Aligned Marketing Blog

My wife and I big fans of The Celebrity Apprentice. Sunday night Donald Trump fired Sinbad, the comedian. It was one of the few bad Apprentice shows we’ve seen. The reason it was a bad show is because the outcome was so predictable to anyone who has worked on a project team.

Sinbad was the project manager for ‘Men’s” team’s and he made several lethal mistakes. Here are the big ones:

1. He did not unite his team around a common goal or a common vision. They had a general direction but nothing concrete to guide them on a decision-by-decision basis. They could not operate confidently and effectively without Sinbad, or even with him for that matter. A good project manager gets everyone on the same page at the beginning of the project and assign roles, responsibilities, and specific tasks.
2. Bret Michaels is clearly a high strung guy. He became agitated by Sinbad’s lack of direction, poor communication and fuzzy goals during the team's first meeting. Bret had a point but he handled it poorly by getting angry. Sinbad decided to ignore Bret instead of confronting the petulant Poison frontman. That proved to be a mistake since, Bret, had no choice but to (reluctantly) share his concerns with Mr. Trump in the Boardroom, where the firings take place. Sinbad enabled his poorest performer by not addressing his concerns and taking positive corrective action, that could later be used to deflect an attack.
3. Every project, no matter how small, has milestones and communication checkpoints. That’s how you know progress is being made and the team is still aligned. Project timelines are lost at the beginning of projects, not at the end. Sinbad took his responsibility too lightly. He was responsible for everything. He was responsible for the process and the outcome.  He forgot he had to answer for A-Z to Mr. Trump.
4. So where was his “team?” Coming off the drubbing the Men's team gave the “Women” in week one, the Men were a little cocky and, apparently, unwilling to step up in a positive way for one another. They let their leader die. Shame on them. They all knew the project wasn’t going to magically come together at the end, that Sinbad was a poor leader, and that he would probably take the fall. Why didn’t one of them warn him? Because the Celebrity Apprentice is a competition, a game.

I guess that means that none of these things, these fatal flaws, could happen in real life? Nonsense, these same team dynamics happen in real life all the time. If you see them happening on one of your team's, do the right thing. Step up and help correct the situation. Don't get mad and pout, bring the team together, objectively define the issues, and take corrective actions.

Now we know why Sinbad got fired.

Steve

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Do you ever feel dumped on?

I talked with two well-regarded companies last week, both leaders in their industry, and came away with the feeling that their marketing teams are being dumped on. Their stories are remarkably alike.

Their IT Departments built capable websites years ago under the direction of senior management. Both sites contain useful information, have comparable functionality to their competitor’s sites, and represent their brands well. They are, in effect, brochure sites designed to communicate a general message to a general audience. Both sites were developed based on generic business goals.

Sometime between the birth of those sites and today senior management figured out that a website is a strategic asset. A website needs to be part of an overall business and marketing strategy. I know, shocking.

Senior management goofed. Now they want marketing to lead complete makeovers of these websites and, in addition, launch the company into the world of social media. The word "world-class" was used by both teams. As Sportscaster Keith Jackson would say, “Whoa Nellie!”

First, this is a great opportunity for marketing to step up and make a major contribution. The problems are:

1. The existing marketing teams have minimal competence in online marketing. They have a basic understanding of the web, as consumers, but lack the deep understanding needed to create an exceptional web-strategy from the ground up.
2. The existing marketing team has always been a support group, the nice people that create brochures, so they have little strategic capabilities and the requisite confidence needed to lead effectively.
3. Senior management has failed to articulate the business goals that are necessary for successful online marketing.

That last point is critical. As mentioned, both teams have been told they need to build “a world-class website.” As I told them, I’m in the business of building websites and I don’t know what that means. No one does without a clear understanding of the overall business goals.

Here’s why. A world-class website must be tied to a business goal. The architecture of a world-class website built to drive lead generation can be markedly different from a world-class website built to be a central repository for technical information, a library of support, if you will.

Can the two goals co-exist on one website? Sure they can. You bet. In fact, every page should have a business goal. The same applies to social media.

