Throughout this blog series, we have made the case that creating and implementing strategies is a full-time job best completed by an owner with the authority to hold others accountable. In many cases, this means creating a growth focused executive role (Chief Commercial Officer, Chief Growth Officer, etc.). In this blog, we will discuss the … Continue reading “Building a Team to Support Growth Strategy”

In the last three blogs of this series, we outlined our framework for organizing a differentiated growth strategy, aligning the organization to that strategy, and evaluating and adjusting the strategy as new information is received. Because of the iterative nature of these activities, the work of creating and driving organizational growth strategies is a full-time … Continue reading “Ownership and Accountability of Organizational Growth”

To this point in our organizational Growth Strategy blog series, we have shared our framework for creating a growth strategy embedded in differentiation and outlined some best practices for aligning the organization to that growth strategy. However, the initial crafting and alignment of a strategy is not designed to achieve perfection from the start; rather, … Continue reading “Evaluating and Adjusting Organizational Strategy”

In our first blog of the Growth Strategy series, we shared our framework for crafting a comprehensive growth strategy. While this framework helps to bring clarity to the strategy, it is only the beginning of the journey. Once defined, a variety of roadblocks exist that deter success, the first of which is organizational alignment. In … Continue reading “Aligning the Organization to the Growth Strategy”

The cornerstone of a successful business is a growing business. However, in the competitive world of today’s B2B companies, determining where that growth might come from and how to capitalize on it is often a challenge. Even for businesses in the fortunate situation of having clear growth paths in expanding markets, creating a comprehensive strategy … Continue reading “Organizing a Growth Strategy”

When developing Service Chains™ it is important to evaluate their business value and your ability to implement them in the market. At McMann & Ransford, we recommend tracking the following criteria to help foster customer intimacy:

Let’s take some time and discuss the power of ideas and their importance as the central component of a True Solutions™.  Good ideas facilitate the road to true customer intimacy. 

A solution is the embodiment of an idea – and how the idea can be realized.  The idea is the kernel of the change in the relationship from pushing products and discussing business opportunities.  Often conversations that are supposed to be about solutions are really about how to better use our products and get more bang for the buck in our relationship; these are valuable issues but not True Solutions™ discussions. 

In the simplest sense, marketing has a direct role in market strategy, participation strategy, and enabling the success. Because of their unique role and perspective on the business, marketing owns or is heavily involved in the strategy of the business, and often drives the decision-making process of how to address commoditization issues.

Anything worth doing is, by definition, challenging and requires fortitude. How do you keep the organization focused and maintain the momentum?  

Let’s keep in mind that companies have difficulty focusing for long periods of time and (like children) want immediate gratification. Therefore you and those who are like minded must be responsible for getting them on the journey and keeping them on the path.  

As we mentioned earlier there will be natural forces within the company that will work against its success – normal, but they can be destructive, as we see in many public cases of organizational transformation attempts.

Internecine warfare is a common reaction when you set about changing your business model. It’s not simply a go-to-market adjustment.  When building a customer intimacy business model, their are several unique attributes that cannot, and must not, be compromised: