I’ve been studying company culture for awhile now. At its’ best it drives profitability. At it’s worst you’re replacing staff every time you turn around. Who is responsible for creating your company’s culture? If  you’re the business owner, you are!!! That means you can change it if you don’t like what you’ve got. You change it by changing how you lead.

What are the benefits of creating a great culture? Why should you care? I could name dozens of reasons, For today let’s just name 4 biggies.

• 32% more productivity
• 25-100% more profit
• Ability to take a vacation
• Growth of the asset value so the company sells more easily, for more money

Here are some things that great cultures develop:

1. Culture book – a small book that employees contribute their comments to, almost like hard copy blog. It can be used to build pride among employees. It also can be used as a recruiting device.
2. Five minute beginning-of-the-day meetings where people get on the same page, share what they are going to accomplish that day and ask for resources from others. This is a stand up meeting.
3. End-of-the-day huddles where staff share great moments from the day. An appreciative customer’s comments, something that went really right, thanks to each other for specific kindnesses or making the ‘transaction’ go so smoothly. These can be video or audio recorded and loaned to prospects and new staff to show them what it’s like to work there.
4. A clearly communicated vision for the company’s future that everyone understands and is motivated to contribute to.
5. Clearly communicated values that everyone lives, especially leaders who model value oriented behaviors for everyone else.
6. Very selective hiring practices that prioritize alignment of vision and values before task related skills.
7. At least 4 institutionalized programs that give appreciation, respect and encouragement (ARE) to employees.
8. Random acts of ARE that happen often and unexpectedly
9. Development of the character of employees in addition to the job related skill training. Development indicates that the company is interested in growing the individual as a leader, that you will be better at whatever you do if you know your personal vision and values so you can see whether or not they align with the company’s
10. Survey of the employees at least once a year
11. Managers who regularly ask their frontline staff, ‘How can I best support you?’
12. The philosophy that the frontline staff person who talks to the client everyday is the most important employee of the company.  He’s always touching the ‘boss’ that pays everybody’s salaries (the customer) he gets the best feedback (which contributes to innovation), he handles most of the customer complaints, he’s in the best position to ensure that the customer continues to spend their money with you.

Please add your thoughts and comments. I’d love to hear from you.

What is a culture of connection and what does it do for the profitability of a company?

In your industry who is eating who for lunch? (yes you’ll understand what I mean if you read through the article.)

Years ago when I had my IT company we received a $1,000,000 RFP. It was a bigger job than we ever had done before. We knew we had a good chance to win it. Everyone in the company worked on parts of it. The accounting department worked on the financials we had to submit with it. Our purchaser got best pricing from our product sources. Our trainers estimated the training costs Our word processing expert figured out how to respond in the format that was required.. I created a document and the verbiage that pulled everything together. We worked on it for a couple of weeks. We were close to deadline and one of our inside sales people offered to call and find out how late the office was open and drive it right to the location and deliver it. Twenty of us really worked together as a team because we had a common purpose, respected each others talents and abilities, and listened to each other’s suggestions. Our company had to meet with a committee and defend it like a doctoral dissertation. One of my salespeople and myself were the key people in that meeting. We had gone over the questions they had sent ahead and we were prepped. We went in and bowled them over with how much we were on the same wave length about how our company’s capabilities matched their needs. We were completing each other’s statements, sensing together when we needed additional clarification, working the committee like a couple of pros. It just flowed and it felt wonderful and exciting.

In this example from my own background I’ve experienced working as part of a team that connects. Each person contributed. No one watched the clock to see if it was 5pm. They were all about getting the project won. Each person was engaged and connected to each other. What are the three elements that come together to form this high level of engagement, enthusiasm and connection?

1. Purpose. People feel they are working toward something bigger than themselves. It captures their imagination and their motivation and helps them focus on a target outside themselves.
2. Respect. When each person is recognized as special and valuable, each individual feels worthy and unique.
3. Contribution. When each person feels his/her opinion is heard, even if there isn’t agreement, they feel a sense of belonging and giving. Listening, contributing, and accepting reinforce our bonds to others.

In the ebook “The Connection Culture: A New Source of Competitive Advantage” By Michael Lee Stallard the author defines a connection culture. He writes: “Unless the people who are part of a business feel a sense of connection—a bond that promotes trust, cooperation and esprit de corps—they will never reach their potential as individuals, nor will the organization.” An organization with a high degree of connection has employees who are more engaged, more productive in their jobs, and less likely to leave the organization for a competitor. Organizations with greater connection also have employees who share more information with their colleagues and, therefore, help decision-makers make better-informed decisions and help innovators innovate. Connection is what transforms a dog-eat-dog environment into a sled dog team that pulls together.

So what is connection anyway? When we interact with people, we generally feel that we connect with some and not with others. Phrases such as “we really connected” and “we just didn’t connect” are common in our daily conversations. Connection describes something intangible we sense in relationships. When connection is present, we feel energy, empathy, affirmation and are more open. When it is absent, we experience neutral or even negative feelings. Although we know what it’s like to feel connected on a personal level, few among us understand the effect connection has on us and on the organizations we work in.”

So if you grow a connection culture in your business, how would it help the bottom line?

• 32% more productivity per person according to some studies
• More employee retention, it cost 2 to 3 times an annual salary for someone new to be recruited, hired, trained and come up to speed
• The level of engagement among employees is directly connected to the level of customer loyalty according to many studies. Loyal customers refer more, sing your praises in word of mouth advertising and social media
• Your customer acquisition costs go down, It costs 5 times as much to get a new customer than to keep an existing one, according to the finding of Frederick Reichheld, Bain & Co,
• A 5% improvement in customer retention translates into a doubling of margins, same source
• If a majority of your customers are predictably loyal, you can buy or staff up in predictable patterns – saving you money in the long run
• Loyal customers buy more and cost less to service
• Loyal customers don’t require heavy discounts, they accept higher prices because they understand the value of the relationship and the product/service
• More fun at work, less stress, less money spent on sick time, late arrivals, etc.
• They innovate more and create new products/service/processes that help move the company forward and gain/maintain market share
• They take initiative and handle more responsibility allowing owners to take worry-free vacations, ‘think days’ for strategic planning, and leadership training, ultimately allowing the company to grow exponentially

We did win that RFP.

If you are not fostering a ‘connection culture’ in your company, and if you don’t think it can be a competitive advantage, then your head is in the sand. Your competitors who do will eat you for lunch.

I’d love to read your comments and experiences on this topic.

