Strategy: How to outcompete the competition

Sustainable Competitive Advantage

In strategy: how to outcompete the competition is about how business leaders can create a sustainable competitive advantage within your market. Sustainable competitive advantage is a position where a business can continually hit the sweet spot in bringing the right product to the right market at the right time. Few companies can lay claim to this holy grail market position for any length of time, retaining a sustainable position within a market.

Here are some that come immediately to mind: Ferrari, Rolls Royce, Hoover, Apple, Boeing, Sky, Microsoft Windows, are all good examples of global companies who have achieved that today. Sustainable competitive advantage is the ability to create and sustain a position within a market. Sustaining a desirable market position provides long-term competitive posiitoning for that brand.

The competitive advantage most companies strategically aim for is to own the space of early adopter within an adoption curve. That position is where a brand is seen as a premium player. Producing innovative new products and services and able to command and earn premium prices for those products. That premium position, finding, and holding the early adopter position in any market, is seen as the optimum competitive position within any market.

By finding that competitive position, a brand often helps creating the structure of the market in the process. A brand which can and does take ownership of that the competitive position can drive the development and evolution of that market. A company can choose to operate anywhere within a market. Market makers, who develop a sustainable competitive advantage, and make it competitive, can build their business model to a defined market position.

Making it Sustainable

Making a competitive position sustainable requires a brand to develop its ability to sustain its position over the long term. That sounds easy in theory, but in reality is hard. Short-term attitudes in growth and profit can easily distract a leadership teams focus. Failing to invest in sustaining their brand’s market position, or stakeholder demands short-term profit taking, are the two of the most common pulls that destabilise a brands’ established market position.

The challenge for any leadership team with their business is to be able to see the market position they want within that market position. Sustainable competitive advantage, the holy grail of a successful business is not easy to find, straight forward to own or simple to sustain, and that’s why it is every leaders’ holy grail.

How to Outcompete the Competition

In mature (and often saturated) markets developing a unique strategic position can give a business sustainable competitive advantage. A sustainable competitive advantage in any market is the holy grail for business owners. To be somewhere that your competitors aren’t, and to have something that cannot be taken away, is what every business leader wants to achieve in setting up in business. It is one clear defining way of out competing the competition is to develop a sustainable competitive advantage in a market.

Dyson Vacuum Cleaners: How to Outcompete the Competition

To be recognised as the market maker, such as Hoover, whose name is synonymous with vacuum cleaners, gave the Hoover brand unbelievable control of the market for most of the 20th century. Hoover, the brand leader owned the global market, with an unparalleled history, and complete market dominance. The brand name itself became synonymous with the product category, everyone hoovered with a Hoover.

So what changed? A loss of focus and desire to continue to own the market coupled with the airplane ticket fiasco which opened the door to new competitors. One man in particular James Dyson who grabbed the opportunity to replace Hoovers’ once held position in the market, launching his own Dyson brand through technology shift of his cyclone bag less vacuum.

His passion, created from vacuuming at home and becoming frustrated. Then seeing the cyclone idea at a sawmill which then took 15 years, 5,127 prototypes to turn into a winning product. Today this winning product benefits upon 60% recommendation purchases and has allowed Dyson to spin his cyclone technology into hair and air dryers as well as washing machines.

Features of Strategic Competitive Advantage

What are the key features of sustainable competitive advantage for any company in their market. Well here are the most commonly found top five:-

Charge a premium for its services; even low cost suppliers out price other low cost suppliers.
Lead the market through innovation; will get to market new ideas quicker or in a more dominant way to shift the market to your agenda.
Controls the key channels to market; from buying decision processes to pricing structures.
Owns the pace of change within the market; from technology development and consumer mind set, being the pace setter in the market.
Control of buyer activity; the significant majority of the Share Of Buy (SOB) and Share Of Space (SOS) decisions through its dominance.

Sustainable Competitive Advantage

Sustainable competitive advantage is an extremely difficult goal. Most successful brands only ever achieve the challenger market position, one that challenges existing perceptions within a market. Developing a sustainable competitive advantage requires an organisation to constantly challenge not only the competition but also itself, to sustain its desirable position within its market.

