Startup Best Practices 15 - Start With The Why

“People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.” This line from Simon Sinek’s TED talk captures the power of a values based marketing campaign. Simon contrasts feature-based marketing - start with what the company is selling continue to how they do it and finishes with why - to value based campaigns which reverse the story-telling order. Values campaigns start with the why.

Starting with why is a simple but powerful framework for startups to develop a unique marketing message, particularly in a competitive marketplace. Starting with why focuses on values which are difficult to emulate, not features which can be copied. Without question product differentiation matters, but it may not suffice in a world where “Customers, generally speaking, see significantly less difference between us and the competition than we do ourselves. It’s not that they think most suppliers are particularly bad on brand, product, or service. It’s just that [customers] don’t think [suppliers are] particularly different.” Source:CEB

Apple embodies starting with why. No surprise, then, that Apple owns the most powerful brand in technology. There’s no better example than the 1997 Think Different campaign whose narrative embraces a set of values and in so doing, inspires us:

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Which other computer company embraces rebels? And how many millions identify with that espirit? And once Apple has done it, it’s impossible for any competitor to copy the strategy without being regarded as a pretender.

Similarly, inside each Moleskine notebook, a small, embossed card tells the buyer that a nearly identical journal captured the creative genius of Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, and Ernest Hemingway. No other notebook can claim that. That card has mooted the traditional competitive axes of cost, size, and paper quality.

There are many other eminent consumer brands who start with why, like Virgin and Nike. While there are fewer in enterprise software, some do exist. Salesforce’s iconoclastic “No Software” moniker tops the list. As Marc Benioff describes in this blog post, he started with why:

A brand is a company’s most important asset. A company can’t “own” its facts. If the company’s facts (speed, price, quality) are superior to the competition, any good competitor will duplicate them, or worse, improve upon them, as soon as possible. What a company can own, however, is a personality. We own NO SOFTWARE—not because we are the only one doing it but because we were the first to think it was important to customers. By consistently delivering an attitude that is future focused and pioneering, we have created a personality.

Starting with why is the Challenger Sale, the most effective sales technique, in a different form. The challenger sale provokes prospective customers to think differently about what they are buying, to focus on something other than features, namely values. And that marketing and positioning, when well executed, uniquely positions a company to win by creating an unreplicable advantage.

This marketing technique applies to competition, hiring, fund raising, and every important sales process for a startup. It’s an invaluable skill to master.

SOURCE: Tomasz Tunguz

Uncover Your Customers' Mobile Pathways To Win In Mobile Moments

We all know it: Consumers are glued to their mobile devices, glancing at them hundreds of times in a day, and spending almost 67 hours on apps and sites in a month. These glances -- anytime you pull out your phone to do something --  are what we call "mobile moments." What could this moment be? To set an alarm. To browse Facebook. To check your email. To go to your favorite retailer's site to shop. To do seemingly anything you wish.

The meaning of these multiplying mobile moments to brands and marketers is clear: You need a mobile strategy. But what should this strategy be? How can you win in your customers' mobile moments?

To help answer this, Forrester has launched a new report: Master Your Customers' Mobile Pathways. A collaboration with Ted Schadler and Nicole Dvorak , it presents a new type of data analysis: Mobile Pathways. So, what is this data and how can you use it? Here are some key things to know:

• What is mobile pathway analysis? Mobile pathway analysis is defined as: Charting the immediate path customers take to and from your brand's mobile moments.
• Where does mobile pathways data come from? We’ve been tacking mobile sessions in the US and UK to learn about how people use their phones – what sites they visit, what apps they go to, and what string of actions they take in a mobile session.
• What does mobile pathway analysis tell you? In mobile pathways analysis, we aim to help answer 5 pressing questions:
  1. Do customers visit your mobile app or mobile site? Or both?
  2. How strong is direct engagement with your brand? Did your customer go directly to your app with purpose?
  3. What did your customer do before their visit? Were they biding time on social media sites?
  4. What did they do after their visit? Did they -- cringe -- head to a competitor? 
  5. How do different customers behave? Are there segment-based insights?
• Why do you care? You need to set the right strategy to win in your customers' mobile moments. And from the conversations I have with marketers, its clear this isn't an easy task. So marketers, omnichannel strategist, mobile experience developers, media mix planners, and agencies: these insights can help shape key decisions on where to invest, the context of your customer’s brand interaction, and where to place your Awareness and Discovery bets. 

