Recruiting, Acquiring and KEEPING upper echelon employees begins with…

Most companies are striving to get the best employees and keep them as they know this is integral to their success and growth. Competition is steep as the number of “A Players” seems to be dwindling by the day. The consolation? Not many have mastered this art, so making an effort goes a long way!

As usual, let’s start at the beginning…

How do you attract “A players” in the first place?

One of the most innovative and effective ways is by creating interesting and fun videos to tempt great employees and leaders to your company. I have seen this succefully done by companies like Zappos and MindVakkey, it has the top employees coming to them to apply and vy for positions!

But how do we accomplish this for our company when it isn’t young and hip or when we don’t have a fun business because  we sell widgets!

IF your perspective is open and willing, then you can accomplish the goal of painting a picture that is appealing for prospective employees. NOW, let me preface this with this admonition, IF your company only paints the picture as being a good, fair and fun company to work for but it is riddled with a different culture totally, then even if you are successful in recruiting top employees, they will shortly find out the reality and move on to a company that better suits them. SOOOO, this is only the first step to having an employee team of  upper echelon employees.

Alright, so now back tot he video idea…

ANY subject can be fun and interesting if you have the right perspective. You may not have this perspective, so you might want to hire someone to make this or even better, delegate it to some of your employees. Ah! Here’s an idea: Have a contest for different departments to make each a video for recruiting. They can talk about how it is to work there or about events that you hold, whatever. But, then you can have a viewing party and vote for the best video. Make a day out of it!

Don’t believe ANY subject can be funny? Would you think it is possible to be funny when delivering the “speech” all airlines must give before takeoff, “There are four exits…” etc.?

Thin again. Check out this video by Virgin Airlines. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eyygn8HFTCo&NR=1

Have a recruiting video already? Post a link here, we would love to see it and learn from your example.

To your continued success,

C

 

 

Got publicity? Need to get the word out? Here are 10 ways from Dan Janal to get it out there!

Dan Janal gives us 10 tips on how to publicize our Press Release, article, or event. Give this to your marketing person or team. Let them know the priority level of each, so they know what you expect from them, then let them run with it.

REMEMBER my rule: Set up a check-in point to get a progress report. Determine successes and failures in the system and improve as possible, then implement again.

——-Dan’s list———–

Here are 10 ways to promote your publicity:

1.     Tweet a link to the article. I do this for my clients, when they tell me about their publicity via PR LEADS. I use a provocative title to get attention. Here’s an example: Need writing tips for a job application? @prleads client Diane L Samuels gets publicity on Monster.com http://ow.ly/2tGcI Notice how I use the keyword “publicity” so anyone looking for “publicity” on Twitter will see this. Use your own keywords as well so more people will find your links.

2.     Post the link on your Linked In profile.

3.     Post the link to relevant groups on Linked In.  Heavy emphasis on “relevant.” Don’t post it in places where people wouldn’t care. You’d be hurting yourself if you did that. Also, don’t say “I’m quoted here” and post the link. Tell people what they can learn by reading the article. Your focus should be on sharing information and not appearing self-promotional.

4.     Send the link and article to your prospects, clients and followers via email.

5.     Post the link and the article to your blog.

6.     Frame the article and hang it in your waiting room. Consider highlighting your quotes and name in yellow so it stands out from the rest of the article. The highlighting will focus a reader’s attention directly on your quote.

7.     Copy the article and print it in your sales or marketing kit. The media give you a form of credibility that is unmatched. Use it.

8.     Include the article in your book proposal. Book acquisition editors want to know that you can create publicity for the book. Show them here and you’re more likely to get a contract and more likely to get a larger advance.

9.     Create a list of headlines of articles in which you were quoted and post that to your website. Include live links to the articles. Reporters and prospects will be impressed that you have so many media hits.

10. Use the front page of your website to let the world know you have been quoted. To many clients get PR and hide it! Let the first impression people have of you be from the media.

That oughta keep your publicity team busy!

Want more info about Dan? Here’s his info:

Dan Janal
Your Fearless PR LEADER
http://www.PRLEADSPLUS.com

Let me know if these work for you.

My best,

C

Waiting for your fairy godmother (venture capitalist/ investor) to save you?

There are no EASY ways to do business. When talking with a client today, I realized something I had never really admitted before, BUSINESS IS TOUGH!

There is no magic bullet, no get-rich-quick. It’s about something much more.

Now, that’s not to say SOME people may find success by being in the right place with the right thing at the right time, but those times are far and few rather than the norm.

