Hi, I'm Drounz, and thank you for taking the time to read this mail, today.
These notes were taken from The Knowledge Project Podcast which was a discussion with April Dunford. "How to get more sales."
April starts strong and direct on this episode. And since this is a very long one I have broken it down into 3 parts so it is easily digestible. This is part one
The what?
Great positioning is about where you have the higher chances of winning and focusing on that and usually, that's the small market the big guys don't care about.
The core of good positioning is on what differentiated values you bring to the customer that no one else can, and great positioning puts that value in a context that no one else can.
By definition, positioning defines how a product is the best at delivering value that a well-defined set of customers care about. Forget all that 'if it's not simple enough for a grandma to understand, then it's wrong,' because if it's not meant for a grandma, it's not meant to be simple enough for her. It should be simple enough for the people it's meant for.
It is like context setting, it's the context in which a product is set to its customers, that's why the most common way tech companies position is that they find an underserved sub-sector and serve that sub-sector and with time push out from there.
B2B vs B2C marketing:
In B2C, decision-making can come down to all kinds of things, it can be from peer pressure to the color of the product, and so many. But In B2B, there are a lot of things on the line, there are usually 2-3 people involved in that buying process, the stakes are higher, people's jobs are on the line, promotions, and positions are optimized for high rewards, there are no "vibes". You can either help the business make money or save money.
Action: There has to be some justification for your product if you are to pitch to a Business.
Emotions when it comes to B2B vs B2C marketing.
In B2C, there is a lot of talk on emotions, and a lot of different emotions are at play. In B2B, the granddaddy of emotion is fear, fear of looking like a bum to your boss, board of directors, manager, etc. So, fear is the major driver of emotions when it comes to B2B.
Action: If you help reduce this fear you can raise your chances.
50% of the time B2B deals end in no 'decision' because the persons involved are scared, and there is fear of them making a bad decision, so if you break in, you are in, and breaking in is hard!
Action: Position yourself to feel more reliable and show the potential to reduce your customer's fear on an individual level.
In conclusion of this first part.
Positioning in a B2B market most times combines a focus on answering the questions of "Why pick us?" instead of trying to answer "Why pick us over the other guys?"
Founders and C teams often think of their product in isolation all the time, forgetting that 100 more people are doing exactly what they are doing. When they should be rather putting themselves in the position of the buyers very often.
Thank you for reading!
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