“No Customer Success = No Your Success”
One of the greatest business leadership gurus of all time is a man called Peter Drucker who said the following:
"Marketing and innovation make money. Everything else is a cost".
It is quite easily one of the most profound things said on #Entrepreneurship—ever!
This is the type of statement I would write up on a poster, and put on every entrepreneur’s wall for you to read every day until you Get it! And if you say you Get it now, you have not yet Got It!
You have to learn to market the Product. You only become a true entrepreneur when you can Market effectively
Now I have spoken a lot about Innovation on this platform, but I have never spoken about Marketing. Only a true entrepreneur can truly appreciate that you have to learn to market the Product! And it is actually not easy!
There are a lot of people who can invent a product, or even come up with a truly groundbreaking new innovation, but you only become a true entrepreneur when you can Market effectively. It is something that even now I’m still learning to do.
Advertising is not Marketing, it is just part of Marketing! Many of you are in the Senior Class now, and I want you to begin to reflect deeply about marketing, and the process of developing a brand.
Think about this a minute: How rational is it that you can buy a plain white shirt or a blouse from a store (an unbranded store) at one price... and right next door, it is being sold by Gucci for 100x more?!
Does the person who enters Gucci not know that it is almost exactly the same item that is cheaper next door? They do, and they don’t care! So Gucci makes the real money! (I know there may be some notable differences to discerning customers, but you get my point... the Gucci's began their luxury brand in 1921!)
As an entrepreneur, I only began to make money after wrestling with this issue, and coming to understand it (in part) through intense study. Now, it is your turn!
I look at the great entrepreneurs of all time, and what they all have in common is a unique gift to Marketing their product with a burning passion. The style might differ, but the ability is the same: Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Jack Ma, Sam Walton, Akio Morita ... all of them had a burning passion for marketing, and innovation!
Even before you go out to sell something, you must learn to Market effectively, and in an innovative way.
There is more to being able to sell than standing on a street corner and shout to (people you hope will become!) your customers, but your ability should reflect the passion of the man who is willing to spend all day on that street corner. Personally I have a lot of empathy with small informal traders who sell at street corners and markets.
As a young entrepreneur, one of my favorite pastimes was reading the autobiographies of great entrepreneurs, and without doubt, I loved the chapters where they talk about selling their products and building up customers. In the beginning, they almost all did it by themselves, and even when the business grew bigger, they kept a hold of this part of their business the longest. Sales is where you are in closest proximity to the most important person in the business: the customer!
Marketing is not just something you learn from experience. Today it is a highly complex discipline about which many tens of thousands of books have been written. Also, it is a subject of college and university study. If you go into my study and look at my business books, guess which subject has the most books? Marketing!
Even if you studied Marketing at university level, it is a subject that is constantly and rapidly evolving, such that you must keep in touch with its developments and techniques, constantly.
__The simple fact is this: as great as your product may be, if you lose touch with marketing and sales techniques as they evolve, you may not be able to survive in business.
In this short series, I will talk to you about marketing. I want to engage you in how you deal with this important aspect of the process. It is about the “Master of Scale”, as Reid Hoffman (founder of LinkedIn) likes to say.
So let’s get started by talking about your own business.
Do you have a Marketing strategy? Is it as innovative as your product or service? How do you listen to your customer?
Tell me about it.
What do you want to learn?
To be continued. . .
Afterthought 1. “Simply put: No Customer Success = No Your Success. You make sure your customers are successful and they’ll make sure you’re successful". Lincoln Murphy.
Afterthought 2. The entrepreneurs who have always fascinated me the most, are the guys that take something quite basic, like a “hamburger” (a bun with meat and onions, and perhaps some cheese) and create a brand like McDonald’s! #Absolute genius!
Afterthought 3. The other day, I spent a whole evening watching a documentary on the bottled water industry in the USA. So many of these guys basically take tap water, and put their label on it, and it sells for 10,000x the value of tap water! Shall we call it a “scam”? No! Because the people that buy it, know what it is, and they are very educated people, and they choose to pay that money!
As an entrepreneur, I need you to study marketing, and aspects of marketing such as packaging and advertising.
Afterthought 5. Marketing is a deceptive skill because most entrepreneurs think they know what it is, when in fact they have never actually done anything to study the subject. After a few years, they are so convinced they know what it is, it becomes impossible to teach them anything!
Afterthought 6. A business that does not spend money on Marketing is throwing away a big part of its profits, even when they are selling everything they have (particularly so!)... Don’t wake him up, if he is sleeping!
Reflection:
“Marketing and Innovation make money. Everything else is cost”
~Peter Drucker.
Why do I keep coming back to this statement? It is so loaded! He is actually saying that to “make money” in business you need to focus on three things!
Recap: If you want to start, and grow a business, you focus on three things:
(1). Product;
(2). People;
(3). Process.
But, if you want to “make money” through a successful business, you focus on three things!
Can you list the three things?
