Successful people are willing to do things that unsuccessful people are not willing to do.
If you are a baseball fan or even if you are not, you would probably agree that the New York Yankees has been the most successful baseball team in history.
They have won many American League championships and the World Series more times than any team in history. It is funny that they call it the World Series, since it takes place only in the United States, but that is another story.
On the other hand, Soccer has a real world series since every country in the world can participate. Spain won the cup fair and square and the players must be very proud to have done so. They are really the world champions.
Anyway, talking about the NY Yankees, the catcher for that team is Jorge Rafael de Posada, re-named by the Yankees as Jorge Posada. (They said for publicity purposes, it was much easier to pronounce and write). Jorge is my cousin. In fact he and I are the last Posada’s in our family line.
Luckily his first born was a boy, second child a girl and I have had two girls so the name has a chance to continue because of that boy although I haven’t given up yet.
When Jorge was much younger, Jorge Luis, his father, asked him if he wanted to make it to the big leagues. Jorge Luis is a scout for the Colorado Rockies and very knowledgeable about baseball.
Jorge replied, “Yes, Dad, I want to make it to the big leagues” “Well” said Jorge Luis, then you have to be a catcher”. Jorge was a second baseman and he liked that position. Jorge Luis explained that he had a better chance as a catcher because of his strong legs, his strong arm and in addition, he can hit a baseball. But he wasn’t fast enough to play the infield.
He started learning the position and working very hard to develop the skills necessary to reach the big leagues.
Another day, Jorge Luis asked his son if he still wanted to go to the Major Leagues and he said yes. “Well then, you need to star batting left handed”. Jorge said, “Dad, I am right handed”. “Well, if you want to make it to the big leagues you must be a switch hitter, bat left and right”. “OK, Dad, I will do it” said Jorge.
The kid started batting left handed and he struck out sixteen times in a row (his Dad told me he struck out 19 times in a row but for sure at least sixteen) until he had a hit.
In 1998 Jorge batted 19 homeruns and 17 were left handed. In the year 2,000, he hit a home run from the left and from the right and in that same game Bernie Williams did the same thing making it the first time in history that two players from the same team have done that. That year he hit 28 homeruns. In 2,001 he hit 22 home runs and signed a very hefty well deserved multimillion contract. It seems signing that contract did him some good psychologically, since he hit 30 home runs in 2003 establishing a record for all the catchers of the New York Yankees, tied with Yogi Berra.
He is the only Major League catcher to ever have hit .330 or better with 40 doubles, 20 home runs, and 90 RBIs in a single season. Since 2000, my cousin had more runs batted in, home runs and hits than any other catcher in baseball.
Why has Jorge Posada been so successful? Because he was willing to do things that unsuccessful players were not willing to do.
An excellent basketball example about willing to do what others are not willing to so, is Larry Bird. I have done psychological work for three teams, The Milwaukee Bucks, the Los Angeles Lakers and most recently the New Jersey Nets. I have seen great efforts by basketball players but
Larry’s example is very present in my mind. He was willing to study every inch of the basketball court to find imperfections and not lose the ball by bouncing it in that area. He also noticed marks in the court so that he could be facing away from the basket and knows exactly how many feet to the basket. He could then jump without looking at the basket and turn around in the air and take a shot without much possibility to be blocked. He would then take 300 foul shots for practice.
He was willing to do things that unsuccessful basketball players were not willing to do.
No matter what you do in life, if you want to be successful, you need to do what others are not willing to do.
When Domino’s pizza wanted to be successful, they did something that others were not willing to do, deliver a pizza in 30 minutes or your didn’t have to pay for it.
If you have a business, you need to know what your customers want and then give it to them. You will find that many of your competitors are not doing that and you will obtain a competitive advantage.
What a simple principle, do what others are not willing to do, and yet not many put it into practice.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
The importance of being different and communicating it to the customer
The importance of being different and communicating it to the customer.
Let’s say that you need to paint your car. Puerto Rico is an island so lots of people live very close to the beach and as you all know, salt is the enemy of metal and many cars show the rust that affects the car. You go to the yellow pages or to the internet to look for a reputable body shop with a good offer and lo and behold, what would you find?
