June 2018 – Page 2 – Korsell Corporate Consult

IN THE EYES OF A CUSTOMER

June 7, 2018 Published by kccadmin

This is a hypothetical interview conducted with a customer. It is intended to provide first-hand insight into the needs and basic expectations of a customer in order to guide the provision of services. This interview is structured in a generic sense and would prove useful for any startup.

P.S. It is assumed that the basic courtesies have already been exchanged. The interview commences with the main issues brought into perspective.

Interviewer: Why would you buy from a company?

Customer: I usually would buy the things I need from any company, depending on whether it is located close to me or not. In other words, I am more determined to prevent extra costs that may arise from having to transport the commodity or service across a long distance. Nevertheless, I am bound to remain loyal to a company if it affords me the best service, compared to many others who are selling the same thing.

Interviewer: What is the one thing that drives your loyalty?

Customer: I am bound to be loyal to a company that does not only sell to me, but meets my welfare needs. I don’t only need a place to buy from, I need a place that thinks about me as well.

Interviewer: For you, where does your interaction with a company begin and end?

Customer: I should expect a company to reach me through advertisements, by any means possible. If it is a company that does not offer me extra value other than what is sold across board, my interaction with them is as good as dead after I make the exit. If the opposite happens, my interaction with that company has no ends.

Interviewer: What would you call value addition?

Customer: I believe every company exists to solve a particular problem. For me, value addition arises in the Unique Sales Proposition the company adopts. This USP must have me as the focus and should make it impossible for me to not return

Interviewer: Would you consider it necessary for a company to know why you are buying their service or product?

Customer: Absolutely! It is the only condition upon which I would be sure the product or service is cut out to meet my specific need. Otherwise, I may just be fixing square pegs in round holes.

Interviewer: How do you suppose a company would know why you are buying the things you are purchasing at a particular time?

Customer: By communicating with me. The company should talk to me about my needs and communicate the value addition I am getting from their service. By this, they would be in the position to understand why I am making a particular purchase and would be better placed to tailor it to my demand.

Interviewer: Given that you are already buying from someone, what would you want the relationship between the two differing companies to be like?

Customer: Ordinarily, I would expect there should be some competition. It is the only way I would know they are striving to be the best at meeting my needs. In a more definite sense however, I expect they would know where I get my deepest satisfaction from.

Interviewer: is it necessary for a company to know how much money you have to spend?

Customer: In a strict view, yes. But in a stricter view, absolutely yes! The company must be able to predict my purchasing power and spending ability so that there is no embarrassment of the demand and supply chain. What better way to ensure utility of production and purchase than wield some knowledge of how much I can really spend on an item.

Interviewer: What drives your opinion of a company?

Customer: I don’t form an opinion of a company in isolation. It would always arise from a summary of whatever experiences I suffer at their hand.

Interviewer: What is the best gift you would give a company that treats you well?

Customer: My absolute loyalty. My loyalty means I not only buy from you but give people reason to buy from you as well. My recommendations and referrals to family would never cease when a company treats me right.

Interviewer: I thank you for your time.

Customer: It is a pleasure.

Photo Credit: Sustainable Farming Conference’ 17.

A BUSINESS LEADER’S NIGHTMARE

June 6, 2018 (updated June 6, 2018) Published by kccadmin

There is a very special reason for the existence of leadership in every business space. At top glance, leadership provides direction, motivation and guidance for the pursuit of stated objectives. There is a great tendency to lose the focus of the organization and business when there is leadership crisis within the organization. Undeniably, leadership provides a central symbolic figure within which the business organization may find its representation. The business leader has a responsibility of identifying what strategies are best applicable for the enterprise and applying the organization to the best procedures and protocols.

Essentially, the idea of a business leader arises in respect of an identified follower base. The follower base is the vehicle of implementation of the vision of the business leader, akin to the ideals and objectives of the organization. It provides support to the stated goals and in equal measure, steers the activities of the organization towards meeting its targets.

For any business leader, a disloyal staff could mean the end of the business. It frustrates productivity and wears off any incentive to encourage ingenuity, given the fear that it may lead to complete uneventful sabotage.

Shelter Adeti is Executive Secretary at Korsell Corporate Consult. She avers;

“I can deal with a system that does not make me a leader. I would however have a hard time dealing with a system that makes everyone a leader in his or her own right”.

When a business leader has to deal with a staff that is highly skilled and still very unyielding to authority and company structures, it is very necessary to be tactful, compromising when necessary and still unwavering in upholding the values of the organization.

By all means, communicate appropriately the lines and limits that exist in consistence with the company’s organogram. Depending on the form of rebellion you are dealing with, you may not have to compromise on your standards. A business leader has every need to acknowledge his own authority before he expects same from his staff. An assertive leader may come across as authoritative and domineering. Nevertheless, is this ruthlessness not what is needed to crush any rebellion? It is neither brutish nor Machiavellian any more than it is prudent and productive.

Note however that your customers are not your employees. See how to deal with different types of customers and their complaints.

A business leader has to focus attention on several other emerging challenges in the organization. Lay off disloyal staff if you have to, implement sanctions at any cost and make sure there is no room for sabotage and disloyalty. It is the greatest challenge any business leader would have to deal with, especially when it involves a very efficient and skilled staff. Nevertheless, it is important to emphasize a unity of authority from which coordination in the organization would emerge.