—The answer is in what Peter Drucker said!
#Perfect score!
Kachavhi Gift writes,
(1). Innovation
(2). Marketing
(3) Costs
To make "money" through a successful business you need to keep on innovating, strategize on marketing and reduce costs by all means.
My reply: You got a perfect score. The answer was right there in the statement itself.
Reflection: If you have time today, sit with your browser and study the perfume industry. Look at expensive brands like Chanel of France.
Did you know that the contents of each bottle of perfume costs a fraction of the cost of the bottle and box in which it is sold?
Like Bottled Water which I have used in this discussion, perfumery is a business driven completely by skilled marketing.
It is one of the best examples of what Peter Drucker meant when he said:
“Marketing and Innovation make money, everything else is cost”.
Lets acquire this skill called marketing!
Pause: My first brand was a service called “Buddie”:
Our objective was to “sell” pre-paid, cell phone lines, but we created a brand called “Buddie”.
We spent months developing our marketing strategy around this brand.
We literally created a “persona” around this brand. When we finally released it, people went crazy.
Unilever doesn’t “sell” soap; they have “Dove”.
Nestle doesn't “sell” water, they “market” a brand called “Perrier”!
Stop selling, start marketing!
Naboth Munemo writes,
Thank you Chief for this great lesson on marketing "creating a successful brand". My Question now is "how, one can create a successful brand?". How Coca-Cola managed to create a brand that sell a black drink. There should be a great mystery behind this, Am on it researching more on creating a successful brand that sells. Thank you Sir.
My reply,
It is only by asking this type of knowledge that we will come to understand the genius of marketing in order to emerge with a brand like Coke!
There are hundreds of books, and articles written about Coca Cola’s “Marketing Prowess”. Go on line and look for books on the history of Coca Cola.
Adebimpe Ayodele writes,
@ sir strive masiyiwa.When I first started my business.I divided my market into five segmentation which has really helped me a lot. I had Government/Parastatals,Institutions/Schools, Multinational Companies& Gas &Oil,Banks and Telecoms,Agencies and associations.For each of these segment,somebody would handle and report at the end of the month. Marketing is fun and it pays.
My reply,
This is your #Sales strategy. It has nothing to do with marketing.
Pause: “Make money”: means “Profit”! Serious entrepreneurs don’t confuse “revenue” (gross income) with PROFIT.
Profit is driven by attention to three things:
#1. Innovation;
#2. Marketing;
#3. Cost management.
When you have a perfect balance of these three, you are “making money”!
Abel Moyo writes,
Strive Masiyiwa i am eager to find out how marketing can be applied to a small business because i just realized all im doing is sales 101
My reply,
When my business was a small start-up, I grappled with this issue. I was growing through sales, which meant that my margins were small in a very competitive industry. Then I discovered #Marketing!
I began to buy books from marketing experts around the world to give myself a deeper understanding.
You must consider doing a course Online in marketing.
I got to understand what is a Brand [not the way most people talk about it]:
(1). I defined my brand very carefully, and differentiated myself;
(2). Unless you are prepared to spend money, you are not committed to marketing.
Every month I set aside 10% of my money to pay for marketing.
When I advertised, I did not even say what my company did.
With my small budget I tried to be very Innovative on marketing.
I once went to the local authority and asked them if I could replace some bus shelters. I bought some bus shelters and public bins in shopping malls. In those days, it was so new.
I went to local schools and fixed play grounds in exchange for leaving my bill board.
Many people would often remark that our company must be very big, because they thought these things could only be done by big companies.
As my “brand equity” grew, people in our business looked for me.
There are so many things that you can do even with a small business and small budget that are really innovative.
Pause: In the same way a good football coach can spot a talented young player, I have become wired to spot and admire powerful marketing campaigns!
There is a South African restaurant chain called Spurs. I remember how they came up with an innovation in marketing:
Celebrating children’s birthdays!
Being a parent of young children, we were at a Spurs virtually every weekend, either for our own kids, or their friends!
It was amazing:
Overnight their franchise chain expanded rapidly, and now they are all over Africa.
McDonalds Restaurants were all about cheap toys with a meal for infants. This marketing innovation enabled them to draw parents, and they could push up their prices.
This type of Innovative approach to marketing creates price elasticity [gives you room to make more money] even in a business that looks cut throat.
Now, here is an exercise for you:
From today open your eyes to professionally spotting great marketing which is not just sales.
Make it your hobby!
You can even comment on it here, because that way you might give others an opportunity to @Fast Follow!
Someone said : Sometimes customers are troublesome
My reply: A person who sees customers “as troublesome” is destined for failure.
Look; not everyone who goes into a business is actually an entrepreneur. Some are just trying to make money, and these are the ones most likely to feel customers are troublesome.
The true entrepreneur studies carefully the “troublesome customer” and seeks to develop some learning for themselves that ultimately lead to a better business.
Related Topics : Business, Marketing, Strive Masiyiwa,
