U.S. Construction industry Still Recovering

We are still recovering in the U.S. construction industry.  As you can see from the graph, we have over 200 billion to grow to fully recover to our pre-recession level of construction spending.  Our public sector spending has recovered but our private sector spending (The largest area of our construction spending) still has a ways to go.  This tells you how bad the 2008 financial crisis really was.  Because we are still recovering and we are 8 years from our peak spending year in 2006.

To schedule a discussion session, simply call
Amos B Robinson, Practice Leader
Robinson Business Consulting, LLC
(804)651-5400
www.robinsonbc.com

Retail Sector Of Our Economy Continuing to Restructure

This past Christmas season, 2013, marked a change in the retail sector of our economy.  For the first time, the growth in online retail sales accounted for the increase in retail sales for the Christmas season versus sales growth attributed to our retail brick and mortar stores.  Online sales are becoming a more important factor in growing your retail sales today.

This restructuring in the retail sector is evident with the continuing loss of jobs in the retail sector.  The number one area of job cuts in the U.S. economy for the first 4 months of 2014 is retail.

Top 5 Job Cutting Industries in April:
Retail 6,993
Financial 4,124
Aerospace/Defense 4,075
Health Care/Products 3,242
Food 2,865

To explore a report on this subject, click Sad Slow Death Of Americas Retail Workers

To schedule a discussion session call
Amos B Robinson, Practice Leader
Robinson Business Consulting, LLC
at (804)651-5400
www.robinsonbc.com

How can small to medium sized business owners and sales professional’s best grow their sales?

The economy is currently growing and in a growing economy, no matter how slow, we need to be focusing on growing the sales of our firm or business. So how can we as business and sales professional’s best grow our sales? It’s done by increasing our customer engagement. In a matter of fact, customer engagement is the best way to grow our firms through organic sales. Another name for growing our firms in this way is called growing your customer base in the emotional economy.

Research shows that rationally satisfied customers will leave you or force you into a relationship that can be win/loose. In other words, if your customer does not have an emotional connection with you, your firm and its’ products and services, then you are at greater risk that they will turn over or insist on lower prices that lead to lower margins that lead to lower business performance.

Soft stuff like emotions really count with customers. As Simon Cooper, former president and CEO of The Ritz-Carlton Hotel company expressed: “When it comes to the customer, feeling are facts.” We have to understand that we not only have to meet the rational needs of our customer but we also have to meet their emotional requirements as well.

In addition to the rational needs of our customers there are four emotional needs that are based upon a hierarchy that must be met as well. These four customer engagement hierarchy of emotional needs are Confidence, Integrity, Pride and Passion. When customers feel that that these emotional needs are meet every time they do business with you, they are much likelier to become emotionally engaged with your company, which has a positive effect on with your sales results.

To discuss or request a talk be given about this topic,
call Amos B Robinson, Practice Leader (Article Author)
“We help work places become more profitable, productive and happy”
(804)651-5400
www.robinsonbc.com

Entrepreneurship Is On The Decline In The United States

As the below graph indicates (courtesy of the The Brookings Institution), we have had a steady decline in business formation over the past 30 plus years.  My concern is that entrepreneurship is the driver of job growth.  If there is not a focus put on entrepreneurship and policy decisions made to create an environment for businesses to form, more challenge on the job creation front is in store.

To access the complete report click Decline of Business Formation in the United States

 

It is possible to reduce this cost category by as much as 70 to 75%

Healthcare costs are one of the significant costs that businesses and individuals have to deal with today. The United States spent $2,500.000,000,000 on healthcare in 2009 (two and a half trillion dollars). Almost half of this comes from Medicare and Medicaid, and the other half comes from private insurance and out-of-pocket spending. This means that the average American pays $8,000 per year per person for healthcare. To give you some perspective on this, our annual spending on the Afghanistan and Iraq war was costing us $200 billion per year. To give you another comparison on how significant this is the country of India GDP is 1.5 trillion. That figure represents their whole economy.

One of the surprising facts that many businesses and individuals don’t know is that according to the Centers for Disease Control 70 to 75% of healthcare costs are related to preventable diseases, such as diabetes, heart disease and obesity.

