your customers. You may be able to increase sales or production capabilities, but if you lose your customer base – your market share – what will you have?

Do you know who your customers are? What do they look like? What do they buy?

Placing a consistent emphasis on your clients can be difficult, especially if you have to deal with an employee issue or inventory problems. It is far too easy to become distracted by the inner workings of your business and lose sight of what’s most important – customers! Good management maintains the company’s priority on the consumer.

What’s best for your customers? Is it keeping the sidewalk clean and safe? Maintaining a pleasant, inviting interior in the store? Making sure your website is current and easy to navigate? Offering rewards to loyal patrons? Ensuring your pricing is reasonable and fair? Providing a step beyond exceptional customer service?

You may disagree, but weigh whether a misplaced order for stock inventory is more important than making sure a customer’s problems are resolved to his/her satisfaction. Solve the problem with inventory when the customers are taken care of, or find an employee with the ability to solve it and give them the authority to resolve it.

Put yourself in the consumer’s shoes for these examples:

The line is backed up in a convenience store. One register is open for several consumers while four employees are behind the counter, joking about who’s going to the bank. How likely would you be to return to that convenience store if you didn’t have to go there?

You’re parked at the drive-through window of a fast food restaurant. Your order has been paid for and is sitting on the service table, ready to be handed to you. Unfortunately for you, the drive-through attendant is talking on their cell phone to their best friend. Feel like pulling over and having a chat with the manager? That’s likely to only add to your frustration because the manager is allowing that behavior to happen in the first place.

What do those examples tell us about the company and how well it markets its brand? It is an all-too-often occurrence in the fast food industry, and irritating to think those employees would do better work if they were paid more. Company managers need to spend more time in the trenches, like Undercover Boss, and learn what’s happening on the front lines. Or you can consider engaging Brand Irons as a secret shopper to do the investigating and report back on the findings … provided you’re ready for the truth.

Brand Irons has some rather simple solutions to remaining focused on your customers, and it starts at the top of any organization:

1) Take the time to think through what your customer service orientation is and should be;

2) Take the time to train your employees on what the expectations are for customer service … all the time, and hold your employees accountable; and,

3) Take the time – whatever it takes – to take care of your customers the way they want to be taken care of … remember and never lose sight of that objective.

Brand Your Work – Work Your Brand!

Planning for 2014

Now that it’s less than a month away, it’s time to take a few minutes and think through your business strategies for 2014. If you’ve already done this, take some time to review them and make sure you are going to be on the right track.

First step – What is the right track?

Look at where your business is today and try to project out a year from now. Where would you like to see your business in mid- to late-December 2014? Have sales shown an increase or are they holding steady? Will you be in a growth stage? Transition phase? Or will it be time to think about exit strategies?

The key area to consider is what your consumers want and need. You need to know what the market is asking for, and then be prepared and able to deliver it on a consistent basis. Be on top of industry changes. Know your market. Some communities are a year or two behind on trends, and you need to know where your consumers are in your marketplace. You should be slightly ahead.

Second step – Where are your profit margins?

Remember, you’re in business to make money. Consumers understand that, yet still want a good value at a fair price. They also want to know why you’re different from your competitors so they can rationalize buying form you and remain loyal to your brand. If the margin you’ve been operating on has provided your company with good profitability, consider making changes to increase your margins. Those changes could involve cost reductions, if appropriate. They could mean price increases if the market will bear them, at the potential risk of pushing too far and losing market share.

Third step – How strong is your brand?

If yours is the only barbershop in town, you’ve got a good chance of securing 100% of the market share. It doesn’t mean you have a strong brand if the way you treat customers is like you’re the only place in town where they can get their hair cut. You have a strong brand when your customers love coming in, catching up on the latest gossip, enjoying the experience you provide in cutting their hair, and leaving with a satisfied expression because they know they’ve received a good value for the investment.

There are many variables that you need to think through when it comes to strategizing about your business for 2014: Management, competition, pricing structures, overhead, growth, productivity, marketing (including sales, advertising, and public relations), and finances, among others. Call Brand Irons at (920) 366-6334 if you’d like some help.

Take the time to think things through … then act!

Brand Your Work – Work Your Brand.

Year End Review

December is a hectic month for most business owners. The Thanksgiving holiday cut short the end of November and, in retail, started the huge push to put black on the bottom line for the year. December adds holiday parties, end of the month, and end of year in the last week without mention of Christmas, Kwanzaa, New Year’s, and football games.

December is also a good month to review your performance for the last year. A year end review can be a lengthy process or a quick overview of how your business did. It should be done in conjunction with laying out strategies for 2014 as well, which we’ll cover in next week’s blog. Brand Irons can assist you with year end reviews and 2014 strategies.

10 things to think about as you take a look at 2013:

How much of an improvement, if any, does the bottom line show over 2012?
How does cash flow look at year’s end?
How did sales do in comparison to expectations?
How has productivity been improved during the last 12 months?
What has been the trend in consumer demand throughout the year?
What have been the significant changes or innovations in the industry?
What percentage of customers have you been able to retain?
What areas have been identified where staff or employees may need more training?
What does your profit margin look like?
How well are you doing, personally, on your retirement goals?

