What is The Gap Between Your De Facto and Your Desired Positioning?

A lot of people don’t really understand positioning.  They equate it with a “mission statement” like, “We are the highest quality and the most caring company in the food business, providing the best-tasting nutritious frozen meals and baby foods throughout the world.” 

Mission statements are what the management and the board of directors think of themselves. Customers don’t care. Customers care what’s in it for them.

The positioning of a product or a company is what comes to people’s minds when they hear its brand name. That’s called the de facto positioning. It’s also called reality.

But what would management want people to say?  That is their desired positioning. If there is a gap between the two?  Then there’s an identity and a marketing problem.

The first step is to find out: what is our standing right now?  How do people place us in their lives, versus other options?  What are our assets and our baggage?

The first step is to find out: what is our standing right now?  How do people place us in their lives, versus other options?  What are our assets and our baggage? 

“Think about (your name).  What comes to mind?” 

Put words in their mouths and thoughts in their minds.  What are they?  If they are different than today’s’ groups, what shall you do? Is it fixable? What must change?

Positioning is the key marketing ingredient. I’ll talk later about how to create a winning position and also about how to position yourself for failure!

George Lemmond

It’s a viral thing, according to Joffrey’s Coffee and Tea Company.

For those of us who enjoy a cup of coffee or two you will want to take a look at Joffrey’s Coffee and Tea Company.  Joffrey’s has put together a “beta test” for one of their coffee brands.  They are offering the first 10,000 bloggers who sign up for this beta test free coffee and a blog link on their website.

Though I am not a huge fan of “viral marketing” I like what Joffrey’s is doing because they are appealing to two things that are important to me.  First, they sent me free coffee (which I very much enjoyed) and second, they have added my link to their blogroll.  As I sit on their website and see the links scroll, I am amazed that they have 1215 blog links - well on their way to 10,000. 

So to all you bloggers out there who not only want your link on another website, and free coffee to boot, check out Jofferey’s site, sign up and join the viral movement.

Joffrey’s, thanks again for the coffee and the link!

Who gives a rip what business you’re in?

It’s important to have at least a general idea of what business you’re in, so you’ll know where to look for it in the yellow pages.  But if you want to grow and prosper, you should dig deeper. What do people need and what are they buying?  If you don’t know this, your “business” can pass you by. 

My elevator speech is “I am a marketing guy and I teach marketing and advertising at Georgia State. I help clients find out ‘who cares?’ what they do and act accordingly.”

 Let’s put it this way—what are you selling, as opposed to what are they buying?  Some examples:

• Black and Decker sells little machines that goes round and round and they call them drills.  But people don’t need a drill.  They need holes.

• Barnes & Noble says— right on their logo—they are booksellers.  But people don’t eat books, they read them.  B&N is in the reading business, and they make it easy and enjoyable for people to come in and read.  They’ll buy later.

• Ask a professor what business your college is in.  He’ll say, “Education.” But what they hope to get is educated alumni—the kind that gives money back.

• Do you like Starbucks Coffee? It ranks 21^st.   But when was the last time you said, “Let’s meet at Starbucks”?   Are they in the coffee—or the meeting business?

Free yourself from definition tyranny. Join the customer in his never-ending quest to find a better use for your product.

                                                                                                                                             George Lemmond

Are you a motorist or a pedestrian?

Today’s blog is written by George Lemmond.  He will be writing exerts for Dunn’s Den of Knowledge from time to time and we are excited to have him on our team!  Thank you, George, and I look forward to your writings:)))  Please respond to George’s post, and let us both know what you think. 

“Segmentation” has always been a worthy goal of marketers. It’s a good way to target your customers, so you don’t waste your time going after people who don’t like you anyway.

It makes sense to know who might buy your product.  Rich people or poor? Young vs. old, farmers or city-dwellers? College grads, illiterates, parsons or felons?  It’s useful to put them into big buckets. That makes your media and promotion efforts efficient.

The fad now is “psychographics”—the art of grouping people into lifestyles. Psychologists have sliced up the population into many pieces, like—-Early Achievers, Stay-at-Homers, Front-runners, Bookworms, and Deadenders.

The problem is it pigeonholes people into static stereotypes.  Once you’re a  trend buster, always a trend buster.  But people change roles and attitudes daily, even hourly.  Are you same person at eight as at five? Monday as Saturday? At a ball game as in a traffic jam?

I ask my students whether they are a motorist or a pedestrian. Most think awhile, then choose the one which best fits them.  (They thought I was analyzing their inner selves.) But after discussion they all agree that the right answer is, “BOTH—it depends!” And there are times they are a cyclist or an equestrian. Sometimes they’re even motionless.

Psychographics can be interesting, maybe useful. But it becomes psychobabble when it replaces common sense. Wouldn’t be better if you would segment your product according to the benefit it bestows, and let the customers self-select across all artificial lines?  What do you think?     George Lemmond

What is Social Media and how can I use it in my Business?

