Episode Transcript
[00:00:32] Speaker A: Welcome to another episode of Balancing Acts. I'm your host, Linda Hamilton, a CPA certified exit planning advisor and systemologist. Balancing Acts is a show where we know the numbers matter, but we have to look beyond the numbers for the story your financials tell. Because so many things impact profit. Today we're going to focus on positioning actually and with a specific vent on B2B service companies. So we're going to talk about differentiation, the science of positioning and the corporate buyer psychology and growing your B2B service company. It's my pleasure to introduce Chala Dinkai, a marketing strategist. She's the CEO and founder of the Reposition Expert, a division of Coach Tactics. She's a marketing strategist who, who helps service companies change their messaging to attract more decision makers. In her formal life, Tchala was an award winning marketer at companies like Pepsi, Pizza Hut and Frito Lay for 20 years. Now she's marketing consultant and the author of Gentle A Gentle Way to Attract Loads of Clients and how to Win Friends the Way Apple Wins Customers. Cha is a regularly featured expert on major television networks, television such as abc, NBC, Fox, and a popular speaker at international conferences. Tala, welcome. Thank you for being willing to share your expertise with us today.
[00:02:00] Speaker B: Thank you. And thanks for that screenshot of my little guy and me at NASA in my about page.
[00:02:06] Speaker A: I love that. I love that. And it looked fun. So we're going to talk this segment about what you call the B2B business to business differentiation crisis. Your research shows that 86% of B2B buyers can't tell the difference between vendors. That sounds like quite a problem. So why would you say there's such a widespread difference?
[00:02:31] Speaker B: There's a widespread issue in this differentiation which I, you know, and this is not my research, this is like, you know, vetted, you know, Harvard, big studies that have proven this. Right. And so what we're seeing is that for 18 years, when I bought services, I saw this as well. Everybody's saying the same thing. Everybody's doing the same thing. Everybody thinks they have a differentiator and they don't. And buyers are just saying like, it's not. This is not differentiated enough for me to even give you a meeting. That's the number one problem in all the rooms you and I are in when we're talking to people trying to sell to corporations. Is that not their biggest pain?
[00:03:10] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. How to differentiate and how to really get attention, to attract attention.
[00:03:16] Speaker B: How do you get that meeting right?
[00:03:17] Speaker A: Right. So you worked with major brands like you've said, like Pepsi and Pizza Hut. So how did your corporate experience kind of shape your view on differentiation?
[00:03:30] Speaker B: We launched seven to 10 new products every year at, you know, at Pepsi, Pizza, Frito Lay. I last worked for Diageo, which is a drinks company. And we had to find a place for them in the market in, you know, the marketplace. We couldn't place them on the same shelf and expect people not to cannibalize from the same brand. So I learned from the big, you know, guys, the consumer, you know, packaging goods companies and industries where and how to differentiate. And so I've perfected that skill for the smaller companies like us to be able to differentiate and place themselves into a gap in the market now that a corporation is looking for. And a corporate buyer would be able to jump through all their multiple layers of buyers to be able to buy from you when they already have an incumbent in house doing that.
[00:04:19] Speaker A: Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. So how about sharing a success story about how you helped a client stand out? You've often shared one about this $805,000 in one quarter example.
Tell us about that.
[00:04:33] Speaker B: Yes, yes. And I know you've heard this in my executive roundtables where you've been. And it's the story of an IT company. And IT companies are usually so generic. There's so many of them. Every time you say, oh, I'm, you know, I work for an IT company, I own an IT company, people's eyes roll to their backs, like, especially buyers. Right, We've got one. No, thank you. So what they were trying to do was trying to get new corporate clients. And what we did is we looked at how can we differentiate them? So we looked at their positioning, and we did the research and found that there was huge gap in the healthcare industry where people are calling in call centers. People were calling and they were on hold for so long that they would hang up and they would go to die, or they would get sicker and they would defer, you know, the treatments that they needed because of this really long, long. And it got even worse during COVID So what this company did is they didn't have to hire anyone, buy anything new. They just repackaged their services and were able to reduce the call wait time in call centers for hospitals through just rewriting something or repackaging something. And they rebranded this under an umbrella name called On Hold Rescue. And with their, you know, local marketing team, they did the brand like the brand of a woman on a call center, like the sign of a call center woman with the Red Cross sign for hospitals. And it was like, and I think the tagline was something like, don't let people wait longer kind of thing. Don't let patients wait longer. And so they sold 800 of 5,000 as soon as they came upon this gap in the market, which they would never have found through guessing, which is one of the biggest mistakes that small businesses make. But I think we're going to talk about that, right?
