Two roads diverged in a yellow wood (How to plan for growth in 2012)
Posted on | January 25, 2012
(my apologies to Mr Frost)
When you’re trying to grow a business, it’s not really two paths that diverge is it? It’s more like ten. Or twenty. Or…what day is it today? It could be a hundred.
(By the way, this doesn’t have anything to do with the sheer number of hats – I hadn’t realised I’d be an accountant AND a therapist this year – you have to wear when you own a growing business.)
No. I’m talking about opportunities.
I remember when I first started my company. I was pretty new to business in general (ok, very new) and I saw opportunities everywhere. I ran around chasing most leads, qualifying very few of them, and generally wasting my time. I dabbled. I had a vague notion of growing a business – I knew I wanted more clients and more money – but if I look back in honesty, I was running around with no real sense of plan.
Does this sound familiar? How many businesses do you think dabble? I don’t mean you don’t know what you’re doing. You probably do. But if you really want serious business growth, do you really think dabbling is the way forward? Do you really think that an unstructured approach is going to work? It may work sometimes. You can always get lucky and, if you’re a decent chat, you can probably get a number of people on your side. Lord knows I did. But real significant sustainable growth didn’t happen for me until I got a plan.
I’m lucky in a way. My company specialises in marketing strategy. We spend every waking minute of the day thinking about where to place our clients so that they can achieve significant growth. We understand the need for building a comprehensive structure around business development and we are locked into the notion of focus. I practically get in tattooed on new employees.
When it came to creating a structure and strategy for my business, I had all the tools I needed at my disposal. I had over six years of experience in building these strategies for other people, and in seeing how they needed to evolve and change over time as circumstances (internal and external) changed.
Every week I revisit my strategy to ensure that I’m doing the things I need to do to achieve the goals I have set out. And every year I take a look at where we need to get to over the next 12, 24 and 36 months and I readjust the strategy to suit.
What do I look at every year?
- Business Focus
This is critical. It’s too easy to get sucked into the idea that any business is good business. It’s simply not true. Anybody can start a business and anyone can lose money. Anyone can just scrape by. The reality of growing a profitable and long-term business is different. You need focus and, more importantly, you need to be focussing on the right things. Over the last three years I have been slowly refining our business model into the one that I want. I’ve also been narrowing our focus. We turn away a lot of business now if it doesn’t fall within our key focus areas. Focussing on the right business models and the right target markets are the most important thing you can do every year. You have to have the courage to do it, but it’s worth the pain. - Strategic Partners, Champions & Referrers
Surrounding yourself and your business with the right people is one of the key parts of having a successful business. Having the right team is absolutely essential. Your team is more than your staff, it’s also about who you have surrounded around your business who can stand beside, behind and, sometimes, in front of you. Every year I look to create relationships with key influencers who I want associated with my business. Every year I look to solidify relationships I have already developed. The stronger these relationships become, the stronger my business becomes. - Networking Opportunities.
You can’t throw a stick at the moment (at least in Edinburgh) without hitting another opportunity to do ‘networking’. I’m of several minds when it comes to networking. I used to do a lot of it, and now I do a very very small amount. I don’t actually believe that 90% of the networking most people do is effective. Certainly my old networking wasn’t. This, by the way, had nothing to do with the quality of the networking groups or the calibre of people I was meeting. I met a lot of great people. But networking has to be twinned with focus. I have to ask “why am I going here?” and “what am I trying to achieve?”. That isn’t about winning more work, but is about my business focus. You should be looking to network and build relationships with a direct link to your business focus. Your focus should drive your networking, not the other way around. Once you realise that, you can start to understand where you need to be and what relationships you should be trying to build. - Marketing & Profile
Again this is a pretty obvious one for me, but every year I look at what I want to achieve with our own profile and marketing initiatives. One doesn’t drive the other. There is no point in thinking up clever marketing if it’s not driving the right business. For me, I start with the type of business I want to build that year and work backwards. I think about what activities can help me achieve those goals and where we may need some help. - Cost of Growth
Finally, I look at what growth I’m trying to achieve in the next twelve months and what that may mean from a financial and capacity point of view. Case and point: we’ve just hired someone. That means wages, taxes, desk, computer, travel…the list goes on. I look at the growth I’m trying to achieve that year and I put different plans in place for what that will mean to the company in real financial, personnel and overhead terms.
