Released on = November 22, 2006, 5:55 pm

Press Release Author = Federico Giller

Industry = Small Business

Press Release Summary = Employees are the most overlooked profit center within any
business. Here, marketing legend Tom Feltenstein presents how to profit from your
employees

Press Release Body = Whenever I meet with a new client, they expect me to start
talking about product differentiation and how to advertise with snappy slogans. They
are startled when I guide our marketing discussions around the quality and morale of
their internal customers - their employees. I\'ve come to realize that the quickest,
cheapest and most effective way to boost sales is through a company\'s internal
customer. My 23 year experience assisting well know companies like Coke, Hyatt,
Sunoco, LA Weight Loss Centers, Express Personnel Services among scores of other
fortune 500 companies and single \'mom & pop\' establishments have taught me that a
superb customer experience, is the fastest way to impact your top line, and the
quickest way to guarantee a superb customer experience is through your employees.

I will share with you a handful of my key findings, strategies and tactics - they
sound remarkably dumb, (perhaps this is why only a handful of businesses implement
them) - but they pack a predictable power punch to your profits.

"You can\'t get good help these days." "Nobody cares about customer service anymore."
"I can\'t afford to hire the good people." "These kids today. . . ." Business owners
complain that we have a recruiting problem in America, but they\'re dead wrong. What
we do have is a retention problem, because first - our hiring processes is terrible
and second, we don\'t take care of who we employ.

Red Auerbach, the legendary coach of the Boston Celtics basketball team, once said,
"If you hire the wrong people, all the fancy management tactics in the world won\'t
help you out." Low-cost employees are really, really expensive because they\'ll quit
in three months-and the most expensive person you hire is the person you have to
fire.

A well respected restaurant chain estimated the cost of turning over a single
manager to be about $26,000 per year (it ranges from $22,000 to $30,000). If you
have a large organization and you turn over 100 managers in a year - this is a cost
of $2.6 million - no small change.

Stamford University has one of the highest success rates in graduating students who
enter as freshmen, an astounding 95% of them graduate. The key to their success is
that they have one of the most rigorous acceptance programs among universities. They
devote huge resources into finding, recruiting and interviewing students so they are
certain that the student is perfectly matched to their world class curriculum. Their
acceptance criteria go well beyond just looking at SAT scores, and evaluating
essays; but this is only half the story. Once a student is accepted, they assume
full responsibility for ensuring the student graduates, and gets the best education
possible.

Lesson #1 - Develop a profile of who you want to be a member of your staff. You must
determine up front exactly what qualities you want in your employees. You want
people who are experienced, people who already have a job and are really good at it.
Lesson #2 - Learn to hire, and if you don\'t know how to do it well (hint - look at
your results for the past 12 months) - then find a company that can assist you.
Lesson #3 - Once you\'ve hired the best, give them everything they need so they
really win big in their job.
Lesson #4 - Set high standards. Employees often fail not because they can\'t do the
job, but because they won\'t. Challenge them incrementally, give them incentives with
proportional rewards, and show them what\'s possible.
Lesson #5 - Match your employees\' skills, abilities and preferences to the work they
do, give them the skills required to grow and let them know when they are doing
well.


"The Best Investment of Your Time and Money Is to Train Your Internal Customers To
Be Their Very Best Selves - it\'s by far the best, most reliable and predictable
return on investment I\'ve ever come across"
Has your business been in a funk lately?
The only contact point between you and the customer is your employee. Your frontline
is your bottom line. The quickest way to get out of the blues is to have your people
doing what they can be the best at, and challenging them to do it even better.
Suppose you find someone who doesn\'t smile but seems awesome in every other respect.
You think, I would for a moment put this person in front of a customer? If you can\'t
find this person a position that doesn\'t require customer contact, you should wish
her good luck on her continued job search.

Training programs based on the Neighborhood Marketing Philosophy need to address
core objectives such as promoting world-class performance among employees, engaging
their talents and expertise in areas where they are already strong. A recent Gallup
study found that training programs alone don\'t engage employees. I quote from the
report: "Decades of Gallup research reveals that people achieve the greatest
increases in performance when they focus on building their strengths" yet most
companies provide training as a way of fixing weaknesses. The study revealed that
one in five employees work in roles that maximize use of their talents.

Now, I want you to TAKE THIS PERSONALLY! Look at your staff roster and consider that
only 1 out of every 5 employees is using their strongest talent to perform their
tasks. I bet you know who this person is! They are productive, joyful, creative, and
always seem up, and they give the best of themselves without it ever having to be
demanded. Perhaps its time to find out how to get the other 4 to flourish. If you
can re-assign them - then do so, otherwise encourage them to find another place that
fits them better. You owe it to yourself, the individual, and the rest of your
staff.
Most Likely, Your Internal Customer\'s Brain is Starving - Here\'s How to Feed It
Your first step in developing people is to identify their talents, their strong
points, their uniqueness. Give them jobs that help them expand their skills and
knowledge to build their strengths. I\'m not saying this to sound nice or to be
liked, I\'m saying this because it\'s the fast-track to profitability. It\'s one of
these remarkably dumb things to do, but you\'d be surprised how few operations do it.
It\'s so stupidly obvious that everyone misses it - at a huge loss to their company.

Marriott Vacation Club International and Gallup Management conducted a study on the
ability of employees to boost average sales per guest. They analyzed the impact of
strengths development against actual sales performance and found striking
differences in their results. All 75 employees who received feedback on their
strengths had an 11 percentage point increase in their average sales volume
percentages than the 55 employees who did not receive strengths feedback.

Now let\'s put this in perspective. Do you know of an advertising campaign,
promotion, mass media blip, radio advertising, pay per click campaign - anything -
that you can run forever, that costs you absolutely nothing - and that would NET you
a hefty 11% sales increase? If you find one, tell me about it - I\'ll give you a
million bucks for the tip! In the meantime, implement this one.

You make a little extra cash just for patting your employees on the back when
they\'ve done well - what a concept huh?

Now, lets just suppose that Gallup was a little overzealous in analyzing their data
- even if it were a 2% increase, would it not pay you to do it? (I can show you how,
but it will take more than this article). Here are a few nuggets of Uncommon Wisdom:
The Neighborhood Marketer\'s 4 Step Formula for Keeping Good Employees.

· Identify the strengths and preferences of your internal customers.
· Fit them to the task or position that is best suited to them.
· Develop their strengths by providing key skills training.
· Engage them and challenge them by giving them progressive responsibility and rewards.
How to turn your internal customers into CA$H
Internet giants like Amazon realized the value of every individual customer when
they started their affiliate programs. They capitalized on present customers by
asking them to refer other customers to them - and pay them a percentage of each
sale. At no initial cost, Amazon was able to round up an entire commission-based
sales force of people who were eager to do what they did.

It is surprising to me how some companies with thousands of individuals in the
workforce who interact directly with customers on a daily basis fail to see the
revenue potential right within their stores. What if each one of your employees
could bring in only one customer per week into your store or establishment? Could
that employee receive a percentage of this sale? Now, to give you an idea: Suppose
your average sale is $50, and you have 100 employees - if each employee brought only
one customer per week that would mean an extra $5,000 / week or $260,000 a year. Do
you see what I\'m getting at? This is the extraordinary genius of really dumb ideas.

If you want specific information about how to turn your employees into powerful
associates committed to growing your bottom line, send me an email or give us a
call.


Web Site = http://www.tomfeltenstein.com

Contact Details = To contact Tom, call (561) 650-1315 or fax to (561) 650-1309.
Visit his website www.tomfelteinstein.com or e-mail him at:
Tom@powemarketingacademy.com