The company’s social media goals need to be well defined. Are you trying to become or extend your role as thought leader? Is the goal to reduce customer service costs by utilizing platforms such as Facebook and Twitter? Or are you just trying to drive more traffic to your website?

There’s no absolute right or wrong here. I take that back. I think it’s wrong when senior management fails to do their job and then dumps on marketing.

Steve Hartkopf

800-707-9150

Many people are more comfortable with ideas than they are with data. That's too bad because without good data it's hard to get the funding you'll need to implement your good ideas. The business world is driven by facts, sales projections and generating a return on the investment.

Granted many of the projections are nothing more than educated guesses tied up in your ability to sell and gain a consensus. That doesn't make them useless or wrong, it just makes them, as stated, a guess.

As a creative type person, as a marketer, I had to acquire my taste for numbers. What I found was that the "what-if" scenarios appealed to my imagination. Where as a numbers geek would embroil themselves in the data looking for the one, single, truth, I knew no such single truth existed but found joy in exploring what was possible.

I knew that we could make a reasonable projection based on a certain set of variables and that work would exhaust our capabilities. Working beyond that point is wasted energy but, at times, the politically-wise thing to do.

Ours was a search for excellence, not truth. If you don't believe me review your last ten-years January sales projections. More than likely you'll find half of them are significantly wrong, missed guesses.

If you struggle with data, with facts, then try framing the process in terms your imagination can embrace. Try searching for "possible outcomes" instead of "the number."

Thought of and shared the right way numbers can be fun. If you don't believe me then watch Hans Rosling's amazing presentation about myths and predispositions surrounding the third world.


Steve

On Monday we talked about golf and related it to your business: You have to play the ball where it lies in the same way you have to make business decisions based on today’s realities. Wishing for a better lie is silly.

Our economy is in the rough and, while most are slashing expenses, people and marketing budgets, some leaders are using this pre-recovery time to increase investments in marketing. In a recent BtoB Magazine survey, “2010 Outlook: Marketing Priorities and Plans Survey results, 11-16-09, 71% of those surveyed are investing more in their website in 2010 than they did in 2009.

In a separate study from Bain covering over 2500 companies, about 24 percent more firms were shown to “move from the back of the pack to the front of the pack,” with regards to sales and profits, during recessions than do during non-recessionary times. Do significant marketing investments during a recession make sense?

It did for Southwest Airlines and Wal-Mart (see Monday’s post). Both were noted in the Bain study for their vision and results but other companies have made smart pre-recovery investments as well. For example, the “Intel Inside” campaign was launched during a recession in the 1990’s. Before that, Proctor & Gamble invested heavily in Ivory Soap during the Great Depression and achieved spectacular results that lasted for decades. What is it that Southwest, Wal-Mart, Intel, Proctor & Gamble, great companies all, knows that other companies seem to miss?

It’s this, marketing investments that are consistent and aligned with your customers’ needs and aspirations are always wise investments. Now is the time to assess your customers’ needs, as well as your own strengths and goals, and invest.

Slashing marketing to survive in 2008-2009 may have been necessary but now you have to play the ball were it lies. What’s your plan for 2010 and 2011? Do you know what your competitors are doing? Who was weakened by the recession and who became stronger is important marketing intelligence. As the dust settles, where do you stand or do you even know?

A return to the pre-recession competitive landscape in 2010 is unlikely. The mammoth adjustments necessary for survival changed the playing field. You and your competitors were not affected equally and new options, most likely driven by technology and the web, are available to your customers and prospects. In every segment of the economy customers are beginning to look at products and services through a new, post-recession lens. How visible are you?

John Donahoe is CEO of eBay and to summarize what he said,

“It’s not about battening down the hatches and waiting for the storm to pass anymore than it is about betting big in the vague hope your hunches will pay off. Instead, it’s about executing what you do well better than ever before, making improvements, seeing the potential in new opportunities and, most importantly, having the vision to see beyond the immediate situation and taking action…“There is more market-share shift in turbulent times than there is in good times — more of an opportunity for a strong company to gain ground.”

Donahoe is right. You can’t stand over the ball forever. At some point you have to pick a club, commit to the shot and make an aggressive best swing. Are you going to play another round defensively, trying not to shoot over 100? Or are you going to play aggressively in hopes of breaking 90? It’s your choice. Take the shot.

