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Author: Phil Wrzesinski

It’s a Wonderful Life!

Yeah, watched one of my favorite movies last night, It’s a Wonderful Life with Jimmy Stewart as George Bailey. Cried like a baby at the end, just like I always do.

Then it dawned on me…

This is a movie about incredible customer service.

All those people who came to bail out George at the end did so because first he had given them incredible, over-the-top, unexpected, bend-over-backwards customer service.

Unlike Mr. Potter, George put helping others above personal gain. George made a difference in other people’s lives. Let me repeat that.

George made a difference in other people’s lives.

Does your business do that? Does the customer service you offer make a difference in other people’s lives? Or is it simply a nicety that makes the exchange more pleasant?

The latter only gets a thank you at best. The former? It is the stuff angels are made of.

If you want your customers to show you the kind of love George got at the end, you better figure out a way to make a difference in their lives. When you do that, you’ll find that retail IS a Wonderful Life!

-Phil

What is Your Story? (Here’s Mine)

My first official day of work at the Toy House came the day after my 14th birthday. With work permit in hand, I joined the team in November 1980 and took my place behind the glass counter that housed all of our handheld electronic games.

Games like Simon, Coleco Football, Speak & Spell and others.

My parents figured if anyone could explain these games to parents & grandparents, it would be a kid like me. And I was good at it. So good that I could play all the games upside down and backward (that’s how they were to me when I showed them to you) better than most of my friends could play them right side up.

What a perfect job – paid $3.35 an hour to play with games!

The hot toy that year was Simon by Milton Bradley. The old Simon with the round black body and four colored lights on top. We owned one at home and I was the champ there, too.

We sold tons of Simon games, as many as they would send us. By early December we were sold out. We started a waiting list in hopes that Milton Bradley would ship some more. They did, but still not enough to meet the demand.

Every day I looked at the empty spot on the shelf where Simon had sat.

The Christmas season flew by fast. It was finally Christmas Eve, my favorite day of the year. We stayed busy until about 3pm when my mom started calling people with big layaways still here. You’d be amazed how many people forget about their layaways until the very last moment.

One guy had completely forgotten and had already gone out and bought a whole bunch of other gifts for the kids. He told my mom to cancel his layaway, he’d be in to get his deposit back after Christmas.

At 4:05pm, less than an hour from closing and too late to try calling people on our waiting list, my mom brought over a Simon game from his canceled layaway and laid it at my feet.

“See if you can sell this before we close,” she said.

I turned around a minute later and saw him. He was easily over six feet tall. In retrospect I figure he was in his mid-60’s but he felt so much older than that. The look on his face was tired and beaten. His shoulders were slumped in defeat.

He explained to me that he had left Detroit that morning because his six-year-old granddaughter he was raising only wanted one thing for Christmas. He had been to Ann Arbor, Lansing, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo and Battle Creek but no luck.

The gal in Battle Creek gave him directions to our store saying, “If anyone can help you, Toy House can.”

He pointed to the empty spot on the shelf and with a sadness in his voice said, “I suppose you don’t have any Simon games either.”

There are moments in your life when you know there must be some sort of greater power at work. Call it fate, call it destiny, call it Karma. Call it whatever you want, but I knew instantly I was in one of those moments. I felt it even before I leaned down to pick up the Simon game between my feet.

“Well, today is your lucky day!” I said as I handed him the last of our Simon games.

Thirty years of dust and defeat were shook off in that moment. He started crying, saying “God bless you, God bless you, God bless you.” He reached over the counter and gave me a bear hug.
I couldn’t help but join him in the moment. With tears now running down my own face we hugged and hugged as though we were long lost relatives. Still he repeated, “God bless you,” over and over.

As he left the store, he shouted “Merry Christmas!” to everyone within earshot, and I swear this old man had a dance in his step as he entered the parking lot.

I was fourteen years old at the time. Now I have thirty years of Christmas Eve memories at the Toy House. But none will ever replace that moment in time. I remember the details like it was yesterday.

God bless me?
Believe me, he already has!
Merry Christmas,

-Phil

Measuring ROI (or in other words… Did it Work?)

John Wanamaker of Wanamaker’s Department Stores in Philadelphia is credited with the famous quote decades ago,

“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted. The trouble is I don’t know which half.”

