Focus on the Right Type of Customers

A thought provoking article in the Globe and Mail on the 10 types of customers this morning. How many can you pick out? Are you targeting the right customers? Firing the wrong ones. How many fit into the delighted and ideal categories? Is your value proposition clearly being articulated to ensure customer expecations are met? Something to think about.

Marketing the Value Proposition

At the recent LTE North America conference, one analyst relayed a story from a tier 1 operator’s CEO. “We only deploy technologies to solve business problems. When it saves time and money over what we do today, call me.”

This comment reinforces a common issue we face while working with technology companies, especially those that are technology led. What is in it for the customer? It was drilled into me early in my career, product benefits either save time or money, or make life easier.  Product features need to roll up and support these benefits. If they don’t, one could ask why the features were green lighted by development in the first place. But let’s be honest, sometimes developers throw in features that basically come along for free when building something else and sometimes customers ask for features that may make sense only for them.

Good marketing hits the high notes (the benefits!!!) with key supporting features as needed, and leaves the low-level features for the product specification.