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Casting a NET that WORKS
Having the right people on the team is the key to winning.
Having the right people on the team is the key to winning.
In 1985, the Big East conference in the NCAA featured the best teams in the country. Georgetown was the favorite to win the college basketball championship. They lost to the lowest seeded team in the tournament of 64 college basketball programs.
How could this happen? Georgetown seemed to have the better players. What went wrong? Nothing! Villanova, a small Pennsylvania college had the perfect players for their program to defeat the mighty Hoyas.
Small business owners need to take a page out of the Villanova book. They sometimes cry about the big companies dominating the world of business. Use the Wildcats strategy of just getting the right people on your team. Don’t worry about your competition. Play your best game with your players!
March Madness: From Basketball to Business
March Madness
From Basketball to Business
Striving for Greatness! The Best of the Best.
March Madness is a compilation of the best college basketball teams in the world. Some teams are looking to play Cinderella and win their first championship ever. Other teams expect to be in the championship every year. These teams prepare, perform and propel to greatness.
Some businesses are ok with the occasional championship win. These same companies struggle to stay in business because they cannot generate constant cash flow. They don’t prepare, perform and propel to greatness.
Prepare: Great teams prepare by practicing behaviors of greatness! Basketball teams that practice teamwork on offense and defense a habit typically win multiple championships. Companies that develop a team with a habit of focusing on the customer as a rule generate constant cash flow because the customer knows what to expect at all times.
Perform: The best college basketball teams perform without thinking about what they are doing. The preparation has created a culture of winning and an expectation of teamwork. No one wants to be the person who lets the team down. Small businesses need to create this type of culture to have employees perform without thinking.
Propel: Achieving true greatness requires a lot of sacrifice and hard work. Don’t get me wrong every college team makes sacrifices and they work hard. The perennial champions take it to another level. They seem to be a step faster than their competition. This is what business owners need to strive for when competing in business.
Are you ok with your company being one of the best? Or, are you striving for greatness to be the best of the best?
The Wooden Effect
The Wooden Effect. It’s about your character!
Be more concerned with your character than with your reputation. Your character is what you really are while your reputation is merely what others think you are.
John Wooden, Hall of Fame College Basketball Coaching Legend
John Wooden is considered the best college basketball coach ever. It’s hard to dispute his record of ten NCAA national championships in a 12-year period, including seven in a row. No other coach has done this.
Wooden stated that he developed a character (brand) for the UCLA Bruins that players had to respect, follow and defend.
Imagine if a small business had this type of success. The best brands in the world develop a character (brand) for their business that people respect, follow and defend.
In order to imitate this success small business owners must start with three basic steps.
- Understand who you are. The UCLA Bruins clearly understood who they were in college basketball. Coach John Wooden ensured that they played basketball displaying the characteristics of the Bruin brand. Small businesses should not compromise their character. But first they need to know what that character is.
- Who are you serving? The Bruins knew that they were there to help the college to be successful, not only in sports, but overall. Wooden demanded that his players represented the UCLA brand with pride, dignity and respect. Many of his players went on to be great professionals in the NBA. The college is still benefitting from the great tradition developed by Wooden’s teams. If small business owners can understand their purpose, then they will undoubtedly achieve long term success.
- Know your market. Los Angeles is a high profile city with great expectations. Wooden knew that he needed to prepare his players and his coaches for these extreme circumstances. Small business owners ignore the market conditions because they fail to do research. If you understand the environment for your business, you will know how to prepare your company on how to deal with them.
Small business owners need to develop a solid character for their company. Success is all how you build great character, not a reputation.
Measuring Marketing Results
Is it science or a guessing game?
In my 30 plus years in marketing I have always heard from non-marketers that it’s hard to measure marketing efforts. In my experience, you cannot begin without setting the expectation for success.
Measuring marketing efforts is extremely easy if your company developed goals and milestones for what a successful campaign looks like. Branding can be measured by setting standards for your company’s culture. It IS a science!
- Set a vision for your company that focuses on solving a problem in the market.
- Develop a mission that makes your vision a reality with a clear direction.
- Create a company culture that brings your vision and mission to the people.
The way that you measure your marketing goals is to align them with your business goals. For example: If you are trying to impact one million customers then your marketing efforts must be aligned to reach at least ten times that amount to get the desired result.
To learn more about measuring your marketing efforts join YOUR Marketing Mentor, Shaundell Newsome inside the Sumnu Solutions Zone!