When your dreams are a crock.

I wasted some time today to complete an estimate for a modest-sized potential client today.

Kind of a waste, because I’m doing it out of obligation for someone for whom I know will not buy it. It didn’t take too long, so I’m not bothered, but I thought it blog-worthy because for the umpteenth time, its another boot-strapped start-up that I know they’ll stick to their dream instead of facing reality.That reality is that dreams require sacrifice.

Experts will tell you that most start-ups fail due to under-capitalization. I suggest that that is a symptom of a greater issue: Common Oprah pabulum encouraging your dreams. I know, what a downer. "No one ever got anything without dream

s!" Whatever.

Nothing wrong with dreams. “Go get ‘em, Tiger!”

But dreams are only useful when you understand the reality. Not only the plan for when the dream is realized, but also the plan for when it fails. As a mentor to entrepreneurs, I’ve sat through plenty of VC presentations. 70% of the presentations never addressed the Plan B. Never have I seen an initial plan lacking a discussion of risks ever make it past the initial presentation.

The idea of having one’s own business, building one’s new widget, being one’s own boss is too great a draw to allow concerns about the costs, (time to market) runway, and the outside help that is needed to see it through impact your decision, because,

“Follow your dreams!” said Thoreau*.

So off they go.

So when the dream becomes work, when the risks become higher, when set-backs become more common than anticipated, the fledgling entrepreneur takes shortcuts.

Extends credit to the unworthy.

Buys services from the cheapest comer.

Plays Three Card Monty with incoming invoices.

And when the reality of the present overwhelms the dream they had in mind, they hold tight to that dream because in spite of the unpreparedness, in spite of the lack of planning, they

“Hold tight to the dream”. Because that’s what the poster in their office says.

But too often in the self-absorption common to mere mortals, we forget that our dreams are not others’ dreams. And dreams, to paraphrase Ayn Rand, are not claims on reality.

So my rates aren’t in your budget. (As if I believe you ever created a budget.) Yes, Billy Bob was cheaper. That’s fine, Billy knows what he’s worth. Or maybe Billy Bob is chasing his dream too, blind to the reality that you, too, are looking for the easy way out. Life is not a Successories poster.

So I’m not going to lower my rates for your dream. I’m not going to extend you credit for your dream. I’m not going to trim off the preliminary steps I think are critical to success with the project.

I have my own dreams.

*Thoreau never said this.

The New, New Frugality.

Once again, an opinion in an earlier blog entry was reinforced through research from Booz, Allen and Company. In this report, Booz suggests that the age of frugality in America is a permanent state, much like I suggested here. The reason I bring this up is because, frankly, I like to be right. I also bring it up because I am in the middle of a project for a client who has historically marketed their products on the promise of more for less.

Besides the suggestions I laid out in the earlier post on frugality among consumers, the latest Booz report reminds me that as more marketers get on the bandwagon of frugality, marketing messages and product development, even merchandising and certainly pricing strategy will again equivocate as all marketers take such positioning and make it so much table stakes. So for my client and others like them who applied a value message as a key brand value, it becomes less and less of an effective differentiator.

Note that the New Frugality doesn't mean that everyone is looking for the lowest price, or even the best value. What it does mean is that consumers - including businesses - are looking for reasons to defend the purchases they do make, whether to colleagues, bosses... or themselves.

As marketers, that's the job New Frugality requires of us. Defending our brand and its market positioning. Just like the good ol' days. Again.

Why?

Everyone knows that the bane of parents of toddlers everywhere is the repeated question, “Why?”. If a toddler wants to know why the sky is blue, they’ll ask again and again until you move off your initial perfunctory response of “God thought it looked pretty that way” to actually answering the umpteenth “Why?” by explaining the refraction of the sun’s rays on our atmosphere in terms a three-year-old can understand.

“Why?”

Because even an inquisitive toddler knows that asking “Why?” repeatedly is a great way to get to the answer. Not just AN answer. THE answer. There is even a rule of thumb in Six Sigma circles involving the “Five Whys”. It is a Six Sigma tool that doesn't involve statistical hypotheses… and so can be completed without complicated Minitab calculations. Asking “Why?” repeatedly can quickly drill down to the core of a problem saving time by focusing on causes, not just symptoms.

“Why?”

Because in marketing, as in manufacturing, solutions are often not as simple as they may seem initially. There are now layers upon layers of tightly woven inter-related initiatives that build brands and drive leads.

“Why?”

Because marketing today isn’t as linear as it once was. Since 2000, marketing has become increasingly segmented, specialized, and multi-directional. Information is accessible anytime, from a multitude of sources, both positive and negative.

“Why?”

Because technology, namely the Internet, Social Media, Dashboard software, and Web 2.0 have both created new, responsive interactive channels and revealed new ways to measure old (mass media) channels that make marketing far more quantifiable, measurable, accountable and effective than ever before... and marketing needs to embrace this paradigm.

“Why?”

Because if marketing ever wants a seat in the boardroom and to assume its rightful place in setting strategy for the organization, it will need to not only know the right answers, but be sure it is asking the right questions.

You don’t need marketing.

As the old saying goes, “People don’t need a quarter-inch drill bit. They need a quarter inch hole.”

“No, we don’t need marketing. We need sales.”

“No, we don’t need marketing. We need more prospects to include us in RFPs.”

“No, we don’t need marketing. We need our customers to know how to use the product better.”

“No, we don’t need marketing. We need to attract better applicants for our open positions.”

“No, we don’t need marketing. We need our employees to understand what we stand for.”

“No, we don’t need marketing. We need to sales to understand our target customer.”

“No, we don’t need marketing. We need a bigger goal.”

True enough, people don’t need marketing. They need everything marketing provides.

So in a sense, you’re right. You don’t need marketing.

You need a miracle.