Be Different or be dead

April 23, 2018

Spectacular new ideas have a strong social purpose

Source: Pexels

The entrepreneur’s dream is to launch THE new product idea that will “change the world”.

Aspirations, however, must be tempered by the reality that less than half of startups survive five years — the kill rate is high.

At the heart of whether or not the entrepreneur survives is the nature of the idea itself, the problem it solves and how it compares to other ideas and solutions in the market.

Successful new ideas must serve a compelling purpose and be different

The success of a new idea starts with the purpose it serves and ends with it’s uniqueness . The mind blowing new idea has to serve a relevant, compelling, easily understandable purpose and it needs to be different from competitive alternatives.

And, on the other hand, a new idea that is simply different won’t necessarily be a winner if it doesn’t easily resonate with people as having huge benefits that could be realized by many people.

There are two bookends that describe new ideas: one is an idea that addresses a narrow specific need. These tend to be innovations targeted at a small specific application. Go to the App Store to see some examples — different types of keyboards, music apps, photo apps and a plethora of others targeted at niche demand.

At the other end of the spectrum is an idea that addresses a broad purpose and is often driven by societal problems.

eBrake is an example of a new idea that is a unique solution to the distracted driving problem where drivers use their mobile devices to text, email, watch videos, post on social media and engage with practically every other app that takes their mind off the road.

Both niche and broad spectrum new ideas are valid, but eBrake is likely to outperform the more micro specialized solutions for these reasons.

1. Distracted driving kills people

It addresses a broad compelling need. It’s common knowledge that distracted driving causes more traffic accidents and deaths than any other cause. Worldwide media are constantly reporting on the problem and what governments are doing to solve it. Social media as well keeps the topic alive.

2. eBrake talks to many people

It resonates with multiple market segments; it’s a special solution for many types of applications.
eBrake’s flexibility to deal with many segments needing a distracted driving solution is appealing, whether you are a parent concerned about your new driver or an organization with a substantial fleet operation.

3. A 10 year old could explain it

It’s easy to explain. Everyone knows what the distracted driving problem is all about and how the problem can be solved by locking out the driver’s phone while they are driving. eBrake does this while allowing passengers the use of their phones.
In less than a minute eBrake can be explained in simple terms that people understand and, what’s even more important, they can explain it to their friends and family in the same way.

4. It’s the only real distracted driving solution

It’s the only solution that does what it does. There is no other solution that does what eBrake does.
In fact eBrake is the only REAL solution to distracted driving because, unlike other solutions in the market, the app can’t be turned off by the driver. People get that if the driver can turn the app off, it provides no solution at all as the driver can simply text away to their heart’s content.

New niche oriented ideas that can be clearly differentiated from a competitive product can be successful but the energy and resources to turn them into profitable businesses is significant. And the investment required could exceed the time one has available to “stay alive”.

5. Find an idea with HUGE social appeal

In these cases the key to success is not simply being different; rather it’s about simplicity of the value proposition and the social narrative it serves.

Better to find an idea that has HUGE social appeal — large potential market available — and can be explained by a 10 year old.
And one where the cool technology isn’t relied on to sell it; rather the technology merely sits in the background doing what it should do — making the new idea work.

Serve a compelling social need in a way that is different than any other solution and you will indeed have a big idea that could — but not guarantee — win you the lottery.

But it has a better chance than a new niche idea that may be cool but doesn’t have the emotional appeal and potential critical mass to attract massive interest.

Cheers,
Roy
Checkout my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 4.23.18 at 04:07 am by Roy Osing
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March 26, 2018

6 easy ways to improve marketing and sales working together

In every organization there is a degree of conflict between marketing and sales

Marketing complains that sales don’t move products or services effectively; sales claims they don’t get the support from marketing they need to do the job.

Marketing says that certain sales activity is off strategy; sales responds by criticizing that marketing doesn’t provide clear enough direction.

Around and around it goes.

A certain amount of this dance is healthy; too much, however, and it’s dysfunctional and can adversely impact organizational performance.

These 6 actions will help link marketing and sales in harmony.

Clarify the roles of each party

Marketing sets strategy; sales executes it. Sales is a channel to market; setting the channel strategy — i.e. what channel sells what product — is the responsibility of marketing.

Sales has no formal role in setting overall market direction other than providing input as the frontline customer facing team.
It’s critical that all align with these roles otherwise dysfunction occurs as groups trip over each other and little constructive gets done.
If there are issues about who does what, escalate to the highest level in the organization to get resolution.

Develop a detailed marketing plan

The marketing plan must have sufficient granularity for sales to create their sales plan incorporating the strategy focus and priorities they must carry out.
This is often a major issue where the marketing plan lacks the clarity required to define the specific actions sales must take to execute successfully.

Without absolute clear translation for sales they will be forced to make their own interpretation of what marketing expects. This puts sales in a quasi-planning role for which they are not responsible nor ill equipped to play.

Engage sales in setting the overall revenue target

This does not mean sales has a decision making role in setting the target; this is the responsibility of marketing.
Sales, however, should be looked to provide critical input on the available revenue potential and decide how it should be allocated at the customer level.

In addition, should there be any shortfall between the tops down marketing driven revenue target and bottoms up sales driven quota — and there always is — sales should decide how the difference will be allocated among customer groups and specific customers.

Implement an internal report card

The report card is a vehicle that allows marketing and sales to review and rate one another in terms of how well each function supports and meets the needs of the other.

The process is simple: marketing defines their 6 critical needs of sales who, in turn, outline what they expect of marketing. Every 6 months report cards are exchanged and each side rates the other — ‘A’, ‘B’, ‘C’ and ‘F’ rating — on each support item. Results are analyzed and actions taken by both sides to address where performance has fallen short of expectations.

Jointly review revenue results monthly

Joint action planning based on results against monthly revenue objectives will solidify and direct the relationship to enhance performance.
Name calling is reduced and energy directed to resolving issues rather than blaming the other side for any performance glitch.

I mandated that these sessions be formally planned and would drop in unannounced to witness the proceedings and ask questions that challenged how well the team was working together. It became an integral part of “how things were done around here”.

Celebrate achievements together — good or bad

You either make it together or you fail together. There is no finger pointing, only sharing. Remarkable teams are created by jointly owning performance results.

As president of the organization I hosted quarterly performance celebrations between the two groups. We reviewed the successes — and recognized the heroes — and shortcomings — and what was learned through the process.
We tried to recognize groups of individuals with a mix of marketing and sales to further the notion of teamwork.

Aligning marketing and sales is not good enough. They need to be joined at the hip in order to deliver the high level of performance every organization expects.

Leadership needs to be engaged to make it happen otherwise nothing will change and mutual distrust will continue.

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 3.26.18 at 03:55 am by Roy Osing
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February 26, 2018

How a good marketing leader can become really great

Source: Unsplash - Bealach na bà

How a good marketing leader becomes great.

Marketing’s role in any organization is critical; its leaders must be extraordinary.

Unfortunately, I don’t think marketing generally has stepped up to the challenge of doing remarkable things; in fact I think the craft is currently quite boring and unimaginative.
I offer this perspective as a guy who spent at least 80% of his 33+ year career leading marketing organizations and fulfilling the role of CMO.

Sure, the internet has spawned a plethora of new tools to engage with and sell to people, but the essence of the marketing strategy employed by most organizations hasn’t changed much. There is still a relentless focus on price, mass advertising, product and service flogging and applying traditional marketing tools introduced years ago and pushed by academics and consultants alike.

Marketing leaders must take responsibility for this state of affairs; for the apathy they have accepted from their marketing teams. They must be held accountable to move the marketing discipline from an approach that was practiced in the past, and is now underperforming given the dramatic changes that have occurred in the market.

They must take responsibility to personally lead their teams to a new relevant place, and not accept the inertia caused by their junior teams of marketing
practitioners who have been taught principles of the past.

If marketing leaders accept how their team performs its role, they can’t be surprised when lacklustre results are produced.

Parochial leaders get mediocrity.

Organizations need marketing leaders to take control; people who will not stop until their team produces unheard-of results by practising the new relevant art.

Here are eight actions marketing leaders can take if they want to stand-out and turn their marketing teams into achievers of remarkability.

1. Set short-term revenue goals

Focus on the next 24 months rather than be a victim of the 5-year plan. This shorter term view will force an execution and results focus and avoid the “hockey stick” phenomenon where sales are supposed to miraculously show up at the end of the planning period.
Set revenue targets monthly and review performance to ensure you are on track.

2. Make revenue targets bold enough that you don’t know exactly how to achieve them

Discomfort and ‘I don’t know’ is an effective way to drive innovation and creativity. If you know how to deliver your expected revenue, there is little or no incentive to do different things.
If you follow yesterday’s path, nothing remarkable happens.

3. Eliminate benchmarking as a tool for marketers to use

Copying won’t step your organization up to a higher level; it simply keeps you in the competitive herd. Ask, “How can we be different?”. Apply this question to every proposal you review. 
If a proposal from one of your marketers doesn’t move your organization towards standing out from your competitors to being a ‘different breed’, reject the proposal out-of-hand. And fire any marketer who makes the same mistake twice.

