Stalled out in Denver due to weather in San Francisco. First flight-leg reading, Traction by Gino Wickman. You know, I don’t often do book reviews, but this one caught my eye. Not that it breaks any new ground, but it is a well-organized reminder of the mechanics in building an organization.

It begins with a quick organizational diagnostic (20 questions) which tells you where the book is going. Each section has some sort of checklist, tool, core questions that would be valuable to any organization trying to define this stuff. My favorite was the section on Vision and his Vision/Tracker Organizer (TM), which contains a two-page template that distills the best thinking you can muster about your organization. But then, I must admit I’m a sucker for models and templates.

The real estate on each of the two pages dictates the amount of documentation required to complete, but don’t fool yourself. The most difficult pieces of thinking will be required where the word limit is the lowest.

Here’s why I think this is important. During this recession, in many places, all hell broke loose. We stopped thinking like this while we were down in the storm cellar. It’s time to get out of the cellar and start to rebuild.

Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business

This concludes our conversation with Jaynie Smith, author of Creating Competitive Advantage.

Tom:
As we move from the recession to recovery, and as we attempt to acquire new customers, gain market share, where do customer and client disconnects occur?

Jaynie:
Again, our research shows that 90% of companies have no internal agreement on what matters to customers. We always ask our clients to guess which three attributes came in 1, 2 and 3 in their customer research. Not only don’t they guess it right, they have no agreement amongst themselves. So how can the market-place receive what it values when the internal team is riding off in 25 different directions. The answer is simple: It can’t. We must have internal agreement based on the voice of the customer to know where to concentrate operationally and in alignment with our sales and marketing messaging.

You can find Jaynie’s book Creating Competitive Advantage at Amazon.com.

This continues my conversation with Jaynie Smith, author of Creating Competitive Advantage.

Tom:
Can you talk about the necessity of integrating marketing elements with operational reality to drive new ideas into existing and emerging customer segments?

Jaynie:
Our research shows that 95% of companies are not focused on the things that matter most to their customers and so their resource allocation is not aligned operationally with delivering what matters most to their customers.

A tour operator spent lots of time and money chasing industry awards only to learn that it matters last on a list of 20 attributes to their clients. But would-be travelers wanted solid knowledge delivered by their destination specialists. This company invested in everyone who sold a “continent” to make sure they had traveled to the countries sold and had extensive ongoing training relative to the vendors used. Cross training, then became the next operational investment. This company is booking at a better rate than nearly all of their competition even in a down turn.

The conversation continues the rest of this week. You can find Jaynie’s book Creating Competitive Advantage at Amazon.com.

This continues my conversation with Jaynie Smith, author of Creating Competitive Advantage.

Tom:
In an attempt to scratch out precious points in market share, which will multiply during the recovery, what changes should companies design into their marketing strategies?

Jaynie:
Companies should delete the “blah, blah, blah” cliched messages of yesterday and substitute with solid metrics that speak to reliable past performance. Unlike a mutual fund, past performance is the best indicator of whether or not you can deliver in the future. We need to build confidence and remove risk, more than ever, right now, in their buying decision.

So, we don’t say…”we will deliver in 24 hours”, that is a promise. No one believes promises anymore. But if you say, we have measured on time delivery for the last 3 years and are tracking at 98.2% , customers know you hold folks accountable for it, so you have more credibility.

The conversation continues the rest of this week. You can find Jaynie’s book Creating Competitive Advantage at Amazon.com.

If you think we are at the bottom of this recession and can breathe a sigh of relief, think again. Year over year, we may see improvement in sales volume, but even as your revenue builds, there is still whiplash in this market. So, I spent some time with my friend Jaynie Smith, author of Creating Competitive Advantage.

Tom:
As we make this slow turn from recession to recovery, what are the biggest mistakes companies make attempting to re-engage their markets, the ones, by necessity, they have contracted away from?

Jaynie:
Most companies are delivering yesterday’s value proposition, using old messages, and assuming their customers and prospects have the same buying criteria they did two, three and five years ago. Markets change and certainly with this recession, each company has redefined what it values in making purchasing decisions.

For example, we have seen, across the board, in the last year, market research showing that, despite the industry, many buyers want to know the vendor/supplier they choose has strong financial stability. Yet, few marketing and sales messages address this key attribute. We have seen prospects tell our clients, first and foremost, they want to receive easy-to-understand and accurate billing. Simple.

All this makes sense in view of the recession, yet few companies take the time to learn what their customers truly value in today’s world.

The conversation continues the rest of this week. You can find Jaynie’s book Creating Competitive Advantage at Amazon.com.

I just got my hands on a copy of Make Your Move by Alan and Brian Beaulieu.

These are the guys that kept most of my clients out of trouble during this past recession. With their help and forecasting, we started preparing for this recession as early as 2006. With their help and forecasting, we are now working on the recovery.

Inside, you find explanations of their business cycle, its four phases and what to do, as a business, in each phase. They also explain their powerful predictive tool which graphs a very simple fraction through time to show your Rate of Change.

You can get the book at Amazon or directly from www.ecotrends.org.