Archive for the ‘Market Positioning’ Category

18 Self-Destructing Marketing Dogmas The Privately Owned IT World Is Infested With Part 1

Tuesday, June 11th, 2013

Conventional sales wisdom has raised former car salesman, Joe Girard all the way to the Guinness World of Record, and he’s documented as the best car salesman in the world and one of the best salespeople who’s ever walked the Earth.

Then many years later, Dan Pink wrote his brilliant book To Sell is Human, and reveals the unadulterated truth about Joe Girard’s blazing success.

The fact that he was a diligent cold-caller and a ruthless manipulator, basically a liar, in order to acquire new customers.

And the same has happened to the same and similar business development dogmas in the world of information technology and how privately owned IT companies use them.

IT companies that rely on obsolete business development methods to acquire new business, that worked in the past but not any more, are shooting themselves in the foot. Actually, some of them, after firing, nail their feet to the floor too just to make sure they can never walk away from those obsolete methods.

They build their own prisons in which they are both the guards and the prisoners.

With that in mind, we’ll look at a few sales dogmas and pieces of conventional wisdom, that can keep IT companies in the dark ages and can force them remain fungible vendors and dreaded peddlers for the rest of their lives.

By overcoming these dogmas, they can move over to the respected expert side of the IT service provider continuum.

And this is what we discuss this month’s brain-fryingly electrifying episode of Tomicide Solutions, entitled, 18 Self-Destructing Marketing Dogmas The Privately Owned IT World Is Infested With Part 1.

Enjoy!

Posted in Market Positioning, Marketing | No Comments »

8 Ways IT Companies Can Kill Themselves By Responding To RFPs

Tuesday, April 23rd, 2013

The old Chinese proverb says, “Victory goes to the one with superior forces at the point of contact.”

In the movie Braveheart, at the battle of Stirling, the Scots used very long spears to receive the English army’s heavy horse attack. That was the first and most powerful step of attack of the English army.

Since the Scots successfully annihilated the heavy horses, the English army was basically defeated on impact, and the rest of the battle was “mere” formality. Well, all right. A bit more than that.

What that means in business development is that you have to create a powerful point of impact to meet buyers the first time. But, unlike the Scots in the movie, you may want to keep your buyers alive, because this impact will define the fate of your whole sales process.

This first impact can go two ways and that will define the outcome.

One option is that your buyer meets a street peddler representing a fungible vendor type company trying to hawk some lukewarm commodity.

The other option is that your buyer meets a respected expert representing an industrial authority type company offering some unique products/services.

And whatever the government says, when the connection between buyer and seller is the RFP process and the bidding war, that seller gets pigeonholed as a peddler, representing a fungible vendor type company and hawking some lukewarm commodities.

And this is what we discuss this month’s brain-fryingly exciting episode of Tomicide Solutions, entitled, “8 Ways IT Companies Kill Themselves By Responding To RFPs”.

Hope you finds it valuable.

Enjoy!

Posted in Client Work, Market Positioning | No Comments »

18 Criteria To Define Whether Your IT Business Is A Sought-After Authority Or A Replaceable Vendor

Wednesday, September 26th, 2012

As IT buyers have been becoming more and more suspicious of sellers’ real motives, the best sellers have realised that the only way they can handle this new buyer behaviour is by changing their approaches to business development.

In the 80s and 90s hunting was the prevailing approach. Hunting down buyers, pinning them to the ground and taking their money almost by force. Companies hired armies of hyper-aggressive salespeople, trained them to be even more aggressive and manipulative, and let them loose on the market.

But that approach doesn’t work anymore. Buyers hide behind multiple walls (procurement departments) to protect themselves. So, there must be a pretty big shift in how sellers have to sell in this new environment.

And while it’s a pretty big shift, it’s necessary, especially if we consider that while in the pre-internet age buyers relied on salespeople for product/service information, today, in the internet age, buyers can obtain all the information they need without ever to meet salespeople.

