Creative Agency Secrets

I went to the Blogs And Social Media Forum… and my happy sheet got picked out for the post-event website!

Just read down the blog here from Russell Davies on how the Interesting 2007 day got organised…. and then read the event wiki to see who came.

Wow.  Collaboration to make an event happen with small manageable bits of help from loads of people (and their clients) plus some great attempts to record the day in Flickr, Video and site links…

How good are your questioning skills? 
When taking a brief, you need to be able to ask "open-ended" questions in order to get a deep understanding of the customer or prospective client’s decision making process when hiring.

I found a nice American sales trainer Barry Rhein’s promotional video tha you might like to try for yourself.
He sets a "sales challenge" which describes a classic sales skill set as:

• Information gathering
• Creating customised value
• Relationship building

Try the four steps on his video and see how your questioning skills match up….. it’s a good summary that works in our industry.

Interestingly, Dan Dimmock has just told me he’s left FHD and is off on his own!  Brave move.  But let’s face it, if you are good a biz dev and can generate business leads and convert them, you must be gold dust to a start-up creative team.

Will let you know where he lands…

(more…)

Years ago when I was working for Don Peppers we anticipated the rise of customer-driven businesses who oriented their service offering around direct customer feedback.  It seems that day has arrived for banking.  Check out Umpqua bank in USA.  The ‘bank’ looks more like a bookshop crossed with a coffee shop or a top hotel.

When we say "Welcome to the World’s Greatest Bank," it’s more than an
expression, more than a slogan. It’s our commitment to our customers
and communities, and it’s our commitment to ourselves. It’s the reason
for everything we do.

Whether you’re visiting one of our stores, or visiting us
online, we want to provide you with an environment and a feeling that
you couldn’t match anywhere else. It’s a place where you can find all
the services of a larger bank, while enjoying all the comforts of your
neighborhood store.

some customers will pay more for personal service in a place and manner that is convenient. Others will use internet banking and never speak to a branch.  Today’s business is challenged by technology and ‘old fashioned’ values to provide the means for customers to transact business in whatever manner and time and place of their choosing.

Not really possible for some of us - but definitely acceptable for leading edge companies to try and deliver. 

For example, Mail order  PLUS a retail store. 
I suggested this to a large music retailer in the UK - why not put internet terminals into your shops so customers can buy ‘online’ and have it shipped direct to their homes?  You can choose whether to maintain a price parity of not between these methods of delivery.
Curiously they didn’t want to do this….. and in an industry that has so many price margin challenges, that seems interesting.