A rush to the doors has been evident during 2020, with pandemic-fuelled retrenchments, dismissals, business failures and unforced closures.
Years of expertise, experience and training have been lost to entities, sectors, commerce and society. The subtle art of nuances, understandings and corporate cultures have been shelved and compromised.
Customer service standards and consumer expectations have been adversely affected.
GROWTH INDUSTRY
Generous, loosely defined structures and administrated incentives, training and support initiatives, funded by Federal, State and local governments have been catalysts for a growth industry. That is, the creation of not-for-profit entities, whose primary beneficiaries appear to be their own employees and sub-contractors.
Under-resourced micro-small businesses, typically employing two or fewer people (in some instances up to five), are targeted for basic, introductory and rudimentary 2,4,6 and 8-hour courses in social media, finance administration and other detailed issues.
As if such complex issues could be resolved with limited exposure, led largely by subcontractors who have graduated in the past two, three or four years with little practical experience and expertise in managing departments, leading teams and operating businesses. Reality often strikes with telling force. Participating small business owners soon realise that applying newly-learnt skills requires time, money and resources. Priorities need to be set. Time spent at a console forsakes the opportunity to speak to, influence and enthuse, existing, prospective and past clients. Cash-flows? What cash-flows?
WHAT MESSAGE?
Small business cohort members have learnt to despair at the exhortations of trainers about the need to be creative, innovative, original and disruptive. Words! Merely whims.
Such urgings, well intentioned as they may be, represent little value and provide sparse substance, foundations and directions.
Motherhood statements are not bankable in the prevailing locked-down local marketplaces, state economies and commerce at large.
Moreover, in excess of 80% of prospective customers, sales, revenues and profit lie with past, often established customers. In the main, they are not seeking, or demanding, creative, innovative, original and new products, services at standards.
Re-establishing, supporting, complementing and celebrating relationships are greatly valued.
MORE EXPERTS, THAN EXPERTISE
A striking characteristic of the growth industry which has rapidly evolved because of and during the pandemic is the presence of countless experts, espousing often pre-packaged resolutions and actions.
In many instances the targeted small business owners are the means to gain access to government funding, which is essential for the employment of the experts and their subcontractors.
Like so many things in the digital era, the clients have become the product. Look no further than the marketability of the privacy details of the applications and platforms on social media. Access to these (and to the social media users) is marketed and sold to advertisers.
A lack of precedence, experience and past lessons learnt dictate the need for customisation of unique and varying situations that especially confront individual small to medium-sized enterprises.
Generalised concepts, campaigns and strategies will typically lack the capacity to achieve impact and to resonate with primary, secondary and tertiary target audiences.
BE BOLD
Collaborative endeavours by grouping the owners and managers geographically “local” businesses are laudable, but largely ineffective.
Many skill-sets and experiences are not readily transferable and applicable to a broad spectrum of entities, sectors and precincts.
Scant funding inhibits capacities to perform, to recruit and to deploy. Some things similarly need to be paid for. That is the nature of investments.
Copy-cat marketing abounds in the prevailing challenging economy. Anecdotal evidence show success rates are isolated and marginal. Customisation is an imperative to address, satisfy and fulfil unique needs and expectations.
Implementing idealised outcomes and goals, free from operational, financial and established constraints can be energising, accelerating and educational. Defining quantifiable measures instils appropriate measures of structure, monitoring, reviewing and refinements – the essential nature of WHAT.
The issue of HOW should only then be addressed.
CONTEXT FIRST
To win back and retain customers requires businesses, big, small and medium to provide, promote and extend compellingly attractive ambiences and positive experiences. That is, context precedes the importance and sequential flow of content.
Managing expectations, and delivering the promise are effective means to generate and to enhance traffic, be it foot, social media, telephone, text and yes, even mail-based.
Energy and urgency create emotion, which still represents the largest force for demand, selection and transactions.
RETURN TO ME
It is inevitable that most businesses, having endured the coronavirus pandemic, will be smaller, with reduced team-member numbers, narrower and contracted product ranges and restricted supply chains.
None of these should impact on the ambience, experience and customer service extended to existing, prospective and past customers.
Achieving an increased rush to the ingress lane of the doorways will require an initial focus on winning and welcoming back key frontline service providers.
Barry Urquhart
Marketing Strategist
Marketing Focus
M: 041 983 5555
E: Urquhart@marketingfocus.net.au