"Greetings". We have some more timely and thought-provoking articles for you this month, so read on.  The whole thing will take about 8 minutes to read.

 

Other versions of this Newsletter:  PDF 

 

 

Customer "ownership" starts with a clear understanding of what your target customers really need or want.  But trying to get inside your customers' heads is not always easy.  Here are our three simple questions that have worked powerfully for hundreds of clients. 

Answering these three questions, honestly and completely, will bring you a profound understanding of your customers and will help you create hundreds of  "customer-owning" service and marketing ideas.

When our target customers are buying what we sell, and when they're doing business with us...

Question #1:  What are they really trying to DO?  How can we help them to do that more effectively?

Question #2(a):  What do they want (or need) to KNOW ABOUT US in order to...

-	be aware of us, understand our compelling value and to how to find us,
-	have confidence in us and trust us,
-	have an efficient, uplifting and stress-free experience doing business with us?

What must we do to help them to know that?

 

 

Question #2(b):  What do they want (or need) to KNOW ABOUT WHAT WE SELL in order to...

-	have confidence in themselves,
-	make the best purchase decision for them,
-	have an efficient, uplifting and stress-free experience doing business with us...and,
-	in order to get the most functional, emotional and financial value out of what they buy from us...and to have an efficient, uplifting and stress-free experience with us and what we sell?

 

What must we do to help them to know that?

 

Question #3:  How do they want to FEEL when they do business with us and every time they use what they buy from us?

What are the many things that we can do to help them to feel this way at every point at which our target customers "touch" our business and our products or services in any way?

 

 

That's it!  Asking and answering these three simple questions will open you up to hundreds of marketing and service innovations that will "grab" your target customers, clearly differentiate you from your competitors and grow your bottom line. These questions are easier to ask than to answer, but the resulting insights will amaze you!

Create a Task Force of a few of your best people and set aside just two hours to start asking these three questions.  Think and feel like a customer through every step of the process of choosing, buying and using what you sell...and then, get creative!   How can you help your target customers, to know and to feel what they want, in a way that will create customer "ownership"?

 

 

 

 

4.  One Day Management Symposium in Melbourne, Australia 

 

We are working with an excellent organization in Melbourne who is keen to host one of my one-day Management Symposium in October 2007.  During my past trips to Australia we've received many enquiries about our Management programs and when they will be offered on a cost-effective basis.

 

So, here's the good news, we're offering our Aussie "fans" an opportunity to attend this transformational event...especially those in the Melbourne area. The cost will be approximately $660, with volume discounts for three or more people attending from the same company.  If you're interested in learning more about this opportunity to rethink, refocus and re-energize your business, simply email Sharen Skene, our wonderful Director of Marketing, by clicking here.  

 

In addition, the organizer is looking for one lead corporate sponsor for this event. With an investment of $5500 AUD you will be entitled to send up to 12 of your management team or VIP clients for the entire day (that would be a saving of $1100 in registration fees). Your company will receive promotional exposure in all materials relating to the event and, "an evening with Donald Cooper" following the event for you and your team. During this additional 3-4 hours of one-on-one time with Donald he will debrief your team and answer specific questions regarding how his powerful business insights can be most helpful to your organization. As an added bonus, as the "lead sponsor" you will receive a complete set of Donald’s DVD Business Seminars (valued at $360). If "lead sponsorship" is of interest to your organization, please email "lead sponsorship" is of interest to your organization, just email the Sharen lady ASAP by clicking here.

 

 

 

5.  Are you missing opportunities to be "famous" in your business? 
(time to read this section is about 90 seconds)

 

"Famous" is good.  Whether you sell a product or a service, creating celebrity status gets you noticed, attracts more customers and improves your bottom line.  Yet, I'm constantly amazed at how many really bright business people miss golden opportunities to get their local media to help make them famous.  Here's an example.

