Asking the right questions in the market – 2

Human Brain, Marketing, Questions, Sales, Thinking

I have already written a few posts on the ability to ask better questions.

When you are in a leadership position its very easy to get caught in the “why” spin. I am also at fault on this because I have been a big follower of the 5 Why’s process. The challenge which I always had was that I was dealing with people – whether my own sales team or the customer.

It’s not always easy to get the emotional side with a Why question.

The second part was that in a lot of cases you get multiple points which seem to be the root causes. The key is how do you prioritize among them.

When you’re dealing with machines and factories it is relatively easier to prioritize using things like the Theory of Constraints.

Today while I was going over the book The Road Less Stupid by Keith Cunningham I came across another type of question which he gives. I think you should read this book if you are someone who makes a living by managing teams.

He says one question structure which he has found very useful is “How might I …. so that I can…..”

I tried this same structure on one of the pertinent problems we face. Till now my general system for understanding the problem, as I mentioned was the 5 Why’s.

Today however I tried this and the answers which came out were much more constructive. Now I need to see how easily they get implemented. However it did change my thinking and made me less adversarial.

I would suggest you also try this method and off course read the book and let me know your views.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

Asking the right questions in the market

B2B, Marketing, Questions, segmentation, Testing, value proposition

Understanding which questions to ask is an art. It was said that Socrates had a great method to ask questions which got him to the bottom of a problem.

I have actually been very weak in asking questions. It takes me a lot of understanding to get down to the bottom of things.

I have used frameworks like the 5 Why or 7 Why model to figure things. I have used things like the 80/20 rule to try to identify the small causes for repeatable/fractal patterns.

In most areas in life asking the right questions makes a lot of difference to your success.

In marketing its all the more important because you are dealing with different types of people. In B2B marketing where there are even more players involved at the customer level, understanding the different drivers for each player becomes critical.

If you ask a question about “why is the customer not wanting to buy from me” versus “what could be the compulsions for the customer to not look at my solution ” you could get completely different answers.

Those questions will totally change the way you address the issues in the market. You may be able to figure out a completely different value proposition from what you were thinking about. Your niche or segmentation could completely change.

The other thing about marketing that I have learnt over the years is that there are no absolute truths in the market. The market and its participants have a mind of their own and their perception is their Reality. Once a perception has been created it becomes very difficult to change.

So the bottom line is to think of questions from different vantage points to get to different possibilities and then Test them.

I am still learning this art and working to improve myself. How about you?

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

Account Based Marketing

ideal customer, Marketing, Methodologies, single target market

In the B2B space , especially technology related , you will hear about ABM a lot. I was introduced to this term by the consulting firm Gartner about 5 years back. Since then along with other buzz words like intent data and AI I have been watching the progress in these technologies and methodologies.

I have generally refrained from using buzz words in my blogs. Today however I was going through some articles on how the B2B space has changed in terms of marketing. What are the trends that are taking place and found ABM is occupying a lot of mind space.

Getting large scale leads to fill the funnel has always been a challenge in B2B compared to B2C. In addition there are multiple people who take a decision, which adds to the inertia of decision making. Due to this people don’t like to change an incumbent until its absolutely necessary in B2B.

In technology marketing the other issue, with customers, is also the decision whether a technology should be adopted or wait and watch.

When you start with a single niche and choose a bunch of a 100 or thousand accounts (you can read my earlier post on identifying the economics ) to target you automatically learn the challenges of the customers over a period of time.

In ABM also look at an Ideal customer profile in a specific niche. What I found different and useful about ABM is that you first get into an account or customer and then spread your wings within the account so that more people know you and you can sell more value within an account.

What I still need to figure out, and I will let you know once I do, if there’s a size or type of company where this will work better or if there’s a type of offering for which this is not suited.

If you have used ABM , I would love to hear your experience

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

Understanding your competition

B2B, competition, Marketing, Product Management, segmentation, single target market

If you can’t think what your competitors can do you will be someone’s lunch soon.

In my earlier posts I have written about why it’s important to have competition. For one it shows there’s a market. That’s a very critical point.

Second if the competitor has entered the market before you then you can learn from their mistakes. Third it helps you define your niche even better.

But competition is a very dynamic thing. The horse carriage people did not think Automotive would make them a relic.

Especially when you are doing product management in a technology industry you need to look out where the next competition will come from. Generally it never comes from your known competitors.

Did Nokia realize that Apple will totally decimate them. Or for that matter Kodak even though Kodak itself had built the first digital camera.

One of the best ways to understand where you competitors could hurt you is by placing yourself in your competitor’s shoes. Knowing the weaknesses that exist in your existing product or service or technology identify where could some other company come and displace you.

This may not always alert you to the company who could hurt you but it could help identify trends in the market which could go against you.

Which brings me to the other aspect of product management. Be out there in the market, in the store or with a customers, consistently trying to understand why customers are looking at something else instead of buying from you. It’s most often not only about price.

Till next time then….keep watching for your competitors.

Carpe Diem!!!