{"id":30771,"date":"2023-03-30T08:00:14","date_gmt":"2023-03-30T12:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/?p=28684"},"modified":"2023-03-21T16:37:58","modified_gmt":"2023-03-21T20:37:58","slug":"critical-errors-5-rules-guaranteed-to-ensure-your-failure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/critical-errors-5-rules-guaranteed-to-ensure-your-failure\/","title":{"rendered":"Critical errors! 5 rules guaranteed to ensure your failure"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<!-- iframe plugin v.6.0 wordpress.org\/plugins\/iframe\/ -->\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border:none\" src=\"\/\/html5-player.libsyn.com\/embed\/episode\/id\/26180913\/height\/100\/width\/\/thumbnail\/yes\/render-playlist\/no\/theme\/custom\/tdest_id\/606730\/custom-color\/f7a011\" height=\"100\" width=\"100%\" scrolling=\"no\" 0=\"allowfullscreen\" 1=\"webkitallowfullscreen\" 2=\"mozallowfullscreen\" 3=\"oallowfullscreen\" 4=\"msallowfullscreen\" class=\"iframe-class\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe>\n\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A sure way to fail in your efforts to reach your target customers is not to understand how things work where they are. Some hilarious examples are in this article, \u201c<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/bettermarketing.pub\/11-of-the-biggest-brand-blunders-f291d96a7fbb\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">11 of the Biggest Brand Blunders.<\/span><\/i><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d<\/span><\/i><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> This lack of understanding can occur domestically or globally, in different age groups or different cultures. If you don\u2019t know about what is important to your prospects and what they value, you are sure to fail.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><b>Watch Colin talking about this on YouTube:<\/b><\/p>\n\n<!-- iframe plugin v.6.0 wordpress.org\/plugins\/iframe\/ -->\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yOm1qp0LpdY\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" 0=\"allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;\/iframe\" scrolling=\"yes\" class=\"iframe-class\"><\/iframe>\n\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><b>Subscribe to our <\/b><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UC9M10xfsJx5hkL3gYIkX-eA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><b>YouTube channel here<\/b><\/a><b> to see all the latest videos!<br \/>\n<\/b><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UC9M10xfsJx5hkL3gYIkX-eA\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-30945\" src=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1678200571964-1.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"60\" srcset=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1678200571964-1.png 600w, https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1678200571964-1-480x48.png 480w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 0px) and (max-width: 480px) 480px, (min-width: 481px) 600px, 100vw\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Organizations have proven this rule through marketing campaigns that have failed on a global stage. For example:<\/span><b><\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Braniff International translated its slogan, \u201cFly in leather,\u201d which was about their fine upholstery seats. However, the Spanish translation of the tagline was, \u201cFly naked.\u201d How about that for getting to know your seatmate?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Coors also had problems with its Spanish translation. Their slogan, \u201cTurn it Loose,\u201d in Spanish is a colloquialism for having diarrhea.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gerber baby food puts pictures of babies on the jar, which is cute\u2026except in Africa, where baby food makers put pictures of what is in the jar.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Instead of explaining the chicken was finger-licking good, KFC in China was telling their Chinese customers to \u201ceat your fingers off.\u201d Yum.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Electrolux had a one-time marketing slogan in the US with a tagline of,\u00a0 \u201cNothing Sucks like an Electrolux.\u201d Frankly, I like that one.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">People\u2014and languages\u2014are different and knowing who your customer is and what they want absolutely vital. So, if you want to fail, don&#8217;t bother learning who your customer is and what motivates them and what they want.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-30952\" src=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1-2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"940\" height=\"788\" srcset=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1-2.jpg 940w, https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1-2-480x402.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 0px) and (max-width: 480px) 480px, (min-width: 481px) 940px, 100vw\" \/><\/p>\n<h3><b>Rule #2: Ignore customer feedback.<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I read an article, <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/www.odro.co.uk\/15-famous-brands-who-failed-to-innovate-and-missed-the-boat\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">15 Famous Brands Who Failed to Innovate<\/span><\/i><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">,\u201d and what I noticed is that hubris plays a role here, too. Sometimes, strong leaders disregard feedback, which is a trait we often admire when it pays off. However, it\u2019s the same trait we admonish when the company fails, which is more often the outcome.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(That said, one could argue that the people that succeeded did so because they read and understood the market better than usual and in spite of the feedback. But I digress\u2026)<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><b>Rule #3: Fail to adapt to change.<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nokia made great phones at one time, the phones everyone wanted. Then, the iPhone came out. I met with someone high up at Nokia around that time that told me, \u201cYeah, the iPhone won&#8217;t survive because the battery doesn&#8217;t last long enough.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Clearly, this person didn&#8217;t understand the market. He was correct, the first iPhone battery didn\u2019t last as long as the Nokia; and back in those days you would charge your phone and it used to last three days. However, the advantages of the iPhone were so fantastic, that the short battery life wasn\u2019t as much a concern. Moreover, Apple fixed the battery problem.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-30953\" src=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Article-Images-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"940\" height=\"788\" srcset=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Article-Images-1.jpg 940w, https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Article-Images-1-480x402.