The early life-cycle of a startup is all about validation.  Especially for first-time founders, the struggle is often to figure out what’s missing (both in their own knowledge/skills and from the entire project picture) or what can be done to convince an investor to take a chance and part with some major money.  Whether looking for funding, or convincing a prospect to become a customer, startups must provide outsiders with “reasons to believe.” 

Note that as you move up the pyramid above, the degree of validation increases.  Also note that the product itself is not really ever in focus… it’s not a sacred cow.  In today’s world, a truly quality product is second to eyeballs, revenues (SALES!!!!), and relationships.  A weak product can always be improved… Twitter is proving this right now as it actually has contracted out to redesign its entire product.

The goal is to reach the second to the top layer:  Consistent Revenue= money in the door.  Growth + Retention= new product/service lines plus repeat purchases from return customers over a significant period of time.  Both of these results will create a break-even, and eventual profit, with happy, paying customers. 

The problem faced by the buyer is something of a tipping point.  If they are aware of the problem and are troubled by it, they will act.  If they don’t… no sale.  So, how do we incorporate the buyer’s problem into our marketing and revenue generation strategy?  And, how do we choose the right problem to begin with without harping on the negative?

1. Start with your assumed strategy:  what are you going to sell, to whom do you plan on selling it, and through whom will you reach these buyers?
2. Consider the issues behind your assumed strategy:  your challenge is to identify a buyer problem for which you have the strongest solutions.  Make a long list and then prioritize.
3. Rationalize this list down to your “best” problems.  This is decision time.  If you are good at solving buyer problems that offer little reward, you will major in the minors.  On the other hand, if you are focusing on the right problem but are not in a strong position to fix it, the competition will eat your lunch.
4. Now, ditch your strategy, and rebuild it around the problem.  If you’ve chosen the right buyer problem, you should let it guide your future strategy. 

Judge which businesses and/or consumers suffer most from this problem, and will be most prepared to pay money to have it fixed.  This is your new market.  Determine what a complete solution to this problem looks like.  That is your new offering. 

Having recast your strategy, we now need to help our prospective buyers to act.  Businesses and most consumers don’t just wake up in the morning and decide to purchase something.  They take a journey:

• First, they have no problem;
• then, they do;
• then, they know they need a solution;
• then, they choose between those options;
• and finally, they receive the benefits for which they had hoped.

We refer to this progression of thought as “the buyer’s journey.”  Marketing is a crucial means of identifying and managing the steps in the journey.  It all boils down to the fact that people pay money to have their problems solved.  Choose the right one, help your customers and prospects see it, and profit. 

I find that most business owners and marketers make the same mistake. They have a great product or service and they know all the ins-and-outs of all the features and functionalities, but they neglect to go those last inches and help their prospects fully understand the value of how this product/service will make the prospects life easier, better, faster, sexier, whatever.

The problem with most sales training is that it starts from the vantage point that your company does NOT have an effective marketing plan. Which is true…most companies DON’T have a systematic, sure-fire way to draw highly-qualified prospects to their doors like moths to flame.  Instead, most companies fly by the seat of their pants when it comes to marketing and either don’t do ANYTHING to attract highly-qualified, interested prospects to their business… so, they simply lean on their salespeople to “get out there and make calls”.

Or, if companies do any advertising, they use the “brand-building” or “image” advertising to attempt get prospects to call… and it simply doesn’t work.  People don’t get an emotional attachment to things that they don’t realize could solve problems or improve their lives.  So, these executives end up saying things like “marketing and advertising doesn’t work”… and force their salesteams to go back to the archaic, cold-call grunt work.

Ask yourself… what would you rather do?  Spend your time teaching your people all the latest “closes” and churn through dud after dud trying to occasionally find highly-qualified prospects…or would you rather just have the good ones come to you? 

The solution is simple.  You have to structure sales conversations to ask the right questions to get prospects talking about their goals and needs.  This conversation then sets the stage so that when you explain the product/service you provide, it’s clear that this item is the perfect solution to your prospects’ problems.

Results:  Instead of lowering prices to get more business, companies can increase their fees.  Even in a strange economic environment, you can still position yourself for competitive advantage and make more money.  Wouldn’t you like to have prospects eager to pay the prices you charge?

When your prospects fully understand of how much better off they’ll be or how much more successful they’ll be with your products and services, more people will want to work with you and buy from you and they’ll happily pay more to do so.

Delivering poor customer experience puts customer relationships and revenue at risk.  It also leads to the destruction of enterprise value.  “Suppose a customer calls to complain to your firm, and his complaint doesn’t get resolved.  He may not actually defect to a competitor for some time, but the likelihood of his defecting has suddenly increased, and the probability of his buying more things from you has just as suddenly declined,” state Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D., in their book Return on Customer.  “When this customer hangs up the phone… your company loses value at that very moment.”

Even companies with the best of intentions have struggled with transitioning from the strategy to execution stage of customer experience management.  Below are three Customer Experience Management best practices designed to help a business bridge the gap between “planning” and “doing.”

