nickshanagher

Start With Why is a TED talk by Simon Sinek that has been watched more than 24.8 million times. Plus a further 701,000 views on YouTube. It takes 18 minutes to watch and is inspiring. There is also the book , advertised as a global bestseller. It will take you four to six hours to read and I recommend that you take longer than this. While the talk is brilliant and the book seems to say not much more across its 200 pages, the benefit of spending time with Sinek’s ideas comes from challenging how well you can answer the question: “Well why should I do business with you?” The first part of the book is all about business as usual. The manipulations that companies use to keep customers - price, promotions, fear, aspirations, peer pressure, and novelty (a.k.a. innovation) - are all entertainingly eviscerated. “Price always costs something. The question is, how much are you willing to pay for the money you make?” Sinek prompts. Manipulations are perfectly valid strategy for drivin...

The Curve by Nicholas Lovell is a book that will help you to think about your business differently and particularly about how to think about your customers and how to make money from them. For example, at one point he discusses the difference between “free” and “cheap” by quoting a famous experiment where psychologist Dan Ariely set up a table to offer customers two kinds of chocolate, a high quality Lindt truffle or an “ordinary” Hershey Kiss. “A large sign above the table read, ‘One chocolate per customer’. Customers could only see the chocolates and their prices once they stepped up to the table. “Ariely started the experiment by setting the price of Lindt at 15 cents [the cost price was 30 cents] and Kisses at 1 cent. [The customers] acted with a great deal of rationality: they compared the price and quality of the Kiss with the price and quality of the truffle, and about 73% of them chose the truffle. “The purpose of the experiment was to see what impact free had on...

The end of the independent bookstore (and a new golden age for books) is an unmissable Seth Godin comment piece that has resonance for any local shop. His analysis of how multiple retailers can take the profit opportunity from independent retailers who develop a market applies to more markets than just books. Think Easter eggs. Think back to school. His market positioning for the independent book shop of the future is great. How can you use what he says to apply to your business and to your customers. While the convenience business model appears to be robust enough to withstand the advance of the internet, you cannot afford to stand still. Think about how you can "own" the hearts and minds of your customers. For more, see www.betterretailing.com .

Luke Johnson, the entrepreneur behind Pizza Express and former head of Channel 4, is a compulsive reader and he warmly recommended Made in America by Sam Walton. For years I resisted the chance to read the story of the man who made Walmart and boy was I wrong. Quite simply this is a brilliant manual on what you need to do to be a successful independent retailer. In one chapter on thinking small, Walton says: “I always wanted to be the best retailer in the world, not the biggest.” In 1960 in a newspaper article called Success Story of the Year it described how he and his family and managers had built up a nine strong chain of variety stores. He told the paper that nine was as big as it could get as it was as many as he could supervise. Most readers don’t need to worry how he moved beyond nine to become the biggest retailer in history (he did this by hiring and inspiring great people). What they need to recognise is that Walton remained a great independent retailer till...

One person cannot be the sole catalyst for change. Great ideas can come from anywhere. You have to trust your team.   These thoughts on leading change from Richard Gerver, formerly a star head teacher and now a travelling speaker, form a cornerstone of Change, his exciting new book published by Penguin. Gerver is a maverick and most independent retailers will warm to him immediately from the pacey prologue. Change is a short book. It is beautifully presented and filled with ideas that will encourage you to live your dreams and to connect to other people. “We have all got to stop assuming we live in unique little silos that nobody else could possibly understand,” says Gerver. He recommends that you take time out from your shop to explore the world and learn half-a-day at a time from other people’s experiences. His book is not about self-help nor is it a management book. What Change does do is give readers ideas on how their ideas about developing their businesses ...

In my latest Retail Express column I write about the need for local retailers to have some sort of digital platform so that they can build a network of followers. The email that follows is from a shop called Alfred the Grape, which is in Marlow, a town about 10 or 12 miles from where I live. Except that I was already going to a birthday party - and the weather forecast was dreadful - this is a great email, selling the idea of fun things to do, not necessarily connected directly with buying stuff. Have a read and think about what you tell local customers - and what you could tell them. If you're at a loose end this Sunday, why not go to the Marlow Food Festival. Apparently it's free, fun and we're wines merchants  extraordinaire ! So to live up to this bill we'll have some fabulous bottles open for you to try (&, hopefully, buy if you like them enough). For the full blurb, see below.     Moving forward, I'm planning regular Friday evening in-stor...

How does a man whom poverty drove into work at the age of 12 and who is now the fifth richest man in the world think? And what can you learn from him? Amancio Ortega is worth $31 billion according to Forbes but The Man from Zara , Covadonga O’Shea’s often brilliant story of his business career unpicks his retail secrets. There are two reasons to read this book: ·         Firstly if to be inspired by a retail genius ·         Secondly to imitate his ideas on being a successful leader. O’Shea structures the book around a series of interviews with Ortega and many of his key staff. A highly secretive man, Ortega commands loyalty from all who know him well. O’Shea writes clearly and layers detail across the book so that you need to engage with every chapter. Doing so is worthwhile as you build an understanding of how to be successful. Ortega’s career was sparked by a grocer refusing his mother credit wh...

Bob Gorton's book Boosting Sales  (Bloomsbury, £9.99) available on Amazon,  gives the owner of every business a lasting insight into the simple rules that will help you make more money than you are today. The success of the book is not because it is full of new ideas but because it presents simple business rules in a way that is easy to grasp and easy to follow. "I once tried sport parachuting," Bob writes, "and when I had stopped trembling for long enough to listen to him, the jump master taught me a very important lesson. He said: 'Once you are out there, look at the white cross on the ground, because people generally hit what they are staring at.' So those people who look hard and constantly at the competition...seem to find a lot of it. Look hardest at your customers, you will better understand their wants and needs and find more customers." The book is organised logically. Bob is an engineer and he is sharing the rules for business success, rul...

The definition of what makes a convenience store often depends on the outlook of the person asking the question. For a local retailer, stocking milk, bread and a few essential grocery items is often enough. For a major grocery supplier, 3,000 square feet of gleaming store, well planogrammed and merchandised is often a starting point. I like Nigel Mills' definition. If most of your shoppers pick up a basket when they walk in, you have a convenience store, he says. So news that Waitrose is to open hundreds of c-stores around the UK may be a concern if your shoppers are picking up baskets. It could be that your shoppers are the ones it is targeting. However, this week's stock market update by Marks & Spencer chief executive Stuart Rose shows that he believes Waitrose is after his shoppers. M&S has unveiled advertisements showing that its wise buys are cheaper than Waitrose's essentials. If shoppers think M&S is more expensive, it is not true, says Sir Stuart. ...