How to get started with Open Marketing
Step 1. Believe in your customers - Part 1

Hello everyone. I am Hayashi, the representative of Monosus.

In the last two articles, we have focused on the Food Hub Project in Kamiyama.
We talked about Open Marketing.

From this time on, we will return to the original flow and delve deeper into the idea of Open Marketing.
Over the next few posts I would like to explain how you can actually incorporate Open Marketing.

Be honest about your own values.

When starting Open Marketing,
The first thing we need to do is reposition our minds.
We need to reexamine our business stance and approach our products and services with a new attitude.

What you need to do here is to be honest with your own values.

I have worked with many business owners in the past.
The biggest worry for managers is not a lack of sales and profits,
It's not that employees don't act as expected,
I think it's because I can't do the business I want to do.

A few years ago, I did a project with the managers of a motorcycle dealership.
At that moment, this hypothesis became a certainty for me.

I would like to talk about this with some examples.

The project involved working with a chain of authorized dealers for a certain motorcycle manufacturer.
There are nearly 100 stores nationwide, but each store is owned by a different company and is run independently.
At that time, I worked with the owners and managers of about 15 stores on a project to improve performance.

As an authorized dealer, we only stock bikes from that manufacturer.
In other words, from the outside it looks like a chain store that sells the same brand of bikes.
In the case of automobiles, dealerships such as Lexus, Nissan, Honda, and BMW all look the same to the average person.
However, in reality, each company has a different manager and is run independently.

As we talked about improving business performance, we had various conversations.
One day, I suddenly became curious and asked the business owners and store managers, "Why did you decide to specialize in this manufacturer's bikes?
And why did you decide to own/operate a bike shop?
I asked him, ``Why?''

There were many things the managers said to me at that time that I still can't forget.
Since I have the opportunity, I would like to introduce two of them.
I don't remember it word for word, but
In order to make it easier to understand, I will write it as if the person himself were telling it.

Store A - Store owner in Kyushu -

This store has been in business since my father's generation.
The current store was relocated after I took over,
When I was little, the store and my house were in the same building.
So I often saw many motorcyclists coming to see my father.
At the time, I thought of motorbike riders as noisy, rough people, and I never had a good impression of motorbikes.
However, at that time, everyone was riding motorcycles, so when I got older, I started riding one too.

When I started riding a motorcycle, I felt that there was no other sport that was as fun as this one.
That is what it means.
I ended up getting so hooked that I even got an International Class A motocross license.

At that time, I thought to myself, "If I'm going to open a motorcycle shop, I want to open a shop that will increase the number of riders who ride motorcycles as a proper sport."
That is what it means.

In other words, you need to learn proper techniques, follow traffic rules, and observe etiquette.
I wanted to create a shop that would nurture skilled riders who could enjoy motorcycling as a sport.

And if you ride a bike for sport,
I think the bikes from the manufacturer I currently handle offer the best balance of price and performance.

Store B - Store Manager in Tohoku -

This restaurant was originally my wife's family home.
I came here during college, met my wife and ended up working here.
I believe that a motorcycle is only fun to ride if you know how to ride it properly.

From that perspective, I believe that the brand of bikes that we currently handle are ones that respond better than any other brand to the rider's intentions of "how they want to turn."
You can experience what is known as "oneness between man and horse."

But to experience this, you need training.
Unfortunately, I think there are very few riders who have been able to experience being one with their horse.
I feel that it's such a waste.

I would be very happy if people could buy a bike from this shop, ride it and experience the feeling of being one with the horse.

There are many other episodes I would like to introduce,
Here are some comments from two business owners.

Why do business owners want to do what they want to do?
Can't I do it with the person I want to do it with?

For me, the stories of each of the managers were very memorable.
They are charming, interesting and the kind of managers I'd love to interact with if I lived nearby.
On the other hand, to what extent were they able to express this feeling in their own stores?

I think we probably didn't even achieve 10% of it.

When I asked them why they don't advertise it in their stores, they said,
The answer that came back was,
"You can't make a living doing that."
The majority of responses were as follows.

I have a clear idea of what I want to do and my ideal business.
Even though we have a clear idea of the type of customers we want to attract,
"That's not profitable," he thought, and gave up.
They are offering a service that they don't even want to sell, in a way that is not ideal.

When I heard this, I realized that I had been listening to many company executives.
Furthermore, I felt like everything I had experienced firsthand over the nearly 10 years I had been a business owner was connected in a single thread.

In fact, the worries of many managers are simply that they can't make sales,
It's not that I'm not making a profit, much less that I'm busy.
I realized that I was not doing the business I wanted to do with the people I wanted to do it with.

So why is it that so many business owners are unable to "do the business they want to do, with the people they want to do it with"?

I believe the reason for this is that they don't trust their customers.
The reason is that they are not telling their customers honestly and openly about the type of business they want to do.
They don't think their customers will accept it.

If you are not confident about the type of business you want to do,
Of course, there may be some aspects like that, but as a manager,
I have to borrow a lot of money to run the store,
In the case of the project mentioned earlier, there is also a commitment to only sell a certain brand of bikes.
In other words, to a certain extent, for the way you do business and the products you handle,
If you don't have confidence or a sense of worth, you may be able to start, but
It probably can't continue for years.

In other words, what they don't believe in is their customers more than they do themselves.

We aim to continually build relationships with our customers,
To create a happy environment for our customers,
The first thing that is lacking is that the companies providing the products do not trust their customers.

This has gotten long, so I'll end it here for now.
Next time, I would like to delve deeper into the idea of "trusting your customers first."

Thank you for reading to the end this month as well.