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Here are the prizes:

• A 1-hour Crush the Competition Session with me. In this session we’ll develop three new ways you can clearly differentiate yourself from your competition. In addition, you’ll receive a condensed version of my sales coaching webinar, including a 30-minute follow up session and a signed copy of my book, Communication Wins.

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How you’ll Win:
It’s easy. Write one paragraph, at least three sentences, describing what you like best about my interview with Gary and post it here, at www.aligned-marketing.com website blog page (it’s free advertising), under Comments (email address required to win). Then email your paragraph and additional comments to me at: shartkopf@aligned-marketing.com.

Bonus:
Those who tell me what you plan to do with what you learned from the interview will receive special recognition (it's a surprise!) for contributing to the community.  

Contest Rules and Prizes: 

• One winner will be chosen at random to receive our Grand Prize - the Crush the Competition Session, signed copy of my book, free professionally design social media page from M3SocialMindz and Holiday video-card from ImigPro and copy of Gary’s book.
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• This contest runs from Tuesday, October 13, 2009, through Friday October 30, 2009.
• Winners will be notified by email on Friday, November 6, 2009.

Good luck!
Steve

Bob Parsons is CEO and Founder of GoDaddy.com. He’s famous for his over-the-top advertising, which include commercials featuring a porn star or race driver Danika Patrick in a bikini. To me he’s the Howard Stern of entrepreneurs, sophomoric but highly successful.

His business success and therefore, acumen, is what gets overlooked. Like Stern, this mega-millionaire knows what his target audience wants and he gives it to them. While his actions seem cavalier, my guess is there are few casual events in Bob’s business life.

In his September he shared his 16 Tips for business success, which you can view here: Bob Parsons' videoblog. Once you get past the girlies in their tank-tops, I think his advice is both unconventional and excellent. If you want to avoid the girls, here are Bob’s tips in text format:

1. Get and stay out of your comfort zone. I believe that not much happens of any significance when we're in our comfort zone.  I hear people say, "But I'm concerned about security."  My response to that is simple: "Security is for cadavers."
2. Never give up. Almost nothing works the first time it's attempted.  Just because what you're doing does not seem to be working, doesn't mean it won't work.  It just means that it might not work the way you're doing it.  If it was easy, everyone would be doing it, and you wouldn't have an opportunity.
3. When you're ready to quit, you're closer than you think. There's an old Chinese saying that I just love, and I believe it is so true.  It goes like this: "The temptation to quit will be greatest just before you are about to succeed."
4. With regard to whatever worries you, not only accept the worst thing that could happen, but make it a point to quantify what the worst thing could be. Very seldom will the worst consequence be anywhere near as bad as a cloud of "undefined consequences."  My father would tell me early on, when I was struggling and losing my shirt trying to get Parsons Technology going, "Well, Robert, if it doesn't work, they can't eat you."
5. Focus on what you want to have happen. Remember that old saying, "As you think, so shall you be."
6. Take things a day at a time. No matter how difficult your situation is, you can get through it if you don't look too far into the future, and focus on the present moment.  You can get through anything one day at a time.
7. Always be moving forward. Never stop investing.  Never stop improving.  Never stop doing something new.  The moment you stop improving your organization, it starts to die.  Make it your goal to be better each and every day, in some small way.  Remember the Japanese concept of Kaizen.  Small daily improvements eventually result in huge advantages.
8. Be quick to decide. Remember what General George S. Patton said: "A good plan violently executed today is far and away better than a perfect plan tomorrow."
9. Measure everything of significance. I swear this is true.  Anything that is measured and watched, improves.
10. Anything that is not managed will deteriorate. If you want to uncover problems you don't know about, take a few moments and look closely at the areas you haven't examined for a while.  I guarantee you problems will be there.
11. Pay attention to your competitors, but pay more attention to what you're doing. When you look at your competitors, remember that everything looks perfect at a distance. Even the planet Earth, if you get far enough into space, looks like a peaceful place.
12. Never let anybody push you around. In our society, with our laws and even playing field, you have just as much right to what you're doing as anyone else, provided that what you're doing is legal.
13. Never expect life to be fair. Life isn't fair.  You make your own breaks.  You'll be doing good if the only meaning fair has to you, is something that you pay when you get on a bus (i.e., fare).
14. Solve your own problems. You'll find that by coming up with your own solutions, you'll develop a competitive edge.  Masura Ibuka, the co-founder of SONY, said it best: "You never succeed in technology, business, or anything by following the others."  There's also an old Asian saying that I remind myself of frequently.  It goes like this: "A wise man keeps his own counsel."
15. Don't take yourself too seriously. Lighten up.  Often, at least half of what we accomplish is due to luck.
None of us are in control as much as we like to think we are.
16. There's always a reason to smile. Find it.  After all, you're really lucky just to be alive.  Life is short.  More and more, I agree with my little brother. He always reminds me: "We're not here for a long time, we're here for a good time!"

