Five Ways to Increase Profitability By Doing The Right Thing
1. Base your business in the Magic Triangle. Honesty, integrity, and quality are the three sides of the Magic Triangle of business success. Create the kind of company that stands for something more than the bottom line, and your bottom line will increase. 2. Stop worrying about market share. The world has more than enough customers for you. When you embrace abundance--the idea that the universe provides enough to go around--all the energy you've put into chopping down competitors can be channeled into productive, growth-enhancing activities. Example: By opening up the PC architecture many years ago, IBM dropped its market share--but created a vast expansion in the overall market (and its PC revenues). 3. Partner with your competitors. It may sound counter-intuitive, but competing and complementary businesses can become your best sales agents. The world's largest companies understand this--which is why Toyota and General Motors have product development partnerships, and why FedEx and the US Postal Service cooperate to deliver Express Mail and to provide FedEx collection points at post offices. 4. Understand the true brand experience. It's not your advertising and marketing--it's what happens when a customer attempts to do business with you. How helpful and courteous are your staff, both in-store and on the phone? How friendly and useful is your website? How does the customer really feel about working with you? 5. Turn customers into sales agents. At least one third of your business should be repeat customers or people they've referred. If you're still struggling to pull in business, either you haven't set up good systems to harness these super-profitable customers, or you need to address the deeper reasons why they don't return. By Shel Horowitz, founder of the Business Ethics Pledge (http://www.principledprofits.com/25000influencers.html) Copywriter, marketing consultant, and speaker Shel Horowitz is the author of six books and publisher of five websites, five webzines and three ezines. His two most recent, Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First (http://www.principledprofits.com) and Grassroots Marketing: Getting Noticed in a Noisy World (http://www.frugalmarketing.com) have both won awards. He's currently engaged in a campaign to get 25,000 people to sign--and spread--the Business Ethics Pledge: http://www.principledprofits.com/25000influencers.html
Related News
|
 |
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Avoid Outsourcing Pitfalls in the Injection Molds and Stamping Dies Markets
When looking to outsource overseas for Plastic Injection Molds or Stamping Dies there are many things to consider.
Usually price is the first thing to be looked at, that's probably why you're looking overseas for a new mold or die source-to save money.
One of the first places to come to mind is Asia.
Large labour forces and low wages can get your job done quickly and cheaply. Or so you think.
3 Steps You Can Use Developing Leaders In Your Industry
With the economy bordering on a recession, every company is looking for ways to increase revenues while decreasing costs. Some companies believe one of the easiest ways to do this is to cut their employee training budget. However, businesses interested in long-term viability recognize that to be successful they must continually develop their people, especially their leaders.
Making Assumptions - A Critical Communication Mistake In Business And In Your Personal Life!
We draw conclusions about people through observation, their behavior, past experiences, other people's comments, etc. We assume who people are, what they think/need/want with such speed we fail to recognize how our own viewpoint colors the way we connect with and relate to people and situations. We even hold assumptions about ourselves!
The Punitive Approach to Marginal Performers
MANAGING A MARGINAL PERFORMER: Often a marginal performer, even after therapeutic counseling, may not understand that his or her work is seen as substandard. The manager will have to ask the employee directly how the performance could be improved. If the manager still meets with resistance or avoidance, as a last resort he or she will have to give suggestions.
Performance Management Made Easy
Performance Management is a process that both employer and employee often fear!
One Crazy Cookie
In order to survive, you have to be happier than if you were in your right mind.
Why and How to Work with a Consultant
A good consultant provides specialist abilities and experience, innovative ideas, second opinions (reality checks), unbiased appraisals, and new approaches.
13 Comments on Bad Meetings
Bad meetings are a cultural malady that senior executives pass on to new
employees.
Succession Planning for Your Business - 7 Key Benefits
A core activity in many successful businesses, Succession Planning is simple and quick to implement - here are seven reasons why you will find it of great value in your business or organisation. But, you need to lead - it works only as well as the support it gets!
Conflict Resolution Training- When Personal Safety is an Issue
Conflict generally arises by having your needs, desires, perceptions and values challenged.
A Rare Leadership Skill: Dealing With People Who Want Out By Offering Crowns For Convoy
As a leader, you'll inevitably be faced with people wanting to leave your team or organization. Dealing with the challenge is critical for your leadership success. Your response will have ramifications far beyond your immediate circumstances. One of the best ways to respond comes from Shakespeare's Henry V.
Unveiling the Value of Your Expertise
All of us have knowledge, expertise, and experience that others can benefit from. This is one of the reasons we play some of the roles in life that we play: leader, trainer, teacher, coach, mentor, and more. We all can contribute to other's success with our expertise. Unfortunately, some things keep us from doing this as successfully as we could.
HRM: Contributing to Well-being or Ill-being at Work?
If you were to take the people out of an organisation you would be left with some stock and machinery that would be of little value, and possibly some property. It is the people that make an organisation function, so having the people functioning to the best of their ability must surely be best for an organisation. Yet much of what is undertaken in the field of HRM actually serves to detract from people functioning at their best. Evidence from studies of wellbeing in the workplace reveal some interesting findings that raise questions as to whether the current focus of HRM will adapt to the evolving future workplace, or whether it will need to be redrawn along different lines, focussing on maintaining wellbeing above all else in the workplace to enable people to be successful for their organisations.
The Ins and Outs of Internal and External Relations
INTERNAL PUBLIC RELATIONS: Never overlook an opportunity to do internal public relations about your department and its offerings. A training department must, first and foremost, be visible in the organization it serves. Larry Lottier, Manager, Education of Dana Corporation publishes a training department course catalog with faculty, course listings and course descriptions to publicize his department's offerings. Gary Slobodian, Assistant Manager, Corporate Staff Development, of Great-West Life Assurance Company has found that getting training on the agenda at national sales meetings increases his department's visibility.
Twitch Speed: Reaching Younger Workers Who Think Differently
Every parent, educator, and manager knows that "Nintendo children"--those born after 1970 and raised on video and computer games, Walkmans, the Internet, etc.--are different. Unfortunately, the Gen-X discussion has focused mainly on the youths' supposedly short attention spans and attention-deficit disorders, ignoring or underemphasizing what is perhaps the most crucial factor--that this under-30 generation thinks, and sees the world, in ways entirely different from their parents.
Managing People - Why Is It So Difficult?
Managing, supervising, being a team leader is the hardest
job in the world and I'll tell you why.
Imagine what it's like to drive a car. You turn the key to
start the engine, select drive or the gear you want and
press the gas pedal. The car then moves off and if you want
to turn you rotate the steering wheel to the right or left
and to stop, you press the brake pedal. All this was quite
difficult when you first learned to drive but its easy now.
Interviewing: How to Stay Out of legal Hot Water
Some interviewers ask great questions; others ask dumb questions; and, worst of all, some ask questions that can get them into legal hot water.
Problem-Solving Success Tip: Measure the Right Things.
Measure the right things.
It's not enough just to measure-you have to measure the right things.
To Meet or Not to Meet - What are the Questions?
Meetings can be a total waste of time or a powerful and productive communication tool that solve problems, stimulate ideas, promote team spirit and generate action. The results lie totally in how they are run. Organized and well-managed meetings will inevitably produce effective results. Whereas, meetings that are poorly managed lack purpose and focus are a total waste of an organization's time and money.
Pitching to Employees
The senior flight attendant on the WestJet flight was starting the routine safety talk: the bit about flotation vests and emergency exits that we ignore at the beginning of every flight.
|