4. Stop new customer acquisition programs

Insist on seeing proposals that generate more revenue from your existing customer base as opposed to providing special deals or promotions to prospective customers who you want to attract from your competition. The truth is that customers who join you from the competition can’t be counted on for any loyalty or added revenue over the long term.

Offer any special promotions or deals to your existing customers first; reward their loyalty.

5. De-emphasize price and establish value creation as your raison d’être

Ask what value is being created for your loyal customers, not, “How can we lower our prices?”. Everyone plays the price game and it leads not to competitive advantage but rather financial ruin.

Declare the marketing rule “There will be NO price incentives offered around here!” as the way to disrupt the momentum of using boring prices as a marketing tool.
And replace the product manager position with the product value position and reward those who are prolific at creating value solutions.

6. Recruit weird people

Marketing success today is all about finding what small specialty groups desire or want (satisfying what they need is passé) and proving them with unmatched value.

Start to populate your marketing teams with these types of people who can relate better to these curious customer segments. Look for contrarians. People who have bizarre ideas and question the common ways of doing things. People who hate fitting in.

You need a team of weirdos to carry your mandate breakaway from traditional marketing ways.

7. Expand your marketing team to include the frontline

The new marketing excellence is produced by understanding the deep innermost secrets of people you want to serve. The customer-facing frontline in any organization is THE most effective receptacle for customer learning; what customer’s desire. Recruit these people even if they don’t meet your “minimum education standards” — which are largely irrelevant in most cases anyways.

Get their ideas and implement them. And tell the rest of the organization what you are up to; hopefully they also will recognize the value of the human face to the customer.

8. Develop a competitive claim that is more than just hot air

The new marketing leader is not guided by aspiration. They are practical people who covet granularity, clarity and precision when it comes to defining why people should buy from their organization and none other.

Be clear and specific that the value you deliver to your customers is distinct from your competition. Create The ONLY Statement for your business.

They focus their attention on answering the killer question, “Why should I do business with you and not your competitors?” and purge comparative notions like best, number one and leader as ways of describing their market value proposition.

Marketing leaders must step up their game and take personal ownership of the changes needed to stay relevant and survive. Their organizations depend on it.

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 2.26.18 at 04:18 am by Roy Osing
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January 1, 2018

Why amazing marketing involves the special person not the boring masses

Source: Pexels

Why amazing marketing involves the special person not the boring masses.

Organizations produce or distribute products and services; marketers are given the challenge of creating demand for what is pumped out of the manufacturing process or handed to them from suppliers.

How do they do it?

They are victims to the method most people follow; they look for the easy way.

A way to perform their responsibilities by deploying a minimum amount of effort and hoping to achieve maximum payback.

Most marketers (my observation over 30 years) resort to applying the “one size fits all” principle; that any product can satisfy the needs of the mass market.

It’s a simple process.

Flog the product to as many potential customers as you can stressing the features and benefits believed to satisfy the “average” consumer.

And hope for a high hit rate.

This approach is a waste of time and effort.

Why?

Because there is no such thing as an average customer or a mass market! No two customers are alike in terms of their needs, wants and desires, thus this “lowest common denominator” strategy of marketing to a diluted level of demand is flawed from the outset.

Yes, it will result in some sales (where a person exhibits the demand characteristics of the masses targeted), but this hit-and-miss approach will fall short of achieving a healthy return on investment because of the many targeted individuals who don’t “look like” the mass persona and don’t respond to the offer.

It’s time for organizations to shift from the supply world to the demand world.

Where the wants of specific consumers are given precedence over what the organization produces; what the customer “covets” trumps what the product or service does.

One-size-fits-one

This requires re-vectoring the focus for marketing from a one size fits all to a one-size-fits-one philosophy where:

— products and services are targeted to a small number of potential customers whose requirements are special and unique to THEM;

— products are integrated to produce solutions having greater value than the sum of its product elements;

— “common” or “average” is purged from the marketing lexicon;

— success is measured by the number of personalized solutions created;

— the ultimate goal of segmentation is to discover as many segments of ONE as possible to understand demand at the micro personal level;

— the role of “Customer Manager” is introduced in the marketing organization to create personalized offers for discrete groups of customers; the emphasis on traditional product management is reduced;

— marketing’s primary performance metric changes from product market share to share of customer - the percentage of a customer’s total spend an organization holds.

Lazy marketing persists with one size fits all; relevant marketing in today’s world has moved to one size fits ONE.

Cheers,
Roy
Check out my BE DiFFERENT or be dead Book Series

• Posted 1.1.18 at 04:13 am by Roy Osing
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