Perspective

Every once in awhile, something happens in the world that is so immense that it jars us out of our daily routine. The earthquake in Haiti is one of those events. It puts into perspective our daily travails: business concerns, stress, minor disagreements with family, and that ten or twenty pounds we want to lose or gain.

Of course, many people here at home and globally struggle with serious issues, too. For those of us whose worries are not so dire, this is a good time to remember that we are empowered to help - to support people in Haiti and everywhere whose lives are truly a day-to-day struggle. In the instance of Haiti, consider an online donation to the Red Cross or to Clinton Foundation fund for Haiti Earthquake Relief.

Win-win. Still extant?

[caption id="attachment_666" align="alignleft" width="150" caption="Not the meeting you were hoping to have today."][/caption]

Anecdotally, we're hearing that it's vicious out there, yes, even more so than usual. Dog-eat-dog business conditions, shall we say? We're suffering (hopefully) the last moans of a long, wearisome recession, and after all that business has contended with during 2008 and 2009, the fun-meter of commercial endeavor is running on low for many a company.

Certainly, brand loyalty has taken a hit: Just four out of 10 brands held on to at least half of their highly loyal customers from 2007 to 2008, according to the study from Catalina Marketing Corp's CHKHDC.UL Pointer Media Network, which gathers purchasing data at 23,000 stores nationwide. But the news is more dire than that; the power has shifted away from companies with even the greatest brands. As George F. Colony, CEO of Forrester Research says, "You can no longer own your customer -- your customer will own you." This is true in B2B situations as well as B2C; the win-win balance is way off, bad customers are ruling the roost and, as social media marketer Jeramiah Owyang blogs, sometimes the seller must cut the cord - even during times when you'd think every penny was worth tolerating a lot of nonsense and indignity to attain. He's talking to marketing firms, "hearing from a few vendors and agencies, that they’re letting go of their least wanted clients. Why? During a recession, vendors are focused on being efficient with all resources, and in some cases, some clients are net negative in time, energy, resources, and morale." Net negative - that's a good term to remember.

Too, many of the 8.2 million employees who've lost their jobs during this slump are unconvinced that their loyalty to the job meant much when times were tough. To quote a line from the upcoming movie Up In the Air, a fired employee asks the hired gun who's there to dismiss him, "What are you going to do this weekend? You have money in your bank? You got gas in your gas tank? You going to take your kids out to Chuck E. Cheese?"

It's not just actions, though, it's attitude. How many of your price discussions with suppliers or customers have turned unpleasant? How much of the integral way you run processes has been questioned and turned inside out by customers demanding to "see it done better"? How many days do you and your associates go home exhausted and stressed?

There's another viewpoint about the current economic climate and its impact on win-win relationships, however. Some businesspeople believe that the recession will forge new, stronger partnerships as business becomes more reliant on very solid partners to get the job done in a world of scarcity.Richard Lambert, Director-General of CBI, the UK's leading business organization, says that, "In a more collaborative, less transactional world, closer relationships with customers, suppliers, employees and shareholders look like becoming the new norm."

At vSA, we suspect it'll cut both ways for some time to come - scrappy, messy business deals for many, collaboration for a few lucky others. Firms that want to become increasingly vital and not be pushed around like the youngest kid on the playground must identify their genuine strengths, empower themselves with offerings as unique as they can muster and be nimble... ever more nimble.

Your thoughts?

... and nothing was ever quite the same again.

[caption id="attachment_658" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Once upon a time, all was well with the world."][/caption]

Once upon a time, tech start-ups talked about their "burn rates" a lot, as in, "How much money will we flame through before we get the next big round of funding?" Some of them had bubbled glass in offices for people who'd never completed the development of the product being funded. Delicious lunches and indoor soccer were not out of the question. Then the tech bust hit  around 2000, for many start-ups signifying the beginning of... The End.

Fast forward to now. We're kind of deep in the latest recession, a Great One to be sure. Oh, perhaps we're swimming toward the surface now. But will business be the same as it was before the fall? Or is RESHAPING a more accurate term for what's ahead than RECOVERY alone?

Well, not ALL is not all fog and mystery. In a time when vSA staff is asked more days than not what WE see ahead, we're happy to talk about the reshaping (and that touch of recovery) that we, as marketers in the thick of it, are party to...

•   Businesses moving forward with cautious optimism. Maybe not happy-ever-after-times, but better times are coming. Whether, in the lingo of economists, it’s V-shaped (quick), U-shaped (gradual) or W-shaped (another dip ahead) is unknown. However, we’ve likely hit bottom and are on the way back, however gradually, to prosperity.

•   Marketers using the Web. We’re seeing a major surge of Web-related business coming in the door. Why not? People are going online to reach prospects quickly and efficiently. Whether creating an online catalog, interacting with customers or getting your Web site into Web 2.0 or beyond, it’s a smart place to start.

