Instagram and TikTok are growing Social Media that are gaining more and more attention everyday.
When it comes to Fashion, Apparel, Make up, and similar products, Social Media is the Foundation of Marketing Communications.
how to influence consumers on social media and which communication channels should they use
You can use Social Media to Promote your products through Ads (Sponsored Content).
There is a more lucrative way of using Social Media to communicate with your customers!
Enter: Microinfluencers
Microinfluencers are celebrities of Social Media.
Microinfluencers have 5k to 30k followers. Followers are loyal and they view all the content that the microinfluencer posts!
microinfluencers brand ambassadors social media communications
Microinfluencers create unique content for a well-defined and highly engaged audience.
Followers trust their influencers, copy their attitudes and behavior.
Why would a company waste money convincing the consumer to buy their products, when they can simply pay Influencers to do it instead?!
Companies realized that they could promote their Products for them.
Microinfluencers became the Focal Point of Brand Sponsorship.
When to choose Microinfluencers as Brand Ambassadors?
Ideal Customer Age for hiring Microinfluencers
If you are targeting Generation Z (24 years and younger) then you simply MUST hire a Microinfluencer.
If you are targeting Generation Y (24 to 39 years old) then it would a good plus to hire a Microinfluencer, but you don’t have to.
Ideal Customer Location for Microinfluencers
42% of Microinfluencers’ market is in USA. Therefore, if you are targeting customers from the United States, hiring a Microinfluencer is a GREAT STRATEGY to reach and promote your product!
Emerging markets are also interesting; Korea, Brazil and United Arab Emirates have shown incredible growth in Microinfluencers’ market. Definitely consider hiring a Microinfluencer if you wish to expand your business in the aforementioned countries.
Who are the best Microinfluencers?
female influencer women microinfluencer
Women have a proven record of being successful influencers! [klear research]
Women build great CONNECTIONS with their audiences. They ENGAGE with followers and FOCUS ON WHAT FOLLOWERS WANT rather than what they want.
Research indicates that Consumers TRUST FEMALE INFLUENCERS MORE THAN MALE INFLUENCERS.
Female influencers pay extra attention to DETAILS and speak about how they FEEL about the brand rather than just expressing opinions!
There you have it…
As an entrepreneur, you are now able to choose whether to spend money hiring microinfluencers or not.
Put yourself in the shoes of your customers and think about the digital places where they go to search for information!
Microinfluencers are very useful in building BRAND COMMUNITY
With the presence of giants like Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and others, all small-medium businesses are prompted to get louder and spend more efforts on adapting business and content strategies to meet the qualifying standards of these megalomaniac, reticent and autonomous organizations.
The case of Porsche Carrera
The Customer Segment
You’ll find that most Porsche Carrera customers are middle-aged, divorced/single and financially well-situated men. These men are looking to revive their old selves and be at their prime again!
This feeling is possible when you drive a Porsche Carrera – from the masterpiece of interior design to the artistry of bodywork – you will fall in love with this car!
But this Love is Pricy. Between $80,000 and $150,000, to be exact.
Customers are having a problem with the Infotainment System
According to Edmunds (One of the most visited Online Car Reviews Page), Customers seem to think that the Infotainment system is ‘Quirky.’
The Customer feels outdated and inferior when toggling through through the computer’s options.
This feeling is bad for the relationship with the customer. It a clear sign misunderstanding the customer!
The customer wishes to be young again, not to feel old and outdated!
Content Marketing Increases Purchase Intent
By creating content that educates customers about Infotainment Technology, marketers could improve the chances of purchasing the Porsche Carrera.
Here is the Decision Making Process for purchasing a Porsche Carrera:
Decision Making Diagram with Content Marketing Implemented
1. YouTube Videos on how Technology is Simple and Easy to Use in Porsche Carrera
A Short Video about how the Infotainment works would fit this process well.
Customers will YouTube Search the car prior to buying it. Coming across a video – that depicts the infotainment system as user-friendly and beneficial – customers are encouraged the to consider the Purchase!
