I'm Engaged!

I am a terrible person to go to the movies with and I'm even worse when it comes to the theatre. I criticize everything! Cinematography, storyline, acting, directing, writing, editing... Everything! I can appreciate a film based on individual elements but when I love a movie, chances are, so will you. My critique might seem complex and fussy but I only actually ask for one thing... To be engaged. I want film, television and theatre to engage me. I also believe that this is the one thing, as business owners, we need to critique ourselves on every single day.

How engaged are we in our own business?

You have likely heard the phrase... It's not personal, it's business. It has been a repeated staple and business ideology for years. You may have said it yourself or even been at the receiving end. What you may not know is that it was originally coined by one Otto Berman. Otto was a very bad man. Arrested at fifteen for attempted rape, He soon after became an accountant for American organised crime. He was shot by a hired assassin and died at 44 years of age. Nothing personal though right? It's just business. This phrase is ridiculously untrue and should have died with Otto.

Business IS personal. It requires you to personally engage, every single day, with your customers, suppliers, prospective customers and team. So how are you engaging? Let's take some time to audit your engagement...

1. Engage with your vision... Do you have a clear vision about where your business is headed and how often do you think about it? How often do you spend time working on it? What prevents you from spending time on your vision?

2. Engage with the numbers... Do you have a sales / sponsoring goal each month? How are you measuring your progress from day to day or week to week? When you see numbers are low, what is your plan to increase them? Of those who have joined your team, do you have their numbers and how are you keeping track of their progress?

3. Engage your team... Are there personal or business obstacles in their way and how do you know that? What is their goal or dream and how do you plan to resource, inspire and empower them to achieve it? Are you under-managing them? Are you micro-managing them? What can you do to Improve your team engagement? How often do you ask this question?

4. Engage your customers... Do you have a database that helps you to learn everything you can about each customer? Are those that are on your database, regular buyers, and how often do you re-evaluate and tune up your database? Do you offer your VIP customers special offers, including joining? How do you go about doing that? What is your customers' preferred choice of contact? How many of your customers will often tell you.. No? What can you do to improve this? What do your customers know about you?

And lastly, do you use social media to engage people to increase your business? I'm a firm believer that to engage people on social media sites, you MUST be personal. Have a look at the last 5 status updates on your Facebook profile... And jot them down. Out of those 5, what has your attention the most? What status has been shared, commented on and liked the most? Do you have a seperate Facebook group or page? Have a look at the last 5 posts on that page and carry out the same exercise. 

So... Here is mine...

Personal profile status....

1. 3 days to go. Can't sleep!

Liked 11 times and commented on once.

This is about my up and coming trip to NYC. Something that would not happen without my business... It's the achievement of a dream.

2. A comment about the removal of Sesame Street from NZ television.

1 person liked it. 1 person felt sad. 1 person felt angry.

This shows my interest and passion for something I believe in.

3. A Facebook quiz... What type of woman are you? 

2 people liked it.

I added to the profile because it speaks a little about myself and it's a fun, lighthearted thing. Something needed from time to time.

4. Mansplaining... A comment about how women should not be talked over by a man.

2 people loved it.

5. 4 days, 11 hours... Pens collected from Nutrimetics trips... What else can I add to my collection.

1 person loved it, 15 liked it and 2 comments made

Clearly the favourite. This came with a Photo of the pens.

My business page...

177 people like my page.

Of the last five status updates, I have engaged with people 181 times and my introduction video has been viewed 38 times.

So... How does yours measure up? More importantly, do you spend more time running your busines and working hard on your business than you do auditing your engagement activities and working smarter for your business?

Work smart... Not hard. Work in your business... But don't forget to work on your business too.

Remember Us?

You can tell a lot about a generation by the way they spend money. Generation groups are influenced by different things. If I gave you all a thousand dollars, here is how you might respond...

As a baby boomer, you would likely "save it for a rainy day." That's your thing. You own that phrase.

As a mellenial or gen y, you'll likely spend it. Mellenials are typically bigger consumers than any other generation. But you may spend it wisely or not so wisely. You are not likely to have buyers remorse. Companies just LOVE gen y's!

As a gen xer, you will do a little of both. You are likely to spend, but's likely to be a calculated risk. You like to have all the facts before you make the decision and you don't like it when companies sugar coat or gloss over the truth. You are intelligent spenders and although you find it hard to trust, you do become brand loyal to those you do trust. Companies have to work harder to earn a sale from you.

Did you find yourself aligning with one particular example? I personally am so tired of hearing about how companies have been founded by baby boomers and are spending millions on marketing to gen y's... these companies have made a catastrophic mistake. And most of them don't even know it.