One of my more interesting clients over the years has been the Hydroponic Merchants Association.  "Hydroponics" is the process by which plants are grown indoors, quickly and efficiently, in nutrient enriched water, under artificial light.  If you want to see an absolutely amazing display of how this works, visit the Epcot Center at Disney World in Orlando, Florida.

As part of my research in this industry I spoke with a hydroponic retailer in Baltimore, Maryland who told me that, through a friend in the US Government he won a contract to design and sell a complete hydroponic growing system to the big US Government Research Station in Antarctica.

Living thousands of miles from nowhere, in perpetual ice, snow and minus 40 degree weather,  these scientists need fresh vegetables for both health and sanity.  The answer...hydroponics!

This is a great story and here's how it sounds..."Baltimore hydroponics retailer is selected by the US Government to design and supply a complete indoor vegetable growing system to keep Antarctica scientists healthy under Planet Earth's most adverse growing conditions!" 

I asked this guy if he had contacted his local newspaper and TV stations with this story...and, of course, he hadn't.  He missed a huge opportunity to promote hydroponics as a healthy lifestyle and productive hobby. He missed an opportunity to promote himself and his business as the local expert on hydroponics.   And, he missed an opportunity to become "famous".  Not Hollywood famous...but famous in his local area, to his target customers.

He could have had a full-page interview on the front page of the Lifestyles Section of his local paper, complete with pictures. He could have been interviewed on a local TV cooking show, gardening show and general interest show.  And, since the media are sheep, that would likely have led to many more interviews and more celebrity-creating exposure. 

Who knows, he could have ended up on the David Letterman Show and convinced Dave to set up a hydroponic growing system right in the studio to check up on each week.  It would be called "Dave's Big Science Fair Project" and would include Dave's "Top 10 reasons to grow your own vegetables indoors!"...and one small business in Baltimore, Maryland would have become "famous".

Clients always ask me, "But why would the media do this for me?"  They're not doing it for you.  They're doing it for themselves.  They have to fill 100 pages of newspaper or 24 hours of airtime every day...and that's a huge problem for them.

 

When you're doing something unusual, bizarre, heartfelt or extraordinary, that's "news".  When you get an unusual order, sell to a famous person, solve a customer's impossibly difficult problem, or win an award, that's news. Now you're a solution to the media's problem...and they love you for that!

 

So, four final thoughts here...  

1.	Be a true expert at what you do. Then, be passionate and articulate.  The media is searching for passionate, articulate experts on every subject because those are the people who make their job easy.
2.	Start creating a computer database of media contacts who could be interested in what you do. Think of community and big city newspapers, trade magazines, local business magazines, radio and TV stations.  Identify the specific people who you will contact along with their phone number and, most importantly, their email address.
3.	Learn to recognize a "story" when one happens in your business and then visualize what the most wonderful exposure would be that you could get from it. Then, start with your local media and go from there.
4.	Start proactively creating "stories" of interest to the media by creating events, products, special services, acts of kindness, contests or bizarre promotions that will get their attention.

   

In our retail days, our one amazing fashion store on the outskirts of Toronto got 133 major media exposures in just three years by following these four steps...and we became "famous"!  What will you do to get the media to help you become "famous" in your market?

 

6.  Bits & Pieces:
(time to read these bits of wisdom is about 90 seconds)

 

Item #1:  Don't take safety for granted in your workplace. On average, 4 Canadians die on the job every day and over 3000 work-related injuries or illnesses are reported.   For our many readers around the world, do you know what the comparable numbers look like in your country?

 

Item #2:  The power of shopping locally:  According to a recent study, every $100 spent in a locally owned retail store leaves $68 in the community, compared to just $43 when the $100 is spent at a large chain store in the same community.   
 

Item #3:  How goofy can you get?   General Motors Plant #2 in Oshawa, Ontario is ranked #1 for efficiency and #2 for quality of all the car plants in North America...but it is still scheduled to be closed next year.

Meanwhile, the Ford plant in Michigan that scored #1 for North American auto quality was closed permanently on June 1st, 2007.

