Strategic positioning is the 2nd of the 3 cornerstones reinforcing business longevity |

The King is dead, long live the King! With change and renewal being the only long-term constant, business positioning and product prediction become key to survival. ‘Strategic positioning’ is part two of a three-part blog series outlining the cornerstones required for reinforcing business longevity.

Clairvoyancy or Cunning

Your strategy requires provision to have the right assets to create future revenues, but as you can’t see into the future to identify trends, what are those assets? Only the lead market innovators predict with certainty because they disrupt the market to make the changes happen to their will. But ‘Strategic Positioning’ provides some tricks to help everyone else.

Strategic Positioning

Quenching the thirst of the consumer is the key to future revenues, and preparing your business to take advantage of these revenues requires business preparation and outcome probability. The following three areas should be core to your strategic positioning.

Fortune favors the prepared mind

If you have an umbrella you are prepared for when it rains, you are not predicting rain. In fact if you have an umbrella, sunscreen, bandaids, etc., then you are prepared for a number of eventualities neither of which you can predict.

It is the same in business. You need to have in your strategy all the elements required to overcome and leverage a future event. Added to this should also be the skills to use these elements, and the ability to mobilize them quickly.

Predictive Analytics and AI

As described succincltly in this CIO.com article, predicitve analytics provides pattern-based predictions using historic and current data surrounding a topic of interest with AI providing the power to aid data assessment and pattern recognition. For example, as outlined in this Deloitte article referring to predictive analytics in the automotive industry, it can be used to assess the probabilities of likley outcomes across the whole value chain.

Placement and marketing

Consumers and businesses buy if they ‘need’ or ‘want’ something. ‘Needs’ are usually addressed quickly and with a steady fact based approach, but ‘wants’ are susceptible to influence. Placement and marketing is the influencer in this context and drives consumer requirements by making the consumer ‘want’ something they may never knew existed. From hotdog toasters to toilet seat lights some great examples can be found here.

Thanks to a globally connected world, social media is driving trends at a faster pace than at any time in history. It is a huge and growing platfrom to provide placements and marketing, enabling a far wider influencer outreach. Some good tips on using this are in this document from Smart Insights.

Scenario play

With an agile business model ready to flex when needed with a strategic kit bag to assist, what is left is to amass scenarios based on the predictive analytics, and influences identified and play out those scenarios using a business digital twin to provide weighted outcomes. These outcomes then form the breadth of your strategic thinking and the versions required for forecasting, and place you in a position to benefit from the future.

OK I’m interested, where do I start?

IFS CPM solutions allow what-if scenario play to provide performance feedback through your business KPI’s, and integration to your budgets supporting the 3 strategic cornerstones mentioned in this blog series. Go onto the IFS website IFSworld.com to find out more, or email me on steve.treagust@ifsworld.com.

Read part three of this blog series here.

I welcome comments on this or any other topic concerning Finance, HCM, CSR & business strategy. Connect, discuss, and explore using any of the following means:

Twitter: @stevetreagust

IFS website: www.ifsworld.com

Email: steve.treagust@ifsworld.com

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