Ratatouille & Why Small Businesses Fail + Sea Mice in Deep Basins

Remy

According to the latest statistics from our Small Business Association two thirds of small businesses survive two years, and only 44% survive at least four years. So that leaves us with more than half of all small businesses failing in the span of four years, ever wonder why? I think a major reason is simply poor communication with customers and lack of sales engagement and expertise in the product or services area. Brian Head, Economist with the SBA Office of Advocacy, noted that the latest statistics are a much more accurate assessment of new business success rates, and that "as a general rule of thumb, new employer businesses have a 50/50 chance of surviving for five years or more." I found this information at business know how along with a their seven reasons for failure, which I don’t necessarily agree with: http://www.businessknowhow.com/startup/business-failure.htm

The Seven Pitfalls of Business Failure

1. You start your business for the wrong reasons.

2. Poor Management

3. Insufficient Capital

4. Location, Location, Location

5. Lack of Planning

6. Overexpansion

7. No Website

During the course of my career I started, cofounded and/or joined six small businesses and I don’t agree that small business failure can be attributed to these seven pitfalls only. In my experience knowing, understanding and engaging with customers to understand their stated and unstated needs is the key ingredient for success. There is no question that if don’t have the right location for your business, you don’t plan, you over expand and don’t have enough money you probably will fail and deserve to. Aren’t these all key management decisions? There are of course many people that have life style business aspirations and need to limit their businesses growth, and start businesses for all the wrong reasons. But today if you are not selling products over the Internet, my question is do you need a website if you are on Facebook? I would love your comments on this.

Engaging Customers

How many times have you walked into a small business and felt ignored? And how many times have you walked out of a small business without making a purchase because of this? I think this is one of the primary reasons why so many small business fail, lack of marketing and sales engagement by employees and small business owners. I also think that merchandizing of store windows and products within small business is another reason for failure. If the products and store doesn’t look inviting and products aren’t well presented in the signage then why should I go into the store? We are visually oriented beings and our journey begins with our eyes, although the nose can play an amazing role.

Last weekend I went wine tasting in Sonoma County California with friends and visited a number of new small businesses in Healdsburg, a small quaint but up and coming town. Clustered around its center square are bookstores, wine shops, specialty gourmet stores and art galleries. One business, a new cheese shop in town looked inviting and we I walked in. Upon entry I saw a small figurine of Remy, the famous rat from the movie Ratatouille. There were two people behind the counter and no one greeted us upon our entry, it wasn’t until I picked up Remy and asked if he was for sale that the person who appeared to be the owner spoke to us. Even then she did not seem friendly or engaging, and did not do what would seem obvious to me, tell me where she got Remy and ask me if there was something special I was interested in. Not at any time was there an engaging conversation started and they never asked us if we needed any help, which I think is a stupid pedestrian question in this day and age.

Net/Net

When I walk in your store, don’t make me feel like a stranger, engage me even if I am a visitor to your town. Make me feel like I am welcome and you are not doing me a favor by talking to me. Small business owners need to carefully select employees with engaging personalities that will foster a business personality and environment that drives sales. In any business the customer experience or what modern marketers call “the brand experience” begins before you even enter the door, but in my mind it’s all about communication. All of this sounds like common sense, but it is the biggest challenge in retail today. Communications and engagement are only the first step the second and most valuable is expertise. And if you are a cook and have not seen the movie Ratatouille yet do it!

The Personality of Fish: Sea Mice in Deep Basins of our Oceans

Along the Eastern seaboard of the Northwestern Atlantic Ocean there are a series of deep basins often more than 2000 meters deep. Some have been named after early bathymetric scientist/explorers such as Wilkinson, Tilles and Stellwagon. These basins are unique ecosystems that are inhabited by bizarre looking animals and plants that spend their lives living in the dark. The fish and invertebrates have highly evolved chemo and olfactory sensory apparatus that enable them to find food, reproduce and survive. They are part of an ecosystem rarely seen and/or explored even with ROVs, (remotely operated vehicles) and this is where I encountered the sea mouse.

As a marine scientist I volunteered to do ground fish surveys up and down the Atlantic seaboard, where we often encountered, the sea mouse, Aphrodite aculeate. Sea mice are actually segmented worms and slowly cruise along the bottom like vacuum cleaners scoring the surface. I never had the opportunity to dissect one and examine their stomach contents, but I can imagine that is was a strange mixture of detritus, mud and other dead things. We often used Yankee Otter trawls to drag up everything from these basins and what I remember very vividly was the distinctive almost noxious smell of these animals live in the dark.

My favorite flounder species, the grey sole flounder can be found in these basins, along with perhaps the most disgusting of all fish species, the Hagfish . Hagfish are eel like and live inside dead things like some fresh and salt water eels. When the nets are emptied out comes the hagfish and as a defense mechanism it surrounds itself with a thick and absolutely disgustingly thick mucous and slime that reeks of the basin depth. Grey sole was a highly sought after fish because of its delicate and unique flavor. However, its populations have been decimated by overfishing of the basins, and because of our ineffective and dysfunctional government management systems. Until next time I wish you great selling and marketing in the millennium.

Comments

You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

чат рулетка майл ру

одноклассника

vkontakte ru app2462

сайт вконтакте

авторизация одноклассники

http vkontakte ru app109518

одноклассники знакомства мамба

odnoklassnikah moya stranica

однокласники україна поиск

программы для вконтакте

однокласники поиск

как увеличить вконтакте

вконтакте все сложно с самим собой

как найти человека

vkontakte настройки

посмотреть закрытые фотографии вконтакте

фильмы

21 mail ru знакомства loveplanet моя страница нижний мир 03 03 mail ru http vk com id4393596 майл ру подарки vk com ua вход вконтакте сейвер www mamba сайт знакомств http www odnoklassniki ru subs