@Spirocks

Make Local Sell Local

It’s About People

In a stellar restaurant the separation from good to great is primarily created through the ability to cultivate a team of intellectually invested people who have a common goal. A goal to provide hospitality in a way that delights their guests. This goal applies to all hospitality businesses, it can apply to a small mom and pop hamburger shop and to a five star restaurant, to a Surfer Hostel and a Luxury Resort. The principles are the core, the facilities are the tools to deliver.

When an establishment has a clear set of goals, what it wants to deliver, what is the specialty, what the public will understand it to be, and how the team can stay within these parameters, finding the right people to take part will be easier. Once they are part of the team and allowed to create and deliver, there may be coaching moments to keep them on the path to deliver the goals, but they will more often push the project further than need coaching.

Its a win win.

This is not a trick, it is a plan. One that delivers the autonomy and patience to the team members to pursue an area of interest to them for profit and enjoyment. This is the idea. Creating the opportunity for someone to join the team who is doing what they love as their occupation.

This is a job for someone who has vision, belief, and the ability to take a well intentioned leap of faith. We are not cherry picking ripe figs from the branches of a tree that grew in our backyard without any care. We are cultivating, watering, pruning, and enabling these team members to blossom and grow into their potential. When they do, they will benefit, our guests will benefit, and the business will benefit. Without all three, how successful are we?

The architecture of your team, is your responsibility, it is the most challenging and most rewarding part of building these unique establishments. To my teams, I look forward to the big steps in front of us as we all grow, and deliver experiences that delight our guests along the way.

I am Spirocks on Twitter.

The First Question We Should Ask When Starting a New Business.

WHY?

The basis for asking WHY we are doing what we are doing is to avoid a deep-rooted flaw in the way we build, brand, and market our new business. That flaw could lead to a division between what our customers, employees and community stakeholders truly care about and what he business stands for. 

Answering the simple question, Why? Will guide us as we build this brand to be the most admired, profitable, and case study inspiring brand possible. To achieve this we must realize that our financial success and ability to survive the test of time lies not in chasing earnings or in trying to sell more “whats” to more “whos,” but in aligning our offerings and values with the “why” of our customers.  

So, Why?

I am Spirocks on Twitter.

The Apple Swan Song Begins, is Tim Cooked?

Guess what is happening, a slow awakening in the masses that Apple’s aura outshines its value and competency.

tim cooked

Sometimes those that appear invincible start to believe the same and they neglect those that gave them their might. They make dumbed down versions of what was once the undisputed champ, they play to the masses with low end devices and leave their flagship grounded on the beach of inferiority.

This is a quaking, a cracking, the schism that demands attention and discipline to repair. Will the giant listen to the murmurs, pay attention to those who have left it for more power and innovation at a lower price or will they find an excuse and continue to tell its consumers they should accept less and pay more?

Some of us have walked away already, others will follow.

Apple, give us the storage we need, the battery that gets us through our day, the screen that doesn’t crack with such ease, and the chance again to say that you are the greatest we have known. Sell your ‘Pro’ laptops with the best processor available, usb C charging ports. Build your software not only for novices but for those that truly want to be the pinnacle of their craft, whether photography, video, or accounting. the pendulum has swung, and in its breach you lose more of us who ‘do’ everyday in the chase of those who consume. You can not win this way, and the results have begun to show it.

For today you are following the path of blackberry and AOL, you are not delivering the best innovation nor value outside of the status that some of your customers find in your logo. Instead of leading your strategy reveals you would rather depend on your users reluctance to learn something new, to admit they don’t have the best, or to switch from defending you to saying they were wrong.

The time is now to deliver us a product that stands shoulders above the rest, or to admit you are faltering, shrinking, and dumbing down what you dance on stage to introduce.

Steve Jobs isn’t walking though that door, its up to you now.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/apple-reports-first-quarterly-sales-drop-since-2003-1461702629

I am Spirocks on Twitter.

Explain the story behind why you do what you do.

The premise of this idea is that people are motivated more by the WHY in what you do than the WHAT, and for that reason it is important to tell your story as you explain the business.

Whether you are the third generation Baker who is carrying on the traditional recipes of your  grandfather’s Italian village, or the founder of a shoe company that donates one pair for each sold, your story is a powerful motivator to get customers to try your product.

Many of us get seduced by the technical stats of our products, or the value of our pricing strategy. More GB, twice the loads of laundry per bottle, 30 more cubic feet of storage than average in its class… We here them all the time. Those are valid points but they don’t elicit the same desire as a story about why we make our products.

The organic all natural cafe that sources all its healthy ingredients with care, garners a following with its story of wanting to support organic farmers and producers while serving its community healthy food. They don’t trumpet the number of ounces in their chicken and hummus wrap.

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So share your story and the WHY in what you do. It’s that passion that ignites customers desire to try the WHAT you do.

I am Spirocks on Twitter.

Dear Chefs and Bartenders – part 2

“I’d rather play Chiquita Banana and have my swimming pool than play Bach and starve.”—Xavier Cugat, born 01-01-1900

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There is a point in time when creating something that people want, in an extremely well done way trumps doing something you want to do regardless of whether it is wanted. That point in time is when you decide this is a career to make a living and not a hobby.

