Leadership – Demand Generation Consulting

On Goals

March 15, 2015September 8, 2018MattLeave a Comment

If you’re alive and not on a yacht in the Mediterranean right now (and even if you are), chances are there are things in your work or personal life that you’d like to change. You pretty much can’t look for productivity advice without hearing or reading some mention of the word goals.

After a while it all sort of blends together and starts to sound the same. So while goals are an important part of progress, at times it can be intimidating to describe them and put together a plan for achieving them. If we put all of the work into goal setting and planning and we fail, then what?

Here’s the good news – goals aren’t just about success. In fact, many companies (Google included) encourage employees to set goals that are nearly impossible to achieve. Why? Because when you set your sights on something audacious and fail, chances are you’ve still moved the needle a long way in the right direction. And let’s say you didn’t move the needle. Let’s say the entire thing blew up in your face, down in flames, on your walk home it’s raining and someone drives by and splashes you; so bad you actually want to listen to that “Had a Bad Day” song. Guess what? As long as you learned something from the experience (even if it’s just the proper distance to stand from the curb on a rainy day), it’s not a failure. Failure is actually very hard to achieve if you’re paying attention. Do your work. Take notes on what happens (good and bad). Move forward.

Don’t be afraid failure.

Taking Advantage of Change

March 6, 2014September 8, 2018MattLeave a Comment

I just moved into a new house, and to say that things have changed is an understatement. It’s amazing how a new location can take all of our old habits and throw them right out the window. Everything is in a new place, nothing is where you thought it was, and time flies right by. But I’m not complaining, not even a little bit. This change has given me the opportunity to break out of old habits, to re-evaluate what I was doing, and to plan what I want to do now.

I probably won’t admit this in public, but it’s kind of fun when your computer crashes. You have to go through the same sort of exercises – figure out what was important to you and bring it back – but you also get to drop a bunch of dead weight.

So do you need to move every week or drop your computer down a flight of stairs to make sure you are focusing on the important? No. But it is a great exercise to step back and say, “If XXXX happened, what would I really miss? What would I be secretly glad was gone? What would I need to get back ASAP?” Really analyze those answers and you’ll begin to find under-appreciated areas (or people) that need more attention/praise and those that need improvement.

When You Think You’ve Done Enough…

July 3, 2013September 8, 2018MattLeave a Comment

Do More.

This is a quick motto that I keep in my head for those days when I just want to get that euphoria (I can’t be the only one) that can only be felt by clicking the task as completed in Outlook.

We all have project timelines and it’s important to keep to them. But, the difference between good and great could be that little extra effort that you put in when the competition has already gone home. This is especially true when working with customers. Take the extra time, make the extra effort, and they will reward you by coming back and telling their friends. If you don’t, they will still tell their friends, but you won’t like what they say.

Fighting a Kingdom? Find the Back Door

June 6, 2013October 16, 2018MattLeave a Comment

Many times in marketing we are faced with a similar challenge – dethrone the king and do it on time and under budget. Many of us relish this challenge, and it’s probably why I’m still in marketing today. It’s fun to be the underdog. Nobody expects you to win, so you avoid all the pressure and focus on the task at hand.

While it may be the initial thought, we don’t have to go to feature war on all fronts with competitors. They are simply too massive. Imagine Apple going after Microsoft in the late 90s – it wouldn’t have worked. Microsoft was too firmly entrenched and had too much money to spend.

Instead, upon his return, Steve Jobs focused on the back doors to the Microsoft kingdom of consumers. He went after the surrounding consumer market. Enter the iPod. By creating an all Apple, all new product that was second-to-none and the ecosystem to back it up – Jobs was able to introduce his company to the market at a lower price point than a new computer.

With the iPod, consumers got a taste of the Apple magic both in the hardware and software. When people saw how well it all worked, they wanted more. That means more sales of iPhones, iPads, and yes, eventually Macbooks, and the Mac OS.

It’s a powerful strategy if you can find the right button to push. Google is taking on Facebook in a similar manner. Though they have similar features, Google+ has yet to take off. By incrementally introducing features – Google is trying to slowly ween people ONto its platform. A great example is the automatic picture correction just announced last month at Google IO. Pictures are more “sticky” than comments. People like to go back and revisit them time and again. With mobile devices increasingly being used as primary cameras – Google is hoping to become the place people store and share them.

Other companies, like Path are taking a different approach. By limiting the number of connections a person can have – they seek to avoid the noise that people so often complain of with Facebook.

This strategy can also work with small businesses – highlight something that you are really good at. Lots of people are fitness trainers but you can distinguish yourself by offering services that others neglect. Instead of gym training, offer home training or public park training. Instead of losing weight, focus on scrawny people who want to gain weight. Instead of just focusing on training, offer consultation on nutrition and partner with someone who will supply the food.

