Nov 7, 2024 | Analytics, Management, Marketing, Strategy
How do you anticipate the reactions of competitors to your initiatives?
First you must understand them holistically and well. The better you understand them, specifically the strategic and tactical frameworks they work with, the better able you will be to anticipate and respond. You should also reflect on the leadership of your competitors, as their behaviour drives their decision making.
11 questions to ask yourself and your team:
- Will they react at all?
- Will they see and understand the strategic and tactical drivers of your actions?
- Will they feel threatened?
- Will mounting a response be a priority?
- What options will they actively consider?
- Do they have the right mix of resources to respond meaningfully?
- Which option are they most likely to choose?
- How many moves ahead do they look: do they play draughts or chess?
- What metrics do they use that will influence their decision making?
- What are the lead times required to respond effectively?
A final and key question in this volatile environment that is often missed:
- Who might emerge to be a competitor, who could change the dynamics of your market that currently would not be classed as a genuine competitor?
Commercial history is littered with failures to see the possibility of a disruptive new competitor emerging from left field.
Anticipating competitor reactions to your initiatives is a competitive superpower.
It enables you to strike at their weak points, and repel their advances at minimum cost to you, while having them consume resources for no result.
The downside of focusing on competition is that your customers do not see the world as you do. They are looking for the supplier who best addresses their need, solves their problem, or scratches their itch.
Those who spend their time looking over at their competition are risking taking their eyes away from their current and future customers. Lose sight of your customers, and one way or another, you will be eaten!
Nov 4, 2024 | Branding, Marketing
There is a big difference between a customer who always chooses your brand because they genuinely love it, and one who may prefer it as one of a group of acceptable products, but picks you just because of a good deal.
A truly loyal customer will choose your brand without thinking twice.
They come back because they trust your quality, your service, their emotional connection for one reason or another, and what your brand stands for. Price becomes irrelevant.
Working from home, good coffee is a crucial part of my morning routine.
I usually buy a specific brand to feed the habit, but only when it is on special.
The ‘standard’ shelf price is close to $40 per kilo, but on special, you can find it around $22. I tend to buy ‘pantry stock’ when it is on special to ensure I do not run out. On occasions I have run out, I switch to other brands, usually ones I am familiar with, on special at around that ‘special floor price’ of $22-25.
If asked in a research group to name my Favorite brand, it would be XXXX. Asked which I most often used, the answer would be the same. As a result, I would be classed as a ‘Loyal’ user. However, this is less the behaviour of a ‘Loyal’ user than one who simply has a preference and shops accordingly. The aggressive price discounting has established my perception of what it costs per kilo for a quality coffee I will enjoy. It is up to $25, not the $40 that is the nominated ‘usual’ shelf price.
The choice is driven by availability and price rather than loyalty, although I would be classed as ‘loyal’.
The power of the retail gorillas, and relative weakness of their suppliers have served over time to drive this gap between ‘normal’ shelf price and a promotional price that has become a category floor.
In the process it has killed brand loyalty. Dead.
Retailers make their money from the ‘rent’ suppliers pay in many forms for the shelf space, and thus access to consumers. The cash from the tills is the cream.
Suppliers over the last 30 years have made a rod for their own backs that is only getting heavier. They have forgotten the difference between brand loyalty and brand preference. They allowed retailers to dictate the split of available investment in their revenue generation activities.
There is a huge difference strategically between brand building activity, driving a consumer to take a product off the retail shelf because it best fills their personal requirements, and in store sales activation.
Suppliers to FMCG have forgotten that key driver of long term success. They have collectively taken the easy way out, and kicked the can down the road.
Nov 1, 2024 | Branding, Customers, Marketing
Imagine you’re at a bustling cocktail party.
The room is filled with chatter, each person vying for attention.
Now, picture your company in that room. How do you make sure it’s the one everyone remembers?
That’s where positioning comes in.
What is Positioning?
Positioning is like choosing the perfect spot at that party, and being interesting enough to attract others into your conversation. It’s not about changing who you are, but about how you present yourself to leave a lasting, positive, and compelling impression. In the business world, it’s about carving out a distinct place in your customers’ minds.
Think of it this way: When I say “safety,” you might think “Volvo.” When I say, “overnight delivery,” “FedEx” might pop into your mind. That’s not by accident – it’s careful positioning at work.
Why Does It Matter?
In today’s crowded marketplace, being good isn’t enough. You need to be memorable. Positioning helps you cut through the noise and stick in people’s minds.
Remember, your customers don’t care about all the features your team has painstakingly built. They care about how those features solve their problems or improve their lives. Positioning is about highlighting that connection.
How Does It Work?
Positioning isn’t just a catchy slogan or a clever ad campaign. It’s a strategic framework that guides everything from product development to sales pitches. Here’s how you can make it work for your company:
- Find Your Niche: Even if it’s small, being a leader in a specific category is powerful. It’s better to be a big fish in a small pond than a minnow in the ocean. However, like everything, there is a limit. There may be a niche in the market, but you had better make sure there is a market in the niche.
- Simplify Your Message: In the world of positioning, less is more. Aim to “own” a word or concept in your customers’ minds. Make it easy for them to understand and remember what you stand for.
- Align with Customer Needs: Your positioning should resonate with your target market’s specific needs and expectations. A product that seems irrelevant to one group might be a game-changer for another if positioned correctly.
- Create a Mental ‘Box’: Help customers categorize your product or service. If they can’t quickly grasp what you offer, you’ve already lost them.
- Be Flexible: As markets shift and your company evolves, be ready to adapt your positioning. What worked yesterday might not work tomorrow.
Putting It into Practice
Imagine your company has just developed a new line of double-glazed windows and doors. Instead of listing all the technical specifications, you might position them as the solution to high energy bills in harsh Australian climates. Suddenly, you are not just selling windows and doors, you are selling comfort, savings, and style.
This positioning would then guide everything from how your R&D team refines the product to how your sales team pitches it. Effective positioning creates a coherent story that resonates across all departments and customer touchpoints.
The Bottom Line
As CEO, think of positioning as your strategic compass.
It is not what you say about your product, it is what your customers believe about it that counts.
When done right, positioning:
- Gives customers a clear reason to choose you over competitors.
- Aligns your entire organization towards a common goal.
- Makes your marketing more effective and efficient.
Remember, in the crowded marketplace of ideas and products, it’s not the loudest voice that wins. It is the one that resonates most clearly with its audience.
That’s the power of positioning.
What position do you want your company to occupy in your customers’ minds?
Answer that challenging question, and you will have taken the first step towards market leadership.
Oct 29, 2024 | Innovation, Leadership
Evolution has given us this ability to act on ‘autopilot’, or habit, while subconsciously remaining attuned to our surroundings. Our brains have limited capacity, so it needs to save as much as it can to allow it the space to deal with the unexpected, crises.
Our ancestor woman while walking to the stream on autopilot is thinking about getting the water, wondering what the hunters might bring back for dinner, and how to keep the kids in the cave. A slight rustle in the grass, will immediately focus all her attention on where it came from, adrenaline rushing, just in case it is a predator.
This autopilot mode is highly beneficial for efficiency. It is the way we evolved. It frees up cognitive capacity for more immediately important things, consigning to habit the things that do not require the effort of thought.
It also obstructs innovation.
In our modern world, the predators in the grass have been largely eliminated, so we are not subconsciously looking for them anymore, and our situational awareness has degraded, creating ‘blind spots’. This prevents us from seeing opportunities for innovation. The problems we learn to work around become invisible, and the solutions we become accustomed to seem unchangeable.
Take luggage as an example. For decades, travellers endured dragging heavy suitcases through airports. In two iterations, 16 years apart, two people, thinking from first principles which is often an antidote to habitual thinking, added wheels. Vacuum cleaners all lost suction as their bags filled, until James Dyson challenged the accepted norm. The QWERTY keyboard, originally designed to prevent mechanical typewriters from jamming, is still used today despite its inefficiencies for modern typing.
Seeing hidden problems that become opportunities requires intentional, conscious practice.
- Regularly ask yourself, “Why do we do things this way?” Document even small points of friction. Observe how others interact with products or processes and take note of any struggles or workarounds.
- Approach familiar tasks as though you are experiencing them for the first time. Seek perspectives from individuals outside your field.
- Question assumptions, especially those that are widely accepted without scrutiny.
- Step away from problems periodically and return to them with fresh eyes. Study analogous challenges in other industries. Try explaining processes to a child—their innocent questions often expose hidden assumptions.