There it is. A simple formula to look growth on an annual basis. Simple to say – much more difficult to do. But then, that’s why people hire us ;-)
-j
Hey you! Yeah you! I’m talking to you!
Posted on | January 19, 2012
Subtle eh?
Yep it’s that time again. We’re looking to hire someone new. It’s kind of like a weird version of christmas (the same anticipation of what you’ll get under the tree, with the added bonus of having to pay for it yourself) if Christmas came with an inflated tax bill and a need for an extra computer.
The new position could be full-time or could be a shorter contract (with the intention of full-time) – it just depends on the person and the situation.
But yeah, we’re looking for someone new and exciting to join our team. This is a more junior position suitable for someone at the start of their career (or is looking for a change) who is looking for an amazing opportunity. Someone who wants to learn and develop, to challenge themselves and grow. Someone who wants to be in a dynamic environment and really contribute to our success.
As I’ve said before, I’m not really one for job applications, CVs and interviews. It’s just not me. But to be fair to everyone, I thought I’d take a moment to list out what we’re (sort of) looking for and why you’d want to work with us. It’s not an exhaustive list, but it should give you a good idea of whether you’d like it here.
What’s it like working here?
Busy. Exciting. Fluid. Curious. Challenging. Fun.
We are a growing company. We all have to be a bit of an all-rounder. Some days we’ll be working on launching a new product and other days we’ll be talking to franchisees down in London on how they can drive new sales in their region. It changes. You need to be flexible. You need to look ahead. You need to be quick and be precise.
This is a fun company. We work hard when we need to and there can be long days and long nights. We also have fun. There’s a lot of banter. There is a lot of curiosity. We get to know our clients. We get to meet new friends.
Every week is different. Every project is different. We make a make a big impact on our clients, and it’s a big responsibility. It’s also a big privilege. We get to see the fruits of our labour played out every week.
What type of skills will you need?
Yes I know. I said right from the start that you’ll need to be a bit of an all-rounder. And that’s true. We are a small company. We don’t have room for people who can’t accomplish a lot of different tasks. I’m also looking for someone who will fit into the company dynamic – we are a young, growing, creative, ambitious company.
But there are skills we need:
- Curiosity and creativity- we are a creative company. We develop marketing strategies for businesses and we do it really well. I want someone who will be curious and creative. Someone who wants to learn a new way of working and will bring a strong creative outlook to the business. Equally, someone who is willing to make suggestion; bring their ideas and their perspectives; open and anxious to improve the processes we already have in place.
- Communication skills – this really should be obvious, but we are a marketing company and it’s essential that you have good communication skills. You’ll be working directly with clients, creatives and our strategic partners, and when you do, you represent the company (and me personally).
- Responsibility – We’re all busy. We have a lot on the go. We’re going to be relying on you and we don’t want to be let down. We’ll give you as much support as we possibly can, but you will need to step up your game and take responsibility for things. It’s an awesome chance to prove it to yourself and to us.
- Know how to use a bloody computer – Seriously this should also be a no-brainer. You’ll be doing research, you’ll be writing, you’ll be working. If you can’t use a computer (preferably a MAC) then you probably shouldn’t apply.
Why work for Designate?
Well, first off, there is a salary and room to move up. As we grow, so will you. But I’m not really interested in hiring someone who is only in it for a 9-5 pay check. This is a growing company. I want someone who wants to play a big role in an exciting business. Someone who wants to make an impact and see the real value in the contribution they make. As we grow and spread our wings, we’ll be taking you along with us. There is a lot of scope to develop your role and I’m always happy to help my staff develop.