Creating dominant sustainability requires the leadership to create a clear vision of where the company is going. That requires leaders to assess where the market opportunity exists. It takes leadership with passion, dedication and drive, for a brand to succeed in moving from a challenger brand to one which can dominate its market such as Dyson. For men like James Dyson, the advantage was that he was in the right place at the right time, with the right product. That has enabled a technological shift in the market with his bag less vacuum and a move to smaller cable-less products dominate the innovator position within the market.

Strategy: How to Outcompete your Competition

If you want to develop your company’s position then there needs to be a vision for it. Where it is going and why. If your look for some advice on developing your company, its marketing, its sustainable competitive advantage then contact us at Cowden to see how we can assist you, or read more about us in this blog or at Cowden.

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Values matter in BUSINESS more than ever

Values in Business must be transparent

Business leaders face many challenges, some immediate and others which are not so obvious but can be far more dramatic to business success. In today’s business world the way you provide your product or service and to whom, says more about you than how much business you do. How you do your business now determines your current credibility and future success. Credibility is as much about your values in becoming successful as about the success you have. Values in BUSINESS must be transparent and lived by everyone inside the organisation.

For longterm success your values as an organisation as demonstrated by everyone inside your organisation matter to both existing, and potential customers, in choosing to do future business with your ad your brand. People have choices and they can now exercise them more freely than ever before, that means customers can access information instantly and make choices that are more informed. Examples such as Ikea’s staff misinforming undercover Times reporters about their sustainable and certified sourced products at a number of shops are one symptom of Ikea’s rapid growth and its underlying boardroom culture, allowing the core values to erode and trust in its reputation suffer. The damage to brand reputation from such as activities such as “greenwashing” create longterm brand damage as brands jump on popularity wagons.

Values Must Live in the Moment

Almost everything in life is in today’s world is in real-time and instantly communicated to circles of ever increasing influence and far beyond. A restaurant having bad night can have a poor reputation before the starter has even been cleared away, as customers post live feed back to sites such as Qype or Trip Advisor. Therefore, before the waiter, maitre d’ or chef knows what’s happening the world outside, potential customers already do, through instant social media channels such as Twitter and Facebook, and are cancelling their reservations in droves. Live experiences matter when they happen not in the apology afterwards.

Leadership teams must ensure that their business values are being lived ever day in what is called real time. The real experiences customers face every moment are the living touch points of a brand experience. Asking employees to make decisions and to own the decisions they make is vital for brand to live in the moment, but they have to be supported by the leadership team and not criticised for making the calls they make. If the call they make is in the best intentions to support the customer but is outside the experience you wanted to give the customer then that is not the employees fault it is leadership teams in designing the experience.

Why clean lavatories matter?

The old adage that if you want to know how clean the restaurant kitchen is, inspect the lavatories! This is because they tell you how the restaurant values cleanliness, is a great example of modern customer awareness of living values. Do you live your values or just post them on your website? Is the question customers want to know in establishing and experiencing trust with you, and your brand.

Seeing under the skin of a brand, or behind the marketing facade a brand promotes is now easy due to transparency in legislation, global media sources and a digital world. There are few places to hide as a brand in what and how they undertake their operations. From sweat shop labour, to brown paper envelopes down to paying influencers there are no places to hide, that’s why clean lavatories matter to customers.

Rail companies learning fast

A recent story of the man on the train talking too loudly causing enraged customers to Tweet complaints about his behaviour which was picked up by a duty manager hundreds of miles away who then contacted train’s conductor to track down the loud caller and asked him to quieted down.

This story is very much testimony to the growing demands of customer expectations, immediate online response, not waiting for passing train staff to react. This story is part of the reputation shift that train companies are actively pursuing to listen and understand customer’s real needs and expectations.

Values in Business must be owned and lived from the top.

The values that a business lives really matter to customers and to the brand reputation. Values are not bland statements in brochures, websites or company walls, but living attributes in how people behave (even when no-one is looking). Values start at the top, and must be owned, lived and driven by the leadership of an organisation. It is no-one else’s responsibility but the leadership’s to ensure they establish, spread and re-enforce those values throughout their people.

