Adaptation
So, what do finches have to do with business success?
Quite a lot, actually.
Darwin studied the finches of the Galapagos Islands carefully, and made predictions about their future ability to succeed.
He was brilliantly right. The finches, he predicted, would have to adapt to survive in an environment of change. Twentieth century scientists delivered proof he was correct.*
What’s that got to do with your business?
Plenty. In the last ten years, even the last five years, there have been profound, Darwinian changes in the behavior of decision makers, and the communications channels where buyer and seller might connect. A majority of companies have not fully adapted to these new realities. Have you? Have your competitors?
Buyers are now in charge of all transactions, and they do not want to hear what you’re selling.
They have learned to avoid sales pitches so thoroughly, it is less and less cost-effective every year to “push” any message that even resembles an ad. Response to print ads are in decline. Your prospects listen to iPods, not radio. DVRs, voice mail, spam filters prevent contact. Sure, ten years ago a consumer might have used the Yellow Pages, but nobody under 70 does today. Yes, a purchasing agent might have found you in a printed directory then, but today, if your website doesn’t come up on her smart phone, you lose sales.
We adapted. We evolved.
We went from ad agency to branding agency, realizing that advertising is now just one tactic among many, not a cure-all. The communications mix is more complex than ever.
Is your brand active on social networks, for example?
It had better be. We’re just sayin’. Some of the tactics that can work effectively for your brand today (that is, open a dialog with your best prospects) didn’t even exist a few years ago. Twitter, iPhone apps, crowdsourcing, targeted prayer. (We just invented one of those.)
It’s a jungle out there.
Adapt. Evolve. (We can help.) Call 312 836 0050. Tell us a little birdie sent you.
*One example: on one Galapagos Island, 1020 of the 1200 native finches died off after a drought killed their normal food supply. The 180 who survived the drought (and only 12 were females) were the finches with slightly larger (0.39mm, 15/1000 of an inch larger!) beaks, who could break and eat seeds. They re-populated the island with offspring that were, not surprisingly, larger-beaked, and evolution was off at a gallop.
“The Beak of the Finch”
I carve different shaped holes
in my birdfeeder
Posted by Arlene Teck on Apr 17, 2011 at 10:04 am
Of course some Galapagos Finches just decided to survive by drinking the blood of the local and much larger Blue Footed Boobies, using their sharp pointy little beaks to poke bloody holes in their hosts and keeping the blood flowing until satiated!
Today this a widely adopted customer retention strategy for many IT, media, telecommunications and other service based businesses.
Posted by Alan Kent on Sep 20, 2011 at 9:40 am