Visibility – Hype – Engagement – Conversion – Trust

Introducing The Business Relationship Framework

Visibility is Money

How can visibility create an improved return on investment?

What products do Apple, Microsoft, or Google offer? Can you name them all? These are the top 3 brands in the world. However, if you don’t work at a market research firm, work in their sales departments, or have this in mind for your upcoming Jeopardy appearance, you probably don’t know. This is a visibility growth opportunity.

What about your company’s product visibility? How visible are you in your respective marketplace? How do you make your company more visible?

Visibility has two components to it. There is a ‘seeing’ component and a ‘caring’ component.

But first here is a second line of questioning as critical as the one above but often overlooked: What does ‘know’ mean to you and what does ‘know’ mean to your audience? This is not a philosophical question. There are many levels to ‘knowing’ something. You can ‘know’ what a giraffe looks like from a cartoon. You can ‘know’ even better what a giraffe looks like from feeding it a leaf at the zoo and watching it give a slobbery lick to a family member’s face standing next to you. That happened. One is what would be ‘cursory’ knowledge and the other would be ‘intimate’ knowledge. An efficient framework that regularly improves requires both quantitative and qualitative knowledge to be thought out and have a planned shift from cursory to intimate (or for the data scientists reading this -> a shift from statistical premise to algebraic knowledge should always be the architectural outcome of your well designed efforts)

How Visibility Works in Business: Here is foundational truth of visibility. The human mind works to forget unpleasant and irrelevant information. What is unpleasant or irrelevant can vary and can even be dis-congruent in a person’s conscious and unconscious mind. It does this because there is a limited amount of energy your brain has to accomplish what it needs to. When it runs out of this energy, it gets decision fatigue. When it becomes fatigued like this, it makes decisions that it normally wouldn’t or ones it may consider distasteful at full energy. This is important for the math coming up.

I know about Thai food but it is my least favorite cuisine. Advertising to me with a door mailer is money tossed away (let’s represent me as a -1 to visibility since you created visibility with the mailer but my distaste for your offering causes my mind to ignore the information you are providing). The mailer doesn’t make me dislike Thai more but again my inherent distaste is so strong I ignore your visibility push by forgetting about it. My wife loves Thai food so your door mailer is effective on her (she works on a base +1 visibility because of her enjoyment of the cuisine) .

Let’s say we become hungry and a decision for cuisine is needed. She remembers the mailer. However, she knows my distaste for Thai is a -1. So the discussion for where to eat starts. Or to define it in a math statement (Kelli (K) = +1, Jason (J) = -1, Flyer (F) = Visibility Force Multiplier, Desired Cuisine (C) = 1):

(K + J) * F >= C

In this case, we probably won’t be eating Thai for a long time even with an amazing 20% visibility force multiplier (1.2), see below:

(1-1)*\bold1\bold.\bold2 >=1

\bold0 >=1

False

So let’s evaluate this situation. The company could create the best Thai food in the world lowering the Desired Cuisine (lower is better as it represents a more achievable agreement). Let’s say the company is the best Michelin star, most affordable Thai in the world. We would represent it as a .1 to highlight how strong the offering is. Why a lower number? Lower energy to achieve a desired outcome is a positive. It is more efficient as is represented in this case:

(1-1)*1.2 >=\bold.1

\bold0 >=.1

False

Did we move the needle? No. It is still a zero sum outcome since my distaste for Thai is still lower than your value offering. Now let’s say you ran the best campaign in the world? You achieved a full double visibility force multiplier. They are the Band-Aid brand bandage of the Thai food world. People think of Thai food and it’s that company’s name. Let’s put that math in:

(1-1)*\bold2 >=.1

\bold0 >=.1

False

The human mind is designed to forget, especially unpleasant things. So even with all the energy, time, and money invested in the door mailer advertising system to improve that company’s visibility effort, it will continue to fail. Jason’s -1 is the real obstacle for visibility improvement, not the marketing or merchandising as proven in the math above . Also, Kelli or the company attempting to brute force that visibility would be resisted violently with the person going even more negative than -1. Force feeding as a strategy never has positive connotations.

