Beeeee Positive!

As some of you know, Mrs. Toddwaz is a realtor.  Jana hosted a “realtor open-house” for a new fourplex listing the other day.  Some of the realtors from her office spent time commenting about the hookers a few blocks away, the limited parking and all of the negative aspects of the property.  It’s actually in an area of rapid urban renewal, close to downtown and a perfect starter resident for an active young single or couple. In a B-to-B (business to business) situation, the onlooker might feel an inescapable obligation to tear-apart the product in front of them, fully believing that their expert criticism is helpful in some way.  It sometimes works that way with jewellery presentations. 

When I look at a line of 3-400 rings, I don’t see sellers and non-sellers.  I see each piece as the answer to someone’s quest.  There is a buyer out there for every design you’ve ever looked at in a travellers bag.  Maybe you haven’t conditioned your marketplace to respond to a certain styling.  Maybe the craziest looking design that you summarily dismissed would have sold to the tourist who came in the next day.  Maybe you’ve just overlooked a ring that would have sold 4 times in the coming year because in your opinion it was too high, too low, too wide, too narrow or too “froofie.”  (Don’t laugh, I’ve heard that before!)

This is a tough business and you can’t buy everything that comes along.  I appreciate a retailer telling me why they think a new design won’t sell quickly in their store.  I really do.  Maybe it will cause us to modify a design if few enough jewellers choose to stock it.  But, I’m invigorated by buyers who look at designs and identify what kind of client will love that piece.  Looking for the positive in jewellery designs makes for a more enjoyable supplier visit, and I believe a much more productive one for selecting profitable designs.  Looking for the positive in every customer that walks in has its’ own rewards.

Enjoy this video, featuring Sir Paul McCartney and Nanaimo’s very own Diana Krall…

Spinning or Winning?

Business or personal it’s all the same.  You can be positive by spinning or winning.

When I took my ARMS management training (where I first met Mr. Greg Bird,) the session leader asked us all how business was.  We mumbled various responses.  He corrected us and trained us to give the response, “UNBELIEVABLE!”  He was training us to put a positive “spin” on things.  He wanted us to allow our interlocutors to draw the conclusion that business was unbelievably GOOD when it just as easily could be unbelievably BAD.  Spinning is the art of deception.  Pick and choose truths and half-truths to build a conclusion for the sake of your own motives.

When someone asks, “How are you?” or “How’s business?” you can easily brush them off by saying “fine,” and get on with your day.  That’s fair because some people haven’t earned a close enough relationship with you to justify a deeper explanation.  If you want to present a perfectly positive and prosperous persona, you might proffer a passionate, “unbelievable!”

Here’s the thing.  If you have your eye on a far-off goal of a highly effective “you” or a highly successful business, and you’re doing things to make that happen, you’re on a winning path.  You’re either learning things that you’ll need to avoid as you approach your goal, or your doing things that work and get you closer to your goal.  Either way, you’re making genuine headway towards the positive future that surely awaits you.

As you keep your eyes on the prize (whatever that means to you) you can have a GENUINELY positive outlook.  You can honestly say, “fine,” “unbelievable,” or “super” in response to other people’s inquiries.  You can, not only say positive things, but you be honest about set-backs in light of their contribution to your journey.

Just ASK!!!

No, I’m not talking about closing, but always ask for the sale too!

Marketing is a big catch-all term which can include advertising, networking, social media, events and publicity.  Publicity is out there for the asking.  Just ask.

Imagine Todd sitting in his Easy-Boy trying to think about what to write about for his next blog.  He’s written over 300 articles and hasn’t fully explored the collective wisdom of an entire industry yet, but it’s still a challenge to decide what to write about.  Then I get an email from a jeweller who has a fund-raising promotion having to do with jewellery, or who has discovered a great training pamphlet for watch-battery servicing.  Well, bingo!  Now I know what to write about, and I know that at least one of my readers care about this issue.

It’s the same with your local radio news director or journalist.  They’re sitting there not knowing what to write about next.  If you hand them something interesting and give them a leg-up on writing the piece, you’re doing them a huge favor! 

Here’s a few rules to follow for the do-it-yourself publicist:

·      Call it a “news release”.  News is what they seek.  Press is what other people want from them.

·      Start-out with “For Immediate Relase” or “For Release February 12th” so they know when the news piece would be relevant

·      Make sure your announcement is interesting, and newsworthy or at the very least timely (relating to a current trend, event or occasion)

·      Always make the W5s easy to spot (who, what, when, where and why.)

·      For the body of your news release take one of two approaches

o   Write a fully developed news-piece as you would wish it to be published – and then invite the writer to edit and make it their own

o   Write a compelling introduction and then give a list of bullet-point facts; drawing them to ask more questions and create their own “angle.”

·      End the text of your news release with “-30-“ centered below the last line to indicate that anything following is not meant for publication

·      Supply all contact information

·      Cut and paste it into the body of an email and also attach a PDF of the nicely formatted document.  Some media outlets have such high-security firewalls that attachments are problematic.

Most media outlets have a spot on their website for “news ideas” or “submit a community event.”  Wherever possible identify the writer, editor or news director who is likely to write or assign the piece and give them a call; asking who to send your news release to.

Exclusively yours…

**Attention: Haitian Heroes Go For Gold collectors: Please send-in scrap-gold contributions to Customgold by January 23^rd.  Thank you.**

WARNING:  The following is a guest-blog from a fictitious “cranky supplier”.  I publish this to illicit responses from those who care about this issue.  If you have thoughts, please chime-in.  If you respond by email, please indicate whether I can publish your reply to Toddwaz Report readers.

