Dear Marketing Professional:

Post-COVID, I find myself playing a little game inside my head:

“Perry, imagine that you time-travel back to 2019. You tell people what you are seeing with your own two eyes right now. Then you if anyone can solve the riddle.”

You take your family to an Italian restaurant. There’s an awning with picnic tables in the parking lot. You and your kids sit down outside. Everyone who is dining looks normal. Wait staff is wearing masks. What’s going on?

Zoom stock went from $65 to $250 in six months. What happened?

Air travel is down 90%. Perry doesn’t have any trips until October. Why?

There’s a baseball game on TV. Players are on the field. No fans in the stadium. What’s going on?

My business consults in first few days of COVID included…

• Gyms
• Bowling alleys
• Dentists
• Accountants
• Sales & business strategists
• Real Estate
• Roofing
• Mortgages
• Nutritional Supplements
• School curriculum
• Capital equipment for manufacturing
• Professional speakers

As you can see, these are NOT info products sold through Google Ads. Only a minority are “internet marketing.” Planet Perry is fast becoming action central for COVID-19 business problem solving.

What advice are we implementing TODAY?

Not just to survive this chaos…

But to set ourselves up for a Slingshot Recovery once America stumbles out of our forced social distancing, bleary-eyed and ready to resume our lives?

The first day that COVID hit the USA, I got a “911” call from the director of a large fitness center. Local schools shut down. Kids sent home. He’s like, “Hey, I’ve got to keep this place running. What do I do now?”

They cancelled all group classes and will soon be forced to shut down entirely. Customers are asking for refunds because programs have been canceled until further notice.

One dentist shut down entirely; another is only open for emergency cases.

A member who sells industrial equipment says, “All major capital equipment expenditures are on hold until further notice” and he needed to know what to do right now.

Warren Buffet famously said, “When the tide goes out, you find out who’s been swimming naked.” In every case, someone was swimming naked… not only the client, but the client’s client as well… and this is key.

In every one of these situations, the solution was not immediately obvious. Initially I was baffled. But as we began to disassemble their situations, a way out would emerge every time.

The crisis laid bare gaping weaknesses for all to see. Those who shore up those weaknesses will propel forward when the immediate lockdown is over.

And the bleeding necks are clues. But the clues are camouflaged.

The equipment manufacturer is in a lousy position to sell large equipment contracts right now. NOT gonna happen. But… the tide has gone out and also exposed the cost excesses for his customers. Managers are seeking every possible way to trim costs. Bob has X-ray vision to see sources of waste which, one month ago, nobody would have trifled with. Suddenly those cost overruns are under a microscope.

Players like Bob who know what to do today, tomorrow, the next day – and what not to do – will be the ones who live beyond the lockdown.

Many will not live to see that day.

You need two things:

1. What to do (and not do) right now
2. A grid for how to see into the very near future – because the grid you have been given up to now is obsolete!

Please don’t brush past #2. Because:

This means: All expectations, models, norms, standards, best practices, ideals, aims, goals, objectives, processes and systems are in a state of suspended animation.

Subject to MASS RESET.

What business you’re actually in today, how many hours you work, what you “should” be doing, how much your employees and vendors go the extra mile, what you WILL be doing three months and three years from now… all up for grabs.

EVERYTHING is subject to question. (But the problem is, only 20% of it is worth questioning. Most people are asking the wrong questions.)

I believed, at the time, that there was no problem great marketing could not solve. I believed you didn’t have to “outrun the bear.” All you had to do was “outrun the other guy.”

I was so wrong.

The result: I coached a number of clients in the mortgage industry and the real estate business, and… my clients were among the last to go bankrupt.

In other words… they made a valiant effort but still could not save them.

It was only later that I really learned how to pick battles… and not fight battles that you cannot win.

It may be possible that you need to run, run, run, as fast as humanly possible, from the business you’re in right now.

Or you may be sitting on a literal goldmine, and all that’s necessary is several significant pivots.

What’s most important is that you find out which path to take… AS FAST AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE. This is precisely why I’ve created Slingshot Recovery.

The virus lockdown exposed a weakness for the fitness center: their personal trainers have too much “ownership” of the customers. Roberta Ravella, Roundtable member and business coach, pointed out that all real estate offices struggle with an identical problem.

So we redefined his fitness center as not only a physical location but also a media platform. The director now has a plan to establish their leadership going forward. Meanwhile he has made wise moves to cement relationships with his staff in this very fragile time.

SLINGSHOT RECOVERY is rooted in a practical understanding of chaos patterns in real business – and how an elevated, removed perspective on every crisis helps you make correct decisions for your business.

“Normal” died three years ago. The earth shifted into a new energy, a new era, a new Kairos, in mid to late 2016. Most people are only now getting the memo.

Normal has been bereft of life ever since.

But most people in the world are still trying to get Normal back.

Normal was a kind man… a faithful man… Normal worked hard and provided for his family. Normal purchased a life insurance policy. Normal was loved and respected by everyone who had the privilege of knowing him.

Normal is survived by his wife Norma and his children Constance and Chastity. We will always hold Normal in our thoughts, cherishing the good times we spent with him. Normal will be dearly missed. Normal will live in our hearts and memories forever.

But Normal is deceased. Normal is buried at the Pleasant Acres cemetery on Main Street, two blocks up from the library.

Most people are immobilized, awaiting Normal’s return. They lie awake on the couch chewing their fingernails like a frazzled parent waiting for a teenager still absent three hours after curfew… suppressing dark fantasies about disasters that may befall their son or daughter.

Others are groping around in the Five Stages of Grief. Most are at the “Bargaining” stage right now, holding placards and waving protest signs.

Some hold out hope that a new president… a new fiscal policy… a new health care plan or political party will bring Normal back. Some think Normal may return if we ban firearms or pass stricter abortion laws or get better Supreme Court justices or overturn Brexit.