{"id":71,"date":"2012-02-21T17:20:52","date_gmt":"2012-02-21T17:20:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ayoub-associates.com\/blog\/?p=71"},"modified":"2012-07-31T04:46:37","modified_gmt":"2012-07-31T04:46:37","slug":"identify-the-problem-then-solve-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ayoub-associates.com\/blog\/identify-the-problem-then-solve-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Identify the problem, then solve it"},"content":{"rendered":"

Let me repeat a basic principle in the sales and marketing\u00a0 world: People don’t usually buy products and services. They buy solutions to\u00a0 problems.<\/p>\n

And adhering to that\u00a0 principle determines who succeeds at sales.<\/p>\n

Successful salespeople and\u00a0 marketers learn that fundamental lesson early on. They tailor their products and\u00a0 services to meet a demand that is not necessarily immediately evident, but\u00a0 nonetheless very real. They identify problems in terms of solutions.<\/p>\n

Solutions come from a variety\u00a0 of sources. One of my favorite examples eventually led to the creation of the\u00a0 iconic Goldfish crackers. You have Margaret Rudkin to thank for this tasty\u00a0 treat.<\/p>\n

Margaret was a 40-year-old\u00a0 homemaker in rural Connecticut whose son had severe allergies and asthma. He had\u00a0 to avoid most commercially processed foods and was eventually put on a diet of\u00a0 fruits, vegetables and whole grains. This is not a modern-day story. These\u00a0 events took place in the 1930s, when ingredient lists weren’t on packages and\u00a0 fresh produce was only seasonally available.<\/p>\n

So Margaret experimented with\u00a0 baking stoneground whole wheat bread. Her first attempts were utter failures. In\u00a0 fact, she joked, “My first loaf should have been sent to the Smithsonian\u00a0 Institution as a sample of Stone Age bread, for it was hard as a rock and about\u00a0 one inch high.”<\/p>\n

But she didn’t have the\u00a0 luxury of natural foods stores, so she persisted. She eventually hit on a recipe\u00a0 that her son and his friends loved, as did everyone else who tasted it. And the\u00a0 best part? Her son’s health improved so dramatically that the doctor began\u00a0 prescribing the bread for other patients.<\/p>\n

So Margaret approached a\u00a0 local grocer about selling her bread. He thought it would be too expensive — 25\u00a0 cents a loaf compared to the 10 cents a loaf at that time for commercially\u00a0 processed white bread. But rather than arguing or negotiating, she asked the\u00a0 grocer to taste it. He was sold. He bought all she had. And that’s how Margaret\u00a0 Rudkin started Pepperidge Farm.<\/p>\n

The story continued when\u00a0 Margaret’s husband took the bread to work with him in New York. Then the word\u00a0 really began to spread. She baked her 500,000th loaf of Pepperidge Farm bread in\u00a0 1939, still working in her home kitchen. She added her line of cookies, and\u00a0 later marketed the famous Goldfish crackers.<\/p>\n

Her company achieved an\u00a0 annual revenue growth rate of 43 percent, and eventually exceeded $1 billion in\u00a0 sales. She didn’t set out to establish a baking empire. She just wanted to\u00a0 improve her son’s health. I suspect that most people who eat Pepperidge Farm\u00a0 products today don’t choose that brand for specific health issues. But this\u00a0 frustrated mother identified a problem, and was smart enough to realize that\u00a0 others would appreciate her solution for a variety of reasons.<\/p>\n

\"keys\"Let’s switch gears. My friend Brian Tracy, the author and sales guru,\u00a0 tells this story on himself. He took his car in for routine maintenance. But the\u00a0 mechanic found more than $3,000 worth of problems. At first, Brian rationalized\u00a0 that the repairs would cost less than a new car. But the dealership’s sales\u00a0 manager pointed out that when the new models come out in a couple months, his\u00a0 car’s value would decline about $2,000. So the actual cost of keeping and\u00a0 repairing the car would be about $5,000. He offered to take the car as a down\u00a0 payment on a new car.<\/p>\n

Up until then, Brian was satisfied with his\u00a0 paid-off car. But within a few minutes, he went from no problems, to a big\u00a0 problem, to a solution.<\/p>\n

Example #3: Joe Markham’s three-year-old German\u00a0 Shepherd loved to chew rocks. His teeth were ground down to one-third their\u00a0 normal size from his habit, which was also threatening his health. Joe, who was\u00a0 a partne\"doggyr in a motorcycle shop, discovered the dog chewing on a\u00a0 rubber-knobbed part from a car he was working on.<\/p>\n

He had solved his own\u00a0 problem, and figured other dogs would love toys like this too. So he embarked on\u00a0 a journey of prototypes, rejections, manufacturing issues and late-night\u00a0 commercials. His faith in his solution led to the Kong toy, with more than 50\u00a0 million sold — almost one for every dog in America!<\/p>\n

Three very\u00a0 different industries, three completely different solutions. Everyday products —\u00a0 bread, cars, dog toys — that presented problems. Or more accurately,\u00a0 opportunities for improvement. Smart salespeople sell\u00a0 solutions.<\/p>\n

Mackay’s Moral:<\/strong> A problem is just an\u00a0 opportunity waiting for a\u00a0 solution.<\/em><\/p>\n

By Harvey Mackay<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Let me repeat a basic principle in the sales and marketing\u00a0 world: People don’t usually buy products and services. They buy solutions to\u00a0 problems. And adhering to that\u00a0 principle determines […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":88890,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business"],"yoast_head":"\nIdentify the problem, then solve it - Ayoub Sidhum & Co.<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Ayoub and Associates CPA Firm is a full service Corona CPA firm that provides services in accounting, tax preparation and planning, IRS audit, and sales tax. 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