Have a mobile strategy question in mind? Stuck on an investment decision? Check out the report to see an analysis across  several verticals including some top retailers, and learn how this can help.

SOURCE:  Forrester

The Risks and Rewards of Brand Personification Using Social Media

Social media can increase customer interest in your brand — if used wisely.

In this era of economic uncertainty, buyer apathy and product
obsolescence, businesses need to take a fresh look at how consumers
view the company’s brands and what makes a brand compete better
in the marketplace. For the average company, it is quite hard to
achieve the level of brand differentiation that the recognizable business
icons like Apple and Nike enjoy.

The key problem, according to academic researchers and industry
practitioners, is that many companies have become too disengaged from
their customers by relying on cost-saving, self-service technology
solutions. These tend to dehumanize the customer experience and
distance the firm from its buyers, causing them confusion and
frustration, as happens when a call placed to a company’s toll-free
line is answered by an automated voice offering a relentless sequence
of vague or impersonal options.

Fortunately, technology, often seen as the bane of customer relationship
marketing, may also be its savior. The rapid advent of social media tools
provides a ready mechanism to engage customers, talk to them, soften a
brand’s image, and present a friendly and accessible “face” to the public.

Research shows that when brands are given an emotional identity through
advertising and social media tactics, consumers tend to attribute human
traits to them in a phenomenon known as anthropomorphism. They may
view a given brand rather like a person and describe one as “cool” and
“fun,” another as “kind” and “sensitive,” and yet another as “snobbish”
and “aloof.” Brands that have been anthropomorphized in a positive way
have been empirically found to enjoy more favorable consumer attitudes
and command higher loyalty than those that do not.

Consider the upmarket hospitality chain Kimpton Hotels. To portray a
warm, friendly and empathetic brand image, Kimpton created a social
listening desk, which is a panel of employees whose principal job is
to listen to what customers are saying on social media and find novel
ways of attending to their needs. When customers post queries or
comments on these platforms, the desk promptly responds to them
with careful, considerate actions. Recently, when one guest tweeted
that she was enjoying the Kimpton experience but was feeling under
the weather, the desk routed the tweet immediately to the hotel’s local
team. They in turn delivered a bowl of soup, warm tea and a get-well
card to her room.

Yet when it comes to brand anthropomorphism, some inadvertent and
negative consequences are possible. An organization that conducts its
business in a highly methodical and clinical manner can develop a brand
image of being cold, impersonal or even ruthless. Another brand’s
personality may be stodgy, boring and colorless, as the company may
not have made the necessary investment in its marketing communications
and customer engagement practices. The negative brand connotations
may persist and actually accumulate over time, which then creates a
tactical opportunity for competitors. The company’s management may
be oblivious to these problems until it’s too late.

Firms can improve their brand perceptions and engage customers on
social media by making a personal connection with them through upbeat,
light-hearted posts, direct replies and witty remarks. Taco Bell once
seemed a faceless, even dour brand, but now it is perceived as positively
cool on social media and has garnered a large, youthful following. It
projects a carefree, fun personality by using short, funny tweets and
doesn’t shy away from engaging in friendly banter with followers.
Similarly, Lush, the U.K.-based cosmetics company, uses an informal
tone on all its social media pages, where it’s made clear that each
customer’s feedback is valued and appreciated. That helps foster the
“neighborhood feel” that Lush is known for and creates a strong sense
of community.

The tactic of culture-jacking (also, newsjacking) can be employed to
personify a brand as current, topical and in tune with the times.
If executed seamlessly, as Oreo did during the power outage on the
2013 Super Bowl, a company may connect its brand with the trending
topic of the day, appear clever and witty, and have the message become
viral. But it can also backfire quite easily and bring unwanted negative
attention toward the brand. This is what happened when Gap sought to
drive traffic to its website through an indiscreet tweet during Hurricane
Sandy. Clearly, tactics such as these are potentially risky and need to
be conducted with extreme caution and sensitivity.

How do you avoid the risks and capture the opportunities from brand
personification? Here are three key considerations:

1. Use social media to articulate your brand’s personality and core values
   (its DNA), which are often most effective in influencing prospective
   customers and converting them from casual to loyal buyers.
2. Create attention-grabbing content using visuals, wit and humor
   to engage brand followers, but be careful about treading the boundary
   between what seems clever and funny and what can be deemed as
   controversial and insensitive.
3. Understand that even on social media, less is more. Too much content
   and too-frequent updating can be off-putting and devolve into noise,
   so it is best to strike a balance and develop a positive and engaging
   image for the brand.