2. Blogging about The Power of Technology in Porsche Carrera
Great articles can be written about the Power and Control behind the Infotainment System. How Technology transformed the car into a true Stallion ready to conquer new roads and impress everyone!
Such articles turn this mess around 180 degrees. The customer will be convinced that the Porsche Carrera is nothing but True Joy. TOTALLY WORTH THE MONEY!
Technology should empower customers!
How Content Marketing can help Entrepreneurs
As a small business owner or an entrepreneur, you MUST use Content Marketing. It is not optional….
Content Marketing is what defines your Digital Presence. It is what your customers read and watch about You!
Content Marketing is how you rank up in Search Engines and OUT-COMPETE others in your industry!
According to many sources, context marketing is about capturing the right data, in the right setting at the right time, then connecting it across all resources in the right way with the right customer.
I don’t know about you, but my experience has taught me that this is very hard… To do such a feat successfullyyou would need to hire a team of marketing experts. I guess that’s why marketing experts insist on context marketing being ever-encompassing and complex.
What is context marketing?
Context Stimuli affects Color Perception
Consumer perception plays a major role in purchase behavior. Perception is reference-dependent; the perceived attributes of a focal stimulus reflect the contrast between the stimulus and its context. (figure 1: context influences color perception).
Context Stimuli affects Shape Perception
Keeping the focus stimuli fixed and changing the context stimuli results in distorting consumer perception. The main message conveyed is the same. However, paying attention to an object makes all its features accessible – including those that aren’t linked to the primary (focus) stimuli. (figure 2: context shapes a ‘B’ or ’13’).
1. Prior Context
This type of context is stimuli that was present for a while and then was removed abruptly. For instance, you see a picture of a racing car and then click on a completely different page.
Almost all marketing managers ignore prior context as they simply don’t understand it.
Priming in Marketing Communications:
When discovered for the first time, it was observed that subtle stimuli that bypasses the conscious filters of our mind proceeds to influence our decisions over the course of time, gradually fading as exposed to new stimuli. The researchers that discovered this effect called it thePriming effect. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priming_(psychology)
2. Current Context
A more obvious stimulus is Current Context. It is a stimulus that is actually in the background of the point of inference (focus stimuli). Current context is not a subtle stimuli – it is direct and present.
An example of Current Context is FRAMING. The basic principle of Framing is the passive acceptance of the formulation given. Because of the passivity, people fail to construct a canonical representation for all extensionally equivalent descriptions, leaving them at the mercy of the given context.
90% LEAN IS BETTER THAN !0% FAT
For example, a 90% lean meat is exactly the same as a 10% fat meat. However, the emphasis is on the leanness of the meat, and therefore, the reference point (context) is the leanness of the meat – in this case it’s a whopping 90% (which in reality is normal and may be considered fatty).
Invariance cannot be achieved by a finite mind.
Framing in Marketing Communications:
Let’s consider two scenarios of information shared with consumers:
A: Every third visitor of our online shop buys at least 1 item
B: Two out of three visitors of our online shop leave without buying any item
The same piece of information, when framed differently will affect the perception of the reader in two completely opposing directions. By choosing to state formulation A, we frame consumers to engage the shop with the perception that there’s a good probability they will find something interesting to buy. While formulation B will frame consumers to think that there’s a high probability they won’t find anything interesting to buy.
Anchoring in Marketing Communications:
This one is truly a mind-boggler. Behavioral psychologists often refer to it as a cognitive ‘bias.’ What they mean to say is that they can’t quite put their finger on it. They call it the Anchoring effect. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anchoring
Anchoring is a marketing technique of deliberately setting the context in consecutive steps that lead to shaping the consumer perception (and choices and preferences thereof). A famous experiment baffled the academic society around the world. This experiment proved that the outcome of rolling dice before answering a question significantly influences the answer!
Less Noise, More Compassion!
