Category Archives: Positioning

Apr 23 2012
Creativity, Positioning, Presentations, Solutions

Trim-Work

Have you seen the documentary Helvetica? It starts as a history of the font, then turns into a thought provoking discussion on graphic design.

Graphic design matters- it is the aesthetic.

  • It sets the tone
  • It turns utility into usability
  • It is fashion sense

Look around.  When you’re aware of good and bad graphic design you’ll notice:

  • The way people dress
  • Magazine layouts
  • Signs on local businesses

Can you see graphic design (or lack of it) now?

Turn your attention to our domain, enterprise software. Graphic design seems an afterthought, limited to trim-work. Look at the solutions you present. They are basically:

  • online forms
  • with rows and columns of fields, justified left and right
  • and a “Save”  button with cryptic messages about what you did wrong

An opportunity?

Enterprise applications are going mobile.  Decent graphic design is built into platforms (It’s pretty hard to screw up an iPad user interface).

In a world of free creative tools, anyone can take a picture, anyone can record an album, anyone can self-publish a book. In the hands of graphic design professionals, working alongside architectural and process designers, enterprise software can be inherently appealing and useful. Even beautiful.

Our audiences are sensitive to the aesthetic.  It means usability, which means adoption which means return on investment which means value.  Decision makers will choose the more pleasing option over the more functional if they can see themselves using the pleasing option.

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Apr 10 2012
Creativity, Positioning, Presentations, Tools

I Made Them Up

I had a list of questions I expected in the demo and knew I wouldn’t be able to answer; questions about configuration of this and that, system architecture, product road-map, etc.

I shared the list during the dry run, asking who would take ownership for each in the meeting proper. This vetting of the list helped make sure we had the right people in the meeting, and that answering the questions was quick, helpful, and professional.

Someone asked where the questions came from. “I made them up.” Hilarity ensued. “Seriously. I think these are the questions they’ll have.”

We’re so programmed to solve problems, to score well on the test, that these were presumed a list of requirements- yet another homework assignment- from the customer.  And by answering formal questions with the best answers, we’ll be picked.

No.

This list of questions was ours.  It was necessary.  It was the result of thinking about the customer’s situation and what they’ll want to know, how they’ll perceive the solutions, how they’ll attempt to grasp our something different from what they have today.

The questions aren’t requirements. The questions are the poking and prodding the customer will do to understand our message.

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Apr 09 2012
Creativity, Learning, Positioning, Presentations, Tools

Letting Go?

You work in teams.

Teams imply collaboration

Collaboration implies more than one person responsible for execution.

A challenge creeps into this cooperative approach, this division of labor, even when those in the team execute according to expectations. Their execution and vision isn’t the same as yours. It’s of a different quality. The writing – the messaging you’re trying to craft- looks like it came from a committee. The audience will see this. 

But…

How far can you push before the whole project crumbles? Do you let go and face the audience knowing it isn’t the best? Do you go all Steve-Jobs-it-must-be-insanely-great on the team?

Tough call.

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Mar 15 2012
Creativity, Positioning, Presentations, Solutions

Imagine yourself in a Cordoba

Our peer-approved standard is the day-in-the-life demonstration.  Agreed?

Our energy and creativity are poured into the perfect and entertaining demo mold of how our customer could use our system throughout their day.  The premise is they’ll see themselves clicking, typing, dragging-and-dropping merrily away in our system.  Because they’ll see how their life will be better, their business processes improved, simpler, faster, and automated through the use of our solutions, there’s no doubt they’ll go with us.

If we’re all saying “Imagine yourself in a Cordoba, surrounded in rich Corinthian leather,” then as competitors we’re all just trying to win the test-drive.  Heck, if they’re walking on the lot, chances are they’re going to drive home in something new today.

You’ve got to do something different.

Who is the silent party in every day-in-the-life demonstration?  Who is on the other side of the order, return, marketing campaign?  Why, it’s your customer’s customer.

