The Donald Cooper Corporation Newsletter
Volume 3, Issue 3 - March 2004
 Greetings !
If this is your first time receiving our Newsletter, "Welcome"!! We post all articles from past newsletters on our website in the Free Articles section. For your convenience, these articles are available by category.
1. The incredible power of redefining your customers!
(time to read this article is about one minute)
For a printable version of this article, click here.
Most businesses define their target customers by "who" they are. Some are also clever enough to define them by "where" they are. But it will be much more useful to define your target customers in three ways. By...
1) Who they are,
2) Where they are...and by,
3) What they're trying to do.
Perhaps the best way to explain this is with an example. A client of mine in high-end residential real estate, a small but very competitive part of the market, was trying to redefine herself to clearly differentiate her business, add client value and increase revenue. (wouldn't we all like to do that?)
After just one hour of discussion, we created the following description of her target customers that achieved all three objectives and transformed her business. Here's what we came up with...
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Our target customers are… High income, international business executives, and their families, who are relocating into the Greater Toronto Area and who need housing and other relocation services that will help them to quickly and comfortably become part of the business, social, education and cultural life of the city. |
This four line definition defined her geographic market, provided clear insights about the value-added services that would be compelling to affluent executive newcomers, and also defined the type of staff needed to deliver that value, better than her competitors.
How would this simple format work for your business? Using the template below, define your target customers in all three ways....
1) Our target customers are (who) ______________________________________________
2) In the geographic area of (where) _____________________________________________
3) Who are trying to __________________________________________________________
What insights does this definition bring you about who your customers are, what kind of help they need, the compelling value you can deliver and the type of products, services and staff that you need to make this all happen?
2. Forget "Unique"...be "Compelling"! Two powerful steps to creating customer-owning value in your business!
(time to read this article is about two minutes)
For a printable version of this article, click here.
To thrive, or even survive, in today's over-supplied and fiercely competitive business environment, you must...
1) Develop a clear understanding of what life's really like for your target customers,
2) Then, based on that understanding, you must deliver compelling value and a consistent and compelling customer-owning experience to every customer, every time.
For years business schools, business books and marketing consultants have been telling us that we must be "unique"; we must create USPs (Unique Selling Propositions). Sadly, they've been lying to us! It's not good enough to be "unique"; you must be compelling! You could paint your business pink and you'd be unique...but not compelling.
Compelling Points of Difference are value propositions that are so powerful, so unique and so consistently delivered that they...
1. Clearly differentiate you,
2. Attract and "own" your target customers...and,
3. Make you FAMOUS!
Simply put, Compelling Points of Difference are any product, any service, any experience, any price...anything that's so appealing to your target customers that they feel compelled to do business with you, to be loyal to you and to help you grow your business by telling others about you! In this competitive and over-supplied world you must create, deliver and communicate compelling value. Forget "unique"!
To create compelling customer-owning value, you must, first, have a clear and deep understanding of your target customers. Who they are, what they really need or want, how they really feel...and how they want to feel. Every customer comes to us with "baggage". Part of our job is to be a "baggage handler".
Step #1: Develop a clear understanding of what life's really like for your target customers.
Start by setting aside two hours and, thinking and feeling like a target customer, answer the questions below. Create a Task Force of a few of the smartest and most caring people in your business to work with you on this. Go somewhere quiet and uplifting. Together, get inside your customers' minds and hearts! Dig deep!
Whatever you sell, people buy with both their minds and their hearts. If you're not marketing and selling, intelligently and passionately, with both your mind and your heart, there's a fundamental disconnect between how you sell and how people buy.
An effective tool for improving your customer understanding is to answer, in detail, these two sets of questions...
1) When our target customers are thinking about buying what we sell...
(a) What do they want (or need) to know?
(b) What do they want to do...and,
(c) How do they want to feel?
2) When our target customers are actually doing business with us...
(a) What do they want (or need) to know?
(b) What do they want to do...and,
(c) How do they want to feel?
Step #2: Now, based on your powerful new understanding of your target customers, you must commit to delivering compelling value and a consistent and compelling customer-owning experience to every customer, every time.
Specifically, what will you do, consistently every day, to...
1. Help them to know what they want (or need) to know?
2. Help them to do what they want to do?... and,
3. What will you do to help them feel how they want to feel?
Define the compelling value and extraordinary customer experience that you will always deliver and the values you will always live by that will make powerful emotional connections with your target customers.