[00:06:21] Speaker A: Guessing is.
It's very hard to put yourself in the shoes of your buyer and guess what's in their mind. So that's a really, really insight to share. What would you say are the top mistakes you see B2B companies making when they try to differentiate themselves?
[00:06:41] Speaker B: Well, I mean, that's one of them guessing. How many times have you seen it, Linda? How many companies are guessing at their strategy, at their positioning, at their targeting? And so that's one of the things that I don't do. I don't let anyone guess. And I don't guess. Like, I've worked with marketing companies for my own company where they would just sit behind, you know, Google and AI now and ask them questions about what we should target. And, and I work with AI, but I don't use AI for that. So those are some of the biggest mistakes, is that they're using these generic tools to be able to figure out what is the differentiator and the positioning. So that's mistake number one. Mistake number two is thinking they're already differentiated and they're not like years in service. Just because you're old. I always say, just because I'm old doesn't mean I'm differentiated.
Location, like geography. Unless that service or product is so unique in that geography that there's nobody else doing what you're doing. These are not differentiators. Your size is not a differentiator. It's just a safety factor. Like, it's just a credibility. But so many CEO groups that I speak to, I have them fill out a pre survey and I have them say, what is your differentiator? I swear to you, it's longevity. They think a quality service, which is like breathing. Quality service is like breathing. Is everyone not saying you have quality service?
[00:08:10] Speaker A: I was just going to ask you that.
CPA firms, too, there's thousands and thousands of them. So you kind of expect it right in the door. Quality of service, right?
[00:08:21] Speaker B: Well, like in your case, accuracy, Right. Like who would even think, like, like who, who would even, even think that you wouldn't be accurate? It's Just, you know, like having a phone number or breathing like you have to have it. Right.
[00:08:37] Speaker A: You know, I always say you have to think beyond the numbers. The numbers are very important, but they tell a story. So you're kind of saying that, too. You really have to think beyond that. What you see as your own differentiators. Oh, what? You know, we're proud of the things that make us unique, you know, and business service businesses are very proud of what they do. So what you're talking about is really trying to communicate that to someone else. Right.
[00:09:04] Speaker B: And there's a very specific way to.
[00:09:05] Speaker A: Do it, which I'm sure we're going to talk about.
So how can people quickly just share your LinkedIn and your website if people want to talk about differentiation?
[00:09:18] Speaker B: Yeah, for sure. The website is repositioner.com and if you're looking to work with someone like me, go to repositioner.com schedule and let's, you know, chat. Let's book a call and chat. That's where you can go for more information. That's right.
[00:09:33] Speaker A: That's great. We're going to, we're going to take a commercial break. I would say what I got out of this segment is really to even look at my own differentiation, which I always find difficult to do. It's very different than what you're naturally your natural skill set. I'm very good at accounting and tax advisory and training. But conveying that why that's important is not so easy. So we're going to take a commercial break and Shala is going to help us talk about the science of positioning when we come back.
Welcome back to Balancing acts. I'm Linda Hamilton, your host, the CPA certified exit planning advisor and systemologist. We're talking with Chawla Dinkoi, the CEO and founder of the Repositioner Expert.
Today we're talking about differentiation and B2B service companies. So this segment is about the science of positioning. So, Chawla, you have an interesting take on positioning because you call it scientific.
Can you break that down for us?
