Updated High Performance Messaging Report
Just a quick note to say that the updated High Performance Messaging REPAMA Segment Analysis Study has been uploaded to the Lustratus site. It now contains the reverse-engineered product marketing strategy for TIBCO’s Messaging Appliance P-7500. Existing customers and Lustratus research subscription holders will already have been contacted with details of free upgrades.
Following on from the blog entry I made when the first version of the report was released I thought I’d show the updated value proposition below. As I mentioned in a previous blog entry TIBCO’s primary competitive focus is very unusual – it is TIBCO Rendezvous – one of its own products. The different approach to the market doesn’t stop there as you’ll… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, go-to-market, high performance middleware, marketing, positioning, product category, product management, product marketing, Vendor-Related Posts | 
29West, competition, competitive, Danny Goodall, ibm, Lustratus, Messaging Appliance, middleware, product marketing, REPAMA, solace systems, Strategic Marketing, tibco | 
Leave a commentStandards-based marketing – an antidote “Partner” Part 5
I’m carrying on this series of posts on how vendors can differentiate themselves in the market when technical standards have had the effect of removing significant functional difference between competitive products.
This time I’m going to look at partnering to create differentiation in your offer. Whilst the product proposition will remain materially similar to that of the standards-driven competition, a proposition carved from the synergies of the product and a strategic partner can be beneficial.
Partnering – Other complimentary vendors
As I suggested in this post, broadening the product portfolio is one way to create differentiation. Whilst this can be done through internal product development, it is also possible to broaden the product proposition through strategic partnerships.… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, differentiation, go-to-market, marketing, Marketing Strategy, Marketing Tactics, positioning, product marketing | competition, competitive, Danny Goodall, Lustratus, marketing, messaging, Partner, Partnering, positioning, product marketing, REPAMA, standards, Strategic Marketing | 1 CommentStandards-based marketing – an antidote “Broaden the Debate” Part 4
Part 4 – Broaden the Debate
I’m continuing this series of blogs here by looking at the techniques that software vendors can use to create the “illusion” of differentiation in markets where technical standards have led to little material product difference.
So moving on from my last blog where I looked at the way an organisation can differentiate based on the way that they sell, this entry will look at techniques to move the focus away from the technology and onto some other element of the proposition where real differentiation between vendors exists.
I should perhaps first acknowledge that achieving this sort of holistic approach to taking a proposition to market is not the work of moments. It takes… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, differentiation, go-to-market, marketing, Marketing Strategy, Marketing Tactics, positioning, product marketing | competition, competitive, Danny Goodall, differentiation, Lustratus, marketing strategy, product marketing, REPAMA, standards, Strategic Marketing | Leave a commentStandards-based marketing – the homogeneous effect of software standards – Part 2
A History Lesson
Continuing on from this blog entry, I’ve decided to create another mini series of blogs, this time looking at the difficulty of differentiation in markets where software standards have created homogeneity amongst the offerings of the protagonists.
So first a little bit of a history lesson…
I surfed the wave of middleware resurgence in the early stages of the new millennium and had great success marketing various technologies. Initially, working with some of the best people in the industry, I introduced SonicMQ to the world while at Sonic Software (now Progress Software). This was a market proposition that was heavily based on standards. Well at least we… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, differentiation, esb, go-to-market, marketing, Marketing Strategy, Marketing Tactics, product marketing, SOA and Integration, Vendor-Related Posts | competition, competitive, Danny Goodall, dave chappell, differentiation, JMS, progress software, REPAMA, soa, sonic software, standards-based, Strategic Marketing | 2 CommentsOpen Source and the Impotence(sic) of Being Earnest
Q. What do the questions…
“How do porcupines make love?”
and
“How do you ‘sell’ open source software?”
…have in common?
A. The answer to both is “Carefully!”
Software sales is a funny business. Push too hard and you’re open to accusations of potentially ripping people off through aggressive tactics, don’t push hard enough and you end up having had many nice discussions (tea and biscuit meetings as they are known) with many nice people but your children go hungry. It’s a balance. And nowhere is this more in evidence than in the open source world.
I was chatting to an ex-colleague last week about the issues they have taking their open source software products to market.… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, go-to-market, marketing, Marketing Strategy, Marketing Tactics, product marketing, prospects, Vendor-Related Posts | Apache, Danny Goodall, JBOSS, lead generation, marketing, marketing strategy, MuleSource, open source, Red Hat, REPAMA, Strategic Marketing | Leave a commentAudience Strata
In infrastructure software sales and marketing, Lustratus categorises the primary end user target audience as one or more of the following three categories:
- IT Technical – Represents the overtly technical disciplines within the IT organisation that have no management, strategic or commercial responsibilities
- IT Business – Represents the higher management levels of the IT organisation that have strategic and/or financial responsibilities
- Business – Represents the line of business functions outside of the IT organisation
Whilst there are many subtle distinctions between these these layers a general description of the types of positions and the role of they play in enterprise software sales for infrastructure software is shown in the diagram below:
Danny Goodall
Related posts that you might also… Continue reading
Positioning and the Positioning Statement
Positioning and the Positioning Statement
This page contains a summary of a series of blog entries I made during January and February 2009. It describes the format of the positioning statement that we use in the REPAMA competitive intelligence methodology. I refer to the concept of positioning and the positioning statement frequently so I wanted to pull them all together in once place. So here you are.