What products, services, policies and processes will be required to be compelling to your customers? What will it feel like to do business with you? How flexible and adaptable will you be to customers' needs and wishes? What will you do to be their "Caring Coach"...the business that they can count on to help them wisely choose, effectively use and have the best possible experience with what you sell?
We invented this process some years ago to create our award-winning ladies clothing store. While every competitor demanded "No food or beverages!" and "Limit 3 items in the change room!", we created change rooms with four hooks, a stool to sit down on, a shelf for your eyeglasses, a mirror in every change room...and our magic sign that said, "Please take as many items in the change room as YOU wish!"
We offered a choice of seven free beverages, electric massage chairs for husbands, a pirate ship play area for kids and washrooms with change tables, free diapers, diaper wipes and cream for mom's and babies in distress.
One regular customer with two small children summed it up beautifully one day when she said, "You know Donald, this is the only store in the world that I can shop in and feel like a human being!" That's customer ownership!
Our competitors, the tiny minds and tiny hearts, as we like to call them, told me that I couldn't do this stuff and they gave me 11 reasons why not. Isn't it sad that many people are at their creative best when thinking of 11 reasons not to do something wonderful.
We took the time to understand our target customers. We knew exactly what compelling value and extraordinary experience they wanted and we had the creativity and the courage to make it happen!
We stood out; we built compelling relationships and we became famous. Not "Hollywood" famous...but famous in our market, to our chosen customers...and we achieved sales of $600 per sq. foot when stores of our size were averaging $240.
We just kept asking two of the most powerful questions in the world today...
"For our customers, our business and for our team...
1. What's possible...and,
2. What's next?"
You can't do everything at once...but something can always be next. And, ultimately, everything is possible!
Through our Seminars, Keynote presentations and Coaching, this two-step process has helped thousands of businesses to redefine and reinvent themselves. Have you the creativity and courage to "break the rules" to create and deliver compelling customer-owning value in your business? If so, this two-step process will help!
Need help? For in-depth, step-by-step help to create compelling customer-owning value in your business, you can bring Donald to your organization or Association...or you can order our new...
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HUMAN MARKETINGÒ Video Workshop and Complete Implementation Guide |
 This 3 hour interactive Workshop and Complete Implementation
Guide will transform your business!
It's available on CD or DVD for only $80.00. To order, visit our Online Store at www.donaldcooper.com or contact Sharen at 1-416-252-3704.
3. A marketing lesson from a restaurant with 12 empty seats...and a fabulous soup recipe for you! (time to read this article is about 30 seconds)
In the tiny village of Port Sydney, Ontario, just south of Huntsville in the beautiful Muskoka Lakes Region, is a wonderful little restaurant called Beauideal. If you're ever within 50 miles of Port Sydney...go there! (705) 385-3772. Scott Buchanan, the chef / owner is talented, passionate...and a character. During the summer, Beauideal is a very busy place; but through the winter, it's a bit of a struggle for them.
When I called Scott in early February to book a table for two for Valentine's evening, he said that he could squeeze us in at 6 o'clock, but other than that, he was oversold. "Wish I had 50 more seats", he told me.
So, on February 14, between 6 pm and 8 pm we enjoyed course after course of Scott's wonderful creativity while staring in disbelief at 12 empty seats all around us. What happened to "oversold"? As a business guy, I kept thinking about the $500 in lost revenue in just two hours. This might not sound like a lot of money to you, but for Scott at that time of year, it's a big deal.
I called him the next day and said, "You're a great chef Scott, but you really do need help with marketing! With your talent, your quality and your reasonable prices, every seat in your restaurant should have been occupied last night by the professional and business people and affluent retired folks from throughout your community. That's your target market. They eat out more, they spend more and they'll tell all their rich friends about you". To which Scott said, "Yea, but I have no idea how to find and communicate with those people."
And then it occurred to me...every year millions of people go to school to learn to be chefs, or veterinarians, or hairdressers, or surveyors, or chiropractors, or something, but throughout all that schooling there's not five minutes spent teaching these people about "the business" of running a restaurant, or a veterinary practice, or hair salon, or whatever. Not five minutes on marketing, planning, budgeting, management or leadership! What are they thinking?
