Business901 » Lean Marketing

Lean Sales & Marketing Summit Announced

business901 — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 04:48:00 +0000

I am honored to be included on the same agenda with noted author, speaker, and lean pioneer Bill Waddell. On April 17th, Bill will be presenting
Aligning the Entire Organization to Achieve the Sales Strategy. He will show you how to devise a sales and marketing strategy built around creating the most value for your customers; how to set prices strategically, rather than on the basis of standard costs, assuring that prices will not cause you to lose a sale. We will align the entire company around assuring the success of the sales strategy, with a focus on maximizing value for your customers and using lean tools to eliminate everything that is not contributing to the prices you charge. When we are finished you will see a clear and practical path to devising a practical plan to creating and accomplishing a sales and marketing strategy, and succeeding not by becoming the lowest cost and price competitor, but by becoming the highest value source in your markets.

The next day, I will be presenting Using Lean to Create Repeatable and Scalable Sales and Marketing Systems: A Customer Centric Approach Through Lean. The workshop will be two-thirds presentation and one-third interactive exercises. A partial listing of the subject matter:

Why value can no longer be defined by what the customer will pay for.
The New Rules of Marketing in a Demand – Driven World
The Marketing Gateway of EDCA > PDCA > SDCA
Lean Engagement Team
Leader Standard Work for Sales and Marketing
Achieving Mastery

All Participants will receive a Marketing with Lean workbook to include a CD that will contain the four published books in the series; Lean Marketing House, Marketing with PDCA, Marketing with A3s and The Lean Engagement Team.

Learn how Lean Sales and Marketing is essentially a knowledge transfer system; it’s a training system on how to define knowledge gaps and close them. Not from the perspective of educating the customer but from the perspective of learning from the customer and understanding how your customer uses and benefits from your product or service.
Learn how to let your customer be the professor, the Sensei, who will take you through their decision making steps and how to improve your reactions to these steps in a systematic way.
Learn how to apply the Marketing Gateway of EDCA to PDCA to SDCA.
Learn how Leader Standard Work is the foundation of Lean Sales and Marketing and the fundamental process that replaces the “Silver Bullet” found in most typical marketing jargon.
Learn how to take responsibility for finding and creating demand.
Learn what makes Lean Sales and Marketing so incredibly powerful.

Lean Sales and Marketing is built upon the philosophy that there has been a subtle shift to knowledge as the way to engage, develop and retain your customer base. Your Lean Engagement Teams must act as a vehicle to cultivate ideas not only within their four walls but more importantly from their customers and markets. Successful Sales and Marketing departments are no longer just responsible for getting the message out but also for developing strategies to get the customer’s message in. The ability to share and create knowledge with your customer has become the strongest marketing tool possible. Lean Thinking is the fundamental process needed to achieve this but it must be viewed from the demand side of the supply chain. We no longer live in a world of excess demand and supply side thinking is no longer valid. Learn how to change your mindset and bring continuous improvement to your sales and marketing through Lean. Join me in Indianapolis on April 17th to listen to Bill and stay the following day to participate with me on April 18th.

The host of this event is Lean Frontiers. They provide high-quality, laser-focused events aimed at integrating organizational silos in support of the lean enterprise. These focused events provide an ideal venue for like-minded professionals to explore the common issues they face in supporting lean. Upcoming Workshops will held in Fishers, IN (Indianapolis Suburb).

P.S. If you buy the book series before the event and attend, I will refund the purchase. Marketing with Lean Series – 4 Pack.

This event will sell out!

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Marketing with Lean Series – 4 Pack

business901 — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 04:40:00 +0000

Special Offer

It is even more special for a limited time, if you stay on the Business901 website for more than 30 Seconds!

Lean Marketing House (More Info): A starting point for creating true iterative marketing cycles based on not only Lean principles but more importantly Customer Value. Recommended 1st reading of series.

Marketing with PDCA (More Info): Targeting what your Customer Values at each stage of the cycle will increase your ability to deliver quicker, more accurately and with better value than your competitor. It is a moving target and the principles of Lean and PDCA facilitates the journey to Customer Value. Recommended 2nd reading of series.

Lean Engagement Team(More Info): The ability to share and create knowledge with your customer is the strongest marketing tool possible. Recommended 3rd reading of series.

Marketing with A3(More Info): Enables sales and marketing to use the Lean tool of A3 as a structured approach for their problem solving, strategies and tactics. Recommended 4th reading of series.