 

  
Item #4:  In the "who's winning and who's losing" department, in 2006 the Hong Kong Stock Exchanged raised more money through corporate IPO's (initial public offerings) than did New York's three stock exchanges combined. 

 

The main reason?  The cost of complying with US regulations, introduced following the Enron and other corporate scandals, makes it much more expensive to be listed on USA based stock exchanges.

 

Item #5:   How could you use your website to better connect with customers?  Dole, the global produce giant, is doing a very neat thing on their website to connect concerned consumers with their organic products. 

 

 

7.  Is there still room for "small" businesses in the world of globalization? 
(time to read this article is about 50 seconds)

 

Many of my small business clients wonder if there's any future for the "little guy".  The following developments in agriculture suggest that there are, if you do it well.

 

While agri-biz and global food companies continue to grow and Wal-Mart has become the largest grocery retailer in America, the number of small, local Farmers' Markets in the USA has more than doubled in the past few years. Some people just love the quality, the experience and the relationship that comes from doing business with small businesses run right.  There's an emotional value-added that is worth a lot to many of us. 

What this tells us is that, whatever your product or service, if you can offer better quality and a more personalized experience to niche customers, small can be very successful. But "small and ordinary" will get you killed.  Remember, "mediocrity" is no longer an option.

Ironically, even the "big guys" are getting in on "small".  Supervalu, the huge Minnesota-based grocery chain plans to open 50 small Sunflower Market grocery stores featuring "local treasures" in produce, milk, cheese, meat, etc. from small, local producers. And Whole Foods Markets are offering $10 million in low-interest loans annually to help local small farmers.  Whole Foods also opens their parking lots on Sundays to local farmers wishing to sell directly to Whole Foods' customers.  

 

So, if you're "small", what are you going to do to deliver higher quality and more extraordinary experiences to those who want that?  And, if you're "big", what will you do to appear "small" in terms of the personal experiences and connections that you make with your customers?

 

Thanks to all of you who answered our May Quiz question, which was..."Halifax, Nova Scotia was the birthplace of two of Canada's oldest banks.  Clearly, one of them is The Bank of Nova Scotia, now called Scotiabank.  But what is the other one?" 

 

The answer:  The Royal Bank of Canada (originally called the Merchants Bank of Halifax). 

 

Congratulations to Roger Menard of Michelin North America, this month's winner of one of our DVD Seminars.

 
This month's Quiz: 
A recent survey in the USA found that most people have no clue about the country of origin of some of the world's most famous brands.  Let's see how you do.  What is the country of origin for each of these famous brands...

a)  Nokia.

b)  Lego.

c)  Samsung.

d)  Adidas.

 

Send your guess to Sharen Skene, our wonderful Director of Marketing, at     sharen@donaldcooper.com.  Each correct answer received within 10 days will go into the 'pot' and one winner will be randomly selected.  The winner will receive his or her choice of any of our excellent DVD Video Seminars worth $60 to $80. 

 

 

 

10.  That's all for this month:
(time to read this section is about 15 seconds)

"Thanks" for all of your great feedback and suggestions.  We especially love to hear of your successes using our insights.
 
Don't forget to visit our Free Articles section on our website for lots more valuable info on how to sell more, manage smarter and make more money in your business. 
 
Also, let us know what you'd like to hear more about...or less about.  And, do send us your stories and examples of great, horrible or just plain bizarre business practices that you find in your travels.
 
Finally, if you know of others, anywhere in the world, who will find value in this E-Newsletter, we'll appreciate your sending this along to them and inviting them to sign up at www.donaldcooper.com.

 

Kindest regards, 

Donald Cooper,  MBA

Certified Speaking Professional

Member of the Canadian Speaking Hall of Fame

For information about booking Donald for your company or Association, contact Sharen Skene our wonderful Director of Marketing at Sharen@donaldcooper.com.

Back Issues of our Newsletters are available on our website (along with lots of other valuable articles and implementation tools).