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Why should I join a Peer Advisory Group?

team-training

A Peer Advisory Group, also known as a Peer-to-Peer Advisory Board or Peer-to-Peer Advisory Group, is a group of business owners or executives who meet regularly to share their experiences, challenges, and insights with each other. Here are some benefits of joining a Peer Advisory Group:

  1. Peer learning:  Groups offer a unique opportunity to learn from the experiences of other business owners and executives. Participants can share best practices, strategies, and solutions that have worked for them in similar situations and learn from each other’s successes and failures.
  2. Accountability: Your group members help each other to stay accountable to their goals and commitments. Participants can set goals and action plans and receive feedback and support from their peers to help them stay on track.
  3. Networking: These groups provide an opportunity to build relationships and network with other business owners and executives. Participants can expand their professional network, develop new partnerships, and gain new business opportunities.
  4. Perspective: Other members can provide a fresh perspective on business challenges and opportunities. Participants can gain insights from other industries and perspectives that they may not have considered before.
  5. Confidentiality: Advisory Groups should provide a safe and confidential environment to discuss sensitive business issues. Participants can share their challenges and concerns with their peers without fear of judgement or negative consequences.
  6. Personal and professional growth: Peer Advisory Groups can help participants develop new skills, knowledge, and perspectives that can help them grow personally and professionally.

Overall, Peer Advisory Groups can provide valuable support, insights, and resources for business owners and executives who are looking to grow their businesses, overcome challenges, and achieve their goals.

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Who is My Ideal Customer?

What if you could create a perfect marketing message that spoke directly to your ideal customer? I mean a message that really connected with the internal conversation they were having with themselves right at that moment.  In a previous blog post I spoke about marketing saturation and how many ads we are exposed to everyday, and the answer is just mind blowing.

Who is my customer

The fact is that most businesses sell to multiple customer types so how do you compose a message that resonates with all of them?  The answer is simple – You Don’t!  The idea that there could be one message that grabs the attention of everyone that might possibly want to do business with you is simply ridiculous.  But if you look at almost anyone’s website this is exactly what you see.  A massive amount of information that covers almost anything that anyone visiting the site might be interested in.  It just doesn’t work!

In the words of John Nemo, who runs a LinkedIn lead generation company, you need to niche it down.   If you have never read his book – LinkedIn Riches, you should.  It might just change the way you think about lead generation on LinkedIn.  Anyway, the concept is you need to clearly identify with one very well-defined customer – Your customer avatar.  This is not to say you can’t do business with other customer types but your approach and your solution to that customers problem are a perfect fit.

I often use the Dominos Pizza story as a perfect example of this.  If you have ever had a Dominos pizza you know it is certainly not the best pizza on the market.  So why are they so dominant in the pizza industry?  They discovered a market segment, that they would perform best in, and design their entire business around it.  The result is a $17 billion company with stores all over the world.  Pretty good strategy, don’t you think.

Multiple Customer Types

What if it’s just not possible to niche down to one customer type?  Not all companies can find a way to separate themselves from the crowd but you should at least try.  If you can’t and you must have multiple customer types than create unique messaging for each customer group.  In my own experience, my company sold multiple types of services to different departments within the same account.  One message wasn’t going to work.  The overall company identity and mission had to resonate with all of the department directors but the problem we were solving for each of them was unique.

In the old days, before digital marketing even existed, we didn’t have the advantage of landing or squeeze pages to direct our customers to, when marketing to them.  Today however, you can create a message unique to each customer without watering it down to make everyone happy while maintaining an overall company identity.   So, if you need to address multiple customer types spend some time understanding who each customer is and what the message and language is that will really connect with them.  Then create a location, be it in your CRM or on your website that you can direct them back to with a well-defined message identifying the problem they are having they don’t want, and the solution they want but don’t have.  You need to grab their attention by connecting with their internal conversation.  What is the specific problem you are solving for them and what does your solution look like in their eyes?  Pictures work well in this scenario.

Conclusion

Spend some time in the New Year identifying your ideal customer.  Who are they?  Where do they go to find solutions to their problems – social media, industry journals, support groups.  What language fits them best – professional, casual, witty.  What type of solution are they looking for in their mind.  You might have the right solution but are presenting it in the wrong way.  I have seen many business owners go immediately to price, thinking low price wins, when response time, efficiency, or quality is the answer the customer was looking for.  Starbucks coffee gets two and three times the price of other coffee vendors because they spent time to get this right!

If you have multiple customer types, speak to them separately rather than trying to create one message that will fit them all.  It’s not who you are – It’s how you solve the problem they are having!  Now let’s Get It Done!

 

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Time for the Holidays!

It’s interesting that you see this phrase used so often during the holiday season. Because this is the season that most feel they are time starved – lacking the time to get everything done.  This is what started me thinking about your time as a business owner.  A business should be more of a lifestyle than a job!

