Marketing Canvas - Aspirations

Last edit: 20/10/2024: The final edits focus on reviewing the scoring system and refining the Green Clean example.

In a nutshell

Aspirations in the Marketing Canvas help businesses uncover the deeper, often emotional and social goals that customers strive to fulfill through their product or service. Aspirations move beyond functional needs and focus on the personal growth, societal impact, and environmental contribution that customers seek. Identifying these aspirations enables businesses to create stronger emotional connections and long-term relationships with their audience.

For example, Green Clean customers likely aspire to more than just maintaining a clean home. They may also want to live a healthier life, reduce their environmental footprint, and contribute positively to their community. By understanding these aspirations, Green Clean can better align its marketing and service strategies with the values that resonate most with its customers.

In the Marketing Canvas

The Marketing Canvas is a powerful tool for entrepreneurs and non-marketers to build a robust marketing strategy. It consists of six meta-dimensions, each with four sub-dimensions, for a total of 24 sub-dimensions defining your Marketing Strategy. One of these sub-dimensions is ASPIRATIONS, which falls under the CUSTOMER meta-dimension.

Introduction

The Aspirations sub-dimension is part of the Customer category within the Marketing Canvas. It focuses on understanding the personal, societal, and environmental aspirations that customers have when interacting with a product or service. These aspirations often reflect the desire to improve themselves, their community, or the world around them.

While Jobs To Be Done helps identify what customers aim to accomplish in the short term, Aspirations delve into the long-term goals and ideal visions that shape their decisions.

The importance of defining Marketing aspirations

Aspirations are the personal dreams, social causes, and environmental goals that drive customers' choices. They represent the deeper values and long-term visions customers hold for themselves and the world. Unlike functional needs, aspirations are often intangible but highly influential in shaping behavior.

For example, Green Clean’s customers may aspire to:

• Improve their health by maintaining a safe, non-toxic home environment.

• Support environmental sustainability by reducing waste and using eco-friendly products.

• Be role models in their community by setting a positive example of environmental responsibility.

These aspirations connect to broader societal and environmental movements, giving brands like Green Clean a pathway to build meaningful connections with their customers.

Aspirations: an in-depth perspective

Customers often seek products or services that align with their broader goals for personal growth, societal impact, or environmental contribution. They look for solutions that help them achieve not only immediate functional needs but also their vision for a better self or a better world.

For example, customers using Green Clean might aspire to:

• Live more sustainably by choosing eco-friendly products that align with their environmental values.

• Contribute positively to society by promoting sustainability and setting an example for others, reflecting their societal values.

• Improve their personal well-being by creating a healthy, toxin-free living space, aligned with their personal values.

Understanding these deeper aspirations helps businesses tailor their marketing and offerings to align with the customer’s long-term goals.

How the Marketing Canvas aligns aspirations and strategy

To effectively connect with customer aspirations, businesses need to focus on the emotional, societal, and environmental goals of their target audience. Understanding aspirations allows companies to align their strategies with their customers' vision for the future, building loyalty and fostering deeper relationships.

Questions to consider:

• What personal aspirations do your customers have that align with their values?

• How does your product or service help them contribute to society or the environment?

• How can your marketing reflect their vision for personal growth or impact on the world?

Aspirationals are defined by their love of shopping, desire for responsible consumption, and their trust in brands to act in the best interest of society [1]

Examples

Example 1: Patagonia

Patagonia, the outdoor clothing and gear company, has an audience whose aspirations go beyond just having quality outdoor clothing. Their customers aspire to protect the environment, which is why Patagonia's commitment to sustainability, ethical sourcing, and environmental activism resonates with them. Patagonia's alignment with these aspirations has helped them cultivate a highly loyal customer base.

Example 2: Tesla

Tesla's customers are not just buying a car; they are buying into a vision of a sustainable, technologically advanced future. Customers' aspirations here include reducing their carbon footprint, being part of cutting-edge technology, and the status associated with owning a Tesla. Elon Musk understood these aspirations and built Tesla's brand around them.

Example 3: Dove

Dove, a personal care brand, understood that their customers aspired to real, authentic beauty rather than the unattainable standards often portrayed in the media. Their "Real Beauty" campaign resonated deeply with customers worldwide, helping the brand build a strong emotional connection with its audience.

Statements for self-assessment

For a comprehensive evaluation of your understanding and application of the Aspirations concept, rate your agreement with the following statements on a scale from -3 (completely disagree) to +3 (completely agree):

1. You have clearly identified consumers' aspirations for improving themselves (personal values).

2. You have clearly identified consumers' aspirations for improving the world around them (societal values).

3. You have clearly identified consumers' aspirations for improving the world around them (environmental values).

Interpretation of the scores

• Negative scores (-1 to -3): A negative score suggests that you disagree or strongly disagree with the statement, meaning you lack a solid understanding of your customers' aspirations, whether they are personal, societal, or environmental. This could result in your marketing and offerings being out of sync with the emotional and values-driven goals of your audience, weakening brand loyalty and connection.

• A score of zero (0): A neutral score reflects uncertainty or only a surface-level understanding of your customers’ aspirations. You may recognize that aspirations exist but do not fully grasp how these emotional, societal, or environmental goals influence customer behavior. Further exploration is needed to deepen your understanding of their long-term aspirations.

• Positive scores (+1 to +3): Positive scores indicate agreement with the statements, meaning you have a strong understanding of your customers' personal, societal, and environmental aspirations. You recognize how these aspirations shape decision-making and can align your product and marketing strategies with their broader goals. This deeper understanding helps you build a stronger emotional connection with your customers and reinforce their loyalty to your brand.

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Marketing Canvas Method - Customers - Aspirations by Laurent Bouty

Case study: Green Clean's aspirations

• Misaligned understanding (-3, -2, -1): Green Clean focuses only on functional needs (cleaning services) and does not recognize its customers' aspirations for personal, societal, or environmental improvement. By ignoring these deeper aspirations, Green Clean risks losing customers who value sustainability and seek brands that reflect their broader goals for positive change.

