Arrogance versus Self Confidence

I thought of taking a break from just talking about marketing.

Those of you who follow my blog know that I like to identify the differences between words in English and how they get used. An Oxford dictionary is still among the prized possessions in my library.

I was listening to a talk by Sean Stephenson on the Ilovemarketing mastery program by Joe Polish and Dean Jackson.

He brought out an important point on Arrogance versus Self Confidence.

Which led me to the dictionary again and this is what I got at the meriam-webster site and I have taken it from there and posted below

Definition of arrogance

: an attitude of superiority manifested in an overbearing manner or in presumptuous claims or assumptions

Definition of self-confidence

: confidence in oneself and in one’s powers and abilities

Sean’s take was that people with confidence have a tendency to always want to improve themselves and keep increasing their capabilities which increases confidence further.

On the other hand people who are arrogant are always trying to prove a point to others or to themselves.

What was more interesting was what he mentioned after this. Can people who are confident about themselves come out as arrogant to others.

As per him if someone thinks of your self confidence as arrogance, then it means they are jealous of you. Which is the price for being successful.

Bottom line is if people are jealous of you then you know you are being successful. And if people are not jealous of you then maybe you are not playing a big enough game.

Till next time.

Carpe Diem!!!

When you polarize….you monetize

differentiation, Marketing, Positioning, Product Management, Sales

I heard this statement from Dr. Sean Stephenson at the ilovemarketing mastery inaugural course.

The word polarize means to split into such that they seem so different like the north and south pole of the earth. The key terms in this statement are split and different. Like the red pawn and black pawn in the picture.

This is so closely related to what I have been talking about in the last few days on differentiation, perception and choosing a niche.

Apple polarizes is audiences, so does a Lamborghini. You don’t go into a Lamborghini showroom and ask for a discount…. they may tell you there’s a waiting list. They are angle to do that because they own that space in the minds of the customers. Similarly if you don’t value the positioning of Lamborghini you won’t even go into their showrooms

The job of good marketing is to attract your best prospects and repel all others. Once you do a good job there you can really make good profits.

Till next time.

Carpe Diem!!!

Selecting a Niche – Part II

differentiation, Marketing, Positioning, Product Management, Sales

In the first post on Selecting a Niche – I spoke about Selecting a niche in the market and finding a market in the niche for your product. In Product Management this is like the fundamental step for you to look at

While one of the reasons of selecting a niche is to be able to differentiate, the other reason is to avoid the big players who are already present.

Its not a good idea to be a better Honda or a better SONY or any other market leader. They can be a better themselves by themselves and they have the marketing and financial muscle to outlast any competition.

When selecting a niche you should be looking at a market which is big for you, but not big enough for the market leader to be bothered about that small market, that it puts its energy in competing with you. So a convenience store like Seven-Eleven has a niche where it charges the prices it wants and is profitable. It does not try to compete with the Walmarts of the world.

Given what I mentioned above – the size should be large for your capability (market in the niche) but should be small enough for the leader to ignore (niche in the market). Then you start differentiating. The kind of products and product packs that are available in a Seven-Eleven will not be found in a Costco or a Walmart.

And you will know you are being successful when people start comparing their offering with yours or as the late Dr Sean Stephenson used to say “Anti-Fans” start talking something bad about you and customers will call the category by your product/service name. Once that happens, you will polarise a certain section of the market to always keep coming back to you and your selling costs will come down and your profitability will go up.

At the end of the day the job of a person in product management is to ensure that she can create a category which she can own with her product

Till next time.

Carpe Diem!!!