This blog is a follow up to my speech last week at the Greater North Fulton Business Expo.  Thank you to all those who attended not only the Expo, but my speech.  The Expo was a huge success and I would like to personally thank all the committee members and volunteers.  Thank you!!!

An overview of my speech is this:  ”Social media describes the on-line technologies and practices that people use to share opinions, insights, experiences, and perspectives with each other.”  Wikipedia says social media is about utilizing technology to communicate, connect, join a conversation and/or a community and it is about collecting and categorizing.  Most importantly though, social media is about change!

What it is not is a message channel to bombard me with messages or ads that I do not care about.  It is not about pitching me. It is about building a relationship with me utilizing mediums I CHOOSE.  It’s not about the application.  The application is useless if you do not find value in it and ultimately, use it.  Determine what it is you want to accomplish, then choose the application that helps you accomplish your goal.  

Social media allows us the ability to collaborate on a global scale with like minded people.  You don’t believe me?  Then why is it that the last time you purchased something on-line you took the time to read the comments about the item?  I don’t know you and you don’t know me….right?  

It allows me, the consumer, to communicate directly with a corporation.  If I like your product or service, I will communicate it.   If I do not like a product or service, I will communicate that as well. Social media makes me the R&D arm of any company.  Is your company willing to join the conversation?  

Lastly, don’t let the pendulum swing too far.  Daily I pick up the paper and read that another company is taking large percentages of their ad budget and putting it into social media.  That is fine as long as you continue to use traditional mediums and integrate social media with them.  Also, don’t try to be the jack of all trades.  Pick a handful of applications.  You don’t have to use every single social media application just because you receive an invite.

Some of the barriers companies face with social media are: cost of development when joining a site, losing control of what is being expressed, scalability and the time commitment it takes to converse.  If you want to develop a relationship, it takes time.

For a list of twenty-five social media sites to explore, click HERE.  This guide not only gives you the hyper-link to each site, but provides you page views with a short synapses of each application.

As usual, I look forward to your comments and questions. Take the social media challenge and join a conversation, with me or someone around the world! 

On  a side note today 4/22/08 I received an email to the link below. HMMMMM  coincidence?  I think not.  How many of these same C’s did I cover in my lecture?  Here is the link: http://tinyurl.com/5jl98z

 

 

 

Is Twitter for you?

In pretty much every conversation I have with clients, I always talk about social media and why they should be involved. Let’s face it. If you own a business don’t you want people to find you and purchase your goods and services? Isn’t that why you have a sign outside your location, a website and your car wrapped? Then why would you not be using social media to let others know where you are located, build loyalty programs, and create relationships with your customers and prospects?

One of the tools that can provide you the vehicle to do this is Twitter. What is Twitter you ask? According to Twitter, they are a tool “for staying in touch and keeping up with friends no matter where you are or what you’re doing.” What I take away from this basic definition is the ability to stay in touch and keep up with friends, clients and prospects. For a relationship to take place, some sort of interaction must occur. Twitter can be used to help build and/or strengthen relationships.

A few weeks ago, I read Dave Fleet’s blog “Twitter…in Plain English” and was glad to find that he included a resource that describes a more detailed account of what and how to use Twitter. This guide to Twitter can be found here. It is well worth the sixty seconds it takes to read. Lastly, I am including a video below about Twitter (the run time is 2:25). Get out there, join the conversation and build relationships using social media. To follow me on Twitter, click my name: TownPlanner.

What can we as Marketers learn from client #9?

What does $4,300 buy you?  Put another way, what service could you possibly sell with a market value of $4,300 an hour?

After a series of informal, highly unscientific polls, we pretty much all agree that Eliot Spitzer, aka Client 9, paid $4,300 for something.  It wasn’t the girl — he had to ask the dispatcher to remind him of what she looked like.  Was it the sex?  Kris Kristofferson once wrote, “Ever since the first I had, the worst I had was good.”  So if it wasn’t the girl, and we all agree that there’s no way on the planet, even with the most bizarre fantasies imaginable that it was the sex — what did Client 9 buy? Starbucks sells coffee, right?  Coffee is much cheaper in other places, and even Consumer Reports showed that McDonald’s coffee outperformed Starbucks in taste tests.  So if it’s not coffee they’re selling — what is it?  Is it the funky jazz and the baristas and the heavy cardboard cup with the now-considered designer overwrap?  

 

In my head — there are two questions at the core here.  One (and I guess the least important for this discussion) is how in touch are we, as consumers, with what it is we’re buying — really?  Are we aware of why we do what we do — why we think we love Starbucks?  I guess this is where I really don’t want to believe we’re all a bunch of lemmings. 

