Joe Polish & Lisa Wagner’s Rich Cleaner Blog ::

Only two answers to that question…

… no and hell no.

I am continually dumbfounded by the ideas coming out of Washington to try to create jobs and stimulate the economy.

The business acumen of most of the politicians’ brains in Washington could pretty much fill a thimble.

Maybe that’s too harsh… let’s say a coffee mug.

What’s this have to do with marketing? Actually, a lot.

You see, the way D.C. tries to create economic growth is not unlike many with careers in the image advertising space. They have a canny combination of being Dumb and Complicated at the same time.

They present unproven, unsupported, and untrackable recommendations – and present it in such a long complicated, long-winded way, that you simply give up and say “well, they must know what they are doing.”

Here’s a hint for you… if someone cannot quickly explain key metrics that will show if a plan (or ad) IS working, or is not, then they don’t really have a smart plan for you.

The blind leading the blind…

I had an owner of a restoration company tell me that he has been paying TEN thousand a month in 4-color full-page ads with two local directories.

I asked him how many jobs he’s gotten from the ads – and he said none. In THREE years, none.

You do the math.

“But I need to be in the yellow pages… and the rep insists that when the flood happens they will choose my 2 page spread over the others.”

For that kind of money, the YP rep should be going through neighborhoods busting pipes for the guy.

And that rep will continue to insist that he needs to be in those books to give impressions to the marketplace so they will recognize him as a reliable brand.

Pure horse doo-doo.

And I can’t get mad at the YP rep. He doesn’t know any better. “Success” to him is landing another big ad – not that his clients’ ads actually work at bringing in money.

The business owner though… I can get mad at him. That is a lot of money to be blindly paying with NO accountability, NO tracking, and NO results.

I don’t care how crazy-busy his business and life are… it’s his responsibility as a business owner to run his business, and manage his money, responsibly. If he can’t do that, then he needs to close his doors and go work for someone else man (or woman) enough to run a business right.

Waiting for some of that STIMULUS money?

Yeah, me neither.

I am one of those crazy entrepreneurs who prefers to work in the real world, and take actions to create real money.

Handouts are for sissies.

So – how to create your own stimulus? That’s easy – you need to employ a direct response marketing mindset throughout your entire company.

What does this mean? It means every action, every expense, needs to be taken to create a specific and immediate result.

You need to be MILITANT about every dollar you put into your marketing, and know exactly what return on investment you generate from every one.

If you have no idea where to start, here are a few suggestions for you:

1) Go to download “Seven Steps To A Successful Ad” – and use this FREE article to evaluate EVERY ad and marketing piece coming from your company. Marketing done correctly is an investment, not an expense. Properly executed, it will generate a constant growing cash flow for you.

2) If you are not using our Healthy Home Client Newsletter – then it’s time to take action on getting this started. This is Piranha’s #1 repeat and referral business generator for our members. You are LOSING thousands of dollars in jobs every month you put off getting this done.

3) If you want an education on direct response marketing and the importance of being a metrics junkie then you are going to love Joe Polish’s Genius Network interview with Marketing Powerhouse MaryEllen Tribby.

4) Finally, if you are looking for turn-key templates, campaigns, and ready-to-roll strategies to grow your cleaning or restoration company – take that wasted money you are putting into the yellow pages and put it into something that is guaranteed to generate jobs. Piranha has a complete Marketing Kit for Cleaners to remove all of the guesswork out of what to use, and all of it field-tested for cash creation performance.

5) Just do SOMETHING. Sitting around thinking about what to do gives an illusion that something is being done, when nothing is getting done. That’s a DC move – hold a bunch of press conferences to talk about how hard everyone is working. That is fake work. You want to see REAL work – then go follow a Piranha Member out making money by taking action.

If you want to talk to one of our business growth consultants, the Piranha Team is always happy to help entrepreneurs who want to work to grow their companies. Give us a call at 800-275-2643.

In fact, if you call our office for more information and mention this DC BLOG, they will give you a special (and free) business growth gift.