Steve

Several people have commented on the number of people in my online social networks. I have over 400 people following me on Twitter, over 200 connections on LinkedIn and over 500 on Facebook, which my protégé, Zach Bigby, manages. (I have no idea who some of those people are…)

There are a lot of people with larger numbers but mine are larger than most of the people I know. So what?

That’s a great question because while we’ve all been trained to pay attention to “the numbers” in this instance the numbers are meaningless. It’s not about the number of people in your network, their titles, or anything of the sort. The purpose of a social network is productivity, just like any team.

When evaluating your social network team you need to ask yourself two basic questions. (1) What can your team accomplish and (2) what can I contribute?

My team is very good at helping people find employment and we are getting better at producing revenue for Aligned Marketing. I work very hard for my team and am always looking for ways to contribute and provide value. Feel free to contact me if you want proof.

My team is good at finding employment for others because we have thousands of people in the network if you count our respective organizations. On a day-to-day basis, we are responsible for producing billions of dollars in revenue, millions in earnings and we trust and respect one another. If someone on my team recommends “Joe” as a “solid guy” then my team believes Joe is a solid guy. That gives Joe an edge in the job market.

How did I create an effective team? It started by being honest, professional and helpful. Virtually anyone on my team knows they can contact anyone else on my team, for the most part, and receive an “honest, professional and helpful” response.

I’ve also noticed that while there are people on my team who are almost always helpful, there are some who offer help repeatedly but somehow can’t locate their round-to-it when it matters most. That’s unfortunate, but true.

My advice to you is pitch in, participate, and help others whenever possible. I know it takes time, everything of value takes time. In return, your team will help you when (not if) you need them. That’s how a productive team is built and how they operate. People tend to respond well to someone who they trust and can rely on when it matters most. This isn’t rocket science.

But let’s not be naïve. There are a lot of people who are takers. As the saying goes, they wouldn’t pee on you if you were on fire. Those people are transparent and easily identifiable. I help them just as much as I would help anyone else.

Why? Because I believe it is the right thing to do. It is ingrained in my values. Besides, and this is where I may be naïve, I still believe that leading by example is the best way to lead. My goal is to coach them so one-day they will mature beyond a teenager-like sense of self and the unending glorious celebration of "ME." It’s a big world Bubba, and it’s not all about you.

Online and off, the person who gets the most out of a team is the person who is actively participating. It’s the alignment of being a good person, a good neighbor and a smart businessperson.

You can’t always contribute to every group on LinkedIn, for example, but how often can you be absent from the team before it no longer remembers or cares about you? This is voluntary. These teams do not have the obligation of family cementing it together.

Every time you ask your team for something try to contribute something of value back. It makes the team better and brings everyone closer together. The more you can leverage the contributions of your team, the more productive the team becomes, which makes others want to be part of your team.

When I worked at Square D I actually had two people come into my office, shut the door, and ask if they could join my team. When I asked them why they wanted to join my team they said, “you guys get stuff done and that’s really hard to do around here,” as it is at any large company. That wasn’t about me. That was about my team – Darren Torr, my boss Scott Harris, Bruce Whitbrodt and the senior management support I received from Bill Snyder, Ken Fairleigh and others.

Has anyone ever shut your door and asked to join your team?

