The Power of Simplicity for Business Success

Every day we observe the levels of complexity that companies reach, given this situation a narrowing has emerged in the fields of action of man.

Institutions have been forced to execute their actions with a number of specialists outside of a global vision, on the objectives of that entity called company.

We see thus, maintaining that line of thought, we have built a conglomerate of business terms of short useful time, which companies cannot fully implement when they are already out of date, with the need to move to the next generation of administrative techniques.

When a company has true executives, essentially firm, with a great sense of commitment and with the desire for teamwork, organization and business solutions are simplified.

Business management is a great exercise in common sense.

Simplicity forces us to think about what is essential and to clarify it.

What we have learned in the industrial age has led to the creation of further complications. In the same way every day more people learn the need to simplify, not to complicate.

Simplicity is the utmost sophistication.

Really business is not complicated, it is the people who are dedicated to complicate it. The way to attack complexity is by implementing simplicity.

"Complexity should not be admired, it should be avoided" You can use language, logic, and common sense to detect key points and establish a specific line of action.

Common sense is the wisdom that we all share. It is something that a community considers an obvious truth.

Leonardo Da Vinci imagined the human mind as a laboratory that collected materials through the senses, materials that were then channeled through the common sense organ, thus understanding that Common Sense is a kind of super sense that dominates all other senses.

Xerox company recognized for its history of manufacturers of copiers, instilled in him that the offices of the future would have equipment that was all integrated, telephone, copiers, computers. Because of this Xerox had to manufacture this type of new technology to offer them in that automated and modern world about to arrive.

Xerox had to do it because people viewed it as a high-tech and expert company, but this was just a guess. In reality people considered it as a copier manufacturing company.

Twenty years later, after millions of dollars invested, Xerox found that the office of the future was still very focused on the future and that any Xerox team that did not make copies was in trouble.

With this we verify the painful experience that shows us how technical knowledge and intellectual subtlety unfortunately overcame good judgment, or common sense.

To think in simple terms, based on common sense, it is advisable to take into account the following points

Leave your ego out of the situation: good judgment is based on reality.

You must avoid illusions: The things we want are not always presented in the desired way, accepting the way they occur is being in tune with common sense.

You must improve your ability to listen: the thoughts of others are the basis of common sense, your ability to listen allows you access to common sense.

You must be cynical: Common sense is based on the experiences of many, not on the good wishes of a few. When someone tries to convince you otherwise, things often lose the shape of what they really are.

Great ideas are almost always expressed in simple words.

When you receive information with complex words or a confusing concept, do not overlook it. Ask exhibitors to translate their complex terms into simple words. It encourages simple language, in all areas of professional and personal development, both in the way of speaking and writing.

Write short sentences.

• Choose a simple word instead of a complicated one.

• Choose familiar words.

• Avoid unnecessary words.

• Give your verbs action.

• Write as you speak

• An understandable and imaginable expressions.

• Share your reader's experience

• Take advantage of diversity

• Write to inform, to express not to impress.

The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook

William James

American Psychologist and Philosopher

Len Riggio, CEO of Barnes & Noble, predicts that in the 21st century people will take pills that allow them to empty their minds. Losing ideas and forgetting; It will equate to losing pounds and dieting.

Some more effective recommendations to decrease unnecessary information, can begin to implement.

First recognize that you cannot absorb everything you think you need to know. It accommodates the important thing, eliminates information that is not necessary, when you limit the content you will begin to understand better.

Keep only what is of high quality, eliminates marginal information. Be simple in your writings, publications or anything you transmit.

Cor Healthcare Resources is an excellent example of information simplification, it publishes excerpts from articles.

Its goal is to simplify the complex healthcare sector, making it an understandable structure.

If complexity is minimized, uncertainty alike. Thus decision makers can take charge of their jobs and their lives.

As you step through the complexity, remember

There is a difference between data and information. You can become addicted to your favorite communication device. Do not retain everything, you can recover anything with today's technology. Most of the requests are not as urgent as their senders believe. Select the messages according to their priority. Be brief when answering.

If you clear your mind you will think more clearly.

A Fortune magazine article titled, in "Busca de Ingenuos" aptly stated; The counseling business has been hijacked. Every day we see new gurus, who feature only pens, podiums, and tremendous shamelessness, have taken what used to be an attractive and upright profession: Offering good advice to businessmen and women.

