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<\/div>\nStarts By Defining Needs And Requirements<\/h2>\n
As an inventor, startup or small business owner, the way you define your business development needs and terms plays an essential role in how you engage help and grow your business.<\/p>\n Because, if you don\u2019t know how to describe what you need, it\u2019s challenging to get the right help or for people to contribute effectively.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve spent the last couple of years meeting business owners at networking groups. People would always ask me what I did. I would say a combination of commercialization, marketing, and business development.<\/p>\n As a way to make conversation, I would ask, \u201cwhat do you think marketing, commercialization and business development mean?\u201d I\u2019d explain that everyone I\u2019ve met has a different understanding of the terms and I was curious to hear their thoughts.<\/p>\n I asked nearly 200 people the same questions. Here are the most common answers.<\/p>\n For What is Marketing,<\/strong> the most common answer by far was advertising. After that, it was a mix of websites, SEO, social media, or some other promotional tactic. Sometimes branding would come up too.<\/p>\n For Business Development,<\/strong> most people assumed some form of professional sales; as in drumming up new business. Occasionally, someone would suggest a focus on how to operate and scale a business.<\/p>\n For Commercialization,<\/strong> the most common response was not knowing what it means or that they don\u2019t use that term.<\/p>\n What do you think these terms mean? How would you ask for help?<\/p>\n Did you know that even amongst industry professionals, there is little agreement on these terms? Even a basic question like, \u201cWhat is Marketing?\u201d,<\/a> must be operationally defined.\u00a0With all the assumptions and disagreement on terms, you must be careful not to assume understanding or agreement on anything.<\/p>\n Before jumping into definitions, let\u2019s discuss why it matters.<\/p>\n When you ask for help, are you describing what you want or what you require?<\/p>\n Examples of Wants:<\/strong><\/p>\n Examples of Requirements:<\/strong><\/p>\n If you\u2019re not clear on your wants versus requirements, get some help clarifying them first. By defining your requirements, and your financial constraints before you start, it will help keep you on track. Constraints are things like your budget, timeline, profit margin and max cost of sale, etc.<\/p>\n Most people look for help by asking a friend for a referral or they go to Google and type Marketing Companies<\/strong> or Advertising Agencies.<\/strong> Some will look for Marketing Consultants<\/strong> and fewer yet will look for Commercialization Companies.<\/strong><\/p>\n Worse yet, people focus on their wants and go looking for tactical specialists. The specialists are often great at what they do, but they rarely confirm what you\u2019re asking for is what you require versus what you want.<\/p>\n This is where understanding the difference between terms is essential. If you know what\u2019s required and can ask for the right type of help, your odds of success improve immensely. Let\u2019s clarify some terms.<\/p>\n Investopedia defines Commercialization<\/u><\/strong><\/a> as \u201cthe process of bringing new products or services to market. The broader act of commercialization<\/em><\/strong> entails production, distribution, marketing, sales, customer support, and other key functions critical to achieving the commercial success of the new product or service.\u201d Commercialization takes a big-picture or systematic view of the business development process. The focus is on pulling together a business system designed to produce economic outcomes.<\/p>\n Marketing is more complicated to define, as there is little agreement on its definition.<\/p>\n One of the definitions I like is from Wikipedia.<\/a> They say \u201cmarketing is the study and management of exchange relationships. Marketing is the business process of creating relationships with and satisfying customers. With its focus on the customer, marketing is one of the premier components of business management.\u201d<\/p>\n The emphasis is on the customer and the business processes that forge economic relationships.<\/p>\n You can find a full-length article defining marketing here.<\/a> You can read an article introducing marketing in system terms here.<\/a><\/p>\n Dictionary.com defines Advertising<\/a> as \u201cthe act or practise of calling public attention to one\u2019s product, service, need, etc., especially by paid announcements in newspapers and magazines, over radio or television, on billboards, etc.\u201d<\/p>\n Advertising is an important facet of Marketing. Advertising is not marketing<\/a>. We always look at advertising as the last step in a 20-step marketing process.