Many of the Pithy Sayings I listed in an earlier post mentioned the critical needs to both understand the target market and then to find a customer. So how do you go about doing this?
I have found that two of the best ways to research these topics are Trade Shows and Public Company data.
As far as Trade Shows go, here are a few pointers:
If you want to find out the key players in a market, just walk around.
If you want to learn more about a product, just ask any of the sales people staffing the booths. Sales people are always happy to talk to everyone (often without qualifying them as a prospect or competitor first).
If you want training or more detailed information on a particular subject, there are often seminars or training sessions provided.
If you are not able to attend in person, you can still review the exhibitor list from the show website afterwards.
You can sometimes even find copies of the presentations from the training sessions or copies of submitted research papers at the same place.
On the subject of Public Company data, what makes them so great for research?
It is because they have to publically keep their investors up to date on their activities. They do this by creating investor presentations, press releases, and various filing documents that provide a good picture of their markets, competitive landscape, and key customers.
In addition to all the market related data, they also have to report financial information, which includes revenues, margins, cost models, and more. These can be used to validate business case assumptions for profitability and ROI.
The best part is that many of these documents are available for free on the company website and can be used for market intelligence.
https://www.darkwatertek.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/dwt-orig.png00douglashttps://www.darkwatertek.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/dwt-orig.pngdouglas2014-06-06 05:19:382015-04-13 04:47:24How to find a customer?
How important is alignment within an organization?
If a car’s wheels are not aligned, it will cause a lot of vibration in the frame. If a machine’s drive shaft is not aligned, it could cause the machine to self-destruct from the vibration.
I believe this same principle also applies in business. If the key stakeholders are not all pulling together, the resulting vibration can destroy the company.
I have to admit that I did not really appreciate the importance of alignment for much of my early career. I simply came in every day and worked hard side by side with my colleagues to build products that would satisfy the needs of our current and future customers.
However, as my career progressed and I had opportunity to expand my horizons outside of engineering, I became aware of all the stakeholders that exist in a business beyond just management, employees, and customers, and I also realized the strength of opinion that can be expressed by each group.
There are founders, shareholders, investors and board members. These groups are generally not involved in the day to day operation of the company, but they expect the company to deliver a return to them – whether it is fast or slow, hockey stick growth or steady progress, or something else altogether.
There are also the other stakeholders within the company, each with potentially strong and different points of view. Engineering departments strive to build elegant perfect products. Operations departments want high quality repeatability and tend to be conservative. Financial departments want the numbers to add up and come in or under the cost projections. Sales departments want the new product delivered yesterday – the date they promised it to the customer.
In recent years, I have seen many examples of company misalignment.
If the Founders just want to build cool stuff, but investors want revenue growth …
If the Sales team continually makes promises that engineering can’t keep …
If the Board focuses the company on a totally new direction solely based on a massive market projection but without considering the true costs and likelihood of success …
On the other hand, there are also examples of great success when everyone is appropriately aligned.
I now know that as a Leader, I need to account for all of the different stakeholders in my decision making in order to ensure the business does not self-destruct from the resulting mis-alignment. I do not always need to agree, and I do not always need to take the stakeholder’s advice, but I DO always need to account for and respect those differing points of view.
How important is alignment within an organization? It is INCREDIBLY important!!
I have been receiving the newsletter from Jeffrey Gitomer for some time. A recent edition had a section about where he said that the most important sale you will make every day is in your own mind.
This is REALLY hard. It is much easier to get up in the morning, and enjoy some good coffee, and maybe some more good coffee, and sit and think about all the meetings that have not panned out … about the people that I met but have not pursued further … about the people I have tried to follow-up and engage with but who have not returned my call or email … and on and on. It is easy to hold a pity party and complain.
At times like these, I invariably realize (at least eventually) that it is totally unrealistic for me to expect that folks I do not know well, or at all, should respond to a single email from me and be really excited to engage with me … a guy that they have never heard of, or that they vaguely remember meeting at a networking event and talked with only briefly.
The easy answer is to be more persistent, and more annoying, and to cast my nets wider. To play the sales cold calling numbers game to increase the odds of my success.
But, upon reflection, I don’t think those easy answers really address the problem. They can be good and everything, but they tend to get me to just do more of the same and expect a different result.
I think the true answer starts somewhere else … it starts with clearly stating the Why. Why should someone meet with me? Why should they take time out of their busy schedules to meet with me? How can I help them? And why would I want to help them? And, I need to make it easy for them to respond! And I need to make it easy for them to say yes!