Positivity Investing (Direct): So what do we do to get rid of that -1? Pander in more campaigns to Kelli? I’ve consulted for groups that do this. The theory there is turning Kelli into a 1.01 or above will overwhelm Jason’s -1 to above zero so the visibility force multiplier is no longer being multiplied by zero. This works but to move a person to above a natural mean requires a tremendous investment of resources directly into that person. And as you can see from the math above it is not achievable via marketing or merchandising. Instead, it is an investment directly into the person to ‘wow’. Gift with purchase visibility strategies are an example of this approach. In this case, giving a free meal with great service to Kelli may allow her to override Jason in their relationship’s favor economy. This can be a significant gamble without understanding your potential customer base as you incur only present cost from that customer in hopes of future investment. The human mind works against you in this situation as the positivity you generate can fade with temporal distance without a bulwark strategy.

Negativity Mitigation (Direct): The other option is to try to get Jason to a -.99 or less. Why do I hate Thai food? The texture? The flavor? An experience? I may not entirely know myself (in this case I don’t like peanut and coconut). This approach requires getting in touch with Jason, getting Jason to give me thoughtful, insightful feedback, and then giving us a chance to ‘differentiate’. Voice of the Customer programs are designed around this strategy. They are oftentimes very expensive and difficult to achieve compared to marketing, merchandising, and positive investment due to the fact that negativity or friction is a natural law of the universe. Sometimes its like trying to get a car with square tires to go faster. It’s just not possible and you should instead re-evaluate the positive investment strategy.

My recommendation for both of these strategies is to invest in a very focused, inexpensive way until you develop credible evidence that your direct investment generates the desired positive change for your business. Instead of rolling out a free meal at every Thai location you own, try just one store and one neighborhood. Achieve your quantification and qualitative measurement. Find what works and then grow from that. If your business is very small, speak with friends and family for honest feedback from +1 and -1 individuals before a dollar goes out of your pocket. Oftentimes, startups only hear from one side without the other. Try to get an equal balance as it makes for better math and that leads to better decisions as seen above.

Applying the Framework

So let’s return to the initial discussion above. Why do you not know all of those companies product lines? It’s because if a person hasn’t experienced something and they don’t know of any reference points, they are naturally neutral or zero. Or in other words, here. You (Y), Your Network (N+) (+ plus representing as many people in your network related to the product), their advertising (A) = Visibility Force Multiplier, Product Visibility (V). Notice how they line up to what we have been speaking about and this applies to your business:

(Y + N) * A >= V

Let’s say you don’t use Apple’s ecosystem of products but aren’t negative about it (0) , let’s say they are on an advertising blitz to let you know about this new product (10), and let’s say this product is obviously superior(.5, lower better):

(0)*10 >=.5

Would you logically ‘know’ about this product (remember know is not just a forgettable fact but a cursory knowledge)

\bold0 >=.5

False

This math is the same for your business:

• Do you have an issue where marketing and merchandising aren’t efficient? You need to improve the people equation in the parentheses.
• Do you have strong people in there but your results are poor? Then you have a poor force multiplier.
• Do you have good people in parentheses and a good force multiplier but you can’t achieve the greater than or equal of your operational side (too expensive, too time consuming, out of reach, etc.) ? Invest in improving your merchandising (includes all aspects of the product)

See how straightforward that is compared to the overly complex models and concepts sold on the market? That’s how you know it’s good math and good business.

Thank You & Summary

Thank you for your time. I know it is a sacrifice and I appreciate it. I really want to share what I’ve learned as many have helped me get where I am.

I provided

• A basic intro to the first step of the VHECT formula
• An overview of visibility
• An anthropological snippet on how visibility works
• The core formula on how this all works to build off
• Two examples of the formula, one about cuisine decisions to think about while you are having fun and another to think about when you are working
• The ability to explain why more marketing, merchandising, or people engagement may not improve your business (wrong lever to pull to improve or too expensive)

If I failed in any of those points I provided, let me know. I will iterate and improve.

Next up, I will build on this formula to give you more control as we expand out into the three P strategy (Person, Place, Product). I will also provide the additional variables that expand and refine the provided formula.