In short, I prefer to work with someone who wants to take responsibility, who wants to be passionate about where they work, who wants to try new things and who wants to make a difference to my company and our clients.
What I can promise in return is a fun working environment, an exciting and challenging opportunity to learn and my full support.
If this sounds about right to you, or you feel you know someone who fills the bill, drop me a line:
Jordan@thedesignategroup.com
I haven’t really been away for long….
Posted on | January 13, 2012
Hello, hello, hello…
Every time I log into my LinkedIn account it sits there. A stark reminder that I haven’t written in this blog for ages. I have to admit, it’s getting on my nerves.
It really hasn’t been that long. It just feels that way. December was a write off – lots of running around, lots of evenings out, and then I (as tradition seems to dictate) got ill in the last week of work. Time slipped further and further away.
But I’m back now. It’s a new year. I love this time. So many possibilities.
I’ll write more over the course of the next week, but for now I just wanted to send out a big happy new year. I can’t wait to get stuck into 2012.
-j
What’s so great about a start-up?
Posted on | November 25, 2011
I’m not kidding. Who cares?
It’s a topic that keeps cropping up in my circle of friends/business acquaintances.
Startups, startups, startups.
It’s an obsession with some people. I’ve noticed it a lot recently. There are startup programmes at all the universities. There are incubators. There is funding to do it. There is support. There is a whole legion of people in Scotland who are obsessed with the notion that startups are the thing to focus on. The only thing to focus on. The holy grail of business.
(seriously, if you listen to some people you’d swear that startups can simultaneously cure AIDS, end poverty, make David Cameron less of a shitty prime minister…the list goes on).
I’m not buying it. Startups mean nothing to me. Sustainable businesses, on the other hand, do.
Look, starting up a business is easy. You can do it in about five minutes. All it takes is a credit card and a name. You register it at Companies House and BAM – you’re a director. There is nothing special in that. There is nothing holy or impressive.
Now building a business – that’s hard. I know from first hand experience. There are sleepless nights, hard choices and a lot of ups and downs.
But I think it’s deeper than that. It’s also about the kind of business you want to build.
When I started Designate, an exit strategy never occurred to me. Nor did a fall back plan. I was determined to build a business.
I was also determined to build my business. The business I wanted to work in. The business that could be a great company, with great people and great services. I wanted to build the best team. I wanted to make the best environment. And yes, I wanted to make the best money as well. Work hard, play hard – you know how it all goes.
But the majority of startups I see nowadays don’t seem to focus on that.
It’s a quick in and a quick out. We’ll build this up and sell it on in five years. We have an exit strategy.
What are you focussed on if that’s the case? Are you trying build a business or are you trying to follow a business plan? Are you trying to make the best products/services or are you just trying to get to the end?
I know that some of this is driven by the investment community we have in the UK. There is a huge focus on quick exits. In and out. We need an exit return after three years. Or maybe five. And I understand that investors need to be able to make their money and their profits. It’s how the whole thing works. But how much are building a false economy here?
What’s the shame of having a sustainable business that grows over twenty years? Or thirty? Have our businesses really gone the way of our construction industry – we build them cheap and they last a short period of time. Is this really the business world we want to create?
I’d like to see us focus a little less on startups and more on building lasting companies that grow. I’d like to see us concentrate less on the short term win and more on the long-term growth. I’d like to see less incubators promising “FREE FREE FREE”, and more support for growing and building a business.
As I said at the beginning: Startups mean nothing to me. Sustainable businesses, on the other hand, do. And I think we need to concentrate more on building great companies than on obsessively starting up companies doomed to fail.
- J
Franchise Marketing – Why Invest in Local Marketing?
Posted on | November 8, 2011
It’s a question that was posed to me the other day whilst I was speaking to a franchisor about my company’s new Franchise Marketing System (you can read all about how it helps you support your franchise network in effective local marketing). They spend a fortune on marketing, he argued, so why would they spend more money on something new.
