Are You The Voice Or The Echo?
Image by Mandy Fontana from Pixabay
We tend to give more thought to the competition than we really should - and I say that with the full (and practical) understanding that our competitors can influence a lot of what goes on in the markets we play in and the customers we serve.
We worry about their pricing and their product features. We worry about their sales activities and their breadth of client access. We worry about their last move, and their next move.
We then plan our movements in accordance to those features and prices and products and actions. We talk about defining our brand but, in our practical steps, we echo their strategies as we develop and implement how we go to market.
In other words, we get so caught up in what they’re doing, that we forget what we should be doing. We stop acting like we’re the voice and instead, become the echo. It’s an easy and instinctive solution. And it’s the wrong one.
Because what it means is that we’ve forgotten who we are and what we stand for. Or worse, we’ve never taken the time to define that in the first place. (Spoiler alert: it can’t be about making money.)
It means we haven’t taken the time to get to know our customer and what they really want. What are the prime interests, what are their tradeoffs, what do they need to move the needle, so to speak.
It means we haven’t done the work to translate that understanding into a tangible product or service that will mean something to them. Something real, something unique. Something that they will (figuratively and literally) fight tooth and nail to get and hold on to.
It means we haven’t done the work to, as Seth Godin likes to say, gain their permission. To show them that we’re real, we’re authentic, that we’re obsessed with making them better and that is our primary focus.
Being the voice in your market means doing all of those things. And when we’ve done all of those things, it means doing all of them over and over and over again.
That’s hard. It’s a ton of work. But it’s the only way to get beyond “just making a buck”. Any brand that you and I truly value, that means something to us has done that work and they’ve done it consistently.
So where do we go from here?