Over the years, products/services have become much more complex and sophisticated, which also means that with every purchase, buyers take on higher levels of risk.

And this is what we discuss in this month’s brain-fryingly exciting episode of Tomicide Solutions, entitled, 18 Criteria To Define Whether Your IT Business Is A Sought-After Authority Or A Replaceable Vendor.

And the accompanying podcast.

Enjoy!

Posted in Market Positioning, Sales | No Comments »

Eight Advantages Of Premium Pricing Strategy And Eight Disadvantages Of Economy Pricing

Wednesday, May 23rd, 2012

Setting up its pricing model is a crucial part of every IT business. Or at least it should be.

While IT bits and bobs are getting cheaper every day, pricing IT based products/services on purely technology, as opposed to the value to the client, would lead to financial disasters.

In this article we’ll take a closer look at some pricing options, and why a solid premium pricing strategy always beats economy pricing.

We have to accept the fact that many clients don’t need IT support, but what they need is an external entity to take the blame for the mess management has created.

For instance, the client’s security has been breached, but the breach is still contained. So, the company desperately wants to hire an IT firm, and then blame the breach on it, even to sue the IT company.

This is why IT companies must be careful about which clients to accept and which clients to reject.

And this is what we discuss this month’s mind-menglinlgy stupendous episode of Tomicide Solutions, fiendishly entitled, “Eight Advantages Of Premium Pricing Strategy And Eight Disadvantages Of Economy Pricing”.

Enjoy!

Posted in Market Positioning, Pricing | 1 Comment »

15 Ways Marketing Can Support Your IT Sales Success

Monday, January 2nd, 2012

Just as suicide bombing has become popular in recent years to draw attention and cause horrific damage to both life and property, forced selling in the IT industry without due marketing has also gained popularity, based on the false notion that marketing is a waste of money, and the secret to higher sales is just hiring higher number of more aggressive salespeople who are willing to go through concrete walls to meet buyers.

But it has turned out to be a big belly flop, and as a result of that retarded approach, most IT companies are forced to compete on price as replaceable vendors. The status of the respected industrial authority, even if it’s ever existed, is dead and gone.

So, IT companies either carry on competing on price and duking it out in bidding wars, responding to RFPs, or pull their stubborn heads out of their arses, realise that times have changed and start changing with the times.

And this is what we discuss this month’s toe-curlingly exciting episode of Tomicide Solutions, entitled, 15 Ways Marketing Can Support Your Sales Success.

Hope you find it valuable.

Enjoy!

Posted in Lead Generation, Lead Nurturing, Market Positioning | 1 Comment »

“How To Segment The Marketplace For Your IT Business

Friday, November 25th, 2011

Imagine a thoroughbred race horse that is locked up in a small stable.

The horse feels something is wrong but doesn’t know what. He wants to run in the fields, but his owner denies him the privilege. The owner, who knows nothing about horses, is frustrated because the horse is acting up by kicking the door or the walls of the stable.

Then on race day, after six months of confinement and lack of training, the owner brings the horse out for a race.

Of course, the horse loses, and the owner is now thinking about turning the horse into sausages.

Now, I don’t say that you should turn your bad clients into sausages or show negative feelings against inappropriate prospects. All I’m saying is that in all your dealings, favour prospects with “great client” potential and emotionlessly walk away from problematic prospects.

Note that it is your market that defines your branding, positioning, packaging, pricing and even the claims you make.

You must know your market’s size, growth rate, demographics, psychographics, technographics (technical sophistication: abacus vs. computers), needs, purchasing habits, and many other factors. Different companies segment their markets differently, but this segmentation method you’re about to read about applies to every industry.

There are two attributes to consider…

And this is what we discuss this month’s mind-menglingly splendid episode of Tomicide Solutions, entitled, “How To Segment The Marketplace For Your IT Business”.

Then come back here and voice your thoughts.

Enjoy!

