July 20, 2014 at 14:38How the agency / web studio does not go too far with narrow positioning
Hello, Habr! Usually we write quite detailed reviews on various aspects of management, marketing and sales in the studio (for example, a large overview of how an agency’s marketing strategy should look like material on a web studio business plan template with analysis of many indicators). But today I would like to convey a rather short and understandable thought about the problem that many agencies in the market began to face.
I always told during speeches, lectures and other materials that it is very important to stand out among the total mass of studios and agencies (and there are more than 10,000 of them only in Russia) due to the distinct and often narrow positioning on key services, client segment, technologies, approach to work.
But quite unexpectedly for ourselves, we saw that many market players faced an inverse problem. Increasingly, we are being approached with something like “ We started looking for narrow positioning points, and decided that we would only make sites on Ruby, only in Nizhnevartovks and only for cosmetics stores. We have a problem here - there is only one such store in Nizhnevartovsk, and we have already done it, and not at all in Ruby . ”
Thus, many people begin to grind too much, and the process of work becomes something like this:
In addition, many do not think (or simply forget in a happy wave of having come up with unique positioning) that there should be an increase in work efficiency in any segmentation of the target audience selected segment. Hence the very idea:
The narrow positioning and allocation of a certain segment of the target audience (it does not matter, by industry, by client position, even by the color of the hair of the office manager) is always a narrowing of opportunities. You take on the sight not the entire potential market of customers of your service, but a certain part of it.
So, the effect of this narrowing should overlap the growth of your overall efficiency (marketing, sales process, average receipt received, etc.) due to work specifically in this segment.
If your potential audience of site-building customers was 100 companies, you narrowed down your positioning, allocated your target audience and it became 33 companies, but your efficiency in this segment has only doubled - this is not positioning, but complete rubbish - and it’s not only not useful, but also harmful enough. Given the reservation at the end of the material about the "monopoly position" in the segment.
Now, if in the given example you began to work more efficiently 7 times (once again, we are talking about a certain overall efficiency, which immediately includes a set of indicators both in marketing, in price, and in the quality of the work performed) - then this made sense .
That, in fact, is the whole thought. Do not overdo it and treat any marketing tips with a share of common sense - “action for action” can lead your agency to pretty disastrous results. Think about whether you now have such a problem, maybe not for the whole business, but for some particular service, segment, etc.
And, of course, we must not forget that narrowing the target audience has an absolute effect - if you take a segment that is too narrow, even if you work with a very high efficiency, you can choose it very quickly and the market will collapse. This is still not bad, but you must have a strategy in advance for new segments and the expansion of Central Asia. And so, of course, a strong “monopoly” position in a narrow segment is better than the residual share of the entire market - but it depends on the size of the segment and further development options, taking into account the advantages of using this mini-monopoly. These advantages are often quite significant and can slightly offset the discrepancy between the narrowing of the target audience and the growth of efficiency in the segment.
Terekhov Andrey, according to the results of communication with various studios in the framework of the Ruward project and not only.
I always told during speeches, lectures and other materials that it is very important to stand out among the total mass of studios and agencies (and there are more than 10,000 of them only in Russia) due to the distinct and often narrow positioning on key services, client segment, technologies, approach to work.
But quite unexpectedly for ourselves, we saw that many market players faced an inverse problem. Increasingly, we are being approached with something like “ We started looking for narrow positioning points, and decided that we would only make sites on Ruby, only in Nizhnevartovks and only for cosmetics stores. We have a problem here - there is only one such store in Nizhnevartovsk, and we have already done it, and not at all in Ruby . ”
Thus, many people begin to grind too much, and the process of work becomes something like this:
In addition, many do not think (or simply forget in a happy wave of having come up with unique positioning) that there should be an increase in work efficiency in any segmentation of the target audience selected segment. Hence the very idea:
The narrow positioning and allocation of a certain segment of the target audience (it does not matter, by industry, by client position, even by the color of the hair of the office manager) is always a narrowing of opportunities. You take on the sight not the entire potential market of customers of your service, but a certain part of it.
So, the effect of this narrowing should overlap the growth of your overall efficiency (marketing, sales process, average receipt received, etc.) due to work specifically in this segment.
If your potential audience of site-building customers was 100 companies, you narrowed down your positioning, allocated your target audience and it became 33 companies, but your efficiency in this segment has only doubled - this is not positioning, but complete rubbish - and it’s not only not useful, but also harmful enough. Given the reservation at the end of the material about the "monopoly position" in the segment.
Now, if in the given example you began to work more efficiently 7 times (once again, we are talking about a certain overall efficiency, which immediately includes a set of indicators both in marketing, in price, and in the quality of the work performed) - then this made sense .
That, in fact, is the whole thought. Do not overdo it and treat any marketing tips with a share of common sense - “action for action” can lead your agency to pretty disastrous results. Think about whether you now have such a problem, maybe not for the whole business, but for some particular service, segment, etc.
And, of course, we must not forget that narrowing the target audience has an absolute effect - if you take a segment that is too narrow, even if you work with a very high efficiency, you can choose it very quickly and the market will collapse. This is still not bad, but you must have a strategy in advance for new segments and the expansion of Central Asia. And so, of course, a strong “monopoly” position in a narrow segment is better than the residual share of the entire market - but it depends on the size of the segment and further development options, taking into account the advantages of using this mini-monopoly. These advantages are often quite significant and can slightly offset the discrepancy between the narrowing of the target audience and the growth of efficiency in the segment.
Terekhov Andrey, according to the results of communication with various studios in the framework of the Ruward project and not only.