[00:11:09] Speaker B: So as I was saying, it would be about consumer insights to find out how do we get these products on the shelves without cannibalizing each other. And we would find out from consumers whether this was a good idea or not and how much they would pay. So that's where I learned the science of niching. Because if unless you had niching and differentiation, these products would all cannibalize each other and they would never generate the kind of incremental revenue year over year for the companies that I worked for. So when I started working for myself and started advising companies on their marketing strategy, I found that they had no clue on how to pick a positioning, how to pick a target group, how to pick a specialty. They were just throwing spaghetti at the wall and trying to guess at these things. So that's when I took what I learned at the large corporations and made it into a two to four week process so that we can develop a super niche for them that we could use as a hook to get into meetings. And an example is a super niche is when you are serving a very specific target group of one industry and then you pick one facet of a pain point that's very costly for them to become an expert in. Where your marketing now educates and pumps out content about this pain and your expertise in the pain and how you help solve the pain. So the science has to do with, you know, several steps of vetting who to target, what pain point they have, and then it concludes in actually checking, fact checking and data checking with personal interviews with the key stakeholders in the market. So the market never lies. And that's why the program always works, because the program is forcing my clients to go and talk to decision makers who are potentially in pain and in positions to hire them. So that is the science.
[00:13:11] Speaker A: So let's talk about niching, which, you know, I was just in a meeting this weekend with a group of business owners at Pinnacle Global network and the subject of niching came up and there was a lot of pushback against it. You know, if I niche, I'm. That means I'm not going to be able to do business with others. That's. I'm going to lose revenue. And there's a lot of fear around it. I know, I felt it myself when I first started my CPA practice and sometimes I still am a little squeamish about the word niche. So can you talk about, you know, what about that fear for B2B service companies who are worried about losing opportunities?
[00:13:53] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, it's, you know, we call it fomo. Fear of missing out. And what if I serve only women? What about men? You know, how much money do they leave on the table? And statistically, any company that goes from generic to niched doubles and triples their sales. So there's no, you know, like, it's just, it's not even an issue with more developed companies that are bigger in size and have much more developed strategies because they recognize that not only do they have to be niched, but they actually Divide and conquer according to each industry, niche and or specialty. So but to make, you know, the smaller companies feel better, now I take less of a hard line than I used to and say that you can just pick one super niche, which is one specific industry and one specific pain point at a time so that, you know, pick the first one for six months and it could be, you know, on not on paper, it could be silent. So you could have a full marketing strategy without changing your website. You can develop and pump content out with a sub brand page, just a landing page without changing anything else in your business. You never have to say no to new business. You never have to stop anything that you're doing with anyone else. This is just an incremental way and a hook to get new business and to grow faster.
[00:15:17] Speaker A: And does this only work if you're trying to do business with corporations? Like for instance, you know, a CPA firm, a law firm. How would they think about niching in terms of that? Or is it only if we want. If I wanted to get a corporate contract?
[00:15:32] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, listen, my child's dentist that has a giant screen on top when they lie down and plays cartoons all day charges twice of my dentist. And we pay it because. And they have smaller, you know, tools and they have like the toys when they get out. So. And there is a reason for that. Even though every human has teeth that I know of. Right. So, and so it works in everything. So with, with accountants, they can first of all niche in industries where they get to become known in their networks, in their trade shows, in their associations and organizations. That's the one of the beauties of niching in an, in an organized community like an industry or an interest group like we bank is an interest group. My super niche is weed bank and WBEs and MBEs. And just as an example, I have such a huge network that I've put together. I put together a meeting in New York City with your help and with the local webank's help, and we filled that room in a record 12 hours. That is the beauty of niching. If I didn't have an industry focus, I wouldn't have had those networks and I wouldn't have been able to have the community developed around a consistent presence in those networks. Does that make sense?
[00:16:57] Speaker A: Yeah, it does. And for those listening, we bank is Women's Business Enterprise Council and WBE is a Women Business enterprise or MBE, a male business enterprise.
You know, that is very interesting. And I think it also shows not just, you know, is the Power of networking and finding a community that you're comfortable in, whether it's a trade association or an interest group like that. So thank you for sharing that in your experience. The, you know, you work with 1 million to 10 million dollar companies and that's a pretty wide range. What's the biggest positioning mistake that they make?