Expecting that fairy godmother to come and make all of your dreams come true is a great way to feel like a failure!

THE SMARTER AND MORE SURE WAY TO SUCCESS? FOCUS! Focus on the right things at the right time. Focus on serving your current clients/customers/patients better! Focus on making loyal followers, die-hard fans. (See my post earlier today about Facebook fans and their worth, if you are using social networking as part of your plan.)

Here’s another way to think about it, to quote our man, Seth Godin, “Delight the audience you already have, amaze the customers you can already reach, dazzle the small investors who already trust you enough to listen to you. Take the permission you have and work your way up. Leaps look good in the movies, but in fact, success is mostly about finding a path and walking it one step at a time.”

SOOOOOOOOOOO? How will this change your day, your month, your year?

C

Retention, referrals or acquisition? Which is most important to you?

When it comes to you and your clients/customers/patients, do you spend more $, time and energy on retention, on getting referrals or on acquiring new?

Which should you be concentrating on?
I have seen through practice that retention is cheaper, and has a bigger payoff, than the other two! Hence, I recommend YOU start there and stay there. When resources for a referral plan exists in ADDITION to the plan for retention, THEN and only then should that take resources from the business for referrals. Lastly, the attention/resources should be brought to acquisition of NEW clients/customers/patients.

What do you think?

What could you do to make what you do in all three arenas better?

C

Typical Media is dying, what can you do about it?

The last flight I took, I browsed the shelves of the magazines. I LOVE MAGAZINES! I had my own magazine, once! I published, wrote and LOVED it!

As I browsed those shelves, my heart lurched, I ached to work with magazines again. My brain slipped right into working with a magazine, marketing a magazine, designing a magazine, the possibilities!

But, I then moved through the thoughts and jerked back into REALITY! In reality, magazines are dying! As are most brick and mortar versions of media! Unfortunate as this is, IT IS TRUE, whether you admit it or not!

So, how can you deal with this shift if you are a part of brick and mortar media?

OR even better, how can YOU benefit from the shift? Because SOMEONE WILL WIN! Someone will succeed! You can be part of that or not…

Seth Godin has a BRILLIANT take on this, basically, he points out that the opportunity is there for you to take! The opportunity is that YOU can reach and build your fan base with micro-magazines!

“There’s room in the market for 100,000 profitable micro-magazines. Why not have one about Aruba, for example? If all the people who vacation in Aruba could read about the island in detail every month, read about restaurants, resorts and politics, for free, in an easy to share format… Multiply this by every destination, every interest group, every type of profession (how about a micro-magazine for ethnobiologists?)

Surely you can think of a group of people that share a demo- or psychographic, that are appealing to an advertiser base and want to learn and share what they learn… for free.”

Here is how he defines an ideal magazines:

• Being digital (probably a PDF), that’s free to ‘print’, fast to make and easy to share. (Newsweek spends seventeen million dollars a year on paper.)
• Having subscribers, either by email or RSS
• Focused on issues that appeal to some, but not all
• Having a very specific audience (call it a tribe)
• Enabling that tribe to connect by sharing the ideas in the magazine among them, as well as supporting it with a forum or blog
• Containing ads that are relevant to that audience
• Being longer than 140 characters or even a blog post, so significant ideas can be exposed in detail.

So, what group could you target?

How could you use this to your advantage?

What will this change, improve, create for you?

C

Case study: Doubling sales through social media – iMediaConnection.com

Want to get social media fame? You can!

Want to double your sales?They have done it, so can you!

Think you need a huge marketing budget? Think again!

Sometimes what we need to do is get off our keesters and get to it! See how a company doubles its sales in one month flat!

Case study: Doubling sales through social media – iMediaConnection.com

SOOOOOOO, how will this change what you do today? Tomorrow? Next week? And next month?

If it doesn’t help you improve your future, STOP READING, YOU INFO-ADDICT… and get to implementing, thank you.

C

True success in business lies with a blatant, in your face, absolutely RAW use of this:

(Read this is a flaming, singsong voice) PERSONALITY!!!!!!

How are today’s successful companies achieving and maintaining a competitive advantage?

Why are companies who have better products/services not thriving, when other companies are?

What makes one more successful than the other?

There have been hundreds of books written about success and business and some are still very relevant today. BUT, the consumers today are not like the consumers of previous generations, there is an all new dynamic that we as the drivers of the business MUST study and edit how we guide our marketing and delivery.