A simple way we can employ Anchoring, is to add a short surveyasking the consumer a few, seemingly irrelevant questions right before accessing the landing page. The objective is to influence the consumer to expect higher prices for the products by affecting his/her value perception. Consequently, the consumer is pleased to see lower prices than expected and purchases a few products, as it seems like a good deal at the time.
3 Context Strategies for Entrepreneurs and Small Business Owners:
1. Priming (Online Content / Testimonials )
If you’re using native Ads, blogs, or similar written content to drive traffic onto your landing page, use ACTION words. Also, use it in first person perspective in present tense.
e.g. I move. I spend. I buy. I jump. I kick. I sign.
The reader infers the information (focus stimuli) from your content while setting a subtle reference point (context stimuli). When reading in 1st person, the subconscious mind sets the context as if it was real and happening in the moment of reading.
fire up the consumer before driving them onto your landing page!
2. Framing (View Cart / Open Shop Page)
Right before accessing the online shop, there is a short moment of buffering. Extend this buffer for a second to frame the consumer. It should be a total of just 3 seconds of deliberate buffering; long enough for the consumer to read our information statement, but short enough not to reflect on all aspects of this statement.
Facts improve Product Perception – Framing effect for landing page
The consumer didn’t get enough time to analyze the information statement we presented.
The consumer is now at our online shop, browsing and looking for potentially interesting items.
3. Anchoring (Interactive Landing Page / Survey with Search and Filter Options)
A well-designed step-by-step marketing funnel with pre-tested content gets you a good conversion rate. Adding an anchor survey while loading the landing page will increasefurther that conversion rate, but also, unrealisticallyimprove your customer reviews!
Surveying online visitors and setting an anchor point to improve Product Perception
Right before loading the landing page, install a pop up that appears in the middle of the screen. The pop up is an anchor survey with three questions.
Let’s imagine we are selling refurbished Samsung Galaxy S7. The market price range is $100 – $200. This wide price range gives us the space to implement an anchor successfully. Answers should be numbers at least double the upper threshold, but not greater than 1000.
Interactive Landing Pages are great Converters! Use it along with Site Filters, as Pop Ups on Your Shop Page, or at exiting the Cart without a Purchase.
Very high numbers will blow it out of proportion and we lose the reference point due to disassociation from the context stimuli.
The questions could be anything, for example:
1. How many companies does Unilever own?Correct answer = 400 companies
2. In meters, what is the length of Knock Nevis, the largest ship in the world? Correct answer = 458 m
3. How many kilograms weighs the heaviest person alive in the world? Correct answer = 610
Pop Up that appears when the User clicks on ‘View Cart’
Once all the questions are answered, the consumer has anchored a reference of 400. Seeing the prices, the consumer learns that there are smartphones 4 times cheaper than the biased reference point. What a delight! It’s time to purchase a Samsung Galaxy S7!
Some marketers prefer questions related to the product. You can do whatever you want, as long as you set the reference point (context stimuli) correctly
“Morality and awareness of consequences are above all! Your actions will shape the future. Improve the livelihood of your audience and you will thrive!“
Your email header must be unique, professional and personalized. Many companies fail to find the right wording for their email titles. If you don’t get the title right, all your campaign efforts will be in vein!
EFFECTIVE EMAIL TITLE
A strong email title drastically increases the email open rate. In B2B, avoidusing emoticons, exclamation marks, special characters and caps lock.
HOW HEADER/TITLE APPEARS IN INBOX
In some cases, the right email header helps bypass spam filters that use exempt rules (or AI for spam detection). To elaborate, when you are using the company name in the header, it could be recognized as internal communication, which switches off filters.
In B2B, you need to work hard to keep you emails from getting flagged. Start by fixing your Title.
#2 The right Email content
There are many ways to build your email content for your email campaigns. I will give you the structure that I use:
EMAIL CONTENT SEGMENTS
Here as an example of how I compile content:
EMAIL CONTENT SEGMENTS
Some people advise using pictures and videos. Due to formatting issues and blockers, I avoid it. However, you can always attach additional files.