[00:17:38] Speaker B: So the, the companies that I work with, even though their size might be large and in the US 10 million is not that large, but they're usually unsexy. You know, transportation companies, logistics companies, you know, IT companies, some PR companies, but they're, they're usually not very sophisticated with their marketing strategy. And the number one issue that I find that they have around positioning differentiation is that they're guessing at it or they're not. They're not at all. They're not even trying. They don't even recognize or want to be niched or differentiated or they think they're already differentiated, but they're so generic that they're all saying the same things, doing the same things, talking to multiple people, like industries, trying to sell multiple things at the same time. And it's just not working. It's too slow. Because the only way they can grow is word of mouth. And if you're trying to grow beyond the Rolodex, as I call it, which only if you're over a certain age do you recognize that term Rolodex. But beyond the Rolodex really takes a consistent niched strategy to grow.
[00:18:46] Speaker A: So let's talk a little bit about that, about what it means to. Does that mean I work with women business owners? And why do I get them? Is it because my positioning is that I have good quality services or that I get their tax returns out on time? Is that enough of a positioning really, when I'm trying to talk to them?
[00:19:13] Speaker B: So let's take your business as an example, if you're okay to play. And you know that this is something that I do on when I speak on large stages and conferences. So, you know, if, if I have your permission to polish your pitch, I would ask you, well, give me a target. And you would probably say women business owners, right? Yes, women. Let's say it's we bank women's business owners wbs. And what is the number one problem that they have that you can solve for them that's costing them a lot of money? Linda.
[00:19:43] Speaker A: They are chasing growth and they have no idea what the profitability is on that growth. So I show them what parts of their business are making them money.
[00:19:53] Speaker B: Okay, so. And Then I like to throw in a statistic around the problem. So how many, what percentage of women business owners are suffering from that and what's it costing them?
[00:20:06] Speaker A: What does cost? What's it costing them? So I'm not sure I have good answers to all of that, but I would say only 2% of women owned businesses break seven figures at all and 88% of them make less than $100,000 a year. So it's, it's tough to grow a business.
[00:20:22] Speaker B: So what I'd love is if you could give statistics around the problem that you solve. So the consequence is that they never break the seven figure. But the, the, if there's three quarters of women business owners have the problem that you solve, then that's what I would start with and that would be my specialty. Now I, I would never let you guess it. We would work together to figure out what they actually say is their problem. Out of two or three that we offer them, which of them are the biggest bleeding, most painful pain points. Now the other thing to watch out for is that it has to be something that they see. It can't be something you see that they don't see. So that's the other problem is a lot of my clients, I had one today. She's like, you know what? They don't see it. They don't see it. And I'm like, you can't educate them into a problem. You, you have to, they have to be tearing their hair out looking for you to solve that problem. And then you can get in with that hook and then you can solve it with how you know and love. Right?
[00:21:21] Speaker A: Does that make sense? Fascinating. And it does make sense. We're going to take a commercial break in a moment. I've learned that I need to work on some statistics. Chawla, how can people find you? Why don't you share your website and then we'll come back and do another segment together.
[00:21:36] Speaker B: Absolutely. Repositioner.com and if you are looking to hire someone like me, you can go to repositioner.com schedule to schedule a call.
[00:21:47] Speaker A: And when we come back, we're going to talk about the corporate buyers psychology, which should be very interesting.
Welcome back to Balancing Acts. We're talking with Chala Dinkoi today about repositioning and how B2B services can position themselves to find corporate clients. So this segment is about the corporate buyers psychology. Chala, you spent 18 years as a corporate buyer right on the other side of where you're doing now. So the biggest misconception you would say B2B companies have, about how buyers think. What is that misconception?
[00:23:00] Speaker B: The misconception is that as a buyer, I should know and understand what you're selling and how it can help me.
People just show up and throw up, you know, suppliers, I almost gave birth during one supplier presentation that lasted three hours. And all they talked about was themselves. And that's what they get wrong, is they don't understand that they have to know, already know before they come into that room what my problem is. And they have to be coming to me with solutions and case studies of how they've already helped exact people like me or companies of exact size. Don't show me companies that are three times bigger or, you know, 10 times bigger than me and what their budgets did. I need to know that you're speaking to my pain and my size, otherwise you're wasting my time.
