MARKETING COMMUNICATION DIGEST

The IBB approach to marketing success for entrepreneurs- Well, it happened again. I was approached recently by an entrepreneur who had tried to segment the market top-down to prepare a Marketing Plan and found it delivered groups of customers who were defined too generally and were too numerous. The numbers were way beyond his resources to reach, and supply and the requirements were so general so as to make the product-service fit to the customer impossible to implement. The drilling down process was killing him and he was suffering a classic case of paralysis by analysis. I suggested to him that a better approach was the entrepreneurial approach because this is what many entrepreneurs do naturally; identify, build, and broaden (IBB). It is a bottom-up process unlike segmentation which is top-down. The approach involves identifying the perfect customer, easy to change, accessible, and fundable with an economic number of similar cohorts. (For many entrepreneurs, this is...

If you want a job you love, follow your biggest value for society, not your passion! I stumbled upon a TED Talk from a very inspiring young thought leader called Benjamin Todd who founded the non-profit career guidance organization 80,000 Hours (the  average number of working hours over a career). I'm still digesting his challenge of my long established belief that to have a fulfilling career you should find your deepest interests and follow your passion or calling. For many people interests and passions change over time and as a result they may not be the solid foundation that we perceive them to be. A much more sustainable anchor is finding where you can add most value to society over your lifetime. To note, this can be done in many different ways; for some this means joining a non-profit, for others it means joining the corporate world and contributing inside or on the side, for others it means starting companies...there are no shortage of problems and...