The Problematic Truth

My mama always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get – Forest Gump (Tom Hanks)

The Interesting quote above from the movie Forrest Gump somehow is very true in this life. I would like to share a little about my experience in business and life. This sharing is a continuation of my previous sharing “The Road to Success is Always under Construction”.

As I stated before that we started the new Klick N Save on January 2007. Basically we concentrated on the nursery products with an online marketing approach. The whole team began the journey with full of passion. Let me show the deepest appreciation to the great team, and I feel so lucky to have a chance to be one of them.

However, there are a lot of different problems not only from the business point of view. Different problems also came from the personal life of the members. One of them had to go back to Indonesia due to the sickness of the family member. The other had to go to China to pursue his education. I personally experienced a very bad mental breakdown approximately a couple of months ago due to the financial situation, pressures from the business, and of course the difficulties from the transition period since I just finished my university.

With so many problems we decided to stop the online business operation at the end of September 2007. I will continue the security analysis division to live my dream. Probably I am the most stupid person in the world due to the fact that I still want to keep the company and try to work on it. I really cannot imagine where I will bring the company and how I will drive the company. I just try to concentrate to make up the pieces of the puzzle and hopefully I can create a complete picture in the future. I know there will be more challenges in the future so please wish me luck!! Honestly, I feel so sad about the situation.

Hopefully this little piece of experience would be useful to the fellow readers.

David Herlambang

MarketingFirst

Another Form of the Good Will Marketing

In January 2007, I wrote a sharing with a title towards the good will marketing which combines the marketing and public relation strategy. This sharing outlines how to be a good company within the society by being a philanthropist and how the good will actually increases the awareness of the society towards the company. Moreover, this practice will allow us to give back to our society since we are living in the society.

I March 2007, I revisited the good will marketing with another approach. I believe that all manufacturers must have a good will towards their distributors and retailers. They always try to keep the good profit margin by creating the healthy competition in the market. They would not allow people that will sell at discounted price to enter the market easily since this would kill the rest of the network. Moreover, they would also kill the positioning and the branding of the products.

For the third time I would like to point out the importance of the good will marketing within the business. Have you heard the name Enron? Have you heard the name Arthur Andersen? Hermawan Kartajaya stated that business has to be conducted in honesty in order to be sustainable. I personally believe that true honesty, good wills, and great management skills that would create a sustainable business.

Enron employed around 21,000 people (McLean & Elkind, 2003) and was one of the world's leading electricity, natural gas, pulp and paper, and communications companies, with claimed revenues of $111 billion in 2000. Fortune named Enron "America's Most Innovative Company" for six consecutive years. It achieved infamy at the end of 2001, when it was revealed that the reported financial condition was sustained mostly by institutionalized, systematic, and creatively planned accounting fraud. Enron has since become a popular symbol of willful corporate fraud and corruption.

Arthur Andersen was once one of the so-called "Big Five" accounting firms (the other four are PricewaterhouseCoopers, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, Ernst & Young and KPMG), performing auditing, tax, and consulting services for large corporations. In 2002 the firm voluntarily surrendered its licenses to practice as Certified Public Accountants in the U.S. pending the result of prosecution by the Department of Justice over the firm's handling of the auditing of Enron, the energy corporation.

It is so amazing how giant companies like Enron and Arthur Andersen abruptly disappeared and bankrupt because of merely not being honest to the public. This example really shows how a leader in one situation does not mean an eternal leader. Their bankruptcies really affect the global business climate. After the September, 11 attack the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) suffered bear market for a month. However, when Enron case happened it suffered a three months bear market. How many people being redundant after the falling for these giants? The answer is too sad to be true.

Comments, opinions, and questions are greatly appreciated

David Herlambang
MarketingFirst

Sometimes Being Simple is the Answer

I would like to share a bit phenomenon that I just found out this afternoon. My company just decided to create a new subsidiary and I will be the main operator. The subsidiary will concentrate on the diversified financials which basically will be investing the parent company’s money in a lot of different financial products. Hopefully, in less than a hundred years this could grow and become like Merrill Lynch, UBS, Morgan Stanley, or Macquarie Bank (fingers crossed…hehehe).

Secretly, I also have a deep interest in the financial market. I started trading in the Australian Stock Exchange approximately three years ago. There are a lot of interesting phenomena when I was analyzing the companies within the market. Today, in particular, I started the analysis by collecting the important raw data and information to be processed to the next step of the analysis. I came across to a company which almost has never attracted the media attention. Interestingly, this silent company somehow has grown for almost 700% in price within the last five years.

The name of the company is The Reject Shop. They are basically the discount variety retail sector. Therefore, their target market obviously does not expect luxurious and branded items. Basically, there are a lot of discount shops like them in Australia. What makes them special and different from the others? Why the customers prefer to shop in the reject shop instead of the two dollars shop in the corner?

Unlike the majority of the discount stores which usually very unorganized and uncomfortable, The Reject Shop differentiate themselves by creating organized and comfortable stores for their customers.

Tight budget does not always mean sacrificing comfort and tidiness. This is a very simple concept. Shopping items at the discounted price in a “shopping mall” like store. No wonder their share has increased crazily for the past five years. Sometimes we forget about simple things in marketing. There are a lot of new luxurious supermarkets fighting to obtain more market share by doing more promotion. Therefore, sometimes being simple is the answer.

What do you think about simplicity in marketing? Do you have more examples that show simplicity in marketing? Do you have a simple idea that can change the market? Please share it to the rest of the group.

Just a simple sharing!!

David Herlambang

MarketingFirst

Meet Me in Media Kawasan

The second article is out people!!! hehehehe

Wow, it is actually a great experience running this blog and writting articles to the media. I have received a lot of support from my readers and friends. Thank you for all your support!!

Let us enhance the power of sharing.

Here is the short abstract to the latest column for them who do not understand Indonesian:

More than Just Advertising

In the modern business environment customers have reached the saturation point in terms of being exposed to advertisements. Therefore, marketing surely takes more than mere advertising in order to conquer the market. A few decades ago advertising managed to create leaders such as Procter&Gambler, Coca Cola, and American Express. However, time has changed this nature. We need to redefine marketing in order to survive. Lazy marketing with only advertising as the main agenda would no longer applicable.

Hence, we need to create further connection with our customers. We need to cooperate with our recent customers in order to obtain the new customers. We need to ask our customers what can be done in order to fulfill their needs. For instance, eBay has created an affiliation program with the recent customers in finding the new customers. They would not be hesitant in promoting their customers’ businesses. Moreover, they also give their customers commission whenever sales is done through the customers.

The example shows that modern marketing requires endless creativity and closeness to the market. I am sure there are still a lot of marketing strategy that could be implemented specifically to your business, and hence no more lazy marketing.

Feel Free to Comment, question, and give any opinion (positive or negative) to me

David Herlambang

MarketingFirst

The deepest condolence to all Virginia Tech Shooting Massacre

On behalf of the MarketingFirst Group I would like to express my deepest condolence for all the family and friends of the innocent victims of the Virginia Tech Shooting Massacre. Be strong.