Steve

The goals for my blog are to educate and entertain. The topics are almost always business related. I have veered into politics a time or two. With the warmth of Father’s Day still upon me I will use today’s blog to unleash my inner self-help guru. Ready?

The third act of life starts when youth begins to surrender to aging, our career may be hitting a plateau, our children are grown and our parents are no longer around to lead our fan club, connect us to our youth, and provide a buffer against life’s harsher lessons. This is also a time of growth and contribution. It is a chance to listen to the melodies of life and not just the drumbeats.

My third act began after more than 25 years in corporate America. The work began to feel routine and the standard corporate decision making process too tedious to tolerate. Change meetings came and went but, from my angle, were ineffective, pointless. The energy to get after the next big it waned. It was time to refresh.

I have always been driven to continuously improving myself physically, mentally, and spiritually. Spiritual improvement is the most important and rewarding. It is also the most difficult. It requires constant work outside of my comfort zone and constant adaptation as major decisions take on life-long and life-fulfilling consequences. As I pondered the next challenge I realized I wanted something enduring.

For most of us enduring means making a difference in another person's life, our children for example. But how do we do that on a broader scale and in a more systematic way? I believe one way is to do what inspires us, what we love. Doing that is a gift to the world and that gift can have unintended and potentially enduring consequences. There are no guarantees because there are never any guarantees. It's a shot.

To release my best on a personal level I focus on my strengths and share my own unique views and talents through my relationships, work and writing, which is my passion. To further extend my reach I decided to think BIGGER. But how? As is often the case, in order to look forward I began by looking backward.

Three characteristics make our generation different from our parent’s and those past. First is the “bonus round” of time, perhaps an extra decade or more, of active life that will be available to millions of people who have treated their body well. Second are the stronger financial resources and the desire for lifelong learning that tends to flow from having earned a college degree. Third is our desire to give back. Some Psychiatrists call this Mattering. What does that mean?
    
I think that means a rethinking of roles. Traditional Japanese and Native American cultures are a good working model. They offer a society where the roles of older people expand: We mentor the young, care for the sick, deliver justice, and tell stories that reveal the meaning of life. In sum, elders in these cultures ensure the spiritual well being of the community, the tribe. That sounds like internal growth and contribution to me so I plan to do more of it. Look out friends and family!

Oprah Winfrey said, “You’ve got to be in touch with your mind, body, and the spirit to live the life you were meant to claim. When all three are completely engaged, you’re able to fulfill your potential on earth. To own the abundant life that’s waiting for you, you’ve got to be willing to do the real work. Not your job. Not your career profile. But heeding your spirit, which is whispering its greatest desires for you. You’ve got to get silent sometimes to hear it. And check in regularly. You must feed your mind with reading material, thoughts and ideas that open you to new possibilities. When you stop learning, you cease to grow, and subconsciously tell the universe you’ve done it all – nothing new for you. So why are you here?”

What does any of this have to do with business? Nothing. Everything.

I’ve bludgeoned you all with survey results, spending information, and agency forecasts to drive home the point that a titanic shift is taking place from offline to online marketing. With 70% of product and service searches beginning online, it’s no surprise the marketing dollars are flowing in that direction, toward the people.

Your phone calls and emails are supportive but many of you are experiencing issues with your leadership. This is what I’m told:

Senior management refuses to act and are ignoring their own real-world experiences, since they too use Google and make purchases online. That frustrates people.  Here’s what that sounds like over the phone: “We sit around and talk about web-commerce and being found on Google all the time, but we never decide anything…” Line two: “We know our web-strategy is poor but we have other priorities that we're more comfortable working on, so that’s where our time and money goes. I guess it’s a comfort thing but it’s costing us sales.”

In second place (sorry senior management), leadership is dumb. Ever heard that one before? The grumbling comes because senior management says they believe the data and think of themselves as fairly web-literate. Really? One very frustrated VP said, “I’ve been pounding the table for over a year and they just don’t get it.” Another person said, “We spent a lot of money on a good website and they (senior management) actually think we’re done. That no other actions are required…it’s amazing.”

