Coffee, Chat and getting insightful!

Sunday, April 26, 2015 · Mike Davis

Good morning! I truly hope your weekend is going great. My weekend could have ended after I pulled away from my hometown yesterday and it would have the perfect weekend. Lunch with my mother as well as some time with my older brother and a relaxing ride back to Dover. I beat myself I a lot over not seeing my mother a lot, but when I do it is very enjoyable and special. So my weekend was perfect! Thankfully the weekend isn’t over and I have today to enjoy before heading into a 12 day stretch of work at the base. Yes indeed, next weekend I have my weekend duty and it seems as if I just had it! This afternoon Lew and I are meeting with Rob Levy and an associate of his to discuss what is “No Finish Line Running?” I have mentioned Rob a few times as he writes for the Portsmouth Herald as being a great runner and he also has a marketing business. The goal for this short meeting is to reign in the message and create some clarity that gives the general public understanding of who we are to them. That clarity will also help us to better focus our time, resources and direction as we move forward. Back when I opened the invisible doors to coaching running and “No Finish Line Running” was created, I offered my services to any one that needed a running coach. One of my advisors told me that I would be better off if I limited that scope of coaching as to be clear who my target audience would be. I understood that advice and kept it in mind, but didn’t necessarily follow it. Some years later “No Finish Line Running” has become the number one resource for those seeking running coaches as well as training groups on the Seacoast of New Hampshire. In that time we have worked with Boston qualifiers, other marathoners, half marathoners and all the way to beginners. We have also worked with triathletes with a third of their training and also coached runners online as well. So I guess it would appear that we help anyone that laces up a pair of running shoes. Probably not exactly accurate nor do I necessarily want that to be the case. We most certainly have the knowledge, training, resources and experience to help wannabe runners through competitive marathoners that are not available elsewhere in New England. Yes that’s a bold statement but between our technical knowledge and many diverse resources there are not many even in the big cities that have our capabilities. However all of these capabilities often make it hard to direct our message or direct our business focus. Someone asked if I would consider moving away from the “No Finish Line Running” name if it would benefit “the Center” to be called something less specific to running and more general to all endurance sports? There is no way I would away from “NFLR” as it best represents who I am. The challenge when we opened the “No Finish Line Running Coaching & Endurance Resource Center” was how to market the other services that would also benefit various other endurance sports. While I appreciated the desire to want the “Center” to be all inclusive, I would never move away from “NFLR.” Establishing “NFLR” and what it represents is not the challenge we have in front of us. The challenge is defining who our focus is and not trying to stretch ourselves so broad that we dilute our value. Case in point: Back in February we began planning for a Dover spring/summer training group and the CEO (me) had a brilliant idea. Let’s have a multifunctional training group that would benefit wannabe runners through more advanced runners. The plan would be to train for multiple races throughout the spring and summer. Sounded like a great idea right? So we set out to create flyers as well as market this training group every possible way we could. About 2 weeks before the start of the training group I realized I erred in my thinking. Because there was no time to change direction I knew we would have to stay the course and hope I was wrong in my thinking. That first night we met pretty much validated my fear by the low turnout. I believe that marketing such diverse levels of runners for a single group created a deterrent to the different levels of runners. New runners are not comfortable with more advanced runners while advance runners probably feared that they would be held back by being part of a group that would be just starting out. The reality was that we had a plan for separate training within the one group but in hindsight we sent a mixed message. Don’t get me wrong, the size of the group is fine but I think we would have attracted more of each level had we had two different groups. The mistake the CEO of NFLR made kind of brought us to discuss the definition of our target runners is? We want to help every runner that comes to us, but is that a beneficial concept? We have the capabilities to help someone become a runner as well as qualify for the Boston Marathon but would one diminish our ability to help the other? That question is important to me because I don’t want our capabilities spread thin at the expense of our runners. From a business standpoint it is not wise to be all things to all people (runners in this case) unless you have a large enough infrastructure that can support various disciplines. While we have resources such as running form analysis (gait analysis), strength and conditioning, trained certified coaches and a full service resource center, we are still limited to be all encompassing at the level I would demand. I like working with all runners and that is the problem somewhat. While I can help most any runner that doesn’t mean I should be trying to help every runner. Targeting who we want to focus on and in turn market NFLR as such will help us serve that group of runners far better. Having people know exactly what to expect when the reach out to us is important for both us and them. We will always have outliers that we will work with because we are not good at saying no, but hopefully today we will outline our “NFLR” model so that the world will know what they are getting! Not sure if sharing all of that with you over a cup of coffee was useful or even enjoyable but many of you have been a part of NFLR for a while now and I am always looking for your thoughts and feedback. Others are welcome as well! Hope you have a great week and if you are looking for a multi-functional training group, there is one available in Dover! God Bless! Mike