• Surface understanding (0): Green Clean acknowledges that its customers have aspirations, such as wanting eco-friendly products, but it does not fully understand the emotional significance behind these aspirations. The company might see environmental responsibility as a secondary factor, without realizing how central it is to the customer's personal, societal, and environmental values. This limits their ability to connect deeply with their customers.

• Deep understanding (+1, +2, +3): Green Clean fully understands its customers' aspirations for personal well-being, societal contribution, and environmental responsibility. The company aligns its services and marketing strategies with these aspirations by offering eco-friendly solutions, promoting sustainability, and helping customers achieve their vision for a healthier, more sustainable lifestyle. This deep understanding strengthens the emotional bond between Green Clean and its customers, making the brand a trusted partner in their long-term journey.

Sources

1. https://blog.globalwebindex.com/trends/why-aspirational-consumers-matter/

2. Report: https://globescan.com/five-human-aspirations-and-the-future-of-brands/

3. "Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action" by Simon Sinek

4. "Building a StoryBrand: Clarify Your Message So Customers Will Listen" by Donald Miller

More on the Marketing Canvas

Hack: Marketing Canvas and Triple Bottom Line

As Marketers, we are not excused for being complaisant with the world around us. It should have been always the case but today the situation is so critical that we need to take action.

REVISIT STEP 2 - SET YOUR GOAL

The original approach at Step 2 was profit oriented. Indeed, during this step, we recommend to set a financial goal (revenue) before starting step 3 which is the assessment.

The triple bottom line approach (wikipedia) as proposed by John Elkington consists of extending the bottom line concept with sustainable elements. In addition to Profit, Elkington proposed to add Planet and People. The Marketing Canvas Method can be easily hacked for integrating the Triple Bottom Line concept by simply changing the way Goals are set during step 2.

HOW?

At Step 2, you can define goal for Profit (original approach) but also goal for Planet and People. It is not fully clear for me whether a standard framework exists with clear KPIs linking Marketing Strategy and Planet/People elements. You can chose the goals that would specifically work for you when discussing Planet and People topics. Based on a very quick desk research, I identified few topics that could be used for defining objectives for Planet and People. It would be interesting to have your point of views and make this list more robust. Don’t hesitate to comment this post.

LIST OF GOALS FOR PEOPLE AND PLANET

• Energy Management: How could you reduce your energy consumption and use more renewable energy when executing your marketing strategy? Goal?

• Resource Management: How could you make use of resources for your marketing strategy in such a way that our next generation or in future there are no effects on the resource? Goal?

• Waste Management: How could you collect, transport, process or dispose of, manage and monitor various waste materials generated by your marketing strategy? Goal?

• Employee Welfare: How could you reinforce employee welfare when executing your marketing strategy? Goal?

• Fair Trade: How could you reinforce fairness in your marketing strategy through dialogue, transparency and respect, that seeks greater equity in international trade? Goal?

• Cause Marketing: How can you better the society while executing your marketing strategy? Goal?

PROCESS

When you have defined these goals (e.g. CO2), you can apply the Marketing Canvas Method for assessing your current situation (STEP 3). Let’s take 2 examples from the 24 dimensions.:

• JOB TO BE DONE (CUSTOMERS): Is the knowledge of your customers’ job to be done helping you from achieving your goals?

• FEATURES (VALUE PROPOSITION): Are the features of your value proposition helping you achieve your goals?

By asking these questions, you have interesting discussions about your current ability to achieve these goals (like CO2) or not (Brake or Accelerator).

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Marketing Canvas Method and Triple Bottom Line

Marketing Canvas - Market and Economic Value

Economic value: what is it?

Economic value can be described as a measure of the benefit from a good or service to an economic agent. It is typically measured in units of currency. Another interpretation is that economic value represents the maximum amount of money an agent is willing and able to pay for a good or service. The economic value should not be confused with market value, which is the minimum amount a consumer will pay for a good or service. Thus, economic value is often greater than the market value. (Investopedia)

So in simple words, this notion of economic value will help you defining your price and indirectly your benefit. It is a subjective notion (except for past economists like Karl Marx) as it contains tangible and intangible value of the product. A coffee in beans as less value than drinking a coffee with your partner on a romantic place. Nespresso created more economic value by creating a new experience for coffee lover at home.

5 different economic values

Before deciding on your own marketing strategy, you should understand what the market is currently proposing to buyers! Based on the work done by Pine and Gilmore (HBR, The experience economy), we can identified 5 different types of offer:

1. Commodity: Buyers cannot differentiate between offers. It is often referred as commodity. The cheapest takes it all. I buy it because I need this (benzine, sugar, flour, …).

2. Product: Buyers have multiple offers that differentiate themselves on features (more of that, less of this, …) that can even create emotional differences for the buyer (make me younger, smarter, …). This is what we where and still use to see for fast moving consumer goods (chocolate, drinks, …) even if some brands are trying to elevate their product to experience by organising multiple stages (think about RedBull). I buy it because i use it.

3. Service:  Buyers receive a service in addition to the product they bought. Competitors differentiate themselves with these services (after-sales, analytics, …). I buy it because I need it and they help me using it.

4. Experience: Buyers are going through stages which are personal and potentially sensational. Products and services becomes commodities (we can find similar offer everywhere). Competitors differentiate themselves with experience (before, during and after purchase). Most of the companies are trying to build experience but few are really successful to achieve long term sustainable differentiation on this. I enjoy buying and using it and it is the reason why I bought it.

5. Transformational: Experiences are elevated from mere enjoyment to actual personal transformation. Buyers are looking to be different after the purchase and use of it. I am not buying running shoes, I become a runner! I buy it because it helps me to become someone different.

What does it mean for the Marketing Canvas Method?

When you analyse the context, just define where the market is today. The higher the market is on this curve, the higher the economic value is. When looking at your context (please use Market cards):

• Identify where your market is on the curve (1-5)

• Identify if one competitor is trying to move upward (game changer, challenger)?

• Identify where the market is on the product life cycle curve (Introduction to Decline)?