Tom Peters accepts that we are the only society that trusts that it can constantly improve things.

What you have to understand is that complexity is the very reason for a bad consultant's business. Thus we see how companies are not willing to pay large amounts of money, for something simple. The less understandable the process, the more the company is willing to pay for it.

If it were something simple, the same company would do it.

A 1977 Bain & Company survey found that 77% of the 4,000 executives interviewed confessed that the management tools they bought promised more than they actually accomplished and that it never matched financial success.

Here we present some criticisms of the theory of organization:

They end in fads, because they are only quick fixes for specific problems. They seldom have information on their success rates. They waste energy and resources. They create expectations far from reality. They undermine the confidence of employees, who receive each new buzzword with increasing skepticism.

In war everything is very simple, but even the simplest is difficult.

Karl Von Clausevitz, Famous Military Historian

The Marketing war is more valid than ever. Companies must learn to face their competitors. How to avoid its strengths and how to exploit its weaknesses. Organizations must learn to make their competitors die for it.

For a company to be successful, it must target the competitor. Find the weak positions of your competitors and launch strategic marketing attacks against those points.

The key is to determine the correct competitive strategy and understand the four types of marketing wars and choose the right one for your situation.

I - The defensive war is the one waged by market leaders: Leadership belongs to those companies that he publishes perceives him as a leader.

II - Offensive warfare is the strategy for him number two or three of a category: What you want is to find his weak point and attack him there. For this you must put all your energies at that point.

III - Smaller or newer opponents try to establish a beachhead in a category by avoiding a head-on battle and launching attacks on the flanks - this is a new idea, involves maneuvering into an area without competition and contains the element of surprise.

IV - Guerilla warfare is often the solution for small companies: it is the strategy of the big fish in a small pond. Even when you succeed, launching yourself as a leader is what kills companies in guerilla warfare.

Know your competitors, avoid their strengths, exploit their weaknesses.

The concept of strategy gets confusing, thanks to gurus like Michael Porter of Harvard. In his 1985 paper, Competitive Advantage. It showed several generic strategies that companies could implement, but when choosing any of these things tended to be very complicated.

Despite Porter's varied examples, a plain and simple truth stands out; In a world where everyone is hunting for your business, the main thing is to offer your customers a reason to buy your products and not those of your competitors.

If you don't reward them with a good reason, you had better offer them a very good price.

So this reason that leads you to place your products in the minds of your customers and prospects. It is what we call positioning.

To differentiate yourself from others requires:

• Have a simple idea that separates you from your competitors

• Having the credentials or the product that makes that concept real and credible.

• Develop a program so that your clients and prospects are aware of this difference.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Ideas that make powerful differences are permanent. They only need a little update sporadically. What they do not require is a change, for example, Coca Cola should never have left its motto The real thing, ose El Autentico.

The problem that we find regularly, in the strategic plans that are elaborated, is that they talk a lot about what to do, but little about how to do it.

Many years ago, Rosser Reeves wrote a landmark book called Reality in Advertising in which he coined the expression "Unique Sales Proposition" or PUV. That is something you should look for in your efforts to differentiate your product.

Being different can be the difference. The National Aquarium in Baltimore faced the problem of “being there, doing that” their strategy was to reposition the Aquarium, changing the idea of being a fish pond, to a dynamic and wonderful and constantly changing aquatic world. What it meant to him was that there was always something new at the Aquarium.

Customers are not always right. They are wrong as often as they are right.

Harold Geeen

Former President of ITT

The reality of marketing is that the market is made up of consumers held tightly or weakly by a number of competitors. Likewise, a

Marketing campaign must consist of keeping your current consumers and trying to conquer the consumers of your competition.

It is feasible to state quite truthfully that being consumer oriented only serves to get you into the game. But this is not going to determine your differences from the competitors who in many cases will have read the same books as you and adopted the same measures, some of which offer lower prices and superior technology.

Another delicate aspect of consumer orientation is the psychological fact that people tend to buy the same as others. This quality is known as the herd effect. In this way you can impress your consumers by talking about the popularity of your product instead of its characteristics.

There are times when customer orientation can make a difference, is when you make service your differentiating idea.

The differentiating idea is the one you use to attract new customers.

Conserving is an activity where companies are currently investing more time and money. Besides that modern technology allows it.

The discipline of consumer service is based on two common sense ideas: your consumers should be treated in such a way that they buy more from you and complain less.

Make your clients proud to be so.

“I assigned him an unlimited budget, and he exceeded it”

Edward Bennett Williams

Moving slowly can cause your competitors to reap the rewards of your effort.

The annual budget, many times becomes an obstacle, although it is a means of taking care of money, it is also a system that has little flexibility when it comes to making changes.

Launching your program could make a big mistake for your main competitor and the opportunity to take advantage of that situation may require a significant increase in money and effort. By the time next year's budget comes to you, it could be too late.

We have spent many years finding a system that takes a fixed amount of money and spends it to the maximum advantage.

In terms of budget, the question we hear the most is:

What percentage of sales do companies typically spend on marketing? Our response "Enough to get the job done."

Let's look at an unconventional approach that maximizes the amount of money allocated to the budget and turns its focus to things being done as they should be:

Step I: Prepare marketing plans: this consists of formulating plans that position each product in terms of its marketing life cycle.

Plans must be honest and based on reality.

Step 2: Classify the opportunities of the products: in this step the numbers intervene, as you determine which products offer the greatest potential for profitability if the work is done as it should be.

This step requires a great deal of perception work, because it is not possible to predict the future. What we are trying to do is weigh each measure to determine which presents the best possibilities to generate the highest returns.

The weaker your competition, the greater your advantages of being successful.

Step 3: Assign advertising tasks: Advertising is usually the most expensive part of any marketing plan, it is important that you make sure you spend money for advertising where better results can generate you.

Advertising is not very effective if you try to persuade a prospect's mind. Or if you just amuse them and don't focus that difference on their minds.

Step 4: Stop when your money runs out: When you have set priorities for different programs based on their potential payoff and effective tasks, start from the top down.

Invest your money where your opportunities are, not where they were.

One thing is worth what the buyer wants to pay for it.

Pubilus Syrus

Roman writer, 1st century BC.

Staying on the field means that your prices must be at the level of your competitors, because once your customers start to wonder "if they are paying too much for your product", competitors have the opportunity to steal your business.

When people pay a little more for a product, they do so because they perceive added values that represent benefits.

High quality products are more expensive, they are worth more. To achieve this, the quality must be apparent.

Thus we see how the most expensive products offer prestige. What sets the price high on a product? That it has greater value.

The last to arrive generally enter based on price. The low price strategy by competitors is common when there is already a solid market leader.

High prices and high profits attract its competitors. When competitors sniff your success, they will come in packs to take their share of it.

Smart companies don't squeeze the market, they keep their prices low to dominate the market, and discourage new competitors.

When you increase your profits with a new category, you invite your competitors to observe you and see what you are doing and therefore assume that they can do the same.

If you get your customers used to buying by price, you can help self-destruct your product. You must listen to the price competition, but to manage discounts there are things that can be done and things that cannot be done.

Commandments when establishing a discount:

• Discount should not be based on others offering it

• Be creative in discounts.

• You will use it as a means to minimize your inventories and generate additional income

• The discounts must have a time limit of offer.

• Offers must be received by the client

• You will only offer discounts to survive in a mature market

• Once you can, you will stop offering discounts.

It is difficult to win with a low price, achieving position with a price is different from using a low price as a strategy.

Low prices only work if you have a low-cost, structured advantage over your competition.

With factors such as competition, currency stability, and declining prices, this implies new strategies such as adding value in exclusive ways.

Promotional money should be incorporated into your price; Pricing should allocate an adequate amount of money to build the brand. Generally, a certain amount of marketing expense is incorporated, but not enough to make the price attractive.

It is also seldom taken into account that building a differentiated brand requires an initial investment. Sophisticated marketers "spend investment." They do not generate profits at the beginning of the process, but instead reinvest sales in building the brand.

One thing is worth what the buyer agrees to pay for it and what your competitor lets you charge.

Running a company in this competitive world is like running a war. It should be addressed based on what the military calls the KISS principle, which stands for "Keep it simple, stupid" in Spanish, keep it simple, stupid.