And, it all starts at the beginning of every day when I need to make my most important sale … the one to my own mind. The sale to myself everyday that says why I am worth it and why I can help and how I can bring real value for those I connect with.
https://www.darkwatertek.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/dwt-orig.png00douglashttps://www.darkwatertek.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/dwt-orig.pngdouglas2014-05-23 05:24:582015-04-13 04:46:33The Most Important Sale You Will Ever Make!
How to find a customer?
Dark Water BlogMany of the Pithy Sayings I listed in an earlier post mentioned the critical needs to both understand the target market and then to find a customer. So how do you go about doing this?
I have found that two of the best ways to research these topics are Trade Shows and Public Company data.
As far as Trade Shows go, here are a few pointers:
On the subject of Public Company data, what makes them so great for research?
It is because they have to publically keep their investors up to date on their activities. They do this by creating investor presentations, press releases, and various filing documents that provide a good picture of their markets, competitive landscape, and key customers.
In addition to all the market related data, they also have to report financial information, which includes revenues, margins, cost models, and more. These can be used to validate business case assumptions for profitability and ROI.
The best part is that many of these documents are available for free on the company website and can be used for market intelligence.
Happy Hunting!
Alignment
Dark Water BlogHow important is alignment within an organization?
If a car’s wheels are not aligned, it will cause a lot of vibration in the frame. If a machine’s drive shaft is not aligned, it could cause the machine to self-destruct from the vibration.
I believe this same principle also applies in business. If the key stakeholders are not all pulling together, the resulting vibration can destroy the company.
I have to admit that I did not really appreciate the importance of alignment for much of my early career. I simply came in every day and worked hard side by side with my colleagues to build products that would satisfy the needs of our current and future customers.
However, as my career progressed and I had opportunity to expand my horizons outside of engineering, I became aware of all the stakeholders that exist in a business beyond just management, employees, and customers, and I also realized the strength of opinion that can be expressed by each group.
There are founders, shareholders, investors and board members. These groups are generally not involved in the day to day operation of the company, but they expect the company to deliver a return to them – whether it is fast or slow, hockey stick growth or steady progress, or something else altogether.
There are also the other stakeholders within the company, each with potentially strong and different points of view. Engineering departments strive to build elegant perfect products. Operations departments want high quality repeatability and tend to be conservative. Financial departments want the numbers to add up and come in or under the cost projections. Sales departments want the new product delivered yesterday – the date they promised it to the customer.
In recent years, I have seen many examples of company misalignment.
If the Founders just want to build cool stuff, but investors want revenue growth …
If the Sales team continually makes promises that engineering can’t keep …
If the Board focuses the company on a totally new direction solely based on a massive market projection but without considering the true costs and likelihood of success …
On the other hand, there are also examples of great success when everyone is appropriately aligned.
I now know that as a Leader, I need to account for all of the different stakeholders in my decision making in order to ensure the business does not self-destruct from the resulting mis-alignment. I do not always need to agree, and I do not always need to take the stakeholder’s advice, but I DO always need to account for and respect those differing points of view.
How important is alignment within an organization? It is INCREDIBLY important!!
The Most Important Sale You Will Ever Make!
Dark Water BlogI have been receiving the newsletter from Jeffrey Gitomer for some time. A recent edition had a section about where he said that the most important sale you will make every day is in your own mind.
This is REALLY hard. It is much easier to get up in the morning, and enjoy some good coffee, and maybe some more good coffee, and sit and think about all the meetings that have not panned out … about the people that I met but have not pursued further … about the people I have tried to follow-up and engage with but who have not returned my call or email … and on and on. It is easy to hold a pity party and complain.
At times like these, I invariably realize (at least eventually) that it is totally unrealistic for me to expect that folks I do not know well, or at all, should respond to a single email from me and be really excited to engage with me … a guy that they have never heard of, or that they vaguely remember meeting at a networking event and talked with only briefly.
The easy answer is to be more persistent, and more annoying, and to cast my nets wider. To play the sales cold calling numbers game to increase the odds of my success.
But, upon reflection, I don’t think those easy answers really address the problem. They can be good and everything, but they tend to get me to just do more of the same and expect a different result.
I think the true answer starts somewhere else … it starts with clearly stating the Why. Why should someone meet with me? Why should they take time out of their busy schedules to meet with me? How can I help them? And why would I want to help them? And, I need to make it easy for them to respond! And I need to make it easy for them to say yes!
And, it all starts at the beginning of every day when I need to make my most important sale … the one to my own mind. The sale to myself everyday that says why I am worth it and why I can help and how I can bring real value for those I connect with.