SOURCE: MIT Sloan Management Review

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Marketing Your Small Business

Buying In On Branding

Everywhere you look, from brick-and-mortar stores to the Internet, you’re constantly bombarded with advertisements, logos, and messaging in effort to get your attention and earn your business. For most business, including small business, building brand awareness can’t be accidental – it has to be intentional. There is tremendous value in supporting a product or service by not only offering a valuable commodity, but also by attaching that commodity to a recognizable, and ultimately business-supporting, string of thoroughly
developed and easily-identifiable marketing practices.

Small businesses in particular should be aware of how building a strong brand around their
company can impact their sales in the short- and long-term. However, finding the right way
to build your brand into something consumers not only identify with, but flock to, can feel
like a daunting process. For this reason, we want to reach out to small business owners with
a few tips on how to effectively construct a brand from the ground up, and begin to establish
a place in their industry.

Research the Rest

Take a moment to think of all the brands you’re currently familiar with. Now, think further
about the brands relevant to your own business – those already in the same field your company
will be competing with for customers. Many of the large players in your industry have likely
been part of this niche for a long time. Yet, there are always new brands inserting themselves
into the mainstream – so what about these particular brands that stands out to you? Do they
have a distinct and noticeable logo united with a strong tagline? Is the “voice” of their brand
 messaging on point with what consumers are looking for in your business category?

Far and away, most companies spend a great deal of time putting together a solid marketing
and branding plan from the beginning. Why? Because they don’t want to wait until after their
product or service is launched to begin thinking about how to differentiate themselves among
their competitors, what they want consumers to experience upon visiting their store or website,
or be tinkering around with several different logo designs when they should instead be focusing
on growing their business.

Yet, even if you’re already established as a business, you can always get a fresh start on your
brand. First, start by researching what elements have helped larger companies build their
presence in consumer’s minds; second, look into the core messaging of the strongest brands
in your field of expertise and see what’s working for them; and third, brainstorm ideas on your
own company’s identity and guidelines in order to build a solid brand.

Get Social

Once you’ve established your brand elements, and sculpted your logo and messaging into a
fine piece of marketing art, it’s time to hit the ground running with your new campaign. With
so much of business making its way to the internet, there is no time to waste dillydallying
when it comes to building out your online profile. Let’s face it – Google loves brands. Therefore,
you as a small business owner should spend a day (or however long it takes) opening up social
media accounts, updating your website, and tastefully inserting your brand into every nook and
cranny of the internet. This will not only give your customers somewhere to gather for insight,
tips and up-to-date information your company, it will serve your business by pushing you up the
search engine rankings towards page one – which is where you’ll ultimately want to be. And stay.

There are other sites outside of traditional social media platforms – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn,
etc. – to push your small business’ branding onto the web, but neglecting the big players may
mean you are shortchanging the reach of your marketing efforts. Also, make sure after you’ve
created these outlets, you keep them constantly updated with new product or service offerings,
as well as taking the time to speak directly to your customers on their concerns and personal
victories regarding your company.

Tell Your Story

Now that you’ve got your brand pretty well disseminated all over the web, it’s crucial to keep
the storyline going beyond social media interaction and the continual fine-tuning of your brand messaging. Demonstrate your company’s brand by offering your customers something beyond
the sometimes forgettable marketing ploys that initially enticed them to your organization.

One way to do this is by starting a blog on your site where you can write about topics that relate
to your company, even if they are only mildly relevant, because even topics outside of your expertise
are still of interest to your audience. This blog is an example. We help small business owners with
investing and consulting, but we also want to establish ourselves as authorities in the whole category,
which means our blog posts don’t exclusively focus on one or two subjects – we make sure to cover
everything of interest to business owners, large and small.

Aside from a blog, you can also spend some time crafting interesting tidbits about your products and
services, both by telling your company’s story in a well-written “About Me” page, and by sharing
reviews from customers from around the web. However, make certain that no matter where you
center your efforts, you are thinking about how it will impact your brand and what impression it will
leave on new visitors to your site – then you’ll really be a star player in the game of branding your
business.

- See more at: http://www.evolutioncp.com/blog/entrepreneurship/marketing-your-small-business-buying-in-on-branding/#sthash.rF0MNi2D.psdRvyrs.dpuf

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