samirabid.com

I now run a “digital marketing” strategy consultancy. Bit of a mouthful. However, after much debate with learned and not so learned friends and colleagues, that is the term we decided best describes what the business, Entia Limited, does.

I felt a slight irony therefore while having a haircut in the barbers recently. This is a place I have used regularly for years after one day chancing them because I was stuck in traffic and decided I could do with a trim, while the commutes got their acts together.

Barbers are funny places. They are a world away from your posh hair dressers that the girls use, where they somehow manage to spend 3 hours and £100 getting their hair cut, coloured and blow dried. At the barbers you go in, either sit down straight away in the next available chair, or sit on a bench waiting your turn and reading an old classic car magazine.

As they know me in there, the barbers have followed my journey from Engineering, through MBA, fatherhood and now full time business owner. If you’ve ever watched “Desmond’s” its like that, only they are white.

The thing is “digital marketing strategy” doesn’t have a clear meaning to my barber – “Do you mean TVs and stuff?” Websites to them mean nothing either, from their business point of view at least – the barbers is cash only, they have no need for an online booking service and they are not computer savvy (I am not even sure they have a telephone!)

What then, does digital marketing have to offer my barbers? I feel that if I can answer this question, then it will help me understand really what any of this technology has to offer anyone.

Of course the answer is simple, is about value.

If I could show the value of digital marketing to my barbers with demonstrable increases in profits for him and his business, then that would be the start of an interesting conversation.

However, the fundamental point is that my barber really doesn’t want to work any harder, grow the business, hire more staff or buy another shop. His barbers shop, is a kind of lifestyle business and lifestyle businesses are not attractive for investors or digital marketing consultancy’s – there is no win-win, it would appear.

The strategic part therefore is to know the business one is pitching too as well as the technology. My barber had no clue as to how any form if digital marketing could benefit his business. Brainstorming with him, while he had scissors in his hand cutting my hair, was really not the best environment (and potentially dangerous!).

If one is to do this properly, then your digital marketing consultant should know your business inside out and where the win-win’s are. They should know theirs of course too but you want to know what is going to be effective in your industry and not generically.

Searching around my competition it soon become clear that the word strategy is bounded about quite loosely. Just as anyone with a spanner in their hands is an Engineer these days, so, it appears, anyone with a bunch of crude advertising tactics is now a “strategic consultant”.

Business strategy, for me, is about having SMART objectives based on a focused, data-driven objectives that have been derived from sound Market strategy and market validation. In other words, you’ve worked out you can add value and then how, when and where you’ll implement that value. That is what the MBA teaches you – this and how to go about delivering it too.

The challenge for Entia, as I see it, is how to be heard above the spanner wielders and how to find tactful ways of highlighting to customers that they have either been mislead or could really benefit from having a re-think about their business strategy.

But what has digital marketing got to do with business strategy, they may ask??

I am afraid therefore that here be dragons, political in-fighting and general back stabbing; no-one in an organisation wants to be seen to “get it wrong”. Furthermore, less than no-one wants to pay a consultant to tell them this either …

Suggestions on how I tackle this conundrum are welcome … please comment below!

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I am trying to leverage the “link juice” from this blog to use for my digital marketing strategy business called Entia Limited (link also at top of page).  If your business needs a digital marketing strategy, an existing website optimised or website hosting, then Entia can help you do it successfully and cost effectively.

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I am trying to leverage the “link juice” from this blog to use for my digital marketing strategy business called Entia Limited (link also at top of page).  If your business needs a digital marketing strategy, an existing website optimised or website hosting, then Entia can help you do it successfully and cost effectively.

I read an interesting article today by one of our (Warwick’s) MBA professors, Nigel Piercy.  The business schools and MBAs are being blamed by some quarters for the economic meltdown.  Nigel puts forward a balanced and decent repost to this notion in his article, published in the Wall Street Journal – click here.

My view is that greed is human nature.  Everyone was party to taking advantage of easy credit, fuelling the housing price boom and running up credit card bills to buy consumer items.  Its a cycle, a churn of money which spirals up and down; although we can’t directly control it individually, we are all party to the macro economy.

The macro economy is not the issue on its own, it is long established, the issue for the west is the rate of leakage of that money from the spiral.

