Home » Influence » Page 8

Category: Influence

Neighborhood Kids Causing Trouble? Involve Them in Your Business

My grandfather served on the USS Arkansas Battleship in WWII. Fought at D-Day and Okinawa. Shortly after the war, with three kids and nowhere in town to go for toys, he opened our store.

The original Toy House was not in the best shopping location, but rent was cheap on the edge of downtown near the residential neighborhoods.

One of his friends told him, “Phil, you’re crazy for going there. The neighborhood kids will vandalize the heck out of your store… when they’re not in shoplifting you blind.”

Oh, my grandfather was crazy. Crazy like a fox.

Every morning he raised the flag outside the store. Every evening he lowered the flag. And he did it with all the pride and honor of a decorated WWII veteran. Oh yeah, and he included all the neighborhood kids in the routine. Taught them how to say the Pledge of Allegiance, how to stand at attention and salute, how to fold the flag and pay it respect. Showed them how to raise the flag quickly and lower it slowly. A true adolescent color guard.

At first there were a couple kids involved. Then a few of their friends joined in. Pretty soon it was a small crowd of young patriots standing at attention with their hands over the hearts.

Vandalism? Never a problem. Shoplifting? Are you kidding? He had an army of young men that took pride in the success of Toy House. No one was going to hurt the store on their watch.

How are you reaching out to your community and getting them to stand behind your store?

-Phil

What Difference Did You Make?

Sometimes we forget the impact we have. And this time I’m not talking about the social impact of the products we sell. I’m talking about money. Pure cold hard cash.

Do me a favor… Go read this article .
I’ll wait…

Think about the billions of dollars of economic impact that one company has had on the world.

Now think about your own.

There have been studies that say a dollar spent in a local independent retailer circulates seven times through the community. Some have put it as high as fourteen times. Others question if seven is too high. But none dispute the facts that the money spent in your store goes around the community more than once.

So let’s use lucky number 7. Take your gross sales for the year and multiply it times 7.

That is the impact you had on your local economy.

That money allowed families in your town to keep their homes, feed themselves, and buy clothes. That money sent kids to college so they could learn to solve future problems. That money plowed the snow on your streets, sent firemen to rescue old Mrs. Hodges, and helped the police make the biggest drug bust in a decade.

That money maintained the park where your kids play, helped your dentist buy a better, safer x-ray machine. That money kept two kids out of jail because they got an allowance from their employed parents.

Sometimes when you look at your business, good or bad, you wonder what it’s all worth. As you reflect on 2010 know this… it’s worth more than you originally thought!

Happy New Year !

-Phil

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

Why You Should Care

Saturday, November 13th is Neighborhood Toy Store Day – a day to celebrate the wonders and delight of your neighborhood independent toy stores.

The genesis for this day comes from the American Specialty Toy Retailing Association (ASTRA).

Yes, it is a contrived celebration, not unlike the Hallmark holidays like Bosses Day and Sweetest Day. Yes, it is a marketing ploy designed to get shoppers into these local toy stores ahead of the Black Friday fiascoes. And yes, it is a lot of work for these toy retailers to plan activities, run promotions, and market themselves.

There are pretty much three responses from toy store owners on events like this:

  1. Some are going to ignore it and decide it isn’t worth the effort. They figure it won’t move the needle much and won’t be around for long so they won’t get sucked into the hype.
  2. Some are going to go half-ass and do just enough to say, “Yeah, I did something, but it didn’t work out for me.”
  3. Some are going to embrace it fully, plan wonderful events, inspire their staff to get excited about it, inspire their customers with their own creativity, and make this one of the most special days of the year.

Which of the three do you think will reap the most benefits?

The big difference is PASSION. When you show passion in your business, those around you cannot help but be sucked in by it. Your staff will mirror it. Your customers will embrace it. And your sales will show it.

So embrace those moments where you can let your passion for business shine through. If your industry creates a special holiday, put some passion into celebrating it. Your customers will notice and react accordingly.

-Phil

PS We are celebrating in style on the 13th with one of the biggest Playmobil Play Days we’ve ever had! The staff is excited. The buzz is building. Yeah, it’s going to be an awesome day!

Two Classic Election Ad Mistakes

I hate politician advertising! I turn off the radio, change the channel, or flip the page.

It isn’t so much the politicians and the political process that bothers me. I love a good political debate and discourse. It’s the horrible advertising that drives me crazy.

Most political ads make the same classic mistake – they make claims without evidence to back them up.