Curious

More on the method here

Buy our cards and discover our templates for your workshop here

Le Marché dans le Marketing Canvas

Marketing Strategy Design Cards

Dans l’enthousiasme de travailler sur sa stratégie marketing, on se précipite souvent et oublie l’importance de ce que je considère comme la première étape: la compréhension du marché dans lequel nous allons opérer (startup) ou nous opérons déjà (entreprise existante).

Les questions qu’il faut se poser sont les suivantes:

• Comment définir le marché?

• Comment mesurer le marché?

• Comment qualifier le marché?

Comment définir le marché?

Bien que la question puisse paraître simple et évidente, elle ne l’est pas.

Petit exemple: dans quel marché TESLA a-t-il décidé de se lancer avec son modèle S? La majorité des voitures électriques avant TESLA se situait dans un marché d’acheteurs urbains avec des petits déplacements. TESLA a privilégié le marché du luxe et plus particulièrement le marché des voitures sportives luxueuses dont la référence est … Porsche. En choisissant le marché, certaines constantes sont fixées telles que: le prix moyen (100k€ pour une voiture de sport de luxe) ou certaines caractéristiques clés du marché (performance, design, vitesse, …).

Comme illustré dans mon exemple, le marché conditionne certaines hypothèses de départ. On peut bien sur être un game changer et redéfinir ces règles toutefois elles restent pour l’acheteur un cadre de référence qu’il va utilisé pour comparer votre produit (lorsque vous louez une chambre chez AirbnB, vous comparez votre achat à une location dans un hotel, un gite ou un bed & breakfast).

Bien qu’il existe de nombreuses définitions d’un marché, celle que je préfère vient de Bill Aulet [1]. Il définit le marché en 3 règles:

1. Les clients dans le marché achètent tous des produits similaires.

2. Les clients dans le marché ont le même cycle d’achat et s’attendent à ce que les produits fournissent de la valeur d’une façon similaire.

3. Il y a du bouche à oreille entre les clients d’un même marché.

La première question est donc: Dans quel marché comptez-vous opérer?

Comment mesurer le marché?

Après avoir défini le marché dans le lequel vous allez opérer, il faut essayer de le mesurer afin de définir son potentiel et votre ambition. Une méthode provenant encore de l’entrepreneuriat s’appelle le TAM (pour Total Available Market), SAM (pour Serviceable Available Market) et SOM (Serviceable Obtainable Market) .

Derrière ces acronymes, ce cache des concepts assez simples:

• Le TAM correspond au marché total possible. Si on prend l’exemple de Airbnb cela correspondrait à toutes les locations de chambres dans le monde pour une année.

• le SAM correspond à la partie du marché où vous êtes actif (ou allez être actif si vous lancer votre activité). Le passage du TAM au SAM dépend de vos critères: géographique (là où vous êtes actifs), type de produit (ioS ou Android, premium ou cost), ...

• le SOM est votre objectif en part de marché. Combien de % du SAM voulez vous obtenir?

la seconde question est donc: quelle est la taille du marché ? 

Comment qualifier le marché?

Finalement, il vous reste à qualifier le marché. Qu’est ce que cela veut dire? Le marché a une vie et est dynamique comme un organisme vivant (il apparaît, grandit, se stabilise puis décline). Si vous ne comprenez pas l’etat du marché SAM dans lequel vous entrez, vous risquez de mal définir votre stratégie commerciale (le volume des ventes diffère entre chaque état).

Source: Wikipedia

La description ci-dessous provient de Wikipedia (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cycle_de_vie_(commerce))

1. Stade de lancement: Introduction du produit sur le marché

   • coûts élevés de production et de développement

   • faible volume de vente

   • pertes pour l'entreprise

   • prix élevés

2. Stade de croissance

   • coûts réduits par les économies d'échelles

   • croissance importante des volumes de vente

   • profits croissants pour l'entreprise et marges élevées

   • prix assurant une large part de marché

   • début de simplification du marché: les grandes entreprises achètent les PME innovantes

3. Stade de maturité

   • marges réduites, disparition des compétiteurs incapables d'économies d'échelle (absorption, retrait, faillite, oligopoles, stabilisation des parts de marché)coûts de production faibles, mais coûts de promotion commerciale et de services à la clientèle élevés

   • maximum des volumes de vente

   • forte sensibilité à la conjoncture

   • profits encore très importants mais stagnants

   • fortes segmentations : les gammes de produits se sont diversifiées pour répondre à une demande exigeante

   • tendance à la baisse des prix en raison de la concurrence

   • anticipation de produits de remplacement par la recherche et le développement

4. Stade de déclin

• diminution des ventes

• diminution des profits

• diminution des prix

• apparition de produits de remplacement

La dernière question est: quel est l’état du marché ?

Conclusion

En répondant à ces 3 questions clairement, vous aurez plus facile lorsque vous définirez votre stratégie commerciale. L’étape suivante dans l’exercice du Marketing Canvas est de définir la compétition.

Référence

1. Bill Aulet, Disciplined Entrepreneurship : 24 Steps to a Successful Startup, John Wiley & Sons (30 août 2013)

2. Cycle de vie, Wikipedia
   

6 simple principles for your marketing strategy

6 simple principles that could help you when working on your Marketing Strategy

1. Goal: You should always start with a quantitative goal

2. Target: Who is your ideal buyer/user/persona you will be targeting with your action?

3. Action: Define the action you should do to for achieving your goal with your target

4. Execution & measure: Build, launch and measure your action.

5. Corrective action: fix the original action based on what you have learned from the execution.

6. Amplification (scaling): when you have fixed the action, you can scale it (growth hacking philosophy) and reach your goal.

Some companies are trying to be perfect before moving to step 4. While we should always do our best at step 1-3, I believe the most important are 4-6. Time is key and if you are agile, work in sprint and define a time limit for steps 1-3.

How to connect your ambition with your operations

I had an interesting discussion with @nicolasdebray (Semetis, Academic Director) about the Ambition in the Marketing Canvas Process. He made the following comment:

Having a high-level financial objective is definitely important but often people in the field have difficulties to link this high-level objective (generate a revenue growth of 5% thus 1M€ more) with what they could do!

