telcoinabox

Finally the Doom and Gloom of the global economic crisis has got to me. There is no doubt that there are issues with the financial framework and the actions of some greedy bastards in the financial sector have been the catalyst for the current situation but really!!! It is a self fulfilling prophecy. If we stop buying our lunch from the food court at work then the guys that own the food outlet cannot buy the Holden car they were going to buy and then the Holden company need to lay off workers and so on. The key here is to keep spending. I take a "cautious aggressive" view to recession. Like any chaos within business, and a recession is definitely a chaotic situation for business, it creates opportunity. While my competition clams up like a hetro guy at a rave party, we have employed more sales staff and more resources to handle that growth. from July 1 alone our wages bill increased by $500K. Bring it on I say.

If more companies took this approach, rather than taking a "woe is me" attitude, we will skip a long drawn out recession and defy the rest of the world. Granted that this is not everyone's cup of tea. Even internally we have looked at any unutilised resources, but we have looked to re-allocate those resources to where they are more highly valued and can generate either more growth or support more growth.

The next person who sits next to me at an industry lunch and lets loose about tough conditions, I am seriously going to rip their ears off. Before the current environment, they were whinging about how hard it was to get good people and now there are lots of them in the market due to redundancies they are whinging about the environment. What a great time to employ good quality people. Please understand that I am not advocating stupid spending and reckless behaviour, but a positive approach to the situation and a removal of the blinkers of the daily press and look for opportunity and growth.

Mind you the Wayne Swan's of the world do not exactly inspire confidence and action. At least Costello was funny and generated opinion. Wayne on the other hand is as animated as a shop mannequin.

Tough times create huge opportunity, it creates the environment for change, for re-invention and for a chance to take market share. Consumers, or any purchases of goods and services change their habit in tough times. They break habits of buying the same brand and think, "what else is available". Telco is no different, SME's and Residential customers look for options. Telecommunication resellers stand to benefit from this the most. If well run they should be (in general) offering a sensational service at a value price. "Sensational Service" is relative to the performance of customer service functions of the largest telco's. Have you ever tried to ring them and get an answer from the one person (let alone waiting on hold for 20 minutes)?. So back to my point, " Sensational Service at a Value Price", in tough times why would an SME or a residential customer not at least take a look at this.

I laugh while writing this, because we have taken an aggressive approach to the current market and I sit at my desk telling the Telecommunication reseller industry to wake up and go hard (or go home) which only makes my job harder through other aggressive competition. At the end of the day resellers play against the big guys and that is where we get our market share. so I am not too worried. If a Senior manager reads this from one of the lumbering giants we call carriers, by the time they get sign off it will be all too late.

M2 impresses me. They have taken a very aggressive approach to the market and have used the opportunity to acquire poor performing businesses. Love it!!.

In my last Blog I ripped into the useless and pompous Franchise Council of Australia (I am yet to hear from them. Mind you apparently the head of the FCA has other things on his mind). I look to see the leadership they are showing in these times. To date there has been none. Franchisors are incredibly placed to take advantage of the current market. With redundancies everywhere, people have some cash in their pockets disillusioned about the fact that they thought that working for someone gave them more security. They are now reassessing that mind set and looking to secure their future with something they have more control over. The Franchise industry will be a huge beneficiary of this and the FCA should be preparing and talking up this situation. The industry leaders and industry bodies need to start talking up the opportunity and lead through communication to their members and their greater industry. People are looking for answers and good news. I was looking on their website this morning to see if they had provided any leadership in this matter and surprise, surprise their website is down.

To all who read this, start spending, talk up the opportunity and above all have a good time doing it :) Damian Kay