The grumbling and accusations are not new to senior managers. It’s no fun but when knowledge and action fail to intersect, they take the brunt of the storm. It comes with the big check.

The solution is having a clear marketing strategy that begins with a web-strategy. That’s right, new marketing strategies begin on the web, not the other way around.

Here’s the image:

It’s a three-part strategy that forms a virtuous cycle, with each part supporting the other two and all of them supported by traditional marketing tactics. The results are clearer messaging, better branding, new sales leads, increased revenue, higher margins and a lower cost-to-serve model. It’s a very productive cycle.

1. Social media locations like YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter, or whatever works for your company, are great for having direct conversations with your customers. You need to know what they’re thinking. It’s Marketing 101 stuff; only the data-collection tools have changed. You can call your customers if you want but you’ll probably get voicemail. They’re online.
2. The reason social media activity is important is because it will improve your rankings on the search engines. That means all those great products and services you offer, as well as that fantastic website you invested in, can actually be found by customers. Did I mention 70% of product and service searches begin online, mostly on Google?
3. Marketing generated action, such as Blogs, search engine optimization (SEO) strategies, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, and adding videos and photos to your site, not only provide fodder for social media, they also drive search engine rankings. Google bought YouTube so it’s no surprise that YouTube videos rank high in Google’s algorithms.

Traditional marketing doesn’t go away, advertising and print media still have their role. It’s a supporting role.

The payoff for all this strategy is more website traffic to drive sales. Finally, something we can all agree on.

Steve

Are you unhappy in your job? You're not alone if you are. More than four out of five (84% to be exact) people surveyed by CareerBuilder.com are unhappy at work! That's an incredible number.

What’s causing all the angst? A growing number of people believe the reason is our culture’s preoccupation on weaknesses. Think about your last performance review, it was probably low on praise and high on finger pointing. Who treats teammates that way? Professional athletes sure as heck don’t and the people who have joined the Strengths Movement don’t either.

The goal of the Strengths Movement is to end the angst. Dr. Donald Clifton (1924-2003) of the Gallup Organization began studying human strengths over 40 years ago. To formalize the study the StrengthsFinder assessment tool was created. To date it has been translated into more than 20 languages, used in more than 100 countries, and competed by more than 3 million people. That data is the foundation of the Movement.

Several excellent books have been written around the StrengthFinder data and most of them provide a way for you to take the test online at no additional cost. Many bestsellers such as StrengthsFinder 2.0 by Tom Rath, First Break all the Rules by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman, and Go Put Your Strengths to Work, also by Marcus Buckingham, have gained national acclaim and were featured in venues ranging from the Harvard Business Review to Oprah.

There are common threads in each book. Following are my thoughts on a few.

1. Too many resources are spent making us better generalists and not enough are spent identifying and building up our strengths. A fifth-grade math wiz may not be able to find a challenge equal to his potential, yet tutors and extra assignments are readily available to boost his English proficiency if the system rated him as Needs Improvement.
2. Focusing on our weaknesses does not build self-confidence, which is crucial to success at work and, some would say, in life. Successful people tend to have real confidence in at least one area of expertise. From that confidence-well they can draw the strength they need to succeed in other areas.
3. The reality is if you are not innately good with numbers you will not become a great statistician, period. As Tom Rath said so precisely in, Strengthsfinder 2.0, “You cannot be anything you want to be – but you can be a lot more of who you are.” Stated more positively, when we concentrate on developing our naturally steel-like talents and passions, our upside is far higher than when we ignore them and try to wedge our skills into some more conventional mushy-middle. Our great talents have leverage. Our average talents do not.
4. A plethora of leadership books list attributes as if once mastered we would, in effect, then become Winston Churchill or Mahatma Ghandi, for example. That seems odd. All great leaders have a grand vision, but most have far more differences than similarities. In the above example, the differences are dramatic; one is brash and aggressive while the other is polite and patient. The Movement’s focus is on accentuating the person on the inside and not the actor on the outside, no matter how good the actor.

I’ll never be Ernest Hemmingway, but now that I’m writing this blog twice each week, I’m going to go take that CareerBuilder.com test again. I may be able to bump the minority number up (those who are happy at work) to 17%.

Steve