Category: Customer

The Pitch

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

A colleague has left the safe confines of his large conservative leading architecture firm to start up his own – K2LDC. So now his new job role isn’t CEO, rather ‘salesman’.

 

So how does an architecture differentiate themselves with their pitch? here’s a tip – it’s not through anything to do with power point slides or boring details. Especially as it concerns visual services such as architecture. It’s about creating theatre, sparking imagination and getting the client into your mind.

 

So K2DLC did this: After a brief discussion at the pitch they left the client with a deck of cards (samples below) with their pictures and thoughts on how to approach the design.

design-process-cards1.jpg

 design-process-cards2.jpg

Result: The client considered what the firm was trying to achieve.  They played with the cards. They put them on their fridge. They put them in their order of favorite. They had an in depth discussion. They took themselves on a visual journey. They loved it.

 

K2DLC won the pitch.  

Goodwill

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Here’s a tale of two cafés. Both are within walking distance of the startup blog office. After a while I noticed a few things changing in my favourite of the two. The decore, the Barista and eventually the clientele all changed.

 

Coffee is personal. The caffeine, hot steamed milk and the chocolate sprinkles are only part of the experience.

So I moved to the café up the road. I’d even walk past the other café to get my ‘new’ caffeine haunt. It was pretty obvious that the first café had lost its cache and customers along the way. I still trades, but not nearly as well.

Then I discovered the owner actually sold about the time everything started to change. The new owners put their spin on things, tried to improve it…. fully leverage the ‘goodwill’ they purchased. Seems the opposite has occurred.

And so it is with restaurants and cafés alike.

The owner is the goodwill.

 

People buy coffee from her. Her greeting, her skill, the ambiance she created. It can’t be passed on. It can’t be bought from a sole trader.Exceptions such as coca cola, big macs and starbucks grande lattes are already replicated thousands of times…

When buying a business from a sole trader – Goodwill? – No such thing.

Balance Sheet Marketing

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Quite often we must make decisions by looking at the balance sheet. It’s a fact of business life. But when it comes to marketing such decisions can be the death of a brand. The fact is, most marketing efforts are immeasurable before the decision.

 

Irish brand Waterford Crystal has just done some Balance Sheet Marketing.

 

A quick summary for the uninitiated:

Waterford city is the Crystal County of Ireland

Waterford has been making crystal here since 1783

Currently one fifth of their products are made in other parts of Europe

They haven’t made a profit in 5 years

They’ve just cut 500 jobs in Waterford Ireland to move all production

Their Chief executive Peter Cameron was quoted as saying, “We can source things from Eastern Europe under the Waterford fanchise. That’s not going to be an event that will change the perception of the brand”

Maybe Waterford Crystal have underestimated the emotional links passionate users have with brands.

 waterford.jpg 

Start up blog view:

Maybe they should charge what it costs

Maybe consumers would pay what it’s worth

Maybe they should tell consumers they must increase price or leave Waterford

Maybe ‘all’ production should be in Waterford Ireland

Maybe they should sing this fact as loud as possible

Maybe they should leverage their history a bit more

Maybe that would turn a profit

The best financial decisions protect innate brand equity, not destroy it.

Did you build it?

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Did you build the website? Yes

Did you build your blog? Yes

Did you design the property development? Yes

Did you renovate your house? Yes

Did you launch the product? Yes

Did you manufacture the product yourself? Yes.

Did you landscape your own garden? Yes.

Did you make that advertisement? Yes

Did you self finance the business? Yes

Yes you did all these things, and more, every bit of them. You orgnaised the project, you had the idea, you got the finance from the bank, you conceived it and you made it happen. Never mind if the advertising agency made the creative, the PHP programmer coded your website or the bricklayer built the house.

You did it with your mind, your management skills and your ability to execute the project. None of it would have even started without you.

So whenever anyone asks if you did it? You say “Yes”.

Best way to differentiate your online startup

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Have an actual phone number listed on your site where you can be called. Anytime.

A real phone number, with a real person answering, in real time, for real customers / members / web surfers. Real easy.

Why? Have you ever tried to call Yahoo, Google or Ebay?

There’s no easier way to differentiate your start up and outdo a big guy.