MSME DIGEST With Kola Owolabi
REVERSE ENTREPRENEURSHIP Series (8)
In the last edition, we looked at the subject of selling as the most financially valuable skill that an entrepreneur should possess. That is very true. It is when you sell that you put your product or service in the hands of the customer. No sale takes place until the customer has paid for your product and service and starts enjoying the benefits of that product or service.
However, before the customer is able to pay and take possession of your product or service, he must take the decision to go for your product or service out of the several options available to him in the market place. Hardly do you have a product or service that consumers don’t have alternatives to choose from. From selling physical products like food and detergents, to services like air travel and higher education, there are competitors jostling to have a piece of the.money in the buyers’ pockets. Marketing refers to all activities that an entrepreneur is involved in to incentivise or motivate people to make the critical choice to go for a particular product out of the options available in the market.
So, if you know how to motivate buyers to buy from you than go for your competitors’ brands, then you have the potential of shooting to the head of your market segment; that is become the market leader within a very short time. Coca-cola (the world’s largest selling cola drink) got ahead of other drinks very early in its life because of its sharp marketing skills. One incident proves the point of Coca-cola, as a company with one of the most prolific marketing skills of all time. During the second world war (1939 – 1945), when production had stopped and there were no physical products to supply the market due to the constraints posed, Coca-cola did not stop advertising. They still kept on advertising. What was the slogan in their advertising? “Coca-cola has gone to war”. Why did they continue to advertise? They still wanted to maintain the name of the brand in the consciousness of the market even though the product was not available for buyers to take advantage of. Having a product or service in the consciousness of buyers is what is called “mind share”; that is making the people continue to think of a brand with so much passion so that when that person ultimately decides to take a step to buy a product to meet his or her need, it is the brand that has possessed his mind that he will go for.
So, marketing involves all activities for having a superior mind share of the target market. It is a mind game and not a physical game. While selling talks about putting a product or service in the hands of buyers, marketing involves putting the product or service in the mind of the buyers. I am sure you know that buyers will reach out physically for a product or service that is already in their minds.
In the next post, we shall discuss how to use the principle of Reverse Entrepreneurship, to have a much more superior mind share of your target market than your competitors..
Kola Owolabi (08023203198)
Kola Owolabi is a Fellow of the Nigerian Institute of Management Consultants (FIMC.CMC) and Chief Executive Officer of David Solomon Consulting Limited, based in Igbesa, a suburb of metropolitan Lagos, in the vicinity of Crawford University. The company can be reached via phone or WhatsApp at 08023203198