Let's peel it back for a moment to define the generational groups. Baby boomers are the group of children born out of post world war 2. Our heroes came home and made babies! They were born between 1946 and 1964 and are now 52-70 years old. But believe it or not, it is the mellenial a or y generation that have more baby boom going on than the generation that coined that phrase. Ahhh Gen Y... The generation everybody talks about. From around 1982 to 2002,  gen y's are aged somewhere between 12-32 years old. But between the years of 1964 and 1982, there is Gen x. The smallest of the three generations, if you fall into this group, you are aged between 34-52 years old. Where Boomers are retiring and gen y are "coming of age", the gen x group are growing companies, wealth and skeptisism... In that order.

Categorised as directionless, gen x people are incredibly misunderstood and ultimately left out. We are the middle child, sandwiched between a prolific baby boomer group and the hip, tech savvy gen y's. We are small in population because boomers invented something that changed how we treated life...  Welcome to the world of birth control. Boomers, who always believed in the santicty of marriage and who would always opt to stay married, even if it was just for the sake of the children, taught us gen x'ers how to self-actualise. We learned how to live indepently.  The generation that was all about babies, taught those same babies to be fiercely independent adults. Growing up, we were latchkey kids.. Kids without supervision outside of school and before boomer parents got home from work. Gen x also coincided with a sexual revolution. Children and teens of gen x had been witness to sex education in school and the emergence of AIDS. 

Where boomers are said to forge the way for civil rights, gen x were the kids that lived it. Cultural integration, diversity and acceptance has placed gen x as the least racist generation by any standard today. However, we aren't all sweetness and kindness... We are the generation known as the people who do not believe in God. The boomer children had to go to church so weren't as strict about passing along that tradition. Perhaps coincendantlly we are also the generation who has seen the biggest spike in the divorce rate and we invented the term 'de facto' for unmarried, live in relationships. We are the MTV generation, experiencing the emergence of music videos, grunge, alternative rock and hip hop. As young adults, we are the FRIENDS generation... A little self involved and aimless... But fun. In France gen x was known as Generation Bof... Bof means.. 'Whatever.' We have been portrayed as cynical, bleak and disaffected. No wonder companies don't understand how to market to us!

But we are also known as the entrepreneur generation... As much as gen y... If not more... Gen Y are tech savvy as long as tech is savvy to them... Otherwise they lose patience and interest. Not so for Gen x'ers. I remember getting my first computer and sitting there day and night until I worked out how to use it. Baby boomers would be afraid and frustrated by this first kind of technology and gen Y would be looking for an iPad. But gen x know how to get stuff done. We are business owners and we really mean business. You would be forgiven for thinking that companies like Twitter are a gen y focused phenomenon. But you would be wrong. Twitter's founder is a gen xer, along with the founders of Amazon, PayPal, Electronic Arts and yes... Even McDonalds. 

Why am I so passionate about generation x? Because firstly, I am one. Secondly, I believe that companies have got it wrong when marketing their product to the world. They overlook gen x, despite the fact that this is the generation that is working, that takes risks, that has income. They overlook us because they don't understand us. But instead of spending millions of dollars focusing all of their marketing on gen y, they should be spending their budgets on gen x for 3 fundamental reasons. 

1. Any product related to looking after their parents in their old age, is going to be purchased by a gen xer for their baby boomer parents. 

2. Gen x'ers are not afraid to spend money, if they have been given the facts of what they are spending. We are not easily fooled... So don't fool us... And watch your sales climb. Because we are loyal to those who treat us well. 

3. We are the glue between boomers and gen y's. We understand both generations we are sandwiched with. Companies can use gen x to communicate with both boomers and y generations. AND we have the money to buy for both generations. Technology speaking.... We learned to type on a typewriter or word processor (just like boomers) but we learned the technology that gen y focussed products are based upon... Computers... Laptops...smart phones... iPads. WE are the missing communication link.  Stop writing that book about how to communicate with gen y.... There are thousands of books on the market just like it. Instead... Phone your gen x friend... And change your thinking!

Over the next couple of days... Have a look at what companies are focusing on what generations. You might be surprised. I hope you are pleasantly surprised! Because gen x, as small as we are, are the group of people who are taking over companies, businesses and even countries. 

And by the way... Prior to writing this I put it to Facebook, what generational group do people affiliate themselves with. There were some who had no idea. There were some who knew and declared it proudly. But of those who connected with me and answered the question... ALL OF THEM... Were generation x. We are out there... It's time the world listened.