Discipline in the Sun

February 11th, 2009 Chris

Since we’ve arrived down here in South Beach for the rest of winter, I’ve had many a friend ask how we can afford to take this much time off. When I protest that it’s not vacation, I get the inevitable Yeah, right…

Well – it’s not! We’re working!

But it is tough… Something about all the temptations of a temperate climate…

So I’ve developed several rules that keep me focussed and on-task. I’d thought it worthwhile sharing them as I think that they can be of use to anyone working at home.

Oddly enough, they all involve avoiding temptation. As many know, this is particularly important for me as I am, well, easily tempted by all manner of vices.

Anyways, here are my three rules:

1. Regular “office hours”. First, I force myself to be actually at my desk and working by 9am at the latest and go until 5pm. The former is a bit tough for me as I’ve been trying to get some exercise (running on the beach) and the latter is tough on the dog who struggles to wait until them for his daily romp. Regardless, we make it through and forcing yourself to be at your desk helps to avoid temptation to take an early afternoon and head out to the (many) neighbourhood bars. Sure, both Colleen and I normally work at night and on weekends – but core hours during the day really helps productivity.
2. Daytime Prohibition. There are very few things that I enjoy more than sitting back and drinking a beer. I do suffer from two simultaneous foibles that make this extremely dangerous. First, I am less productive after a drink. Second, I typically don’t stop at “a” beer – so the issue gets exasperated (see foible #1). So, during those hours, nary a single beer cap gets popped and I stay focused. There is a related issue with junk food but that has more about me becoming a dough-boy…
3. No TV. What goes better with that elicit beer than last night’s Daily Show. Stop! Do not turn on the TV – even for that brief time while I make lunch. I do listen to CBC Ottawa radio down here but the TV does not get sparked up .

These three rules keep me focused on the task at hand and make sure I stay productive. There are so many distracting vices – especially when you don’t have a little competitive peer pressure to keep you on your toes.

And when you think about it – it’s crazy to not stay on task. If you don’t focus, work hard and continue making money then you could be forced to go back to the corporate world and a regular job.

Noooooooooooooooo!!!!!

C.

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What, are you wacked?

February 4th, 2009 Chris

We did something crazy the other day. Something particularly foolish given all the doom and gloom of the current economic situation. We raised our prices.

Why did we do it? Well, to make a long story short we confirmed three things about new, higher pricing:

1. We are competitively priced
2. We provide substantial value
3. We are aligned with the way we were selling

The first one is sometimes hard for us in our micro-business. There are many, many competitors out there with different slices/niches of the sales training business. But we can get a sense of the pricing of those that offer similar services and products, ensuring that for what we are offering, we are in the right ball park. Oddly enough, there is a fair bit of consistency (at least in our market).

This is a bit tough for me. I’m used to getting out powerpoint slides with granular analysis of competitors pricing at different volume, studying discretionary discounting, etc… And maybe I’m making excuses for not getting that gory. It’s just that we’ve found our market for our services there is a lot of price elasticity so along as you’ve got good value, you can charge appropriately.

A good example of this is the speaking business. There are speakers that are $1,500 a day and there are speakers that are $30K an hour. In that spectrum of prices you get different value – speakers who are more engaging, more entertaining, more famous, more impactful, etc… And there is good business volume through out that entire range. So the key is maximing speaking fees based on your return-on-investment to the customer.

 That’s a long winded way of getting to my second point. That is, value is king.

So when I said we raised prices, how did we do it? We took each of our services and added additional value. For example, in Colleen’s base level coaching program, we went from one web class a year to four. That has tremendous value and more than compensates for the price increase. And, showing again the importance of managing costs, we can do so with no incremental costs to the business. So that price increase is pure profit (good for us) and the customers get even more return on their hard-earned dollar (good for them).

Finally – one of the most profitable things we did was align what we sell with how & where. For example, when Colleen speaks at an event, she used to offer our base coaching program. That it, our cheapest offering and the same one we sell on-line.

Then we realized that this was nuts. Here is our greatest asset – our sales queen – up in front of a live audience and she’s only selling the base offering. We changed that at the beginning of January and now Colleen sells her mid-tier package (at it’s new even-more-value price). Low and behold, our sales quantities dropped by about a third but the package is over four times the price. So, we’re far ahead.