There are more than 200 body shops in Puerto Rico more or less. You start looking for ads that attract you, ads that convince you that you should give that body shop a try and you don’t find any that stands out. They all say things such as “ We are here to serve you”, “we do all kinds of body work”, “computerized estimates”, “Chassis specialists”, “Fair Prices” “oven painting”, “we deal with insurance companies”, etc. etc. etc. In summary, all the ads look alike and there is little differentiation, which is the reason why
I am writing this column on marketing.
First of all, everyone must realize that 200 body shops mean that there are more body shops than we need. If divine justice worked perfectly, and all the cars involved in accidents were divided into all the body shops in the island, we know that they couldn’t survive. So, for any body shop to survive, it needs to take business away from other body shops.
I bet that if we did a study, the Paretto principle would work in this situation. For those of you that don’t know the Paretto principle or have forgotten about it, it is also called the 80/20 principle. It says that 20% of all the body shops in Puerto Rico do 80% of the repair business. It says that 80% of all the accidents are caused by 20% of the drivers. 80% of all the sales in a company are sold by 20% of the salesmen and the other 20% of the sales are sold by 80% of the salespeople. 20% of the people commit 80% of all crimes. This principle has stood the test of times and it is amazing, even uncanny, how it works.
The challenge for every repair shop in Puerto Rico is to become part of the 20% that will do 80% of the business because if it doesn’t become a part of this elite group, it will go out of business. We can also say that in five years, only one out of five body shops in business today will still be in business.
What can a body shop or for that matter, any other types of business do to become one of the successful ones? This is not an easy question and the answer is quite long and complex. We can ramble out some answers right here: Offer great service, do quality work, be well capitalized, be well managed, have good marketing etc. In this article, I want to concentrate on one aspect of marketing, one that is very important for businesses to understand no matter what field that business is in.
I am referring to the Unique Selling Benefit or the Unique Selling Proposition as it is also called.
The ads I looked at in the Yellow Pages didn’t convey a unique selling benefit in most of them.
What is a USB? A unique selling benefit is that distinct, appealing idea that sets your business apart from every other competitor in your marketplace.
Pay attention to this, your entire marketing and operational success should be built upon your Unique Selling Benefit.
Your USB may touch any part of the marketing mix—price, service, quality, or even uniqueness. But it must be very clear to the client what your USB is. Most businesses don’t understand this concept.
There are many examples of USB’s. Let me share a few with you so that you may get an idea of what your own USB might be.
Some companies position themselves as having the best selection or the broadest range of buying options. Their USB is “ Broad Choice”
Other companies do not have as many options but their USB is “lowest prices” or “lowest mark up”.
Other companies may decide they don’t want to be known for just price or range of options, so instead they offer excellent quality at a higher, but reasonable price. Quality or exclusivity—even snob appeal—is its USB.
Still, another company may offer a product at average prices but their distinct selling appeal is that they offer an excellent service or a super guarantee.
The possibilities for building a USB are unlimited. A business, though, should communicate a USB that addresses an obvious void in the marketplace that you can fill and fill very effectively. Be very careful, though: It is a big mistake to adopt a USB if you can’t fulfill the promise.
I would like to describe a curious situation. When you ask a business owner to articulate clearly and concisely in one paragraph or less, his or her USB most business owners have no answer.
A few years ago I met with some executives from a well known super market chain and I asked the President if he knew what his USB was and that if I asked the other two executives in the meeting, would they have the same answer. He said that he was positive that all three would have the same answer. I proceeded to take three pieces of paper and I gave one to each and told them to write it down. They did and when we looked at the answers, they gave three different answers. The President was flabbergasted and couldn’t believe his eyes. I was hired by the way to work with the company.
Why did this happen? Because they had never thought through or analyzed what their real strengths are in the market.
Most businesses have no USB’s, only a “me too” spine less, nondescript, business that feeds solely upon the momentum of the marketplace. There is nothing unique, there is nothing distinct. They promise no great value, benefit, or service---just “buy from us” for no justifiable reason.
