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Wednesday, March 6, 2024

Lesson #359: How to Cut Dead Weight Out of Your Business

Posted By: George Deeb - 3/06/2024

  In business, you need to be running as efficiently as possible.  But, I have seen many businesses carrying a lot of “dead weight”, which i...

 


In business, you need to be running as efficiently as possible.  But, I have seen many businesses carrying a lot of “dead weight”, which is holding them back.  Some of that dead weight are smaller things, like being overstaffed or spending too much for services.  Or, poorly investing their sales and marketing dollars.  And, some of that dead weight is pretty material, like operating too many divisions or focusing on channels that don’t have a material payback.  This post will help you learn how to identify the various types of dead weight, so you can assess your business and see if there is any pruning to be done.

Strategic Dead Weight

Strategic dead weight is building a strategy plan that has you focusing in areas that the business really shouldn’t be focused on, investing resources in a way that is either not driving an ROI or it has become a distraction to more profitable areas of the business.  This could be things like supporting too many brands or divisions, or too many products, or too many sales channels, collectively taking focus away from the real core competency or most profitable product line of the business.

Operating Dead Weight

Operating dead weight is basically running the business inefficiently.  That could be having a staff that is too large in relation to the true business needs, or renting an office that is larger than you truly need, or paying more for services than is truly market rate, or worse, paying for services you really aren’t using at all.  Every penny matters in early-stage businesses, and ineffectively investing your precious cash resources means you are flushing dollars down the toilet that couldn’t have been better invested in other higher ROI activities.

Sales and Marketing Dead Weight

Sales and marketing dead weight, is investing your payroll dollars into salespeople that are not driving enough sales to hit their goals (or at least cover their costs) or investing your advertising dollars into campaigns that are not driving a profitable return on ad spend (ROAS). You need to be religiously studying your sales team’s performance and your advertising team/agency’s performance to ensure they are hitting their goals.  And, not only in the aggregate, but line-by-line for each specific campaign, to optimize and prune accordingly.  You always need to be cutting your “losers” and re-investing those dollars to “double down” on your “winners”.

A Strategic Case Study

As a strategic example, when we acquired my current business, it was operating two brands, Restaurant Furniture Plus, targeting commercial buyers, and Your Bar Stool Store, targeting residential consumers.  When running two of anything, that meant double the effort.  We needed to build and maintain two different websites and two-different marketing campaigns, as an example.  When we studied the financials by brand, we learned that Your Bar Stool Store was driving around 20% of the revenues, but only 5% of the gross profits, as its average order size was only $2,000 compared to $6,000 at Restaurant Furniture Plus.  And, there were material operating inefficiencies with serving the consumer market, which often resulted in a lot more phone calls to answer and a lot more claims and returns, which created a lot of extra work.  At the end of the day, Your Bar Stool Store was break even at best.

We decided to shut down Your Bar Stool Store, the original brand of the company, to help us cut our “dead weight”.  It helped us increase our strategic focus on more profitable commercial buyers, it helped materially improve operating efficiencies, and most importantly, it helped us re-invest those marketing dollars into the higher performing commercial business to materially accelerate our revenues and profits.  The “sacred cow” of the founders was sacrificed, to help propel the “better business” to newer heights.

Closing Thoughts

Small businesses cannot afford to be carrying any dead weight. They need to be nimble for maximum speed, and laser focused on what will drive the most profits.   Any things that get in the way of that goal, need to be sacrificed for the greater good, no matter how much you like that “sacred cow”.  It may result in some short term pain, but trust me, the long term gains in focus, efficiencies and profits will quickly mend those wounds.  So, what are you waiting for?  It is time to take out your magnifying glasses and start scouring for any dead weight in your business.  And then, take out your hatchets for larger inefficiencies, or scalpels for smaller inefficiencies, and start cutting away.  Your bottom line profits will thank you!!


For future posts, please follow me on Twitter: @georgedeeb.


Lesson #358: Revenues Lost is More Important to Measure Than Revenues Won

Posted By: George Deeb - 3/06/2024

Revenues, and resulting profits therefrom, is often the primary metric that businesses use to measure their success.  I would argue there is...


