I consider myself truly fortunate to have been able to attend the Elite Retreat Conference sponsored by Jeremy Schoemaker of Shoemoney.com fame. Of all the lessons learned, perhaps the most important is that of “scalability.” When a business proposition was thrown around, the savvy members in the group would always ask “Is it scalable?”

Questions to ask about your business:

Can revenue grow exponentially without an equal growth in expenses?
Can revenue grow exponentially without an equal growth in human resources?
Can revenue grow exponentially without an equal growth in key personnel? (Do you need multiple super-smarties?)

Look at the parking lot photo below, a few blocks away from our hotel for Elite Retreat. The parking lot owner had a choice. Do nothing to expand and hope to maximize their profit with the space available. Buy more real estate to park more cars. Or buy the vertical rack to allow 3 times as many cars to park. The last choice created an opportunity for 300% more revenue at the lowest cost.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

As you develop a marketing plan, remember to focus on your positive traits.  Do not attempt to elevate your stature by demeaning your competitor or their products.  If your product or service cannot succeed on its own merits, then work to develop your service and improve it.  Successful products and services typically do not need to compare themselves to their competitor’s, rather they are marketed on and succeed on their own merits.

From Chabad.org:

Which crime is worse, financial exploitation or verbal abuse? “Money can be reimbursed,” the Talmud notes, “but the hurt from words is irreparable; money is a person’s property, but words hurt the person himself.”

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Jumbo shrimp.  Plastic glasses.  Diet ice cream.  Daily special.  Google customer service.
The economic base in the United States has long ago shifted to a service economy. Rather than manufacture goods our economic power and stability is predicated upon providing service to individuals and other industries. Yet it seems increasingly commonplace that the foundation of a service economy – customer service, is lacking or even nonexistent.

Let’s take a look at the remarkable example of Google. Google must be the largest corporation in history that has no readily apparent customer service department.

Need to get in contact with a human being regarding an issue on Adwords or Adsense? Good luck.

Has your business revenue plummeted because your ranking on Google has dropped dramatically and you want to talk to someone at Google about it?  No chance.

Would you have imagined 10 years ago that a multibillion dollar company having a significant global impact could exist without offering access to a single customer service representative on the telephone? It boggles the mind.

I’ve been having an issue with one of my Adwords accounts on Google. I had received the standard bot e-mails, and eventually recevied an email message indicating my issue would be elevated to the level of a specialist.  It never was apparent that it was elevated and my issue was never resolved.  While attending Pubcon 2009 (a search marketing conference) I stopped by the Google booth, and actually spoke to a human being from Google!  They listened to my issue and took my business card and contact information and said they would forward it to the appropriate individual.  That was a month ago, and no one has ever contacted me.  This disregard and disinterest is experienced by small customers as well as large customers of Google who spend six figures a month.

The customer service at Google is a terrible omen for our economy.  We have no manufacturing base.  What happens when our service economy doesn’t offer service?

P.S.  Look at this vignette of Richard Branson trying to generate business.  Do you ever expect see Sergey Brin or Larry Page do that?

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

We agree with Guy Kawasaki, you should be a mensh and that should be one of your driving principles.

Here at Tova Group, we were offered a business deal by a potential client who was in a desperate business situation. They pushed hard for a deal to the point they wanted to pay earnest money even before any results came through our potential partnership. They offered a five figure amount in earnest money together with more if the deal came to fruition. However, we felt this fit was not perfect for us, and we declined to sign up. In fact, we predicted that the other party might soon be forced to liquidate and announce bankruptcy even with our potential involvement. We did not want to profit from nor take advantage of someone in a precarious position when we felt we couldn’t help their final outcome. We could have signed a letter of intent and walked away with the earnest money, but we declined to do so feeling this would be taking advantage of another party in a desperate situation. Sure enough, about 12 months after the deal was offered the other party had to liquidate and declare bankruptcy.

This brings us to our story of Al Davis, the general managing partner of the NFL Oakland Raiders and his un-mensch-like behavior. In the late 1980’s the Raiders (then in Los Angeles) were running high. In 1984 they had won the SuperBowl in just their second year in Los Angeles and were considered among the NFL’s elite teams. They captured the imagination of many football followers and were among the NFL’s leader in sports merchandising and fan interest. As their cache grew and grew, so too did seemingly their sense of entitlement. In 1987 Al Davis announced that he was unhapy with their current stadium the Los Angeles Coliseum, and he wanted to move the team to a new stadium

Irwindale, a town of about 1000 people 20 miles east of Los Angeles, threw their hat in the ring and proposed to the Raiders that they could build a football stadium in a huge gravel pit near the highway. The courtship began. Everyone was seemingly happy on both sides. There was one small catch. Al Davis had the city sign a letter of intent which required the city of Irwindale to put up a non-refundable $10 million to begin negotiations. It soon became clear that the deal would not be completed and the negotiations quickly fell apart. Well, Al Davis and the Raiders walked away from the deal, and a few years later moved the team back to Oakland. The Raiders pocketed the deposit, walking away with $10 million from a city of 1000 residents, all for a deal that many thought had no chance to go through in the first place.

