Archive for the ‘Dan’s Rants’ Category

Last Sunday I was sitting in church thinking about network marketing.  (I know, it was wrong in so many ways.) I was thinking about the concept of duplication. Most Network Marketing companies teach duplication.  It is the concept that explaining your business must be so easy that an eight year old can do it. You may be the worlds greatest salesperson, and sponsor all kinds of people into your business. Yet, if those people are not able to do what you do, then your organization will never learn it themselves and your organization will be very shallow. I know duplication is so important in my company,  SendOutCards that I have taught it to my 10 year old granddaughter.

The lesson in church that made me think about duplication was around the discussion of Christ being crucified on the cross. I thought, he could have easily split the skies open, made the earth to shake and turned all the Roman soldiers to dust. He was the same Christ who calmed the roaring seas and healed the sick. Yet, maybe the reason he died on the cross was because of duplication. He knew that we would have a hard time with that earthquake thing and He wanted to show us that we all could do exactly as he did, die and rise again. Thus, duplication. I got the message, how about you?

The Dunce Hat has to go to McDonalds. For the past 10 years since presenting customer service programs, I have been keeping track of how many times my order is wrong when going through a drive-thru at a fast food restaurant.  You know the ones I mean – where you pull forward and wait when you just ordered 2 hamburgers and a fry. The current percentage is 68 percent of the time, something is wrong with my order.

I still have the hamburger where they forgot the meat. (Amazing thing is that it looks the same 6 years later. Not a speck of mold.)  My wife doesn’t like cheese, so when I say no cheese, all those speaker boxes must transmit is “Cheese.”  With all my grandkids, my orders are usually rather large, but I still pull over and lay everything out on the seat and check it all. I’ve learned to dread those words uttered in an insincere manner,  after going 3 miles back, “Sorry about that.”

I include Arby’s, Wendy’s,  KFC, Hardee’s, Fazoli’s in my calculation along with McDonalds.. The error figure has never dropped below 50%. None has ever been 100% right. McDonald’s scores the worst. At one time McDonalds put a sticker on the bag that said,  “Double checked for accuracy.” That lasted about 6 weeks and then disappeared.

It’s amazing that we still go back to a business that screws up 68% of the time. Glad it’s not my bank or airline!

Your thoughts?

Today at the grocery store, the cashier asked, “Did you find everything OK?” My response was that I had several problems finding everything. All she said was “Oh” and continued checking me out. She never brought up the topic again and was probably sorry she ever asked the question. She was simply repeating a matra that she probably learned in her training rather than a sincere interest in me as her customer.

She could have easily offered an apology followed by a solution for the next time I visit the store. The old sales technique of Feel, Felt Found could have been used. “I’m really sorry you had a problem. I know how you feel. I felt the same way before I came to work here. What I found was the more I visited the store, the easier it became to blah, blah, blah.”

What you say isn’t near as imortant as the fact that you are listening and communicating with a customer.

What do you think?

“Decide that you want it more than you are afraid of it.” Bill Cosby

The question that I am most asked is, “How do you overcome the fear of speaking to a group?” In the early days, I did experience everything from shaky legs to cotton mouth, but today I don’t feel any jitters, even if I’m speaking in front of several hundred people. I have completely conquered that fear and in fact, when I’m waiting to be introduced, I can’t wait to get on the stage.

I learned a valuable lesson from an unknown speaker in my past. She said she always put a post-it note on the lectern that said: “Remember, it’s not about you!” I truly believe fear comes from focusing on yourself and not on your audience. Become excited about what great wisdom you have to give your audience and not focused on how your hair looks or will I remember everything. Be excited about carrying on a conversation with your audience.

I once gave a speech to 200 women with my zipper wide open. No lectern to hide behind to correct the situation either. Once you have had an experience like that, nothing should be fearful!
There could probably be a book written about all the strange things that have happened during my speeches. Experience helps alleviate fear.

Place your focus in the right place and watch the fear disappear.

Have you ever noticed that the word “great” can have two meanings? When you ask someone how their business is doing, they will answer you “great” meaning –
1. Business is really good. Products are selling and the money is rolling in. I hope that’s the case for you. Or they say, “great” which means that -
2. Business really sucks. I’m not selling much product, I can’t continue like this and my employees are out of control. Many business owners have read in a business book that if you say “great” long enough, it will really come true.

