How To Be A Genius

“If I go to one more customer service seminar where they tell me to smile, I’ll just scream”, exclaimed one conventioneer at this year’s Bowl Expo. 

This same refrain, I am sure could be heard from a conventioneer at the American Restaurant Association, The Hardware Retailers Association, The Amusement Park Association  and any other association that has customers…which is just about all of them.

Everyone is teaching and training and doing their best to increase the “customer experience”; to give great service; or “over the top” service; or “service that delights”; “service that exceeds expectations” and “service that makes the customer feel appreciated, wanted, needed and loved”.

Problem is everyone is focusing on the wrong thing. 

Service is important, no doubt about it.  But you can’t give great service to someone if you don’t have anyone to give it to and you can’t give service to someone if you or haven’t already sold them something or are not actively trying to sell them anything.

You need sales to service people. You need revenue to train people on “better service.”  You need profits to expand and modernize your center so people will be attracted to come into it so you can sell more.

Without sales, you won’t stand a chance. 

So here’s today’s $64,000 question: Who is teaching your employees to sell? 

Recently a copy of Apple’s training manual got out. It’s called Genius Training- Student Workshop – all hundred pages plus.  

It talks about training the employee to better help and serve the customer, but the reality is it is a very slick psychological training tool to get employees past sales obstacles and to use the famous “feel felt and found” tactic that has been taught for decades; fortunately it still works

Here’s a little excerpt of it. Note that the emphasis is on selling; NOT servicing. After all it is a store, says Apple.

“Before you can don the blue shirt and go to work with the job title of "Genius" every business day of your life, you have to complete a rigorously regimented, intricately scheduled training program. Over 14 days you and will pass through programs like "Using Diagnostic Services," "Component Isolation," and "The Power of Empathy."

 If one of those things doesn't sound like the other, you're right—and welcome to the very core of Apple Genius training: a swirling alloy of technical skills and sentiments straight from a self-help seminar.

The point of this boot camp is to fill you up with Genius Actions and Characteristics, listed conveniently on a "What" and "How" list on page seven of the manual. What does a Genius do? Educates. How? "Gracefully." He also "Takes Ownership" "Empathetically," "Recommends" "Persuasively," and "Gets to 'Yes'" "Respectfully." The basic idea here, despite all the verbiage, is simple: Become strong while appearing compassionate; persuade while seeming passive, and empathize your way to a sale.

No need to mince words: This is psychological training. There's no doubt the typical trip to the Apple store is on another echelon compared to big box retail torture; Apple's staff is bar none the most helpful and knowledgeable of any large retail operation.

A fundamental part of their job—sans sales quotas of any kind—is simply to make you happy. But you're not at a spa. You're at a store, where things are bought and sold. Your happiness is just a means to the cash register, and the manual reminds trainees of that: "Everyone in the Apple Store is in the business of selling." Period.

So your challenge for today is:  start hiring people who have some propensity to sell, who may actually like it and who can succeed at it.  Then go to your local college and see if you can find someone who can help to train your “sales organization.”  

This isn’t about outside sales or inside sales. It’s about sales training; about developing a sales culture; about being in the business of creating business.

If you need help on this, please call us. We have been doing it for years:                   516 359 4874

Definitions

For most of us, we define ourselves by our limitations. 

For the Steve Jobs types of the world, they define themselves by their dreams and aspirations.

Have we fallen into a pattern of limiting ourselves?

Is getting to “even to last year” good enough?  Is having 50 more bowlers a success?  Or is getting to 90% of capacity what you dream about?

Is doing $1900 on a Saturday night and beating last year by $150 a good (limiting) goal or is having 29 out of 32 lanes filled, kicking off $200 per lane per night your dream?

Do we view open play as another "price cut" program or have we positioned it as a "unique experience" that deserves and warrants a better price?

Is it limitations you want? Or dreams?

Recreate or reinvent or reinvigorate or revolutionize and then release the dream you once had.

Start now. With this new league season. 

We Are (NEW) Family

August 21, 2012 CNN News:

“The number of single people in America is growing at more than twice the rate of those who are wed, and if that trend continues, single adults will soon account for a larger share of the U.S. population than married couples for the first time on record, according to CNN.”

The number of new marriages in the United States declined 5% in 2011 alone.