Since that quote marketers have spent billions of dollars trying to measure the ROI (return on investment) of their marketing and advertising efforts. Do not follow in their footsteps.

I repeat, Do Not Follow In Their Footsteps!

Trying to calculate the ROI on your advertising is like trying to decide which butterfly in Mexico caused the tornado in Texas. The variables would make a meteorologist’s head spin.

Oh, but the experts say measuring ROI for an event or coupon is easy. Oh yeah?

Cause of Success
Was the success of your last event because you posted it on Facebook?
Or was it because you posted on FB at the optimal time; two hours earlier or two hours later and no one of any influence would have seen it.
Or was it because you ran into a friend at the gas station and mentioned the event to her while she was heading to lunch with her very influential girlfriends?
Or was it because you put up the in-store signs just in time for the newspaper reporter who happened to be out shopping on her lunch hour to see them?
Or was it because the road two blocks over was closed for temporary repair and all the traffic came down your street all three days the tent-sign was out on your sidewalk?
Or was it… you get the idea.

(Look, you can come up with a list of excuses twice that long for why you failed, why are you so willing to credit your success to one thing?)

(Note: I didn’t address coupons because I don’t believe in them, but a similar list of variables can come into play making one coupon offer work while a similar offer fails.)

Marketing doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Nor should it.

Cover Your Bases
If you are hosting an event at your store, you need to be plying every avenue you can muster to draw your crowd. Facebook, Twitter, email, in-store signs, and press releases at a minimum (because they are basically free). Radio, TV, newsprint, direct mail as the budget allows. And networking, networking, networking. Get your butt out in public and talk. The more you do, the more success you’ll see. And the harder it will be to determine which method made the most difference.

So don’t worry about figuring out which method worked best.

First, you never really know. I have on my sign-up-to-win forms a question, “How did you hear about this event?” At one event 30% circled newsprint – even though there wasn’t a single mention in any newspaper!

Second, it doesn’t really matter, because you can’t fully factor all those variables listed above. So anything you learn above and beyond the simple lessons that have already smacked you in your face is no guarantee to move the needle the next time.

Third, you don’t have the budget to properly test your ROI.

Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics
Let the MBA’s falsify their stats to prove whether one form of marketing works better than another. The reality is that if you use your chosen media right, they all work. And if you use them wrong, they all fail. And the best laid plans can be derailed by a snowstorm, an orange cone, a bad news day, or a butterfly in Mexico.

Don’t waste too much time trying to calculate ROI. If you’re hosting an event, pick the marketing where you feel most comfortable. Put your energies there with all your conviction and the results will follow.

Then get out there and sell the dickens out of the crowd you draw!

Merry Christmas!

-Phil

PS Some of you might think this runs counter to my discussion of mixed media. That discussion was geared towards long-term branding. This is about short-term event marketing. Different beasts requiring different methods.

Is Social Media Working?

In one of my online communities the question was posed…

Is Social Media working or not working? Is it making anyone’s register’s ring?

The purpose behind the question was because of mixed reactions from businesses who have found success through Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, etc. and those who haven’t.

Personally, I think the question missed the mark. I would have asked…

HOW is Social Media working for those of you who have found it successful?

No matter what the marketing medium, some will find success with it, others will not. The problem isn’t in the medium, but in how you use it. If you use it right, the rewards are there. So I would want to know how people are using it right.

My Facebook Experience
We have found Facebook to be a lot like networking. It is about building relationships with people by getting to know them and seeing if there are any mutual benefits to our relationship.

The one thing I have learned in my experience with Facebook is that I get far more response when I ask questions than when I send out announcements. I get far more interactions when I ask for opinions and advice than when I post information. And I get a far better opportunity to interact positively with my customers when they post comments than when I just throw info at them. Most importantly, that viral aspect of Social Media kicks in the more people I include in the conversation.

The one definite ROI that I have been able to track is that my fan base grows faster the more comments and conversations I get on a post.

Mutually Beneficial
The benefits of these conversations are HUGE! We get a chance to learn what our biggest fans are thinking. Sometimes we even learn stuff we didn’t know. Sometimes we get to answer questions they forgot to ask in the store. Sometimes we get to clear up misunderstandings.

