Someone to Learn From

It’s not often that the death of someone I never met affects me emotionally. I don’t mean that I never feel sadness for someone’s loss but rarely does my mind keep reflecting back on the death someone who I never knew. However for the past several weeks I have experienced a sense of great loss with the passing of Steve Jobs.

I think it’s because I really admire the way he embraced challenge and change. Of course, he was also brilliant and that doesn’t hurt, but lots of truly gifted people never make their mark on the world like Steve Jobs. It was his ability to use his gifts and draw the most from them that really inspires me. Because of this, I have collected some of the things he believed in so that I can review them again and again.

I thought I’d pass along some of the ones I hope shape the way I view life and challenges from now on.

1. “Sell Dreams Not Products”. He understood that the iPhone was something more- a lifestyle not a phone. This applies to us as custom framers. We don’t sell framing- it’s much more than that. Knowing what your product really gives your customer is the key to selling it.

2. “Create Great Experiences”. People remember things tied to emotional experiences. Want your business to be remembered? It takes more than just a great product- it takes a great experience.

3. ” Master the Message”. If you understand that you are selling dreams and realize the impact of great experiences, you can then create a message that is powerful and far-reaching.

Finally, if you haven’t seen this video from the commencement address he gave at Stanford in 2005, I urge you to do it now. It brings home how little time we really have to do so much. He places a total urgency on doing what makes you happy and therefore fulfilled. Here’s the link. Save it someplace so you can draw on it when you need it. I know I will.

 

The Final – Part 4 of Industry Pain

If you have followed along with our discussion about why people don’t do more custom framing, you know that studies have shown that custom framing is perceived  to be too time consuming, prices are perceived to be elusive and unknown and many feel that choices can be overwhelming. If that didn’t present enough challenge, then consider the this common objection to purchasing our products:

Customers  feel pressured to make the perfect choice

Why? The study showed that because customers were framing something of high personal value and because the price to frame was somewhat expensive, they felt the pressure to make the perfect design choice. The pressure also grew because this investment will be featured in their homes or offices for many years to come. If the result didn’t match or exceed their expectations, then they would be reminded of this every time they looked at the piece!

Wow- that’s at lot of pressure! What I hear in that comment is that far too many stay away because they doubt their own ability to make a proper choice.  Until I read that, it never occurred to me that so many placed the burden of the decision upon themselves. I just assumed they knew that’s what our designers did- helped them make the perfect choice…..

Apparently, our role is not so clearly defined to most shoppers. They don’t understand that they are not supposed to be experts at designing a custom product. No wonder they are hesitant- they feel too much responsibility, we haven’t communicated how the process really works!

Now that we know that customers feel this responsibility, it is essential that we make it clear that WE are the ones responsible for their satisfaction. How can we do that? Why isn’t it being understood by most customers? How do we take out the stress of making a perfect decision?

 Please share your ideas on how to remove this fear from our industry. Why do you think the fear still exists?

I hope this series has helped you understand the reasons why we are not busier. Now that we know, there is only one thing to do- work to change to perception of our industry. If we ignore what this study has found, we are destined to continue to serve less than 10% of all potential clients. If we meet the challenge and remove the hurdles, we have the opportunity to attract a lot more business.

Dealing with the Pain – Part 3

The seminar I’ve been giving most often this year has talked about how our brains make buying decisions. One of the most important things we’ve learned is that our brains are lazy. They don’t want to deal with any more than they have to. It’s called avoiding the pain.

Today almost every industry in the business world is being challenged in its relevancy like never before. The game is changing at a very rapid rate and it’s not going to slow down. The industries that survive will be those who adopt by recognizing the pain experienced by their customers and find ways to ease it.

This is the third in our series of four discussions about the pain which exists in the picture framing industry. Market studies have shown that framing is considered to be:

1. Too much of a time-consuming of a process
2. Prices are perceived to be unknown and elusive

Number three is: Choices can be overwhelming

Our brains feel pain when they have to make choices. The study shows that when people think of custom framing their brains hurt because there are too many choices. Knowing that, we now must find ways to simplify the process of making a decision.