Save when buying all 4

This series of books is about developing a continuous improvement culture in your sales and marketing and re-positioning your customer as the center of your organization. The further we are from our customers’ knowledge base the more effort has to be made to create a larger and larger supply of prospects. The ability to share and create knowledge with your customer is the strongest marketing tool possible. Successful Sales and Marketing are no longer trying to get their message out but developing strategies to get the message in.

Disclaimer: There is no silver bullet introduced in these books.

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Lean Engagement Team Book Released

business901 — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 04:55:00 +0000

Sales and marketing can no longer operate in a vacuum. It has become a process output that intertwines across many of the departments within the organization. As companies have become flat, their decision making is increasingly being done by committee. As a supplier, you must mimic your customer decision-making path and as a result your sales and marketing will also be done by committee. Our highest priority is to deliver to the customer content that he deems valuable to his decision-making process.

Lean is the future of marketing and one of the main reasons is the development of Agile under the Lean umbrella. Using the Agile Manifesto as a basis for Agile marketing or Lean marketing is a good start. In summary they are based on these principles:

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Content-rich material over elaborate promotion
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Response to changing customer needs over following a plan

The further we are from our customers’ knowledge base the more effort has to be made to create a larger and larger supply of prospects. The ability to share and create knowledge with your customer is the strongest marketing tool possible. Successful Sales and Marketing Teams are no longer trying to get their message out but developing strategies to get the message in.

Table of Contents

The Path
Positioning your organization from your customer’s viewpoint
Only the Customer Determine Value
PDCA from the Outside-In
The iCustomer and iTeam
New Lean Thinking
Lean Engagement Tools
Lean Engagement Team
Marketing Gateway of EDCA, PDCA, SDCA

The book is available as a PDF download on the Business901.com website or on Amazon:

Lean Engagement Team (Marketing with Lean, Volume 2) [Ring-bound]

Lean Engagement Team (Marketing with Lean, Volume 2) [CD-ROM]

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Mapping the Digital Frontier with the Multiverse

business901 — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 11:51:05 +0000

Where is the Digital Frontier taking us? Joe Pine has 2 new books out this summer, Infinite Possibility and The Experience Economy, Updated Edition. The Experience Economy identified a shift in the business world back in 1999 and many of the items discussed are just being realized today. In fact, the idea of staging experiences to leave a memorable and lasting impression is now more relevant than ever. the reason for the 2nd edition. In Infinite Possibility, Joe applies his leading edge thinking to the Digital Frontier. This is a transcription of theBusiness901 podcast with Joe, The Experience Economy Author, Joe Pine discusses Customer Value on the Digital Frontier.

In Infinite Possibility, Pine and Korn provide a new tool The Multiverse™ that helps your organization to search the infinite possibility of value creation that lies on the digital frontier. The Multiverse consists of eight different realms: Reality, Virtuality, Augmented Reality, Alternate Reality, Warped Reality, Augmented Virtuality, Physical Virtuality, and Mirrored Virtuality. You may want to watch this short video on on the Multiverse before reading, Value on the Digital Frontier.

B. Joseph Pine II is an internationally acclaimed author, speaker, and management advisor to Fortune 500 companies and entrepreneurial start-ups alike. He is cofounder of Strategic Horizons LLP, a thinking studio dedicated to helping businesses conceive and design new ways of adding value to their economic offerings. In his speaking and teaching activities, Mr. Pine has addressed both the World Economic Forum and TED, and is a Visiting Scholar with the MIT Design Lab. He has also taught at Penn State, Duke Corporate Education, the University of Minnesota, UCLA’s Anderson Graduate School of Management, and the Harvard Design School. He serves on the editorial boards of Strategy & Leadership and Strategic Direction and is a Senior Fellow with both the Design Futures Council and the European Centre for the Experience Economy, which he co-founded.

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LabWorks Opens in the Lean Marketing Lab

business901 — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 12:02:00 +0000

The virtual community of the Lean Marketing Lab open its doors (gateway) on Monday. November 21, 2011. This online community was created to further the cause of bringing continuous improvement to the sales and marketing community. The foundational work is in Lean but you will find a flavor of Service Design and Design Thinking intertwined. Now, the paid membership section LabWorks Group has also opened for training and consulting. The presentation below describes the offer..

So before you buy the books above or enroll in a Business901 program check out the special offers that are provided for being a member of the group.

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Lean Marketing Lab Opens!

business901 — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 03:34:00 +0000

The virtual world of the Lean Marketing Lab will open its doors (gateway) on Monday. November 21, 2011. This online community has been created to further the cause of bringing continuous improvement to the sales and marketing community. The foundational work is in Lean but you will find a flavor of Service Design and Design Thinking intertwined. There is a paid membership section that will be used for training and consultation. Reviewing this slide presentation will give you the background on the project.