“Selling’s hard,” she moaned, shoulders drooping. “I get told ‘No’ a lot more often than ‘Yes’ and I’m not sure how long I can keep this up.” How many times have we heard comments like this from a sales person? Selling is hard, but for many it’s harder than it needs to be. With a proper mindset and the right approach, sales can occur much more “naturally.” So what does it take to be successful at sales?

1.       Sales Requires a Buyer’s Mindset

Many sales people have a selling first mentality, focusing primarily on their products and services. Their approach is all about the sale, the transaction itself…closing the deal. I’ve heard it termed the NIGYYSOB (“Now I’ve got you, you SOB”) mentality. A more appropriate mindset is that of an “assistant buyer,” which is all about helping your prospect understand their challenges and address their problems. This approach requires getting to know each other, building rapport, and discovering the prospect’s wants and needs, instead of merely “throwing up on them” about your wonderful products and services. Jeffrey Gitomer says that “People don’t like to be sold, but they love to buy.” If you can help solve their problems versus merely trying to sell them something, your chances of success increase substantially.

2.      Selling Takes Time

Sure, some sales happen quickly, but they are the exception. Relationships need to be fostered, trust and credibility developed, and an understanding of each other’s needs and wants gained. Typically, all of this takes time, and frequently it takes lots of time, involving multiple contacts or “touches,” as shown by these sales statistics (if you are not familiar with them they might surprise you):

2% of sales are made on the 1^st contact
3% of sales are made on the 2^nd contact
5% of sales are made on the 3^rd contact
10% of sales are made on the 4^th contact
80% of sales are made on the 5^th to 12^th contact

What do these numbers say about your sales process? If it is true that only 1 in 5 sales occur before the 5^th contact, what do you need to change? Are you staying in touch and adding value throughout the entire buying/selling process or are you pushing too hard or giving up too soon?

3.      Selling Needs Tracking

Sales people don’t always effectively track their sales activities. However, there are some fairly simple metrics that can be utilized. T. Scott Brumley recommends the following five ratios be used for tracking the effectiveness of a sales person or entire sales team:

Ratio 1: Total sales compensation/gross sales = direct selling costs (%)
Ratio 2: Gross sales/total hours worked by salespeople = sales dollars per hour
Ratio 3: Number of sales/number of full-time-equivalent salespeople = number of sales per salesperson
Ratio 4: Gross sales/number of full-time-equivalent salespeople = sales dollars per salesperson

Ratio 5: Gross sales/number of sales transactions = average sales dollars per transaction

In addition, at a more tactical level, utilize metrics such as:

• Number of new connections made with targeted decision makers
• Number of meetings and conversations held with targeted decision maker
• Total number of contacts made with targeted decision makers (see sales statistics above)

Tracking can help you pinpoint the problem, analyze it, and take action. If these particular ratios are not applicable to your business, then I challenge you to identify which ones are. Whether or not you currently have a sales plan, the numbers you get from these measures might be used to develop sales quotas or targets.

4.      Selling Requires Management

Sales managers need to be hands-on and spend as much time with their sales people as possible. Regular “one on one” meetings are an effective way for both parties to monitor sales activities and targets. Sales guru Hal Becker recommends four areas to cover each and every week:

1. Go over the previous week’s sales and the sales person’s weekly goals. Look at the sales person’s calendar for the week that just ended to gage level of activity and results.
2. Plan the next week’s activity and short-term goals. Look at the sales person’s calendar for the coming week to see what they have scheduled.
3. Take a look at the sales person’s list of prospects. Match sales calls with prospects or orders to see what has closed, what is pending, and what new prospects have been added.
4. Ask the salesperson what areas he or she thinks need improvement.

When sales managers are knowledgeable about progress towards sales goals, there are more options to better priorities activities to improve results.

5.      Selling Demands Consistency

Most sales people and sales managers are not consistent: they do not do the right things all the time. It’s been said that “Consistent persistence will win out over talent every time.” Don’t let paperwork, e-mails, budgets and all the “office stuff” keep you from doing your job!  Sales requires discipline at prospecting, making calls, meeting with contacts, providing support, issuing proposals when necessary, relationship-building, and getting commitments for sales. Discipline must be used to perform these activities all the time, not just when sales are slumping. Have a plan that works for you and stick to it. Schedule time and put the appropriate activities on your calendar, and then execute on those actions to maintain forward momentum. Be proactive and constantly measure progress against your goals.

Sales can be relatively easy if we focus on what we want to learn about our prospects and how we can address their issues. Sales people often have their own way of doing things, but rarely is this done consistently. If you need help curing your ailing sales process, I can suggest other resources as well. To get started follow the above recommendations to improve the health of your sales process and get better results…right away!

If you have a comment about your sales habits, we’d love to have you share them.

According to author, Jeffrey Gitomer…”Customer Satisfaction is Worthless, Customer Loyalty is Priceless” –

Apparently companies like Cosco understand the difference…They have been recognized as the leader in customer loyalty among warehouse retailers, rocketing from start-up to Fortune 50 status in less than 20 years, while spending next to nothing on advertising and marketing because of word of mouth referrals. They know that companies with the highest customer Loyalty typically grow at more than twice the rate of their competition. And, by Raising Customer retention rates by 5% it is possible to increase the value of an average customer by 25% to 100% (The Loyalty Effect, F. Reichheld, 2006). Rather than spending time trying to remember if you’ve ever seen a Cosco advertisement, lets talk behavior and why emotions matter in the customer experience.

Regardless of how high a company’s satisfaction levels may appear, satisfying Customers without creating an emotional connection with them has no real value. This should be a red flag issue, especially when you consider that it’s reported that 90 to 96% of customers won’t complain. They simply walk away. Emotions Matter…because customers and staff are always emotional, and in service industries because it is so personal and stressful, the emotions are more intense.  A healthy way to view emotions is not as a problem But as the basis for forming relationships – This is how we develop Loyalty!

As a consultant who works with business organizations to help improve their performance, our work often starts with a discussion about the vision of the company. If it’s written, you can usually find a statement about customers under glass on a conference room wall. It often goes something like this…” We believe Customer Satisfaction is our #1 Priority.” But when you ask people inside the organization what that statement really means and how it’s measured, the silence is often deafening. If the people in the organization don’t have a clear definition of what you mean by customer satisfaction, then how do they convey it to your customers?

