Last night I had a strange dream. I had been asked to work at a trade show that sold BMW cars. I’m not quite sure why, as I’m not a salesperson, but I was asked how I would approach this task, to which I replied that all cars have a wheel or so on each corner and were for the most part a means of transportation. simple. . So I said that I would focus on the pleasure and wonderful experience of driving a BMW and, of course, on their reliability, making them better cars and better performers than the rest. Of course, that’s BMW’s marketing approach, and while I don’t own one of their cars, clearly my subconscious has been imbued with their philosophy.
Some people I know, both clients and family, have been let down recently by people they trusted, and in every case this was because they were involving amateurs and people who weren’t up to it. It is not a good idea to hire anyone to service your business who is not a full time professional in your area. Part-time and co-opted fans won’t be up to the job, and in fact, it’s not fair to ask them to do it in the first place, because it will all end in tears; ours and those who have failed us, and there will be bad blood.
What I’ve been thinking about is that we need to engage trusted and recommended people to support our businesses, and we need to be the best in our field at what we do. We need to be different from others, have something special about our prospects so that they want to be our customers. We need to be the Waitrose experience (Waitrose is a high quality grocery store in the UK), supply high quality products and services for which we can charge a decent amount and keep our customers or customers and customers coming back to us again and again. and again.
In a tough market, it’s been hard to avoid taking over every part of the business, even when the payoff isn’t great. I have done my best in the last few years because it is not good to work hard without adequate profit. I already give a quality service. I will try even harder to live up to the philosophy of delivering perceived quality in the years to come. What about you? What do you think?
© Jon Stow 2010