Be A Winner! Trophy Business Model

I was watching a child load a trophy into his mother’s car this weekend, and I swear the trophy was almost as tall as the child. I have no idea what it was for; I was too far away to see what the gold fellow on top was doing, but I would assume that this young gentleman came in first.

Branding your business is similar to that 4-foot monster the child was wrestling into the back seat. Your business must be built in a similar manner to that trophy. We start at the bottom, and work our way up.

In order to sell a product or a service, you need to tell the world what you are all about. That’s where the gold plate comes into play. The plate represents your mission statement, which is a testimony of why the company exists. It is here that you want to concisely state what your company is all about. A trophy’s plate simply states who won, what they won, and when; it is not a book, page or paragraph. The mission statement, in the same way, should be short, and tell anyone who reads it who you are and what you do to “win”. On the trophy, it tells anyone who reads it who is the winner. In business, it should do the same.

The pillars of the trophy come next. Those pillars are the values used to build your business. If you had to summarize your business with only two or three words, what would they be? Those words are the pillars that you must build your brand with to be successful. Be wary of using the wrong words. If you are using the word "Price" as one of your pillars, but your pricing is not extraordinary, you are weakening your structure. Make your pillars strong by focusing on reality, not simply what you think your customers want to hear. As you can see in the picture above, there are no words on the pillars of the trophy. You don’t need to announce these words to the world, but you need to make sure that YOU know what they are to remain focused.

The other characters on the trophy, like the eagles above, would be words that form your company’s brand messages. Highlight words you would want other people to use when describing your business. Though your marketing campaigns, you help associate these words with your product or services. When people think of Toyota, what words come to mind? Most say reliable, long lasting, dependable. They are not necessarily the same words that you use as the pillars of your business, but are essential characteristics of your business. They add depth to your branding, and are extremely important. You cannot sell a product without being able to describe its features and benefits. The same is true for your brand messaging.

Anyone looking at your business needs to see the logo, and it helps if the logo illustrates what you are all about. The martial artist atop the trophy, pulling off a complicated kick, allows anyone who sees the trophy know what it represents. Notice, the guy atop the trophy isn’t reading a book. Anyone seeing this trophy knows that its owner practices martial arts. The logo must fit your business, both in what you do, and the spirit of how you do it.

Build your business in this manner, and you will take home first prize.

"Tough New Englanders"

Guest Blog by Chris Gregoire

“When I was a child, I had to walk to school through a blizzard, for three miles. There were no snow days. We didn’t have fancy global warming; it snowed every day. Uphill both ways. Barefoot.”

How many times have you heard stories like this? I remember every single snow day when I was a child, hearing some variation of this story, when I was dropped off at my grandfather’s house. Maybe without the “Global Warming” part; in the 80’s, it wasn’t really as big an issue. There was always an element of fantasy in these stories though, and a morsel of truth. I can just imagine the stories I’ll tell, when my 11 month old daughter reaches school age:

“Back when I was a child, we had to wait until there was snow on the ground before the schools would close. There’s no way a school would say they were closed the night before a storm. We didn’t have that much trust in weathermen. And if there was only an inch or two, school was still open. We used to have these things called ‘Delays’ which meant that the town would plow, and we would go into school a little late.”

I wonder if my daughter will look at me with the same, “Are you serious?” look I am sure I gave my grandfather.

Turn on the news every time a snowstorm hits a southern state, and watch the New England news stations poke fun at the inhabitants down there. And yet there was nothing on the news this morning other than the fact we were getting pummeled with a three inch snowstorm. At 6:30 this morning, Fox news had the totals up, and there were none higher than 2 inches. But it was all they would talk about last night on the 6, 10, and 11 o’clock news.

What happened to the “Tough New Englander”? Is that image no longer fitting? What do you think?

Putting The “Ring for Assistance” Bell Back on the Desk.

I went to a big box store the other day, looking for material and advice to replace a cracked shower tile. The problem was, I couldn’t find an employee anywhere. I don’t know if there was a meeting going on in the store, or if every single employee took the same break at the exact same time, but it seemed as though I wandered aimlessly for weeks before finding someone that could answer my question. Luckily for the store, I was there with the material in hand, with their closest competition fifteen minutes away. Otherwise, I may have simply stopped shopping there, and found someplace more convenient.

Does this happen on your website? Do customers get lost page after page, desperately seeking an answer to a question before hitting, “Add to cart”? I know personally, if I am interested in making a purchase, but cannot get all of my questions answered online, I’m going to a different site. There’s nothing tying me to buying on your page. It’s not like I have a fifteen minute drive in between websites, so chances are, I’m out of there, fast.

We’ll pretend you sell scissors. How many questions could a customer ask? Well, for starters, they may ask:
• Do these work left handed, too?
• How many sheets can I cut through at once?
• Are the grips soft?
• Can they be sharpened later, or are these pretty much disposable?
• How well do these work on hair?”

I know, some of these questions seem silly. Would you want to risk losing this sale, just because the question was silly? I know that if the customer was in the store, they wouldn’t have some of these problems. Now that people are buying more online they have more, shall we say, creative questions.

So, what is the solution? Live chat. Imagine the live chat button on your website as an old-school bell on a countertop. When a customer has a question regarding a product, they ask right away, while they are still on the website. They don’t email you, and then go buy the product elsewhere on the Internet while waiting for a response. They instantly get their question answered, and make a purchase.

I can already hear naysayers, “I don’t have time to sit in front of a computer screen, waiting for people to have questions!” If you have time to sit at a counter, servicing live customers, you have time to answer questions online. The same person can do it. They are both making a purchase from your store. It comes down to training your staff to help online and live customers.

There are other huge advantages to live chat. If you notice someone wandering around your store, you can ask them, “Can I help you?” The same is true of live chat. If someone is on your site, you can ask them, “Can I help point you in the right direction?” You can see how many people are on your site at any time. You can watch what parts of your site are being visited most frequently.

Want to look at this more in depth? Send us an email, and we can discuss this option for your business.