So, to make a long (too) story short, by taking a look at how you can add more value without increasing your costs and ensuring that you align the offering with how you are selling it (or vice versa), you can raise your prices and make more money. Even in today’s economy.

C.

Posted in General, Pricing | No Comments »

Telefun or How I learned to let go of winter and love VOIP

January 28th, 2009 Chris

As many of you know, I have grown to despise all things winter: dark, cold, snowy, etc… And so Colleen and I escape to South Beach as a respite from the deep freeze here in Ottawa. That’s one of the great things about having a micro-business without a brick and mortar presence: we can literally work anywhere.

Typically though, being away from home brings angst that the business will suffer. One of the standard challenges is how to keep in touch with partners, customers, etc… without giving up a level of service and without paying Bell or Rogers too much money. As far as I’m concerned, we are routinely asked to bend over here in Canada when it comes phone services.

That’s why I was excited when one of our customers, Tim Welch from Talkswitch, introduced me to this magical little box that we’ve just finished installing. A magical little box that not only provides us the ability manage multiple lines, have voice mails, auto-attendants (press 1 to get closer to – yet never quite reach – a human being…), etc…, it also can help you stick it to the phone company.

The really cool thing that the Talkswitch box supports that makes this all possible is VOIP. Now – I remember travelling all over the place back when I worked for my former employer and using Skype. Pretty good but with the occasional line drop, poor quality, etc… Not particularly conducive for trying to close a deal. We tried to use it last year when we were down South and it was definitely hit or miss (mostly miss).

When Tim told me about their VOIP support, I was thinking it would be the same as Skype. Well – it’s very different. I turn my computer into a phone – like Skype – but instead of connecting to the big cloud of competing-for-bandwidth-calls-from-every-corner-of-the-earth, the Talkswitch box is our own dedicated VOIP hub. In other words, I can pick up my “phone” from my computer anywhere in the world and I’m hooked up to the box in our office. From there, I can call other extensions or call out – just like I was in the office.

And the same applies for inbound. Someone dials my extension and it automatically rings at my local computer (before going to my normal voice mail or being forward to my cell – however I configure it).

And best of all – the quality is great (usually better than normal phone lines). And we save a ton on long distance charges. And we get all the stuff we’d get from a normal small business PBX (which of course you need anyways if you have more than one or two employees and a fax line).

</geek>

So, if you have the flexibility to go somewhere more fun or warm in your micro-biz, take it! There are tools there that can help you continue to work seamlessly and don’t have to be expensive!

C.

Posted in Telecom | 1 Comment »

I’m Back and Interactive

January 22nd, 2009 Chris

After a long holiday break I’m back. And my New Year’s resolution is to be committed and regular on the blog. Not a great start give it’s the 22nd…

Anyways…

Last fall, Colleen and I heard a guy speak at a conference. His name eludes me but what he said didn’t. He started a very successful on-line dating site and his advice was to focus your efforts on getting people who visit your web site to interact with you personally as quickly as possible.

That stuck with me and just a few days later, I saw a talk about Live Chat. It was a shameless sales pitch, but I couldn’t help but think that there would be a lot of value in proactively asking visitors to your web site if they are finding everything they need.

In case you’ve not experienced it, live chat is like instant messaging, but for the web. You can chat back and forth with an operator in a browser window. It can be initiated by the site visitor or by the operator.

I couldn’t help but think about the analogy of a retail store. Would you have a brick and mortar store without any sales clerks. No one to help shoppers find what they need or answer any questions? That would be insane.

So we bit the bullet and have now implemented live chat on the engageselling.com site. And the results have been great. We had such a reaction in the first couple of weeks that I had to go in and limit the number of simultaneous chats as Casey (in our office) was going insane trying juggle five conversations at once.

And one of the features we really like is that if you stay on a given web page for a certain amount of time (ex. 2 minutes), you are automatically prompted to see if you have any questions. Just like in a real shop!

We’ve even made sales with the chat.

Long and short, we’re going to be doing several things to make our on-line presence more engaging and more interactive – so we can quickly move from a prospect only browsing to a potential client interacting with us personally.

