“Good is the enemy of great.” This is the first line in Jim Collins must read book “Good to Great.” He suggests that when we become satisfied with good, we don’t push for great and in so doing set the stage for our own demise.

Good is easy. Good is comfortable. Good typically means doing it the same as we did last time. This is especially true when it comes to service. The problem is that we as customers have become more demanding. Good service is simply expected. We are no longer satisfied with good.

So, what makes service great? A recent family dinner to a local restaurant to celebrate my parents’ 40th wedding anniversary highlighted three key elements to truly great service.

1. Authentic. It needs to be genuine and delivered with a personal touch that can’t be taught. In fact, if you try and train everyone to do the same thing you become less authentic. We brought our 15-month old son to the restaurant with us. Good service would have offered us a high chair, a kid’s menu and maybe some crayons. Great service saw the server on her hands and knees playing peek-a-boo and the hostess making a tin foil hat for my son to wear.
2. Unexpected. To stand out, you have to catch people by surprise. If we see it coming, the impact is less profound. Good service would have had brought out a cake for dessert to help us celebrate the special occasion. Great service had the chef come out from the kitchen to ask my parents for their favorite ingredients. He then proceeded to make a custom dessert just for them!
3. Remarkable. When you break the word down it means something to remark about. Halfway through dinner my sister went to the washroom. When she returned, she proceeded to tell us about the glass tile, the fountain, the twelve types of hand lotion, and the candles. Everyone else suddenly had to go too. When they returned they also raved about the unbelievable bathroom experience. In fact, we are still telling everyone we know.

Don’t settle for good. Seek out ways to make your company’s service more authentic, unexpected and remarkable. Great service is what brings customers back…and really great makes them bring their friends!

Branding. It’s one of the most commonly used marketing buzz words today and certainly one of the most misunderstood. Branding is too often confused as being just a company’s logo or its “look and feel.” That’s like saying someone’s clothes equal their personality. They contribute to it, but branding runs much deeper.

I like to think of branding as the lasting impression of everything that gets seen, heard, felt or experienced when someone comes in contact with you or your organization. This includes a number of things, for example:

• the way the receptionist answers the phone,
• the way your lobby looks,
• the writing style used on your website,
• the way you do presentations,
• and the way your products or services get delivered.

All of these items impact your brand. And make no mistake, good or bad, everyone and every organization has a brand.

So, how does one proactively and strategically manage one’s brand? Below are four key points to keep in mind when building a strong brand:

1. Transparent. A brand needs to be authentic and consistent. Can you deliver on it every time? People should have the same impression regardless of how they come in contact with your brand. For example, imagine if Campers Village staff all wore suits and ties to work. This inconsistency with the company’s outdoor, adventure-oriented image would send mixed signals and dilute the brand.
2. Compelling. Focus your brand on aspects that matter to the market. If turnaround time isn’t critical to your customers, don’t build a brand based on speed. Even if you are fast, the market won’t respond. It must matter to the market.
3. Different. If it doesn’t stand out from the competition, it won’t be as effective. A brand should be unique to your organization and not built around something other organizations can easily copy. Stand out. Be memorable!
4. Moving. The best brands move their audiences on an emotional level. They don’t focus on facts and numbers. They create an experience that triggers an emotional response. For instance, Nike builds its brand on abstract feelings such as empowerment and seizing the moment, not genuine leather or state-of-the-art shoelaces.

Knowledge is power, so market research can be a source of competitive advantage for many companies. However, when it comes to research, companies need to work smarter, not harder. There are mountains of data available and the sheer volume can be overwhelming. Here’s the trick – ignore most of it.

For small and medium sized businesses, market research should be managerial (not scientific) in nature.  Gather enough facts to test an assumption, but no more. In a business situation, anything more is a waste of time and effort – and both are precious commodities for your business.

The saying "Don't boil the ocean" means don't try to analyze everything. You need to be selective; figure out what your priorities are and identify the most efficient way to meet them. Know when you’ve gathered enough information and then stop. Otherwise, the time spent will not justify the return, much like trying to boil the ocean to get a handful of salt.

Specifically, aim to integrate research activities into your daily operations rather than undertaking one major research project every year. For instance:

• Organize monthly focus groups: they’re easy to set up and can be effective sources of practical, action-oriented information.  
• Train your employees to ask two or three research questions every time they speak with a customer.  
• Form a small advisory group to act as a sounding board on new product ideas, target markets, or marketing campaigns.

A managerial, ongoing approach to research can yield valuable returns. Don’t assume that because you’ve been in business for 30 years, you know your customers. Things change and so do customer needs. Learn to understand what makes your customers tick without having to wade through an ocean of information.

*(Adapted from Ethan Raisel’s The McKinsey Way, 1999)

When the engineer from research and development informs the marketing department of an exciting, technically superior new product and asks them to take it to market, it is too late. When the President announces a newly acquired subsidiary and calls on the marketing team to determine how to best integrate it with the corporate brand, it is too late. And when the head of sales requests marketing support to promote a big idea, it is much too late.

Too often, marketing is viewed as the last piece of the puzzle. It is seen as the function that will take a new product, business or idea and figure out how to make the market want them. This is a traditional and short-sighted understanding of marketing.

Good marketing is about determining what the market needs before spending anytime developing a new product. It is about understanding where the opportunities are before pursuing an acquisition to meet them. Good marketing gets its big ideas from the customer and funnels them to sales, not the other way around.

Good marketing doesn’t overcome poor products, brands that don’t fit, or ideas customers don’t want. Good marketing thinks first and acts second. To do so, good marketing must be called upon early and often.

What business are we in? What business should we be in? What does the market need and want? What will the market find compelling? These are marketing questions and should come first. If marketing is not involved in answering these questions, marketing is not playing the right role nor is it adding real value to your organization.

Marketing can help accomplish big things, but only when it is involved right from the start.