The big point that people in the west are missing, is that while everyone argues about who’s fault it is and how did this happen, no-one is prepared to tackle the real issues, as I see it.  This crisis would have been much less powerful, ifthe west was still a net EXPORTER of goods, rather than importer.   By importing all our consumer goods, food and clothes from abroad (because we are largely too arrogant and proud to get our hands dirty and make them ourselves – why else is it cheaper?) the west has made itself very vulnerable.  It would not surprise me at all if there was a large swing during my lifetime of wealth and power from west to east, that  critically will have a profound effect on the standard of living in the west – if you look it is already happening really (why else would the UK have to borrow so much?)

Nigel was outspoken on the Warwick MBA course and quite polarised opinion within our class – some totally didn’t connect with his teaching style at all.  My feeling was that he challenged us and didn’t spoon feed us information, which I think can only be a good thing if you are to learn effectively.

Interestingly, other than in class presentations, Nigel never graded me that well in the exams; I never quite figured out what it was he was looking for.  I should therefore be frustrated with him but instead I am a fan.  I like people with a strong opinion and who challenge the status quo, making one think.  Its rare to meet people like this, with the courage of their convictions (to many unabated arrogance!) and its nice the Wall Street Journal feels the same.

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I am trying to leverage the “link juice” from this blog to use for my digital marketing strategy business called Entia Limited (link also at top of page).  If your business needs a digital marketing strategy, your existing website optimised or website hosting, then Entia can help you do it successfully cost effectively.

I have passed the Warwick MBA!

- 69.2% average

- 4 module distinctions (70%+)

- 79% for the dissertation.

These stats mean I rank near the top of the class too!  Fantastic.

More than the numbers, the whole experience has been absolutely class.  I did not realise I would learn as much as I have; as much about myself as well as the invaluable business knowledge.

MBA = Massive Brain Accelerator

Bring on the party

The MBA is complete and the parties are over.

The next cohort are probably installing nicely into their new home – looking forward expectantly to the opportunities that a year spent challenging yourself, your perspectives and your life objectives, that doing an MBA can give you.  MBA standing of course for “Massive Brain Accelerator!”

For me it is now about the next project.

Despite the recession, there seem to be plenty of jobs available for the ‘right’ people.   My direction is slightly different and I want to put the broad range of skills and knowledge into practise.   I am therefore working on a number of entrepreneurial projects looking at the electric vehicle ‘market space’ and developing some Internet ideas.

Exciting times ahead.

Best of luck to all the new MBA’s and for my year, I hope you discover what you were looking for to now realise your dreams.

I never thought I could write so much!  Twenty something thousand words and 140 pages later, the MBA dissertation is done.

So to is the course itself.

It has been a roller-coaster of a ride and I now find myself spat out the other end with new plans, new friends and new ways of looking at the world around us; much more than I ever imagined in fact.

Where next?  I am not sure.  There are some projects bubbling and I hope to start a new business in the near future.  Now however is a time for celebration of success and quiet moments to reflect on the last 12 months.  I am also looking forward to spending time with my wife again (an MBA widow of the last few months it has to be said!) and also catching up with friends.

For those reading this and starting on Monday, if you let it, the course will change your life for the better and for good.

Best of luck to those job seekers at the moment!  Sounds like you are having some success and this could be perfect timing to pick up on the recovery.

What a year!

I got my final result today –  I have passed all of the (14) modules from the MBA!

Now just the project to finish.  It has been so quiet on here because there have been a few hick-ups along the way with the project.  My recommendation to anyone setting out on a dissertation project in the future is to make sure you get a good brief and keep it simple.

Find these new useful tools in the MBA Resources area.

Here is a link to some thoughts and a top ten on start-ups and what they don’t teach you at MBA school.

The dissertation continues a pace. I am finding it an excellent experience and a tough slog at the same time.

The topic of my dissertation is looking at determining business feasibility (very interesting) combined with Motor Sport (extremely interesting!)  Through the company I am working with, I have been conducting primary research (i.e. new, not from a book research) with some successful and influential people in the Sport.

For example so far, a multiple Indycar and Indy 500 winner, a former F1 test driver and now successful team owner and an F1 team principal. Furthermore, I have interviewed a former England Rugby star and have other exciting meetings in the diary for the next few weeks.  What a different experience!

It is great to be involved and meeting these people, who have freely given their time (nearly 3 hours in one case) to help me with researching my project.  Having a chance to apply the MBA / business perspective is awesome.

The hard slog is when I am back at the desk, alone and needing to crunch through the information and pull together the report.  Like many, I am a people person so miss the energy of the class.