organic growth

Linking Early-Stage Marketing and Late-Stage Marketing

Dan Adams — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 15:30:41 -0500

Last week we defined Early Stage Marketing as figuring out what the customers’ needs are… and Late-Stage Marketing as satisfying those needs by promoting our new product to them. Many B2B companies (my area of expertise) do a simply awful job of Early-Stage Marketing and then express surprise when their new product fails.

Early-Stage Marketing vs. Late-Stage Marketing

Dan Adams — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:08:11 -0500

In last week’s blog, I described how marketing could be explained in three parts: Design (What does the customer want?), Development (What product/service would meet this need?) and Delivery (How can we get this product/service in the customers’ hands?). When time is short, I’ll often abbreviate this to describe marketing in terms of Early-Stage Marketing (Design) and Late-Stage Marketing (Delivery).

So What Does Marketing Really Do?

Dan Adams — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 12:22:04 -0500

For many years, I held various marketing positions in large B2B manufacturing firms and would be asked this question: “So what do you guys really do, anyway?” I found that mumbling or pulling out some helpful Dilbert cartoons really weren’t addressing this question well. So eventually I began describing marketing’s role in three parts: Design, Development and Delivery.

Three Reasons for Competitive Side-by-Side Testing in New Product Design

Dan Adams — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:00:00 -0500

In the last blog, we talked about a fairly rigorous way to understand competitive capabilities when designing a new product. The punch line was… you need to truly understand your customers’ needs before you can measure your competitors’ capabilities. When you do this well, three very good things happen.

So What Can Your Competitors Really Do?

Dan Adams — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:57:34 -0500

When a team develops a new product, they often fall into the trap up making assumptions of two broad types: customer needs and competitive capabilities. And these are not independent. Here’s why:

What Will Your Company Learn During the Downturn?

Dan Adams — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 11:46:36 -0500

I just got off the phone with a magazine editor and she asked several insightful questions during the interview. One of them was, “What should companies be spending their money on during a recession?” My answer was learning.

#3 Economic Survival Tip: Engage Your Customers More Closely

Dan Adams — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 09:27:42 -0500

This week, we finish our three-part series on surviving and thriving in a miserable economy. This tip can best be practiced by companies providing products or services to other companies (not end-consumers). Outstanding research done by Huthwaite International shows the best way to sell a product is to simply ask customers what they want. (For more on this, read S.P.I.N. by Neil Rackham.)

#2 Economic Survival Tip: Learn New Best Practices

Dan Adams — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 23:26:24 -0500

Last week, we began a three-part series on surviving—and even thriving—in a miserable economy. This week, consider if there are new practices your company could adopt to rapidly boost your effectiveness in critical customer-facing activities… such as sales management, pricing or marketing communications.

#1 Economic Survival Tip: Cut the Right Waste

Dan Adams — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:18:18 -0400

Warren Buffet said it well: “Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.” But even well-managed companies may feel a little “exposed” in this economic downturn. What are your choices? For too many, short-term interests will be pitted against longer-term interests… and we all know which will win, right?

So THAT’S What the Customer Wants!

Dan Adams — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 12:32:14 -0400

Yesterday, I had more fun than a trainer/consultant has the right to have. Each of my client’s teams was presenting its Business Case—the justification for proceeding into the development stage for a new product. In product development parlance, these teams had just passed through the “fuzzy front end” and were about to start spending the big bucks in their labs and engineering offices to develop prototypes of their new products.

How to Waste Millions of Dollars

Dan Adams — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 20:42:55 -0400

OK… the title of this blog is a bit misleading. Most companies don’t need to learn how to waste millions of dollars. They already know how. In fact they are already doing it. The average Fortune 500 company squanders at least half of the tens-to-hundreds of millions of dollars that they pour into new product research and development. (Studies show that 50-75% of R&D expenditures are invested in products that flop when launched.)

Customer-Reactive Sales Call vs. Market-Proactive Interview

Dan Adams — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 19:20:30 -0400

Last week, this blog focused on the virtues of face-to-face customer interviews… particularly when that customer is a business (not an end-consumer), and the subject is “we’d like to know more about your needs so we can design a better product for you.”

How to Interview a B2B Customer

Dan Adams — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 14:29:49 -0400

In my last blog, I mentioned all the ways that a B2B customer (another business) is different than a B2C customer (an end consumer): they tend to be more insightful, more rational in their decision-making, more dependent on suppliers…and there are generally fewer of them. In essence, your B2B customers are very smart… and will make you a lot smarter if you know how to extract that knowledge.

Great Product Development: Is it Different for B2B vs. B2C?

Dan Adams — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:07:18 -0400

Are you responsible for developing new products or services for your company? If so, there’s a good chance you’ve read some books or articles on the subject. Maybe attended a conference on new product development. Perhaps even hired a consultant to figure out this whole new product development process thing.

Business-to-Business New Product Innovation

Dan Adams — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 20:47:56 -0400

Does your business develop new products and services for other companies…not consumers? Pick up B2B-specific tips here to help you generate exciting results. Drawn from Dan Adams book, New Product Blueprinting, and the workshops he conducts globally for large firms. (www.newproductblueprinting.com)

Google Doesn't Have an Organic Growth Problem

Anand Sanwal — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 01:09:22 -0400

The popular blog on all things technology, TechCrunch, recently had a post on something you don't typically see on the blog - organic growth. The entry entitled "Does Google Have an Organic Growth Problem" - discusses an analysis by Citi equity research analyst who argues that Google's organic growth is decelerating.