You Can’t Always Get What You Want…

My “Inner Marketer” has been working overtime lately.

Let me just say, right here at the outset, that if you don’t have an ‘inner marketer,’ thank your lucky stars.

Inner Marketers are relentless. They will not let you rest. They make you answer incredibly boring and irrelevant questions. Questions such as…

“Who needs us?”

“How are we different from competing alternatives?”

“What is the ONE thing you want your name associated with?”

So, 30 years experience in the marketing world has taught me to answer those questions, or else your “inner marketer” pesters you to death and beyond.

Here are the things an inner marketer says:

“Find out what your target customers want, and them give it to them better than anyone else.”

“So, who needs BUILT TO LEAD, anyway?”

“How are you different?””

“What’s the ONE thing you want to be associated with in the minds of your market?”

“The formula: Unmet needs drive solutions.”

Ouch.

I’d rather have schizophrenia. At least there are drugs you can take for that.

Here’s what I FINALLY came up with this morning in consultation with my Band mates:

The formula’s broken.

When we talk with prospective customers about what they WANT, we don’t provide it.

We do not sell “the magic pill.”

The “silver bullet” is someone else’s product…

The “quick fix” has a 90% market share, of another market, not ours.

Most prospective customers want a fix. Someone to fix their team, their business, their customers. Maybe their spouse.

“Over our pay grade” is our reply.

Here’s what we do promise:

REAL. HARD. WORK.

Starting with YOU.

You want an excellent team? Be excellent.

You want more collaborative clients? Collaborate.

You want to become a great leader? Lead a great life.

What we provide is almost always NOT what our prospective customers want.

Excellence in the craft of leadership rests on mastery of the art of living.

Through the latter, we deliver the former.

Not necessarily what you want…

…but if you try sometime, you just might find, you get what you NEED.

Thank you, my Band mates, for your patience.