<rant>

OK, while I’m talking about live chat, I must share my frustration with some of the vendors servicing the entrepreneurial market. The gentlemen I mentioned above who was pitching his live chat solution was charging $3K plus $80 a month. It came with scripts and set up instructions along with the on-going chat service (the actual back end is hosted in most solutions). Long story short, he got everyone riled up, because live chat makes sense, and made a bunch of sales.

I tend to not make impulse purchases when it comes to the business (or in our personal life according to Colleen) and so while she was half way to the stage with her credit card in hand, I said Whoa. Instead, I did some reseach over two evenings and found that what the gentlemen was selling at the event did have industry leading features but he was reselling someone else’s service.

I found and contacted the service directly (god bless google) and got the exact same service for no money upfront (vs. $3K) and $79 per month.

The moral: always shop around… (the way I figure it, Colleen owes me $3K)

</rant>

C.

Posted in Marketing, Web, Web Site | 1 Comment »

The Bad Economy Can’t Kill the Beast

December 18th, 2008 Chris

We run a 1 Oct to 1 Oct fiscal year. That means that we are about to wrap up our first quarter of the new fiscal year. We’ve been nervous for the last couple of months – concerned about all the economic turmoil and its impact on the business.

We’ll the results are in and there is good and bad news, and an important lesson.

First the bad. In the biggest lines of income, year over year, sales are a bit down. We’re not particularly surprised as the biggest bucket, custom training, is one of the first places that organizations cut when they are concerned about their numbers. Relatively big ticket discretionary spending is usually the first to go.

The good news? Over the last year we’ve leaned into (aka invested) in additional lines of income. Coaching, events, web class are areas that we put some sales and marketing behind. Heck – even I got off my ass and did some training (however, that was a mistake, ad passim).

The results – we’re up year over year, met our targets and will be closing one of our best quarters.

Now, let me knock on wood and hope it’s not just luck – but I don’t think it was… It was a direct result of creating additional revenue streams so that if our mainstays are impacted, it’s more than compensated for by others.

Now – anyone that worked with me in my former life knows that there is a huge concern when people start to talk about doing multiple things. What’s the word – Focus! The old adage that you can’t do anything well if you do too many things.

I still agree with that – hence why I feel my own forays into training were a mistake. That didn’t leverage our existing assets and distracted me. But that’s different than creating new streams of revenue by new creating products and services that leverage common assets. In other words, stuff that doesn’t take that much work to tailor or modify and deliver in a different way that will be valuable to customers.

Now – just because it doesn’t take a lot of new product or service “development” doesn’t mean that you can skimp on sales and marketing. That’s the resource that you have to manage and ensure you’re giving each of your “lines” an opportunity to succeed.

Oddly enough – it’s a very different constraint than I’m used to dealing with. In the technology world – the conversation on resource constraints is often about development resources. Here, at least in our micro business, we work hard to make sure that’s not the case. And ultimately that is our way of ensuring focus.

Here’s a challenge: grab a beer or glass of wine over the holidays, put your feet up and think of one additional way you could generate additional revenue next year – without creating a new product or service from scratch. Then, repeat – at least the first bit…

C.

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I have seen the future…

December 11th, 2008 Chris

I’ve been itching to update our web page. Trying to make it more interactive, more engaging. Generally to help people get to the information they need faster and take the next step in engaging…

I’m a big proponent of seeking inspiration from industry leaders (surely not blatant copying…). The other day I came across one of the most brilliant ways of helping your prospects find what they need and get engaged with you on a personal level…

It was done by a guy named Ford Saeks who is one of the leading internet marketing guys for small business and entrepreneurs. His home page treatment is brilliant: http://www.profitrichresults.com.

Every one’s using flash but I thought the marriage of video, engaging graphics and a clear call to action was unique.

You want a good test: go to Ford’s home page, then go to your home page. When I did it I was blown away by how unintuitive it was without the video and clear “do this now” direction.

We must copy his approach. In fact, I pledge to have something done like this within three months. Feel free to keep me honest!

C.

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Back from the Grave…and Ready to Party!

