Paint Brush Policy

My grandfather Edward (he made us call him "Ed") was a painting contractor -- and his tools / paint brush policy was something like this ...  when a new painter was hired, Ed supplied the painter with a set of brushes.  The painter was 100% responsible for their care. 

On his nickle, Ed replaced any painter's brushes when the painter presented Ed with a full worn out set of brushes.

If the painter lost the brushes or otherwise mishandled them, Ed again supplied a new set of brushes -- and reduced the painter's wage for the cost of the new set and the cycle began again.

If the painter quit without returning the set of brushes, the cost was deducted from the final paycheck.

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It was all agreed to upfront ... Ed told me he used that policy for 30 years and it worked like a charm.





Prof. Mike







Prof Mike • Class Star offers two, 3-hour core courses and several live courses. www.ClassStar.com Your business and referrals are appreciated. The Porch weblog and all contents herein are © 2013 Mike Ballif. All rights reserved.

Mike's Marketing Axioms

I really am a professor and I teach marketing courses.  Just for fun, I herewith present to you...

Mike's Marketing Axioms 

Axiom No. 1
Marketers have all the fun and make all the money.


Axiom No. 2.
Never, ever, try to fool your customer.


Axiom No. 3.
Entrepreneuring is marketing at its finest.


Axiom No. 4.
Don’t just keep your customer satisfied. Delight your customer.


Axiom No. 5
Don’t ever let a machine answer your phone, unless a machine is phoning you. 


There’s a customer on the phone that spends money that pays your salary. Answer the phone. Talk to the customer. Listen to the customer.


Axiom No. 6
Always include the janitor and the receptionist and loading dock part-timer in the marketing plan. They know what's going on at least as well as the boss. Innovation rarely if ever occurs in the boardroom or CEO's office.


Axiom No. 7
Talk to your customers regularly and ask them for feedback.


Axiom No. 8
Give something back to your customers regularly.


 Axiom No. 9
Finance folks, engineers, economists, managers, education administrators, production folks, and accountants receive their paychecks from marketers.


Axiom No. 10
Never put economists, accountants, or production people in charge of your marketing and and your humans, e.g. your top line.


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'Have you any I ought to put on the list?





Prof. Mike




Prof Mike • Class Star®ClassStar offers two, 3-hour core courses and several live courses. www.ClassStar.com 
Your business and referrals are appreciated. 
The Porch weblog and all contents herein are © 2009-2012 Mike Ballif. All rights reserved.

Paul is Dead. The Boy in the Curtains. Classic Coke vs New Coke. Public Sex & Other Paris Hilton Marketing Manuevers.

Paul is Dead. The Boy in the Curtains. Classic Coke vs New Coke. Public Sex & Other Paris Hilton Marketing Maneuvers.

Again, and probably permanently -- I’m going to diverge from the real estate industry. You all have more than you can possibly read about the trade and how to manage a career in it. 

So, just for fun …

Coke released "New Coke" with more sugar in it a few years ago...to compete with sweeter Pepsi. The public "hated" it, and demanded the original Coke...which Coca-Cola rushed back to the market, re-named as "Classic Coke," which it is still named today.  NewCoke has quietly been taken off the market...and Coke enjoyed a resurgence in market share.

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It's my conspiracy theory you know... The Coca-Cola "disaster." I've never heard of anyone else talking about it. I've just sort of looked between the lines on it and I think the outcome was sheer genius. So I've wondered if it was deliberate and a planned marketing maneuver, based upon the premise you speak of--there's no such thing as bad press--or if it was just luck on the part of Coke.

I've never heard of a Coke officer getting canned for the snafu, although that really isn't a necessary outcome of an executive making an error...but sometimes it is.

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I know of two instances of both accidentally-on-purpose-will-probably-generate-some-publicity scenarios--one planned and one coincidental: in the movie “Three Men And A Baby,” there is a boy standing in the curtains that supposedly is the boy, [who's real life room the show is filmed in] supposedly fell out of the window and was killed (in real life). The boy's death was initially a rumor; but then the story became juicy gossip and we all went and rented the movie a second time -- to see if there really was a boy standing in the curtains. We never saw a boy in the curtains before.

There was a boy standing in the curtains near the window.

Later on, the show's producers (one of which is Leonard Nimoy, aka Mr. Spock from “Star Trek”) admitted to the marketing gimmick.

The other example is the Paul Is Dead rumor about Paul McCartney of the Beatles. Everyone found a lot of "he's dead" clues in the Beatles' album art and also in the music. We all went out and bought new copies of the albums, and all the radio stations started talking about it and playing Beatles tunes -- years after they were released. It was however, coincidental and purely rumor. The Beatles' management spokesman said they wished they could have been that clever..."but sorry;  [they] weren't."

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Do you think Coke did it deliberately, or was it purely luck?

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Does Paris Hilton continually have a continuing succession of unfortunate events--purely at random?

Consider ....

Naughty daughter, heiress to a fortune...

Accidentally (on purpose?) a boyfriend releases a video tape to the Internet of the two "in the act" for all to see.

Her dog gets stolen. Later returned.

She has a horrible falling out with her TV co-star Nicole Ritchie (no one knows what the fight was about)...

Her T-Mobile Sidekick cell phone with nude photos of herself and celebrity phone numbers in it, was stolen (don't we all pose for, edit, and then regularly store nude photos of ourselves on our phones?).

Paris does a bikini-clad hamburger ad slithering about on a very expensive car being washed... but Carl's Jr. pulls it because it's too controversial.  Carl's Jr. itself determined it was too controversial ... after the company had paid for its production.  

Lots of photos and smiles and headlines.

Mother's Day gifts stolen from her car. Later recovered.

DUI

Goes to jail for a little while.

Reconciles with TV co-star Nicole Ritchie (still, no one knows what the fight was about)...

Cries publicly on David LettermanShow

Announces she's visiting Africa. Reason unknown. But pending trip to Africa is publicly announced. Lots of photos and smiles and headlines.

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Someone ought to calculate the statistical probability of the above events occurring at random to the same person. They are pretty much, random, aren't they? ;-))

All the foregoing was continually front page news.

Mercy.

No such thing as bad PR indeed.

    

Prof. Mike

Prof Mike • Class Star®ClassStar offers two, 3-hour core courses and several live courses. www.ClassStar.com Your business and referrals are appreciated. 

The Porch weblog and all contents herein are © 2009-12 Mike Ballif. All rights reserved.