When they identify your biggest business need right now, we will make the gift specific to that area so it’s not some random, no thought item (that would be soooo D.C. to give you something you can’t even use…).

Look, I know I got political here. If you think my view of D.C. is not on target, let me know in a comment below. And if the stimulus has actually helped YOU – I want to know that also. It’s almost like a sighting of Big Foot… I just don’t believe it until I see it.

And I would NEVER let D.C. run my business. Unless I wanted it run into the ground.

- Lisa

Just Because You Can Do Something, Doesn’t Mean You Should…

I was talking with Erin from FedEx Office last week. I was asking about the yard signs she is creating for our Piranha Members (which are getting Members LOTS of jobs by the way…).

She mentioned to me that a business owner had ordered signs without the H-metal sticks to post the signs in the ground.

The gentleman was going to… *ahem*… and I quote, “weld some sticks together myself for the signs.”

Did I mention that the order was for a hundred signs?

Did I mention that ordering without the metal H-sticks saved him just a few bucks per sign?

Did I mention that he OWNS his own business?

OPERATION MONEY SUCK

My favorite copywriter, John Carlton, has a phrase he coined “operation money suck” when he describes business owners spending time on activities not making them money instead of the activities that do.

In a quest here to save a few bucks per sign, this person was willing to instead spend a day welding sticks instead.  Instead of what?

Instead of working on getting marketing campaigns out the door.

Instead of working on sales strategies to land more large jobs.

Instead of doing REAL high-value activities.

What will it COST him to save this money on signs? It will cost him the time to spend on opportunities that really make a difference for his business.

Don’t laugh… you know there is some area in YOUR business where you are doing the same thing. It may not be welding.  It may be checking email, for the TENTH time today.  It may be texting absolutely nothing of value to someone who also is looking for a reason to not work.  It may be running off to the office supply store because you need one thing (do you really know how much it costs YOU to do this?).

There are times when we spend effort keeping busy instead of spending it on CREATING business.  We are all guilty of this!

When a business owner is choosing to do TEN dollar an hour work (or in this case FIVE dollar an hour work) instead of work that is bringing in hundreds of dollars an hour, then he … or she … is choosing to tear up hundreds of dollars.

I hear it all of the time, “I don’t need to hire help, it’s just easier to do it myself.”

Penny-wise and pound-foolish.

If you are the owner, or key person, in your company, then it is your responsibility to make most of your “work” time executing the highest value activities in the company. Period.

If you choose to do $10 an hour work, that’s fine, but go work for someone else and quit pretending that you are a REAL business owner.  It gets tiring to hear some business owners drone on about how hard running a business is, and when you look closer you see they spend most of their time doing fake work.

Want to find more hours in your week? Here’s strategy for you. One I learned from a great business mind David Kekich.

Sit down and identify the most valuable activities that make money for your company. (I’ll give you a hint – marketing and sales!)

Put a stopwatch around your neck.

For one week, click it on ONLY when you are doing activities that are truly MAKING you money. When you are doing something making no money, or spending money, keep it off.

At the end of the week – see how many hours (or minutes – yikes!) you honestly spent on MONEY MAKING activities.

This will be good and bad news.

The bad news will be that it will be much less than what you thought you were investing in a “typical” week. (Even worse, you know many of your employees are likely not anywhere near your total time.)

The good news is that you will be able to see how you can easily double your productive hours. (Even better, if you encourage your team to follow your lead your company can produce some incredible results in a short time.)

Want some suggestions on how to jump right into some “valuable money making” activities right now, I have one quick one for you.  Go to www.joepolish.com and request the “Seven Steps To A Successful Ad” report. With this outline you can improve EVERY marketing piece your company is currently running. The report is free. It will make you money.

Keep it ELF!
Lisa

P.S. I came across Dave Kekich’s Time Tracker document on our Members only website www.PiranhaCentral.com and thought we’d go ahead and share this with our loyal Rich Cleaner Blog readers…  Click Here To Download The Time Tracker File

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