Revenues, and resulting profits therefrom, is often the primary metric that businesses use to measure their success.  I would argue there is an even better metric to measure, which is “lost revenues”.  What revenues did you lose during the course of the year, and what were the specific reasons you lost those customers?  Why do I say this; because you typically close 20% of your leads and lose 80% of your leads?  If you can figure out how to reduce that 80%, you can materially grow and accelerate the 20%.  And, increasing your conversion rate by 10 percentage points, is the equivalent of increasing your revenues by 50%!!  This post will help you figure out how to best define and measure your potential reasons for lost revenues, to help you get your arms around how to best lower that amount.

What Are the Typical Reasons for Lost Revenues

There is a wide range of reasons for losing revenues.  Some are related to your company, including your product, pricing, sales and marketing efforts.  Some are related to your buyer’s company, including having management approval and budgets in place.  Some are related to individuals involved in a transaction, including your salesperson, the buyer at your customer’s company or some other middlemen that may be involved.  And, some are related to other outside factors, including competition and economic conditions.  The key is figuring out which of these is the exact reason you lost each sale, documenting those reasons in such in a way you can build reports to learn from, and putting action plans in place to address each of these hurdles, to remove those constraints from your future sales efforts.

Issues Related to Your Company

Remember the four P’s of marketing you learned in business school—product, price, promotion and place?  Each one of those are variables in whether or not someone will buy from you, or they will look for solutions elsewhere.  So, you need to do lots of research here?  Ask your customers what they do and don’t like about your product.  Lean into the positives in your marketing messaging and fix the negatives and try again.  Test the elasticity of demand by changing your pricing and seeing at what price the most revenues are created.  Test different marketing messages, to see what offers resonate the most in terms of driving conversions.  And, make sure your products can be discovered at any and all places a customer may be looking for them.

Issues Related to the Buyer’s Company

The largest issues at the buyer’s company are whether or not they have the management approval to proceed, with an established pre-approved budget in place.  No matter how much a junior level staff member wants to purchase something, if their bosses won’t let them or they do not have enough funds in place to purchase your product, they won’t and can’t.  So, as you are going through the sale process, make sure you ask these very important questions—who are the key decision makers involved here, and have budgets been approved?  Then, you can work the decision makers to get them sold on the idea, and know you won’t be wasting your time on projects that don’t have a cash budget in place to afford the purchase.

Issues Related to Individuals Involved

Like the band Depeche Mode said, “People Are People”.  You may not get the sale because of the specific people involved.  Maybe your salesperson is not very good, and needs training?  Maybe your client has personality conflicts with your salesperson, and doesn’t want to work with them?  Maybe you are working with a middleman, like a design agency, and the designer is just using you for ideas and doesn’t really have a contract in place with the client yet.  It could be a myriad of reasons like this.  So, make sure you have a firm handle on the “people issues” of the persons involved in the transaction, and maybe try selling into other people at the same target company that are more open to a transaction with your business.

Issues Related to External Factors

Sometimes you are not getting the sale because of external factors that are out of your control?  Maybe your big competitor just dropped their prices, and you didn’t react quickly enough.  Or, maybe the economy is soft, and buyers are just nervous about making a big discretionary purchase right now.  Maybe your product is seasonal or cyclical, and people just aren’t going to buy snow shovels in July, or voting booths in non-election years.  Or, maybe government regulations are getting in the way (e.g., they won’t purchase your product because it is made in China with high tariffs incurred)?  So do whatever you need to do, to track these external drivers, and have a message that best resonates with your customers despite whatever hurdles are presented in the market.

What Needs to Be Measured Here?

You pretty much need to be measuring every single thing that was discussed above in this post.  Are you tracking the success of your marketing campaigns, A/B testing with different offers and creatives?  Are you measuring the success of your various salespeople, and cross fertilizing best practices and weeding out underperformers?  Are your tracking your competitors’ moves?  Are you asking the right questions of your customers that didn’t purchase from you, as to the specific reasons they didn’t purchase from you?  You will be amazed how much intelligence can be gleaned from your customers by simply asking them the question.  And like with anything else in business, you can’t manage what you are not measuring, so make sure you have reports that measure all of the above “lost revenue” drivers, so you can see “no” turning to “yes” more frequently through higher conversion rates over time.

Closing Thoughts

Hopefully, you now have a better understanding on why it is so important to focus on the reasons behind the 80% of sales you lost, instead of celebrating the 20% of sales you won.  If you focus on the 80% of lost revenues, you may be able to increase your win rate from 20% to 40% and double your sales in the process.  Good luck!!


For future posts, please follow me on Twitter at: @georgedeeb.




