#008 – 2007 Spring
It’s important for all organisations, regardless of your size and resources, to get to know your tribe (clients, customers, staff, suppliers, contacts, and anyone else with an interest in your organisation). How else can you be sure you’re making the right decisions?
While many of the business owners I’ve talked to agree with this point, some thought that simple and effective research would cost them up to $10,000. It doesn’t need to be this expensive. This incorrect perception stops many organisations from doing vital research, slowing their growth.
Many businesspeople are unaware that there are free resources and inexpensive courses to help you do research in-house; or if you don’t have time for this, there are professional options for almost any budget.
So this edition of Tribal Voice is all about getting to know your tribe. Our feature article highlights the different perspectives of clients, staff and suppliers; and a small business case study takes you through the process of developing an internal data collection strategy.
Happy reading!
Kate Tribe
ask@triberesearch.com.au
T | +61 2 9264 4432
Tribe Research News
New Tribe Research Products
Running a business can be hectic, but are you up to date with your tribe’s needs? We are excited to announce four new products that can help you do this:
Tribal Know-How Quiz are free quizzes that uncover how well you know your tribe and your business, and where you need to increase your knowledge.
Tribal Tool-Kit Action Map is a simple but effective survey that transforms your tribe’s views into an action plan for what to market (as your best selling points), what to educate your customers about (to increase your perceived value), and what to improve (to enhance your tribe’s happiness and loyalty).
Know Your Tribe Research is an affordable research package that gives you valuable insights into your tribe and direction for your marketing and planning strategies – effective research doesn’t have to be out of your budget!
Know Your Tribe Strategy is where we review your data collection process and provide a strategy you can immediately implement in your business. You will be equipped with the tools to understand your tribe and keep this knowledge continually updated within your business.
Feature Article
Is your tribe full of raving fans?
We believe that the best way to understand and grow your business is to know ALL your tribe: clients, customers, staff, suppliers, contacts, and anyone else with an interest in your organisation. Their perceptions are a largely untapped source of information that hold the key to growth.
Kerrie Nairn’s Up for Grabs uses the concept of a collective creative mind… “combined imagination, insight, curiosity, inventiveness, thinking and enthusiasm of all the people who work in or contribute to your business”.
In Flying Solo, Robert Gerrish and Sam Leader categorise the people around you as: stranger > nodder > smiler > hugger > raving fan. Raving fans will actively refer you, so you should aim to create more of them.
So the objective is to understand the collective creative mind of your tribe, so you can turn them into raving fans. Here’s how and why your tribe can become raving fans:
The tribe of your clients or customers
- For customers to be promoters, Fred Reichheld says they need to answer a 9-10 for: How likely would they be to recommend your organisation, on a scale of 0 to 10?
- Even unhappy customers will return to a company if they can voice their opinion and see that it is heard.
- Happy customers referring you to their network through word of mouth is the most cost-effective form of advertising.
The tribe of your staff
- Motivated staff are 40-70% more productive.
- Staff turnover can cost 150% of their salary when they leave.
- Employees have their own networks: if they are proud of where they work, they talk about it, increasing your exposure.
The tribe of your suppliers
- Your suppliers grow with your success so it is in their interest to help your organisation to grow.
- They know what you do with their product, your standards and expectations, and can help you avoid problems.
- Engaging your supplier, discussing your direction and how they fit into that develops a close, long-term relationship, resulting in optimal business outcomes, and them raving about you!
Sometimes we don’t see the problems our stakeholders see. Second guessing their thoughts could cause you to be misled by the loud minority. The trick is to objectively measure their views: asking why they keep coming back to you (or don’t!), what you do right, and where you can improve, will arm you with the information to make changes that will get them raving about you.
The first step is to build a data collection and storage system into your organisation so you can track changes and incorporate the feedback into your business planning and marketing strategies.
Case Study: Song Division
How do you turn your tribe into raving fans? Most small businesses know they should be doing things like feedback forms, identifying trends, understanding your best and worst customers… but they often find it’s still on the “to do list”. Song Division knew they needed to do these things, and enlisted our help in developing a Know Your Tribe Strategy
Song Division Logo
Song Division is a unique employee bonding experience where people – usually a group of employees – get to work with real musicians in professional venues. Their clients bond by composing and recording their own song: no musical experience is required, but all employees get to act like rock stars!
Song Division’s Know Your Tribe Strategy
Their first year focused on getting themselves out there, bringing in clients and coming up with ideas. However, Song Division soon realised that they needed feedback systems and procedures to ensure the continued growth of the business.
This is a common realisation in small business! While Song Division is a unique company, their business issues aren’t.
First, we had a great day at a Song Division session with staff from a large corporate. After reviewing the existing systems and procedures with Andy Sharpe (Managing Director), we discussed where he wanted the business to go, and who Song Division’s important stakeholders were. These are all crucial steps in developing a plan for collecting meaningful data.
Next, we set to work developing a strategy that Song Division could implement immediately. We went through the following steps:
* analysed how their clients moved through the buying cycle (looking at both the client company and their employees who participate, as well as event companies on-selling Song Division)
* designed separate surveys to collect relevant and usable data from each important stakeholder group
* developed a plan of when and how to conduct surveys for each of these groups
* designed a database to match the strategy so the data could be recorded in an easy and practical way
Song Division can now be sure that their data will be collected and recorded in a consistent way, they won’t overlook changing client needs, and their knowledge will be continually updated.
Building a data strategy into your ongoing systems and procedures means you won’t have to go out of your way to get important information about your tribe, because you will already have it!
By the way, we met Song Division at the Last Thursday Club networking group.
