January 30, 2012

3 Alerts For Benchmarking

I know that Benchmarking is viewed as a necessary process for most organizations. But I have a major issue with it.
Beware of these 3 things:

1. It’s copying. It doesn’t make you special. It may help you improve your position in The Herd, but it does nothing to help you Stand-out from The Herd. Copying is the enemy of BE DiFFERENT. if The Herd goes East, go West. If The Herd says Black, say White.

2. It keeps you in The Herd. Best of Breed is still in The Herd. An imprint of the #1 Herd Member still keeps you with your ‘Sameness brethren’. The Herd is not your friend. You need to break away from it, not find consolation in it’s attributes.

3. It robs you of your individuality. Benchmarking forces you to conform. Forces you to BE SaME. Forces you to capitulate to the leader of The Herd. What’s your problem? Can’t think for yourself?

YOU owe it to yourself to express your uniqueness. The Herd is common. Invisible. Ignored.

Express yourself. Distance yourself. BE YOU!

It’s ok to observe what The Herd is doing and adopting from the Best what might improve your performance. It’s quite another thing to assume that copying them will help you win the competitive battle.

Winning is about Standing-out not Fitting-in.

Look at The Herd.
Go a DiFFERENT way.

Cheers,
Roy
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Posted 1.30.12 at 05:20 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)

January 26, 2012

11 Steps to Build a Killer Loyalty Program

Everyone is trying to build a better Loyalty Program that will hold customers forever.

Here are some thoughts to consider (in no particular order)...

1. A Loyalty Program should be RELEVANT (something your Fans Care about) and UNIQUE (something they can ONLY get from you).

2. Identify your Fans and go get from them the Top 3 things they care about.

3. Design the Plan around these 3 things.

4. Observe what the competition is doing, but act on what your Fans are telling you. Many organizations design something on the basis of what their competition is doing. WRONG!

5. Consider building an ONLY Statement for the Loyalty Plan. “Roy’s Fan Club the ONLY one that….” Is how you could actually build it.

6. Avoid Benchmarking other Plans unless you want to exercise the Contrarian Marketing tool (go the opposite way). Copying Best of Breed might allow your status in The Herd to improve, but it won’t allow you to stand-out from The Herd. To BE DiFFERENT.

7. Consider greater benefits to those who have been with you the longest. Someone who has been with you for 10 years is worth more than someone who has been loyal for 2 years. Treat the 10 year old accordingly by delivering more benefits to them.

8. Design a communications strategy to support Roy’s Fan Club to be constantly engaging with your members. Keep the Club alive and constantly tweak it based on Fan Feedback.

9. TEST the Plan design with your Fans. Make sure it addresses their High priority wants and desires - the RELEVANCY Test.

10. Personalize the Fan Club. Have a variety of versions based on the unique desires of your various Fans. The One Size Fits All Approach is what The Herd does, and it produces Invisibility and Mediocrity.

11. Give Fan Club members a special “Fan Club Service Line” to call when they need to talk to you. Differentiated levels of service is an appropriate way to recognize the relative value of customer groups.

Cheers,
Roy
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Posted 1.26.12 at 08:04 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)

January 16, 2012

3 Ways to “Bloody-Up” Your Plan

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Your Strategic Plan document is NOT to look pretty. Pristine. Like the pages have been bleached and ironed. Like you haven’t looked at it since it was created. Probably a year ago.

Rather, the document should look like it has been used. Used a lot. To record what you have learned while trying to execute your Strategy.

How to make your Plan an Execution Learning Guide?

1. Record Results Constantly. As you implement your strategy, what worked? What didn’t? Why? Write it down: in RED if the outcome was NOT on Plan; in BLACK if things worked out as planned. Clarify the implications of falling short of your objectives so you can take corrective action. Evaluate what worked well with reasons so it can be repeated.

2. Work in the document Daily. Refer to your Plan everyday. Make a point of commenting on some aspect of it. Study your notes. Call a meeting with colleagues to problem solve an important matter.

3. Shout out the Negatives. Executing any Plan is neither nice nor tidy. It’s a messy business. Progress is extremely Inelegant. People get hurt. They get frustrated. They sometimes get stressed out. That’s the way it is. And it needs to be told that way. People can’t go along that The Plan is going along well and that there are no bumps being encountered. Keep it real and honor those Heroes who been relentless in squeaking out progress in the face of painful odds.

And, after religiously adhering to these 3 tasks you have not messed up the Plan Document - blood stains from paper cuts, coffee stains, dog-eared pages and barely legible notes on every page - THEN it’s clearly of no value to you and you are getting nowhere implementing it.

Get Bloody!

Cheers,
Roy
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Posted 1.16.12 at 05:00 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)

January 9, 2012

3 Resolutions for 2012

If you have the bandwidth to do only a few critical activities in 2012, these three will pay you back in spades:

1. Adopt BE DiFFERENT in your Leadership vocabulary. Start asking “How will this make us DiFFERENT?” when someone presents a proposal to you. Make this the test you apply to all new investments.
If a $10,000 new investment doesn’t make you Stand-out, why are you making it?
In addition, replace Best in Class conversations with “How do we Stand-out?”
Have a Stand-out Workshop every week to continually explore opportunities to breakaway from The Herd.

2. Focus on your Fans. Trust that if you take care of the people who are loyal to you and CARE about what you do, they will return the favor by spreading your word to others.
This is the real source of long term GROWTH.
Resist the temptation to offer special promotions to try and entice people to leave their current suppliers and come to you. “New Customer Acquisition Programs” that reward switchers and not your loyal Fans have no long term value.
In fact they insult the people who have supported you over the years.

3. Create The ONLY Statement for your organization as your competitive claim. “It’s not good enough to be the best of the best. You need to be the ONLY one that does what you do.” said Jerry Garcia of The Grateful Dead. Amazing insight from the world’s most successful touring band. Uniqueness is the name of the game. If you’re not Relevant and Unique you will be common, invisible and ignored. And eventually dead.

Make these 3 strategies your priority for the coming year.

You’ll never look back.

Cheers,
Roy
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Posted 1.9.12 at 05:31 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)