December 3rd, 2008 Chris

I know it’s been a couple of weeks. My life is slowly getting back to normalcy. At least my special version of it. I re-read my last blog posting and it was depressing. Now that I can see light at the end of the tunnel, all is better…

I did learn a good lesson: focus. I know that everyone is different and there are uber-entrepreneurs who can manage multiple businesses at once. I am not one of them and when there are only two of you in charge – it’s really hard to take your eye off the ball without it blowing up. I’m actually surprised that Colleen didn’t fire me.

But I’m back now and we’re planning for January – typically a good month for us to update our product and services. With the general economic climate – it really is time to make sure that you’re compelling and competitive (without giving up on your revenue targets):

1. Re-confirm your value proposition. If you are selling with the same messages that you were using a year ago – you could be in big trouble. A year ago, helping customers to sell more, to go faster, to build team spirit, etc… was fine. Now – it’s a train-wreck. It takes a different value to get those increasingly scarce dollars to be liberated from the buyer’s iron grip. Today, messages around cost savings, increased efficiencies, reducing headcount (gasp) is what resonates with business buyers. They are trying to control costs – just like you are – and you need to align with what they care about.
2. Focus on the ascension model by buyer. Here’s a great exercise: sit back and think about your ideal customers – who are they, what do they want, how do they buy. Think to your products and services – what is the first logical thing to offer a customer for purchase (perhaps a particular $ value or product type). What would you do next to step up the value (a product of greater value? a different product/service type). Think about that ascension model of what makes sense for the ideal buyer to purchase in the different phases as they engage with you. Map that back to your sales and marketing programs so you can focus your efforts and move prospects through their lifecycle in a way that maximizes results by delivering the right value to your customers at the right time.
3. Focus on products and services that are the key revenue drivers. Over the last few years, Colleen (due to her prolific nature) has assembled quite a collection of coaching programs, study kits, CDs, web classes, events, etc…  Some of these are key for revenue and profit, some have a negligible impact. Given my love of spreadsheets, we know which are really key to meeting objectives versus those that are nice to have. Given you’ve got a limited number of opportunities to engage a prospect and turn them into a customer, focus on the stuff that makes money! And with the other stuff – instead of actively marketing and selling it, why not include it as a bonus or add-on to incent the sale of those key products/services you need to make your numbers.
4. Deliver more value with current programs & services. Note that I’m not saying drop prices – I’m saying figure out how to provide customers with more value. For example, we’re going to be announcing additional member benefits to Colleen’s coaching programs. These will be benefits that will make our programs even more attractive without increasing our costs. As I’ve written before (here and here), we’ve done a lot to establish a cost structure that has minimal variable components.

These are four quick processes that are designed to make sure you focus in on what is going to make you successful in 2009 – despite what is happening in the economy. Why not sit down in a pub or favourite restaurant with your business partner (or friend who will listen to you as long as you buy the beer) and run through each of these. It’s a couple of hours that can make the difference between blowing away your targets next year and just blowing.

C.

P. S. The title of this blog is from one of my favourite movies from the 80s, “Return of the Living Dead“.

Posted in General, Marketing | 1 Comment »

I am going insane…

November 12th, 2008 Chris

OK – I know I have been super delinquent. The fact is I am going insane.

I have officially max’ed out and it was stupid. And I think there is a lesson here.

When I first went to work with Colleen, I suffered from ego-interruptus. That is, the small amount of respect and industry recognition I had obtained as the CTO was a bit addictive. Nothing like telling the story over drinks about briefing Congress or pioneering a new high-growth market. It’s a long way to writing copy and working on a web page design.

So, I went to take on additional challenges that would feed my ego. First, I got a teaching gig at our local University’s MBA program. Then I joined a colleague in doing Product Management training at a large technology. What was I thinking!?!

And it’s not like there was nothing to do with our micro-business. I’ve got things back from last December I’ve not done yet.

But now, I sit here – working from 6am to 11pm each day and doing nothing as well as I’d like. And worst of all, I’m hurting the business that allows us to have a great lifestyle and is going to help us retire.

It must stop. After my current commitments, I am going to re-focus on the one business that’s most critical to us. And if my ego suffers once and a while… in the words of a good friend of mine (and a former post), I’ll have to “suck it up, princess.”

C.

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