Posted in Lead Generation, Lead Nurturing, Market Positioning | No Comments »

Three Practical Objections Against Cold-Calling To Sell Premium IT Solutions

Monday, June 27th, 2011

Believe it or not, Carl Lewis has undoubtedly been one of the greatest athletes in US sports history. During his career he won nine Olympic gold medals and eight World Championship gold medals. He became an athletic icon.

But this iconic status got somewhat shattered when, in 1987, he decided to get into music, and created the pop “masterpiece”, entitled “Break it Up”.

Rightly or wrongly many of his fans started ridiculing Carl for his musical act.

So, what does this event have to do with cold-calling?

Well, just as Carl’s brave act alienated him from lots of his fans, cold-calling alienates sellers from their target markets.

Today, in the age of suspicion and scepticism, buyers regard cold-calling, that is, calling them, a hanging offence, and I bet some of them are working hard on criminalising cold prospecting.

Buyers rightfully believe they have the right to buy whenever they are ready, not when sellers try to ram something down their throats.

And buyers raise massive walls, well, peddler fodders, to keep peddlers outside of their operations at a safe distance.

And what do sellers do?

Well, this is what we try to figure out this month’s brain-boilingly stupefying episode of Tomicide Solutions, entitled, Three Practical Objections Against Cold-Calling To Sell Premium IT Solutions.

Posted in Lead Generation, Market Positioning, Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

How Do We Know If We’re A Replaceable Vendor Or A Trusted Technology Advisor And A Respected Technology Authority? Part 2

Saturday, February 26th, 2011

In this month’s issue of Tomicide Solutions: “How Do We Know If We’re A Replaceable Vendor Or A Trusted Technology Advisor And A Respected Technology Authority? Part 2″

Today we continue our journey into Vendorville and Authority City trying to discover the main differences between replaceable vendors and respected authorities, their mindsets and their operations.

Last month we discussed 11 differences, and this month I’ll torture you with 11 more.

Some of the differences apply to your company in a positive way, that is, in that area your company is a respected authority, but we all have replaceable vendor characteristics.

And these are the little chinks we want to correct in our armours, so we can come across as the perfect authorities that buyers are looking for. Of course, we can never achieve perfection, but it’s worth travelling on the road that takes us closer to it.

And this is what we discuss this month’s horrifyingly terrific episode of Tomicide Solutions, entitled, “How Do We Know If We’re A Replaceable Vendor Or A Trusted Technology Advisor And A Respected Technology Authority? Part 2“, and if you feel brave enough, then hop over and check it out.

Posted in Market Positioning | No Comments »

How Do We Know If We’re A Replaceable Vendor Or A Trusted Technology Advisor And A Respected Technology Authority? Part 1

Tuesday, February 1st, 2011

Who the sausage is Jane Williams?

While Jane has nothing to do with making sausages, she may love eating them or even throwing them out of aeroplanes.

But in 1984 – BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU! – Jane threw herself out of a plane but the shit hit the fan, and her parachute didn’t open.

As the saying goes “Flattery can take you pretty far”, but if your chute fails to open, no amount of flattery can save you from ending up pretty flat.

Anyway, Jane survived the fall by landing in three feet of water in a farmer’s pond.

The interesting thing is that many IT companies start hiking the steep and treacherous trails of trying to reach the glorious heights of becoming trusted information technology advisors, but they often lose momentum, come to a screeching halt on their climbs and then start rolling down the hillside faster and faster.

Some get up, dust themselves off, regroup, review their strategies and start climbing again.

Some declare defeat and give up IT altogether. They become chimney sweepers, spon runners or hell knows what.

So, what can IT companies do that instead of coming to a grinding halt and risking a spectacular downhill roll, they can keep climbing and reach the respected industrial authority stage.

And this is what we discuss this month’s stupendously inexplicable episode of Tomicide Solutions, entitled, “How Do We Know If We’re A Replaceable Vendor Or A Trusted Technology Advisor And A Respected Technology Authority? Part 1“.

Posted in Market Positioning | 2 Comments »