I have come to the realization that “Customer Loyalty is all that matters,” especially when you define loyal customers as people who will do business with you again, tell others about you without hesitation, and refer people they care about to do business with you. Hugh McColl, referred to as the greatest banker of all time, founder of North Carolina National Bank, that ultimately became Bank of America had a simple philosophy: “I take care of my people, my people take care of my customers, my customers take care of my shareholders.” He never said, “I want to be the number one bank on the planet.” Loyalty is earned…it stems from actions that are taken and the words that are spoken by employees. It’s not just business as usual …

From TED, Ideas Worth Spreading

Need more clients? Listen to Simon Sinek talk about how you can use the ‘why’ of your firm to inspire and connect  – yielding people who buy because they believe. This creates tipping points and wildly successful products. Our brains are emotional. We buy based on emotion. The ‘why’ is more important than the ‘what’ or the ‘how.’ How strong is your ‘why’? Do you use it to inspire others?

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action.html

Disneyworld has a customer experience story that illustrates how the customer experience is designed and choreographed like a dance – a memorable performance with staging, lighting, performers, music and a variety of other elements. The customer experience is the product of strategic thinking and execution as much as it is personal warmth.

The Disneyworld Story

The most remembered part of any experience is usually the last part of the experience. It sticks in your memory because it’s the most recent. When leaving Disneyworld after a long fun day, the kids are tired and starting to get cranky. The parents are worn out and the kids are starting to frazzle their nerves. The last part of today’s experience is going to be finding the car and leaving the parking lot. But there are a zillion parking lots and bezillion cars in each one. Sometimes we remember to look at the lot and zone numbers where we parked when we first entered and write down the numbers. But if we’re really excited to go on our first ride, we might have forgotten to write it down, or maybe we just lost the slip of paper.

Is it Disney’s problem that you don’t know where your car is?

In all fairness, no. But if Disney wants your last impression to be your best impression, they will anticipate your inadequacies and choreograph a work-around that delights you. And here’s how they do it. When you enter the park at the beginning of the day they steer you to a parking lot and a row that is filling up at that time, which is recorded. So when you’re leaving the park, all you have to know is the time when you entered and they can drive you to the exact spot in the exact lot where you parked your car. So they get the family loaded in a little golf cart and take you directly to your car.

What’s involved in solving this problem? Certainly listening to the customer, anticipating their needs, caring that their experience is a WOW experience, creativity to find a simple solution, having the tools to record the times different rows are filling up and golf carts to take people directly to their cars.

Who are the Disney staff that know this problem exists? The parking lot employees. They see it everyday. They hear the kids. They see the parents with shot nerves. Who are the best people to come up with a creative work around? They are – especially if they are part of a culture that empowers its people and encourages regular employees to show initiative and even make mistakes while they figure it out.

Choreographing the Dance

Here’s how different aspects of this metaphor match up to your business’ creation of the ideal customer experience.

• Just like a choreographed dance has the choreographer’s ideas, a business needs a leader with vision, strategic thinking about profitability, and care for the customer.
• In a dance there are performers and a cast of characters who co-create the roles with their own style and project with their own personalities.  A business’ employees do the same. They enhance and execute the vision of the ideal customer experience. They personalize the delivery and treat every customer as unique and valuable.
• Lighting, music, set design, props, costumes and makeup create an environment for the performers to create their magic. The ideal customer experience also benefits from a planned and aesthetically pleasing environment that’s engaging and appealing. (includes branding, location décor, graphically pleasing website, etc.)
• The sound system, lights and stage mechanics create the behind the scenes infrastructure just like a business needs technology systems to track customer information, orders, and parking lot entry times and golf carts (in the case of Disney).

Are you planning your customer’s experience with your organization? Are you choreographing it like a beautiful dance to delight and engage your clients? Are you committed to earning your client’s loyalty and reaping the benefits of more repeat business, more referrals, increased market share and higher profitability?

I invite you to tell a story of a well-planned customer experience that you either created or were delighted by. Thank you for all your ideas.

Nancy complains, “Why can’t they get their act together? This is so frustrating. The first person I talked to wasn’t even nice. The second person was much nicer but couldn’t make a decision. I got sent to a technician and got lost in their phone system. It turns out they don’t have the fix I need. Then when I try to return what I bought, it sounds like the person in accounting doesn’t even know what to do to give me a credit.”

Has this ever happened to you? Not a pleasant customer experience.

Each organization’s moments of truth are when it touches each customer. Is the customer experience delightful, positive and successful? The whole point of all the company’s strategizing, structuring, systematizing, training, employment practices, service/product creation and testing, marketing and sales efforts, is to get that customer to buy and to buy multiple times. Most of us have heard that it takes 5 times as much money to get a new customer as a repeat customer. Also, we’ve heard that raising customer loyalty by 5% can increase profitability from 25-100%. So creating that positive customer experience (first time and every time) is the focus of everything we do when we build a business. Whether or not we’re thinking about ‘total customer experience,’ the customer is always thinking:  Am I liking this? Will I stay? Will I come back? Is the product/service good? Is it worth the hassle if other parts of the experience are not good?  Will I tell other people about my good/bad experience?

So if your organization’s total efforts are not leading to good customer experiences, you are missing the boat and leaving money on the table.

What goes into the Total Customer Experience?

Let’s look at Nancy’s complaint and the ‘moments of truth’ that are revealed. What does it mean ‘to get their act together?’

Emotional Connection – The first person wasn’t even nice. People buy from people they know, like and trust. If someone isn’t personable, caring and relating to Nancy as a unique human being, your company isn’t even getting to first base.

Empowered Decision Making – Too bad Nancy had to get passed around.  It’s frustrating to get passed from person to person until there is finally someone who has any authority.. Companies who are recognized for their superior customer experiences empower the person who answers the phone to make most decisions. In order to make this happen, they recruit wisely and invest in developing their people to make good decisions, to buy into the company’s values and vision, to understand the customer’s needs, to gather feedback.

Infrastructure – The phone system, the staff’s capabilities using phone and technology, availability of information about each customer (customer relationship management), knowledge database,  technology to track trouble tickets or complaints. This kind of infrastructure allows caring staff to do a better job with the resources they need. It allows for quicker troubleshooting and availability of information on a broader basis for more empowered decision making. It would have allowed Nancy to find out sooner rather than later that ‘the fix’ she needed wasn’t available. But even better it would collect information about how many customers were having the same issue so the company could create ‘the fix’ sooner and take the issue off the table.

Systems – If the accounting team had a documented system for handling returns and credits, and each person was trained in it, then Nancy would not have had such a terrible experience. In fact, if the process were really systematized and the infrastructure were in place, the initial person who took the call could have handled it himself.

These are just a few of the things that companies who manage the total customer experience look at. Of course, it all starts with leadership. Leaders who get their heads out of the sand and recognize the importance of the customer experience want to infuse attention to the customer experience as they do strategic planning, diagram the organizational structure, create systems and processes in all departments, design their internal reward and recognition structures, and recruit, develop and empower their personnel. That’s what Nancy’s comment about ‘getting their act together’ is really all about.