I’m sick and tired of retailers asking for exclusive distribution of my product.  My line contains hundreds of items, so why should I limit my network for a dealer who carries less than 5% of my designs; let alone the ARMS guys who want to cherry-pick my top 10 designs and return half of them for stock balancing. 

How big is an exclusive territory anyway?  One shopping mall, one town, South of the river, 50km radius???  I can’t figure it out.  With the dollar at par and more competition at-hand there’s no loyalty anyway.  I’ve been busting my butt for Canadian retailers for years and in the last few years these glitzy branded goods made in some sweat-shop who-knows-where have come-in an diluted my business anyway.  How do I tactfully tell a jeweller that they’re no longer buying enough to maintain an exclusive when they might just drop me altogether?

If I’m spending over $30,000 per year travelling my territory I’ve got to make it count.  Why can’t we just get back to the good old days?

I believe the issue comes down to true loyalty.  Dealers who give suppliers a good dose of loyalty will get a good dose in return.  I don’t think our industry is that much different from others.  The world is shrinking, borders are becoming more permeable and competition is increasing.  The tactic of exclusivity is now only one piece of a much more complex puzzle.  The good old days may have been good, but they’re gone.  Better days could lie ahead for those who learn to adapt to the changing tide.

Naughty, naughty Tungsten

After receiving a bulletin announcing that Lashbrook Designs will be pulling Tungsten Carbide options from their offerings (for now,) it peaked my curiosity.  So I did some investigative journalism.  The mineral Tungsten is scientifically known as Wolfram (W on the periodic table of elements).  It appears that Tungsten has been involved in all manor of trouble, making it the bad-boy of the mineral world.

Trent West (the Godfather of Tungsten Carbide jewellery) has been suing companies left-right and center in recent years over its’ 9 patents having to do with the production of Tungsten jewellery.  Of two recent defendants, one chose to enter a licensing agreement and another told Tungsten to go get stuffed. 

Tungsten has also been listed as a potential conflict material; as much of it comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo.  Tungsten is so wily, it was discovered on the left ring-finger of Congressman Barney Frank, whose Dodd-Frank Consumer Protection Act requires public companies to monitor the origin of raw materials to avoid “conflict” minerals.  According to the Huffington Post, he and his husband have no idea if their rings contain Congolese Tungsten. 

Although Tungsten (W) lives five doors down from Gold (Au) on the periodic table of the elements, its’ density is almost identical to that of gold.  According to a New York Post Article, Tungsten has been going around dressed-up as gold to fool investors.

This “Tungsten” character can be one bad apple, but through all of these issues he seems to have survived with hardly a scratch. 

Neuromarketing

A new four-part series of articles by CBC News investigates a new science called neuromarketing.  Imagine if you could produce advertisements for your jewellery store that you knew would tickle the brain in a way that compelled them to come-in and immediately buy diamonds.  That’s the “brass ring” of this new area of study.  What if Zales, Future Shop or Home Depot can afford to pay-for and implement tactics from neuromarketers to sway consumers their way instead of yours?

One of the reasons they want to use MRI and EEG monitoring to see inside consumers brains as they respond to ads and merchandising is, "It's really giving you a lot of insight into his emotional response, much more so than if you were just to ask him how he’s feeling.”  The first of two insights I gained from this article is that consumers won’t always tell marketers and salespeople what they’re truly thinking.  They might “pull punches” to avoid insulting the salesperson, or they might want to placate the marketer by half-heartedly agreeing with their assertions.  Sales training and relationship building are the two ways to increasingly break-down those boundaries between us and our clients.

The second insight I gained was from their experiment with the classic “Coke vs. Pepsi taste-test.”  When neuromarketers monitored brain activity during a blind taste-test, they witnessed brain-activity consistent with sensory analysis, and the results were even.  When the samples were labeled as “Coke” and “Pepsi”, activity was also seen in parts of the brain having to do with memory and experience.  Preference leaned towards Coke in this scenario.  What this tells us is that everything you’ve always been doing in your jewellery store forms an indelible impression in your client’s mind.  That cumulative impression can override subtle differences in product “taste,” tipping the scales in your favor.

Despite marketing mind-tricks discovered by high-tech wiz-bangs, a history of happy customers will serve you well in the long-run.

Toddwaz Report Volume II

As most of you know, it was a social media marketing objective for me to publish 300 blog posts in 2012.  That box has been “checked.”  In 2013, I have decided to publish 2 to 3 blogs per week as inspiration leads me.  If I manage 100 posts, so be it.  If I put the Report on Hiatus to write a book, training program or work on a system of posts for you to send to your tribe, so be that too. 

I’m going to take it as it comes until a clear opportunity or objective reveals itself to me.  After-all, the blog in and of itself isn’t my vocation.  It’s a marketing tool and a way for me to give back to an industry that has taught me so much, and through which I’ve gained so many wonderful friends.  I look forward to writing to you and discussing matters important to you.  Please keep challenging me with your feedback and comments.  I love to discover those of you who, like myself, care about the future of our independent retail jewellery platform.

As I travel three Provinces representing three companies, I will continue to try and do more than just “sell jewellery.”  My mandate remains to help retailers develop a mutually beneficial relationship with the amazing companies I represent, while adding value to the process through sales training, education and sharing some of the best-practices I am privileged enough to witness.

Looking forward to a Sizzling twenty-thirteen with you all!