To innovate effectively, we need to develop our ‘peripheral awareness’: the ability to notice opportunities on the fringes of our focus. This requires maintaining a state of relaxed alertness, where you are engaged in the present task but also open to noticing details that others may overlook. I use my phone and notebook to note interesting things on the go. I regularly transfer these cryptic notes into an ‘ideas bank’ kept in One-note on my computer.
Every major innovation begins with someone questioning the status quo.
The next time you find yourself thinking, “That’s just the way it is,” take a moment to challenge that assumption. You could be on the verge of a significant discovery. While our brain’s efficiency is a valuable asset, it can also limit our potential. By honing our peripheral vision for innovation, we can transform these mental shortcuts from obstacles into pathways for creative thinking and, hopefully, distinctive, and innovative solutions.
Oct 24, 2024 | Governance, Leadership
The cost of a wrong hire is huge, and for an SME can be devastating. Not only do you lose the money put into the process, but you also lose the time of those engaged, the opportunity to find that perfect candidate, and perhaps most importantly, the damage that a wrong hire can do for the implementation of the key activities for which they were hired to do.
The damage that a wrong hire can do to those remaining and the culture of the organisation after the problem is fixed can also be devastating.
There are a lot of fancy consultants out there with all sorts of testing regimes that claim to uncover the best candidate. They can add considerable value when used well.
However, we humans evolved successfully by being able to pick those with whom we could work harmoniously and productively, those who could earn our trust, and on whom we could rely. While we make mistakes, trusting our instincts drawn out by that most primitive of communication methods, talking, is the real test.
Over the years I have done a lot of recruiting for those for whom I worked, as a manager and advisor. Not all worked, mistakes are made, but a significant majority went on to add great value to their employers. When you make a mistake, recognising it early, and correcting it quickly benefits both parties in the long run. However, there are a range of conversation starters, often called questions, which can reveal the ‘fit’ a candidate will have with, and the contribution they can make to an organisation.
Why are you here today? This can reveal the personal motivation of the candidate, rather than enabling them to just respond about the skills they bring to the role. It turns it around to look at the ‘why’ they are seeking a new job. Having a real motivating driver is way better than just a general, ‘I need a job’ sort of response.
How would you like to be remembered? This can be asked in several ways, so that the response to those with whom you worked, and those to whom you were linked in more personal ways.
Would you rather be respected, liked, or feared? Often the response to this can reveal the leadership style they have, or believe they have. There is no right answer, but the ‘fit’ to the context of the role they may be walking into is important.
How would those around you now describe your personality and management style?
Very few are able with any accuracy to see themselves through the eyes of others. However, the response to this question can tell you a lot about their own self- image.
What would your current boss say if I rang him asking for a reference?
As with the question about how their peers would describe them, this question goes to their self-image. It also will provide cues about how they relate to the formal hierarchy
Tell me about the times you have failed? This question often puts people off, as they are cued into thinking about the success they have had, and how they might translate into the environment for which they are interviewing. Failing is a part of learning, and you can learn a lot from a conversation about the failures of a candidate, what led to them, how they responded, how they worked themselves out of the hole. And indeed, is it one of the failures that led them to be sitting in front of you now?
What did you want to be when you were a kid? This one can be a good conversation starter, and lead to discussion about the path towards where they are now, and why they took the choices they did along the way
Show me how you walk the talk. A conversation will always reveal what people want to be revealed, particularly the more personal things, hobbies, personal style, passions they may have commented on, so I dig into them. Once while interviewing for a plant engineer, I asked a candidate that question, and his response was along the lines that he was able to get people on the line to talk freely to him, to help him diagnose problems and opportunities they faced every day. Then he surprised me by saying ‘let me show you’. He stood up, grabbed a dust coat and hat from the stand in the corner of my office, and said let’s go. We walked into the plant where he demonstrates conclusively the ability he had just spoken about. He did a terrific job for a number of years afterwards, before being poached for a much bigger job, which he also did with distinction.
Can you tell me a joke? I would leave that to late in the day, but it can reveal how well they think on their feet, and communicate in an awkward environment, and connect to those with whom they are communicating.
Header cartoon credit: Dilbert’s mate aces an interview question: courtesy Scott Adams.
