Tag Archives: Business and Economy

May 4, 2016 · 10:51 am

What They Want

Over the years, it’s been a main tenet of the screed that we don’t do politics in this space. I’m going to veer close to the line today although please believe me when I say that my interest here is only to use something that’s been happening in politics to make a business point.

Donald Trump enters the Oscar De LA Renta Fash...

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It appears that Donald Trump has assured himself of being the nominee of the Republican Party. What started out as somewhat of a sideshow became the main act as Trump sent 15 other more “mainstream” candidates packing. The response of the party elders has been along the lines of this quote:

With Trump’s success, “I’m watching a 160-year-old political party commit suicide,” said Henry Olsen, an elections analyst with the Ethics and Public think tank.

That’s mild compared to some other statements, and the morning shows have been filled with Republicans mourning the death of their party and expressions of fear about the forthcoming November debacle.

As an observer of all things business-related, I find the entire thing both logical and instructive.  Think of the Republican party as a business that has only one competitor (Donkey Co.) in their business sector.  Let’s call the business Elephant Co.  For most of their customers, using the other business isn’t an option because the product Donkey Co. sells is totally unacceptable.  As it turns out, the product the Elephant Co. has been selling hasn’t been totally satisfactory either.  The management of Elephant Co. was way more focused on the upcoming sales season than on customer satisfaction and delivering on the product promises they had made.  Each model year they’d make promises and ask for money, and each time they didn’t really deliver (while continuing to ask for money for maintenance).  What would you expect to happen?  I’d expect the customers to revolt.  In my mind, they’d send a message to Elephant Co’s management.

That’s what I think has happened here.  We have a political party that’s out of touch with a significant segment of its customer base.  No company can afford to ignore customer feedback.  No brand can fail to deliver on the promises it makes on a consistent basis over a long period of time.  As Ray Davies of the Kinks wrote, “You gotta give the people what they want.”  In this case, since the people weren’t being given it, they’ve decided to take matters into their own hands and send management a message.  That’s my take.  Yours?

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May 3, 2016 · 10:53 am

Refreshed

I’m back from my mini-sabbatical. I think once the exhaustion wears off, my mental acuity, as well as my productivity, will be better than they were before I left. One thing that I can already feel, however, is that I’m refreshed. Let me explain why this might just be important to your business thinking. 

It’s not so much the break from the daily grind although there is an awful lot to be said for that as well. It’s that my perspective has been recentered. My golf group consists of a dozen of us. We have folks from all over the country (including one guy who’s now living in Thailand). We work in different business sectors – lawyers, media folks, defense contractors, consultants, and others. We’re all senior people, and we have the complete spectrum of political views in the group. In short, we haven’t siloed ourselves into an echo chamber, where confirmation bias can run rampant. We have a few common interests (golf and good food among them) but from there, we’re very diverse.

How is this refreshing? I won’t speak for the other guys, but it forces me to listen to different points of view which come from a different experience set. Ask yourself how often you’re speaking only with people in your own company or your own business sector.  That’s not a broad enough view, in my opinion.  It’s scary once we get outside of our own group-think bubble (which can be as small as a department or as big as an industry) but it’s absolutely required of us if we’re going to continue to be effective.  Sure – we read the newspaper and we watch the news and we probably have the news come to us via various social media.  What’s even better is an extended person-to-person discussion, and that’s what I had over the last few days with the boys.  It invigorates one’s brain and forces you to be certain of your facts, at least if the group is as smart and experienced as mine is.

So I’m back, with lots of energy and, hopefully, a few new thoughts stemming from my refreshed perspective.  Stay tuned, won’t you please?

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April 26, 2016 · 9:41 am

Getting To Know You

One of the most basic things we should do in business is to identify the group of people that is most likely to buy our product or service.  That’s not a profound insight, I know, but because it is a “duh” moment, I wonder why more business people don’t really do it?  How you define your audience is something that influences everything from marketing to product.  Understanding how those customers and potential customers interact with your business is incredibly basic and yet it often goes undone.

One reason I hear for that, particularly among earlier stage businesses, is that it’s expensive.  Putting aside what I’m about to tell you, it’s critical no matter the cost.  While we may have self-driving cars, there are no self-operating businesses of which I’m aware.  However, the cost isn’t really an issue.  There is a lot of free infomration available from the government. Maybe you thought all the Census Bureau did was count us all once a decade – check out their free stuff and I’ll bet you’re surprised.  Do you have analytics on your website?  Google Analytics is free, at least until you become a high-traffic site (and you won’t mind paying at that point).  Finally, if you’re a physical location, you can ask people to fill out surveys about basic demography.  Heck, you can have an employee jot down who they see.  Online questionnaires are easy to implement and also are free.

My point is this.  I rail from time to time in this space about the overwhelming amounts of data we confront these days.  It’s often hard to make sense of it and we often get conflicting information.  That, however, is a far better outcome than having NO data.  Getting to know our customers and their behavior, likes, media habits, who they are, where they are, and why they buy from us is an important part of business.  It’s not optional!

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