One of the first things I notice when I watch framers design, is that those who seem to make the process enjoyable are also the same ones who ask questions and then talk customers through the process of making a choice. We all design that way- no framer just starts grabbing mats and frames hoping to find the “lucky” combination. No, we all have a plan in mind that simplifies the choices. The problem is that many of us don’t share the process out with the customer. In my framing company we emphasize the need to “talk the customer through” the design process.

This is one way of simplifying the decision-making and removing the pain of too many choices. I’m sure there are many more. If you have worked on easing the pain of overwhelming choices, tell us how you do it. The future of our industry depends on overcoming the pain associated with using our services.

The Second Major Obstacle

Last month we talked about a study that showed the reasons why people don’t do more custom framing. There must have been something to that study because 92% of all potential customers do not use custom framing. That means there must be a LOT of perceived pain built into the process of shopping for what we do. The way I see it, there’s a lot of opportunity here- but the old ways of doing business just aren’t going to get it done.

The first obstacle  cited by the research was that custom framing takes too much time.  Some great ideas were sent to me but one that I really liked was the comment by Sarah Adams, CPF from Indianapolis who is taking this restriction on time very seriously. Sarah says “Now I offer a MOBILE business. I discuss the piece, pull samples, drive to the client’s home/office/meeting place and design with them in the space the art will occupy. I take the art back to the warehouse/shop, frame and then deliver and hang it.”

Now I know mobile framing operations are not new, but this is an example of committing to a new model of business. This is someone who realizes the old way is working anymore.  Sarah is taking an aggressive step to remove the hurdles involved with custom framing.

the second obstacle to growing custom framing sales is…..

The ultimate price is perceived to be unknown and elusive

Sure, it’s a custom product. We are creating the price as we create the design. But the study shows that people find this painful. I’m not saying that the only way to avoid this pain or change perception is to create packaged pricing, however, many framers have found ways to effectively use  that strategy. What I do know is that people find something unpleasant in the way pricing is revealed to them in our industry.  Now that we know,  we must remove the problem. You don’t have to publish prices to address this problem. There are many ways to help customers overcome this pain, but the key is that you cannot ignore that it exists. It does. If you believe the study is correct, if you believe our model for serving customers needs a correction, what do you suggest should be done to overcome the obstacle our customers have toward our unknown or elusive pricing?

Keep the ideas and answers coming. The more we understand what holds us from growing, the more likely we are to fix it. The survival of our industry depends upon it.

Working on the Pain

In my last post I talked about the things that research has shown to be big obstacles to selling more custom framing. If you’ve been to my latest seminar, you know that these obstacles are areas of “pain” for our brains and the human brain is wired to avoid pain at all costs. Because our industry presents several areas of “pain” to potential customers, it could very well be that we could attract more of the 92% of shoppers who steer clear of custom framing and get more business from the 8% who buy custom framing.

Last time I listed the 4 obstacles that produce the pain. I have received a huge amount of feedback about the need to change how our industry is perceived. Because of this, I thought it might be good start a dialog on each of these 4 areas. The first obstacle that many perceive to be a problem with custom framing is:

CUSTOM FRAMING IS PERCEIVED TO BE A TIME-CONSUMING PROCESS

In this busy world, people avoid things that take too much time. Everything today is about getting what you want when you want it and getting it immediately. If customers think that designing a custom framing project takes too long, they will put it off until they forget about it. Think about how  many times someone has told you they’ve had something they’ve wanted to frame but have never found the time. It seems to happen a lot. If the process didn’t have the perception of being so time-consuming maybe we would see more work coming in….

My company, Framing Concepts, has been working on several ideas over the past couple years to combat this “pain”. I’m more than willing to share those ideas and what we have learned from the changes we have made, but first I’d like to hear about what you have done. How have you addressed this issue of being too time consuming? If you haven’t tried anything, maybe you have some ideas about it?

Please comment back on what you think and I’ll include your thoughts for others to read. I’ll also add some ideas about what I think can be done. If this subject continues to gather a lot of feedback, I’ll keep going through the three other areas of pain. Solving these issues is vital to our industry. Business models have never gone through as much change as they have in the past 3 years. The “old way” of doing business is never coming back. Almost every industry is faced with creating a new model that gives the customer what they want. If industries fail to change their ways of doing business, if they fail to listen to what customers are demanding, they will become obsolete. Industries that listen will create new models that can attract more business than ever.

Are we listening?