Business

Two Ways To Start A Business

Two Ways To Start A Business

Garth Beyer

Starting A Business
One way is to start with your own idea, build a business plan around it, and shout, shout, shout with hopes people hear you, switch from competitors to you, and give their attention. To be successful with this, you have to change the way people think, act, and feel.

Damn difficult to do.

Another way is to start by searching for a niche, an area that’s been untouched, perhaps listening to more than a million complaints of people until you come up with a solution. The method: you find a small problem and you provide a small solution.*

To be successful with this, you gather a tribe of like-minded people who have the same complaint, the same problem and you give your solution to them. Instead of changing the way people think, act, and feel, you’re listening, understanding and reacting to how people think, act, and feel.

You can shout, advertise and sell or you can connect, gather, and give.

Two ways to start a business. I think you know which way is better.

 

Stay Positive & Either Way, Have Fun With It

*All big problems have been solved with big solutions. Times have really changed. Think the taxi industry. Big solution for big problem. Then think of Uber and Lyft. Small problem. Small solution. Huge success.

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My Issue With A Team Based Philosophy

Garth Beyer

I got to chat with the staff of a general excellence award winning city-regional magazine today. Their editor-in-chief couldn’t make it, but a few of the other team members did. (One person from design, editorial, online and business.) It was a rough start when they began by trying to tell us about their magazine and philosophy.

First they had to decide who would do it. (Don’t you think they should all be jumping to talk about it?) Once they decided who would give the spiel, it came out much less a spiel and more of a “we cover these main things and we focus in on this city-region.”

A magazine philosophy, a PR agency philosophy, any team philosophy isn’t just for the top dog to know. What if the top dog isn’t there to give the spiel as was the case today? Will everyone on the team be able to fill in the blank when someone wants to know about the product or service?

As a some-what aside, something I love about most of the startups I’ve encountered is everyone working has an elevator pitch. From the founder, to the marketer, to the salesmen, to the customer service folk; everyone can give you an elevator pitch, everyone can share the startups philosophy, everyone has a spiel they can give. And, most importantly, everyone wants to.

 

Stay Positive & A Philosophy Says Just As Much About Your Team (knowing it) As It Does Your Business (acting on it)

What Does Your Business Obituary Read?

What Does Your Business Obituary Read?

Garth Beyer

The Economist ends their magazines with an obituary, sometimes of famous people, other times of someone very few people know. They’re a nobody to most, but even nobodies have stories. When you read one, it’s incredible how the writer knew so much about the person. When you think hard on it, you realize the obituary was written long before the person’s death or at least a reporter kept a tally on the person’s life so they had everything to write it when it was near the time for them to kick the bucket.

Most celebrities, political figures, and all-around famous folk. All of their obituaries are drafted.

Yours? Mine? Likely not yet, anyway.

This concept had me thinking. What about your business obituary. Have you thought that far out about it? What will its legacy be? What will people say its story was? Is what you’re doing worth remembering years later? Are you keeping track of the little moments that have made your business great?

The Economist writers don’t follow people around and make their life into a grand story; the people are living a grand story and the reporters are merely telling it.

This begs the big question: what does the draft of your business obituary look like right now?

Is it worth one?

 

Stay Positive & It’s Interesting When Your Both The Subject And The Reporter

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After Years Of Arguing It

After Years Of Arguing It

Garth Beyer

Writer Garth Beyer

I’ll finally admit it… Identifying your passion, discovering what it is you really love to do, finding your purpose is a damn difficult thing to do.

For some it seems to come so natural. That, too, I once believed. I don’t anymore. Being more forward with you, I thought I knew I always wanted to be a writer, an entrepreneur and a PR guy (even though I didn’t know the term PR at the time). “It’s  just who I am!” I would tell people.

Investigating my past, though, I can’t recall the moment when I knew. There was no epiphany, no wide-realization, no godly pronouncement of my passion.

After scrutinizing my past, I realized that it was through a series of forcing, tricking, and driving myself to love the things I did that lead me to declare I was a writer, I was an entrepreneur, I was what I now know is called a public relations strategist.

I didn’t always love writing, but I was always finding ways to love it. (Still am.) It started with poetry because I knew I couldn’t fail. It moved on to bullshitting school papers because I could mock the system when I received the same grade as someone who spent weeks on the same paper, and I, only hours. Writing became more fun when I could write love letters and make women blush. And starting this blog? Best decision of my life for reasons it would take a book to detail.

