Competition has become persistent. What the Information Age has brought forward is the most turbulent times for business, as the pressure is unrelenting. A century ago, the total sum of knowledge that mankind had, doubled every 500 years. Today, it doubles every two years. This pace continues to accelerate.
What the experts claim is that the high school seniors of today needs to absorb, cram, more education in their final year alone, than what their grandparents did their entire lives. As everything in life is accelerating forward and evolving at a rapid pace, it’s competition that’s pushing this fierce momentum forward.
It’s foreign competitors that are entering our markets, corporate downsizing giving way to the ease of technology or outsourcing, which transforms thousands of displaced executives into entrepreneurs.
The knowledge explosion continues, as new technologies constantly provides radically different and quicker ways of accomplishing the same task.
Rapidly Increasing Perpetual Competition
The result is compounding competition in every industry, and is now an identifiable marker, a characteristic of our speeding economy, that we need to get accustomed to, this for the immediate and foreseeable future.
What these rapid forces of change and growing competition on a daily basis, has brought is a cloud of confusion to CEOs, this especially the “old school” types, where they refuse to transform themselves.
Kernel Explosion
Think about popcorn at the local movie theater, kernels will sit inactive at the bottom of the gigantic popcorn machine, this until heat or hot oil is applied.
As the heat accelerates, the kernels begin to pop, which creates a chain reaction, and before long, the once empty popcorn machine is full of popcorn.
This analogy is how most businesses will attempt to increase their sales, this once the temperature that’s created by the growing competition increases.
As the heat grows, they realize they need to do something. Similar to a kernel of exploding popcorn, someone has a good idea, and what they’ll do is lunge at it.
Mostly Superficial Ideas
Similar to the popping process, what happens is there’s a frantic chase of a variety of ideas, hoping that one of them will be the solution to their various marketing issues. The problem is that these ideas are random, and they don’t have anything in common with one another.
They’re just generic superficial solutions to issues which are a lot deeper in scope. Their time and energy however is diverted towards these superficial ideas, while not solving the problem.
For instance, placing an ad in a trade journal can be a superficial solution, this for a company that doesn’t have a system for identifying qualified prospects.
A landing page to collect emails might be superficial for an organization, who doesn’t have the proper feedback mechanism set in place to adequately profile its customers.
To Create A Marketing System
There has to be a better way, one that won’t drain out creativity, time, and capital. A sales and marketing system which is interconnected, having a measurable set of processes and tools, which ultimately results in increased revenue.
Where would a fast food chain be without a system to consistently produce hot burgers. Where would a car manufacturer be, if they didn’t have a funnel to design and build new automobiles.
The key to success when it comes to these businesses, is their ability to create and then manage an effective system to accomplish their goals.
Sales and marketing should be treated the same way. The process of acquiring customers while expanding the business with them, should be a systematized process.
If you’re able to create a working system, then you’ll be investing your time and resources more effectively, which produces accelerating revenue results.
Know What Their Needs Are
It begins with a thorough concise understanding on what the most common interests and hurts, of the prospect are. Then fold that into a honest awareness of the unique value that your company offers to the market.
What you’re then developing is the framework for your system. It should be focused on the highest potential market segments, along with developing segment specific processes and tools, this to help you effectively reach your market in a way that’s the most cost effective.
Once your system is developed, you’ll then have a set of criteria which helps you adequately assess the method of delivery, such as online ads, social media, ecommerce, etc.
What a well-designed system allows is moving away from a destructive desperate reactive mode, and more into an aligned organized proactive mode.
To Determine If You Have An Effective Marketing Operating System
• Are your objectives specific and realistic when it comes to your sales and marketing efforts?
• Have you identified your highest potential market segments?
• Do you know the sequence of decisions that your typical prospect goes through, this so they’ll buy your product or service?
• Do you know the key activities and processes which needs to take place on a monthly basis, this so you’ll reach your sales objectives?
• Do you have a monthly measurement of the quality and quantity of your key marketing activities?
• Do you know the exact cost of customer acquisition?
• Does all of your marketing methods directly support the processes and purpose of your system?
A Well Defined Marketing System
Competition is fierce, so you need to be as concise and focused as possible. What having a well-defined marketing system means that you’ve shifted from a reactive to a proactive marketing strategy. What this provides is a cleaner more precise predictable revenue model.
What not having all the answers shows is you have some work to do, this to transfer your sales and marketing efforts into a more proactive state, which allows you to compete more effectively.