[00:23:52] Speaker A: Interesting, that. Yeah. So you really, you really need to do a lot of research. Right. Before you meet with a, a corporate buyer, or any buyer for that matter, whether they're corporate or otherwise.
[00:24:03] Speaker B: Right, exactly. I mean, I, I, this is why I want companies to specialize in an industry, because once you're specialized, you know not only all their pain points, but you've already done so many presentations, you've already worked with so many companies of that same size and industry that you know them cold. In fact, you're the expert in their pain. And they can see it because case study after case study after case study, all they can say is, that's us. Oh my God, that's us. Look, this person can do these things and this is what the result was for them. When can we hire you? That's what they say. But when you go in and all as a supplier, you talk about yourself, your services, why you think you're special, your location, the number of people you have, like, I can't even tell you how many. And I've worked in multiple regions and multiple companies and multiple departments. It was always the same. The, the biggest suppliers of the country would come in, of their industry leaders would come in, and they still didn't know how to sell to us. And the ones that did got in, but it was a very few, far between minority, unfortunately. And that's what I dedicated my life to, teaching.
[00:25:22] Speaker A: Interesting. Yes. And I have learned a lot from listening to your talks whenever I can find them and in person at conferences. So I'm glad you're there to share all that with us.
[00:25:33] Speaker B: Don't make mistakes. That's all I want. Yeah.
[00:25:36] Speaker A: So you have a book, gentle Marketing, and you talk about building trust, which is really incredibly important for all of us. And no matter what type of business we're in, it is about trust. So how has that changed trust building in the post pandemic world?
[00:25:53] Speaker B: So first of all, after the pandemic, so the pandemic made online buying for even up to statistically million and a half dollars worth of services by corporations safe, meaning it started to happen. But what it did change is the, the role of the sales rep. So three quarters of the buying journey from need to interest to research to everything, like everything, even sometimes including the price, research is done three quarters of the way online.
So it used to be that as soon as there was a need they would contact the rep. No more.
They're all the way, they've made their decision, they've called it down and they've got two or three people or maybe two. And that's when they bring them in and that's when. So now you can imagine how important your content has become. If you're a generic, you're pumping out AI generated content and you don't have a market driven super niche, you're going to be completely lost and nothing, they're not going to be even able to, they won't even give you a meeting. And that's what most people are finding. Like AI is amazing that it's gotten us so many amazing tools and now through AI there, there's a lot more outreach you can do but it's so much less effective now because everyone's doing it and it's so easy and quick and cheap to do, but it's not working because none of the messaging resounds. It's all blending in with everyone because it has nothing to do with the super niche, it has nothing to do with a specific pain and you're not positioned in front of them as a pain. You know, key stakeholder expert.
[00:27:46] Speaker A: Yeah, A pain reliever, so to speak.
Right. Which is, makes it different. And you know, in AI I see AI do a lot of work with AI myself, I include it in my financial fluency training classes. But you have to be careful. It's only a tool, as so many things in the software world are. It's a tool, it can help you brainstorm, it can help you kind of, you know, get your collect your thoughts, but you cannot rely solely on it and you have to be very careful about using it for any type of facts as well, for verification. So I'm glad you raised that. So use the tool. But just like getting our, you know, building trust in the buy sell, you got to, you have to not, you have to trust, but verify when you're using your AI tool.
[00:28:32] Speaker B: And you know, buyers, they want safe, right? That like there's research that I present, around 50% of corporate buyers want to buy a service but don't. And the reason for that is because they're afraid of losing their job or they're afraid of losing face. And the graph for the sphere goes up as the size of the buying team goes up. And the average buying team size has gone up to average of 8 people on a corporate buying team for any one given service.
[00:29:04] Speaker A: Wow, that's a, that's a pretty high number and I can see that. So you have to be able to really think about it. I always say, you know, they're people on these buying teams, they have jobs, they have families and they're also trying to balance bringing, you know, vendors in, which is part of their job. But at the same time they want it to be a safe vendor. So it's really hard to get them to change. Right as well. So you've mentioned that cold calling is dying. So what's replacing it in business to business sales?