There are multiple ways to potentially connect this ambition with your operations: (1) either you attract more users, (2) either you retain more users; they stay longer, (3) either they buy more often (ARPU) or (4) they buy more products and/or services. This is connected with the notion of Customer Lifetime Value (CLV).

The discussion you should have in the Marketing Canvas will help you to make this connection. How? By understanding which driver(s) could help you.

Q1 - Is your MARKET helping you to achieve your ambition?

For answering this question, we can refer to the product-lifecycle approach using the 4 stages definition of a market:

• Market Development or Introduction: Personas are not yet used to buy this kind of product or service. They need a lot of explanations and trust is not installed on the market, yet the volume of potential buyers is huge as the market hasn’t been addressed. It is clearly an Accelerator because the market orientation is positive (growth of sales but not in terms of profit).

• Growth: Personas are getting used to buy this kind of products/services. They now understand the benefits of the products/services and trust providers. There is still a huge volume of buyers available on the market and traction is high. It is definitely an Accelerator because the market orientation is positive (growth of sales and profit).

• Maturity: This often means that your market will be saturated and you may find that you need to change your marketing tactics to prolong the life cycle of your product. It is a Brake as most of the market has already bought a solution to their problem. Sales are flat.

• Decline: During the end stages of your product, you will see declining sales and profits. This can be fuelled by changes in consumer preferences, technological advances and alternatives on the market. It is a Brake as the market is declining.

Q2 - Is your Customer Acquisition helping you to achieve your ambition?

For answering this question, you can use 2 important concepts: Customer Acquisition Rate (CAR) and Cost of Customer Acquisition (COCA).

• If Customer Acquisition Rate is below market average, then it is a Brake because it takes more time to get new customers than your competitors;

• If Customer Acquisition Rate is above market average, then it is an Accelerator because you attract faster new customers than your competitors.

• If COCA is above market average it is a Brake.

• If COCA is below market average it is an Accelerator.

CAR has the priority on COCA and therefore the final status for User is defined by CAR; COCA is telling how effective you are.

Q3 - Is your users’ ARPU helping you to achieve your ambition?

For answering this question, you need to understand if you have an optimisation strategy in place for your ARPU:

• If your ARPU is below market average, it means that you are either attracting low value customers and/or not fully stimulating existing customers. It is therefore a Brake.

• If your ARPU is above market average, it means that you are either attracting high value customers and/or fully stimulating existing customers (recurrent revenue, up sell, cross sell). It is therefore an Accelerator.

Q4 - Is your users’ Lifetime helping you to achieve your ambition?

For answering this questionnaires, you need to understanding of you have a retention strategy in Place for your users:

• If the lifetime is below market average, it means that you are not capable to keep your existing users as long as your competitors. It is a Brake.

• If the lifetime is above market average, it means that you are capable to keep your existing users longer than your competitors. It is an Accelerator.

• A second concept worth looking is the Cost of Customer Retention:

• If COCR is above market average it is a Brake.

• If COCR is below market average it is an Accelerator.

Conclusion

At the end of the exercise, you will have a better view on how you will achieve your ambition. It will also help your team in charge of the operation to understand what they have to do:

1. And/Or Getting more clients on board

2. And/Or Developing and/or selling more products to their existing client base

3. And/Or Keeping their clients longer (satisfaction, retention)

Definition

• Customer Acquisition Rate (CAR)=Number of customer acquired/Length of time period.

• Cost of Customer Acquisition (COCA)=All the costs spent on acquiring more customers (marketing expenses) by the number of customers acquired in the period the money was spent.

Marketing Strategy Execution - How to start a movement?

Most of the time, I am facing the situation where I need to engage people in executing the strategy. Easy to say but probably the most difficult part of being a CMO (make it happen). One of my friend (@alainthys) showed me this video few years ago and it is so true!

When working on an innovative project or on a new commercial activity, who might be your first follower? Your existing client (a co-creation model)? Your sponsor (classical Corporate Model)? Your peers (collaborative model)? Anyone, that trust your idea?

So my question is: have you found your first follower? could you tell us what is his/her usual profile?

source: https://www.ted.com/talks/derek_sivers_how_to_start_a_movement?language=en

Marketing Canvas - Ambition

Dans le cadre d'une Marketing canvas, il est important de démarrer le processus à partir d'une question claire et simple basée sur l'ambition que vous souhaitez atteindre à l'aide de votre stratégie marketing. Une vidéo simple pour expliquer ce concept.

MORE ON MARKETING CANVAS:

Discover the process HERE

Discover the cards HERE

Download the template HERE

Marketing Strategy for Millennials from Marketing Cloud

Interesting Infographic from Marketing Cloud proposing 5 steps to creating your Marketing Strategy for Millennials. As you might have noticed, I am advocating the use of the Marketing Canvas for designing your Marketing Strategy. Let's check whether these steps fit into the process?

1. Step 1 is definitely a no-brainer. Data and customer knowledge will help you to be very specific when discussing canvas. Dimensions like Humans (if you want to uncover key insights and customer preferences), Journey (if you want to design great customer experience), Value proposition (if you want to design the most relevant offers) and conversation (if you want to be at the right place, right time with the right subject) will help you.
2. Step 2 is clearly identified in the canvas: Channel (in Journey), Content & Stories (Conversation), Media (Shared and Earned) and finally the global topic of conversations.
3. Step 3 is also covered in Engagement (word of mouth), Influencers (Conversations), Proofs (Value Proposition) and Moment of Truth (Journey)
4. Step 4 mentions that technology is key for millennials. It is true and it will influence preferred Channels (Journey), Media (Conversation) and Features (Value Proposition) but don't forget that Job To Be Done is why they engage with you and what problem they are trying to solve.
5. Step 5 is all about your Purpose (Brand) and  Listening (conversation). I am not a fan about education as I believe we don't educate customers but we engage them.

The conclusion is that the Marketing Canvas fits perfectly with these steps and can be applied for Millennials. Finally, I would like to mention that in the Budget dimensions, they are 2 important topics (capabilities and people) where you should invest for having the required tools and skills in your company if you want to do all of this.

