HOW CAN YOU BE NUMBER ONE IN THE GAME OF BUSINESS?

Consumers are attracted to buy the brand first and the product later. Hence, brands spend huge amounts on marketing campaigns to be number ONE, the BEST, BEAT the competition. Which will surely lead to what is known in any industry the "brand battle" usually include tactics such as ambush marketing, viral marketing, evangelism marketing and so on. (Pepsi ad for example)

First we need to understand the fundamentals of the "business game" we are all in and dragged to play. Simon Sinek defines that "GAME" very well in the below video

To sum things up in DIPLOMACY, MONOPOLY or any board game, even in soccer or tennis, the players are known, the rules are fixed, and the time is set. The winners and losers are easily identified by scores. This is the finite game as per Simon.

In THE INFINITE GAME, which I like to call the BUSINESS GAME, the participants "employees/ leaders" come and go, the rules are variable, and there is no established endpoint. There are no winners or losers in a business game; there is only ahead and behind.

The earlier we start to understand the difference between these two games, the faster we start moving our brand, our team into a mindset of boundless winners. Many companies struggles exist simply because their management are more busy with their competitors rather than with their own products/ brand/ team. They automatically tend to fall behind in innovation, performance and creativity due to that fact.

When you as an infinite player embrace the mindset that you are your own competitor and your customer is your only challenge, you then build stronger, more innovative, more inspiring brands and teams. And the ability as a leader to have the resilience, perseverance and passion to thrive in an ever-changing world holding a mindset that you are as good as your brand is, will surely lead your organization to any position you put your mind to.

Here are 10 points you need to consider to prosper as a leading player:

1. Be clear on your brand positioning and where you want to be. Use the love and respect brand axe here to define your brand positioning and draw a road map/ plan to where you want to go and how will you get there. SET the game rules and broadcast them.
2. It is not what you know it is who you know, recruit the right team, resources on board. Build your relationships as only these will support you to grow your brand. Even the best football player cannot be the best without his team even if you put him alone facing the worse team ever they will out-beat him.
3. Know what the tricks are and play your cards right, investigate, research and keep learning to grow your brand and understand your customer better. Don't get dragged into your routine work and forget the main key to success = your customer. It's like any relationship, if you ignore your partner or take less notice to them they will outgrow you and move on. Keep them interested focus on their needs, their wants and how can you cater to them better tomorrow.
4. Set high goals for yourself and your team, you need to pay attention to set the right goals that are realistic. Why realistic? because such goals are based on results, past performance in addition to your past components to establish the right goals. You need also the past components/ results of others along with yours to set the right aims yours + your competitors + others outside your industry when you combine all three you come out with the best right goals.
5. Keep your eye on the bigger picture, you want to win the "game" and not just a battle. It is all about knowing when to give in and when to hold out, not every battle needs to be fought. Going forward you need to measure your responses, your actions and your moves.
6. The player who doesn't make mistakes is unlikely to achieve anything, by making new mistakes you will be learning, pushing yourself, trying new things thus you are changing and by you changing you would be changing your world, your life and growing your brand to reach higher peeks.
7. The art of a great player is to get talented people to exceed their own capabilities. It’s difficult. For example, if you give a creative designer a flower, s/he will do what s/he does because s/he think that’s what you want. It probably won’t be. The art to inspire is what a great player/ leader is all about. It’s your responsibility to have the vision that allows any of your team to expand into something they haven’t done before. You lead them along the path of enlightenment and trust me they will all respond when you help them to foresee a better way by giving them clear directions.
8. Don't give a speech put on a show, you need to understand your audience and how do they foresee things. 90% are visualizers, words words words won't get you anywhere with these stakeholders. If you want things to be approved and deliver on your message try to draw a picture a rough sketch. The more striking the visual/ video the more people will remember you. Same things goes for the brand customers who are looking for the experience and not the brand name, you need to touch their emotions people will forget what you said and what you did but they will never forget how you made them feel. Build that lovemark to be the next Apple or Kleenex in your industry.
9. Get out of advertising and more into experiential, marketers tend to constantly do the same mistake research the competition, their industry and forget that the best ideas are not there. Ask any creative director about anything related to any commercial he will answer you directly. Ask that same person anything about finance he will not have an answer. Diversity is key and only knowledge can give you that consequently, being knowledgeable beyond your profession is what will set you different from others.
10. Being different and having the guts to broadcast it to set the tone, trend of your brand in a cluttered industry where the players are finite and the game is infinite is what “brand leadership” is all about. Finding your brand edge to differentiate it from others is key and delivering it through the right marketing campaigns is crucial to the brand success and ROI. And to do all that you need to constantly grow your personal brand “YOU” through personal knowledge again and remember “the day you stop learning is the day you stop living “

In conclusion, some people/ brands achieve extraordinary things in life and other don't. The difference between the two consist in leadership and accountability on how they play their business game to win

And remember when it can't be done. DO IT. If you don't do it, it doesn't exist or someone else will have the guts to do it instead of you.

#marketing #brands #consumerengagement #customer #customerfirst #advertising #marketingcampaigns #businessgame #brandscompetition #advertisingandmarketing

Some Article Ref. Simon Sinek - The inifinite game - book coming out in October ? Paul Arden - it's not how good you are, it's how good you want to be.