David Young | Branding Blog - Marketing Advice and Advertising Strategy for Local Business Owners

Boys and Their Toys

Years ago, I did a bit of free consulting ("Hey Dave, let me bounce a few ideas off of you.") for a heavy equipment operator's school. My advice was to close the school and open an adult sandbox. Seriously. Let grown-ups play on the equipment and charge through the nose. He thought that all he needed was better recruiting. Here's a picture of me on his bulldozer taken with a crappy PDA of the era. Do you think I can remember anything about his boring school except for the fact that he let me drive a bulldozer?

When I went on a press trip to learn about some new Goodyear tires, they let me drive a mine haul truck. That's me on the right. You can't help but grin when you're standing on this truck.

Do you think I remember anything about the trip besides the haul truck? (OK, maybe the flight in Mark Cuban's 757 on the way to the haul truck.)

Now, my partner Mike Dandridge dredges up (yes that was a heavy equipment joke) a story about a company in Colorado that has come through on the sandbox dream! I love it.

How would you change your business if the only thing you could offer your customers was the experience?

Out to Lunch: Would this Person Make a Good Client, Boss, Employee?

What clues do people give off when you are in the courtship phase of a new relationship?

A simple shared meal at a restaurant with table service is a great place to pick up clues about how YOU will soon be treated if you enter into a relationship (business or otherwise) with your dining partner. Watch how your guest treats the staff at the restaurant. Watch especially closely when something goes wrong, or a waiter makes a mistake.

Now, use your empathy to decide if you would like to be the waiter at your table. Mentally, put yourself in the shoes of the waiter and imagine what it would be like as a person to serve your guest.

If your potential client treats the wait-staff as servants, you're in for the same treatment after the honeymoon period wears off. If she treats the waiter with warmth and talks to them as an equal, you can likely expect the same.

As a Myers-Briggs ENFP, I have no problem with the empathy part. What usually trips me up is giving the person the benefit of the doubt, over and over. We ENFPs often make the mistake of thinking we can have a nice human relationship with the most un-human of people. If we would only follow our intuition when it says "warning!" we'd be able to easily avoid some of life's drama!

What other clues should we watch for? What's been your experience?

The Art of Transparency

Can I trust you? Will you do the right thing if something bad happens?

I wish I had a dozen more clients like Houston photographer Aric Hoek. First off, he's a brilliant photographer and a really nice guy. When Roy H. Williams first saw Aric's work, he spontaneously said, "You're the master of shadows." Aric liked that. He's been using it ever since and it's true.

Aric put up a blog post today that really tells a great story about what kind of business he operates. As a one-man-brand and a wedding photographer, he can only sell his services to one customer on a given wedding day. He needs policies to protect himself …too many cancellations and he's out of business. But, he has the empathy to recognize that he can also serve his customers when things go wrong.

Go read his post and tell me if you don't agree. Oh, and be sure to have a look at his work. Aric uses his blog as a tool of transparency. You can read about how he decides to offer a new product line, or how he plans his week. Spend a few minutes reading his writing and you'll quickly decide whether you want him at your wedding or taking pictures of your family.

Disclaimer: Aric is a client of mine and he is building a business with very little advertising money. He is unbelievably committed both to creating photographs that are worthy of word of mouth and to using viral marketing such as his blog which will speed up the process. I wish I could take credit for what a nice guy he is, but I think his parents deserve that.

This post was originally published on American Small Business.

Two Loose Screws

Last night I completely disassembled and reassembled my laptop computer. I've been having some struggles with Best Buy's Geek Squad. The condensed version is that it involved restoring my system twice and reinstalling all my software, losing a bunch of email and eventually, after a misdiagnosis, a new hard drive. Quite maddening.

I had just one more complaint. My laptop's fan makes a clicking noise like a tiny diesel engine in need of better fuel or a tune-up. The geek-boy listened for 4 seconds and pronounced the fan just fine. I protested, "You can't hear it in this noisy store. I sit with this laptop all day in a tiny Wizard Cave beneath my front porch in Nebraska. I assure you it makes exactly the noise I'm describing."

A Bagful of Dentures

A dentist client told me last week that if a new patient shows up with a zip-lock baggie containing half-a-dozen sets of old dentures, it signals the beginning of a rough relationship. The patient is wordlessly communicating to the dentist that no other dentist has ever made him happy and it is now his turn to prove that no dentist ever will.

These are the customers/patients who will sap your energy with whining, drain your valuable time and resources and then complain about you after they have finally defeated you and found their next victim/vendor/doctor.

Last year we saw Best Buy unroll their strategy to separate their Angel customers from their Devils. I thought it was a super effort. I'd like to read about a followup.

In consulting, it's the business owner who complains about the poor advice he's received from every other consultant he's retained over the past 10 years. He expects me to rise above the crowd. At a car dealership, it could be someone who tells you that she always ends up buying a lemon. Potential employees will recite a litany of lousy bosses.

What do you do with customers or potential customers whom you can identify (or who self-identify) as problems before they ever buy from you?

My advice is to politely send them away. I've even helped clients design 'anti-personas' to help make their web site unattractive to problem customers and to help their sales staff see the bag of dentures before the customer walks in the door.

(Disclaimer: It is not my intention to disparage denture wearers. I was a huge fan of Martha Ray. I'm sure that there are denture wearers out there with legitimate complaints who really have been unable to find a single competent dentist who cares enough to solve their unique problems. I am sure there is a dentist who can help. I wish I knew his name so I could refer you. Just keep trying. Best of luck to you and Godspeed.)