The Competitive Advantage

March 26, 2014

Do you have a favorite client?

I’ll bet you do.

But have you ever thought about WHY they’re your favorite client?

Interestingly, it’s almost never the size of the client.  Bigger isn’t always better.  And it isn’t always those clients that have the employees you connect with on a personal level – though that’s surely part of the equation.

More often, it’s defined by the ‘relationship’… and specifically, by the collaborative nature of it:

March 19, 2014

If you build it, will they come? Not necessarily!

As I write this, I’m sitting in a coffeeshop that opened about 3 weeks ago.  It’s in a fairly busy shopping center along a well-traveled road, has the latest barista tools and they even roasts their own beans in the back of the store.

And I’m the only one sitting here.  OK, it’s Sunday morning at 8am, but even when I’ve driven by at “normal hours,” I’ve never seen more than one table full.  Good location… good product… even a unique POD (Point of Differentiation) – the roaster.  So, why is that?

March 12, 2014

Same ol’ marketing & sales in 2014? How’s that working out for you?

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… “If you keep doin’ what you’re doin’, you’ll keep gettin’ what you’re gettin’.”

When it comes to business development, it simply means this… if your marketing & sales activities last year resulted in a certain level of business… and the activities planned for this year are essentially the same, why would you expect your level of business this year to be any different?

March 5, 2014

Ever mess up a client’s project? How’d you handle it?

First, you get excited that you picked up a new client.  Then you find yourself really fortunate when that client comes back to you again and again.

And then it happens.  You drop the ball… a detail falls through the crack… the research gods stop smiling on you – and a project goes badly.

What do you do?

February 27, 2014

15 easy, low-cost marketing and sales tactics for 2014 – Part 2

In Part 1 of this two-part article, we discussed eight “little” ways a company can improve its marketing and sales in 2014 without spending much – if any – money. To recap, the list included:

1. Improve you elevator pitch.
2. Hand write thank-you notes.
3. Enhance your e-mail signature.
4. Create impressive business cards.
5. Try A/B e-mail testing.
6. Collect client testimonials.
7. Test LinkedIn advertising.
8. Clean up your database.

I hope you’ve had a chance to give a few of them a try! Here are seven more to include in your business development plans this year.

February 26, 2014

Giving client gifts? Are they “unexpected?”

On my flight home from the MRA Conference in Las Vegas two weeks ago, I was watching an old movie on my iPad… Finding Forrester, with Sean Connery.  A really good movie, by the way, if you haven’t seen it.

In it, he’s giving advice to young man on the best way to a woman’s heart.  And his is advice is to give… “an unexpected gift at an unexpected time.”

Great advice… and it works for clients, too.

February 19, 2014

Advertising works… and I was in Las Vegas last week to prove it!

I was in Las Vegas last week to speak at and attend the annual joint conference of the Southwest and Northwest chapters of the MRA.  Nancy Hernon and Rommell Montenegro and all of their colleagues put on a really nice event – good sessions, good food and some really great people.

It was the first time I’d been to Vegas in a while that I really had the chance to get out of the hotel and “experience” the city.  My wife, Lisa, was with me and after a few days there said, “You can’t describe Las Vegas, you have to see it!”

And what I saw more of than anything was advertising. Dazzling outside signs 5 stories tall, ads in the hotels and on the hotels, on buses and cabs, at the airport, on permanent and drivable billboards, in those special hotel guest magazines… even being handed out on the street corner.  It was everywhere!

February 13, 2014

Google Consumer Surveys Ramps Up Product and Marketing… Are You Ready?

I haven’t heard much from or about Google Consumer Surveys in the past couple of months, then all of the sudden, I received an email from them last week.  It looks like they’re expanding the capabilities of their service… with longer surveys and mobile respondents (by the way, no change in pricing).  A tough competitor just got tougher.