I asked him to list out where they spent their marketing budget. His answer:
- Creative Company
- Leaflets
- Posters
- Advertising
- PR
- SEO
- Website Development
The list was pretty good. I was impressed. They definitely were not shying away from spending money on marketing.
There was a problem, however. His franchisees were still complaining to him that they weren’t seeing return for their marketing levy. They weren’t happy, and they were letting him know about it.
He asked me the question: How can that be?
From my view it’s pretty simple. Just because you’re spending money doesn’t mean it’s money well spent. If you spend £70K on an advertising campaign that only generates £20K worth of business, do you really think people will be congratulating you on investing so much on your marketing? Like hell. They’ll be asking you why you wasted all that time and money with no reward to show for it.
You don’t get points for trying. You get points for results.
Back to my conversation. I more or laid out this same idea to him. The reason his franchisees were unhappy was that they weren’t seeing any benefit from the marketing spend. From their perspective, all they were seeing was money flying out the door. It never seemed to be coming back in.
Sure they got the leaflets delivered every month, and yes they were very pretty. But there was nobody helping them with what to do in their territory. Nobody really helping them get the most out of what they had to work with.
Now THAT is where local marketing comes in.
And the even better news?
It’s normally cheaper and more effective.
How? It’s a simple numbers game.
Let me give you an example. Say our franchisor decides to put on an offer and send it out to all of his network. He prints up 500,000 leaflets and gets them distributed to all 50 of his franchisees. It’s the same offer to everyone, with no recognition of the differences between the different local markets.
Now in this scenario, only about 15 of his network thinks that the offer will work in their territory. 15 out of 50. If we assume that they will only use about 30% of the printed leaflets, the numbers start to get scary:
500,000 Printed Leaflets: £5000
Distribution to 50 Franchisees: £500 (£10/franchisee)
Total Expenditure: £5500 (£110/franchisee)
Sure that’s not a lot of money. Only £110 per franchisee.
But hang on. Only 15 of the 50 are going to use the campaign, and they will only use 30% of the leaflets. If we look at those numbers we really only need to print up 45,000 Leaflets. That’s a much more targeted way of doing a marketing campaign – send out the most effective materials for those areas. The numbers look better:
45,000 printed Leaflets: £650
Distribution to 15 Franchisees: £150 (£10/franchisee)
Total Expenditure: £800 (£54/franchisee)
See any difference? We can make it even more brutal:
Total spent on mass campaign: £5500
Total spent on targeted campaign: £800
Wasted Marketing Spend: £4700
That’s 85% of the campaign budget being flushed away.
THAT is the importance of local marketing.
THAT is where franchises need to focus on.
And if you want to know more, give me a shout.
- Jordan
(This article was originally written at www.franchisemarketingsystem.co.uk – please contact Jordan directly if you’d like to learn more about Designate’s unique local marketing systems for franchises)
Somewhere over the rainbow…
Posted on | November 1, 2011
It’s been a long month.
(Scratch that. October WAS a long month, and now we get to see how November pans out. Here’s hoping eh?)
So yeah, it’s been a long month. A long month of ups and downs. A lot of time spent reflecting. A lot of time spent searching. Even some time spent selling.
The past three months my company has been working on a new game plan. We’ve been refining a couple business models (and opportunities) over the past couple of years, and we’ve finally been in a position to execute. It was a tough slog. There were times when I had to really hold my nerve and go after what I knew to be true.
Sometimes everyone believed in me.
Sometimes nobody did.
But I believed, and I held my nerve and, well, here we are.
November. Almost the end of the year.
So how’s it going? Pretty well thanks.
It’s all down to focus.
I don’t know how many times I have seen businesses stagnant because they lack one key ingredient: focus.
Focus is everything.
I was speaking to a friend of mine the other day. Their business is doing, well, what their business always does – they reel from crisis to crisis, from boom to bust, like a drunken sailor staggering from one end of the pub to another. It’s not a pretty site.
It also drives me nuts. He’s got a pretty good offering. He’s pretty good at what he does and his team is pretty good at executing. They have all the opportunity in the world to build a solid platform for their business.
