This newsletter is an update of an article from last February. Why? Because I’ve had the same bad experience with the organization mentioned in here too many times recently. Feel free to share this with the marketing execs at Staples 😉
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The Super Bowl is almost here, and with it, the media scrutiny of thousands of journalists who cover the event. All eyes are on the Panthers and Broncos, and their eyes are on each other—preparing strategies and refining playbooks (and fortunately they don’t have to check for under-inflated footballs).

In business, every company has its version of the big game, a “Super Bowl moment.” It’s a make or break time when planning is paramount and every employee must be revved up.

For retailers, that moment is Black Friday. This day kicks off the holiday season which generates about 1/3 of annual revenue in the retail business. On the last Black Friday, I went to a local Staples store to buy a few items. Simple enough? No. The customer experience was horrible. An inexperienced cashier fumbled the handling of my rebate check, had a poor attitude and with 4-5 other errors the entire experience – which should have taken one minute – took twenty five and left me feeling cold. This particular Staples store blew their Super Bowl Moment.

Hopefully this store was a atypical for the chain. With nearly 1,900 locations in North America, Staples generates an estimated $1.5 billion in revenue on Black Friday weekend. If only a small fraction of their customers had an equally poor experience, the impact on their business would be significant. It begs the question:

What are your company’s Super Bowl moments and how can you better prepare?

Some considerations:

• Define the levers that drive your customer experience
• Quantify the impact of each lever on sales and then improve them accordingly. Particularly in planning for Big Game Day.
• Think about how your best laid plans can come undone and how can you mitigate against those risks.
• Plan how your approach to Super Bowl moments can be part of your knitting every single day (for your regular season).

There’s no excuse for poor performances during Super Bowl moments. And with proper planning and excellent execution, every day can be a victory.

Drop us a line if you’d like to have a conversation about your business. Enjoy the game!