I didn’t always want to be an entrepreneur either, but I always found ways to love it. (Still do.) I started my own vending machine business with my dad because I loved eating the leftover candy. I helped run a card shop because I loved collecting pokemon cards at the time and got to watch old batman movies when no one was in the shop. Instead of a lemonade stand, I had a beanie babies stand because it connected me with more kids my age.

I didn’t always want to go into Public Relations, but it was a knack of mine finding ways to love it. (Still is.) Meeting new people and going to events alone was rough, but I made business cards for myself. They made me feel I deserved to be there even though I didn’t have an established PR business. I went to dozens of Toastmaster (public speaking org) meetings, not because I was fearless, but because I could learn from others’ failures so I didn’t make the same when I finally forced myself to the podium.

Passion isn’t really something you seek out on purpose, it’s more of something you come across. You don’t need an “aha” moment to realize what it is you’ve been put on this world to do. You get there by finding reasons to love what you’re already doing.

 

Stay Positive & You’ll Do What You Love, When You Love What You Do

Reaching The Market Outside Your Home Town

Reaching The Market Outside Your Home Town

Garth Beyer

Marketing Outreach

This is a longer post than I usually write. You could easily skip it and respond to the notification awaiting you on your phone. Alas, I hope you find this as practical, if not more.

We’re All Marketers

I’ve never understood PR folk talking about “outreach” in their own community. To me, that’s inreach, as in, easily in reach; as in, if your business is remarkable enough, the success of it will have enough momentum to touch all those in reach. A great business has inreach built in. Steven P. Dennis calls the hometown diehard fans of a business the obsessive core. Marketers, therefore, are for reaching out beyond the core.

Business plan = inreach.

Marketing = outreach.

Clear? Now let’s tackle the outreach by going over a few tools every marketer needs to understand to reach the market outside their zone, their base, their marked territory.

Not Your Average Advertising

As complicated as Facebook advertising is to understand, it’s quite easy to use to target consumers outside common ground.

Say you’re marketing MobCraft Beer to a state other than Wisconsin where they are based and a current Wisconsin resident follows Mobcraft’s FB page. This follower also has a few out-of-state friends she regularly interacts with. Facebook’s advertising algorithm will pick them up and advertise directly, noting to them there Wisconsin resident friend has liked MobCraft Beer’s FB page and they should too.

All social network advertising, not just social media networks are taking into consideration the value of connections, of handshakes, of conversations over the value of eyeballs. You don’t want the mass, anyway. You want those who matter. Right? Advertising isn’t what it used to be. (That’s a good thing for us marketers.)

Working Email and Mailing Address Lists

There’s no reason not to be A/B testing.

A/B testing in its most simplified definition is trying two different things and seeing which works better. Does a zen-like website page get more click-throughs than a collage-designed page? Will a handwritten card with a great photo on the front work better than a brochure? Will emailing small-time bloggers be more effective than a press release to those in authority? It’s time to find out.

Test and measure, test and measure.

And remember: Don’t get on the scale unless you’re willing to change your diet and exercise routine and don’t change your diet and exercise routine unless you will regularly step on the scale. Test and measure.

Surfing the Internet

If I’m not doing some grunt work, I know I’m not doing the best marketing I can. No matter what client I’m working with, I search on multiple search engines to find forums, blogs, and other places where the tribes have gathered. (And, yes, I go into the depths of Google, far beyond the first, second and third pages of results.) The long tail matters. Every small tribe matters.

A smart place to start is Reddit. A fellow PR daily contributor, Mickie Kennedy wrote a short bit on how to use Reddit for PR.

Through surfing the Internet, you’ll realize very quickly (if you haven’t already) how critical being human is. Most online tribes are skeptical; they will downvote blatant advertising and seek clarification of credibility before they upvote, make a purchase or share what you offer.

You’ll also learn (if you haven’t already) those who are the most loyal to brands are the most likely to turn their shoulder to a brand if they feel the outreach is robotic, if they believe the email they received is the same email everyone else on the list received, if they think you’re just in it for the money or job security or because it’s what your boss told you to do.

Moreover, Outreach has Changed/Improved/Realligned

When I get a pitch that tells me I am part of a company’s ‘blogger outreach program,’ it feels condescending to me. My inclination is to get bristly with the person doing the pitching. Other social journalists feel the same way.” – Shel Israel

Now, I wouldn’t be the first to say you have permission to market to everyone, but why would you need 10,000 strangers when you can make 10 friends, 10 people who trust you, 10 acquaintances who respect you, 10 passionate folk who need you.