If we do not, we will be left in the dust of other companies who have responded and innovated and henceforth, been rewarded for hitting the mark!

One of the major pieces that is important to today’s plan for a business is personality. Consumers do not want a boring, faceless company to provide their products or services anymore. We want to be entertained, emotionally involved, and personally connected with companies, like never before.

Hence, authors like Seth Godin talk about the Purple Cow and Tribes in describing a companies products and followers.

A book called Personality NOT Included talks at length about this. I am reading that along with 30 other rescently published works, ah the plethora of info consumes us!!!! So, I leave you with the words of Seth Godin “There is no tribe of normal”

People don’t coalesce into active and committed tribes around the status quo.

The only vibrant tribes in our communities are the ones closer the edges, or those trying to make change. The center is large, but it’s not connected.

If you’re trying to build a tribe, a community or a movement, and you want it to be safe and beyond reproach at the same time, you will fail.

Heretical thoughts, delivered in a way that capture the attention of the minority–that’s the path that works.

So, the point my dear friends?

Make your business YOU, it shoudl have personality, just like you do. It should be REAL, what we are all looking for. And it is easier than ever with social networking and youtube video sites galore! And it is FREE, hello, can you say cheap?

So, how will this change you? Your bsuienss? Your plans today?

If it doesn’t change something, stop wasting your life reading my blog!

Puleaze!

C

How to Name Your Business! Or Brand Your Image!

In working with  a client yesterday, we discussed at length HOW to name a new company. Many people get caught up in semantics, opinions from others, and what has already been DONE! The same issues happen with branding an image or company. And more often than not, time is lost striving in the wrong direction.

The key with naming a business is to understand the core concept that no one should do this for you, whether you are a soloprenuer, inventor, retail store owner, or doctor, because with time, generally you will see that this “definition” of who and what makes your business special will be inaccurate.

Seth Godin says that the problem with hiring a consultant or a company to find your brand essence is that “if you have to search for a brand essence, you are unlikely to find one”.

He goes on to say:
Standing for something means giving up a lot of other things, and opening yourself to criticism. Most people in the financial services industry (or any industry, actually) aren’t willing to do that, which is why there are so few Charles Schwabs in the word.

First, decide it’s okay to fail and to make a ruckus while failing. THEN go searching for the way to capture that energy and share it with the world.

Clothes don’t make the man, the man makes the man. Clothes (and the brand) just amplify that.

So, how does this help you name your company, brand your image, define your company?

Well, one is that it needs to be true and pure for YOU, not your colleagues, friends, or competition.

Second, the name is not EVERYTHING, but instead the ancillary information is going to support what you want your brand to be, that is the logo design, the exterior and decor of your location, the advertising and marketing pieces you put out to the world.

I believe one of the most important parts of branding and naming is to be bold! People today recognize and adore a strong opinion and personality in a company, if you think about some of the most profitable and successful companies, you will see this to be true.But, this discussion is for another day.

Last thing that is important, don’t feel like you need to EXPLAIN everything in the name. If you think about retailers or medical offices, if they explain everything in the name, then they are perceived and generally are value priced. So, unless you are offering value pricing, stay away from highly descriptive company names or marketing messages.

Instead come up with a name, it can even be obscure, then support the accurate definition of your brand with the ancillary words and styling.

I could write about this literally all day! SOO, more on this later!

C

Retailers keep the customers from buying on the net! HOW to win the WAR?

If you are in retail, then you are at WAR! The internet is always going to have a cheaper, faster, better resource for your prospects to buy from. So, how can you compete?

You can offer the one thing the internet cannot, the environment, the smells, sounds, what will keep buyers coming back. See how a bookstore competes with giants like Amazon, Barnes and Nobles and Books-A-Million.

http://tinyurl.com/MontagueBookstore

How can YOU take this concept and WIN?

I want to hear about it!

Your coach,

C

Why companies/marketing/tactics fail!

The reality of the world today is harsh, whether we will admit it or not. It’s a killer situation for many businesses, destined to FAIL!

Why??????

They simply are not good enough! Average is not praised, noticed or bought anymore.

Seth Godin puts it well: “The biggest mistake companies make is that they chicken out.  If your idea doesn’t become a virus, it’s most likely because it didn’t deserve to become a virus.”

I blog and rant about it all of the time, if you aren’t innovative, you will not make it in this economy! So once again, I implore you, stand up, be counted! Be deserving!

Your coach,

C