Believe - part two

Believing in what you are doing in business, or anywhere in life, is critical. Customers will sense if you aren’t buying-in to what you are saying or presenting. But what is believing? Is it drinking the Kool-Aid? Is it merely repeating what you have been told to say? Is it blind faith?

Believing is personal. It means you think something is right—not necessarily perfect or magical. It’s something you understand and can share with others.

You have to believe to do a great job, to serve your customers and your company. 

Barry LaBov

LABOV Marketing Communications and Training

www.labov.com

Believe - part one

Your workplace would be entirely different if everyone believed—believed they were delivering something great, asking a price that was fair, etc. More often than not, belief doesn’t come into play in the everyday business world we live in.

“I do what I’m told.” “I know the client won’t like this.” “I guess this is what the powers that be want, I don’t get it.”

The above is what is said. It’s good people who don’t believe, going through the motions. Problem is if they do talk to the client about a price increase, for example, the client will smell that they don’t believe in it either and that can set off a chain of bad events far worse than not getting a small price increase. 

Barry LaBov

LABOV Marketing Communications and Training

www.labov.com

A secret worth telling

In the business world, for the most part, you don’t want to be a best kept secret. In fact, you want to be just the opposite. That’s why people advertise and market their products. But sometimes if a company has been around awhile—30, 40, 50+ years—it can fall into the trap of assuming customers already know all the great things about the product it manufacturers. After all, if they’ve been around for that long, shouldn’t everyone know what’s great about their product? Maybe…but it’s a risky assumption. Just how risky is usually unknown until someone new comes along and begins to take away market share.

When fresh competition enters the scene, it’s a good time for a company to evaluate the strength of its brand. Has it fallen into complacence and weakened or lost its brand signal? It can happen to the most respected, longest-standing companies out there. But as long as the foundational elements like a good product, solid differentiators and a customer base are still present, a brand can be revived. 

Barry LaBov

LABOV Marketing Communications and Training

www.labov.com