The trouble is – he’s not interested in a solid platform. Solid platforms are boring aren’t they? He wants the win. He wants the whale. He wants the big ticket that makes him a star.
And he doesn’t want to wait.
Let me ask you a question. When did being Entrepreneurial become code for being stupid? When did being a risk-taker become synonymous with taking stupid risks? It doesn’t impress me when he does that. It doesn’t make me admire his spirit or willingness to fail.
It makes me think he’s an idiot chasing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
And so many businesses seem to be like that.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m a risk-taker by nature. But I’m about calculated risks.
When I look at business, I look for good, stable strong profitable income streams. You can build those. You can build whole cities on those.
But he’s too busy looking for the big win that he doesn’t even realise the potential that he has. He has no focus. He has no structure.
If he ends up winning (and as a friend, I hope he does) it will be in spite of all of his efforts. It will be down to dumb luck and circumstance.
Let me put it in simple numbers.
By being focussed in his approach, and by being focussed on the right type of business to develop, I reckon he has a 75% chance of turning his business into a £1-2M business within 5 years.
By shooting for the whale, I reckon he has a 1-5% chance of having a £20M buy-out within the same amount of time.
Which would you rather have?
I’m going for option 1, thank you very much.
-Jordan
Can Aspirational Be The New Exit?
Posted on | October 6, 2011
Like everyone else, I woke up this morning to the news that Steve Jobs has died. I’m not overly sentimental. I won’t be attending any iPhone vigils. I won’t shed any tears. I didn’t know the man, and I have no personal feelings about his death.
But early this morning, as I checked my Twitter feed on the iPhone that always lies next to my bed, the news of his death did cause me to do something.
I started to think a bit about his technology.
I admit it. I am unashamedly and unabashedly an apple fanboy. I love their kit. My office is full of iMacs. I carry around an iPhone and an iPad. I want an iPad2.
(Scratch that: I need an iPad2)
It’s always been a bit of a battle-ground for me and some of my friends. They hated Apple’s products for a variety of reasons. Too restrictive. Too much arrogance. Too pretty. No command lines. Whatever. We’d battle it out on a fairly regular basis – never coming to any agreement, but always willing to waste a few minutes (hours? days?) almost coming to blows. I’m not sure any of us really cared that much about the companies involved (I mean, they HATE Microsoft) but there did seem to be a fundamental difference in the way we saw the technology. They thought I was a follower in some weird cult. I thought they needed to have more curiosity about the world.
I have a confession to make. I’ve recently been testing a lot of non-Apple products. I’m a bit ashamed to admit that. My girlfriend has been looking at the HTC phones, my flatmate needs a cheap laptop…it’s not really me (I swear) that’s interested, but it’s me that needs to find out more and give the advice. I promise.
So recently I’ve played with a lot of different kit. I’ve tried five or six other tablets. I’ve tested three or four netbooks. I’ve fiddled with six or seven other phones. And this morning it finally crystalised, for me, where the difference truly lies.
Apple’s products are aspirational. The other products are not.
What does that mean?
Sometimes you can’t put your finger on it. Is it how a line is drawn exactly right. Is it the curve of a corner? Is it the blend of perfect design with perfect interaction? It could be any one of these things. It could be all of them.
But there is a much more important ingredient: Apple’s products are trying to be the best they can be. The others aren’t.
Test me on it. Go out and try some of the other tablets out there. They are a response to the iPad. That’s it. They have no life on their own. They weren’t dreamed up. They were made. They weren’t designed. They were spec’d. They exist because a market was created and a company wanted a piece of the action. That is their reality. That is their dream. The iPad wants to be more. It wants to be the best device it can be.
Aspirational products change the world. They change how we work. They change how we live.
I can’t think of a better tribute to Steve Jobs than that.
Can Aspirational Be The New Exit?
My early morning thoughts about Steve Jobs and Apple also stirred something else in me. Something that has been stewing in there for a long time.