If you have a story about a really great customer experience, please share it here along with your thoughts about the components that came together to create the delightful experience you had. Thanks for sharing.

I hear from CPA firms. It usually goes like this: Clients expect so much. If they don’t get what they want, they threaten to go elsewhere. So firms are in a struggle to meet client demands while not burning out their staff, kind of caught between a rock and a hard place.

How do you solve this kind of problem? The answer is in the word ‘leadership’. If you feel as the managing partner of your firm that you have no choices, then you’re in victim mentality. I find quite a few CPA’s who are complainers. Things aren’t going like they would like or maybe as they used to, so they complain and wish clients, the economy, staff would go back a few years to when they didn’t have to market, didn’t have to make tough choices, didn’t have to lead their firms through a change process.

Here’s how to get out of the rock and hard place situation. None of these is easy to implement but they can be done. Leaders take responsibility for making things happen.

1. Look at your client.

- Is he realistic in the pressure he is putting on you? Maybe he’s the client that you shouldn’t have. He wants everything for nothing, takes up too much of your time and your staff’s time and never shows appreciation or makes a referral. I counsel my clients to draw up a list of criteria of their ideal client such as Pays on time, Pays our rate, No hassle to the staff, Provides required information readily, Gives referrals, Has additional work for our firm, Friendly and Appreciative. Give each factor a weight and create a 1 to 10 point system where you rate each of your clients. Each year, get rid of the bottom 5-10% and replace them with clients more like the ideal client at the top of the scale.

- Is he a fine client but you haven’t communicated with him well enough to shape his expectations, explain the hours/talent required for the work promised? A good leader has negotiation skills that make the client feel good about the service they are getting. Price pressure is usually because the value of the service is not well represented or because there is insufficient trust in the provider. Have you as a partner taken the time to get the prospect/client to know, like and trust you? Business happens with people we know like and trust. And we all know that an accounting firm is a people business. If this is not your best skill set, delegate it to someone who is talented in this area. Your responsibility as a leader is to delegate to others according to their strengths, including yourself.

2. Look at your organization.

- Have you created a strategic plan and have you communicated it to your staff? People can get very frazzled when they find themselves without direction, duplicating work, or worse going in the opposite direction from the partners because they didn’t know what the partners were thinking. If you haven’t communicated the plan well enough so that everybody knows what it is and what their part in it is, then you haven’t garnered any motivation, inspiration or excitement that comes with achieving individual and group goals. You haven’t created a high performance team that is excited and engaged in doing their best. So of course, they won’t be at their peak performance in servicing clients. Stress in the workplace creates fatigue and a higher level of burnout.

- Are people given training in personal growth as well as skill growth? Do you look at them as individuals with personal lives or as staff employed for the organization’s benefit? People work best when their personal goals, efforts and personalities are recognized and valued.

- Human resource studies show that the overwhelming reason that people leave their jobs is because of difficulties with their managers. Do your managers show praise and/or appreciation every day to every person? Do they identify guidelines about tasks or do they let people fail and only offer negative correction after the fact? Do they micromanage or let people take initiative? There’s a fine line. Have you trained your managers in how to manage?

- Do you have a way to measure client loyalty? Certainly you can start with a paper or online quick survey. But you can get more information through interviews and focus groups. Do you want to get better at customer service? Let your clients tell you where they see the holes. Then you can decide if you need to make staff changes, technology changes, strategic direction changes and how to allocate resources. Client complaints are your greatest ally. Learn as much as you can from them.

You as a partner or managing partner are the leader of your firm. Taking action to shape your firm, train your clients, bring out the best in your staff, make changes that lead to happy clients and happy staff are all your responsibility. Yes, you can and should get input. But it’s up to you to bring up the subjects, ask the questions, make decisions, get buy-in and create the future you want. There’s no room for complaining here. You don’t have to accept the spot in between the rock and the hard place. You can wiggle free and create a whole different future.

Certainly your clients are people; they are individuals you connect to in many ways. Perhaps they are the point person of the organization that is actually who is paying you. You connect by having a personal relationship as well as a professional relationship. Part of your professional relationship is your hope that they see so much value in the service you provide that they give you a testimonial and they bring referrals to you and your business. Many professional service firms grow mainly by referrals from current clients.

So a client is also a business asset. It is an asset you can and should leverage to get other clients, to grow your firm, to accomplish your business’ vision.

How can you best leverage this asset? Here are some ways.

1. Have your client give you a testimonial letter. Use this when you’re talking to a new prospect, attach it to an email, include in your brochure or prospect packet. Some people might have put this into a ‘Brag Book’ in the pre-digital world.
2. Put the testimonials on your website. You can see an example testimonial page on my website by clicking here. Use this as an opportunity for your clients to showcase their own businesses. Case studies work well here.
3. Run a cross endorsement campaign. Another professional who targets the same target market can introduce you to five of their clients in trade for you introducing five of your clients.
4. Have your clients speak at one of your seminars or teleseminars. They can talk about your process and the quantifiable results. They don’t have to laud you to all the other attendees. The fact that they are there and willing to describe their experience speaks loud enough.
5. Have a referral meeting. Set up a specific appointment to go over referrals that your client can introduce you to. Tell them about your ideal client so they know who to look out for. Go over your plan for each introduction. Will you be introduced over lunch or breakfast, at a networking event, by email or 3 way conference call? If your client just gives you a name and tells you to make contact, it’s not much of a referral. It’s always best to have this type of meeting when the client is feeling very good about the service you’ve provided.
6. If you belong to some networking organizations that have regular referrals, invite your client to be your guest. Your client meets new contacts which might help him. When he says something that praises your work to the other participants, they become extra convinced of the value you can bring. They can then be even better at finding new prospects for you.
7. Partner with your client to do something for the trade association that he belongs to in order to attract similar clients. Write an article together, give a seminar together. Let him put you in touch with the trade association conference organizer so you can be a speaker at the industry event. You both win.
8. Does the client belong to any alumni, social, spots, country clubs or specialized groups that you can be invited to as his guest? Especially when he’ll introduce you to someone specific.

Leveraging your client assets is a smart way to grow your business. Clients are eager to help if you’ve provided great value and if you ask in a way that the client sees what’s in it for himself. Status (personal or professional), deepening the relationship with his contact, enhanced or new connections for his business, a better relationship with you are all rewards he might get from giving you a testimonial or referrals.

The eight ideas above are just a few ways to leverage your client assets. If you can add more, we’d all enjoy hearing your ideas and experiences.

