July | 2014 | Teik Oh

A Branding Opportunity – Hit or Miss?

Jul 30 2014

Here’s something that just happened to me, which I think is a branding opportunity gone amiss, and only somewhat recovered. I am doing home renovations and have to have 2 sensors of the home alarm disconnected, and booked a technician for today (the last day before work starts). I’m waiting and no technician arrives, so I phone the alarm company. I explain the situation.

Alarm: I rang and left a message saying the tech couldn’t come today….

Me: Where did you call?

Alarm: Your home phone.

Comment 13

Let’s all stick to our own knitting!

Jul 28 2014

I’m about to insult lawyers.

The rest of you – you needn’t cheer quite so raucously. I only choose to use lawyers as an example of a highly trained group of professionals, skilled and experienced in what they do and good at their multi-faceted jobs, but because of that, think that they can self-handle other aspects of their business where different specialist skills and experience are required.

I could have chosen accountants, or doctors, or engineers (there, some of you are not so comfortable now are you?).

One of my clients is a firm of commercial lawyers specialising in insolvency. In their business they run the constant risk that their clients cannot pay. To give them their due they always perform at their best and never stint on service, despite this possibility, but now and then, they get caught.

In one such instance they worked for an owner of advertising billboards scattered around the suburbs. Having satisfactorily won the case for their client they found that the client is cash strapped and unable to pay them, asking for a payment plan over a year or so. Clearly not a good situation. The senior partner, true to the entrepreneurial spirit of the firm then negotiated a contra arrangement where they get to use two billboards and paste up advertising for the law firm over a year. In this way a $20,000 doubtful debt is used to gain $40,000 worth of billboard advertising – quite an advantage? Read More

Comment 13

Leadership Vs Management

Jul 24 2014

harvard pic Harvard Business School change management guru John Kotter outlines the fundamental differences between Leadership and Management as follows:-

– Establishing direction vs Planning & Budgeting
– Aligning people vs Organising and staffing…
– Motivating & inspiring vs Controlling & Problem-solving.

In Kotter’s view, while management produces an order of predictability, order, and the capacity to attain desired short term targets, the qualities of Leadership prodeuces change, often to a dramatic degree and often potentially useful change to create a future vision.

In my consulting, I use my own process called vision-driven planning, first creating a vision for the group (in great detail, to the degree that it is internally viable and credible) which is then quantified through a Balanced Scorecard approach (“If we were to achieve our vision, how must we look and behave in the area of…”). The quantification of the vision is converted into Performance Measures, and then these are redirected as Strategies. Read More

Comment 13

Increase your sales through a highly focused marketing plan!

SMART Marketing: In this book, the owners of a small business are led through the SMART Marketing 7 Step Process to produce a marketing plan targeted at their most desirable customers. Any business can use these principles and in 4 to 6 weeks implement a plan to get them through the door! Find out how...

The SMART Marketing Workbook: Companion to “SMART Marketing”, this workbook sets out the SMART Marketing process in 7 workshops for you and your staff to complete questionnaires and templates that at the end, form the marketing plan you need to sell your REAL product to your REAL customer! View now...

Archive - July 2014

Get FREE weekly ideas to grow your business

A Branding Opportunity – Hit or Miss?

Let’s all stick to our own knitting!

Leadership Vs Management