The current thinking of a mission indicates that the statement of a mission collaborates in explaining what a company wants to be when it grows.

Most of these mission statements have little positive impact on a company's business.

A simple approach is to forget, "what you want to be". Managers must focus on "what you can be." This really means being productive.

It is not enough to hang the statement of what we can do on the wall of the company. Bring this basic business strategy to the entire important structure of the organization and make sure they understand it.

The sole purpose of every mission statement is to receive it by all company personnel.

A confusing mission statement is a sign that the company does not know where it is going.

Good leaders know where they are going.

The statements of strategy, vision and mission go hand in hand with the premise that you must know where you are going.

The way to be an effective leader is to go through the mission of the organization, define and establish it, clearly and visibly. The leader sets goals, sets priorities, and sets and maintains standards.

To become a great strategist, your mind must be dedicated to the market. You must find your inspiration in the flow going through the prospect's mind.

Keeping the line of contact with the front lines in the structure can become the most important factor in the growth of a corporation.

Marketing is war and the principle of war is force. The largest company is the one with the advantage. Large companies give up on this advantage focused on the battle of marketing, which takes place in the consumer's mind.

You must keep in mind the tactics of the battle you want to win. Focus on your competitors, on their strengths and weaknesses. Finding that idea that makes you different and that works in the field of mental battle.

You must dedicate all your efforts to formulating a coherent strategy that allows this idea to be exploited.

You must be willing to make changes in the organization in order to exploit external opportunities.

The true leader never uses the word "we should," his response will always be "let's do it."

The true leaders go beyond the direction, they are motivators, narrators and facilitators. His sense of direction is reinforced by words and actions.

A quality of leaders is that they usually live the business and even personify it.

A visible leader is a very powerful weapon for clients and prospects.

Companies with such leaders enjoy excellent credentials.

Long-term strategic plans would only work if you also formulated those of the competition.

Long-term planning boomed in 1963 under its founder, Bruce D. Henderson of the Boston Consulting Group. It became the first of many strategy boutiques.

History is full of daring predictions that were never made, the best way to foresee the future is by observing trends.

The future cannot be investigated. Assuming that things will not change is a way of forecasting the future with the same conviction that things will change. The unexpected is always ready to happen.

More sensible activities that positively affect the effects of planning are to provide simplicity in the process.

Your staff should know that the broadly detailed strategic scenarios are a waste of time.

The true value of strategic planning lies in setting the course of business and in being the instrument to overcome the competition.

Encourage your planning staff to sit down with the operational executives from each business area so that together they discuss management guidelines and different economic assumptions.

Define that what is sought is a simple and strategic plan that guides and the company that surpasses the old formal planning.

"The future belongs to a well-organized and well-focused company."

Correct strategic conduct is inspired by good organization.

The technique for a good organization is that everyone is identified and directed towards the same structure.

In the competitive world economy it is too difficult to have a complex structure. Companies are choosing to get rid of these and resume simpler management than they can handle.

Eatsman Kodak sold his Sterling Winthrop medicine unit and two other businesses to focus on his vital movie operation.

Merck has disposed of almost all of its non-medical businesses.

Large companies can integrate different multi-brand structures that adapt to changing markets.

Hallmark, the most recognized card company, has the classic Hallmark line, the Ambassador line for discount stores, the Pet Love line for pet owners and the Shoebox line of humorous cards.

In contrast, small companies in a single category have a specialized structure.

Volvo interprets "Safety", Intel interprets "Chewing Gum", Com USA interprets; retail computers.

Decentralization prevents senior management from steering the entire corporation in the same direction and then shifting in another direction if market conditions change.

It is more convenient to run an inefficient but centralized company, with a large market-oriented approach in which new elements can be interpreted if necessary.

A decentralized company cannot have a focus on a correct strategy. What a decentralized company loses the most are opportunities to grasp and master the next generation concept and harness its potential.

Marketing consists of converting simple ideas into strategies.

Marketing ensures that everyone interprets the same ideas, and that this differentiating idea becomes a consistent marketing guideline.

A differentiating idea is a competitive mental perspective. In other words, the battle is fought in the prospect's mind. Competitors that do not exist in minds can be ignored.