Most importantly, we have conversations, back-and-forth conversations. And conversations lead to conversions.

Make Your Registers Ring
The best sales people know that the key to successful sales is conversation. As long as the customers keep talking you have more opportunities to solve their problems and sell them what they need. If you treat your Facebook and Twitter programs as conversation starters, not information spreaders, you’ll find that the info actually spreads faster and farther and the sales will result.

Social Media, like all other forms of marketing, works when it is done right. If all you do is post info and tell, tell, tell, you won’t get the kind of return you want. If you think of it as a two-way conversation where you ask more than you tell, then you are on your way to doing it right.

-Phil

Doing a Charity Event Right

We just hosted a fundraiser with our local radio stations for Toys for Tots in Jackson yesterday morning. We raised over $6500 in donations of money & toys and all that money was quickly turned into sales at our store. For a one-day event in a market like ours, that was a pretty good day.

In fact, it was a win-win-win. Toys for Tots won because of the incredible exposure and the huge outpouring of the community (not to mention $6500 worth of toys). We won because of the incredible exposure and the $6500 in sales. The kids won because we made a major impact on not just the quantity of toys they will receive but also the quality.

Using a charity as a way to draw traffic is a huge marketing tool. Here is a how-to:

Find a Charity
First, you need to find an appropriate charity. We chose Toys for Tots because we sell toys. If you sell coats, line up with a Warm the Kids campaign. If you sell eyewear, contact the local Lion’s Club. Somewhere there is a charitable group that needs what you sell.

Then meet with the coordinator for your local organization. See if he/she has a radio station that is willing to support them. Local AM talk-radio stations are good for this. Their listeners include lots of business people and community-minded people who are more willing to support local causes.

Plan an Event
Next, have the charity contact the radio station to plan a morning event at your store. For our event we had both the AM and FM stations do their morning shows from our store 6am to 9am. They read the news, announced the weather and talked about the charity all morning long while encouraging people to come to our store or make donations by phone.

But be sure to have the charity make this call. Since they are a charity, they are more likely to get the radio station to do the promotion for free on their behalf. You just happen to be the location of the event.

After that, contact your local bakery and local coffee house. They might be willing to donate coffee & donuts for the free plugs on the air. If not, still support them and buy a few dozen donuts and brew a full pot of coffee. Get some OJ for the kids and non-coffee drinkers.

Set up an Account
Then set up a special account for the charity. That way you can take donations all year long. If someone wants to “tip” you, encourage them to instead make a donation to the charity through you. We actually raised over $500 this way in the past year. (Note: make sure your bank will accept checks from you that are made out to the charity.)

When you have your event date, promote the heck out of it through your own channels, too. FB, website, email, etc. The radio station usually talks about events like this on the air for about a week prior. You should spend at least a week or more promoting it too. Send out press releases. Call/email your favorite reporters.

Be Gracious
And finally, when you get the chance to be on the air, remember to make it all about the charity, Thank everyone who makes a donation. Shout-outs are great, especially when they are community leaders. We had half of our city commission come in this year so on the air we challenged the other half to step up – and they did! Our DDA director showed up minutes later to make a donation, afraid that he would be called out next.

Teaming up with charities is always a positive. It also makes your staff feel good. And at the end of the day, not only will you have done something wonderful for the community that benefited you, too, you will have created a perception of your business as the experts in town.

Merry Christmas!

-Phil

PS Email me if you want more details of what we did.

Don’t Panic

You’re at sea in the middle of a storm. Waves are pounding you from all sides. First from the right, then from the left, then two more from the right. You never know where the next wave will hit. You brace yourself for whatever impact will come and hold on tight.

The only way out of the storm is to keep a steady hand on the helm and keep the ship pointing in the same direction.

Okay, captain?

Economic Storm
We are in an economic storm right now. Ups and down without any predictable pattern. Customers spending more, customers cutting back. Positive and negative news from the media. Positive and negative signs at the register. Sales up big one moment, down big the next. promotions that work and promotions that fall flat.

Want an example from the weekend?

