Prioritize, then Diversify

While many business professionals say the kiss of death is the inability to sustain growth, the over-diversification of a company can also be a death nail. Diversification without time, money and employees can stall a company's growth. Too many companies fail because of one simple reason; They try to do too many things instead of focusing one or two products or product lines and making that product the best it can be.
Don’t get me wrong, I think offering a lot of products is great. Diversification, both horizontally and vertically, is something a company should strive for as it creates jobs, cuts cost and increases profit. But this should be done once a company has created and perfected their niche product.

For example, it took Ray Kroc nearly fifteen years to add the Big Mac to the McDonalds menu. Until that time, it was hamburgers, cheeseburgers, fries, sodas and milkshakes. Twenty billion or so customers served later, McDonalds is one of the most recognized brands and best business models in the world. I believe this is because they decided that instead of creating new companies or expanding too fast, they laid out their simple plan and executed that simple plan to perfection.

Build one brand, unite the company in one vision instead of breaking into separate companies, separate divisions. I have seen this more than once in companies that I have worked for. And they fail dramatically. They waste resources, employees and worst of all, time. Jobs are lost, investors are lost, all because the primary vision for the company was lost. It is time that can better be used defining one product, creating that product and selling it with all hands on deck.

If your company ever gets into this situation of over-diversification, ask yourself to revisit the reason you got into the business to begin with.

Was it to create ninety brands of ketchup or one amazing brand? Was it to create a company that simply served corporate travel clients or did you want to start your own wholesale travel company with thousands of clients with only one agent?

So ask yourself if you have a company ready and profitable before you add more and more. If you need investors to make that move possible, maybe wait a few years and save enough to pay for it yourself. Diversification is great, if you can sustain it.

Tough Economy, Aggressive Advertising

Since the Fall of 2008 and recession that has caused nearly 10% reported unemployment and hundreds of thousands of small businesses to go out of business, American companies, large and small, have been cutting back. They are making changes to their core business that in the long run hurts their bottom line. Cutting down on advertising, which for many companies is hardly a priority anyhow usually consisting of roughly 2-5% of net sales, has been a problem across the board.

Cutting advertising when a company is in desperate need of bringing in dollars, either by investments or profit, is counter-intuitive.

Think about it. In essence, companies are saying, "In order to sell our product, gain market share and secure investments, we need to take our message and remove it from the public eye. We need to remove any chance that we have of talking to our customers and convincing them that even though its hard economic times, they should still by our product because it's necessary and worth the cost."

This type of thinking is what separates those companies that were in business at the beginning of the recession and still are and those that are now, unfortunately, either struggling or out of business altogether.

Have you ever heard the saying "When the good gets tough, the Tough get going?" There are many ways you can take this quote but in my opinion it means that when you are up against a wall, you don't quit. You push back. You put your company out there more! If everyone else is giving up and taking their advertising away, BOOST YOURS! Times may be tough but somehow people are still spending money. They are just being more careful, more selective.

With the right message and the right product, advertising gives you the chance to help consumers make the right decision.

Publication Priority #1: Content is King

Magazines of all shapes and sizes are going broke. They are losing advertisers left and right and there is a simple explanation. They aren’t listening to their readers.

A publisher’s first and main priority needs to be putting together a great product. You need a publication that piques a reader’s interest, shares valuable knowledge and, most important of all, encourages the reader to read more and look forward to that quarterly newsletter, weekly magazine or daily newspaper. If a publisher puts the reader first and makes every decision with the mindset of “What would a reader think of this?”, that publisher will have a successful publication.

In publishing (as in all business), the priority should not be the advertiser, even though they are ones footing the bill. The priority should not be your company. The priority is the reader. if you do not have content that second-to-none, your readership will dwindle and slowly but surely you will lose those precious advertisers. And when you lose advertisers, you lose your publication. Don’t believe me? Just read this story from the New York Times in October 2009, by clicking on the link below, about the fate of Gourmet magazine and several other Conde Nast publications. http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/05/conde-nast-to-close-gourmet-magazine/

In addition to upside-down priorities, most companies go for tradition over innovation. However, the traditional business model of print publications is slowing going the way of the Dodo. In order to compete in this mass media market, your publication needs to stand out. This means not just using traditional means of printing your publication. You can still print, but ask your readers if he/she would like the magazine or newsletter in electronic form. It cuts down on costs and allows your company to use more and more advertisers as space is not limited.

Keeping the reader informed on a regular basis is important. If you have a website and have a new story that you would like to share immediately, post a message on Twitter or Facebook.

The important lesson to take from this blog is if you focus your efforts on your readership, everything else will fall into place.

Scheduling E-mail Marketing

When is the best time of day to send an marketing email, eblast, or press release to a prospective client? It is important to know roughly what your client's schedule looks like (i.e. always in meetings in the morning, takes long weekends), preference of message delivery (loathes email but loves to Twitter!), and what level in the company he/she is. For example, if you send an executive (CEO) an email that is intended for a management level employee (Marketing Manager), you could irritate the executive and may even have him/her lose interest in your product.

Here are some easy guidelines to remember:

1.) Do not send important emails on Mondays and Fridays. Especially Monday morning and Friday afternoon! Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons are your best bet to get your client's attention.

2.) Do not rely on email marketing alone. Use social networking sites and if need be, the United State Postal Service. You might have audiences varying in size from large to small but not everyone communicates the same way.

3.) Do not bury the lede. Make sure that your message is "above the fold." Email programs have many different viewing options and this is important to take note of in your email design.

4.) Keep pictures to a minimum. Emails with a lot of flashy pictures are tough to get through Spam filters. Simplicity is the name of the game.

5.) Finally and most importantly, Keep your emails short. You have 5-10 seconds to get your clients attention before they dump your email into their deleted items bin. 100 words or more is too much! 60 word emails are about as long as they need to be.