I was talking to a CEO of a new technology company last week and he asked me what was the biggest marketing mistake I’ve seen in my career. I had to qualify his question a bit: Did he mean the most costly mistake or the one I see most frequently? He said both.
I’ve seen all sorts of marketing mistakes over my career (and committed many of them myself). In general, I think the most costly mistakes have to do with personnel. Hiring the wrong person costs a fortune, not only in training and rehiring, but also both in opportunity cost and credibility. Hiring people who are both a cultural fit and excellent at what they do is an art that is only improved through experience. And yes, recruiters can help with the process, as long as they are themselves good hires and not simply trying to fill a position with a warm body.
But hiring is more of a general management function and not necessarily a marketing mistake per se. In marketing, the most common mistake I see is around differentiation. Companies just don’t dig deep enough to understand and support their differentiation strategy. Let me give you a few examples that I found just by running a Google search for Clinical Research Organizations:
- So what makes us different? We’ve structured our organization into five distinct business units: Early Phase, Phase II/III, Late Phase, Medical Device and Pharmaceutics.
- Our steady but measured growth has been fundamental to maintaining our reputation for commitments to timelines, quality of clinical service offerings, and budgets. Our clinical research expertise include Phase I-IV studies for Rx, OTC, Device, and Generic products. We have worked with a wide array of clients including large pharmaceutical companies, established biotechs, and start-up drug development organizations.
- We are committed to providing clients with critical thinking, customer service and quality deliverables. Our 25+ years of experience allows us to optimize each investigational product’s chance for success. We are dedicated to ensuring that each clinical trial is executed to the highest possible standards.
Do any of these statements really differentiate the organization? Don’t some other CROs use distinct business units to handle their clients’ business? What CRO doesn’t talk about hitting timelines and having quality service offerings? Does 25 years of experience really convince a client to use a particular CRO? If you can’t say something unique about what you do, then you aren’t trying hard enough. Compare this to a company like Clinipace who spell out their differentiation this way:
- We invented a new way to deliver services called Right-Sized™ Clinical Research Solutions. That means you get the right mix of resources, at a fixed price, to fit your specific trial or registry needs. Not more. Not less. And our contract services are amplified by our proprietary eClinical technology – TEMPO™.
Now that is a clear and compelling competitive advantage! Sure, they may not compete effectively with Quintiles for large multi-national trials. But they understand what trials they can compete for and have built a differentiation strategy that allows them to clearly articulate what makes them unique.
Why say what everyone else is saying, when you can create your own unique space in which to sell your products and services? How much easier is it to sell for a CRO that can articulate that clear competitive advantage, rather than one who sounds like every other CRO?
So while I’ve seen plenty of marketing mistakes around inconsistent branding, campaigns that don’t properly measure results, and ineffective advertising, the most common mistake I see is the lack of a differentiation strategy. For me, differentiation is the cornerstone upon which all other marketing activities sit. Get it right, and it makes every other marketing task easier. Ignore it, or do it wrong, and everything else is difficult.