Black Friday I put out some doorbusters – really good sales on some of last year’s Step2 kitchens. Even had a $10 coupon from the company to sweeten the deal. Didn’t sell a single unit all day! Customer count was exactly the same as last year, but average ticket was down 8%.

Fast forward to Saturday – Small Business Saturday as promoted by American Express. 5% decrease in customers but 10% increase in average ticket. You might think the Amex promotion helped. Yet we had less American Express charges that day than a typical lazy Tuesday in August!

Stay the Course
Some businesses, after a weekend like that, will start twisting and turning every which way thinking that they need to chart a new course with every passing wave. But doing that will never get you out of the storm.

Keep a steady hand on the helm of your business. Adjust the sales as necessary, but always keep heading in the direction you have plotted for your success.

One thing we have learned in sixty years of retail. Smoother seas are always just beyond the storm. You just gotta stay on course.

-Phil

Rocked My Week!

It has been a fun week here and it just got better…

Not only are we just moments away from Black Friday – the real point when the Christmas shopping season begins… (no matter how hard some stores try to push the holidays)

Not only are we just hours away from my last day off for weeks… (I’ll only be at the store for a couple hours Thursday, I promise:)

Not only are we closing in on one of my favorite meals of the year… (it’s actually creamed turkey on Sunday at my mom’s house)

But I just got two bits of news that have rocked my week, so forgive me for doing a little tooting.

Entrepreneurial Vision
The Greater Jackson Chamber of Commerce just named me the 2010 Entrepreneurial Vision Award Winner for helping entrepreneurs and businesses in Jackson County.

Coolest thing about the award is it has nothing to do with what I do for the Toy House, but everything to do with how I share that knowledge with you.

Running the Jackson Retail Success Academy, working with the FasTrac start-up businesses, doing workshops for the Chamber, doing leadership and teamwork training for other local businesses, speaking at the Michigan Downtown Conference, writing this blog, publishing my book has all been a labor of love for me. Being recognized is just icing on that delicious cake.

More importantly, the award spotlights the importance of helping out other businesses, using the skills that have made us successful to help others reach their success. I just love that the Chamber has created such an award, and honored to be this year’s recipient. Cool!

Highlights for Hiring & Potter’s Wheel Book
The second thing to rock my week was an online interview I did for Business Info Guide. The book is getting rave reviews, but this interview will help me open it up to a whole new (bigger) audience.

If you haven’t read it yet, there are excerpts here on this blog. And if you are responsible for hiring and training, it is a book you definitely should read. Heck, at $19.99 it makes a great Christmas gift.

So I’m having a good week. How about you?

-Phil

Black Friday Deals – A How To

Okay, you’re gonna venture into the murky waters of Black Friday with some doorbuster specials at your retail store. You better know what you’re getting into. Do it right and you’ll see your registers ring. Do it wrong and you just might be borrowing trouble.

Here are some tips to help you navigate the seas of this retail extravaganza.

First answer this… Why are you having Black Friday doorbusters? Is it to draw traffic? Grow market share? Move out some slow sellers? Because your shopping center makes you?

Knowing this makes all the difference in the world.

Going After Market Share
If you’re trying to grow market share and draw in new traffic, you have to have a really good deal on a whole lot of good stuff. And you need to share that info with the whole marketplace, not just your fan base. Email and Facebook won’t help you grow traffic and market share. They are only preaching to the choir. You’re going to need a flier in the newspaper or an ad on radio or TV. And that deal better be a killer deal because you’re up against a whole bunch of killer deals from a whole bunch of deep-pocketed retailers.

Still not afraid? Good.

Now you need to make sure you have enough product to keep the momentum going. Run out of your best deals in the first few minutes and the rest of the day is sunk. You need to have enough merchandise to last the first couple of hours minimum, otherwise you’ll send away far more unhappy people than happy ones – not a good marketing plan this close to Christmas.

And lastly, you have to make sure your staff is ready for the challenge. Do you have traffic flow under control? Is everybody up to speed on the deals and how to ring them up? Is everybody okay with the new hours? (especially if you’re opening up extra early) Are they trained for dealing with unhappy customers, unruly customers? It’s a given that you’ll have at least one or two.

That’s a minimum of what it will take to attempt to grow market share on Black Friday. (And there’s no guarantee it will work. The competition is pretty savvy.)