On the other hand, business students spend four to six years learning how to run a business, but most of them they don't know how to create or produce anything. This is also goofy!
I have a personal interest in making sure that Beauideal stays open, because we love the place... and, trust me, you want Scott's fabulous recipe for the Tandoori Sweet Potato Soup with Leeks & Cauliflower that he served on Valentine's evening. This is one of the very best soups I've ever had...and I'm a soup fanatic! So, here's the deal. I agreed to help Scott with his marketing if he'd give me his soup recipe to pass on to you. This is a "win-win" for everybody!
To download the recipe, click here or go to the Free Articles section on our website in "Other Neat Stuff".
4. The 90 Minute MBA...10 things you must know about your business, your customers...and your life! (time to read this article is about 20 seconds)
One of our most asked-for Keynote presentations is...
"The 90 Minute MBA...10 things you must know about your business, your customers and your life!"
To thrive, or even survive, every business in the world today must create, deliver and communicate compelling value that will...
1) "Grab" their customers,
2) Clearly differentiate them from their competitors...and,
3) Grow their bottom line!
In just 90 minutes this "no holds barred" presentation will focus your team, or Association members, on the 10 things they must do to sell more, manage smarter, make more money...and have a life! For more information, contact the wonderful Sharen at our office.
5. Do all of your business communications meet these 5 key objectives?
(time to read this article is about 45 seconds)
For a printable version of this article, click here.
Whatever business you're in, there are literally hundreds of ways that you communicate. In fact, everything you do communicates.
How you "look" in every part of your business, how you "sound", how you serve, the price you charge, how and where you advertise and promote and how you care for your community and our planet, all communicate...
* Who you are,
* What you do,
* How well you do it,
* Who your target customers are... and,
* What you're worth.
To create and deliver a clear, powerful and congruent message to your target customers, everything you do should meet the five communications objectives below. To be effective, all of our communications must help us...
1. To be noticed and remembered by our target customers. If we aren't noticed and remembered by our target customers, we simply don't exist.
2. To be understood and differentiated. If our target customers do not understand all of the value that we deliver and if that value does not clearly differentiate us from our competitors, we're a "commodity".
3. To build confident, trusting relationships. If we aren't building confident, trusting relationships with our target customers in these cynical times, we aren't building anything!
4. To create a buying decision.
5. To enhance the long-term value of our Brand.
Set aside two hours with a few of the best minds and hearts in your business. Make a list of the hundreds of ways that you communicate in your business and ask yourself if each and every communication helps you to achieve these five key objectives. If not, what needs fixing, who will do it ...and by when?
6. The 4-Step creative / reinvent process that will change your business:
(time to read this article is about two minutes)
For a printable version of this article, click here.
As I work with clients throughout the world to redefine and reinvent their business, I've found that there are four steps to the process.
Step #1 - Awareness: "Awareness" is simply knowing that some part of your business isn't "right" yet. You're not yet where you want to be, or need to be, to be a profitable market leader.
Perhaps your products aren't the best they could be, or you're falling short in delivering the customer experience that you've promised. Perhaps you've not created the internal business environment required to attract and keep the best people at every level of your organization. Perhaps you're falling short in planning and budgeting, control and accountability, or follow-up. Your shortfall could be in technology, systems or communication. It could be that you've not yet met your commitments to your community to reduce pollution or waste.
Are you aware of the specific areas in your business that aren't "right" yet? Can you list them and prioritize them? Without "awareness", there will be no improvement. But "awareness" alone will get you nowhere! Which brings us to...
Step #2 - A passionate commitment to fix it: Many businesses know that something's wrong...but they don't really give a damn. They're not prepared to do the work to fix it.
Years ago my Father had a Jaguar XJ6 with the world's most unreliable windshield wipers, which he thought a bit odd given that it rains most of the time where Jaguars are made. By chance, Father met the Chairman of Jaguar at some big shot business event and when he mentioned that he was a Jag owner the Chairman enquired, "And how do you like your Jaguar?" Not wanting to miss an opportunity to go right to the top with his problem, Father told him about his huge frustration with the wipers. To which the Chairman of Jaguar offhandedly replied, "Oh Jack, we don't seem to have that quite right yet, do we!"