More on Marketing Cloud: https://www.salesforce.com/products/marketing-cloud/best-practices/millenial-marketing-strategy/

3 Cs in a Digital World

Interesting article from Roland Berger Consultants about Sales in a Digital World. Their thesis is that you need to master 3 Cs if you want to have a voice in this new world:

1. Develop the Customer Base: It is definitely in line with what I am preaching. You should not only focus on acquisition but also on stimulation and retention. The CLV dimension of the Marketing Canvas is telling you how much you perform versus your ambition;
2. Orchestrate the Channel: I also agree but I would extend this to Orchestrate the Customer Journey as it is much broader than channel and it is integrating elements like Brand experience, touch-points, emotions and wow moments.
3. Manage the complexity: it is maybe fluffy as notion. We all know that we should manage the complexity, the question is how should I do that. One possible answer is in the article when they discussed centralisation. I think the key element there is to automate your processes (BPM, scripting, algorithms, ...) in order to reduce the chaos and uncertainty. but don't forget to keep the human part.

Source: Roland Berger, Think Act, The digital future of B2B sales

Vos clients sont peut-être dangereux pour votre croissance?

Pensée du jour!

Je constate lorsque je discute innovations commerciales (provenant de nouvelles technologies ou de nouveaux modèles commerciaux) que la plupart des entreprises répondent de la même façon: c'est intéressant MAIS nos clients ne nous le demandent pas et donc nous préférons nous concentrer sur les affaires ... urgentes ... qui bien évidemment ont un impact direct sur les finances.

Oui mais ces mêmes clients demanderont un jour une réponse rapide de votre part lorsque ces innovations deviendront accessibles pour eux et à ce moment-là, il sera probablement trop tard. Ces clients chercheront une réponse rapide et plus que probablement se tourneront vers un autre fournisseur si vous n'êtes pas capable de réagir rapidement.

Si on suit cette logique, les clients seraient donc la priorité court terme et en même temps, souvent, l'ennemi de l'innovation long-terme!

Vos clients sont peut-être dangereux pour votre croissance?

Marketing Canvas, some tips about the process

Canvas works really well if:

1. Start with a clear ambition, S.M.A.R.T. and linked with the finance. One of the usual mistake when doing a marketing strategy exercise is to not properly link the marketing actions with the financial consequences. In the Marketing Canvas exercise, we genuinely start from the financial ambition for addressing this issue. This ambition is about growth and thus the canvas is about growth hacking your marketing strategy.
2. Start with a clear persona representing a customer cluster sharing the same Job To Be Done (problem to be solved by your offer). It could happen that you can't achieve your ambition with your current persona/segment (in classical strategy, it corresponds to a cash cow or a future dog). If it is the case you should consider another segment with another job to be done.
3. Assess the current situation of your marketing mix by asking the 28 questions as defined in the canvas. Define clearly if each dimension TODAY is helping you to achieve your ambition (it is an accelerator) or is not (then we define this dimension as a brake). Do this exercise in team as it will create a shared understanding of the situation and support your answers with facts. 
4. Backward thinking is a very powerful way of finding solutions to any problem. In this process, try to visualise/imagine how dimension(s) defined as BRAKES would look like if they would help you with your ambition. What is different? Could you describe it? Does it really help with your ambition? If yes, then you have one idea of potential solutions. Find as many ideas as possible.
5. Having generated plenty of ideas (some could even be yellow ideas aka impossible ideas), you should prioritise it in order to finalise your preferred vision of this future where your ambition is achieved. What are the actions you should do to transform this future into a reality: Start Doing, Stop Doing, Do More, Do Less, Simplify, Magnify? Brainstorm as a team and list all actions.

6. You now have identified all actions for building your future but you have to organise it into a comprehensive and feasible roadmap. Some actions are low hanging fruits while others require more time and effort. One way to do this is to use these 2 criteria: contribution to the ambition and effort. Congratulations, you now have a roadmap and a marketing strategy.

New Business Models in a Digital Future

In a world strongly influenced by new technologies, new business models are emerging for brands. We usually defined this new world as a digital world but what digital really means? In this presentation, I explore the impact of digital and propose some recommandations that could help defining new ways of creating and capturing value.

You need a SHARP Value Proposition

When developing your Value Proposition and Brand Positioning, it has to be S.H.A.R.P.

What does it mean?

SHARP stands for:

• S for Simple. At the end Simplicity is the winner. You have a doubt, have a look at the Simplicity Index
• H for Human-Centric. Being able to develop your strategy around the human will open new doors and untapped values. Be inspired by Human-Centered Design
• A for Ambitious. Your VP has to be ambitious if you want to stand out from the others.
• R for Relevant. You should build it with competitors and alternatives in mind.
• P for Purposeful. I am a strong believer in purpose driven strategy (reason why I created with friends thebeyonders.agency). Curious what it means, read this article on hbr. 

Do you have a S.H.A.R.P. Value Proposition ?

Questions you should ask with the Marketing Canvas

Below you will find a list of questions that will help you during the assessment of your marketing strategy with the Marketing Canvas. How does it work? You take the Canvas and go through all dimensions (after having defined your ambition - see article) asking all questions. You can have 2 potential answers for each question:

1. I don't know or No then it is playing against your ambition. It is a Brake and the colour is RED. This is something you should improve or change if you want to achieve your ambition.
2. Yes then it is playing in favour of your ambition. It is an Accelerator and the colour is GREEN. This is something you can leverage for achieving your ambition.

Customer Life Time Value

1. Is your MARKET growing? The market situation plays an important role when you are trying to grow. A saturated market will play against you while a new and growing market will play for you. Understanding this will help you when building your marketing strategy.
2. Is it easy and/or cheap to attract new USER ? Getting new customers has a price and could take time. If your customer acquisition is cheap and easy it will most probably play for you while if it takes time and/or it is expensive it will play against you when building your marketing strategy.
3. Are you maximizing the ARPU of your user? ARPU stands for Average Revenue Per User. It is a combination of transactions (how frequent people buy products/services) and prices (how much they pay when they buy something). If you believe you are maximizing the ARPU of your users, it will play for you. If not (or worst if it will decrease), it will play against you.
4. Is it easy to extend the LIFETIME (reduce churn) of your user? Keeping your users will generally play an important role in your financials. The more users you have, the more revenues are at stake. If keeping your users is expensive and difficult, it will play against you. If it is easy and/or cheap, it will play for you. 

