Strategy Session

One strategy in your business that has probably changed in the last few years is the way you approach your customers and market your products to them. Marketing has shifted to a large degree from mass marketing to marketing to smaller communities. I see it everywhere--every day. I’m sure you do, too. One key driver of this shift is the Internet.

In his book, The New Influencers, author Paul Gillin looks at social media and why marketers must change their tactics to reach customers. Marketers need to engage with customers in a new and different way. Many of you have probably already heard the phrase “conversation marketing,” which is what many are calling this new discipline.

Call it whatever, the bottom line is this, as Gillin puts it: you have to understand who your customers are, who influences them and how to engage with those influencers.

The shift is not just an on-line phenomenon. Many companies, including those in the electronics industry, are targeting a subset of their customer base with more specific information or products that meet their customers’ needs. John Daane, CEO of Altera, says that Altera went from “being a very insular company five to six years ago to really focusing on vertical applications and developing deep relationships with our customers.”

Focusing more on customer needs was also the basic premise that Gartner used not that long ago. In Gartner’s case it was honing in on a specific, targeted community.

Gartner, the information technology (IT) research and advisory company, a couple of years ago created a new category of research. Called Gartner for IT Leaders, the research is tailored to specific job roles. While the company continued to offer its core company and industry research reports, this new category of research honed in on nine job functions within IT (sourcing and vendor relationships and Security and risk management, to name 2). This is one example of targeting a specific audience with targeted content—in this case useful information and research to help these leaders be successful.

Everyone is bombarded with information daily. How is your company standing out, and what differentiates it from your competitors?