Christo: The tip for today is around positioning. So how you should look at your brand and where you sit in the market. What we typically want to do, as marketers is in the single insight into how we work as we work with brands in more depth and our own brands and everyone we‘re helping, is you typically want to position above the market you‘re actually selling to. Now just to get our head around that. What does that mean? It means that people have to see they get that level of quality, expertise, value for this price. So that they want to make a purchase. Basically, I have to see more value in your product or service that I get from you than I see in the money I hand you. That‘s when you have happy customers. A happy customer is someone who feels they‘ve got more value than the money they spent, equals happy customers. So you need to make sure that you show people the value they get and you do position yourself as this really good top-shelf quality thing for any market you‘re selling to.

One strategy we would often use which is pretty fun is we use something called price anchor. Which we‘ve had a bit of fun with over the years, that‘s one strategy which is a, basically, the brand positioning is above the market you‘re selling to. But we also use this strategy called price anchor which is it‘s one of many, many things. But this is the example of where some brand like Gucci might create a $500,000 handbag from time to time to help them sell $2000 or $3000 handbags, you know the lower end, because it creates this perception of a world-class brand, a world-class quality, that level skill, that level of expertise that can do something so exquisitely amazing value of that but I can get access to that expertise at this rate well now I‘m getting a deal. So now it creates a beautiful contrast but also creates a position of expertise. It‘s not only product that can do this. Service businesses can do it. We‘ve done it with lots of different products, different services where it could be a product from like a jeweler, even a sandwich store. They did this with a high end toasted sandwich which worked really well with generated media. We‘ve rat through the service people or even property buyers and this is where it‘s really like a hand held process where as a high level offering and so on and they can charge themselves out at super high ally rate then this helps them sell their regular rates as well. So that‘s called the price anchor and it‘s an extra little positioning tool that you can go ahead and think about where you could apply that to your own business.

Franziska: This also ties in super well with a question that we got sent in and that is how do I write a really good job ad in order to attract the right talent?

So when you write a job ad, you want to use the same principle of perception and positioning. You want to position your company as something that people want to work for and hopefully they do. It‘s not just about perception, it‘s about real perception. not perceive perception but real perception and real value.

So what you want to do is when you write a job ad, you want to do it the same way as you write any advertisement for a product or a service, that‘s how you also write your job ad. So, of course, it starts with a headline and the headline is something that is attention-grabbing and engaging. Then the first, I have a job ad here that we have used. The first few lines you want to then engage. So the headline can be something like, you know, for us here it was a business development rockstar, opportunity to be a part of a thriving team and then engage the reader, the person with a few questions. Do you love talking to people? Do you get excited about the idea of helping small business owners to have greater success? So a few questions.

Then the next part, you then want to sell your company. So talk a little bit about your company. So a bit of bias. That‘s where you sell your company. You really want to, of course, again share what your company is all about and what is your vision. Why are you doing what you‘re doing because you want people that want to join you on your vision, in your mission. Then the next part is about the role. So here‘s a little bit about the role. The next part, we usually say about you and we have a few sentences about the person we‘re looking for. So you love talking to people, you‘re outgoing and resourceful, you have a can-do attitude and you are self-motivated, etcetera. Then the last part is the details so it could be the salary and how you want them to apply.

So the answer to the question how to do a great job ad to attract the right person is write your ad as if you‘re writing an advertisement for a product or a service. Just put effort into making it appealing. Making your company and this job appealing and you will attract greater talent.

Christo: It‘s worth it. You get the better talent. You obviously want the better talent there is. One person who‘s an amazing team member, we all know could be worth five times worth an average team member‘s worth. So it‘s worth putting in the extra effort and it‘s worth growing your team and trying to attract the best of the best in your field.

Franziska: Exactly.

And now talking teams, we of course, here at Basic Bananas, we do a lot of team training and innovation sessions. We recently did an innovation session with Aga and we are gonna show you now a little bit behind the scenes of this innovation session that we did looking at how we can be more productive.

Christo: Let‘s do it.

Aga: The qualities of a smart team player are basically, we as a smart team are purposeful and that means that we‘re focusing on what..looking at what we need to focus on and when we‘re choosing the right tasks to work on and that we‘re working on the tasks that are making the biggest impact.