If that doesn’t change the dynamic of society and the landscape for us marketers, I don’t know much else that will.  The changes that this will bring in terms of food, clothing and shelter purchases as well as recreational purchases will be profound.

For example, since single people tend to stay up later, maybe we will need to open later and close later.  Maybe we will need to add more “21 to 34” entertainment options (i.e.) cooler bars, more “grazing” food, more “craft” beers, more party atmosphere. Or more of a Starbucks atmosphere. Or more connectivity during the day time hours,  as a great place to meet people, especially for those who work at home and sometimes want to be around people.

As a bowling proprietor, you will need to really redefine what family entertainment means to a new generation of people who have not yet formed THEIR family, but are still part of their EXISTING family, even if they are older children; perhaps even living at home again like 29% of all 25 to 34 yr olds are doing these days.

It hasn’t been a “Fathers Knows Best" family image out there for a long time, but soon this image will be a vague remembrance of bygone times and old wines.

Maybe we need to examine more closely this "new" family unit and how its members define themselves. "Brothers or sisters or cousins?  There is an old song by Sister Sledge. The lyrics go something like this: ‘”we are family. I got all my sisters with me”.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=eBpYgpF1bqQ&NR=1

There are other references to family in the movies, “Band of Brothers” and TV shows, “Brothers and Sisters” so it seems that as a culture we value the word family but are redefining it differently than before.

Just ask a single Mom or Dad with one or two kids if they are “family?”  Or ask two single Moms who have moved in together with their children if they are family?  Or ask two Gay or Lesbian people if they are family; some even with children?

The answer will always be a resounding YES.

What programs do you have for these nontraditional Moms or Dads?  Or groups of friends that are so close that they refer to each other as brother or sister?  And it’s just not an ethnic thing.  It’s an American thing.

So the lesson is; we need to learn how to do business with these new demographic “family units” or go home and watch reruns of “Ozzie and Harriet.”

Once Upon A Time...

Late last night, after the dinner, the conversation turned to politics and one of my Republican friends made the claim that under this administration, the number of people living in “poverty” increased from 28 million to 45 million.

My other friend, a Democrat, indicated that this number was erroneous because the government is only counting “cash payments” and not food stamps, housing subsidies and other public assistance programs as part of the income to households. Thus, he exclaimed, the number of people living in “poverty” has really remained the same.

Do you think that either of these two guys, as a result of this conversation, changed their opinions about who should be the next president?

Of course not!!

Analysis and presentation of facts rarely change the opinions of people we are trying to persuade.  What does change people’s minds are stories that the other side MAY be able to relate to and identify with. 

When was the last time you told a story about your bowling center or family entertainment center that influenced people enough to want to bowl?  So few bowling centers tell “marketing stories” on their Facebook page, their website or even in their blog that it is silly.

Here is an opportunity that costs almost nothing and almost all we do is use it these tools as a cheap form of putting out fliers and price specials.  YIKES!!

Look at all the great things we do when it comes to fund raising, teaching kids a lifetime sport, working to support veterans (BVL) as well as being one of the most affordable forms of FAMILY entertainment.

But who knows this?  You, me and the lamppost! 

And last time I checked, lamp posts didn’t have any money.

Stop all the price selling and start telling.

Boom, Here's Your New Customer

Zig Ziglar, the world’s greatest salesman tells the story about traveling on a plane and sitting next to a “good ole boy.” He noticed that the man had his wedding ring on the wrong finger. Zig, always conversational, turned to the man and said, “Excuse me friend, but I noticed that you wear your wedding ring on the wrong finger.  Why do you do that?  The man looked over at Zig and said, “Yeah, I married the wrong woman!!”

This may be funny to some, but it is really sad.

As sad as going after people who have no interest in buying your product.

But there is a segment out there that could have a BIG interest in buying your product.  

For example:

·         They account for 49% of all sales

·         Over 50% are on Facebook

·         There are more of them than the entire population of the UK

Follow this link to get a great picture of who is this customer.

http://marketingzeus.com/infograph/baby-boomers-americas-great-consumer-generation

They could be the right customer you marry. 

Are you using Facebook as Your Own TV Channel?

What Is The Value of A Facebook Fan?

A new report from Forrester Research© addressed this question and very simply found out that for such brands as best Buy, Walmart, Coca Cola and Blackberry, being a Facebook fan boosts purchase, consideration and recommendation.