[00:29:38] Speaker B: Well, I mean, what I'm definitely recommending and teaching my clients and doing myself are small, intimate gatherings of high level decision makers around to discuss a very, very specific pain point in very specific industries. And people will literally hop on a plane and come if it's the right pain point, if it costs them enough money to have that pain, and if they're interested in a industry peer, you know, discussion about this pain and you know, you're a wpo, like you're part of these CEO networks and God bless them, they give you the forum to be able to discuss pain points and to, you know, peer share and, and mentor each other. But there isn't one that is put together only around a very specific pain point in a very specific industry. And those are the ones that are different and those are the ones that draw these key decision makers depending on how bad, you know, how bad the problem is for them. So that intrigues people into coming out. And also the peer networking itself is, you know, to a level, but to discuss the specific problem within that peer network is also the biggest draw. So that's really what is working really well.
Always person in person presentations. So being visible with your, you know, what you're doing, for example, and being able to speak as an authority in front of your exact target by being on the speaker Circuit of some sort, like books, all that is great. But I am such a proponent of the in person stuff because in this world and age, like literally you can pump out more outreach emails and DMS than you know, in a second than any human can. But, but it's just not landing, it's not converting anymore.
[00:31:37] Speaker A: Well, that's in part because there's information overload. Right. I could spend my entire day consuming content and I love content, but then I wouldn't be spending my time on anything else. So are you saying that the buyers, the corporate buyers will attend events that will attend, you know, how do you get in front of them if you can't get a meeting?
[00:32:01] Speaker B: So there are corporate buyers that will never leave the office, but their bosses have to because they're either speaking at events, they're either being awarded. They have to have certain contacts with industry leaders if they need to keep their position. So we always go through the top, we're always being introduced through the top, or we're directly hitting them with the problem. And the problems always have to be strategic problems that they are in charge for, for their company and their industry to resolve. So we always go to the top and they send someone that we're targeting or our marketing actually targets the top so that they're the decision makers.
[00:32:46] Speaker A: So that's very interesting and trying to think about how to again position yourself for that. How important do you think industry specialization is when it comes to selling to a corporate buyer?
[00:32:58] Speaker B: It's a hundred percent. We would never, when I worked in corporate, we would never ever buy from anyone who had never done any work in our industry. And there were plenty who tried to, you know, bridge over. But I always worked for very large corporations and they didn't want to take risks. It's risky.
[00:33:16] Speaker A: So I don't want to leave people, you know, who maybe aren't there yet. You know, we may have a lot of business owners who are smaller listening to us and looking for ideas. Maybe they'd like to sell to corporations, but they probably have to start smaller with industry experience or something or partner with someone else. Do you have any suggestions for businesses who may be not quite ready to go and look for a corporate buyer?
[00:33:42] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean if you're a one man show or if you're a small shop, you're not going to be scalable for, you know, Capital One or a Pepsi. So you, you got to know that going in. And you've got to go in if you're gonna go in and pursue them. You've Got to go in for very, very, very specialized, smaller scale things that you can actually handle. Or you have to partner with other small companies and then be in on bids that they're, they're, you know, right. Placing RFPs or whatever it is. Like you have to do the heavy lifting for them. You can't expect the buyer to say, oh, here you three, you can get together and come back to me. They're never going to do that.
[00:34:23] Speaker A: Right. Of course. So how can people find you on your website.
[00:34:28] Speaker B: Yes. Repositioner.com and to book a call repositioner.com.
[00:34:34] Speaker A: Schedule and Chala Dinkoy is a true expert in this area and very good at helping business owners find corporate contracts and be able to speak to corporate buyers to, to increase the odds of getting that kind of business. So we're going to take a commercial break and when we come back, we're going to talk about growth strategies for B2B service companies.
Welcome back to Balancing Acts. I'm Linda Hamilton, your host, a CPA and certified exit planning advisor. And we're talking with Chawla Dinkoi, the repositioner expert about B2B service companies and different strategies they can use to have a strong marketing plan and to differentiate themselves. So this segment is about growth strategies. Charlo, let's start with, you know your clients are typically service based companies, Right. So what unique challenges do they face in scaling?