#3 Leverage Email perception
One important facet of email marketing is the email perception. Marketing experts often neglect it as they do not understand consumer behavior.
I will reveal one (of many techniques) that I use to influence my audience. When reading emails, the reader “Z scans” the email. Z SCAN is the process of perceiving written information. The eyes scan through the information in a Z pattern; hence the name.
Z SCAN EMAIL READING
While Z scanning, some of the information is absorbed by the subconscious mind. That’s usually highlighted and coloredbuzz words along the pattern. This tends to passively influence the behavior of the reader; in ways we’re still trying to understand…
Z SCAN EMAIL READING
Please note that most professionals use mobile devices to check their mailbox. This means that your email needs to be responsive!It has to adapt to mobile interface! Test and review emails internally with your colleagues prior to sending out. I can’t stress it enough, make sure your email is in line with your strategy across all significant devices!
#4 A/B Test & Analyze
Lastly, I would advise using Google Analytics (or similar software) to study your email campaign. You want to keep track of behavioral changes when implementing a new strategy.
Start by differentiating audience groups and understanding good/bad behavior. If you notice an underscoring group, see if there is an underlying denominator; e.g. region, language, industry, etc. Then go ahead and tweak your email parameters to sync with your target group.
# Bonus Tip
There is no perfect strategy… Each audience is different and requires trial and error until you get it right.
As a bonus, I want to warn you about frustration and failure… Yes, you will run into a conundrum… Marketing is both logical and intuitive, you’ll have to trust in your marketing efforts, otherwise you will lose.
Dynamic content is content that is personalized to a visitor using data you have already gathered about them.
All major Marketing Corporations will tell you that delivering personalized experience to the customer can only increase purchase intentions!
How to use Dynamic Content?
1. Data Research
People are visiting your website all the time, searching for things – going back and forth – in high numbers. These activities are indicators of what’s generating sales and what’s not.
There are many ways to collect data from customers; e.g directly by surveying customers either by email, or on Social Media, or even while they are at your website (pop-up).
Google also offers tracking services that you may use by syncing your website to Google Resources and Tools (Google Analytics).
2. Data Collection & Analysis
a) Geographic Location of the Customer
Knowing where the customer is will help you make a Personalized (Better) Offer. Whether you are Car Rental, or a Coffee Chain, or a delivery-service business, you will be able to find a way to make it work for a better Customer Experience.
Customer Satisfaction is what makes the difference between a ‘good’ product and an ‘excellent’ product!
b) Last Page visited – Source of Customer
Wouldn’t it be great to focus your financial resources on the promotional channel that brings the most customers?
Not only that this is possible, but it is easy-doable too!
With Certain statistical tools, such as Google Analytics, you can view from which page your customers have landed (The Source).
Have they found On YouTube and Clicked through to your Shop?
Do most customers come from a single Source (e.g. Linkedin Social Media)?
Identify the Best Communication Channel for your Customer Segment!
c) Previous Behavior – Last Purchased item
If someone just bought a car, they might be interested in buying car equipment or new tires. Right?
If we can view all the users who have just purchased a car and target them with a YouTube Video Ad:
“Winter Tires On Discount of 50%!”
Don’t you think it’s worthwhile?
There are many ways to learn about Customer Purchase Habits for this particular case:
Buy/Use data from Car Dealerships
Buy/Use data from Car Insurance Company
Buy/Use data from Google (Search behavior and purchase intentions)
Entrepreneurs and Small Business Owners can use Dynamic Content for their Niches too!
You don’t have to worry as long as you are not harming the customer then you may collect the data you need.
The main goal is to offer a Better Customer Experience
Recession or not – companies are taking preparatory actions for it – they are resorting to cost reduction measures that will ultimately bolster the company through an extreme economic decline.
Economic Recession is accused of business cleansing.
