Winning Ideas from Winning Women
with Carolyn Rhinebarger

In 2004, the e-mail inquiry arrived. Cherokee Pinder was in need of marketing assistance and wanted to know if Strategic Guru could help. Carolyn Rhinebarger, owner of the Triangle-based marketing and communications firm, was eager to assist another woman business owner and quickly set up a consultation.

Cherokee had recently located to Cary after separating from her husband and was trying to make a fresh start with her two young daughters and a small business in writing workshops. While Carolyn’s heart went out to the young woman, Strategic Guru’s business model was not able to accommodate the needs of a fledgling business such as Cherokee’s. The strategic marketing plans and custom-designed communications prepared for corporate clients were simply out of reach for someone like Cherokee.

While Carolyn had to turn Cherokee away, she never forgot the young woman or her plight. For the next two years, she would continue to explore ways to create a new business model that could serve business women like Cherokee. She became a dealer for an Internet printer, but found their systems balky and their capabilities lacking in offering a complete marketing package. She talked to local printers about partnering to offer small businesses good design at low prices, but none were interested in investing in the idea. She spoke with graphic designers, too, about this business idea that wouldn’t go away. But no one had any interest in bringing the idea to market.

Then in late September of 2005, Carolyn attended a meeting of the Greater Raleigh chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO). At the meeting, chapter president Charlotte DiLeonardo announced something new: book clubs, where business books would be read and discussed in small groups over the course of several months. Thinking this would be a good way to network, Carolyn immediately signed up for one. The book? Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne.*

Carolyn went right out and secured a copy and began reading. And reading. And reading.

Carolyn Rhinebarger

“Blue Ocean Strategy outlines how to move out of the shark-infested red waters to the blue ocean where no competition is feeding. I started thinking about how to serve additional customers in a new and different way but have them experience the same results as Strategic Guru clients—increased sales!”

Before she knew it, she had read the entire book before the first book club meeting was even held. And the entire time she was reading it, she was envisioning her business idea and how to make it a reality using the analytical tools, systematic approach, and success stories laid out in the book. One key case study that hit home was about Curves, the fitness center for women.

“In relating to other women business owners, the number one issue that comes up time and again is marketing. The struggle to initiate a strong marketing campaign with limited funds is a hot topic.”

That’s when it hit her. Why not target the business idea that she had been trying to get off the ground exclusively to women? She turned to friend and business associate, Adrianne Joergensen, a graphic designer and business owner herself, to help mastermind the idea. One of the first things the two decided to do was put together a small focus group to see if the business was viable.

Just 13 days after that fateful NAWBO luncheon, Carolyn and Adrianne met with a small group of women at a local coffee house. The group, some operating small businesses and a few looking for ways to launch a new business, were shown the plans for offering low-cost marketing materials that would provide the complete branded look that was missing from current sources on the Internet or through traditional sources like local printers. The designs were professional quality templates that business women could customize themselves by changing colors, adding logos, and adding or changing images. Best of all, there were complete offerings from business identity to brochures, flyers and mailers. But that wasn’t all.

Modeling the offerings after the custom plans of Strategic Guru, Carolyn negotiated aggregate advertising purchases with local media, press release packages with a local public relations firm, and low-cost Web site packages that, of course, matched the design templates of the marketing pieces. Despite all the marketing products, Carolyn knew from her experience working with clients that an educational component would be required, too. The focus group was instrumental in providing input on topics for monthly meetings and semiannual workshops that Carolyn and Adrianne planned to make a part of the business.

When Carolyn attended the first Blue Ocean Strategy book club meeting the very next day, she kept mum about her idea. Not knowing the other women in the club well, and concerned that the fledgling business idea may not come to fruition after countless past failed attempts, she kept her plans to herself. But she did listen keenly to the struggles the other women business owners voiced over marketing their businesses. It spurred her on.

By the end of October, Pink Power Connection was born—at least on paper. The market research that Carolyn was able to uncover supported the plan to target women in business. Statistics showed that women own nearly half of all privately held U.S. firms and generate $2.5 trillion in sales. And these numbers continue to rise. Women-owned businesses are growing at two times the rate of all privately held firms, and one in 11 adult women is an entrepreneur.

However, when it comes to who gets the lion’s share of the business deals, the facts revealed a shortfall. Although 60% of Fortune 1000 corporations annually spend $1 billion or more with outside suppliers, as of 2003, women's business enterprises captured on average only 4% of this market share. Carolyn’s aim is to help reverse that trend by providing women business owners the tools, resources, and information needed to boost their business.

Carolyn and Adrianne worked tirelessly for the next two months to launch the company. Building Pink Power Connection as a member-based organization, their goal was to provide business women with access to information, products, and services that would help their business achieve greater visibility, credibility, and profitability. Carolyn lined up guest business advisors to appear before members each month. Adrianne worked to ready the graphic components of the marketing materials. And everywhere they went, each business woman they spoke to, they found encouragement and support for the Pink Power Connection mission.

January 3rd, 2006 dawned and their virtual doors opened. Press releases were sent, advertisements were running, and direct mail to almost 3000 local business women was arriving in mailboxes all over the Triangle. The story of Pink Power Connection caught the eye of NBC 17 anchor/reporter Kim Genardo. By January 18th, a feature story on the company was airing on NBC.

Still Carolyn held her breath. Their first meeting was scheduled for January 24th. Would anyone come?

The women of the Triangle would not let them down. The first session, held at Meredith College, attracted a strong crowd of 20 women business owners. Surveys conducted of those who attended gave overwhelmingly positive feedback about the quality of the program, the content, format and, most importantly, that the program met with their expectations.

While there is still much work to be done, more marketing product to be brought to the Web site and more instruction on how best to use the products, Carolyn feels triumphant that at last she has gotten the business idea that wouldn’t go away off the ground. Now there was just one more thing she needed to do.

As she entered the restaurant and looked around, Carolyn didn’t spot her lunch companion. She hesitated. But a tap on her shoulder told her that Cherokee was there. The two women hugged and spent the next two hours catching up on the last two years, reviewing Cherokee’s business needs, and choosing a new brand look from the Pink Power Connection templates for Soul Kiss Writer, Cherokee’s writing workshop business.

Soul Kiss Writer just may be the first success story to come out of the launch of Pink Power Connection. But it certainly won’t be the last.