Someone mentioned to me privately that if he didn’t know better, he’d think I was trying to put a guilt trip on folks with my column “Waiting, Whining or Working. Your choice”.
He went on to say that he figured my point really was that every one who has been used to competing locally has (or will) find themselves competing in a statewide / regional / national / global market had better “man up”.
Pretty faces
I wasn’t kidding last week.
A friend’s business is experiencing just that situation. For the last 20 years, they’ve competed against other Montana firms primarily and occasionally against regional firms.
Nowadays, *every* gig they bid on has national and regional players at the table – and I’ll bet several of you are experiencing the same thing.
In that environment, in their market, qualifications aren’t likely to even make it into the discussion before local firms get pushed off the table.
The national firm’s materials will make them the obvious choice (where have you heard that before?) because a local firm’s marketing materials, sales expertise and experience will be *normally* be hard pressed to match that of a national firm.
Of course, those processing the bids won’t acknowledge it and they might not even realize they’re doing it because worst case, it happens subconsciously as if they were staring at a pretty girl or a handsome man. It’s natural.
Because they have to compete on a bigger, shinier stage, these firms have honed their image and their materials over years of competing with other national and regional firms. It’s quite possible that some of them have had to battle it out with international competitors.
That leaves the local firm with the same choice we discussed last week.
Again, we circle back to “what other people do”. What do they do to succeed that you don’t yet do? It doesn’t matter how important *you* think these things are. What matters is how important they are in the minds of your customers and prospects.
In simple terms: What’s the market think?
Getting preachy
Coincidentally, that was the premise of one of those annoyingly “innocent” questions I like to ask.
The question? “Does your church podcast their sermon recordings?”
Note the assumption – that your church already records them. I asked that way intentionally so that anyone who doesn’t would think to themselves…”do we even record them?”
A CFalls pastor saw my question on Twitter and asked “Why should a church podcast its sermons?”
Which is exactly what I hoped would happen: We’d talk about what “other people” do.
Many churches don’t record, much less podcast their sermons – but some do. Meanwhile they have all kinds of programs in place to reach out to shut-ins, the infirm, nursing homes and so on.
Think about it: Who doesn’t have an iPod or access to the Internet these days? Not too many folks. The last numbers I saw said that 77% of the US population has high-speed internet access (I think that’s a bit high, but that’s another discussion).
Apple’s free iTunes podcast service (like many others) will let you broadcast audio (or video) recordings globally. The price is the same to your local shut-in, a traveler on the road or a deployed soldier.
Free. And most importantly for them, they can listen on their schedule.
If you had to choose between folks not hearing your sermon all vs. not hearing it until their Monday workout or during windshield time on I-90 next week, what’s your preference?
When I asked Twitter and Facebook why their church podcasts sermons, this is just one of the responses: “We are reformed so this past year I did look for podcasts about John Calvin since we celebrated 500th anniv of his birth.”
People are looking to consume (learn / read / watch ) info that’s important to them. Their lives might not allow them to be in church every week.
During your next sermon, ask this question: “Raise your hand if you’re on Facebook.”
Now you have something else to think about. Something “other people do” – even if you aren’t a church pastor.
Want to learn more about Mark or ask him to write about a business, operations or marketing problem? See Mark’s site or contact him via email at mriffey at flatheadbeacon.com.