The aftermath is a catastrophe for many business organizations. Victims will plead for justice! Someone must be held accountable!
Business failing during recession
Is there a Strategy for Recession Management?
What’s interesting about recession is that when it strikes – it hits everyone, the big and small, everyone gets slapped by the invisible hand.
However, not all companies disappear during recessions, there are those who seem to survive and even gain competitive edge for the years to come.
The Definition of Recession Strategy
Operational excellence is a change for better, bigger and faster. In essence, it’s performance boosting. However, operational excellence has a weak point – its inability to cope with reduced trade and industrial activity during recessions.
Studying the companies that performed oddly well during the 2008 recession, it becomes clear that a recession strategy was implemented.
To manage a company during a recession, the leadership needs a complete positioning strategy, not just to improve overall performance.
Recession is a major macro-economic trend and not the good kind.
Companies know that and they devise various strategies to get through it. Unfortunately, most companies don’t make it or lose a significant market share which they can’t recover afterwards.
Each industry has its own specificities, but all companies – regardless of the industry they’re in – need a top-down complete re-organization across 4 dimensions: Performance, Capital, Product and Customer.
Complete Strategic Re-organization for Recession Management
1. Performance
e.g. reducing operational costs by using different means of transport
2. Capital
e.g. laying off employees
3. Product
e.g. developing a new (cheap) product
4. Customer
e.g. focusing on a different segment
How Recession Strategy helped McDonald’s survive and crush competition by re-organizing across all 4 dimensions
A successful recession strategy means re-organization of the company across all four dimensions.
McDonald’s has upset the industry by devising a good recession strategy – re-organizing across all dimensions – keeping a positive balance sheet during 2008. McDonald’s came out the recession as the definite industry leader.
With a complete recession strategy that re-organizes all 4 dimensions, the company will gain competitive advantage and differentiate quickly from the rest in the industry.
However, if the company doesn’t succeed at complete re-organization, it will converge with the rest in the industry; losing market shares at best. A worse scenario is filing bankruptcy.
Human Resource Management in Recession
There is no way around it. Major trade-offs will be made to cope with the recession. Trade-offs must occur across all (re)organization dimensions. A particularly painful trade-off occurs in the capital dimension. More precisely: Human Resources.
Recession management is not just about performance improvement; it’s all about strategic positioning. As the company assumes a new market position, it will no longer use some of the resources.
Firing might backfire!
Employee appraisal metrics are often misleading, one common mistake HR managers make is the so called “fundamental attribution error.”
Where does HR Management fail during Recession?
This is a cognitive bias – where HR managers assume that the lowest performers of the year will always be the worst performers and to fire them as a result – an assumption that overlooks the impact of good or poor management, not to mention business conditions that are beyond employees’ control.
Recession-strategic companies, like McDonalds was in 2008, avoid the fundamental attribution error – by re-organizing human capital from top to bottom.
How Ford prospered from managing HR differently and applying the Recession Strategy while at it
Ford, the car manufacturer, is no exclusion. The top-downHR re-organization during the 2008 recession was the right move.
A new CEO came along and implemented many strategic changes. Three years later (which is a very short time in the automotive industry), Ford had made it with an amazing turnaround!
New executives and new managers bring a new energy to the game. They quickly develop a new culture with new rules to guide the company through crises. They help employees on the frontline to understand their newly formed roles and finalize tasks with maximum efficiency.
Moreover, top-down re-organizations often bring hope to employees at the bottom of the hierarchy. That drive and motivation can be leveraged in the coming recession.
Recession Strategy For Entrepreneurs and Small Business Owners
This article discusses how big companies have succeeded despite their size and enormous losses during Recession.
For Entrepreneurs and Small Business, transforming the organization around the 4 dimensions (performance, product, capital and customer) will be much less complex. Often this transition doesn’t include massive sacrifice or unethical practices (laying off a business unit suddenly).
How Successful Entrepreneurs increase Performance?
