Dec 17, 2009 | Change, Management
In today’s cross functional organisations, “Internal Marketing ” has taken on a whole new meaning.
In the past, functional battles were waged at the senior management level where the resource allocation decisions were made. Now, with cross functional teams and matrix structures having a much larger role, gaining the support of colleagues of differing levels and functional affiliation has become profoundly important. This means that persuasion, or internal marketing has a whole new role to play.
A couple of tips for building support.
- The old Scratch his back, scratch mine comes it the fore. If you support someone else, by speaking in favor, supplying information, or assisting in some way, the sense of reciprocity can be invoked when you need support.
- Invoking an individuals previously stated opinion or activity can swing support your way, as the individual has a degree of credibility invested in their stated positions.
Be careful however, as overt use of either of these strategies can be counter productive. Like anything, common sense and fair play are important.
Dec 17, 2009 | Demand chains, Leadership
Turning a supply chain 180 degrees to become a demand chain is an inordinately difficult organizational challenge, not because it does not make sense, but because it requires organizations and the people in them to be able to see what has always been there, but from an entirely new perspective. The power of the common view, the accepted wisdom, the status quo is never more powerful than when it is under threat.
Seeing what has always been there with new eyes is extraordinarily hard to achieve in a single business, reversing a supply chain to become a demand chain requires that it is done for a series of businesses, all pre-occupied with their own challenges.
This is why if you can do it, the pay-off from the competitive advantage that will come is immense.
Dec 15, 2009 | Management, Marketing
Too often marketing is seen as an expense, to be cut when things are tough. Often this is an outcome of a lack of accountability for results emerging from the investment made in marketing.
It is in the interests of marketers to pro-actively take responsibility for their expenditures, figuring out ways to turn the qualitative into traceable quantitative data.
Advertising on the Box will give you a TARP level, essentially reach and frequency against a target audience, printed media will do a similar job, but after 2 generations bred to filter out unwanted advertising, how effective is that?.
By contrast, the quantitative tools embedded in other sorts of expenditures can be accounted for by the behavior generated.
Coupons in the US started in this manner, but have evolved into simply a discount. Direct response advertising can be accountable, but not all of us are up late enough to see the steak knife ads.
The web is starting to offer tools to count the behavior generated by the ads, click through, and purchase, which have changed advertising media choices forever, it is just that most have not realized it yet.
Dec 14, 2009 | Sales
Part of a small current assignment is looking for a simple ERP system for a SME client, now too big to rely on spreadsheets and simple accounting packages.
Automatically, I went to the web, looking for user groups of similar software, and it got me thinking.
The web is the first place we look for something, from a complicated bit of technology, to a phone number, and this has come about so fast we do not think about it.
The standard early stages of the B2B marketing processes have been replaced by peer contact facilitated by the web, research is done on line, no longer relying on the vendor to do anything more than fill in the gaps, and provide a price.
For some time, I have been on the e-mailing list of an ERP vendor, I just never bothered to click the “off” button, to de-register, but I cannot remember their name now I need their product, or similar, just like old fashioned advertising, until you need it the ad is totally forgettable most of the time.
It seems theB2B game now is to create leads that have been motivated in some way before you get to them, and the sales role is being truncated into the closure, implementation and follow up stages.
Dec 10, 2009 | Management, Sales
You would not build a house without a plan, so why would you set out to manage your major customers without some sort of plan.
For most businesses, their key customer base is the core of their commercial sustainability, so it is worth investing a few resources to ensure you are able to deliver an optimum experience to them when dealing with you.
Engaging the customer in your planning sessions for their business is sometimes a counter-intuitive, but very worthwhile activity, after all, who knows them better, what they need, how they see the future, the internal hurdles they face, than one of their key employees?