1. Walk a Mile in the Customer’s Shoes:  How many companies can confidently answer the question:  What’s it like to be one of our customers?  Most business still view their clients through functional silos which creates disconnected processes and a fragmented customer experience.  Instead, aim for a cross functional approach that gives personnel on the front line the knowledge they need, when they need it.
2. Recognize Customer Differences:  From a business’s perspective, individual customers differ in two important ways:  their value to the enterprise and their needs.  Value and needs insight should be matched up to deliver targeted treatment strategies for different customers.  Customers will be satisfied because experiences are tailored to their needs.  Companies are happy because they are focusing resources on those customers that provide maximum value. 
3. Remember that CEM (Customer Experience Management) is not a One Time Event:  How can CEM be sustained?  Consistently and regularly taking the customer’s point of view is a prerequisite for motivating customers to change their behavior.  With that foundation in place, the organization can design interactions that are not only profitable to the company but also engender customer trust. 

To truly deliver successful customer experiences across all touchpoints, from sales to marketing to customer service, a company must first understand who its customers are and how they differ based on their value to and their needs from the company.  Most companies aim to retain customers for a lifetime, and it requires foresight to understand who your valuable customers are, what they need now, and what they will want in the future.

Do you have a current map of all customer interactions across touchpoints?  Do your employees have access to the knowledge they need to deliver positive customer experiences? 

You’d think most CEOs would know this, but I’m constantly surprised by the variety of attempts made to “save your way to success.” It doesn’t happen, and it’s the ultimate in laziness. Trimming expenses is step one in a two-step process and will only solve 1/2 the problem. Increasing the top line is the second, and most vital, step.

From Robert Scoble’s blog, Scobleizer, January 26, 2008: “Most people here believe we’re in the midst of a recession, which technically is two quarters of negative growth. There’s certainly many here who are gloomy about the future, but there is definitely lots of positivity too. I spoke with Steve Forbes last night (yes, that Steve Forbes) and he thinks that the doom and gloomers shouldn’t be listened to. He sees one quarter of bad news and then sees the economy coming back in the second quarter.

That second quarter is NOW. Again, people, we haven’t yet had one quarter of negative growth… let alone two. I think the only recession we’re heading into is a media contrived one. So, spend lavishly on strategic investments. Invest in sales and marketing. Be wise… spend on any/all business development activities now like picking up those excellent sales and marketing people that your competitor stupidly fired. Yes, monitor and keep tabs on your expenses, but profitable topline growth will always trump expense cutting.

Yabut= “yeah, but…” It’s so much easier to criticize someone else’s work than to create something from scratch. Stop finding (or allowing others to find) all the reason an idea won’t work and get busy making it happen. This is far more complex than just being positive vs. being negative. Yabut people always see why something cannot be done. Successful CEOs see the obstacles (YABUTs), and see the options to make an idea work, but they also see the options that will make it work in spite of these people.

In addition, it is extremely important not to allow your people to YABUT. If you allow your people to start this habit, you are allowing a culture of non-performance. Successful organizations perform… they perform well.

First, recognize that you, the CEO, are YABUTing. Once you see that you and your people are doing it, you have half the problem solved. Then, don’t be afraid to take projects or items off your list. It is okay to say “no.” Saying that your are not going to tackle a project or strategy at this time is much better than allowing it to fail because of YABUTs.

1. Untroubled and unaware
2. Acknowledge pain
3. Define need
4. Receive offers
5. Rationalize options
6. Select first choice
7. Engage

If you hold Marketing accountable for brand awareness, you get a market that knows who you are (but doesn’t necessarily buy). If you hold Marketing accountable for leads (only), you’ll get leads (but not necessarily customers). If you hold Marketing accountable for setting meetings, you’ll get leads that convert into “shoppers” (but, again, not necessarily decision-makers). However, if you hold Marketing accountable for creating buying decisions, you’ll get leads that convert to sales.

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Marketing’s purpose is to generate the leads. Sales’ purpose is to close the deals. However, it happens all the time… these guys butt heads. Picture it: the sales rep and the marketing manager go together to a visit a prospect and close the sale. The marketing manager watches in horror as the product/service/widget/whatever doesn’t perform up to “brand specifications” rendering the entire Marketing department essentially LFC, Liars First Class. Now watch the horror to the nth degree that flashes across the sales guy’s face when he hears marketing blurt out, “We’ll give you another upgrade… this time for free.”

The old line goes, “You can pay me now or you can pay me later.” When a company understands the true essence of both sales and marketing, and applies them in the right blend, the question isn’t being paid now or later. It’s being paid now and later.

Simply stated, marketing takes the long-term view of customer relationships, paving the way for sales to occur in the short-term. One feeds the other. Companies get into trouble when their appetite for short-term sales neglects the key role of long-term marketing.

Putting sales and marketing together in the same group is the single biggest mistake… actually, it’s mistake number 2. The Biggest Mistake is hiring a guy with the title “VP of Sales & Marketing” expecting her to actually do either one worth a crap. These two groups have different goals, and when a wheel falls off, sales always wins because squeaky-wheel problems win against the need for long-term results.