I want you to think about that for a minute!  A job is something people do to make money and it usually requires a strict schedule of working hours.  Although in the new post covid virtual work world that is more and more not the case.  A business is an asset that you, the business owner decided to build using your cash and sweat equity.  Make no mistake that building that asset is going to take time and a lot of energy.  But you are or should be in control of that time and how it is spent.

My wife had a saying she would throw at me whenever I forgot this.  “No one ever dies saying I wish I spent more time at the office.”  When your business is in its early infancy stage you will have a little less control due to the financial risks involved.  But you have control none the less.

Managing your time effectively can change your life.  If you allow others to steal your time, then you have lost control.  Even customers understand you have a life outside of your business and will more than understand your schedule might not allow for that call that they are trying to book during your son or daughters’ basketball game.

Workload

A study by www.gallup.com found that small business owners work as much as 60 hours per week.  That’s 50% more than the average employee.  Now I am not saying you should work less than your employees because that usually isn’t the case at least not until the business is in its mature phase.  But when you need time off to vacation or just recharge you shouldn’t feel guilty about it.  There is no reason you should not be able to cut out early on occasion to do something for you or the family you love.  I had a routine when my business was growing where I split my time between the office and home.  I would go into the office and work more normal hours, but I would then break so I could have time for dinner with the family.  After dinner many nights I would work at home to complete what needed to get done but I always tried to be there to share the days happenings with the kids and the wife.  My wife was right I never regretted taking that time to watch my children grow and the business never suffered at all.

Delegation

No this isn’t a dirty word, and your staff are not all idiots.  I was complaining one day at a business lunch about my shipping and receiving department and I had a CEO of a larger firm tell me that if they did the job as well as me then they would be the CEO.  He was right!  I didn’t hire an MBA graduate to run the shipping and receiving department – I hired a shipping manager for $75,000 a year.  The problem was mine; I expected too much and gave too little of myself to the person I hired.

In an article from www.americanexpress.com they summed it up well – “If everything in your company depends on you, it can only grow as large as your personal capacity allows.”  The problem is when you are starting out you are a solo entrepreneur, and everything is done by you.  As you grow things are moving too fast to start training people, so you still do it all yourself because the result the team is producing is just not up to par with your standards.

Delegation starts long before you hire your first person.  How can that be you say?  While you are developing the business you personally determine the best way to get things done and what the result should be.  Take the time to template the process so when you do hire someone you can easily train them on your way of doing things.  Spend some time before they start to orient them to the company and your way of thinking.  Listen to feedback because they might just have a better way of doing things.  It’s important to remember that there are tasks in the workplace that you should not be spending your time on.  Delegate them to people who are better at them than you.

The Team

Nothing is more powerful than a team of people aligned around a common goal.  If you can surround yourself with people smarter than you who buy into your vision for the company, you are well on your way to finding more time for yourself and growing a company with a great future.  The team will do the things you should not be doing in the first place, and they will make you proud of the results.  Your mission from here is to develop strategies that will allow the business to thrive into the future and provide your team the opportunity to grow in their careers.  Nothing will kill the spirit of a company quicker than stagnation.

So, take the time this holiday season to think about your business and your life.  Are you living your best life?  Has your business taken control of you, or do you have control of it?  A business has a personality of its own.  It needs to be fed with work and money, it is demanding, but it’s yours.  You are in control of its growth and its cultural development.  Think it over and make sure the business delivers you the life you were hoping for when you started it.

The team here at TEC Resource Center wishes you and your family a happy and healthy holiday season and a year of improved work-life balance.  Now Get It Done!

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It’s That Time of Year!

 

No, it is not the holiday season, it is the time of year to look at what your company has done and plan for what it will do over the next three to five years.  I work with countless business owners who before we met thought year end planning was a waste of time.  We have been doing the same thing for years and we are just fine!  It’s a waste of time and money to get the entire team together to think about what might happen!  My favorite is – Forecasting and budgeting is a waste of time, we never get it right anyway!

Does any of this sound familiar?  Spending some focused time and effort this time of year to better analyze what happened last year, both in your company and the industry has benefits far beyond creating Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) to measure success against in the future.  The fact is most companies large and small fail to hit the bullseye when it comes to forecasting.  If you have any money in the stock market this year you know that’s true.

Planning is about the agility and alignment of you and your organization.  As the owner you know where you want to go, that’s why you started the business.  Knowing which path to take to achieve the quickest results and having everyone onboard rowing in the same direction is where planning and budgeting comes in.

Imagine sailing to a Caribbean Island from New York without a navigational map or instruments to predict the weather, direction, or speed.  For the millennials out there, planning a road trip without your phone might be a better analogy.  Of course, we wouldn’t even think about doing these things.  Then why would you try to build a business without an up-to-date GPS to help guide the way.

