13 posts tagged “entrepreneur”
For a couple of hours yesterday, I had the pleasure of A) a great lunch at Home House, the private member's club in Portman Square London, and B) the pleasure of the company of some of the UK's top marketing minds, in a "lunchtime discussion" about what 'Digital means to "Marketing', chaired by Marketing Week's editor, Mark Choueke.
There were some heavyweight types there - the heads of marketing at Ford & Barclaycard, the Guardian, Unilever (VP Global Comms), Alex Batchelor (Chairman of The Marketing Society, ex Royal Mail) and more - UK heads of business units from Google, journalists from Marketing Week. No agencies were present. I was the sole CEO/Founder/Brand Owner of an FMCG brand. The thrust of the 2 hour discussion over lunch went something like this:
"What does digital mean to marketing in the 21st century (ie, how relevant are we, is what we're doing right, and if it's not, what should we do? What's going on?"
and
"Can (traditional, conventional) agencies (media & creative) be relevant (ie make money) out of digital - note this has been a challenge for media owners - ie NewsCorp, content owners (ie YouTube) and ad agencies (Banner ads? How creatively demeaning! Skyscrapers? You want your ad on YouTube? Urrgghh).
Now, this was quite an interesting lunch for me. Firstly, I'd just finished judging around 50 awards for the 2009 BIMA's - more on this after the Awards are presented - we have a final meeting to vote for the winners shortly). Secondly, I've absolutely (& personally) lived, breathed, embraced, leveraged, globalised, King of Shaves' presence 'ONline' since 1995. Firstly, through buying shave.com. Secondly, since signing up to eBay, YouTube, Amazon - when people still thought the latter was a long South American river. And since 2001, blogging (although it wasn't called that then) about what we're doing with King of Shaves as a brand, attempting to enter into an ONline dialogue with our consumers (as blogging was free, and was globally available, this seemed to make great sense to me). Finally, and more recently, I discovered a start-up called Obvious Corporation in 2006, which owned something called 'Twitter' and now, personally, write a couple of blogs here & here, tweet here and generally (try) to 'keep on top of stuff'.
Simply put, what we come across like online is 99.5% down to me. Because, I'm the person who does it...
So, what was the upshot of the discussion?
Well, it was like this.
Confusion, "unsured-ness" reigned. Digital was viewed as 'difficult', 'disruptive', 'disintermediating', potentially damaging and most importantly, from a (traditional) marketing (& traditional agency) perspective, a real threat. Why? Well, it's because in the old days, 'Marketers made speeches to their grateful buying public via things called TV commercials' and now, people simply aren't eyeballing the TV screen, or if they are, they aren't really bothered about the message (unless it's ground-breakingly, fabulously, funny, creative, thought-provoking or challenging). Most of (today's) commercials, simply put, aren't.
Sure, we like to believe Barack Obama when he says "Change, we CAN". People like leadership, they like reassurance, they like believable rhetoric and they love a well delivered, passionate and well timed speech. There is still a space for a Great TV commercial. But, and this is a big BUT, they like even more is having a conversation via the internet - not being addressed by it. People love talking to other people. Why do you think Vodafone, O2, Telefonica, Verizon, Orange - are worth so much money. Witness the explosive growth of facebook (social networking), twitter (sharing with people what you're up to) and shortly - community - stuff like collaboration & sharing (playlists being one example).
So, 'old school' brands are struggling to cope with engaging in the ONline digital conversation. Why? Well, look at the way I've written ONline. I presume 'online' means the fact that the computer is on a line (to somewhere else). A bit of an anachronism, as most stuff these days is wireless. But, anyway. I emphases the ON because the WWW, the world-wide-web, the internet, the 'consumer cloud' never sleeps. It's "Always ON". In the old days, the TV would be turned off at night, after News at Ten, and that'd be that - until you'd get your Sun through the letterbox the next day.
No longer. Now, conversations are happening 247365.25. And, if you're not participating in them (as a brand) then you're not contributing. Well, that's the way i see it anyway. The days are gone where Coke said "Drink me - I'm the real thing", where Gillette said "Trust me, I'm the best a man can get", where McDonalds said "You're Loving It" and Microsoft said "Where do you want to go today - we'll take you there".
Look at the confidence of today's internet savvy brands, who know how to hold conversations with consumers. Ever see Google advertise? Apple? Twitter? eBay? Skype? Surely, these are prime candidates to sponsor the Olympic Games, given their bottom lines and revenues. But, you know what, they don't need to - they don't have to. They're "simply there" helping consumers on a day by day basis.
Because "we're all talking now" the control of the conversation - sorry speech - by brands, to consumers has been lost, probably forever. Some brands "get this" (I'd like to think we do - for example, Gillette Global (a $57Bn dollar business) have just 42 followers (18.09.09) on Twitter, and are following, amongst others, companies they own (duh!). King of Shaves has 2,400 (18.09.09) followers - and growing strongly - and this is a shaving brand, remember!
