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From Economic Insight to Growth Strategy: What CEOs Should Do Now
At our most recent CEO Growth Talks, I spoke with Taylor St. Germaine, Senior Economist at ITR Economics. The timing couldn’t have been better — the latest GDP numbers had just been released, and Taylor broke down what they mean for CEOs planning growth.
As always, ITR brought a clear and fact-based perspective. The economy is growing. Consumer spending is strong. And while some industries are facing headwinds, opportunities abound for leaders who are ready to act.
But the real question for CEOs isn’t just what the economy looks like. It’s: how do you prepare your business to grow in this environment — and the one coming next?
Employer and Market Branding: Building Synergy
Wed, Jun 5, 2024 — Decades of marketing best practices dictate that effective external branding is essential for connecting with customers, enticing prospects, and creating lasting brand affinity. While corporate and product branding is critical to business marketing, few companies extend the same urgency to employer branding.
The Power of a Positioning Statement for Growth in Small and Mid-Sized Businesses
Tue, May 7, 2024 — Many small and mid-market businesses find themselves at a growth impasse, not due to a lack of opportunity but because of misalignment across various functional areas. As a fractional Chief Marketing Officer (CMO), my role often involves diagnosing these misalignments and charting a course for renewed growth. One of the most effective tools I recommend is creating and utilizing a clear positioning statement.
Branding & Growth - Why They are Inseparable
Mon, Jul 31, 2023 — Your company’s brand equals your market position and value proposition. It’s your entire strategy in a single package that is as important to your customers as it is to your long-term success.
How to Use Positioning to Own Your Market
Thu, Feb 9, 2023 — Become a big fish in your pond In my previous blog, “What Tech CEOs Get Wrong About Positioning,” we introduced the concept of market positioning – and specifically, how it helps your customers connect the dots between their needs and your product or service. Of all the marketing strategy lessons we at Chief Outsiders share with founders and business leaders like yourself, positioning ranks among the most critical. It truly is a difference-maker for businesses that wish to become the leader of the pack -- to become, in fishing parlance, the big fish in your pond.
What Tech CEOs Get Wrong About Positioning
Thu, Jul 28, 2022 — If you are a CEO that is lamenting slowing sales and lagging growth at your company, it’s tempting to place the blame directly at the feet of the sales team – those well-intentioned front-line soldiers who are responsible to turn your solutions into the bucks that feed the company growth. Indeed, most CEO’s I talk to feel this way – when product and market fit is not happening with enough velocity, or visions of declaring leadership in their market are unrealized, the obstacle standing in the way is always sales.
Positioning for Explosive Growth: A CEO’s Guide To Enthusiastic Leadership - Part Four
Thu, Apr 1, 2021 — Embracing Your Competitive Advantage Ask any sports athlete what gives them the fire to take their field of play, and they will likely cite the prospect of beating their rival. Indeed, without the subplot of competition, sports would be exceedingly boring – for both the players and the viewers. As CEOs, competition, too, represents our drive, our passion, our reason for being. Though we might actually prefer owning the playing field and having it all to ourselves, we can be relatively assured that we will have company as we pursue excellence and strive for the only true tangible measure of success – revenue growth.
How Does Your Brand Positioning Measure Up?
Tue, Jan 15, 2019 — 3 Sales Lessons from Harry Winston vs. Tiffany, Tesla vs. Mercedes Benz The latest issue of Harvard Business Review (Jan.-Feb. 2019) included one of the best Brand Identity methodologies published in the last few years: What Does Your Corporate Brand Stand For? The authors, Stephen Geyser (Professor Emeritus at Harvard Business School) and Mats Urde (Associate Professor at the Lund University School of Economics and Management) contend that developing and enhancing your corporate brand takes a concerted and lengthy effort between the executives and team leaders throughout your company. It is a far more extensive process if your team has international locations. Yet they share a systematic 9-box matrix exercise that your teams can use to examine your core brand identity along four paths: Strategy (Mission & Vision and Position) Communications (Personality and Expression) Competition (Value Propositions and Core Competencies) and Interaction (Relationships and Culture).
7 Things Successful CEOs Do to Grow their Business
Tue, Jul 11, 2017 — Lessons from UPS, Campbell’s Soup, Amazon, and Others In today’s fast-paced world, it’s easy for CEOs and other executives to get mired in day-to-day fire-fighting, only to find that growth has stalled. Below are 7 things successful CEOs from companies big and small do to build momentum, create and keep a strong culture, and grow their business.
To Grow, You Need to Know – Why Market Awareness is Essential for CEOs
Tue, May 16, 2017 — If your company is not growing, it’s important to dig deep when looking at market changes. James Quincy, the new CEO of Coke is demonstrating the progressive thinking needed to turnaround his company, which is in decline. In a recent article on PYMNTS.com, Quincy talks about critical information that he is using to understand the declines and then respond to them.