There are two results from marketing. There are the low hanging fruit, the leads from prospects that want to buy now and immediately enter your sales process. Secondly, there are the leads that are seeds which need to be planted and nourished. They may turn into buyers in the future when they are ready and feel properly nurtured. It is this second group that these thoughts will address.

What do you do with a seed? You plant it. You water it. You make sure it gets the right amount of sunshine. Sometimes it takes and it grows big and strong and sometimes it doesn’t. Same thing with a new contact.

The new contact is meeting people all the time. Those new people will have top of mind recognition unless you continually remind your contact that you’re there and have something worthwhile to offer.

What’s the best thing to offer? In the professional services arena, education is the best thing to offer. It positions you and your company as experts. It keeps you top of mind. It shows your continuing value as a source of current knowledge. It gives you the opportunity to help the prospect uncover his need so that he is more likely to eventually sense that he has a problem that needs solving. It allows him to assess various vendors in the marketplace and then choose to develop a relationship with you.

People buy from people. Utilizing this time between making the initial contact and entering the buying conversation is perfect time for you to make a connection. Incorporating emotional intelligence into how you nurture that seed means that you see each seed as unique and worthy of a personal relationship. So following  up with a periodic ‘checking in with you’ type phone call, offering a free gift like tickets or attendance at a seminar, a valuable newsletter, introducing the contact to someone that would be valuable to their business are all ways to keep building the personal connection.

While you’re nurturing this seed, keep in mind what the prospect is thinking. Here’s his thought, “How you sell me is how you will serve me.” So honor the prospect by treating him just as carefully while nurturing the seed as when he says he’s ready to buy.

Your seed nurturing program should have as its single focus the development of trust. Then you get more referrals. You spend less time and energy on superfluous distractions. You won’t compete on price.

Sales researchers say that it requires 8-12 touches before somebody buys. This includes all forms of communication. Those who stick with the process for the entire time earn the most sales.

How do you track all the ‘seeds that you’re planting’? How do you make sure you know when you last nurtured a seed or when someone else in your organization helped you nurture a seed? That’s where mailing list software is really helpful. There are plenty of programs that can maintain a mailing list and help you prepare and send a periodic newsletter. There is CRM (customer relationship management) software that can track all the emails, phone calls, appointments, etc. you engage the prospect with. And the information can be shared across your network because this prospect might be touching base with others in your organization and certainly you want to encourage this. It can also track contact with multiple people in your prospect’s organization.

So how are you nurturing your seeds? What tools and techniques are you using to manage and deepen the connection with each prospect? Tell us a success story of how a nurtured seed became a great client.

This is one of my favorite videos on Youtube. It’s all about positivity, smiling, attracting people by how you make each person feel. This is the basis of client loyalty, that personal connection that makes people want to be around you. Each person in this short video feels validated and encouraged to shine.

I mentioned the video in passing in a previous post. Kudos to you if you can find it or remember which post it is. Please tell the rest of the readers. Yeah, you got it. This is a teaser to get you to look at some previous posts.

Please relate a short story of when someone else’s smile was so infectious that you just had to smile as well. All these stories will help all our readers get ideas on how to create more attraction and loyalty in their lives and businesses. Please tell one of your experiences where you felt validated and encouraged to shine.

I always like your stories.

Salespeople are motivated by several things, money and what money will buy, pride and accomplishment, status in the eyes of others.

But the best salespeople, the ones whose customers keep coming back, realize that selling is about using their skills to make people happy, bringing value to people to make their lives better. The best salespeople want the best for their clients helping them buy what is truly in the buyer’s best interest.

If you’re a salesperson, you know that keeping yourself full of confidence each day is tough. Life happens. Yet if you don’t walk into every sales meeting with a very up-attitude, full of self-confidence and a positive outlook, you’re shooting yourself in the foot. So how can you prep your attitude, remind yourself of the benefit you can bring to your prospect, and get yourself pumped up for the meeting?

Many successful people use self-talk, telling yourself things that make you feel confident, in touch with your motivation, in line with your life purpose. I suggest that there are two kinds of self-talk and they are both necessary: Head-talk and Heart-talk. Head talk is when you tell yourself words. You comprehend the words intellectually. They make sense to you because they are your words. Heart-talk is when you let words and concepts turn into feelings. You might use the same words, but you feel them as experiences and you call up the feelings you felt the last time you were in the same situation. Heart-talk is more powerful than head-talk.

Here is something that I use at the beginning of every day.

“Who Can I Reach Today?”

The whole sentence has meaning for me in that as a business and executive coach I really believe I can help my client and that she deserves to have me in her life. And then each word has meaning and calls up experiences for me. The head-talk just sounds like some regular short words. But the heart-talk is powerful.

Who – My prospect is a person, an individual just like me with thoughts, feelings, pride and insecurities. I respect her and want the best for her. I believe in her talent, individuality and ability to make choices that are in her best interest.

Can – Yes, I ‘can.’ I can be anything I want to create myself to be. I can win over this client. I can be a winner, just like I was with  (name other clients who are very loyal and who you really like. Picture them. Feel the fulfilling feeling that I feel when my work with them is successful.)

I – I am powerful. I am my core values and my long term vision. I am my dreams and aspirations. I am everything I’ve experienced in my life. I can not be a help to someone else if I don’t feel strong and capable. People depend on me and I can come through for them because I know who I am at the center of my being. I am capable and what I offer is of value. I don’t have to tell people about my strength. If I sense it, they will sense it. I picture and feel a strong but flexible core spine deep inside my body surrounded by strong muscles.

Reach – Reaching is an action word and nothing happens til I do an action. Reaching out beyond myself, extending out from my core to touch someone at his core is what I’m all about. It gives my life meaning and is in line with my life purpose. When I think about this, I feel my muscles stretch out to touch someone just beyond my reach. I make it a kinesthetic experience. As a dancer that is very meaningful to me.

Today – Right now, not yesterday or tomorrow. I can’t control the past and the future depends on today. So there’s no putting things off. The current moment is my action point, my decision point, my point of creation. I once heard a speech by Lou Holtz (Notre Dame football coach). He stressed asking his team. “What’s important now?” That experience of hearing that speech plays in my head and helps me make choices and be focused on my actions in the present.

‘Who can I reach today?’ Who knew that such a little string of words could provide so much powerful head-talk and heart-talk?

Can you come up with your own string of words that you can use to prep yourself on your way to an important meeting and to create a meaningful experience for your prospect? Can you emotionalize the words with your feelings from your life experiences? Human development professionals call that generalization, transferring felt feelings to new situations or visualized situations. We all spend so much time in our heads with head-talk. Of course, analytic stuff is necessary and our left brain has a lot to process. But if we can engage in heart-talk from our right brains as well as the feelings that we store in the limbic part of our brains, we can be more authentic, more magnetic, more true to ourselves. Customers are smart. They intuitively sense that. You attract their trust and respect. Your relationship deepens and before you know it, you’ve made a sale and possibly a long term customer.