Let me suggest a worthwhile exercise for your employees. Ask them what your company’s USB is and you will be surprised by their answers.
Let’s say that you need to paint your car. Puerto Rico is an island so lots of people live very close to the beach and as you all know, salt is the enemy of metal and many cars show the rust that affects the car. You go to the yellow pages or to the internet to look for a reputable body shop with a good offer and lo and behold, what would you find?
There are more than 200 body shops in Puerto Rico more or less. You start looking for ads that attract you, ads that convince you that you should give that body shop a try and you don’t find any that stands out. They all say things such as “ We are here to serve you”, “we do all kinds of body work”, “computerized estimates”, “Chassis specialists”, “Fair Prices” “oven painting”, “we deal with insurance companies”, etc. etc. etc. In summary, all the ads look alike and there is little differentiation, which is the reason why
I am writing this column on marketing.
First of all, everyone must realize that 200 body shops mean that there are more body shops than we need. If divine justice worked perfectly, and all the cars involved in accidents were divided into all the body shops in the island, we know that they couldn’t survive. So, for any body shop to survive, it needs to take business away from other body shops.
I bet that if we did a study, the Paretto principle would work in this situation. For those of you that don’t know the Paretto principle or have forgotten about it, it is also called the 80/20 principle. It says that 20% of all the body shops in Puerto Rico do 80% of the repair business. It says that 80% of all the accidents are caused by 20% of the drivers. 80% of all the sales in a company are sold by 20% of the salesmen and the other 20% of the sales are sold by 80% of the salespeople. 20% of the people commit 80% of all crimes. This principle has stood the test of times and it is amazing, even uncanny, how it works.
The challenge for every repair shop in Puerto Rico is to become part of the 20% that will do 80% of the business because if it doesn’t become a part of this elite group, it will go out of business. We can also say that in five years, only one out of five body shops in business today will still be in business.
What can a body shop or for that matter, any other types of business do to become one of the successful ones? This is not an easy question and the answer is quite long and complex. We can ramble out some answers right here: Offer great service, do quality work, be well capitalized, be well managed, have good marketing etc. In this article, I want to concentrate on one aspect of marketing, one that is very important for businesses to understand no matter what field that business is in.
I am referring to the Unique Selling Benefit or the Unique Selling Proposition as it is also called.
The ads I looked at in the Yellow Pages didn’t convey a unique selling benefit in most of them.
What is a USB? A unique selling benefit is that distinct, appealing idea that sets your business apart from every other competitor in your marketplace.
Pay attention to this, your entire marketing and operational success should be built upon your Unique Selling Benefit.
Your USB may touch any part of the marketing mix—price, service, quality, or even uniqueness. But it must be very clear to the client what your USB is. Most businesses don’t understand this concept.
There are many examples of USB’s. Let me share a few with you so that you may get an idea of what your own USB might be.
Some companies position themselves as having the best selection or the broadest range of buying options. Their USB is “ Broad Choice”
Other companies do not have as many options but their USB is “lowest prices” or “lowest mark up”.
Other companies may decide they don’t want to be known for just price or range of options, so instead they offer excellent quality at a higher, but reasonable price. Quality or exclusivity—even snob appeal—is its USB.
Still, another company may offer a product at average prices but their distinct selling appeal is that they offer an excellent service or a super guarantee.
The possibilities for building a USB are unlimited. A business, though, should communicate a USB that addresses an obvious void in the marketplace that you can fill and fill very effectively. Be very careful, though: It is a big mistake to adopt a USB if you can’t fulfill the promise.
I would like to describe a curious situation. When you ask a business owner to articulate clearly and concisely in one paragraph or less, his or her USB most business owners have no answer.
A few years ago I met with some executives from a well known super market chain and I asked the President if he knew what his USB was and that if I asked the other two executives in the meeting, would they have the same answer. He said that he was positive that all three would have the same answer. I proceeded to take three pieces of paper and I gave one to each and told them to write it down. They did and when we looked at the answers, they gave three different answers. The President was flabbergasted and couldn’t believe his eyes. I was hired by the way to work with the company.
