How to Fail in Business Without Really Trying

Business: A Loser’s Manual

In a tough economy, there are any number of ways that you can ruin your reputation and sink your company. But why settle for only one? If you’re ready to fast-track your path to obsolescence, here’s a step-by-step guide to ensuring that your business goes down in a truly spectacular blaze of glory.

1. Ignore your customers.

Customers? Who needs ‘em! They’re loud, they’re demanding and they’re constantly contradicting themselves.

Rather than molding your business and its offerings to suit them, charge forth with your plans and your strategies like a bull in a china shop. After all, it’s your company, and nobody knows better than you what your customers should want, need and be forced to accept.

Besides, customers are a dime a dozen. If the current crop doesn’t appreciate you like they should, just tell them to take a hike. Won’t they be sorry when they realize what they’re missing?

2. Resist change at all costs.

Let’s face it: change sucks.

It’s uncomfortable, difficult and just downright annoying. It’s like someone dragging you out of your favorite recliner and forcing you to go for a run. I mean, sure, running would improve your health, but why bother, when you were perfectly content to stay glued to your chair. Stagnation is bliss, right?

It’s the same in business. No one likes branching out from what has been proven to work to try new ideas. Innovation requires risk. There’s safety in the status quo.

What’s that famous line about “If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance a lot less”? Bah. That guy was only Chief of Staff of the United States Army. What does he know about change or the risks that come with it?

3. Chase shiny objects.

Ooh ooh – have you heard? There’s a great new social media network that just launched that’s kinda like Facebook plus Pinterest with a little bit of MySpace thrown in the mix, but it’s only for people who are left-handed. You have to sign up RIGHT NOW! If you don’t everyone else will be there, and your competitors will steal all your customers.

And did you hear about that new app that will do that one specific thing that you never thought you needed until you found out about it? It’s like an answer to a question that doesn’t even need to be asked! It’s amazing!

No need to worry about running your company. It’s practically on auto-pilot. Playing with gadgets and dabbling in social media are way more fun!

4. Refuse to innovate.

You could pursue a new vision or chart a course to lead your company to something bigger and better, but why bother? Surely everything that’s always worked in the past will continue to work in the future. That’s why Circuit City is still going strong after all these years, right? Guys?

5. Don’t listen. To anyone. Ever.

The whole reason to start your own company is so that no one can tell you what to do.

Warning signs? Ignore them! Words of wisdom from more experienced colleagues and peers? They’re not the boss of you!

Just do your thing. Run your company however you want, and don’t pay attention to the handwriting on the wall or the advice of those who’ve been there before. They’re just trying to bum you out and bring you down with their “knowledge” and “insight.”

Back to reality.

On a more serious note, this is clearly a satirical look at why some companies go under while others sail through adversity relatively unscathed.

And while these scenarios are humorous when painted in such extremes, in reality, the underlying tendencies and traits they represent are all too human. At times, we can all be susceptible to such faulty ways of thinking. We all have our moments of arrogance or capriciousness or stubbornness or fear of change. They key is to recognize these dangerous impulses so we can actively combat them and maintain a steady course toward growth and greater success.

Remember: no one is immune, so be alert. Keep an close watch on your own thought processes and focus on creating a culture within your company that fosters self-analysis, creativity and courage.

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Cashing In: 5 Ways to Optimize Your Website's Conversion Rate

Got a website? Check. Strong traffic numbers? Check. Think you’ve got this online marketing thing licked? Think again. It doesn’t matter how many people are coming to your site if they aren’t taking action once they get there. If you want to make those traffic numbers count, you must find a way to convert visitors into customers. Some people would have you believe that all it takes is a nice website and a great product, and you’ll have customers beating down your doors. By this mode of thinking, if your sales are lackluster, it’s most likely an indication that something is wrong with your products, so you work day and night tweaking and tinkering your offering to give the people what you think they want. In reality, it’s more likely that you’ve overlooked some key elements in the design of your website, and now it’s costing you. If your website is performing well in traffic numbers but lacking in sales, it’s time to re-evaluate your site. Here are five key elements to examine and improve to ensure that you’re maximizing your opportunities to capture customers online:

1. Tell them where to go and what to do.

It’s a fact as simple as it is true: when you have a product or service to sell, you want to make sure people know exactly how to buy that product or service. There’s no point in saying you offer consulting services unless you provide a straightforward path to contact and hire you. There’s no point in displaying a product when there’s no immediately visible way to purchase it. Make sure you present a call to action that is obvious and direct. Look at your website through the eyes of the most technologically challenged user – one who has no clue how to navigate through a website or purchase something online. At every step of the way, do you provide the easiest and most direct route from Point A to Point B so that they can progress intuitively through your site? If you have a picture of a product, is there a call to action next to it? Remember, too, that a call to action is not a wordy description that says “Hey, this item is on sale like many others, so look at them all blah blah blah.” It’s a concise statement of action – usually in the form of a button or link – that prompts the user to take the next step. Maybe you want them to “buy now” or maybe you want them to “learn more.” Whatever the next logical step might be, it must be clearly stated. Attention spans on the Web are short; if your site is lacking calls to action, chances are good that you’re losing many conversions to the ever-present element of distraction.

2. Put the kibosh on clutter.

The universal rule of the Web is that less is more. Clutter comes in many forms – too many pictures, too much copy, too many buttons and links. Whatever is clogging up your site, get rid of it immediately. In order to determine what should stay and what should go, you must identify the primary goal of your website and make sure everything is geared toward that one singular objective. If your site exists to sell your products, then sell on every page. Even on your “About” page, your customer cares less about where you went to school and more about how your products came to be. You need a clear message – one that’s easy to understand and easy to share. Don’t stuff every last thing you do down someone’s throat and expect them to make a decision. Give them choices, but don’t make them think too much. You’ll only confuse your visitors, and a confused visitor is not going to stick around and figure it out; they’ll just go elsewhere instead.

3. Focus on feelings, not features.

It’s always difficult to fight the temptation to cover every single aspect and feature of your product or service in painstaking detail in order to make sure that visitors have all the information they could possibly need to make a decision. Sometimes this works, but more often than not, it doesn’t. Why? Because people don’t really spend their money on the products that have the most bells and whistles; they spend their money on what makes them feel good on the inside. They buy things they believe will make them a better person or make their lives easier or solve a problem they face every day. People don’t purchase iPods because they like the device itself; they purchase iPods because doing so makes them feel like part of a greater tribe of iPod (and, by extension, Apple) enthusiasts. Features are really only a secondary consideration. In trying to convert potential customers, your most important job is to convey how you can fulfill their deeper needs. Figure out how your products or services connect with people on an emotional level, bottle up that feeling and build your website around it.

4. Don’t ask for too much.

Don’t you hate when you walk into a clothing store and an associate follows you around constantly pestering you with questions? Doesn’t it irk you when you’re ready to check out and they ask you to sign up for their store credit card and their rewards card and to give them your email address so they can put you on their mailing list? Don’t make the same mistakes online. It’s critically important to provide a user experience that makes your visitors feel at ease. Avoid using pop-ups and other disruptive elements that create hassles during the shopping process. And when it’s time to check out, just let them check out. Don’t require them to create an account, don’t make them answer a laundry list of questions about their purchase and don’t make them give you a bunch of personal information. In short, don’t make your customers jump through hoops to spend money with you. If you try to get more information out of your customers than you actually need to process their order, you’ll raise red flags of mistrust. They’ll immediately recognize your game, and they’ll likely jump ship mid-transaction in order to avoid being bombarded with future marketing. In reality, all you need to be able to continue your relationship with that customer is an email address and permission to send them updates from time to time.

5. Be creative within reason.

Of course you want your website to be memorable. You want visitors to be wowed by its design. You want a unique look and feel that sets your company apart from your competitors. All of these are valid goals as long as you keep the level of creativity within reason. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel in an attempt to be remembered for originality and innovation. If your site deviates too far from familiar conventions, you’ll end up alienating a lot of potential customers because they’ll have no idea how to get around and find what they need. Be creative, but don’t overdo it. After all, less is more.

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