Thursday, February 29, 2024

[VIDEO] What Milestones Should Your Startup Track?

Posted By: George Deeb - 2/29/2024

I was recently interviewed by  ASBN , an online "television network" serving the small business community, about what key mileston...


I was recently interviewed by ASBN, an online "television network" serving the small business community, about what key milestones a startup should track as it is getting its business off the ground.  As you will learn, you can manage what you are not measuring, and these milestones will help you set the proof-points that will impress prospective investors.  I thought this video turned out great, and I wanted to share it with all of you, to make sure you are defining the key milestones and metrics for your busines.  I hope you like it!!



The embedded video player didn't give me the option to change the size of this video.  But, if you want to see a bigger version, simply click the expand size button in the player above.

Thanks again to Jim Fitzpatrick, Shyann Malone and the ASBN team for having me on the show.  I look forward to our next interview together.


For future posts, please follow me on Twitter at: @georgedeeb.

Friday, February 23, 2024

The 5 Steps to Survive a Difficult Funding Environment

Posted By: George Deeb - 2/23/2024

CB Insights, a leading research organization that tracks venture capital financings, recently released its report on the state of the ventu...


CB Insights, a leading research organization that tracks venture capital financings, recently released its report on the state of the venture capital market in 2023 and, most recently, the fourth quarter of 2023.  Long story short, it was a terrible year for raising capital. The global market was down 30% year-over-year to its lowest levels in six years. The U.S. market fell to its lowest levels in 10 years, down 21% in the last quarter alone. Gone are the days of "unicorn" creation (companies worth more than $1 billion), mega-sized financings, and excessive valuations.  And, investors simply can’t exit the investments they have already made, with an anemic IPO market.  A pretty bleak picture if you are a startup raising capital today.  So, what are you supposed to do to navigate these choppy waters?  Buckle up and read on, for some useful tips based on my past experience surviving markets like these.

Read the rest of this post in Entrepreneur, which I guest authored this week.

For future posts, please follow me on Twitter at: @georgedeeb.


Wednesday, February 7, 2024

Dead Weight Expenses Are Costing Your Business

Posted By: George Deeb - 2/07/2024

  In business, managing with a steady eye on efficiency is pivotal, of course, yet I have seen a great many operations carrying unrecognized...

 

In business, managing with a steady eye on efficiency is pivotal, of course, yet I have seen a great many operations carrying unrecognized burdens — from being overstaffed to spending too much for services, from poorly investing sales and marketing dollars and operating too many divisions to focusing on channels that don't have a material payback.  This post will help you assess your own enterprise — particularly with respect to growth prospects — in order to determine if there's pruning to be done.

Read the rest of this post in Entrepreneur, which I guest authored this week.

For future posts, please follow me on Twitter at: @georgedeeb.



Monday, February 5, 2024

Lessons in Leadership: A Jim Harbaugh Case Study

Posted By: George Deeb - 2/05/2024

  I am a graduate of the University of Michigan and lived through the roller coaster ride of the Jim Harbaugh era in Ann Arbor, which has re...

 


I am a graduate of the University of Michigan and lived through the roller coaster ride of the Jim Harbaugh era in Ann Arbor, which has recently come to an end with him returning to the NFL after winning the national championship at Michigan.  But, the last nine years has provided many nuggets for entrepreneurs to learn from, in terms of how to approach leadership.  This article summarizes the best of those leadership lessons to potentially apply in your businesses.

A Quick History

Michigan football is the winningest program in college football history, with a rich tradition of excellence and a rabid fan base that expect nothing less than winning championships every year.  But, when head coach Lloyd Carr retired after the 2007 season, nobody expected it would be followed by the lackluster coaching tenures of Rich Rodriguez and Brady Hoke between 2008 and 2014.  This had Michigan fans even hungrier to restore its championship ways.  And, who better to call on to "right the ship" than Jim Harbaugh, a true "Michigan Man", a beloved Bo Schembechler disciple and former Michigan star quarterback, that had realized head coaching success everywhere he had been (e.g., San Diego, Stanford, San Francisco 49'ers).  Jim Harbaugh agreed to take the reins of Michigan football starting in the 2015 season to "save" his beloved alma mater and return Michigan to greatness.

