Monthly Archives: January 2013

Questionable Surveys

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Asking the right question is as important as asking the right people. We do a lot of primary research work at Silicon Strategies Marketing, and that means we do quite a bit of surveying (so much that we run our own software suite for online surveys). Surveying remains the cornerstone of quantitative investigation even in this age of constant polling where nominal surveys receive less than 0.1% response rates. Which makes the oversupply of sloppy surveying mythologies downright depressing. There is both science and art in survey design. It begins with knowing what critical information is to be acquired – what business decision you are making. Non-specific problem definitions lead to non-specific questions which produce non-specific answers (to be specific). Surprisingly many folks do not precisely understand the business decision they face, and we spend a lot of time in business coaching to improve their focus before assembling their surveys. … Continue reading →

Outsourcing Savvy

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Happily, outsourcing marketing strategy works for everyone. Last year I got a call from a global conglomerate that rakes in over $20 billion each year. They were launching a new product from within one of their divisions. Savvy as they were, they needed help in new product go-to-market messaging.  In the division of that giant corporation, the native knowledge was unavailable. Sadly, this doesn’t happen all the time. Nobody is universally competent. In large companies, even specialists with necessary knowledge are not portable between organization boundaries. Smart marketing executives inventory their talent and outsource as needed to assure everything that needs to be done is done, and is done well. Companies that don’t fail. Early in my consulting career I was hired to help with the pivot of all pivots, changing an entire post-IPO enterprise from a hardware company into a software vendor. The company was successful at what they … Continue reading →

Targeting Buyers

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Marketing is a bit like target practice. You aim for the middle to score the most points. Start-ups are notoriously bad at targeting their buyers. Instead of using a hunting rifle, they choose a shotgun, scattering their marketing spend over vast areas of ill-defined buyers. Thus their spend per new customer is higher than it should be, and their stable of customers contain awkward fits who will be less happy with the product that well targeted buyers. Start-ups entrepreneurs shoot their investment wad and go home without winning. Go-to-market plans need to identify everyone that influences a purchase decision in a viable market segment. If you have not segmented – properly or at all – and you have only vague ideas about the functional and emotional motivations of buyers, their bosses and subordinates, then you are shooting blindfolded and will miss your target. Here are the essential steps in formulating … Continue reading →

Funding Fumbles

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About the time this blog post goes live I’ll be breaking the hearts of a handful of entrepreneurs. Sadistic as that sounds, my job is to insert reality into uncomfortable places. In my speech today I’ll be telling some tech innovators why no angel investor would ever give them a dime. Tears will be shed, anguished screams will be head, and I may get a new laptop if someone throws theirs at me. Entrepreneurs here in Silicon Valley are more common than belfry bats. They exist on the hope of changing the world and getting hit by the money truck. These two aspects mean that they are commonly irrational and unreasonable about their products and prospects. Some of them succeed because they are unreasonable – nothing important has even been accomplished by a reasonable person. Where they often fail is funding. Despite being digital demigods, they rarely put themselves in … Continue reading →