Don’t give away the store!

     As bureaucratic nooses tighten  around small business necks, it’s natural for feelings of desperation to begin setting in, and to respond by reducing prices in order to make sales. It doesn’t take long to be traveling on this road before you’re giving away the store!

     Resist the temptation to undercut your value  by offering “more competitive pricing.” Easy to say, you may say, but when the guy down the street is selling comparable products and services for lower prices, and is getting more people in his door, reality dictates lower prices!”

     Bull! You’ll only be worsening the economic stress on your business.

     Reality dictates  that you will be more successful than the price-slasher down the street by sticking to the prices you have and offering instead more value. Are you being innovative enough to offer product and service line extensions that help customers economize?

[This is not the same as lowering prices. This means offering a high-end mattress cover that zips on and extends old mattress life for a fraction of the price of a new mattress. This means adding the availability of inexpensive payroll services to the lineup of accounting practice offerings. It means adding energy-efficiency, fuel-economy, etc.]

     Do you and 100% of your staff  have a “kill ’em with kindness” attitude 100%  of the time with 100%  of your prospects and customers? Not 99%.  100%.  Truth? What needs to happen to get to 100% of the time with 100% of your prospects and customers? 

Is getting to that point going to cost you more or less in real

dollars and real stress than increased sales at lower prices?

     Like giving a salary raise  to someone instead of a one-time bonus or other reward, and ending up with a permanent long-term financial drain, when you lower prices, you run the big-time risk of never being able to raise them back up again.

     Your customers  will expect your low prices to stay low and when you try to raise them, they’ll head for competitors who offer more value.

     In the end, the smart response  to economic stress is to build and boost and promote value, and not give away the store.    

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Dear FTC: C’mon in. I dare you!

A www.NEWSMAX.COM headline today reads:

“OBAMA’S FTC MOVES TO REGULATE BLOGGERS”

     The story reports  how I (blogger) will be required as of 12/1/09, to disclose all the “computers, toys and trips to Disneyland” (cited as examples) that I’ve received in exchange for blog post endorsements because such arrangements are a “conflict of interest.”

     I thought I had enough  computers. I am too much of a realist to be interested in Disneyland. But: Gee, free toys! Now that’s a cool idea.

     Why does the FTC’s focus  remind me of the infamous captain we’ve called into play a few times? You know, the one who busies himself arranging deck chairs while the ship sinks? With all the major federal trade violations taking place every day, don’t these people have anything better to do than worry about such drivel?

     I’m sorry to disappoint you, “Mr. Obama’s FTC people”  but — BESIDES being appalled at the audacity you evidence by leveling your taxpayer-financed sites at bloggers instead of simply prohibiting advertisers from pursuing those bribery practices that may result in harmful consumption or use (some of which certainly should not be condoned)— BESIDES that:

Do you think for one minute  that American businesses are blind to the fact that your blanket overstepping of bounds serves to fan the out-of-control wildfires of the Consumer Federation of America?

     As a long-term business owner/consultant/author and educator,  responsible by the way, for the first consumer education mobile unit in the United States, and for initiating numerous consumer-benefit companies and programs, I can assure you that the CFA is a radical organization with political underpinnings that is waaaay over the top!

     Some (perhaps CFA?) will jump for joy  at having your implied endorsement to spread the notion of “unethical bloggers.” Could it be possible that something like a desperate smear attempt might be fostered to undermine Internet credibility and reduce embarrassing blogger attacks on sadly misguided administration decisions?

     This is of course particularly convenient timing  as well, as we continue to stand witness to the long-deserved, self-imposed collapse of traditional mainstream media!

     I hate to have to own up to  the fact that I have never engaged in the kinds of underhanded, conflict-of-interest shenanigans that ineffective FTC leadership has chosen to decry, and I’m quite certain that neither have the vast majority of bloggers.

     To be sure though, Dear FTC’ers,  you are cordially invited to examine my blog archives in detail. You might actually learn something.

     You will find only  good, sensible business and personal development advice and ideas… plus occasional (warranted) attacks on your “higher authority” for passing along, promoting and endorsing NON-sensible business and personal growth and development advice… and many bad ideas! Sorry, but it’s true!