Lean Marketing Lab Presentation

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Hope to see you at the Lean Marketing Lab. – Joe

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The SDCA Cycle Description for a Lean Engagement Team

business901 — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 03:29:00 +0000

This presentation is an overview on how to implement SDCA (Plan – Do – Check – Act) in the field of Lean Sales and Marketing. It includes an outline for standard work of this cycle and an embedded video with Dr. Michael Balle, the Gemba Coach at the Lean Enterprise discussing Standard work in a knowledge creating department – Engineering.

Standard Work in Lean Sales and Marketing

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Graham Hill former head of CRM at Toyota Financial Services states that:

Marketing in highly competitive markets is about exploring new propositions on the innovation fitness landscape. The environment determines where to start and complex marketing environments need EDCA. EDCA = Explore, PDCA = Plan, SDCA = Standardize, marketing operations are all about moving along the EDCA>PDCA>SDCA pathway.

The amount of Standard Work that you decide for your teams will differ from organization to organization and from team to team. Standard Work should only encompass part of your time. Knowledge workers should have a a fair amount of slack time built into their process, i.e. Google, 3M. On the other hand, just about every person wants some form of standard work. Most enjoy doing tasks that they are comfortable with and it gives them a sense of accomplishment when completed.

The bigger picture is that Standard Work is what provides line of sight for your team. It enables support and provides opportunity for managers to serve you. More information is available in my posts, Lean Canvas for Lean EDCA-PDCA-SDCA, The PDCA Cycle Description for a Lean Engagement Team and The EDCA Cycle Description for a Lean Engagement Team.

Standardizing your work provides opportunity to spread it within your organization and make it easier for customers to go deeper into your organization for knowledge sharing. This provides a flood of new ideas for innovation and co-creation opportunities. But even more importantly it secures a vendor-customer relationship or partnership that is difficult for others to replicate. More on this in the blog post, Positioning your organization to learn from your customers.

And Standard Work does not need to be boring: Is Zappos the Next Toyota?

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The PDCA Cycle Description for a Lean Engagement Team

business901 — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 03:48:31 +0000

This presentation is an overview on how to implement PDCA (Plan – Do – Check – Act) in the field of Lean Sales and Marketing. It includes an outline for standard work of that cycle and an embedded video with Dr. Michael Balle, the Gemba Coach at the Lean Enterprise discussing the Power of Check in PDCA. The video goes on to discuss how to test your opinion with PDCA.

PDCA in Lean Sales and Marketing

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Graham Hill former head of CRM at Toyota Financial Services states that:

Marketing in highly competitive markets is about exploring new propositions on the innovation fitness landscape. The environment determines where to start and complex marketing environments need EDCA. EDCA = Explore, PDCA = Plan, SDCA = Standardize, marketing operations are all about moving along the EDCA>PDCA>SDCA pathway.

Lean Sales and Marketing is essentially a knowledge transfer system and PDCA is an incredibly powerful tool for defining and closing knowledge gaps. Starting with the unknown, we start with EDCA. As we move along the marketing pathway we arrive at a known problem/knowledge gap and PDCA is utilized. Viewing sales and marketing from a knowledge versus a performance gap perspective, can make things a little fuzzy. Refining the Marketing pathway into three separate distinctive cycles of SALES EDCA, SALES PDCA, SALES SDCA allows team roles to be defined and provides clarity to the process. In the blog post Practical Approach to Innovation used by Disney, a video demonstrates an approach developed by Walt Disney and based on the roles of Dreamer, Realist and Critic. However, instead of thinking of the Dreamer think EDCA, Realist think PDCA and Critic think SDCA. This serves as a great analogy on when to use the three disciplines and how they interact with each other.

More information is available in my posts, Lean Canvas for Lean EDCA-PDCA-SDCA and The EDCA Cycle Description for a Lean Engagement Team.

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The EDCA Cycle Description for a Lean Engagement Team

business901 — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 03:30:00 +0000

This presentation is an overview on how to implement EDCA (Explore – Do – Check – Act) in the field of Lean Sales and Marketing. It includes an outline for standard work, an embedded video that discusses the book, This is Service Design Thinking: Basics – Tools – Cases and reference to another book, , Designing for Growth: A Design Thinking Toolkit for Managers (Columbia Business School Publishing). These concepts assist in providing a path on utilizing customer involvement as a method of innovation and growth.

