The loyalty economy (Harvard Business Review)

+ We can talk about products, services, marketing, finance, tech, and strategy all day. But in the long run, a business is only as good as its customers' opinions. Here are our 3 key takeaways from the Harvard Business Review piece on customer loyalty above:

1. Quantify the qualitative aspects of customer engagement and loyalty. This requires creativity around metrics that describe customers' use of products, their levels of satisfaction, and cohort analyses. All of these metrics and technological tools built into an organization's stack must answer two key questions: what is the lifetime value of my customer base and is it improving or declining?

2. Optimize your teams' problem solving around customer needs, which will lead to increased customer loyalty. Often, when businesses begin to grow and different departments are forming, silos can result in competing initiatives (between sales, marketing, finance, ops, etc.). Great leaders will ensure that each group's ultimate goal is to serve the customer better (the global optimal solution), not necessarily to hit specific group metrics (which are often local optimal solutions).

3. Increasing customer loyalty (often) leads to increasing market share. It may seem overly simple, but sometimes problem solving is about inverting to find the solution. Don't ask how you can increase your sales and grow your business in a competitive market, ask how you can build a better relationship with your customers. Without consistent, happy, repeat customers, your business may as well be spinning its wheels in quicksand. 

Table stakes - how to unblock growth in your business (Permanent Equity)

+ We are passionate about helping small businesses prosper. One way to accomplish this is by building systems into everyday routines. By asking certain questions of each side of your operation, we hope you can unlock growth in the areas that need a little refinement. 

For tech-weary farmers, 40-year-old tractors are becoming hot commodities (Star Tribune)

+ "“The main reason we do this is to make money,” Folland said. “Older equipment is a way to reduce your cost per bushel to become more profitable.”"

The death of supply chain management (Harvard Business Review)

+ "It’s not hard to imagine a future in which automated processes, data governance, advanced analytics, sensors, robotics, artificial intelligence, and a continual learning loop will minimize the need for humans. But when planning, purchasing, manufacturing, order fulfillment, and logistics are largely automated, what’s left for supply chain professionals?"

GDPR vs. CCPA - how the difference impacts your data privacy operations (wirewheel.io)

+ "The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) isn’t simply a U.S. version of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). If you’ve already prepared for GDPR, you won’t have to start over to prepare for CCPA, but that doesn’t mean you have all the bases covered."

A timeline of Silicon Valley (Piero Scaruffi)

+ A worthy investment of your time, this list of significant Silicon Valley events spans from the late 1800's to the 2000's. 

Luxury on the installment plan (The Baffler)

+ Post-financial crisis, the luxury-for-rent business model has exploded in industries ranging from apparel to hand-tools to housing. 

Sales-tax ruling strains small online sellers (Wall Street Journal)

+ Taxing online transactions has been a gray area until 18 months ago when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of taxation. Small online businesses are struggling with the complexity of the regulations.

Nothing this week…

Workplace wellness comes for the working class (The Atlantic)

+ "According to U-Haul’s announcement, the company plans to note its policy on job applications, question applicants about their nicotine usage in interviews, and require them to consent to nicotine testing in the 17 states that allow it. The policy will apply to any nicotine use, which means that vapers and other users of smokeless tobacco will be excluded from the hiring pool, in addition to smokers."

7 reasons why video gaming will take over (Matthew Ball)

+ Gaming is social, it is entertaining, and it is becoming a bigger part of the mainstream culture with no signs of slowing down.

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