The first five years of Harbaugh's tenure as Michigan head coach were "ho hum" based on Michigan's goals.  He won 8-10 games in each of those years.  But that meant there were 3-5 losses in those years, and the losses were usually on the biggest stage, losing to ranked teams, in bowl games or to Michigan's arch rival Ohio State.  The fans were most panicked after the 2000 season (COVID year), when the team went 2-4 and people we calling for Harbaugh's firing.  But, the athletic director stood behind Harbaugh, they restructured his contract in light of poor performance, Harbaugh retooled the program, and then magic happened.  In the following three seasons, Michigan's record was 40-3, they beat archrival Ohio State in each of those years, they won three straight Big Ten championships and capped it off in 2023 with a 15-0 season and winning the national championship on the biggest stage.  Michigan had finally returned to being an elite program, and the fan base was beyond ecstatic.  After the season, Harbaugh decided to pursue his dream of winning a Super Bowl, and returned to the NFL as head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers.

Now, here are the resulting leadership lessons that come from this story:

Your Strategy Really Matters

When Harbaugh got started, he was talked into trying more of a spread-style offense, with speed in space, which was what the better teams were employing at the time.  But, with all the big bodies of the Big Ten, they simply weren't winning the battle in the trenches on the offensive and defensive lines.  It wasn't until Harbaugh reverted back to his "tried and true", "smash mouth" style of playing football, that he truly started to excel.  That wasn't a popular strategy, with slow style of play resulting in "three yards and a cloud of dust", but it was a strategy Harbaugh knew well and succeeded with in the past.  So, he pushed in all his chips, doubled down on that strategy, and the wins started to follow.  So, like with anything, do what you know and think is best, regardless of whatever "noise" would suggest otherwise.

Your Management Team Really Matters.  

Harbaugh cycled through a bunch of assistant coaches during his tenure.  It wasn't until he tapped into the defensive schemes used in the NFL, by his brother John Harbaugh at the Baltimore Ravens, that good things started to happen for Michigan. Harbaugh hired two defensive coordinators out of the Ravens, Mike McDonald and Jesse Minter, and those guys helped to turn Michigan's defense into the #1 defense in all of college football, in multiple years.   And, that doesn't even talk about adding in world class strengh and conditioning, and nutritional coaches, as Harbaugh knew those areas were just as important to success as learning the playbook.  So, surround yourself by the best people possible.

Your Employees (Players) Really Matter--Win The Recruiting Battle

When Harbaugh got started, he did everything he could to stand out with recruits and push the envelope within the rules of the NCAA.  He would set up satellite football camps in other states that were recruiting hotbeds, with the logic if they won't come to visit Michigan, we will bring Michigan to them (which irritated the competiting football programs in those states).  He would take his team on big international team building trips (to give the players more than a football experience at Michigan).  He would have dinners and sleepovers at recruits' houses, to show those families how important that recruit was to him.  He launched a documentary about the Michigan football team on Amazon Prime, to get the program more media exposure nationwide, with an "inside look" at how business is done in Ann Arbor.  He may have gathered a lot of strange looks along the way, but there was clearly a method to his madness. Figure out what you need to do to attract the best talent, and stand out from your competitors.

Your Employees (Players) Really Matter--Recruit the Right People

Equally important was recruiting the right type of player.  Harbaugh was critcized for not recruiting enough five-star players.  But to him, it was more about the character of the person he was recruiting, knowing he would "coach up" a three or four-star player, into a "five-star" NFL prospect.  He wanted the guys that were underappreciated, had a chip on their shoulder, had a lot of hurdles they overcame.  He wanted that drive and mindset, as you can't teach that.  So, when the going gets tough, he would have a tough-minded team that would get going, driven to succeed no matter what challenges they were presented with.  And it worked, as evidenced by this year's Rose Bowl, when Michigan's 2 five-star players beat Alabama's 18 five-star players.  So, make sure your hires fit your desired culture, as you can't afford to have any "bad apples" in the bushel.

Your Team Culture Really Matters

I have watched over 40 years of Michigan football, and I have never seen a "team first" culture like this year's team.  They all had the singular goal of winning a national championship (after getting so close the previous two years), they knew they all needed to do their part on the field and in the weightroom, they all truly loved and inspired each other, and they were all "selfless".  Quarterback J.J. McCarthy sacrificied individual passing stats, if the coaches thought Michigan's vaunted running game would win the game.  Back-up running back Donovan Edwards, who could have easily started at any other school, was happy to play second string behind Blake Corum, if the coaches thought that would help them win the game.  Culture is one of the hardest things to build, and Harbaugh masterfully built his. You need to do the same.

