Thought Bubble - The Top Eight Questions Asked by Agency Owners
VIDEO: 6:31 mins
AUTHOR: Robert Craven
In this video short, Robert answers the top eight questions that he gets asked again and again. They are:
Why can't we get more/better customers?
Why aren't we more profitable?
Why won't people do what we expect?
Why aren't we hitting targets?
Why am I working harder?
Should I hand over control?
How do I get back my mojo?
What's the secret sauce?
Transcription:
Robert Craven 00:08
There's eight questions that get asked all the time. I'm going to give you my brief abbreviated answers to them, so that you never have to ask these questions again. But I suspect that actually you will. So here goes, let's just start Question number one, why can't we get more better customers? Because probably your value proposition is pants. Probably your elevator pitch is panned. Probably your website looks like everyone else is probably you're doing everything for everyone. And you don't differentiate yourself. So what you've failed in doing is is the marketing basics, which is differentiation. What makes you different from the rest and segmentation? I focus on particular people with particular hurt problems need itches wants scratches, so why can't we get more better customers? Because you've not nailed that marketing piece. And you haven't got this awesome marketing and business development machine in place, because you hope it will just come by random to why are we more profitable, because you probably don't charge enough because probably you at the same time, he's not charging enough, you probably don't track and understand exactly what your people are doing. And because he might have a business model, which is actually broken, because he has too much non fee earning income, non fee earning expense going on and not enough fee earning income. And because again, as getting up above, because you haven't nailed the marketing and business development machine. And therefore it's been too expensive to acquire customers, your cost of customer acquisition is too expensive. And lifetime value of customers isn't good enough, because you're not focusing on the right ones.
Robert Craven 01:47
Three, Why won't people do what we expect? So I did go, I should have warned you government health warning, you might not like all this stuff. People don't do what you expect, because they don't know what you expect them to do. You get the staff you deserve, you get the customers you deserve. If you lay out clearly what it is you expect and how you wish to behave than there's a likelihood they might actually conform to that. But if somehow they're meant to just guess, and figure out somehow what isn't isn't right, that's fairly likely they're gonna make it happen, that you need to be really clear about what it is you expect them to do, and then they probably will do it. And the force of the real questions is, why are we hitting targets, not only because those targets weren't in any way rationally or scientifically put down because you hadn't thought through or required to make it happen because our strategy is waiting for the phone to ring because our strategy is something normally turns up because you hadn't kind of done the math the very thing that you do for your clients you hadn't done for yourself. So that's those four then there's four questions which are really about me. Why am I working harder? Why is it I'm working harder now than ever worked for I've got more people more turnover. And yet I seem to be working harder. Look in a mirror you are you are your diary. If you want to know what you're doing, look at your diary, you are your diary.
Robert Craven 03:12
So get some organisation work the 80/20 rule. Understand that if you take Friday's off, you'll be way more effective on the remaining four working days and you are at the moment, you know, prioritise, get rid of the to do list delegate, take yourself out of the centre of the business do all the grown up stuff we know we should do and yet we ended up delivering in the detail doing work we normally pay eight pound now someone else to do we do it ourselves. So you're working harder? Because you're not being effective. We can give you back that time. Should I hand over control of rule I feel out of my depth Peter principles kicked in. I'm not happy with what's going on. Maybe you should. Or maybe you should grow some. And you should figure out what is required of you as the business owner, leader founder. Maybe your skill is in tech or your skill is in sales. Maybe you aren't born to be the full on leader maybe you need to understand that. Yeah, most businesses have the the visionary leader and they also have the person who instigates and doesn't make stuff happen. But you need to figure out what your agency needs and what it needs from you and how you can best deliver to it. How do I get back my manager you're working too hard. You're not enjoying it, you've lost. You've lost your enthusiasm. You're tired, you're tired when you get home, you're tired of the family you're tired on your own.
Robert Craven 04:39
You just need to take more time out needs to be a lot more methodical and and recognise that your identity and the business are not the same. You need to recognise that you are more important than that you need to look after yourself. You need to understand that business is a game and you will win and you will lose according to how well you understand on the roof, who else is playing, but you need to gain back control of your mojo because then everything's great without Mojo lousy? And finally know the question, what's the secret sauce, which gives me what's the secret sauce I'm missing. You may not be missing a secret sauce, all these people offering secret sauce 10 ways to triple your income and the next five days or your money back. You know, they're just selling you stuff. The secret sauce is that it's relatively straightforward, relatively low complexity to run an agency, but it's tough and it's hard. And it requires an inordinately large amount of discipline, structure. And luck. Can't rely on the luck, you need to get the systems and processes in place. And they're pretty straightforward because as I said, an agency is really incredibly low complexity compared with heart surgery or aeroplane engine manufacture or traffic light systems or relatively low complexity, and it's relatively repetitive if you imagined a grid. So it's just about nailing that and getting on top of it, which is really really tough. Don't get me wrong, but those that nail it are those that are able to grow the agency run the agency they want so they can live the life they want. Thank you very much for listening.