•   Worn-out ways of doing business... flying out the window. Businesses are scrutinizing everything. Are the salespeople delivering the right message? Is the company even selling through the right channels? Does print advertising work at ALL for this company? Should the company focus on its stronger offerings and (gulp) scrap other products? Tough times create tough questions – as they should. We'll continue to see seismic shifts in businesses - from big mergers to dropped lines and brands, and even to more door closings - as well as hot new companies popping up like mushrooms.

•   Speaking in an authentic voice to build relationships. In a rough environment, trust rules. Savvy marketers are building relationships with the people they need most. They’re using public relations, social marketing, sales conversion programs, and customized grassroots outreach.

•   Executives, coming out of their back-office meetings to communicate new direction. And THAT is good news. Direction, after all, suggests movement. Reshaping, too.

Communication that resonates - how it happens.

Imagine for a moment that the communication in question isn't marketing. Imagine you're at a social event, talking with a stranger you'd like to know. What will keep this stranger talking with you? Will allow him to become intensely interested in what you have to say?

Talk about a topic in which the other person is very interested. ("Oh! You collect spiders?")

Not only BE truthful and sincere - project it. Interestingly, even when you ARE being genuine, people don't always believe it, probably because they have been exposed to so much that is false.

Hear and respond to the other person. Answer his or her questions directly, rather than swerving back to what you wanted to say anyway. Eventually, you can get to your message, but don't force the matter prematurely.

Inspire curiosity. Be interesting enough that the person wants to learn more, and to continue talking with you, and to resume the conversation another time as well.

Now - let's get back to the discipline of marketing. The principles are the same, but the barriers are higher. When you have something for sale (or, shall we say, "skin in the game") you face the challenge of appearing biased. Gosh, wonder why! So it's all the more important to project that you are telling the truth. The type of communication we've described above is a slower, more authentic way to build relationships than old-school hit-me-over-the-head-with-it marketing. But IT WORKS. Banks and financial service companies need solid relationships with customers and clients. So do companies whose products require a major commitment of time or money, or a switch to a new technology platform. So does your company, I'll bet.

Think about the many types of communication you employ - from speaking engagements to webinars, editorial coverage to white papers, social media to sales meetings. Each of these can be studied and, as necessary, retooled to more clearly and effectively speak in an authentic voice.

In a time when trust is rare and business is still recovering from a nasty year or two, is it worth your time to make sure your communications resonate? At vSA, we're voting yes-absolutely-yes, and the nature of our clients' communications increasingly reflects our focus on building trust as we build their brands and sales.

Trust will factor big in recovery marketing

[caption id="attachment_645" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Real trust is hard to find."][/caption]

Even disregarding the in-your-face reality that current economic instability was caused in part by shoddy business practices in the lending and investment markets, marketers during this or any recovery need to pay heed to the one factor more likely than any other to influence a prospect to become a customer.

Not price - it's trust.

How the heck do you build trust, you may ask? In two words, Get Real. Everybody else is as tired as you are of being fooled again, and again.

How to Get Real and Earn Trust, genuinely.

•    Introducing a product or service? Don't jump the gun. All too often, companies announce a new product... and it's not ready when they've said it will be. You look foolish at best, incompetent at worst.
•    Provide valuable information. Yup, it can be hard work to say anything that hasn't been said a zillion times. Every marketer knows this. (Hey, look, I'm writing about TRUST for heaven's sake - not original for sure, but I believe it's timely.) Consider some straight talk that's not a pitch. Gasp. It can be powerful stuff. Using techniques that can include PR, newsletters, informative CDs, the Web, and more lets you position your company as an industry expert. It's a great way - a REAL way - to build trust among customers and prospects.
•    Keep at it. Hey, don't give up! It takes time to build trust. Reach out to the same audiences again and again. Keep the messages consistent - if you appear to be inconsistent, customers won't trust you.
•    Consider testimonials. Real confirmation that others have delighted in your offerings is a confidence-builder for prospects.
•    Listen to your customers. If you survey them, let them know you've heard. If they have a concern, address it. If they request technical support, make sure that it is good and that it is prompt. Again, hard work for real results.
•    Know your market. The more you know about your customer's business, the more that customer can rely on you for solid solutions.
•    Please advise. Whenever you can, use a consultative approach to sales and marketing. That is, inform and advise more than you push the sale. After all, products and services as good as yours practically sell themselves… okay, okay, maybe I'm getting too optimistic here.
•    That brings us to another point: Make sure the products and services you offer DO live up to their promises. Otherwise - poof - the trust is gone.

Marketing asymmetric ends of DNA strands to Qatar using advanced SEO.

Is it just me, or is business getting extraordinarily complex?

Oh, it's just me?

I'll pretend I didn't hear that. Because here's my thesis: nothing is easy anymore. Only the strong will thrive. Just as jobs for low-skilled labor are as scarce as flowers on Mars (or has that changed, too?) successful careers for high-skilled professionals in marketing, technology, industry, and the like are not for the weak of spirit.

Top five reasons why Work is So Complicated Now:

5- The oversupply of really smart people, devising new stuff. Innovations are everywhere.