Is this the problem with the majority of new technology start-ups in Scotland?
How many times have I sat through an “investor presentation” over the past six years and heard more about the market opportunity and exit plans than I have about the company’s aspirations for the future? Ninety percent of the time?
(To be honest, how many times have I been the one asking them about their exit? I’m just as guilty.)
I’m not saying that we shouldn’t think about the hard-nosed financial realities of business. We should. In fact, I think a lot of times, particularly at universities, we don’t think enough about it. We don’t give the reality check of commercial viability.
But a lot of the times, we spend most of our time taking the aspiration out of these businesses. And that’s not what I got into business to do.
Maybe it’s down to who is in the room. Nine times out of ten the main people who get involved in these projects at an early stage are lawyers and accountants. Can you think of a better way of killing off innovation and aspiration than surrounding them with lawyers and accountants? Seriously.
But it’s not all the lawyers and accountants’ fault. We do it to ourselves.
I was at an event a couple of weeks ago and had a really enjoyable conversation with a professor from some university in England. We laughed a lot about the shoddy way universities handle IP and commercialisation, and we talked about some of the good bits that happen in other countries. I spoke about my experience working with some biotech VCs who install a professional business team to run the companies, and let the technology guys do what they do best – create technology.
We were joined by someone from Scottish Enterprise. She said an astounding thing: “We don’t have the appetite here for that.” Are you kidding me? This is coming from someone who is supposed to be fostering innovation and growth? Her take on it was simple – be happy with what we have. Don’t rock the boat. We can’t do that. It won’t work. We can’t succeed.
With her it was all “No, no, no, no and no”.
What a load of tosh.
I look around in Scotland and I see nothing but interested and enthusiastic people. I see innovative thinkers and hard workers. I see risk-takers and salespeople. I see entrepreneurs and leaders.
But give it five minutes and someone will pop up and remind us all that it can’t happen in Scotland. We don’t have it. We don’t have the risk mentality. We don’t have the appetite. We’re doomed to fail if we try.
Is that aspirational?
I’ve been in business for almost six years. In that six years I’ve seen success and I’ve tasted failure. I’ve been up against the wall and I’ve thought I was untouchable.
I’ll let you into a wee secret. I didn’t get into business to make billions of pounds. I started a business because I wanted to build something – a team, an idea…I’m not always sure what. But I know it when I see it.
And if I stopped believing that? I’d quit. It wouldn’t be worth it.
Back to Steve. The quote you’re most likely going to be bombarded with over the next few days comes from his 2005 commencement speech at Stanford University. If you haven’t seen it yet, go look it up on YouTube. Seriously. It’s a great speech. The quote most people will be throwing around on Twitter and Face book is :
“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”
But that’s not my favorite part of his speech. My favourite part comes at the end. He talks about the Whole Earth Catalogue’s final message to their readers: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.”
Now that is aspirational.
- Jordan
We’ve shined our shoes, cleaned our suits…all we’re missing is a punch bowl…
Posted on | September 29, 2011
It’s a pretty exciting time here at Designate. It’s not every day you get to see three years of hard work come together. But it has come together, and I get to walk around the office with my chest puffed out (for a while, until the ladies manage to deflate my head).
I’m very pleased to have finally launched our Franchise Marketing System to the world.