By thinking about that person’s day-in-the-life, how they interact with your customer, and what could make a better solution (the buzzword today is customer experience) for them, you’ll come up with insights for your solution and demonstration that are unique and visionary.   This approach will transform you from an entertaining  demonstrator of requirements into a trusted advisor.

Added bonus: This kind of solution creation gets visionaries excited.  Visionaries are usually in lead decision-making roles.  When they get excited, your sales team will take notice and begin steering the conversation towards commitment and closure.

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Mar 12 2012
Leadership, Positioning, Solutions, Tools

Three strategies

Evolutionary.  Your product has better features/functions/usability than the competition.  You know these points well and can bring them to the front in demonstrations.  Usability, capability, and ease of access all play a role here.

Revolutionary.  Your product has taken the market expectations and gone a whole generation beyond.  You’re thought leaders, innovators, and the risk-taking customers clamor to be with you.

Visionary… in the eyes of your customer.  You look at their needs and find a way to revolutionize their business.  You bring unique combinations of capabilities (some of them even mundane) together to help them better achieve and define themselves. This is what they start to see in the Revolutionary solutions, but here it’s brought into sharp focus.

Being Visionary is the joy of business.  It is truly the engineering side of Pre-Sales.

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Feb 22 2012
Creativity, Positioning, Presentations

A Spoonful of Sugar Helps the Medicine Go Down

Change is difficult.  It’s hard to learn something new.

Yet there you are, standing in front of an audience, demonstrating with great zeal and gusto all sorts of new things and better ways and innovative solutions.

Get ready.  Your audience is about to unleash a barrage of pointed, impatient questions.

It’s not that they don’t like what you’re showing.  They simply don’t understand what you’re showing.  They understand their world and what they do in specific, familiar ways.  What you’re sharing is different, a something-new your product and technology make possible.   And because it is new and unfamiliar, they don’t understand it and they are trying to make sense of it through their questions.

So help them.  Give them an analogy that explains your product, your positioning, your solution in a way everyone can understand.  Let the analogy apply a concept they do understand to their current challenges, helping form your unique solution.

I provided a day long session where I used the theme of a master-planned housing community with all sorts of related analogies: pick from one of four basic home designs, choose your own fittings and fixtures, landscaping is later, be the first ones on the block, etc.  It was a huge pantry stocked with analogies*.  In a follow up call months later, the customer didn’t remember our product’s features and functions, but she excitedly recalled “the house! The house!”

Mary Poppins was a great Pre-Sales Engineer:

In ev’ry job that must be done
There is an element of fun
You find the fun and snap!
The job’s a game

And ev’ry task you undertake
Becomes a piece of cake
A lark! A spree! It’s very clear to see that

A Spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
The medicine go down-wown
The medicine go down
Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
In a most delightful way

*See how I did that?

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Feb 21 2012
2 Comments
Leadership, Positioning, Presentations

They don’t remember the details

They remember their impression of the details.

They remember your analogies.

They remember that you understood their vision.*

They remember you.

You.

*If a leader in the room has a vision you can articulate, it almost doesn’t matter what your product can do.  When you can help someone achieve their vision, you’re the most valuable person in the room.

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Feb 02 2012
1 Comment
Positioning, Solutions

Why Should They Buy from You?

This is the focus and fundamental purpose of sales engagements.  Your company is solid, your customers are thrilled, you have unique capabilities, you’ve articulated your value and messaging.  This is your case to your prospect.

But let’s look at it from their perspective: why would they buy from you?

Because they see in you a path to something better.  They trust in you, your company, and your products to help them achieve their goals, to realize their vision.  They see that you understand their problems and have the insight to help them solve their problems.  You are an expert, available to consult with them.

As you review your discovery notes and look at your solutions, as you  prepare your demonstration systems and fine-tune your positioning and value, be sure to pause and ask yourself the all-important question:

Why would they buy from you?

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