The official blog of Ignition Consulting Group
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-Positioning Strategy-
“Does new business have to be this difficult?” It’s a question Ignition increasingly hears from agencies around the country and around the world. Business development is in fact much harder than it used tobe. And it’s not just the economic recession that’s causing the problem …
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It’s a true and remarkable fact that 60-70% of a company’s market value is intangible; value created by how the brand is perceived by its customers. This phenomenon has been widely studied and plays out in dramatic ways especially in large consumer good companies. A study of brand equity by Prophet quotes former Quaker CEO John Stewart as saying “If this business were split up, I would give you the land and bricks and mortar, and I would take the brands and trademarks and I would fare better than you” …
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When it comes to your agency’s business strategy (positioning), the best place to start is to make sure you’ve struck the right balance between authenticity and aspiration. An agency positioning that’s too authentic is too backward-looking, too focused on where the business was instead of where the business is going. On the other hand, a positioning strategy that’s too aspirational is a shot in the dark based more on hopes than abilities …
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As a professional services firm, the ultimate business strategy is to not just be a category leader, but to create a new category; to be a category of one. The most powerful positionings create a new market, in which you are the leading – and only – provider. The alternative is to produce the same thing most other agencies produce; the stuff that the client community increasingly regards as “commoditized” …
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The effects on your business of committing to a focus that makes the most of your strengths can be not just incremental, but exponential. It’s actually very similar to the growth pattern often seen in the digital world, sometimes referred to as the “network effect” …
“What is it they do again?” That’s the reaction of many prospective clients looking at the list of diverse services listed on most agency websites. The truth is that the agencies with the strongest new business development records are those that don’t try to provide every possible service for every possible kind of client …
As a agency brand, would you rather be moderately appealing to a large group of prospects, or intensely appealing to a select group of prospects? Most agency professionals would say the latter. But most often, their business strategy centers on the former …
Strategy making is about trade-offs. You can’t have both a funky and a business-like culture. You can’t be structured as a local/regional agency and handle global brands. And most importantly, you simply can’t be good at everything …
Companies of all stripes make the mistake of assuming that narrow is the same thing as small; that if you’re focused in one area, you somehow limit your growth potential. While seemingly logical, this is simply not true. Of the top 25 advertising agencies in America, more than half are specialist firms, not “full-service” agencies …
Statistically speaking, the concept of “average” means that you fall right in the middle of the bell curve. No company wants to be thought of as just average, yet that is precisely where their undifferentiated business strategy places them—in the center of the curve. The most interesting and powerful brands are at the edges of the bell curve, because they’re doing things differently …
Although most organizations don’t like to admit it, the way most business models are hatched is by copying the “success” of another organization. By definition, copying means you’ll never really be innovating, just following. And by the time you finally do successfully copy the features of another company’s business model, they’ll be onto something else …
One of the things that leads brands to look and sound alike is the tendency to define the brand’s value proposition solely in terms of product or service attributes. Believing that the more attributes a brand can claim, the more valuable it will be to the customer, brands continue to add more and more features until they appear to be “all-in-one solutions” …
Most managers invest their time and energy in trying to make their brands better, when in fact they should be working to make their brands different. Better isn’t necessarily always better; different is better. Behind the scenes, American Airlines may be working hard to recruit the best people, deliver the most efficient service, and build the best maintenance record. But most of that means very little to customers unless their experience with American is actually different than with other airlines …
Advertising Age recently observed, “The list of great brands that have been damaged, even ruined, as they’ve been milked for growth rather than managed for profit is a long one — and it grows every year” …
At the heart of every notable brand is a compelling brand story. This is the tale of how your firm got started, what its creators were trying to accomplish, and the difference you are trying to make in the world …