The Franchise Marketing System is unique in the industry. Honest:
- Sector Input
We’ve developed it with direct input from franchisors, franchisees and a whole host of franchise professionals. There has been a lot of expertise, experience and input from across the entire sector. We’ve spent a few years talking to everyone from lawyers and accountants to individual franchisees in order to get as wide a perspective as possible. We like being thorough in our work. It makes us feel a lot better. - Tried, Tested, Sorted
Before we launched this system to the wider market, we wanted to shake down any niggling problems – you know, kick the tyres…that sort of thing. We’re pleased to say the system held up and did exactly what we said it would: bring a rigorously structured marketing approach to the entire franchise network – from head office right down to individual franchisee. - It’s Hands On
We’ve been developing and implementing marketing strategies for companies for over five years. We’ve gathered a lot of experience in that time. One of the things we knew was crucial was our ability to work hands-on with each franchisee on a monthly basis. That’s right. We work with each franchisee directly. Every month. No exception. We visit each franchisee at their location on a regular basis, and our team is there to help them drive their local marketing forward. - The Price is Right
Why spend a lot of money on hiring staff when you can bring it into your company in a much more cost-effective way? Our Franchise Marketing System has the answer – we charge you based on the number of franchisees you have. It’s as simple as that. For most sizes of franchise, the monthly investment per franchisee is only £250+VAT. £250 a month to get hands-on local marketing support. That’s not even a question.
So take a look at the new website (it’s new, so it may still need some work) and feel free to send us some feedback. If you’re a franchise owner, drop us a line and we can chat about how we can make a big impact to your franchise community.
- Jordan
Take a little time…a little time to get to know me.
Posted on | September 7, 2011
I feel a song coming on.
Or not. Either way, really.
I was speaking to a group of franchisors the other day.
(For those of you who don’t know the term, a franchisor (person or group/company) sits at the head of a franchise. They are the people everyone else buys their franchise from. They own the brand, have developed the systems and processes, and take a monthly fee from each of their locations.)
So anyway. I was speaking to them. I was there to give them a bit of input and advice about local marketing. It’s a subject that is particularly relevant to most franchises out there. I can’t tell you how many franchisees (the people who buy the franchise) get upset about marketing. Seriously it’s a high percentage.
The thing that drives most of them mad is this – they keep getting given generic marketing strategies that have nothing to do with their area, their competition or their customers. It’s all generic. What kind of support is that?
My company has a bit of a speciality in this area. We developed a comprehensive franchise marketing system to do just that. It’s all about getting results at a local level.
It’s also about learning. Why don’t companies take the time to learn about their customers? Why don’t they take the time to really understand the competition?
This is particularly true when it comes to the franchise industry. Most franchises will boast about their ‘world-class’ marketing support and, to be honest, 98% of them are talking bollocks. Their idea of marketing support is to print up a bunch of generic leaflets and tell the locations to distribute them.
Where? To whom? Why? All good questions.
The thing is, most franchisors miss out on one of their greatest local marketing assets – their franchisees. For the most part, a franchisee buys a franchise within the area they live. They know the history. They know the people. They know who is there and why people prefer one thing to another.
So why don’t they get asked?
When I posed this question to the group of franchisors, how many do you think actually asked their franchisees about this?
Not one. Seriously.
That’s an awful lot of local knowledge they missed out on. It’s silly, and it winds up costing you money.
It’s not just about franchising either. We’re currently bringing two new software products to the market for two separate clients. In both cases we have been doing an awful lot of groundwork to identify and connect to the potential customers. You have to do this, or you’ll end up with a very shiny system with nobody to use (or pay for) it.
Talking to people is important. Listening is even more so. If you really want to practice sensible marketing, take the time to engage with your customers (or potential ones). Take the time to really understand who they are. Look at the real competition, not just the obvious ones.
In short – you need to do the ground work and understand that every area, every city, every group of people, are all different.
Or you can call my company, and we’ll do it for you ;-)
-j
5 ways to ruin your new product launch
Posted on | August 18, 2011
Bold and beautiful title, eh? Yep, today I have a very simple message to people who are looking to bring new products to the market: be careful.
That’s not meant to be negative. There are lots of great examples of recent companies that have brought new and innovative (or some combination of the two) products to the market successfully. There are some really good case studies of companies that have defied the odds and moved up from a start-up brand to a globally positioned one. It’s very possible.
But there are also graveyards littered with the corpses of dead and dying products. Lots of them. It sucks.
Now some of these deserved to die. They really did. They didn’t have a market, or they were badly designed…there are lots of reasons why your new product deserves to fail. I can’t find myself getting to weepy about any of them, to be honest.