EDCA in Lean Sales and Marketing

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I was first introduced to the concept of EDCA (Explore-Do-Check-Act) through Graham Hill. Graham was the head of CRM at Toyota Financial Services. He stated that:

Marketing in highly competitive markets is about exploring new propositions on the innovation fitness landscape. The environment determines where to start and complex marketing environments need EDCA. EDCA = Explore, PDCA = Plan, SDCA = Standardize, marketing operations are all about moving along the EDCA>PDCA>SDCA pathway.

As a result it was refine into three separate distinctive cycles of SALES EDCA, SALES PDCA, SALES SDCA. Viewing your value stream/marketing cycle in this manner creates endless opportunities for improvement. It is also easier to handle the team concept of sales and marketing with this outline. More information is available in my post, Lean Canvas for Lean EDCA-PDCA-SDCA.

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Lean Canvas for Lean EDCA-PDCA-SDCA

business901 — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 18:45:00 +0000

SALES PDCA is the framework I use for the process that takes place in the customer sales and marketing cycle. It is a standard PDCA cycle except the SALES part of the framework is where the sales team gets its directions and coaching from the team coordinator and value stream manager. Within the actual PDCA stage the sales team is empowered to make their own choices and determine their own direction to accomplish the goals of that cycle. This framework is introduced in the Marketing with PDCA book.

Continuing with my Lean journey and the development of the Lean sales and Marketing platform, many of the PDCA cycles became standardized and SDCA was introduced. Graham Hill had mentioned the concept of EDCA (Explore-Do-Check-Act). Graham was the head of CRM at Toyota Financial Services. He stated that:

Marketing in highly competitive markets is about exploring new propositions on the innovation fitness landscape. The environment determines where to start and complex marketing environments need EDCA. EDCA = Explore, PDCA = Plan, SDCA = Standardize, marketing operations are all about moving along the EDCA>PDCA>SDCA pathway.

The Lean sales and marketing team is a cross-functional group whose number and expertise are derived from the decision-making path of the customer. You must first have established directives for a particular marketing cycle and a structure to match it. Are you looking for creativity (EDCA), problem resolution (PDCA), or tactical execution (SDCA)? Once you have established the objectives, you choose a team structure to match it. Without this process you may have creative teams working on tactical execution or on the other hand a problem-solving team working on a creative solution.

The question remained how do we make this knowledge explicit? Several years ago, I would have just framed this as an A3 report and placed the SALES on the left side and the ECA/PDCA/SDCA on the right side. However I have decided to use the terminology of a canvas versus an A3 following the concept developed in the Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder. The BMG Canvas has its roots in Design Thinking which I believe is a better conduit for focusing outside the organization.

Lean Canvas for SALES EDCA/PDCA/SDCA

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In the upcoming week, I will blog about the individual Lean Canvases and Standard Work templates. This slide show is meant to be the introduction to the concept.

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The use of Hansei in Lean Sales and Marketing

business901 — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 05:08:00 +0000

Lean Sales and Marketing is built upon the philosophy that there has been a subtle shift to knowledge as the way to engage, develop and retain your customer base. The sales and marketing team must act as a vehicle to cultivate ideas not only within their four walls but more importantly from their customers and markets. If this is true, how do create new knowledge? How do we learn? Most studies show that we learn best by doing and by being forced to resolve our perspective with those of others who disagree with us. This means that you have to encourage contradictions and be willing to push the envelope with your customers.

Marketing with PDCA

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This is a strange paradox. Disagreement with your customer can hardly be seen as a positive mechanism for sales and marketing. However, it is the embracement of this understanding that will move your sales and marketing efforts to a higher level of performance.

Can you disagree with a customer? Can you purposely cause tension? You must! You must move away from the comfort zone and create a healthy tension and instability in your sales and marketing process.

The next step in the process is surprisingly easy but difficult to do. It is the process of reflection or in Japanese, hansei. There are three key components of hansei:

Recognize that there is a problem – a gap between expectations and achievement – and be open to negative feedback.
Voluntarily take responsibility and feel deep regret.
Commit to a specific course of action to improve.

The first step, acknowledge that there is room for improvement is not that difficult. However, putting a number to it may be a different story. When we create a performance gap we identify 2 things, one where we are at now and where do we want to go. Of course we may not get there overnight but there will be limitations. You have to determine what is realistic to achieve. A simple but effective way of looking at it is, “From what to what by when”.

The second step can simply be stated – don’t look for excuses. Take responsibility, feel a little humility and move forward. Without this, you will never fully release from the past and it may be much more difficult to bring fresh ideas to the table.