A mensch would not have taken the $10 million from the city, and allowed the citizens of Irwindale to keep the money when the deal fell through. Do you believe in karma and “what goes around comes around”? Well in the 20 years since 1988 then the Raiders record has been 152 wins and 179 losses, whereas in the 20 years from 1968 – 1988 it had been 211 wins and 88 losses.

There’s a difference between doing the “legal” thing, and the right thing. Do the right thing, be a mensch, and don’t take advantage of other people, even when you have the “legal” right to do so.

N.B. We are recovering Raider addicts, and still believe the only SuperBowl worth talking about and the greatest SuperBowl ever played was SB XVIII, when the Raiders defeated the Washington Redskins 38-9 setting records for most points scored, largest margin of victory, the longest touchdown run, and the first team to score an offensive, defensive and special teams touchdown in the same Super Bowl. May they return to their mensch-like ways and may success follow them.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Over the course of the past few months it became clear that one of our employees was not meeting the demands of their job. This employee is always cheerful and very helpful when given specific tasks, but their particular skill level is not well-suited for completing the type of tasks that had evolved into their job description. We tried a few different organizational strategies to assist them but these were unsuccessful.

I came to the realization that unfortunately this person would have to be released from the organization. Firing employees is very difficult, especially in a small firm. I’m sure that most small firms such as ours strive to create a collegial family atmosphere rather than a strict authoritarian work environment.

As we reached the decision that we would have to terminate this employing came the horrifying news that they were diagnosed with cancer. I came to the conclusion that the right thing to do would be to postpone the inevitable termination to allow them to get over their surgical treatment. We had a lengthy discussion with our employee before they went off for their long hospital course wishing them well and at the same time delicately suggesting that upon their recovery we may find that circumstances will change.

Upon their return about a month later after a few days we had a somber discussion during which we informed the employee that they would no longer be employed by our firm. Given their health issues and the fact that this person was able to contribute to the firm, although not in an ideal manner, we agreed to keep them in employment until the end of the month. Their last day with us was yesterday, the day before Thanksgiving.

Take away lessons for bosses in small firms who have to fire an employee:

1) Laying people off in a large firm is much different than laying people off in a small firm. Rules applicable for one are not applicable to the other. For for thoughts on laying people off at larger firms read Guy Kawasaki – The Art of Laying People Off . I felt that this much commented upon writing is not applicable for a small business owner.

2) The employee’s intent and attitude go a long way towards the determination of how to deal with them. If they had a good attitude, worked well with others, and tried to complete their job duties to the best of their ability read on. If they had a bad attitude and were disruptive, they should be terminated immediately. They didn’t care about your future so you shouldn’t go out of your way to lose sleep over theirs. For those employees that did their best but could not get the work done read on:

3) Unless a person you’re firing has another job lined up, the economic hit to them will likely be much greater than the economic hit to your firm by keeping them on for another week or two. Be a good person and keep them on for short period of time to help ease their transition to a difficult financial future. Your firm will certainly survive paying this person another week or two since you’ve been doing it for so long to begin with. Additionally since you’ve made the decision that they have a good attitude and do the best they can, you can still use them productively for other aspects in the office until their final day.

4) Immediately inform everyone in your firm about your decision to terminate that employee. Don’t let gossip and rumors overwhelm your small workplace.

5) Firing an employee may be necessary for maintaining team morale. If others feel they have to pick up the slack of another employee, they may become resentful and the team may become mutinous.

6) Most importantly, take responsibility as a boss. Since you hired that person, and they did not work out, you made a mistake that cost your firm. It is not the employees fault, it is your fault. You failed the company. Should the person have been hired in the first place? Did you need to provide more training? Did the company have a proper organizational structure? Something is broken, and you the boss need to find out what it is and fix it.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

At Pubcon 2008, the internet search marketing conference held in Las Vegas from November 11 – 14, social media was one of the hottest topics.  Among the many social networks discussed, Twitter seemed to take over the conference.  PubCon attendees were tweeting like mad, and at one point in the conference Pubcon was the #1 topic on Twitter.  This was not lost on one enterprising Las Vegas business – “Sapphires Gentlemen’s Club.”  They created a Tweeter account  http://twitter.com/sapphirelv , and their very first Tweet ever was to offer a discount to PubCon attendees who would visit their fine establishment.
One of their very first followers was Guy Kawasaki http://twitter.com/guykawasaki , who despite being in Las Vegas at the time, reported he was too sick to attend PubCon.  Hmmmm.
I don’t know about you, but I’m not sure I can ever look at Twittelator quite the same way.
This is a great idea for local businesses.  Find out about a conference in town, and then tweet the attendees with special offers.  Don’t know the difference between a Tweet, a Digg, or a Sphinn?   Get in touch with Tova Media so we can help you with your marketing plans.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites