Six Steps to Position Your-Company for-Greatness Whitepaper

8/9/2019 Six Steps to Position Your-Company for-Greatness Whitepaper

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Step 1: Realize that Your Brand is Critical to Your Success

Step 2: Follow Tese Critical Branding Principles

Step 3: Grab the High Ground

Step 4: Develop a Successul Positioning StrategyStep 5: Select a Branding and Positioning Model

Step 6: Build Your Brand rom the Inside Out

Summary


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Realize that in B2B Marketing, Your Brand is Everything

I cannot overstate the importance o having a clear, compelling and dierentiatedbrand. In act, it is a critical actor in the success o every market leader (company orindividual). So what do I mean by brand? Simply this: Your brand (or positioningi you preer) is the place your company occupies in a prospects or customersmind when he or she thinks about you. Note that I am not reerring to how yousee yoursel, or how you want others to see you, but rather how you are actuallyperceived. You can argue until you are blue in the ace about how you should be seenby the marketplace but the act is, perception oten trumps reality.

So where is your starting point? You may be a totally blank canvas because yourprospect has never heard o your company. Tis can be a good thing because younow have the opportunity to position your organization in a resh way. Perhaps themarketplace has a negative or misinormed image o you, in which case you have

some remedial work to do. And i you are very ortunate, you already occupy theposition you want, and your job is to propagate and reinorce your brand.

Whenever possible, I urge my clients to avoid the perception that they are acommodity provider. A commodity provider is one where there is no real advantagein terms o the product, service, etc., and where theprospect tends to evaluate you primarily on pricing,terms, and so orth. Te alternative to being positionedon a commodity basis is to create a perception odierentiation.

I discuss a number o ways to accomplish adierentiation strategy below. You will know that you have successully branded yourorganization and articulated your dierentiation when you are not in bidding warsor every piece o business. In act, i you brand yoursel successully (and accurately),you may nd that you can generate business where there is no competition, or onlytoken competition. You will also nd that you have less pricing pressure and are ableto maintain decent margins. But this is true only i you nd ways to dierentiateyoursel that are truly valued by your customers enough so that they are willing topay a air price or the privilege o doing business with you.

StepOne:

I cannot overstate theimportance o havinga clear, compelling and

diferentiated brand.


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Follow Tese Critical Branding Principles

Lets jump rom the why to discussion to the how to. Regardless o your currentscenario, you should ollow these six branding principles:

Branding principle 1: Your brand must dierentiate you. I urge

my clients to do whatever it takes to avoid the perception they are

a commodity provider. A commodity provider is one where there

is no perceived advantage in terms o the product, service, etc.,

and where the prospect tends to evaluate you primarily on pricing,

terms, and so orth. Unless you have massive economies o scale

(e.g. Wal-Mart), this is almost always a weak position to hold.

Branding principle 2: Your brand must oer a clear and

compelling benet. In other words it has to pass the who cares

test. Your brand must convey a promise to prospects that matches

a need or desired benet that they can readily identiy with. Weak

benet statements lead to weak brands. Weak brands lead to weak

sales numbers. Te message: Dont be weak.

Branding principle 3: Your brand should be as specic as

possible. Tere is a tendency to go broad in branding by trying

to be all things to all people. Marketers do this because they dont

want to pigeon-hole their company into an overly-narrow and

unprotable niche. Tis is usually a mistake since you will oten

be putting yoursel in a tough competitive position. Te trick

is to own a space that is narrow enough to eliminate most or

all o your competition, yet large enough to meet your revenue

objectives. Tis is not always easy but it is why you must spend

adequate time to crat the best possible branding strategy.

Branding principle 4: Your brand should be easily understood.

It must also be conveyed in as ew words as possible without

requiring a bunch o backup explanation. Do not rely on your

internal sta to determine brand clarity. Tey are usually too close

to what you are doing and tend to overestimate their knowledge o

the marketplace.

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Branding principle 5: Your brand must be congruent. By this

I mean that who you say you are must match the reality o who

you actually are. Tis may sound simplistic but is a principle that

is oten violated. For example, how many companies brag about

providing the best service while actually providing mediocre

service? You dont have to be the best at everything, but whatever

you say you do better than anyone else, you had best be prepared

to prove it. Once you lose your credibility, it is hard to get it back.

Branding principle 6: Your brand must be jealously guarded.

Challenging the conventional wisdom oten works. But never do

anything that creates so much controversy that it weakens yourbrand. And dont be too clever or your own good by launching

a campaign that is great at drawing attention to the creative

gimmick, but is contrary to your key positioning message. In other

words, all o your outbound communications must reinorce the

brand. No exception.

By the way, our brand at Fusion Marketing Partners is Creating Unstoppable B2BMarketing and Sales Machines. Tis is what we say and this is what we do.


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Grab the High Ground

Any competent military commander will tell you that it is usually better to bepositioned on higher ground than your enemy because it is much harder to attackuphill and it is easier to inict pain upon your enemy rom a higher position. Tisis just as true whether your competition is wearing combat atigues or ofce attire.In the world o B2B marketing and sales, ailure to grab the high ground wont leadto your physical death but it can lead to the death o your companys revenue plan,prot margin and aspirations.

So, what does it mean to hold the high ground in a B2B marketing and salescontext? From a big picture perspective, it means thatyou hold the leadership position in the marketplaceor whatever it is that you do. Tis does not mean thatyou have to be the Microsot o the computer sotware

industry or the oyota o the automobile industry(sorry GM). Most o the time, your high ground will besomething a lot more specic and deensible. Every company has (or should have)its unique value proposition that is expressed in terms o a brand promise that isdierentiated rom every other companys brand promise.

I sometimes reer to a companys brand as its brand promise because a good brandcontains a promise o one or more major benets. A successul brand promise isnot just a clever slogan that your marketing department dreams up but rather theoundation upon which your business is built. It impacts each department andevery employee should know the brand promise and be able to explain it succinctly

and compellingly. I your people dont eel and accept the brand promise in theirguts and are not able to rationalize it logically, you will never sell it to the outsideworld. Te brand promise must have absolute believability and it must be based on agenuine marketplace need that will drive protable revenue.

Developing a brand promise is a tough exercise and you may have several stops andstarts. But once you are able to articulate the brand promise internally and externally,and use it as the basis or every marketing initiative, selling becomes much easier andyou will be able to close a larger percentage o deals.

At Fusion Marketing Partners, we are occasionally asked to carry out programs thatare not based on a clearly dened and dierentiated brand promise in other words,to ght the competition rom a position o weakness (the low ground). I urge ourclients to allow us to help them discover and articulate exactly how they are dierentand superior to everyone else in the marketplace. Ten we are ghting rom aposition o strength. Ten we are holding the high ground.

Ste

pTree:

Developing a brandpromise is a tough

exercise


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Develop a Successul Branding/Positioning Strategy

Te rst step in developing a branding and positioning strategy is to determine yourstarting point through a series o nine questions:

1. What is the scope o your branding problemis it to position

an entire organization or simply to position a product or series

o products?

2. In an ideal world, where money, time, and competitors are

not a actor, what is the position you would like to hold in the

marketplace? What is your idealized brand?

3. What is the position that you currently hold? You must bebrutally honest with the answer to this question. I you

dont know the answer, conduct research to nd out. Tis

doesnt mean internal research only; you must also ask

prospects and customers. In many cases, employees have

serious misconceptions about their companys true

marketplace position.

4. What is the position o each o your competitors? How do you

t with each competitor in terms o perceived quality (including

perormance and unctionality), service, and pricing?

5. Is the branding statement or the current product or service

compatible with your organizations overall position?

Consistency between the organization, and its products/services

and personnel is very important.

6. Does your positioning strategy violate the true nature o theorganization, or is it congruent? In other words, does it ring

true in every aspect? Does the brand promise resonate with

every part o the organization? One caveat: I strongly believe

in positioning yoursel ahead o the curvenot just in terms

o where you are now, but where you are going. But beore

StepFour:


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practicing this uture-oriented positioning, make sure this is

where you are really going.

7. Where is the product/service in its lie cycle? Is it a new,

pioneering product or service, or is it in the maturing or

declining phase? Do consumers ask, What is this product?

Or do they ask, Why should I buy this particular model rom

all the choices available? Likewise, is this an opportunity to

reposition a mature product or a resh new market?

8. Do you have the resources to compete with a price strategy, by

oering a product comparable to that o your competition at a

lower cost?

9. Given the competition, do you have the necessary resources to

reach and maintain the desired position in the marketplace?

I the answer is no, you need to know this beore investing

marketing dollars on a ailed cause.

You should answer each o these nine branding/positioning questions in the contexto overall corporate objectives, such as prot, return on investment (ROI), levels onancial risk desired, new technologies, and so orth. Note also that the questions are

airly general in nature and are intended to provide the ramework in which you candevelop the best possible creative strategy.

Te output o this process will be a branding and positioning statement, which canbe as short as one sentence or as long as a paragraph. Do not attempt to develop thecreative strategy until you have complete agreement on the branding and positioningstatement rom all concerned individuals, including marketing, sales, research,customer service, and nance and administration.


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Select a Branding and Positioning Model

Following are examples o the dierent ways that an organization can be positioned. Iam not suggesting that your brand will necessarily ollow one o these models but thelist will give you a starting point or consideration.

Hot Company. o be considered a hot company, you must beassociated with an important and current issue. Hot companiescan oten be ound in industries such as sotware, health care, andmedicine. Google has been a hot company or some time. Buttodays hot company can be tomorrows also-ran.

Technology Leader. Tis works i you can reach and maintain aposition o technology leadership. However, this is becomingincreasingly harder to do, since new technology improvements

are constantly being introduced and the lie cycle or high-techproducts can be as short as nine to 12 months. So, i you wish tobe a technology leader, be prepared or the constant pressure toreinvent yoursel.

Warm and Fuzzy. A warm and uzzy company builds a great dealo trust with the public and can thereore command premiumprices. Examples in the consumer arena include Nordstrom andMaytag. Warm and uzzy companies must earn this designationover time, and it can be reinorced, but not created, byadvertising.

All-Knowing. Tis type o organization and its employees areknown as the industry experts. Knowledge is Americas mostvaluable commodity and, in service industries such as law,nance, and medicine, it is the chie dierentiator amongorganizations. All-knowing companies can also commandpremium prices, particularly i they oer a strong ROI benet totheir customers.

First to Market. Te rst company to market a certain type o

product can have a signicant advantage because it can reach andgain early sales among the innovator and early adopter segments.A danger or a company positioned this way is that the second orthird company will leaprog its introduction with products thatare considerably improved. For example, the iPod was not therst MP3 player, nor the iPhone the rst smart phone, but Appleperected these products and came to dene the marketplace.

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Industry Giant. Te biggest company may not be the best, butit is oten perceived as such. However, because o technologyand re-structuring issues, the most successul organizations willbe those who possess, in the words o ormer General ElectricChairman Jack Welch, a big company body and a small

company soul.

One and Only. I you can convince the marketplace that youare the one and only company that does something specic,particularly i that something is o signicant value, your successis assured. However, the more successul you are as a one and onlycompany, the more likely you are to attract competitors.

Fastest. Even i youre not the best, you can appeal to those whoneed immediate service. Distribution will be a big actor in

marketing, as consumers shit dollars away rom retail and towardelectronic media channels. Federal Express is probably the bestexample o a company which was both rst and astest (with itsovernight delivery service).

Cheapest. Organizations that adopt this strategy are practicingcost dierentiation. Price leaders will always have a good shareo the market, especially i they can combine low price with adecent quality o service (notice that I did not say a high qualityo service). A good example o a company that does this wellis Wal-Mart.

Most Personal. Te ability to provide outstanding personal servicecan be a real dierentiator, but be very careul that you can provethis over a period o time, because such a claim is always treatedwith skepticism until it is proven.

Easiest to do Business With. Many companies succeed not becauseo, but rather despite their selling models. A company that is easyto do business with always looks or ways to minimize anythingthat stands in the way o a pleasant and irritant-ree experienceor the customer.

Regardless o which o these positioning models you choose, or i you adopt onethat is not on the list, you must present it to the consumer in a very clear and simplemanner. It should also be ocused and consistent, since it is difcult to sell more thanone concept at a time.


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Build Your Brand rom the Inside Out

Lon Hendrickson, President o AlphaBrands, is a noted expert on branding andpositioning. Te ollowing section is excerpted rom his excellent white paper titledSuccessul Brand Development. I think you will nd that this reinorces what I saidabout the brand promise earlier in this paper.As we have learned, a brand is more than just a catchy logo chosen on a whim. Yourbrand represents your company, product, or service on multiple levelsemotional,cultural, and rational. A brand no longer represents just your product or service. Nowit is also linked to your labor practices, environmental policies, business alliances,customer service and quality.

Your brand encompasses the entire spectrum o your company, rom its outwardappearance to its internal structure. Tis reality points out two distinctly dierentareas o brand impact on your business: outward, market-acing impact and inward,

internal impact. Market leaders know that great brands are built rom the insideoutlets take a look at what that means or you.

Internally, when you align your organization, operations, and culture aroundyour brand it becomes a powerul perormance driver. Living up to your brandvalues internally brings your brand to lie or the marketplace. Eective internalbranding will:

Focus your organization on a specic value to a specic customer.

Building a strong brand is similar to establishing a company

vision or mission. It acts like a turbocharger or internalperormance, providing everyone with a common vision and

clarity o purpose.

Direct alignment o the various aspects o your business

operations so that you can ulll your brand promise to the

market. I your brand stands or quality, alignment

prevents you rom spending resources in misguided attempts to

beat competitors to the market with an untested or

under-tested oering.

Provide a sense o pride and motivation or employees to live up

to the promises o your brand.

StepSix:


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For a brand to come to lie with customers, the organization must be internallyaligned to deliver the brand promise through the organizations culture, rewardsystems, key success measurements and structure. And, as a business owner ormanager you must demonstrate your commitmentto these values through everyday behavior. An

average brand becomes a great brand by living itsvalues internally. Its an unspoken rule that appliesto all companieslarge and smallwho strive tobe market leaders.

When employees understand and accept that the values are genuine, they can aligntheir attitudes and behavior to the brand values. Here are several ways you can bringthe power o internal branding to your organization:

Invest time in creating eective internal communications to build

employee morale and commitment through the shared beliesand vision.

Give your managers and sta a deeper understanding o your

brand promise and the behaviors and values the promise

demandseven provide training i necessary.

Demonstrate to your employees how their activity and output

contributes to delivering the brand promise to customers.

Review your company policies and programs to insure the

organization is operating in line with your brands promise.

Te only way to create and sustain a great brand is to work rom the inside out,with everyone across the organization pulling together to reach a common goal andmake your brand promises real. Branding makes a dierence in the success o yourbusinessinside and out!

Even when you are not in a position to out-spend or out-market your competitors,you can still reap the benets delivered by creating and sustaining internal ocus,clarity o purpose and alignment o goals.

Te only way to create andsustain a great brand is towork rom the inside out


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When it comes to branding, you cant spend too much time orattention. ake the process seriously and involve key constituentssuch as your employees, customers, and partners. Find a uniqueniche that is based on your genuine strengths. Make sure thatyour brand promise is compelling, dierentiated and sustainable.

Make sure that all your outbound communications reect yourbranding statement. And nally, good brands will stand the testo time, so resist the urge to change your branding unless it isabsolutely necessary.

For more inormation and tips on marketing your business,visit www.usionmarketingpartners.com

About the AuthorChristopher Ryan is a noted expert in B2B marketing and author o the recentlyreleased How to Create an Unstoppable Marketing and Sales Machine. Chris is ounderand President o Fusion Marketing Partners and was ormerly a senior marketingexecutive at companies including Stellent, Sybase, PeopleSot, SpringCMand Group 1 Sotware.

Copyright 2009/2010 Christopher J. Ryan All Rights ReservedFusion Marketing Partners, LLC 719-387-1711

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Six Steps to Position Your-Company for-Greatness Whitepaper

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