Happy New Year. Make it Delicious.

I am Spirocks on Twitter.

Dear Chefs and Bartenders

John Tesar has a few words for you:

Delicious is more important than creative because everything’s been done before. You’re not going to reinvent the wheel. At this point, after the post molecular era and the compositionist era, where basically commercial artists have gone into the food business because its more lucrative for them financially. A lot of the artsy fartsy food is beautiful in pictures and some of it is beautiful in its presentation, but it’s soulless in the eating of it. Because it’s composition, it’s not cooking.

Amen. Happy New Year. Make it Delicious.

-Spiro

Pork_Belly_a_la_plancha_-_Fried_sweet_potato__apple_cider_chutney__charred_peach_vinaigrette_-__eatat15sx__Andover

I am Spirocks on Twitter.

Unapologetic Marketing

Don’t keep acting like you are the only one with a product trying to fill the consumers’ need. That’s just plain doubtful, in most cases the consumer has the choice of hundreds of competitors, and you need them to choose you. With that in mind, are you paying into a marketing scheme that simply states the statistics about your widget and doesn’t really differentiate you on any other meaningful level?

Stop Doing That.

confrontational marketing

It is time to change course, to stop pretending there are no competitors out there, there are. How about you compete with them by acknowledging their existence, you have nothing to lose because your product is better, right? If its not definitively better, stop worrying about marketing and start making it better… then come back and pick up here.

Still Reading?

Lets create a confrontation of sorts, an unabashed comparison, be unapologetic about being better and saying it out loud. Why? Because you are better and you deserve more of the market, because consumers are sick of hearing the same old marketing messages and they are tuning them out. Nothing stands out from the crowd like a bold honest confrontation, a person invested enough to do that with a better product will gain more customers. That’s that.

Some Ground Rules

  1. First and foremost, be truly better. Don’t fake it, the only two people that will believe you if you are not truly better is yourself, and your mom, and that’s not a big enough market to succeed.
  2. Don’t make it personal and petty, and don’t pick a fight with a small time operation. Nobody likes a bully, be the David to a Goliath.
  3. Have fun with it, for example: incorporate pop culture or current events into the messaging, don’t come off as a technical nerd about your comparison.
  4. Understand the difference between hostile confrontational and proud differentiation, do the latter.

The specifics are up to you, if you want to see what I would do you are in luck. We are currently running a few of these campaigns and I will follow up with a post of the best example in a few days. Until then provide a better product than a big competitor and don’t be afraid to tell people about it.

I am Spirocks on Twitter.

Trust and Permission – Gatekeepers and Goals

Lets take a pre-meditated turn off of our beaten path, and forge a new direction that creates surprise, builds trust, and forges connections.

road trips

You are the marketer, the story teller, the ambassador, the person responsible for the way your restaurant interacts with the public. You have lots to share, and lots of motivation for your community to love your place. So how can we improve our ability to break through, to create lasting loyal customers out of those that we encounter with our message? (P.S. it doesnt matter if online, in person, or in print)

We get there by building trust, and getting permission. 

Think about it, how can we invest the time/energy/money in producing a piece of marketing material, whether a website, email, or old media ad without having cultivated an audience that wants to hear about it. The days of barging into peoples attention span are over.

The Art of the Want

Everything your business does to communicate with your community is intensely personal to you, but not to the community, don’t forget that. It is really not about what you want, if it was you would just send out a postcard to everyone’s house that said; “I want you to come eat at my restaurant tonight.”  The want we are after is the want of a guest to hear more about what you are doing, to hear about what you are doing in the future. You have to earn that want, by delivering what you promise in a way that builds trust.  Everyday my goal is to build trust, forge connections, and create surprise in the way my businesses interact with our guests. That goal is the fertile ground where the want that drives my business grows. 

Forge Connections… Why use the word forge? I say that because once you create them they are iron clad, for good or for bad, these are the stories that people associate with you and your business, they are the stories they tell their friends and family, but most importantly they are the stories they tell themselves.  Recently a woman called the restaurant early in the morning while I was doing some work in my office, when I answered I could tell she was stressed. She had forgotten to order a gift certificate for her Boss’s sister’s birthday that was that day. She was going to try and get someone to come get it from the restaurant and deliver it for her, and wanted to make sure we were there that early. So I said: “I can tell you are stressed, I hate that feeling, why dont you let me deliver it for you.” She was stunned, relieved and thrilled. I got the information for the delivery address and her address to mail a receipt. I took a ride and delivered the certificate, then swung by the woman’s office and delivered her a gift card valid for a martini on my tab that read: “I think you could use this today.” She was floored, and a connection was born. I guess you can say I forged a connection and created surprise all at the same time. With that I had permission to communicate with her in the future, and the best part? It was fun. You have to do something different, something original, something you create, for it to resonate and help you reach your goals. 

So today I suggest you invest in your creative soul and use it to help you build Trust and Permission. They are intertwined, and they represent the gatekeepers to your goals.

I am Spirocks on Twitter.