I’m actually a nice person. Many people don’t know this about me. They think I’m a hard ass because I work really hard, am focused and actually care about whether they have a job next year. I push them hard to learn what they need to learn. I ask them hard questions and most of them just don’t like it. 

The world is changing rapidly. What marketers did for the last 50 years is not what they will do in the next 50. What sales people did for the last 50 years will definitely not be what they do in the next 50. Not even the next two years! What business owners and senior executives should be doing today, is vastly different from what was done even a generation ago.  

So let’s get down to business. My philosophy as a sales coach or as a marketing partner is pretty much the same one I have for being a friend. Anybody can tell you what you want to hear, what makes you feel good, what doesn’t challenge you to be better. Real friends tell you what you need to hear, not what you want to hear. Good sales people don’t just do what you ask, they try to figure out what you need, even if both of you aren’t sure what that is. And marketing partners should try to keep you from becoming complacent, from doing what you’ve always done or what others have always done, just because they’ve always done it (or for any other nonsensical reason).

I’ve been in the business world now for 30 years. During that time I’ve watched really good companies, full of really good people go out of business. I’ve seen sales reps bounce from position to position because frankly, no one has the guts to tell them that they don’t have what it takes. And I’ve watched companies spend unbelievable amounts of money on marketing that doesn’t work because that was easier than trying new things that might actually work. So basically, when I’m not nice – it’s because I see you getting dangerously close to those outcomes.

I have a problem with most diets...

They expect you to eat regularly. I don't. Most days I don't even think about food until I hit the back door, which sometimes is close to 8 pm depending on the kid's schedules. Most working days I consume one meal and like 6,000 cups of coffee. Everybody tells me that eating one meal a day is bad, everybody tells me I've ruined my metabolism. I understand that my body needs fuel at regular intervals to work optimally. I just don't think about eating when I'm busy and I'm really, really busy. Unfortunately, I'm not so busy on the weekends, so I do think about and consume food often and this too, according to my scale, is not good.

This is a business blog, so here's the connection. Think of marketing as food that runs our organizations the same way we think of food fueling our bodies. Without enough fuel, our metabolisms slow down to conserve energy and they don't work as efficiently. Instead of consuming a steady diet of marketing during the recession, many organizations reduced their diet to a few marketing initiatives or none at all. This seemed like a good idea to save resources, but now they are left with sluggish organizations that don't respond to a healthy meal of marketing the way they would have had they been eating regularly.

DIG Miniview with Devin Voorsanger, VP, Business Development & Agency Services at Easypurl.com. Mr. Voorsanger discussing the methods Easy Purl uses to grow their business and how he views the roles of agencies and marketing services providers.

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I talked to a business owner this morning who has decided to put all of his marketing budget into web advertising, SEO, banner ads and the like. In order to sell to big companies, he believes, that prospects will have to find him. He has lost faith in the ability of his sales force to find, cultivate and close new business.  

 

Let’s take this apart. He is a digital printer who can produce individually relevant print communication and add personalized landing pages to each piece. He is not a marketing strategist. His firm just executes what his clients bring to him and they sprinkle a little value on top based on what they learned over the years doing this for others.

 

They are not selling ideas, they are selling the service of executing projects dreamed up by others. The hard part of figuring out who to target, what to say, what channels to use and what the results tell you is being done by the client. 

 

My kids like donuts. My husband likes donuts. Heck, I like donuts. They just don’t like me…well to be more specific, they don’t like my hips.  Having said this you would probably suspect that I run screaming and yelling into the night when someone in my family suggests donuts. You are about to be surprised.

 

The nearest Dunkin Donuts to my house is a Dunkin Donuts “Lite.” It is located inside the closest gas station to my home. As a person who has turned driving on fumes into an art form, the location of this gas station is of major strategic import. I use the term “lite” to distinguish this Dunkin Donuts from another one further down the road, which boasts a drive through and baking on the premises. This second one is also strategically placed as it sits just enough drive distance from the Richmond Olympiad gym for a hungry 10 year old to gobble down a plain bagel with strawberry cream cheese before hitting the floor for four hours of flipping, multiple times a week. Said gymnast’s Mom can grab a very large coffee before watching all of this flipping four hours at a clip, multiple times a week.

 

Back to the donuts. For years to the familiar chimes of “I didn’t have time to eat this morning” and “let’s get donuts” I have battled the donut demon. Traveling on the aforementioned fumes, with at least one and sometimes two sets of brown eyes pleading with me through the rear view mirror, I’ve been implored to stop for gas and donuts.  Sometimes, my resolve intact, I have braved a possible personal gas crisis and floored it, pupils fixed and dilated, as we passed the familiar orange and fushia sign. Other times though, in either a fit of motherly love or an inability to deal with the whining, I mean chimes, I would be compelled to stop. After pumping gas, I would enter the gas station, firmly willing my inner-donut-loving-self with a wishful mantra - just a coffee for me please, just a coffee for me please, just a coffee for me please. As I stood in line with my two daughters debating which variety to choose, I would gaze longingly and lovingly at the cases filled with bagels, muffins, donuts and the worst of all waistline enemies, the glazed apple fritter. Unfortunately, I would, on very rare occasions succumb to these temptations and order some…ahem, for the office, of course.