Think of it this way, your Facebook page is your TV station. It is your chance to broadcast your message; to interact with your customer, to entertain them and engage them.  NOT just to sell them. 

Think about contests, rewards, games and anything else you can do to continually build upon a relationship you have just started to develop.

With back to school around the corner, you should be putting information out about how to save money when shopping for back to school supplies, kids’ safety, and any number of back to school subjects readily available for reviewing on the Internet

Be relevant, be needed and your sales will increase among your Facebook fans.  But you have to stay at this. If not every day, then at least 3 to 4 times a week.

Sleepy's Is Cool

“Cool” is a state of mind, a way of expressing oneself that shows confidence, style and to some degree a bit of glamour.

It is the stoic or unemotional response to the thorniest question; it is never letting the other guy see you sweat or run for cover.

It is being able to prevail in the most daunting situation and never get ruffled. It is being able to live by your values, your rules, not by someone else’s values and rules, and prosper.

More importantly, it is an attribute that many marketers covet to associate with their brand, especially if they are targeting those segments that value “cool” over anything else.

"Sleepy’s,” a sleepy old mattress company just rolled out a new TV campaign about “a good night’s sleep”, the obvious end result of a great mattress and what everybody wants, but instead of just showing the product and having people say what a great night sleep they got on a Sleepy’s mattress, they did something different.

They moved away from the mundane and expected and into the unexpected and showed people running, playing tennis, riding a bike, running for a plane and doing a bunch of ACTIVITIES, all the while talking about how getting a good night’s sleep on a Sleepy’s mattress makes everyday tasks effortless.  

The implied promise (fulfilled only by buying the product) is you will be more energetic, happier, productive and thus “cooler” if you buy a mattress ONLY from Sleepy’s.    

Brilliant.                                                                                                                                                       They will sell bunch of mattresses to NEW customers and bring existing customers back. The digital marketing dudes will now Facebook, email, Pinterest and you tube their list to mine for the best prospects, using the umbrella of the TV spot as the lynch pin that holds it all together.                                                          

Segway to bowling.                                                                                                                                           Where is your TV spot?  Or your four color magazine ad in the city paper or local magazine?  Did you know you can buy a local ad in many national publications and on their national on line sites?  (It’s called www.MNI.com). Where is your brand identity?

Where is your “cool?” 

Bad News From Washington State

Greg Olson, the Executive Director of Washington state and a long time respected friend for over 30 years reports the following sanctioned league bowler trends in his state:

·         2011-2012 Season:

            * Adult: 37,700

            * Youth: 3,281

·         2010-2011 Season:

            * Adult: 40,461

            * Youth: 3,533

·         2007-2008 Season:

            * Adult: 48,099

            * Youth: 5,023

He further continues to say, “A full 22% more adult bowlers quit participating in a sanctioned league program during the past 4 seasons and 35% of the kids quit! What a horrible trend that none of us, BPAA nor USBC seem to talk enough about.”

12,141 bowlers during the past 4 seasons have left.  According to Greg, “If every league member paid $12 per week to bowl in a league at your center, that decline represents $145,692 in lost revenue EVERY WEEK!

Or $4.66 million dollars in one 32 week league season!

That’s a lot of cabbage, not to mention money.

And what are we doing about it?

Introducing 8 for 8 leagues, hosting bowling tournaments in the streets of Reno and going to a lot of meetings.

Seems like there is a disconnect somewhere. Shouldn’t there be a plan to help subsidize proprietors to get out there and market their business?  How about sending every marketing guru we have out there to counsel proprietors. (I’d volunteer tomorrow!)

What about national advertising?  Or local advertising by proprietor groups. Or training people on outside sales? Or starting from a different point of view?

Or just doing something DIFFERENTLY?

WE HAVE BEEN ON A SLIPPERY SLOPE FOR 34 YEARS OF DECLINING LEAGUE LINEAGE and all we can do is go to meetings.  C'mon man!

I know people are trying and working very hard to reverse this trend. And I mean no disrespect to their efforts


But maybe we are working on the wrong things.  

IYADWYADYWAGWYAG:  You know what that means. You’ve been to my seminars.

But hey, that's just my point of view. What do you think?

Sorry for the rant.