I invite your comments on selling from the heart. What motivates you?

People

When we go on vacation, we try to go with family and friends that we know we’ll enjoy. Of course, there are exceptions. We may not like certain family members or the friend of friends that happen to come, too. But by and large we’re planning an experience so we know we can enjoy it. We’re inviting the people close to us with whom we have bonds, share fun, derive meaningful conversation, have pleasant past experiences. Each one is an individual with his/her own unique talents, quirks, strengths, weaknesses, interests, style, etc. We recognize each one’s individuality and relate to him/her as a unique person. Our relationship with that person is one of a kind. Our conversations with one person are not the same as a conversation with another. Each person elicits from us a different kind of empathy.

Research done by Gallop polls shows that clients don’t remain loyal to your business because you provide them with a reasonable or even great transactional customer service. That’s just the minimum. Customers keep coming back and become your raving fans because you have personal relationships that show each person that s/he is unique, and deserving of a unique relationship, conversation, and empathy connection. Together you’re creating a shared experience that you can bond over, just like a journey together or a dance (just had to get that in) or a pleasant vacation. You find commonalities (pets, families, music, hobbies, likes and dislikes) that help that customer remember how unique you are as well, not just another talking-business-head at the other end of the phone, but a real person with families, pets, cares, likes and dislikes of your own. A lot of that is communicated by the warm tone of your voice, the eye contact (if you’re face-to-face), the way you ask questions and expect an answer, your ability to laugh and be playful, how you show you care.

If you want your client to feel s/he is on vacation with you, view him/her as a person that could potentially go on vacation with you. (If that’s too difficult, view the person as someone who goes on vacation with his/her own family.)

Sensory Experience

Did you notice in the story I told at the top of this page what I described first was about the beach and the sun (feeling and smelling), ice cream and ‘bars’ (taste), music (hearing), (seeing) the dancers, the sun, the musicians. The way our brains have evolved, when we experience something through our senses and it’s associated with positive emotions, we remember it a long time because we remember the emotions a long time. We may not remember the actual details of the transaction, but we do remember our sensory experience and how the person made us feel that was associated with the sensory memory.

How can we put sensory experiences into the customer’s buying experience? Most retail stores know this. They play music in the background. Bookstores offer snacks and comforting drinks. Visually stores are set up to show colorful, well designed displays that catch your eye, and they create soothing lighting. In longer term client relationships, people touch, hug, kiss on the cheek(s)(familiarity varies with cultures before each of these becomes acceptable) There are food tastings, wine tastings. Companies offer free lunches and company picnics to help bond their employees to the company. In your situation how can you involve a sensory component that helps to enhance the client relationship? No matter how detached and professional you think you need to be, remember we’re all human and respond to our senses unconsciously.

Repeatable Tradition

Every time we’ve gone on this vacation to this shore location, we reinforce our experience of enjoying it together. It becomes something we share over and over and reinforces the bonds we have with each other. Going to the ice cream parlor, for instance, generates conversations of ‘remember when we were here last year and the year before that’. Who sang, what song, who in our party had to sing along, what got spilled, how hard we laughed, who was with us, what’s changed. So we now have this year’s memory that’s layered on last year’s memory and all the layers of years before that. The bonds grow stronger with every layer.

How can we incorporate repeatable and layered positive emotional traditions in our clients’ experiences? If we’re relating to each one as a unique individual, we can bring up memories of things we talk about each time we come in contact. Nordstroms was always well known for salespeople remembering their clients and their unique needs and personal situations. Companies that have CRM (customer relationship management) software can record notes about conversations, birthdays, etc. That helps when there are lots of customers we want to remember. Remembering that Pat likes to talk about her cat and bringing it up the next time you get her on the phone reinforces the pleasurable first conversation. Taking a client to a sports event, an art opening, a nonprofit fundraiser creates these shared experiences. When repeated, they become a tradition with multi-layered bonding.

The Contagion Factor

When new ‘friends’ come along on our family’s vacations, they get swept up in the shared camaraderie. We talk about memories and wind up explaining what originally happened. This generates various versions of the same story, a lot of discussion and a retelling of the traditions which increase the bonds. The new person feels caught up in the group fun and the bonds form a network that includes the new person. Imagine a spider web of filaments going from each person to each person with the new friend caught up in the web of belonging. The new person contributes to the present experience which will become a new component in the evolving tradition. This is part of the experience of the vacation, the group coalescing and magnifying the experience of those who are present even if they don’t yet share all the traditions.

How can we include this in our clients’ experiences? Can we introduce new clients/prospects to existing clients? Certainly if we’re targeting an industry and then become a sponsor of an industry event, the invitees are most likely existing clients and some prospects. If the existing clients are sharing stories of the traditions they’ve shared with you and your company, the prospects can get caught up in the spider web of stories. They’ll catch the contagion and it will enhance their experience at the event and possibly get them started positively as they develop their own repeatable traditions with your firm. In the coaching groups that I’ve facilitated there are traditions in shared vocabulary, goal achieving methodologies, target market/product matrixes and more that each person has had experience with. When they come together in a group, each person reinforces each other’s experiences and there’s an infectious learning that takes place and strengthens the bonds among group members and with their coach (me).

So think about how you can make your clients’ experience more like a vacation with your family so they want to come back again and again. 1) Look at each person as a unique individual worthy of your trust, respect, and a unique relationship, 2) Incorporate sensory experiences that make their emotional experience with you memorable in their core brain functions, 3) Create repeatable traditions of layered experiences, and finally, 4) Use the contagion factor to include new prospects in your existing client’s spider web of bonds and traditions to maximize the quality of relationships and the quantity of raving fans.

I’m always interested in your feedback. Email me ideas that can enhance the value of this conversation.  Want to come with me on my vacation?

1. Dance full out. You can dance small or you can dance big. Have you watched ‘Dancing With the Stars’? Do the performers get any points for holding back? No, the judges want to see full expression and commitment to the movement. Are you committed to your business? Do you really go for it? Put in your heart and soul? If you’re going to do something in your business, do it fully. Accept the risk. Make the leap of faith. When you make a decision, get fully invested in implementing it. Get past your comfort zone. Go for it.