Human

1. Is your current understanding of the JOB TO BE DONE of your users helping you to achieve your ambition? Knowing the Job To Be Done of your future and existing users is fundamental. This might help you to identify the untapped area or new insights that you could leverage. Could you leverage it for your ambition? If yes, it means that you can create value by addressing the job to be done.
2. Is your current understanding of the ASPIRATIONS of your users helping you to achieve your ambition? Knowing the aspirations of your future and existing users will help you to offer more than products or services and contribute to their lives. Do you know them? Can you leverage it?
3. Is your current understanding of the PAINS & GAINS of your users helping you to achieve your ambition? Getting the Job The Done has some pains (negative emotions) but also gains (positive emotions). If you have identified them and you are capable to leverage it, it will play for you. Otherwise, it will play against you.
4. Is the ENGAGEMENT of your users helping you to achieve your ambition? Knowing how much your users are engaged (NPS could help you) and being able to leverage it will certainly play in your favor. 

Brand

1. Is the PURPOSE of your Brand helping you to achieve your ambition? Having a purpose is probably the most important asset for your long-term business. Great companies are crystal clear about why they exist! Do you know your purpose? Is it robust enough and clear enough? Can you leverage it further for creating value? Not knowing or having a weak purpose will certainly play against your ambition. A strong purpose will help you when looking for extra value!
2. Is the POSITIONING of your Brand helping you to achieve your ambition? How to address your category will help you make choices and clarify how to stand out from the competition. Are you a leader (setting the standards), are you a challenger (playing the leader game but challenging it) or are you a game changer (redefining the game)? Can you leverage your positioning further (be more leader, challenger or game changer)? Not knowing this or answering no means that you need to revisit your current positioning for creating value.
3. Are the VALUES of your Brand helping you to achieve your ambition? Your values are your translation of your purpose into key behaviors. Most of the commercial activities are delivered through behaviors (from people or from systems). Do you know your values? Are they helping you for creating more value?
4. Is the IDENTITY of your Brand helping you to achieve your ambition? Your identity is how you translate your purpose into an image. Not having a clear identity or having an identity that couldn't be leveraged will block you when trying to create more value. 

Value Proposition

1. Are the FEATURES of your Value Proposition helping you to achieve your ambition?  Do you address the right functional features? are they aligned with your humans? Can you answer this question? Can you become more unique and different from the competitions? Not knowing if your features (functional characteristics of your products and services) could help you to create more value or answering no means that it will not help you when you will look for extra value.
2. Are the EMOTIONS of your Value Proposition helping you to achieve your ambition? Today, differentiation comes through emotions and not functional features. Do you know if you deliver the right emotional features? Can you leverage more the emotional dimensions in your value proposition for creating value? Answering yes means that you can create extra value through the emotional dimension of your value proposition.
3. Are the PRICES of your Value Proposition helping you to achieve your ambition? Your pricing can be a strong brake for creating extra value or a strong enabler. Do you know where your current pricing is creating value? Can you leverage it further? Being able to leverage your pricing for creating new value is a key asset for your future.
4. Are the PROOFS of your Value Proposition helping you to achieve your ambition? Do you have enough evidence that helps people understanding the value you create with your value proposition? Can you leverage your value proposition with more or better proofs?

Journey

1. Are the MOMENTS of your user journey helping you to achieve your ambition? Moments are the different steps a user is going through when he is trying to solve his problem. When using Mental Models, we can identify all key moments a user is going through and try to formulate the best brand experience possible. Do you know all moments of your users? Can you capture more value through these moments?
2. Is the EXPERIENCE of your user's journey helping you to achieve your ambition? As a Brand, you need to formulate a clear and articulated answer at each moment. These answers should reflect customer identity, satisfy the objectives and meet expectation. Do you have orchestrated answer (or is it random)? Can you capture more value through the experience of your user's journey?
3. Are the CHANNELS of your user journey helping you to achieve your ambition? The number of channels that can be used for transacting with a brand is growing. And each user is free to use channel(s) of his choice. Do you have an answer for all potential channels? Do you orchestrate these channels? Can you capture more value through these channels?
4. Are the MOMENTS OF TRUTH of your user journey helping you to achieve your ambition? Providing an orchestrated experience is already a great achievement. Next step is to transform some moments into Moments of Truth (also referred as like moments or wow moments). Do you know if you offer Moments of Truth? Can you capture more value through these moments of truth?

Conversation

1. Is the way you are currently LISTENING TO your users helping you to achieve your ambition? How can you have great conversations with your users if you don't listen to their voices? Do you systematically capture the voice of your users? Do you capture more value by listening to your users?
2. Are your CONTENT & STORIES for your users helping you to achieve your ambition? Monologues are no more working for engaging users with your brand. Should you have contents and stories? Do you know if you have content & stories? Do you capture as much as you can value through content & stories?
3. Is the current use of your MEDIA helping you to achieve your ambition? You can place your content & stories through different media: Paid, Owned, Earned or Shared? Do you know which media you are using? Do you capture as much as you can value through your media?
4. Are your INFLUENCERS helping you to achieve your ambition? People are trusting people. Do you know if you are using influencers? Do you capture as much as you can value through influencers?

Budget

1. Is your budget for Marketing FEES helping you to achieve your ambition? If you want to propagate your content, stories, and offers, you should balance your media investment between Owned, Paid, Earned and Shared. Have you well balanced your investments amongst these media? Is it enough for your ambition (have you compared this investment with your competitors) ?
2. Is your budget for Marketing PEOPLE (internal & external) helping you to achieve your ambition? To make things happening, you need a team (either insourced or outsourced). Do you have enough people for achieving your ambition?
3. Is your budget for Marketing KNOWLEDGE helping you to achieve your ambition? It is important to collect systematically enough knowledge through research, training, bootcamp or even consulting projects for achieving your target. Do you have properly invest in these topics for your ambition.
4. Is your budget for Marketing CAPABILITIES helping you to achieve your ambition? More and more marketers have a leading role when defining the technical roadmap of the company because of the impact on the customers (web site, mobile applications, automation, CRM and lead generation software, database, ...) Do you have invested enough in these topics for your ambition?