<\/p>\n A tactic is a specific form of advertising. There are dozens of different types. They include traditional advertising on TV and in print, out-of-home advertising such as billboards, signage, tradeshows, direct mail, online advertising, search engines, directory listings, social media, email campaigns, catalogues, videos and so on.<\/p>\n Investopedia sums up Business Development<\/a> nicely with their definition: \u201dbusiness development can be summarized as the ideas, initiatives and activities aimed towards making a business better. This includes increasing revenues, growth in terms of business expansion, increasing profitability by building strategic partnerships, and making strategic business decisions.\u201d The emphasis is on creating long-term strategic value creation in the business.<\/p>\n The business development process includes strategy, sales, marketing and more.<\/p>\n The term New Business Development<\/strong> is where I think the confusion comes in. This term generally implies the act of going out and finding new customers, or the so-called outside salesperson or Rainmaker role.<\/p>\n Professional Sales or the position of Rainmaker, is a role people play within a business. The role involves developing trust relationships with a network of people, for the purpose of generating referrals, sales transactions and forging long-term business relationships. The sales role is often described as running a business within a business. This is because the sales professionals are often compensated for their performance rather than paid a salary.<\/p>\n Did your definitions align with the ones presented? Good for you if they did. If not, you\u2019re in good company. Hopefully, these definitions help you appreciate the important differences and how they might direct your search for suppliers.<\/p>\n In the words of Stephen Covey, \u201cStart with the End in Mind\u201d. It\u2019s important to approach marketing and business development from a requirements perspective. To learn how to ask for what you need and not to assume a common understanding of terms. For more details see our article on how to hire a marketing company<\/a>.<\/p>\n Try to make clear to providers, you don\u2019t care about tactics. What you care about are results. The ensuing results-focused conversation will be radically different than the tactical conversations that normally occur.<\/p>\n Why? Because few single tactics are capable of generating results on their own. To generate results, you need to look at your business development system as a whole and isolate the gaps preventing you from achieving results. You\u2019ll also need to track your conversion rates at each significant stage in the process, and then expect to iterate to fine-tune system performance.<\/p>\n To get you started, we\u2019ve prepared a series of free marketing eBooks<\/a> and a book called BEING Profitable<\/a>. Being Profitable\u00a0breaks the business development process down into three phases and twenty logical steps. The goal is to help you get clear on needs and to approach marketing systematically. We\u2019ve also prepared several articles<\/a> to help you shift your approach<\/a> away from random acts of marketing to a focus on earnings growth.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Starts By Defining Needs And Requirements \u00a0Print This Post As an inventor, startup or small business owner, the way you define your business development needs and terms plays an essential role in how you engage help and grow your business. Why Do You Need to Define Terms First? Because, if you don\u2019t know how to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":221158,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[8397,907,29605,29281,20338,8402,82996,82995,16519,5454],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-221157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-marketing","tag-advertising","tag-business","tag-business-development","tag-commercialization","tag-defining","tag-marketing","tag-marketing-definitions","tag-marketing-requirements","tag-requirements","tag-start"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"Print](\"https:\/\/accruemarketing.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-print\/images\/printer_famfamfam.gif\" "\\"Print")
<\/a>\u00a0Print This Post<\/a><\/p>\n<\/header>\nWhy Do You Need to Define Terms First?<\/h3>\n
A Little Background<\/h3>\n
The Most Common Answers<\/h3>\n
How Would You Answer?<\/h3>\n
There\u2019s No Agreement on Anything<\/h3>\n
Defining Wants Versus Requirements<\/h3>\n
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What\u2019s a Business Owner to Do?<\/h3>\n
How Do People Seek Help?<\/h3>\n
Definitions Are Important<\/h3>\n
What is Commercialization?<\/h3>\n
What is Marketing?<\/h3>\n
What is Advertising?<\/h3>\n
What is an Advertising Tactic?<\/h3>\n
What is Business Development?<\/h3>\n
What is Professional Sales?<\/h3>\n
So How Did You Do?<\/h3>\n
What\u2019s the Takeaway?<\/h3>\n
Where to Start?<\/h3>\n