So what can we do as businesses and individuals to help control our healthcare cost and help our national cause? It basically boils down to the basics of sleep (rest), water intake, diet and exercise.  According to a survey of 400,000 Americans, only 27% get the recommended 30 minutes or more of exercise five days a week. People who exercise at least two days a week are happier and have significantly less stress. Research shows that the benefits from exercise increases the more we exercise but starts to diminish in benefit beyond 6 days in a week.

Researchers monitored participants in a bicycle riding exercise and observed that individuals that exercised in this way for at least 20 minutes experienced a better mood for 2, 4, 8, and up to 12 hours when compared with those who did not exercise.

As a Mayo Clinic publication stated: “A lack of energy often results from inactivity, not age”. As we increase our exercise, we will not only impact our mood but our health, costs and productivity.

To discuss or request a talk be given about this topic, call
Amos B Robinson, Practice Leader (Article Author)
“We help work places become more profitable, productive and happy”
(804)651-5400
www.robinsonbc.com

How do we improve performance in a slow growth environment?

There is no doubt about it we are still in challenging times. Even though the economy has been growing and is continuing to grow, that growth is sluggish. For example, second quarter GDP growth was 1.7%, much slower than the 3%+ growth rate that we have historically experienced here in the U.S. With the political campaigns fully engaged it is creating a mood that is not putting our consumers in a growth orientated type of mood. So what as business leaders can we do?

Since we can’t control the political aspect of the economy (the perceptions of consumers reactions to the political environment), we need to control the aspect of our organization that will support the growth of our businesses and enterprises, the level of engagement of our customers and our employees.

I was reading recently what one Chief Financial Officer gave as his strategy to deal with a slow economy. His answer was to place tight control on costs and to keep a lid on the hiring of new personnel. He also said in the story that his main motivator to keep his employees happy is to give them overtime. With wages not growing as they used to, there is no doubt that his employees will appreciate the additional income. But this CFO is directing his company in a way that leaves money on the table.

What this CFO needs to do in addition to controlling his costs and managing his head count, is make sure that his customers and team members are fully engaged. Because engaged customers buy more often, spend more money on their purchases and afford us a higher margin on the products we sell. It’s all about growing our businesses organically in the emotional economy.

One 30 branch retail bank put this strategy in place and actually increased their earnings by 2% while the average of their peer’s earnings declined by 8% in this sluggish and slow growth economy.

To discuss or request a talk be given about this topic, call
Amos B Robinson, Practice Leader (Article Author)
“We help work places become more profitable, productive and happy”
(804)651-5400
www.robinsonbc.com

Engaged customers are the key to the organic growth of your business

Engaged customers buy more often, spend more money on their purchases and afford you a higher margin on the products you sell. Developing and keeping engaged customers is all about developing your business in the emotional economy. Having engaged customers is the key to growing your business organically.

In the business community you hear so much about managing your business by the financial numbers. There is no question about it, financial measurements are important. But they are a lagging indicator. They also may not tell you what caused the decline or what caused the improvement. As a lagging indicator, they only tell you what's wrong or what went right after it's happened.

Some may think that my customer satisfaction survey will be the tool that I use to make sure that things are going well with my customer. It will help to let me know what is going on with my business apart from my financial statements. We need to know how satisfied our customers are or not with our service, there's no mistake about that. But customer satisfaction by itself is not going to stop customers from leaving your business and going to a competitor, if there is no emotional connection. It is only customers who are very satisfied and have an emotional connection with your firm or brand that is going to make the difference.

An international Marketing Research firm did a study for a retail banking client on the impact of customer engagement on client retention. What they found was that the customers of their retail banking client who were very satisfied and with whom they had an emotional connection had a retention rate that was 37% higher. If this were done throughout their business, revenues and profits would be significantly higher.

Do you know how engaged your customers are?

To discuss or request a talk be given about this topic, call 
Amos B Robinson, Practice Leader (Article Author) 
“We help work places become more profitable, productive and happy” 
(804)651-5400 

www.robinsonbc.com