Sometimes they do it because they can’t back up their claims with facts. Sometimes they do it because they don’t give themselves enough time in their ad because they are being too clever. Sometimes they think the evidence is obvious enough to not need to be included.

To Tell the Truth
We currently have a hotly contested US Congress Race and one candidate parades out a whole bunch of seniors telling the other candidate not to mess with their Social Security and Medicaid. One after another we hear old people chiding the other candidate saying he will ruin their benefits. But not one of them tells us what he did, said or proposed that will ruin their benefits. No evidence means no credibility. I’m not buying it. (In fact, the truth of the two candidates’ actions is that the one being chided has done more to protect SS & Medicaid than the one running the ad, which makes the first candidate either completely ignorant or a bald-faced liar – neither of which I want representing me in Congress).

Tell Me Why
Another ad in a state race included a candidate telling me all about his endorsements. Endorsements are apparently great, yet I see many candidates win without them. Those endorsements would mean a lot more to me if I knew why he got them.

Did he give favors?
Did he promote one of their projects?
Did they give him the endorsement in exchange for publicity?
Are they backing him because he’s a surefire winner and they want to curry favor?

I could surmise all of those reasons for the endorsement, none of which are positive, because he never gave me evidence to tell me why these endorsements make him the better candidate.

Would you like your audience to make up their own (probably false) conclusions about a claim you make?

Give Us Reason to Believe
If you make a claim in your ads such as “We’re the best (insert claim here)…” back it up with evidence. Your ad becomes more credible and your claim more believable when you tell me why. If you don’t have time, don’t make the claim. A claim no one believes will make people doubt everything else you say.

Down and Dirty
The second mistake most politicians make is the dirty, negative attack ads. You can’t play in the mud with getting dirt on yourself. Sure, the mud-slinging might win you a few votes now, but the stink stays with you and ruins your credibility long term.

Politicians might not care. But independent retailers can’t afford to have 45% of the population hating their guts and everyone else feeling kinda uneasy about them, too. If you’re going to mention your competitors, keep it to the facts. Point out what they do, then tell everyone why what you do is better – and back it up with evidence.

A Winning Formula
Be honest, be ethical, be positive. Back up all your claims with evidence. Do those two things and the credibility and effectiveness of your ads will make you a winner this fall.

-Phil

PS To make your ads more believable, I highly recommend the book Currencies That Buy Credibility by Tom Wanek (no, this is not an affiliate link – I make no money promoting this book, I just like it. A lot.)

Credibility Shown

Tom Wanek wrote a book, Currencies That Buy Credibility.

The new CEO of Step2 Company – Jack Vresics – is an embodiment of that book.

Last Thursday I was in Streetsboro, OH for a meeting of Step2 Center dealers – the retailers who sell the vast majority of the Step2 line. Step2 is the largest manufacturer of toys still being made in the USA. But they’ve had a shakeup the past year replacing the CEO, the CFO, and the Director of Marketing.

I was looking forward to meeting the new CEO, but at Wednesday night’s informal gathering we were told that he wouldn’t be at our annual gathering because he had to drive his daughter up to Ann Arbor to move her in for her first year at the University of Michigan. Understandable excuse. I have every intention of being there to help my boys on their first day at away at college, too.

But right before we broke for lunch Thursday a new face entered the room – Jack Vresics was in the building! He drove 3 hours back from Ann Arbor after moving his daughter in just to spend 90 minutes with us before driving back another 3 hours to be with his daughter again.

You have heard that actions speak louder than words. That one action spoke volumes of how important we dealers are to Step2.

He paid the currency (driving an extra 6 hours) to earn credibility, and he earned it big time in my book. He showed me what he was willing to do to make sure I knew how important my business was to him.

What actions are you willing to do, what price are you willing to pay to show your customers how important they are to you?

Read Tom’s book (no, I am not affiliated in any way – just a fan of the book) and you can learn some simple ways to earn that credibility.

-Phil

Who is Your BFF?

Had lunch today with one of my best friends. Good food, good conversation, and more than a few laughs.

Got me thinking about why he’s my friend. We certainly have common interests – go to the same church, hang out with the same people, have boys of a similar age. But there are more than a few people that fit that profile with whom I am not close friends.

Why him over others?

Two reasons come to mind…

  1. Shared experiences
  2. Insider information

Shared Experiences

We’ve done a lot together over the past 15 years – parties, kid events, Red Wings games, travel. Just the proximity of doing things together builds a bond of friendship. Taking our kids to the fireworks, grilling in the backyard, and spending New Year’s Eve together bring us even closer.