     This is not to suggest  that there are not unethical bloggers out there. Y’know, there are also unethical judges, government officials, and religious leaders. Maybe FTC’ers should turn their agency’s venim in those directions and stop being Mr. O’s puppets.

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Is your business too frivolous

to survive this economy?

Of course not!

ONE: Find the people you need as new and repeat customers or clients.

TWO: Show them how they’ll benefit from your product or service.

THREE: Push an emotional trigger.

That’s it!  Let’s put it this way: if you think your business is too frivolous for you to be able to make sales in this crummy economy, you’re right! Fold up the tent and go home!

If you believe that people  are only spending money on basics right now and that they haven’t enough spare dollars to afford your products and services because they’re hardly “essentials,” odds are that you are also letting that attitude show in the ways you conduct and promote your business.

I don’t care if you’re selling  designer soap, dictionaries, Swedish Massage, venture capital pool memberships, jeweled toiletpaper holders,or gold-plated shoelaces … now is not the time to be timid in your promotional messages … or be turning out all your store or office signage lights at night … or going into US Postal Service-style retreat mode.

Now is the time  to rise to the occasion, to innovate, to put in extra hours, to go the extra mile, to show people why they can’t live without your products and services. I know, I know, there’s no excuse like the present. That’s true. There’s also no loss like losing a business.

So toss your chin back there, Buckeroo!  Go get your glove and get in the game. Remember that YOU CHOOSE to give up or slow down or make excuses. It’s just as easy to choose to charge forward and speed up and own up to your shortcomings. Everyone has shortcomings.

“Yeah, sure, easy for you to say,”  you say, “but you don’t know how hard it is and what a struggle I’m having just to pay the rent and salaries!” Ah, but I do know. I also know that feeling like it’s hard and feeling like it’s a struggle are — guess what? — right! — choices!!

Choose to feel like it’s easy and choose to feel like you’re on cruise control.

It will be and you will be.

# # # 

Still Think You’re A Leader?

     Last night  we stepped back from the daily realities of running a business to examine some of the attributes of leadership and facing the reality that being “The Boss” and being “A Leader” may not always be one in the same. WOW! If, in fact, you got that far with the thinking, congratulations!

     Reality is  that we all accept leadership as a special quality. Most everyone would probably agree that a leader needs to have vision, knowledge, courage, integrity, discipline, judgment, and all the hackneyed, overblown qualities that earmark presidents and prime ministers and generals and admirals and corporate CEOs (well, okay, some corporate CEOs).

     But how often  do we hear

        about the need for “Tact” and  

         “Knowledge of psychology”? 

     A leader who possesses “force,”  who has tenacity of purpose, an inner “self-starter” drive, a personal magnetism, is rarely considered a person of “tact,” yet “rudeness” is not the definitive issue here; tact is what cushions the force of leadership upon reluctant minds… tact toward both seniors and juniors!

     The true leader  must have an insight into human nature. He or she must be a practical psychologist and must know and understand others. She or he cannot influence people without a deep understanding of what makes others “tick” and what motivates them, and how.

     We have addressed this  a number of times here, that the only way to truly understand and appreciate what makes other behave as they do is to first understand what makes ourselves behave the ways that we do.

Learning what makes you tick  will open the floodgates to figuring out others, and it is that which holds the magic key to superior leadership skills and practices.

     So where did all these words of wisdom come from? Yes, I have taught semester-long courses and untold training programs on the subject, but guess where tonight’s and last night’s LEADERSHIP material originated?

     If you said  the U.S. Army during World War II, you would be correct! There’s nothing new here. It’s all about being motivated and dedicated to assuming the responsibility for leading others, and it doesn’t matter if it’s 1941 or 2009.

The fact remains that ongoing self-discovery births and facilitates the best of corporate, organizational, political, and military leadership in every instance. Are you really doing all you can to lead your organization (even if it’s just a staff of one!) to successful performances?      

# # # 

OK, Boss, but are you a leader?

     A leader  has been defined as one who must first have a cause to lead, then possess an inner urge — the spirit of a crusader — in furthering that cause.

     Next,  it has been said that the leader must have a determination and even a ruthlessness in carrying that cause to success in the face of every obstacle.

     Finally,  a leader has been noted as someone who must be able to engender in those being led a willing and even eager cooperation in that cause.