Clearly, the Chairman was aware of the problem. He had arrived at Step #1. But, judging by his offhand remark, there was no passionate commitment to fix it. Are you passionately committed to fixing the things that need fixing in your business?
Step #3 - Analysis / Creativity / Decision / and a Plan: Here's where the real work starts. For each problem or shortfall in your business that you're committed to fixing, work through the stages of analysis / creativity / decision / and documenting a Plan.
Analysis: Get the facts. Make sure that you understand the situation. Get to the real root cause of the problem. Remember, if your "size up" is wrong, your outcome will be wrong.
Creativity: Ask both your team and your customers what they think...and know when you need an outside perspective. Who are the outside experts on this particular issue?
Don't try to "reinvent the wheel". What are other successful businesses doing about this problem?
Ask "the wonderful question" which is, "What would be the most wonderful thing that we could do here?" In our famous lady's fashion store we came up with four hooks in the change rooms, electric massage chairs for husbands, a pirate ship play area for kids and free diapers, diaper wipes and cream on the change tables all by asking "the wonderful question".
So, get creative. What are the possibilities? What would be a "BIG IDEA" here? What has never been done? What would blow your customers away?
Finally, what are the costs and the benefits of each of your ideas?
Decision: Don't analyze forever. Commit to a course of action in a reasonable time. There's more money lost through indecision than wrong decision.
The Plan: Document who will do what and by when. Involve all those who's support you need in the planning process and get their commitment to specific outcomes and specific deadlines.
Communicate the Plan to everyone involved. Make sue that they know the objectives, deadlines and expected results. And, make sure that they know why their roll is important.
Determine from your team what additional information or resources they need to be successful, and make sure that they get them.
Step #4 - Effective implementation and follow up: Get it done! Businesses don't die from a single shot to the head...they die, slowly but surely, from a thousand uncompleted tasks!
Effective implementation is one of the biggest problems in business today. Here's the simple solution. Every time you assign a task, agree on a specific date by which it will be completed, document that commitment and always follow up. Then, you must hold people accountable, celebrate success, reward performance and deal with non-performance.
So, there they are...the four steps to the creative / reinvent process. How will you use this powerful process to improve and grow your business?
7. Bits & Pieces:
(time to read this article is about 45 seconds)
A) Proctor & Gamble now sells more Crest Toothpaste in China than it does in the USA.
Should you be looking to new markets or new customer groups to grow your business...new possibilities that could be even bigger than what you're doing right now?
B) Nokia, the Finish company that's now the world's largest maker of cell phones, started off making rubber boots and toilet paper.
Are you open to new product ideas? Are you keeping up with major changes in your markets, your customers' lives and in the world at large...and are you constantly rethinking and reinventing your business? Or, are you firmly stuck in what you've always done and how you've always done it?
C) While flying into Las Vegas earlier this month, two important business lessons occurred to me. First, as I looked out at the absolutely barren dessert surrounding the city, I was reminded that if you have a passionate Vision and a Plan to create something that people will love, you can create something from nothing.
My thoughts then turned to Sigfried & Roy, the Las Vegas magicians who have become famous over the years for making their beautiful white Siberian tigers disappear...and reappear. Last year, in the middle of yet another sold out show, one of the tigers turned on Roy, savagely mauling and almost killing him.
The business lesson here is clear... "Don't piss off the tiger!" Is there a "tiger" in your business that you shouldn't "piss off"? Is it a key customer, a key supplier, a key employee who drives revenue, your employee's union, the bank manager, or an environmental or regulatory group that could shut you down? Think of who it might be that could seriously injure your business if they turned on you...and then don't "piss them off"!
8. On that uplifting note, that's all for this month!
"Thanks" for all of your great feedback and suggestions! We especially love to hear of your successes using our insights.
Don't forget to visit the Free Articles section on our website for lots more valuable info on how to sell more, manage smarter and make more money in your business...and don't forget to try the soup recipe in Section #3 of this Newsletter You'll love it.
Also, let us know what you'd like to hear more about...or less about. And, do send us your stories and examples of great, horrible or just plain bizarre business practices than you find in your travels.
Finally, if you know of others, anywhere in the world, who will find value in this E-Newsletter, we'll appreciate your sending this along to them and inviting them to sign up at www.donaldcooper.com.
Kindest regards,
Donald Cooper, MBA, HoF
Certified Speaking Professional
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