Why you need a bold question for your Marketing Strategy?

What is the best way to start defining the marketing strategy of your company, business or activity? My proposal is to start with a bold strategic question! Why?

Because the objective of your strategy is to achieve an ambition and most probably a financial ambition. Whether you are a startup or a stock listed company, you have to achieve a financial ambition if you want to stay in business. Thus first hypothesis is to have a financial ambition and preferably S.M.A.R.T. one.

Financial Ambition of Your Strategy

Then let's imagine, you don't do any strategy and you let the business in free wheel (no plan). Most probably you will face problems and situations (external or internal) that will block you to achieve your ambition. I suggest that you highlight the biggest problem, your #1 fear for your business. Thus second hypothesis is that you need to define your biggest fear as the context where you will do your strategy.

Biggest commercial fear you have

Question

HOW CAN I (FINANCIAL AMBITION) IN (TOP #1 FEAR) ?

Examples

HOW CAN I GROWTH MY REVENUE BY 5% IN AN AUTOMATED AND DIGITAL ENVIRONMENT? (Shoe Store)

HOW CAN I PROTECT MY REVENUE NEXT YEAR IN A MARKET WHERE UBER IS ARRIVING? (Taxi company)

HOW CAN I BE PROFITABLE AFTER 1 YEAR IN A MARKET WHERE NOBODY KNOWS ME YET ? (Startup company)

Quote

Marketing Strategy should start with a bold question

Next step

• https://laurentbouty.com/blog/2017/marketing-canvas-job-to-be-done

Innovation Bootcamp @Besix

Please find below a video about the Innovation Bootcamp I co-created and facilitated with Solvay Brussels School for a great Belgian Company (they built the highest tower in the world in Dubai). Great team, great people, great energy and fantastic ideas.

Innovation Bootcamp

Resources for Course on Customer Experience

In this post, you will find a collection of resources that I am using and maintaining for my different classes and workshops on this topic. Unfortunately I couldn't list everything that I am reading or watching and I have only selected some vital fews that mights inspired you. It is also a good start if you are interested by this topic. The list contains websites, books, articles and videos.

Cheers

Laurent 

Recommended WebSites

• Adaptive Path: Adaptive Map, Discover the four steps of experience mapping
• Mental Models: Why are mental models important?
• Service Design: Customer Journey Map Tool
• Brian Solis: The Futur of Customer Experience
• Think With Google: Experience & Design
• Strategy-Business: Customer Strategy
• Deloitte Insights: Articles and Multimedia on Customer Experience

Recommended Books

Easy to read and a good start if you are curious about Customer Experience from a Marketing Perspective. A lot of good tools and and a powerful process.

Customers are powerful. They have a loud voice, a wealth of choice and their expectations are higher than ever.

This book covers ten principles you can use to make real world improvements to your customers’ experiences, whatever your business does and whoever you are. 

One step further on this subject with the notion of Moments of Truth. Brian Solis is a though leader on Digital Transformation.

In his new book X: The Experience When Business Meets Design bestselling author Brian Solis shares why great products are no longer good enough to win with customers and why creative marketing and delightful customer service too are not enough to succeed. In X, he shares why the future of business is experiential and how to create and cultivate meaningful experiences.

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Recommended Articles

1998 - Harvard Business Review - Welcome to the Experience Economy

First there was agriculture, then manufactured goods, and eventually services. Each change represented a step up in economic value--a way for producers to distinguish their products from increasingly undifferentiated competitive offerings. Now, as services are in their turn becoming commoditized, companies are looking for the next higher value in an economic offering. Leading-edge companies are finding that it lies in staging experiences. To reach this higher level of competition, companies will have to learn how to design, sell, and deliver experiences that customers will readily pay for. An experience occurs when a company uses services as the stage--and goods as props--for engaging individuals in a way that creates a memorable event. And while experiences have always been at the heart of the entertainment business, any company stages an experience when it engages customers in a personal, memorable way. The lessons of pioneering experience providers, including the Walt Disney Company, can help companies learn how to compete in the experience economy. The authors offer five design principles that drive the creation of memorable experiences. First, create a consistent theme, one that resonates throughout the entire experience. Second, layer the theme with positive cues--for example, easy-to-follow signs. Third, eliminate negative cues, those visual or aural messages that distract or contradict the theme. Fourth, offer memorabilia that commemorate the experience for the user. Finally, engage all five senses--through sights, sounds, and so on--to heighten the experience and thus make it more memorable. 

Read on HBR here

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2002 - Harvard Business Review - The One Number You Need to Grow

Companies spend lots of time and money on complex tools to assess customer satisfaction. But they're measuring the wrong thing. The best predictor of top-line growth can usually be captured in a single survey question: Would you recommend this company to a friend? This finding is based on two years of research in which a variety of survey questions were tested by linking the responses with actual customer behavior--purchasing patterns and referrals--and ultimately with company growth. Surprisingly, the most effective question wasn't about customer satisfaction or even loyalty per se. In most of the industries studied, the percentage of customers enthusiastic enough about a company to refer it to a friend or colleague directly correlated with growth rates among competitors. Willingness to talk up a company or product to friends, family, and colleagues is one of the best indicators of loyalty because of the customer's sacrifice in making the recommendation. When customers act as references, they do more than indicate they've received good economic value from a company; they put their own reputations on the line. And they will risk their reputations only if they feel intense loyalty. The findings point to a new, simpler approach to customer research, one directly linked to a company's results. By substituting a single question--blunt tool though it may appear to be--for the complex black box of the customer satisfaction survey, companies can actually put consumer survey results to use and focus employees on the task of stimulating growth. 