This is your action plan to move forward. However, without step 2, you will seldom be passionate about step 3. It will just be another effort and ownership will be limited. Ownership cannot be done without an emotional attachment.

The steps of Respect first, Reflection second will drive the 3^rd step of Kaizen or continuous improvement. This is the process and culture of PDCA in your marketing cycle. It is the embodiment of tension, a performance gap to send you off on a new path. This path acts as expanding spiral of co-creation of knowledge with your customer that will be truly valued. THE ABILITY TO SHARE AND CREATE KNOWLEDGE WITH YOUR CUSTOMER is the strongest marketing tool possible.

Few companies will take this path. Few companies will take the time to develop the level of respect required. Even fewer will use hansei and look at performance gaps releasing their own pre-determined reasons. Few will ever practice continuous improvement in sales and marketing.

Will you?

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Why won’t Lean commit to the Demand Chain the way it committed to the Supply chain?

business901 — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 03:58:00 +0000

The Supply Chain has matured to the point where many things are understood and acted on very quickly. Few of us are making substantial changes anymore and even fewer can use their existing supply chain as a marketing differentiator or as an instrument for increased revenue (unless you are Amazon).

Why won’t Lean commit to the Demand Chain the way it committed to the Supply chain? I have been addressed this issue in blog posts (Can Service Design increase Customer demand? and Is Lean and Six Sigma a waste of time?) and other discussion groups and have found it baffling to me that most Lean practitioners resist this thought and either ignore it or try to tie sales and marketing to internal improvements. You would think most practitioners would be eager to apply their skills and Lean to the demand side. Unleashing the power of continuous improvement to the immature field of sales and marketing should not frighten anyone, it should inspire them. Addressing the demand side of the equation is the single most important improvement effort and game changer that can take place at a company today.

What is holding organizations back? Why would you not leap at the opportunities? I believe it stems back from the fundamental way that continuous improvement and quality has been developed. It has developed from the field of engineering which is laden with logical, step by step thinking processes. We find a problem define the solution and so on. It has worked very well on the supply chain side but the demand side is anything but logical and seldom follows any pattern. Value Stream Mapping the demand side may identify numerous waste opportunities but which one would you remove? Why should 50% of your marketing fail? is not folklore it is a true statement. It just does not match up to the logical thinker.

Can you apply continuous improvement or Lean to the demand side of the supply chain? I think that you must. However, you must fully commit to it and be willing to develop new skills. These skills are already being practiced in disciplines such as Service Design and with a toolset familiar to Design Thinkers and explained in Continuous Improvement Sales and Marketing Toolset. It will not be the same engineer that led the quality revolution; it is the Designer that must lead on the demand side. The designer understands collaboration, open innovation and co-creation. He knows that it not only functionality but it is also about design which incorporates the look and the feel. These attributes are the differentiators in products and services.

Will your organization change to meet these new requirements? Will you fully commit to applying continuous improvement on the demand side? Will you hire designers or engineers in the future? Will that baton be passed from the engineer to the designer? Will Lean be applied to the demand side of your business?

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Work on demand, ‘It’s the demand side, stupid’

business901 — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 02:33:00 +0000

Working on supply side economics is not putting people back on the payrolls. Commentator Robert Reich has another idea: Work on increasing demand for goods and services here at home. Listen to this audio:

I am not arguing political issues, I am just trying to build supporting evidence for why supply side solutions are not working in the economy and are not working in marketing your product and services. It’s just simply about the Demand!

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Brilliant – Learn by Doing

business901 — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 02:39:00 +0000

Some kids learn by listening; others learn by doing. Geoff Mulgan gives a short introduction to the Studio School, a new kind of school in the UK where small teams of kids learn by working on projects that are, as Mulgan puts it, “for real.”

One theme I keep hearing over and over is engagement and that it is difficult to engage kids today. In a recent podcast, Games maybe your only chance to attract the best and brightest talent, I found one of the top Gamer’s in the world and discussed with him the art of gaming. His insights into teamwork, respect for people and planning skills are interesting. But what this video surprisingly reminded me of is the basic principles that are discussed in Lean Sales and Marketing. Mulga states kids learn best by

Doing
In Teams
Doing things for real

In Lean Sales and Marketing and the iCustomer (Customer Interaction) perspective we follow these basic three principles very closely.

Doing – you must engage your customer to be successful
In Teams – You must engage customers on a peer to peer level
Doing things for real – get rid of the automation and go shake a hand

Maybe, Lean Sales and Marketing needs a studio school?

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