Greetings!

TeamGB's winning cycling team at the last two Olympics can be attributed, in no small part, to coach Dave Brailsford who coined the phrase: "Aggregation of Marginal Gains."

Is this the winning philosophy that MDs, Ops Directors, BDMs, AMs and licensees should be instilling in their organisations?

"Firstly, you need a team with the skills and motivation to succeed"

"Secondly, you need to understand what you want to achieve"

 

"Thirdly, you need to understand where you are now"

 

"Then, you need to put a plan in place to see how you can get from where you are now to what you want to achieve"

 

"Also, it's important to understand the 'aggregation of marginal gains'.  Put simply....how small improvements in a number of different aspects of what we do can have a huge impact to the overall performance of the team."

 

What this means is that the entire TeamGB cycling operation is driven by a simple desire - to seek tiny improvements in many areas that add up to a significant gain in competitive performance.  

 

Dave Brailsford:
Performance director of British Cycling and General Manager of Team Sky.

I know that many licensees and PubCos subscribe to the Network only for the group and function bookings coming through the each day - not surprising when you consider that one PubCo who recently joined us has received over 900 function booking requests in less than 12 weeks. At a per person spend of just £10 those bookings are worth around £730,000. Admittedly there are duplicates but most were highly targeted and in addition there are also phone calls, referrals, repeat business and walk-ins that we can't measure.
 
We have an enviable 11 year track record of delivering booking requests worth many millions each year. - Licensees who succeed in converting these leads do so because they understand the customer needs, respond on time and tailor their offer to meet the customer's requirements.

However, have you ever really looked around the Network and observed how you could make marginal gains which might bring just one, five, ten, or fifteen extra customers each day into your bar? Over a period of a year, these smaller gains could be easier to harvest and much more valuable than the much sought after and more competitive bookings which take a lot more of your time and energy. There are hundreds of such opportunies on the Network, if not thousands.

The Network gets between 500 and 1,000 unique TARGETED visitors a day, sometimes more, sometimes less, depending on holidays, weekends and big events. But on an average day, it's almost always between that figure.

In the corner of my screen, I can see every visitor coming into the site and see exactly what they have typed into google to find us so, I know exactly what they're looking for and where - at the precise moment they're looking for it.

What can sometimes be overlooked, is that these visitors are not simply passing an A board that you've strategically placed on the pavement to grab their attention, or a poster you've stuck in the window hoping to catch an accidental view. These are people, targeted by the Network - via a various positive activities - who are looking for something on purpose and specific to what you might offer.

It could be something off the wall like a pub where pets are welcome, or a bar with baby changing facilities. It could be someone searching for a place which serves Thai food or their favourite pint of real ale.

It could be that they're looking for quiz night next Monday, a karaoke on Tuesday, Real Madrid v Barcelona tonight, Horse Racing on Wednesday afternoon or even Speedway next week. Whatever it is, if you take time to tick the box in your CMS, they will find you - on purpose and not by accident and that's real cash behind the bar.

If Dave Brailsford was in the hospitality industry, he would say that these are the little inconsequential things that could give you ongoing marginal gains, a competitive advantage and what I have called in the past, achieving success, one small advantage at a time.

The other thing that is somewhat disregarded of course, is that once these Network visitors have found what they're looking for, they are very unlikely to want to visit your venue on their own. Unlike normal retail visitors, they are looking to purchase multiple products for multiple people, which - for you, as a licensee, makes each visitor very valuable.

 

Update Your Website and Gain the Marginal Advantage Today...

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Perry Mayer
Managing Director
Pub and Bar Network
0121 288 5486
07951 776 435