Why did this happen? Because they had never thought through or analyzed what their real strengths are in the market.
Most businesses have no USB’s, only a “me too” spine less, nondescript, business that feeds solely upon the momentum of the marketplace. There is nothing unique, there is nothing distinct. They promise no great value, benefit, or service---just “buy from us” for no justifiable reason.
Let me suggest a worthwhile exercise for your employees. Ask them what your company’s USB is and you will be surprised by their answers.
The different perceptual realities we all hold
The Different Perceptual Realities we all hold
In the eighteen hundreds there was a poet named John G. Saxe who wrote about six men in a village named Indostan “to learning much inclined, who went to see the Elephant (though all of them were blind), that each by observation might satisfy his mind”.
Any reader that is familiar with that poem will remember that the first blind man felt the broad side of the animal and described the elephant “to be like a wall.” The second gentleman, feeling the elephant’s tusk, was very surprised: “Did you say that it is like a wall? I can’t believe it, it is more like a spear! The third blind man, grappling with the elephant’s squirming trunk, said, “Wall? Spear? That elephant is more like a snake!” The fourth man, touching the elephant’s knees, said “Stupids! The elephant is like a strong tree!” The fifth gentleman, feeling the ear, said “Have you all gone mad? An elephant is like a fan!” The sixth man, feeling the elephant’s tail, said, “Any chump can see that an elephant is thin as a rope.”
If we analyze each man’s answer perceptually, we must conclude that all of them are right. I mention this anecdote in this article because most efforts to persuade human beings are no more than one blind person asking another blind person to “see or perceive” the elephant as he or she does.
Have you ever considered that your friends, your bosses, coworkers, customers and your politicians live in their own personal perceptual realities?
Wouldn’t it make more sense to instead of expecting them all to see the elephant as you do, why not make an attempt to see what they are seeing? If you persevere and make an honest effort, you might be able to see enough parts of the elephant from different perspectives so as to have a much better chance at understanding the reality of the situation and finally make sense of it all.
Doing this is applying a very wise principle, “seek to understand and then be understood”, one of the seven habits my friend Stephen Covey wrote about.
Human beings must someday understand that most of the truths we adhere to depend greatly on our point of view, on our paradigms, on how we interpret reality.
Right now the Israeli government is battling a problem of perception because they boarded a ship that was supposed to take food and supplies to people in Gaza and they were attacked with sticks and knives. Many people were hurt and about ten died. The Israelis say that the ship belongs to a terrorist organization and that it was within their right to board the ship and the occupants of the ship didn’t want that to happen. The world press perceives that it was an unjustified attack, so unless the Israelis are able to prove their point, they will be in serious trouble. Sometimes, even if you prove a point, the perception still remains and you are also in trouble, especially since for reasons that are not within the scope of this article, the world press is against you.
Right now, there is a strike at the University of Puerto Rico. That strike is affecting thousands of students that want to go to the University to study and advance their lives. Both sides must understand each other or we will get nowhere.
We have serious problems in P.R and because of these disagreements, nothing is getting done. Is our government going through difficult times? Shouldn’t the budget be balanced? Should the government reduce working hours from the employees or should they be fire more of them? Why is the cost of water and electricity so high? Why hasn’t our economy grown some more? What should we do about it?
All of our leaders have different points of view, different ideas on what to do and how to do it. Could it be that they are all blind and they are seeing different parts of the elephant?
There is an old legend I read about in a magazine many years ago about a tribe that was always at war with other tribes. They murdered, raped and stole. They had no morals, love or compassion. Sooner or later they were all going to kill each other.
An alarmed old man called together the few reasonable members of all the tribes to try to save the violent natives from themselves. After much discussion the reasonable members decided to take the secret of success and happiness away from those who abused it and hide it from them. But where should the secret be hidden? Some suggested it be buried inside the earth. Others said to hide it on top of Mount Everest. Still, others suggested it be sunk in the deepest ocean. There was no agreement until the wise elder who had called the meeting made a suggestion:
“Let us hide the secret within the people themselves”, he said. “People like this will never find it there.”
