Marketing 101: It's all in the business concept

If you have an ill-defined business concept and a hastily drawn corporate identity your company is in for a whole lotta trouble.

Often, seasoned entrepreneurs and startups fall into the well-known trap of talking about their amazing products and their incredible services all the time. Moreover, some of them usually incorporate the notion of their inborn greatness into their own business concept and hence, their identity. If this roughly describes what you have been doing so far, or it resumes your marketing efforts, read on. You might be interested in what you are about to find out.

Let’s start with the premise that every company, regardless of its size, has a website, as online presence is critical for your success in business. Hence, I will be focusing primarily on online marketing, while shamelessly assuming that ninety percent of today’s conclusions are also valid in the offline world.

Over time, people have become less and less receptive to advertisements, empty promises, and executive talk. When somebody comes across your website and he or she reads your executive manifesto, praising your quality products, your innovative methods and solutions, your uniqueness, your user-friendly products, and your scalable solutions, do not be surprised if the visitor simply clicks away and moves on to finding greener pastures, namely another company that offers something that is more in tune with the stark reality. This is the time when your red flags should go up and you have to figure out that something is rotten in the state Denmark. Indeed, there might be something very wrong with your very business concept and/or with the very positioning of your products and your services. This is an aspect that is worth investigating in detail.

It might come at you as a surprise, but the ugly truth is that nobody cares about your products and your services. What people care about is the problems that they are experiencing at the moment. What is more, they have come to you in search of solutions. If you just talk about how awesome you are, people will not buy it. In fact, the rules of the online marketing and PR game have radically changed over the last couple of years and nowadays, consumers, and especially online users, are informed, savvy, selective, and impervious to old-fashion marketing seduction and appeals. When on the web, people are hunting for useful information that adds some value to their lives. Hence, they tend to ignore eulogies to a company’s greatness and they filter the information that does not have any significance for them. Consequently, your beautifully crafted vision, your sharp mission statement, your memorable message, and your catchy slogan no longer capture the imagination of real people with real problems. The situation critically aggravates if you happen to implement the notions of your personal greatness and innovativeness into your business identity and you offer “the best products and the most awesome top-notch services in the world.” Oh, wow…This formulation simply begs the “So What?” and “Who Cares?” questions. From here on, your chances to fail flat increase exponentially.

So, attention business owners, CEOs, CTOs, PR people and marketers! Before you found your company or undertake a project that entails corporate identity making or revamping, take some time and forge a rock hard and appealing business concept that engages people. Throughout that process try to answer the following set of questions:

• What real or perceived need do the products and services that I would like to offer fill or address?
• What real or perceived problems do they solve and how do they make the lives of their users easier?
• What value do my products and services add to the lives of the people who use them?
• Why should people care about the products or services I would like to offer (Please, do not answer “Because they are super awesome” and resort to the “show, don’t tell” technique!)?
• How do I stand out from the rest of my competitors (What is your main competitive advantage)?

Attempt to answer those soul searching questions as thoughtfully as possible, be precise, be engaging, and focus on people and their problems rather than on the intrinsic awesomeness of your products and/or services! When you are done brainstorming, write everything down and congratulate yourself on a job well done! You have come up with your business concept and from here on, you can easily create your corporate identity. You are on the right track and you are ready to roll! Moreover, your business concept is now interactive, engaging, people-oriented, rather than product-oriented, and of course, it is competitive!

Yet, remember that this is just the first step on the long rocky road to success. So buckle up, and get ready to read about the notion of feasibility analysis and its overall importance to marketing and success in business next time around. Meanwhile, stay tuned to the feed that rocks, follow us on Twitter or join us on Facebook! You will not regret doing so!