Insider Information

You can’t do that much together and not know a little more about a person than the average public knows. Yeah, we share some secrets. More importantly, because we know how each other ticks, we know how to act and react appropriately to keep the friendship humming. Those insights are part of the glue that holds our friendship together.

That’s why we’re BFF’s.

Here’s a question for you…

How do you turn your customers into BFF’s?

I believe it’s the same way – Shared Experiences & Insider Information. When you actively get involved in their visits by getting to know more about them and sharing more about yourself, you will quickly find those customers becoming more loyal and more vocal about you.

There are thousands of people who fit the profile of what your perfect customer should be, but few of them are loyal, vocal customers. Put your focus on getting to know them and sharing experiences in your store with them and that will change. They will soon be your new BFF’s.

-Phil

Ads That Moved My Needle

There weren’t many.

Last night had to be the worst round of Super Bowl ads I’ve ever seen. There was only one ad all night that I replayed for my wife to see. It was Google’s story of a trip to Paris.

It had an interesting storyline that spoke to the heart. It gave you new information about what Google Search can do. How many of you knew you could check your flight information in Google Search? It had elements of surprise. How many of you were eagerly anticipating what was being assembled? And most of all, it didn’t insult your intelligence.

The other ad that made me think was the Flowers in a Box ad from TeleFlora.com.

It was a direct contrast of them versus ProFlowers.com which is heavily advertised on ESPN Radio, which kinda gave it a CBS versus ESPN feel.

That’s the short list of ads that moved my needle. As for the others…

Doritos? I may never eat one of my favorite snacks again for fear that I’ll become one of those weirdos in their spots.

Bud Light? Has anyone on the planet ever known a real person react that way to a Bud Light? Basically, their ads all said the same thing. “Our ads don’t even come close to matching your experience with our product, which means we’re a bunch of liars, and you’ll never guess what else we lied about.”

Budweiser? What was that longhorn ad about? Cross-breeding?

Vizio? Better than most, but I’m not into all those Apps, and was almost about to tune out those robotic arms – couldn’t quite see what they were doing.

GoDaddy.com? What are you? A porn site? Only one of their ads actually said what they did. The rest were just come-ons to get you to their site (where Danica keeps her clothes on).

Sketchers? Just exactly how does your shoe shape me up better than the others? Tell me how and I might listen.

And the two back-to-back “guys in their underwear” ads was too creepy to even give mention to the lame companies who ran them (and the network to air them one after the other).

Overall, I think Hyundai had some decent ads. They definitely told their story differently than Dodge. I think every woman who saw that Dodge ad decided never again to give Chrysler the time of day. Hyundai chose to give us concrete facts without offending our sensibilities – a concept lost on most other commercials.

And finally, although the eTrade ads were cute the first time around, they are getting tired and predictable and once again reinforced my desire to never do a business with a bunch of spoiled, arrogant babies.

So what moved your needle? Did any ad speak to you in a persuasive way? I’d love to hear your comments.

-Phil

The Oscars of Advertising

To the general public, tonight’s Super Bowl broadcast is the Oscars of Advertising. Like you, I get as much enjoyment out of those multi-million dollar blips on the screen as I do the actual game.

And Monday morning, I’ll be talking about my favorite ads at the water cooler, too. But my criteria might be a little different from everyone else.

What I’m looking for is ads that have the power to move the needle. Entertainment? Yeah, it gets my interest. Humor? Yeah, I like to laugh. But the real power in an ad is not how entertaining, funny or heart-warming, but how persuasive it is. Does it move me closer to the product or company? At the end of the day, if the ad doesn’t bring you more business, it doesn’t matter what the critics think. Your ads have to persuade people to remember you, use you, believe in you. Anything else is just fluff.

As every year, the beer ads are the heavy favorites, and although entertaining, there has only been one beer ad that ever moved my needle… (See it here)

It isn’t very funny or heart-warming, so-so on the entertaining side, but they make one powerfully compelling point at the end (which they back up with the kind of hard evidence that would make Tom Wanek happy) that sent me running to the local grocer. It’s now my favorite light beer.

I’m curious to know which ads you saw during the Super Bowl that had the power to move your needle. What ads drew you closer to the company or product? I’d be willing to wager that your list and my list will be different from most of the critics’ lists.

Let the game begin!

I’ll post my thoughts later in the week.

-Phil