Thursday, March 13, 2008

Is Localism Just a Fad?

We all know that the new organic is not 'super organic', it's local. The new mantra is not to 'buy organic' but to 'grow organic'.

But is this newfound passion in localism just a fad? or is it here to stay? James Kunstler explores . . .


LOCALISM,
By James Howard Kunstler
Wednesday, 05 March 2008

At the moment, the ideas bundled under the rubric of “localism” are regarded as a lifestyle choice, which is to say a fashion statement of environmental concern, practiced by those with the time and means for following fashions. “Locavores” who make a point to eat locally are represented overwhelmingly by college-educated, high-income Baby Boomers who buy those $6 pint baskets of boutique blue potatoes at the farmers’ market as much to make a statement of principle (and derive moral comfort from doing so) as to eat nutritionally sound, good tasting food. Meanwhile, the rest of America keeps driving to the Shop Rite for tubes of frozen ground-round, jugs of Pepsi, and bags of Cheez Doodles made (grown?) God-knows-where. So, the stylishly fit locavores end up looking like stuck-up moralistic snobs while the majority follows the mindless corporate programming du jour like the overstuffed lumbering TV zombies they have become. By the way, locavores also overwhelmingly drive to the farmers’ market, (as I have observed in my town) and usually in motor vehicles the size of medieval war wagons.

Localism, in this sense, is very much related to the current craze for styling one’s endeavors as “green.” Tom Friedman cheerleads for “green” globalism in his New York Times column while Time Magazine runs “Greencast” programs on its website, and all kinds of specialists design green cars, green light bulbs, green toilets, green campuses, and green corporate headquarters (all the better for hawking those Cheez Doodles). Much of this activity can be described, to borrow a locution from public relations, as blowing green smoke up our own collective ass. Such, alas, is the sorry state of our culture nowadays that just pretending to mean well, for most people and institutions, is good enough.


A reality-based view of all this suggests that localism and “green” economic practices will be taken up more broadly and earnestly only when we don’t have a choice about it, and can no longer manage our bad old ways. My personal serene conviction is that we are much closer to reaching that point than most Americans realize. The romance of Climate Change currently holds the nation’s attention because it’s more like a made for Hollywood horror movie plot. Plus, there are a lot of secret side benefits. Will Connecticut become more like South Carolina? Surely some of the denizens of Fairfield County, CT, wouldn’t think that was such a bad deal. Will the grain belt move 800 miles further north into Canada? Very well, then, Canada’s our bitch, anyway. Will there be more tornadoes in Nebraska? Who cares – God made the place only so they could show movies on airplanes.


What’s roiling backstage, itching to shove climate change out of the spotlight, is Peak Oil, which is currently poorly understood at best by the public. For one thing, it’s not about running out of oil. It’s about the complex systems we depend on for everyday life in this country becoming unstable and failing as we enter the slippery slope of global oil depletion – a point which, arguably, we are already at. By complex systems I mean the way we produce our food (oil-dependent agri-business), the way we do commerce (Wal-Mart, et al), the way we do transportation (extreme car dependency), the way we do finance (Ponzi-style), and so on. The oil markets themselves are just another such complex system – and a year-over-year price hike of about 100 percent for a barrel of oil is certainly a manifestation of instability.


Price hikes are one thing. ; There is plenty of evidence that the American public can keep sucking up increases a while longer. What will probably bite harder is spot scarcities, when your favorite convenience store hangs a cardboard sign on the pump that says “out of gas.” This is liable to resolve out of a growing export crisis combined with a new oil nationalism – phenomena only recently acknowledged even by experts in the trade. It now appears that exports, in nations with surplus oil to sell, are going down at an even steeper rate than production declines. A country like Saudi Arabia may have produced X percent less oil in 2007 over 2006, but their exports actually declined X+5 percent. Why? They are using more of their own oil. The population is growing robustly. The Saudis are building the world’s largest aluminum smelter and many chemical factories. Russia, another big exporter, saw its car sales jump by 50 percent in 2007. Mexico is depleti ng so rapidly, and using so much more of its own oil, that it might be out of the export game altogether in three years. The new oil nationalism is prompting countries like Norway and Russia to husband more of their own resources as the awareness hits that they are past peak and might want to keep their own motors humming further into the future. They are also trending more toward selling oil on the basis of long-term contracts with favored customers rather than just auctioning the stuff off on the futures market.


All of this ought to be bad news for big importers like the USA – more than half of the oil we use. These days, we are not such a favored customer among other nations, in particular those of the Islamic persuasion. And when Mexico stops exporting we will lose our number two source of imports. Imagine that? Few Americans have imagined it so far, which is why we are about to be bl indsided by this set of problems.


As they gain traction we’ll be forced to make very different arrangements for virtually everything that constitutes everyday life in our society. Living much more locally will increasingly be the only choice. We are utterly unprepared. We’ll have to grow food differently, at a smaller scale, closer to home, with fewer oil-and-gas-based “inputs.” It will surely require more human attention. National chain discount shopping will shut down as its economies-of-scale dissolve and formulas like the “warehouse on wheels” and just-in-time inventory lose viability. Happy motoring will fade into memory and the entire suburban equation will wilt along with it. And just about everything else you can name from centralized high schools to professional sports will be cruelly affected by problems of scale and energy.


Where arc hitecture and urbanism are concerned, there are several major issues in my view pertaining to local outcomes. One is certainly counter-intuitive. Our big cities will contract, not grow. The fortunate ones will densify at their old centers and waterfronts, but overall the trend will be severe shrinkage, really a reversal of the 200-year-long demographic movement of people from farms and small towns to mega cities. (Places over-burdened with skyscrapers will prove to be exceptionally troubled. The skyscraper is an endangered species that will, like the Baluchitherium of yore, soon go extinct.) The overall trend will benefit the smaller cities and towns, in my opinion, but only the ones that can maintain a relationship with productive farming hinterlands and/or trade-via-water. The implications for land-use regulation are obviously huge. Rural land will no longer be valued for suburban development. Those who chose to live in rural places in th e decades ahead ought to be prepared to follow rural vocations. The end of suburbia will be the end of urban lifestyles lived in rural (or ruralesque) settings.


I happen to believe that our zoning laws and land use codes are un-reformable. Instead, they will simply be ignored. We’ll return to traditional modes of inhabiting the landscape by default, as it were, because we’ll no longer have the choice of doing it 20th century style. We’ll discover the hard way that the New Urbanists won that argument. It will just not be called “New” Urbanism anymore because it will no longer stand in opposition to other practical ideologies like suburbanism or Modernism. We’ll just have plain urbanism – and design disciplines to go with it.


Architects ought to prepare for a return to traditional local materials. Modular snap-together panels and frame syst ems will be increasingly unavailable due to the prohibitive cost of fabrication as well as the cost of exotic metals such as Frank Gehry’s favorite, titanium. It is hard to say how severe this problem may become – a whole new industry will surely arise dedicated to the disassembly of old structures and salvaging of materials – but personally I’d say that we’re headed back to mostly masonry for the best new construction. It will necessarily be regional or local in flavor and it will require traditional tectonic methods of assembly – which necessarily implies at least a return to a kind of methodological classicism.


What remains for now is a terrible grandiose inertia among people who really ought to know better: our culture leaders. The cutting edge has become a blunt instrument unsuited to fashioning the patterns of the future. Everything we do from now on will have to be finer in scale, quality, and chara cter. Exercises in irony will no longer be appreciated because there will no longer be a premium paid for declaring ourselves to be ridiculous. The localism of the future will not be a matter of fashion. It will be in the food we eat and the air we breathe, and we’d better start paying attention.

The New Danger of Greehushing

A great article about why you should tell the world about your green efforts . . .

Greenhushing Doesn't Help Anyone: Why Green Business Should Speak Up

Greenwashing is the corporate image version of money laundering − a way to maintain the status quo under a shiny thin veneer of change. One of greenwashing's negative effects is that it dissuades genuinely green companies from promoting their own far more substantial green practices. Companies that are authentically doing good stay silent, for fear that they'll be tarred with the same brush as those who are carrying on with business as usual. We hereby christen this unfortunate phenomenon "greenhushing." Although its intent is admirable, its effect is almost as negative as greenwashing. Here's why:

To read the rest of the article . . .
CLICK HERE

Saturday, March 08, 2008

*The* Key Factor in Your Offer


2. The Customer Values Question: What things are most important to your prospects when buying what you sell?


IMPORTANT POINT #1: This isn’t what is most important to people in buying from YOU. It’s what is most important to them when buying the generic product or service you sell. This is about their experience of buying as a customer - not yours as a seller. You must put yourself in their shoes. You must learn, above all, to see the world through their eyes.

IMPORTANT POINT #2: We’re asking what is most important to your ideal client - whether or not it’s something you provide yet. If what’s most important to your customer is 24 service but you only have 8 hour a day service, still write it down.

IMPORTANT POINT #3: Remember, there are two parts to any business interaction - there’s what they’re getting and how they’re getting it. There’s the product and then there’s the process of getting it. And they are both equally important. There are things that are going to be important to them about the product they’re buying but there’s also going to be things that are important about the salesperson.

IMPORTANT POINT #4: This question includes not only the value they want to get but the values they hope or expect your business will embody. These values are what makes them feel good about themselves for doing business with you.

Example #1: What things are most important to your prospects when buying a new car?

I want the car to:
o be fuel efficient
o be a nice colour
o have a good warranty
o not have too many miles on the odometer?
o not have too much wear and tear
About the salesman:
o is the sales-person slimy and manipulative or trustworthy?
o can i trust that they have my own best interests in mind?
o no hidden fees?

Example #2: What things are most important to your prospects when buying a new fence?

o I want the fence to: look good, not turn brown quickly, not sag or lean, last at least ten years and be of high quality.

o About the fence contractor: I don’t want any hidden costs, I want the fence to be completed in a reasonable time frame, I don’t want the workers to be scary drug users, I want a reasonable price.

Example #3: What things are most important to your prospects when hiring a life coach?

I want to know that my coach . . .
o will be on time for calls
o is able give me templates, quizzes and other materials to help me
o has made significant, positive shifts in their own life dues to life coaching
o is aligned with my life values
o asks questions vs. doling out advice
o is committed to their own growth
o is certified by a recognized coaching organization
o is not going to pressure me to do things I don’t want to do

Example #4: What things are most important to your prospects when hiring a web designer?

I want to know that my web designer . . .

o will be able to respond quickly to any changes i need to make to my site.
o will ask me a tonne of questions upfront to make sure that they really understand what exactly it is I’m wanting and needing
o can explain to me, up front, their process for designing a website.
o has designed other sites that I like
o will deliver their work on time and on budget

Example #5: “British Airways wanted to keep customers happy, so it asked regular customers on the transatlantic run what they most wanted. The answer was an overwhelming "Leave us alone and let us sleep!" Passengers wanted their own comfy universe, and they got it. British Airways first-class passengers currently dine on a five-course meal with fine linen and candlelight in the waiting lounge before they board the aircraft, and then it's to sleep right after take-off. The seat reclines almost to horizontal - as close to a bed as you can get. The airline lends you a two-piece running suit that is like a nice pair of pajamas and provides you with a comforter and face mask. If you don't want to sleep, you have a choice of movies at your own seat and an in-flight banquet.” - Marketing Without Advertising



Then Identify What They Don’t Want:

“When you identify what is broken among you competitors, you've found a free prize. Your growth will come instead from the dissatisfied and the unsatisfied.

The dissatisfied know that they want a solution, but aren't happy with the solution you've got. The minute they find it, they'll buy it. Yahoo!'s best customers weren't Google's first users. Nope. The happy Yahoo! customers weren't busy looking for a replacement. Google focused on dissatisfied Web surfers.

The unsatisfied are the folks who don't even realize that they've got a problem that needs solving. The question you ought to ask first is, "will people dissatisfied with what they're using now embrace this, and even better, will they tell the large number of unsatisfied people to go buy it right away?”

Yahoo! changed its focus from engaging the dissatisfied and the unsatisfied to trying to maintain it's hold on the satisfied.

Go find some people who hate what you've got and who hate what your competitors have but still have a problem they want solved. Those are the folks that want the free prize.” Seth Godin



Dental Office Example of Industry Frustrations:

“Just fill out these forms and hand them back when you’re done…” say the medical receptionists handing you a clipboard with the pen on a string.

I don’t know about you, but I hate when I hear these words, and I get them a lot. I don’t like them for several reasons.

o I look at forms and go bug-eyed – literally I find most of them difficult to comprehend and a pain to fill out. Apparently I’m not alone in this regard!
o Questions on medical forms are often complicated or difficult to understand – ie they’re often poorly written and confusing … and seemingly irrelevant!
o There’s rarely enough space for the questions that matter, as if I can figure out which ones do matter.
o I just “KNOW” that no one will look at these forms ever again. I “know” that because no one ever seems to mention that information again, and I’m often repeating the same answers verbally later.
o It seems that even though I’m on time for my appointment, I only get my place in line after I complete the forms – anyone who comes in while I’m writing gets in before me.
o Now, because I’m writing so fast, I’m certain my already scratchy hand- writing is doubly illegible! Nobody ever asks for clarification. Nobody seems to care.

(Can you tell I’ve been to the doctor a lot with my kids recently!)

I think completing forms is one of the most obviously frustrating customer service problems that exist in the world today. Big statement, but more so because it’s so obviously unpleasant and yet no one seems to want to do anything about it!

Well Paddi did, and how he fixed the problem is so simple and seamless that it’s admirable and worthy of specific mention.

~~~~~~~~~~~ Back to your Walk Through of Paddi’s practice ~~~~~~~~~~~

You rang the doorbell and were personally greeted by Merilyn, your Care Nurse. Merilyn showed you to your Personal Lounge, and she has just poured you a cup of Special Blend Tea from the lovely Royal Doulton china and silver tea service.

As you chat over your cup of tea, Merilyn is affable and genuinely interested as she asks about you and shares a little about herself (mutual disclosure is another of Paddi’s principles of building trust). You already have a few things in common because of your friend who invited you to the practice.

In the first few minutes Merilyn explains, “As it’s your first visit with us today, as we get to know each other I’ll be asking a few questions about your medical history that might be important for us to know.”

At this stage, Merilyn draws your attention to the laptop computer on the coffee table in front of her that you noticed as you sat down.

“I’ll just take a moment every now and then to type the important information directly into your file. Please don’t think me impolite, but we think it’s better than giving you forms that we’d have to type in later anyway. Is that ok with you?”

“Hmmmmm,” you ponder. You might have to think about that one for a moment!

And that’s Paddi’s answer to the problem of forms. They don’t have them. His Care Nurses have wirelessly networked laptops they carry around with them so they can update client’s records in real time, even in the dental surgery.

It’s perhaps a little detail, but it makes such an impact on anyone who dislikes forms as much as I do. The pain that once was filling out forms has been transformed into a pleasant conversation with a very likable Merilyn over a lovely cup of tea and a fresh baked dental bun.

And it’s a much more efficient use of everyone’s time:


o Merilyn doesn’t have to find time later to decipher your handwriting – let alone another admin nurse who doesn’t know you at all.
o The data is recorded accurately the first time, no additional questions later or mistakes from mistyped information.
o As your Care Nurse, Merilyn is with you your entire visit – in the Personal Lounge and in the dental surgery –you’ll never have to repeat information to Paddi that you’ve already told Merilyn.
o Hence, you only have to share the information once, enjoyably and accurately, in less time than it would take to write the same history.
o And the privacy of the Personal Lounge is so much more appropriate for these somewhat personal conversations than the conventional all-in-one waiting room. As Paddi likes to say, “Treat in public, communicate in private.” (More on this in an upcoming issue.)

People really seem to open up when they’re comfortable and in control, in their personal lounge talking with their Care Nurse. It’s an important part of building faith and trust in Paddi’s expertise.

And because it’s enjoyable, customers are quite happy to spend the time chatting – anyway, they were told in advance that they should set aside 90 minutes for their first appointment, so no one is watching the clock wondering how long all this will take.

For more on the importance of addressing key customer fears and frustrations, see Paddi’s Advanced Manual, “Training Customers to Treasure Your Business” at
http://www.solutionspress.com.au/page.asp?nid=dwzltpp&name=TrainingCustomers

~~~~~~~~~~~ What this means to you? ~~~~~~~~~~~

If you’re in professional practice where new patients fill in forms, you might consider how Paddi’s solution to this key customer frustration might work with your service systems. Paddi has found it a far more simple and effective way of doing things, and the extra 20 minutes or so that Merilyn spends chatting is time and money well invested in the future business relationship.

But even if you’re not in a medical related business, you might consider these points:

o What key frustrations do your customers experience when doing business with you? (ie what are your businesses “Forms & Clipboards”?)
o How can you change your service systems to turn those frustrations into enjoyable parts of the service experience? (If for no other reason than your obvious care in addressing an otherwise common problem in a creative way.)
o How can you integrate your new process into your systems, procedures and checklists so that the problems never arise for your customers again?

Why not make a list of what you think are the most common key service frustrations in your industry and send it to me by e-mail. I’d be interested in comparing notes.

Coming up in the next issue, we’ll visit the one room in Paddi’s practice that has the most impact on how customers perceive his business.

Until then,

Fletcher Potanin
Managing Director
Solutions Press Business Publishing
www.PaddiLund.com

* * *

A COUPLE MORE EXAMPLES:
If you can address the common industry frustrations - you’re going to be ahead of the game.

DENTISTS: No one likes to go to the dentist because it’s such a painful experience.
Potential Irresistible Offer: ‘Sedation Dentistry, the safe, pain free way to healthy teeth.’

REALTORS: People are wary of letting real estate agents sell their homes because the don’t believe the agents will aggressively try to sell them fast enough.
Potential Irresistible Offer: ‘Our 20 point Power Marketing Plan gets your house sold in 30 days or less.’

PLUMBERS: They show up late (or give you an all day timeline, don’t fix it right the first time and charge more than the initial estimate)
Potential Irresistible Offer: ‘We will give you an exact time and guarantee to have some there at that time. If we’re more than an hour late - it’s on us. We guarantee to never charge more than the initial quote and, if we have to come back to fix a job we were already working on - it’s on us. You shouldn’t pay for our mistakes.’

Robert Boduch of the website: www.makeyoursalessoar.com has this to say:

“The best system I’ve seen for developing a strong USP, comes from Marketing guru, Jay Abraham. He suggests taking out 2 sheets of paper. On one sheet write, “You Know How...” and on the other write “Well, what we do is...”




HOMECLEANERS: “You know how most home cleaners only work to schedules that suit them. Well, what we do is send a crew whenever you want, anytime of day or night, 7 days a week, including holidays, 52 weeks a year. When you want your home cleaned, we’re there fast, guaranteed!”

CONTRACTORS: “You know how most contractors promise a hassle-free renovation, then... they’re always behind schedule, leave your house a mess... and they even have the nerve to charge you 15% more than their estimate! Well what we do is ensure your job will be completed on time and at the initial price quoted – 100% guaranteed! And, our crew understands that you’re living in your home throughout the renovation, so we promise to take extra time at the end of every day, just to clean up any mess. We help you create dreams... not nightmares.”