Since the distinctions are not always clear, and since most of us reading this own or run a business, it may be worth taking two minutes out of our lives to assess some of the 8 basic differences between what we may know of someone who is a leader, and someone who “the boss.”

• The boss drives employees. The leader coaches employees.
• The boss relies on authority. The leader relies on good will.
• The boss says “I” a lot. The leader says “We” a lot.
• The boss says “Get there on time.” The leader gets there ahead of time.
• The boss fixes the blame for the breakdown. The leader fixes the breakdown.
• The boss knows how it is done. The leader shows how it is done.
• The boss makes work a drudgery. The leader makes work a game.
• The boss says “Go!” The leader says “Let’s go!”

I recently read of 16 key qualities that “have often been identified as indicators of strong leaders. These include: Vision, Knowledge, Force, Courage, Decision, Tact, Judgment, Knowledge of Psychology, Loyalty, Interest in Subordinates, Justice, Personal Dignity, Selflessness, Personal Integrity, and Discipline.” (and tomorrow night, we will explore some of the more curious points on this list!) 

It’s also been suggested to me that these 16 may be but “just a few of the many qualities desirable in a leader” . . . in fact, I have seen one study which identifies 83 (!) leadership qualities . . . and that “the line of differentiation between those qualities which go to make up a leader and those qualities which go to make up character is thin.”

It’s perhaps worthy of mentioning here as well that those qualities which go to make up character are EXACTLY what the character of your business AND YOUR BUSINESS BRANDING are all about! (and tomorrow night, we will likely experience some element of surprise at the source for much of what’s included in tonight’s post! Tune in Sunday night around 9:45pm ET!)      

# # #

Call 302.933.0116

That’s 302.933.0116

Call 302.933.0116 Now!

     What makes three mentions  of a phone number work better in your broadcast commercial than just one or two, or five or ten? We all know — or perhaps we’ve forgotten — that REPETITION SELLS. Uh, what’s that? Repetition sells. Repetition sells. Repetition sells! (There we go again: 3)!

    If you’re a real estate professional,  it’s LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION, right? Writers live to REVISE, REVISE, REVISE. Scientists EXPERIMENT, EXPERIMENT, EXPERIMENT. From piano teachers to football coaches, the word is PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE.

     Adventurers  EXPLORE, EXPLORE, EXPLORE. Insurance claims people ADJUST, ADJUST, ADJUST. Corporate R&D people and direct mail experts TEST, TEST, TEST (and many kids undoubtedly think that’s also their least favorite teacher’s motto)!

     Politicians and Little League parents  seem universally to think that WIN, WIN, WIN is what life is all about. How many BUSINESS things come in three’s? Why triplicate copies? One for you, one for the customer, and one for who knows what? Many Caribbean resorts process 3 receipts for a bottle of beer! 

     Therapy group shrinks  use triads to process stuff. Olympic stars do triple flips. Fat guys order triple scoop cones. And there’s nothing like a base-clearing triple for excitement. The triple crown. A hat trick. 3-D. 3 tenors. Triple chocolate (Mmmmm).

     Three.  Is it that we can we only count that far these days? Or is America becoming a nation of shameless stutterers?

     Have Wii and WiFi and Twitter and Spaceface (I know, I know, I’m being sarcastic again) put us all into such a fast-track lifestyle that there’s simply no longer any time available for 4, 5, and 6? Or, AHA! It must be the attention span thing. We just don’t have it anymore.

     I mean who could  read a whole book now, when — instead — it’s possible to read eleven gazillion 140-character stories with the same number of eyeball numbing hours in front of your Twitter monitor? Why limit yourself, yes? 

     So, okay, we’ve narrowed it down.  3 works because we don’t want two (or is it we don’t want “three”) pay attention two (pay attention “three”) 4, and 2 doesn’t reach out and grab us by the belt buckle! So what’s a poor business owner two (ah, “three”) do?

     Shucks!  You mean it’s supposed to be to and not two? Well, three still stays three and not “Twee” unless you’re Elmer Fudd . . . now there’s a dateline incrimination!

     Start by realizing that repetition of thoughts and repetition of actions sell as well as repetition of the words we use,  and that there’s a thin line of acceptance (tolerance? Perhaps threelerance?) between 3 and 4.     

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