We‘re also mindful and mindful means mindful of what we‘re working on but then also mindful of how‘s my behaviour impacting the other person. So for example, if we have interruptions during the day, how‘s that impacting the other person within my team.

We are reliable and that means that if we say that we‘re going to do something, we actually follow through with it. `

We are also punctual and that means punctual when we have to be at meetings, punctual at delivering tasks. Just punctual with our promises.

By doing that, by really looking at having these four characteristics as a team player, we create impact because we are working on the right task and we are reliable, we are following through what we‘re promising. We‘re creating impact with the work that we‘re doing. By being purposeful, working on the right tasks and being mindful of the other person, we‘re incredibly focused. By being punctual and being mindful of the other people in our team, we‘re creating respect. We‘re respecting each other as people and as team players. And by being punctual and reliable, we‘re creating trust within our team.

Franziska: That‘s a super fun session and everyone got so into it.

Christo: It was cool.

Franziska: Yeah. The brainstorming was amazing and everyone was really on the same page to really create more principles around productivity and we‘re going to continue run these sessions every quarter.

Now, do you have a book recommendation?

Christo: Yes, book recommendation for this episode. I‘m actually gonna share it, too. Is that alright?

Franziska: Do it. Why not?

Christo: Alright, marketing related. One is called “Predictably Irrational” that‘s written by a guy called Dan Ariely. But basically he‘s like a psychologist, I think he is or he‘s a university professor but he applies the mindsets, you know, lessons. Basically test humans in relation to marketing and selling and generating business for products and services. So it‘s pretty cool. Like in terms of doing tests they might set up like a market store where they‘ll sell a bunch of stuff at a certain price, then they‘ll set up the exact same products on a different market store with a totally different price and then see what sells better. It‘s really cool. It‘s called “Predictably Irrational”. I think anyone in business should read the book.

Franziska: It is a great book.

Christo: Then another book for creative people in a creative space like us having to write books ourselves and come up with ideas and things and lots of people in creative industries in creative spaces, a great book is called “The War of Art”. Not “The Art of War”, it‘s “The War of Art”. It‘s the other way around. This is not a mistake. It actually is called “The War of Art”. It‘s about the challenges people have created, people how they create the time, how they create the space to be creative, allow it to happen. It‘s a super awesome book. It just opens it up and you realise that you‘re not the only alien out there that battles against your own, trying to make time for it and it references how really creative people throughout, you know, history and so on. How from created space to being creative and how they‘re actually almost manufacturing their day to make sure it happens. So a really cool book. I really enjoyed that one and I think you will, too, if you are in the creative space.

Franziska: Thank you so much. They‘re both really great books.

Christo: So now we‘re gonna go to words of wisdom. So let‘s hear from you.

Franziska: Yeah. I have been a little bit obsessed lately with stoicism. One of my friends in South Africa gave me this book called “The Daily Stoic”.

Christo: The Daily Stoic?

Franziska: So basically, stoicism is an ancient Greek philosophy that teaches sort of the development of self-control and how to overcome negative or distractive emotions. So how to be a little bit more in control.

One guy, a stoic guy, his name is Seneca and his quote that I quite like is, “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” What I like about it is that you want to be prepared when opportunity knocks on the door. So you can, in business, also you can do things to get yourself prepared to when the big opportunity comes. So rather than just sitting back and waiting and hoping for luck to strike, you can actually do a few things in order to be prepared. So whether that is, let‘s say you‘re pitching for or you‘re hoping in the future to pitch for investments into your company, you might already have the conversations with the right people or put together the presentation. So for then when you do have these important meetings, that you‘re prepared. That‘s really a lesson that I think is a good one for a business, too.

Christo: That‘s awesome.

Franziska: So get prepared because, if you get prepared, you take action you will most likely get lucky and it is. Luck is often in your hands. So do it. Let‘s just do it. What‘s Branson‘s called? Do it, screw it, just do it.

Christo: Alrighty. Well that‘s been awesome. So if you do have questions, or anything or you‘d like to say any of your questions or any tips delivered in future episodes, let us know what you‘d like to hear from us. You can post it in any of the email addresses or comment on any of our social media channels and we‘ll look after every question, every comment and get back to you there.

Christo and Franziska: See you next time!

Christo: Bye!