Have you ever had the experience of driving along, paying attention to something off in the horizon and next thing you know, you’ve driven to that spot?  And it wasn’t where you meant to go?

The same phenomenon can happen in your business.  Most business owners I met pay a lot of attention to what their competition is doing.  We definitely need to keep an eye on the competitive  landscape.  But there’s a very fine line.

The danger in keeping track of the other guys is that you lose track of your own path.  We tend to move towards what we pay attention to.  And you don’t want to let your competitors determine your marketing strategy.  That’s a quick way to:

• Deplete your resources
• Look like you’re playing the “us too” game
• Lose the momentum of your key messages

You want to be the leader in your industry, not follow someone else.  The best way to beat your competition isn’t watching what they do.  It’s doing what you should be doing.

If you have and follow a marketing plan — you can enjoy the best of both worlds.  The marketing plan keeps you on your course.  Heading in the direction you have determined.  When you know where you’re headed and keep checking the map to see that you’re on course, you can afford to peek at what the competitors are doing.

Just make sure you’re following your course, not theirs.

There are many ways to deliver a marketing message. One that is often overlooked or erroneously dismissed as being too expensive is producing a video. YouTube has changed some perceptions in that arena but not so much in the marketing field.

In reality, the return on the investment can be significant, even if you get a top notch professional to shoot your video. Some of the advantages are:

~ Delivers the intimacy of extended one-to-one communication.

~ Compared to TV ads, non-interruptive.

~ Allows three-dimensional views of products, show a product in use or a service provider in action.

~ With music, action and color, generates emotional impact.

~ Can bring your employees and their passion for your business to life.

~ Can be combined with CD, DVD, or streaming video technology to translate to an easy direct mail piece or web page content.

~ Is a powerful storytelling medium.

Wondering where you can use your video? Your lobby. Your website. Your e-mail campaign. Your annual meeting. Staff recruitment. New business pitches. And that’s just the beginning.

First, let’s establish this truth. We are all sales people.

I don’t care if you are an engineer, a 3rd grade teacher, a social worker or a copier saleswoman. You are in sales.

Every single one of us needs to sell someone on something. It might be getting your boss to agree to closing the shop early on Fridays or getting your students to study over a week’s time rather than cramming the night before. Or it could be getting a prospect to give your copier a spin for 30 days.

So how do you sell? Where do you start? What questions do you ask yourself?

Whose bottom line do you worry about first? Yours or the customer’s?

Jill Konrath, author of Selling to Big Companies, wrote an excellent article on this point. She suggests that most sales people typically ask questions like:

“What do I need to convince them that we’re the best?”

She goes on to say that questions that are about selling TO a prospect won’t get you there. The real trick to successful sales is actually selling FOR your prospect. Ask yourself questions like:

“What can I (my company’s product) do to contribute to my customer’s success?”

When you worry about your prospect’s bottom line…it will take care of yours.

BONUS: Are you a smart, savvy woman who sells? Check out the Sales Shebang Conference. Just a quick drive to Minneapolis on September 23-24 and you can enjoy presenters like Konrath and many more.

You don’t have to spend $2 million dollars on a Super Bowl commercial to have a creative ad that grabs people’s attention. What are some keys to having something that breaks through the clutter?

Try these 5 rules:

1. Surprise your audience. Do something they don’t expect.
2. Make sure it is relevant. Funny for funny sake doesn’t sell more product. Remember your end game.
3. No inside jokes. Everyone should get it.
4. Different medium = different funny. You can be more esoteric in print ads because your audience has time to figure it out. Outdoor — they have about 5 seconds, so get to it quick.
5. Clever funny always wins over mock someone funny.

Because of this medium, my examples are visually creative. But remember, you can create the same effect with words too.

IowaBiz had an excellent post about how as a business owner, it can be incredibly frustrating when your employees always want a little more. Victor went on to suggest some ways that you can help your employees understand the investment you make in them.

What a perfect segue to what I wanted to talk about today.

Want to know how to create a workforce that appreciates you and all you do for them? Appreciate them first. It doesn’t have to be big bonuses or fancy prizes or trips. Most small businesses can’t afford that sort of lavish reward. So unfortunately, most of them decide to do nothing.

Wrong choice.

As long as it is sincere, making the gesture matters more than the monetary value of the gesture. Case in point:

Our building had an air conditioner and furnace go down a while back. Yes, when it was 90 degrees every day. The office itself wasn’t 90 degrees though. It cooled down to a balmy 87 degrees, if we had the fans going. Because we’d had a week of record temperature days, all the A/C companies were swamped.

And our job wasn’t a small one. We’re talking a crane to get the A/C unit on the building etc. So, it took almost two weeks from the day the A/C went down until it was bearable in our office.

And my team didn’t complain. Not once. They made sure the servers etc. were first in line for the fans, so we wouldn’t fry a computer. They tried to figure out how to stay cool and still get the job done.

As the boss, I felt that they needed to know how much I appreciated their attitude during the heat wave. So I went to Dairy Queen and got everyone a $25 gift certificate with a note that said “thanks for keeping your cool!” Then, I went to Target and bought some silly sucker fans. At our staff meeting, everyone walked into the conference room to find a fan/DQ gift card at each place.

For about $30 I said thank you in a way that demonstrated that I had given some thought to how much I appreciated their efforts and wanted to do something special.

How are you doing on saying thank you? And what is it costing you if you don’t?