The complexity of a year end review depends, primarily, on the size of the company and the diversity of the management team.

Most of the check-points listed here pertain to financial information, so it may be wise to schedule a meeting with your accountant to go over performance indicators. Other items, such as consumer demand, are related to market conditions and may require some research to identify existing trends as well as potential growth areas. Others are management- and personnel-oriented.

What is critically important, either in reviewing a year’s performance or strategizing for the next business cycle, is to know what metrics you want to measure. What is essential for the long-term sustainability of your business? What do you need to know? What else would you like to know? Having this in hand makes it easy to compare one year’s results to the following year and put a pinch of realism into budget projections.

Brand Your Work – Work Your Brand.

Thank Your Customers!

In the hustle and bustle of running a business, it is easy to forget the simple things. Then, when you stop and think about things, it is often those simple little things that are the most important to your business.

Telling your customers “Thank You!” tops the list.

You can, and should, thank them for their business when you send out invoices or give them receipts. “Thank You!” should be automatic … and sincere.

Where you can stand out as a business, though, is by finding non-traditional special ways to say “Thank You!” to your customers. Give them a turkey at Thanksgiving or cater in a meal for their employees at this time of year. Have pizza delivered when you know their team is working late or busting it to complete a project for you. Gift them with a bottle or case of wine or their favorite alcoholic beverage, provided it’s appropriate.

If you think this is extravagant and something unnecessary or too expensive, take a minute to think that thought through a bit more thoroughly. What would it cost you to replace those customers if you lost them? Could you recover if they all went away?

Find a way to cover the expense of saying “Thank You!” to the life blood of your business.

Obviously, there are different ways and budgets to account for expressing gratitude to your customers. Most appreciate a simple “Thank You!” when they pay their bill, but the more you say it – sincerely – the more likely they are to remain loyal to your company and your brand. There is a nightmare scenario where your business is seen to be ungrateful for the work you get from clients. Negative word of mouth can spread far more quickly than positive word of mouth.

Another tip: Your method of saying “Thank You!” should reflect your brand … tastefully.

We once recommended to a specialty chair and barstool retailer that they find doll house chairs that they could put their logo on. They wanted something they could leave with prospective business clients that the prospects would remember them for, so they found wooden doll chairs that could be branded and left as business card holders. It was cute, appropriate, and reinforced the brand when they were used to say “Thank You!” to customers who bought their furniture.

Since it’s Thanksgiving 2013, we’d like to thank our clients for their business. We appreciate the opportunity to work with each of you, and hope you find our counsel to be of value in growing your business.

To those who have yet to become clients, enjoy this Thanksgiving holiday and express your thanks to those who matter to you and your business!

Planning vs. Execution

How much time should you spend on planning the affairs of your business?

The simple answer: Enough to know your plan and the resulting effort will have a reasonable chance of success. Success comes in the execution of the plan, and evaluation of the ensuing results.

You can certainly over plan. There are examples throughout history of companies that have spent so much time planning, revising the plans, and reviewing the plans that they forgot to execute the plan and the business failed. Planning for the sake of planning is usually counter-productive. It’s like changing for the sake of change. Rarely a good idea.

One car dealership changed its catchy slogan for its location. When the marketing staff was asked about it, they responded that they were tired of the slogan. When they came to understand that their customers, and potential consumers, would lose their association with the dealership and make it harder to find them because of the change, the slogan came back.

Planning is the process of developing a strategy your company can execute with a reasonable measure of attainment. It’s a rather simple process. You determine what you want to do, gain agreement from those involved in the implementation, figure out who has responsibility for the tasks that need to be accomplished, set a budget, and then you put it into action.

If, for instance, you plan to grow your business by 20 new clients each month for the next year, you should have more than an idea of how it’s going to happen. If you’ve added five new members a month during the past year, you are now expecting to quadruple that sales performance. The planning process involves rationalizing if it’s achievable, and laying down the groundwork to accomplish the objective month-by-month.

Monitoring, or tracking the results, is essential to the process of planning. Using the 20 new clients per month example, if sales bring in 12 new clients in the first month, a quick analysis of how and why that happened assists in the execution strategy. If the goal remains at 20, somewhere those missing eight new customers needs to be made up to validate the goal and the strategy for implementation.

Bring in 22 new clients the second month and now you’re down six. What’s more significant, though, is that the sales people are starting to hit their stride. They’ve had success and are gaining confidence in the process and belief in the goal. That’s how the planning process and execution strategy work hand in glove to provide management with the tools so critical to growing the business and keeping the team motivated.

Yes, you can skip the planning process and trust that your company is on track. You can “wing it” when it comes to measuring results and the performance of your sales team. You can also feel comfortable repeating the same mistakes hoping for different results, then wonder why profits start to slip, customers leave for a competitor, and your business winds up closing.

We have found that planning can be as complex or as simple as you want, once you’ve laid a solid foundation, which is something Brand Irons can assist you with. You also need an accountability partner to keep you focused on the execution of the plan. It is far too easy to be side-tracked by the daily operations and avoid looking at the bigger picture.

Einstein’s definition of insanity: Keep doing the same thing but expect different results.

Take the time to think things through; our philosophy on planning.

Brand your work – work your brand!