To this day, all over the world, all over Puerto Rico people have been persistently pursuing success and happiness, searching for the secret. Very few indeed, have found its hiding place—within themselves.
In the eighteen hundreds there was a poet named John G. Saxe who wrote about six men in a village named Indostan “to learning much inclined, who went to see the Elephant (though all of them were blind), that each by observation might satisfy his mind”.
Any reader that is familiar with that poem will remember that the first blind man felt the broad side of the animal and described the elephant “to be like a wall.” The second gentleman, feeling the elephant’s tusk, was very surprised: “Did you say that it is like a wall? I can’t believe it, it is more like a spear! The third blind man, grappling with the elephant’s squirming trunk, said, “Wall? Spear? That elephant is more like a snake!” The fourth man, touching the elephant’s knees, said “Stupids! The elephant is like a strong tree!” The fifth gentleman, feeling the ear, said “Have you all gone mad? An elephant is like a fan!” The sixth man, feeling the elephant’s tail, said, “Any chump can see that an elephant is thin as a rope.”
If we analyze each man’s answer perceptually, we must conclude that all of them are right. I mention this anecdote in this article because most efforts to persuade human beings are no more than one blind person asking another blind person to “see or perceive” the elephant as he or she does.
Have you ever considered that your friends, your bosses, coworkers, customers and your politicians live in their own personal perceptual realities?
Wouldn’t it make more sense to instead of expecting them all to see the elephant as you do, why not make an attempt to see what they are seeing? If you persevere and make an honest effort, you might be able to see enough parts of the elephant from different perspectives so as to have a much better chance at understanding the reality of the situation and finally make sense of it all.
Doing this is applying a very wise principle, “seek to understand and then be understood”, one of the seven habits my friend Stephen Covey wrote about.
Human beings must someday understand that most of the truths we adhere to depend greatly on our point of view, on our paradigms, on how we interpret reality.
Right now the Israeli government is battling a problem of perception because they boarded a ship that was supposed to take food and supplies to people in Gaza and they were attacked with sticks and knives. Many people were hurt and about ten died. The Israelis say that the ship belongs to a terrorist organization and that it was within their right to board the ship and the occupants of the ship didn’t want that to happen. The world press perceives that it was an unjustified attack, so unless the Israelis are able to prove their point, they will be in serious trouble. Sometimes, even if you prove a point, the perception still remains and you are also in trouble, especially since for reasons that are not within the scope of this article, the world press is against you.
Right now, there is a strike at the University of Puerto Rico. That strike is affecting thousands of students that want to go to the University to study and advance their lives. Both sides must understand each other or we will get nowhere.
We have serious problems in P.R and because of these disagreements, nothing is getting done. Is our government going through difficult times? Shouldn’t the budget be balanced? Should the government reduce working hours from the employees or should they be fire more of them? Why is the cost of water and electricity so high? Why hasn’t our economy grown some more? What should we do about it?
All of our leaders have different points of view, different ideas on what to do and how to do it. Could it be that they are all blind and they are seeing different parts of the elephant?
There is an old legend I read about in a magazine many years ago about a tribe that was always at war with other tribes. They murdered, raped and stole. They had no morals, love or compassion. Sooner or later they were all going to kill each other.
An alarmed old man called together the few reasonable members of all the tribes to try to save the violent natives from themselves. After much discussion the reasonable members decided to take the secret of success and happiness away from those who abused it and hide it from them. But where should the secret be hidden? Some suggested it be buried inside the earth. Others said to hide it on top of Mount Everest. Still, others suggested it be sunk in the deepest ocean. There was no agreement until the wise elder who had called the meeting made a suggestion:
“Let us hide the secret within the people themselves”, he said. “People like this will never find it there.”
To this day, all over the world, all over Puerto Rico people have been persistently pursuing success and happiness, searching for the secret. Very few indeed, have found its hiding place—within themselves.
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