It’s 5pm, still thirty minutes to go before Mr Wong opens its doors for dinner. The line snakes down the street and around the corner. A few people have bookings for tables of six or more, but not many, most are walk-ins who know that if you’re not dining with a bigger group and have no reservation (house rules), then you need to get there early. Mr Wong’s reputation precedes it.

There is clearly no time for the management to worry about what the dozen other restaurants within walking distance are doing and no urgency to allocate resources to traditional marketing campaigns.

Like the Mr Wong team every one of us has a choice. We can spend the majority of our time either managing our reputation or keeping pace with our competitors or we can deliberately create the reputation that precedes us.

What’s the story you want customers to tell about your brand? [Take time to write it down].
How will you make that happen?

Image by deepstereo.