When you hit a bottleneck, instead of getting all worked up and angry about the issue, go and discuss with business partner how to improve efficiency at that particular point of delivery!
Focus on delivering your product and services FASTER.
This is the best performance booster! If you can deliver Faster you can move on to the next dimension:
How Successful Entrepreneurs improve their Product?
Learn where your product is failing and what Consumer Demands are not met by your offer.
Whether you are selling a product or a service, always look for CUSTOMER FEEDBACK.
Instead of focusing on procuring cheaper material, try to develop better solutions with what you have. It is harder said than done, but it is exactly what separates a successful Entrepreneur from a failure!
How Successful Entrepreneurs use Capital during Recession?
Hiring a business management trainee during the Recession is a great way to go about it!
You will have someone who’s sole purpose is to Consult you on how to manage your assets in a way that will save your business!
If you are running a small company or a start up, you should not hire only specialists; you need people with diverse background and various skills.
But if you don’t have a Business Management Trainee, it’s OK! You can get the job done with employees who have multiple skills and are able to do many different tasks.
What Customer Segment do Successful Entrepreneurs target during Recession?
During recession, many of your customer will lose their power to purchase your products. Customer Persona is, thereby, changing according to new properties.
Most Successful Entrepreneurs look for – a cheap alternative for their products – something that they can deliver to the market and still profit from it.
Other Entrepreneurs and Small Businesses, that have Sponsors and Investors backing them up, they prefer to INTEGRATE FORWARD.
Forward Integration is getting closer to the end-user of your products and services. In a way; Forward Integration is cutting the middle man out.
This is how Successful Entrepreneurs combat Recession. These were the Complete Steps for Recession Strategy that any Small Business can employ to manage recession.
Business rivalry turns HOSTILE when competitively similar companies decide to enter full-fledged price competition (a.k.a. PRICE WARS).
Here’s how it occurs, what it does, and how to avoid it:
price wars influence on small business
HOW IT OCCURS AND WHAT IT DOES:
Increasing market shares is a way of gaining the competitive edge. It can be achieved by dropping prices. When two Business Giantscompete through this strategy, they enter what is known as ‘price wars.’
The fierce rivalry based on price competence turns profits from industry over to consumers. The consumers enjoy the best offers from all sides. While employees suffocate and managers burn all available resources!
HOW TO DEAL WITH IT:
This competitive strategy is nothing but self-destructive. In its fulfilled form, it ruins businesses, markets and even whole industries.
Entrepreneurs and Small Business Owners should devise strategies of market competence on dimensions other than price.
Few dimensions exist that allow Entrepreneurs and Small Businesses to create a healthy competitive arena for multiple players without handing over all the profit to the Consumer.
PRODUCT FEATURES
Your competitor may offer cheaper products, but you can focus on developing new features that help you distinguish your product as SUPERIOR!
Bigger companies need R&D Teams.
BRAND IMAGE
What is you stand for? What does your product mean?
Forget about Price, work on your brand IDENTITY!
Safe investment is content marketing. Always be Digitally Present. Always Post, Share, Discuss, Write and Record Online.
Create Content and be Creative about it. You will outpace your Competitor by your SUPERIOR PRESENCE!
SUPPORT SERVICES
You may EXPAND and offer Services with your Product. It is always easier for you to offer additional Services than to your Competitor because you have First-Had Data!
Listen to your customers need and INTEGRATE FORWARD!
DELIVERY TIME
Go LEAN! Develop PERFORMANCE STRATEGIES!
Figure out your BOTTLENECKS and tackle them one by one!
Start with your Timing to Market. Can you do it FASTER? Can you make it BEFORE Your Competitor?
Focus on Your Timing!
Market Competence Outperforms Price Competence any time of the day!
Historically, companies have promoted many addictive offerings such as tobacco, sugar, cocaine, opioid pain medication, gambling, coffee, and Social Media nowadays.
Addiction may stem from various activities; for which consumers develop an excessive appetite.