But the second issue is — as marketers, how in touch are we with what it is we’re peddling?  Do you know what it is you’re selling, really?  Tiffany’s understands what they’re selling and it’s not the jewelry.  Starbucks used to be crystal clear on what it was marketing, too.  What about the rest of us?  If we run a restaurant, is it just the food?  

 

What are your thoughts?  

 

On a side note, if anyone out there can come up with something to market for $4,300 per hour, give me a call!!

 

 

 

Lets get to the core of the matter!

Last week, I had lunch with Steve from Quantum bank.  I was relaying to him my experience with a company, who shall remain nameless, and how the core values published on their website were in no way brought to life with the person I spoke with.

 This got me thinking about core values for organizations and wondering why organizations put their core values on the world wide web for all to see and then do not execute them.  It does not make a lot of sense to me.

Personally, I know a company’s core values when I execute a transaction with that company.  It is how I am treated from the start of the transaction to their follow-up post transaction.   You do not have to post your core values on your website for me to understand them.  Keep them on your intranet and manage your business by them.  It will be a better experience for everyone involved.  

You tell me.  Do businesses with core values published on their website provide a better experience than those without them published?  Does it matter at the end of the day?

 

 

 

Starbucks…glad you are reading my blog and glad I could help!

If you missed my comments to both Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts a few weeks ago, simply scroll down the page.  With that, I came across this post by Starbucks which states in a nutshell that all of their locations will be closing at 5:30 p.m. on February 26th for employee training.  The goal of this training:  “The comprehensive educational curriculum for all U.S. store partners will provide a renewed focus on espresso standards that will help ensure the exceptional quality of every beverage. As a result, baristas will be better prepared to share their passion and knowledge with customers. Customers will be able to truly enjoy the art of espresso as Starbucks baristas demonstrate their passion to pull the perfect shot, steam milk to order, and customize their favorite beverage.”

Looks like Starbucks finally figured out that dollar coffee is not going to work after all!  On a side note, if anyone needs any of those “FREE” itunes downloads, I still have a few.  Let me know.

If you would like to see the press release, please click HERE. 

Is it true that you are getting rid of T-Mobile in all of your stores?  Could it be that you might offer FREE Internet instead of FREE itunes downloads of bands I don’t know? Could it be that you go back to focusing on coffee? 

In any case, I am glad I could help and glad to see you are getting back to your Unique Selling Proposition.  If you you need anything else, give me a call.  You know where to find me.

 Click play below!!!!! 

 

How ooVoo can help us take communication to the next level!

The two most important assets that any business have are its customers and its people.  For anything to happen between these two assets, a thing called a relationship must occur.  This week I was able to be a part of a new company which is taking the ability to build relationships to a whole new level… the level of social video.

I know, I know, we have all used video conferencing to connect with people for conversations.  Why do we want to actually SEE the person we are speaking with?   Simple communication is more than just words spoken!  How many times have you used email to convey a message and had the end user not understand the email you sent?  Then you go back and forth over email trying to communicate your message.  Now picture how easy it would be if you could actually interact with that person in real time using video.  In the end, this is a time consuming process that is not very effective.  Seeing the people you speak with gives all parties involved the ability to use multiple senses when communicating, hopefully allowing for better/deeper/more meaningful communication.

ooVoo, is a new video conferencing, video messaging, and communication company that allows up to SIX people at a time to be seen on a video conference call.  Yes, you actually see the person you are speaking with in real time, not their photo or avatar.  One of the things that is most amazing is that ooVoo is free.  Yes free!  Click the word ooVoo and download it yourself.  If you would like to add me to your contact list, my ooVoo Screen Name is: Scott Dunn.   OoVoo showed me this week how far technology has come and what the true power a computer, a web cam and the Internet can provide for real time face-to-face conversations.

As part of ooVoo’s launch, their ad agency Crayon set up nightly calls with people like:  Joseph Jaffey, John Wall, Allan Cox, Mitch Joel, C.C. Chapman, Chris Brogan, George Parker and many others in the social media space.  We were able to sign up for thirty minute time slots with each of these people and participate in video conference calls.  Talk about cool?  Yes, I subscribe to these folks’ blogs, podcasts and twitter feeds.  Personally, I really enjoyed the opportunity to meet these people (face-to-face) and have the ability to interact with them from the comfort of my own office!!!!  (To see a screen shoot of one my calls with Joseph Jaffe, please click HERE.)  

THANK YOU to all of you who took time out of your schedule to facilitate these calls.  If you decide to do it again, please include me on your list of invites!!!!!  Also, if you see me online, please feel free to give me a call.

Our ability to build relationships ultimately determines our success or failure in business and in life.  OoVoo can be used to help build these relationships in ways that email, texting, and phone calls can not.  No matter how you slice or dice it, SEEING IS BELIEVING. OoVoo gives small businesses and individuals one more arrow in our quiver to help us to better communicate and build relationships.