Permission is one thing, participation is another. Participation is what matters. Find the 10 avid bloggers who need your product or service and connect with them. Find 10 die-hard craft beer drinkers and get on a Google Hangout together. Successful outreach rarely comes from a single click of “send;” it comes from continuous care, effort, and conversation. There’s another obsessive core out there. Reach out to them.

Successful outreach has improved since the days of mass advertising. It’s not about eye balls anymore; it’s about eye contact.

Now is your chance to build your tribe, to establish connections that matter. As for my last PR/marketing tip: never refer to people you are reaching out to as your target market, as part of your outreach program, as part of your market. They are not a special case because they are outside your hometown, your normal campaign realm, your regular target market. They are all strangers at first, then friends, then customers, no matter what geographical market they are in.

 

Stay Positive & Only Reach Out If You Plan To Truly Lift Someone Up

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I Fought The Law And The Law Won

I Fought The Law And The Law Won

Garth Beyer

The law always wins, but that doesn’t mean you have to lose when it does. I’m using “law” in a very, very broad way. Synonymous with system, business, campaign, art, etc,.

Concrete Wall

I ran a program that didn’t allow any exceptions to a deadline. It was law!

Illiteracy, family death, wrong mailing address, whatever the reason, it would never lead to an exception in the deadline. During the program’s conception, the strict deadline seemed like a good idea; it put the pressure on those applying and made them aware there would be no exceptions. Unfortunately, that didn’t stop them from calling with their sob stories asking for exceptions.

I’ve learned pretty quickly if you’re going to push something out before it’s near perfect, be sure to allow for changes, for flexibility, for exceptions. Write in the law that you have the power to change the law. No fine print. No contact forms or application sheets. There are always exceptions. Always. You don’t have to define them ahead of time, but you need to be prepared for them when they arrive. And they will arrive.

Sadly I wasn’t there when the program’s statute was being written. I had no say, no power to change it, to suggest a clause that would allow exceptions. It was too late. This was troublesome for me because I’m a person who would rather find a way to say yes than to say no, regardless if it’s an extremely rare case or a simple courteous plea for an exception.

I once read about a CEO who gives each of his customer service employees $900 a month to spend on making things right with customers. If people expect you to make things right, then you have to tap the unexpected by making them more than right. The expected and unexpected is what divides a one-time-purchase and a loyal customer.

The program was doomed from the start and has since been sunset, discontinued. Had there been provisions for flexibility in the statute, authority to make exceptions with those running the program, and a budget to make things more than right, the program could have grown into something remarkable, instead it’s over, done, kaput.

Never ship a concrete block, concrete business, concrete program unless you can chisel away when someone pleads for a round block, an exception, a refund.

Better yet, why not ship concrete mix instead?

 

Stay Positive & Versatility And Malleability Is Essential For Business Longevity

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It Only Makes Sense

Garth Beyer

When I write long form fiction or create a business plan or branding strategy, I have a check-list by each page.

  • see
  • smell
  • taste
  • hear
  • touch

When you walk into a store, do you notice the pleasant smell? Scent marketers are paid to make the store smell pleasant so you stay longer, enjoy yourself more and generally feel relaxed while shopping. Not all stores do this, in fact, not many do.

Hostess, with their Twinkies, really sells the sound of opening the Twinkie package.

Apple does a fine job with design when it comes to their pads, you can see it. More importantly, you can touch it. You can swipe your finger, hold it in the corner with one hand, graze your palm across it.

Appealing to the five senses even comes in play when selling a home. A couple of homes at the Madison parade of homes did a fine job of checking off the list of senses.

My significant other and I could see the entire house, we could smell lemons in one and a pleasant sort of Febreez smell in another. We could taste the wine and beer just by looking at the bars downstairs. (One house did have water and sprite in the fridge for guests, but unfortunately did not advertise it.) Just outside the homes, there was a food cart. Another house had a very hotel feel to it, specifically in the bathroom. Not three steps into the bathroom my significant other was dancing. They had music playing, fit to the hotel, a Frank Sanatra-feel. And yes, we could touch the railings, the carpet, the backsplash, the cabinet knobs. Check. Check. Check. Check. Check.

When writing, when designing, when strategizing, let’s not forget the other senses. I can’t guarantee a sale, but I can guarantee appealing to all senses lowers the number of complaints and raises the talkability-factor of the product or service.

 

Stay Positive & Mmm Mmmm Good