According to the American Psychiatric Association, Addiction is defined as the repetition of a behavior with known harmful consequences.
Behavioral addiction, as extensive research indicates, activates many of the same regions of the brain as drug-based addictions.
Non-drug addiction share more in common with drug-based addictions than previously recognized!
Social Media (SoMe) Addiction is a type of behavioral addiction. It is one of the most common forms of addictions to digital experiences. See the table below to learn more about the effects of SoMe Addiction:
Habitual behavior is the building block of addiction. It may occur with either minimal self-awareness (through Classical Conditioning – e.g. the Sound of Notifications) or deliberate decision-making (through Operant Conditioning – e.g. taking selfies to gain more attention).
Today, Marketers use Data to learn more about Consumer Habits so they can maintain the Consumers’ attention. They do so by creating Addictive Designs; that are devised for COMPULSIVE USE – causing consumers to spend hours staring into screens of SoMe platforms and Apps.
Addiction is a problem!
Marketers – from Linkedin, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and other SoMe businesses – keep consumers hooked by actively striking dopamine centers and causing craving for more Notifications and more News FEED.
Consumers bow their heads, checking for notifications and scrolling to infinity!
If you are an Entrepreneur, looking to build a new business or already own a small business and you desire to grow, you could use the Addiction Business to grow your business. There is no doubt that it will be a successful strategy. However, keep in mind that Consumers are AWAREof these effects and it is only a matter of time when SoMe companies will have to change this business model due to Government Policies.
Many marketers, including myself, advocate Addiction-Free Designs. We took the side of Consumers, as we believe that CONSUMER SAFETY IS AN IMPERATIVE!
Consumers choose loyalty programs with the idea that it pays off. To some extent, it does. Nevertheless, loyalty programs lead to more shopping and spending.
Great for the vendor; not so great for the consumer.
Loyalty programs keep customers coming to the same retailer, buying the same products. It becomes habitual and consumers, therein, stop thinking about other options (which may be cheaper).
“Addiction is never a good deal.”
– Anonymous
Adults are inclined to follow their habits. Consumers find it hard to establish new choices and preferences. Marketers, therefore, take advantage of the necessity for auto-piloting through daily choices in life.
The habits consumers develop are strengthened by constant targeted Ads across multiple channels, keeping them hooked with endless offers.
While it seems as lucrative business strategy, it does have some ethical implications.
Loyalty programs are marketing TRAPS that consumers fall for. What may seem as a good offer usually turns into undisciplined, perpetual and frantic spending on “discounted” items.
As an Entrepreneur or a Small Business Owner, you don’t want to kick-start your business in controversy!
It is much safer to be customer-centric and revolve around solving problems and alleviating pain rather than hooking your customers with loyalty programs.
Make it your MISSION to always Solve Problems. That way, your customers will remain yours and you won’t need to TRICK them to keep doing business with you!
Said the executive as he walked out leaving a team of stranded subordinates.
The task was to conform to standards but evolve beyond them. It’s like learning Spanish by practicing English. I’m not saying it’s impossible; what I’m implying is that the probability of success is 0.1%.
What is it so scary that we cannot express ourselves? Is it justifiable fear or paranoia of losing control over employees?
Evidence puts Conformity in its true light –a mere performance degrader :
reduces employee engagement,
curbs problem-solving capacity and
diminishes self-reliance.
Conformity is a performance degrader in Small Business and Entrepreneurship
How much more damage could Management cause?
Not all conformity is bad though; it only must be restricted to formality. Tethering the human spirit will only limit its capacity to grow.
Corporations are doing their best to establish clear job roles; to be able to assign understandable and doable responsibilities to their employees, but also to hold them accountable for failing at fulfilling their tasks!
You – as an Entrepreneur and a Small Business Owner – should do your best to stay away from Conformity!
As a new entrant in your industry, you must keep an open mind and innovate all the way. You must be a creative problem solver and so do your employees!
FromBuzzToScience 