As an IT services company, we offer essentially the same services as our competitors. Certainly Avanade is differentiated on the basis of our exclusive focus on the Microsoft platform combined with our global scale -- operations in 22 countries and more than 8,000 professionals all in eight years.
But ultimately, that's not enough to compel someone to choose Avanade over a competitor. Even more challenging is our limited brand awareness.
So the question becomes, how do you create competitive differentiation when we operate in parity at best, obscurity at worse?
With Thought Leadership.
In the marketplace of ideas, the only thing Avanade sells is our perspective on issues and trends impacting our customers -- perspectives that we hope are differentiated and compelling enough that leads prospects to know who Avanade is and want what we offer (awareness and preference).
I define thought leadership rather simply: Having a unique perspective on an issue or trend that differentiates us from the competition -- owning ideas, owning issues and leading agendas
To reach a place that we believe will provide us with thought leadership topics, we needed to understand the trends and issues impacting our customers, and then develop a perspective that is unique and compelling.
First and foremost, we needed to understand the broader business trends and issues, how those trends are affecting developed and developing countries and the impact of those trends on IT decision priorities by geography and by vertical.
Second, we needed to understand how the media and analyst community were following these trends -- what's being discussed, and more importantly, what isn't being discussed (a gap analysis).
Third, we needed to know how our competitors were discussing these issues to see how they were attempting to position themselves (where they are attempting to claim thought leadership).
Finally, we needed to understand Avanade's answer to addressing those trends and pain points with specific services and solutions.
With that information in hand, we needed to conduct a gap analysis to identify the white space no one is claiming -- that place that intersects these various points -- and then develop themes that address those issues. Our PR agency partners were instrumental in this effort.
We're still developing our thought leadership platform and supporting themes, but it's clear to me this approach was the right approach to identifying where we believe Avanade can own issues and ideas and lead agendas.
But, in the interest of competitive advantage, I'm not going to share our thought leadership platforms on this blog. That would be stupid.
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1 comments:
Corey, I believe you have nailed the critical essence of thought leadership after your definition i.e. we need to understand the trends and issues impacting our customers. This I believe is the key to any thought leadership. The second part of this is being prepared to share your ideas, insights, research papers, etc with what I call an abudance mentality. You can't be perceived to be a thought leader if you are not prepared to share your ideas.
Too many companies come unstuck at this level, they hold their cards to close to their chests.
Cheers
Craig
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