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 0px) and (max-width: 480px) 480px, (min-width: 481px) 940px, 100vw\" \/><br \/>\n<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nokia is Microsoft Mobile now, so you can see how that went for them. Nokia isn\u2019t alone in this mistake. Kodak didn\u2019t see what would happen with digital cameras; Blockbuster missed the boat on streaming; and neither one of them is around to share their cautionary tale now, are they?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Many years ago, Charles Handy wrote \u201c<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/EMPTY-RAINCOAT-MAKING-SENSE-FUTURE\/dp\/0099301253\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Empty Raincoat: Making Sense of the Future<\/span><\/i><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u201d In the book, Handy shares the S-curve. If you picture a vertical axis as \u201cperformance\u201d and a horizontal axis as \u201ctime,\u201d and a big bell curve on it, you will get a sense of what this means. The first low point of the bell curve is when a company\/sports team\/new product comes out; it\u2019s just getting started so the performance is low. However, as you move forward in the time axis, the performance builds to the peak of the bell curve. Then, as you continue to follow the time axis, the performance falls off for whatever reason.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What Handy wrote in the book is that the time for change is right before you reach the top of the first curve, when everything is performing well. However, that is also the most difficult time to change because everybody turns around and says, \u201cWhy are we changing? You know, we&#8217;re doing really well. There&#8217;s no point in this.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This attitude is in part inspired by Loss Aversion, one of the parts of Prospect Theory. We tend to be risk averse naturally anyway, but it\u2019s even more so when things are going well. It isn\u2019t until things are not going well, on the downside of that curve, that we are more willing to take risks or make changes.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><b>Rule#4: Not being authentic.<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This rule is kind of obvious, so I won\u2019t belabor it too much. Brands that aren\u2019t what they say they are or don\u2019t follow through on their brand promise, are not going to last. Customers tend to drop companies that are inauthentic.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Do you remember <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/RdSmokR0Enk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Milli Vanilli<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">? If you didn\u2019t wear parachute pants or shoulder pads at one time, or know how to take care of Pet Rock, then you might not.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\"  title=\"Milli Vanilli - Girl You Know It&#039;s True\" width=\"1080\" height=\"810\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/RdSmokR0Enk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.smoothradio.com\/news\/music\/milli-vanilli-now-songs-lip-syncing-death\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Milli Vanilli was a couple of good-looking German French R&amp;B duo from Munich<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. They were singers that danced and had a few hits in the late 1980s. However, they were exposed as frauds that didn\u2019t record the songs; in fact, they couldn\u2019t sing.\u00a0 When exposed at a 1989 concert in Connecticut, their career was over. (Sadly, one member of the duo later died in a hotel room in Frankfurt, Germany, at age 32, the victim of a suspected alcohol and prescription drug overdose.)<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><b>Rule #5: Overlooking diversity and inclusion.<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There are various reasons for wanting diversity, and one of them is to have the kind of leadership that is open to multiple viewpoints. By being challenged and encouraged to look at things in different ways, you can respond to the market.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For example, Victoria\u2019s Secret in the states was the leading brand in ladies\u2019 lingerie. However, their success led to a tunnel vision on what was cool and sexy. They hired the same kind of models and pushed the same style, to the point of being aggressive about it. However, the lack of diversity on what is sexy or what is cool eventually led to their fall. Over time they crashed and burned. It is both an example of rule #3, not adapting to change, and #5, lack of diversity.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-30954\" src=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Article-Images-2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"940\" height=\"788\" srcset=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Article-Images-2.jpg 940w, https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Article-Images-2-480x402.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 0px) and (max-width: 480px) 480px, (min-width: 481px) 940px, 100vw\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There you have it. The playbook of what not to do. So, if you want to make your organization fail, then be sure to ignore the needs of your target market and customer feedback, refuse to adapt to change, be fake, and exclude as many people as possible.\u00a0 Otherwise, do the opposite, and I think you\u2019ll see a lot more success than some of these brands did.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-30955\" src=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Untitled-design-7.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Untitled-design-7.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Untitled-design-7-980x490.jpg 980w, https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Untitled-design-7-480x240.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 0px) and (max-width: 480px) 480px, (min-width: 481px) and (max-width: 980px) 980px, (min-width: 981px) 1200px, 100vw\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We can help improve your <a href=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/customer-experience\/\">Customer Experience<\/a> and Marketing and gain growth. Beyond Philosophy has been recognized by the Financial Times as the leading management consultancy for four years. Why not talk with Colin and his team about how we can help you gain growth? <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/cx-services\/consulting\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Click here<\/span><\/a><b>.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A sure way to fail in your efforts to reach your target customers is not to understand how things work where they are. Some hilarious examples are in this article, \u201c11 of the Biggest Brand Blunders.\u201d This lack of understanding can occur domestically or globally, in different age groups or different cultures. If you don\u2019t [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":30957,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[97],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blogs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30771","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30771\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30957"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beyondphilosophy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}