2. Leaders take care of their followers. Followers have entrusted themselves to you. It’s your job to steer them toward open space and away from potential bumps and bruises from obstacles along the way. It’s your job to give good instructions so that they can respond easily. You will learn by how they respond if your instructions were clear enough. You’ll continually fine tune your instructions so their responses produce the results you’re looking for. If you don’t get the response you’re looking for, hold yourself accountable and figure out how to be a better leader. Make your followers look good. Whether you’re a leader on the dance floor or the office, the same tenets hold true.

3. Followers maintain their own strength, balance, and frame. It’s your job to be steerable, not wimpy. Dancers maintain frame, which means they don’t let their arms collapse or their shoulders give or their spines twist. If their bodies turned to spaghetti, the leaders wouldn’t be able to steer them anywhere. In the business world leaders expect you to use your judgment, maintain the company values, keep yourself stable and strong to fulfill your role. Followers provide real feed back that comes from a center of strength. It helps the leader be a better leader.

4. The value is in being connected. Leaders and followers are responsive to each other’s movements. Good dancers connect with each other. In business we connect with our clients and with our employees. Gallup polls show that customer loyalty is not as much about customer service as it is about empathy and the emotional bond that forms among people who make each other feel special and unique. Retaining clients reduces marketing costs and increases buying frequency. Employee retention reduces turnover costs, increases the stability of the customer experience and retains knowledge within the organization . Understanding the emotional intelligence of leveraging points of connection can make or break your bottom line. It’s a business strategy.

5. It’s all about action. Dancing requires action. You can’t learn or practice dancing by just watching. You have to get up and do it. In business we also learn by doing. Sure you can watch someone else for a while, or read about a subject. But you really need to be doing business everyday to sense the pitfalls, understand the terrain, and experience the joy of success. You can plan all you want, but it’s execution that will make revenues

You’ve sold a product or a service. You’ve calculated your cost and sold it at a profit. So the sale is profitable, right? Not so fast. Is this the first sale to this customer? Have you calculated your customer acquisition cost? If you sold something for $100 and made $20 on the sale and your customer acquisition cost is $60, you may need to make three sales to that customer just to break even.

So what is customer acquisition cost? It’s everything that goes into you getting customers. Here are some obvious examples: your website, media and print advertising, the salaries of your marketing staff, the salaries and commission of the sales team, business cards, brochures and letterhead, gifts that you buy to give to customers, dues and fees to go to events and association meetings where you find your customers, lists that you buy to get new customers, the costs associated with your newsletter.

Here are some less obvious costs: You brand yourself in a particular way through having a clean and sophisticated office, special shirts or uniforms for your workers, your name painted on your vehicles, the music and ease of use of your phone system, the portion of your receptionist’s salary that greets customers, and any other things that create your brand awareness. The point of having a brand is to attract customers so these costs should be included as well. And if you’re the decision maker, you’re using some of your time to focus on customer strategies, niches, problems, sales people issues, etc. So allocate some of the cost of your time, too.

This is the whole point of customer loyalty. If you spend all this money to get a customer and he’s a one-and-done single transaction, you’ve lost a lot of money. If, however, that customer becomes a raving fan, he repeatedly buys your product or service and you can start making money from him. If he then refers other people to buy your product or service, you’ve made more money from him and your customer acquisition costs can be decreased.

So how do you achieve greater customer loyalty? The experts and the research say personal points of connection occur at every point where someone from your organization interacts with a customer. Making that customer feel respected, unique and special, showing empathy, defusing stressful situations and turning that energy into something positive are all ways to build customer loyalty. Whether the buyer is buying a candy bar in a drug store or a multi- million dollar contract, personal connection keeps the customer coming back. That is the ultimate customer loyalty test. Does s/he come back?

I encourage you to:

1. Decide on a past time frame, most likely the last 6-12 months, so you can establish your company’s metrics. You can pull these numbers from your accounting system.
2. Make a list of all your obvious and not-so-obvious customer acquisition costs,
3. Divide the total of your costs by the number of new customers generated during that time frame. That will give you your acquisition cost per customer.
4. Calculate your average sale and your average profit.
5. How many times do you need to earn that profit before you’ve covered the acquisition cost for that customer? (Divide the cost per customer by the profit per sale.)
6. Show this to your sales team to make sure they know when that customer starts becoming profitable to the business.
7. Show that to your product/service fulfillment team so they know how many times that customer has to keep coming back just to break even on the customer acquisition cost and before the profit starts to pay their salaries.
8. Provide customer loyalty development workshops to focus you and all your staff on effective points of connection, handling stress, handling unhappy customers, being positive, and the importance of internal and external customer loyalty.
9. Recalculate every year and track your progress with each customer, and as a total business.

Implementing these steps and actions should help you create a business structure that is profitable and rewarding for the long term. Please feel free to contact me to discuss these strategies and other solutions you can implement in your business.

Recently I was leading a workshop on Customer/Employee Loyalty which I entitled ‘Dancing With The Stars’. Many of us have watched that TV show or a similar one called, “So You Think You Can Dance.” Some of us have even tried some partner dancing, taken lessons, or danced at weddings.

One person told a story about what they witnessed on a cruise, There was some dancing going on in the lounge. Joe was sitting at the bar. Susan, his wife was sitting there, too. She’s getting motivated by the music. She’s watching the other couples having fun, getting close, interacting with each other. Joe is focused on his drink. So she pulls Joe off the bar stool and says “Come on, let’s dance.” What is Susan seeking? An emotionally positive experience that’s hassle free, where she is individually recognized and respected. She wants to feel a connection. She wants to have fun. Joe has a choice. He could get up and do the minimum, go through the motions without really connecting. He could ignore her and continue to nurse his drink. Or he could get up and interact with her, respect her desire to connect, look at it as an opportunity to co-create something between them.

You are given an invitation everyday to interact with customers and employees. The choices you make will dictate your success. When you join the ‘dance’ or interact in a focused caring way, you create a point of connection. Just like dancers have points where they touch so they can respond to one another’s movements and feel bonded to one another, your customer and employee points of connection are very important. Research shows that emotional points of connection create customer and employee loyalty.

So what else can we take from the dance metaphor?

Partners must trust each other. It’s certainly not a good experience if Joe is stepping on Susan’s toes or makes her bump into other couples. The leader needs to be trustworthy. Are you developing long lasting trust relationships with your customers and your employees?

Dancers make each other shine. Give and take happens as the leader and follower roles switch back and forth. Followers add flourishes and kicks to augment the move the leader leads. Sometimes there is ‘playing’ done by both to interpret the music. In the world of sales, being effective means being an assistant buyer and helping the buyer discover what he needs, then offering several solutions from which the buyer chooses and modifies the one that he likes best. There is give and take. Empowered employees think up great solutions to problems that the boss might never have thought of.  Achieving an outcome is about us, not about me. 1+1=3.