Moving Out the Dogs
Maybe all you need to do is get some slow movers off the shelf, make those dogs bark. You can give the appearance of having a Black Friday type event without all the expense and risk, just by marking down some merchandise that you were probably going to mark down anyway.

First, this is a good day to start those markdowns. The Transactional Shoppers are out in force and looking for a deal. Second, you won’t have as many unhappy customers, seeing that it was older, closeout merchandise in the first place.

Plus, you can advertise that kind of sale purely to your fan base and make them feel even more special because they knew what was happening before the general public who has to show up Friday to see what is on sale.

Doing Nothing At All
Then again, you don’t have to do much of anything to make Black Friday special. Put out a pot of coffee for those early risers. Dress up the store in your best Christmas spirit. Make sure your shelves are fully stocked & straightened. Put your happiest smiling faces on the sales floor and let them do their magic.

The day after Thanksgiving has always been a strong shopping day, and it wasn’t the discounts that always drove the traffic. Only in the last couple decades have we seen this day become the who-can-open-earlier-and-sell-it-cheaper event that it is. You don’t have to join that fray to be successful.

In fact, if you take the hands-off approach, make sure you staff your store stronger in the afternoon and evening, and be ready for another big rush Saturday. There are a lot of customers choosing not to fight the long lines Friday. To them, no deal is worth the hassles of long lines, unhappy people and early mornings. They’ll be out in force later and don’t want to deal with those been-up-since-three-don’t-bother-me sales people.

This Black Friday, whatever you decide to do, do it consciously and do it right!

Happy Thanksgiving!

-Phil

Love is a Given

Tiger Woods was on ESPN radio this morning and mentioned a lesson his father, Earl, taught him.

Love is a given. Trust and Respect have to be earned.

That is true not only in people, but in businesses too.

You have customers who love you. We all do. Sometimes it is just the nature of our store. Heck, who doesn’t love a toy store? But have you earned your customer’s trust?

Earning Trust
You can earn their trust a number of ways…

By always doing what you say you will do. If you promise to call someone back with information, you better call them back with that info. If you promise delivery at a certain time, you better deliver at that time.

Sure you might slip up along the way. We all do. but if you can’t do what you said, you better be upfront and honest with why you didn’t perform. When you make a mistake, admit it quickly and apologize profusely.

By always being consistent in who you are. If you stand for quality, you have to drop the products that don’t meet your standards and stand behind the products you do sell. Whatever your principles, you have to show that you are willing to give up some of your profit to be consistent with your values.

By always looking at your business from a “what’s-in-the-best-interest-of-the-customer” point of view. Is your cash wrap set up for quick and easy checkout? Does your return policy favor you or the customer? Are you willing to do what is right by the customer even when it costs you money?

Earning Respect
To earn respect you have to be respectful. Do you always have a positive outlook or are you a skeptic who sits back and take potshots at everything? Do you join in on the solution or just talk about the problems? Do you help out others or only look after yourself?

Your attitude goes a long way towards your ability to earn your customers’ respect.

We all have customers who love us. But if you want to grow your business, you have to earn their trust and respect. And you have to earn it anew every single day.

-Phil

Preaching to the Choir

This morning I gave a presentation to my staff that was the same one I’ve given three times in the past week to customers. It was a 30-minute presentation on Smart Toy Shopping.

My staff already knows this information. Some would say I was merely preaching to the choir.

And they would be right!

Sometimes you have to preach to the choir to get them to sing. Sometimes you have to remind your staff about the stuff they already know. Two quick advantages to preaching to the choir.

  1. The choir gets to refocus and get their eyes back on the ball.
  2. The choir feels good about themselves for knowing the answers to the questions you’re about to ask.

Can we agree that both of those outcomes are worthwhile?

Don’t ever discount the notion that you’re only preaching to the choir. Sometimes the choir is the most important group of people who need to get your message. And in retail, they are the ones in direct contact with your congregation.

-Phil

PS If you have a group of toy shoppers in this area, the talk is free, the lessons timeless. (It’s the same presentation my grandfather was doing over 50 years ago.)

PPS If you are a toy store owner and want a copy of the PowerPoint – send me an email at phil@philsforum.com.