Read on HBR here

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2007 - Harvard Business Review - Understanding Customer Experience

The article discusses the importance of monitoring customer experience. Several examples are presented demonstrating customer dissatisfaction in a variety of situations. Customer experience is defined, and several methods for measuring it are discussed. The results of a recent Bain & Company survey of customers of 362 companies is presented. Methods of collecting customer data at "touch points," instances of direct contact either with the product or service itself or with representations of it, are detailed.

Read on HBR here

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2016 - McKinsey - Customer Experiences

Collection of ideas, articles, thoughts and interviews about Customer Experience. Currently 2 entire collections examining how companies can create competitive advantage by putting customers first and managing their journeys.

Read on McKinsey here

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2016 - PWC - 10 Principles of Customer Strategy

It’s no longer enough to target your chosen customers. To stay ahead, you need to create distinctive value and experiences for them.

Read on Strategy-Business here

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2017 - Altimeter - The Customer Experience of AI

This report explores the impact of AI on the customer experience, lays out a set of operating principles, and includes insight from technology users, developers, academics, designers, and other experts on how to design customer-centric experiences in the age of AI. More than anything, business leaders today should begin to treat AI as fundamental to the customer experience. This means thinking about the values it perpetuates as an essential and eventually indistinguishable expression of product, services and the brand experience.

Read on Altimeter here

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Recommended Videos

Joe Pine introduces the Progression of Economic Value, the foundational model for understanding the role of Experiences in the history of economics.

Brian Solis, award-winning author, prominent blogger/writer and principal analyst at Altimeter Group, helps people understand and define the role we play in the evolution of technology and its impact. In this first talk of the session The Wild Promises of the Digital Customer Experience at Lift16, Brian Solis shows us how brands are focusing their designs on customer experience and why it matters, especially in the digital world.

This is a full keynote based on the story of my latest book 'when digital becomes human'. Presented this on the biggest retail conference in Istanbul. Enjoy! More about Steven Steven is an expert in customer focus in a digital world.

Marketers, You Should Unlock The Next Decade

Marketers, You should unlock the next decade

As CMOs gain more power in the boardroom — and over technology spend — it will be critical that they understand the factors that drive success. As Jerret West, vice president of Marketing at Netflix, said, “We have to look for ways to combine creativity and technology with an understanding of how the business fits into the overarching customer experience. We have to think and act like CEOs.”

This describes the new world of marketing we live in today. And in this new world, new rules apply. CMOs who get on board will find amazing growth potential. Those that keep repeating strategies from yesterday’s playbooks are bound to fall by the wayside. To avoid going down that path, here are five keys to get started...

More on CMSWIRE

Pricing Sensitivity Drivers From Thomas Nagle

Pricing is a science and it is most of the time not considered as such except by marketing veterans. Below you can find a check-list for assessing sensitivity of pricing changes on customers.

• Reference Price Effect – buyer’s price sensitivity for a given product increases the higher the product’s price relative to perceived alternatives. Perceived alternatives can vary by buyer segment, by occasion, and other factors.

How important is the expenditure (portion of income or monetary terms) for the buyer?

• Perceived Risk Effect – buyers are less sensitive to the price when it is difficult to compare it to potential alternatives.

How difficult is it for buyers to compare the offers of different suppliers?

Can we compare attributes of products by observation or should we purchase and consume to learn what it offers?

Is the product new or innovative?

Is the product highly complex?

Are the prices of different suppliers easily comparable?

• Switching Costs Effect – the higher the product-specific investment a buyer must make to switch suppliers (monetary and non-monetary), the less price sensitive that buyer is when choosing between alternatives.

What would be the cost of changing supplier?

For how long are buyers locked in by those products?

Have customers invested heavily in product related services (like training, customisation, ...) that would have to be repeated if they chose to switch? (example is iphone: you need to change your mp3 library from iTunes to something else or your cover, ...)

• Price-Quality Effect – buyers are less sensitive to price the more that higher prices signal higher quality. Products for which this effect is particularly relevant include: image products, exclusive products, and products with minimal cues for quality.

• Size of Expenditure Effect – buyers are more price sensitive when the expense, accounts for a large percentage of buyers’ available income or budget.

How important is the expenditure (portion of income or monetary terms) for the buyer?

• End-Benefit Effect – the effect refers to the relationship a given purchase has to a larger overall benefit, and is divided into two parts: Derived demand: The more sensitive buyers are to the price of the end benefit, the more sensitive they will be to the prices of those products that contribute to that benefit. Price proportion cost: The price proportion cost refers to the percent of the total cost of the end benefit accounted for by a given component that helps to produce the end benefit (e.g., think CPU and PCs). The smaller the given components share of the total cost of the end benefit, the less sensitive buyers will be to the component's price.

How economically or psychologically important is the end-benefit that buyers seek from the product.

How price sensitive are buyers to the cost of that end-benefit?

What portion of the end-benefit does the price of the product account for?

• Shared-cost Effect – the smaller the portion of the purchase price buyers must pay for themselves, the less price sensitive they will be.

Does the buyer pay the full cost of the product?

• Perceived fairness Effect– buyers are more sensitive to the price of a product when the price is outside the range they perceive as “fair” or “reasonable” given the purchase context.

How does the product's current price compare with prices people have paid in the past for similar products?

Can any price difference be justified based upon a plausible cost difference?

• Price Framing Effect – buyers are more price sensitive when they perceive the price as a loss rather than a forgone gain, and they have greater price sensitivity when the price is paid separately rather than as part of a bundle.

Do customers see the price as something they pay to avoid loss or to achieve gain?

Is the price paid as part of a larger cost or does it stand alone?

Is the price perceived as an out-of-pocket cost or as an opportunity cost?

Extract from The Strategy and Tactics of Pricing, 5th Edition. Thomas Nagle, John Hogan, and Joseph Zale. Chapter 6, Exhibit 6-4, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pricing_strategies

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Read more on pricing here

Read our article on economic value here

Discover pricing dimension in the Marketing Canvas Method here

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Marketers, Pricing can often be a confusing topic