Know: ‘timing is everything.’

arget Markets
The age of companies aiming at the mass market is coming to an
end.  Someone said, “Mass marketing is putting the product in
the market, and going to mass on Sunday and praying someone
buys it.”
Mass marketing requires developing a picture of the average
customer. But averages are deceiving. If you have one foot in boiling
water and another in ice water, on the average you’re comfortable. If
you aim for the average, you will lose.
Today many companies are trying to sell products and services
to the “small business market.” So they hire an ad agency to develop
Target Markets
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a mass market campaign to small businesses, with little success. It
would be better to focus on a specific industry or profession and to
reach the corresponding small businesses through someone who has
a standing in that industry or profession. Intuit Inc. sells its small
business software programs not directly but by giving a sales commis-
sion to accountants who recommend Intuit’s software to small busi-
ness clients.
Your company does not belong in any market where it can’t be
the best. John Bogle, founder of the Vanguard mutual fund com-
pany, said, “We’ve never wanted to be the biggest, but the best.”
In choosing a market, remember: It is easier to sell to people
with money than to people without money. And try to sell to users,
not buyers.
echnology
Every new technology is a force for “creative destruction.” Your
company is more likely to be buried by a new technology than by its
current competitors. Horse-drawn carriage makers were not defeated
by a better horse-drawn carriage but by the horseless carriage. Tran-
sistors hurt the vacuum-tube industry, xerography hurt the carbon
paper business, and the digital camera will hurt the film business.
New technology can also change social relations and lifestyles.