But the ones that do get me down are the ones that have the potential but they squander it. The good ideas that fail because of how they are brought to market. That makes me sad because, for the most part, these projects could have been successful with a few minor changes to the plan.
So today, I’m performing a public service. My company specialises in bringing products to the market. We live and breathe it. And one of the things I normally find when I start talking to people about launching their products is that they really have drastically underestimated how difficult it is.
You see, launching something is easy. Getting to it to stick is the hard bit.
So here it is, then. Five ways I tend to see good strong products with potential to grow lose the plot, struggle, and die.
- The Golden Ticket
Willy Wonka aside, there is no such thing as a golden ticket. It doesn’t exist. But you’d be amazed at how many time I speak to people who are convinced that this one thing is going to be the thing that gets their product rolling. The dirty little secret is that ‘this one thing’ doesn’t exist. Getting a product to have a successful commercial lifespan involves so many things – The product, the price point, the market, the need, the economy…. and that’s just a start. ‘That one thing’ will never happen, and if your strategy relies on it you should take your money and go to Vegas. You’d be better off betting on the last card turning up…. - Sure, they’ll do the work for you…
This one makes me laugh. I can’t tell you how many times I have spoken to people who are convinced that getting in the door is enough. “I’m getting my product in Tesco next year” is the mantra I hear all the time. So what? What happens next? Do you honestly think Tesco gives a shit if your product lives or dies? They don’t. You are a product on a shelf. They only care if you are selling. They care about space, and if your product doesn’t sell, it’s off the shelf. I keep meeting people who are convinced that the big players (retail, banks etc.) will push their product off the ground for them. You want to guess how likely that is? Like I said, getting a product to market is easy…it’s making it stick that’s hard. - Who needs all that cash?
You know, there is a big difference between launching a B2B product and launching a B2C product. It takes a lot more money to launch in B2C. A lot more. And I don’t mean frivolous money either. The simple fact is that a B2B product has a much easier time defining the right channels and the right incentives. If the product is genuinely good and has a genuinely good benefit…it’s actually pretty easy. After that it is down to the sales.But with B2C it’s different. That’s harder and has a much more difficult distribution strategy. There are a lot of channels out there, and you have to make them all work for you when you start looking at B2C. I have seen so many B2C companies fail because they underestimated the cost and effort involved with getting a brand new product (and brand) out there. If it takes you £150K to get the product done and produced, why do you think it will cost you £15 to market it? Stupidity in itself.
- Everyone needs it, I promise…
Everyone has seen this one right? It goes along with the “my mummy thinks I’m handsome, therefore…” argument I love to make (and for the record, she does). It’s particularly true when you are dealing with the techie guys themselves, but almost everyone who tries to launch a product is convinced that the market will love it as much as they do. They are convinced that everyone will flock to the (e)stores to buy their product as soon as it’s released.Well that’s not true is it? It’s a lot harder than that, and the timescales are a lot longer. What we think will take two months will almost always take four. It’s the nature of the beast. Nothing goes exactly to plan. And you need to find the momentum behind the product. That’s crucial. Every product I have been involved with has a certain momentum it needs to develop. Sometimes it’s quick and hard and sometime it’s long and soft (oh my…).
- Social Media and Viral is all there is right?
I was in a meeting the other day and the company could pretty much sum up their entire sales strategy as “viral stuff and the website”. Oh dear. Probably not mate. And yet I can’t tell you how often I see companies convinced that the key to victory will be to get an online campaign going. Why? I mean yes that can help, but it’s missing the point. You have to have a balanced approach. You have to see the right paths to walk down and make sure you’re walking in the right direction. It’s a bit of this and a lot of that. You push here and you pull there. It’s give and take.
And that last point brings us to the simple truth: launching a product is not simple. It’s a complicated web. You can’t focus on one thing, you have to push them all along. It takes skill and planning and, sometimes, a little luck. But the upshot is if you do it right you start to get that momentum. And when a new product gets momentum, watch out – it’s time to pounce.
-j
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