So, if you're a marketeer used to making speeches to consumers about how great your brand is, and why it should be bought - guy (or gal), your days are numbered.
However, if you're a marketeer determined to contribute (creatively) to the conversation - to offer out, and take back, and to help people access your brand, product, or service, then hey - you know what - it's a whole new world for you - a world the ad agencies (on the whole) are yet to get to grips with, and because of that, anything, anything at all is possible.
Live at the heart of the online hurricane. Hold conversations with consumers. Make them amazed with your genuine insight. Make them laugh with your creativity. Help them help themselves. Don't tell them what to do.
The past was a different place. They did things differently there. Knowledge is King. Creativity Is Paramount. Share it, and make people laugh :-)
Thinking about going into business? Running your own show? Amazing the world with a new product, maybe destined to be a brand, or service that blows the competition away. Here's my 20 second MBA course for you, as featured in my book.
It's called the Harvard Rule of 4.
Your 20 seconds starts, NOW!
1. NO ONE has it
(Whatever you're thinking about doing, secure a USP for it). ie, "My _______ is the only _______ that ________." (our Azor is the only razor that bends. our shaving product is the only shaving product that's an oil/serum/hybrid oil).
2. EVERYONE will have it
(You're looking for repeat customers, remember. Anyone can set up a one hit wonder company.
3. It's priced for PROFIT
(Aim to ensure your GP1 or gross profit margin is north of 50%).
4. It's priced for SALE
(ie, the sandwich you're selling isn't £4.99 when Tesco are selling theirs at £99p, unless you've made it 'freshly on the premises, like Pret).
Launched last Wednesday, I was delighted to see that the King of Shaves Book book has jumped a further 2,000 places on Amazon today, now ranking in 'Management' & 'Job Hunting'. Excellent!
BA Business Life also ran a great piece on King of Shaves & I, entitled 'What I've Learned' too - cracking month. (Thanks Gav!)
Link to BA article here
King of Shaves Azor continues to grow strongly - and be sure to look out for our first TV advertising campaign coming later this month - as I'm in the middle of reading 'The Greatest Show On Earth' - Richard Dawkins latest bestseller - I know he'd be proud...! Watch this space.
On behalf of Management Today, John Woodward, CEO of The Busy Bees children's nursery chain reviews my book, 'How to build a great business in tough times' - the King of Shaves story. Many thanks John, I'm glad you enjoyed the book, feel it is a good, worthwhile read and I agree with 99% of your views :-)
"The King of Shaves story is enthralling, inspirational and fun, ... This book is a good read, useful as a reference text, and well-timed in a difficult recession. King is forever the opportunist".
Well, you have to be - don't you?
John's full review (copyright ManagementToday) is here. I was also delighted to see the book prominently displayed in Waterstone's, High Wycombe (Eden Centre) today, and took this pic of my son, Cameron with it.
"Keep the child inside (and alongside) you...work hard, and be nice to people".
Earlier tonight, my book was 66,000th selling book on Amazon.co.uk
Now it's 6,341, having risen 60,000 places in just over 2 hours, and doesn't go officially on sale until tomorrow!
Thanks Jeff Randall, Sky News - really looking forward to seeing how high it can go!!!!
You can order it here.
The King of Shaves Story on WH Smith Shelves now, Business Book of the Month. (original blog post)
'How to build a great business in tough times' -
the King of Shaves story is now on WH Smith shelves, and even better,
is 'Business Book of the Month'. I snapped this pic when I saw it at WH
Smith in Gatwick Airport this morning, returning from my holiday at
Kingfisher, Grenada WI! It's also available to order from Amazon, link here!
Surreal!
Although it's not on sale until September 3rd 2009, Amazon have quietly uploaded my book onto their server, and it's available to pre-order. Details here.
I'm so excited, and I just can't hide it!
Top international publisher, Headline are publishing a book on 'The King of Shaves Story' in September. I was approached by James Wills, of book agent Watson, Little last June after he read a profile piece on King of Shaves and I in Shortlist Magazine, the deal was done late last year, and between January and April I was typing hard, writing the manuscript.
Having had the final meeting with Headline executives today, including Jonathan Moseley, I've been told I can let the good news out! I'll be posting snippets about the book over the next few months and weeks time (with Headline's permission of course), but they have told me it's a wizard read, maybe not Harry Potter level, but I've put as much passion and creativity into it as I do into King of Shaves.
'The King of Shaves Story' is the working title - it hasn't got a title yet (any ideas? - I set KoS up in the last recession) - but rest assured, as soon as I can tell you more about it, I will. All updates will be tweeted out here and I'll be setting up a little micro-site too, along with a whole host of other exciting stuff - watch this space!
Many thanks to the dozens of you who've emailed me saying how much you're looking forward to reading it, and to my followers on Twitter who've tweeted and re-tweeted the good news out.
Roll on September!
