The Two Most Important Words In Business Ottawa – Just like the Yin and Yang of Chinese culture, Marketing and Innovation form the two complimentary forces that make up the whole of the dynamic system we call business. Marketing is what determines your prospects “perception” of your business, and Innovation is what defines your business “reality”.
Your ability to use innovation to create strong and defendable points of differentiation (your inside reality), and your ability to communicate that reality with Power, Precision, and Passion (your outside perception) – together determine whether you win or lose in business.
The problem is that most businesses outside perception doesn’t even come close to matching up with the inside reality. And, the consequence of this contradiction is that they end up losing massive amounts of business, month after month, year after year. What’s worse is that most Ottawa area businesses don’t even recognize that they have this problem.
In order to figure out why so many small and mid-sized businesses have their “inside reality” so far out of whack with their “outside perception” lets first take a look at these two sides of any business.
Your inside reality is made up of your skills, your people, your expertise, your service to the customers before, during and after the sale, your systems, your operations, your procedures, your commitment to excellence, your passion – the way you conduct your business. Now lets look at your outside perception. This is made up of two distinct but related components of marketing. One has to do with what you say, how you say it, and who you say it to (your marketing strategy) and the other has to do with the execution of your strategic marketing plan as far as generating leads, placing media, creating marketing tools, and implementing a follow up system (your marketing tactics). When these two complimentary forces (inside reality and outside perception) come together to form a greater whole, you get a dynamic system that only few companies today have accomplished. Think Apple.
The Problem Most Businesses Face Today
Now here’s the problem that most businesses face. Your customers will draw upon their experiences with your business to form their perception of the value that you bring. Your prospects on the other hand, don’t have any previous experience with your business and therefore have nothing to draw upon but your marketing and advertising. Assuming that your inside reality makes your business valuable to your local market, and your customers are happy and loyal knowing exactly why they do business with you – it’s your prospects who are going to have the greatest impact on your business growth. Now what if they don’t even see your marketing and advertising because you lack the ability to effectively represent inside reality and they perceive your business to be just like all of your competitors? Or worse, they don’t even know you exist? When your outsideperception fails your inside reality– you leave your marketing up to chance. And more often than not… it’s your competitors who gain.
Innovation and Marketing – Your Competitive Advantage
It is imperative that you begin to innovate your company so that there is a distinct and defendable reason for people to buy from you. But even with all of this in place, there is still the job of marketing that needs to be done. So if your marketing and advertising fails to 1. Interrupt the prospect, 2. Facilitate the decision making process, and 3. Lower the risk of taking the next step in the buying process, then you owe it to yourself to find out what Instant EDGE Marketing Consultants can do for your business today!
Get the two most important words in business working for your business and win big.