It is the perception of competitors that must be taken into account when selecting an idea, it is not reality.

A mental perspective is the point in mind that allows your marketing program to work effectively. It is the point that you must reinforce to achieve results.

By fixing your idea, you turn it into a strategy. If the idea is a nail, the strategy will be a hammer. Both are needed to fix your position on the mind.

A strategy is not a goal, you must focus on the path, not the destination. A strategy is a consistent marketing direction.

A strategy is coherent in the sense that it focuses on the idea that has been chosen.

Marketing, like politics, is the art of the possible.

A strategy encompasses coherent marketing activities, encompassing product, price, distribution, advertising, all of these activities that make up the marketing mix must consistently focus on the idea.

The purpose of the strategy is to mobilize your resources to appropriate the differentiating idea.

Opportunities are difficult to detect, because they don't seem like opportunities; they seem perspective. Marketing's responsibility is to take that perspective and turn it into a strategy to unleash its power.

The idea dictates the strategy, then the strategy drives the idea. Both go hand in hand and are essential for the development of the process.

The idea differentiates you from your competitors, the strategy drives the idea so that your business can take off.

Your idea should only be original in its adaptation to the problem you are working on.

Thomas A. Edison

New ideas are what drive business and are the fuel that ensures tomorrow's success.

The mind gets an idea by following these 3 steps:

Preparation: you focus on the problem and put your brain to work on it, going to information, data and opinions.

Incubation: At the same time that you do other activities, a part of your subconscious mind turns on ideas, combines their characteristics.

Enlightenment: A complete new and reasonable idea emerges and manifests itself as a good part of the solution.

The simplest way to solve a problem is to borrow an idea.

The simplest way to invent a new product is to adapt to an idea.

Dale Canergie famous for his book Win Friends and Influence people, once wrote the ideas I promote are not mine. I borrowed them from Socrates, I dumped them on Chesterfield. I stole them from Jesus. And I put them in a book.

Show me the idea of someone else.

Goals are just good wishes.

Marketing processes incorporate a lack of realism due to goals.

Goal setting tends to communicate an unwillingness to accept failure. This leads people to focus on unrealistic goals and stop doing the right things.

Goals imply inflexibility. People often miss opportunities that arise alone when they take a different direction due to constant focus on one goal.

Increase your market share and the other figures will come alone.

Growth comes as a result of having done things right, but sometimes it turns out to be a worthless goal.

What makes a company strong is not its product or service, it is the position it occupies in the minds.

It is easier to stay on top than to get to it.

The line extension is a typical thought of a mega-brand that aims to place the brand in as many categories as possible. Whether or not they are related to each other. This is called internal thinking, related to a successful brand with how to make it better and bigger.

Unfortunately the only thinking that works in the market is external thinking. The one that works in the mind of the prospect.

In business you have to differentiate. The more things you try to be and the more you lose your focus, the more difficult it will be for you to differentiate your product.

People do not buy because they have a megabrand, they buy what most resembles what they need.

Decisions are simpler, when your focus is on one thing.

Working vigorously is not as effective as working smart.

According to the dictionary the word "Motivation" means: to push someone to action.

True motivation begins with the flow of an idea and then drives the organization to make it happen in sales, product development, engineering, or any other area.

The real motivation is to accept the real world, and skip the complacent plane of peak performance.

Effort alone is not the answer

Changing and improving are two different things.

German proverb

According to the dictionary, the word motivation means "to impel someone to action".

Real motivation starts with the weapon of an idea and then you challenge the group to make it a reality in sales, product development, engineering, whatever. The real motivation is to fight in the real world, not in the complacent land of peak performance.

Working vigorously is not as effective as working smart.

Evolution implies improving and improving in everything, to finally obtain for us the best of everything.

Deepak Chopra

Improvement Spiritualist

The human being must evolve, grow, improve.

Personal growth is personal. In giving advice they should be covered up, since there are many people who do not accept the exhortations and interpret them as criticism.

Starting with the basic points is vital to start the process. From the simplest to the most complex. After improving these points, we must create new skills.

You will not find success within you, you will find success outside of you.

Success depends on how you react to unexpected opportunities.

To be successful today, imagine that you are a product and not an employee.