A colleague and friend got $30M in VC funding recently. Good times. It was more than he asked for, because the VC wanted to see fast market penetration into several verticals. Market expansion can be done in multiple ways — new products, new geographies, new customers, new channels (reaching new customers), etc. In my friend’s [...]
Tag Archives | Marketing
Marketing is the way we tell our story so it’s relevant to real people in their real lives. Telling our story is more than branding and logos but how the price, the value proposition, the routes to market and all that tie together as part of a whole.
Finding the Core Value Proposition is Key
I recently got introduced to an up-n-coming PLM (product lifecycle management) software vendor who shall remain nameless. There are several notable vendors already in the PLM space including IBM, PTC, Borland, UGS (a division of EDS) , and about 40 others that showed up on the first page of the Google scan. There was value [...]
B2C Marketing Has Its Nuances
Last weekend I wrote about Cisco entering multiple, disparate markets at the same time. While I thought that vertical strategy appears to be a good fit with the strengths and their customer needs, I thought their consumer play would challenge the company. Here’s my point. Marketing to businesses (B2B) is really different than marketing to [...]
Market Entry Moves by Cisco Warrant Review
For every successful market entry, another 4 fail. I learned that in grad school. One of the few facts that made practical sense, and thus stuck. That metric included every type of company: automotive, pharmaceuticals, financial markets, etc. I can’t find a relevant statistic for high-tech firms, but it has to be one out of [...]
Making a Better Widget isn’t a Competitive Strategy
During my day job, I help both start-ups and billion-dollar tech companies pick market niches and position themselves to compete successfully no matter what size. Most of them start with a competitive mindset that is something like “we make a better widget”. Sound like anyone you know? Many tech companies have this philosophy. So it’s [...]
Getting the Low Down that Matters
Do you know what your customers are thinking? Do they love you or hate you? Are they in the market considering other options right this very minute?
Is Loyalty About the “First Click,” Or Does That Happen Much Later?
That’s the question that’s been banging around our brains since reading an article on the front page of the Wall Street Journal on Microsoft and PC makers negotiating on the “first-boot sequence.” The article argues that in the first five to ten minutes after an OS is first installed, most consumers choose software and services they will often use for a lifetime. The comments from Microsoft suggest they think “loyalty is won at set-up.”
Customization Marketing Done Wrong
When Mike Mace joined Rubicon, the rest of us got a chance to see a grown man wear funky white tennis shoes to work, and well, get away with it. Mike has been wearing Jack Purcell shoes as long as Nilofer has known him (15 years). They are practically part of his personality. Turns out that you can get these custom made to your liking, online. So when Christmas rolled around, this inspired a present. Initially, we thought Nike (which now owns the Jack Purcell brand) was cooler than cool, but as we worked our way through the process we found five areas that “broke” an otherwise fabulous idea, and inspires some lessons for good personalized marketing.
Difference bw Google and Yahoo
The press sometimes depicts Google and Yahoo as head to head competitors, but if you work closely with the two companies you’ll notice substantial differences between them. These differences affect the sorts of partnerships you can create with them, and the sorts of competition you can expect if you end up competing with them.
Sequoia VC Evangelizes ‘AskJeeves Meets Google’ Market Trend
Mark Kvamme, one of the true blue-bloods of Silicon Valley, recently shared his take on what will fuel the next wave of technology innovations. Mark, as some of you might know is the former CEO of CKS, and is a current partner at Sequoia Capital, focusing on the same markets as Rubicon, the Software and Services space.
His premise is this: content will drive the next wave of technology innovation, because organizations fail to access 90% of the content in their organization.