Take time in the month of December to run the numbers, analyze the changes in the market and yes, get feedback from your team as to what they see as the best way forward.  Captain Kirk could never have survived without Scottie and Spock helping find the right path.  As the owner the responsibility to move the company forward is yours, but your team will be more loyal and work harder to make the journey a success if they helped create the plan to get to the destination.

Here is to a successful 2023.  All your dreams and wishes will come true if you plan it that way and get everyone aligned around the KPI’s that will guide you to your destination!  Let’s Get It Done!

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Leveraging Your Existing Customer Relationships

Strategic Planning

 

Your existing customers offer you the quickest and least expensive way to grow your company.  As we have covered in past articles one of the five focus areas for every business is the number of transactions you can achieve with each of your clients.  We all know how hard and expensive it is to attract a new lead and then convert them to a loyal and trusting customer.  It would be a mistake not to make the most out of your hard-earned relationship.  Today we will explore a few strategies to increase the number of transactions you do with your customers each year.

Cross Selling

We see this effectively used every time we go to a fast-food restaurant.  You order a burger and a soda, and you are instantly asked if you want fries with that.  A more subtle example is the store owner who places candy by the checkout register knowing well that Mom and Dad will succumb to the desires of the kids.  Shopify actually calls their upsell and cross sell option the candy rack.  As soon as you click the add to cart button, offers are displayed in the form of a pop-up, upselling and cross selling to the customer before they leave the site.  This is a proven strategy for increasing the number of transactions a customer will make during and after their initial purchase.

So, let’s say you are a hair salon and you have contracted with some hair product companies to display their products in your shop.  Most owners do this.  The question is will anyone ask the customer if they would like to purchase this product during their visit?  If you don’t ask, they will not buy.  If you do, it turns out that 34% of the time they will purchase an additional or alternative (more expensive) product at the time of purchase if they are asked.  Better still, open an on-line store that allows that customer to acquire the products they need to keep their hair style looking good between visits.  This store might just produce more revenue and definitely profit for the business than the shop itself!  By the way while shopping they will be reminded that it is time to book their next appointment.

Business Alliances

In the case of the hair salon, the distributor of the hair products sold in the shop is a good example of a business alliance partner.  An arrangement or contract between two parties to share in the revenue sold by the other party.  This is straight forward when it comes to distribution arrangements but what about other alliances.

Take the landscaping company who forms a relationship with an outdoor light company to help accent the beautiful plantings they install.  They don’t have the expertise to install the lighting so they find a company of similar quality that they can form a partnership with and share in the revenue added to the original project.  Think about your business.  Is there a product or service that your customer might buy from you that adds to the value of what you bring the client?

The painter who added window coverings (blinds, shades, curtains…) to his everyday offering increased the revenue of his company by 60% without spending a single cent on marketing.  They simply added this service as part of their normal quoting process.  The window covering vendor was thrilled to have met the painter and has since added many painters to his list of partners.

By the way, the profit of the painting job was increase exponentially because the painter added nothing in cost and a significant amount in revenue by forming the alliance.

Bolt-on Business

As a company grows it may make sense to add synergistic service units to the business.  I will often recommend a franchise business to an owner as an easy way to bolt-on additional revenue opportunities with very little up-front cost.

Take the case of the property manager who is responsible for renting and maintaining the properties for his customers.  They manage everything from the cleaning of the properties to the renovations to keep things looking new and fresh.  As a new business owner, it doesn’t make sense to do anything but find properties they can manage for a fee.  But as the business grows there is an opportunity to add multiple revenue streams by bolting on small low-cost franchises that will perform the cleaning, or painting or renovation work.  Obviously, the owner could go out and buy an existing business or start his own division in any of these categories but then he/she would have to learn the process of managing all these different operations.  With a franchise they come with the training, policies, and know how to run each business all for the low price of a franchise fee (normally between $10,000 and $50,000).

Often this strategy is proceeded by business alliances like those discussed above.  In this case it may be more appropriate to form a partnership or even an agreement to merge the two companies.  As a business owner you should never feel as if you are too small to think about these types of arrangements. I have seen many a large company formed by the merger of many smaller ones.  One word of caution when merging or joining organizations.  Culture is a very significant part of any company and if both parties don’t share the same philosophies when it comes to how things are done it can be disastrous for everyone involved.

Conclusion

As a business owner you know that there is nothing more important than protecting and nurturing the relationship you have with your customers.  There is no better way to do this than to have multiple touchpoints with that customer.  Leveraging those relationships by giving them multiple ways and multiple opportunities to do business with you is a win-win for both you and the customer.  They get to buy a service they need from someone they already trust, and you get to strengthen your bond with them by once again servicing them well.  Call me and we can brainstorm ways for you to leverage your relationship with your

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