[00:36:01] Speaker B: I mean, they are trying to grow through word of mouth, they're trying to grow through referrals. And that's a huge challenge because they don't have a strategy for scaling. And the strategy has to do with literally opening more doors. Like just getting in, getting in is so much harder than closing. Now that's the biggest challenge that I'm hearing. You're hearing it too, I'm sure.
[00:36:25] Speaker A: Yeah, getting in, getting in the door. So let's talk about your niche phobia concept. We've talked about niching and how people often have a fear of that.
So why are companies so afraid to narrow their focus?
[00:36:39] Speaker B: I think one of them is, during COVID there was a lot of industries that shut down. And so they're like, well, if I was, you know, if I had all my eggs in one basket, I would have been devastated. And for those companies that did have all their eggs in one basket, they pivoted. So you know what, the niching strategy, the reason why it works is because it's in this economy, in this geography, in this point in time, what is in demand. And so then once we learn how to find that through some of the strategies that I talked about, through the scientific method of seeking where the gap in the market is, then you no longer ever have to be afraid because you can use the same methodology in any new market or every year if you wanted to, and find what is the most, you know, sweet spot of that market gap that you can make a lot of money in in the shortest term. And you use it again and again and again. So a lot of clients rehired me during COVID because that's exactly what happened. The market changed so much that we needed to use the same tools to refigure what we need to do do. So it is never, never scary because, you know, as, as soon as the market changes or that industry changes or market conditions change, you can pivot. But there's now a tool to figure out where to pivot to instead of just spaghetti at the wall, seeing what sticks.
[00:38:07] Speaker A: Right, right, right. You often I've heard you talk about brand character and so how does that concept apply to B2B companies?
[00:38:17] Speaker B: So brand character is another way to differentiate. And you know, in my book the Gentle Marketing that you talked about, I talk about Nike and you know, Richard Branson, the Virgin brand. I talk about the body shop, like these really, really human based brands that, that really stand for something like Nike stands for the ultimate athlete. I remember their first ads were like shoes with athletes that threw up on them from running too much. Like just the ultimate athlete was their, you know, their human characteristic. And what, you know, studies found is that brands that were based on human characteristics also were very relatable and were very memorable and which made them have a huge differentiator. So some of the B2B examples that I've really seen that do this well is for example the mortgage mom. And she's been like, you know, in existence for many years. She's like a marketing legend. And literally it's a 50s mom. And you know, the website is a cartoon drawn of a 50s mom with the Leave it to Beaver mom with the apron and she's holding an apple pie and she's like, you would never trust your insurance needs to the, you know, just an online robot. So you should always ask your mom. And then like some of the blogs are chicken soup for when you're feeling sick. You know, insurance related but always tying it back to the insurance mom. So these are some of the. And so another one is for example I always talk about Suzanne Evans was, is still. Is a coach. She's a business coach in New York City, in fact. And she just had, I heard, an event. So one of her brands was like, she was completely potty mouth out there, very, like, in your face, direct. A little bit of a New Yorker, I guess. And she used to have, at her events, she used to have these toy bombs, like little grenades with the letter F on them, and she would throw them into the crowd, right? Like, these are brand characters that, like, how many business coaches are. Are there? There are thousands and thousands, if not more. And so she, you know, like her. And she would have, hell yeah. Movement. So she would have these, you know, swear word movements. That's how you can differentiate yourself. I mean, it's no different than, like, if you remember Howard Stern, how he differentiated himself from all the radio personalities because he was so, you know, edgy and he was out there and he would have those kinds of people come on the show and he would use that kind of language. So that's what you can do for your business. You can base it on whether you're a. One of my clients was a crazy. She was a little Portuguese lady, 50 plus years old, and she was a crazy climber. She went and she. She climbed Denali and all, you know, she was getting ready to climb Everest. So, you know, most of her marketing was around achieving and climbing. And she would actually clock her real time when she would go and, you know, on the climbs. And she was able to transcribe all the things that was happening. And that was part of her brand.
