Do You Own a Job or Do You Own a Business?
July 14th, 2010
We work with a Doctor that owned a job. He would get up in the morning, go to his office, see patients all day, then go home too tired to do anything else…understandably. By the time his day was done he would have NOT got to all the important things that needed to be done: bills, manage and lead staff, payroll, training, systems work, business building renovations, bookkeeping, and plans for growth!
This Doctor was very successful and his business was thriving, but he came up against two barriers. One he had little balance in his life with family and wanted to spend more time with them, take vacations and rest to avoid total burn-out. Second, he grew his business to the point were he could not take on any more patients because he was running at max capacity.
All these realizations came to him in our first few meetings and he decided that he would commit himself, his business and employees to achieving his big vision. Going after his big vision entailed hiring another Doctor and freeing up a few of his days to work ON the business. It also entailed going on a vacation with the family and getting away to gain perspective and come back re-energized. Balance is a major key to success.
When he returned from vacation our doctor client was totally re-energized, focused and ready to move forward after his vision. We helped our client develop a strategic plan, worked with staff to assign roles and structured his business to run with out him their and started to lay the ground work for growth. We conducted our Performance Management services.
If you are in the field of professional services and “own a business”, you need to really ask yourself if you own a job or own a business. The difference is key to long-term growth and viability.
How to Get to the Next Level…THINK About It!
June 14th, 2010
Many try to get to the next level but struggle with HOW to actually do it. The most effective way to take it to the next level is to think about it!?! According to Psycho-Cybernetics, “Mental pictures offer us an opportunity to practice new traits and attitudes, which otherwise we could not do. This is possible because, again, your nervous system cannot tell the difference between an actual experience and one that is vividly imagined. If we picture ourselves performing in a certain manner, it is nearly the same as the actual performance. Mental practice is as powerful as actual practice.”
WOW! What a concept! Isn’t is great to think that WE already posses the tools to take ourselves to the next level. Make a commitment to play your own mental movie everyday for 15 minutes. You are the lead actor and you get to create the movie that you desire. Play this movie over and over. You will change your life!
Food for Thought:
Watch your thoughts, for they become WORDS
Watch your words, for they become ACTIONS
Watch your actions, for they become HABITS
Watch your habits, for they become CHARACTER
Watch your character, for it becomes your DESTINY
The Experience is Everything
May 14th, 2010
Marketing tells the potential customer how great their business is and why they should buy the products or services of a company. Once marketing does its job it is important that the hype, promises and excitement are delivered for the customer during their experience with the business. If you talk-the-talk, you need to walk-the-walk!
Delivering a great customer experience is a challenge but there are companies out there doing a great job and in this blog we want to talk about one.
Two days ago one of the Octopus Solution Team and his family had a baby and delivered at Beverly Hospital in Beverly, Massachusetts. This hospital could represent one of the finest examples of the Customer Experience we have seen. Let’s take a quick look at many of the things they took into consideration to deliver an outstanding customer experience:
- The Leading Edge of Caring…this is their tag-line and is represented strongly in their culture and all they do. It is not just words, but sincere actions
- Interior design of the building is warm, clean and open
- The hiring practice is outstanding because regardless of who you deal with they all have a positive and caring attitude.
- The process of delivering a baby from start to finish was carefully choreographed out to maximize each opportunity to delight the patient and make them happy. This was very apparent when you could see all the staff operating from checklists and process systems. It was mapped out.
- The service was better than most top hotels & restaurants.
- Nurses made their job fun and all seemed to enjoy what they do and brought that energy to the patients and families.
- The food was better than most top hotels and certainly better than most restaurants.
- Education and communication were constant throughout the process. Everyone knew their job duties and communicated what was happening to the patient and families through each set of the process.
- They start caring for women in the early stage of their pregnancy, give tours of the hospital, address any questions, having siblings attend classes, and build very trusting relationships.
- The true test came at the end when mothers did not want to go home because of all the support, help and community they were receiving from the nurses, doctors and staff. That was very impressive.
The Customer Experience taken to a higher level can transform your business into a family or community and Beverly Hospital has done an exceptional job of achieving that. When the experience is great word of mouth will spread! It is important to remember that your customers pay the bills, so why not find unique, creative, exciting and bold ways of delighting them! Take care of your customers and always strive for ways to raise the bar with their experience and enjoyment.
How to determine the value of Fans with Social Media
April 14th, 2010
5 years ago I was in the process of opening a sports and recreation business. In that process I was gathering marketing data and reached out to the marketing director of REI (outdoor clothing & equipment store). REI sent out 2 emails each month through their newsletter service. The newsletter was called “gear mail” which was and is sent out to all the emails in their database. They have calculated down to a science that each email sent is the equivalent of $3 spent in stores. So one email equals $6 per month = 2 gear mails x $3 value.
This means that REI is looking to acquire emails across the country. When they attend events their secondary purpose after branding at the event is to gather emails. Emails are their justification for ROI.
In yesterday’s AdWeek there was an article called “Value of a Fan on Social Media $3.60″. These finding from the ad were based on impressions generated in Facebook’s news feed. The firm doing the research concluded that, on average, “a fan base of 1 Million translates into at least $3.6 Million in equivalent media over a year.”
If we look at research reports 5 years after my initial discussion with the marketing director of REI, the value of an email or a fan seems to be inline with each other. I would like to hear from YOU! Does your company use an electronic newsletter and facebook? Can you determine any up-swings in revenue with using the two?
If the value of a fan, follower, friend or newsletter subscriber is around $3 then we need to focus on call to action sales within these venues. We can help with your social media and advertising strategy in these changing times. Email us at info@theoctopussolution.com.