How do you obtain customer input?

Occasionally, we get calls from potential clients who value customer input, but are unsure how to obtain it.

Maybe you can relate.

“We want to conduct research” is their request. We follow up with probing questions to understand their needs better: To whom do you want to talk, and for what purpose?

Using […]

Struggling to revive your marketing strategy?

The insight principle of upstream marketing may be just what you need to transform it.

What is the insight principle, anyway?

The 1989 drama movie Dead Poets Society gives us a great example:

The late Robin Williams, acting as English teacher John Keating, stands on his desk during one of his lectures and […]

What do you know about your important customers that your competitors don’t know?

This is the critical question we always ask in our consulting work at EquiBrand.

Here’s the reality: Collecting the same customer information, in the same way as your competitors just won’t cut it. Not in today’s world – and not in the […]

What’s an often-overlooked marketing principle?

Insight.

Why?

It’s simple: mainly because it lacks tangibility.

Insight is about evolution, not evaluation.

We know it’s relatively easy to quantify innovation and brand identity strength. Things like new product revenues, market share, stock price, and statistical surveys can be evaluated.

Not so with insight: Deep, proprietary understanding may exist within the minds and file […]

Superior insight provides the platform for competitive advantage. Companies with outstanding customer insight usually place a premium on asking – and answering -the right questions of consumers.

How insight impacts business decisions

Often, the clarity this provides leads to counterintuitive business decisions: Competitors head down one path, while the pro-file companies pursue another direction or chart a […]

What is the root cause of moderate or stalled business growth?

After many years helping companies grow, our research and experience at EquiBrand consistently shows the answer is: an overreliance on downstream marketing.

Many companies see their business as largely fixed. This causes them to focus on the wrong problem, using downstream marketing tactics to fight […]

Strategic patterns that work – and win – in upstream marketing can be found in several top companies EquiBrand has profiled.

Through in-depth case studies, we captured insight from hundreds of client executives and industry experts, including a deep dive on seven key companies:

• Amazon
• Apple
• Google
• Nike
• Southwest
• Starbucks
• The Walt Disney Company

What we discovered […]

Begin with the end in sight. That’s a central theme in upstream marketing.

It involves envisioning where you want to be in the future and then working backward to fill the gap, using a create-test-and-learn approach.

Begin with the end in mind…

Sound familiar? If you know Stephen Covey’s bestseller, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, you […]

Upstream marketing: Is it a strategy or a process?

Actually…it’s neither.

Rather, it is a set of:

• Principles
• Framing questions
• Underlying practices

…all of which must be applied consistently. It is about identifying opportunities and fulfilling customer needs. It takes place at a much earlier stage than downstream marketing by developing a clear market segmentation map, and then identifying and […]

When it comes to strategy development, there is a great statement that applies: “A problem well stated is half solved.”

Meaning, when a problem is clearly defined, it’s that much easier to answer.

What is the first step you take when you have a problem to solve? Not everyone will have the same answer.

Consider Albert Einstein, who […]