4- Global everything, with all the cultural differences, language barriers, legal obstacles, and heavy competition that brings. (Leben ist schwierig.)*

*Life is difficult (German).


3- TECHNOLOGY.

2- Related to #3, new communication techniques, and a startling abundance of information sources, some of them reliable. Who can possibly read it all? Or remember 50% of what one would like to know?

1- Energy. And I don't mean alternative. I mean the kind that you and I need just to keep up, let alone lead the pack.

How does a marketing professional serve clients brilliantly, especially when staffing is short, budgets are tight, and careers can live or die by short-term ROI? Few people can glide by for too long anymore without hard work. (And yes, I suspect that once, in a faraway time, perhaps the 90s, some mythical ad people could do just that. Probably they had talent, or charm. Something like that.) In a profession that has at times received and on a few occasions even earned the dubious distinction of being composed of hot air (yes, marketing, unfair as that may seem) the air has cooled, at least for the moment.

Now, working smart is critical. Just for starters, keeping up with industry news and trends is a marketing must. At vSA, we've become selectively engaged with Twitter, for example. We can use it to quickly get the word out about news of interest to important editors and our clients' prospects. We've also seen that our clients can sometimes benefit as much by having customers make positive comments about their products on Facebook and post engaging videos on YouTube as they do from certain trade shows. More than in the past, we feel the need to monitor even relatively recent vSA work to assure that it's up to the minute: for example, some Web applications we created to help clients sell online four years ago need to be updated... already and probably not for the last time.

But we have an additional responsibility as well. Outside of subjects that are clearly "of our industry," it's become more incumbent than ever to follow world news, fast-changing consumer trends, the mood of the nation, the day-to-day state of various segments of the economy, and more. Today I learned something more about Total Recall, a Microsoft research project based on the prediction that an archive of an individual's digital data, largely generated without much of that individual's thought, through GPS, cell phones, cameras, credit cards, health records and everything else he or she does, will someday create a pretty comprehensive record of that person's life... and will thus change the way humans use and recall memory. Concepts like that, when they achieve traction (aside from being in my opinion pretty creepy) are always appropriated by business and marketing interests. So we marketers need to know about them. I also learned today that some prominent economists are concerned that the Obama administration has lost its way in pushing for regulatory reform of the financial markets and that these same economists fear that another economic collapse may be just scant (really scant) years away. Mmmm, hope they're wrong, but better bear it in mind.

My point is that to be truly excellent as a high-level consultant in marketing today requires vision, diligence in meeting world situations face-to-face and the energy to continue to understand the ways people want to communicate now - and what these people want and need to hear. No hot air.

What's the difference between caution and paralysis?

Boston Consulting Group is just one of the voices we've heard recently warning us of the dangers for companies of becoming wildly optimistic in the face of a few positive economic signs. Its study Green Shoots, False Positives, and What Companies Can Learn from the Great Depression "warns CEOs to guard against the kind of hasty optimism - based on an excessive reliance on one or two promising indicators - that undermined some companies during the Great Depression" according to a press release from the firm.

American Public Media's August 3rd Marketplace show featured a segment on navigating the upturn, in which Standard & Poors Chief Economist David Wyss says mistiming the end of the recession can be a fatal mistake. He warns that "The danger is that in some industries if you sort of stay in self-protect mode too long, you're going to miss the upturn completely and end up losing market share. More companies go broke in the upturn than they do during in the recession." However, he then goes on to say that he doesn't think the fabled upturn has arrived yet. Hmmph, he's probably right.

So, what's a company to do? We ask our clients to separate risks too big to assume in uncertain times from sensible business moves that have a way-better-than-even chance of paying off. As a marketing firm, we've watched with dismay as some clients have chopped budgets and then complained about anemic sales. (In case you wonder, we ourselves have navigated through client budget cuts by taking on a larger number of clients, including a number of new ones, balancing out the reality that most companies are spending less than they did in 2008, and in some cases, probably less than in 1908.) We've used more media relations and other PR, more Web surveys, more grassroots marketing, and a lot fewer big splashy campaigns to get the job done for clients.

Where one Downturn Downfall comes in, we believe, is in paralysis. If revenues are shrunken, sure, reduce spending somewhat. But don't cut off all your outreach or you will be forgotten by an uncaring world. And if your company can't seem to decide what product to introduce in this tough market, or when to introduce the thing, GET TO WORK ON DECIDING. If sales are down, sell harder. Sweat still works if you combine it with smarts. The fact that the company down the street announces its sales are down 30 percent, or even the fact that your own company's sales were down 45 percent last quarter, is not adequate reason to assume that you will inevitably match this depressing performance going forward. Expect more, just don't spend all your mythical earnings yet.

The economy is an orchestra. It does take a combined effort to make sweet music, sure, and we're an earplug-worthy cacophony right now. But each musician - from Acme Ant Traps to Toyota - has a singular part to play. Your mother was right. Practice your music longer each day, focus, be open to inspiration, and improve your - and all of our - performance.