As one CEO I told this to said ‘are you calling my small business a pig!?’…well I kinda am, but listen to why.
When Your Small Business Is the Pig
When something is ugly, we call it a pig. It’s unfair, it’s untrue and it’s probably some sort of pig-racism but there you have it. So your small business is ugly (and a pig) if it’s not growing, it’s not differentiated, it doesn’t have a clear strategy and it’s failing to reach its objectives. That’s what I call a pig in business and unfortunately we’re surrounded by a lot of pigs according to statistics. 61% of companies miss their sales targets every year****. I hate to break the news to you but if you’re one of these businesses, you unfortunately may have a pig on your hands.
What’s the Lipstick?
Lipstick is what businesses try to put on the pig (the lack of profits or growth) by putting bandaid marketing and selling solutions on the core problem. Namely that of lack of a proper strategy. They create expensive websites, logos, social media programs, and write page after page of blogs. On the sales front, they hire teams, outsource to call centres and even enter into partnerships in the hope of increasing revenues and still don’t see the ROI for their efforts. That’s because (say it with me) a pig is still a pig, even with lipstick on.
Give the Pig a Makeover
Now say we were to take the pig (your small business) and give it a whole new repositioning to sharpen its focus. Then we were to re-message that positioning to the right target market. Well, that’s when the pig would have a much needed makeover. It would no longer be a pig. It would be a gazelle. Sleek, elegant and fast. No gazelle needs lipstick. It just is that great. So, before considering throwing every tactic out there onto your small business and getting lacklustre ROI, consider a strategy makeover for your business. You’ll save a ton on lipstick in the long run.
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***Source: MarketingSherpa
