Positioning for Professionals: How Professional Knowledge Firms Can Differentiate Their Way to Success - Hardcover

Williams, Tim

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0470587156 ISBN 13: 9780470587157

Publisher: Wiley, 2010

Synopsis

It's not the best companies that prevail in the marketplace, but rather the best brands.   The goal of business strategy is not just to be better, but different.  Learn how to build a differentiating value proposition by clearly and carefully defining your brand boundaries: Calling, Competencies, Customers, and Culture. 

 Positioning for Professionals shows how a well-defined value proposition can help professional service firms create their own success instead of copying the success of others, including such concepts as:

- How and why professional service brands become homogenized

- Why standing for everything is the same as standing for nothing

- Why there's no such thing as full service

- Deep and narrow as a strategic imperative

- Why it's better to be a profit leader than a market leader

- Differentiation and price premiums

- How to map your brand on the matrix of relevance and differentiation

- How to define a value proposition that will make your firm intensely appealing to the customers who want you for what you do best

 Based on the proven premise that the most profitable business strategy is not to aim at the center of the market, but rather at the edges, Positioning for Professionals is written for leaders, managers, and other senior executives of service companies in with a particular emphasis on professional service firms.

About this title

About the Author

TIM WILLIAMS leads Ignition Consulting Group (www.ignitiongroup.com), a business consultancy devoted to helping professional knowledge firms create and capture more value. As a recognized thought leader in marketing, Tim is a frequent speaker for marketing and business organizations worldwide. He is a regular contributor to business and professional publications and is author of Take a Stand for Your Brand, ranked by Amazon as one of the top ten books on brand building. As an adviser in developing professional service brands, Tim has worked with both large and small professional service firms—most notably advertising agencies and other marketing communications firms—in both the U.S. and abroad. He began his career on Madison Avenue working for large multinational advertising agencies and later served as president and owner of several midsize independent firms.

From the Back Cover

Better isn't always better.

Different is better.

"Most managers invest their time and energy in trying to make their firms better, when in fact they should also be working to make their firms different."
From Positioning for Professionals

Why are some professional service firms so much more successful than their competitors? The difference isn't just talent, but focus. The best firms know that standing for everything is the same as standing for nothing. Instead of trying to be good at everything, they do what they do best and find resources for the rest.

Destined to become the positioning strategy companion you'll turn to again and again, Positioning for Professionals offers executives of professional service firms proven strategies for positioning their firms for maximum success in the marketplace.

Drawn from his decades of work in the advertising and marketing fields, thought leader Tim Williams helps you develop a differentiating value proposition with valuable insights on:

• Why it's better to be a profit leader than a market leader
• How to overcome your natural fear of focus
• Making your firm hard to imitate
• Out-of-the-ordinary ways to differentiate your firm from the "sea of sameness"
• Why every company is a brand, like it or not…
• …and why every single business decision you make affects the success and reputation of your brand

It's no coincidence that a handful of top firms keep winning the most business, attract the best talent, and earn the highest margins. They're the ones that have staked out a differentiating positioning strategy that capitalizes on their strengths. Rather than being mildly appealing to a broad group of prospects, they're intensely appealing to a select group of prospects. They're the firms that follow the valuable principles you'll find in this book.

GET POSITIONING FOR PROFESSIONALS TODAY AND PUT ITS WINNING IDEAS TO WORK FOR YOUR FIRM.

From the Inside Flap

POSITIONING FOR PROFESSIONALS

How Professional Knowledge Firms Can Differentiate Their Way to Success

In the last twenty years, no marketing concept has captured the collective business imagination more than "branding." While many professional service firms are in the business of helping their clients build a stronger brand, they seldom pay the same kind of attention to developing their own brand. As Positioning for Professionals reveals, it's all about differentiation. Filled with proven insights and valuable differentiation strategies, this visionary book takes a step back to examine how your professional firm can make the transition from being a "recognized name" to becoming a highly focused brand and why a stronger brand means stronger profits.

Marketing and advertising thought leader Tim Williams reveals how developing a well-defined positioning strategy can help your firm earn a more powerful reputation in the marketplace. Take a look inside for world-class guidance on:

• Why building a successful brand means going against your instincts
• Foregoing best practices for "next practices"
• Why there's no such thing as "full service" or a "general market"
• Why copying competitors' strategies doesn't work …
• …and why differentiating does with big results

Destined to become the desktop brand development and business strategy companion you will turn to again and again, Positioning for Professionals offers you powerful, insightful ideas for positioning your firm for maximum market success.

Edition details

• Publisher: Wiley
• Publication date: 2010
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0470587156
• ISBN 13: 9780470587157
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 208