[00:41:33] Speaker A: That's interesting. I never thought of brand that way. That was a very. I think you just painted. It was a very visual picture for me and actually trying to be creative in coming up with something that makes you different from. From your competitors who do the same thing. So that was really a great explanation for that.
You've helped clients double and triple their revenue. And when you first. What's the first thing you look at when you start working with a new client?
[00:42:02] Speaker B: Well, you know, we look at their positioning. They're usually generic. And then we look at, okay, what are the industries that you want to double in in the next six months? And then we go deep into how do we find out their pain points and then how do we talk to them about their pain points so they could give us more information? And then how do we get in front of them for a second meeting after the initial informational interview? And they usually, if they're pain. If they're in pain, they'll give you that second strategy meeting. And those strategy meetings convert. And that's I have clients who've graduated years ago, years ago. They're still using that, you know, methodology even though like they no longer need to do the interviews.
It just works so well to ask.
[00:42:48] Speaker A: And this is mainly for, for clients who are looking to get corporate contracts to work with corporations. Not just because B2B many of us sell business to business. Right.
As opposed to business to consumer. But you know, whether you're selling to smaller businesses or midnight sized business or, or corporations, there are a lot different strategies going with that. Even though some, I think some of what you teach can easily be adapted for a smaller business on the path to that when they're growing.
[00:43:21] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, I think the smaller businesses can get away more with not niching just because, you know, they, I guess they have a lower capacity for service and they fill up with word of mouth and that's fine. But when you're trying to sell to large corporations and you've, you know, staffed up to be able to do that, you need to be pretty precise in your specialty, your niche, otherwise you're not going to get their attention. And that is the number one way to double and triple is to very quickly go very niche and then, you know, launch yourself at a very specific target using that super niche hook. Get in, get their attention and then get the sale.
[00:44:04] Speaker A: And I would say from the finance side, you have to have the capacity, both in the financial capacity, the human resources, the people capacity to be able to serve a large contract like that and not have it kind of ruin your company and create a tremendous amount of stress from you. Because it's exciting to get a contract like that. But you do need. Capacity is important. Before we wrap up, for our listeners who are running B2B service companies, what's one action they can take this week immediately to start repositioning their business?
[00:44:39] Speaker B: I want them to pick an industry that they'd like to double in in the next six months. And I want them to go out and talk to five decision makers in those industries that have not yet hired them, but know them through some means or been introduced to them or met them in some past life and asked them what their most expensive pain point is that they could help with and then capitalize on that. Yeah.
[00:45:06] Speaker A: And so now before we close, people may want to find out more, not just your website, whether it's LinkedIn, are you doing any events that you'd like to share with people, tell us how they can get in touch with you.
[00:45:17] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean the best way is repositioner.com/schedule. Let's book a call and let me get to know your business and what city you're in. Most of the events that I'm doing now is piggybacking on my speaking schedule to do executive roundtables. Like I'll be speaking not tomorrow, the next day in Dallas at the Business Expo, Small Business Expo. And so I've also piggybacked a an executive roundtable in Dallas. So if you're in the Dallas area and you're listening to this before the 20th, let me know and or if you're interested in joining other ones where we talk about how to get larger corporate clients and we peer share in a NDA signed private group with no fees or selling to be able to meet a new network of, you know, women business owners. But also these CEOs are trying to grow beyond the Rolodex.
[00:46:11] Speaker A: Thank you. And Tala, how about spelling your name for them? Tahla Dinkoi. So people can find you even on LinkedIn.
[00:46:18] Speaker B: Chala C H A L A Dincoy D I N C O Y And that's exactly what is it is on LinkedIn.
[00:46:25] Speaker A: Thank you so much for sharing your expertise with us. I got so much out of this and I'm going to take you up on thinking about that one action you shared with everyone. And I'm going to look for industries I want to work with, actually women business owners, which is an interest group rather than an industry. And I think I'm going to look for booking some meetings with them. So thank you and I hope everyone gets a lot out of this. Come back next week for another episode of Balancing Acts.
[00:46:57] Speaker B: Thank you. Thank you for having me. Linda. Always a pleasure.
[00:47:03] Speaker A: This has been a NOW Media Network's feature presentation. All rights reserved.