There are plenty of opportunities to find your way around a giant – think about your market and go get-em!

Video Games and Marketing Leadership

April 12, 2013September 8, 2018MattLeave a Comment

So here is where my parents get to feel validated for buying me that first Nintendo way back when. Feel free to keep this argument in your back pocket. Video games used to be considered a waste of time. However, I believe they’ve taught me and countless individuals how to be proactive and curious.

Whenever I first played Super Mario Bros. with my brother and cousin we were so excited to play that we died very quickly. We just wanted to see what it was like. There wasn’t a fear that if we died, we’d never get to play again or (as in the arcade) we’d run out of money.

This is an important concept in leadership and on a career path – don’t be afraid to jump at new opportunities. Be curious. Yes, it can be scary and yes you might fail, but in failing, you learn how to come back the next time and jump that hurdle (or Koopa Troopa or Bullet Bill). Sure, in life we don’t have unlimited time, resets, or funding, so choose wisely – but choose, and get moving! Don’t be paralyzed by a fear of failure – the biggest failure is not trying. Soon using the experience you’ve gained, you’ll be flying through like an expert.

Set Your Goals

January 10, 2013September 8, 2018MattLeave a Comment

With the new year in full swing, let’s talk about goal setting. Goal setting and tracking should be an essential part of your planning process. If you don’t have the Commander’s Intent in mind before starting, you are likely to end up somewhere nobody anticipated, with little idea of how you got there.

The article linked above is interesting because it states that the Commander’s Intent is not simply the end state, but also a description of the tasks, and sometimes, the purpose of the mission. This helps teams better understand the reasons for the mission and thus helps them think proactively about achieving the preferred end state.

Does this take more effort? Sure. Does it delay the work? In the short term. Is it worth it? Absolutely. The time and effort spent planning and tracking your goals will reap plenty of rewards in terms of a shared vision, results, and knowledge.

There are plenty of tools out there for goal planning, I’ll list some below. But the main point is to take the time to think about your goals BEFORE starting any project and to revisit them while you are chasing them. Otherwise, it’s very hard to know where you came from and even harder to control where you are going.

http://milestoneplanner.com/

http://www.goalsontrack.com/

http://weekplan.net/why/

Between the Customer and the Bottom Line – Who Wins?

October 10, 2012September 8, 2018MattLeave a Comment

In the business of marketing it’s our job (among others) to drive new sales. Often, we get caught in the middle between a sales team that wants all-or-nothing, no holds barred tactics, and our own sense of ethical marketing. While gimmicks and tricks can help boost the pipeline in the short run, in the long run they can be a death sentence. Think about these facts from SCORE :

The High Cost of Losing A Customer

The lowest-ranking employee in a business can lose more customers than can be gained by the highest-ranking employee.
In the average business, for every customer who bothers to complain, there are 26 others who remain silent.
The average wronged customer will tell 8 to 16 people (about 10 percent will tell more than 20 people).
91 percent of unhappy customers will never purchase goods or services from you again.
If you make an effort to remedy customer’s complaints, 82 to 95 percent of them will stay with you.
It costs about 5 times as much to attract a new customer as it does to keep an existing one.

The fourth bullet really stands out to me. 91 percent of unhappy customers will NEVER purchase goods or services from you again. In tandem with the last bullet, it’s plain to see that we want to do everything we can to keep customers happy.

The temptation is always there when it comes to e-mail marketing. It is simply too easy, and too quick to push a button to see if you can move the needle. Keep customer interests, not your bottom line, as the number one priority. The beauty of it all? Find where those two intersect and you’ve got a winner!

If you are asked to choose between pulling tricks to pull in revenue and honest, effective marketing, remember these stats!

The End of Average

August 22, 2012August 22, 2012MattLeave a Comment

Today I happened to catch an interview with Thomas Friedman and he said something that made my ears perk up, “Average is Over.”

His argument, in the interview and in his column is that with our new “hyper-connected” (flat was before Facebook and Twitter) society, the average worker is too easily replaced. It’s too easy these days to find someone or some thing that will do it cheaper, faster, and/or better. In order to stay afloat in this new world, we need to overachieve.

Even if we put globalization aside (which we probably shouldn’t), the fact is that the chances of hiding behind mediocre work are rapidly slimming. It is simply too easy in a digital world to research and document a person’s work record. Hoping to land a dream job? A dream resume is not the prerequisite, you need to be able to prove that you can do exceptional work.

Say we buy Friedman’s argument and average is over. Now what? How do we stand out in a world where everybody is striving to stand out? There are two options: Be perfect or be different. If we are battling machines and six sigma percentages – the odds are better that we can deliver something different.

I often wonder what would happen if the business world was structured like the pro sports world. How many of us would be earning long-term deals, and how many would be journeymen going from team to team just hoping to stay for one more year? Think about which one you are, and which one you want to be.