Each dancer maintains his or her own balance. It’s no fun dancing with someone who is falling all over the place. Employees need balance. Are their personal goals working in concert with the organizations goals? Are your personal goals and professional goals dovetailed? Do you seek quality customers that seem to be have balance, can pay their bills, realize you have a life also, and maintain an emotional even keel?

A good dancer has firm arms, strong abs and sturdy legs and ankles. Each partner supports herself/himself and maintains a connection and a strong frame. Strength in the business world is identified by core values such as integrity, respect, customer service and providing value, Vision of where you’re going and where you’ll be in the future is also a source of strength. Probably the biggest source of strength is self-esteem. Do you foster the core values, vision and self-esteem of each of your customers and employees so they can be better partners in the dance of business?

If you’d like to watch a real dance (not show stuff) with great connection, please click this link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TyqjMp2HNI

Ever seen a leaky pail that you’re trying to fill? It never gets full because as much as you’re filling up the top, there is water pouring out of the cracks in the bottom. Do you work hard to get customers? If they don’t stay for a 2nd purchase, you’ve got ‘leaky pail’ syndrome.

I’ve been reading the book we’ll be talking about at the next Business Book Discussion Group, The Loyalty Effect. Reichheld’s research in many industries and countries shows that just by increasing your customer retention by 5% (plugging a leak in your pail), you can increase your profits by 25 to 100%. That’s mind blowing, what would you do with 100% more profit? So how does that happen? Here are the 5 ways loyal customers build a business’ profit.

1. Base profit. Every time you sell a product or service there is the usual profit the business takes every time the purchase happens over the time period, for instance, 7 years. That remains stable.

2. Revenue Growth. When customers are loyal they buy more, sometimes more of the same product or service, often other things that your business offers. As they get more comfortable they buy even more.

3. Cost Savings. Repeat customer sales cost less to process, less time to take the order, fewer mistakes, better relationships between the buying person and the selling person with more trust, more knowledge of how that customer can be delighted or their sale customized, more order predictability yielding better business planning (Covey’s Speed of Trust is relevant here. We discussed that book in a previous Business Book Discussion Group. When trust goes up, speed increases and costs go down.)

4. Referrals. Loyal customers give very credible referrals and to people like themselves generally, who have the potential to also become loyal customers. The loyalty coefficient of the organization increases tremendously.

5. Price premium. Loyal customers usually are willing to pay full price because they see the value in what they are receiving and the people who are providing it. They aren’t looking for discount coupons and promotional pricing. They like doing business with your company and pricing is not their top issue. Loyal customers are like annuities. Their value just keeps on growing.

Reichheld also maintains that customer loyalty and employee loyalty go hand-in-hand. One doesn’t exist without the other. Happy employees generate happy customers and vice versa. Investing in your employees is a necessary component in increasing the employee retention and, therefore, the customer retention in your organization.

In the last issue we gave some metrics that indicated how focusing on customer loyalty can save you money and grow your sales. Start thinking about your customers in terms of their lifetime value. If each sale is $1,000 and a customer may buy something twice a year, that’s only $2,000 per year.

But multiply that times the 20 years that he may buy your product and you have an income source for $40,000. Most buying decisions are based on emotions. Gallop polls have done research that indicates that customer loyalty is achieved by unique points of connection, emotional interactions and memories that touch the hearts of your customers, something that makes them feel special or gives them attention. Your staff can be developed to recognize and leverage points of connection, understand and manage emotions and communication styles, use empathy and elicit trust. Providing your staff with the tools to better address their stress management will also help them focus on being empathetic with your customers. Your staff is your biggest asset and the main factor that makes your business unique. Outstanding customer-centric staff make for an outstanding business. To see a great customer loyalty story, go to http://stservicemovie.com/ Let me know what you think of it.

Here are some numbers dealing with customer loyalty. It has been proven that organizations with high levels of loyal customers typically grow sales at 2X the rate of their competition. It costs 5 times as much to get a new customer than to keep an existing customer. The most effective and least expensive form of adverting is word-of-mouth. An organization with disloyal customers will typically spend 4 to 5 times more in advertising to get additional customers. Loyal customers will be less likely to be swayed by discount pricing and other incentives offered by the competition. They are generally willing to pay more and are more forgiving if there is a mistake. 6 out of 10 customers will never return when they experience bad service. They won’t complain, they just won’t come back. The ultimate question to measure customer loyalty is, “How likely is it that you would recommend our organization, products and services to a friend or colleague?” Get your customers to answer this question on a scale of 1-10. It has been shown that there is a direct and strategic correlation between an organization’s revenue growth and this customer loyalty score.

Action Step for This Week

Develop a way to measure customer loyalty in your organization. Add up how much customers spend. What get’s measured, get’s focused on and has the best chance of being improved. Develop a questionnaire with the key question. “How likely is it that you would recommend our organization, products and services to a friend or colleague?” Poll your clients via email, phone calls or postcards. Listen, listen, listen. Summarize and share the information throughout the organization. Make this an on-going strategic policy.

The Hedgehog Concept’ comes from Jim Collins’ book Good to Great. After analyzing companies that had met his criteria for explosive and sustained growth, he discovered that they had achieved an understanding of their sweet spot of impenetrable strength and great success (like a hedgehog). You can find this for your business also. It is where these three components intersect.

• what you are passionate about,
• what you can be best in the world at,
• what drives your economic engine.

It may take a while to refine your concepts, understand your strengths and analyze the market to find this spot. But when you do, it will lead to breakthroughs and sustained success.

Action Step for This Week

Ask yourself these questions to find your hedgehog:

1. What are you deeply passionate about? What do you love? What motivates you? What do you love the process of doing in your business so much that you look forward to getting up every morning?
2. What can you be the best in the world at (or your corner of the world)? What do you have a natural talent for? Where are you strong? How can you tweak your company’s purpose to make it unique, simple, understandable and the best?

What drives your economic engine? What can you make money at by focusing on? What indicator or denominator will you use to measure your success that will, when multiplied, drive your success?

Ask yourself these questions to find your hedgehog:

1. What are you deeply passionate about? What do you love? What motivates you? What do you love the process of doing in your business so much that you look forward to getting up every morning?
2. What can you be the best in the world at (or your corner of the world)? What do you have a natural talent for? Where are you strong? How can you tweak your company’s purpose to make it unique, simple, understandable and the best?

What drives your economic engine? What can you make money at by focusing on? What indicator or denominator will you use to measure your success that will, when multiplied, drive your success?