Patience Is a Virtue

It would have been very easy for Athletic Director, Warde Manuel, to cut ties with Harbaugh after their dismal season in 2020.  But, Manuel believed in Harbaugh, and was willing to give him another chance.  It may have taken 9 seasons instead of 5 seasons to win a national championship, but Harbaugh ultimately delivered on the goal of restoring Michigan to greatness.  So, when making your hiring and firing decisions, be sure not to throw out "the baby with the bathwater".

Sometimes You Need to Eat "Humble Pie"

You have to know that Harbaugh was frustrated with his performance in 2020.  He was hired to restore the Michigan brand as one of the elites.  He wanted that more than anybody.  But, Harbaugh was willing to make the hard sacrifices.  He voluntarily cut his lofty salary in half, and made it more of a pay-for-performance structure, where the better the team did, the higher he got paid.  And, he pushed more of the team's salary budget, into the hands of his assistant coaches to increase their rewards for their hard work.  And, during COVID, even took personal monies to save certain staffers from getting fired.  That was not normal actions in the egomaniacal world of college football coaching.  But, these actions all instilled trust with the adminstration and loyalty by his team.  What can you do for your teams, to replicate this level of trust and loyalty to you?

Don't Publicly Disclose Your Actions Unless You Have To

The one big criticism of Harbaugh was his perennial flirtation with the NFL.  In 2022, it was with the Minnesota Vikings.  In 2023, it was with the Denver Broncos.  In 2024, it was with the LA Chargers who ultimately hired Harbaugh. Even if Harbaugh's intent was to create negotiating leverage for his contract renewal with the University of Michigan, you don't do it publically in the media, for all the current players, coaches and recruits to see.  It doesn't create a sense of stability, and would naturally have everyone looking for the door, especially with rival coaches fueling that messaging in their recruiting pitches.  Which is part of the reason Michigan's recruiting class ranks suffered.  So, keep your cards close to your chest any time your actions could have a negative impact on the team.

Timing Is Everything

If Harbaugh had left Michigan after his disastrous 2020 season, his reputation would have been permanently stained.  It would have been his first real failure, and his reputation with the university he loves, would have gone from beloved Michigan Man to a pariah.  But, by righting the ship, and leaving after winning the national championship, all is good with the world.  Harbaugh accomplished his goals, the fans are euphoric and he will be fondly remembered as the man that "saved" Michigan football.  And, even if he wants to go scratch that itch of coaching in the NFL and leaves Michigan, sobeit, we wish you the best.  In three short years, Harbaugh legacy evolved from "loser" to "legend".  And let's be real, there is only one way to go when you are at the top, and it was unlikely for Michigan to have another undefeated season in 2024 with top ten programs like Texas, Washington, Oregon, USC and Ohio State on the schedule, in the wake of four Pac-12 teams joining the Big Ten next season.  Timing is a critical compotent to your success and reputation, so use it wisely in your own efforts.

If It Isn't Broken, Don't Fix It

On the heels of Michigan's first national championship since 1997, losing your head football is not what an athletic director wants to deal with.  But, Manuel's actions were swift, and rightfully so.  He promoted Offensive Coordinator, Sherrone Moore, to head coach. Why?  Firstly, because Harbaugh said he was the next guy to carry the torch, and Manuel trusted Harbaugh's opinion.  But, more importantly, the players loved him, and he would maintain Michigan's very unique culture going forward, hopefully giving the team increased odds for additional championships in the future with a "winning recipe" in hand.  And, everyone remembers Moore's success filling in for a Harbaugh during his three-game suspension last season (for the sign stealing scandal), winning all three games against Michigan's three toughest opponents that year (Penn State, Maryland and Ohio State).  So, he was a known entity.  Could Michigan have hired a big name coach out of another program? Sure, it could have.  But, it would have risked toppling the entire apple cart in the process.

Closing Thoughts

Thank you Coach Harbaugh for everything you accomplished during your tenure at Michigan, you exceeded everyone's goals with three straight wins over OSU, three straight Big Ten titles, three straight trips to the College Football Playoff, and a national championship this year.  It may have taken you a couple extra years, but you ultimately did it.  The Michigan fan base wishes you nothing but success in Los Angeles.  And, for all you small business owners out there, see if you can apply any of these leadership lessons in your businesses. Go Blue!


For future posts, please follow me on Twitter at: @georgedeeb.


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