Competition never sleeps

Summary : It is a basic principle of tactical awareness that the competition never sleeps. You must assume that they are always trying to find areas of competitive advantage and working to reverse any areas of competitive disadvantage. During the eighties, the ascent of Japan's semiconductor equipment industry was accompanied by high customer satisfaction with their tools and general dissatisfaction with tools made by western suppliers...

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Strategy versus Grand S ...

It is a general rule that a strategy will fail against the competitor who can master a grand strategy. The reason is that a strategy is composed of one vector where its single focal point is more fragile when e ... See more

Needs and benefits alwa ...

15 Jun 1985

This jewel is one of the most important lessons I remember from Bob Graham. The setting was at an off-site meeting in Monterey during the mid-eighties. Applied Materials was working on its next block-buster: ... See more

Elephants can innovate

Does real innovation only occur in small companies? Not true: here are some big companies that have shown how to innovate. ... See more

If you apply classical ...

It’s not that classical marketing is totally ineffective. But it is only marginally so. The reason is that classical marketing is what tech-marketing gurus refer to as the fluff part of marketing. It appeals ... See more

Segment products and ma ...

One of the greatest problems in marketing is effectively communicating the differences between products so that they are clear in the customer’s minds. Pricing provides one of the most effective ways to do thi ... See more

It is a strategic princ ...

Misalignment of external and internal communications is a common leadership failure. They are often seen as isolated entities. Two failure modes accrue when two separate messages are sent. One is the percept ... See more

Problems are markets … ...

Marketing pro’s love to use the word ‘solution’ as a synonym for ‘product.’ This way of thinking can lead to the common strategic product development error ... Avoiding the error is easy with a simple mental re ... See more

More on principles and ...

The underlying principles and purpose of their leaders govern the outcome of all businesses. ... See more

Sales and Marketing sho ...

When the two are combined, the strategic parts of marketing often get short shrift. This often leads to feature-oriented product development which is almost always a disaster. At the same time, sales should h ... See more

Disruptive products sta ...

It is a common mistake in tech to approach product development from a classical marketing position of identifying a large market opportunity, performing a competitive analysis, surveying buyers to find what the ... See more