Danny Goodall
Links to Original Posts
The Positioning Statement
FOR… positioning element
WHO…positioning element
OUR…positioning element
IS A…positioning element
THAT PROVIDES…positioning element
UNLIKE…positioning element
OUR PRODUCT…positioning element
Part 1 – Positioning
Happy 2009! I’ve been in debate with a number of correspondents about the layout and format of the positioning statement… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, differentiation, go-to-market, ideal customer, marketing, Marketing Strategy, positioning, product category, product marketing, product name, reason to buy, Uncategorized, usp | alternative, audience, benefit, competition, competitive, competitor, customer pain, Danny Goodall, ideal customer, Lustratus, main benefit, messaging, offer category, positioning, positioning statement, primary alternative, primary reason to buy, product category, product marketing, product name, REPAMA, Strategic Marketing, target customer, unique sales proposition, usp | 1 CommentPart 8 – The “OUR PRODUCT [has this unique selling proposition] element from the positioning statement
The Unique Selling Proposition
Throughout this series of blogs I’ve been examining the format of the positioning statement that we use in our REPAMA consultancy and analysis services.
In this final entry in the series I’m going to close out by looking at the pay-off, the crescendo, the exclamation mark at the end of the positioning statement – the USP or unique selling proposition.
But first, and for one last time, let’s take a look at this element in the context of the complete positioning statement.
FOR [the ideal customer] WHO [has this specific pain or problem] OUR [product name] IS A[product category] THAT PROVIDES [this main benefit and reason… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, esb, go-to-market, marketing, Marketing Strategy, product marketing, usp, Vendor-Related Posts | benefit, competition, competitive, Danny Goodall, esb, ESB Guidance, Lustratus, marketing strategy, microsoft, oracle, positioning, positioning statement, product marketing, REPAMA, Strategic Marketing, strategy, tibco, usp | Leave a commentPart 7 – The “UNLIKE [the primary alternative]” element from the positioning statement
The Primary Competitor or Alternative
I’ve been looking at the positioning statement In this series of blogs. This entry will focus on the UNLIKE [the primary alternative or competitor] element.
So just to recap here we’re constructing a natural language statement that captures a number of key strategic marketing positioning elements. This particular element in the positioning statement above is where the ideal customer’s alternative to our product is defined.
First let’s see this element in the context of the complete positioning statement.
FOR [the ideal customer] WHO [has this specific pain or problem] OUR [product name] IS A[product category] THAT PROVIDES [this main benefit and reason to buy] UNLIKE [the… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, go-to-market, ideal customer, marketing, Marketing Strategy, positioning, product marketing, usp | alternative, competition, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, competitive, Competitive Marketing, competitor, Danny Goodall, Lustratus, marketing strategy, positioning, positioning statement, product marketing, REPAMA, Strategic Marketing | Leave a commentPart 6 – The “THAT PROVIDES [main benefit]” element from the positioning statement
The Main Benefit or Reason to buy
In this series of blogs I’m exploring the format of the positioning statement that Lustratus uses in our REPAMA research methodology.
Today I’m looking at one of, if not the most important elements. This is an element that in my experience vendors often find the most difficult to define about their own offering. This is the “THAT PROVIDES [main benefit]” element. First some let’s look at how this element fits into the context of the complete positioning statement.
FOR [the ideal customer] WHO [has this specific pain or problem] OUR [product name] IS A[product category] THAT PROVIDES [this main benefit and reason to… Continue reading
Posted in All Blog Categories, communication, Competition and Competitive Intelligence, esb, go-to-market, marketing, Marketing Strategy, positioning, product marketing, reason to buy, Vendor-Related Posts | audience, benefit, competition, competitive, Competitive Marketing, Danny Goodall, esb, Lustratus, marketing strategy, positioning, positioning statement, product marketing, reason to buy, REPAMA, Strategic Marketing, strategy | Leave a comment
- On Informatica, Evangelism, Audience Strata and BIG-DATA
- The marketing strategies of open source versus closed source ESBs
- Part 2 – First output from REPAMATron – WSO2 versus FuseSource versus Talend versus the ESB market
- First output from REPAMATron – WSO2 versus FuseSource versus Talend versus the ESB market
- WSO2 – Fits in between Talend and FuseSource…
- WSO2, or rather one of its competitors, has thrown its hat into the ring
- Wordcount.org – it counts words…
Recent Comments
May 12, 2011 (12:01) The Goodall Technology Reading Ease Index - How Complex is Your Marketing Copy? Hmm. I really do like the name Sarah but what about my ego? If I were to call the index 'GoodRead...
May 12, 2011 (11:36) The Goodall Technology Reading Ease Index - How Complex is Your Marketing Copy? I suggest calling it the GoodRead Index. Maybe it's over-reaching a bit, but you'll just have to ...
October 14, 2010 (4:19) Truth Denied? The Software Appliance Revisited. I hope you could tell that I was being more than a little flippant here Jacques. Perhaps I should...
October 13, 2010 (1:56) Truth Denied? The Software Appliance Revisited. Allow me to disagrre. At a customer, we have used Datapower for years to process XML (BTW, it is ...
June 7, 2010 (4:38) New Report From Lustratus Research: A Competitive Review of SOA Appliances Pete,Thanks for your comments, and those of your colleague. I think Danny has answered the 'mar...
June 4, 2010 (4:03) New Report From Lustratus Research: A Competitive Review of SOA Appliances Hi,I'd very much like to develop a point made in the report where it is asserted that software ...
May 6, 2010 (12:35) New Report From Lustratus Research: A Competitive Review of SOA Appliances Thanks for your comment Blake. This is a marketing-focused blog that looks at different vendors' ...
May 5, 2010 (1:23) New Report From Lustratus Research: A Competitive Review of SOA Appliances Hello There - It seems that this is a very provocative report, especially with respect to the sta...
April 14, 2010 (2:57) The Decision Making Unit for Cloud Computing Nice Technology Related Blog. Will visit again.
October 16, 2009 (5:56) The Decision Making Unit for Cloud Computing Very interesting point of discussion. I would be very interested to hear your results.