Distinguish your offering
IF YOU want to be around in 10 years you’ve got to do something to differentiate yourself from the pack, says US actor Chris Evans, known for his “differentiating” role as Captain America.
To many companies, differentiation is the holy grail of marketing, but all too often the pursuit of perfection can result in a level of mediocrity that makes distinguishing a company’s unique characteristics all but impossible.
In her best-selling book, Different, one of my favourite authors, Youngme Moon, the Donald K David Professor of Business Administration and the senior associate dean for strategy and innovation at Harvard Business School, cites the example of Jeep and Nissan.
While Jeep used to be known as a truly rugged 4x4, the Nissan 4x4 SUV was known for its reliability and for being more “luxurious”.
However, in analysing their strengths and weaknesses, Jeep discovered that not being reliable (and luxurious) was a weakness and took the strategic decision to focus on upping its reliability and on being more family-oriented, comfortable and luxurious with all the trimmings.
For its part, Nissan focused on improving its ruggedness.
The result was little or no differentiation between the two – and the strengths that had differentiated them became irrelevant.
Too often, in an effort to overcome weaknesses, businesses end up ignoring their strengths – the very aspects that differentiate them.
This applies as much to the entertainment industry as it does to the motor industry.
While the majority of entertain- ment providers focus on working on their weaknesses, those who stand out are those who take the risk of doing something different.
What’s needed in this industry is for the players to assess their strengths and weaknesses and work harder on their existing strengths, avoiding the temptation to focus on their weaknesses and strive for a “well-rounded” reputation in the market place, rather than a “lopsided” one where you are known for a particular strength.
Moon gives Ferrari as an example. Known for being the “baddest” sports car on the market, it embraces that positioning instead of trying to build the brand on the basis of child-safety standards.
However, Moon points out that for businesses the knee-jerk impulse to move to a more well-rounded output “can be hard to resist”.
“And the cumulative effect of this, in too many cases, is a herdlike regression toward the mean.”
As I write this, Starbucks is experimenting with offering breakfast value meals in its coffee shops, while McDonald’s is experimenting with putting coffee bars in its fast food outlets.
The entertainment industry is not an easy environment in which to be different.
It’s not only over-stimulated with shoppertainment, seemingly the name of the game in every mall and casino, but we’re also operating in a difficult economy, with every form of entertainment competing for that same entertainment rand.
It was this need for differentiation which prompted our decision to introduce Boktown to Montecasino and, although the temptation was there to provide just another more cost-effective and simpler “fan zone”, we aligned our brand with an experience that couldn’t be found elsewhere, leveraging Boktown as a distinguishing offering.
The partnership with South African Rugby Union and the Springbok Supporters Club has been a mutually rewarding one, culminating in sold-out games for the Rugby World Cup at our Montecasino, Silverstar and Suncoast entertainment destinations.
This philosophy of focusing on high quality in terms of its entertainment offerings has become Montecasino’s distinguishing characteristic.
But it takes a constant commitment to ensure capitalising on this USP as the property’s key strength, as tempting as it is to sometimes drop the quality standards to attract a more mass-market footfall.
Producers and promoters still get rather anxious and irritated with us when we turn down an event – proclaiming loudly, “but I’m renting the space, I can do what I like.” Ah… no! The fact is, intuitively we all understand that excellence of any kind almost always involves a tradeoff – and that more often than not it is worth it.
So be different, be distinguished – and be excellent.
Noëleen Bruton is Tsogo Sun’s director of marketing
The entertainment industry is not an easy environment