The long term effects of such emphatic and drastic resort is a righteous fear that provides peace and serenity within the workspace.

Photo Credit: Google Images

A BUSINESS RISK YOUR START UP NEEDS

June 5, 2018 Published by kccadmin

Ordinarily, before you establish a business, there is a stated statement of problem that exists to be solved. This statement of problem is derived from an assessment of a deficiency in society and a realization of what capabilities your startup has to solve those deficiencies. Essentially, the market value of this proposition becomes the trade off point for your business and that enables your profit making fortunes. As a general rule of thumb, you are required to conduct some market survey to establish the point of convergence between the problem and your solution. This survey is represented in various forms and for varying objectives. A successful market survey would inform the best market practice and product that is consistent with your objectives.

Time has a special way of changing market conditions in your favor and against you in unparalleled similitude. At one point of conducting the survey to determine your market niche, it is possible to realize some factors that would convincingly outline the objectives of your startup. You may discover that consumers are not able to commute in the desired way at particular periods and this could be the focus of your startup, stretching over a long term. Further feasibility studies may show that your preferred solution to the problem is viable and cost effective. After such convictions have been established, your startup may be established, as logical consequence of pursuing this time tested narrative.

In your line of operations however, you must realize that the factors that were initial guarantors of your product’s viability are not constant, relative to time. There is a real risk of being caught behind evolving problems on the same challenge you sought to deal with. If your startup is not better equipped to accommodate the new and emergent problems, you could well be out of business before you even started.

Your startup needs to understand this possibility of change even in the problems it sought to address. Your chances of success are deeply steeped in your startup’s ability to quickly adapt to the changes that emerge from time to time.

At Korsell, we believe in a holistic assessment of business solutions with a futuristic perspective. It is what drives market growth and regulates industrial sustainability

Photo Credit: Bing Images

SALES AND ANOTHER FIVE LETTER HEADACHE

June 4, 2018 (updated June 4, 2018) Published by kccadmin

Sales has come to represent the heart of any profit making enterprise. It is the embodiment of progress and in itself marks a significant tool for assessment of growth. It is also the tiresome part of business; given that it involves translating a product into the most sought after need of the consumer. It requires convincing another individual who may not have any immediate need for the product to realize a sudden need for the very same product. For most sales persons, it is not enough to be diligent in carrying the message across. It is everything to not despair at rejection, the twin company of sales. What would make a business survive is what problem the business exists to solve. That should be the defining moment for any sales person. From this board, trade can be launched, in spite of the seeming headache it is characteristically known for.

There are a number of resources that are viable and efficient in the way they address the headache that typically accompanies sales and trade. At Korsell, we list a five-point solution to making you most competent at the art and most fruitful at the end of your endeavors. There is no point in experiencing the characteristic headache that accompanies sales and trade. When you set goals, identify your prospects, guarantee your qualification, commit to the process and consistently follow up, you are sure bound to meet the full heights in your enterprise as an entrepreneur or a salesperson.

GOALS

Goals are the stated objectives that guide the transaction of any enterprise. It defines the limits you should go to and outlines what your intentions are for plying the particular trade. Most SMEs fault in setting goals for the flawed assumption that there is no measure to the strength of the SME. Contrarily, SMEs that are notably involved in meeting clients with products that translate into sales and establish trade have a heightened need of immediately identifying the goals they want to be associated with. This is to measure their progress. Usually, the goal is defined, relative to the problem that exists to be solved and its bounds extends to the means by which customer satisfaction would be established.

PROSPECTING

There is an important need for a salesperson to note the opportunities for success and failure and where they exist. This is necessary to avoid unfortunate risks that do not translate into assets for the salesperson in the long run. Prospecting opens up the company to identifying potential customers, what their specific needs are, what avenues exist for addressing their specific needs and the risks of failure that equally accompanies the endeavor.

QUALIFYING

Before you set out to commit to sales, be sure it is just what you want to do. Qualifying is an easily negligible resource in the society we are found, given the need to survive with any job offer that is presented, including sales. This is unhealthy and it can permanently leave you disgruntled for life, whenever the options arise for any such commitment in future. Be sure you have an unwavering passion for sales and make that passion a hobby. You would deny yourself the unimaginable headache that has left many frustrated at this very crucial part of a business life.

THE PROCESS

You may adopt different strategies for carrying out sales and trade. Only make it a system and process that works best for you and that identifies with your individual values, goals and aspirations. Having outlined the process you want to adopt, commit to it wholeheartedly and with religious might.

FOLLOW UP

Make sure your customers return to you. Be ruthless with desiring their referrals and continued trade with you. Follow up on the products you sell. Invite them to workshops that are based on the product you are identified with. Keep a calendric note of when they started trade with you and offer discounts on those days. Follow up on the services you sold and be willing to make adjustments when they identify a fault. Keep a golden plate for your customers from which you would serve your best service and refresh them with sustaining desserts.

We believe that sales and trade must not be a hard endeavor for anyone who identifies the passion. It is why we are convinced you can be a great KCC Agent. Contact us for more details and be on the lookout for our upcoming editions of The Executive Table where we share these time tested and foolproof resources with you on how to make your business grow. You would be pleased you did.

Photo: KCC Sustainable Farming Conference, 2017

Month: June 2018