Category: Marketing

Howard Wolpoff Guests On The Horse’s Mouth – February 5, 2020 #1

Howard Wolpoff Guests On The Horse’s Mouth – February 5, 2020 #1

Posted on by Howard Wolpoff

Welcome to “The Horse’s Mouth” with Tom McManus, a cool, unique talk show where Tom’s guests sidle up to his bar to discuss business, marketing, and life. No gossip, no hearsay, no BS—just the straight-up truth, right from the source.
Tom’s longtime love of bartending has come full circle since his days as a linebacker on the inaugural Jacksonville Jaguars football team—slinging drinks and talking shop with everyone from high-profile sports figures and entertainers to business leaders, journalists and community leaders.

He and his guests trade insight and anecdotes, explore day-to-day topics and tackle the hard subjects, all with equal measures of energy, honesty and laughter. Get the skinny on the real people behind the headlines, straight from the horse’s mouth.

Today Tom sat down with Howard Wolpoff from Profit Master Business Solutions, Chris Ramaglia from Broadband Communications, Grayson Marshall from Digital Direct Media, Daniel Burstein from MECLABS Institute, and Mike White from BluHorn.

 

 

Untangle the Red Tape

Untangle the Red Tape

Posted on by Howard Wolpoff

In the last post we talked about how to bring the big-company mindset into your business and your team. This will help you overcome the mental obstacles that will keep you from being successful. Now, that you’ve learned how to overcome that, we’re going to talk about who your fish is. It’s important to know about the fish you are looking for before you put a plan together. We’re also going to take a moment to talk about the potential “red tape” you may encounter along the way.

The most important thing to know about your fish is their purchasing habits and procedures. There are four main things you need to work on in order to be successful:

  1. Responsibilities: You need to know who has influence over purchasing, who does the actual buying and who can kill a deal if they want.
  2. Get on Their List: You need to know how to get on their list of people to buy from. Your name needs to not only be on the list, but at the top of it and in as many categories as possible for the more interaction. Ask about a procurement program and what you need to do to go through the application process.
  3. Lingo: You need to learn the company’s unique language and communications methods. These could include report names, buzzwords and even the nicknames they have for their employees.
  4. Fiscal Budgets: It’s essential you know the fishes fiscal budget, so you know exactly when they are planning their expenses for the year.

Now that we’ve talked a little about what you need to know about your fish, let’s a quick look at the “red tape”.

Bureaucracy might as well be a four-letter word with the emotions it stirs in all of us. “Red tape” is a necessary evil, but one you can use to learn from. There are two ways to learn from their system:

  1. Analyze their activity.
  2. Review their correspondence.

Being an outsider looking in can have its advantages too. If you hate dealing with the “red tape”, imagine how their employees feel dealing with it. If they need to crunch some numbers, offer to do it. If they need more info, make sure you are giving it to them in a user-friendly way.

The things we talked about in this lesson will help you prepare for the big approach. If you need help with any of this, try our GUIDED TOUR to find the right tools to get the job done.

The Corporate Puzzle

The Corporate Puzzle

Posted on by Howard Wolpoff

The 7 specific areas you need to consider in your franchise prototype process:

  • Primary Aim
  • Strategic Objectives
  • Organizational Strategy
  • Management Strategy
  • People Strategy
  • Marketing Strategy
  • Systems Strategy

These 7 areas will fine turn your plan for the ultimate level of success. In this lesson we
are going to cover the first three.

Primary Aim
It’s essential in business development to set goals and see a vision for the future. This
needs to go beyond the business and you need to think about what you want out of life.
What do you dream about? How do you see your success unfolding? Knowing and
understanding these things will give you the momentum to get started and the stamina
to see it through. Even take a minute to write them down and tape to your desk for a
constant reminder of what you’re aiming for.

Strategic Objectives
These are essential in taking your business from surviving to thriving. All of these
objectives should offer solutions for how to get to your primary aim. There are many
things you can use to set strategic objectives, but here are a couple of the most popular:

1. Money: Setting monetary goals is a great, simple way to see how you are doing
at any point in the game. It’s easy to measure and easy to find adjustments to
help meet this goal.

2. Worthy Opportunities: When considering partnerships and other business
opportunities you need to think about whether or not they will help you reach
your primary aim. Those that will are the best opportunities to seriously
consider.

The key in setting standards and goals is not to limit you or stress yourself out. You need
to find some quantifiable things you can use to measure your progress toward your
primary aim. These are just two suggestions, but make sure no matter what you
standards you set you are paying attention to the details, as these are one of the biggest
keys to your success.

Organizational Strategy
The strength of your organizational structure can make or break your business, so it’s
important to take the time to put together a solid structure for your business to grow
from. Generally a company is organized around the roles and responsibilities that need
to be taken care of on a daily basis and the personalities that need to fulfill those roles.
No matter what roles and responsibilities you’ve defined for your employees, you must
always keep your personal primary aim separate from your company’s primary aim or
mission statement. Once you’ve identified the primary aim for your company it will be
easy to set up a position structure that will work.

Don’t forget to put together position contracts. Your employees should sign a statement
of their roles and responsibilities. This helps keep them clear for you, the employee and
other employees/vendors or other individuals.

You can see how these areas all work together to build a solid structure on which to
build your business. If you need help defining any of these areas, you can check out the
resources, tools and speak with one of our fantastic coaches during your GUIDED TOUR.

You Turn Me Right ‘Round Baby, Right ‘Round

You Turn Me Right ‘Round Baby, Right ‘Round

Posted on by Howard Wolpoff

The biggest area of turn-key businesses is franchises. There is franchise for ever industry in the world and they are fairly easy to acquire and come with practically a pop out of the box pre-assembled system. McDonald’s is a prime example. In fact, a $40 billion, 28,707 strong example.

There are a few things we are going to talk about:

  • Business Format Franchise
  • The Franchise Prototype
  • Franchise Prototype Standards

Business Format Franchise

The business format franchise came from an earlier model call the “trade name” franchise. The big change was in the rights. During the “trade name” days the franchise owner only had marketing right’s, now franchise owners have owning rights to the entire business including systems. This has allowed for a shift in focus to go from the quality and name recognition of the products carrying the business to sales techniques that carry the business.

The Franchise Prototype

It was really the franchise prototypes that allowed for the changes to be made that help today’s franchises really shine with the techniques developed by the owners instead of the corporation. This can make a significant difference in the success of the franchise as the owner can custom tailor their marketing and promotions to the direct needs of their local target customers.

Franchise Prototype Standards

Now, the above being said, no one in their right mind would purchase a franchise if the parent company didn’t have a solid plan of action set up to ensure the prospective success of the business. So, there are a few standards that are put into place that helps jump start the process of opening a successful franchise.

Build model of prospective customers/clients, suppliers, creditors and employees who will consistently offer high quality work.

  1. Build a user-friendly model that can be used by individuals of any skill set.
  2. Build a defect-free model.
  3. Build a model with Operations Manuals.
  4. Build a model that will provide guaranteed, consistent results.
  5. Build a model that encompasses the same branding in color, dress and facilities codes.

These are all ways the parent corporation makes sure their brand stays the same and in the front of the minds of customers. When you are purchasing a widely-known brand you will attract customers just for being you.

If you are considering purchasing a franchise, talk with one of our experienced business coaches during our GUIDED TOUR.