Learn more about strategy and how to build yours in your business, click here or on the book below.

Strategy: The Leader’s Role by Richard Gourlay

Where Does Tomorrow’s Business Growth Come From?

Business growth is not an accident. Why some businesses succeed and others do not is not by chance. Business growth requires leadership to plan out where they are going within there market. All markets change through both evolution and revolution (think of those disruptive players in any market and the impact they have). This slideshow explains why it is important for leadership to use business planning tools to effectively plan their growth. So where does tomorrow’s business growth come from?

Tomorrow’s Business Growth

In every market there is always new opportunities always arising. Markets do not go up (or down) equally. Some segments and individual customers grow faster than others due to their strategic or tactical successes. Knowing where external and or internal market factors are influencing or driving segments within any market is the vital strategic insight which leadership teams need to understand. Even markets declining do not do so at equal rates. Change happens in every market so knowing where to look for positive changes within any market is a key skill for leaders to learn.

Growth and development of every market happens at different rates, in different parts of markets around the world. Looking out and at tomorrow is a vital element for leaders to undertake as part of their role.

Leadership is About Looking for Growth

Being successful in business is all about seeing the bigger picture and understanding future growth. For a business to grow and develop, the leadership team must invest time building it. That requires the leadership to step back from the day-to-day operations of the business and focus on working on the business. Like to learn more, click the slide presentation below to learn successful leaders work on their business to find growth.

If leaders aren’t looking for growth and the development of their business within the market then they need to develop these skills for success. The slideshow below will show you more or get in touch with Cowden today to discuss your business needs today, click here.

Where does tomorrow’s growth come from by Richard Gourlay Leadership must think strategically if it is to be successful in growing its business. If you want to develop your strategic thinking then why not start by reading my step-by-step guide on how to think strategically.

Strategy The Leader's Role by Richard Gourlay

Strategic Planning Workshop is the model for successful Business Planning

Strategic planning is the process of defining your business’s key priorities as a business. Successful business’s have clear priorities which their business as a whole unit focuses on to achieve. Each of these key priorities are defined within a business as a strategy. A strategy, a course of action which will deliver a pre-determined business goal. For leaders undertaking a Strategic Planning Workshop is the model for successful business planning, putting leaders in the driving seat of their business.

Successful business planning is about developing your strategic plan for your business based upon proven business development tools. The Strategic Planning Workshop pulls these together into a single process. This process takes the guesswork out of your business success.

Maximising Opportunity: Reducing Risk

Taking the guess work out of your business success is a step-by-step process which develops business owners skills to strategically plan their business. Good strategic planning enables businesses to take advantage of emerging markets, emerging trends, develop and launch new products. Strategic planning also enables companies to make structurally improvements to their business to improve its profitability, reduce costs and enhance productivity.

Strategic planning workshop is a proven method of developing and implementing success see www.cowdenconsulting.com.

Strategy: Leadership Skills

Strategic planning creates a clear direction for a business take. Working on your business, not just another day in it, crating a sense of direction, for the whole team to take. Working on your business, from developing your WHY (Simon Sinek, the power of why) through to creating a strong sense of purpose and direction. Where you are going and why is a powerful outcome from a s strategic planning workshop.

Secondly for leaders the ability to discuss their personals goals and ambitions in an environment which allows open discussion and development of those linked to their business is a real focus for personal leadership skill development.

The third leadership outcome from a strategic planning workshop is the forward plan of where the business is going. That creating of a clear focus supported by detailed action plans moves the whole team forward as one.

Strategic Planning Workshop (Slideshare about Strategic Planning Workshop)

Click the link below to begin the slideshow to learn the fundamental skills and how to undertake a strategic planning workshop.

Strategic Planning Workshop from Richard Gourlay

Strategic Planning Workshop

Like to learn more about what a strategic planning workshop delivers to business owners in creating growth, focus and direction then get in touch and learn more. Enquries@cowdenconsulting.com or contact Cowden Strategy.