Thought leadershit
Where do YOUR thoughts LEAD?
The wrong incentives
Charging by the hour creates the wrong incentives. Focusing solely on revenue creates the wrong incentives. Applying discounts without a clear criteria and policy creates the wrong incentives. Serving everyone creates the wrong incentives. Leaving things to wait so that you don’t face the hard decisions now creates the wrong incentives. Trying to make compromises with 2 opposite approaches creates the wrong incentives. Overlooking bad behaviors creates the wrong incentives. And when your…
A new series
Pre-S. Got down on a flu for a few days. No fun at all. But all good. We’re back at it. 🙂 Now, onto our thing. A new series: Marketing misconceptions It’ll be a few dailies on things clients, friends, and lots of people have a sort of an understanding, but easily gets mixed up with other things —or in the ways that things were taught. Having these things better understood will bring you clarity in your decision-making for your business. It will certainly give you an advantage to most of your…
Ep 1. Push and Pull
Push or Pull marketing? None. Because they don’t actually exist. Here’s why. What most seem to forget is the final part of it: Push or Pull marketing strategies. It’s actually a strategy that gets applied to the customer in a context of distribution (aka how you get to more people buying). What does it mean, anyways? It takes the center on the customer. It’s a push ON them or a pull FROM them. Has nothing to do with you. (: Push You push your offering towards your customers. You take…
Ep 2. Selling
Selling. The dirty word. Makes you cringe. A natural reaction. When it’s understood as we’ve been taught: convincing, finding ways to sneak in things that will be (mostly) in your favor, doing whatever it takes even when it feels wrong. You can try a different conception of Selling: “Helping people you like get what they want” Jonathan Stark. Because selling can be seen as not trying to convince anyone of anything. It’s vetting them to see if they’re a fit for you. Vetting them if it makes…
Personal brands
Inexistent. Personal brands —or you being a brand— is not real. First, because you’re a person. Not a thing. Second, because brand is a perception. There are as many brands to a product/service/organization as touchpoints. Third, because it’s artificial. It’s a construct to give consistency to the market. Fourth, because a brand can be rebranded. Changing at times EVERYTHING about it. You’re a person.
Fixed prices
They fail. It’s hard to get it right. The scope can always change and it’s a minus-business. That’s right. The way those fixed prices for projects fail is because they were built had most the only way we are taught to create prices: you create a scope, add some time/resources and a buffer, and is all focused on how much effort/work/time/resources it might take. If you miscalculate, you take the big hit. And that’s backwards. It doesn’t take into account how much money it will mean to the…
Bringing solutions
It’s funny. Every time I see a business saying they “bring solutions” I smile. Ponder this question: If you bring solutions… does it mean your competitors (in their marketing and communications) say they “bring problems”? Here’s the thing Bringing solutions is not the thing that makes you different. It’s something else. Usually, it’s the way you get to the transformation. What’s your way?
An oldie but goldie
A brand is the gut feeling a person has about an organization, product or service. [video] Not about a person. Here’s why Because from a functional perspective, an organization, product or service adapts to the market, even when that means they need to change the core of themselves.A rebrand. The way they adapt is by either adding, changing or eliminating features and characteristics. It can make them take radical pivots to their core, even to change or disappear completely while keeping its…
Price difference
“Knowing how much your competition charges will let you know where you can set your prices. So that you don’t charge too little, or charge too much.” Sure. This makes sense when you want to be a me-too player. To be easily exchangeable. Undifferentiated. Expendable. But if you have something truly special? Should you charge the same as everyone else? Here’s a rule of thumb: Make your price AT LEAST 60% higher than your competition. 20, 30 or 40% is too similar. 50 would be fine… but since…
