by Bert Shlensky | Jun 7, 2018 | Operations
It would be pretty cool to be a super-secret agent like James Bond, or Jack Bauer, or Jason Bourne — or ETHAN HUNT! Yeah, that guy from the films “Mission: Impossible” played by the one and only Tom Cruise. What’s funny is that the best business culture out there embodies the secret agent accomplishing amazingly insane feats, hanging by a thread on a plane or scaling a big building. Maybe disabling a bomb with a toothpick? Now I’ve got your attention, but you’re pretty confused: how can your business culture be like that? Easy:
The Trick to Your Business Culture Being Like Espionage Is Competitive Analysis, Namely KNOWING HOW TO PRICE YOUR PRODUCTS EFFECTIVELY!
And it’s no easy feat. Take our word for it. Many small businesses have the tough challenge of trying to price their products at the right amount — not too cheap, not too expensive. They want to be competitive enough…. But not sell themselves short. And honestly more often than not, you’ve got a lot of businesses out there pricing way too low.
The trick is to analyze the competition. Spy on them. Sort of “break in” to their secret facilities and know how they operate. This is especially the case when it comes to the biggest e-commerce giant Amazon as the lead competitor. How it relates to business culture? Your team, your entire business, needs to review everything the competition sells, in and out.
Scout the websites. Look at what Amazon is doing. What they’re selling. How they’re selling it. How much are they selling their stuff for. See if you can dynamically offer something better, something more unique. Match the price, look at your overhead. It allows you to be more competitive when you’re willing to spy on the competition, and believe me: it’s a lot easier to do that!
No lasers to do cartwheels over. No masking the traps or finding the loopholes. Back in the day it was hard trying to analyze the competition given the brick-and-mortar, but nowadays with websites just a click away, it’s pretty easy slipping into Amazon and getting the inside scoop.
So Make Sure Your Business Culture Is Doing Exactly That: They Need to Be Go-Getters, Predictors, Forecasters, Finders…. TRENDSETTERS. SECRET AGENTS.
Now we won’t say you could ever take Amazon down completely…. But you’ll definitely carve your niche and let the big boys know that you own it. And no on else will. Want to know more?
Dr. Bert Shlensky, President of The Startup Connection, directs all small business clients toward maximum sales and profit thanks to his 40 years of high-quality experience. He does this through technological, social, and online integration, supercharging your business success into the next level, so don’t hesitate to sign up for a free consultation RIGHT NOW.
by Bert Shlensky | Sep 11, 2017 | Operations
No doubt that many avoid any kind of research, let alone market research, like the plague for a lot of reasons. This undoubtedly means your business culture suffers greatly due to a great fear in the office. A cloaked figure of darkness and a scythe, waiting to envelope you in the shadows of despair as you’re engulfed in never-ending data, statistics, and reading. It’s not fun!
Hence Why Your Business Culture Tends to Be More About Action and Results, Not the Preparation That Ensures You Get There
We want results — without a whole lot of work to get there. And don’t get us wrong: there are many things we do on a daily basis, best practices to optimize your business planning with the proven model that gives you the most minimal time crunch and maximum output and results. But hear us on this: you never, ever discount the preparation and planning, meaning the market research!
Fear is a funny thing, honestly. It’s only as terrifying as we make it out to be, but thankfully when you’re in on the trends of today and the power of the Internet, and other best practices you make second nature — there’s no doubt you make this grim reaper of market research more like a puppy dog!
Here are the best reasons for doing market research without breaking a sweat (or fearing death):
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Google’s Marketer’s Almanac — How easy it is to just click the link and get all the information you need right at your fingertips on consumer behavior changes, especially during the seasons, holidays and special events. Yep, Google has the ability to give you that information in just minutes.
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American Fact Finder — There’s no better research space than the U.S. census, but holy COW would it take forever for you to research that mile-long 
book. Thankfully, this website allows you to research all of it with a few button clicks and filters by age, income, year, race and location. Oh, and it’s free to use.
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County Business Patterns — When was the last time you scouted businesses clear across the country? Probably never. Travel’s expensive, but this site makes it easy as it provides info on the areas and regions for large numbers of all sorts of businesses. Check it out for yourself.
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Business Dynamics Statistics — Remember all that census data you just found? Guess what: now you can use this site to view the economic data on job creation, startups, openings, expansions, shutdowns, and even closures.
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FedStats — The best part about finding information on certain industries is getting the info from all sorts of federal agencies. What’s hard is finding that info from those agencies as quickly as you’d like. This site accesses all that info for you immediately, for such verticals as agriculture, education, transportation, and energy.
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MyBestSegments — This is next-level campaign research stuff when you think about it. We don’t know of any other tool out there that can review any region’s demographics in terms of lifestyle and habits. In other word, click on this site, and you can start researching your locale immediately to determine how your consumer base will react to any campaign you launch and even what competitors are near you.
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SurveyMonkey — Surveys are the weapon to use, but for many people, they’re hard to create. Unless you use this site.
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Loop11 — Even sicker and futuristic is this crazy site allowing you to actually test the websites of your competitors secretly. Simply create a form and recruit people. You have to see it for yourself!
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Userlytics — Definitely last, but most certainly not least, is Userlytics, which does the uncanny. This platform actually allows you to webcam and screen-shot a user testing your mobile apps, videos, display ads, and much more. Talk about real-time and verifiable research….
And you better believe this trend-setting business planning stratosphere will continually evolving. Perhaps even avoiding death and achieving immortality.
That’s Why You Have to No Doubt Shut Off the Fear Due to the Tools. Fear NOT Market Research.
For these days it’s plenty easier getting all the data you need to ensure you have all the information you could get your hands on. And that cloaked demon over there ends up not as scary. Just a guy with bad skin, looking for a corn field to harvest.
Dr. Bert Shlensky, President of The Startup Connection, directs all small business clients toward maximum sales and profit thanks to his 40 years of high-quality experience. He does this through technological, social, and online integration, supercharging your business success into the next level, so don’t hesitate to sign up for a free consultation RIGHT NOW.
by Bert Shlensky | May 27, 2014 | Marketing
We all understand the importance of goals, purpose, direction and measurement in establishing commitment, success, team work, and coordination. Somehow between that understanding and the execution things often go awry.
One of the key mantras of a relatively new industry, direct marketing, has been the focus on setting goals and measurement. Google Analytics, and products like it, have quickly become business tools of choice for companies seeking to set goals and measure results. These new direct marketing tools are so effective and relatively easy to use that businesses both large and small can now instantly measure and observe results.
One typical reason goals are often not set correctly is that it can be a difficult process. One of the advantages of professional sports is that the goal of winning is simple, clear, and easy. It is not always quite that simple in other businesses. (more…)