As a business Coach and Consultant, my follow-up question whenever I hear the second “great” and interpret it as meaning “poor” I ask, would you like some help fixing the problems? As brilliant as we all think we are, everyone needs help at some point in their business. Have you ever got your car stuck in the mud or snow and tried to get it out yourself. It can be practically impossible until someone comes along and gives you that extra push.

The word “Coach” also has several meanings like “Brainstorming, tough questions, experience, knowledge, accountability, caring, systems for success and in some cases, a shoulder to cry on.”

If your “great” means the latter, maybe it’s time to look for help. If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got!

Not you, my readers, but a guy I met yesterday. He was with a network marketing company that helps you buy things cheaper on the internet after joining his organization. He asked me this question after just meeting me. “Would you be opposed to earning over 6 figures a year?” Although I didn’t say it. I thought, are you an idiot?

First of all, that question belittled me by assuming that I don’t already make over 6 figures a year. Second, it assumed that I am money motivated. Many who know me realize that I drive an older car, have lived in the same house for over 30 years and the least of my worries is monetary. Third, anyone answering that question any way but affirmative would seem like an idiot themselves. People who start conversations with questions like that, in my opinion, give network marketers a bad name. They don’t take the time to understand the person or their “why” as my friend Bill Hartman pointed out as we discussed this over breakfast.

We all have our “why.” Mine is family and my 6 kids and 18 grandkids. Mine is my wife of 43 years and our lifestyle together. Mine is personal development. Mine is helping others build their businesses and seeing others succeed. If you want to hit my hot button, talk about my “why.” Don’t ask me a stupid question about making 6 figures when you have never made over $50,000 a year in your life. What is your “why?” Are you taking the time to learn about other people’s “why?”

When I owned a Printing Company we decided to have a sale. I knew that offering a 10% discount wouldn’t mean much to our customers. I knew I could buy 2 liters of Pepsi and Coke for $1.00. I offered my customers one 2-liter bottle for every $10. they spent in the store. I piled Coke, Pepsi, Diet and Sprite high along one wall of the lobby to attract attention. I called and sent postcards to my current clients as this gave me a reason to call them and tell them about the sale.

Here’s what happened. For a $50. business card order, they would carry out 5 of the 2 Liter bottles. Since the bottles are bulky, the perceived value is large. One secretary brought in a $500 dollar order and I helped her carry out 50 bottles of soda. It filled her front seat, back seat and trunk. She said she gave it away to co-workers and friends and put the rest in her garage. That was more soda than she had ever had in her life! You can imagine the impact that it had. She certainly told everyone about her treasure! Word spread and we were swamped.

We went through a lot of Pepsi and Coke during that promotion. Funny thing was that I tried to buy it direct, but it cost more through the companies so we bought it at any store that had a promotion. Great thing was, it didn’t cost us a dime more than if we gave an insignificant 10% discount. We ran the promo several more times and it always worked.

A friend recently asked about an LLC versus a sole proprietorship. Over the past 10 years I have coached hundreds of entrepreneurs who were starting a business or whose sales seemed “stuck.”   In so many cases,  I’ve noticed that this question comes up way too early in the planning stages. Another question is about bookkeeping when there is nothing to book-keep. All of these details are important, but not nearly as important as the big question, who will buy my product or service?

You can have the most unique, high quality, priced-right product or service but unless you know who will reach in their checkbook and write you a check, it’s my opinion that everything else is immaterial until that question is answered.

Those letters of Inc. or LLC will not make one sale for you.  So if you’re bothered by the trivial details of setting up a business, focus on the elephant in the room, sales and marketing and the rest will come easy!

in the recent Snowmaggedon that hit the Northeast, the Washington Post reported what happened when a lone employee braved the blizzard to get to his job at Safeway, only to discover he was the only one who showed up for work. Safeway has a policy that there have to be at least two employee in a store, so he left — and forgot to lock the door. That day, ten customers trudged through the snow to get groceries only to find the Safeway untended. What did they do? Help themselves and run? No. They took what they needed and left cash and IOUs.

Guess there’s still a lot of good people out there!

This ad recently appeared on my FaceBook page: