REALITY Vs. PERCEPTION

A great deal of a businessperson's time is spent creating the right perception of her business. She wants to be sure that her target market have the opinion she wants them to have. Is her practice a high-end boutique practice, an "every-man's" kind of practice or a practice designed to accommodate those who can't afford other venues? She might want to position herself as the friendliest, the most authoritative, most experienced etc.

The perception of her practice to her prospects should be based in the reality of her practice. Just ask her previous clients if their perception of her practice proved to be the reality. If she positioned herself as an expert in construction issues and was unable to read the blueprints put before her, well ... not only are her clients going to be a little more than disheartened, she might have done actual damage to the their case, the process, her individual practice and the industry as a whole. The reality did not support the perception.

On that note, a great deal your time should be spent on building an APPROPRIATE perception of the reality in your target market's minds. How do you do that?

First realize what your strengths are. Determine your niche. Then determine what position in that specialized market place you want to take. It could be based on your fee schedule, your expertise, your personality, your geographic location, or, well, pretty much anything.

Then design your marketing and promotional pieces to reflect the "personality" you've chosen for your practice. Be sure that your marketing choices give a true reflection of the perception you want folks to have. If you are trying to position your firm as the high-end provider in the area, don't scrimp on paper quality, real estate, or staff.

If you're a non-profit - the reverse is true. Recipients of your letters want to know that you're frugal with the little money you have. They want to see your information on less expensive or recycled papers.

In essence - the reality, and the perception of that reality, need to be the identical in order to avoid any cognitive dissonance in your target market, not to mention keep them coming back for more.

If you need any help in trying to determine whether or not the reality matches the perception you are trying to create, give me a call - we'll mediate the gap.

Some Questions (And their answers)

Here's a question that might actually be your answer. Next time you're working on your practice-building strategy, ask yourself this:

If I ran a competing practice, how would I beat mine?

Which weakness would I attack? What would I do to distinguish my new practice from my current practice?

Then --- eliminate that weakness from your practice. Either augment your activities, your location, your service, your support systems, etc. or outsource them. Your weakness is your soft underbelly, and probably the reason you are losing some business.

Next --- build on your distinguishing strength before someone else starts doing it.

Always ask yourself, "How would I beat me?"

Another good question to ask.

Whenever you consider your business's next steps, ask, "if we were starting this business from scratch, what would we do differently?"

Then do that. Every now and then it's good to start from scratch.

Wonder!

At an international conference of ADR consumers a while ago I overheard one gentleman say to another "Mediation is the greatest thing since sliced bread"!

Well, here's the thing about sliced bread.

It was invented by Otto Frederick Rohwedder in 1912. A simple yet brilliant idea: a machine that could take a loaf of bread and (voila) slice it!

Otto's machine was a complete failure.

Around this same time was the beginning of the advertising age (which meant that no matter how a good a product or service was, without good marketing it had very little chance of success.

It was about 20 years later, when a new brand called Wonder started marketing sliced bread, that the invention caught on. It was the packaging and the advertising that worked - not the convenience or innovation of pre-slicing bread.

How does this translate to your practice?

Well, I know your service is great and you know your service is great - but if your consumers don't know it ... well, frankly, it just doesn't matter how great your service really is. You've got to reach out to your consumers and tell them how great your service is. Tell why you're different, better, faster, cheaper, bigger, smaller,.... But the point is - you've got to tell them.

If you need help figuring out ways to tell you customers how great your practice is, give me a call and I'll you strategize some practice-building and marketing activities.

Promoting through Public Speaking

One of the most obvious and most effective ways to promote your practice is through public speaking. It puts you directly in front of your target market and establishes you as a credible authority on your topic ... IF you're a good public speaker that is.

If you need to polish your public speaking, one way to improve is to join your local toastmasters club where you can hone your impromptu and prepared speaking skills

alongside others like yourself. Another option is to join a local community theater

company where small speaking parts allow you to dip your toe in the sea of public

speaking with minimal attention. You might also try your local college for a public

speaking course.

In many regions oratory still thrives, and indeed is performed in clubs and associations that allow people like yourself to learn the trick of the trade and have an opportunity to engage in the honorable, ageless practice of public speaking. Most programs and organizations that offer such training and participation have nominal costs, if any. For those of you who don't want to pay for a private coach, but need the skills necessary to hold an audiences' attention, these group venues might be just what you need.

Once you're comfortable in front of a crowd it's time to your skills. But not on primary, secondary, or tertiary target markets. Nope. Try them out on us first. Speak or present to the resolution industry. Our organizations should be your comfort zone and will give you the right platform to take your expertise public. Speak to us. Teach us something that you're passionate about. Give us your best. From us you'll learn how to prepare for presentation, how to deliver it, and very importantly - how to follow up on it.

Now that you've got some practice it's time to swing for the fences and speak and present to your target markets. What do your perspective clients want to hear? Or maybe take the riskier route and deliver a speech about what they don't want hear - but might be necessary for them to know. As you reach out to associations and organizations to which you want to speak, it's always a good idea to ask the all-important question; what do the members want to hear or learn. That might better define or even entirely change the subject matter of your presentation.

Once you've got the gig be sure to share all about it on your social media accounts (which should be populated with your target market contacts) and if appropriate invite them to attend. under the spotlight people come to you be prepared to network come with cards aplenty  offer to give attendees whatever follow up they need - a phone call, a face to face meeting, or more information.  if the association to which you speak doesn't have a survey in place to determine how well you did - get their permission to survey the attendees. 5 or fewer short questions and (this next thing is super important) a place for testimonials. If you can post to social media during or immediately after the event do it. Be sure to thank the association or organization for allowing you the opportunity to speak to their members. update your bio credible authority on the issues your target market face

The key component now is to follow up on the connections you made and move those interactions in relationships. Send your new colleagues a follow up email whatever information they requested or you offered, meet them coffee, add them to your LinkedIn network, and continue to keep in touch. Keeping yourself front of mind and you'll turn potential clients into prospective clients and then again into paying clients.

If you need help finding places to speak, a topic on which to speak, or to get the most from your speaking gig, give me a call. I'm always happy to help.

Before, During and After

Before advertising mediators had word of mouth. Our services were talked about, referrals made, and our services purchased.

The best mediators had the best reputations and busiest practices.

During advertising it's pretty simple - if you advertise and market directly to consumers your sales go up. A partnership with an appropriate PR and Marketing firm means you can grow your company nearly as large as you can imagine.

After advertising, well, we're back nearly where we started. But instead of your practice growing slowly and awkwardly by word of mouth alone, the power of your network combined with intelligent PR and marketing can drive your practice to great heights at rocket speed.

Striking a balance between self-promotion and professional promotion can be the defining combination for success. If you're not a business-minded mediator find someone to help with business development. If you're not entrepreneurial find someone who is to help create that never-ending drive for you. If you're not a bookkeeper - outsource your books to a professional. Essentially - do what you do best (mediate) and find professionals to augment your business with their special talents.

The combination is unbeatable and the balance you create will pay for itself in more ways than just your bank account.

If you need help balancing your practice-building and marketing activities give me call and I'll help you with your strategic needs.

Your Website - Yes, You Need One

Do you have a website?

Do you need a website?

Here's what you should you know.

1. Your content should be 80% - 90% about your viewer, their concerns, their fears, their issues, their position. It's all about them and what's in it for them if they hire you. Speak to their problems and provide them the solution.

2. Graphics and colors should be developed based on the lowest common denominators of your viewers' computers' abilities. If your target viewers are not at all Internet savvy - don't ask them to download files or add software to view your site. If your viewers are older - use a larger font and use a font that is a True Type font so that the majority of the computer systems will view the font you want them to view.

3. Keep your navigational bar clean, clear, and consistent. The same buttons should be available in the same order on all pages.

4. Provide your contact information on every page.

5. Be careful not to provide your viewer a "back door" to your competition. You work too hard and expend too many resources to invite viewers to leave your site for your competitor's site.

6. Although providing your viewer with educational articles and links about ADR - you don't want to overload them with information on your site - instead invite them to contact you or to use your personal library.

7. Make changes to your site at least bi-annually and inform your clients and prospects about these changes.

8. Be sure you watch your website statistics. Make note of the pages on which viewers enter, leave and spend the longest amount of time. Change your site appropriately based on these findings.

9. Use your photograph so that viewers have the advantage of a virtual introduction.

10. Keep an eye on your web hosting. You shouldn't have to pay more than $8.00 per

month in today's market.

11. Links are free. Any web designer that wants to charge you for links is taking advantage of you.

12. Most providers don't need a site that exceeds 10 pages.

13. A template is great - one of my favorites is available from Mark Johnson (a mediator himself and webdesigner) at www.TKOwebdesign.com

14. If you don't know how to code your own site you can easily hire a designer to make the changes for you. If don't need to make changes often - don't pay for them. You can hire a designer to make changes at equally low rates for "change orders" as opposed to fixed contracts. If, on the other hand, you want to make regular changes a maintenance contract may be the route to go.

15. Unless your viewers read and speak in high Oxford English - write your content using kitchen English. You know the language you use in casual conversation - less any slang.

The goal is to make your viewer feel comfortable and confident in your knowledge of ADR and their dispute. Make your site as easy as possible for them to get the information they're looking for and to reach you once you've let them know that you're the right person for the job.

If you need help with developing an appropriate website don't hesitate to contact me.